Page 38

A quarter mile from Devon Mirabel’s mansion

For the first time in her career, the Unicorn had a long and horrific moment in which she did not know what to do and did not know if it was going to be okay.

The moment the face of Dr. Brown filled their monitors, everyone in the van went silent—Gramercy, Atlas, two tech agents whom KC had handpicked, and a marine provided by the embassy.

Gramercy moved first. He left the van, taking with him the comm set that gave him a direct line to the highest decision-makers and was reserved for literal national emergencies.

Atlas started talking to someone at Evenes, snapping at the tech to pull up intel. Their eyes met Yardley’s. “Stay with her.”

“She can’t hear me.”

“But you can hear everything going on in the room, you can see it, and you can send messages to the visual comm. Get it together, Yardley. Get it the fuck together.”

KC still hadn’t said anything. One of the techs was already talking to Kris, likely trying to figure out if there was any way to wipe or disable the drive remotely.

They already knew there wasn’t, but this was a desperate moment.

The other tech was pulling down every mind in the CIA to keep any alarm or notification off KC until it was clear whether she had a shot of escaping with the drive.

Twelve hundred days.

That was what Yardley thought, frantically, and it was enough to start her heart beating again.

They would make it to twelve hundred and one.

She studied the monitor showing KC’s visuals. This time, instead of looking at Dr. Brown’s face with shock, she started looking at the circumstances and how to get KC and the drive out of there. In that order.

She sent a message to KC’s visual display. Checking Dr B credentials.

It was the understatement of the year in a year that deserved every bit of hyperbole she could throw at it.

Yardley didn’t know for sure why Dr. Brown was in Mirabel’s carriage house, but she had certainly prepared herself for the possibility he’d show up.

There was always a chance Dr. Brown was here in good faith.

In Yardley’s experience, however, the good guys didn’t suddenly appear where they weren’t supposed to be, and they didn’t engage with people whose shock at seeing them could potentially endanger their mission.

She’d kept the secret of Dr. Brown’s supposed black op from Atlas and Gramercy, despite her reservations.

There simply hadn’t been any way to preserve KC’s safety while also opening up questions about the veracity of Dr. Brown’s involvement in the development of this weapon to a wider audience.

There were very few “trust no one” circumstances in the trade, despite the movies, but when such a circumstance arrived, it was time to figure out where you were in the web and who you cared about.

KC stood up from her crouch in front of the safe. It had only been moments, but they’d felt like hours. Yardley noted, hated, and ignored KC’s biometric readings, which had all been within normal range until she was surprised by Dr. Brown.

“You’re here.” The comm on the safe picked up KC’s voice as clear as a ten-thousand-dollar speaker, for which Yardley was grateful.

“It’s much more surprising that you are.” Dr. Brown looked around. “I assume we’ve still got borrowed time from the boys?”

Dr. Brown always called tech “the boys.”

“Mm. Has the auction started?” KC’s voice was even. Her heart rate had settled into a respectable rhythm.

“You don’t know?” Dr. Brown reached up to tap his own ear. “Who’s your handler?”

“I didn’t have intel you’d be attending.”

Good. KC hadn’t answered his direct question. Yardley didn’t know yet where KC had determined Dr. Brown’s loyalties lay, but a careful operative remained circumspect. KC was a careful operative.

“You’re not going to be told more than the basics, Tabasco. I can only assume you’re in the field because the Unicorn’s been compromised. Or turned.”

Yardley felt her nostrils flare. Turned was bait. Dr. Brown was baiting KC. Dangerous for a handler to fuck with agents’ emotions.

Her heart was pounding in her ears. Where was Gramercy with the intel?

“I’m glad you’re okay,” KC said. “Truly. It was frightening to know you were hurt and not hear from you for so long. It’s been difficult to keep my loyalties safe.”

Yardley held her breath. She didn’t know Dr. Brown well enough to know whether his ego was such that he would believe KC would keep his secrets above all others, but KC seemed to know him.

She held eye contact with him for several seconds, until Yardley watched tension she hadn’t known where to look for melt out of his expression.

He wanted to believe KC. If he could, it would mean his hold on her was intact. Double agents had such a problem with narcissism.

KC’s gaze flicked to a dark hallway. Yardley’s schematic told her it led to a bedroom with sliders that opened to the wide lawn facing the narrow road along the water.

Yardley sent the schematic to confirm KC’s escape route, hoping she hadn’t read too much into that glance. That glance meant KC was thinking, and thinking would keep her alive.

Then KC’s eyes blinked in an odd flutter.

“You’ve managed to find the drive. What are your orders?” Dr. Brown leaned against the wall behind him. His tone had lost the note of imperious formality. That was promising. Any amount Dr. Brown trusted KC was time bought and paid for to get her out.

Unless KC genuinely trusted Dr. Brown, and he could tell, which was why he was so relaxed.

KC’s eyes fluttered again.

“C,” Atlas whispered. “C! That’s Morse code. With military abbreviations.”

“C’s affirmative,” Yardley whispered, though KC couldn’t hear her. “My goodness, honey.” She directed the drone over the exit area from the sliders and sent the feed to KC to give her the view she’d asked for.

“You know I can’t tell you.” KC’s tone wasn’t one Yardley had ever heard before. “But my time’s about up. We’ll need cover inside at the auction, or they’ll come looking for me.”

“Jack with the Sisters has got it handled,” he said.

“No one knows I’ve stepped out. Meanwhile, everyone’s wondering where you’ve got to.

I have a boat waiting and Franklin in my ear hassling me over how long this is taking because he’s pissed Ada couldn’t talk the diplomats into letting us bunker-bust on Swedish soil. ”

General Franklin, he meant. And he’d name-dropped an active Canadian agent and the president. Either Dr. Brown was operating at a deeper level of cover than Yardley had been privy to or he wanted to make KC believe that was the case.

There was a flurry behind Yardley. “A burn notice was issued.” It was Gramercy’s voice. Thank heavens. “Flynn has ID’d him as the man who arrested her in Dublin. We have pretty solid intel from the analysts suggesting we should assume everyone with a Northern Europe assignment is dirty.”

“That’s a small army,” Atlas said. “Yardley.”

“Yeah.” She understood the implications of what Gramercy was saying. It meant that whoever Dr. Brown worked for knew about and potentially controlled every perimeter, extraction, and mission unit they had out here. For now, they had no idea how deep the corruption went.

Plans B through F were out of the question.

This was well beyond KC’s experience. Dr. Brown was packing an armory, and KC hadn’t even brought a knife to a gunfight.

He’s turned , she typed for KC to read on her visual. The hair on the back of Yardley’s neck stood on end.

Not a single change in KC’s biometrics, and she didn’t give them another Morse acknowledgment. She sidled closer to Dr. Brown. “If that’s the case, then come with me.” She sounded strangely compliant. “We’ll do this together.”

“I can’t.” Dr. Brown smiled. It was a nice smile.

At a vulnerable time in KC’s life, he’d been present for her.

He’d opened doors. How could she be expected to think with her head, not her heart, at a moment like this?

“You’ll have to give me the drive. Report the handoff to your team, and we’ll talk at the ambassador’s residence. ”

Their presence at the residence was Sensitive Compartmented Information. Even inside the agency, no one should have known they were there except people who absolutely needed to know.

Maple Leaf was well and truly compromised.

“We have to dump the drive and extract KC,” Yardley said.

“It’s done. He’ll kill her for it if she tries to hang on to it, but if she hands it off, she has a chance.

We can find another way. He can’t have been that careful.

We’ll infiltrate whoever he’s with.” She was talking fast, thinking faster, channeling her resources into her innate talent for strategy because it was one advantage she had over Dr. Brown.

All she had to do was keep one step ahead of him. Half a step.

“That’s not what they’re telling us to do.” Gramercy’s voice was tight. He still wore the emergency comm link that gave him a direct line to the director and the White House. “They want her to try to hang on to it. I’m sending you the orders now.”

Yardley glanced at them.

No.

A robot drone had been deployed to the slider’s entrance. It still hadn’t been tracked. She was to order KC to toss the drive for the drone to retrieve under what would be a hailstorm of Dr. Brown’s gunfire.

They really, truly intended to get KC Nolan killed.

She had told them not to do that.

Yardley rose to her feet inside the small van.

“I’m afraid our orders have been compromised.

Impossible to know how far up the chain the breach goes.

Can’t risk following directives.” This was a blatant lie, but Atlas let out an exhale that sounded distinctly like relief.

“My circle of trust is now the people in this van and Agent Nolan. Soldier, get out of the driver’s seat. ”

“Ma’am.” He looked at her desperately.

“I will court-martial you right back to the New Jersey suburb that hatched you. Get up.”