Page 108 of Spymaster

The pasture wasn’t out of rotation, it was in use, and recently so. That was a bad piece of intelligence from the Lithuanians. He prayed it would be the only one.

CHAPTER 63

WASHINGTON, D.C.

They met at the Riggsby bar in the Carlyle Hotel at DuPont Circle. Ryan wore an emerald-toned dress that matched her eyes. Kopec wore a black, ill-fitting suit that matched his mood.

“I’ll have a Manhattan, please,” she said, as the waitress took her order and disappeared.

Kopec, as was his habit, had arrived before her and had started without her. He had been halfway through his second cocktail when she entered the bar.

Though it was only a few years old, the Riggsby looked as if it had been around since the 1940s. With its forest green walls, old-school furniture, and keyhole entryway, it was a passage back to a bygone era.

A plate of sardines sat on the table and Kopec nudged it forward, indicating Ryan should help herself.

“I’m fine, thank you,” she replied.

“That must be how you stay so skinny.”

He was maudlin. The booze was probably part of it, but there was something else going on.

“What do you have for me, Artur?” she asked.

Removing his phone, he pulled up a series of photographs and slid the phone across the table to her.

Ryan scrolled through the photos. “Where did you get these?”

“My contact in Belarus was able to access one of the kits,” he said. Technically, it was his contact’s contact, but she didn’t need to know that.

“That’s wonderful. Where are the rest of them?”

“Somewhere near Minsk, we believe.”

“All of them?”

The Polish intelligence officer nodded.

“This is very good news. Who has control of them?” she asked.

“We don’t know. They’re using a cutout, a middleman.”

“Then how do we get them back?”

“You must purchase them.”

Ryan glared at him. “Purchase them?” she snapped. “The hell we will. Those are property of the United States government. We’re not paying someone to give us back what’s rightfully ours.”

“You don’t have an alternative.”

“Like hell I don’t. I’ll send a team in and we’ll take them back ourselves.”

“A paramilitary team. On a direct-action assignment.”

“Yes,” she replied. “Exactly.”

Kopec shook his head sadly.

“I paid you a lot of money to track those kits down, Artur. It wasn’t your job to set up a purchase.” Pausing, she then asked, “Are you trying to rip us off? Because if you are, I promise you, we’re going to have a big problem.”