Page 204 of Whisper

Dan drove to Langley’s executive parking lot, closest to headquarters. He had a spot right up front with his name on it. Why did Dan even give him the time of day?

“Ryan has set up a counterintelligence polygraph interview—”

Kris groaned. Hethunkedhis head against Dan’s passenger window.

“Youknowwe have to do this. We have to know everything, Kris. And we have to be certain.”

“Today? Rightnow? You know polygraphs are junk science, right? And you know us SAD guys are trained to beat them?”

“I’d advise you don’t advertise that to the polygrapher. You’re in enough shit as it is right now.”

They walked in through the front doors, and as they crossed the CIA seal, Kris stared at the wall of stars, the Memorial Wall to fallen officers. Each star was carved out of the marble, chunks pulled out, each star representing something—someone—missing from the CIA. Dawood’s star was up there. He’d spent hours in front of it, feeling the edges, running his fingers through the darkness, the hollow spaces.

But Dawood was alive. He was back. How did a fallen star get put back up?

Dawood was stealing CIA property. Was he working against the CIA?

How did a good man go bad?

Allah detests violence against the innocent, Dawood had said.Wickedness. Jihad is only to be waged against the evildoers.

There are objective evils in the world.

The truth is complicated.

Kris’s heart, his soul, trembled.

His access to headquarters was restricted to being under armed guard and escort. Dan waited in the lobby with him while a retinue of internal guards arrived, each carrying an MP5 in a neck holster and glaring at him like he was a filthy traitor to the stars and stripes, to apple pie and the American way.

I was first on the ground in Afghanistan,he wanted to scream at the hulking guards.I built this agency’s terrorist hunting program. I have more kills than you’lleverknow.

But the only thing he’d be remembered for, inside the halls of Langley, was Camp Carson. And now, for breaching national security, for having his CIA files stolen by a ghost, a man who didn’t believe enough inthem, in their love and in what they were, to reach out to him for a decade.

It was Ryan’s first question, once he was in the polygraph room and hooked up to the reader. “Whynow? Why is Haddad backnow?”

“I don’t know.” The polygrapher stared at her monitor, displaying readouts of Kris’s heart rate, the speed of his breathing, his skin temperature, his sweat. A dozen cables wrapped around his chest, EKG pads were stuck beneath his collarbones, and a pulse monitor squeezed his fingertip. A camera stared at his right eye, watching for pupil dilation.

“How long have you known Haddad was back in the United States?”

“Two days. September seventh. I was on my way home—”I was on my way to Dan’s.“—and I stopped for a drink. He showed up at the bar.”

“He showed up?” Ryan’s eyebrows shot sky high. “He just… showed up. Out of the blue.”

“He said he was following me.” Kris shifted. The cable across his chest stretched.

“Following you. Outstanding countersurveillance work there, Caldera.” Ryan pushed off the wall and started pacing. “What did he say about where he’d been?”

“In the mountains, he said. He said he was cared for by a man named Abu Adnan. The father of Al Jabal.”

“The father of the man who tortured him? Who was planning on murdering him?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Ryan kept pacing, wall to wall in the cramped room. “What does he want from you, Caldera?”

“I don’t know.” Kris’s voice shook. He felt his heart beat faster, felt his breath speed up. “I don’t fucking know. If I knew that, I’d know what to do.”

“What the fuck do you mean?” Ryan glared.