An American Spy (23 page)

Was he frightened? Certainly, but that was packed away, too. Was he without hope? No, but he couldn’t know if it was true hope or the artificial hope Tourists manufacture to fuel their forward movement. He needed to put pieces together, to turn them around in the light and understand exactly where he stood and what his options were. It had been months since he’d called himself a Tourist, but the simple clarity of Tourism had not yet left him.

As it stood now, he had no choice. Xin Zhu did not engage in empty threats, nor did he take a step without having thought five steps ahead. Milo could not walk away from this, nor would he be able to collect his family and escape. Xin Zhu would have planned for those possibilities.

The cell phone in his pocket buzzed. This time it was a private number. “Yes?”

“Where are you going?” Xin Zhu asked quietly.

“To get in touch with Leticia.”

“You can’t do that from your home?”

“Afraid not.”

“How is it done?”

“Your people can watch and learn.”

“I’d rather know now.”

Milo told him.

“Like the other night,” Xin Zhu said.

“Yes.”

“You have an hour,” he said. “Why are you rushing?”

“Because I need a drink.”

Xin Zhu hung up.

On Flatbush, he watched for busy restaurants and bars and noticed that Mooney’s Pub, which was scheduled to be demolished at the end of the month, was packed. A rarity at noon, but he supposed that nostalgia was hitting everyone at once, so he squeezed in, nodding at a couple of faces he recognized from the neighborhood, working his way to the bar, waving a hand and calling for a vodka martini.

Mooney’s was by all outward appearances a dive, but it was an institution that was now a victim of gentrification. There was a mix of old hands and hipsters here, mostly white, and as he carefully carried his drink away from the bar, he used his right hand to touch jacket pockets. By the time he reached the wall, he had someone’s iPhone in his palm and was sliding it into his own pocket.

As he drank, he watched the crowded entrance, half-listening to Johnny Cash and June Carter singing of Jackson. The black man didn’t appear again, but a single Caucasian woman in her thirties wandered in, looking subtly out of place. Perhaps it was her, perhaps not; she gave no sign.

Contrary to his training, he thought for too long about blame and realized that he’d done this to himself. It was he who had made the call to Director Stephen Rollins. Chaudhury had even warned him to leave it alone. Told him he didn’t want to be on the man’s radar. Now he was.

Could he have let it go? Could he have just accepted that Chaudhury was CIA? No, and Xin Zhu had probably known this. Milo imagined the sequence of events: He confronts Chaudhury about not being a Homelander, provoking the next layer of the story. He works for the Company. Chaudhury passes this information on to Xin Zhu, who says,
If he presses, give him this number
. One of Xin Zhu’s talents was knowing when to flex and bend to accommodate unexpected twists, like Milo’s curiosity. Xin Zhu was the ultimate pragmatist. He arranged it so that once Milo made the first call, he had a full day to plant his shadows, and then by the time he called back Milo was trapped.

He had no way to know if Xin Zhu would have let him be if he hadn’t called, and that was what helped fuel his self-doubt. It was why reflecting on blame was anathema to good Tourism.

Halfway through his drink, he pushed off the wall and worked his way back to the toilets. He didn’t look back, nor did he hesitate, for hesitation is like wearing a sign on your back. He pushed through to the small, dirty bathroom as an already drunk guy was pushing out, then leaned against the door and used the iPhone to dial the number he’d been repeating to himself ever since ordering his martini.

After three rings, Janet Simmons said, “What?”

“It’s Milo.”

“Are you in a bar?”

“I need you to arrest my family.”

“What?”

“Tonight, if possible. They’ll be at home, and I want you to take them into custody. They’re in danger.”

“From whom?”

“You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Where are you?” she asked as Milo felt pressure against his back; someone was trying to get in.

“Brooklyn,” he said. “Get here and take them. That’s it. I’ll let you know when it’s safe.” A fist banged against the door. Milo called, “Just a sec!”

“You’ve got some crazy ideas about my authority. Remember all those tricks you played on me? You didn’t earn me any bonuses.”

“Then fabricate something. If you don’t, they’ll end up dead. When they’re safe, call me, but not before.”

“Does this have to do with Dennis Chaudhury?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Company?”

“Chinese,” he said, and when she answered with silence, he said, “I have to go. Just do it. Please.”

“You’re serious.”

He hung up and opened the door, apologizing to a six-foot man with a mustache, then worked his way back to the front, passing the single woman on his way to his drink, which was still where he’d left it. For verisimilitude, he paused to check his zipper, and perhaps it was that which provoked the attention. The single woman glanced at him—briefly, the way one takes in a whole room—but it was a definite look.

He finished his drink and, leaving the iPhone behind his glass, walked out. At twelve forty-four, he faced the busy network of traffic on Grand Army Plaza. He didn’t look back, just waited at the curb for the light to change, then crossed streets until he’d reached the triangular island. He stood completely still. Around him, cars continued their loud, congested parade as he waited, trying to think of nothing.

10

On the walk home, he decided he hadn’t done enough. Though he trusted that Janet Simmons would do her best to help him, he didn’t know what was and was not possible for an agent in her position. The other alternative, though, made him queasy. The last time he’d asked his father to hide someone, it had been a fifteen-year-old girl who, in the end, had escaped the old man and was killed on the side of a French mountain road.

The circumstances now were different, but he still felt unsure as he developed his second strategy, beginning with a visit to the grocery and buying materials for a Vietnamese noodle soup. He took the items up to the apartment and julienned the vegetables, and before storing them in the fridge grabbed a ballpoint from the counter and slipped it into his pocket. He unwrapped the paper covering the chicken breasts and, as he put the paper into the trash, ripped off a rough square and slipped it into his other pocket. Then he pounded the chicken, seasoned it, and slipped it into the oven to grill while he went to the small bathroom behind the front door.

As he undid his pants, he took a look around the small space—toilet and sink, a mirror and an overhead lamp. He found no signs of surveillance, but in fact, he worked less from observation than from the hope that, while the apartment might be full of cameras, Xin Zhu’s men had no interest in watching this space. He sat on the toilet, took out the pen and paper, and began to write in Russian.

He picked up Stephanie from camp, putting on a happy face, and listened to her complaints about Sarah Lawton, who’d had the audacity to wear a ballerina outfit to school without informing Stephanie first. When they got home, she smelled the air. “You’re cooking?”

“Noodles. You like my noodles.”

“I thought grandpa was taking us out.”

“It’ll be more comfortable here.”

She sighed, heading off to her room.

When Tina arrived at five thirty, she asked the same thing and seemed equally disappointed, and when Milo went down to meet Yevgeny’s chauffeured car, the old man was more than disappointed; he was angry. “They don’t give these reservations to just anybody, you know.”

“Don’t be an ass,” said Milo, trying on a smile. “Tell your driver to join us if he likes.”

“Francisco doesn’t like home cooking,” Yevgeny said as he leaned down to the open window. “Do you, Francisco?”

“Despise it, sir,” said Francisco, a beefy, dark man with a South American accent. “You will call when you need me?”

“I’m afraid I will,” Yevgeny grumbled before turning to follow his son into the building.

Milo didn’t pass the note on the street or in the stairwell. Though he didn’t trust his own apartment, he was even more wary of anything in the public realm, which was why he had vetoed the restaurant. It wasn’t until they were inside, and Stephanie was running up to him, that Milo grabbed his father by the waist, shouting, “Watch out for the maniac!” and slipped the paper, folded around the spare apartment keys, into Yevgeny’s rear pants pocket. The old man certainly felt the move, but he played along well, making a loud noise of terror as his granddaughter barreled into him.

Milo patted him on the shoulder. “Drink?”

“Immediately,” said Yevgeny, then pinched Stephanie’s cheek so hard that she yelped.

As they settled into conversation, Milo realized that he was now in Alan’s shoes, the Alan he had talked with on the roof two and a half weeks ago, the Alan who was agonizingly preoccupied by a matter of life and death but unable to communicate it to anyone. Now, here, Milo had to pretend to listen to Yevgeny’s description of Public Service Day, and all the wonderful things the United Nations had done to celebrate it. Why, Milo wondered, hadn’t Alan slipped him a note? Why hadn’t he shared more on the roof? Because Alan didn’t trust that which he did not personally control, even if it meant not trusting Milo. Because Alan didn’t believe anyone other than himself could rescue Penelope.

Or was Milo wrong? Had Alan dropped clues that he was too dense to have noticed? He thought back.
I keep seeing those dots
. . .
there were other survivors
. . .
cabins on Grand Lake
—
Grand Estes
. . .
he got married to some sweet young thing
. . .
I wasn’t planning to bomb
. . .
You don’t even know their names, do you?

Nothing pointed to anything. Or it all pointed to everything.

For the moment, none of this mattered. What mattered was Homeland Security and his father’s people, and what they could do for him. Each time he heard footsteps in the stairwell, he waited for the banging on the door, then the inrush of agents. How would they do it? Would Simmons be with them? Would they take Milo and Yevgeny as well?

Yevgeny leaned close to Stephanie—who, wary of another pinch, pulled back—and said, “You’ve got something here.”

“It’s Magic Marker on her eyelids,” Tina informed him.

“No,” he said, and pulled something out from behind Stephanie’s right ear. He opened his hand to reveal a rather beautiful bracelet made of five rows of polished agate stones. “How could you hear a thing?”

“Wow,” said Stephanie, taking it carefully. She wasn’t sure what to think.

“I heard you were making friends in Botswana,” he told her. “So I told their ambassador that I knew a girl with a burgeoning interest in his beautiful country. I asked for advice on a gift. He made some calls and had this sent over in the diplomatic pouch, direct from Gaborone.”

“Wow,”
Stephanie said again. “Thanks.”

Milo thought,
I never told him about Stephanie’s Botswana friend
.

She latched the bracelet onto her wrist while Milo brought out the serving bowl full of noodles and broth, to which he had added the chicken. Then came smaller dishes of vegetables, and another of a fish sauce concoction. “It looks good,” Yevgeny admitted, before examining his hands and saying, “I had better clean myself.”

“Use the small bathroom,” Milo told him.

While his father was gone, Tina helped with silverware and asked if he was feeling all right.

“Sure, why not?”

“You’re a little distant.”

“I’m fine,” he said and kissed her on the lips, thinking mawkishly that this could be their last kiss in a long while.

Once Yevgeny returned and gave Milo a significant nod, verifying that he would, according to the instructions in the letter, take Tina and Stephanie away tomorrow evening, he actually did feel better. He reminded himself again that the old man’s failure with the fifteen-year-old really had been a different situation. This time, Milo was being smarter. He’d admitted to Yevgeny that he was under constant surveillance and told him to not speak of this until his girls were absolutely safe. He’d said only that the Chinese were involved but refused to go into details until he knew Tina and Stephanie could not be touched. Yevgeny seemed to understand everything, and the only sign of anxiety was the now more frequent swiping at his cheek.

The noodles went over remarkably well, and halfway through the meal Milo’s phone bleeped a message. It was a single word from a private number: roof. He deleted the message, patted his napkin against his mouth, and rose. “Sorry, I’ve got to make a call. Be right back,” he said and walked out of the apartment.

He found Leticia Jones standing in the center of the roof, smoking a menthol cigarette. It was a blessedly cool evening, and she wore a long black linen jacket that reached her calves, which were covered by leather boots. “Hey, baby,” she said.

“Come on downstairs. My noodles are a hit.”

She smiled, then stepped closer. “Sorry, I gotta see a guy about a thing.”

“That’s always the way.”

“You are
cute
,” she said, touching his cheek with her long, painted nails, knowing exactly how to keep a man off balance—or some men. To Milo, she was only growing more wearying. “But let’s be serious, okay? I’m assuming you’re in, or else you wouldn’t have called.”

“Yes.”

“Would you like to tell me why?”

“Because I don’t have a choice.”

“I hope you don’t think I’m forcing you into anything, Milo.”

“You don’t need to,” he said, “Alan’s already done that.”

She nodded, perhaps understanding, then exhaled. “Well, it’s this way. You’ll go to Georgetown tomorrow for a two o’clock meeting with some people who want to talk to you.”