“Instead, we’re going to Lebanon, is that it?”

Cutler helped himself to one huge slice of the cake, licked icing off his fingers. “You’ll go where I send you, when I send you.”

Whitman brought out several sheets of paper, which he unfolded. “I haven’t been sitting on my hands these last few days. I’ve worked up an alternate approach that I know will work.”

Cutler snatched a mouthful of cake off his fork, regarded Whitman placidly while he took his time savoring the dessert. When he had cleared his mouth with a swallow of coffee, he said, “This plan of yours, was it vetted or approved by Hemingway?”

“You know damn well it wasn’t, boss.”

Cutler set his cup down, cut into his cake again. “Well, then.”

“But that’s the point. No NSA involvement; no leaks.”

“Unless you’ve forgotten, we take our orders from our clients.”

“Fuck the clients,” Whitman said. “This is the right thing to do. I mean, what happened to the NSA’s near-hysterical directive to find him? Has he suddenly become a friend of the United States government? Come on, boss.” He pushed the papers toward Cutler. “At least take a look.”

Cutler paid no attention to the plan. “Seiran el-Habib is no longer at the villa. He’s off the grid. NSA has no idea where he is.”

“Red Rover will find him.”

Cutler put his fork down, pushed his chair back from the table. “Gregory, I’m only going to say this once. NSA is our largest client. It pays through the nose—the bulk of your salary and mine. Now let me spin out the scenario you’re suggesting. Let’s say I give you the go sign. Let’s say by some miracle you manage to find Seiran el-Habib. Let’s say, further, that the op is a success and you bring the sonuvabitch back. Then what?”

“You tell Hemingway that we’ve done the impossible.”

“The op wasn’t sanctioned; in fact, Hemingway told me in no uncertain terms to turn our attention to Lebanon. So what d’you think happens when I tell him we have Seiran el-Habib? He has a shit-fit—”

“He won’t.”

“—he fires us; we are no longer the recipient of the government’s largesse. Ain’t gonna happen, my friend. End of story.”

* * *

Rain fell out of the sky as if it had nowhere in particular to go. It pattered on the sidewalk, the roofs of parked cars, got thrown off windshields in metronomic fashion by wiper blades. Charlie, walking home from the Elf Lord’s apartment, had three whiskeys in her stomach and a sense that she was being followed.

She’d had no shadows since right after she was released from juvie, when she was still too green to know how to lose a tail—local muscle and then the odd detective, in those days. But she was clever and a fast learner. Subsequently, a tail could never hold her for more than three minutes, tops.

Now she had the feeling again—the crawling of the skin on her back, the itch at the nape of her neck. She saw no one suspicious, but they might be mobile—in a vehicle or a series of vehicles that switched off every couple of blocks. Whatever the setup, she was in someone’s crosshairs. Years had gone by, and now just forty-eight hours after she had agreed to join Whit’s team at Universal Security Associates, she was being monitored. For what? No clear idea, just a couple of nebulous thoughts she needed to let marinate before they would come into focus.