Searching for a man who didn’t exist.

Slaton had a fleeting urge to contact Christine. He imagined how it would feel to hear her voice, to know that everything was all right. It was, of course, no more than a teasing thought. He had not briefed her on any method of making contact, and with good reason. Slaton had seen more than one mission blown in the name of comfort. He had seen men tracked down and shot because they’d exposed themselves in order to say good night to their child. He’d seen a wedding party bombed because one guest had allowed sentiment to override reason. Slaton knew exactly what came of such breaches, and he would not allow it. He could only trust that Christine was safe. Trust that he had done enough, and that she was making good decisions. Because right now, his concealment was the best weapon either of them had.

*   *   *

Slaton disembarked at Geneva’s Sécheron Station under a splendid sky, and he dispersed with the other commuters into the heart of the city. Geneva was a place Slaton knew well. He had come here twice before, once as a teenager to attend the nearby Montreux Jazz Festival, and again years later to kill a man. Both aims had been achieved and, for reasons that escaped him, seemed fixed in his mind with equivalent weight. On one shore of Lac Léman he had spread himself on green grass and listened to Ray Charles play his glorious standards, and on the other he had spread himself on a rooftop ventilator to put under his reticle a Yemeni bomb-maker, a proven and indiscriminant killer of women and children. Two fulfillments that could not have been more divergent, yet both set here, on a pristine lake charged by Alpine water, crisp air flowing under a faultless blue sky.

He walked west along Avenue de la Paix, and in a matter of minutes arrived at Geneva’s United Nations Office. The main building, originally built to house the League of Nations, was as grandiose as the ideals it represented, a blunt ivory tower of stone and columns and square edges. All around were offshoot wings fronted by broad lawns and reflecting pools, and on a central pathway the flags of the world were aligned in perfect harmony. It was a splendid and pompous place that Slaton might have ignored but for one reason. This was his starting point.