He’d gone up against her time after time, driven by the hope of hurting the thing that hurt him most. It’d taken nearly five years before he’d managed to do it, and like an animal taunted for years by those he couldn’t reach, he hadn’t been kind when he’d managed to break free. All he’d had to do was tag her. He’d knocked her out cold with the butt of his rifle and left her cuffed to the underside of an engine block.

She’d shown up a day later, never said a word about it, but she’d upped the stakes for the next round, proving yet again that winning was never the end and that the only way to truly win was to refuse to play.

He hadn’t had that choice back then.

Her world had been all he knew and all he had, and bruising, bleeding, and breaking had been easier than facing the push-pull of love and rejection, which she’d honed into a precision weapon. To rebel had always hurt more in the end, so he’d complied.

He’d hated her and loved her—hated and loved her still.

Had wanted to destroy her and had wanted to make her proud.

This hunt for Dmitry was a different side of that multifaceted coin.

He turned and headed back to the stairs and down to ground level, and all the while Clare’s voice, in his head, echoed variations of itself over the years.

You’re answering the wrong question, John.

No, this isn’t about tactics, it’s about strategy.

He angled across the courtyard and past the Savoy’s restaurant garden, guarded against the hit squad, against Dmitry and, most of all, against his own damn mother, still unconvinced this wasn’t her tugging at his strings. He exited onto Fasanenstrasse, a full diagonal from where he’d gone in, and strolled the tree-lined sidewalk, past boutiques and restaurants, and pushed through gilded glass doors into a throwback world of marble floors and wood-paneled walls.

He spotted the first target at the edge of the lounge just off the lobby, six feet flat, well fed, poorly exercised, earpiece, bored, and only partially attentive, but no name badge and suit too nice for hotel security. Jack threaded past a large central floral display and pressed on toward the restaurant. He found his second target beside the elevator bank, five feet nine, not quite as well fed, better exercised, identical earpiece, similar suit, equally bored, and twice as attentive.

This guy’s jacket was open, his holster partly visible.

Sloppy.

They were a different kind of crew than what had waited at the airports, had a different feel about them, and were easy to find because they’d made themselves easy to find. Not to scare him off, but as an invitation to approach.

Curious.