Jack stopped her, Jack running his fingers through his hair, absentmindedly scratching the back of his neck, asking her to join him at the table, and just like that, he’d taken what had been her idea and made it his.

She swore under her breath, packed up the rifle, stashed her kit behind an electrical box, where it’d be days, or forever, before someone noticed it, and she jogged down to street level empty-handed, all big blue eyes and big blond hair, extra padding still up in her bra, looking a whole lot more like Barbie than Beatrix Kiddo.

She rounded into the open at an angle that kept her out of Jack’s line of sight and put her dead-on for collision with the guy across from him, and she strode forward, eyes locked, fists clenched, coming in hard and fast like a brawler looking for a fight.

The man caught sight of her, tensed, as if he couldn’t decide whether to bolt or stay, and that told her more than any interrogation would have.

Told her brother she’d arrived, too.

Jack’s right hand dropped off his lap. Fingers dangling toward the ground, he signed to her the way she’d signed to him in the airport, spelling out Belmopan, taking her back to a time and place where unified silence had netted information.

He pointed to the chair at his right.

She slapped his shoulder, slid around him, said, “Sorry I’m late.”

The newcomer stood and stretched a hand in her direction.

“Luka Marinov,” he said. “I’ve come on behalf of your father.”

He had the easy fluency of Moscow buried under decades of London and was about ten years and two countries removed from the voice on the phone that’d arranged to get them to Berlin.

She gripped his hand in a power grab.

He wasn’t Dmitry, wasn’t the solitary spotter, wasn’t either of the superspy wannabes at the Berlin airport, most definitely wasn’t the voice that had started this all, and wasn’t connected to any of them, because the one thing they all had in common was that they knew exactly what they were looking for.

This guy hadn’t recognized her from Eve.

She let go, sat, crossed her arms.

Marinov cleared his throat. “As I was telling your brother,” he said, “you came to meet your father, and clearly, I’m not your father, and for that I apologize.” He chuckled, more fake than nervous. “It’s not a good look, is it? A last-minute change like this? I assure you it’s not what your father had in mind, either.”

She stayed silent, expressionless, but it grated on her, the way he kept repeating your father, as if the matter had already been settled. Belaboring was what Clare would call it, a clumsy, transparent attempt to bully a baseline understanding.

That wasn’t a good look.