The Kremlin's Candidate: A Novel полностью

“I thank you for your kind invitation,” said Dominika. “It’s an inspired idea, General Sun. I believe I can secure authorization from the director [I really mean from Putin] for this trip.”

The general bowed his head. “I am delighted we will have the opportunity to host you,” he said. “There is some need for haste, however; our operative has already made contact with the American. Would it be even remotely possible for you to fly to Beijing tomorrow? It is an eight-hour flight, with an additional three hours to Hong Kong from Beijing.”

You’ve got no SRAC, you put a hold on personal meets. Even if there were time for you to put down a note—there wasn’t—it would be days before a Moscow officer could get black and retrieve a message that Nate is a target and should be yanked out of Hong Kong immediately. If she knew him, Nate’s probably trying to develop this Zhènniǎo. Idiotka, all you can do is go to Hong Kong and somehow try to warn Nate, or spoil the approach without burning yourself. She could not bear the thought of both Gable and Nate being taken away from her.

“I will be ready tomorrow,” said Dominika.

Dominika called the Kremlin. Gorelikov was delighted with the prospect of her Hong Kong trip, and said he would inform the president, who would also be greatly pleased at her remarkable progress. It was unprecedented that a senior SVR officer was even invited to China, much less asked to advise on an entrapment operation. “Your specialty,” crowed Gorelikov, to which Dominika silently told him to go to hell, and thought sadly of Ioana and all her sister Sparrows.

“The president just yesterday asked whether you liked your dacha at the cape,” said Gorelikov, conversationally. “He looks forward to taking you around the mansion, to explain the restoration work, and to show you the famous antiques of Tsar Alexander.” Dominika read the message: Her weekend at the dacha (naturally) was a matter of record, but her meanderings about the palace with the young Pole Andreas had been noticed (cameras, bugs, or security?), including their peeking into the master suite. She remembered now that Andreas had told her the ornate bed had belonged to Tsar Alexander. The end of the evening with Andreas in her dacha was presumably also known, but Dominika didn’t care. Gable long ago had told her always to assume uncontrolled rooms were bugged, and that the best way to reassure the watchers was to feign ignorance of the surveillance, demonstrating guiless innocence. “Let them see you alone in bed,” Gable had said, “hands under the covers moaning, crashing the yogurt truck. Give ’em a show.” Dominika had pretended to be shocked, telling Gable Russian girls didn’t do that. “Probably why most of ’em got mustaches,” he had said, and she had called him nekulturny, laughing. How she missed him.

There was another component to the president’s invitation: with the acuity of a Sparrow, she knew Putin would not hesitate to lead her into his capacious bedroom, dismiss his bodyguards, and determine whether his new Director of SVR would follow any and all directions. What would she do? Benford would probably tell her there were no limits, that access was the ultimate goal. Gable would tell her to bring a tin snips with her and shorten the already diminutive president by a couple more inches. Nate would go red in the face, caught between duty and jealousy. Wise, experienced Forsyth would take her aside, hands on her shoulders, and advise her to tell Vladimir that if he wanted a Sparrow she would get him one, but if he wanted a Chief of the foreign intelligence service, there could be no thought of anything more; she’d kill for him, but she wouldn’t share his bed. God knew what his reaction would be.