The Invisible

For a long moment, Kealey couldn’t reply. It was hard to believe he had heard correctly, because the words just didn’t make sense. On some level, he knew they combined to form a perfectly grammatical sentence, but the overall meaning, the very implication, was just too far-fetched to believe. Somehow, he had walked into something he didn’t fully understand. Finally, he managed to find his voice. “I don’t understand. You want me to . . . kill Marissa?”

“No! ” Machado blurted. With that single word, Kealey heard all the certainty, strength, and confidence drop out of his voice. He hurriedly regained control, but the younger man had caught the slip, and he was already thinking about how he could use it to his advantage. “God, no. I only need you to . . .”

“To what?”

“To injure her. To take her out of the field,” Machado said. There was a long pause. “Kealey, there is more to this than I can really—”

“No,” Kealey said.

There was an uncertain hesitation on the other end of the line.

“What do you mean no? What are you talking about?”

“I won’t do it. I won’t shoot her. You must be out of your fucking mind.”

Kealey heard a long, weary sigh, and then Machado spoke in a voice devoid of emotion. “You don’t understand. I knew you wouldn’t understand, but it needs to be done. It’s the only way.”

“The only way to what? ” Kealey demanded, his frustration rising to match his anger and confusion. “Why are you asking me to do this?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Then explain it.”

The pause lasted much longer this time, and when Machado finally spoke, Kealey was caught off guard, his attention divided between Fahim, the gun in his hand, and the blurred form of Marissa Petain in the near distance. “You know about Caroline? Did Marissa tell you about her?”

“Yes, she told me what happened.”

“Then you know how she died. You know what the Colombians did to her.”

“They tortured her,” Kealey said uneasily.

“No,” Machado said. “You’re wrong.”

“What?” Kealey was confused; he remembered every word of what Petain had told him in Cartagena, and while she hadn’t delved into the details of her sister’s death, she had made the graphic nature of the incident reasonably clear. “I thought—”

“You’re wrong,” Machado repeated quietly. “You see, it’s a matter of degree. They didn’t just torture her, Ryan. They started with her toes, so she wouldn’t try to run. Once they had them off, they began removing her fingers. Do you understand what I’m telling you? Do you understand the severity of what I’m saying? They took her apart piece by piece. That is not torture. That is something else entirely.”

Machado stopped talking, and Kealey decided to venture a few words. “Look, I can understand how you —”

“They gave her a mirror,” Machado continued. His voice was unnaturally calm and casual. “Did Marissa tell you that? They gave my firstborn child a mirror so she could see what they had done to her. Once they had taken her fingers, she obviously couldn’t hold it up for herself, so they did it for her. Very courteous people, the Colombians, and very thorough.” Machado let out a low, mirthless laugh.

“You can say what you like about them, but they are devoted to their work, and they certainly like to be recognized for it.”

And to that, Kealey had no response. Suddenly, it was clear to him just how far gone Javier Machado actually was. His daughter’s death—not to mention the nightmare he’d walked into when he’d opened his front door eight years earlier—had clearly pushed him over the edge, and there was no bringing him back. The only thing Kealey could do now was try to talk him out of the bizarre demand he had levied a few moments ago, but for that to happen, he had to know how Petain figured into the story.

When he asked the question, though, Machado merely offered a short, hollow laugh. It was a deeply unsettling sound, and Kealey had to pull the phone away from his ear just to get away from it. “You still don’t get it, do you, Kealey? Marissa joined the Agency because of Caroline. I’m sure she told you that.”

“Yes, she did.”

“Did she tell you that I did everything I could to stop her from joining? That I used every ounce of my influence to keep her away from Langley?”

“No,” Kealey said. He remembered thinking the exact opposite, that Machado had used his pull to get her into the Agency. “She didn’t mention that.”

“And why do you think she did that? Why do you think she ignored me when I pleaded with her to reconsider? Why do you think she ignored Elise when she begged her to stay in Spain?”

“I don’t know.”

“Because she wanted revenge. She wanted to find the people who killed Caroline, and she wanted them to suffer. And now she’s just a few months away from getting her wish.”

Kealey went suddenly cold. “What are you talking about?”

Machado laughed again, but it was a bitter, angry gesture. “Didn’t Harper tell you? Of course he didn’t . . . That isn’t his way. One hand never knows what the other is doing. That’s how it is at the Agency, though . . . I only wish I had known that sooner.”

“What do you mean?”

“Two months ago, Marissa was selected to participate in an upcoming op in Colombia. And by ‘participate,’ I mean she is the op. Once she lands in Bogota, she’s on her own. No control, at least not in-country, and no support from the embassy. Nothing but biweekly reports to Langley. The target is the NVC, otherwise known as the North Valley cartel.”

“The same cartel that killed her sister,” Kealey murmured. He was speaking more to himself than anything else, but Machado had heard him over the line.

“Exactly. The same people who butchered my Caroline. Marissa is going after the same bastards, but it’s not going to work, Kealey. She has minimal experience working undercover and almost no experience working without a team. They’ll weed her out in no time, and when that happens . . .”

Kealey let the silence linger as he thought it through. Perhaps Machado wasn’t as mentally unstable as he’d initially thought. But then again, what he was asking was just . . . As if sensing the younger man’s second thoughts, the Spaniard hurried to fill the dead air. “You know as well as I do that they’ll kill her. I’ve tried everything. I’ve tried arguing with her, threatening her, and I’ve tried pulling some strings at the Agency to keep her away from this. Nothing has worked . . . Not even Elise can talk her out of it, and Harper seems intent on sending her. The Agency is desperate to get a foothold in Colombia. But if, for some reason, she wasn’t physically able to go into the field . . .”

“Then Harper would have no choice but to scrap the op,” Kealey concluded. He didn’t know what to think about what he had just heard, but for the first time, he had a glimmer of understanding. He had to admit that in some ways, what Machado was proposing made perfect sense. At the same time, there was nothing rational or even sane about what the older man was asking him to do. “At the very least, he’d find someone else to send.”

“Exactly,” Machado said. He sounded resigned and despondent, but also resolute. “This is the last thing I want, Kealey, believe me, but it’s for the best. She will still be able to stay at Langley. She has exceptional skills in other areas, and she’s a brilliant girl. Much too smart to be wasted on an operation like this. It is destined to fail . . . Believe me, I know. I spent some time in Medellin when I was with the DO. I know what it will take to infiltrate the cartels, and one person with limited experience is not the answer. If she goes, she’ll be dead inside a week. I guarantee it.”

Kealey looked over at Petain, who was standing in front of the transformer, her left wrist cuffed to the access door. Her head scarf had come loose and was blowing across the gravel footpath. Her pale face was blurred by the rain, but he could tell that she was staring in his direction, waiting for some kind of sign. As he watched her, something clicked in his mind, and he made his decision.

“I understand what you’re saying,” he said slowly, “and you’re probably right about what will happen if she goes, but you’re going to have to figure out another way to stop her. I’m not going to do it, Machado. If you have to