Black Ops

“And he gets away with that?”

“One time only,” she said matter-of-factly. “If he marries again, and the second wife is unfaithful, that’s proof that he cannot judge character.”

Castillo suddenly realized he had turned on his side.

And then his hand, as if with a mind of its own, reached out and his fingertips brushed her cheek.

“I have never been with another man, Charley. Only Evgeny. Is true.”

“Well, what did you think?”

“I didn’t know it could be like that,” she said, smiling warmly.

“Either did I.”

Castillo leaned to her and kissed her gently on the lips.

The gentleness didn’t last long.

VIII

[ ONE ]

Nuestra Pequena Casa

Mayerling Country Club

Pilar, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina

0705 30 December 2005

Max was having trouble waking Castillo, who was sleeping soundly and who had not responded to either a gentle nudge with Max’s muzzle or a paw laid gently on his chest. Finally, Max delicately took the pillow edge in his mouth and, without apparent effort, jerked it out from under Castillo’s head.

That did it.

Castillo opened his eyes, saw the dog, and reached out and scratched his ears.

Then he was suddenly wide awake.

He looked quickly to the other side of the bed. It was empty.

“Where the hell were you last night, Max? Getting an eyeful?”

Castillo sat up and swung his legs out of the bed.

Max gave him his paw.

“Okay, okay,” Castillo said, and walked somewhat awkwardly to the door to the corridor, unlocked it, and stepped into the hall.

“Who’s down there?” he called.

“It is I, the warden,” Sandra Britton cheerfully called back. “Seven bells and all is well in the cell block!”

“Let Max out, will you, please?”

“Your wish is my command,” she called. This was followed by a shrill and surprisingly loud whistle. “Come on, Max, baby!”

Max happily trotted down the corridor toward the stairway.

Castillo went back into his room, closed the door, and walked to the bed. Then he went back to the door and locked it, cleverly deciding that if someone walked in on him while he was concealing the traces of his nocturnal visitor, there would be a certain curiosity aroused.

He remembered that at some time during the night, she had gone and gotten her cigarettes and an ashtray. And when he had seen her coming back into the bedroom from the bath, starkers, he had decided on the spot that she had to be the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

Yet there was absolutely no trace of Svetlana.

Nothing in the bed, nothing around the bed, nothing—surprisingly, remarkably—in the bathroom.

That may be, of course, because Lieutenant Colonel Alekseeva of the SVR, as a highly trained intelligence officer, knows how to remove all traces of a clandestine visit to someone’s room.

He tried the interior door of the bathroom. It was locked.

Or it may be that it never happened at all, that it was an incredibly realistic wet dream— courtesy of my active imagination and that wine I chug-a-lugged.

That could very well be it: I haven’t had one of those since West Point. The sight of those erect nipples really got to me, and I haven’t had my ashes hauled in a long time.

You are pissing in the wind, Charley.

It happened.

The proof of that came immediately when he looked in the mirrored wall over the sink. There was an angry, curved, bluish bruise on the soft skin between his right shoulder and armpit.

He remembered when she had bit him.

“Why the hell did you bite me?” he had asked some minutes later.

“I didn’t want everybody rushing in here to see who was screaming. I knew I couldn’t scream if I had my mouth full of you.”

He gently rubbed the teeth marks with his index finger.

I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do about that, except maybe swim wearing a T- shirt.

And I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do about Lieutenant Colonel Svetlana Alekseeva.

With whom, I think, as incredible as it sounds, and as fucking insane as I know it is, I think I’m in love.

No, lust.

No, love.

“I couldn’t scream if I had my mouth full of you.”

Wow!

He stripped off his underwear as he had the last time he had taken a shower, and this time got both the shorts and the T-shirt into the wicker laundry basket, the latter with a rim shot.

And then he stepped under the showerhead. This time he didn’t even turn on the hot water. He just closed his eyes and let the cold water stream on him until he heard his teeth chatter.

Edgar Delchamps, Alex Darby, Jack Britton, and Tony Santini were waiting for Castillo, when he came down the stairs dressed in a polo shirt and swimming trunks, five minutes later.

“We need to talk, Ace,” Delchamps said seriously. “Okay?”

Oh, shit! They know!

Castillo nodded, gestured toward the door of the library, and raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Fine,” Delchamps said.

What the hell am I going to say?

“Sorry, guys, it won’t happen again”?

“Excuse the stupidity”?

Or maybe “Well, you guys know how it is. When was the last time you turned down a piece of tail?”

No, that one I won’t use.

That wasn’t a piece of tail. I don’t know what it was, but it was a hell of a lot more than a wham, bam, thank you, ma’am quickie.

The words “a meeting of souls” just popped into my feverish brain.

Castillo was somewhat surprised—But not really; the help here is incredibly efficient, and thank God for that . . . I need a jolt of caffeine—to find an insulated carafe of coffee and a half-dozen china mugs on a tray in the center of the library table. There was a red leather-upholstered captain’s chair at the head of a library table. Castillo poured a cup, sat in the captain’s chair, and made a two-handed gesture signifying