Virginia. He was in place for the moment of revelation, and equally important, everything was arranged upstairs in the hotel. The cleaning staff of the management, a management genuinely concerned about the grieving widow's sorrow, included a new member, experienced and instructed by the Czech. Frequency-designed intercepts had been placed in every room; no conversation could take place without being recorded by Varak's voice-activated tapes in the adjoining suite.
Taxis drove up to the hotel on the average of one every three minutes and Milos studied each departing fare. He had seen twenty to thirty, losing count but not his concentration. Suddenly he was aware of the unusual: a cab stopped on his left, across the intersecting street at least a hundred feet away. A man got out and Varak moved farther back into the unlit recess.
'I heard it on the radio.'
'So did I.'
'She's a bitch!'
'And if they're alive, they have to get out of the country. Can they get out…?'
' What are your speculations?'
'It's not the biggest news story of the day.'
'And Bollinger?'
The man in the top coat, the lapels pulled up, covering his face, walked rapidly across the street towards the hotel's entrance. He passed within ten feet of Inver Brass's coordinator. The traitor was Eric Sundstrom, and he was a man in panic.
The Icarus Agenda
Chapter 34
Ardis Vanvlanderen gasped. 'Good Christ, what are you doing here?' she cried, literally yanking the rotund Sundstrom through the door and slamming it shut. 'Are you out of your mind?'
I'm very much in it, but yours is out to lunch… Stupid, stupid, stupid! What did you and that horse's ass of a husband of yours think you were doing?'
'The Arabs? The hit teams?'
'Yes! Goddamned fools—’
'It's all preposterous'.' screamed the widow. 'It's a horrendous mix up. Why would we—why would Andy want to have Bollinger killed?'
'Bollinger…? It's Kendrick, you bitch! Palestinian terrorists attacked his houses in Virginia and Colorado. There's a blackout on the news but a lot of people were killed, not, however, the golden boy himself.'
'Kendrick?' whispered Ardis, panic in her large green eyes. 'Oh, my God… and they think the killers are coming out here to assassinate Bollinger. They've got it all backwards!'
'They?' Sundstrom froze, his face ashen. 'What are you talking about?'
'We'd both better sit down.' Mrs. Vanvlanderen walked out of the foyer and down into the living room, to the couch and her cigarettes. The pale scientist followed, then veered to a bar where there were bottles, decanters, glasses and an ice bucket. Without glancing at the labels he picked up a bottle at random and poured himself a drink.'
'Who is they?' he asked quietly, intensely, as he turned and watched Ardis on the couch lighting a cigarette.
'She left about an hour and a half ago—’
'She? Who?'
'A woman named Rashad, a counter-terrorist expert. She's with a cross-over unit, CIA joining up with State. She never mentioned Kendrick!'
'Jesus, they've put it together. Varak said they would and they did!'
'Who's Varak?'
'We call him our co-ordinator. He said they'd find out about
