The Kremlin's Candidate: A Novel

Walk south on Neglinnaya, stair-step west, use the empty high-end walking street Stoleshnikov, luxury stores dark, surveillance would shy away from this funnel, this choke point, so look for the squealing, leapfrogging units hurrying to get ahead, negative, turn north on Bolshaya Dmitrova, cross street for a snap look, parked car with sidelights on, negative, past Muzykalnyy Teatr, its bas-relief columns illuminated, woman with shopping bag, second hit, but she’s hurrying home, disregard, and cut through Petrovskiye Vorota, leafy walking path lined with empty weekend market stalls, no flanker silhouettes under the trees, get to the little car parked under the sooty overhang of the Rossiya Theatre, no stakeout units, no finger smudges around the door locks, get in, pause,

smell the car for the lingering reek of an entry team, proceed, check the trapped glove box, tape still in place, pull out in traffic, ignore horns, look for trailing units reacting, swerving to keep up, keep windows down, hear the street, feel the street, north out of town on Tverskaya, change lanes, watch for reaction, keep speed slow, lull coverage, no turn signal, merge onto the M10, gradually increase speed, traffic sluggish, articulated trucks belching smoke, headlights slotting behind? Negative

, Sokol District coming up, pay attention, take split onto Volokolamskoye Shosse, lighter traffic, goose it, watch for reaction, negative, nearing timing point, black ribbon of Mosky Canal, check time, Svoboda overpass coming up, reach into the oversized purse on the passenger seat, feel for the button under the fabric, light rail overpass for number six tram coming up, check mirror, clear,

now, two-second, low-power burst, 1.5 watts waking up the SRAC receiver buried six inches under the grassy rail embankment under the catenary lines, yellow light inside the purse winking green, electronic handshake, message received, message to Nathaniel, secrets in the night, moles in our midst, ICBMs and warheads, now the roar of the tunnel underpass, check mirror, drifting, steer straight, don’t jackrabbit away, looping ramp to the elevated E105 ring road, traffic faster now, your six is still clear

, past sleeping towns, Strogino, and past Myakinino, and past Druzhba, the Rodina dark, Mother Russia in shadow, her countrymen snug in their homes, believing only what their blue-eyed tsar told them to believe, eating only what the tsar fed them, hoping only for what the tsar let them hope for, fatigue now from gripping the steering wheel for so long, watch for the exit, west on Rublevskoye, take it slow, left, right, left, natural reverses in the triangle formed by Rublevskoye, Yartsevskaya, and Molodogvardeyskaya, look for swirling coverage, negative, cross Rublevskoye and east on Kastanaevskaya, her building, Number nine, dark windows, half-covered by ivy, bulb burned out over the entrance, dim staircase, she’d have to finger the key into the lock of her apartment door.

She rested her forehead against the steering wheel. Kastanaevskaya at this early-morning hour was completely lined with parked cars, both sides of the street. Cursing, Dominika had to cruise several blocks west before she found an empty spot near an all-night Almi pharmacy, its green neon sign coloring nearby trees and the scrawny grass verge in front, its front door reinforced with bars and opened remotely by the duty clerk. Trash paper swirled in the empty lot. Dominika locked her car door and started walking on the darkened sidewalk toward her building. The neighborhood was deathly silent. She clutched the oversized tote with the stiff bottom that was the concealment for her SRAC unit, antenna wires and transmit button sewn into the leather, standby and receive LED lights concealed as interior compartment snaps.

Once home, she would fit a thin lead into a port inside the bag to download the incoming message from CIA: intelligence requirements, or personal meeting skeds (schedules), or occasionally the rare operational requirement. Since her recruitment five years ago, she had met her CIA handlers overseas—sparingly and cover permitting—to participate in a recruitment, or in a false-flag approach, or in a debriefing, all of them glorious, heady trips to meet her secret CIA colleagues, including Nate, with whom she was still furious, but missed terribly. What message awaited her? Last week’s message had mentioned Istanbul, and Dominika anticipated new instructions.