Bloodmoney by David Ignatius Read Free Book Online

messaged us about six hours ago to say that it had been moved up. He was supposed to be there at nine p.m., Karachi time—nine a.m. our time. But he missed the meet.” She looked at her watch. “He’s now almost an hour past due.”
    “Call his BlackBerry. Tell him he’s late. Ask him where the hell he is.”
    “We did that. No answer.”
    “Flash message?”
    “No answer.”
    Gertz stroked his goatee as he pondered the possibility that this wasn’t just a screw-up.
    “What about the asset he’s supposed to be pitching? The tribal guy.”
    “The asset is waiting for Egan, at the place they agreed. There’s just no Egan.”
    “Have you called the access agent, the Pakistani who set this up?
    “Yes, sir,” said Marx. “His crypt is AC/POINTER, true name is Hamid Akbar. And yes, we’ve tried that. He isn’t answering his phone, either.”
    Gertz shook his head. This day had started off so reasonably. The bad news didn’t fit.
    “Maybe Egan is spooked,” he said. “He got the jitters the last time he was in Karachi, aborted two meetings. Maybe the same thing happened this time. He’s just freaking out somewhere, having a drink and looking at shadows.”
    “Maybe, but we don’t think so,” said Rossetti, the operations chief. “We’re still tracking his BlackBerry signal. It’s been on the move for the last two hours, plus. He’s just not answering.”
    Gertz shook his head. The room was quiet. He looked at Rossetti.
    “Christ. This is bad.”
    “I’m afraid so.”
    Gertz stared at the floor, trying to compose himself. The color had drained from his face. It was almost as if he were embarrassed that something had gone wrong. His people weren’t supposed to make mistakes. They had big hearts. There was a dead quiet, which Rossetti filled.
    “What’s Egan’s cover job?” asked the operations chief. It wasn’t on his cheat sheet. He was new. He still didn’t know most of the network.
    Gertz was still looking at the floor, stroking that goatee some more. Marx broke the silence.
    “He works for a hedge fund in London called Alphabet Capital. The only person there who’s witting is the chief executive.”
    “Perkins,” said Gertz. “His name is Thomas Perkins.”
    “That’s not very secure,” said Rossetti. “Why doesn’t Egan have his own platform?”
    Gertz frowned. He didn’t like being quizzed by his operations chief.
    “He’s a legacy, Steve. Blame your friends at Headquarters. Where’s Tommy? He can explain it.”
    Tommy Arden, who as head of Support was responsible for organizing cover, scurried forward.
    “He was a holdover from the old NOC group,” said Arden. “We got him from the Global Deployment Center. He’d been working for another investment company in London. We found him a new cover. It seemed to work, until about an hour ago.”
    “Who knows he’s traveling?” asked Gertz. “Does he have a wife and kids?”
    “Nope, he’s the usual NOC loner.”
    “Good, that’s fewer people to notify.”
    Gertz was being a hard-ass, but that wasn’t right. Not today. To be a leader, you had to take the lead.
    “Okay, when London wakes up I am going to call Perkins and tell him that his man is missing. He’ll have to put out a statement. Otherwise, zip it. Total radio silence. Understood?”
    Sophie Marx nodded assent, along with everyone else. She watched as the group fell away. She wasn’t a religious person; her counterculture parents, when they had thought about religion at all, had told her it was lies and nonsense. But as she thought about Howard Egan, gone missing halfway around the world in a frightening city, she asked God to watch over him.
    Marx recalled her last conversation with Egan. She wished now that she hadn’t told him to “suck it up” when he had expressed anxiety about the mission.

STUDIO CITY, CALIFORNIA

    Jeff Gertz bulled into his office, Steve Rossetti trailing behind. The others understood that they weren’t needed anymore. It was a