on,” Steiner prompted.
“And then…Stone disappeared,” Paige said, her voice softer than she had intended. More emotional? People like Steiner didn’t like emotion, not of any kind. That’s why they were here. Why they were the ones in charge.
“You woke up the morning before you were to cross the border and found that Stone was missing.”
She nodded, determined not to remember the events of the night before that discovery. She had done that too many times. Especially during that first year.
A long time ago. Just saying those words in her head was a form of comfort, putting distance between her life now and what had happened then. Do it, she told herself. Tell him the rest and be done with it. Put it behind you again.
“Russian tanks rolled in less than four hours later, and Griff, through our contact, ordered me out. I wasn’t given any choice about whether I wanted to leave or not.”
“And exactly what did you do in those four hours?”
There seemed to be accusation in the tone of the question, and Paige’s eyes narrowed against it. “I tried to find Josh. We had to get out before the Russians came, so I tried to find him.”
“And the nerve agent?”
That’s why they had been sent into Vladistan. To find and bring out a deadly neurological toxin, a new class of nerve agent for which there were no antidotes. It had been developed in one of the old Soviet weapons complexes, located in the region. When the rebellion started, the fear in the West was that the rebels might use the agent against the invading Russian troops, provoking a nuclear retaliation.
And then suddenly, feeling stupid that she hadn’t figured it out before, Paige realized this was what Steiner’s summons was all about. There was again unrest within Vladistan. Some people were already predicting another rebellion. Had that nerve agent now shown up in the wrong hands?
It could, of course. It could have at anytime during the last three years, she supposed, because when Joshua Stone had disappeared, that lethal toxin had disappeared with him.
“Josh was carrying it in his backpack,” she said. “I never saw it again.” Or him.
She had told Griff the truth about what had happened between them. A truth that might even be included in the folder Steiner had in front of him, but she didn’t intend to mention her personal involvement with Joshua Stone unless Steiner brought it up. The uneasy silence built until he broke it.
“When you woke up,” Steiner said, his voice flat, no longer questioning, “Stone was gone.”
Paige nodded.
“And you never saw him again?”
Something about the question bothered her. Not the words themselves, which were only the truth, but the nuance of tone in which he had asked. Was that skepticism she heard?
“Griff believed Josh must have been killed shortly after he left the building where we had taken shelter. The whole area was in chaos. Full of rebel patrols.”
“Yet Stone, an experienced operative, left the safety of your hiding place. And he left it alone, leaving you asleep.”
“Maybe he heard something and went out to investigate.”
She had tried for three years to come up with a viable explanation for Josh’s actions. That was the only one that made any kind of sense to her. She could tell by Steiner’s eyes that it made none to him.
“Or maybe he had an appointment,” Steiner said. “A highly lucrative one.”
At the time of his disappearance there had been elements within the agency who suggested Joshua Stone had seen an opportunity to make a fortune and had taken it. A new and very lethal nerve agent would bring millions on the terrorist black market. Stone had both the skills to get it out of the country, and, with his External Security Team experience, the contacts that would be necessary to sell it.
Griff Cabot had never credited that explanation for Josh’s disappearance. Cabot had always had complete confidence in the integrity of his team. Stone, however, wouldn’t have been the first CIA operative to have gone rogue, Paige admitted. And there had been something about his eyes that last night…
“If you’re suggesting that Joshua Stone turned traitor, then you need to review his record,” she said aloud, blocking that niggling, disloyal image. “Griff Cabot, who knew Stone better than anyone else, dismissed that possibility out of hand.”
“Griff would never admit that one of his operatives had gone bad. I’m afraid I’m not quite that…trusting.”
“If you seriously believe Joshua Stone sold that nerve agent to the highest bidder, then how do you explain why it’s never been used?” A shot in the dark, Paige acknowledged, but she had heard nothing in the last three years to suggest it had.
“Maybe whoever bought it is biding their time, waiting for the right opportunity.”
“Or maybe whoever killed Stone never found the toxin,” Paige said. “Maybe they never realized what he was carrying.”
“I confess I prefer your scenario to mine,” Steiner said. “I suppose only time will tell which of us is right.”
“It seems to me that three years is time enough to tell. Joshua Stone wasn’t a traitor.”
“And I sincerely hope you’re right about that, too,” Steiner said, closing the folder and getting to his feet. “If we need any further information, we’ll be in touch.”
His face was unreadable, but it was clear from his words that he considered the interview to be at an end. Paige knew she should be relieved, both that it was over and that his questions had been no more probing. For some reason, however, there was a letdown after the abruptness with which this questioning had ended. The whole thing seemed anticlimactic, especially in the face of the frightening suggestions he had made.
Paige stood, pushing the heavy leather chair back from the edge of the desk. She wondered if she should offer him her hand and decided, illogically, that she didn’t want to shake hands with Carl Steiner. She didn’t want anymore contact with him than was necessary. She reached the door to his office and then, very definitely against her better judgment, she turned back.
Steiner was still standing behind his desk. He was looking down at the file he had just closed, the tips of the fingers of his right hand resting on top of it, as if it might spring open if he didn’t hold it shut.
“Why now?” she asked again.
His dark eyes lifted, questioning.
“Why bring me in to talk about this now?” she asked.
There was the smallest of pauses, not even enough to call suspicious, unless you were already suspicious. “The region is becoming unstable again. This is a loose end that was never satisfactorily resolved. The agency doesn’t like those. Since you were the last person to see Stone alive…”
A loose end? Somehow Paige didn’t think he meant the disappearance of Joshua Stone. Steiner’s concern was almost certainly for that incredibly dangerous chemical
