The Kobalt Dossier Read online

  BY ERIC VAN LUSTBADER

  THE BRAVO SHAW NOVELS

  The Testament

  The Fallen

  Four Dominions

  The Sum of All Shadows

  THE JACK MCCLURE NOVELS

  First Daughter

  Last Snow

  Blood Trust

  Father Night

  Beloved Enemy

  THE PEARL SAGA

  The Ring of Five Dragons

  The Veil of a Thousand Tears

  Mistress of the Pearl

  THE SUNSET WARRIOR CYCLE

  The Sunset Warrior

  Shallows of Night

  Dai-San

  Beneath an Opal Moon

  Dragons on the Sea of Night

  THE CHINA MAROC SERIES

  Jian

  Shan

  THE NICHOLAS LINNEAR / NINJA CYCLE

  The Ninja

  The Miko

  White Ninja

  The Kaisho

  Floating City

  Second Skin

  The Death and Life of

  Nicholas Linnear (ebook)

  The Oligarch’s Daughter (ebook)

  THE JASON BOURNE NOVELS

  The Bourne Legacy

  The Bourne Betrayal

  The Bourne Sanction

  The Bourne Deception

  The Bourne Objective

  The Bourne Dominion

  The Bourne Imperative

  The Bourne Retribution

  The Bourne Ascendancy

  The Bourne Enigma

  The Bourne Initiative

  THE EVAN RYDER NOVELS

  The Nemesis Manifesto

  OTHERS

  Sirens

  Black Heart

  Zero

  French Kiss

  Angel Eyes

  Batman: The Last Angel

  Black Blade

  Dark Homecoming

  Pale Saint

  Art Kills

  Any Minute Now

  www.headofzeus.com

  First published in the UK in 2021 by Head of Zeus Ltd

  Copyright © Eric Van Lustbader, 2021

  The moral right of Eric Van Lustbader to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN (HB): 9781800243132

  ISBN (XTPB): 9781800243149

  ISBN (E): 9781800243163

  Head of Zeus Ltd

  First Floor East

  5–8 Hardwick Street

  London EC1R 4RG

  WWW.HEADOFZEUS.COM

  For Victoria, my one and only, my everything.

  Revenge has become our way of life. Now we enter the darkness.

  —LYUDMILA ALEXEYEVNA SHOKOVA

  Contents

  By Eric Van Lustbader

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  PART ONE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  PART TWO

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  PART THREE

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  PART FOUR

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Notes on the Novel

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  PROLOGUE

  THREE AND A HALF YEARS AGO

  “The obliteration of the face,” Anouk said, “is essential.” She regarded Bobbi Fisher with her gray-flannel eyes. “This point cannot be stressed enough. Without complete obliteration it may be possible to forensically retrieve the teeth.” She lifted a long forefinger. “Even one tooth can be enough for identification, and you will be undone. Exfiltration cannot be accomplished.”

  She paused, a broad-shouldered woman with muscular arms, thick legs, and features as blunt as a weapon. Bobbi had turned her head to check the closed door to the square room—a kitchen that had been turned into an ad hoc classroom. Bobbi sat on a high stool at the central polished concrete island. By her right hand was a pitcher of ice water and a glass tumbler. Fists of rain beat against the streaked windows, blurring the restless trees that separated this two-story house from the identical ones around it. The rain-swept streets were as clean and clear as one would expect in a new development in Virginia, suburban sprawl of DC.

  “Bobbi.” Anouk’s voice was as sharp as a knife blade. “What are you looking at? You are required to pay strict attention.”

  “Where is Leda?” Bobbi said without looking back.

  “I am here now, Bobbi.” Anouk, standing beside the refrigerator, arms at her side, hands half-curled, stood as straight as a sentry. “It is to me that you report.”

  Bobbi’s head snapped around. “My condition when I was recruited was that Leda—and only Leda—would be my handler.”

  Anouk’s smile bared her small white teeth. “That was some years ago,” she said. “Leda has moved on.”

  “Then I should have moved on with her.”

  Anouk pursed her lips in distaste. “You had an affair with Leda, didn’t you?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Everything about you is my business, Bobbi. You should know that.” When no reply was forthcoming, Anouk went on: “It was quite torrid, from the reports I’ve read.”

  “Damn you.”

  “Ah.” Anouk grinned like a crocodile. “At last I have your undivided attention.”

  “Indeed, you do.”

  “Well, then, you should know that Leda is dead.”

  “Dead? No.”

  “Purged.” Anouk sneered. “And I can easily arrange for you to follow her.”

  Bobbi rose from the stool. “Is that a threat?”r />
  Anouk shrugged. “You’d better get used to it; it’s my method.”

  Grasping the tumbler Bobbi drained it of water. “I want something else,” she said. “Something sweeter.” She walked the length of the counter, to where Anouk stood. “Excuse me.” Anouk moved just enough so Bobbi could reach down for the handle of the half-refrigerator tucked beneath the counter.

  As she opened the refrigerator door, she smashed the tumbler against the edge of the counter. Anouk’s arm was coming but, anticipating, Bobbi grabbed her wrist, controlling it. Anouk was stronger than Bobbi, but Bobbi had the leverage, and, in any case, she only needed a split second to drive a knife-like shard into Anouk’s left eye. Anouk jumped as if electrified. Bobbi kept tight hold of the bottom of the tumbler, ground it farther and farther, until the tip of the shard pierced Anouk’s brain.

  She stepped smartly back, avoiding both the corpse’s collapse and the last spurts of blood. The kitchen’s door opened. She turned to see Leda step smartly inside, close the door behind her.

  Leda smiled. Everything about her was medium: height, weight, features, and yet there was something about her, something magnetic that was almost a physical thing. You might not recall her if she passed you on the street, but if you sat down opposite her in a bar or restaurant for drinks, you’d be hard-pressed to pull away.

  She didn’t even bother checking out the sprawled body, merely stepped over it as she crossed the large square room. “You haven’t lost your reflexes, I see,” she said.

  “Or my rage.”

  The two women embraced.

  “Fisher. I never could get used to your married name.”

  Bobbi shrugged. “What’s in a name?”

  Leda chuckled. “It’s been a long time since we’ve seen each other.”

  Bobbi nodded, a smile wreathing her face. “Too long. Texts are no substitute for the real thing.”

  They kissed, then broke away. Though it was a businesslike kiss, their eyes were shining, a remnant of what once was.

  A man and a woman in boilersuits and latex gloves entered, but Leda bade them wait with a commanding wave of her hand. Now she crouched down, examining Anouk’s corpse with the thoroughness of a forensic pathologist. When she rose, she said, “Idem.” Come on.

  Leda led her through the sparsely furnished living room and into a space that would someday be a den or a media room, leaving the suited and gloved pair to clean up the blood and get rid of the remains.

  Bobbi’s eyes narrowed. “She knew about our affair.”

  “Did she?”

  “She said she read about it in reports.”

  “That was an out-and-out lie.”

  “Really?” Bobbi cocked her head. “But isn’t that your job: to recruit through seduction?”

  “Seduction is only part of my job description. A small part—or, more accurately, a selective part. I’m much more elevated than a sparrow, else I wouldn’t be here now, with you. I am your handler.”

  “But you have seduced others.”

  Leda’s expression turned enigmatic, as if two or more thoughts had occurred to her at once. “You’re jealous.”

  “Of your time, not of your charms.”

  “Perhaps,” Leda said. “Listen to me, Bobbi. I did seduce you. Yes, I did. Without question. But let’s not mince words: you wanted to be seduced.”

  Bobbi thought about this, thought about how right Leda was. She did want to be seduced. Badly. Perhaps desperately. Was that need a weakness in her? If so, she would do well to eradicate it. On the other hand, she was where she wanted to be, so why should she care about the rest? And yet, she did. She had an innate abhorrence of weakness in any form. With an almost physical wrench, she returned her thoughts to the present. “You didn’t answer my question: how did Anouk know about our affair?”

  “Well, now,” Leda said with a twinkle in her eye, “that’s an excellent question.”

  A silence yawned between them. Behind the kitchen door scuffling, muted sounds of the cleanup in progress. Otherwise the house, being new, was very still.

  Then Bobbi had it. “You told her.”

  Leda laughed softly. “It did get your blood up, her knowing, didn’t it?”

  All at once, it seemed obvious. “So this was a test.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Oh, it was more than that.”

  “Seriously?”

  “You were always meant for greater things, Bobbi. I hand chose you. I didn’t seduce you on a whim or because I detected a weakness. You did not hold a position advantageous to us.”

  “No.” A slow smile. “Evan is like an impenetrable vault.”

  “Well,” Leda said, “we’ll see about that.”

  Bobbi frowned. “Meaning?’

  “You will see.” Leda went back into the kitchen and returned with an ice-rimed bottle of vodka, two spotted water glasses, and a manila envelope, also ice-rimed, tucked firmly under her arm. She poured triple shots into both water glasses and handed one to Bobbi. Leda lifted her glass high and Bobbi followed suit. They drank in the Russian fashion, all in one. They were clearly toasting something, Bobbi’s graduation? Anouk’s death? Bobbi had no idea what.

  Leda set aside her glass. “Anouk was your final exam,” she said as if reading Bobbi’s mind. “Your schooling has been long, I know. And now you have graduated summa cum laude. As a consequence, two weeks from now Bobbi Ryder Fisher will cease to exist. She will die. And from then on you will be known only by a new operational name I will give you when you leave here.”

  “A new life.” Her eyes flicked to the envelope, but she said nothing. She knew to wait.

  Leda nodded. “It’s what we promised you. It’s what you wanted above all else. Is that still true?”

  Bobbi was incredulous. “Of course!” She had married knowing what would happen someday. Paul had insisted on kids and, frankly, when consulted Leda was all for it, wisely saying that it would only deepen Bobbi’s cover. “But there’s a risk,” she had warned. “A mother’s love can—” “I have no trace of a maternal instinct,” Bobbi had interrupted. “I don’t see the point of children, not in this day and age.” And Leda had been satisfied.

  “Nothing whatsoever has changed since I was read the terms of my recruitment.”

  “Then to your first—and last—assignment in DC.” Leda opened the envelope and removed a 5x7 photo, which she handed to Bobbi. It was a head-and-shoulders shot, the image lacking vivid color, flattened due to the long-lens surveillance camera with which it had been taken. “You know this woman, yes?”

  “Of course,” Bobbi said. “It’s Benjamin Butler’s wife, Lila.”

  “She’s a friend of yours,” Leda said, “yes?”

  “You want me to go to Berlin?”

  “Mrs. Butler arrived here this morning,” Leda said. “Her father isn’t well.”

  Bobbi considered this for a moment. “It was you who made him unwell, wasn’t it?”

  “Well, not me personally,” Leda said, half-offended. “But, yes, it was achieved on my order.”

  “So the end could come here, where I am.”

  Leda’s smile spread slowly, like butter in sunlight. “You are my best pupil, Bobbi. I knew it the first time I laid eyes on you, in Copenhagen when you were seventeen. We’re like family now.”

  “How?” Bobbi said. “How could you know I’d be your best pupil?”

  “Between you and your sister you were the one having fun.”

  “I was enjoying life.”

  “No,” Leda said. “You were devouring it.”

  *

  Forty-eight hours later and after a brief respite the rain had persevered, though reduced to a drizzle. The residents inside the Beltway, umbrellas unfurled, hurried along slick sidewalks. Those bravely, or foolishly, without sprinted toward crowded doorways or shimmering awnings.

  Bobbi saw Lila Butler before Lila saw her. She had texted Lila the day before, made a date for a shopping expedition and lunch, “to take your mind off your
father,” she’d said. Lila had been openly grateful for both the break and the company of an old friend, giving Bobbi the sense that living in Berlin was starting to grate on Lila. Bobbi had a remedy for that.

  She looked both ways, waited several moments, checking her wristwatch for the time. Her heart rate picked up as she crossed the street against the light to intercept Lila before she turned in to the department store where they’d arranged to meet.

  Beneath Lila’s umbrella, they embraced. Lila had always been birdlike, but now she was thinner, paler, and the wetness on her cheeks was tears, not raindrops. Bobbi’s hunch had been right: Berlin did not agree with her.

  Bobbi first asked after Lila’s father’s health. It was failing, quickly. Bobbi wondered what Leda’s people had given him. Only then did she ask about Berlin.

  Lila sighed deeply. “Berlin is so gray,” she said. “And the people …” Lila shivered. “They’re friendly on the surface. Maybe too friendly. Underneath there seems a darkness—the river Styx running through them. And now the immigrant issue has given a fervent raison d’être to the neo-Nazi movement.”

  They were standing at the curb in order to avoid the crowds of foot traffic along the sidewalk, shoulders touching beneath Lila’s umbrella. Bobbi placed a gentle hand on Lila’s arm, bony as a sparrow’s wing.

  “I’m sorry you’re unhappy,” Bobbi said with one eye on the oncoming traffic. “How about Zoe. How’s she doing?”

  “Unlike me, Zoe loves it over there. But then again she’s four so her world is as small as any four-year-old’s.”

  “Be sure to give her my love, though I doubt she remembers me.”

  “Of course she remembers you,” Lila exclaimed. “She remembers everything and everyone.”

  Bobbi smiled. She saw the SUV. Its rain-streaked tinted windows reflected the buildings and the low sky as if in a fun house mirror. “When do you think you might all come home?”

  Lila shrugged. “I don’t know. Ben’s still got business over there.”

  “Of course. So, how long will you be in DC now?”

  “That will depend on my father’s condition. But I already miss Zoe.”

  “Your father’s health aside, and even missing Zoe,” Bobbi said, “I think the trip back here will be good for you, even if it’s only for a few days. Berlin is so gloomy, isn’t it?”

  “So gloomy.” Lila smiled. Bobbi had forgotten how the space around her lit up when she smiled. “I’m so glad you contacted me.” Lila gave Bobbi’s arm a brief squeeze. “I can’t tell you how good it feels to see a friendly face. Things are pretty grim at my parents’ place.” And she leaned in to give Bobbi a peck on the cheek.