“I’ll do it.” Caruso raised his hand, despite the fact that it was a voice call. “The agent I got it from assured me this thing’s been checked by FBI computer techs.”
“Have I taught you guys nothing?” Biery snapped. “Do not even get that drive close to anyone’s machine until I get there.”
Chavez’s head snapped up. “Wait, what? You’re coming here?”
“Gerry approved it. This USB is obviously important to you, but I’m not letting it near one of my machines until I run some of my own diagnostics. FBI techs . . . Please! Anyway, we’re at the hangar now—already on the plane—just waiting for the pilots to get here. Here’s Lisanne. I’m going to get some sleep since Jack’s not here to hog the couch.”
Lisanne Robertson was the new Adara Sherman—director of transportation for The Campus. Gerry Hendley had recruited the energetic former Marine after she pulled him over for speeding on the Jeff Davis Highway. Her Lebanese mother had raised her to be fluent in Arabic—she had two tours in Iraq under her belt by the time she was twenty-seven. After separating from the military, she’d spent four years with the City of Alexandria Police Department. Both jobs gave her the chops she needed to transform from uniformed flight attendant to effectively become a one-person Phoenix Raven unit, pulling security on the Hendley Associates Gulfstream when it was parked at less secure airfields—which seemed to happen all the time.
“Hey, guys,” Lisanne said in her usual chipper voice. Dom could imagine her blue-black hair bouncing as she spoke. “We’re estimating wheels-up out of Reagan in an hour with an ETA into Dallas Love Field of four thirty-five a.m., Central Time.”
A collective groan ran around the room.
Clark shot a glance at Dom. “You’re staying in Texas with me,” he said. “The rest of you will get to Buenos Aires well ahead of Chen and set up a reception. Follow him and see what he’s up to. There’s still a hell of a lot to find out about him and his operation on this end.”
22
Ba Meiling braced, her small chin tucked, narrow shoulders pinned, along with six other servants in the slate-tiled entry of Foreign Minister Li’s home. Dressed in black slacks and crisp white shirts, they stood with hands folded and eyes locked to the front. Minister Li did not like to be gawked at. The butler, Mr. Fan, stood beside Meiling under the harsh light of the crystal chandelier. Beads of perspiration coursed down the side of the man’s ashen face. A recent addition to the household, Mr. Fan had been brought on shortly after Minister Li had seen an episode of Downton Abbey. It was a whispered joke among the staff that the minister was a Chinese man who owned a German car and lived in an Italian villa with an English butler—or at least a Chinese butler he dressed up like an English one. Mr. Fan should have been in bed but was too frightened of the foreign minister to admit that he was gravely ill.
The Li home was located northeast of Beijing, outside the 5 Ring Road. It was just far enough to escape the worst of the enormous cloud of yellow haze that choked those unfortunate enough to live in the city. The thirty-kilometer distance between home and office gave Li’s driver plenty of time to alert the staff, providing them a chance to convene for his arrival.
The thud of the big BMW sedan’s door caused Meiling to jump. Silence crept over the entry. No one breathed—which was good, because all the air seemed to have left the room.
Meiling willed her employer to hurry. These inspections were worse than a mere annoyance; they kept her from doing her job. She was an accomplished chef, a graduate of the Culinary Institute in Hong Kong, but the foreign minister disliked the term chef. He was the only chief in any area of his home, and that included the kitchen. Meiling and her assistant, a young woman named Yubi, should have been prepping for the dinner party, but when the foreign minister arrived, all else was put on hold—the immutable laws of science and cooking notwithstanding.
The front door flew open as if blown by an evil wind, and Foreign Minister Li strode in. He stepped out of his shoes so easily that Meiling wondered how he’d kept them on all day, and into a pair of slippers that were waiting directly in his path. Meiling had seen the minister on the television news, where he appeared to be so temperate and even-keeled. In his own home, even one step out of his desired routine to slip a toe into a slipper could send him into a spitting rage.
Slippers slapping the tile floor, Li removed his suit jacket. He dropped it as he walked, certain that Mr. Fan would be there to catch it. The poor man was so sick he nearly toppled over in the process. If Li noticed his butler was ill, he made no mention of it. One of the two girls Li called hostesses handed him a Gibson martini with three cocktail onions, while the other exchanged his day glasses for a pair of less flattering readers and four evening newspapers.
Meiling watched the way the minister looked at the two younger women. Had either of them been able to cook, she would have been sacked. Their skin was alabaster, while she was darker. A tiny mole above her upper lip stood out in stark contrast to their flawless oval faces. An American college student had once called the mole a beauty mark, but Foreign Minister Li looked as if his stomach was upset each time he saw her. Meiling dismissed it as the will of the gods. Minister Li doted on his wife, but everyone knew the hostesses had not been hired for their ability to mix a perfect Gibson martini.
Minister Li paused at the bottom of the stairs, taking a sip of his drink. The staff, even the hostesses, who surely had his ear—and more—held their collective breath.
Li peered directly at Meiling. “Add two more to the guest list. Minister Ip and is lovely wife will join us.”
Meiling teetered in place. She grabbed at her assistant’s shoulder for support as soon as Li turned to continue up the stairs. Two more guests! That was impossible, the worst of all catastrophes. The chef wasn’t worried about the food. It was to be a British feast, and, as with all feasts, there would be far too much roast lamb and too many side dishes for anyone to eat. But Mrs. Ip was going to pose a problem.
Yubi’s mouth hung half open, like she was about to be sick to her stomach. Meiling understood the feeling. “Do you have enough for Mrs. Ip?” the assistant chef asked.
Meiling closed her eyes and took a series of calming breaths, attempting to steady herself. It did not work. “I do not,” she said.
“The minister will kill you.”
“He will not kill me,” Meiling said, doubting herself even as she said the words.
“But he will say we should have been better prepared.” Yubi’s slight body shook with tension, causing her black bangs to shimmer in the light of the chandelier. “What if he blames me as well?”