NOTES: OK, I got a bit of the sort of feed back I appreciate, and I wanted to clarify a point. Lonny J. tells me he finds my story moderately interesting, but not really 'growing out of canon'. He also notes that all views of canon are interpretations, which is a fair point.
I don't intend my story to 'grow out of canon', per se. I want it to be compatible with canon. Certainly my story is not by a long shot the only possible subsequent events after the Quinnzilla rampage! I do want to create a story that plausibly could emerge out of that rampage and its aftermath, using the standards of plausibility for the Chuck universe. A theme of my story is that choices have consequences. While not everything is random, the decisions and choices the characters make do affect the outcomes, and to some degree determine them. All the characters in my stories have made both good and bad decisions, particular good and bad decisions that brought about a particular set of outcomes. Other choices would have created a different story, one equally compatible with the canon.
It's certainly true that every fic writer's (and everyone else's) view of the canon is an interpretation...but some interpretations are certainly more likely and plausible than others, too. Even Fedak and Schwartz are bound by this to some degree. If they announced tomorrow that we'd all misunderstood the show and it was actually set in Denver, not Los Angeles, all along...it would be fair for the fans to demand an explanation for that before accepting it, because everything we saw on the screen points to L.A., not Denver.
I think my interpretation of Sarah being almost certain to leave Chuck IF she didn't have her memory back is very, very likely, given human nature and what we've seen of Old Sarah's outlook and personality. I haven't revealed her reason for not coming back right away when she did regain her memory, I think it fits her personality over the course of the show, but people will have to make up their own minds when I get that far. Whether she was right to react that way is also something people will have to decide for themselves. Her reasons were not trivial...but that might well have still been a bad decision. Sarah herself thinks it was a bad decision, in 2020...except of course that it led eventually, albeit indirectly, to Charlotte-Mary. So if you offered her a chance to undo her 'bad' decision in 2020, she probably wouldn't take it since that would wipe her little girl out of existence. Choices have consequences, usually both good and bad...
Sometimes I'll apply a less-than-most-likely interpretation to a given canon event, to help the story along. But do that too much and the story becomes unbelievable (by Chuck standards). So I try to limit that.
About my previous chapter notes, someone called them a 'sermon', and rereading it it does come across as a bit more overbearing than I meant it to be, that wasn't intentional. It wasn't meant as a lecture, it was meant as an explanation of why I think the 'standard' fanfic story doesn't fit the ending of season five very well, and why I'm going in a different direction.
Now, in response to Guest's comment about the CIA putting an agent with amnesia into the field...they didn't simply put Sarah back in the field. They did use her for some missions, but with a handler and on probation, basically in a 'retraining mode' and in a supporting role. She was five years behind the times, after all, as Guest noted.
Of course once she regained her memory, matters were different, though things were still not the way they had been before. There were huge trust issues in play on both sides, and Sarah was psychologically a mess at that time. A useful mess, but still a mess.
So...onward.
LANGUAGE NOTE: [] Indicates Italian language.
CHUCK vs. THE NO-WIN QUESTION CHAPTER 8: Business and Pleasure 6...
Mariano's Fine Italian Restaurant, Los Angeles, CA, 12:10 p.m. local time...
"Next time I'll walk," Sarah groused. "It would be faster!"
"I don't need a speeding ticket," Chuck replied, as he he pulled his Suburban into a parking spot. "Or a dent. This is still a nice ride, you know."
"It's a boat," Sarah replied, as they emerged from the air-conditioned comfort of the cabin into the hot late Spring sunlight. The temperature was already well above ninety and climbing. "A big, lumbering, beached whale of a boat! I'm surprised it doesn't need tugboats to get it into the parking spaces!"
"I'll admit it's not a Porsche," Chuck said with a laugh. "But it attracts less attention, is much cheaper to insure, and has more storage space! Plus the basic black doesn't show dirt! Saves on cleaning costs!"
"Chuck, you're pushing forty, not seventy!" Sarah exclaimed, as they walked toward the welcoming cool of the restaurant. "And you're a freaking multi-millionaire! You sound...sensible! What happened to the guy who used to go with Morgan to drool over DeLorean's and Mustang's?! This is a dad car!"
"Well, I am a dad, and this middle-age-machine has room for car seats, which is a big deal. Besides, I'm not scheduled for my mid-life crisis for another year or two," Chuck replied, and he and his ex-wife stepped into the blessed shade of the overhanding porch in front of the restaurant.
"But I guess I could move it up, if you really want me to. Let's see, I'll need a cool convertible muscle car...hair dye for the gray-or should I run with the gray? I probably need to work out a little more...sorority girls...no, wait, Carina...but we're talking a millionaire having his mid-life crisis, so let's go with Carina and the sorority girls, I'll bet Carina already knows some soror-OW!"
"You're not as funny as you think you are, Chuck," Sarah said in a deceptively sweet tone, as they stepped into the restaurant proper. It was blessedly cool inside, which came as a relief to Chuck in his suit.
Chuck rubbed ruefully at his arm where Sarah had 'playfully' punched him. The punch had left his arm aching where her fist had struck, even through the suit coat and shirt.
"All right, I'm sor-well, actually, no I'm not." Chuck said, laughing "You have to admit you set yourself up for that."
"I don't have to admit anything, sweetie," Sarah said with that smile that Chuck had always thought of as being like a nova in a dark room.
The room was slightly in shadow, though the windows admitted enough sunlight that everything was clearly visible. The hostess led them to a table near the back, and Chuck nodded. Sarah had suggested this place and they clearly knew her. The table was near where two walls met, enabling the one sitting back to corner to observe anything approaching the other one from behind. Sarah took the corner seat, facing the room. From the table, it was possible to observe the main doors, the side doors, and the fire escape doors. Chuck had been plotting out 'escape paths' from the moment he entered the room, something that he did by reflex after over a decade in this insane business. He knew as soon as they sat down why Sarah liked this table.
A few minutes later, the waiter came and took their drink orders, both of them choosing non-alcoholic drinks because they had driving to do later in the afternoon. Chuck let Sarah order for both of them, since she was familiar with both the restaurant's menu and his tastes, and after the waiter left, they chatted about nothing in particular for a few minutes.
Then Sarah made a small gesture, a barely noticeable one, unless one was alert for it. Chuck nodded, and took out his cell phone, as did Sarah a moment later. Both pretended to be engaged in ongoing phone calls, even as Chuck also very quietly placed a device under the table, and activated it. It was a bit of sonic magic from the labs at Carmichael Industries. With it running, a boom mike pointed at their table would pick up what would sound like casual conversation between ex spouses, nothing more. Close-up sensors and microphones would pick up static. The two sat facing each other, at such an angle that a lip-reader would have had great difficulty getting anything, even if there had been plenty of light. With the relative shadow in the room, they were now fairly safe from being overheard.
They put away their cell phones, the distraction having served the purpose of letting Chuck plant the sonic jammer.
"How did it go?" Sarah asked. Both were speaking quietly, but not whispering. Whispers would have been more conspicuous than quiet conversation.
"Worse than I thought it would," Chuck replied, wearily. "You won't believe what stupidity the Committee has approved this time."
"Want to bet? As usual, the rumor mill has the big secret. Scuttlebutt has it they're reactivating Project Omaha," Sarah replied. "That rumor's been in the winds for weeks now."
For a moment, Chuck considered the dire warnings from General Conroy about the security classifications, then he sighed and laughed to himself. The rumor mill would have the whole story quickly anyway, if it did not already, he reflected. He knew he could trust Sarah to be discreet, and he was in no mood for the JIA's games just then.
"The rumors are right," Chuck said, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "They're trying again. You know what the difference between the CIA senior leadership and a lab mouse is?"
"One is vermin and the other is a rodent?" Sarah answered cheerfully.
In spite of himself, Chuck laughed. "You said it, I didn't."
"It's what you were thinking." Sarah said. "Can't really blame you."
"Actually," Chuck said, after their conversation paused for a moment when the waiter brought them salad and garlic bread and lasagna, "what I was really thinking was that a lab mouse can learn from experience, whereas your bosses seem incapable of learning from anything. They're gonna try to make their super-agent again, and they're going to take short cuts again, I know them. They'll take short-cuts, they'll try to 'improve' it all the fly...and they'll end up making another disaster for the poor bastards they con into volunteering for this."
Sarah hesitated, and then she nodded. "I've been trying to warn my trainees about volunteering for things like this. But it's hard to get through to someone just out of college with a head full of fantasies and no experience. They just don't listen very well."
Chuck smiled. "Hmm...I've heard you used to have an involuntary asset kind of like that. You were supposed to protect him and keep him out of trouble and somehow he just wouldn't cooperate."
"I was never very good at the 'keep him out of trouble' part," Sarah laughed. "I couldn't get him to stay in the car. He wouldn't listen, he'd just jump in and do whatever he thought best. Sometimes it almost got us all killed."
"So why did you put up with the ungrateful little snot?" Chuck asked, after a sip of his lemonade.
"He could give you this puppy-dog eyes expression," Sarah replied. "Made it hard to stay mad at him. That and he could usually make me laugh. That's worth something. And...sometimes he saved us all, too, by jumping in and ignoring my orders. It was maddening. I never knew what was coming next."
For a moment the two fell silent, just looking at each other. For a few minutes, the two ate without speaking, but sometimes silence could be loud.
"You know they'll try to put pressure on you and Ellie to share your work on the Intersect," Sarah finally said.
"Of course," Chuck replied. "But we've been there before. They can't offer us enough money to move us, and if they try to apply legal pressure our legal department will press back. If they try to go off the books...well, they tried that before and all it got them was embarrassment. The data they stole turned out not be quite what they thought it was. Though I'm sure they wasted quite a bit of money and effort in finding that out."
Silence reigned again for a moment, then Chuck spoke again.
"Do you think they'll try to get you to help them get what they want?"
"I doubt it," Sarah replied. "They like me where I'm at, I'm useful to them, and we've got an unspoken agreement in place. They know I'd walk away before I'd knowingly work against you, and like I said, I'm useful to them."
"An 'unspoken' agreement...those have a way of suddenly turning out to be no agreement at all," Chuck pointed out, "when the pressure is on. You have access to me and Ellie, and you're one of the very few people on this planet who could show up at the gate of Carmichael Estates at three in the morning, completely unannounced, and be admitted right then, no questions asked. Your bosses certainly know that."
Chuck fell silent for a moment, looking around slightly nervously. For all the technology and precautions, a double check never hurt. He saw no indication of anyone listening, and continued.
"Sarah, if they want this badly enough, and based on past experience, they probably do, they might try putting pressure on you through your family. We both know they're capable of it."
"The only family I've got that they have potential access to is Dad. Mom and Molly live with you guys at Carmichael Estates, it's hard to see how they could put pressure on them. My father is slippery, I'm not sure even the CIA or the NSA know exactly where he's at. But..."
Sarah fell silent, and Chuck understood all too well. One of the principles of spy work was that anyone could potentially be working against you, even if it was against their will. If a loved one was at risk, people could be forced into doing things for others, or against others, that they would never otherwise consider. Chuck knew Sarah was now thinking seriously about her father, and not liking where her thoughts were going. She was a past master at controlling her facial expressions and other tells, but Chuck had known her too long, and too well, not to be able to read her fairly clearly.
"Damn it, they might just do it," Sarah finally said. "If they start getting excited about Project Omaha again, they just might try it. Now I can't stop thinking about it."
After the waiter departed, "Do you know where Jack is?"
"Not off the top of my head," Sarah replied. "I could get a message to him...but it would probably take some time before he saw it, and then who knows how long it would take for him to respond, and if I went out and tracked him down I might be drawing the CIA's attention precisely where I don't want it! Damn it, I thought I didn't have to worry about this anymore with Ryker gone! I thought my family was finally safe from the alphabet soup!"
Chuck hesitated. There was something he knew that would interest Sarah, but it was...touchy. He had been wanting to bring it up with her, but this was the first time they had been face to face in weeks. The conversation had just given him an opening, but he proceeded with caution.
Chuck said, "Sarah, I know roughly where your father is. I could probably make indirect contact without drawing attention to him, and get a message to him within twenty-four hours or less."
She looked up at him in surprise, a forkful of lasagna pausing half way between her plate and her mouth.
"Is he working an angle with Carmichael Industries?" Sarah asked, putting her fork down.
"No," Chuck replied. "But...I had occasion to talk to Jack about two weeks ago. I ran into him by accident."
"Is there some particular reason you haven't mentioned that since?"
"Yes," Chuck said. He took a moment to finish off his lasagna, and pushed the empty plate aside. "This really needed to be in person, it's kind of...delicate. This is the first time I've been with you since I last talked to Jack."
"So what is my father doing?" Sarah demanded.
"Well...he's running an angle in Moscow," Chuck said after a moment, and braced himself.
"Moscow?!" Sarah exclaimed, eyes widening and her voice rising slightly in spite of herself. She caught herself, lowering her voice to a safe level, and demanded, "What is my father doing in Russia?!"
"Well, you know that Putin has been putting the squeeze on the remaining oligarchs, trying to bring the remaining 'independent' ones into line, and some of them are looking for things to invest their cash in to hide it from the Kremlin. Some of Putin's cronies are also trying to move money around to evade various sanctions, too. There's a lot of cash moving around looking for a place to go, and apparently your father saw...opportunities."
Sarah had suddenly turned pale. "Oh my-How much trouble is he in, Chuck?!"
"As far as I know, he's fine," Chuck assured her. "He's acting as a middle man."
"Yeah, he's fine," Sarah said, an edge of fear in her voice, "he's fine! Until he sells one of those billionaire murderers or some ex-KGB thug the Hope Diamond or the Taj Mahal or Nevada or something! Then he's a walking dead man! Some of these people make Rajiv Amad look like a middle-school bully! If Dad gets the FSB after him, he isn't safe anywhere on Earth! Why didn't you tell me?!"
Chuck knew the look on his ex-wife's beautiful face. He would have been willing to bet that her mind was in a whirl, calculating odds, considering possible scenarios, and examining her options for getting to Moscow quickly.
"For one thing," Chuck said, trying to keep his voice calm and soothing, "Jack asked me not to tell you. He was afraid you'd worry."
"Of course I'm worried! Chuck, the people he's dealing with are dangerous! I don't want him hurt or tortured or killed!"
"I know," Chuck said. "Normally I'd have been on the phone to you that same day. But it's a strange complicated situation, and he's not working alone. He's got a patron with local connections and he's got local protection. And his patron is making sure he doesn't get carried away."
"Who does my father know that could provide him with local contacts and protection in freaking Moscow?!" Sarah demanded. She did not sound reassured, if anything she sounded more afraid than ever.
"I don't know how they met, or when," Chuck said. "But I do know the person providing the protection and contacts, and I asked her to make sure Jack didn't do anything stupid, or get carried away with the wrong people. She promised she would look after him."
"You asked-her-Chuck, who are we-NO! Don't tell me that bitch has my father?!"
Fear had suddenly been joined by fury in her eyes.
"Afraid so," Chuck nodded. He had been afraid of just this reaction. "He's not her prisoner, they're working together on their angle in Moscow. From what both she and Jack told me, they've apparently worked together several times over the last ten years."
The normally cool-sapphire eyes of the woman seated across from him were now pools of blue liquid fire. Chuck sighed, he had known that discovering that her father was working with Stephanie's mother was not going to make Sarah happy.
"I have to get to Moscow!" Sarah exclaimed. She started to reach for her phone, but Chuck caught her wrist...carefully! He knew that Sarah was volatile in this mood.
"Hear me out first," Chuck requested. "There's more. You may not like it, but you need to know it before you do anything drastic."
"I already don't like it!" Sarah snapped. "How much worse could it get?!"
You'd think Sarah would learn not to say things like that, Chuck mused.
"He's using an alias, he's being Tony Rogers," Chuck said.
"I know that one, he's used it before," Sarah said.
"Apparently that's the name he's always used with her. I didn't dare ask directly, but I don't think she knows his real name...heck, I don't think I know his real name! I mean, I'm sure Jack Burton is an alias, but you've never told me his real name-do you know his real name?"
"Chuck! Focus! Tell me about Dad and Moscow!"
"Well, I don't think she has any idea about his connection to you," Chuck went on. "I mean she knows him as 'Tony Rogers', but from what she said I don't think she even suspects that Rogers is your father. So if you show up there, you'll be 'outing' him to her."
"That won't matter once I get him safely out of Moscow and beyond her reach or the Russians' reach!"
"I don't think he'll willingly come," Chuck went on. "You see, it's not just 'business' opportunities that are keeping Jack in Moscow. I'm pretty sure that he's romancing a lady there."
"What?!" Sarah's eyes suddenly widened in horror. "Wait, not with her-?!"
Chuck actually shuddered at the mental image Sarah had just conjured. "No! Damn, that's a mental image I didn't need, Sarah! Can you imagine Jack as Stephie's stepfather?! That would make you sort of technically something like Stephie's stepsister and I'm Stephie's father and that would make us-you can't be her stepdaughter!-I mean that would make you Charlotte-Mary's half-stepsister, that would be insane, but then that would me your-gahh! I need brain bleach. Not even Jeff and Lester would-uh."
Sarah looked a little shaken as well. Obviously that thought had unnerved them both.
"No," Chuck said after forcing that thought out of his head, "he's seeing a Russian woman. They're still in the honeymoon phase of it, I think. She's working the angles with him."
"So my father is dating a Russian con woman?! Chuck, this just keeps getting worse!"
Chuck sighed. "I've run a little bit of a quiet background check, Sarah. I'll get you the file. But I don't think he's quite ready to introduce you to her yet. I think he was just as concerned about that as he was you worrying about his safety when he asked me not to tell you."
Sarah was quiet for a moment. Then she snapped, "I want to know everything you know about the operation Dad is running, and this...woman...he's seeing, and everything else associated with it!"
"All right," Chuck nodded. "And Sarah...if you still want to go to Moscow when you're done, I'll arrange to get you there in a few hours. I've got the connections to get you there almost as fast as the Air Force could do it. And I'll go with you if you think that would be best."
Sarah drew a long and rather shaky breath. "Chuck, I still need to warn Dad to be on the lookout for possible trouble from the U.S. authorities. I'll put together a message, you said you can get it to him."
"Yes. I have to contact Stephanie's mother soon anyway, and she can get the message to your father. And don't worry, it'll be in a cypher that she doesn't know how to read."
"So how will my father read it?"
"He's got the translation key. I gave it to him before I left, and I'm sure he's smart enough to keep it hidden. Heck, knowing Jack he's probably got it stored somewhere with Putin's personal grocery list by now."
Sarah smiled wanly. "I wish I could laugh, but that's too likely and too scary!"
"What are you going to tell him?" Chuck asked.
"I don't know yet," Sarah replied. "But I'll come up with something. So you're going to have to to talk to her, are you? Business or pleasure?""
Her slight glare was not lost on her lunch companion.
"Business," Chuck replied. "Highly classified business that was discussed in the meeting today. It involves fungus." Chuck was smiling when he said this last, though it was of course true. "I'm sure the rumor mill will tell you all about it within a few days."
"How very appropriate," Sarah replied. "I must admit that when I think of that woman, somehow I do associate her with fungus."
"I suppose," Chuck said, "we ought to either order dessert or let them have this table back."
"No time for dessert," Sarah said, looking at her watch. "I'm going to be pushing the schedule to make my plane now. I need you to drop me off at my apartment, if you don't mind."
"It would be my pleasure," Chuck said, "the Middle Age Machine and I will get you there in plenty of time."
"Chuck, you're actually calling your own car a MAM," Sarah said, as they stepped out of the restaurant into the heat.
The countryside outside Naples, Italy, 10:35 p.m. local time...
The night was mild and clear, the stars shining relatively brightly, in spite of the distant glow of Naples washing out some of the dimmer sky-jewels. A slight breeze was blowing, rustling the new springtime growth on the trees, giving a faint sound to the otherwise quiet night.
A house sat off to itself, well back from the lane, surrounded by a well-tended green hedge that rose a good seven feet above the ground. A neatly trimmed green lawn surrounded the two-story residence, which was much like any of hundreds of other houses in the same region.
There were few lights burning in the house. One was on in the kitchen, another dim light flickered behind the curtains of a second-story bedroom. A door in the wall of that bedroom led to an external balcony, a good twenty feet from the ground.
A large tree, probably at least a century old, grew beside the house and shaded it during the hot summer days. Now, if there had been anyone to see, there was movement amid the branches of the tree. A very, very sharp-eyed viewer close at hand, or someone who knew where to look with 'night sight' binoculars, might have seen a humanoid figure standing on a branch...or they might not. The figure was clad in form fitting black all over, blending into the shadows.
A viewer who did see this person might have been surprised when the figure moved again, because the motion was a leap through the air, across the substantial gap to the balcony with the lit door. The figure handily made the leap, coming to rest on flexing legs with apparently effortless grace and little sound. What sound there was would have been difficult to hear over the sudden sound of dogs barking in the near distance at the same time.
A hypothetical observer who was watching very closely and had either very good night goggles or who was very close might have noticed that the form-fitting outfit of the leaping figure revealed very feminine curves, in fact suggesting a superb figure. But there was nobody to see Elaine Carmichael as she leapt onto the balcony, and that was just the way she wanted it and just the way she had planned matters.
Nicely timed, John, Ellie thought to herself as she listened to the dogs. She and John Casey had planned that little distraction hours earlier, and Casey had stirred up the watch dogs around the safe house right on schedule. With a little luck that covered the noise of my arrival.
The balcony and its door opened onto a corner bedroom, and the other outer wall had a door with a balcony as well, ninety degrees around the corner of the building from where Ellie waited. She she had hoped, the people in the bedroom went to that other balcony to see what the commotion was about. A few moments later the dogs were quiet again.
Now Ellie pressed herself flat against the wall beside the door, motionless and quiet. The door to the balcony was slightly ajar, letting in the mild evening air. She herself had left it ajar hours earlier, and as she had hoped, it remained so.
Convenient that the air conditioning is on the fritz tonight, isn't it? Ellie mused to herself with a little smile behind her black mask. And this old house has thick walls and gets hot, so there's motive to leave windows open.
Ellie suspected that the occupants of the room, if they had given the matter any thought, had probably assumed that nobody would be able to get up to the balcony without a ladder or making a lot of noise, and even if they did, they would need to be carry equipment to overhear quiet words over the sound of a running electric fan inside. Normally, those assumptions would be right. But Ellie Woodcomb was not a normal woman. Ellie Woodcomb was a fully implemented Human Intersect Level 8, Third Iteration.
The latest versions of the Intersect that Ellie and Chuck had refined and perfected had abilities, or rather brought out abilities in their users, that well surpassed the previous versions. The people in the bedroom were sitting at a small table well inside the room, and an electric fan was blowing, and Ellie was carrying no listening equipment. What she did have was two functional ears, and brain that the I-8 taught how to do very special things.
...blood flow to auditory nerves increased, auditory sensitivity at max...signal processing beginning...filtering extraneous data...
Processing signals, both sonic and visual, to pick out faint elements and screen out 'noise', was routinely and usefully done with powerful computers. The processing power of any human brain (or indeed many animal brains) far surpassed even the most powerful artificial computers ever built. People 'in the know' sometimes spoke of the Human Intersects as having 'a supercomputer in the head', but that was in fact inaccurate. In actual fact, everyone had a supercomputer in his or her head, a super-supercomputer. It was just that most people lacked the necessary skills, the 'software', to use that processing power in out of the box ways.
The Intersect in a Human Intersect was a structure of information, software, and neural commands that provided that absent 'know how'.
Now Ellie, without even having the consciously think about it other than activating the Intersect, was taking the steady flow of data from her auditory nerves, and filtering out the 'noise', the extraneous information that was irrelevant to the 'signal', the actual data she sought. The sounds of the night wind, the birds in the trees and the insects all about, faded out. The sound of the electric fan, though present, vanished from her perceptions, precisely filtered away. Just as one could usually pick out one's own name being said even through a cacophony of other sounds, and by a somewhat similar process, Ellie now picked out the exact sounds she sought out of a huge array of vibrations.
At the same time, her body, guided by her Intersect, cranked up the sensitivity of her auditory nerves, increasing her hearing perception by nearly twenty percent.
As a result of all this, standing quietly on the balcony outside the door, Ellie could hear the barely-above-a-whisper conversation going on inside, a good twenty feet away, in spite of the interfering sounds, and with no equipment at all.
Ellie was very pleased at the smooth performance of the I-8. She was far less happy about the content of the conversation she was (almost literally) eavesdropping upon.
["You were supposed to take him at the party!"] a female voice was saying. Ellie's heart sank as she clearly recognized the voice of Mrs. Nachera saying those words.
["We made the attempt,"] a male voice replied smoothly. Ellie knew from the very perfection of his tone and the perfect delivery that it was probably not a native speaker, but someone covering an accent. ["The Carmichael Industries people were unpleasantly efficient in response."]
["When you will make your next attempt?"] Ellie heard Mrs. Nachera ask.
["We won't,"] the male voice replied equably. ["The C.I. people have been extremely professional in protecting your husband. That Casey, especially, seems to have raised paranoia to an art form. I've been in your husband's employ for many years, Francesca. But they won't let me near him alone. Oh, they're very smooth and polite, it always looks like just a natural ebb and flow of activity, but he always has a protector close at hand and you can't separate them. I'm afraid that a kidnapping is simply out of the question with us all in this house. This is a C.I. safehouse, after all, they're on their own ground and ready for anything we might attempt.
["No, Ma'am,"] the male voice continued, ["I fear we must take more drastic action."]
["Wait! Should we even be...discussing...this, here?"] Mrs. Nachera asked. ["After al, this is a Carmichael safe house, surely that have some kind of bugs or something!"]
["Yes, they do,"] the male voice said. ["But not in this bedroom that you share with your husband. Very thoughtful of them, isn't it? Don't worry, Francesca, I doubled checked myself, this room is clean. Apparently, they were willing to indulge your husband's sentimental concern for privacy."]
Not exactly that, Ellie thought to herself with a mental sigh. More like baiting a trap. Damn but I was hoping I was wrong about her!
Ellie had begun to suspect that Mrs. Nachera was involved in the attempts to infiltrate her husband's company weeks before. The clues were there. She, Casey, and Chuck had examined the evidence separately and all of them had come to that same conclusion, the effort had inside help near the top and Mrs. Nachera looked like much the most likely suspect.
Ellie had hoped, though, that the assistance was limited, that Mrs. Nachera was not plotting against her husband's life or safety. When she had returned to the USA for the Bartowski Barbecue on Mother's Day, she had taken the time to order a 'deep dive' on Francesca Nachera...and come up with nothing particularly damning or suspicious in her past. She appeared to be a fairly typical member of the Neapolitan local upper class, had married Mr. Nachera when they were both 22, and she had five children with him and fifteen grandchildren, and a newly-born great-grandson. There was little to indicate any reason why she would be plotting against her husband or trying to undermine the family business that was the basis of her very comfortable lifestyle and substantial social position. Yet there was little question that she was doing so.
["We can't stop now, it's gone too far,"] Mrs. Nachera was saying. ["We're running out of time here."]
["I agree. Since our abduction plan must be considered off the table, I think we have only one option left."]
Silence reigned for a moment (well, other than the sounds of the fan and other night sounds that Ellie did not permit herself to hear), and then Mrs. Nachera said, so softly that even with the Intersect Ellie had to strain to catch it, ["I was still hoping it would not come to this."]
["It is late in the day for sentimentality,"] the male voice said. Ellie still could not identify him, he had mentioned that he worked for Nachera, but that could still have been any of a dozen men who regularly visited the safehouse, and his voice was so perfectly controlled as to give few clues. She wished she dared look through the doorway, but that was simply too risky to even considered under the circumstances.
["That's easy for you to say, Arkady, he isn't the father of your children, you don't have grandchildren with him."]
["Francesca! I said there are no bugs, but that is no excuse for carelessness! You must not use my real name, the habit could be disastrous!"]
Arkady?! That's a Russian name! Ellie thought in surprise. Mr. Nachera has no Russians working for him...at least not openly! We went into the backgrounds of almost all his employees!
["I'm sorry, Beppe. I'm upset and not thinking straight right now. But we have no time for this. If we do have to...if he has to...well, what do you propose? The C.I. people are on edge since the failed kidnapping, I doubt if even I could get close to my husband armed."]
Beppe? That narrows it down to maybe three men! Ellie exulted. Finally a break!
["Of course,"] 'Beppe' was saying. ["But consider: your husband is no longer a young man, and he has already suffered one heart attack."]
["Two years ago. He's recovered very well, the doctors say he has a good chance of living well for many years yet, if he takes care of himself."]
["Ah, but he did have the previous incident, which means another is always a reasonable possibility. He has been under great stress of late, an attempted kidnapping, even a failed one, is surely a strain. He is concerned about you, and his children and his grandchildren, and struggling to hold on to his business. It would be no shock if all that were to bring on another heart attack.
["There is a drug,"] Beppe/Arkady went on, ["that when given to a man with a heart condition, will usually bring about a heart failure within a few hours. It looks quite natural, and leaves little trace. It is only likely to be detected if the person doing the autopsy knows exactly what to look for, and even then it must happen within a very short time. It can be given in food or drink.
["You have been taking your meals with him since they brought you both here,"] Beppe/Arkady continued. ["I think you would find it simple to make sure he receives the drug. Within a few hours...the matter is done. I won't tell you that his death will be painless, because you know better, but his suffering will not be for long. And we have few alternatives, as you well know."]
A long moment passed with no comment from either occupant of the bedroom. Then, finally, very softly, Ellie heard Mrs. Nachera say, ["All right. When would be the best time?"]
Ellie closed her eyes. She had been doing this for years now. Treachery and betrayal were nothing new to her. But somehow it never ceased to sadden her when family betrayed family.
TO BE CONTINUED...