Page 19 of Skotos
Red gave a solemn nod. “Washington doesn’t pull a Tier One out of a hat. The President’s fingerprints are all over this. If they’re putting you in play at that level, it’s because they think whoever’s behindthe assassinations is going to keep going—and they might be worried they’ll cross the pond to do so.”
Will leaned forward. “We need everything you have on the second hit. Witnesses, timelines, surveillance, the works.”
Red reached into a drawer and pulled out a manila folder thick enough to kill a small rodent. “Way ahead of you.”
He slid it across the desk, and we both leaned in.
Red stood, walked to a cabinet I hadn’t noticed in the corner of the room, and returned with two more folders, handing one to each of us.
“Your new legends,” he said. “Effective immediately, you’re both FBI liaisons assigned to assist French, Swiss, and other allied services with post-war intelligence coordination.”
I opened my folder to find a crisp new FBI ID card, a passport, and a few other cover documents: trainings completed, language certifications, official directives from Washington authorizing our travel, and access to diplomatic resources. The whole thing was a backstory ordinarily memorized and then rehearsed over several days.
We had the luxury of a few hours.
Will flipped through his. “Will Barker?”
“What are you, a retriever?” Red snorted.
I smirked and held up the first page in my packet. “Thomas Snead sounds like a man who owns a dry goods store in Ohio.”
“Or moonlights as a serial killer,” Will said dryly.
Red chuckled. “Don’t get too attached. If this goes south, you’ll be back to being ghosts.”
He pulled a fourth folder from his desk drawer and opened it flat on the desk.
“Contacts,” he said. “In France, your primary is Étienne Ravel at the Sûreté. He’s discreet and loyal, with a distaste for anything that smells like fascism. In Greece, the Foreign Ministry has quietly green-lit access through a junior attaché called Demetri Papadakis. He’s young but connected—his uncle’s in Parliament.”
Red flipped a page. “Switzerland’s trickier. They’re officially neutral but are also one of our closest allies behind the scenes. You’ll be working with a senior inspector named Anton Giger out of Bern. Keep it quiet with him—he’s good at his job but surrounded by people who aren’t.”
Will nodded, soaking it in. “What about resources?”
Red pushed over a final envelope. “You’ll have a burn fund courtesy of Treasury and encrypted channels through diplomatic pouches for written comms. Use those only in extreme cases where you either need to inform Washington of something imminent or seek direct authorization to go beyond your mission brief. Last resort, go to the embassy wherever you are and use the station’s secure comms room. That will expose you to any foreignservice watching our embassy, so try to avoid it if possible. If things get too hot, we’ll extract you through Vienna. Pull points and details are in this folder. Otherwise, you’re on your own.”
I tapped the table. “What has Paris station picked up so far? There’s got to be something on the wire.”
Red sighed, his eyes dropping to the table as he scratched the back of his stubbly head. “Not much. It’s only been a few nighttime hours, and most people are still recovering from the shock.”
“That’s not good enough,” I said, pressing. “You know something, Red. I can see it.”
He hesitated, then leaned in and dropped his voice, despite our cloistered location two floors below the US Embassy. “There’s chatter out of Athens, but we haven’t had time to verify any of it. I . . . I really shouldn’t influence . . . well, shit. Youneedto know this. My Greek counterpart flagged an undercurrent of discontent following the king’s death—radical elements, mostly from the far left, are calling for another revolution. People aren’t happy with the appointment of the foreign minister as regent.”
Will frowned. “He’s a hardliner, isn’t he?”
Red nodded. “Think of him as Stalin’s little buddy. The left hates him. Liberals are planning the usual disruption tactics, but this time . . . this time it feels different. The temperature’s rising faster than I’ve seen since the war. Some are talking of takingout Constantine and putting a whole new family on the throne, one who wouldn’t require a regency. My contact, usually more cautious than a house cat, is afraid this is already turning into another civil war aimed at dynastic change.”
He reached into his desk and pulled out a single photo: a close-up of a spent shell casing recovered from the Palais. “There’s also this. It’s not in any public report yet, and I don’t think the Sûreté or DGSE have shared it with anyone but us and the Brits. From what I hear, the cops didn’t even want to share it with the spooks, but President Auriol insisted we all play nice together.”
Will and I leaned closer.
Drawn into the brass casing shown in the photo was a faded symbol. It appeared etched by hand but was neat enough to be an artist’s rendering.
“Recognize it?” Red asked.
“A spear? Looks like an ancient style, but that’s all I can tell.” Will squinted at the casing and shook his head. “It doesn’t look like any manufacturer’s mark or military stamp I’ve ever seen.”
Red raised a brow in my direction, so I shook my head.
