Nikolai (Black Inc. #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

US Consulate, Naples

“Bruschetta, signore?” the roving waiter asked.

Nikolai Garin suspiciously inspected the tray he was holding.

The last thing he’d eaten—tried to eat—from a tray held by one of the waiters, he’d gagged, spit it out in his hand, and searched for a plant to drop the half-chewed remains of whatever it was in.

He’d survived a thousand firefights, been stabbed, shot, run over, had had a partial parachute fail.

And the greatest danger he’d ever faced had been some foodstuff offered by the United States Consulate in Naples, Italy. It had been that bad.

But the bruschetta being offered looked really good. Ripe tomatoes, juicy mozzarella slices, aromatic fresh basil leaves all gleaming with what looked like excellent extra virgin olive oil…yes.

His courage was rewarded. It was delicious.

He was really hungry, since he’d skipped dinner last night going over the Consulate floor plans, breakfast had been a hurried espresso and lunch had been a tiny slice of cold pizza.

So life owed him a decent bruschetta, or two, at the very least. He was going to treat himself to what was considered the best restaurant in Naples this evening, Il Terrazzone.

He turned around and rested his arms on the balustrade of the huge terrace of the Consulate.

It had a spectacular view. The Consulate rested right on the famous bay, overlooked by the even more famous Mount Vesuvius.

The sea sparkled, blue and green, hovercraft heading out to the islands of Capri and Ischia, or heading back in, all leaving a starry wake.

The city was amazingly beautiful, ochre and brick-colored palazzos bright in the late afternoon sun.

A view to tug the heart.

Nikolai allowed himself to relax and enjoy the beauty. Beauty and work seldom went hand in hand for him. He specialized in bad guys and bad guys preferred shitholes, and God knows he’d been in plenty of them over the past years.

One of his last assignments had been overseeing an addition to the US Embassy in Pritzky, a broken city full of bullet holes and explosion craters, most walls bearing the black scorch marks of firebombs.

At least three terrorist organizations had considered it a personal challenge to make the life of the construction workers impossible as they tried to build.

He was here in Naples consulting for the Consul General on a contract set to start in four days’ time.

The Consul had some serious concerns, but Nick had given himself a few days off before the contract started.

While he was here, he was really enjoying the balmy weather, the beautiful architecture and the views.

He hadn’t eaten goat once, which was his culinary staple while in Pritzky, which amongst its many lousy attributes, was also a dry country.

He’d been very very happy to fly out, mission accomplished. Instead of flying home, which was a luxury service flat in London, he’d simply flown a couple of days early to Naples and was looking forward to just wandering around.

And now he was at work, easing into it gently, since the Consulate was closed today for the 4th of July. From the briefing with the Consul General over a secure line, he was beginning to suspect she had someone in-house who was selling secrets. And that someone was probably here.

He turned around lazily, back to the warm parapet, and studied the people who had been invited to the Consulate’s annual 4th of July blowout, and who were going to be unhappy with at least some of the food.

He scanned the huge terrace as if scanning enemy terrain.

Scan a quarter of the field, blink to black, scan the next quarter…

And that’s when he saw her. The most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

She took his breath away. It took him a moment to even get a general sense of her.

Blue-black hair that hit her shoulders, shimmering like liquid when she moved.

Eyes a piercing cobalt blue so intense they looked artificial, as if gemstones had replaced her eyes.

And to continue that Snow White vibe, porcelain skin that stood out in a group of people who were all deeply sun tanned.

She had on a sharply tailored green linen top and linen skirt and looked sleekly elegant compared to the overdressed ladies on the terrace.

Oh man. Nick had to get to know her. He’d spent the past months on mission with teammates and was sick of male company. With any luck, maybe his stay in Naples wouldn’t be so bad, after all. He began drifting her way, but then hurried over when he saw what she was picking up off a tray.

Laughter rose from the clusters of guests on the sunny terrace—rich expats, Italians with embassy ties, naval officers from the Sixth Fleet stationed in Naples, a scattering of local politicians eager to sip American champagne and be seen.

The 4th of July in Naples was always one of the most lavish parties of the consular season, and George Stillwell should have been basking in the glow of it, surrounded by familiar colleagues, good food, privilege.

Everything he dreamed of when he sat for the series of exams to join the Foreign Service. He imagined exactly this. Cocktail parties on sunny terraces with the rich and powerful. Mingling with them, one of them.

Finally.

Instead, his gaze fixed on Nikolai Garin. The man hired by the Consul General, Caroline Munro, to do a security check on the Consulate because she suspected leaks.

Well…yes.

Yes, the Consulate had leaks. Very lucrative ones, too. His bank account was grateful. George was sure that the spyware he’d installed in Caroline Munro’s cell was absolutely undetectable, but…damn. Garin was a part-owner of Black Inc., and no one’s fool.

Garin stood against the balustrade of the terrace, back to the Bay, close enough to watch the crowd but far enough to be half-forgotten by it.

He was observing everyone carefully, and George was grateful that he wasn’t an imposing physical presence.

It had made his life hell in high school, being thin and nerdy, but right now, Garin’s gaze slid right past him without stopping.

Garin, instead, had presence. Lines of power surrounded him, even though he was utterly still. Not glad-handing himself around the terrace like everyone else.

He was a big man, with an athlete’s build, made to attract attention, though he was clearly trying to be unnoticed.

He didn’t move like the diplomats and businessmen and government servants circulating on the terrace. He had that terrible stillness George had only ever seen in predators—large cats pacing behind glass at the zoo when he was a child, eyes tracking prey across the walkway.

Garin shouldn’t be here. An outsider, a…

hired thug dressed in a suit. Caroline Munro, the Consul General, might be dazzled by him—Munro, with her crisp diction and upper-class schooling, who’d taken charge of the Consulate as though she’d been born to command palazzos instead of the Kansas plains.

She’s the one who chose Garin to investigate security at the Consulate, and she’d chosen the best.

George had tried to direct her, discreetly, to hire a second-tier company he knew would be unable to trace his app. But no. Munro went right to the top.

Munro tried to pass herself off as Everywoman, with her friendly manner and Midwestern accent.

But George had taken a dive into her personal life.

Her family ran something like 200 silos throughout the Midwest. And her father, instead of being a useless drunk like his father, was a canny investor.

Munro had a trust fund of eight million dollars, though she tried to live within her salary.

But Daddy always came through on Christmas and her birthday, with a new Mercedes, a diamond necklace, Apple stock.

She always pretended she was practical, no-nonsense, but she wasn’t a self-made woman. Not at all.

And now she had hired Garin after announcing, that there were “security concerns.”

Security concerns. George felt his throat tighten. If she only knew.

The air smelled of perfume and food, but George’s stomach clenched instead of growling. He lifted his glass of wine as though to toast a passing colleague, but he drank to buy himself time. To look occupied, harmless, one more functionary in the safe, predictable ranks of Foreign Service officers.

No one could guess. He had been careful.

Brilliant, even. The app he’d loaded onto Munro’s phone was elegant, invisible, undetectable.

When she spoke, he knew. When she wrote, he read.

He wasn’t stupid enough to keep the data on his work computer; no, he had a chain of digital dead drops, private accounts buried under layers of misdirection.

He’d been paid well for the information he was able to get—Russians with their thick promises and thicker accents, the Chinese, so business-like, Neapolitan mobsters with flashy clothes and good haircuts and deadly smiles.

Each payment more intoxicating than the last.

Soon it would be as if he were a trust fund baby too.

He had more than his miserable salary could ever have bought him—tailored shirts now, real wine instead of boxed, restaurants where the waiters knew his name.

His colleagues pretended not to notice, and if they did…

why not? It wasn’t as though anyone openly said what George had known his whole professional life: that half of them were bankrolled by family money.

Trust funds. Estates. Summers on Martha’s Vineyard.

He had nothing but his degree, his thinning hair, his drab government paycheck.

Until now.

“I wouldn’t eat that, if I were you,” Nick said just as the beautiful woman was about to pop the formless gray blob in her mouth.