Amberlough(79)

“No one is, not even Van der Joost. He’s a fiction. And he was useful: Here you are.”

“Well played, Mr. DePaul.” Memmediv inclined his head. “Very well played.”

It was that dark, luscious dialect that should have set Cyril’s hackles up from the beginning. Memmediv wasn’t a disillusioned Tatien expatriate; he was furious. A state-loyal fanatic who’d kept his hatred of Amberlough so well hidden Culpepper had brought him right into the warmest part of the Foxhole.

Years in the profession had given Cyril a keen sense of irony—espionage could be as good as tragic dramas. He hadn’t acted on facts, setting up this meeting, but on the sense that Memmediv as the Ospies’ mole was so bitterly perfect it had to be true. And he’d come running at the sound of Van der Joost’s work name. So that proved something.

“Have a seat,” said Cyril, gesturing to the empty chair across from him. There was no food on the table, but he’d ordered a bottle of dry white wine. Two glasses waited, empty. Cyril lifted the bottle. Memmediv let him pour, but didn’t pick up the glass when it was full.

They stared at each other. Cyril was keenly aware of the balance of power. Scant months ago, he’d outranked Memmediv by several leagues. After all, Cyril was—or had been—one of Culpepper’s best agents, and a division head, while Memmediv was just her secretary. But Memmediv had been spying for the unionists since … well, Cyril didn’t really know. And he’d blown Cyril’s cover as coolly as Cyril would have broken his. It was Memmediv’s fault Cyril was here, now, and needed a favor.

Turning his wineglass, Cyril breathed in the green, mineral nose, and sipped. Only then did he say to Memmediv, “How long?”

The other man blinked slowly, shuttering a cold, blank gaze.

“The Ospies, Vasily. How long?”

Memmediv’s lips pulled tight across his teeth. “Two years, give or take some weeks.”

Cyril had been in Tatié, when Memmediv turned. Not that he would’ve known, to stop it. “And Ada still doesn’t suspect anything?”

“Of me?” Memmediv’s crooked eyebrow telegraphed insult. “Of course not. You … have not been so careful, Cyrilak. The whole city knows whose side you’re on. You used to be better than this.”

Cyril bristled at the Tatien diminutive, and more, at the truth of Memmediv’s insult. But he tamped down his irritation and continued. “You still have access to her papers?”

“Not all,” he said, drawing his fingers in tantalizing arcs around the base of his wineglass. “Not officially.”

“Semantics,” said Cyril, dismissive.

The corner of Memmediv’s mouth curled up slowly, like burning paper. He lifted his wine and drank without comment.

“Look.” Cyril hunkered forward on the table. “With Hebrides dead, Van der Joost wants me to bring in Ada.”

“And why, then, do you need me? You’re the man with the paddle.” Hovering one lean hand above the table, he twisted his wrist as if manipulating a marionette. “I hear Konrad is very pleased with your work so far.”

“He may be pleased,” said Cyril, “but he doesn’t know Müller. The man won’t hold Ada without charges. He’s an honest cop, mother love him. And I played on it to bring him over.”

Memmediv sneered. “You blackmailed him, DePaul. Don’t try to elevate it.”

“The blackmail was a clincher,” said Cyril. “But I promised him an aboveboard police force. If I can’t give him that, he’s gone.” He could feel an angry flush rising up his neck. Memmediv saw it, and graced him with an infuriating, thin-lipped smile.

“We have him.” The “h” was guttural. “He is commissioner by the grace of the One State Party. His wife is involved with an undesirable alien, a known associate of smugglers and deviants. He cannot afford a false step.”

“He can’t,” agreed Cyril. “But people don’t care about consequences when they’ve been pushed and pushed and pushed. I’m trying to reel him back, Vasily, not shove him off the cliff. Keep testing him and eventually he’ll jump on his own.”

“Like you did?”

Cyril set his wineglass down with deliberate care. “Excuse me?”

“Culpepper did not mean to push you.”

“We’re not here to talk about me.”

Memmediv didn’t acknowledge him. “She should have known. Bowing and scraping to Tatié, to the very people who nearly killed you? Then the desk work: humiliating. And just as you resigned yourself and started to get comfortable, she dragged you back into the field. You were like a child who fears the water, after nearly drowning. And she just threw you in.” He flicked his fingers over his wineglass. Softly, so that Cyril almost missed it, he added, “Splash.”

Cyril sat back and crossed his arms. “She’s good at her job.”

Memmediv’s laughter was quiet, rich as velvet. “She’s a fool. I suggested you, for the Landseer action.”

It came to Cyril then, like an anagram resolving. Memmediv had groomed him. His anger was swift, scorching, and bitterly impotent. “She listened to you?” he hissed. “Why, for queen’s sake? You’re a secretary. What do you know about espionage?”