Page 76 of Winterveil

“All the information about your father was redacted,” Klaudia went on. “Is there anything you can fill in? Anything you remember?”

“He was a scientist.” A distant look came into Nadiya’s eyes. “We moved to Langley when I was seven, so he could work for the CIA. Before that, he worked in a lab at Columbia. His degree was in neuroscience.” Her gaze returned to Klaudia. “That’s all I can remember. Sorry.”

“That’s all right,” said Klaudia, trying to keep the disappointment from her voice. “There are other avenues to try.”

Klaudia glanced over at the table. Julian and Giselle were arranging the canned food into stacks, though seemingly without much purpose, while Crispin looked on, as eerily silent as ever. What Klaudia noticed was that Giselle seemed to smile easily, and that she kept making Julian smile, too.

Maybe Julian wasn’t the most gregarious one among them. After all, Giselle was a former pageant queen. Something fluttered uncomfortably in Klaudia’s stomach.

“What about her?” she asked.

Almost imperceptibly, Nadiya tensed. “Giselle?”

Klaudia nodded.

Another beat of silence. Nadiya’s expression was unreadable. When she didn’t reply, Klaudia pressed, “Is it real, what it says in her file? About her memory?”

“It’s real.” Nadiya watched Giselle. Her eyes looked strangely soft. “I’ve seen it.”

Across the room, Giselle said something that made Julian laugh. Klaudia’s chest tightened.

“And do you have any sense,” she said slowly, “of how it might relate to our mission?”

Nadiya turned back to her. “She’s important to Professor Blanchard. He was doing these . . . experiments on her. I think it has something to do with the hologram technology. During the showcase, I . . .” She paused and let out a breath. “It feels like we’ve been told to solve a puzzle but we haven’t been given half the pieces.”

“Yes,” Klaudia said. “It’s starting to feel that way to me, too.”

“The fact that Deckard isn’t allowing us to have any weapons . . .” Nadiya’s gaze swept around the room again. “But I suppose anything can be a weapon, if you’re desperate enough.”

“In your hands, maybe.” Klaudia had disconcerting visions of herself trying to knock someone over the head with a fireplace poker.

Nadiya smiled faintly. “I have been trying to keep a tally.”

“You should,” said Klaudia. “Deckard claims it’s just a simulation, but I find it hard to believe that he really expects this mission to be resolved without some sort of force. He’s just limiting our options.”

“Yeah.” The smile faded from Nadiya’s face. “I guess this is the sort of thing Valeran has been preparing us for.”

Theoretically. Klaudia had never imagined being a clandestine officer. She belonged behind a desk, scrutinizing aerial maps, not in the field, parachute jumping into enemy territory.

She also could not picture Julian behind the wheel of a speedboat. He should be rubbing elbows with diplomats or courting foreign officials. Rumor had it that East Germany trained male officers known as Ravens to seduce key assets. It was not the most unlikely career path for him. He would never make it as a little gray man; he was too good-looking, too magnetic. Too conspicuous.

And Giselle? Well, at least she had charisma. Maybe her accent and earnest, salt-of-the-earth demeanor would convince her marks to let their guards down.

But Nadiya seemed the only one among them with the proper skills and training. It made Klaudia all the more perplexed.

“Let’s begin with a cursory survey of the area,” she said. “If we split up, we can cover Traumstadt in an afternoon.”

“All right,” said Nadiya. “But we’ll have to be careful. Deckard has probably posted enemy agents here, blending in with the crowd. Holograms programmed to sniff us out.”

“Of course.” Klaudia’s gaze flickered over to Julian and Giselle again—and to Crispin, who had now approached the table but was not engaging. He merely stood, rocking slightly back and forth, hands braced. And watching. Always watching.

“You don’t trust him, either, do you?” Nadiya’s voice, lowered to a whisper, made Klaudia turn back around.

“I don’t trust Deckard’s intentions,” she said, equally quiet. “The idea that he’s just here to help feels too good to be true.”

“I agree.”

They both looked at each other for a moment without speaking, though the silence was not uncomfortable. In fact, Klaudia felt a glimmer of relief, maybe even hope. Nadiya was like her, a survivor. She, too, kept her world controlled and remote.