Chapter 46
Evelyn's POV
In my experience, Kholod's operations were efficient, clinical, focused on achieving objectives with minimal complications. This elaborate psychological theater seemed unnecessary, even risky.
"What message?" Caldwell asked, his voice tight with controlled anger. "What truth are you so eager to have me spread?"
"I want you to send a text message to your chief of staff," Viktor said, his instructions precise and unhurried. "You're going to name that man, Senator. You're going to create a record, a trail that investigators can follow after your body is discovered."
"And if I refuse?" Caldwell's question carried more defiance than I would have expected from a man in his position.
"Then my operative will send the message after you're dead," Viktor replied calmly. "Your phone will be found with your body, the message in your drafts folder, never quite sent but clearly indicating what you'd discovered. Either way, Senator, the message will exist. The only question is whether you'd prefer to send it yourself, maintaining some small measure of control over your final communication, or whether you'd rather I handle it for you."
I stepped closer to Caldwell, pulling my own phone from my pocket to check the time. The police would be working their way through the building systematically, checking floors, clearing rooms. We had perhaps fifteen minutes before they reached this level, maybe ten if Julian's security team was being thorough about coordinating the search. Enough time to complete Viktor's instructions, to ensure Caldwell sent his message and then to finish what I'd come here to do.
"Take out your phone, Senator," I said, my voice falling into the flat, professional tone that Vorkuta had trained into me. "It's time to send your message."
Caldwell looked at me for a long moment, and I saw something in his expression that made me deeply uncomfortable—not fear, not anger, but a kind of sad understanding, as if he'd suddenly seen past my carefully constructed facade to something more complicated underneath. Then, slowly, he nodded toward his jacket pocket.
"Inside pocket," he said quietly. "Left side."
I reached into his jacket and retrieved his phone, a standard iPhone in a leather case. I held it up to his face to unlock it with facial recognition, then opened his messaging app and pulled up his chief of staff's contact information. The screen glowed between us, waiting for whatever message Viktor wanted sent.
"Now, Senator," Viktor's voice came through my phone's speaker, calm and inexorable. "You're going to dictate a message. Something simple, something clear. Tell your chief of staff that you've identified the company behind the threats. Tell him you've discovered which defense contractor has been trying to intimidate you into abandoning your investigation."
Caldwell stared at the phone screen, his jaw working as if he were physically struggling with the words Viktor wanted him to speak. I could see the calculations happening behind his eyes—weighing options, assessing possibilities, trying to find some way to resist even though resistance was clearly futile.
"I need a name, Senator," Viktor prompted, his voice carrying just a hint of impatience now. "Which company have you been investigating most aggressively? Which one stands to lose the most if your inquiry continues? You know the answer. You've known it for weeks. All you have to do is say it out loud."
But Caldwell didn't speak. Instead, he continued to stare at the phone in my hands, his expression shifting from calculation to something that looked almost like recognition. His eyes moved from the screen to my face, studying me with an intensity that made me want to step back, to retreat from whatever conclusion he was drawing.
"Senator," I said, my voice sharper now. "Viktor asked you a question. Answer it."
Still Caldwell said nothing. He just kept looking at me, his gaze moving from my face to my hands to the phone and back again, as if he were piecing together some puzzle whose solution I couldn't see. The silence stretched between us, broken only by the distant sound of police radios and the faint hum of the building's ventilation system.
"Evelyn," Viktor's voice carried a warning edge. "Is there a problem?"
"No problem," I said quickly, keeping my eyes on Caldwell. "The Senator is just being difficult. Give me a moment."
I moved closer to Caldwell, lowering my voice to something just above a whisper. "Don't make this harder than it needs to be. Viktor is right—whether you send this message or not, it's going to exist. All you're doing by resisting is ensuring that your death is more painful than it needs to be. Just give me the name. Tell me which company you think is behind this, and we can end this quickly."
Caldwell's expression shifted again, and I saw something almost like pity cross his face. "You really don't know, do you?" he said softly. "You have no idea what you're actually doing here, what you're being used for."
"I know exactly what I'm doing," I replied, though even as I said it I felt the lie of it. "I'm completing my assignment. I'm eliminating a target. The reasons don't matter."
"The reasons always matter," Caldwell said, and there was a note of something almost like regret in his voice. "Especially when the person pulling the trigger is being played just as surely as the person in the crosshairs."
"Evelyn," Viktor's voice cut through the moment. "What's happening? Why hasn't the Senator sent his message?"
"He's stalling," I said, not taking my eyes off Caldwell. "Trying to find some way out. But there isn't one, Senator. You know there isn't. So stop wasting both our time and just send the damn message."
"I have other matters to attend to," Viktor's voice cut through the tension with characteristic abruptness. "Handle the rest yourself, Evelyn. I expect confirmation within ten minutes that both the message has been sent and the target has been eliminated. Don't disappoint me."
The line went dead before I could respond, leaving me alone with Caldwell and the weight of Viktor's expectations pressing down on my shoulders like a physical thing.
Caldwell shook his head slowly, and I saw resignation settle over his features like a shroud.
"All right," he said finally. "I'll send the message. But first, I want to ask you something, Mrs. Winthrop."
The use of my name sent a small shock through me. He recognized me now.
"You don't get to ask questions," I said, my voice harder now. "You get to send the message Viktor wants, and then this ends. Those are your only options."
"Humor me," Caldwell said, and despite his situation—tied to a chair, facing imminent death—there was something almost gentle in his tone. "I'm a dead man anyway. What harm can one question do?"
"One question," I said curtly. "Then you send the message. Agreed?"
Caldwell nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving my face.
"I'm curious," he said, meeting my eyes with that same unsettling pity I'd seen before. "Do you know that the employer is Adrian?"