The Spy Who Came for Christmas Read online

“If you ever forget, if you ever hurt your wife and son, one day I’ll come back and remind you of this conversation.”

  “You won’t need to.”

  Ted held out his hand.

  Kagan shook it, noting that, despite everything that had happened, Ted’s grip was firm.

  “I believe you.”

  At the front door, he looked back at the baby snuggling contentedly in Meredith’s arms.

  Are you sending me another sign? he wondered. That everything’s going to be okay?

  “Enjoy your roses, Meredith.”

  “Thank you for saving our lives.”

  “No need to thank me. I’m the one who put you in danger. We wouldn’t be alive if all of you hadn’t been strong.” Kagan pointed toward Cole. “I’ve known some professionals who aren’t as dependable.”

  “Well, thank you anyway,” she said, “for keeping your promise.” She looked at Ted and then back at Kagan. “You gave me a Christmas present.”

  As Kagan gathered his resolve and reached for the doorknob, she added, “You never told me your name. The man outside called you ‘Pyotyr.’ Does that mean ‘Peter’? Is that your name?”

  “That’s what he calls me.”

  Meredith thought about it and nodded. “I understand. Whoever you are,” she replied, “Merry Christmas.”

  * * * * *

  KAGAN OPENED the door and exposed himself to the overhead lights. If Andrei meant to shoot him, this was his chance.

  But nothing happened.

  Everything’s an act of faith, he thought. Shivering, he stepped from the house and walked through the falling snow toward the gate. He heard the faint rumble of an engine. As he reached the lane, he saw the dark shape of a Range Rover.

  When I open the door, that’s when it’ll happen, Kagan thought, snow pelting him.

  The passenger window descended.

  “Pyotyr, you promised you’d help! I can’t defect if the clients and the Pakhan are hunting me and my family. The last time they’ll be together is tonight! This is my only chance.”

  It might be a trick, Kagan thought. But at least I saved the child.

  “From now on, there won’t be any lies,” he said, hanging back. “My real name isn’t Pyotyr.”

  “Imagine that. What a surprise.”

  “It’s Paul.” Kagan stepped toward the door. He hoped that his tone made Andrei realize he was telling the truth.

  “I’ll never get used to calling you that.”

  “Then keep calling me ‘Pyotyr.’”

  “Are you thinking about shooting me through the window?” Andrei asked.

  “Actually, I was thinking about you and me doing some good,” Kagan replied.

  His hearing had improved sufficiently for him to realize that the sirens were nearer than he liked.

  “Doing some good?” Andrei thought about it and shrugged. “Why not? It’s better than stealing babies.

  When Kagan opened the passenger door, he saw that both of Andrei’s hands were placed firmly on the steering wheel.

  “Now’s the time, if you want to shoot me,” Andrei said. “I’m helpless.”

  Kagan got in from the cold.

  “I can’t imagine you ever being helpless.” Kagan shut the door.

  Andrei put the Range Rover in gear and drove along the lane. The deep snow crunched under the high vehicle’s tires. A short time later, he turned right onto Canyon Road, where a few cars were now in motion.

  “Do you hear that?” Andrei asked.

  Kagan strained to listen.

  “The sirens?”

  “The cathedral bells,” Andrei said. “It’s midnight.”

  “Christmas.”

  The word made Kagan think of his dead parents and the Christmases he would never spend with them.

  “Look behind us,” Andrei said.

  Kagan turned. The Range Rover’s window had a heating element that melted the snow landing on it. In the distance, he saw the hazy red and blue flashing lights of police cars doing their best to move up Canyon Road. The flashes reminded him of lights on a Christmas tree. Then the snowfall strengthened, obscuring them.

  When Andrei steered left onto another road, the Range Rover’s tire tracks blended with others. He drove over a small bridge, reached a stop sign, waited for the lights of a car to go past, and followed it to the left. A few seconds later, the lights of another car came along the street behind them.

  Andrei peered into the rearview mirror. “They’ll be looking for a blue Range Rover. Downtown’s only a couple of blocks away. We’ll find a parking lot and abandon the car. It shouldn’t be hard to find something else to steal. No one’ll notice it’s gone until the morning.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  Andrei pointed at twinkling lights on houses they passed. “Where I grew up, there wasn’t any such thing as Christmas. After the Soviet Union collapsed and I snuck into the United States, I was amazed by all the decorations.”

  “Only the decorations? What about the Christmas spirit?”

  “Since you appear to have developed a conscience, maybe you can teach me.”

  “You already have a conscience,” Kagan said.

  “Don’t make me regret it.”

  Andrei reached for something under his ski jacket. For a moment, Kagan feared that Andrei had fooled him and was drawing a gun. He almost lunged to defend himself. But then he realized that Andrei was turning on the radio transmitter that was hooked to his belt.

  “This is Melchior,” Andrei said to the microphone on his coat. “I have the package.” He paused, listening to his earbud as he drove through the slow-moving traffic. “It’s safe and ready for delivery. The mudak is no longer in business.”

  Andrei listened some more.

  “Yes, it was a pathetic attempt to persuade me to join his corporation. In the end, I made sure he realized what a fool he was. The only person I’m loyal to is you.” Again, Andrei listened. “The main thing is, I corrected my mistake. Tell the clients I meant what I said. When I deliver the package, I want an apology, along with a bonus. We’ll be there in half an hour. Oh, and tell room service to deliver vodka for us.”

  Andrei pressed a button on the transmitter, turning it off.

  “A half hour. That gives us time to prepare.”

  “Mudak. That’s a tough thing to call me,” Kagan said.

  “It’s better than what the Pakhan called me. Is your name truly Paul?”

  “I’m trusting you with it.”

  “Paul.” Andrei tested the name. “No, it won’t do. Pyotyr, after you help me defect, perhaps you can spend next Christmas with me and my family.”

  “It’ll be a pleasure to see them again.”

  The baby’s safe, Kagan kept thinking. Nothing else matters. I saved the baby. I can bear sitting here, trying to make jokes with Andrei, while we drive to a gunfight. I can tolerate helping him whatever way he wants. As long as the baby’s safe.

  “Perhaps here in Santa Fe. Perhaps this is where Anna and the girls would enjoy living,” Andrei said.

  “A little too close to business, don’t you think?”

  “I know how to blend.”

  “You do indeed,” Kagan admitted.

  “The mountains. The light. The quiet. There are many things here they’d enjoy.”

  “Quiet’s a good thing,” Kagan agreed.

  Thank God the baby’s safe, he kept thinking. His ears recovered sufficiently that he could now hear the cathedral bells.

  “Do you have enough ammunition?” Andrei asked.

  “My Glock’s empty. I have a partially full magazine in Mikhail’s pistol.”

  “Here’s a spare magazine for the Glock.”

  Kagan watched warily as Andrei reached into his ski jacket. But when his hand came out, it held only the magazine he’d promised.

  “Pyotyr, maybe you can explain something to me.”

  “Whatever you want to know. I told you that from now on, I’ll be completely honest.”
<
br />   “Have you seen the movie It’s a Wonderful Life?”

  Kagan overcame his confusion and answered, “Many times. My parents watched it every year.”

  “I’m surprised you could watch it even once. It mystifies me. Why do people like it so much? Don’t you think that fat angel looks stupid? And what’s with James Stewart? He’s too skinny. He should have stuffed himself with more Christmas dinners.”

  “If he stuffed himself, he’d look just like the angel,” Kagan said.

  “I didn’t say he should stuff himself that much. But the character he played was so trusting, it’s a wonder he wasn’t cheated out of everything he owned.”

  “Someone needs to make sure that doesn’t happen to people,” Kagan said.

  The bells rang louder.

  “Merry Christmas, Andrei.”

  “Whatever that means.” Andrei thought about it. “The same to you, Pyotyr. Merry Christmas.”

  Afterword

  Christmas in May

  The idea for The Spy Who Came for Christmas occurred to me in a place that isn’t normally associated with snow and Christmas trees. A couple of years ago, in the heat of May, I was in Jacksonville, Florida, at a readers’ festival called Much Ado about Books that was sponsored by the local library. More than a dozen other authors participated, and after a day of giving presentations, we were driven via bus to a reception at the ocean-side home of two generous library patrons.

  En route, I happened to sit next to a novelist I’d not met before, Mary Kay Andrews, whose Southern friendliness was irresistible. As we described our various writing adventures, she pulled a novel from her purse and showed it to me. It was what publishers call an Advanced Reader’s Copy, a paperback version of an upcoming hardback in which the text hasn’t received its final proofreading. Because reviewers and bookstores need to see books months ahead of their publication, ARCs are pretty much the only way they can assess upcoming volumes.

  Mary Kay’s novel, scheduled to appear six months later in November, was called Blue Christmas. Its attractive cover had a blue background and showed a young woman in rolled-up jeans struggling to drag a silver Christmas tree across the page. The engaging text on the back described a holiday narrative set in historic Savannah, Georgia, one of my favorite cities. Filled with local color, the plot involved a young woman who owned an antiques store and wanted to win a Christmas window-decorating contest, but all sorts of mysterious events kept getting in the way. It promised to be a charming seasonal story with plenty of atmosphere.

  I became so interested that I didn’t realize the bus had stopped at our destination. While Mary Kay and I walked toward an impressive waterside home, she mentioned off-handedly, “Why don’t you write one?”

  “A Christmas novel?” The idea surprised me. True, years earlier, I’d written a novella, The Hundred-Year Christmas, about Santa Claus and Father Time. That book had received a World Fantasy best-novella nomination, but it isn’t typical of my fiction. As I reminded Mary Kay, “I’m known for action and suspense. Christmas books are supposed to be warm and cozy.”

  “Why?” she wanted to know. By then, we were on the back patio, looking at a beach, palm trees, and boats on the water.

  “Why can’t a Christmas story have action and suspense? You’ve written spy novels, haven’t you?”

  “Quite a few.”

  “Then write a Christmas book about a spy.”

  The thought made me smile. I love trying something different, and I could think of only one novel in which Christmas and espionage were paired: Ian Fleming’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. I recalled another James Bond novel, The Spy Who Loved Me. That made me think of John le Carré’s The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and the next instant, the title, The Spy Who Came for Christmas, occurred to me.

  In the midst of that crowded cocktail party near the beach, ideas fell quickly into place. The Savannah setting of Mary Kay’s Blue Christmas made me want to use a comparably historic city known for its local color, one that was renowned for its Christmas atmosphere. I wouldn’t need to do much research because I’ve lived there many years: Santa Fe, New Mexico. Some people think Santa Fe is a heat-baked desert community like Phoenix, but actually it’s more like Aspen or Vail. Located in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo mountains, it’s a ski resort, a top-ranked winter tourist destination with a mile-long Christmas display in the art-gallery district of Canyon Road, which the American Planning Association lists as one of the top-ten streets in the United States. I decided that my story would take place on Canyon Road more or less in real time between nine p.m. and midnight on Christmas Eve.

  A boat rumbled past the sprawling house. A warm breeze nudged fragrant flowers. A boy and his dog scampered along the beach. But for me, snow fell as a man raced for his life among the thousands of revelers on Canyon Road. His left arm dripped blood from a gunshot wound. Even so, under his coat, he held what was for him the most precious object imaginable: a baby known as the child of peace, with the power to change the world.

  Someone’s glass hit the floor, literally shattering the moment. As reality abruptly intervened, Mary Kay and I finished our conversation and went our separate ways, chatting with library patrons and other authors. But in the days and months that followed, The Spy Who Came for Christmas stayed with me.

  Summer arrived, and then autumn. I finished a novel I’d been working on and immediately felt the urge to start the Christmas book, wanting the process of composition to build as the year progressed toward its conclusion. I hoped that I would type the final words on Christmas Eve at the same time that the events in the story reached their climax. Indeed, a few nights before Christmas, a serious snowstorm matched the one I was describing. When my wife, Donna, and I joined the Christmas Eve crowd on Canyon Road, we walked the snow-drifted route that my main character, Paul Kagan, took in his desperate effort to elude his hunters. But even though the physical details of the story were verified, the novel was not yet finished, and I didn’t type the last line until New Year’s Day, which has its own symbolism, things coming around and beginning again.

  “Coming around” because there was a time when the only novels I wrote were about spies. My 1984 novel, The Brotherhood of the Rose, was an attempt to create something new by combining the contrasting espionage worlds of John le Carré and Robert Ludlum: white collar spies versus blue collar, conference rooms versus back alleys. Numerous spy novels followed, including The Fraternity of the Stone, The League of Night and Fog, and The Covenant of the Flame. Obsessive about research, I received extensive training in espionage techniques, courtesy of retired spies. I was accepted as an honorary lifetime member of the Association for Intelligence Officers.

  However, after a dozen years of writing espionage stories, I worried about getting locked into a pattern, so I decided to look for other approaches to action and suspense. One of these involved creating main characters whose artistic professions (photography in Double Image, painting in Burnt Sienna ) are a shocking contrast with the violent circumstances in which they find themselves. Another experiment resulted in Creepers and Scavenger, what I call “eerie” thrillers that have the moody tone of a ghost story but without anything supernatural in the plot.

  The consequence, I suddenly realized, was that I hadn’t written a true spy novel since 1996’s Extreme Denial more than ten years earlier. Writing The Spy Who Came for Christmas, I felt good revisiting my former espionage territory but with a decade’s perspective. What I particularly enjoyed was inventing the spy’s version of the traditional nativity story, the narrative that Paul Kagan tells to Meredith and Cole. The idea that the three Magi who arrived in Herod’s court were actually spies from Israel’s major enemy, Persia (what we now call Iran), came to me as quickly as the overall idea for the book. I looked at the nativity story as presented in the gospels and tried to add an espionage interpretation while remaining true to the original text. Among other things, Kagan’s narrative intrigued me because it explains why Joseph
is never quoted directly in any of the gospels and why he disappears so early in them.

  Christmas presents seldom come in May, particularly not on a sun-drenched Florida beach, but Mary Kay Andrews certainly gave me one when she showed me her novel, Blue Christmas, and suggested that I might enjoy writing a comparable book about spies. My thanks to her. The best of the season to all of you, no matter the time of year.

  Acknowledgments

  Special thanks are due to the residents of the Canyon Road area of Santa Fe, which includes Acequia Madre, Garcia, Camino del Monte Sol, and other adjoining streets. Each Christmas Eve, they transform their neighborhood into a fabulous seasonal delight that attracts visitors from around the world. Their hard work, good cheer, and holiday hospitality are much appreciated. The American Planning Association deservedly lists Canyon Road as one of the top-ten streets in the United States.

  In addition, I’m indebted to the following people:

  Mary Kay Andrews, whose charming holiday novel, Blue Christmas, prompted a conversation in which she suggested I write a Christmas book about a spy;

  C. J. Lyons, an exciting novelist (Lifelines, Blind Faith) and specialist in pediatric emergency medicine, who told me about emergency substitutes for baby formula as well as other details about infant care that were handy for my main character to know;

  Roger Cooper, Peter Costanzo, Georgina Levitt, Amanda Ferber, and the wonderfully supportive group at Vanguard Press/Perseus Books;

  My editor, Steve Saffel;

  My publicist, Sarie Morrell, and my Internet guide, Nanci Kalanta; and

  Jane Dystel, Miriam Goderich, and the rest of the good folks at Dystel/Goderich Literary Management.

  All of these people light my path.

  —David Morrell

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  David Morrell is the award-winning author of First Blood, the novel in which the character Rambo was created. He was born in 1943 in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. In 1960, at the age of seventeen, he became a fan of the classic television series Route 66, about two young men in a Corvette convertible traveling the United States in search of America and themselves. The scripts by Stirling Silliphant so impressed Morrell that he decided to become a writer.