Read sample The Ultra Betrayal

PROLOGUE

Eve Lind scrubbed her hands with a stiff bristle brush and lye soap. Already chapped and cracked, they were soon spotted with beads of blood. She stopped herself and dropped the brush into the sink, raising her hands to her face and drawing in a deep breath. There was no remaining scent.

She picked up the small packet of bacon fat and poison, which she had wrapped into a three-inch square of brown wax paper, put on her wool waistcoat, and took a seat in Gunnar’s favorite chair. She knew she would not have to wait long.

If the Crown Inn’s landlady continued her tedious routine, she would emerge at the top of the hour from her flat across the hall, she and her dog, a brown cocker spaniel that expressed her dislike for Eve at every turn. The dog, Winny, would nearly drag Mrs. Buckmaster to the stairs that led down to the inn’s front door. Tonight, though, the routine would be altered. Eve’s husband wouldn’t be sitting in his favorite chair near the stout coal-burning stove, and he wouldn’t announce to Eve the moment he heard Mrs. Buckmaster and Winny embarking on their nightly walk. Because Gunnar Lind was gone.

Eve would give the woman and her fiendish dog enough time to make their way to the woods behind the inn before she set out into the chilly night to join them. Eve had been angry that, ever since she and Gunnar had had their worst argument several weeks prior, Gunnar had spent a lot of time with Mrs. Buckmaster in the downstairs pub in the evenings. When she had asked him about it, he would only say that the woman, a widow in her late sixties, was lonely. Her two sons were in North Africa with the British Army, and she hadn’t heard from them in quite a while. Eve didn’t believe him. Since their evening chats had begun, she could feel the once warm and friendly landlady had turned cold toward her—which meant the woman was a threat.

Eve looked at the clock on the mantel. It was time.

She quickly descended the flight of stairs. None of the sparsely numbered pub patrons took notice of her, and once outside, she picked up her pace and closed the distance to the woman and her dog. The gravel crunched under her shoes, echoing under the leafy roof that covered the path, but that was fine. She didn’t need to sneak up on the woman.

When she was twenty yards away, Mrs. Buckmaster stopped and turned around. Eve couldn’t see her face clearly, but when the woman took two steps back, she realized that the landlady was frightened.

“Who is that?” she said.

Winny began her own questioning with a sharp series of barks.

“It’s just me, Mrs. Buckmaster. Eve Lind. I didn’t mean to startle you. Please excuse me.”

“Well, you did just that … startled me, that is. What do you want? Shush, Winny.”

“I’ve been meaning to knock on your door. For a visit. I wanted to ask you about Gunnar,” Eve said as she bent over to pat the dog. But Winny was having none of it as she backpedaled, stopping behind Mrs. Buckmaster’s legs.

“What about him?” Mrs. Buckmaster said.

“He never came home last night, and I haven’t heard from him all day. I know you two have been spending time together in the evenings lately. Did he say anything to you?” Eve said, taking a step closer.

Mrs. Buckmaster didn’t answer. She retreated a step and stepped on Winny’s paw. The high-pitched yelp startled both women.

“I’m worried. I’m sure you can understand that,” Eve said, adding a noticeable quaver in her voice.

“Maybe you should ask those people he works with. They should know. Not me.”

The lie came to Eve easily. “I already have. They were no help.”

Mrs. Buckmaster shook her head. “I can’t help you.”

Eve inched closer. “You can’t or won’t, Mrs. Buckmaster?”

“Actually, Mrs. Lind, if you must know, I won’t.”

“I see. And why is that?” Eve said, drawing out the small wax paper packet from her pocket.

“I heard enough from your husband, you could say.”

“And what was that? What did he say?”

“I’m done talking to you. Now leave us alone.”

“Did he ever mention anything about a letter or letters?”

Again, Mrs. Buckmaster didn’t answer. But when she flinched at the mention of letters, Eve pulled the bacon fat from the packet and tossed it at the woman’s feet.

“What is that? What are you doing?”

Winny wasted no time lapping up the lard. Eve tossed the wax paper on the ground for good measure.

“Stop, Winny,” Mrs. Buckmaster yelled as she pulled at the dog’s leash.

“It seems that Winny was hungry. You must not be feeding her enough.”

Mrs. Buckmaster pulled at the leash, and Winny choked several times. With another tug, Mrs. Buckmaster began dragging Winny away.

Eve didn’t want to kill the dog. It was just a necessary step. She had debated whether to do it before or after. It had depended on the way Mrs. Buckmaster answered her, and her cold and uninformative replies had made the decision for Eve. Killing the dog in front of the meddlesome landlady suited Eve just fine.

Winny sprawled on her side in the gravel and started convulsing. Her paws spasmodically sprayed the gravel across the path.

“What have you done, you witch?” Mrs. Buckmaster bent down to tend to the dog.

Eve reached inside her coat pocket and pulled out the sock filled with stones the size of chestnuts. It was one of Gunnar’s socks. She had bought the pair for him last Christmas. She whipped it around in a tight circle, and it landed on the back of Mrs. Buckmaster’s head. The crunching sound would be hard to forget. Blood spattered on the back of Mrs. Buckmaster’s coat and Eve’s bare legs.

Eve rolled over Mrs. Buckmaster’s body and placed her index finger under her nostrils. The woman’s breathing was evident but labored. Eve had a cure for that. After all, she was a doctor. She squeezed the woman’s nose shut and placed her other hand over Mrs. Buckmaster’s mouth. Five seconds later, Mrs. Buckmaster began to struggle, her legs kicking and her hands tugging on Eve’s coat. Eve brought her weight down on the old woman. The struggle was short-lived.

Breathing rapidly herself, Eve rose to her feet and ran to a nearby stand of trees to retrieve the shovel she had left there the night before. The rush of adrenaline was liberating. Problem solved.

CHAPTER ONE

The paper-thin walls of Hut 8 failed miserably at keeping the dampness brought on by the steady rains at bay. Alan Turing had his scarf wrapped tightly around his neck, and his gloved hands coiled around a tepid cup of tea. He stared across the office at Gunnar Lind’s desk. Its surface was a complete mess, just like his. The only difference was that Turing had shown up for work, whereas Lind had not. Turing was not exactly sure how long it had been since Lind, his Swedish cryptologist associate, was last at his desk. Turing had been so deep down the rabbit hole in his own work for the past several days that he had lost all sense of his surroundings. Yet he knew that it would be one of the first questions Travis would ask him. He better have an answer.

Turing turned to a calendar pinned to a corkboard near his desk and saw that it hadn’t been flipped to the new month. He pulled it down, changed the page, and studied October. Turing remembered a conversation he’d had with Lind after enlisting in the infantry section of the home guards. Lind had asked him why he would do such a thing, and Turing had answered that he wanted to learn to shoot a rifle. Lind had laughed, which puzzled Turing. His reason seemed to be perfectly logical. It was the next day, after that conversation, that he’d first noticed Lind didn’t appear in Hut 8. That would make it 15 October. Four days ago. Turing padlocked his mug to the radiator and picked up his phone.

Edward Travis, head of the Government Code & Cypher School, sat behind his desk, which was marked by a wooden inbox overflowing with paperwork. A desk lamp was switched on to combat the gloomy skies outside the unsightly Victorian country mansion that housed the main offices of the GC&CS. When Alan Turing, one of his leading cryptologists, was shown in, Travis saw a drenched, dark-haired man in his thirties who looked like he hadn’t changed clothes for days on end.

“You know, Turing, there must be hundreds of brollies in Bletchley Park. You seem to not have noticed.”

Turing ran his hands through his soaked hair and flicked them free of the rain. “Of course, sir. But it’s such a short walk from the hut, and I didn’t want to waste any time.”

“What’s so—”

“Gunnar Lind has not shown up for work for four days,” Turing said. “He also hasn’t been seen at the Crown Inn, where he was billeted. I know this because it is the same place where I live.”

Travis turned his palms upward and shrugged. “Under the weather possibly? That would certainly be understandable given—”

“I placed a call to Mrs. Buckmaster, our landlady, who is quite a headstrong woman. She believes, by the way, I have contributed nothing to the war effort.” Turing paused. “Do you think someday she will know? That would be some comfort.”

“And?”

Turing cocked his head. “And what?”

“What did the landlady say, Turing?” Travis said, not hiding his annoyance.

“Oh, well … the strange thing is that no one knows where Mrs. Buckmaster is. She hasn’t been seen since late Saturday night, I’m told. Her daughter, Maisie, reported her absence to the local police.”

Travis sat up straight. “That’s a strange coincidence. What was Lind working on?”

Turing sucked in his breath. “I work best alone, but Gunnar knows when to pose the right question at the right time. He’s very much a muse, so to speak. I need my muse.”

Travis stood quickly, startling Turing. “Again, Turing, what was he working on?”

“He was refining the hand code-breaking methods that I devised for the cryptanalysis of the Lorenz cipher produced by the SZ40 and SZ42 teleprinters.” Turing sucked in a quick breath. “Tunny. He was working on Tunny.”

At the word “Tunny,” Travis gasped and plopped back into this chair. The Germans used the Lorenz teleprinters to send enciphered messages wirelessly to German High Command and army group commanders in the field. Fish was the British code name for any German teleprinter–generated ciphers. It was inspired by the German name for one of their wireless transmission systems—Sägefisch, or sawfish. Tunny was the name given to the wireless traffic enciphered by the Lorenz SZ machines. Worse, Tunny was a major part of Ultra—British military intelligence’s designation for signals intel that came from high-level Nazi cipher traffic—as was breaking the German Enigma machine codes. Lind’s knowledge of Fish and Enigma code-breaking efforts, should it be passed on to the Germans, would be catastrophic to upcoming Allied operations in French North Africa and General Montgomery’s El Alamein offensive. “Why in God’s name didn’t you mention this sooner? Four days? Four bloody days, Turing?”

“Ahh, ahhh, ahhh, ahhh …” Travis knew this was Turing’s habit to keep people from interrupting him while he was thinking of a response. “I was lost … in my work. I try not to pay attention to my surroundings. Except when I need something.”

Travis was stunned when Turing spun on his heel and left his office.

That was all he needed: a missing cryptologist with intimate knowledge of Ultra. Travis reached for his phone. “Headley, ring up Winterbotham at MI6 straightaway. Then have my car brought around. I am sure they’ll want to take their pound of flesh in person.”

CHAPTER TWO

The lanes of Savoy Court were jammed with cars spewing a cloud of exhaust smoke that was slow to escape the narrow, canyon-like street in front of the famous London hotel. Conor Thorn, OSS agent and former lieutenant in the US Navy, had just returned from a mission with beautiful MI6 agent Emily Bright. He pulled the Buick Roadmaster to the curb and turned to his driver, Hollis. Conor always insisted on driving, so she was sitting comfortably in the backseat, reading the Daily Mirror. Its headline blared news of a new German attack on Stalingrad.

“Miss Hollis, we’ll jump out here. We won’t need you any further tonight,” Conor said, seeing Emily raising an eyebrow in his direction. He reached over and opened Emily’s door. They darted across the Strand, and a doorman well into his seventies saw them approach. He was dressed in a black three-piece suit with a top hat. The ensemble, Conor noticed, was a size too small; the lower vest buttons looked very distressed. The doorman opened the door, which let the chatter from the lobby drift into the court.

Conor and Emily stopped in the expansive lobby and took in the sight. The black-and-white-checkered marble floor gleamed, as did the dark wood of the reception area. A bellboy rushed past them carrying a tray with an envelope on it as Conor watched Emily survey the scene. Her light-brown shoulder-length hair glistened, and her eyes sparkled.

“Don’t you think that we deserve a little spoiling after our mad dash across the Mediterranean, tracking down those who would do us harm?” he said.

Emily turned to Conor and cracked a smile. “What do you have in mind, Mr. Thorn?”

Conor leaned in and got a whiff of lavender. “Actually, I was thinking of getting a room key.”

“Whatever for?” Emily said in faux shock.

“Well, for one thing, I hear the Savoy decor is something to marvel at.”

“Then we’ll have to experience that, won’t we?”

A wide-eyed Conor nodded, pleased by this response. “Wait here a minute,” he said and headed toward the reception desk.

A tall man with slumping shoulders and a burgeoning waistline was coming down a side staircase. He was wearing the dress whites of a US Navy officer, the rank of a captain. He passed Conor, then stopped and turned back.

“Thorn?”

Conor stopped and saw Captain Bivens, the last captain he’d served under—the man who had forced Conor out of the US Navy. Conor’s shock was quickly eclipsed by his anger at seeing his old commanding officer. Emily joined Conor as the man spoke.

“I almost didn’t recognize you, Thorn.”

“I’m not wearing a uniform, Captain.”

Bivens nodded but didn’t reply.

“This is Emily Bright. Emily, this is Captain Bivens.”

Emily shook Bivens’s extended hand. “Hello, Captain. Nice to meet you.”

Bivens gave Emily a quick nod.

“Still on sea duty, Captain?” Conor asked.

“No, no. Too old. I’m the assistant naval attaché here in London.” Bivens stammered. “L-l-listen, Thorn. My wife left me for some desk-bound lifer from the State Department that she was cheating on me with.”

Emily looked at Conor, who made no attempt to respond.

“So I did you and the navy a major disservice when I told you to resign your commission. She eventually told me that you didn’t … assault her. She was just trying to get my attention. But by then it was too late. You had already tendered your resignation. I’m sorry. If there’s anything I—”

“Captain,” Conor said, and then stopped for a beat. “There’s nothing I could ever want from you. So stop.”

Bivens nodded and carefully placed his combination cap on his head, wheeled around, and walked out of the lobby into the chaos of Savoy Court.

“That’s a story you never told me,” Emily said.

“I was in a bad place back then. It was probably for the best.” Conor took her elbow and headed upstairs to the American Bar, passing the reception desk without getting a key.

Immediately upon entering, Conor saw his father, Jack, at the bar, chatting with Ed Murrow from CBS Radio. He felt Emily tugging at his sleeve, then saw her motion to a woman several feet away, sitting at a small cocktail table and writing rapidly on a sheet of paper. It was his sister Maggie. She also worked for CBS Radio after leaving Republic Broadcasting Service, run by their father, Jack. A letter was lying to the side, and tears were streaming down her face. “Emily, I can see Dad at the bar. Can you join him? I need to see who or what made my little sister cry.”

“Sure. Let me know if I can help.”

Maggie was so focused on her writing that she was unaware of Conor’s presence as he approached. “So, can I buy you a drink, young lady?”

A startled Maggie looked up at Conor and dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief. She picked up the letter and handed it to him. “I received this today. It’s from Sue Ryan.”

Conor knew Sue Ryan well. She was with Grace, Conor’s late wife, when they first met at a Sunday afternoon tea dance at the Naval Academy during his plebe year. Sue and Grace were so close that Grace had asked Sue to be her maid of honor. Conor took the letter. “Is she okay?”

“Just read it.”

Conor looked up from the letter, his lips pressed together. A buzzing in his ears blocked out all other sounds. Maggie was staring at him, fresh tears slowly making their way down her cheeks.

“Keep reading.”

Conor looked around at the steady stream of patrons filling the bar and took a deep breath.

“Son of a bitch,” Conor said, prompting a few stares.

Conor’s eyes welled with tears, but he quickly blinked them away. How did he not notice the pain she was in? Was he so consumed by his own career that he couldn’t see she was troubled? But Grace was right. He wouldn’t have stopped until he’d found the bastard that violated his wife. But maybe it wasn’t too late for that. I’m sorry, Grace. I know this is not what you wanted, but I just can’t let this slide. He carefully folded the letter, placed it back into the envelope, then put it into his breast pocket. Maggie handed him the sheet of paper she had been writing on. The Savoy Hotel stationery was tear-stained. On it, Maggie had written several names in a bold script.

“What’s this?”

“Names of the men that were at the dinner. The ones I remember.”

There was a short note after each name. Conor recognized several of the names as old friends of the Maxwell family. One name was already crossed out by Maggie—Bill Maxwell, Grace’s father. A name jumped out at Conor—Preston Simms, Grace’s stepbrother. Next to his name was a note—USAAF Public Affairs officer at RAF Daws Hill. On the bottom of the list were two question marks. Conor looked up at Maggie.

“I’m so sorry, but I just never got their names. I was drinking too. I think one was a friend of Preston, who was a jerk, and the other guy arrived late. I wish I knew more.”

“That’s okay, Maggie. Thanks for letting me see the letter. And thanks for the list.” Conor began folding the paper.

“I loved Grace, Conor. She was the best of us.”

Conor cleared his throat. A moment passed. “She sure was that.”

They both rose and headed toward the bar, Maggie taking the lead, when a hand grabbed Conor’s shoulder. Already tense, he spun around, ready to pounce.

“Hey, buddy. Didn’t think I’d see you so soon.” The moment Conor saw his old friend Bobby Heugle, the tension drained from his body. “Hello, Maggie. How’s things?”

Conor gave Bobby, also an OSS agent, a handshake and a soft chest bump.

Maggie hugged her old boyfriend and gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek. “I’ll leave you two boys alone,” Maggie said as she headed toward the bar, which was now three deep.

“So, you got thrown out of Lisbon too? How long were you there? Three days?” Conor asked, referring to both of them being reassigned from Tangier two weeks prior.

“Ha. About that long. After that shit storm you triggered at Portela Airport, the Portuguese government ordered the United States and Germany to expel five staff members each. I was the fifth.” Bobby had aptly described the skirmish at the airport between Conor, Emily, and elements of the NKVD and Abwehr—it was a shitty mess that went from bad to worse in an eye blink. With a big human toll. And nothing to count for it. No missing plans for the Torch invasion nor the man who betrayed the Allies. Luckily, Conor and Emily had eventually caught up to both the missing invasion directives and the man who wanted to place those directives in the hands of the Nazis.

“What about the Soviets? Or did they get a pass?”

“Not sure about that. Hey, I’ve got a tickle in my throat. How about you?”

The rest of the evening was a blur. He listened mostly, said little. Heugle held the floor, like he usually did. And Conor was grateful for it. Emily kept by his side, her arm intertwined with his, and seemed to enjoy herself for the first time since they’d met in the basement pub at MI6 Headquarters. But the seismic emotional shift from feeling like a giddy schoolboy with his dream date on his arm to being a sullen hulk of a man with rage building up inside him was too enormous for him to grasp. When Conor told Emily he had to leave to take care of something, she looked hurt. And that just killed him to see.