“Yeah.”
“Where is she from?”
“Who said it’s a she?”
Miles waved at someone at the entrance. Dean turned around and saw a muscular man that looked like he was manufactured in a gym. He looked slightly older than forty and also dressed like he was there for tourism.
Miles stood up, smiling as the man approached their table. They hugged as if they hadn't seen each other in a long time.
“Dean, this is the man that made my first gig in Europe possible. Those crazy Interpol guys in Italy would have made my life a living hell if not for this guy here.” They hugged again. “Reece Donovan, this is my friend, Dean Bowen.”
Dean was on his feet as he shook hands with Reece. Miles pointed at Kash and said, “He’s also with us.”
Kash waved at them from his table. Miles dragged a chair for Reece to sit. Miles brought Reece up to speed with the purpose of their mission. He skipped the part about the bracelet on his wrist and some other information for the sake of time. Being the pilot on the team, Reece was curious to know the number of passengers he would deliver.
“There are five of us,” Miles said.
“Oh, is that pretty lady there among your crew too?” Reece asked, referring to the lady with Kash.
“No. They will be here in four or five minutes. The pretty lady you’re looking at is just a local that'd cost my friend, Dean, 100 dollars.”
“How so?” Reece asked, smiling at Dean.
Dean turned to Miles. “Oh, so, you heard me when I was telling you about it?” He smiled and turned to Reece as he began to explain how it happened. “We were just goofing around, but Kash decided to up the ante. When he told me he would walk straight to the couple and snatch that lady from her man, I thought to myself and said, this man is about to get kicked in the nuts so hard that doctors would have a hard time finding his sack of balls. I already made up my mind to deny ever knowing who he was. I have no idea what he said to her when he walked to that table. If I was the boyfriend, Kash would have bled strawberries and all the chicken nuggets he's gulped since this journey for even trying.”
“That’s because he’s not the boyfriend,” Miles said. “If you had joined us earlier when I told you to stop taking pictures of the entire Eastern Russia landscape, you would have seen the supposed boyfriend trying to preach his faith to everyone that cared to listen. Most of the people he approached shoved him away, but he was insistent with that lady until Kash went and rescued her.”
There was a beep tone. Miles checked it and said, “It’s time to get out of here, guys.”
Miles put his palmtop in his backpack. There were two more bags on the floor. Dean grabbed a yellow bag containing his personal effects, leaving a blue backpack for Kash.
Immediately, they left the hotel premises; a yellow motorcycle cab carrying a female passenger pulled up close to them.
“Just in time,” Miles said. Right before he introduced her, another yellow cab pulled by, also carrying a female passenger.
"Okay,” Dean said, “this is going to be intense."
Only Miles understood Dean’s sarcasm. The two ladies were from Israel and Pakistan. The first lady was Avi Benayoun, a twenty-six-year-old Israeli who was an expert at unlocking manual or digital locks. She was also fluent in eight languages, including Russian.
The second lady that joined them was called Nima Ahmad, a thirty-year-old ex-marine that served in the US. She was an expert in bomb detonation and was currently a medical resident in India.
_______
Boris, an ex-military and the youngest of the Rusev brothers, had been frequenting the Ural Mountains after Vasily’s death. One of Petrov’s dying wishes was for Romanov and Boris to ensure that his dream of reuniting the Soviet nation doesn’t get sabotaged or usurped by power-hungry aristocrats.
The private detective they had hired in Boston had informed them when Miles left for the mission. He had envisaged Miles’s plan to enter the secret cave through the tour guides that worked in the area. That was Vasily’s plan, too, before he was captured by the Russian Intelligence and murdered during interrogation. Boris anonymously reached out to the agency that oversaw tourism in the Ural region and was able to get the contacts of every tour guide. With that, he was able to monitor incoming and outgoing calls and messages. For hours, he waited in a hotel room until he finally heard the first American accent.
“Hello, is this P.S. Rosisky?”
“Speaking,” someone with a slight Russian accent answered.
“Okay. I just looked up your profile on a site called the Yamantau Facts and Tours. I wanted to know if you’d be available for a day or two to show us around.”
“Sure. Can I get your name, please?”
“Dean Bowen.”
The name didn’t register at all. According to the intel from the detective in Boston, Boris was supposed to expect a certain Pierce Neumann.
“Alright. So, how many guests are we expecting?”
“Five. There are five of us.” This response made Boris a bit suspicious.
“How many kids?”
“None.” When Boris heard this response, he concluded in his mind that the man he was expecting must have traveled with a false name. While the caller was still answering other questions from the tour guide, Boris penned down the phone number, the name of the tour guide as he heard earlier, and the GPS radius as indicated on the router.
Boris went to the bathroom, washed his face, and came back to the room to pick up his hat and his heavy leather bag. Tracing someone or an address around the city was made easy by the demographics and easy transportation system in the region. The city wasn’t as busy as Moscow and some other metropolises nearby.
Before he stopped a cab, he looked at himself in a glass door at a coffee shop and adjusted his hat.
The cab dropped him in front of a restaurant. It was the only lively place in that neighborhood. Most of the buildings seemed deserted or under construction.
Boris had looked up the picture of the tour guide. The only physical similarity he shared with the man was their clean-shaven faces. The tour guide had all his hair, contrary to his features. Boris’s hairline had receded further than normal for most men his age. He couldn’t tell the height yet, since he had only seen a passport photograph of the tour guide.
In less than five minutes after entering the restaurant, he spotted the tour guide answering his phone. Luckily for him, he understood Russian. The tour guide was making an excuse to someone so he could hurry up to another job. Boris purchased some fries, but he followed the man with his gaze as he went toward the garage. He gave the cashier a note and didn’t worry about the change as he hurried out to meet the tour guide, who was in a red SUV.
“Hey, erm, are you heading my way?” Boris asked in Russian.
“What’s your way?”
“East. Towards the mountains.”
“You’re in luck. Hop in. That’s exactly where I’m heading.”
“You don’t say,” Boris added as he sat on the front seat, carrying his bag on his lap.
They maintained their speed at forty kilometers an hour as they came down a very sloppy plain. Boris ate his fries while he nodded to the pop music playing on the car stereo. When they got to a bend, Boris flashed a revolver he had removed out of his bag. The tour guide was still too focused on the road to notice it.
“Hey,” Boris called. “Pull over.” Boris had to wave the gun side to side to bring the man’s gaze down. His facial expression changed instantly when he realized that he was in danger. He stepped on the brakes and turned off the engine on Boris’s instruction.
“T-Take the car. There is some m-money in my wallet. You can have that too.”
“Thanks for your generosity,” Boris said.
He switched over to the driver’s seat while the tour guide was outside. When he was about to move, he pointed the gun at the shivering man and squeezed twice. He was a few feet away when he noticed that the man was still mov
ing. He pulled up by the side and walked back to meet the tour guide, who was dragging himself toward the road. Boris lifted his hands and dragged him in the opposite direction instead. He dragged him far into the forest and shot him in the head.
12
Chapter Twelve
Yekaterinburg – Ural Region
May 2019
Kash was on the wheel in a rented minivan as they traveled to the Ural. Miles had spent the last forty minutes trying to educate the new members of his team on the coordinates and how they intended to enter the underground facility. The idea of swimming through a large expanse of water for almost an hour didn’t sit too well with Kash when Miles had brought it up on the plane. But after the ladies nodded through the briefing without protesting the idea of passing through the water channel, Kash peeked through the rearview mirror and said, “Ladies, I know y’all have had a couple of swimming lessons, but what Miles isn’t telling you is that we might be up against sharks, whales, and a bunch of stuff that doesn’t want to be disturbed. You know, it’s their habitat. I’m just saying.”
Miles covered his mouth with his hand and whispered, “Someone’s trying to dump his phobia on others.”
“I heard that!” Kash yelled.
“Eyes on the road, man,” Dean cautioned.
“This isn’t about aquaphobia. I’m just concerned for the ladies. I know I’m not Michael Phelps, but I can hold my own…with diving kits and all.”
Some laughed at Kash’s last comment.
“I don’t think you need to worry about the ladies, Kash. Nima is an ex-marine, and I’ve seen Avi rescue her bearded collie that fell off the boat while we were trying to make it to the shore of an island.”
It became quieter as they continued on the trip. The cool breeze that came in through the opened windows knocked Miles into a nap. Reece spotted the bracelet on Miles for the first time. And so did the ladies too. They allowed him to get much-needed rest until they arrived at a guest house.
Dean had tried to call the tour guide several times, but he wasn’t getting a response. He sent a few messages, informing the tour guide to meet them at the guest house.
At the guest house, they discussed the coordinates further and how Reece would come in when the missions were complete. Reece had access to a chopper owned by his former employer in Moscow.
Reece held Miles by the arm and dragged him to a room for a private talk.
“Miles, I get that you’re trying to save some time, but stop dodging my question. That bracelet clearly shows that we don’t have much time left. Are you making plans to die in the cave?”
Miles glanced at the bracelet. “I still have two days, man.”
“Yeah, I can see that. It’s forty-eight hours. Why would you trade five years of prison time for a suicide mission? Help me make it make sense.”
Miles exhaled. “I’ve got a daughter, Reece.”
“What?”
“Listen, I haven’t met her yet. But I checked out their crib. It’s not good, Reece. Dani’s always making bad choices when it comes to relationships. And this time, she went over her head, dating a crackhead. I can’t let my daughter grow up in such a toxic environment. You see this mission? As dangerous as it seems, it's my only option to secure a future for my daughter.”
“I hear you, pal.”
There was some quietness between them for a few seconds. Then, Reece placed his hand on Miles’s shoulder and asked, “Can the bomb lady have a look at it?”
Miles didn’t argue with the suggestion. He went back to the room where the others were sorting out the kits for their mission.
“Hey, um, Nima? I’m sorry. Can this time be paused or removed without setting it off?”
Everyone suddenly paused what they were doing.
“I assessed it in the car,” Nima said. “That’s a high-tech radioactive device built to transmit the pulse or heartbeats of the bearer. Even if the timeline doesn’t expire, it will go off once it detects any irregularity in your pulse or heartbeats.”
“That’s not good news,” Dean said.
“Yeah. There are only three countries where the company is licensed to produce such models, and they are the US, Russia, and Israel. I’m afraid I can’t do anything without understanding the layout. I tried to contact a former colleague who's more experienced, but he’s too busy helping Israel build weapons that will wipe out innocent lives in Gaza.”
“Yeah, the war is between innocent war-loving Hamas and the Israelis. The typical Palestinian false narratives,” Avi instantly jibed at Nima.
“Really? You want to go there?” Nima started to get provoked while the men tried to restore calm. Nima raised her voice even higher. “No, no. I’m over it. I was just going to educate her.” She moved close to the window, making everyone assume they'd heard the last of it. She pulled up her shirt and turned around to show them some long scars on her back. “Twenty-three different stitches. I served in the US Marines for eight years, and not once did I get a single visible scar until I traveled to my home country with my fiancé to help my pa renovate their building. The same night, I lost my fiancé, father, and three siblings to the drone strike from the peace-loving Israeli forces. I spent the entire morning picking through body parts that I couldn’t tell which one was the right pair to the other. Ask around, ask about Ahmad Bashir. My father was outspoken about his hatred for the Hamas group. And even he wasn’t spared from the drone strikes. Innocent children, women, and hundreds of civilians were decimated by people who were so eager to test their nuclear power on us!”
“Eager? I'm sorry for your loss,” Avi said and then countered by raising her voice above the attempts to calm her. “Some civilians in my country also had their fair share of Hamas rocket launchers, but the media would overlook that part. No one sees any wrongdoing with Hamas, hiding behind their civilians during the exchange."
“Enough!” Miles let out his frustration. “I get it. The two countries hate each other over some disputes that started even before anyone in this room was born. Maybe someday, the leaders of the two nations will come together to reconcile their differences and end this generational strife once and for all. But until that day, let’s recognize that before anything else, we are humans with the same blood running in our veins." He sighed. "I’m sorry; that’s the only speech left in me. Now, can we get back to this mission before I explode into tiny shreds? We already got one of five chances in this. Let’s not lose all of it.”
Miles turned to Reece and said, “Collect the key to the minivan from Kash. I think the tour guide will make arrangements for the rest of us.”
“Speak of the devil,” Dean included, noticing a new message on his phone. “Got a text. It says he’s on his way.”
Reece wished Miles, and his friends, luck and left the guesthouse. A red SUV pulled up in front of the guest house some minutes later. Dean confirmed that the tour guide was waiting. They picked up their bags and left the building.
“Sorry for keeping you guys. I was held up by something urgent that I needed to attend to. Hope I’m forgiven?”
“It’s alright,” Miles said as he opened the back door. He lifted the seat in the middle and scooted toward the corner of the back seat. Dean Bowen joined him. Nima took the front seat while Avi and Kash took the middle seat.
Miles browsed the internet for the Yamantau Facts and Tours website once again. He looked up the name, P.S. Rosisky. Dean had been following his browsing processes, and when the picture of Rosisky came up, they looked at each other.
“Fine weather, Mr. Rosisky. Or what do you think?” Miles subtly asked.
Nima turned to her left, wondering why the driver didn’t respond to Miles's question. When Boris realized that the question was for him, he said, “Oh, sorry, I was trying to be focused on the road.”
Miles tapped twice on Dean’s knee. He avoided the urge to make a facial expression or say something and let Boris realize that he had been made. Dean typed What do we do? on his phone screen and lowe
red it toward Miles, using the back of the middle seat to avoid being detected in the rear mirror.
Miles typed under the same text, telling Dean to do nothing in the meantime.
They pulled up at the first landmark, close to a hill. Everyone alighted out of the vehicle as they climbed the hill. Boris followed closely, calm and observing the team from a vantage point.
While Kash mouthed what he knew about the region through the short walk on the hill, Miles surveyed the area using his binoculars. He spotted some other tourists in the distance. From the mountain, they could see the beautiful view of the green lushes, Volga River, and the various mining industries around the region.
“What’s that mountain called?” Nima asked Kash, pointing at a very tall mountain.
“I don’t know,” Kash said for the first time. He had provided answers to most of her questions regarding squirrels, wolves, wolverines, bears, lynx, and elk. “Maybe we should ask the tour guide.”
Noticing the awkward position they were about to place Boris in, Miles asked, “What do you want to know, Nima?”
“That tall mountain.” She pointed again.
“That’s Mount Narodnaya. And if you want to know if we’ll be climbing it today, the answer is no.”
Miles gave her his binoculars to feed her eyes for the moment. She passed it to Kash, and when he had had his fill of sightseeing, he handed it over to Avi. They looked very convincing to anyone who might think they were tourists, and enjoyed their short time on the hill.
“Alright, guys, it’s time to move on to another location,” Miles urged them.
Boris got to the vehicle before everyone else.
“But what kind of a tour guide doesn’t talk or provide explanations where they are needed anyway?” Avi expressed her displeasure with the supposed tour guide while they climbed down.
To prevent another argument, Miles was quick to nip that in the bud as quietly as he could.
“Well, you can’t blame the man. We didn’t pay for the five-star treatment. We would have to make do with the muted services for now.”
Hunt for the Lost Sanctum Page 9
