by Seeley James
“Is that it then?” I asked Viktor. “You’re going to try to kill twenty thousand Sabel Security employees?”
“The Sabel Industries building, well-guarded.” He gave me a long sneer. “Three men in underground garage. Two in lobby. Two more on floors. Sabel Technologies headquarters in Columbia, eight armed guards wandering location. Ah, but Sabel Gardens, so many acres and so many trees.”
CHAPTER 14
On the flight back to Stavanger, all Yuri could think about was the general’s expertise with a switchblade. Slicing between ribs without the steel glancing off bone was a practiced skill. The placement had been perfect. Higher and it could’ve severed a vital artery or vein. Lower and it could’ve slashed the diaphragm or intestines. But Strangelove cut him deeply where it would do no permanent damage. It would leave him in pain, carrying a memory of who was in charge for weeks afterward. Every breath was unbearable, every movement excruciating. And every second filled with hate.
He held himself together with drugstore painkillers because he refused to seek help in Kaliningrad. But the agony finally overwhelmed him. He collapsed on arrival in Norway. Airport security sped him to the local hospital, where they worked to inflate a collapsed lung. After a couple of hours, they moved Yuri to a room to recuperate.
Yuri told the nurse to let Vasili in. Through the painkiller-soup of his mind, he grabbed his lieutenant’s wrist. The movement sent shockwaves of pain rattling through his body. “How did he find the keylogger? Did you tell him?”
Vasili turned away.
“I’m sorry.” Yuri let his lieutenant go. He took a deep breath.
“I told you it was a bad idea.” Vasili stared out the window.
“My country has betrayed me. My commanding officer has betrayed me.”
“Talk like that leads nowhere.” Vasili faced him. “Maybe one of the banda is a traitor? You picked only half of them. He sent the others.”
Yuri vetted them all, regardless of how they came to him. He tried to visualize each man, but the drugs swirled his focus and kept bringing him back to the ultimate betrayer. Strangelove.
What the hell was wrong with the old man? The general waited until Vasili was back in the room just to humiliate him. From the beginning, Strangelove talked only of sacrifice. Good soldiers are fully prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice. Over time, the general had extended the concept: anything—friends, family, even morality—could be sacrificed for the greater good.
Through his soggy mind, Yuri came to the slow realization of why he was stabbed. Why there were no written orders. No confirmation of Popov’s approval. Extra security sweeps of Strangelove’s office. That’s how the old man found his keylogger. Yuri and his banda were sacrificial lambs. They were to be sacrificed at the whim of political powers far away. Men in Washington and Moscow would one day come to an agreement that #HuntersFail must be avenged. The people must be given blood. Don’t get caught. If you do, do not worry. I’ll handle everything.
Indeed, the fat old general would do just that.
Yuri was done. Never again would he make sacrifices for Strangelove’s Motherland. He’d talked his men into murdering 365 Americans. Why? What outcome could possibly be worth it? Yuri and his banda took all the risks. And what did he get? Stabbed. He didn’t need Strangelove. He didn’t need Russia.
Yuri looked up quickly to see if Vasili was reading his mind.
His lieutenant stared at a TV screen in the corner. The American Presidential Debate was in progress. The three candidates stood at podiums. William Charles, the Democratic candidate, shook his head in disbelief as Roche expounded on unfounded conspiracy theories to explain why Hunter should be in jail. President Hunter cast a longing gaze at Chuck Roche. It occurred to Yuri that Hunter was in love with the billionaire—although he couldn’t be sure his assessment wasn’t due to the drugs they’d given him.
Yuri retreated back to his thoughts. There was only one way to get out from under the general’s command. Strangelove must die.
But to reach that goal, he had to earn the general’s trust. He had to crawl back into Strangelove’s good graces to be close enough. Or was this all a revenge fantasy that would go away when the drugs wore off? Maybe he should accept his Avos’ and let Strangelove stab him at will. He pushed his earbuds in and brought up the music app on his phone.
With thick fingers, he accidentally played a song that brought back memories from his childhood—Verdi’s Requiem, Dies Irae. He was innocent back then. Trying so hard to impress his mother. He played the oboe in the Moscow Youth Orchestra. It was quite an achievement just to be accepted. He pictured his smiling face looking up to his mother, desperate for her approval. She told him to keep practicing.
He switched songs. Annie Lennox poured her soul into Strange Fruit, the classic 1937 song protesting the lynching of African Americans. An appropriate lament for his mood.
Roman and his anarchist friends were right about going rogue. It was possible. After all, he’d kept several million dollars of Alexi’s ill-gotten gains in an offshore account. He alone knew it existed. He could use it to start something. Then one day he could be an oligarch like Yeschenko. He could tug the general’s leash. But first, the old man would have to give up his secrets. Why kill Sabel? Who is he? Could an enemy of Strangelove prove useful?
“He thinks he owns me.” Yuri clenched his fist.
“He knows he owns us.” Vasili turned from the TV. “We are soldiers. He is our commander.”
Yuri scowled at his lieutenant. Neither man spoke. Yuri calmed himself. Vasili was indeed the New Soviet Man. He would run to Strangelove at the first hint of mutiny. He could be turned in time, but only with great care and patience.
Yuri took a deep breath and let the jazz flowing through his head calm him.
They looked out the window and watched the city lights until a thought struck him.
“Why did he give us so much time to take care of Sabel?” Yuri frowned. “It doesn’t make sense. They’ve doubled our social media assignments. His superiors order new conspiracies by the hour.”
“Sabel owns a security company.” Vasili kept his gaze fixed on the debates. “He’s giving us time to come up with a plan.”
They thought for a moment to process their schedule.
“Go get our laptops. Bring them here. We should get started.”
Looking relieved to get out of the place, Vasili left. In his haste, he nearly knocked over the pretty waitress from Cirkus.
She carried a tray covered with a kitchen towel and stood at the door, shy and unsure what to say.
“Come in.” Yuri waved. “We’ve not met formally. What’s your name?”
“Andrine.” She blushed. “My father sent food.”
He relished her pronunciation: ahn-DREE-neh.
She lifted the tray an inch. He waved her in closer and pointed to a rolling stand. She set it down with a glance his way. He watched her every move. She wheeled the dinner tray to the bed and looked up again. She smiled quickly, then turned aside.
“I apologize.” Yuri knew he would never win her without taking a risk. He lowered his gaze. “The medication makes me forget my manners. You are quite beautiful, and so I stare shamelessly.”
Her face brightened, revealing a conflict between anger and pride. After thinking it over, she softened and removed the towel.
Yuri couldn’t believe it—homemade piroshki with salad. “There is a Russian in your family?”
“My mother.” She smiled. “She escaped in the ’80s.”
He felt like a child in her presence. Or was that the painkillers? He laughed at his thoughts and looked up to see Andrine watching him.
“I like your beard.” She blushed again and lowered her eyes. “I must go. I will come back for the tray.”
“Wait.” He felt his voice too harsh and softened it. “Tell me about you, Andrine. You are at university?”
“I graduated last year.” She lifted her face with pride. “University of Oslo. I
have a Masters in Human Rights.”
He ate his food and rolled his hand for her to keep talking.
“Someday I hope to champion the people oppressed by dictatorships.” She looked up at him quickly. “I don’t mean to insult your country.”
“You don’t like Vladimir Medevtin?” When she shook her head, he laughed. “Politics is your area of expertise, I will trust your opinion.”
“You approve of him?”
Yuri shrugged. “I did not choose Russia, I was born there.”
“Is that why you moved to Stavanger?” she asked. “Was it too hard?”
“What about you? Are you going to change the world from this fjord?” He took a big bite and waved her on.
“Stavanger is not in a fjord.”
He felt himself flush with embarrassment over his limited geographical knowledge. She was kind enough to look away.
“I had a job lined up with Amnesty International in London, but …” She stopped and looked out the window.
He waited and ate, but she didn’t continue. “Oh, is there a boy keeping you here?”
“No.” She smiled and then drooped. “I was too shy. Homesick before I left.”
“Surely you are ready to see the world, Andrine.”
“Have you seen the world?”
“Not Australia or Antarctica, but the rest of it.” He shrugged. “It’s nice.”
“Have you been to America?” She stepped to the bed and gripped the rail. “San Francisco?”
“Yes.” He laughed. “They’re crazy. The bridge is not golden—it’s red.”
“Did you like it? America?”
“The only problem with America—it’s full of Americans.”
She laughed and covered her mouth. Andrine paced back to the window and threw open her arms. “I want to see it all. Especially New York City and the Grand Canyon.”
He finished his food. “It would be a lucky man who would escort you—”
“I couldn’t find your other battery pack—” Vasili stopped three feet in the door, his eyes bouncing from Andrine to Yuri.
She grabbed the dishtowel, threw it on the empty tray, scooped it up, and fled.
For a minute, the two men stared at the empty doorway, hoping the young beauty would return. Then Vasili, several laptops slowly slipping out of his grip, staggered to the rolling table.
Yuri paid no attention to his lieutenant. He could still smell her perfume. Andrine. Andrine. The name evoked the scent of flowers in a child’s hand. An open meadow in the Urals.
“You’re going to abuse the barkeeper’s daughter?” Vasili opened one of the computers and booted it. “I liked the place, and now we can never go back.”
Yuri grabbed Vasili’s arm and squeezed hard. “Never speak of her like that again.”
Chuck Roche leaned around the jamb of the office door in Air Force One. “What the hell were you doing?”
Hunter looked up. “What are you doing here? Who let you in?”
“Wrong question.” He stepped around the corner and pointed at her assembled aides. “Everybody out.”
Hunter glared at him, then looked at her people. She snapped her fingers and pointed to the door. They filed out silently and closed the door. When they were alone, she stepped out from behind the desk and crossed her arms. “The press watches everyone who gets on and off my jet.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Chuck grabbed a decanter on the sideboard and dropped a couple ice cubes into a glass and poured himself a bourbon. “I told them I’m here to negotiate your surrender. They bought it.”
Hunter rolled her eyes before bringing them back to focus on the drink. She needed a drink.
“What the fuck were you doing in that debate?” Roche swirled the bourbon and ice. “You made me look like an idiot. We had a deal.”
“You were utterly unprepared.” She stepped in front of him. “What happened at your practice sessions?”
“You had a part to play.” His voice shook with rage. “You were supposed to go easy.”
“Keep it down.” She put her hands up and glanced over her shoulder at the door. “My staff knows nothing. They’d all quit.” She looked him over. “Tonight was about as easy as it gets, Chuck. If I went any easier, people would be asking questions. You have to prepare. Study. Read. Practice. Take this seriously.”
“Screw the debates. I’m not going to do them anymore. Nobody cares about that crap. I’m a genius at this presidential stuff. I could renegotiate all our treaties in a couple months. I’ll be the greatest president ever.”
“Of course you will.”
“Alan Sabel’s poking around the Russian business. They found Pozdeeva’s microdots. It’s only a matter of time before they decode it.”
Hunter gasped. “How do you know that?”
“I have sources.” He took a sip of bourbon and winced. “This is terrible stuff.”
“You’re not still connected to Popov, are you? Chuck, tell me you’re not talking to them.”
“Hell, no. I’m not stupid.” He set his glass down. “You should be worried about Sabel too, you know.”
“Don’t go near the Russians. You have to keep ten layers of separation from them.”
“I’ll do what I want.” He glared at her. “Quit fucking me on stuff like the debate.”
Hunter moved in closer and touched his arm. “Let’s not argue.”
“I’ll never marry you.” Roche pushed her away. “That was never part of the deal.”
Hunter away. “Don’t say never.”
CHAPTER 15
At the end of the long flight from St. Petersburg, Pia waited in the Gulfstream’s cargo hold for the pilot’s signal. More than an hour after midnight, he sent a short beep before he drove off the tarmac at Ercan Airport. Seven miles west lay Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus. They were on a mission to retrieve caches of evidence Dad had left behind twenty years earlier. Time and the pace of his rapidly expanding business empire had obscured locations and content, but he was convinced they would bury Roche. Pia just liked working with him.
Her father and Tania remained silent beside her in the dark. Pia wore the coveralls of an aircraft mechanic, her hair under a male wig and a t-shirt. Due to her height and build, it was easier to disguise her as a man—a fact she didn’t like but agreed to because the gypsy act had been too difficult. Tania wore a waitress’s dress. Alan dressed like a bum with five-day stubble.
The Major and the body doubles had long since left for the hotel as a decoy convoy to throw off any potential covert surveillance. Later they would provide backup for the operation.
Pia opened the hatch and hopped down. Tania and Alan followed right behind her. The facility looked almost abandoned at two in the morning. They found car keys behind the tire of the only car left in the lot, a Suzuki Ignis.
Pia and Alan squeezed themselves in. Without an inch to spare, their shoulders rubbed against the windows on one side and each other in the middle. After the Sabels raked their seats back, eliminating the backseat footwells, Tania climbed in crosswise in back.
They drove away on the dark, rural airport road. Two miles north across a dry, barren plain, they passed a small shopping mall. A car pulled onto the road behind them.
“Am I being paranoid, or did they not take the bait?” Pia asked.
“If they didn’t f-f-follow the Major, they’re smarter than w-w-we thought.” Tania sank below the rear window and loaded an assault rifle.
“You were right,” Dad said. “They anticipated my visit. That’s not good for Eleni. We must hurry.”
He raised his phone to take a selfie and used the camera to zoom in on the car behind them. “Four men, considerably larger than the average Cypriot male.”
Pia watched the mirror for a moment before taking the cloverleaf onto the main highway to Nicosia. The Mercedes sedan followed them. She downshifted, revved up the tiny engine, and accelerated halfway through the arc. As she expected, they matched her speed. She took it up anot
her notch, and they stayed with her. Her car banged over a pothole. Pia and Alan smacked their heads. The much faster Mercedes closed in, tailgating.
“Now?” Tania asked, her finger stroking her trigger.
“If we start shooting now, do they have backup?”
“Let’s shoot them and find out.”
“Let’s try bluffing first.” Pia swerved through a tiny opening in the tree-lined median and drove into a dark petrol station. Their pursuers were unable to make the turn but went to the next break in the median and came back.
Pia’s tires squealed around the large pumping islands built for tractor-trailers. She rounded the back of the empty building and slowed. Tania opened her door, rolled out, and disappeared into the dark.
Pia sped up. She rounded the next corner and slammed the brakes, bringing them headlamp-to-headlamp with their adversaries.
Two men, silhouetted by their brighter lights, held Kalashnikovs aimed at them. They were lightly dressed in clothing similar to the local farmers’ garb. No room for hidden weapons or body armor. Two more men remained in the car.
“Are they going to kill us?” Dad asked.
“Not yet.” Pia raised her hands. “You do the talking. My voice doesn’t match the disguise.”
The men with rifles motioned for them to get out. They complied. Alan stooped, keeping his head down, and pulled a few mangled and dirty euro notes from his pocket. Shuffling in his best approximation of a Cypriot bum, he moved toward them and held out the bills.
One of the men shouted something in Turkish. Alan shrugged and tried a pathetic look.
“Your ID,” the man said in heavily accented English.
They pulled out their wallets. Pia had to think about where it was before remembering the back pocket. She handed it to her dad to keep her polished nails from becoming too obvious.
The man looked them over, comparing pictures and people. He nodded at his companion. The pair jumped back in their car and sped off.
“Dad, are you OK?”
“How do you do it?” Dad’s knees were shaking. “I thought they were going to kill us.”
