Ivanov’s driver pulled to the curb outside a print shop, got out, and held the door. Alexi lumbered ahead to the shop, Ivanov following. The pair went past a deserted service counter and down a hall, passing a room crammed with six large copiers. Two thin harried-looking women were harvesting sheets of text spitting from the machines amidst the ear-shattering din. At the end of the hall the bulky chauffeur rapped twice on a door and ushered Ivanov into a back office paneled in cheap faux cedar.
Mysterious puppet master Leonid Shurkov proved a disappointment. After all the cloak-and-dagger business Ivanov had expected a glowering, menacing figure dressed in an expensive suit and wreathed in smoke. Instead, he got a squat, rotund, shirt-sleeved apparatchik with a bad comb-over. The wreath of smoke was there—the result of two chewed cigars smoldering in a mound of ashes in a glass ashtray. Shurkov, his ear glued to the phone, acknowledged his visitor with a quick wave while barking thick, Russian-accented English in his phone. Ivanov assumed the person on the other end of the conversation had displeased Shurkov by failing to complete an assignment. The call continued as if Ivanov and his minder did not exist.
Alexi shifted piles of paperwork from two weathered vinyl yard chairs to a corner of Shurkov’s groaning desk. The driver offered Ivanov one of the chairs and took the other. Ivanov sat, his eyes taking in the rodent’s nest.
Shurkov slammed the phone, concluding the call. He snagged one of the cigar stubs and puffed it back to life. “So, you are Dimitri Ivanov, one of Boris Levich’s young sharks, eh?”
“And finally I meet you, the renowned Leonid Shurkov. My boss sends his greetings.”
Shurkov leaned back, blowing smoke rings at a yellowed ceiling panel above his desk. “Good. And how is the old bandit? Is he well? Do not lie.”
“He is well.”
“Still feared and respected.”
“As always.”
“Do you know why you are here, Dimitri Ivanov?”
“I don’t need to know. I only need to serve Boris Levich in whatever way I can.”
Shurkov chuckled. “So young, so diplomatic.”
Ivanov kept his emotions in check, his eyes neutral, a hint of a polite smile showing.
His eyes on his visitor, Shurkov said, “What do you think, Alexi? Will Dimitri Ivanov carry out the mission the brothers in Moscow have burdened him with?”
The bull-necked man squirmed sideways to appraise Ivanov. “Perhaps. Surely Levich would not have sent a child to do a man’s work.”
Ivanov smiled, the driver’s insult ignored.
“Ah, he has a sense of humor,” said Shurkov. “He may need it, eh?”
Shurkov planted his elbows on the desk, propped hands under his ample chin, and narrowed his eyes. “So, Dimitri Ivanov, tell us what you know of your mission. Why does my friend Boris Levich send you all the way out here to California?”
Ivanov recited the briefing Levich had given him in Brighton Beach. “To find a certain book belonging to a certain man. My boss said you have sources that have traced the whereabouts of this book. He said the Brotherhood in the motherland wants it back. It belongs to them.”
“Good,” said Shurkov. “Do you know why it is important, this book?”
Ivanov shrugged. “No. I know only that my boss has been given the job of finding it and returning it to its rightful owners. This assignment he, in turn, has given to me. Why I have to come all the way out here is a mystery to me. And why you put me up in some shit hole is also a mystery to me.”
The sounds of the machines in the front room died down. A ceiling fan slowed. Ivanov heard Shurkov’s voice drop lower, taking on a more menacing tone.
“Arrogant pup. You know nothing. Listen carefully to me, Dimitri Ivanov. I tell you why this book is so important. And I tell you about a man who now has this book that does not belong to him. I will tell you who he is and where he can be found. And when you take the book from him you bring it to me. As for your accommodations…your shit hole, as you call it…do you know nothing of how to disappear among the people? Do you think you are some big New York man who can come in here without being noticed? No, you don’t think of these things. Your job is not to be seen, fool. Now, you listen to me. I explain to you how things are and what you are to do.”
For the next thirty minutes, Shurkov unraveled the mystery of the book for Ivanov. When he finished, he paused dramatically and asked a final question. “And when you have the book, what do you do to this man?”
Without hesitating, Ivanov said, “I will most certainly kill him.”
“Exactly!” Shurkov thundered, clapping his hands. “And for that you need a weapon, which you do not now have. Alexi will furnish this. You cannot fail, Dimitri Ivanov. Failure, as Americans so often say, is not an option.”
Shurkov pointed to his driver. “Alexi will be with you to see this is accomplished.”
On his feet, Ivanov returned Shurkov’s stare. “I prefer to work alone.”
Shurkov waved away the objection. “You have no say in this. Alexi is my eyes and ears. Remember, I have a stake in this as well. And thus Boris Levich has a stake also. You succeed, I succeed. Your boss succeeds. You fail, I fail…and Levich fails.”
Ivanov relented. “Of course. I know this. I only thought—”
“Ah, mistake number one. Do not try to think, just do. Alexi will be with you every step of the way. You can rely on him. You work for Levich, Alexi works for me. We all work for the Brotherhood, do we not? When you finish, hand over the book to Alexi. He will give you a return ticket and a token of my gratitude for your success.”
Shurkov came from behind his desk. Though not quite six feet, Ivanov loomed over the smaller man. Wagging a stubby finger in the air, Shurkov said, “We will not meet again. If you do your job right, I may not even read about it. Go with Alexi. Find this man who has the book, take it from him, and see that you give it to Alexi.”
Ivanov felt his patience fray. “And where do we find this man?”
“Did Boris Levich not tell you?”
“He only said to me that you had sources who knew about this book now being in California and that is why I had to come all this way.”
“Ah, only because your people missed their chance in Virginia Beach. There would have been no need for you to come this far if they had done their job correctly the first time.”
Ivanov bristled. “Those were not my people.”
“Nonetheless, they missed their chance.”
“I still don’t understand why your man Alexi here cannot find this book without my help. Surely you have others with ah, certain skills.”
“This is a favor I do for my old friend Boris Levich. He wishes to correct the mistake his people made. He must think highly of you to send you this way. Understand, Dimitri Ivanov, I don’t do this strictly for friendship, you see. It is in my interest to do this.”
“So, where do we find this man?”
“San Diego.”
Chapter 53
On the opposite coast, Verlov was thinning the ranks of potential rivals with grim efficiency. A week following Sergov’s execution, he caught two of Ivanov’s crew off-balance in a twenty-four hour Laundromat. The pair were lured by a phony drug deal too good to pass up and trapped by Verlov’s hired guns. Vasily Philipenko and Yuri Borkov, forced to kneel alongside a terrified patron at the rear of the business, were executed with a single shot at the nape of the neck. The witness bolted through a back door only to be brought down in the alley. Alerted by an anonymous caller, police arrived one hour later to find the unlucky customer sprawled by a Dumpster at the back of the business. A search of the Laundromat turned up two corpses—Philipenko and Borkov—stuffed like pretzels in industrial-sized dryers.
That night a panicked Sergei Helinski called Ivanov.
“Dimitri, bad news. Terrible.”
“Levich is dead?”
“No. Worse. Sergov’s dead. And Philipenko and Borkov. All dead.”
Ivanov groaned. Three of his c
rew wiped out. “Verlov?”
“Has to be.”
Fighting to recover, Ivanov said, “Does the boss know?”
“I can’t get to him. Nobody can get to him. He’s locked up tight.”
“No way to send word to him?”
“How? I can’t risk trying to see him. Verlov’s byki are now with the boss most days. They trade off with the old regulars. Anyone wanting to talk to Levich now has to go through Verlov.”
“I knew it. I told you not to let your guard down. I said Verlov would be making a run at you. I just didn’t think it would happen this quick.”
A whine in Helinski’s voice. “When do you come back?”
“I leave tomorrow to wrap up a job here before I can return. It may take me two days, perhaps three at the most.”
“Three days! That’s a lifetime, Dimitri. So what am I to do? There’s only me, Yuri, and Petor left.”
“You find a place to hide. Get out of town for a while. Disappear.”
Ivanov heard despair in Helinski’s voice. “If we do what you say, Verlov will tell Levich we’ve run out on him. You know how paranoid the old man can be.”
“I know. But you have no choice. I’ll fix things with the boss when I get back. It’s important that you not take on Verlov without me.”
“Maybe me and Yuri can take him when he’s over at Dagmar Danilev’s like you planned. It could work.”
“Don’t try it. You need me there, Andrei.”
An accusation. “And you ain’t here, are you?”
“Not by choice. You think I want to be here?”
“I don’t know what to do, Dimitri. I didn’t figure on this.”
“Do what I tell you. Get the guys and go to ground somewhere.”
“Yeah, but Verlov—”
“Fuck Verlov! You want to survive to fight another day, then you disappear now! You listening to me, Andrei?”
A pause. “Yeah, yeah. I hear you. Okay, I do it. Only you got to come back or we’re not gonna make it out alive, Dimitri.”
“I’m coming back. Don’t you forget. Wait until you’re somewhere safe before you call this number again. You talk to nobody but me, got it?”
“Just don’t take too long or there won’t be nothing to come back to.”
“I’m trying, Andrei. Just remember, leave Verlov to me.”
Chapter 54
After a prolonged breakfast at Reggie’s mom’s insistence, and promises to visit again soon, Wolf and Reggie got back on the highway. She drove, her usual chatter subdued after the tearful mother-daughter goodbye. Leaving Santa Barbara behind, they joined a serpentine stream of traffic battling coastal fog for an hour. Finally thinned by offshore winds, the clouds yielded, revealing a sparkling Pacific. The view brought back memories for Wolf. As a youth, he had driven this very road, exploring the coast for surf in a van filled with boards and adolescent tribal mates. All that behind him now, he still longed for the occasional reunion with graying acquaintances—longboarders like himself. Lost in his reminiscing he didn’t hear Reggie’s questions.
“Tom, have you heard anything I’ve said?”
“Thankfully, no. Just kidding. What were you saying?”
“Shame on you. I was asking about your visit with the writer. You never shared much with Mother and me.”
Wolf faced her. “Not much to say, really. I think he’s agreed to look into some of the information I furnished him. He’s going to check the validity of what I gave him.”
“You’re being evasive. That doesn’t answer my question.”
“That’s all I can say at this point, really.”
“But it’s a non-answer.”
“It’s the best I can do, Reggie.”
“You and Sam are so frustrating at times.”
“Reggie, you’ll have to ask Sam about all this when we get home. He knows more about what we’re doing than I do.”
“And what exactly are you two doing?”
“Fair enough. Without going into too many details, we’re trying to make sure Dan Colter didn’t die in vain.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize that was the purpose of your visit.”
“It was Sam’s idea.” A solemn Wolf stared at the road ahead. “That’s all I’m going to say about it for now. Good enough?”
Chastened, she nodded, her green eyes sympathetic.
After an hour fighting the sluggish LA pace, Reggie surrendered the wheel. Wolf drove the remaining miles to San Diego. Nearing home, Reggie took a call from McFadden.
“Hi, Sam. We’re twenty minutes out. Mother insisted we stay for a long breakfast. You know her. She hates to say goodbye. Were you worried?” A change in Reggie’s tone caught Wolf’s attention. “Oh, I see.” He took his eyes off the road to read her troubled expression. She handed the cellphone to him. “Sam wants to talk to you.”
Left hand on the wheel, Wolf pressed the phone to his right ear. “I’m here. Go ahead, Sam.”
It was Reggie’s turn to study Wolf’s face. Betraying nothing, he nodded, saying, “I understand. Yes. Roger that. Fill me in later.” He gave back the phone. “Sam wants to say goodbye.”
“Honey, anything wrong? Please tell me what’s going on.”
Wolf’s eyes darted from the road to Reggie and back again. He kept his expression neutral. No sense in panicking her, he thought. That’s Sam’s problem. Plenty of time for that later.
Reggie finished the call and turned to Wolf, her eyes pleading. “All Sam will tell me is that we have some sort of situation. He wants us to go straight home and meet him there. Why would he say that? What’s this about?”
Wolf tossed her a half-truth. “Seems those FBI agents want to come by the house and do a sit-down with me, maybe Sam as well.”
“Is this about Dan Colter? What’s your involvement?”
“When Dan and I were in Russia, we were assaulted in the airport while waiting for our connection to Tokyo. We think it was gang members who came after us. One of them had a knife and seriously wounded Dan. He ended up being taken to a Russian hospital where he died.”
“We saw the news reports,” she said. “And we saw that horrible phone video one of the passengers took. It was all over Fox and CNN.”
“Well, the whole episode left me with a lot of unanswered questions. I made something of a nuisance of myself with the State Department.”
“Sam said that. I’m sorry, Tom. Those details…I didn’t realize—”
“Don’t worry about it, Reggie. My guess is the feds want to interview me again. I’m hoping they have some news about why this went down.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s enough, isn’t it? I mean, it’s not every day I sit down with the FBI. I hope their coming by the house hasn’t upset you. I suppose we could ask them to move the interview to Sam’s office.”
“No. That’s fine. We’ll get through this. I’ll stay out of sight.”
“Don’t worry. You’re not part of this, Reggie.”
“Good. The whole idea makes me nervous.”
Certain she had bought the story, Wolf switched subjects. Avoiding her eyes, he said, “We’re almost there, Reggie. I don’t know about you but I’ve had enough time on the road to last for a while.”
Chapter 55
“Why are San Diego Police Department cars in front of our house?”
A uniformed officer spotted Wolf at the wheel of the approaching SUV and broke off a conversation with a colleague in a second squad car. The bareheaded cop strolled to the middle of the street and blocked McFadden’s driveway. Wolf eased to a stop and lowered the window.
“What’s this all about, officer?”
“Are you Mr. Wolf?”
“I am. And this is Ms. McFadden. Her husband is expecting us.”
The policeman said, “May I see some ID, please?”
Reggie stiffened. “That’s my house, Officer.”
Polite but firm, the cop held up a hand. “Just a precaution, ma’am.”
Wolf showed his license and waited as Reggie dug in her purse. After scanning both, the deputy waved them into the driveway.
“Probably just an escort for the FBI team,” said Wolf. “A professional courtesy.”
“You’re such a bad liar, Tom. There’s more to it than that.”
Wolf didn’t have an answer. He eased into the driveway next to an unmarked car. Reggie got out of the SUV. “That’s got government issue written all over it,” she said.
“I’ll get the luggage,” he said.
Once inside with the bags, he found Sam and Reggie locked in an embrace. McFadden broke away. “We’ve got company, Wolfman.”
Wolf set Reggie’s bags on the floor. “So I see. Where are the Hoover suits?”
“Poolside. I asked them to wait on the lanai. They’re here to see you. I’ll join you in a few minutes.” Arm around his wife, McFadden said, “Let me get Reggie settled.”
“Do that.”
“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?” she wailed.
Wolf didn’t wait to hear Sam’s answer. He went through the kitchen, grabbed a San Miguel, and went out to the pool. Two suited agents got to their feet, removed their sunglasses, and straightened their ties. The heavier of the two, a balding white male, thrust out a hand. “Agent Tom Smathers.” They shook hands. “My associate, Agent Larry Kutzler.” The second man, athletic, square-jawed, and serious, nodded at Wolf.
Wolf pulled up a chair in the umbrella’s shade. “Gentlemen. What can I do for you?” He took a long pull on the bottle.
Smathers said, “We’re helping out the State Department, Commander. Seems you’re a popular man back east. They say they’ve had a hard time getting hold of you.”
Another sip, the icy beer refreshing. “Judging from my emails, I’d agree. I’ve been away, busy. What exactly are we talking about here?”
“The incident in Moscow…and now this unfortunate turn of events here in San Diego.”
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