by Tim Heath
That was bad.
Alex had been on the edge of St Petersburg the last time they’d heard from him. He was with Phelan, someone Alex had agreed to get into Russia, but he had continued to travel on with the former Irish terrorist to help him get into position. Phelan was there to assassinate the Russian President, a man who had been in power for less than five months and yet was already an enemy to so many.
The world was not fully aware of the danger of the new president, something of which the two agents knew about only too well.
“What does Gordon have?” Sasha asked, referring to Gordon Peacock, who headed up the technology side at MI6. He’d been a long-term friend and support for all three agents and had been the man to initially hand Alex their first significant lead into Russia. Now that same man had been tasked with trying to locate where Alex was inside that vast nation.
“He’s working on it. Cracking the Russian satellites is proving harder than he expected. We don’t have any British ones available to use,” Anissa said. In any case their mission was not sanctioned by MI6. They were doing this under their own steam, operating way outside the lines of legality, but things had escalated well beyond their control.
The West was celebrating the end of Putin, someone they feared, and someone they thought was hell-bent on world domination and his own agenda. Anissa already feared that the new man in power was a ten times greater threat. She wasn’t going to have the wool pulled over her eyes, nor was Sasha. And worst of all, it seemed Filipov had something on their own DDG at Vauxhall House, Anissa certain Bethany May was passing information to the Russians. To the Russian President himself.
They’d not been able to track what was being passed, nor gain evidence beyond the unauthorised calls, the cameras going offline and May herself accessing areas of the system that she shouldn’t have been allowed to do alone. But the disappearance of Alex on Russian soil––by themselves the Russians wouldn’t have known he was even there––was further proof of a leak. And Anissa was confident that she knew who that leak was.
Maybe Alex should have taken the job when offered the post himself? The position of the Deputy Director General had been Alex's to turn down, and he’d done that so as not to end his active service days, nor his partnership with Anissa. Some partnership, Anissa thought. She herself was banned from travelling to Russia, so had never been considered to go with Alex, nor was it official or legal anyway. Plus the involvement of Phelan made it too risky.
Alex had volunteered for the mission. Anissa only now understood why. Alex was heartbroken, reeling from Anastasia, his Belarusian lover’s apparently genuine rejection of him. Yet since then Anastasia had come to Anissa with a pile of evidence incriminating her husband. Dmitry Kaminski, Anastasia’s husband, was now being held in custody as preparations were made to bring him to trial. Bail had been denied. Kaminski was deemed too much of a flight risk. There was no way the British were going to allow this particular Russian to escape before a trial. Anissa knew there was more than enough to convict the man for a very long time. It didn’t matter how good a lawyer Kaminski would pay for––and he could afford anyone––the man was guilty.
Anastasia had done that for Alex. Yet Alex was gone. Anissa was yet to confirm this to the Belarusian. She’d been postponing that part for as long as possible, desperate to hear back from Alex. Hopeful that soon the deafening silence would be broken. Maybe he’d needed to drop all communication devices, perhaps heading to the border at that moment?
There was no news from Russia about the President, however. Nothing to suggest Filipov was dead, nothing to indicate an attempt had been made. What did that mean? Did it prove they’d been caught?
The longer it all went on, the more Anissa feared. She didn’t need Sasha to point out all the dangers that awaited a rogue MI6 agent in Russia, but he told her anyway. Sasha was very concerned himself.
Gordon poked his head round the door of their shared office.
“Anything?” Anissa said, looking up with hope etched onto her face, though that soon vanished.
“Not what you are after, but I have more on the BMW case.” That was their codename for the search into their own DDG––the Bethany May Witch-hunt.
“Show me,” Anissa said, Gordon passing some printouts he had in his hands. It showed call logs going back several months, the calls to the same unregistered number starting the week Bethany began in her new post. None were originating from Vauxhall House from before the date May arrived in her new role.
“It’s certainly damning,” Anissa said, her mind racing to the next logical question, though Gordon passed her another sheet of paper. He’d already thought of it.
“Similar calls were made from the building where she used to work. I even have one from her home address. There is no question, it is her making these calls.”
Sasha had filled them in on what technology these calls were likely linked to, having come across it in his time with the FSB. They were unhackable voice recorders. The initial call was only to get into the system. Another number would then be needed to leave a specific message. That number did not show up on the call logs. Without it, there was no way of accessing who the call was for; who was listening at the other end. Anissa was sure it was Filipov, the President.
“We have her,” Anissa said, jumping ahead of herself, as the evidence wasn’t as damning as Anissa was making out. It proved something was going on but didn’t give anything specific, and it was only on Sasha’s word that such devices were used in Russia. Gordon had not personally come across anything like it himself. So he wasn’t sure how much damage the printouts could do. They indeed pointed to the DDG, and people in these roles were under extra scrutiny, but they were also highly valued and protected. If you went for them and got it wrong, you were out. Gordon knew that they needed caution. Their careers depended on it.
“What do you think?” Gordon asked, looking at Sasha who had remained quiet.
“It certainly gives you just cause for looking into her, but we need more. From what I understand of your system here, this isn’t enough to expose her.”
“Not enough?” Anissa said, a little put out and clearly deflated by Sasha’s comment. She thought she could have counted on him for his encouragement.
“Anissa, if we flag up this information without anything more, we risk losing the chance altogether,” Gordon said. “We risk her cutting us loose for being out of line. We risk a cover-up. We risk everything.”
“But she’s making calls to the bloody Russian President right from inside this very building!”
“That’s what we believe, Anissa, but these printouts do not show that. They just show calls to a wrong number. When dialled, and until the correct code is entered, the call doesn’t connect, the tone indicating to anyone calling that no number has been recognised.”
“But it’s not a wrong number! Who calls the same wrong number multiple times across months and years?” Anissa said, but she could see she was fighting a losing battle with these two. She missed Alex all the more at that moment. She was confident he would have backed her, the pair having worked together for well over a decade. They had great chemistry, all professional, nothing more. Anissa was happily married with two sons she loved deeply. But she had tremendous respect for Alex and had been happy when he’d turned down the position of becoming the new Deputy Director General of MI6. Despite that, she couldn’t help but think that if she had put her feelings aside, if she had given him encouragement to take the post, they wouldn’t be in their current position. Alex would be in the UK, and the Russian President would not be receiving information directly from the British Security Service. Bethany May wasn’t the first high profile spy to be leaking to the Russians. Sadly, Anissa doubted she would be the last, either.
That only highlighted what they needed to do. Filipov had his finger in too many pies, people placed in deep cover for years already, usually people with secrets that Filipov had come across. That was how he’d got Phelan firmly c
aught in his web. Filipov the spider had closed in for the kill then offered a way out at the last minute. Work for me and your troubles are over. Except, they never were. Now he had a way of making you dance to his tune. Bethany May was just another fly caught in the Russian oligarch’s––now President’s––web.
“We have to find out what Filipov has on her,” Anissa said, her mind thinking like an agent again, and pushing aside her disappointment with what she’d just been told about the lack of evidence.
“Sorry?” Sasha said, not following the change of topic.
“It’s how Filipov works. We know what he had on Phelan, why he made him do what he did. A secret so powerful, he was able to control and twist the Irishman to do his dirty work. That only worked because Phelan had something he couldn’t risk losing.”
“His family,” Sasha said, catching up fast.
“Exactly. And a huge skeleton in his past, that no one else, it seems, besides Filipov, knew about.”
“And he has something on the DDG?”
“It’s the only logical conclusion,” Anissa finished. It was possible that she was just a Russian sympathiser, a deep-rooted mole of some kind, though that sort of connection or possibility would have been flagged much earlier in the process, and also wasn’t the way Filipov seemed to work. Filipov needed a stick to beat the horse with, the threat of a whip to strike terror into his subjects. It was how he operated, they’d seen that now. Anissa was certain that Bethany May was hiding something. If they were able to find that out, and therefore hold the same power over her, it was possible they would then be able to get the evidence they needed, or at least sever the link.
Anissa dropped the papers on the desk. Deciding how to catch their DDG did nothing to the current situation with Alex. For all she knew, Alex was relying on them to find him and get him out alive.
“We must now focus on finding Alex though,” she said, bringing the other two both back to the main priority at that moment.
“I have people working on it, and we can speak to the Americans if needed, but if we do it will come back. They’ll have to confirm it with the top.”
“Which we can’t allow to happen,” Anissa said, aware they’d hit that roadblock before. For the first time, she wondered if they’d made a huge mistake in going after Filipov. It had to remain a secret, had to stay a black-op known to a very few. Alex’s disappearance, however, would soon be noticed. Explaining that away was not easily done.
“I’ll leave you to it, and I’ll get back to the screens. If I hear anything, I’ll let you know straight away.” Both Anissa and Sasha thanked Gordon as he left the room. Now it was just the two agents again.
“He’ll be okay,” Sasha said, taking Anissa’s hand into his. He could see the fear and concern on her face.
“I know he will,” she replied, though her eyes showed doubt. Sasha’s eyes did too.
3
Peterhof Palace, St Petersburg––Russia
It had been a day of meetings for the Russian President. For the first time since winning the election, he was to the south of St Petersburg at a palace built by Peter the Great. It wasn’t a visit that had been announced, though indeed a few had known about it.
The British had known. And had it not been for the early warning coming through from Bethany May, they might have succeeded in what they had attempted to do.
As it was, the President had been in no great danger. Rad had seen to that. As Svetlana Volkov walked the empty corridors of that beautiful building––the whole house and gardens closed off to the public for two days already, much to local complaints––Filipov was holding the first of several meetings.
Outside, in the grounds and less than one kilometre from where they were, a team of men were collecting a body, another team having captured another man as he fled the scene. The vehicle had been searched, but it was clear from what they saw, and what they’d been told, that it was just the pair of them. The danger had been contained. Both teams were coming back towards the building as Svetlana got to the door where Filipov was addressing a group of politicians based in St Petersburg. The President was there to assess whether to keep them in place; did they show loyalty to his new way of doing things, or were they to be removed from office and a new set of people brought in? People that Filipov knew and trusted. People who would do precisely what he asked them to.
Svetlana poked her head round the door. Filipov had been expecting that interruption at some point, just not that soon. Those gathered, the men especially, were eager to see the actress who’d laid down that aspect of her life, it seemed, to work for the new President. She was also one of the most beautiful women in Russia, and indeed the most famous. She still had it.
“It’s contained,” she said, looking across to Filipov and ignoring the other men in the room, all of whom were looking her way. She had a splendid figure. Filipov looked up from the table.
“Gentlemen, please excuse me for a moment,” he said, standing and leaving the room, Svetlana vanishing back behind the door as quickly as she’d appeared.
Once outside, the door shut behind him, Filipov led the way down the corridor.
“I hadn’t expected it to be so soon,” he said, his words fast, slightly faltering, but his resolve hardening with every step. The fact they’d actually come for him, actually put something in place to assassinate him, was all the more concerning. He would give them hell to pay for taking such a move. He would expose everyone involved.
“Rad killed one, as ordered, and the men detained the other,” Svetlana said, though Filipov expected nothing less, given the circumstance, given his orders, still reeling a little from the fact it had already happened.
“Where is the body?” he asked. He had to be sure.
“This way,” Svetlana said, now taking the lead, the building empty but for those he’d just left behind in the meeting room. The grounds, however, were crawling with security. His men had done an excellent job.
“And Rad?” Rad was Russia’s best sharp-shooter, a sniper with a record unequalled by anyone in modern-day Russia, but someone kept under wraps for that very reason.
“He was packing away the last I heard, due to leave anytime soon. Did you want to see him?”
Filipov obviously thought about it for a moment, silence filling the corridor, only the sound of their feet on the stone. “No, let him go. You can pass on my congratulations when this is all tidied away.”
Svetlana reached the door to the storage room. “It's in here.”
Filipov opened the door, the room filled with boxes and merchandise around the edge, but in the middle there was a table and on the table, a body. Filipov recognised the familiar face of a man he had once employed. It was Phelan.
The President went over to the table, looking down into the face of the man he’d once discovered, the man he’d used on many occasions to carry out his plans. The man with a huge secret, which Phelan had assumed was buried and forgotten until Filipov’s team uncovered it.
There was not a mark on the body apart from the clear bullet hole in the forehead. Death would have been instantaneous. The sheet that had been put on the table underneath the body was stained red, especially around the head. Filipov didn’t need to see to know there would be a sizeable chunk missing from the back of Phelan’s skull, a weapon of the calibre that Rad had used undoubtedly leaving an impression on exit, even when the entry was so accurate and neat.
“Get this cleaned away. No one is to know. Burn the body, destroy all paperwork, scrap the car. This never happened, okay?”
“Of course,” Svetlana said, though she knew that was how it would be. Filipov preferred to fight his battles behind the scenes rather than in the open. He would certainly make those who were responsible pay for what they had attempted.
“And the agent?” Filipov asked. “Where is he?”
“We have him at the end of the corridor, in the security office. It was the most secure room available.” She led the way.
; Two men stood on duty outside the room, both stepping to one side as Svetlana approached, the President a few paces behind her. She opened the door. Inside, two more men were standing a few feet from Alex, both with marks on their faces of having been in a fight––Alex had apparently tried to evade capture––but that was nothing to how the MI6 agent looked. Filipov took in the man’s clothes, ripped and stained. There was both blood and dirt, and his trouser legs were dripping water.
“He made it to the water before the men caught up with him. Put up quite a fight, too,” Svetlana said. She would only mention the two men who were currently on their way to the hospital at a later point, once their condition was known.
Filipov grabbed Alex by the hair, forcing him to look up at him, the agent previously slouched in his chair. Alex was chained to the chair at both wrists as well as his ankles being secured to the legs of the chair. Alex had two black eyes, a cut on his cheek and a split lip. If that had happened in the capture, it had been some struggle. Filipov wondered if they’d gone to work on him since. It would certainly get a lot worse for Alex, Filipov was now determined.
“Alex Tolbert, of MI6,” Filipov said in English. Alex was conscious, his eyes open, but he wasn’t going to speak. Alex would let them have their fun, let them say their piece, but wouldn’t dignify them with his own pleading or fear. He needed to remain strong. “I’ve just seen the body of Phelan, his brains blown out by my man,” Filipov started. Alex knew Phelan was dead, he’d been right there. “But I wanted you alive, for now. That’s why I ordered my man to only take out the Irishman. You, however, are another thing altogether. A British spy, caught in the act of an attempted assassination, together with a terrorist who had no reason to be in this country. I’ll make sure this destroys the lot of you. You have no place in Russia, you don’t understand my country, and you certainly can’t be allowed to influence it,” he said, punching Alex in the face with such force that the chair was knocked to one side. Alex hit the floor hard but had been expecting the impact, preparing himself as best he could. Still, his already painful face was hurting even more. The two men lifted Alex and his chair back up, placing the agent once again before the President. Filipov’s anger had subsided a little, the punch allowing him to release some of the pent-up rage that had been rising, ready to explode, since Svetlana had poked her head around the door minutes before and confirmed the worst.
