Cold Fire

by Dustin Stevens

  Lining the bottom of the package were two items of clothing, both double knit for warmth. The first was a simple black watch cap, a half-arc affair meant to cover the head and ears without coming down over the eyes. In my case it would also serve well in holding back my hair, keeping everything tucked away.

  The second was a long-sleeved polypropylene shirt, also in black, tightly knit for warmth from the biting cold wind. It would serve me much better on the move than the dress shirt and jacket I’d been wearing for two days, offering me better mobility and decreased visibility.

  “X, I owe you, friend,” I muttered, taking the phone up from my lap.

  The main line to the southwest headquarters was the same as it had been when I worked there five years before. Hutch had insisted that every field agent know it by memory, wanting it to be stored as few places as possible, despite the fact that it could be found using something as simple as a Google search. One at a time, I punched out the numbers, a small beeping sound resonating with each one, before bracing my back against the wall, my gaze aimed at the sliding door before me.

  If anybody was coming inside, there was no way they were coming through the window. With my left leg propped on the bench seat I was sitting on and the briefcase open on my lap, I kept my right hand wrapped around the handle of one of the Mark 23s, and the other hand kept the phone pressed to my face.

  Best guess, the local time was around two in the afternoon, making it somewhere between two and four in the morning in California, depending on my exact location. Just two weeks before I would have never dreamed of making a call any later than ten p.m., but now I dialed without thinking twice.

  Something told me the person I was looking to contact would be awake anyway.

  “Diaz,” she snapped, not a single trace of sleepiness in her tone. She sounded annoyed, her official voice on. The fact that she was at her desk and answering the phone explained both.

  “Hawk,” I said, a simple one-word statement. If she was surrounded by anybody, she could cut me off, say I had the wrong number, or just hang up the phone. If not, we could talk.

  There was a pause and a long sigh, followed by the moan of a door swinging closed, the latch catching and sealing it shut. The distinct sound of a lock being thrown also rang out, followed by her falling back into her chair.

  “Where the hell have you been?” she asked, suddenly sounding much more worn down, exhausted even.

  “I take it the raid didn’t yield a damn thing?” I asked.

  “Not really,” she replied. “By the time our guys figured out a location and we got there, they had cleared out. We found a couple of safes standing empty, a few trash can fires still smoldering with ashes, but not a hell of a lot we could use.”

  I processed the information, which was much the same as I had expected. “So enough to indicate you had the right spot, not enough to implicate anybody who might have been there.”

  “Exactly,” Diaz said. “We had two SEAL teams, a half-dozen agents from the office here, me, Hutch, all standing around looking at a bunch of nothing.”

  That, too, seemed to coincide exactly with what I had expected.

  “So where are you now?” I asked.

  “We seized the house and sent a tech crew through it. They’ve been there all day, that’s actually why I’m still on now. I’m expecting a call from them at any time.”

  I adjusted my weight and settled in against the wall, keeping the case leveled on my lap, my fingers resting atop the trigger guard. “They finding anything?”

  “Yes and no,” she said. “Traces of cocaine, drug residue everywhere. DNA evidence coming out the ass. Looks like the place could be anything from a brothel to a drug runner’s den, we just don’t know yet.”

  “Shit,” I muttered, shaking my head, the cold steel of the outer wall starting to pass through the suit coat and button-down I was wearing.

  “We went back and shook Juarez down again today,” Diaz said, “managed to get a couple more names out of him of distributors he didn’t give up in the initial case. We’re going to go after them first thing in the morning—but I have to be honest, at this point we don’t have a lot. The Russians seemed to have vanished.”

  My eyes went glassy as I stared at the door in front of me, for a moment almost wishing it would open and one of the Bloks would be foolish enough to step inside. The tips of my fingers went white as I pressed down on the handle of the gun, aching to slide it free and unload the magazine inside it.

  “So, where are you?” she asked again.

  Every part of me wanted to tell her. She had earned the right to know, and, more important, she had earned my trust. At the same time, there was no way to be certain the line we were speaking on was clear. More than once our plans had been leaked to the opposition. Last night’s fruitless raid was just one more example of that.

  I was too close to allow something so foolish to derail me.

  “I was in Russia this morning,” I said, “but didn’t find what I was looking for. I’m headed back to the airport now to catch a flight to Kiev.”

  Lying to her wasn’t something I was fond of, or even proud of, but it was a necessary evil. It coincided with the fake ticket Pally had purchased for me just a short time before, and it would provide continuity if anybody was listening.

  “Kiev?” she asked, obviously confused. “What the hell is in Kiev?”

  “I’m told that’s where the Krokodil is coming from,” I said. “I’m almost to the airport now, I’ll contact you whenever I know something more. Apologies for calling so late.”

  I could tell by the tone of her voice there were more questions she wanted to ask, but she picked up by my tone and my statement that the conversation was over. Very soon it would all make sense to her, but for the time being that was as much as I could divulge.

  “No apologies,” she said. “Keep me posted, and get your ass out of there if anything gets ugly. This isn’t your fight anymore.”

  Her choice of words brought an ironic smile to my face. Despite the fact that I was no longer an active agent, this was more my fight than anybody else’s on the planet. The Bloks and the Juarezes and whoever else might be affiliated had ensured that long ago. The fact that they sought me out years after the fact only served to reinforce it.

  “Right,” I said, my gaze hardening, my grip growing tighter on the phone in my hand. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  The guard watching over the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in America’s Arlington National Cemetery was trained to act on a very precise schedule. He began by taking twenty-one paces across the front of the tomb. A rubber mat, replaced twice a year, was laid out on the ground to keep the continual foot traffic from wearing a trench in the polished white marble. There was a twenty-one-second pause before the guard would turn, take the same number of paces in the opposite direction, and pause again.

  Years before, Sergey Blok had heard about this practice while watching a documentary on the Cold War. The program had been shot and edited by Americans, so the entire thing was little more than self-serving propaganda, but that lone piece of trivia had stuck with him.

  It surfaced now as he paced back and forth in front of his desk, waiting for Pavel and Viktor to arrive. Almost a full day had passed since their midnight retreat from the compound in Baja, twenty-four long hours of him waiting, assuming the worst, hoping it wasn’t as bad as feared.

  Twenty-four hours for the animosity, the resentment of his nephew, to stew and grow.

  At twenty minutes after the hour he spotted the 1938 Buick Town Car pull to a stop on the curb. His pacing ended halfway across the room, and he was drawn toward the window to watch from the second floor as both men piled out onto the sidewalk. The moment they were out of the car his driver sped away, his profile never once turning to face them, indicating the drive had been less than ple
asant for all parties.

  At first glance, Viktor looked disheveled, his steps uneven as he opened the front gate and headed toward the door. Behind him Pavel walked with both hands balled into fists, his standard-issue glower more deeply set than usual. He remained a couple of feet back from Viktor as they made their way forward. Sergey was almost able to visualize how much Pavel wanted to explode on his unwanted charge.

  Sergey waited until they were out of view before taking a seat behind his desk and waiting for them. He had given Anya explicit directions to remain out of sight for the morning, telling his butler to escort their visitors up the moment they arrived. At best the conversation that was about to take place would be heated, at worst a complete donnybrook.

  Given the circumstances, and what he’d just seen coming up the front walk, Sergey honestly couldn’t tell which outcome would be preferable.

  It took three full minutes for Pavel and Viktor to make their way up the stairs into his office, though the voice of Viktor long preceded them. Sergey could hear him stumbling around the house, bumping into items, his boots stomping against the hardwood floors. Repeatedly he berated the butler, calling for vodka and wine, demanding food after their journey. More than once Sergey wanted to jump up from his chair and go storming down the stairs after his nephew, but forced himself to remain in place. There was already enough bad word of mouth surrounding the Bloks out there, and he could ill afford to add to it by rumors of family infighting.

  If something needed to be done, it would be done quietly, far away from any curious eyes or ears.

  Pavel was the first to enter, knocking softly on the door to the office and waiting for permission from Sergey before pushing through. He walked in and stood to one side of the desk, every muscle in his body coiled, a mountain of pent-up rage, his entire being strung as tight as a guitar string.

  “Good morning, sir,” he said, his hands balled up and resting atop his thighs. He glanced down at Sergey just a moment before shifting his gaze to the wall above him, his jaw clenched.

  A moment later Viktor spilled in, the smell of booze hanging around him like a cloud. A black dress shirt hung untucked from his skinny frame, a rumpled black trench coat over it. His hair was disheveled and his eyes bloodshot, and he looked to still be entrenched in a bender several days in the making.

  “Uncle,” he said, coming to a stop beside Pavel, and running both hands back over his scalp, attempting to force his hair down into some form of normality.

  Sergey could feel contempt well within him as he stared at his nephew before shifting his attention to Pavel. From this point forward the young Blok was nothing more than a liability, a hazard to be hidden out of sight at all times, kept away from any serious business discussions. His handling of Baja the last few months had long had Sergey leaning in that direction, but his appearance this morning, his physical state, had sealed the decision.

  “How was your trip?” Sergey asked.

  Pavel pushed an angry breath out through his nose, a simple gesture meant to relay his displeasure, before nodding. “We arrived safely. Thank you for making the arrangements.”

  Reading between the lines, Sergey could surmise that Viktor had been a pain in the ass from the minute they left.

  “Were there any problems?”

  “No,” Pavel said. “The arrangements were clean, our identities never questioned, in Mexico or in Hong Kong.”

  Sergey nodded. His question had been aimed more to let Pavel know it was okay to speak freely about Viktor, but knew his enormous employee would never do so, mindful always of the pecking order.

  “What happened in Mexico?” he asked. Already he had received multiple reports on the incident, complete overviews covering everything from the evacuation to the apprehension by enforcement officials. He wasn’t as much interested in what the men before him had to say as to see his nephew’s reaction.

  The politics of a family business meant that he couldn’t simply pluck away a problem person like a weed and cast him aside so that the rest of the organization could grow. He had to set a trap, allow for the individual to do something foolish, to overstep boundaries, to do something that would cause the other family members to excuse the action.

  His brother had been gone the better part of a decade, succumbing to cancer long before his time. In his stead his wife, Sergey’s sister-in-law, controlled their interest in the organization. To simply do away with Viktor, no matter how warranted the action might be, would be a stroke of disrespect to both his sister-in-law and his brother’s memory.

  “When word came in that the DEA was coming,” Pavel said, “we followed the protocol you laid out for us.”

  Beside him, Viktor raised a hand, taking an uneven step forward toward the desk. “What happened was the first time a little trouble showed up, we tucked our tails between our legs and ran away like cowards.”

  Sergey felt a flush of heat rise to his cheeks, noticed Pavel’s fists grow a little tighter, but kept his attention on Viktor. “And how would you have handled the situation?”

  “Like a man!” Viktor bellowed, stepping forward and pounding the side of his fist down on the desk. The combined sounds of the outburst rang through the office, setting Sergey back an inch, pulling Pavel closer, ready to pounce should the need arise.

  Bitterness flowed into the back of Sergey’s throat, the taste acerbic on his tongue, as he regained his bearings, staring back at Viktor. His mind shifted to the .38 revolver stowed in the top drawer of his desk, within easy reach, almost daring him to draw it and take aim. For just a brief moment he allowed himself to envision the sight of his blood-spattered nephew flying backward through the air, landing in a heap on the floor as the last little bit of air wheezed from his lungs.

  “Are you saying I am not a man?” Sergey asked, letting the rage show in his voice.

  Again Viktor pounded his fist down on the desk, the deep boom sounding out in the room. “I’m saying we should have fought! We built this business by taking what was ours, not running and hiding! Not asking for permission!”

  Unable to stop himself, Sergey rose to his feet, pressing both fists down into the top of his desk, prickly heat running the length of his body beneath his maroon track suit, sweat threatening to burst through at any moment. His eyes receded into tiny beads of black, his head glistening beneath the overhead light.

  “Listen right now, you little shit,” he spat, “we didn’t build a damn thing. I built this business from the ground up, forty-five years of toiling away, day after day, to make this what it is. You haven’t done anything. If it was up to you, this whole thing would have gone down in some Wild West showdown last night.”

  “No, Uncle,” Viktor said, leaning forward, his posture matching Sergey’s, “my father built this into what it is. He was the driving force. Since his death, you’ve done nothing but tread water.”

  “Tread water? Are you an idiot?” Sergey spewed back at him, spittle hanging from his bottom lip, dripping onto the desktop beneath him. “Who do you think the architect of Krokodil has been? This stuff would have been on the streets years ago, but your father wouldn’t hear of it.”

  Viktor’s face twisted itself up into a mask of self-righteousness and rage. “No! That is not true. It was all his idea to begin with—it’s just taken you this long to do anything with it.”

  “You want to call us cowards?” Sergey said, leaning forward farther, continuing the attack. “The only coward here was your father, replaced now by you.”

  There were no more words between them. In one swift movement Viktor snatched his right hand up from the desk and swung it across Sergey’s face, his fingers connecting with cheek, the sound of skin slapping against skin ringing out in the room.

  The blow stunned Sergey a moment, his body snapping back more from surprise than pain. He could feel the outline of Viktor’s hand on his face, the spot tingling with each beat o
f his heart. His jaw dropped open as Viktor loomed before him, finger stretched out, pointing toward his chest.

  This was the moment he’d been waiting for, the opportunity he had hoped might present itself since they first arrived. He wasn’t expecting an actual physical assault, though that worked just as well as anything he could have imagined.

  Rotating his head at the neck he turned to Pavel and nodded once, a short upward movement no more than an inch or two in length. A look of unbridled pleasure passed over the cross features of the enormous man, his right hand appearing beside his shoulder and driving itself forward, a quick, spring-loaded action practiced thousands of times over the years.

  The shot caught Viktor just behind the temple, Pavel’s massive fist covering most of his victim’s head. Sergey watched as the light blinked out of Viktor’s eyes, as his face went blank, as his entire body fell slack. Head and shoulders leading the way, his form was lifted into the air, hanging a long moment before collapsing onto the floor, contorted into a heap. There was no sound from him once he hit, no movement of any kind.

  Sergey circled his desk and stared down at his nephew. His intentions were never to get physical with the young man, but Viktor himself had broken that barrier first. Even better, he had done it in front of a witness. Sergey could now bring his nephew home, stash him far away from the front lines, and there was nothing anybody could say against him.

  He shifted attention up from the unmoving pile of black clothing, the smell of blood and vodka in the air. “I bet that felt good, didn’t it?”

  The corners of Pavel’s mouth peeled back in a stilted smile that looked out of place on his face. “I have been waiting years to do that.”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  All told, it took just over ten hours for the Trans-Siberian train to deliver me from Moscow to Vladivostok. The farther into my journey I got the less crowded the train became, and I spent the final two hours with just a fraction of the original crowd. Most riders got off at a small town not far from the big city, using the firmenniy as a form of modified commuter rail. Along the way we picked up a handful of strays here and there, but it was readily apparent even to me that the destination was a far less attractive place to be than the origin.