Rasputin's Shadow

by Raymond Khoury

  He just didn’t know what.

  It was enough to persuade him that he had to get the damn meat wagon and take it somewhere quiet so he could look at it properly. Maybe even take the whole thing apart if he needed to. Luckily, he had lied to the feds about where he’d left the van. Not through luck, actually. It was more like second nature.

  A second nature that was kicking into gear and baying for blood.

  ***

  KOSCHEY WAS DUMBSTRUCK.

  The eye drops had done the trick. Just as they had many times before.

  Sokolov had told him everything. And it was way beyond what Koschey had read in the brief the general had sent him.

  As he sat there facing Sokolov, he felt exhilarated. The man sitting across from him was a bona fide genius. Not in the sense that people used it these days. Koschey hated that. It was a term that was grossly overused, especially in the West. Everyone was a genius there when, by any reasonable standard, they were not even remotely so. But Sokolov certainly was. And what he’d achieved made Koschey’s head spin.

  It also fired up his own brand of creativity in all kinds of ways.

  There was huge potential here. Opportunities to be exploited. Plenty of them. Taking Sokolov back to Russia, back to his superiors, as per his assignment—maybe that was no longer the best play.

  He needed time to think. To plan. To strategize. He knew that this was the opportunity he’d been waiting for. This was his chance to even the score. To make things right. To slam down his two-faced comrades in a way that they’d never forget.

  Sokolov had handed him something unique. Something that could achieve all kinds of things for all kinds of people. People who would be willing to reward such achievements very, very generously. People Koschey knew and had done business with in the past.

  The best part was that right at the moment, no one else knew what he had. Sokolov had guarded his secret well. Not even his wife knew about it. The Americans certainly didn’t know about it. And the general and the select few back at the Center and the First Directorate who knew about Sokolov’s work were way behind the curve. Decades behind. What Sokolov had achieved back then was already staggering. What he’d done with it since was nothing short of astounding. Koschey reveled in his handlers’ ignorance. His contempt for them only bloomed when he imagined them back in Moscow, at the Center, all smug and self-important and drowning in corruption while being clueless about what he had just uncovered.

  Which meant he had a free hand. A free hand for the foot soldier to turn into the kingpin.

  But before anything, there was a major hitch he needed to address.

  He could see Sokolov’s eyes flagging—subjects who’d been administered SP-117 fell into a prolonged, deep sleep after their interrogations. And he needed one more piece of information from Sokolov before he allowed him to drift off.

  He reached out and clasped Sokolov’s chin tightly in his hand, forcing him to focus on him.

  “Tell me more,” he told Sokolov, “about this ‘Jonny’ and where I can find him.”

  37

  Jonny turned left off Crocheron onto 169th Street and slowed his Kawasaki down to a crawl. He circled the entire half block at walking speed, scanning left and right for any sign of cops, and saw none.

  The van was still where he’d left it—parked in an alleyway behind the tree-lined suburban street, the rear license plate backed against a wall and the front one hidden by a Dumpster that he’d pushed against it. He hadn’t wanted to drive across the bridge or through the tunnel in the van, not with its partly spiderwebbed windshield or its other assorted bullet holes. He figured that if there hadn’t already been an APB out for the van before his conversation with the feds, there had to be one now.

  He needed to get the van off the street, fast.

  He was also eager to see what made it so special to Sokolov. But that would have to wait. Regardless of how desperate he was to flick the metal switch and see what would happen, this wasn’t the place to fire up a siren that was so loud it required ear protection.

  He chained his bike to a solid iron fence at the mouth of the alley, then walked back and rolled the Dumpster away from the front of the van.

  He climbed inside and started the engine.

  His first thought was to find somewhere around the mess of access roads where the Cross Island and Grand Central parkways met by Alley Pond Park, but he immediately dismissed the idea. Although the traffic noise would mask the sound of the siren—or whatever the hell it was—he knew there were traffic cameras there and he couldn’t afford to be spotted.

  The other option was much better. His gang had a warehouse off Powells Cove Boulevard, close to the water. There were no houses on the block, just a lumberyard on one side and a waste-management company on the other, both of which would be deserted at this time of night. He also knew there were no cameras at all on the side of the lumberyard that faced Long Island Sound.

  He set off, and given how late it was, the streets were empty. He was there in no time.

  He parked the van alongside the graffiti-covered warehouse and gazed out across the water. If the siren was seriously loud, it might even be mistaken for a boat’s foghorn. Certainly, unless they were standing right next to the van, no one would suspect the battered white panel van with the refrigeration unit bolted to the top. Besides, the place was quiet as death.

  He gazed at the button for a long time, then without further thought, grabbed a pair of ear protectors, slipped them on his head, and flicked the switch.

  Nothing.

  Not even the faint sound of a siren.

  Only total quiet.

  He pulled off the headphones.

  Still nothing.

  He flicked the switch back to off and shook his head.

  He could feel a headache coming on. Little wonder, considering the way things had gone since Sokolov had come to see him two days earlier. And now his blood brother, the boyfriend of a cousin who was more than a sister to him, was dead, and he was in the crosshairs of the feds. Now that his brother was no longer running things, Jonny was supposed to be keeping everything ticking over while his boss was in Miami, not dragging the gang into an unwanted spotlight.

  He cut himself a couple of lines and snorted them. One of the benefits of being so high up the supply chain was near-constant access to high-grade product, and this was certainly a privilege he didn’t want to lose.

  He took a few breaths and let his heartbeat go back to normal after the initial hit of the powder.

  The whole thing was ridiculous. Surely the switch had to do something.

  He had the key in the ignition and there was definitely power to the electrics.

  Then he realized that he still hadn’t looked properly inside the van’s main compartment. He’d been so preoccupied—first with Sokolov, then with his wife—that he hadn’t even opened the back for a good look.

  It was time to remedy that.

  He climbed out of his seat, opened the cabin door, and squeezed through the narrow doorway.

  The rear compartment was neat and tidy. It was lined with a hard white plastic surface, like the inside of a fridge. It was mostly empty, apart from a big metal storage box that was bolted to the cabin’s floor. Along the opposite wall were four low black boxes that were also firmly attached in place. These looked like old PC towers, but they seemed new and had small panels with red and green LEDs and digital displays on them. A thick but tidy stream of wires linked everything. More wires ran up the inside of the van and into the refrigeration unit, while others disappeared into the base of the partition behind the driver’s position.

  The storage box was secured by a bar and a large padlock, but there was no key for it on the van’s key ring.

  Jonny left the van and went looking for something with which to force the padlock.

  It didn’t take long. A length of rebar was lying on the ground about twenty feet away, probably from the waste-management yard.

  He brought i
t inside the van and used it to bust the padlock. On the third attempt and to the soundtrack of him cursing out loud in Korean, it popped open.

  The box was stuffed with elaborate electronic gear. It was like some kind of mega-stereo that someone had built themselves, a metal rack covered with dials, meters and sockets. An abundance of wires crisscrossed between them.

  Apart from a laptop secured to the top of the stack, he had absolutely no idea what any of it was. Whatever it was, it was complicated.

  After a few minutes spent staring at the boxes’ contents and trying to divine what they were there for, he decided to bring in an expert.

  He took out his cell, dialed, and waited.

  A sleepy voice answered.

  “Shin,” he said, “get your ass over to the chop shop. There’s something you need to see.”

  38

  I was back at Federal Plaza, feeling on edge and antsy. Not a great feeling, especially when it’s coming up on one in the morning and I’m still at the office instead of annoying Tess with my alleged snoring.

  On one level, it felt like the game had been played out, and we’d lost. Our mystery Russian—who we’d all started referring to as Ivan—had Sokolov and had pulled back into the shadows. Maybe that was it. Sokolov seemed to be what Ivan was after. Now that he had what he wanted, maybe they were gone for good. But if so, it left a lot of unanswered questions. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t help feeling that this was just a lull before the real storm.

  As you’d expect, everyone was burning the midnight oil on this. We’d had three incidents with a total of eleven deaths in less than seventy-two hours. No one was going home just yet. I’d texted Tess to say I didn’t know when I’d be back and not to worry. That last bit was, of course, kind of pointless. By now, she knew it meant we were dealing with something seriously nasty and worrying was entirely reasonable. But what else could I say?

  Information was streaming in from various corners. All five of the dead Russians, as well as the one at the hospital, were confirmed to be part of Mirminsky’s outfit. The Sledgehammer had lost seven men, with another out of action and in custody. We’d picked up a couple of calls informing him of this, but rather than going ballistic over it as you’d expect, he seemed oddly subdued. This lined up with the unexplained reverence he showed toward Ivan.

  I wanted to know how we’d missed tracking the other two bratki, the ones who’d been at the real meet with Ivan. We’d put as tight a lock on all of the Sledgehammer’s comms, and yet Ivan was still able to get through to him and arrange for his escort. Our surveillance guys were reviewing all the video, audio, and data from Mirminsky’s club to try to figure out how Ivan had bypassed us. Ultimately, I doubted it would lead to anything. The key, as it always was, was Sokolov. Which was what the more intriguing bit of information that came in was about.

  A background search on Leo Sokolov—or Lev Sokolov, to use what would have been his real Russian name according to our resident guru Joukowsky—didn’t turn up much. His prints were clean. The little on record confirmed that Sokolov lived a straightforward, uncomplicated life. Then the search threw us a major curveball: it kicked up a Lev Nikolaevich Sokolov who was born on the same day as our Leo, back in 1952—but who died nineteen years later. Which could be an incredible coincidence. Or, and this was far more likely according to my finely honed detective intuition, Leo—our Leo—wasn’t really Leo Sokolov at all. He’d somehow got hold of Lev’s birth certificate and used it as a breeder document to get himself a social security card and build a fake identity from it.

  Which threw everything into question.

  Leo Sokolov wasn’t really Leo Sokolov at all.

  ***

  JONNY ARRIVED AT THE chop shop on Cross Island Parkway fifteen minutes after he’d broken into the metal locker. Shin was already there, leaning against the double doors, smoking a hand-rolled cigarette. He was dressed in a tattered old tracksuit and faded sneakers, with the hood of his top almost obscuring his entire face.

  As the van turned onto the lot, Shin slapped one of the big doors three times with the flat of his hand. They both swung open with the grating sound of metal being dragged over concrete, then Jonny drove the van straight into the large space inside. Shin followed on foot and the doors immediately creaked shut behind him.

  The chop shop was a twenty-four-hour operation. At present, there were four guys remodeling a Porsche Panamera and a Bentley Continental, readying them to be shipped out to Moscow or Beirut, where they would end up with new owners who weren’t particularly bothered that their new cars had been stolen from someone a couple of continents away.

  As Jonny jumped down from the cab, one of the crew working on the hot cars pointed at the van with his wrench.

  “Hey, Jonny, nice wheels. You want us to drop a five-seven-two and some nitrous tanks in it? Or just fix your eight-track player?” He cracked up, as did his friends.

  Jonny’s face didn’t even crease into a smile.

  “Jachin’s dead. Some Russian gaejasik took him out.”

  The laughter died instantly.

  The team’s top dog, a muscle-bound Kkangpae called Bon, wiped his oily hands on a cloth and walked over toward Jonny.

  “That’s rough, man,” he said, running a finger along one of the bullet holes in the front windshield. “So what are we gonna do?”

  “Something, that’s for sure. I don’t know what just yet. Meantime, I need to figure something out.”

  Shin appeared from behind the van, causing Bon to sneer.

  Bon said, “With that?” Meaning Shin.

  “Yeah,” he told him. “Now, get back to work. I’ve got to take care of this.” Then he remembered his bike. He fished out his keys and chucked them to Bon. “I need someone to bring back the Kawa. It’s on 169th. The alley by the Laundromat.”

  Bon spat to one side, shrugged, and headed back to the Bentley. “No problem.”

  Shin approached Jonny and pulled down his hoodie, revealing a crew cut atop a skinny, haggard face.

  The sight surprised Jonny. “What the hell is wrong with you? You look like shit.”

  “I’m living off fucking food stamps, man. Fucking PhD’s not even good for wiping my ass.” He shook his head ruefully. “They keep feeding me the same dog shit that I’m overqualified. No jobs. No teaching posts. Nothing. Why? ’Cause I’m overqualified. How fucked-up is that?”

  He looked close to tears.

  “So lie,” Jonny told him. “You can’t live like that.”

  “It’s Nikki, she . . .”

  Jonny spared his old school friend the humiliation of having to admit that he was pussy-whipped within an inch of his life. “You could come back to work,” he told him. “This new guy we’ve got takes twice as long to scan and code an RF key, and then when he’s done, half of them don’t work.”

  “I promised Nikki, man.”

  “It’s good money.”

  “Maybe I should. I don’t know.” Shin didn’t sound very convinced. He nodded toward the van. “What’s this worth?”

  Jonny’s eyes narrowed.

  “I’ll let you know when you tell me what it is.”

  Jonny gestured for Shin to follow him through the van’s rear doors. Inside, he opened the metal storage box and moved back to sit on a wheel arch while Shin moved in for a closer look.

  The postgrad went quiet for a moment as he examined its contents, then he let out a long whistle and turned around.

  “Mwuh-ya yi-gae, Jonny. Where’d you get this? Area 51?”

  39

  Who the hell was he?

  I didn’t have a clue.

  None of us did.

  Was he a sleeper? If so, what had he been up to all these years? Or was he running from something? If so, what was it and who was he hiding from? And why was this all happening now, thirty years or so after he’d taken on the Sokolov name?

  It was easier to pull off back then. Things weren’t that computerized, you didn’t have the level of electro
nic databases we have these days. It wasn’t that hard to get yourself a driver’s license, Social Security card and bank account, either by getting a doctor to sign a fake birth certificate or, as seemed to be the case with Sokolov, using the identity of someone roughly the same age who died as a teenager.

  We didn’t know who he was. We didn’t know where he was from. We didn’t know why he was valuable, valuable enough for someone to kill this many people over him without hesitating. There was a hidden history here that we knew nothing about. Old secrets that had sprung back to life with a vengeance. And the most frustrating thing about it was that maybe it was all over before we even got started. Now that Ivan had him, maybe that was the last we’d ever hear of Leo Sokolov, and we wouldn’t know what the hell it was all about.

  I hated this feeling.

  I hated having so many open questions, not just about Sokolov, but about Ivan. We knew our shooter was either a high-level Mafiya enforcer or a state-sanctioned operative. I was hoping for the former. If it was the latter and if this wasn’t over, then things were going to get complicated, politically. A Russian agent gunning down several American agents on our soil—not exactly a misdemeanor. Either way, we’d need to bring in other agencies to find out more about Sokolov’s background: CIA and ICE, for starters. There wasn’t much we could tell them beyond giving them a set of his prints that we’d sourced in his apartment. Maybe that would be enough. If he had a secret Soviet history, they might know. Whether they’d want to share it with us was another story.