Czar of England (SOKOLOV Book 6)

by Ian Kharitonov

“Why do you ask? It’s beside the point.”

  “Just humor me.”

  “He doesn’t know about it yet. There has been no formal approach. He is our top priority, but we have a backup plan in place as well, if he mulls over it for too long. I don’t think he will require much convincing, though. He’s used to doing as he’s told.”

  “But so far, he’s oblivious to Project Jutland, isn’t he? And that makes him and his family unwitting targets, marked for death by Frolov. The Kremlin will kill them all. And not just them. The lives of many more innocent people could be at stake. If we’re going to help you, Sir Gray, we won’t be doing it to advance your neo-colonial agenda. You may consider that we’re signing on for the sake of Harry’s son, Archie Mountbatten-Windsor, as much as his parents and other unsuspecting victims of your game.”

  Sir Gray nodded contentedly at Constantine’s rationalization.

  “Good. I knew that common sense would prevail.”

  “I suggest that we start by contacting Prince Harry and telling him about the conspiracy to assassinate him.”

  “A commendable gesture, but it would be utterly pointless.”

  “Why?”

  “Harry is under protection around the clock, seven days a week. He cannot change his plans and cancel his entire schedule over some vague suspicion. He receives death threats routinely from all sorts of lunatics. The warning won’t be taken seriously, even if it comes from us as the source, without the hard facts to back it up.”

  “But we do know that Frolov wants to kill him. The body count is a testament to that.”

  “However, you don’t know when, where, or how it’s going to happen,” Sir Gray countered. “So if you want to prevent the plot, it’s your job to find out. And you’d better get down to work right away.”

  37

  Andy brought them to a different area of the building, which appeared to be a former gentlemen’s club, shut down and no longer in use, although they still didn’t know where exactly it was located. No guns or black hoods over their heads this time around. He was assigned either to assist or watch over them.

  They were given a private room inside the clubhouse for office use. It wasn’t much—a set of chairs positioned around a table, and a massive bookcase. The books wouldn’t be much help, Sokolov thought. There were also more portraits hanging on the walls.

  “Who were those guys?” Sokolov asked Constantine. “Do you know any of them?”

  “Just because I’m a historian, I don’t know every historical fact,” Constantine replied.

  “Really? How disappointing.”

  Andy said, “They were famous Whigs.”

  “Who?”

  “Leaders of British Whiggism, opponents of Tories. They rejected absolute monarchy in favor of a constitutional parliamentary system. Early liberals who found support with rich aristocrats. Their grip of power throughout the eighteenth century was so strong that the period of their supremacy in British politics was known as the Whig oligarchy.”

  “Rather fitting for Project Jutland to draw inspiration from them. I’m impressed, Andy. You keep surprising us today.”

  Andy grinned almost sheepishly. “So, how did your talks with Sir Gray go? Are you on board?”

  “If you mean joining your clandestine organization and advancing Project Jutland, then the answer is no,” Constantine said. “Suffice it to say that we’ve reached a compromise with Sir Gray. We’ll collaborate only as far as pursuing common interests and stopping Frolov.”

  Sokolov conceded that with the Albanians and the SVR on their backs, a temporary alliance with E3 was inevitable, but he wondered how long it would last. They’d deal with the problem later. For now, they didn’t have to worry too much about Andy and his gunmen. But he and Constantine would have to walk a fine line between saving Prince Harry’s family and becoming toys in the hands of Sir Gray.

  “Okay,” the former SAS grunt said. “Have you managed to get anything from Lana? How did her meeting with Phil go?”

  “She’s dead,” Sokolov said. “Phil is gone. So is her phone.”

  “So we’ve hit a dead end?”

  “There’s a slim chance we might still find a lead.”

  “How?”

  “Lana gave me the password to her online account.”

  “Good. Let’s try that.”

  “But first,” Sokolov said, “how about you get us some tea?”

  As Andy fetched a steaming teapot and a tray of biscuits, Sokolov tried his luck with Lana’s Internet credentials. He added a new profile on his phone and entered her username and password. The entries matched and he logged in. The new account began syncing. What mattered was the cloud storage. Sokolov switched over to the online drive app and checked the recently added files.

  “What are you doing?” Constantine asked.

  “Hoping that whatever photos Lana made using her phone were uploaded and that Phil failed to delete them from the device.”

  “And?”

  “Yes. We’ve got new uploads. The files were added a few minutes before her death, according to the time stamps.” Sokolov quickly tapped to select multiple items to transfer them to his phone’s memory. “It could be something important or a whole bunch of nothing. We’ll see.”

  The download progress bar crept to 100 percent and the transfer was finally completed.

  Sokolov opened the gallery and browsed through the newly added folder.

  A lot of the photos were blurry and he couldn’t make anything out even zooming in.

  “Well, what did she find?”

  “Documents of some kind.”

  They scrutinized the images. Taken off the screen of Phil’s phone, some were incomplete, showing only the first page, and often even that had often come out cropped.

  But even those scraps provided enough information.

  The bits and pieces of data quickly added up to give them an insight into Phil Korolev’s activities.

  Bank transfer receipts. A flight itinerary. Commercial invoices. A bill of lading. Tropical beach photos.

  They were onto something, indeed.

  Yet they needed help figuring out exactly what it was.

  Sokolov forwarded the files to Monteith. After a few minutes, the American got back to put it all together for them.

  “Those money transfers are corresponding hawala payments.”

  “What?” Sokolov asked.

  “Hawala,” the ex-CIA man repeated. “It’s an informal finance system spread throughout the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia, devised in the eighth century and still in use today. The Iranians, for example, are relying on the hawala system to skirt U.S. sanctions. It’s also popular with the likes of money launderers, terrorists, and drug dealers everywhere, from Afghanistan to Somalia.”

  “How does it work?”

  “Through a series of middlemen, in simple terms. You give money to a hawala broker in one country, to be transferred in some other part of the world via a different broker. The hawala operator only sends a message to his counterpart with the amount, the recipient’s name, and a special code which the recipient has to use for confirmation to collect the money. The system is based largely on trust. There is no traceable link, the money doesn’t move across borders, and it’s totally beyond control from financial watchdogs or government authorities. It’s believed that there are approximately 5,000 hawala brokers across the world.”

  “And the bank transfer?”

  “It was carried out on behalf of Korolev’s charity organization. The beneficiary was another small trust which raises funds for disaster relief in third-world countries. It was set up by a Pakistan-born businessman who’s known to moonlight as a hawala middleman.”

  “So there’s no way of knowing who the money actually went to?”

  “Not if you intercept just the bank transfers between the two local, U.K.-based charities. Thankfully, we have the other pieces of the puzzle. From what you showed me, we do know that Korolev was in contact wi
th a man named Abdul Azizi.”

  “Who is he?”

  “He’s a Taliban-linked militant based in the Maldives. Apparently, Korolev traveled there recently, judging by the boarding passes. It’s likely that he visited Azizi. And one of the images shows a local wire for the same amount of money, confirming receipt of the hawala transfer by Azizi. Looks like it was payment for the shipping consignment. That’s all I’ve got for you.”

  “Thanks, Jeff.”

  “As for the shipment, if the cargo really is what it says … Just hang in there.”

  Constantine said, “It makes sense. The Russian security services have been supporting the Taliban for years.”

  Previously, strong rumors of a Russian bounty program targeting U.S. forces in Afghanistan had been reported, with the Taliban being paid to kill American and Allied troops. The Kremlin hid behind deniability, deploying mercenaries in Ukraine and Syria instead of the regular Russian army, so using the Taliban to attack Prince Harry seemed like a plausible scenario.

  “Prince Harry served in Afghanistan, didn’t he?” Sokolov asked Andy.

  “That’s right. He was known under the name of Captain Wales in the Army. Did two tours. He was an Apache pilot in 2012. Ground troop support. He rescued injured American soldiers who got ambushed. Sprayed the Taliban bastards with machine gun fire, killing a few. Taliban leaders have vowed to kidnap or kill him ever since.”

  “Was there any substance behind their threats?”

  “Sure was. Captain Harry Wales was stationed at Camp Bastion, a NATO air base. It was attacked by Taliban insurgents. Two U.S. Marines were killed. Buildings and aircraft were damaged. It remained unclear if the attack was aimed at Harry specifically, but he was unharmed.” Andy’s voice became distant, as if he were transported back to Afghanistan. “Later, we received intel about another planned strike by the Taliban. Captain Wales was definitely the target this time. Our unit raided the militants’ hideout, a village house in Kandahar. It was a night-time mission. I remember it all so vividly. We rappelled down from the Chinook. As we approached the house, we heard gunfire. A young lad of perhaps twenty came out running at us, crying for help, holding his hands up. I forced him down to the ground and zip-locked his wrists. When we entered the house, I saw his entire family there. Father, mother, uncle, brothers, sisters, cousins. They lay on the floor. Dead. All of them. Tied up and shot in the head. Murdered in cold blood. Someone set us up. It was a massacre.”

  “A setup? What do you mean?”

  “Afterwards, the lad—Omar, I think he was called—made a claim against us for mistreating him and killing his relatives. It was enough to launch an investigation and begin criminal proceedings against us in the U.K. The case might have gone all the way to the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes. The media would’of had a field day with stories of a rogue SAS unit executing unarmed Afghan civilians. I was prepared for the worst. But nothing happened. Fortunately, the whole inquiry was quietly brushed under the carpet. All thanks to one man.”

  “Let me guess,” Constantine said. “Sir Gray. It’s how he recruited you to work for E3.”

  Andy nodded. “We were forced to quit our SAS unit, but Sir Gray offered us a fresh opportunity back home. I would’of been finished if not for him.”

  “What about the Afghans? Omar and his family?”

  “The Taliban killed them, and spared his life in exchange for the false accusation against us. Later, I learned that one of the most notorious warlords was behind it. His name was Abdul Azizi.”

  As they delivered the news to Sir Gray, the old fox furrowed his brow pensively.

  “Interesting developments. You’ve presented a most intriguing theory regarding the Taliban’s involvement. It needs following up. What else have you learned?”

  “Korolev and Azizi have arranged a shipment from Russia to Pakistan, which appears to be vital to their plan. The cargo is ammonium nitrate.”

  “I’m afraid my knowledge of chemistry needs a refresher,” Sir Gray said. “What is it?”

  “Fertilizer,” Sokolov explained. “Russia is the world’s largest manufacturer of the stuff. But the chemical is also very dangerous, being highly explosive, making it a popular choice for bomb-making.”

  Sokolov was speaking from first-hand experience. He himself had recently utilized ammonium nitrate-based industrial explosives to detonate a building, with devastating results.

  “Pakistan imports huge amounts of ammonium nitrate, far beyond the country’s agricultural needs,” Andy said. “It’s long been suspected that Pakistan is a kind of a hub for the Taliban. From there, they smuggle the chemicals into others countries like Afghanistan, and produce thousands of IEDs each year.”

  “Could it be used in an act of terrorism against Prince Harry and his family?”

  “This particular shipment totals about three hundred tons of ammonium nitrate,” Constantine said. “That’s enough to level several city blocks and kill hundreds of people. And there’s no trace of it once it reached Pakistan. It could be anywhere now. But given that Korolev and Azizi were behind it, there’s every chance that they are planning to use it.”

  “An attack is imminent,” Sokolov said. “Everything points to that. It might happen next week—or tomorrow. We don’t know. Only Phil Korolev does. And perhaps Azizi. He might also know where Phil is hiding.”

  “The other option is Berisha,” Constantine added. “He’s the main link to Korolev. And given his track record in contraband operations, the Albanian could also be aware of the shipment details.”

  “Finding Phil is paramount,” Sir Gray agreed. “As well as figuring out where the cargo is. And I believe that Andy has an old score to settle with this Azizi chap. You have my full backing, gentlemen, and every resource will be made available to you. They won’t be expecting us to be aware of their scheme. We can’t squander this golden opportunity. Use whatever means necessary to stop them.”

  “Yes, sir,” Andy said. “We’ll track them down.”

  “Well, go on, then. Good hunting.”

  38

  The Maldives. A group of atolls in the Indian Ocean, consisting of 1,190 islands. Formerly, a Muslim sultanate after Islam had arrived there in the twelfth century, then a British protectorate until the 1960s when the island nation had finally gained independence to become a presidential republic. As a luxury resort destination, thanks to its beaches famous for their turquoise water and white sand, the country attracted over a million holidaymakers and honeymooners each year, the thriving tourism industry largely driving the economy.

  But behind their idyllic, tropical paradise appearance, the Maldive Islands had become a hotbed of violence.

  Political turmoil gripped the country.

  A former president was serving a lengthy prison term on corruption charges. A vice president had been jailed for terrorism, having attempted to assassinate his ex-boss.

  A state of emergency had been declared recently. Military police had stormed the Supreme Court. Opposition members had been arrested, and one found in his home with his throat slit.

  Civil unrest was brewing, allowing for increased activity by recruiters from radical Islamist groups. A bomb attack in the nation’s capital had been thwarted.

  Human rights abuses had been reported, and the death penalty reinstated after more than 60 years.

  The U.K. government had advised British nationals against travel to the Maldives due to security risks and a growing terror threat.

  No wonder that someone like a Taliban warlord would prowl the turquoise lagoons and land at one of those pristine sandy shores.

  Perhaps Korolev was holed up on one of the islands as well.

  Sokolov picked up all this information skimming the headlines as he scrolled the news feed on the way to the airport.

  He was going there, to join the ex-SAS team during the assault on Azizi’s hideout.

  He was aware of the danger, but he couldn’t sit it out while Andy Stevenson and his
men risked their lives.

  Unlike Andy, he had no personal agenda in regard to Azizi.

  But he had to be there.

  When and if Phil went down, he had to witness it.

  And he had to see whatever intel in relation to Project Jutland they could find. Sokolov’s presence was vital for that.

  The private jet—a Dassault Falcon 7X—took off from London City, sweeping into the sky. Destination: Velana International Airport on Hulhulé Island, the Maldives. The flight would take ten and a half hours, and the charter cost a six-figure sum, but the provided comfort was well worth it. The executive plane seated up to 14 passengers, so there was plenty of room to spare for Andy’s five former SAS commandos.

  Sokolov didn’t feel like engaging in small talk with Andy or his comrades in arms. And while the elegant cabin of the Dassault Falcon was whisper-quiet, openly discussing their offensive plans wasn’t a good idea lest the crew might overhear them. Instead, Sokolov washed down a melatonin pill with mineral water to help him sleep through the flight, and shut his eyes, leaning back in the supple leather seat.

  Soon, he would lead the troops into battle, and storm a troubled paradise where all hell was about to break loose.

  39

  Constantine was spared the indignity of a blindfold as he left the E3 clubhouse. He still didn’t know its exact location. He assumed it was somewhere in Mayfair because one of Sir Gray’s men led him to a nondescript crossover SUV with tinted windows and transferred him to a luxury hotel. It was a very short trip. The hotel was a five-star affair, small, classic, intimate, and charming. He was given a key to the suite right away. He didn’t have to check in or confirm his identity as per normal security requirements. He would be staying there incognito, the arrangement obviously made through Sir Gray’s connections.

  Alone in the bright, well-decorated room, he found himself in relative safety—from the SVR and the Albanian mobsters. For now, at least. The E3 would no doubt be keeping an eye on him.