Send a message, Barney, the senator had said, his eyes glistening with a simmering wrath, the flames of the Alibi Club’s fireplace reflected in their depths. If the fools in this town want to dance, they’re going to have to pay the piper.
1:39 P.M. Pacific Time
California
It had all been a mistake, Korsakov thought, staring murderously at his cellphone as Viktor used his still-active FBI access to read off a list of roadblocks.
The California State Police were sealing off every major artery. And Nichols was gone.
He cast a glance into the back seat of the SUV to where Yuri sat, chewing on a sandwich of deli meat. His lieutenant looked like death itself, his face seared with the heat of the explosion, the hair singed off his forearms.
Four men. That was all he had left—and that was if you counted in both Viktor and himself.
Even as he looked at it, the phone in his hand began to vibrate with an incoming call. His heart almost stopped.
No one had this number. No one living.
“Yes?” he asked, motioning to Viktor to attempt a trace as he answered the call.
“It’s time this was ended, Sergei.” Nichols’ voice. The tone of a man on the edge, barely in control of himself. Trembling with anger.
An encouraging development.
Korsakov listened in silence as the American continued. “Innocent people died last night…for what? You’re not going to get paid for this.”
The assassin cleared his throat. “I told you. This isn’t about the money—this is about the men you have killed. My men. And I don’t care who has to die, so long as you join them in the end.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Viktor hold up four fingers. “You were clever last night, Mr. Nichols. Audacious, even. What is that Latin phrase they teach in your military colleges? Fortune favors the audacious? And even more of my men died.”
Three.
“I gave you the chance to walk away last night,” Nichols responded. “Leave it all behind—make your way out of the country as best you could. That was before the freeway. No one else had to die…but now you do.”
Two. He could see the smile grow on the boy’s face. Keep stalling. Keep him on the phone.
“So now you intend to kill me?”
A click was all that answered his question, and he shot an anxious glance in Viktor’s direction.
Do we have it?
The look of intense concentration on the boy’s face was unbroken for a long moment, then he began to nod.
1:44 P.M.
The oil field
“Did he have time?” Harry asked, looking over to where Carol sat in front of her laptop.
It had been so close.
“All depends on how good his tech support is. It’s a reasonable hope.” She ran a hand over her forehead. “You couldn’t stay on the phone any longer—he would have gotten suspicious.”
“Do you still have your gun?”
She looked up as though startled by the sudden question, then nodded.
“Keep it handy,” he advised, catching Han’s eye from across the room. “Time to take up our positions.”
2:39 P.M.
The Bellagio Hotel & Casino
Las Vegas, Nevada
Dominoes.
Samir Khan watched, mesmerized, as the dealer shuffled a set of dominoes with slim, agile hands, dealing them out to the players surrounding the table.
Nothing could have prepared him for the luxury, the decadence.
“A drink, sir?” He turned to find a cocktail waitress at his elbow, a tray of drinks in her hand.
“No, not right now,” the lawyer responded, finding himself flustered by her smile. All the years he had lived in Vegas, practicing law, he had never entered one of the casinos—and now he understood why. Their allure was irresistible…seductive. “What is this that they’re playing?”
“Pai gow?” she asked, touching him lightly on the arm. “It’s a Chinese game, one of the most popular in the casinos of Macau. Do you want to take a hand?”
Samir shook his head, looking her up and down appreciatively before moving off into the crowd. He had a purpose for being here, he thought, forcing himself to focus.
Five years he had lived in this country, ever since leaving his native Pakistan with his men. For five long years they had labored in the house of war, waiting for this moment. For the word of the shaikh.
He thought back to that morning, a week ago—when the message had finally been left in the Drafts folder of his inbox. And he had known in that moment.
Their time had come…
7:39 P.M. Eastern Time
The Church of the Holy Trinity
Washington, D.C.
“God rest ye, merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay…” Childish voices, lifted in praise to the heavens.
Michael Shapiro leaned back in the pew, smiling as he regarded the form of his son in the choir, shifting awkwardly in his robes.
This was the life worth living. Away from his job, away from all the stresses of the day. Here with his kids, he almost felt at peace.
Almost.
A shadow fell across the pew and he looked up, half-expecting to see his wife. She was supposed to join them later, in time for mass.
“Good evening, Shapiro.” The form of Bernard Kranemeyer settled into the pew beside him, awaiting no invitation to sit down.
A puzzled smile flickered across the face of the deputy director. “And to you, Barney. Didn’t expect to see you here.”
Kranemeyer nodded, his arm stretching out easily along the back of the pew as he gazed up at the choir of children toward the front of the dimly lit sanctuary.
“Didn’t imagine you would. Never had much use for church. Or for pious people, for that matter,” he added after a pause. “Most of them are frauds, in my experience. People living a lie.”
The strange look in the eyes of the DCS grew reflective as Shapiro watched. “Nichols was the only Christian I ever truly respected…and we both know how that’s panned out.”
“Yeah,” Shapiro assented, still puzzled by his appearance.
Those coal-black eyes turned upon him, contempt radiating suddenly from their depths. The deputy director felt a chill wash over his body.
Kranemeyer shook his head, reaching inside his trench coat and pulling forth a handful of photographs. He held one of them up, eyeing it critically in the flickering light of the nearby candles.
“What have you been playing at, Shapiro?” the DCS spat, throwing the photograph into Shapiro’s lap.
His fingers beginning to tremble as if in the grip of a fever, he reached for the photo, turning it over.
And there it was. The proof of his betrayal.
Shapiro looked up to see death in the eyes of his colleague—cold, implacable death. His gaze darted wildly around the sanctuary, toward the mute, silent icons along the walls.
No salvation to be found there.
“I—I…this wasn’t what it looks like.”
The DCS laughed softly. “You can do better than that, Mike. You might be the deputy director, but you’re a second-rate liar. I don’t have to guess what it ‘looks like’. I know what it is…you passing intel to the Iranians. You sold out my men. All I want to know is this: was it worth it?”
He looked over at Shapiro, watching contemptuously as the man trembled, his face ashen.
“These are surveillance photos— taken here in D.C,” the deputy director stammered, a drowning man clutching desperately at a straw. “You’ve violated the CIA’s charter—this will never stand up in court.”
Kranemeyer closed his eyes, the H&K under his coat seeming to quiver with anger. “Who said anything about court, Mike? Did Davood Sarami get a judge? A jury? God only knows what other assets you compromised.”
Silence. He could still remember standing there at Dover, the fall wind rippling through his hair as uniformed Marines carried Davood’s body out of the back of a C-5.
“You’ll g
et what you gave, Mike. That’s justice, isn’t it? Or maybe it’s just retribution—I couldn’t give a flying crap either way.”
“You don’t understand, Barney. It’s not like that. I didn’t have a choice.”
A bitter smile crossed Kranemeyer’s face. “That’s an old refrain. And false as it is old. We all make choices. What did the Iranians have on you?”
The deputy director seemed to shrink into his seat, his voice growing soft. “It wasn’t the Iranians.”
“Indeed?”
Shapiro shook his head desperately, licking his lips with the very tip of his tongue. “You have no idea who you’re dealing with, do you?”
“No one who’s powerful enough to save you from me, I know that much. But why don’t you enlighten me?”
“I can—but I want this all to go away. All of it, the photographs…everything.”
It was amazing, Kranemeyer thought—the deputy director was still playing politician. Making deals.
“You don’t have anything I want that badly,” he retorted, staring up at the rows of white-robed children, their faces smiling down like a heavenly choir of angels. The last innocents left in this city. “And if you get a deal, it will be on my terms.”
Shapiro ran a hand along the collar of his shirt, his fingers coming away damp with sweat. “Anything. What do you want?”
“Tell me everything you know—I want details, names of everyone involved. Everything.”
“And what do I get in return?”
“You get to take the honorable way out. And your family—your kids—never have to know the type of man their father was.”
“You mean…” Shapiro’s voice trailed off, trembling querulously.
“I do,” came the remorseless reply. “Or, so help me, I will destroy them as well.”
5:06 P.M. Pacific Time
The oil field
California
“Are you sure they’re here?” Korsakov lowered the binoculars from his eyes, glancing back to where Viktor sat in the back seat.
The boy hesitated. “They were here. Less than four hours ago. That’s all I know.”
Korsakov glanced toward the oil field once again, the ghostly spires of the derricks looming out of the gathering twilight. It would have to be good enough.
He pushed open the passenger door of the SUV, moving around to the back to retrieve his Steyr AUG. Korsakov’s night-vision goggles were the only pair they had left—everything else having been lost at Andropov’s mansion.
They would have to move cautiously, the three of them.
Viktor came around the corner of the vehicle at that moment, his youthful eyes shining above the scraggly black beard that cloaked the lower half of his face. The Glock Korsakov had given him was in his hand, his fingers fumbling with the slide.
“I’m ready.”
Korsakov shook his head, stepping forward to put both hands on the boy’s thin shoulders. “Nyet, tovarisch. I need you here in the car, monitoring communications.”
It was a lie, and he could see in the boy’s eyes that they both knew it. The assassin hesitated for a long moment, emotions warring within him, then he drew the boy into a fierce embrace.
Guided as if by a premonition, his hand slipped into the pocket of his assault vest, drawing forth a small password-protected thumb drive and pressing it into Viktor’s palm. “I’ll be back soon, Vitya. Ne volnuysia.”
Don’t worry.
Another lie, but he would see this through to the end.
There were some things a man simply could not walk away from, the death of his brothers being one. That none of his men were related to him mattered not at all—the bonds of battle were far stronger than those of blood.
Korsakov turned away, motioning for Yuri and Misha to follow him. Spread out, they moved down the side of the road toward the abandoned oil field, flitting from cover to cover like wraiths in the dusk.
Fifty meters and the assassin paused, pulling back the charging bolt of the Steyr to chamber a round. The weapon felt cold in his hands, cold as the certainty of what was to come.
8:11 P.M. Eastern Time
The Church of the Holy Trinity
Washington, D.C.
“And that’s all you know?” Kranemeyer asked quietly, staring into the eyes of the deputy director. He ignored the singing with an effort, still struggling to process what he had just been told.
“And in despair, I bowed my head. ‘There is no peace on earth’, I said.” The children knew not the gravity of which they sang. Nothing of the evil that lurked around them.
Shapiro swallowed hard, nodding. “Haskel’s not in it alone, but he never trusted me.”
The DCS snorted. “I wonder why.”
“There’s someone up higher, I always knew there was. Haskel’s too cocky—has to have someone covering his back. Someone powerful. They ordered Lay’s murder. I didn’t want to be a part of it, you know that, don’t you?”
“Go,” Kranemeyer whispered, his voice devoid of mercy. Of pity. He had heard enough. He thought for a moment of asking why—then decided against it. It could be any one of a dozen things: threats, blackmail, money—to name but a few. Or perhaps most likely, a simple lust for power.
“For hate is strong, and mocks the song of peace on earth, good-will to men!”
He saw the plea in Shapiro’s eyes and his face hardened. “Go.”
“How do you know that I won’t run once I leave this building? That I won’t call the police?”
Kranemeyer nodded toward the white-robed boy in the front of the choir, his cherubic face smiling down upon the darkened sanctuary. “Because you know what will become of him if you do. Do you want him to live his life the son of a traitor? Do you want him to remember you that way?”
Indecision. He saw the father glance up toward his son, agony on his countenance. Then a nod. Shapiro rose, pulling his jacket close around his body as if to shut out the cold. “I’m sorry.”
There was no suitable response, and Kranemeyer made no attempt to offer one.
He remained in his seat, arm over the back of the pew, as Shapiro made his way to the aisle, hurrying toward the vestibule. And still the children sang. “Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: God is not dead, nor doth He sleep; The Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail, With peace on earth, good-will to men.”
Wrong? Right?
There were times when he could scarce tell the difference. He listened as the strains of the final stanza died away, watched as the priest dismissed the children. Watched as a little boy scampered down from the platform, his eyes searching the darkness for a father that was no longer there.
A father that would never return again.
Rising from the pew, Kranemeyer walked forward, taking a candle from the tray and mounting it. Pulling his Bic from his pocket he touched fire to wick, watching as it blossomed into full flame, casting dark shadows across his face as it flickered.
He glanced up toward the crucifix, his voice rich with irony as he whispered, “Forgive me, Father—for I have sinned…”
8:24 P.M.
The Francis Scott Key Bridge
Washington, D.C.
How many times? How many times had he driven over this very bridge? Shapiro glanced from the sidewalk into the six lanes of traffic spanning the width of the bridge. Traffic unabated even at this hour of the night.
Mute witnesses to his impending death.
He shuddered, the wind tugging at the hem of his coat. Where had he gone wrong?
Wrong? He had dismissed the very idea as irrelevant during his days in college. All that mattered was der Wille zur Macht, as Nietzsche put it. The will to power. Moral absolutes? Archaic rubbish from a bygone era.
God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.
He forged on, out toward the central arch, a solitary plodding figure in the glare of the oncoming lights. He thought with regret of the twins, a tear leaving its icy trail down his cheek.
No goodbyes. Perhaps it was b
etter that way—they deserved better than the man he had become.
He paused at the edge of the parapet, his body trembling uncontrollably, the wind cutting straight through his thin coat, chilling him to the bone.
Tears running down his face, Shapiro mounted the parapet, feeling a sudden attack of vertigo overcoming him as he stared down into the choppy, ice-cold waters of the Potomac, nearly a hundred feet below. He swayed, the fingers of his left hand digging into the concrete in desperation.
Suicide. It was an unpardonable sin, yet how could it be any more damning than all that he had already done?
The deputy director paused, torn by fear and indecision. He could see the traffic from where he had come, but no one noticed. Or no one cared. It could have been either.
His right hand came up, making the sign of the cross over his chest. In the name of the Father…and of the Son…and of the Holy Ghost.
Closing his eyes, he released his grip on the parapet, his dress shoes slipping from the ice-slick concrete, a scream of panic escaping his lips. Falling into the darkness below.
The abyss.
5:35 P.M. Pacific Time
The oilfield
California
He had given consideration to climbing one of the derricks to get a better view of the surrounding territory, but rejected that idea rather quickly.
Beyond height, a derrick offered none of the other necessities that a sniper required—most importantly, the ability to move readily after firing a single shot. It might have worked well in the movies…but not in real life.
Harry moved into position behind a deserted forklift, its yellow paint chipped and rusting. He and Sammy had traded weapons, leaving him with the SCAR.
He raised the weapon to his shoulder, adjusting his eye to the night-vision scope and using it to scan the surrounding terrain. The oilfield’s perimeter fence was down in any number of places—pushed down by vagrants in the years since the field’s abandonment.
Too many avenues of attack. And they had scarcely eighty rounds of ammunition among the three of them—everything else having been abandoned in the van the preceding night, rounds left to cook off as the vehicle went up in flames.
He swung the SCAR’s barrel in a slow one-hundred-eighty degree arc, scoping out the perimeter. Back and forth.
Day of Reckoning (Shadow Warriors) Page 43
