Wiser Than Serpents

by Susan May Warren

  Nearly.

  But he’d been dodging that impulse, with success, for almost a decade. Well, all but once. Still, starting a relationship—the kind he wanted to finish—with Yanna could only lead to heartache. And not just because they lived on different sides of the ocean. But because they lived on different sides of eternity. For now. He’d never stop hoping that might change.

  “Wait here.” The little man stopped him with an outstretched hand, and David stood still, his heart thumping as he watched the man disappear behind a three-story stack of metal containers. From behind him, he heard footsteps. He turned and tried not to flinch as two of Kwan’s muscle materialized. They both looked like they’d done time in a Chinese prison—their noses set poorly, bodies wedged into ill-fitting suit pants and silk shirts. Homemade tattoos lined their forearms. He recognized silver Russian-made Makarov pistols in their grips and he kept his hands out from his pockets. “Where’s Kwan? I agreed to meet with Kwan.”

  “He wants a sample of the merchandise before he’s willing to meet with you,” said the taller, nastier-looking of the two.

  David shrugged. The guns were real enough. They had to be, to make it overseas and into the right hands. Yet inside each gun, the CIA had installed a surveillance chip to leave a trail that David and the other members of this op could track.

  Hopefully, in the end, they’d bring down Kwan’s organization. Before they sacrificed precious lives. “Fine, I’ll want a sample of his merchandise.”

  One of them smiled, and it sent a warning into David’s gut. Something didn’t feel right. He’d been undercover in enough hot spots over the world, first as a Green Beret, and then as a Delta Force operative, to recognize something sour in the air.

  But he said nothing as he turned and wound his way to the container he’d set up for just this scenario. He hoped Chet had heard the exchange and had him in his sights.

  Not that Chet would step in should the op turn ugly. This was important enough to both of them, to the war on terror, to the thousands of soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan being mowed down with their own American-made weapons to sacrifice David’s life, should it become necessary.

  David stopped before a locked container and entered the code to the mechanical lock. The door came open with a teeth-grating whine.

  “Inside.”

  With the moon rising over the water, streams of hazy light raked the container yard. But it couldn’t penetrate the palpable blackness of the container. However, David had personally secreted the one crated box of weapons in the container and now walked over to it without hesitation. He reached out to crack it open when a light flickered across the crate.

  “Stop.”

  The voice came from the darkness, and David couldn’t make out the face of the speaker. When the light panned the floor, he plainly recognized the man writhing in the pool of luminescence, bleeding from the head, his hands tied behind him.

  Chet.

  David stared at him and everything inside him turned to liquid. “What’s going on?”

  “We have a problem.”

  David narrowed his eyes, trying to get a fix on the speaker.

  “We caught your partner here working with the CIA.”

  Chet glanced up at him, his face granite. David leveled the appropriate glare at Chet. Lord…

  “We’d like to think that he was double-crossing you, Ripley.”

  Was that a question? David walked over to Chet, grabbed him by the hair. “Is that true, O’Hare?”

  Chet looked at him, and slowly nodded.

  Pain cut through him, and David thought he might gasp. Instead he backhanded Chet. His partner fell back and the sound of Chet’s ragged breathing filled the container, burned right into David’s soul.

  “I think we’d like a demonstration now.”

  David looked up, into the shadows. He made out a taller man, deep-set eyes, a thick build. “I was supposed to meet Kwan.”

  “First a demonstration. Then Kwan will see you.”

  Which meant that David couldn’t end this here, couldn’t somehow shoot their way out in a blaze of gunfire and fists.

  “What demonstration?” he growled.

  The man nodded past him, toward one of his men. David heard the crate being wrenched open and bile burned in his mouth. He met Chet’s gaze with a coolness meant to mask his feelings. Chet glanced away from him, closed his eyes.

  No, God. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Especially since Chet was more than a partner. In a way, he was family.

  How would David ever tell Chet’s cousin Gracie—who just happened to also be his pal Viktor’s fiancée?

  He heard one of the men behind him uncrating the Smith & Wesson double-action .45 semiautomatic from the straw and oil that kept it dry and secure. He then heard the ratchet of the eight-round magazine as it slid into the chamber. He tightened his jaw, fixing a hate-filled look he didn’t feel on his “betrayer.”

  The cold, round end of a pistol pressed against David’s brain stem as another man stepped forward and handed him the pistol.

  David nodded. “Step back. It’ll be loud, so be prepared for trouble.” He took the gun by the shiny silver handle, felt the weight, the cool grip.

  Chet’s captor stepped away from Chet, leaving the man alone and helpless on the floor. David heard the men behind him also move back, perhaps not wanting to risk soiling their clothes.

  What about their souls? Please forgive me, Lord.

  He aimed the pistol at Chet and prayed.

  Chapter Two

  Y anna couldn’t decide which place felt more dismal—her basement office at FSB HQ, with the harsh fluorescent lights, the musty smell of mold and cement, cables snaking the floor like land mines, the sharp neon eyes of endless computer screens; or her third-story, two-room flat, with the dark brown carpet, the occasional hot water, the temperamental electricity. She’d dreaded Elena’s departure for months, and when it happened, she found herself running from the echo that greeted her at the end of the day.

  She flicked on the light to her office. The fluorescence played coy for a moment, then flooded the room with wan light. Tossing her workout bag onto her faux-leather sofa, she moved to her desk, wiggled the mouse to bring her computer to life, then logged in.

  A schematic of her newest project flashed on her screen. She’d designed a microsize GPS radio transmitter to fit into a chip no larger than a one-carat diamond. Her latest tweak included a “panic” button that reported a precise latitude/longitude/time. She hoped that one of her surveillance applications would earn her an office with a view of Red Square in Moscow.

  It also gave her something to do during the long weekends that Roman spent with Sarai, or when Vicktor holed up in his flat IMing Gracie, back in Seattle.

  No, she wasn’t lonely. Really. She had all the humming CPUs to keep her company. Yanna clicked open her e-mail program, checked through a list of recent messages. One from Artyom, a techno engineer inside the FSB who helped her refine her applications. One from Gracie, confirming Elena’s flight information. Two from her volleyball coach, detailing upcoming meets and practices. Noticeably absent were any e-mails from David.

  As usual, she clicked her Internet icon, logged on to the net and entered a private chat room. More often than not over the years, she’d found David logged on and waiting for company. Good thing he didn’t know how often she’d rejected face-to-face company, curled up on the sofa with her laptop and spent the night tapping to him. Sometimes it just seemed safer, especially with David five thousand miles across the ocean, to unlock her secrets to a computer screen than to those who saw her every day.

  “Where are you, David?” Things would have been just fine if she hadn’t seen David less than a year ago. He’d swooped in with his confidence and bravado and unshakable loyalty to help spring their pal Roman from a Russian gulag during the coup in Irkutsk. But David might as well have escaped with her heart, also, because seeing him after all those years had reminded her that a
lthough she might not need a man she wanted one.

  The wrong one. Because, according to her last assessment, David Curtiss wasn’t only an American, but one in the business of fighting terrorists. And the recent headlines from Moscow said that their governments didn’t exactly see eye to eye on whom, exactly, the terrorists were. More than that, David was religious. Vicktor and Roman called him Preach, and rightly so, because she couldn’t have a conversation with him without it turning spiritual. Not that he attacked; on the contrary, he answered questions. And took God seriously.

  But she’d seen too much of life to really buy into the idea that God cared, really cared about the details, or even the big picture. One quick glance at the headlines across the world told her that God had checked out long ago.

  No, she’d let David and Roman and, lately, Vicktor do the praying—the spiritual surveillance—while she designed the physical equipment.

  Are you there? She typed the words in the chat room, but his name wasn’t lighted on her list of contacts and she didn’t hold out hope for a response. I miss you, she almost typed.

  Instead, she minimized the window and wrote a note to Artyom, detailing a new idea. Then she sent a letter to Elena, wondering if she’d checked out of her hotel at Incheon airport yet. Two days without a word from her sister had started to annoy Yanna. Especially since she’d found her brown spike-heel boots missing and had an idea of where they’d run off to.

  “Dztrasvootya.” A knock followed the greeting and Yanna looked up to see Vicktor at the door, one hand on the jamb. “What are you doing here this late?”

  “I should ask you the same question.” Yanna leaned back in her chair. “Working a case?”

  Vicktor gave a half nod. “Chief Arkady sent it over. His department found a body behind the Amur hotel. A woman, someone from Thailand or some other Asian country, it looks like. We’re running her ID now. Meanwhile, we have the man listed as her husband in custody. Looks like he ran up a gambling debt, and took his frustration out on the first available target.”

  As an agent in the international crimes department of the new face of the KGB, the FSB, Vicktor spent too much time in the Russian casinos and strip clubs, tracking down foreigners trying to run from justice.

  Yanna winced. “And people wonder why I don’t want to get married.”

  Vicktor shook his head. “I’m not sure these two are married—he’s Russian and the girl looked awfully young. Besides, not every man in the world is like your many dads, Yanna. There might be a few good ones left.”

  “Maybe,” Yanna said. “So, what brings you down to my lair?” Yanna oversaw the Internet and IT department, something that had earned the respect of her fellow FSB agents. But what Vicktor didn’t know was that she’d put in a request to transfer—to Moscow. The idea had been simmering for months, and when Elena had announced her potential engagement, Yanna took it as a sign.

  Besides, with Vicktor engaged, and Roman and Sarai spending every free moment together, she needed to get on with her life. Alone. And far away from any reminder of the man she could never have. Because, really, why torture herself?

  “Gracie called.” Vicktor didn’t smile, and the omission made Yanna uneasy.

  “How’s Elena? Did Gracie get her settled in? I really appreci—”

  “Elena never got off the plane, Yanna.”

  Yanna’s breath hitched. “What?”

  “Gracie searched the terminal, then contacted the airline. Elena wasn’t on the flight.”

  “But that’s the right flight. I wrote down the numbers myself.” She leaned forward, pulled up her e-mail to Gracie. Then she opened another Internet window and typed in the address for Korean Air. The numbers matched.

  “She wasn’t on board. Just to be sure, I checked all the incoming Korean flights over the past two days. And then I checked the flights to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.”

  Yanna’s chest tightened. “None of them?”

  Vicktor shook his head. He sighed, looking past her, worry in his eyes.

  Yanna let the information sink in, settle like acid into her bones. “I don’t understand. I saw her get on that plane, Vicktor. I walked her right through passport control, right into the gate area, watched her climb the stairs into the plane. Saw it take off. I’m telling you, she was on that plane.”

  Yanna typed in her access to international passport-control information. “Did she clear passport control in Korea? She wasn’t supposed to exit the international side of Incheon airport—her hotel was right in the airport, and she didn’t have to go through passport control to stay there.” She scanned the screen, scrolled down and answered her own question. “No.”

  The spiral of panic hit, affected her voice, lit her nerves on fire. “What about Katya? Was she on the flight to America?”

  “No.”

  Yanna pressed her fingers to her temples, her voice low. “Where are they, Vita?”

  Vicktor shook his head, a grim look on his face. Then he stood. “There’s something else, Yanna. The M.E. called. The Korean embassy faxed over a picture from their morgue. Utuzh needs you to come down to his office and identify a body.”

  Yanna’s breath left her, and something inside snapped. She heard a moan deep down inside, but she wouldn’t, couldn’t let it surface. “Ladna,” she said, agreeing to his request in a voice she didn’t recognize. She stood and followed Vicktor from the office.

  “I just want to know one thing, Bruce. How did Kwan find out about Chet?” David kept his voice low, but his tone meant business as did the barrel of his Glock 47. He’d been asking himself that for three days as he lay low, not returning to his house, or the humanitarian aid company he used as a cover business. Three days of waiting before he could sneak into the Kaohsiung hospital and see for himself that Chet was going to live.

  Three days to sort through his brain the scenario at the docks, and come up with an answer. Three days before he could track down Bruce, bribe a waiter and yank his CIA contact away from dinner with a group of loud Americans and meet him in the bathroom. Where, just because he was angry and on edge and not entirely sure who to trust, he met Bruce with right hook and a knee to his spine.

  He drove the muzzle into Bruce’s jaw, the other hand he used to tighten his submission hold on Bruce’s hand. He leaned close and leveraged the thinner man onto the grimy bathroom floor. Yeah, like that smell, pal? “How did he find out?”

  “Back off, David.”

  “Listen, I’m living off the grid. I look and stink like something that crawled out from under a dock and it’ll take very little for me to simply disappear. I’ve already shot one friend, so it just may become a hot streak if you don’t start talking.”

  “You were there. We were alone. What do you think happened?” Bruce tried to wiggle out of David’s grip, and earned a moan.

  “I think that you—or someone inside your department—is on Kwan’s payroll.”

  “Why would I—”

  “And I’m going to find out who.”

  The silence behind that statement told David that Bruce heard him, and well. He swallowed. “I know.”

  David said nothing.

  “Yes, okay, we have a mole. But it’s not me.”

  David didn’t move.

  “C’mon, Curtiss. You know me well enough to know that I’m a patriot. We’ve worked together for years. I wouldn’t turn over a friend.” He lowered his voice. “And I wouldn’t shoot a friend.”

  David flinched, but he let Bruce go. Bruce instantly found his feet. Stepping away from him, David watched the man’s hands in case he delivered a payback swing, but Bruce preferred the far end of the room.

  He smoothed his dress shirt, his office haircut, and his hands shook slightly. “Believe me, I’m as sick about Chet as you are.”

  “You didn’t shoot him.”

  “You had no choice, David. Chet told me what happened. He told me they jumped him, and that it was either him or both of you. You did the ri
ght thing.”

  David wished he could agree. Wished he didn’t hear Chet’s agony every time he closed his eyes.

  If it weren’t for the high drama the sounds of the shooting wrought, and the need for immediate egress, Chet would be lying in the Kaohsiung morgue and not in ICU. David had gotten clear and called Taiwanese police in time to save his life. Meanwhile, Kwan’s men vanished and David went dark. Three days later, David wasn’t sure if he might find a bomb in his scooter’s carburetor, be dropped with a clean shot to his head from some sweet-potato kiosk, or if a Thai call girl might show up on his doorstep as a gift from his new business partners.

  The entire thing made him sick and the smell of raw fish and tofu emanating from the café kitchen only made his stomach roll. He wished that someone would remind him, again, why he was trying to take out Kwan? Because lately he had a hard time figuring out which side he was really on.

  “I’ve run the scenario through my head a thousand times. The leak had to come from someone inside.”

  “We’ll figure it out, David. Only a handful of people knew about this op. Me, my director, the American attaché to Taiwan. And even they didn’t know names. We’ve swept our phones for taps, scanned all communication going in and out of the embassy. I don’t know, but I promise, I’ll find out.”

  David closed his eyes, ran his hands down his face. He sighed. “Now what?”

  Bruce stepped to the door, opened it and glanced outside. When David shanghaied him, Bruce had been dining with two Taiwanese ladies and a small contingency from the American Institute, aka the American embassy in Taiwan. “I’ll talk to Lee. See if he knows anything.”

  Lee Quinn, the khaki-wearing, apple-cheeked man from Iowa who ran the American Institute? The boys on Bruce’s staff called him Q, mocking his ability to even boot up his computer without crashing a system or two. Yeah, he was sure to have insider information.