by Cliff Ryder
"I could kill you out here and leave your bodies for the carrion feeders."
One of the women looked up. "Please, I have a child. She needs me."
"You disgrace your child," Taburova said. "You disgrace God. And you think only of yourself."
The woman wept openly.
Taburova stepped forward and kicked the woman in the side. She screamed and tried to get away. He kicked her again.
"Be still," Taburova ordered. "And stop crying or I will kill you, instead of offering you a chance to avenge your husband and yourself, and to make your daughter proud of you."
The rest of the women watched him fearfully. They knew what he was talking about, and they knew that — in the end — they had no choice.
"I'm going to offer all of you that chance." Taburova stared at them while the woman he'd kicked shuddered on the ground. "Like God, I don't have to be merciful. You have lost your husbands fighting the Russians. Your sons. Your fathers."
Tears tracked down the faces of all the women.
"Those brave men gave their lifeblood fighting for your freedom," Taburova went on. "You can do no less. Your country needs you."
"My daughter," the woman on the ground wailed.
Anger spiked within Taburova as he turned to look down at her. "Your daughter is an orphan." He pointed the AK-47 at her head and pulled the trigger.
The bullet exploded through the woman's head and the detonation caused the others to jump. Her blood was the only thing that moved on the ground.
"Death became your fate when your husbands, brothers, sons and fathers died," Taburova told the rest of them. "All of you have sinned. You know you have sinned. It stains your hearts, and it brought the bad luck that has left you here."
His words left them shaken. What he told them was nothing new. They had grown up steeped in such beliefs. And Taburova knew that no one who had ever dealt with misfortune felt they were without sin. Every person, eventually, blamed themselves for where they were in life.
These women lived hard lives even before they'd been left without guardians.
"I will give you the opportunity to redeem yourselves," Taburova said. "And to strike back at the Russians."
He paced in front of them, searching the dirty faces for the one who could be the leader he needed among these women. They couldn't all be sheep. God willing, there was a lioness among them.
"Don't you want to make the Russians pay in blood for all that they have taken from you?" Taburova demanded. "They have stripped you of everything. You have no one to speak for you. Stained by sin as you are, you have no chance to get into heaven. I will take you there."
A young woman stepped forward, but she ducked her head fearfully as she faced Taburova. "I will go. I will bring death to the Russians."
Taburova walked toward her. Her resolve lessened as he got closer. She stood on shaking legs with her chin trembling and tears streaming through the dirt on her face.
"Who are you?" he asked in a soft, nonthreatening voice.
"I am Roza."
"That is a fine name."
She bowed her head. Upon closer inspection, Taburova doubted she was sixteen years old. In some ways, she was still a child. Dirt streaked the dark tangles of hair that hung below her headscarf. Sadness and defiance gleamed in her dark eyes. She was thin, but she had a figure.
"My mother's name was Roza," Taburova lied. "She was a fine, brave woman."
Roza nodded.
"Why do you wish to kill the Russians, Roza?"
"My husband was a soldier. He died fighting the Russians in March."
"You loved him?" Taburova was only mildly curious. Some families sold their girls as early as they could to rid themselves of daughters.
"I did." Pride hardened Roza's eyes. "He was a very fine man. A good man to me."
"Did he have no family for you to take shelter with?"
"No. His father and brother died in the same battle. Only his mother and I were left."
"She would not take you in?"
Roza pointed her chin at the dead woman. "She is there. She had no place to go, either."
Taburova stared at the young girl and knew the eyes of all the other women were on them. "Were you a good wife to your husband?"
"Yes."
"And you say you loved him."
"I will always love him."
"Then I will give you a way to honor his memory and once more be with him. Do you want that?"
Roza answered without hesitation. "Yes."
"Then come." Taburova turned to look at the other women. "If you want vengeance for everything that has been taken from you, if you want to strike back at our enemies, come with me."
None of them said anything, but they were all aware of the dead woman at their feet.
Taburova turned and headed down the hill to where Bislan waited. Roza stepped in behind him. He glanced at his men. "Shoot any of these women too cowardly to follow Roza."
"Yes, sir." The soldiers readied their weapons.
Taburova stole a glance to the side where he spotted the squat shadows left by the noonday sun. A row of shadows followed him out of the mountains.
23
London
"It appears I've made a mistake," Samantha said softly. She wore an earwig that connected her to Kate Cochran in New York through a heavily encrypted line.
"CardinalSin might not have been the best choice," Kate agreed. She was also logged on to the website, but Samantha didn't know what name she was using.
"Given the arena in which I'm to play," Samantha said, "I thought the name fitting."
Almost as soon as Samantha logged in to the chat room, a dozen invitations to go to a private area had popped up on the screen. She didn't know how she was supposed to tell which one was Ajza Manaev.
More invitations hammered the screen with text blocks.
The digital clock at the bottom of the monitor clicked over to ten o'clock.
Samantha scanned the names. All of them were offensive and suggestive. None looked like it belonged to Ajza Manaev.
C'mon, Samantha thought angrily. She couldn't believe she'd made the situation harder than it had to be. Some of the people who'd extended invitations became irritated and lashed out at her for ignoring them.
"Do you see her?" Samantha asked.
"No," Kate replied.
"Did anyone log on at ten?"
" Seventeen new names at ten. More are jumping in now."
"This is ridiculous," Samantha lamented.
"She's counting on the volume of users working for her," Kate said.
"Currently they're working against her. I'm not going to be able to tell when she tries to contact me because of all the other invitations."
"Then you're going to have to contact her," Kate said.
"That's bloody unlikely." Samantha swore in disgust. "I don't know who she is."
"You don't know what her name is in this chat room," Kate stated quietly. "But you know who she is. Give her a way to let you know who she is."
Samantha's fingers flew across the keyboard. She typed a general message — If you want to talk to me, tell me your brother's name.
* * *
Ajza stared at the entry by CardinalSin. As soon as she'd seen the name in the chat room, she'd known her contact would experience problems getting to her. She hadn't expected that.
The invitation quickly scrolled up. A dozen chat-room users quickly submitted names, either their own or whatever came to mind. One even offered to allow CardinalSin to name him or her whatever he or she wished.
Indecision twisted Ajza's stomach for a moment. She made herself breathe.
She typed in Ilyas and waited.
* * *
"I have her," Samantha told Kate.
"I see her," Kate said. "We're starting the trace at this end, but I don't expect she'll be on long enough for us to secure it."
Samantha silently agreed. She typed rapidly trying to entice the young woman into meeting with her.
&n
bsp; * * *
Ajza refused the request for a meeting. She glanced at the time. Trevor would be working his magic by now. If everything went right, he'd know where the contact was coming from. However, he'd told her she could only spend minutes in the chat room before they were exposed. She was nearing that limit.
I thought maybe you'd be interested to know how your brother died.
Stunned, Ajza watched as the statement scrolled up toward the top of the chat box. Other users chimed in and started asking questions, wondering if their dialogue was some kind of role play and whether they could get in on it.
Ajza's prepaid cell phone vibrated. She knew it was Trevor because he was the only one she'd given the number to after she'd bought the phone in Leicester. However, given everything the mysterious people tracking her seemed to know, it was possible she wouldn't know the person on the other end of the call.
She scooped it up and answered it.
"Get out of there," Trevor said.
"What if they know how Ilyas died?" She knew Trevor was tracking the chat-room conversation.
"It could be a trick. They know you, Ajza. They know which buttons to push."
Ajza didn't say anything.
"You're exposed." Trevor strained to keep his voice calm. "I can't keep you safe if you don't follow my advice."
Was it about safety anymore? Ajza thought of the gaping hole Ilyas's death had left in her family. It was a wound that wouldn't heal. Could she pass up this opportunity? Even if it was bait in a trap?
"Ajza," Trevor pleaded.
She ignored him and typed rapidly. Where do you want to meet?
"You've got to get out of there," Trevor said. "For all you know, they could be right outside the door."
Paranoid, Ajza glanced at the door. At that moment it opened and two young men wearing T-shirts entered. She watched them.
"Ajza."
"Have you tracked the connection at the other end?" she asked.
"I've tracked it back to the United States."
That surprised Ajza. She hadn't expected the trail to go there.
"They've also got a big-time nasty computer system," Trevor said. "It's negating nearly everything I can throw at it, and I'm throwing the lot. I've tangled with very few sites as intricate as this."
"Government or corporate?" Ajza asked.
"I honestly couldn't say, love. But these bloody well sure aren't people you just muck about with for no reason."
"I've got a reason."
"Ajza," Trevor said. "I don't want to lose you, too."
"You won't." Ajza's eyes tracked the conversations, looking for further dialogue from CardinalSin.
A moment later CardinalSin wrote, Why don't you pick the place?
Ajza thought quickly, then typed, Jubilee Gardens. Near the memorial.
* * *
I'll be there.
How will I know you?
I'll know you. We'll talk about your brother.
His name was posted in this chat room.
* * *
There was a brief pause. I'll mention the name of the man you spied on in Istanbul.
Shocked, Ajza realized that whoever she was talking to knew far more than she'd ever expected.
"Does that mean anything to you?" Trevor asked.
"Yes."
"Then get out of there. This could all still be a bloody trick."
Ajza didn't think so. If these people knew as much as they evidently did, they could have come for her in a straightforward manner. So why had they come at her this way? It was irritating, and it made her curious.
When can I meet you? Ajza typed. If they were located in the United States, she expected travel arrangement would have to be made.
Say, two hours?
Surprised, Ajza stared at the entry.
"The connection tracks back to the U.S.," Trevor said, "but they've got someone located here in London. This is getting dicey, love. Doesn't leave us much time to prep."
"We couldn't prep enough for these people," Ajza said. She typed, I'll see you there. Then she logged off the site.
"Get up and get moving," Trevor said. "The longer you hang about there, the more dangerous it's going to get."
Ajza knew that. She grabbed her coffee and scone and left the building.
24
London
Samantha slid into her car, keyed on the ignition and lowered the windows a bit to let the hot air out. Then she turned the air conditioner on fall. In her mirrors, she watched the two security men get into two different black sedans. A moment later the first one pulled into traffic and she followed it. The second sedan trailed her.
She punched numbers into her phone. Kate answered on the first ring.
"Well?" Samantha asked.
"She's exactly what we thought she'd be," Kate replied. "I'm leery of the public meeting place."
"If she hadn't spotted the men we had on her, I might have been able to approach her more easily."
"That's off the table." Kate sighed. "We'll just have to play this out as it is."
"At some point," Samantha pointed out, "we'll have to trust her."
"I know. I'd just like a little longer to get there."
"We could delay this. I don't know if that's the wisest course. The problem in Chechnya is either high priority or it's not. Your call."
"Given everything I've learned about Taburova and Mustafa's sudden interest in brokering weapons — American weapons — I want a look inside Taburova's operation as soon as possible. We don't have anyone else free who could slip inside the way I think Manaev can."
"True, but I'll have to tread carefully," Samantha said. "I'm risking exposure here, and I don't want to be taken out of the game."
"You feel that you have to make this meeting?" Kate asked.
"Without question," Samantha said.
"All right. While you're doing that, I'm going to see if I can get some help inside Moscow."
"Do you have someone there?"
"Of course I do," Kate said. "I have someone everywhere. For all its nonexistence, Room 59 is big. Stay in touch."
* * *
"I see you, love. Don't get your knickers in a twist."
Even though she had chosen the meeting place, Ajza felt incredibly vulnerable. Mothers and nannies took children to the park. A few of them held brightly colored balloons that bobbed in the gentle wind. Sunlight slanted through the trees and cast moving rectangles across the green grass and winding walking paths.
"I'm fine," she said. Trevor waited at the other end of the phone connection. Ajza's hair hid the earpiece she wore. She was fine. She reminded herself of that.
But she knew she'd feel better if she had a pistol on her. Despite taking the one last night, she hadn't brought it to the park. She was already in trouble if MI-6 was watching her meet with someone she didn't know — for reasons she couldn't quite fathom herself, other than to try to keep her family safe.
Maybe if Ilyas hadn't gotten killed, or if MI-6 had been more forthcoming about his death, she wouldn't have been so concerned. However, MI-6 had lied to her parents, had lied to her and had blackmailed her into continuing that lie to her parents.
She owed them nothing regarding her personal life.
However, getting caught with a weapon by a passing policeman who thought she looked suspicious — and she was certain she did look suspicious — wasn't a good idea. She wasn't authorized to carry a weapon inside the country.
"Have you cut into the video feeds?" Ajza resisted the impulse to look at the cameras hidden around the park. With the terrorist-threat level high, covert video equipment had blossomed everywhere.
"I'm in, love. You don't have to worry about me." Trevor sounded calm and collected. "I see more now than you do. I'm everywhere."
Ajza glanced around the park again, suddenly aware of how much her aloneness made her stand out. Everyone else was there with someone. Parents played with their children or talked to each other. Young lovers walked hand in han
d. A handful of young men threw a Frisbee.
Quietly Ajza cursed. She didn't know why she was looking. She didn't know who she was supposed to meet. In fact, she didn't even know if she was going to meet a man or a woman.
She focused on the need to keep her parents safe, and she told herself she was clever enough to get away no matter what happened. Ilyas's smiling face filled her thoughts, even though she didn't want it to. He'd always been so confident of everything he'd done, always worked to stay one step ahead of everyone.
What got you caught, Ilyas? What got you killed? Those questions cycled constantly through her mind. At the moment, they almost consumed her.
"Hey." Trevor's voice held a note of concern.
"What?" Ajza looked around, then took a few steps toward the street, ready to get out of the area. She headed out of the open space into the trees.
"Somebody's spoofed the blinking camera."
"How?" Ajza put more muscle into her stride. Her heart hammered within her, urging her to run.
"Don't know, love, but whoever did it, he's cherry, he is. I'm looking at the screen, but it's showing the same footage over and over. Techs monitoring this at the desk, they're not gonna notice it."
A trapped feeling filled Ajza.
"Do you want me to call the…"
The earpiece went dead in Ajza's ear. She pulled it out and pocketed it so that her hearing was sharper.
"Ms. Manaev, over here."
The woman's voice surprised Ajza. It was quiet, totally controlled. Like someone who was meeting an acquaintance.
Ajza tracked the voice back to the lone figure standing under a nearby tree. The woman stood with her hands, fingers spread out, at her sides. The stance wasn't natural, and Ajza knew of several weapons that could be hidden or quickly retrieved.
"We cut your friend out from the cameras and your phone connection," the woman said. "I do want to talk to you. Please don't panic."
Don't panic? Ajza seized the anger that floated up inside her. She used it to fuel her movement.
"Perhaps we should both be feeling a little panicked at the moment," Ajza said.
The woman smiled. "If it's any consolation to you, I'm not exactly at ease either."
But you have friends that shut my friend out, don't you? As Ajza closed in on the woman, she watched the frees through her peripheral vision. She expected the woman's bodyguards to close in on them, but no one appeared to take any special interest.
