by Andrew Watts
The hotel had laid out the finest spread of appetizers. A private bartender prepared cocktails for both men. Morozov’s regular harem of imported women were already enjoying their drinks. Two of them began making their way over to Morozov and the FSB man, but Morozov waved them off.
“In a few moments, ladies. We need to speak alone.”
Vasily looked at the women and said, “Now that is something the Americans I do business with don’t often provide. Are they Russian?”
“I source my talent from all over the globe,” Morozov replied. “But to be honest, I can’t remember where these two are from.”
The two Russian men sipped their drinks. Vasily was admiring the ocean view. The sky was getting dark, but it was still peaceful. Morozov didn’t pay the view any attention. He was focused on Vasily.
“When will they arrive?” Morozov asked.
“Tomorrow. Midmorning, Eastern time.”
“Flying into Washington, D.C?”
“Yes.” Vasily paused. “How will you—”
Morozov clicked his tongue, shaking his head. “This we cannot discuss. But suffice it to say that we have very good targeting information on his plane.”
Vasily flushed.
Morozov took a deep breath. “I can see that you are uncomfortable with this.”
“If it goes wrong, Pavel…”
“I know.”
“He is not a man to be trifled with,” Vasily whispered.
Morozov’s face darkened. “Neither am I.”
“And what of the Fend boy? Is he still out on the loose? I told you that I wouldn’t give my approval unless he was taken care of.”
“He’s on his way.”
“What? You’re bringing him here? Is that wise?”
“You wanted confirmation. I’m giving it to you.”
Max was escorted into a luxury hotel on the coast. He was guessing it was Amelia Island, based on the time it had taken them to get here.
The Russian henchmen led Max to a small hotel room and sat him on a couch. The Ritz-Carlton. Max saw the words on one of the cupholders. The two Russian guards sat on the beds, watching bad TV. Every few seconds, they would look at him. Charlotte—or whatever her name was—had left them when they came in.
They remained in the room for several hours. Max attempted small talk a few times. If the Russians understood English, they feigned a lack of understanding quite well.
Charlotte came in after midnight. “He’s ready for him.” The guards shoved Max out the door and down the hallway.
Pavel Morozov was waiting for him with another man. Two women in cocktail dresses were draped over them. Seeing Max, Morozov sent the two women away.
Morozov looked at Max Fend. “It’s good to finally meet you, Max. I hope your father is well. Did he tell you about our special relationship? About how he worked for me?”
“He didn’t work for you.”
Morozov smiled. “Is that what he told you? Let me guess. He told you that the CIA was controlling him. That it was all part of a ploy to feed me false information. The almighty American intelligence agency—the saviors of the Cold War. Are those the lies that he told you?”
Max didn’t say anything. Charlotte stood in back of them over a rolling bar. She plucked an olive with a toothpick and began chewing it, watching Max. The older man next to Morozov sat quietly in his chair.
“Your father was a traitor to his country,” Morozov said. “The only reason he switched sides was because he wanted to save his own skin. He got caught. He was bad at it. He didn’t follow the proper precautions like I had taught him. Once the CIA and FBI knew that they could use him, your father cut a deal with them. Before that, I had been giving him everything. His aerospace company would not have been nearly as successful without the documents that I provided him.”
“Come on, Pavel. We both know that the Russians stole everything from the US military back then. Not the other way around.”
Morozov smiled. “Tsk-tsk. Revisionist history. Of course that is what the American textbooks say. But the truth is malleable. And the CIA, along with your own press, has changed the story of what really happened at the end of the Cold War. Your father wasn’t a hero, Max. He was a traitor. And he was responsible for your mother’s death.”
Max’s face reddened.
“He probably told you that it was me, right? Of course. Then why didn’t he ever come after me? Hmm? Why didn’t he go to the authorities? That is what any reasonable person would have done. What any real man would have done. But your father? He kept quiet. He covered it up, along with the CIA. Ask yourself—why?”
Max clenched his fists but stayed silent.
Pavel smirked. “The real reason your mother died? Because your father betrayed me. He knew the penalty for crossing me. And he didn’t care. Your father only wanted to protect his baby. Not you, Max. His precious Fend Aerospace. That was what he really cared about. He was willing to sacrifice anything to grow that business. Even your mother.”
He spoke with conviction. Like he’d had years of practice manipulating others. He had, Max reminded himself. As a KGB operative during the Cold War, Morozov’s two main jobs had been to squeeze information out of people, and to insert false information.
Max couldn’t play the game anymore. He couldn’t stomach it. “You’re a sad little man,” he said.
“Nothing hurts like the truth. I don’t need you to believe me. I have gotten you and your father to do exactly what I want. Now it’s just a matter of executing.”
“So you’re still planning on stealing the Fend 100 technology? Are you an imbecile, Pavel? Everyone knows what you’re planning. It’s not going to happen. There are probably US law enforcement officers listening to us right now.”
“I doubt it. They think I’m on my yacht, which is docked south of St. Augustine, quite a ways from here.”
“How do you know what law enforcement believes?”
“The information is all out there, if you know the right people.” Pavel turned to the older man sitting next to him. “Enough of this. Vasily, are you satisfied? You heard him, correct? He said steal the technology. That is what they think I am going to do. May I dispose of him now?”
The old man studied Max and nodded. “Da.”
Pavel made a whistling noise and gestured to his security guards.
“Wait,” Max said. His mind was racing. Pavel and this other Russian were planning something else. They didn’t intend to steal the Fend 100 technology. “You let me live because you wanted to mislead MI-6? The CIA?”
Morozov smirked. “And you just confirmed that we were successful.”
The guards stood over him now. “But you must have intended for me to upload your software into the Fend 100 with the thumb drive. If you’re going to kill me, then how are you planning to access the Fend data?”
Pavel Morozov’s expression darkened. “Now, Max, there’s no reason for you to know that.”
“You’re pathetic. My father beat you at your own game back during the Cold War. He humiliated you. He let you provide false information to the USSR on his defense projects. And you believed him, you Commie bastard. Now you’re trying to get revenge on him by sabotaging his company. They know what you’re doing, Pavel. No wonder the Soviet Union collapsed. It was filled with morons like you.”
Pavel looked at Charlotte. “Miss Capri?”
“Yes?”
“I am ready for you to take our guest away.”
“Very well.”
Pavel breathed in deeply and exhaled. “Max, I bid you farewell. Rest assured that your death and subsequent blame for what happens tomorrow will allow you to live on in infamy.”
Morozov nodded to his security men, and they grabbed his arms.
Max struggled against the guard’s grip. He needed to create options. He kept trying to dig. He wanted Morozov to get emotional and slip up. To give him some tidbit of information that he might find useful.
“You’re walking into a tr
ap, Morozov.”
Pavel smiled, but didn’t say anything.
“This is reckless, even for you. Revenge on my father isn’t worth spending your life in an American prison. Think about that. They’ll know what you did. They’ll know you killed me.” Max didn’t see any reaction from Morozov.
The men began dragging him away. “You think this will make you feel better about losing the Cold War for your country? This won’t change anything for you. You’ll still be just another stooge for your president.”
At that, Morozov’s face went red, and he held up his hand. “Wait.”
Morozov walked over to Max. The guards held him tight. Pavel shot a leathery hand out and seized Max by the jaw.
“Say that again.”
Max tried to seem as insolent as possible as he choked out his words, staring down Morozov. “That’s right, Pavel. There’s only one leader in Russia, and it ain’t you.”
Morozov nodded slowly. “Okay.”
He let out a weird snort. Then he unleashed a furious blow into Max’s stomach. His eyes nearly burst out of their sockets, and all the air shot from his lungs. The pain was excruciating. Max couldn’t breathe.
Pavel whispered in his ear as Max’s mouth remained open, empty gasps trying to suck in air.
“I know that I may be vain, young man. But I am not stupid. And you don’t have enough respect for me, or where I came from. Yes, the Soviet Union collapsed. But I didn’t. My people are everywhere. My plans are often years in the making. For this operation, you were just my personal cherry on top, as they say. But I’m happy to exclude you if it means that everything else will flow smoothly. Tomorrow your father’s life’s work will be destroyed, and you’ll take the fall. But a man like me wouldn’t go through all this trouble just to exact revenge upon your father. I have a much grander vision than that.”
Destroyed?
Max’s thoughts were a swirl of activity. The way Morozov was talking—it didn’t fit with what they knew. Something was wrong, and it was staring him in the face.
They started to drag Max away, and then it clicked. Max’s eyes widened. He finally knew what they were really up to. Holy shit. Of course…
“You aren’t trying to steal the data at all, are you, Pavel? That was just a ploy…”
Vasily looked uncomfortable. “Pavel.”
Morozov waved him off. “Relax. He’ll be dead soon.”
“It won’t work. We know who your insider is.”
Morozov scoffed. “Who, then?”
Max thought about guessing, but in truth, he hadn’t a clue.
A wide smile formed on Morozov’s face. “The desperate words of a condemned man, I think.”
Then he said something in Russian to his men, and they took Max away.
19
Renee had seen the Russians’ SUV pull into the parking lot of the Amelia Island Ritz-Carlton. Renee had parked about one hundred yards away, near the resort’s tennis courts. There were lots of cars. She was pretty sure she wasn’t noticed.
Renee had seen the Russians leave their SUV in the parking lot and walk with Max into the hotel. She’d thought about calling the police. But Max had specifically forbidden that. He couldn’t have foreseen this circumstance, however. She had to get help somehow. Why hadn’t she gotten Wilkes’s number from Max?
Calm down. Give Max some time. Maybe he had gone here on purpose. Maybe this was part of some plan. He would be okay. He did this for a living. Right?
She needed a weapon. If she went fast and came back here, she could be ready for when Max reappeared.
Five minutes later, Renee walked into a local sporting goods store and scanned the rows for what she needed. Football. Golf. Pool equipment. There.
Hunting and fishing.
The department was back of the store. Renee practically ran there. An overweight man in his early twenties stood behind the counter. He wore a red shirt with the words “Go Dawgs” on the front, a toothpick in his mouth.
“Can I help you, ma’am?”
She tried to act normal. Behind him, rifles and bows lined the wall. Under the glass counter he was leaning on were dozens of models of handguns.
“I need a weapon.”
The man stared back at her. “Mmm. Okay. Well, it appears that you’ve come to the right place.”
“It’s for self-defense. But I prefer not to use a gun.”
The man eyed her. “Right. We’ve got this little sucker over here. Ain’t had nobody interested in it before. But there’s always a first, I guess.”
“What is it?”
“It’s kind of like a paintball gun. But these little plastic balls are made special. They’re filled with some sort of pepper spray mix that stings the eyes something awful. Blinds you for a few seconds and then you just go down until you can wash it out. Never tried it myself, but—”
“I’ll take it.”
The store clerk looked at her. “You alright, miss? You sound like you’re in some trouble.”
“I’m fine. Just in a hurry. Can I pay here?”
“Sure.”
“Do you have flashlights?”
“Yes, ma’am. Right over there.”
“Good. And one more thing…do you have any field hockey sticks?”
She paid and hustled to her car, then drove back to where she had seen the Russians park their SUV. She waited in the parking lot of the Amelia Island Ritz-Carlton for several hours. As the night went on, she drove herself insane wondering if she hadn’t made a mistake. What if he was already gone? What if they had killed him?
All she had to hold on to was the car they had arrived in. She watched it to see if Max would reappear.
Max was once again in the backseat of the Russians’ SUV. They drove south along A1A, back the way they came. It was dark now, and no one spoke. Max could hear the rhythmic thumping of the tires against the slabs of highway.
They turned left off the highway and onto a single-lane road, driving deeper into the darkness. The headlights briefly illuminated a sign for Little Talbot Island State Park. Palms and swampy trees hugged both sides of the road.
Max tried to remain calm, but his mind was racing with what he had just learned. Morozov wasn’t trying to just steal the Fend 100 technology. He was trying to do something far worse. And he was going to blame it on Max somehow. Maybe that’s why he had decided to let him live, when they could have killed him in Key West.
No. It was more than that.
They had misled Max and used him to feed bad information to…who? To Wilkes? To his father? What was the bad information he had given them?
The thumb drive solution? Max had told them of MI-6’s plan to defend against another one of Morozov’s cyberattacks.
But Wilkes and the people at Fend Aerospace weren’t even going to use that now. They had a backup plan in Maria. None of this made any sense…
Max needed to get out of here and warn them. They couldn’t let the Fend 100 get airborne.
He examined his driving companions. Two large Russian men. Ex-special forces, likely. Both armed and deadly. Driving along a deserted street at night. Max would only have one chance. He would have to make it count.
The car came to a halt in a large open parking lot. Max thought he could make out a few other cars there, on the other side of the lot. But it was hard to tell in the darkness.
The Russians were talking to each other, but they were speaking in their native tongue. Max couldn’t understand a word. The one in the backseat kept his weapon out, pointing it at Max. The one in the driver’s seat got out and walked around to Max’s door, opening it. The man sitting next to Max in the backseat started pushing him forward, weapon trained on Max’s back.
Max had been hoping to have an opportunity to take on just one of them at a time during the transition out of the vehicle. But they had obviously done this before. He would wait. Maybe try falling in the sand and…
“This way,” Thug One said, pointing with his silenced pistol.
> They marched him along the dunes, parallel to the beach. It was slow going, their feet sinking into the sand. Lots of brush. Crabs scattering as they trudged through.
Waves crashed on his left side. Slow rhythmic bursts of white noise. Max made calculations in his head. They were getting farther from the parking lot. It was now or never. He gave himself about a ten percent chance.
Someone called out from behind them.
“Hey! Excuse me?” came the female voice. “Can you help me out?” A flashlight cut through the night behind them, shining on the sand and illuminating the ground between the Russians and a woman walking towards them.
The men said something to each other in Russian. Max imagined that they were wondering whether Morozov would get mad if they killed her too.
The flashlight changed direction and reflected the body of the woman approaching them. Her white shirt was unbuttoned and wide open, revealing a bright-pink-and-white bikini top and tight jean shorts. Seeing that, one of the Russians whispered something to the other, which was followed by snickering.
The way the light was pointed, her face wasn’t visible. One of the Russians grumbled to Max, “You stay quiet or we shoot you both right here.”
He didn’t reply.
The flashlight moved erratically, shining towards them and then back towards the woman. Both Russians clumsily hid their weapons from the woman behind their legs. If she was looking carefully, she would probably notice.
“I’m so sorry,” the woman said, “I’m lost. Would you gentlemen be able to help me find…” Max recognized the voice.
The light flashed back in their eyes. Max and the two Russians instinctively winced. What they didn’t realize was that the flashlight was connected just under the barrel of Renee’s pepper spray gun.
It had the look and feel of a large plastic 9mm Beretta, but it fired paintball-type rounds, filled with a combination of tear gas and pepper spray.
Renee fired multiple times into both of the Russians’ chests and faces. Quick clicks and pops, and the sound of high-speed plastic pellets bursting into the muscle-bound men.
