Field of Fire

by Marc Cameron

  And there was—a black rat the size of a small dog. The thing looked up with pointed eyes and made a little phhht sound that Bowen imagined was the sound rats made when they were disgusted. It didn’t seem too fazed by their presence but waddled off, raising its tail toward the two men in what must have been the rat version of flipping them the bird.

  “I hate rats,” Thibodaux muttered.

  “I got more blood,” Bowen said, pointing with a bladed hand to the garbage chute above a rusty, powder-blue dumpster as soon as his eyes adjusted to the light.

  They made a quick sweep of the room before stopping to investigate the blood, checking the double doors across from the Dumpster where the garbage truck would back up from the alley. It was secured with a padlock, but the dented metal man-door beside it swung freely, with nothing but a hole where the knob was supposed to be.

  “Puddles of blood, rats, and lord knows what else,” Jacques said, taking a quick peek into the alley. “This place is spooky as shit. Apparently, the management feels that no one in his right mind would come in here to steal anything.”

  Satisfied they were safe from ambush, Bowen held his breath and leaned over the lip of the Dumpster to find two bodies partially wrapped in blood-soaked sheets.

  “Neither one of these looks like Petyr,” he said.

  “Holy hell.” Thibodaux came up behind him to see for himself. He gulped, eyes glued to the carnage. “Neither one of ’em look much like anybody anymore,” he said.

  The Cajun was right. Whoever bludgeoned the two men had left little to identify their faces. It was no wonder there was so much evidence of a violent death upstairs in Petyr’s apartment.

  “I’m pretty sure they’re dudes,” Thibodaux said, regaining his composure by slow degree. “Middle Eastern maybe, but that’s about as far as it goes. Let’s get a couple of photo—”

  The almost imperceptible scuff of a footfall on concrete drew both men’s attention toward the stairs. Thibodaux put a finger to his lips and drew his Kimber and pointed it toward the doorway. Bowen’s Glock was already in his hand. Bowen nodded that he understood and took up a position to the right of the door while the Marine stepped to the left, angled to avoid crossfire. Pistol muzzles angled toward the floor, both men froze, waiting. Bowen knew it was likely the super or someone else connected with the building but after seeing the bludgeoned faces, neither he nor Thibodaux was willing to take any chances.

  The scuff of another footstep whispered down from the stairwell, followed a few seconds later by a third—then silence. Bowen was just beginning to wish he’d left the lights off when the point of a leather boot, followed by a knee, crept slowly into view.

  Because of their angles, Thibodaux was closest. He gave Bowen a wink, and nodded to the Glock while he holstered his Kimber. Bowen understood immediately that he would provide lethal cover while the big Marine, one of the strongest men the deputy had ever seen, would grab whoever came through the door.

  They didn’t have to wait long.

  A glimpse of brown flashed through the doorway. Thibodaux pounced, snatching what appeared to be a sleeve. He ended up with nothing but an empty corduroy jacket. Whoever was on the other end turned and tore back up the stairs, heavy boots slapping the concrete steps in an all-out sprint.

  “Cochons!” Thibodaux said, drawing his pistol and doing a quick peek around the threshold before bolting through the door and up the stairs. Bowen followed a half a step behind, catching just a glimpse of a bearded runner before he rounded the landing above, swinging himself around the steel railing with one hand as a pivot.

  “I . . . hate . . . stairs . . .” Thibodaux ranted as he ran, in perfect time with his feet hitting the steps.

  The bearded man hit the fire door hard at the top of the landing, shoved it open and ran onto the roof. The heavy door slammed shut behind him, echoing in the concrete well like a gunshot.

  Faced with the closed door, both Bowen and Thibodaux slowed. Each knew better than to rush out into the unknown. The metal door opened outward. Crouching in the stairwell, Bowen tipped his head toward an exit sign above and frowned.

  “Fire exit,” he said, catching his breath.

  “Great,” Thibodaux said. “Our turd’s just waltzin’ his way down the fire escape while we’re trying not to get ourselves killed.”

  “Or he’s waiting right outside the door to shoot us,” Bowen whispered. He glanced at the door handle, which was nearest to where Thibodaux stood. “What do you think?”

  The Marine flung open the door in answer. Bowen did a quick buttonhook, rolling around the threshold to allow Thibodaux fast access behind him. It was too easy to get bunched up and play Keystone cops going through a door with a man as large as the big Cajun.

  Through the blue darkness between the night sky and the black tar roof, the arched supports of a rusted fire escape ladder over the lip of the building squeaked and moved under the load of someone climbing to the ground. Bowen ran to the edge and peered over, just in time to see the bearded man jump into the passenger side of a dark sedan that waited on the street below. They sped away without any lights.

  “Tell me you got a good look at him,” Bowen said as Thibodaux came up beside him.

  “Oh, hell yes, I did,” Thibodaux sighed.

  “It wasn’t Petyr,” Bowen said, waiting for Thibodaux to confirm what he already knew.

  “Not unless he’s grown a black beard, lost fifty pounds, and turned into a track star.”

  Bowen bounced his fist on the lip of the waist-high cinderblock parapet that ran around the edge of the roof. “I’ll get with NYPD. They may have some cameras down on the stree—”

  The metallic squeak of the stairwell door sent a chill down Bowen’s spine. He froze, shooting a sideways glance at Thibodaux and held his breath. The quarry gone, both men had relaxed too quickly.

  Somewhere in the darkness behind them, Bowen heard the unmistakable snick of a rifle safety coming off.

  Chapter 15

  Nome

  Ahowling wind blew in from the Bering Sea, shoving at Volodin like the horns of an angry bully. Kaija stood hunched over as she worked on the man door to the hangar, assuring him over the screaming blizzard that she could get past the combination lock. He had thought the lee of the metal building would block the storm, but the wind seemed to come from every direction at once. There was no hiding from it. Crystalline snow scoured the exposed skin of his face and neck, forcing him and his daughter to withdraw into their scant clothing like tortoises in a sandstorm.

  It seemed impossible, but the attack he’d seen on television was of his creation. Someone had sold or given away New Archangel. Only he and Lodygin had the codes to the lab, so it had to be Lodygin. If the Captain was involved, then so was Colonel Rostov. Evgeni Lodygin was a vile thing to be sure. Volodin warned Kaija to stay well away from the pervert. But from what Volodin had seen, the Captain would not so much as get a haircut unless he had the approval from his boss.

  His back to the wind, Volodin pounded at his forehead with a palm, trying desperately to fill in the growing black holes that seemed to be taking over his mind. He knew he was a bad man. Chemical weapons had been called “a higher form of killing,” but Volodin knew that was a lie. There were no high and low killings. Only killing. It made no difference if it was for money or patriotism. Anyone who would create a substance as deadly as New Archangel had made a deal with the devil. Volodin cursed himself at the thought. He could not remember making the deal, but he must have. And if he made a bargain so vile, what else had he done?

  “It is open,” Kaija said, entering the hanger without looking back. Her anger toward him was palpable. And why shouldn’t she be angry? It was his fault they’d been forced to hide for hours in the cramped attic above the lavatories of the air-charter building. They were unprepared, and they both knew it was his doing.

  They’d waited another hour after the building had closed, moving only when they heard the last of the employees lock the door
to the charter office.

  It was Kaija who located another hangar where they could spend the remainder of the night. She was a supremely intelligent girl, and had, Volodin supposed, spent enough time around him to know that people, even smart ones, tended to write down things like door combinations. This one was scratched into the paint of the metal siding a few feet away from the push-button cypher lock.

  Volodin lit a match as soon as he entered the pitch-black hanger. Kaija was quick to blow it out, using the light from her mobile phone to point to three high-wing bush planes and the assorted fuel cans stacked around them.

  “Papa,” she said, shaking her head and glaring with her small mouth set in a hard line, the way her mother had looked when she was cross. “This is not a place to light matches.”

  “Of course,” Volodin said, tapping at his forehead with an open hand again. “I should have known better. I am sorry, child.”

  Kaija led the way across the rough concrete floor. A metal desk, a filing cabinet, and a small refrigerator set one area of the open bay apart as an office area. Thankfully there was a stack of candy bars and four plastic bottles of water inside the fridge. Kaija scooped them up along with something wrapped in white paper that turned out to be a pastrami sandwich.

  Kaija cut the sandwich in half and handed part to Volodin. “Eat this,” she said, biting into her half. “It will help you get your strength back.”

  They ate in silence for a time, with Kaija playing the light of her phone around the huge space, past shelving piled high with airplane parts and winter gear.

  “I need to know something, Papa,” Kaija said at length.

  “Of course,” he said. He’d dragged her this far. What else could he say?

  “The spill into the river,” she said, eyes piercing even in the dim light of the phone. “What were you thinking?”

  Volodin sighed. He’d taken only two bites of the sandwich before his stomach began to rebel. He carefully wrapped the rest and set it on the corner of the desk so Kaija could eat it later.

  “Honestly,” he muttered. “I do not know. It seems to me that the entire lot of what I have done should be destroyed. I must have thought that if I released the chemicals one half at a time, they would be inert and cause no damage.”

  “They would have, Papa,” Kaija said, frustration showing in her twitching brow. “But for some unknown reason you decided to release both components within minutes of each other. Had you not rinsed out the original batch you would have been killed when you simply flushed the second set down the drain.”

  “Perhaps that would have been better than what is happening to me now,” Volodin said, hanging his head.

  “We have been rushed, Papa,” she said, stating the obvious. But perhaps he needed the obvious. He certainly made enough mistakes. “Rushed into fleeing our homeland when we are unprepared.”

  “I know this,” he whispered.

  “Do you, Papa?” She was fuming now. “Do you understand how important it is that we discuss big decisions? There are many places in the world I would have wanted to go besides the United States. Your foolishness has put us in jeopardy. You have put everything in jeopardy.”

  “I am a horrible man, kroshka. Tomorrow I will turn myself in to the American authorities. I will tell them you had nothing to do with this, and they will give you asylum. Perhaps you will like America.” He smiled. “It is not such a bad place. They have excellent universities”

  “I do not wish to live in America!” Kaija screamed. “We will be at the mercy of filthy, thieving zhid!”

  Volodin slapped her, hard, bringing a trickle of blood to the corner of her mouth. “Never use that word,” he said. “Your great-grandmother was a Jew.”

  Kaija rubbed her jaw, staring at him. For a moment, he thought she might hit him back. Instead, she merely shook her head. “I am very tired,” she said.

  “I am sorry, kroshka,” Volodin said. “I should not have struck you.” Her mother had held such racist thoughts, and it had been a constant source of friction between them.

  Kaija held up her open hand. “The fault is mine, Papa.” She clearly had no remorse about what she’d said, only that she’d said it to him. “I will watch my words. We are both exhausted.”

  There were no cots inside the hanger, but there were several pairs of nylon wing covers, quilted bags to protect the plane from snow and frost. Two of them folded made a serviceable if lumpy mattress to keep them off the chilly concrete. And two more proved large enough to climb inside and use as sleeping bags.

  “Go to sleep, child,” Volodin said as he settled in against the stiff nylon. It smelled of oil and mildew, but it was American oil and mildew. “We must not be here when the owners of this place come in tomorrow.”

  “Papa,” Kaija said, facing away in her own makeshift bag. “I am concerned about your plan to go to the authorities tomorrow.”

  Volodin rolled onto his shoulder. His eyes had become accustomed to the darkness, and he could just make out the lump of cloth that was his daughter in the dim glow from the computer on the desk a few feet away.

  “What would you have me do?” He asked. “We cannot hide for long. Those men are surely still looking for us. I expect I will see more by tomorrow. Rostov has eyes everywhere. They will crawl through car and building until they find us.”

  “I am sure this is true.” The heavy nylon wing covers rustled in the darkness as Kaija rolled up on her side as well, looking directly at him. “And that goes to my point. Nome, Alaska, is a very small place, barely larger than Providenya—and just as remote. We will eventually have to go to the authorities, but not here. It would be better to wait until we are in Anchorage where we have a better chance to find someone not in league with Colonel Rostov.”

  “Anchorage?” Volodin said. “There will be people looking for us at the airport.”

  “I have a friend,” Kaija said. “A girl who lives in a small village northeast of here. If we can get to her, she will help us. It will be out of the way, but according to her, the authorities do not check identification on small aircraft within the state. We can get to Anchorage without raising suspicion.”

  “How do you know this girl?” Volodin said.

  Kaija fell back in her bed, laughing. “You are such an old man, Papa. The Internet makes it possible to have friends all over the world. We will find a flight out to my friend, Polina, in the morning. She will help us.”

  “So I should not turn myself in?” Volodin said.

  Kaija gave an exasperated sigh. “No, Papa, you should not.”

  Volodin stared into the darkness. She was angry with him again. They had been arguing about something, but he could not remember what it was.

  Chapter 16

  New York

  “NYPD!”

  A blue-on-blue shooting—catching an acci dental bullet from another officer—was a constant danger to any law-enforcement officer in plain clothes. Bowen had been on the other end of the gun in the same situation and knew he was a hair away from catching a volley of bullets in the back. He let his pistol fall to the rooftop, breathing a sigh of relief when he saw Thibodaux was smart enough to do the same thing.

  “We’re on the job!” Bowen yelled over his shoulder without turning around. Considering all the blood and bone the responding cops had walked by on the floors below, there was no doubt they would be a little twitchy on the trigger.

  Bowen could feel more than one officer behind him and knew even without seeing them that several muzzles pointed in his direction. He’d felt the feeling before, and it was not an easy thing to forget. Thankfully the officers were well-disciplined and absent the melee of contradictory commands that were often issued under stressful confrontations.

  “Step away from the guns!” a voice barked. It was deep and sure, accustomed to giving orders. “Hands away from your sides!”

  A moment later both Bowen and Thibodaux were bum rushed by a swarm of police. Bowen caught glimpses of blue windbreakers and go
ld shields swinging from neck chains as he was forced face down. Detectives, Bowen thought. That made sense.

  “U.S. Marshals,” Bowen said as the handcuffs ratcheted closed at the small of his back. His voice was muffled. He tasted tar from the roof. “My creds are in my left jacket pocket. Badge is inside my shirt on a chain around my neck.”

  A hand reached around to retrieved the black credential case. “Wearing your badge inside your shirt is a good way to get yourself ventilated,” the authoritative voice behind him said.

  “Can’t argue with that,” Bowen said. “This thing went from interview to shitstorm before we knew it.

  “They got a way of doin’ that around here,” the detective said.

  Bowen chanced a look over his shoulder. When no one kicked him in the head, he began to relax.

  A stocky man with a flattened nose from one too many fights stood back a few feet, perusing both sets of credentials. From the way the other men seemed to look to him for direction, Bowen guessed he was the detective in charge.

  “They’re good.” The man nodded to the contact detectives. He snapped the black leather cases closed, apparently satisfied. “Go ahead and take the cuffs off and help them up.”

  Bowen and Thibodaux brushed the dust off the front of their clothes and took back their credentials in turn. The lead detective raised a blond eyebrow at Thibodaux. “What in the hell is OSI?”

  The Marine shook his head. “I know, right?” he said, not bothering to explain.

  “Detective Sean O’Hearn,” the detective said. “Sixtieth precinct organized crime squad. I’m assuming you guys came to speak to the mope in 307.”

  “We did,” Bowen said.

  O’Hearn rubbed his face. “Well, said mope has recently started keeping company with people who are on our radar.” He suddenly looked directly at Bowen. “Looks like you been on the wrong end of a fist.”