Stabenow, Dana - Shugak 10 - Midnight Come Again

by Midnight Come Again(lit)

  Special Agent Haley was small and thin and red-haired and harried. He was also easily cowed, and in spite of the mountain of paperwork piled on his desk he didn't hesitate to go in search of the errant agents. He found them two floors down, assisting in the sorting of evidence from the bombing of an airliner which had gone into the Atlantic off the coast of South Carolina.

  Carroll looked up and saw Haley in the doorway. "We're saved," she told Casanare. There were only so many ways a witness could describe a plane blowing up, all of them resulting in the death and dismemberment of everyone on board. When you've read one eyewitness report, you've read them all, whether they were knee-deep in the ocean off Myrtle Beach, revering or reviling the memory of John Brown at Fort Sumter, or visiting your mother-in-law under duress at Tybee Island.

  "Who says there's no god?" Casanare replied. If he had to look at one more report of a severed limb floating to shore, he was afraid he might vomit. You just don't vomit at headquarters. In the field, yes, neatly and discreetly behind a bush, and at a crime scene no one blamed you, but not at headquarters.

  Maxine Carroll was a tall blonde with deep blue, almost violet eyes.

  Alberto Casanare was an inch shorter than Carroll, fifty pounds heavier, all of it muscle, and as dark as she was fair.

  They were key members on the task force investigating the Russian Mafia presence in the United States, recently covering themselves with glory following the successful cracking of a multinational organization controlling but not limited to credit card fraud, money laundering, illegal alien smuggling, white slavery, weapons trafficking and tax evasion, and the indictment (if not the trial and imprisonment, Haley thought regretfully), of one Pyotr Razikin, AKA Peter the Great, the alleged leader of the organization.

  "What's up?" Carroll said in the hallway.

  Haley, preoccupied with watching her walk, didn't hear her at first.

  Casanare, grinning, nudged him in the side before Carroll turned around and caught him. He colored and stuttered, "Uh, the boss wants to talk to you."

  "What about?"

  "I don't know," Haley said.

  Carroll halted to examine him through narrowed eyes. "Like hell. You're worse than a Soviet mole in the CIA. You always know what's going on."

  Haley's red face darkened to purple and he very nearly wriggled with pleasure. "Really. He just said to find you, he didn't say why."

  "But your best guess would be--?" Casanare said.

  Haley only shook his head and marched determinedly to the elevator.

  Casanare raised an eyebrow at Carroll, who shrugged and followed.

  The lack of windows in Samuel Golden's office was disguised by the blizzard of memos, department communiques, ten-most-wanted lists, crime reports and hand drawn, crudely lettered cartoons scatological and profane dealing mostly with Senate oversight committees tacked to the walls. Golden himself was an intense, wiry man of fifty-two years, smart, tenacious and a Bureau man down to his toes. His family was Jewish, originally from Minsk, and he was fluent in Russian. He'd been a twenty-year veteran when tapped to head up the Russian Mafia task force.

  At first the task force had been him and one administrative aide.

  After the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Republic broke up, the power and global reach of the Russian Mafia expanded exponentially, and eventually he was allocated his pick of the personnel roster. His first choice had been Alberto Casanare. On Al's recommendation, his second was Maxine Carroll. As they settled into their seats, he ran a mental review of their jackets, which were very nearly as colorful as his own.

  Maxine Carroll's great-grandfather had been born Anatoli Chernofski, which became Carroll on his way through Ellis Island in 1899. He had traveled by train across the country to Dawson City, where he met a dance hall girl named Norma Swensen. They married and moved to Seattle, where Anatoli used Norma's savings to establish himself in the timber industry, gradually diversifying into paper products, soon landing a lucrative and apparently infinite contract with the Department of the Interior and thereby ensuring the security and comfort of his family well into the next century. In the fullness of time, Anatoli and Norma had children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, of which Carroll was the third. At her great-grandfather's insistence, his children had grown up speaking both Russian and English, a tradition passed down through the generations. When Carroll graduated from the University of Washington in 1989 with a degree in economics, she was recruited by the FBI. She was thirty-four years old, single, with no children. Golden looked at her beneath drooping lids. If he could have said the same, and if he weren't her superior officer, she wouldn't have been for long.

  Carroll's family was one generation up on Alberto Casanare's, whose grandfather had waded across the Rio Grande in Texas, picked lettuce until he had enough money to send for his wife, and who, by the time the Immigration and Naturalization Service got around to asking, had sired nine children, all born safely north of the Rio Grande and the eldest of which was an attorney specializing in civil rights. Al, the sixth of the grandchildren, had grown up speaking Spanish and English, which facilitated his talent for linguistics. He majored in foreign languages at the University of Texas, specializing in Russian and Japanese and, like Carroll, was recruited by the FBI on graduation. He'd spent four years in El Paso, that black hole of the FBI, intercepting drug shipments, before his fluent Russian got him seconded to Golden's task force. He was four years older than Carroll, happily married and the father of three, all of whom called Carroll Auntie Maxie, which she said made her sound like a Southern spinster, but that was all she said, so Golden figured she didn't mind that much.

  They'd been partners for five years, and speculation was rife in the Bureau over the possibility of an ongoing affair. Golden knew better.

  Casanare was married to one of the smartest, prettiest women Golden knew, not excluding Carroll, and Carroll had all the moral flexibility of Carrie Nation. No, they were partners, and friends, no more. He approved. There was nothing worse than sex to fuck up a relationship, not to mention the job site.

  Carroll moved restively in her seat, and Golden tried not to admire her legs, displayed to advantage beneath a slim skirt and a jacket that made everything else nip in and stick out the way it was supposed to. The woman was a first-class clotheshorse. "You wanted to see us, sir?"

  Golden got his overactive imagination back under control. "Yes." He chucked a file across the desk and she caught it neatly. Casanare rose to read over her shoulder. "Couple of reports out of Russia. First one's a bank robbery. The ruble equivalent of $10 million. First National Bank of Commerce and Trade, St. Petersburg, March 25. They were transferring the rubles from the branches to the main bank."

  "Seems like a hell of a lot of money for a provincial bank," Casanare observed.

  "A hell of a lot," Golden agreed. "But then they do a hell of a lot of foreign trade. Finland, the Baltic states, like that."

  "Over or under?"

  "The table?" Carroll nodded, and Golden shrugged. ''s up to the Russian cops. Anyway, it's about eleven-thirty; there are three vehicles: a four-door sedan with a driver, the bank manager and a clerk, an armored truck with a driver and a guard, and a troop truck with twenty soldiers on board bringing up the rear." He paused.

  "Let me guess," Carroll said. "A detour sign."

  Golden nodded. "Except they didn't take the detour." "Figures," Casanare said.

  "Yeah, but it didn't help them, the crooks knew they wouldn't, and a couple streets on they were met by an army captain with a detachment who directed them down a dead-end street, ambushed them with automatic rifles, blew the doors off the truck with a handful of homemade C-4 and got away with all the marbles."

  "Job inside or outside?"

  "Outside."

  Carroll made a face. "Everyone dead?"

  "All but one," Golden said coolly, ignoring Casanare's wince. "Which won't surprise you." "Why not?" Carroll demanded.

  Golden jerked his head a
t the file in her hands. "Check out the description of the police captain."

  She skimmed through the pages and came to a halt, her eyes running rapidly down the page. She went very still. "Ivanov." "Ivanov?" Casanare said, sitting up.

  "Ivanov," Golden said, nodding.

  "Back in business," Casanare said.

  "He was never out," Carroll said.

  Ivanov, the only name by which he was known, had been the missing person in the Peter the Great case. There was no clear file photo of him, only a description of a tall, broad-shouldered blond with blue eyes, Slavic cheekbones and a thin-lipped smile that one terrified informant had described as "a fucking throat-cutter, and happy in his work. I mean, Jesus Christ, if Ivanov smiles at you, you know you're dead." Ivanov had sat at Peter the Great's right hand, had been his enforcer, had been, literally on one memorable occasion, Pyotr's hatchet man.

  Carroll's gaze was narrowed and fierce. "You said there were two reports."

  Golden tossed her a second file. "This one's a theft. A military base near the Ukrainian border was hit. We have reason to believe Ivanov was involved."

  "What reason?"

  "A description of one of two men in a white van that drove into the base late the night of the robbery. Tall, broad-shouldered--"

  "--blue eyes--" Carroll said.

  "--Slavic cheekbones--" Casanare said.

  "--and a smile you could cut yourself on," Golden said, nodding.

  "Two men?"

  "Two. The other man didn't seem to make much of an impression on our witness, other than being shorter, heavier, older and with less hair. Of course, he was covered with Russian prison tattoos."

  "Mafia."

  "Looks like."

  "And who is our witness?"

  "Was. He died after he gave a statement."

  "How'd he die?"

  "He was shot. At point-blank range."

  Casanare said grimly, "That sonofabitch doesn't like to leave any loose ends lying around, does he?"

  Golden shook his head. "Wasn't Ivanov."

  "Bullshit."

  "Our witness was one of two guards on the gate that night, both of whom had been alerted by the base commander to expect company, with full descriptions of both so they could be passed through. The guards followed, as per instructions. Ivanov went into the general's office and stayed there, coming out only once, the guard thought while the general was on the phone."

  "What general?"

  "The base commander. Armin Glukhov. Four stars, much-decorated veteran of Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan, Chechnya, and on loan for a dozen little insurrections around Africa and South America."

  Carroll's brows twitched together. Casanare said, "What did they steal?"

  "Ten kilograms of plutonium." Silence. "Plutonium?" Carroll said.

  "Plutonium," Golden confirmed.

  Another silence. "They make bombs with plutonium," Casanare observed.

  "Yes."

  "Nuclear bombs."

  "Yes."

  "With, like, fallout and radioactive poisoning and nuclear winter and all the other modern conveniences."

  "Yes." Another silence. "And you're telling us Ivanov stole ten kilograms of it? What's that in pounds?"

  "Twenty-two," Carroll said.

  Of course she would know, Golden thought, she knew everything, or thought she did. "And you only need about a pound to make a bomb with a one-mile blast radius, according to the mad scientists in the lab. Even a marginally competent design would fit into a suitcase, they say.

  Imagine a dozen suitcases placed strategically in bus station lockers around Israel. Or India." He paused. "Or the United States."

  "Jesus Christ," Casanare said, shaken out of his sangfroid. "I know things are bad over there, but--" "But nothing," Golden said. "The Russian Mafia and the government pretty much run the country now, and business is along for the ride. People are making millions selling off government property, a dozen tanks here, a battery of ground-to-air missiles there. Everyone's involved; government, business, and they're both in bed with the gangs. Yeltsin's own minister of defense was caught hiring a hit man from a local gang to take out some undersecretary who didn't hand over the minister's share on a deal. Hell, Al, they are averaging a little under a hundred contract killings a month in Russia right now. There are five, almost six thousand separate criminal gangs in Russia, at last count. It's worse than Columbia, Venezuela and Bolivia combined. At least the drug cartels aren't electing presidents and appointing judges and misappropriating government funds. Yet."

  "I hadn't heard that about the defense minister," Carroll said, affronted, as though the defense minister should have apprised her in advance before taking out a contract for a hit.

  "You know how they do business over there nowadays? Say a ministry needs a million dollars to fix a road. They apply to the Russian parliament for the funds, the lawmakers--hah!--approve them, and then the ministry takes three percent off the top and hands it back to the lawmakers. Who then bank it in Switzerland or the Bahamas or Macao, or launder it through the Bank of New York." Golden wasn't telling them anything they didn't already know, but they also knew that it was useless to try to derail him. "Christ, I miss the good old days when all we had to worry about was a KBG mole bugging the men's washroom at Langley."

  "Why didn't Ivanov just buy the plutonium from the government? If everything's for sale, why not that, too?" Carroll said with a frown.

  Golden grunted. "He doesn't believe in bribes."

  After a moment they all realized how funny that sounded, and the three of them burst into a roar of laughter that jolted Dennis Haley at his desk in the office outside.

  "So how did it go down?" Casanare said, sobering.

  "Report says the driver handled the actual trade, while Ivanov and Glukhov waited it out in Glukhov's office."

  They considered this. "Glukhov nervous, wanting insurance," Carroll said. "He keeps Ivanov with him while the transaction goes through."

  The stakes had just gone through the roof, but both agents were maintaining, although Carroll's fair skin was a little flushed and Casanare tugged at his tie. "Yeah," Golden said, "that's my take on it, too. The whole thing's pretty slick. There's a forklift warmed up and waiting, one of the workers rides one of the forks into the plant, I guess pointing the way. They weren't inside more than twenty minutes.

  So, maybe an hour all told later, Ivanov comes out, walks past the two guards to the outer office door. They turn to escort him out, and the general shoots both men in the back, bang, bang, a walk in the park."

  Carroll examined him with a shrewd eye. "They were in on it with Glukhov, weren't they, the two grunts."

  It wasn't a question. "Yes. But--"

  "But what?" A crook was a crook, in Carroll's book. She had no sympathy or regrets to waste on a crook.

  For the most part, Golden agreed with her. Still-- "One of the guards had been with Glukhov since Czechoslovakia, the other since Afghanistan."

  "Cold," Casanare said with distaste. "When he decided to go, he decided to go all the way."

  "Price of entry into the brotherhood," Carroll said, curling her lip.

  "Ivanov would require it." Golden smiled inwardly, anticipating their reaction to his next news.

  "He's been seen. Two days ago."

  Carroll's voice was tense with excitement. "Ivanov?" "No," Golden said, still smiling. "Glukhov."

  Her enthusiasm waned noticeably. "Oh. Where?"

  "Anchorage, Alaska." "Alaska?" Casanare said blankly. "You mean like the Arctic?"

  "Yes, Al, the Arctic, with dog teams and Eskimos and blubber," Carroll said, but then she was from Seattle, which was practically a suburb of the Last Frontier. "Where in Anchorage?"

  "Outside the midtown post office," Golden said, enjoying himself. "To be precise, he was spotted standing on the curb, talking Ukrainian into a cellular phone."

  "Who spotted him?"

  "Remember Alex Kornbluth?" He waited.

  Carroll
's frown cleared. ''s right, Kornbluth, he's from Fairbanks.

  He transferred up when they opened the new office in Anchorage. They needed someone who spoke Russian because the border's opening up between Alaska and Siberia. Alaska Airlines is flying between Anchorage and Magadan and Providenya nowadays, and they've got Russian trawlers docking at Dutch Harbor and other ports during the fishing season."