“Do you think he knows about the travel restrictions already?” Director Lucas said. “Is that possible?”
“Only if there is a leak.” Gibbons knew most of the men and women personally who were in that meeting. He couldn’t fathom one of them could be feeding a tech billionaire inside information. Other than Director Lucas, there were only five other people in the meeting. “As soon as you know where Warshaw is going, I want to know. And if it is the airport, he can’t leave.”
“You got it.”
Gibbons pressed the button on the phone that ended the call. His first thought was wondering whether or not he was doing enough to keep America safe. Had he made a mistake by sending in a small team to root out what was going on? He had never been one to second-guess himself, but he also had never been personally responsible for so many lives. And with Sam’s meeting to try to retrieve the vials not happening until morning Moscow time, and King not checking in after making moves in Alaska, he couldn’t help but worry he had let his country down. His number one job as the head of the United States was to ensure that people could safely go after their dreams with the least amount of resistance possible.
If all of them were dead, that would make it rather hard to pursue life, liberty, and happiness.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Moscow, Russia, 1:05 a.m.
The streets of Moscow were mostly empty. The streetlights glowed yellow, making the sky above seem all the more dark. Though Sam had gone to bed a couple of hours earlier, she never really had any intention of sleeping. Not when Zhanna was in danger. She’d snuck out of Patrick’s flat and taken a cab down to the address given by the mysterious man. She had done a search for local hot spots nearby, and there was a bar open on the corner across the street. The wind was cold as it swirled around her. When she pulled her coat tight, she could feel the stitches in her shoulder letting her know they were still there.
There were a few late-night patrons coming and going from the bar as she walked by. Several cabs were picking people up and carrying them away, but overall it was fairly dead for being in the middle of a city. She stood on the corner and looked diagonally across the street. The only thing she saw there was a deli, its lights dark, and the windows even darker. Upon a more detailed look, she could see that the windows had been boarded up as if the closing had been of the more permanent variety.
Sam crossed the street when she had an opening. She moved her eyes from the first level of the building to the light that was on two stories high. Windows wrapped all the way around the building on all three levels. There were a few other lights dotted on. Above the retail space were apartments. Not an uncommon thing in a city. She wondered if Zhanna were in there somewhere.
She walked up the block to the next crosswalk and crossed over to the deli’s side of the street. Most of the windows were too dark to see inside. She continued toward the deli’s entrance, giving it a once-over as she strolled by. No real sign of a way in. Sam walked around to the back of the building. A man and a woman were making out, and the smell of vodka wafted all the way over to her. There was nothing else back there but some dumpsters and a few parked cars, but the smell of vodka reminded her that she could at least warm up in the bar while she thought through her next move.
When she turned around, two men were coming out of the deli. The closed and boarded-up deli. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. One of the men turned and locked the door behind him, while the other couldn’t take his eyes off Sam. This was the point in espionage where Sam had a clear advantage over Alexander King. Sam was a beautiful woman. Though she wasn’t as young as she once was, she looked five to ten years her junior. The man staring at her was clearly intrigued. A nice-looking woman, from years of experience, can spot that look a mile away. No matter how mature or intelligent a man was, he still had instincts. And his testosterone never lied. Sam flashed him a wide smile as she walked by.
The man said something in Russian. Sam turned around without stopping, held out her arms, and said, “Sorry, I only speak English.”
The man’s smile grew. “I speak English too,” he said, his accent so thick she could hardly understand him. “You are thirsty?”
Sam looked back over her shoulder at the bar, then back to the man, and raised her eyebrow with a flirt. He said something in Russian, and now both men were looking at her like a buttered steak.
She waited for a break in the cars, then jogged across the street. The two men followed closely behind. Two young women were exiting the bar, and Sam stepped inside before the door could close. Inside the bar was nearly as dark as the sky outside. The bar top ran the length of the room on her left, and black hanging lights glowed red above every other bar stool. Booths lined the wall on the right, and four-top bar tables made up the space in between.
The bar was still half-full. Sam had no idea what time it closed, but she didn’t care either. The reason she had decided to come down to the given address in the middle of the night walked in right behind her. All she was hoping for was to maybe find something to make the meeting in the morning go more her way. She couldn’t help but think the two men who had just hooked their arms around hers were that very thing.
They escorted her to an open booth. Before she sat down, she looked at the handsome man who’d spoken to her outside. “I have to go to the ladies’ room. I’ll be right back. Maybe get a girl a vodka martini? Extra dirty?” she said with a wink.
The smile on his young face was creepy at best. He loved the extra dirty line, as she knew he would.
“No problem. Hurry back, beautiful.”
She gave him a nod and walked back toward the back of the bar. The restrooms were just up ahead. As she turned the corner, she noticed someone already taking their drink order back at the booth. She stopped short of the bathroom and took out her phone. She waited there patiently with her thumb on Patrick’s contact. One eye on the phone, one eye on the men. After a couple of minutes, the drinks arrived at the table. She moved behind the wall as much as she could, with one eye peeking out. Her goal with the two men was to get them drunk enough that she could steal their key. Something she could easily do, but it would take hours. She was happy to see one of the men take something out of his pocket and drop it down into her drink. If she played this right, she could be inside the boarded-up deli within an hour.
She tapped Patrick’s contact. It rang twice and then a very sleepy baritone voice answered. “Sam. Sam? Are you all right?”
“Deep breath and wake up, Agent O’Connor.”
“Sam, where the hell are you? I saw you go to bed.”
“I’m figuring out how to get my friend back, and I think I have a way in. But I need you down here in case I’m wrong.”
She heard Patrick take a deep breath and also the rustling of sheets.
“Yeah, yes . . . Why didn’t you just tell me you were leaving?”
“Didn’t think I would find an opportunity like this. There’s a bar across the street from the address given to us for the meeting tomorrow. Turns out it’s a boarded-up deli. Anyway, I’ll be here with two men who are going to carry me back to that deli in about one hour. It will look like I am drunk, drugged, or both. Just keep a watchful eye.”
“Sam, we don’t know who these people are. Why take the chance tonight?”
“Because, my friend might be inside, and I’m not going to just leave her there.”
“Fine. I’ll be down shortly. Don’t leave until I get there.”
“Make it quick. I don’t want to fake flirt with these boys any longer than I have to.”
Sam ended the call.
Now she just had to figure out a way to drink her martini without taking a single sip. It wouldn’t be easy, but on a scale of tough missions, it ranked pretty low on her difficulty list.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Barrow, Alaska, 2:40 p.m.
Kuznetsov and King walked into the elevator. Kuznetsov was holding a briefcase full of deadly liquid and its vaccin
e, and King was holding the dead guard’s AR-15, stocked with a fresh magazine, and his Glock in the holster at his back. King fully expected the cavalry to have come from the gate after they spoke with the guard, now dead, on his radio. He was hoping his earpiece to Josiah would come back online before they were in eyeshot of the security cameras, so at least he would know what he and Kuznetsov were walking into.
“Josiah, you hear me?”
For the first time since going underground, he heard a voice come back on the radio, but it was broken. Every third word was intelligible.
“Josiah, say again?”
A couple more words could be discerned. He heard the words movement and gate, but it didn’t tell him anything he hadn’t already expected. So he did the only thing he knew to do until full communication returned.
“Fire, fire, fire fire!” he shouted as the elevator reached the top floor.
Finally, Josiah’s voice came in loud and clear. “We got two of them, but two made it through the gate! They’ll be inside!” Josiah sounded out of breath.
“I hear you, I hear you. Any other movement?”
“We’re almost to the gate. One more truck just came through. There will be more. We’ve gotta get out of here!”
King heard two gunshots after Josiah stopped talking. He could tell immediately they were hunting rifles.
“I got one more going through the door. Could be as many as five or six inside with you now.”
King and Kuznetsov stepped out of the elevator into the tiny holding room. The last room without cameras.
King stopped Kuznetsov from walking to the door. “Will any of these guards have access to this door?”
“Only man you tied up. No one else.”
That sounded good, but King didn’t search him for a key card, so he still had it on him. If his men were able to bust into the break room, they could very well have freed him and could be waiting just on the other side of the door in front of them.
“Stay here,” King said. “It’s the safest place for you.”
He didn’t wait for a reply; he readied the AR-15 and opened the door. He jumped back out of the doorway, just in case, but no gunfire came. So far, so good.
“Josiah, I’m about to go into the main lobby. If you see men in a mall-cop type uniform, don’t shoot them. They aren’t with the other guards.”
“We are at the gate, be to you in a sec.”
“Negative. Hold back.”
“But, X!”
“Negative.” King walked forward. “I need you and your man alive. If these guys in the truck you saw driving in late have been alerted, there will be more, probably making their way to the airport just in case. Just get one of the trucks ready to go. When I need you to pick us up, I’ll say fire again.”
“You’re the boss. I’ve got two more officers heading to the airport, and three more headed here. This is turning into an all-out war. You sure you don’t want us coming in from behind them?”
Josiah saying what he did about a war gave King an idea. There was a way Josiah could be useful from a distance.
“Scrap what I said. Can you create a diversion?”
“What are you looking for?”
“An explosion by the entrance would be great. If not, maybe let one of those extra trucks loose on the front door?”
“Hold on, let me . . . Yeah, keys are in the truck left here.”
“Can you run it into the front door of the building without being in it?”
“I can run it into the building. I’ll bail before it gets there.”
“Go now. Give me a three, two, one when it’s going to hit. Then I’ll make my move.”
King heard a door slam and an engine start.
“Be there in a few seconds,” Josiah confirmed.
“I’m ready.”
King could absolutely use some help in his current predicament, and he was happy to have thought of a way for Josiah to distract the guards without putting himself at risk. As he approached the door to the lobby, he looked up into the camera. He figured the longer he took to get out the door and start shooting, the more time one of the guards would have to get lucky.
He readied his rifle and placed his hand on the doorknob. He closed his eyes, and as he waited for Josiah’s countdown, he pulled up the image of the lobby in his head. Fortunately, he’d spent many hours there the last week and a half. He could see every detail. Other than behind the desk, there was no place for men to hide. He figured by that point at least a couple of them had already moved into the break room to free the other two guards. There was no time to worry about Arnie, only time to focus on killing as many men as he could in the shortest amount of time possible.
“Okay, X,” Josiah said.
King gripped both the door handle and the rifle a little harder. He heard a door open in his ear, some wind rustling, then a loud grunt and a shout of pain. Josiah had just jumped from the moving truck.
“Shit! Three . . .”
King pulled down on the door handle with his left hand.
“Two . . .”
King brought the AR up to eye level and bent his knees into a crouch.
“One!”
King shoved the door open and brought his left hand up to help steady the rifle. The guards inside must have already had their guns trained on the door because gunshots blared and bullets began pelting the now open door. This didn’t surprise King, as he’d figured they were watching on camera. What did surprise him was just how loud the crash was when the truck slammed into the building.
King made his move. As soon as he hit the lobby, he saw the nose of the military-style truck halfway through the door. There was glass everywhere. The engine was still running, but the truck had come to a stop. It was time for King to start. One guard was picking himself up off the floor, so King squeezed twice and he went down. Directly to his left another man tried to bring his focus back to King from the truck, but it took him too long. Two more squeezes and blood erupted from the man’s neck.
The rest of the lobby was hidden from King until he got to the edge of the wall on his left. As soon as he made it there, he just started shooting. At about the third shot another man came into view, but King was already filling his body with bullets. He sidled up to the wall and took a quick glance around the corner toward the doorway of the break room. He was nearly hit by a man who was ready and waiting for him with plenty of bullets. King had taken three down, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw two more who had fallen victim to the truck. That was five, the man at the door made six, and he felt fairly confident that the last two were the guards who’d come in with him who were still tied up.
“We’ve got another truck on the way in, Josiah.” This was a new voice. It must have been the man Josiah had brought with him.
“Josiah,” King interrupted. He had to shout over the man still shooting at him in the lobby. “Get the SUV ready that I drove here in. I’ll be out in a second. Both of you just start shooting at the incoming truck if you have cover. Just try to buy me a minute. I just need a minute!”
King dropped to his knees, stuck his head and gun around the corner, and shot the guard in the doorway in the knees. The guard dropped to the ground, but King had no idea there was another man standing behind the guard, and he was ready to shoot. King was dead to rights. Just as he started to raise his gun, the guard’s gun fired, but it was severely off line due to Arnie hitting him in the back with a chair right beforehand. Another split second and King would have been dead.
“Any more of them back there, Arnie?” King shouted.
“Just the two we have tied up, and Roger. He believes that you’re an agent now, by the way.”
“Both of you get the hell out of here, now!”
King turned and moved back down the hallway. “Kuznetsov! Open up! We gotta go!” he shouted as he approached the door.
The door began to open slowly. King took hold of it, slung it open, and grabbed Kuznetsov by the coat, pulling him along.
“Josiah! You’re awful quiet! How we looking out there?”
King pulled Kuznetsov out into the lobby.
He didn’t get an answer back from Josiah.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Moscow, Russia, 1:45 a.m.
The two Russian men who had walked out of the boarded-up deli about an hour before, and escorted Sam across the street to the bar, were starting to get handsy at the booth. Sam was getting tired of acting like she was a drunken slut to encourage them. So she couldn’t have been happier when her fellow agent, Patrick O’Connor, finally walked through the door. She was beginning to think it had been a mistake calling him at all. She knew she could deal with the two bozos currently keeping her company. But not knowing what she might find once they took her back across the street, she was grateful he was there.
The big guy walked into the door and scanned the bar. Sam made sure she was looking at him when his eyes found her. She managed to give him a wink to let him know all was good. Patrick walked over to the bar and took a seat at one of the bar stools that could swivel enough to keep an eye on her. She had never worked with him before, so all she could do was hope he was as good as she heard he was if things went sideways.
She was about to find out one way or another.
When Sam had come back from the bar, she managed to take a full martini off a table on the way to her booth. She picked the moment when a strange man was standing near the booth she was sharing with her two gentleman callers. She banked on the fact that they would be hotheaded, testosterone-fueled fools if someone upset her. So she held the stolen martini behind her back and made sure the stranger “bumped” right into her. She made a production out of him bumping her, and when the two men jumped to her defense, Sam slid into the empty booth, and while their attention was on the stranger, she placed the drugged martini under the table and stomped on it. When the two men were finally finished showing off their bravado, Sam downed the clean drink when they were watching and asked for more. They looked at each other with elation that Sam would soon be theirs for the taking.
Alexander King Thriller Series: Books 1-3 Page 38
