by Steve Berry
He’d tossed his gun on the passenger seat within easy reach.
If he could catch her, he’d stop her.
She barreled her way through another interchange that, luckily, had attracted few cars. He saw a busy boulevard. She slowed an instant at her approach then roared into the traffic, shooting out of her lane and crossing the double line into opposing traffic. Horns blared and he heard the screech of rubber on asphalt as cars veered out of her way. She wove in and out in neatly executed maneuvers that kept her moving forward. He’d have to maintain pace or lose her, but he didn’t want to place anyone at unnecessary risk. So he approached the intersection with caution, assessed the situation, then sped past the congealed traffic, using the far-left shoulder to maximum advantage.
Petrova drove hard, but didn’t seem accustomed to speed in such tight confines, making small mistakes, using more brake than accelerator, misjudging corners, overcorrecting the rear-end drift. His Escape shuddered as if riding on cobblestones, not built for this kind of intense driving.
But he was.
At a patch of open road he floored the accelerator. The route here was now four-laned and medianed from oncoming traffic. He caught a glimpse as she broke out of the stream half a mile ahead.
Then trouble appeared.
Flashing blue lights, moving into position behind Petrova.
A Maryland state trooper had found her.
In his rearview mirror he saw that he had an escort of his own, tight on his rear bumper, lights flashing, siren blaring.
He retrieved his Defense Intelligence Agency badge from a pocket. With one hand tight on the wheel he punched the button for the driver’s-side window to descend and stuck the badge out so the idiot behind him could see. The trooper veered into the left lane and sped up parallel, the passenger window down in the patrol car.
Luke pointed ahead and yelled, “Stop her.”
The trooper nodded and gained more speed, closing on his colleague following Petrova. They, of course, had the advantage of a radio, so he was hoping some local help might, for once, prove productive.
Both hands returned to the wheel and he kept pace with the troopers. Cars obliged them by moving left and right onto the shoulders, creating a wide path. They were headed east, out of town. A bevy of buildings surrounding him on both sides of the road looked governmental. He knew that the Naval Academy was somewhere ahead, adjacent to the Chesapeake Bay.
They continued on for a good two miles, then the troopers ahead came parallel to each other, a car in each lane, and slowed. That gave Petrova room as she raced onward. He knew what they were doing. Like beaters driving an animal toward guns. A rolling roadblock, a way to contain the traffic behind them.
He realized what that meant.
He whipped the steering wheel to the right, surging the Escape onto the narrow paved shoulder, where he had enough room to scoot past the troopers. He yanked the wheel hard left and ducked back onto the roadway. Nothing now stood between him and Petrova, the troopers slowing their speed and blocking anything approaching from the rear. Traffic was still four-laned and split by a concrete median. The buildings had ended, the road a straightaway, slightly downhill, leading to a long uphill expanse and a massive bridge.
Then he saw them.
Four more trooper cars on the bridge incline, about halfway up, blocking the way forward on both sides.
Damn. These guys move fast.
No traffic was coming in the opposite lane and the officers were allowing cars ahead in this lane to pass by, ready to pinch things off once only Petrova remained.
Which happened.
Nowhere now for her to go except straight through the blockade, or a 180 that cut across the median, back in the opposite direction, where the two troopers behind him would surely cut her off.
He saw guns leveled.
This was not what he wanted. He needed her alive, but he couldn’t stop what was about to happen. Everything seemed like a movie. There, but far off, not real. Yet it was. He realized that the locals only practiced scenarios like this. Here, finally, was the real thing. No way they would allow this opportunity to pass. He heard shooting. Apparently for the tires, as Petrova’s vehicle suddenly swerved left, right, then slammed the bridge railing.
Sparks flew.
Forward momentum was enough to free the weight off the back axle, which launched the car upward, turning it into a projectile, responsive now only to the laws of motion and gravity.
Over the side it went.
He wheeled up, slid to a stop, and burst out, finding the smashed railing just as the car below met the first line of trees leading down to the water. Nothing could stop the assault. The mass plowed through like a cannon firing, jackknifing upward and spinning full circle, Petrova ejected outward. He heard tatters of a scream, then a thud. The car, too heavy to stop, folded onto itself like a telescope, its front end gone, finally settling on its roof, wheels spinning, engine wailing then coughing a final spasm. Petrova was thrown all the way to the water a few feet from shore.
He leaped the railing and thrashed through the tangled underbrush, slithering down the steep embankment, almost losing his footing, using exposed roots to stop his boots and keep his balance until he was within a few feet of where she lay. The sun moved in and out of the clouds, casting sharp, moving shadows. She floated half submerged in a slurry of mud, water, and ice, the torso twisted to one side.
Two of the troopers followed him down.
“Stay back from there,” one of them yelled.
He was in no mood and found his badge, “You stupid assholes. Who told you to do that?”
The troopers stopped a few feet away.
He glanced down at Petrova. The sharp angles of her neck and legs signaled she was dead.
“Who the crap are you?” one of the troopers asked.
He turned back toward them and shook his head in disgust. “I’m the federal agent who’s going to kick your sorry ass for killing the only lead I had.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA
10:49 P.M.
Zorin tightened the straps for his parachute. When he was first trained back in the 1970s the equipment had been rudimentary, unreliable, and often dangerous. More than one of his fellow students had been injured or killed. Parachuting was not popular among KGB trainees, but he’d loved it, recording nearly a hundred jumps. He’d specifically requested a chute designed for higher altitudes and better maneuverability. Not quite military quality, but close enough. Jumping at night was problematic from the start, but once the chute opened it was like any other fall, especially with the advent of night-vision goggles, a luxury that he’d not had the chance to experience much in the past.
The Gulfstream had made it across the Atlantic in good time. They’d found North America at Newfoundland, their course adjusted from west to south, straight for New York. Over the Gulf of St. Lawrence the pilots had radioed to Canadian air traffic control that they were having trouble with pressurization and requested permission to drop under three thousand meters for a few minutes so they could deal with the problem. The ground had balked at first, then consented, most likely concerned that to refuse could court disaster.
He snugged the helmet on his head.
His gun was safely tucked inside a knapsack beneath the black jumpsuit that had been waiting with the chute, as were his last bits of money. Not much. Maybe $5,000 U.S., which should be plenty. The Russian rubles he’d left aboard, useless to him from this point on. Google Maps had provided a location for the jump along the north shore. Prince Edward Island was huge, stretching 220 kilometers east to west, 64 kilometers at its widest north to south. He knew the place. A low-lying hump of red sandstone and fertile soil, it was home to about 140,000 people, many descendants of the original 18th-century French and British colonists. He’d visited its capital, Charlottetown, back in his KGB days.
“We’re approaching the shore,” the pilot told him over the intercom.
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Only a quarter moon shone tonight. The cabin had already been depressurized, the lights extinguished. The idea was to stray slightly off course, which normally would be directly over Nova Scotia, veering fifty kilometers west directly over Prince Edward. Once he was gone, the pilots would correct the deviation, blaming it on their pressurization problem, and hope no one questioned them.
“Less than a minute,” the pilot said.
He grabbed the door’s latch and wrenched it open. The heavy panel dropped inward on its brackets, angled to a full ninety degrees. Frigid air rushed inside, but he was wearing three layers, which included a coat beneath the jumpsuit, gloves, a full balaclava, and a helmet with goggles. One of the pilots appeared in the flight cabin doorway and raised two hands, displaying ten fingers. Force of habit caused him to check the buckles of the chute at all the control points one more time.
Everything seemed fine.
Only five fingers were now displayed.
Three.
Two.
One.
He slapped his arms across his chest.
And jumped.
Bitter cold air assaulted him, but the layering was doing its job. He knew the math. At three seconds out he was moving eighty kilometers per hour. Six seconds later his speed would increase to two hundred kilometers per hour. The whole jump should take no more than three minutes, tops. Everything in the air happened fast, the experience akin to falling nose-first into a wind tunnel. His forehead tightened. His cheeks beneath the balaclava’s wool seemed as if they were running off his face.
He’d not felt those sensations in a long while.
But he liked them.
Through the night-vision goggles he saw that he was still out over the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but forward velocity was quickly driving him toward shore. He carried no altimeter, but he’d been trained the old way. Know your starting point, then count down, the idea being to pull the chute at 1,500 meters, then settle into a soft glide and work your way to a reasonably safe landing.
He threw his arms and legs out, stopping his body from spinning, leading with his belly. So much could go wrong. Tangled lines. High winds. Canopy tears. Most were fixable, provided they could be solved before 500 meters. After that, nothing really mattered since there wasn’t enough time to do much of anything except die.
The jump was going great.
Ahead, past a narrow beach, he saw the blurs of cliffs, rock faces, then the jagged outlines of treetops that blanketed the shore. Large boulders, like the teeth of an animal, protruded in a ragged line down the ridges. He had to avoid those. The clearing he sought, a meadow, opened just to the right, an area that the satellite map he’d accessed online noted as being about a hectare, more than enough of a target.
The alarm in his brain sounded.
1,500 meters.
He pulled the cord and the chute exploded upward.
A violent jerk and loud pop immediately signaled trouble.
The idea was to have a square, stable, steerable canopy. Instead, his had folded onto itself like a popped balloon, the cords shooting upward twisted and tangled among themselves. His body spun like a puppet on its strings. A blooming canopy meant a slower, manageable descent, but he was falling faster, twirling along the way, blood rushing toward his feet thanks to the centrifuge effect. If he didn’t stop spinning he’d black out. He carried a reserve chute, but it could prove useless since its lines might also become entangled with the disabled main chute.
He had to drop the main away.
He reached for the cutaway handle, but the force of the malfunction had yanked it upward, out of reach.
His internal clock told him that five hundred meters was coming fast.
Just a few more seconds until the ground found him.
Luckily, he’d been taught how to fight panic and think clearly. He decided there was only one option.
No matter the risk.
He released the reserve chute.
The packet shot upward, opening fully, only minimally affected by the tangled main lines. His drop slowed, as did the spinning, enough that he could grab his bearings and play with the lines. Two canopies, only one hungry for air, swung above him on opposite sides, flying him in a steep downplane to the ground.
Way too fast.
He twisted the reserve lines and began to steer his fall, angling toward the meadow. Google Maps had revealed that the national park stretched forty kilometers along the north shore. Not a light burned in sight, nothing but forested wilderness all around, which had seemed like a good thing. Now, if he was hurt, it could be days or weeks before he was found.
Three hundred meters to go.
He crossed the beach, now fully over dry land, zeroing in on the meadow.
Two hundred meters.
He fought ground rush, that alarming feeling of the earth coming toward you uncontrollably.
Fifty meters.
The trees were just below. This was a place of old growth, the stands thick and tall. He quickly decided that he should land using his whole body, as opposed to only feet, since he was moving fast enough to snap a knee. He yanked on the canopy lines and tried to create more drag.
The meadow appeared ahead.
Flat, open, inviting.
But also trouble since it was cold, hard earth.
He decided to make use of the trees, tugging on the canopy lines and adjusting his fall so that he brushed the tops of the ones near the meadow’s edge. His feet caught on the limbs and the drag had the desired effect as he slowed. He angled the chute farther down and dropped more so his boots kept brushing limb after limb, which hampered his ability to keep control. But once he passed the last few trees and found the meadow he was definitely moving slowly enough that he was able to fall the remaining few meters and use his legs to absorb the impact.
His body collapsed to the ground, the chutes fluttering to rest behind him.
He stared back up into the sky.
The Gulfstream was long gone.
Surely, the bastard from the charter company had sabotaged the main chute. Jump accidents were rare. The charter company most likely had feared what he might have in mind once on the ground and wanted nothing traced back to them. So they took his money, flew him halfway across the globe, then made sure he would not survive. Not a soul would have ever known the difference. Just a corpse on the ground or, even better, in the water. How it got there would never be explained. At least they’d allowed him to jump to the right spot. Most likely assuming it didn’t matter. He’d be dead regardless. Any other time he would go back and kill them all, but that was no longer possible.
He had a mission.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
ANNAPOLIS
10:00 P.M.
Stephanie sat in the waiting room, where she’d been for the past few hours. An ambulance had rushed Peter Hedlund from his house to the nearest hospital. A lie, that she was with the Justice Department, had gained her a ride along with Hedlund. The local police had arrived just as they were leaving and followed them to the emergency room. She’d explained about Anya Petrova and Luke Daniels and the officers had reported about a hot pursuit on a local highway. Two hours ago she’d been told that Petrova was dead. When the locals started asking more and more questions, she’d referred them to the White House and the Office of the Chief of Staff. The people there, she’d said, would be more than happy to provide answers.
The day’s events weighed on her.
Cotton in trouble. Speaking to Cassiopeia again. Russians. Soviets. Litchfield. Being fired. Hedlund shot. Now Petrova dead.
The bright spot had come when she’d checked in with the White House and Edwin had told her that Cotton was on the move with Cassiopeia, headed for Canada on Aleksandr Zorin’s trail. Thank goodness he was okay. She could always count on Cotton to be right there when she needed him. And Cassiopeia, too, who now seemed to be fully back in the saddle. Edwin had also explained all that Cotton had reported, which filled in the gaps in what
she already knew. A picture was emerging—an incomplete one, but an image nonetheless.
She heard a familiar stamp of boots to tiles and looked up to see Luke approaching down the hall. He also looked beat.
“Sorry about that,” he said to her.
They were alone in the waiting room.
“The locals got overenthusiastic,” he said. “But I got this.”
He displayed a cell phone.
“Looks like a prepaid unit bought on the fly,” he said. “It was switched off.”
She told him what she knew about Cotton and Zorin and nukes.
“Looks like the players are all making their way toward us,” he said.
That it did.
“How’s Hedlund?” he asked.
She explained that one bullet tore into his rib cage, the other grazing across his right shoulder. He’d been lucky, as the chest round could have proved fatal. He’d been taken straight into surgery, his wife appearing a couple of hours ago. She was now with her husband in his recovery room.
“Quite a surprise that Hedlund was ex-FBI,” Luke said. “He got that gun when he was upstairs in his bedroom.” He shook his head. “Friggin’ Lone Ranger tryin’ to save the day.”
“It’s a miracle he’s not dead.”
“He’s also a liar.”
That caught her attention.
Luke fished another cell phone from his pocket. “It’s Hedlund’s. I took it from him before he headed into the library. He made a call with it while upstairs.”
She listened as he told her what happened—“Nothing here to find”—then asked the obvious, “Who did he call?”
