“You know damn well that it’s better for you if I don’t answer those questions.”
I wanted to kick myself. I should have known MI6 would use a professional for an operation like this, not some clueless secretary. Still, Tony-D’s plan might work.
Sherri wasn’t having it. “We’ve been on some dicey missions together, Max, but you always told me the score. I don’t like being deceived and I’m not going to disrupt a MI6 debriefing, which is what this looks like. I have a child and a sick mother to care for. I can’t be doing hard time in Wormwood Scrubs.”
The Scrubs is a London prison, with a nasty name and a worse reputation. I could have told Sherri that the Scrubs is for male prisoners, but I got her point.
Sherri made an observation vital to our success. “Your Juliet might recognize me. That would blow the operation and get us all into trouble. So, count me out.”
“Can I use your team?”
She folded her arms. “I hired them. I’m responsible for them.” She didn’t say, “No.”
“I need the team, Sherri. Unless I talk to Romeo, my investigation hits a dead end.”
She looked at me thoughtfully. “You tell them enough about what they’re getting into so they can make a good decision … and give them a bonus, if they want to play.”
“Done, but you don’t get to hear my pitch. I don’t want you tainted.”
The team returned and Sherri departed, probably to replace them at the lobby bar. I didn’t level with the team. Too much was riding on my hoped-for conversation with Romeo. I did tell them we could get into trouble with the British government and maybe go to jail if the op went bust. And I dangled a bonus, if we separated Juliet from Romeo and if I got what I needed from Romeo. I had worked with these guys before. They trusted me. So, I skipped the “for God and country” speech. All four signed on.
Now, I needed to get Jill Rucker to replace Sherri on the op. Jill had pestered me to give her a bigger role than paymaster. So, it was easy to enlist her without divulging anything other than the Romeo-Juliet cover story. I still didn’t trust her, but if she was involved, I could keep an eye on her. The downside was she could keep an eye on me.
* * *
On Thursday, at a quarter to noon, the team was in place and our radio signals were five by five—the best. Juliet arrived and sat at her usual table in the hotel dining room. She placed her purse, holding her cell phone, on the floor beside her chair.
Pretending to read a newspaper in the lobby, our guy alerted the team. “Juliet’s here. She didn’t make a room reservation.”
That was the go signal for our operation. Our hacker entered the dining room. As he passed Juliet, he disabled her cell phone with some electronic magic in his briefcase.
Juliet ordered lemonade and told the waitress she was waiting for someone.
A few seconds later, Jill Rucker approached Juliet. Jill was wearing a black wool blazer with a set of borrowed concierge’s crossed keys on her lapels. She smiled and said, “Excuse me. I believe you are waiting for a gentleman.”
Juliet was surprised, then wary. “I am. How did you know?”
“You told the waitress you were waiting for someone. Your gentleman friend called the hotel and said you would be in the dining room. He asked us to tell you he’s been delayed by friends from home.”
We hoped Juliet would interpret that to mean Kulik was tied up with someone at the Russian Embassy and couldn’t keep their lunch date at the hotel.
Jill continued, with a smile. “Your friend requested that you meet him at a restaurant closer to his place of employment. He said it was urgent. He sent a taxi for you.”
As we had anticipated, Juliet went for her cell phone, maybe to call Romeo or her MI6 colleagues. That’s why our hacker had disabled it.
After Juliet’s second try at reviving the dead phone, Jill Rucker said, “Your taxi is waiting, ma’am.” Jill extended a hand in the direction of the door. “Please follow me.” Juliet threw the useless phone into her purse and followed Jill to a taxi at the curb, motor running. The driver was one of Tony-D’s guys with orders to get Juliet lost for an hour.
As the taxi pulled away, Jill removed the concierge insignia from her lapels. She went to the desk, made a reservation, and left a key for Kulik. Not knowing what name Kulik used, she described him to the desk clerk.
The man gave her a sly smile. “I know the gentleman. I’ll see that he gets his key.”
Minutes after Juliet departed in the cab, our man in the lobby radioed the team. “Romeo just arrived. He picked up his key at the desk and he’s on his way up.” With humor, he added, “Turn down the bed. Turn up the heat.”
Kulik unlocked the door and entered the suite. The first thing he saw was the back of a chair with Jill Rucker’s naked leg draped over the arm. As he advanced toward the chair, I entered from the adjourning room, accompanied by Tony-D. Kulik halted, his eyes registering surprise.
“Don’t be alarmed.” I didn’t want the team members to know his name. “Your friends don’t know that you are here with us. We’d like to keep it that way.”
“You are Americans. What do you want?”
“An hour of your time, as usual. Then, you’re free to go.”
“I want to go now.” He turned and headed for the door. One of Tony-D’s guys—the biggest one—stepped out of the bathroom and blocked the exit.
I said, “You can talk to me or you can explain to your ambassador what really goes on in these rooms when you meet your secretary here.”
That got his attention. He turned back to me. “What do you want?”
“As I said, an hour of your time … and no one need know you talked to me. This way, please.” I directed him into the bedroom. Tony-D and his assistant followed us into the room to reinforce the perception that we were in control.
The blinds were drawn. There was a table and two chairs in a window alcove. Kulik and I sat down. I said, “I want to discuss your conflicting loyalties. Am I correct in assuming that you would prefer this to be a private conversation between the two of us?”
His eyes darted from Tony-D and his teammate to me. He said a nervous, “Yes.”
I asked my muscle team to wait in the next room. When the door was closed behind them, I said to Kulik, “We have very little time before you will be missed. So, let me tell you what I know, what I want, and how I can help you. Agreed?”
He said nothing, but he didn’t make a dash for the window.
“I am,” I told him, “the only one on my team who knows where you work, your real reason for coming to this hotel, and who you meet here. Those are not my concerns. I will not expose those arrangements, if you give me the information I need.”
“What information?”
“First, let’s deal with the lady you were supposed to meet for lunch. In your name, we called the concierge and left a message that you were delayed at your embassy and asked that she meet you at a restaurant close to your work.” I gave him the address and phone number. “You sent a taxi for her and she’s on her way as we speak.”
I continued, “When we’re finished here, call her cell phone. Say you have to cancel. You have urgent business at the embassy. If her phone’s not working, call the restaurant and tell her. That will cover you with your British friends. Do you understand?”
He looked at the restaurant phone number, then at me. “Yes.”
“Now, to business. I should tell you that we—you and I—want the same things, to preserve the freedoms of the West and to protect Russia from plunder by Putin and the oligarchs. Therefore, I won’t use any of the information you give me to harm Russians, British, or Americans.”
“Are you CIA?”
“No. I represent a well-financed group of American patriots who want to know if the allegations in the Ironside Dossier are true.”
“How do I know that you don’t want to discredit the dossier?”
“American fake news media are already doing a good job of that, don’t
you think?”
His eyes searched mine for something. I guess he found it. “What do you want to know?”
“Tell me about your meetings with Jeffery Ironside in 2016.” That was a guess.
“I don’t know any Jeffrey Ironside.”
Here we go again. Ironside’s face had been around the world in papers and on TV.
“Our time together is limited. Please don’t waste it. Even if you didn’t talk to him, you would know who he is. His face has been on television constantly regarding the dossier’s allegations of President Walldrum’s ties to Russia. I’m sure that’s a topic of interest at the Russian Embassy. Should I call your ambassador to confirm it?”
Kulik sighed. “That won’t be necessary. I met with Ironside. I didn’t know his name until I saw him later on the television news.”
“Did you meet here, in the hotel?”
“No. The secretary and I spent a romantic weekend in the city of Bath. That was the cover story for Ironside to interview me.”
“Why did he come to see you?”
“He knew that I worked in Putin’s office, the Presidential Administration. It is similar to the West Wing of your White House.”
“How much time did Ironside spend with you?”
“About four hours.”
I had fifty minutes. I needed to establish priorities. “In your meetings, what subjects were of most interest to him?”
“He wanted to know about the FSB’s dossier containing kompromat—compromising information—on Walldrum that could be used to blackmail him.”
“Did he know about the compromising dossier before he talked with you?”
“Yes.”
He knew because Bogdanovich had briefed him.
Kulik continued, “Ironside wanted to know if the dossier existed or if it was FSB disinformation. If it was real, what did it look like? Where was it located? Who maintained it, and so forth?”
“What did you tell him?”
“The dossier exists. I have seen it. I have not read it.”
“How do you know it was Walldrum’s if you didn’t read it?”
Kulik paused and lit a cigarette, maybe taking time to gather his thoughts, or compose a lie. “When I worked in the Presidential Administration, I assisted the—you would call him—staff secretary. Most documents that went to Putin crossed the secretary’s desk. I saw many of them, but there were documents the secretary did not control or see. Two, in particular, were the dossiers on Ted Walldrum and his opponent in the election. They were controlled by Petrov, Putin’s spokesman. Petrov kept the dossiers in his safe and removed them only when Putin directed him to do so. Petrov, himself, would carry the dossiers to Putin’s office. The only other times they were out of the safe was when documents were being added.”
“The dossiers were not updated electronically?”
“No. I was told there are no digital copies of these two dossiers. Putin is afraid that your NSA might hack into our computer system and destroy them.”
Tony-D opened the door and pointed to his watch. The taxi carrying Sydney Swope-Soames in circles was getting close to the restaurant. My time with Kulik was running out.
“If you didn’t read Walldrum’s dossier, how do you know it exists?”
“One Friday, Putin was reviewing the dossiers. He was also preparing for a trip, but he was called away for an emergency meeting on some military matter—Syria, I think. Petrov was away from his desk. So, the dossiers remained in Putin’s office, awaiting Petrov’s return. Putin did not return to his office. He sent an aide to collect documents for his trip. The aide took everything on Putin’s desk, including the dossiers. He went to the airport and accompanied Putin on a flight with the dossiers in a case chained to his wrist. The problem was the dossiers were marked to be handled only by Petrov and were not to be taken out of the Presidential Administration. Putin’s aide had ignored the markings.
“When Petrov returned to his office, he received a phone call from Putin instructing him to secure the dossiers in the safe. Petrov searched Putin’s office, but couldn’t find them. He panicked. We had to stop work and search for the dossiers. Of course, Petrov had to tell us what we were searching for and he showed us a copy of the special cover attached to such dossiers. That is how I was made aware of their existence.”
Kulik described the cover in detail and continued his story. “When the dossiers were not found, security was called. The office was locked down. We were interrogated and searched. Petrov was beside himself. He threatened us, but I think he feared what would happen to himself when he told Putin the dossiers were missing. Hours later, Putin called to say he had the dossiers. That was a happy ending for everyone, except Putin’s aide. We never saw him again, only his replacement.”
That story accounted for two dossiers. There could be others. Ironside reported that Walldrum was supplying Putin information on Russian oligarchs’ businesses in the States. I played a hunch. “Are dossiers on oligarchs also kept by the Presidential Administration?”
“Yes. They are kept in an archives office, staffed with FSB personnel. Special permission is required to enter. My superior would call the archives and ask for the dossier on a certain oligarch. The FSB officer would bring the file to my superior, who would take it to Putin’s office immediately. Dossiers could not be left unattended.”
Time was running out. I had to focus Kulik on what I needed. “Ironside’s dossier made reference to a number of sources, some in the Kremlin, Russian Foreign Ministry, intelligence agencies, and among émigrés. Do you know the names of those sources?”
Kulik said, reluctantly, “No.”
I was about to remind him that we could expose his relationship with MI6, when my security timekeeper knocked again, stuck his head in, and held up his wristwatch.
“Are there sources in Russia who would help me verify the Ironside allegations?”
Kulik stalled, grinding out his cigarette, maybe trying to decide how much to tell me. “I am concerned that Russians will die if I answer that question.”
“Freedom may die if you don’t. Isn’t that why you talked to Ironside? Isn’t that why you put yourself in danger by offering your services to MI6?”
He studied me with sad eyes before admitting, “Inside the kleptocracy that is stealing Russian resources, there are good men and women who risk their lives to work against Putin, the oligarchs, the secret police, and the mafia. They are a secret society.” He gave me a tired smile and added, “We Russians are drawn to secret organizations. One such organization is the Omega Group, or simply Omega. Some members, like me, hold positions of trust within organs of the state. Ironside asked me how to contact Omega.”
“What did you tell him?”
“There is a market in Moscow. You go to a certain shop during the same hour for two consecutive days. You carry a certain shopping bag and you buy something. If you are not being followed, someone will contact you. The contact might happen in the market or elsewhere. It will be somewhere in the open while you are walking. In Moscow, you must assume there are microphones everywhere, even on park benches.” I wrote down the remaining contact procedures as Kulik dictated them.
I asked, “Is there a procedure for contacting this Omega Group in other cities?”
“No. You must make contact in Moscow. If you are going to other cities, your Moscow contact will tell you how to contact Omega at your destination.”
“What about St. Petersburg?”
“St. Petersburg is difficult for Omega. It is Putin’s hometown. He was deputy mayor there in the 1980s. Putin has many allies there, many admirers, much as Mussolini is still admired in parts of Northern Italy. They say, ‘He is a bad boy, but he is our boy.’”
“Was Ironside going to Russia after he talked to you?”
“Where else would you go in pursuit of the truth, if not to the heart of the lies?”
At that moment, Tony-D burst into the room. “Screwup. Our taxi driver called. Juliet got her phone working
. She’s sending someone here to see if Romeo showed for lunch.”
CHAPTER 14
THERE IS A saying among combat veterans that the battle plan goes out the window when the first shot is fired. That’s not always true, but it’s a reminder that if success depends on everything going according to plan, you’re planning for failure. You’re planning for a miserable failure if success rests on precision timing and the dependability of twenty-first-century electronics—as my Romeo interview did. The immunization against failure is to have a Plan B. I had one.
The success of my plan depended on keeping Juliet away from a phone until the cab dropped her at the new luncheon rendezvous. So, I had gamed Plan B, in case she got phone access en route. She had. In her place, I’d call Romeo to verify that he changed the lunch location. No answer? I would proceed to the new location. Romeo might have another thumb drive to drop off. I would also call my MI6 colleagues and send them to see if Romeo was at the hotel. This scenario and Plan B required that I give Kulik a new set of instructions to save himself.
“MI6 will be here soon to see if you kept your usual meeting schedule. Don’t lie to them. Go down to the restaurant. Call your lunch date. Tell her you’re here. Ask where she is. Tell her you have a problem. Of course, you won’t discuss it on the phone. When MI6 shows up, tell the truth. There was a key for you at the desk. You came up to the room. You were met by a fellow with a British accent, but you think he was an American. He had security men with him. He asked you about the Ironside interview. They will be suspicious. Don’t lie. They will check to see who reserved this room, who sent the cab, everything. Sometime soon, they may give you a polygraph test. If you fail, everything you give them afterward will be suspect.”
My final instruction to Kulik was, “Tell your MI6 handlers that if they try to find me, I’ll expose you to the Russians.”
I wouldn’t do that. In any event, I knew my threat wouldn’t keep MI6 from trying to track me down, but it would give them pause. By the time they decided what to do and how, I’d be on my way to St. Petersburg.
The President’s Dossier Page 8
