by Peter Nealen
Dmitri led the way to the overgrown doorway into the warehouse, the weeds now brown, dead, and covered in snow. That door was locked, as well, but he got it open quickly enough, shoving it open with a grinding creak.
It was dark inside, though the windows set high along the roof were still letting in what little daylight remained. They were filthy, and several were broken. The warehouse floor was shrouded in shadow.
Flanagan and Gomez, armed with their submachineguns, followed Dmitri inside, Flanagan clenching the flashlight they’d taken off the dead gangster back in the safehouse clamped to the PP-2000’s foregrip. He shone the light around the inside of the warehouse, revealing a dusty space littered with a few tarp-wrapped heaps of indeterminate shape, along with a scattering of rusting junk. His breath smoked in the flashlight’s cone of white brilliance. The rest of the team filtered into the warehouse behind them, Childress and Wade taking up positions covering the door with their Krinkovs.
Dmitri led the way to the nearest tarp and reached for the edge. Gomez stepped up behind him, the AEK-919’s muzzle pointed at the base of his skull from three feet away. If he grabbed a weapon or a detonator from under that tarp, Gomez was going to core his brains out with a burst of 9mm.
But when he pulled the tarp aside, kicking up a cloud of dust, it revealed nothing but a stack of wooden crates with Arabic and Cyrillic markings on them.
He was reaching for one of the crates when light blazed through the windows, accompanied by the rumble of engines and the crunch of tires on gravel and freezing slush. The Blackhearts froze, and Gomez’ finger moved to rest lightly on the AEK-919’s trigger.
Chapter 11
Javakhishvili hissed at Dmitri in Russian, and got a desperate, near-panicked reply. “He says that he doesn’t know what they’re doing here,” Herc translated. “This site was supposed to be left alone for another two weeks.” It made some sense, especially if the Bratva was running guns on the side, in addition to doing business with the Russians and Transnistrians. They were trying to keep something of a low profile.
That was if Dmitri was telling the truth. Which was becoming more questionable by the second as three trucks pulled into the yard outside.
The engines died and the lights went out. Flanagan had extinguished the flashlight, and the interior of the warehouse was plunged into shadow. “Get back from the door and set in,” Brannigan whispered loudly. Outside, they could hear doors slamming, and a voice was raised in Russian, asking a question. Most of the Blackhearts couldn’t understand it, but the context and tone were pretty easy to figure out.
What are these vans doing here?
Javakhishvili suddenly grabbed Dmitri, pulling him close and hissing into his ear. After a moment, Dmitri’s head bobbed in the dark.
“Hold your fire,” Javakhishvili said quietly. “I’ve got an idea.”
“We won’t have a lot of time to react if your idea turns out to be shit,” Jenkins said, a little too loudly.
His voice echoed through the warehouse, and everyone froze. But it was too late. A query was yelled from the other side of the door in Russian. A moment later, the door was bulled open and a big, barrel-chested man with an AK in his hands burst inside.
Javakhishvili prodded Dmitri in the ribs with his Tokarev, and Dmitri called out in Russian. He sounded like he was trying to be casual, but his nervousness and sheer, borderline panic was just as obvious. But the big man with the AK stopped, the rifle not quite pointed at anyone. But he was clearly ready to snap it up and fire if presented with a threat. Or an excuse.
Brannigan watched the big Russian as he swept his eyes around the room. He obviously couldn’t see much; it was already dark inside the warehouse, and the light in the windows high up in the walls was fading quickly. “Shto ty delayesh, Dmitri?” he asked.
Dmitri stammered out a hasty reply in Russian, and since Javakhishvili didn’t shoot him, Brannigan gathered that it was the right answer. He didn’t know exactly what Herc had told him to say, but for the moment, they’d play along.
The big man had moved a few more steps into the warehouse, and two of his companions were crowding into the doorway behind him. Brannigan kept his own Tokarev pointed at the floor, but he didn’t take his eyes away from the Russian brodyagi, either.
Lowering the AK and handing it to the short man behind him, the big guy stepped forward, looming over Dmitri and peering at him in the dark as if he could see. There was something a little creepy about the Russian giant, even more so when he reached into his pocket and pulled out a flashlight. Every one of the Blackhearts’ muzzles rose fractionally at the movement, and Brannigan knew that the Russians in the doorway saw it.
But the big man just turned on the flashlight, illuminating his features from below.
He was the very picture of what most of the Marines that Brannigan had led would call a “Cro Mag.” His bullet head, covered with a knit cap, was massive, his facial features thick and slightly exaggerated. His nose had clearly been smashed flat a couple of times, and his small eyes were deeply set beneath a beetling brow line.
He stood there over Dmitri for a long moment, his dark eyes flicking up and down the smaller brodyaga, then moving to study Javakhishvili before scanning the rest of the warehouse as revealed in the small circle of light from his flashlight.
Finally, his eyes settled on Dmitri again. He growled a question in Russian. Dmitri, noticeably trying to appear nonchalant, spread his hands and replied in the same language. Javakhishvili glanced over both Russians’ shoulders to look at Brannigan, but kept his expression neutral. The situation was delicate, at best, and he didn’t dare say or signal anything that might give the game away.
But Brannigan thought he understood. Dmitri wasn’t acting like he was trying to explain that he was stealing stuff. He looked like he was explaining that his “good initiative” didn’t equal “bad judgement” in this case.
How well that was going to go over with the Russian mob remained to be seen.
The Russian monster looked at him for a long moment, his eyes flicking up to Javakhishvili again, then back. Then he turned and looked back at the smaller man behind him, who was bundled up in a dark greatcoat, and stepped aside.
The man had a pointed nose that seemed to dominate the shape of his face. He looked a little weaselly, somewhat balanced out by his dark beard. His eyes were gimlet glints in the scattered light of the flashlight.
He asked a question in Russian. He had a high-pitched, nasally voice. Dmitri answered, and motioned toward Javakhishvili behind him. The doc stepped forward, the Tokarev having magically disappeared back into his coat.
Javakhishvili and the little man talked for a few moments. Brannigan thought he caught the name, “Gogol Gogolevich.” Whether or not it was the little man’s real name was anyone’s guess, but Brannigan guessed the answer was “no.”
Javakhishvili looked over at him and waved at him to join them. Gogol looked over at him, his face hidden in shadow as he turned away from the flashlight, but his eyes still glinting slightly with the reflection.
Something about the guy just made Brannigan want to snap his chicken neck like a twig.
But years of discipline allowed him to step forward, slipping his own pistol into a coat pocket, his expression as bland and composed as Gogol’s.
“You want to buy weapons?” Gogol asked. His English was faintly accented, but not bad. He’d clearly spent time in an English-speaking country. Knowing what he knew about the Russian mob’s activities in the States, Brannigan darkly wondered just where, and how much human misery had been spread because of it.
“If you have the merchandise we’re looking for,” he replied, going off what he had figured the game was. Dmitri must have told them that he’d gotten a hot deal, some people looking to buy, and was trying to make a sale with stuff that he knew wasn’t slated to be anywhere yet. “Dmitri here says that you do, but we’ve been…disappointed before.” He motioned toward Gomez, who was holding his AEK-919 easily in his grip, wat
ching the big guy. Gogol’s eyes flicked to the copper-skinned, hatchet-faced former Recon Marine, then back to Brannigan. His expression didn’t change perceptibly, but there was just enough of a shift in his stance and manner to make it clear that he’d gotten the message.
“Of course we have the merchandise,” he said easily. “If you have the money. Guns are plentiful in this country, but they are not free.”
“We’ve got enough money to pay a fair price,” Brannigan said. That message was received, too.
Gogol waved at Dmitri to get out of the way and stepped toward the pile of crates. Dmitri limped aside, and Gogol caught it, his eyes narrowing for a moment. But then he composed himself again, and called over his shoulder, his hand on one of the Arabic-marked crates.
As one of the henchmen disappeared into the yard, he turned, his hand still on the crate, and looked at Brannigan. “We did not yet have a buyer for this shipment, so you are in luck,” he said. He slapped the crate. “Fresh from Qatar. They were meant for the black-asses in Idlib, but some of our friends got to them first.” He glanced at Dmitri again.
Despite the chill inside the warehouse, Brannigan was sweating under his coat. It was only a matter of time before somebody put Dmitri together with the dead bodies in Gorev’s safehouse. Sure, that was in Chisinau, over a hundred kilometers away, but if they were part of the same organization, the word had to be going out. He was frankly surprised that nobody had started shooting yet.
Of course, it was entirely possible that the guy outside wasn’t going for a crowbar, but was bringing reinforcements. In which case, this was going to go very badly, very soon.
But when the man came back into the warehouse, he was just carrying a prybar. There was no sign of an assault force of any kind coming in after him. That didn’t mean that they hadn’t called for backup, and that there weren’t dozens of armed men on the way already. But they still had time.
Gogol took the prybar from the man and started wrenching at the lid of the Arabic-labeled crate. The nails came loose with rusty shrieks, and the lid crashed to the floor. Gogol took the flashlight from the shaved ape behind him and waved for Brannigan to come see.
Inside the crate lay five Vz.58s, Czech rifles that might look like Kalashnikovs, but shared no common parts with the Russian designs. The Czechs had designed them to go along with Moscow’s requirement that all Warsaw Pact nations field rifles in 7.62x39mm, while producing an objectively better weapon than the AKM that had been in service across most of the Eastern Bloc at the time.
“How many more?” Brannigan asked. Five wasn’t going to be enough, and he didn’t want to stick with the Krinkovs. They were notoriously inaccurate.
But Gogol shook his head. “Only the one crate of Vz.58s,” he said. “We have AKMs, AK-74s, RPDs, and Uzis, as well. And ammunition, grenades. You need equipment, too?”
Brannigan looked down at him. There wasn’t any treachery he could see in the man’s eyes, only greed. Gogol was putting out the vibe that he didn’t really care who they were, or why they were in Transnistria; he smelled money to be made, and that was enough for him.
That didn’t mean that Brannigan was going to trust him. But he might be able to do business and get some information out of him.
“What kind of equipment do you have?” he asked.
More crates were cracked open. The Uzis were old, worn, and sporting the wooden stocks, but they had multiple spare magazines each, which made them more useful than the two 9mm submachineguns they’d already acquired. The RPDs were ancient, but had been carefully packed in Cosmoline and appeared to still be in working condition.
There weren’t any fatigues, but there were chest rigs and some very basic handheld radios. They were Western models, German by their markings, and were pretty well guaranteed not to be encrypted, but they were better than what they had. Gogol even had a crate of truly ancient Soviet first aid kits, but Javakhishvili shook his head at them. He had better, as limited as the supplies he’d been able to bring in were.
After Brannigan, Santelli, and Hancock had picked out their shopping list, Gogol named his price. It was, as expected, exorbitant. Brannigan immediately offered an insultingly low counter-offer. Gogol looked disgusted, and the shaved monstrosity of an enforcer started to look like he might get to get his violence on after all.
The haggling continued, as Brannigan continued to sweat. Time was not on their side. But he couldn’t afford to show weakness to these people. They were like wolves; they’d capitalize on it in a heartbeat.
They finally agreed on a price, higher than Brannigan liked, given their limited cash supplies, but still about as low as he could expect. Gogol stuck out his hand and Brannigan shook it, still suppressing his intense desire to crush the little criminal’s throat.
Curtis and Jenkins started counting out the money from the backpacks they’d brought along, while Santelli and Hancock started breaking open crates. Wade, Childress, Flanagan, and Gomez stayed on security, and as Gogol pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit up, he could see the little man’s eyes watching them. He’d noticed that they weren’t letting down their guard, and they were going to keep their weapons in hand until they had new ones to replace them.
Brannigan could almost hear the gears turning in the little man’s head.
Gogol took a deep drag on the cigarette and blew the smoke out, turning to Dmitri. He asked a question, his tone casual and relaxed, but Dmitri stiffened. Javakhishvili’s face went slack and dead, his eyes turning hard, his stare sharpening. His hand was in his coat pocket, and Brannigan knew that the Tokarev was pointed at either Dmitri or Gogol.
Actually, given his position, he could easily shoot both of them.
Dmitri stammered out an answer. Gogol looked at Brannigan, one eyebrow raised.
“What is it?” Brannigan asked coolly.
“Well, with our business concluded,” Gogol said easily, blowing vile-smelling cigarette smoke from his nostrils, “I thought I should satisfy my curiosity. You see, we know Dmitri. He is one of Vitalie Petrenko’s boyeviks. I know he came here to steal our merchandise.” When Brannigan’s eyes hardened, Gogol simply shrugged. “We got our money, anyway. Of course, we will have to deal with Dmitri later. But that is not your concern, is it?” He took another drag on the cigarette. The ember glowed brightly in the dimness of the warehouse. It was almost completely dark outside.
“What I wonder about is the fact that Dmitri is obviously wounded, and we have heard that Vitalie and several of his boyeviki were killed in a firefight in Chisinau only last night. Which makes me wonder just who you are, and what brings you here to do business?”
Brannigan was calculating how fast he could get the Tokarev out of his coat pocket and into action. Actually, he was close enough that he could blast Gogol without even taking the pistol out. It was the big guy he was most worried about, though.
“What does our business matter to you, as long as you get your money?” he asked. “Petrenko tried to cross us, and you know what happened to him.”
When in doubt, appeal to fear and violence. Two things that this kind of animals understand and respect.
Gogol chuckled. “A good point,” he said. “And Petrenko had it coming.” Brannigan was having to adjust his assessment of the situation. Gogol and his men might not be part of the same organization as Petrenko; they’d just done business with them. Or maybe they were, and Gogol and Petrenko were rivals.
Or maybe it’s all bullshit to make you let your guard down.
“A man has to wonder,” Gogol continued. “Westerners showing up in Transnistria, looking for weapons, with all the tension and trouble going on. A patriot might think that they are spies. A businessman, such as myself, might see an opportunity. Depending on why these Westerners are here.”
Brannigan didn’t take his eyes off the little man, but through his peripheral vision he could see that more of the Vz.58s were out and loaded. Curtis was going over one of the RPDs, Bianco the other. Both had drums of 7.
62x39 close at hand. Both men were seasoned machinegunners, and Brannigan knew that either of them could have his gun up and running in seconds. Hart, Jenkins, Hancock, and Santelli were loading and prepping the rifles and submachineguns, and stuffing magazines into the old, canvas AK chest rigs.
“What do you know about Eugen Codreanu?” Brannigan asked quietly, taking the chance.
Gogol’s eyebrows went up. “You’re after him?” he asked. He suddenly smiled wickedly. “Oh, we know quite a bit about Eugen. In fact, if you’re trying to kill him, that information might well come at a discount.”
“I gather there is no love lost between your organization and his?” Brannigan asked dryly. At the same time, he thought he could sense something off about Gogol’s reaction. As if he hadn’t been truly surprised that they were targeting Codreanu. As if he knew that someone else was after him, as well.
“He is not a popular man on this side of the Dniester, no,” Gogol said, dropping the butt of his cigarette to the floor. He didn’t bother to grind it out. “Romanian suka.”
Brannigan wasn’t about to try to map out all the intricacies of the rivalries and partnerships in the Moldovan and Transnistrian underworld. He was sure that it was as tangled a web as anywhere else.
“He’s been sitting in his dacha on the riverbank for the last few days,” Gogol said, “ever since someone else took a shot at him. He’s even been trying to contact our Bratva to make a deal to get out.” He grinned again, and it wasn’t a humorous expression. “He hasn’t agreed to meet the price yet.”
“What can you tell me about his dacha?” Brannigan asked.
“That depends on how much more you can pay,” Gogol replied.
Brannigan named a figure in euros. Gogol actually looked impressed. “Okay,” he said, lighting up again. “Do you have a map?”
***
By the time Brannigan and Gogol had exhausted most of Gogol’s information, which had turned out to be disappointingly thin, given how eager the man seemed to be to share it, they had a halfway decent idea of the dacha’s layout and the strength of Codreanu’s remaining security. The initial attack seemed to have killed about half of his detail, but the dacha had reportedly had some newcomers show up by boat from the river the night before. Given that he was trying to sound out the Russian Bratva for passage out of Ribnitza, it was to be expected that he was working other contacts as well, which meant that he could end up moving at any time. Maybe even that night.