by David Wood
“Looks like Tweedledee and Tweedledum are still with us,” he murmured.
“What a surprise,” Leopov replied. “Spot anyone else?”
“No. You?”
“No, but I do see our girl. Right where we told her to be.”
Maddock followed her gaze to a spot near the north corner of the mausoleum where a lone female figure stood, bundled up in a fur-lined winter coat. Her features were partially concealed behind a scarf that was wrapped around her head and lower face, and a pair of sunglasses hid her eyes, but rather than throwing doubt on her identification, these measures confirmed it. In a phone call made from the safehouse, they had warned the woman to keep her face covered.
Maddock took a deep breath. “Okay. Then let’s do this.”
They made a beeline for the woman, striding purposefully, all the while aware that the men wearing track suits were matching their pace. Maddock kept his eyes on the policemen and the soldiers. He hoped their mere presence would keep the pursuers from doing anything outrageous, but he also knew that if the men tailing them were government agents, the police would either keep their distance, or take the side of the enemy.
As they got within a few yards of the woman, Leopov called out, “Lia!”
Uttering the name aloud was like pulling the trigger on a starter pistol. Maddock managed to take one more full step, but even as he set his foot down, he became aware of movement all around him. The rapidity of the response confirmed Leopov’s suspicion that the pair he had dubbed Tweedledee and Tweedledum were only a small part of the surveillance effort. Six men—including the men in track suits—converged on them like warrior ants responding to an attack on the hive. The others wore belted leather jackets and trench coats, almost exactly like the KGB agents in the old spy films he had watched as a kid. Two of the men had pistols drawn, held low and mostly concealed from the view of passersby. The others moved in closer to physically restrain Maddock, Leopov, and the woman they had come to meet. Before Maddock or the others could respond to being accosted, one of the men advanced on the woman and roughly snatched her scarf away, knocking her sunglasses askew in the process.
“Hey!” she shouted angrily, as the unveiling released a cascade of brown ringlets. Her dark eyes shot an accusing glance at Maddock. The goons holding them had a similar reaction as they realized what Maddock already knew.
Although there was a passing resemblance to the woman Maddock had seen in the photographs at the safehouse, this person was, without a doubt, not Lia Markova.
After Maddock and Leopov departed, the man in the off-duty taxi continued to watch the house from which they had emerged. His confederates would continue following the Americans, hopefully to where the Markova woman was hiding, but he had other business. He waited about ten minutes before getting out and heading to the front door of the residence. As he neared the door, he slipped his right hand into the deep pocket of his leather jacket and curled his fingers around the butt of a compact Makarov pistol. He was prepared to shoot through the pocket if circumstances dictated, but hoped it would not be necessary—it was his favorite jacket.
At the door, he checked for surveillance cameras, and seeing none, let go of the pistol and reached into a different pocket to produce a ring of keys. He shuffled through them until he found one that matched the profile of the lock, and then proceeded to insert it in the keyhole. They key was a cut down blank—called a “bump key”—and while it did not match the arrangement of the wafers inside the lock mechanism, it would, with just a little extra effort, permit him to enter.
With his left hand, he exerted pressure on the bow of the key, as if trying to turn it, and then delivered several solid raps with his right fist, all aimed at a spot right next to the latch, jostling the wafers inside the lock, causing them to jump up and down. After a few failed attempts, he chose a different key with the same profile and tried again, this time with more success. On the fourth such blow, the resistance from the lock vanished and the key turned smoothly.
He quickly put away the keys and drew the pistol, keeping it at the low ready as he eased the door open, though he doubted he would need it. If there was anyone inside, they would almost certainly have come to investigate all the racket he had raised with the bump key.
Unless of course they had known that someone was trying to break in, and were waiting to ambush him once he was inside.
As he entered, he brought the gun up, holding it out with both hands, shoulders squared and ready to fire.
The entry foyer was empty. He kept moving, the gun held steady, finger on the trigger, as he moved into the front room. There were two mugs on a table, both empty, but nothing else of note. He moved briskly through the house, checking each room, always leading with the pistol, even though each opened door confirmed his suspicion that the residence was unoccupied. When he cleared the last room, he took out his phone and dialed a number. When the connection was made, he reported that he had found nothing.
“Never mind that,” came the answering voice at the other end. “They are walking toward Red Square. They may be planning to rendezvous with Markova in a public place, for all the good it will do them. Come here. Now. Hurry.”
“Da. I’m on my way.” The intruder thumbed off the phone and headed for the door.
In a small room concealed behind a false wall at the end of the hallway, Bones, Willis, and Professor watched the man’s exit on a closed-circuit video monitor. As he got in the taxi and sped away, they breathed a collective sigh of relief. The search of the premises had been rushed and unprofessional. Not only had the intruder overlooked the secret room, but also the state of the art miniature cameras hidden inside and out.
“That was lucky,” said Professor.
“Dude looked more like a bouncer at a strip club than a spook,” Willis remarked.
Bones nodded. “Hope he kept his day job.”
“I think that would probably be his night job,” Professor pointed out.
“Whatever. I’m just glad we don’t have to hang out in here any longer.” Bones pushed on the back of the false wall, carefully swiveling it out into the hallway of the residence. He stepped out and then stretched, tipping his head back and letting out a jaw-cracking yawn. “No offense, but you guys are a little ripe.”
Professor wrinkled his forehead in dismay and self-consciously sniffed the air, casually lowering his nose toward his armpit. He shrugged. Willis just rolled his eyes.
Bones moved through the house to the front room and peeked out through the window even though the cameras had confirmed the intruder’s departure. “Coast is clear,” he announced. “We’d better get moving.”
Professor lingered in the small room, watching his friends leave on the video monitor. When he was certain that no one had been left to maintain surveillance on the building, he shut off the equipment and restored the false wall to conceal the secret room, then headed out as well.
He did not immediately see Bones and Willis, but knew the route they were taking, and followed it until he spotted them, half a block away and moving north toward the Leningradsky Prospekt. His teammates were taller than he with longer strides, so he had to quicken his step to maintain the interval, but he had no intention of catching up to them.
Bones and Willis paused at the intersection, staring at something off to the left for several seconds before swinging to the right and heading down the avenue. The apparent object of their fascination came into Professor’s view a moment later—an enormous geodesic sphere, easily sixty or seventy feet high, rising out of a ring-shaped foundation like a black bubble poised to lift off and escape into the heavens. They had passed it earlier on their approach to the safe house and Professor had subsequently learned that it housed the Sokol Tunnel Control Center, part of the Moscow Metro system. Composed of triangular panels of dark glass, Professor thought it looked like the compound eye of an insect, but Bones had dubbed it “the Mother of All Disco Balls.” This time however, Bones and Willis hadn’t really been lo
oking at the Tunnel Control building.
Professor reached the same spot a few moments later and followed their example, facing the elaborate structure and, to all appearances, gawking at it like a tourist. From the corner of his eye however, he could make out the figure of a woman. That she was in fact female was not immediately obvious. Bundled up inside a soiled, castoff coat, her head and face were mostly hidden by a heavy scarf and a mangy fur ushanka hat. Professor only knew that this apparent homeless derelict was a woman because he had been told to meet her here.
“Did you see my friends?” he asked, speaking slow and enunciating carefully, even though he had been told that the woman understood English.
“Yes.” The reply was a hoarse, tentative whisper.
“Hold out your hand as if you’re asking me for money.”
When she did, he turned to look at her, seeing her clearly for the first time, but still barely recognizing her as the same woman he had seen photographs of less than an hour ago. He reached into his pocket, took out a wad of ruble notes, along with a Metro card, and placed them in her outstretched hand. “Go after my friends. Keep close, but not too close. They’re going to the Metro station. Get on the same train they do. I’ll be keeping watch from behind. Got it?”
“Yes.” Her voice was even more fearful now.
Professor forced himself to look away. For her sake, he had to treat her like an annoying beggar, ruining his sightseeing vacation. Still, he couldn’t leave her without at least a few words of assurance. “We’re going to get you to safety, Lia. Everything is going to be okay.”
SIX
Maddock yanked his arm free of his captor, and snarled, “Hey, hands off.”
Dumbfounded, the man—the one he’d dubbed Tweedledum—made no attempt to hold him. He, like the rest of the group that had descended upon them, appeared to be in a general state of confusion after being thrown this curve ball. They had clearly been expecting to round up Lia Markova and the Americans who were coming to her rescue, but this woman was not Markova, which meant they had seriously screwed up.
Maddock’s outrage was mostly play-acting, and far more restrained than the situation might otherwise have warranted. He needed to make a scene, but not too big a scene. Just enough to convince their assailants to make a hasty retreat.
The reaction of Lia’s double was neither a performance, nor understated, not surprising since she had no idea what was really going on. The woman, a high-priced escort who catered to wealthy foreign visitors, had no idea of the role Maddock and Leopov had cast her in; she had merely been told to rendezvous with an adventurous American couple in front of Lenin’s tomb, and then to give them the VIP treatment. Now, seeing a small fortune about to slip away, she rounded on the man who had accosted her, and unleashed a torrent of Russian invective, shaking her finger in his face threateningly, driving him back a step with the mere force of her wrath.
The unfolding incident had already attracted the attention of a pair of nearby policemen who were regarding the scene with increasing curiosity. It was only a matter of time before they decided to intervene.
Leopov stepped forward, arms raised placatingly, and spoke in Russian. Maddock didn’t understand a word of it, but if she was sticking to the script, she was giving them a version of the same story they’d given the decoy, deferring to the men as if they were vice cops, explaining to them that it was all a misunderstanding. Prostitution was illegal in Russia, but enforcement was haphazard at best, and the police, more often than not, were more interested in receiving bribes than taking anyone into custody. Of course, these men weren’t vice cops, but Leopov’s explanation would give everyone a chance to simply walk away.
It almost worked.
One of the men—an oily character in a long leather jacket—barked an order, silencing both Leopov and the decoy, and then reached into a pocket and took out his mobile phone. As he looked away to begin punching in a number, Maddock gave the others a big friendly grin.
“Is this a problem?” he whispered through his teeth.
“Could be,” Leopov said through her own big smile.
“Crap. Plan B?”
Leopov gave an almost imperceptible nod. “Think so.”
“Crap,” Maddock muttered again.
Plan B—which barely met the dictionary definition of a “plan”—was to split up, run like hell, and rendezvous at an easy-to-find public location.
The man held the phone to his ear and returned his attention to his captives. His dull black eyes radiated menace.
“Ready?” Maddock asked.
“Ready,” replied Leopov.
Maddock casually repositioned his feet, sliding his right leg back. “Set?”
“Mmhmm.”
As the Russian opened his mouth to speak, Maddock shouted, “Go!” and burst into motion, charging the man with the phone and slamming into him before any of their assailants knew what was happening. The Russian was knocked backward, off his feet, the phone flying from his grasp. Maddock used the impact to redirect his momentum, veering to the left, heading back toward the northwest entrance to the square. Leopov was half a step behind him, slipping through the opening he had created, but pivoting in the opposite direction, toward St. Basil’s.
Maddock sprinted flat out for fifty meters, shouting for people in his way to move. He did not once look back to see if he was being pursued—he assumed he was—or to check on Leopov. There was nothing he could do to help her, except maybe draw off some of the pursuit. With her intimate knowledge of the city, she stood a far better chance of slipping the net than he did.
His own unfamiliarity prompted him to stick to what he knew. He’d reviewed a map of the area around the Kremlin, but map recon was no substitute for a walkthrough, so his part of Plan B relied on the KISS—Keep It Simple, Stupid—principle. He backtracked the narrow street they’d come down earlier. As the blocky yellow Lubyanka building came into view, it occurred to him that he was literally running toward FSB headquarters.
He rounded the corner, taking a hard right to head southeast, and risked a quick glance back, immediately spotting Tweedledee and Tweedledum. They were at least thirty yards behind him, and flagging from the exertion. Outrunning them wouldn’t be a problem. There was no sign of the other men who had accosted them; he hoped they hadn’t all gone after Leopov.
He set his sights on a distant but distinctive landmark, a tall building to the southeast that looked, from a distance at least, like a church spire, but instead of a cross, the structure was topped with a star and wreath, a symbol of the old Soviet era in which it had been built. Maddock had no intention of running all the way to it—it was more than a mile away—but in the unfamiliar city, it was an easily spotted reference point. After a couple hundred yards, the street took a slight bend to the south and he lost sight of the tower, but now he could make out his actual destination, a sprawling rectangular building that occupied at least two city blocks and rose to a uniform height of at least a dozen stories. Just visible from ground level, rising up from the center of the massive structure, was a smaller tower, emblazoned with enormous Cyrillic letters that identified it as the Hotel Rossiya. It looked more like a massive walled fortress with an inner castle keep than a five-star lodging, and indeed, for most of its storied history, it had held the world record for largest hotel, supplanted only by the Excalibur Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.
The Rossiya was not Maddock’s ultimate destination either, but another easily found reference point and the ideal location for him to rendezvous with Leopov. Her escape route, as earlier agreed upon, had been more circuitous owing to her familiarity with the city, but if she had not been caught by her pursuers, she would be waiting for him at the southwest corner of the hotel, near the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge which spanned the Moskva River.
If she had not been caught.
He glanced over his shoulder again. If Tweedledee and Tweedledum were still on his trail, they had fallen so far behind that he couldn’t see them any l
onger. That was a hopeful sign and he slowed his pace to a jog as he moved down the sidewalk to the east of the hotel.
“Dane!”
It was Leopov, but her shout had come from behind him.
That wasn’t a hopeful sign.
He turned and wasn’t at all surprised to find her running toward him at a full sprint, with a trio of men chasing after her. As their eyes met, she made a frantic chopping gesture, and shouted, “Go! Go!”
So much for Plan B, he thought.
He quickened his step, gradually at first, then when she started to overtake him, matching her pace.
“Couldn’t shake ‘em,” she gasped, panting for breath. He surmised she had been running without let up the whole time.
“I guess we should have come up with Plan C,” he replied.
“I have. You’re not gonna like it though.”
Same old Zara, he thought, frowning.
She veered toward a small wooded area at the hotel’s corner and ventured inside. The trees offered some concealment from the pursuers, but Leopov did not leave the path, and a few seconds later, they emerged onto the sidewalk that ran along the front of the hotel. Directly before them was a six-lane street on which cars zoomed by recklessly, and beyond that, the Moskva River. Maddock pulled a step, waiting to see which way Leopov would turn, but she didn’t, nor did she slow down. Instead, she charged headlong into traffic.