The large room contained racks and racks of shells, projectiles, black powder canisters and other supplies. He was grateful for the training that made him memorize the weapons systems on board. The AK-100s fired four different kinds of projectiles. He quickly checked the munitions racks, searching for an antiaircraft round with a radio proximity fuze. With a little tinkering, he could set off the charge with a device similar to a garage door opener.
When he found the rack he needed, he set the empty medical bag on the deck and gingerly slid one of the shells out of its compartment. The entire shell weighed nearly 28 kilos, more than 58 pounds. He eased it into the medical bag, closed the bag and headed for the door. Opening it a crack, he peered out into the passageway. Seeing that it was clear, he slipped out, locked the door and rushed back the way he came. The weight pulled on his arm, and he transferred the bag from one hand to the other as he went.
By the time he returned to sickbay, sweat stained his striped telnyashka dark under the arms and down his chest. He checked on Krupin and found him askew on the cot, mouth open, snoring softly. He set the bag down, went to a nearby hand sink and splashed cold water on his face. As he dried his face and hands he looked around for a place to keep his newfound treasure. He hefted the bag and walked it to a couple of possible hiding places—a bin for bed linens and towels, a closet for cleaning supplies, a storage locker. All seemed too obvious and well-used. Suddenly, the ship’s bell rang the beginning of morning watch, and he heard footsteps outside in the passageway.
Frantic now, he spun around again, desperate for a place to stash the artillery shell. Spotting a gurney in the short hall between exam rooms and offices, he dashed over and stuffed the bag on the shelf below the draped bed pad. He stood and turned to see Rostropovich coming down the passage to report for duty. Heart pounding, he nodded and murmured a greeting. His colleague’s face revealed nothing, but the Chechen wondered how much he’d seen.
Chapter 40
July 28—Suitland, Maryland
A ringing bell signaled the end of a class period for Midshipman Tolliver, and she rose from her classroom desk. Another tough fifty minutes at the Naval Academy that made her question her resolve and her sanity. The pressure was getting to her, and if it weren’t for her stubborn pride she might have quit long ago, gone to her local community college in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and gotten an associate degree in culinary arts, office administration, or maybe, given her penchant for digging, library science. As she headed for the door, jostled by classmates in a hurry to get to their next assignments, the bell rang again. Crap, already late for her next class…
The ringing sounded a third time, rousing Tolliver from her dream. She lifted her head from her desk and groggily reached for the phone, wetting her lips so she could speak.
“Hello?” she rasped.
“I didn’t get you out of bed, did I, sweetheart?”
Tolliver sat up and straightened her skirt, noticing that the windows had turned gray in advance of the coming dawn.
“Frank. Oh, no. Well, I guess I did nod off there for a few minutes. Long night. What have you got?”
“You’re going to love this,” Pospisil said with a chuckle. “I know how you intelligence folks like a good mystery.”
“You said it. What have you got?”
“That flight you asked about? Whoever it was requisitioned a Hercules C-130 for one.”
“One passenger?”
“Yep, but get this. Plane flew to Greenland and refueled at Peterson AFB in Thule. No one got off except the pilot to chat with the refueling crew. When the plane got back to Andrews, the only people on board were the flight crew.”
Tolliver needed coffee in the worst way. She was sure she’d heard Pospisil say… “Wait. You’re telling me that the only passenger on board disappeared en route?”
“Or got off the plane somewhere,” Pospisil said.
“Frank, I need a copy of that flight plan. Could you e-mail it to me?”
“Sure thing, Janet. Sending it now. And you’re my tablemate at FRG this year, right?”
“Absolutely. Thanks a million.”
While she waited for the e-mail, Janet grabbed her purse and went to the restroom to see if she could repair the damage done by the all-nighter. Under the harsh light of the fluorescent lights in the ladies’ room, she looked like a traffic accident victim. Dark circles rimmed her eyes, standing out starkly against her pale complexion. A red crease angled across her cheek where she’d rested it on her forearm during her short nap. Saliva crusted the corner of her mouth where she’d drooled. Embarrassed, she ran the cold water and scrubbed her face clean.
Bits of her dream came back to her, sending her thoughts back in time. The naval academy had been tough. Dozens of times she’d been pushed to her limits, each time anguishing over whether or not to quit. But she’d always found some inner strength, some taurine egotism that wouldn’t let her. There was always someone smarter, stronger, more accomplished ahead of her. She’d resigned herself to the fact that someone always had to come in last. But there were times when the goal was simply finishing the race, and she knew if she didn’t finish her four years at the academy she’d never finish anything for the rest of her life. So she accepted that in a place that trained everyone to be a leader, some still had to follow. And she’d made it. She’d graduated, not as an ensign like everyone else, but as a CWO. Because she was good at digging. She was still a CWO, though she’d been promoted three times to W-5.
Catching a whiff of herself as she moved, she involuntarily wrinkled her nose. No cute NCIS agent was going to want to go out with her if she smelled like a barnyard. She removed her uniform blouse, washed her underarms and rolled on new deodorant. She usually kept a clean blouse and skirt in her car or office, just in case, but hadn’t had time to get to the dry cleaners recently. With Reyna out of action, Janet knew she might have some long nights ahead of her, so she made a note to put a spare uniform in the car as soon as she could. She put the blouse back on, tucked it in and smoothed her skirt. Then she sparingly applied some base to tone down the circles under her eyes and added a light coat of lip-gloss.
By the time she returned to her desk, the windows had brightened considerably and Frank’s e-mail had landed in her in-box. Quickly she settled in at her desk and read over the flight plan. Then she accessed a military flight-tracking program that stored several weeks of radar data and searched back to early July. Based on the flight plan, she searched the database for the time period on July 4th when the C-130 would likely have been flying in to Thule. She set the tracker in motion and watched as small figure of airplanes popped up on the screen in yellow. Several bunched around Peterson AFB. A few scattered figures showed up near the bottom of the map.
She hovered the mouse over the southernmost icons. As she did, the flight number for that particular plane displayed on screen. All were commercial airline flights. Then she noticed another icon headed for the east side of the huge island. When she scrolled over the little figure, the display said, “Blocked.” She frowned. The airbase at Thule was on the northwest side of Greenland. She advanced the file time and checked the flight path again. The plane still headed northeast. She continued to advance the time until the flight track had turned, heading almost due west, toward Thule. Backtracking slowly until the point in time where the plane turned, she zeroed in on the spot. The map indicated nothing there, no airstrip, not even a village.
Intrigued, she navigated to a site she wasn’t even supposed to know about. She was afraid her security clearance might not let her access the page, but when she typed in her ID and password she cleared the security screen immediately. Working quickly, she searched for files on July 4th. Soon, her screen filled with an image of craggy, ice-covered cliffs, narrow fjords and flowing glaciers. She zoomed in on the satellite photo at the coordinates where the C-130 had turned for Thule. The only things evident in the photo were enough snow and ice to discourage her from ever visiting. She wondered how an
yone could live in such an inhospitable environment—and why the big Hercules transport had bothered flying over such desolate terrain before heading for a friendly place to refuel.
Then she spotted the settlement on a fjord near the coast. Increasing the resolution, she zoomed in even closer and saw the heavy equipment, the long pier, the large buildings, the extent of the settlement. Whatever the purpose of the camp, the scale of the operation was massive given the surroundings. The only activity she could think of worth investing that much money and manpower in was mining or oil. She pulled up another image and zeroed in on the settlement, this time using a magnifying glass from her desk drawer to scrutinize the details. Despite the excellent resolution, details at that distance were a little fuzzy.
She searched the time sequence, pulled up a later image and inspected it, too. She picked up more features this time, noticing the steel track leading from a cliff side to the settlement. So, probably a mining camp. Digging something very valuable out of that mountainside. Moving forward in time again, Janet looked at more photos, looking for clues that would tell her why someone on the Lodestar team was so interested in this place, and why that interest was so secret they’d buried a fly-over in a research budget.
But it hadn’t been just a fly-over. Somehow, they’d dropped off a passenger at this spot. At least it seemed this was the most logical place for the passenger to have gotten off since he hadn’t gotten off in Thule when the plane refueled. So how with no landing strip? Parachute in? Lost in thought, she almost missed the difference in the next photo that came up on her screen, and it was huge. A ship suddenly appeared alongside the pier at the camp. She noted the date stamp on the photo, and focused in on the ship. From its size and profile, it looked to be a research ship.
Quickly, she opened another window and pulled up the navy’s list of arctic research vessels and their current missions. She compared ships on the list to the one sitting in port in the satellite photo. Bingo! The Akademik Shirshov. Her eyes widened in surprise and all her antennae went on alert. A Russian research vessel. That put a different spin on her assumptions. She held the magnifying glass over the screen and peered at details in the photo more closely. The trucks and equipment she’d taken for granted she now saw were Russian.
Eager to discover more, she advanced the photos a day at a time and. In stop motion she watched the research ship leave Greenland and head east across the Greenland Sea, The Barents Sea, the Kara Sea, above Russia to an island in the East Siberian Sea. She focused in on the ship’s destination and realized she was looking at a military installation. Kotelny Island. An air force base that Putin had reopened, as a quick bit of research revealed. Now a flurry of activity on the island as engineers and construction personnel worked to expand it. The photo revealed construction of an enormous pier that could handle incoming supply ships and serve as a jumping off point for warships. And anchored just offshore next to the research ship sat a Russian destroyer. She sat back and reviewed what she knew and what she’d discovered, trying to figure out how the pieces fit. Russian base. American plane and presumably American passenger who got out over Russian base. To spy? And she didn’t see the connection to the laser project. Conjecture only took her so far.
Whatever the Russians were mining, though, had military value, not just commercial value. She looked more closely at the air base on Kotelny, but the photo gave up no secrets. She retrieved the next day’s satellite photo and was surprised to see the destroyer no longer there. That the big ship sailed so close to the arrival of the research vessel struck her as more than coincidence. She started to widen the search area to see where the destroyer had headed.
“Tolliver!” Farley barked.
Startled, she whirled around to see the captain standing just outside her cubicle. She did her best to block his view of her monitor.
“You were supposed to have an SSRI on my desk at oh-eight-hundred this morning,” Farley said gruffly.
She looked at her watch—two minutes late—and noticed for the first time the hum of activity around here. She’d been so immersed in what she’d been doing that she hadn’t realized a new day had started at ONI.
“Sorry, sir,” she said. “I lost track of time. I’ll get it right away.”
“That’s better.” He peered at the screen over her shoulder. “What’s that you’re working on, anyway?”
Her heart leaped into her throat.
Chapter 41
July 28—Seattle
“Is everyone okay?” I shouted over the ringing in my ears.
I saw mouths move and heads nod, and assumed that meant yes. I got to my feet, grabbed a gun off the side table and headed for the door at a run. I cringed every time my left foot landed and radiated a shockwave of pain from my knee. My breath was coming fast again, and not from the exertion. Panic welled up inside me on the street as I twisted my head one direction and another looking for signs of Dmitrov. I couldn’t let the bastard get away. I raced to the nearest corner and looked up and down the cross street. Nothing. From far behind me, I heard the sound of a powerful engine revving, the squeal of tires on pavement and a car fading into the distance. I cursed and limped back to the house.
The sky had turned pewter, a layer of marine air forming low clouds that hid the blue sky. The sun would burn them off later in the day, but now they made the air feel cool and clammy. I was anything but, instead burning feverishly, my skin hot and dry, the pain from my wounds, especially my lip and arm, searing and prickly. Fear flushed my neck and face, and anger had my blood on simmer. The faint howl of a siren replaced the retreating growl of Dmitrov’s Mercedes. Reyna appeared through the doorway on the top step and cocked her head when she heard it too.
“We have to go, Blake.”
She darted down the steps and ran past me. I galumphed along in her wake down the block and around the corner to the rental car, stuffing the gun out of sight in my waistband as I went. I got into the car muttering.
“I told you. He’s Russian mafia, for God’s sake. And he got away. He’ll kill us all. He’ll—”
“Blake, focus!” Reyna said, starting the engine.
“He’s out there, Reyna! He won’t stop. Not until we’re dead!”
“Breathe, damn it! You’re hyperventilating. What’s wrong with you?”
I bent over and put my head between my knees, closed my eyes and did what she said.
“Jesus, you’ve got PTSD,” she said softly. “The panic attacks, the anxiety, the fear of loud noises…”
“I’m fine.”
“I saw this happen to guys after the Gulf War. Constantly angry that no one else saw the dangers all around. Always ‘on,’ ready for civilization to crash and burn.”
“I just want to get this guy. Before he kills us, Anya, or anyone else!”
“And I just want my job back. But you’re no good to yourself or to me if you’re going to freak out at the sight of guns.”
“I told you I’m all right. And oh, by the way, you’re welcome for helping get us out of that jam back there. I know Chance saved our butts, but I had a bit little to do with getting us loose.”
Her face soured at the acid tone in my voice, and she pressed her lips together. I let her stew, but voiced my unease over Dmitrov’s escape a few minutes later.
“I’m serious about Dmitrov. I don’t want to be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life. He can’t be very happy we took out two of his men.”
“You worry too much.”
“About staying alive? When people are trying to kill me?”
“Think about it, Blake. Dmitrov was angry when he came back. What’s that tell you?”
Following her train of logic should have been easy—just stay on the rails. But I felt like a tracker in the woods looking for threads on bushes. The answer was in my pocket.
“The package… The circuits Dmitrov sent didn’t work. Or… Wait! What if D’Amato held something back and mailed it to the girl with the doll?”
&nbs
p; “Now you’re thinking. But Dmitrov doesn’t know that. He’ll think you’ve got whatever it is. We don’t have to find him. He’ll come to us.”
“We need the package he mailed. Or what’s in it.”
“Find the girl, find the package, right? That’s where we’re headed, civvy.”
From Seattle north to Everett, one stretch of highway 99 looks pretty much like any other stretch—car dealerships, auto repair shops, strip malls with mom-and-pop businesses and hole-in-the-wall restaurants. It was still early when we got to Lynnwood, so Reyna pulled into a Starbucks. We went inside and I followed Reyna to a table. She excused herself to use the restroom, and when she came back five minutes later, she’d made herself more presentable. I realized I must look like hell, too, so I braved a trip to the men’s room to see how bad the damage was. Other than the split lip, swollen nose, and the nick on my chin, my face wasn’t as ugly as I expected. Grigori had thrown mostly body shots and open-handed blows to the face, leaving less bruising. I washed the blood off my face and arm, and rinsed out my shirt as well as I could before wringing it out and holding it under the hand dryer. I put it back on damp and rejoined Reyna.
She’d already gotten coffee and some sort of breakfast sandwich, so I went up to the counter and ordered. When I picked up my cup, the shakes threatened to spill the contents on the floor. I clamped a lid on it and carried it in two hands to the table. The coffee helped keep some of the exhaustion at bay, but even with the hour or two of unconsciousness, I was running on fumes. Reyna remained strangely silent. I couldn’t tell if she’d been rattled by what had happened earlier, if she was as tired as I was, or if she had something else on her mind. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know so I didn’t ask.
“Do you have a plan?” I said finally.
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