by Larry Bond
“I really wish you didn’t have to do that, Alexei,” Helen said slowly.
“Yes,” the MVD major agreed sadly. “It seems evident that the men we are hunting have allies somewhere inside my own government. And that they will doubtless know of our decision to return to Kandalaksha within hours. But we must have permission to enter the base. How else can we proceed?”
Helen nodded her reluctant agreement and saw Peter doing the same thing. She had the uneasy feeling that following the proper channels was keeping them at least one step behind the bad guys, but what other options were open to them? Once you started cutting corners to obtain results, you were on a slippery slope — headed toward the dangerous paradox of breaking the law to uphold the law. No. She and Koniev were officers of the law — and that meant obeying the law, even if that put their investigation at risk.
Kalitnikovskoe Cemetery, Moscow (D MINUS 19)
Rolf Ulrich Reichardt leaned forward from the back seat to check the time on the dashboard clock of his Mercedes-Benz sedan. It was nearly midnight. He sat back-staring out the window at the rows of tombstones crowding the cemetery to his right. During the 1930s, Kalitnikovskoe had been infamous as a dumping ground for the bodies of those murdered in the KGB’s Lubyanka Prison. Did the man he had come to meet remember that? The German rather suspected he did. Felix Larionov, “the Lariat,” was known for his heavy-handed sense of irony.
Johann Brandt, acting as his chauffeur and bodyguard for this covert meeting, stiffened suddenly. “They’re here.”
Reichardt peered through the windshield and saw two cars pull up and park just across the darkened street. Both were brand new Mercedes.
Russia’s criminal classes had a well-developed appreciation for fine German automotive engineering.
Three hardfaced men in black leather jackets and slacks climbed out of the first car and fanned out — scanning the immediate area for any signs of trouble. They were heavily armed.
One carried a shotgun. The other two cradled Uzi submachine guns.
Satisfied, one turned and flashed a thumbs-up toward the second Mercedes. Its high-beams flashed once.
Responding to the prearranged signal, Reichardt and Brandt climbed out of their car and walked slowly toward the middle of the street. Except for a briefcase carried by Brandt, they were unencumbered, and they were careful to keep their own hands in plain view. The rear doors of the second Mercedes popped open.
Two men stepped out and came forward to meet them.
Both were well dressed and middleaged, but one, a wiry, white-haired man, bore jagged scars on his face that testified to a hard life. A brightly colored tattoo on the back of his left hand showed he had spent time in the Soviet prison system.
Reichardt recognized Felix Larionov from earlier business dealings.
The vory v zakone, the “thief professing the code,” controlled several of Moscow’s most powerful and active criminal gangs. The second man, fleshier and softer-looking, was Larionov’s sovetnik, his “adviser” — a term meaning everything from legal counselor to second-in-command.
Larionov stopped just out of arm’s reach. He nodded once.
“Herr Reichardt.”
“Vor,” Reichardt said politely, carefully masking his irritation at having to come hat-in-hand to this criminal for help. The unexpected persistence of Major Alexei Koniev and his two American colleagues was proving extremely troubling. Gasparov’s heroin smuggling had proved a remarkable stroke of luck — one he had been quick to seize on. Ordinary police investigators would have been quite satisfied to close their case with Grushtin’s apparent suicide.
The memory of the Russian officer’s screams brought him a brief moment of pleasure. Orchestrating Grushtin’s death had seemed a masterstroke — the capstone on the intricate heroin smuggling cover story he had so rapidly contrived to blind the official inquiry into the An-32 crash.
Reichardt’s mood darkened again. But Koniev and these two Americans had not taken the gift he offered them. Instead, they were coming dangerously close to piercing the security screen he had erected around his activities at Kandalaksha. That could not be tolerated or ignored.
Not any longer.
It especially irked him to involve others outside his control in the Operation, but time was short, and his resources, though enormous, were not inexhaustible. He looked steadily at Larionov.
“Can your people handle the disposal of these packages for me? The ones we discussed over the phone?”
The Russian smiled thinly. “They can.” Then he held up a cautionary hand. “But the proper question, Herr Reichardt, is whether or not I will order them to undertake such a task.”
“Of course. My apologies.” Reichardt gritted his teeth. Beggars could not be choosers, he reminded himself coldly. His own security teams were still scattered around the world. He needed the Russian Mafiya chieftain’s assistance and manpower — for now. “Will you accept this commission, Vor?”
“You can assure me this work is not done at the behest of any government?” Larionov asked. The refusal to perform any work for the authorities was an integral part of the Russian thieves’ code.
“Yes,” Reichardt said firmly. “This is a private endeavor. And so I swear it.”
“Then so I accept it,” Larionov agreed. He motioned toward his adviser. “I believe Kiril told you our price?”
Reichardt nodded slowly. Two hundred thousand American dollars plus expenses was well over the ordinary fee for such services, but it was reasonable — given the short notice, relative importance of the targets, and the fact that he insisted on having one of his own men in direct command.
At his signal, Brandt stepped forward and opened the briefcase he carried for the Russian’s inspection. It contained bundles of small-denomination greenbacks and a stack of airline tickets.
“Good.” Larionov smiled more broadly, showing a set of yellowing, tobacco-stained teeth. “Then our business here is concluded.
My boys will rendezvous with this man Kleiner of yours in Murmansk tomorrow evening.”
Near Taif, Saudi Arabia
Prince Ibrahim al Saud looked up impatiently as his personal secretary, Hashemi, brought Massif Lahoud into his private office.
The Egyptian-born head of the Persian Gulf Environmental Trust looked weary. He had traveled half the night from Damascus to Riyadh and from there to Taif. Under other circumstances, Lahoud’s report could have been made in a five-minute phone call, but Ibrahim maintained a single, inflexible rule in these matters. Where possible, his subordinates would never discuss their involvement in terrorist activities electronically. Phone calls, faxes, and electronic mail could all be intercepted, and Ibrahim had a high regard for the code-breaking abilities of intelligence organizations like Israel’s Mossad and the American National Security Agency.
“Well?”
“The Radical Islamic Front agrees to your condition, Highness. One of our freelance Syrian operatives attended the meeting. They have contacted Afriz Sallah and hired him for this operation. Everything is proceeding according to plan.”
Ibrahim smiled. “Very good, Mr. Lahoud. Then I authorize you to release the necessary funds from the trust’s private account.
Take the usual security precautions.”
Lahoud nodded. “Of course, Highness.”
When he was gone, Ibrahim sat back in his chair. A single prearranged order from Lahoud would set events in motion. The funds released from the trust’s account would flow through an intricate network of dummy accounts set up in half a dozen banks — some in the Middle East, some halfway around the world. By tomorrow, the Radical Islamic Front would have the cash it needed to arrange the assassination of the American Undersecretary of State for Arab Affairs. And if anyone ever tried to trace the ultimate source of the Front’s money, they would find only the equivalent of an empty desert — with all the tracks filled in by the wind.
CHAPTER SIX
MANIFEST DESTINY
JUNE
4
Surplus Engine Storage Depot, 125th Air Division, Kandalaksha
Colonel Peter Thorn pivoted slowly through a full circle, carefully checking their immediate surroundings. Broken windows stared back at him from the abandoned buildings visible in every direction. The rust-eaten Lada staff car that had brought them here was parked in front of a large, metal-roofed concrete building enclosed by a sagging chainlink fence. Railroad tracks ran parallel to the fence for a hundred meters before angling off toward the woods around the base perimeter.
Nothing was stirring. Nothing except the hairs on the back of his neck. They were nearly four kilometers from the busier portions of Kandalaksha, and this place was too quiet — too isolated.
He glanced at Koniev and shook his head meaningfully. “I don’t like this, Major. Not one goddamned bit.”
“Neither do I,” Koniev agreed. He jerked a thumb toward the sullenfaced Russian sergeant who had picked them up at the airfield’s main gate. “But this man insists that General Serov himself ordered him to bring us here.”
“Yeah,” Thorn said. “That’s what worries me.”
Nearly two full days had passed since they’d learned that someone had faked Grushtin’s suicide. First, the higher-ups in Russia’s Ministry of Defense had taken their own sweet time — nearly twenty-four hours — to authorize another probe of the officers and men of the 125th Air Division. Hours more had been lost covering the sheer distance between Moscow and Kandalaksha.
Thorn wished again that Russian law allowed foreigners to carry weapons. Whoever had killed Grushtin had been given plenty of warning that they were coming back to this base. And plenty of time to arrange a warm and deadly welcome if that was judged necessary.
He shook his head silently, knowing his concerns might seem ridiculous, maybe even paranoid, to some. But there were too many dead bodies floating around for him to ignore the danger they might be in.
Somebody connected with Kandalaksha was playing a game for very high stakes.
Thorn came to full alert as a big black Zil limousine with tinted windows turned onto the access road and roared toward them. Red command flags fluttered from its hood.
He stepped back — putting the bulk of the Lada between himself and the approaching car. Out of the corner of one eye, he noticed Helen taking the same precaution. If this was an ambush, the rusting staff car wouldn’t offer much protection but he lived by the credo that some cover was always better than none when bullets were flying. As a veteran of the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team, Helen had the same instincts and the same training.
The Zil pulled up and parked within a few feet. Thorn relaxed only slightly when the tall, trim figure of Colonel General Feodor Serov climbed out of the limousine’s back seat.
He hadn’t liked the Russian base commander much when they’d first met, and he liked him less now.
Although Serov had the usual fighter jock arrogance coming out of his ears, that wasn’t what really bugged him about the Russian. It was something else.
Thorn had used the Ministry of Defense-imposed delay to study the O.S.I.A dossier on Serov.
Nothing he’d read gave him a high opinion of Kandalaksha’s commander.
The Russian had a long track record of backing those he perceived as winners — no matter who they were or what they professed. When Yeltsin was on the way up, Serov supported him. When it seemed the communists might reclaim power in Russia’s first contested presidential election, the general had hurried to proclaim his renewed faith in Marxism. But then he’d turned his coat back to the side of the government just as quickly once the election results came in. Pure and simple, Feodor Mikhailovich Serov struck Thorn as a first-class opportunist— a careerist who always looked out for himself. And that made the Russian the antithesis of everything he thought a soldier should be.
“Major Koniev. Special Agent Gray. And Colonel Thorn.” Serov tried a smile. It flitted nervously across his face and disappeared. “I am grateful that you agreed to meet me here.”
“I was not aware we had a choice, General,” Koniev said flatly. He’d read the same files and evidently come to the same conclusions about Serov’s character.
“Perhaps you could explain why we’ve been brought to this godforsaken place. As you know, we have a number of people to question in connection with Captain Grushtin, his murder, and this secret engine project of yours.”
Thorn watched Serov flush an angry red at the MVD officer’s dismissive tone. He hid a grin. Given a whip hand over the Air Force general by Moscow’s orders, Koniev had evidently decided to push him hard. Atta boy, Alexei, he thought coldly. Keep the arrogant SOB off balance and on the run.
With a visible effort, the base commander regained control over his features. He forced another thin, humorless smile. “I understand your mission, Major. And, as I promised Defense Minister Ulanov, I will cooperate fully with this investigation.” Then he shrugged. “I merely thought starting here would save you precious time and effort.”
“How so?”
Serov motioned toward the weather-stained concrete building beyond the chainlink fence. A nearby gate stood ajar. “It would be quicker to show you, Major.”
“Very well,” Koniev said wryly. He waved the base commander toward the gate. “After you, General.”
Frowning, Serov led them through the gate and then an unlocked metal door into the cavernous building. Enough sunlight filtered in through dirt-encrusted windows to reveal dozens of massive metal cylinders lying in rows across the floor. Some were covered by canvas tarps. Others were left exposed to the drafts wafting in through the ill-fitting doors and windows. Turbine wheels, thrust nozzles, and mazes of piping and wiring around the outside identified the cylinders as jet engines.
The Russian general stopped by one of the enormous engines.
He patted it. “This is a Saturn AL-2! turbojet. Two of them power each of my Su-24 fighter-bombers. And each engine produces nearly twenty-five thousand pounds of thrust.
“But these …” Serov patted the vast cylinder again, less affectionately this time. “These Saturns produce nothing — not an ounce of thrust. They are worn out and inoperable. Useless. All of them.”
“And they’re just sitting here — gathering dust?” Thorn asked, eyeing the rows of silent engines in front of him dubiously. No U.S. Air Force commander he’d ever met would have allowed so many defective power plants to pile up. “Can’t they be repaired?”
The Russian general nodded. “Certainly, they could be repaired, Colonel Thorn.” Then he shrugged. “If my government supplied the trained manpower or the money to run an adequate maintenance operation. Unfortunately Moscow provides me with neither. So here they wait and here they rust — just so much useless scrap metal.”
He turned his gaze on them. “Do you understand the situation here at Kandalaksha? Do you know the difficulties we face every day? The fuel shortages? The budget cuts? The pay shortfalls?”
Serov scowled. “My pilots are lucky if they get four hours’ flying time a month — barely enough to learn how to take off and land safely.
Fewer than half my planes are flight-ready—”
Koniev stepped closer, interrupting him. “Spare me the litany of your woes, General. There are many other commanders with similar problems.”
The MVD officer sharpened his tone. “But your real problems go far beyond slow pay and budget restrictions, General! At the moment, one of your officers is dead — apparently murdered by others involved in a heroin smuggling ring operating out of your duty station. The very same officer we believe sabotaged a plane carrying the American arms inspection team and their Russian counterparts. If you wish to avoid a courtmartial for incompetence or worse, I suggest you start discussing this secret project of yours — now!”
Serov hid a scowl. The arrogant, insubordinate young pup! He fought the temptation to cut this interrogation short by pulling rank on the MVD officer. But Reichardt’s telephoned instructions had been explicit.
/> “Give Koniev and the Americans some of the truth, Feodor Mikhailovich,” the German had ordered. “Not all of it. Just enough to convince them they’re on the right trail. I will handle the rest.”
The Russian general grimaced. Even the partial truths he was about to tell revealed too much of his own wrongdoing for his taste. But Reichardt had made it clear that he had no choice — none at all. He was caught in a vise between the German on the one hand and these meddling investigators on the other.
“You have thirty seconds,” Koniev warned.
“Very well,” Serov said bitterly, surrendering to foul necessity.
He would obey Reichardt’s instructions. He nodded toward the rows of unrepaired engines. “You are looking at the raw materials for a venture, Major … a private business venture. One that involved several of my ranking officers and myself including Captain Grushtin.”
Koniev cocked his head. “A business venture? Using state property? Perhaps you had better explain yourself more fully, General.”
“Yes. I suppose I must.” Serov sighed. “Very well. You should know that I have never been a rich man — not on the pittance the State pays me. And even that meager amount will shrink further once I retire.”
He spread his hands in a mute appeal. “My wife and I have two daughters in school, Major. Their fees had drained every ruble of my savings, and we were growing increasingly desperate with every passing month. I knew our finances would only get worse once I could no longer rely on government housing and rations. I even considered resigning my commission early to try and earn a proper living in some other way. Perhaps even as a menial laborer for one of the new private companies.”
He looked down at his feet. “Then several months ago I was approached by a man named Peterhof. He was the representative of a major arms export company — a company called Arrus Export, Incorporated.”
Arrus? Colonel Peter Thorn glanced at Helen., “I’ve heard of it,” she whispered. “It’s a big player in the Russian arms market. Moves tanks, artillery, spare parts, and other military gear all over the globe.”