by Tom Abrahams
“Stop!” I tell the frightened clerk. “Now play it forward. Please.”
The girl hits another button and the video plays in real time.
The Citroen, with me behind the wheel, reappears at the left of the screen and slowly moves into the parking spot. I get out of the car and walk past the woman with the dogs, who turns left and waits to cross the street as a black SUV wheels into the frame.
“Pause it there! Can you zoom in at all?”
“A little bit,” she says. “It gets fuzzy if I go too close up.”
“Zoom in on that SUV.”
She pushes some buttons on the face of the DVR. The image on the screen shifts and zooms into the SUV.
The man in the front passenger seat of the SUV is wearing a white turtleneck and sunglasses!
“Zoom in on the license plate of that vehicle please!” I tap the screen again, inching closer to the monitor to get as good a look as possible.
She enlarges the image on the screen and zooms toward the license plate. It’s long and thin, like most European plates. On its left is the standard blue strip for European Union countries. The rest of the page is white with large black letters and numbers. I can read the white “D” on the blue background, indicating the car is registered in Germany. Next to the country designation is another letter.
“Is that an O?” I ask my unintentional hostage.
“Yes,” she says. “That’s unusual. Is this really the car you are looking for?”
“Yes.” I turn to look at her. “Why?”
“The first letters of the license plate says what city the car is from,” she explains. “It’s one, two, or three letters depending upon the city. This one doesn’t have that designation.”
“What is it then?”
“The letter O means this is a diplomatic vehicle,” she squints. “And that is definitely an O.”
“What about the numbers after it?” I point to the screen. “What do they mean?”
“I don’t know,” she says. “The numbers are codes for diplomatic missions. The first numbers would tell you the country. The second number, after the dash line, would tell you the registration number.”
“The number before the dash is 140,” I say. “We need to find out what country that represents.”
She sits there, looking dumfounded.
“I need help. My friend was kidnapped in front of your store here. I have to find her. These are dangerous people I’m talking about.”
She glances at the pistol tucked into my waist and the Tec-9 hanging on my shoulder.
“I get it,” I say. “I come barging in here, forcing you at gunpoint to lead me into the back room of your office. I’m not going to hurt you. I told you that. I am asking, not demanding, your help in figuring out who took her and where they might have gone.”
The woman’s not shaking anymore, the mascara has dried on her cheeks. She’s not on the verge of hyperventilating with every exaggerated breath.
“Okay,” she relents. “I’ll go to the computer in the front. We can look it up maybe. But then please go.”
“Deal,” I follow her back into the space behind the counter in the store’s main area.
She bellies up to her workspace, punches a few keys, then maneuvers the mouse to some search results. I haven’t even focused on the screen when she announces what she’s found.
“Russia,” she says. “The car is registered to the Russian embassy.”
“Is there a Russian embassy in Frankfurt?”
I’m not surprised. Blogis is working for the Russians. Putin and his brethren would be more powerful than ever if they forced the U.S. into a unilateral nuclear disarmament. We’d be vulnerable to the Russians, the Chinese, even the Iranians.
“There’s a consulate,” she clicks away on the keyboard. “It’s only five minutes from here.” She seems almost excited for me, her fear of my ridiculous weaponry momentarily forgotten. “Maybe less than two kilometers. You could walk it. It takes ten minutes if you go south on Oeder Weg. It is next big street over.”
“Okay. I need two more things, and then I’m gone.”
“That wasn’t part of the agreement.” She backs away from her computer shaking her head.
“I need a box. Or better yet, a soft mailing pouch that’ll hold this.” I pull the strap over my head and lay the Tec-9 on the counter. “I can’t very well walk down Oder Weg carrying a machine pistol.”
She hurries to the back room, returning with a large soft sided shipping pouch and a pair of scissors, which she holds up and waves. “You’ll need to hold onto the gun and be ready to use it, yes?”
“Yes.”
She cuts holes into the bag so that I can grip the Tec-9 while it’s hidden in a nice bright yellow DHL Express pouch, the words Deutshe Post in large black lettering across the front.
“You might need this too.” She tosses me a yellow and red DHL polo shirt. “If you are going to sneak into the consulate.”
“Aren’t you going to get in trouble for this?”
“Our cameras are off right now,” she says. “I had to shut them down to look at the video for you. Now, what is the second thing you need?”
“Hold onto these.” I hand her the two silver hard drives.
“I can’t…” she says, despite taking them from me. “What are they?”
“They have some information on them, and I need to leave them somewhere safe for a few minutes. It’ll be an hour or two, tops.”
She looks at the drives and bites her lower lip. “Hang on a moment.” She disappears into the back room again and then returns with a key. “This is a mailbox key. Behind you,” she points with the key past my left shoulder, “there are some mailboxes that we let. You can borrow one.” She hands me the key and the drives. “Number 2929.”
“Thank you.” I pull the shirt on over my existing one. “Really, I —”
“Please just go now.” She smiles weakly. “It’s good.”
I stuff the drives in the mailbox, the key into my pocket, grab the package, adjust the pistol in my belt, and push my way back onto the street. I’ve got a strong feeling that Bella is at that consulate, but my guess is that she won’t be there for long.
***
The Russian Consulate is a six-story building across from a wooded park. I’m approaching from the park, trying to surveil the situation before jumping in feet first, when my phone buzzes again.
“Sir Spencer, your timing, as always, is perfect.”
“Outside the embassy?”
“Consulate.”
“Regardless,” he replies, “nicely done. Very quick work, Jackson.”
“I won’t even ask how you know where I am.” I take a few steps into the park. “Clearly you know Blogis has Bella. How is that?”
“I told him where you were,” his words hang in the broadband, “and then I gave him your cell number.” His tone is so nonchalant I’d think he was French, not British.
“I —you…”
“At a loss, good man?” he chides. “Of course you are. I’ll fill you in on a little something.”
He waits for me to respond, but I’m still trying to process the fact that he handed us right to the killer who is, at the moment, the greatest threat to our mission and our lives.
“Here’s how it works,” Sir Spencer pontificates. “You have two pieces of the puzzle, as it were. Our dear friend Mr. Blogis has a third piece. In Heidelberg, I believe, exists a fourth piece.”
“We knew this already. How does this —”
“Ah, ah, ah,” he interrupts. “Wait for the full explanation.”
“Go ahead.”
“Thank you for the permission to continue, Jackson,” he says, his voice droll against the ubiquitous clinking of ice in a glass. “Now, as I was saying, we have all of the pieces in sight.”
“All of them?”
“Oh yes,” he says. “Thank you for reminding me. I’ll soon have the fourth piece of the process. Bella’s man, Mack, he�
�s procuring it for me. So, given that we’ll all be headed to Heidelberg,” he chews a piece of ice, the crunch irritatingly loud, “I needed to assure that all of us would manage a reunion there.”
“Why?”
“The way this is playing out, we run the real risk of nobody having all of the pieces to the neutrino process. That would be a shame. Someone should benefit, don’t you think?”
I shrink deeper into the park, hiding behind a thicket of trees.
“I told Blogis where to find you,” he details. “I told him that if he took Bella, you’d give chase with two pieces in hand. All of you would end up together in one place. Then he could kill you, if he chose to do so, and possess three pieces of the process. I’d then negotiate the final piece. One of us would end up incredibly wealthy, the other unbelievably powerful.”
“But that’s not what’ll happen,” I surmise.
“Brilliant boy,” he laughs, “you know me too well. It’s as if we’re family, cut from the same cloth.”
“Hardly.”
“My dilemma is that I never know where Blogis will be,” he muses. “But if I can lead him to you—”
“Because you magically always know where I am.”
“Exactly, I lead him to you, which leads me to him. I can grab, with as much force as needed, the piece I don’t have.”
“You don’t have three pieces.”
“Oh, Jackson,” he laments. “It’s just a matter of time before I have all of them. You don’t care about the process really. You want your freedom. You want to disappear! So,” he says, “you’ll give me what I want to get what you want. That’s what this was all about to begin with, right?”
“What about Bella?” I ask. She won’t give up so easily.
“What about Bella? She’s collateral damage in this, Jackson. Do you really believe I would lie in bed, colloquially of course, with the daughter of a man whose work I fought so hard to stop?”
Collateral damage was the same phrase he’d used to describe me in the eyes of Bella’s father.
“This is business, Jackson. This is money and power and the blood that must spill to ensure the preservation, nay, the growth of both intoxicants. Bella, that untrustworthy little demon, will die at the end of this. She was a conduit and nothing more.”
“But —”
“Jackson,” he scolds, “enough now. Understand that I entered into this agreement with her, this offer of help, only because it was so much cheaper than trying to play Dr. Wolf’s ridiculously expensive game. I could not afford to be outbid. So I took the shortcut, exposed him to Bella, and offered my gentle assistance.”
“And you picked me because —”
“I picked you, Jackson,” all warmth in his voice evaporates, “because I know you. I know where you are and where you’ll be. You’re little more than a carbon-based tracking device, Jackson. Certainly, I’ve underestimated your gumption in the past. But let us be honest with one another. This is far above your capability. Follow Blogis’ instructions, lead him to me in Heidelberg, and get your pass to lifelong freedom.”
There’s a click and the line goes dead.
From behind the thicket, I turn around to look at the compound. Rescuing Bella does seem like an impossible task. I could forget this and be a step closer to the anonymous freedom I’ve sought for months.
But can I trust that Sir Spencer will deliver?
Collateral damage.
Conduit.
Carbon-based tracking device.
Screw it. I’m getting Bella. And we’re controlling the process.
***
My dad’s steak was undercooked that night. I remember the pool of dark red juice pooled on his plate, seeping into his helping of mashed potatoes. Regardless, he cut into that piece of meat with vigor, sawing back and forth on the undercooked filet for each bite.
He liked his steaks rare and bloody, but that night’s offering was particularly offensive to a kid whose carnivorous repertoire consisted of chicken nuggets, hot dogs, and the occasional well-done cheeseburger.
He didn’t say much until I instigated a conversation halfway through my second helping of string beans. I was chewing loudly, smacking my lips, trying to get his attention.
“Jackson,” he snarled like a coyote mid-meal, “you know your mother and I have told you repeatedly not to smack your food. It’s disgusting.” His eyes were closed when he said it.
“Sorry,” I smacked. “It’s just so good.”
“Thank you, Jackson,” Mom said, “but your father’s right. Mind your manners.”
I sucked pieces of bean from between my front teeth. “Who was that guy, Dad?”
My mom looked at me and then at my dad, who was busy chewing with his mouth closed. He took his napkin and wiped a spot of juice that dribbled onto his chin. When he finished his mouthful and swallowed, which took forever, he took a deep breath before speaking.
“That was a college acquaintance of mine,” he said. “We used to be on the rifle team together.”
“Why was he here?”
“He and I were both hired by the same company out of college. Then we went our separate ways. I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“What company?”
“It was a government contractor that recruited us at N.C. State.”
“A technology company?” I took note of my parents’ furtive glance at one another before my dad responded.
“Yep.” He took an unusually large gulp from his glass of red table wine. My dad didn’t drink much, that I recall, but he always had a glass of wine with his steak. “Why was he here?”
“Finish your beans,” my mom said. “You asked for a second helping. If you want dessert tonight, you need to clean your plate.”
I nodded at my mom, stabbed a forkful of beans, shoveled them into my mouth, and then looked at my dad.
“He made me a job offer.”
“What?” My mom’s reaction told me that she knew more about this visitor than she’d previously indicated. She wasn’t nearly the poker player my father claimed to be.
“It’s a short-term thing,” he explained. “A few weeks at most for a fairly large commission. I told him I wasn’t interested.”
“Good,” my mom said, further giving away her hand.
“Why were you so upset with him?” I asked. “He was offering you a job, so —”
“Not the kind of job I want,” my dad said firmly. “He and I had a falling out years ago. We didn’t see eye to eye on the way to conduct business or for whom we should work.”
“He was not the most upstanding of coworkers,” Mom said.
“I thought you didn’t know who he was?” I poked my fork into the final portion of beans.
“I didn’t recognize him at first,” my mom said. “His hair is so much shorter than it used to be.”
I had an epiphany. “Wait a second. I recognize him!”
“How do you know who he is?” My dad plopped his forearms on the table, his knife in one hand, steak filled fork in the other.
“He’s in that picture with you,” I said. “You know, the one of the rifle team that sits on the bookshelf in your study next to the big trophy?”
Both my parents are looking at me, shocked that I’ve added two plus two.
“Yeah, he’s the guy with his elbow on dad’s shoulder. The one who dad always said was the second best shot on the team.”
My dad slowly draws the fork into his mouth and sucks the piece of meat off of the tines. He chews, his lips pursed, without answering. My mom pushed herself away from the table, stood, and started gathering plates to take to the sink.
“Who’s ready for some dessert?” she said. “I’ve got cherry cobbler and vanilla ice cream.”
“I am!” My favorite dessert.
“I’ll take some too.” My dad’s expression changed and he winked at me. “Nothing better than cherry pie, right, hon?” He looked at my mom, whose face was suddenly flushed.
“You’re bad,” s
he said. “So bad.”
“Your mom makes the best dessert,” Dad said. “It’s worthy of a whole new conversation, right, bud?”
I got the hint.
***
Like so many buildings in this city, the Russian consulate is cream colored stone and concrete. The structure itself is austere like its homeland. At ground level there are a series of barred windows, indicating a below grade basement.
There’s no easy street access to the building. There’s a waist high gate at one corner of the building, which is connected to a fence that surrounds a compound of what may be four or five buildings. At the other end of that fence is a motorized track gate, intended for vehicular entry and exit. There are no guards or security visible from the street, but I do notice a pair of remotely controlled security cameras affixed to the gutter downspout which runs the length of the building.
Looking past the cameras, there’s a portico with what looks like a double door entrance. Again, no visible security. And no sign of Bella. Taking a deep breath, I cross the street and step to the fencing that runs along the sidewalk.
A ligustrom hedge runs the length of the fence between the two gates. I shuffle past it, looking to my left and into what passes for a parking lot, where I get a better look at the space between two of the buildings. Squeezed between them, hidden in a narrow alleyway, is a white Citroen.
I spent the ten minute walk from the Packstation formulating a plan. Well, let’s be honest, it’s a close facsimile of a plan. Really, it’s more like those Choose Your Own Adventures I apply to the what-ifs in my life.
At the vehicular gate, there’s a metal call box. I push the red button and a loud beep is followed by someone answering the call.
“Russian Federation.”
It’s a man’s voice. He asks me my business. He coughs through the question, making it that much tougher to translate what he’s saying.
“I have a delivery,” I say in Ukrainian. “I’m with DHL.”