Course of Action: Out of Harm's WayAny Time, Any Place

by Lindsay McKenna

  “What?”

  “Think about it. The gas company’s headquarters are in Kiev, but the accident that killed Elena’s husband happened in Odessa. Given her grief and bitterness, what better way to avenge her husband’s death than by destroying the project that destroyed him?”

  “God!”

  Her protests stilled, Anna’s heart seemed to freeze inside her chest.

  “Odessa’s a huge city,” she said with a swallow. “An explosion could cause massive casualties.”

  “Which is Varno’s specialty,” Duke agreed grimly. “And why two officers from the Ukrainian Ministry of Interior’s Counterterrorism Division are flying down from Kiev to meet us in Odessa. So pack up. We need to make tracks.”

  Chapter 7

  Auntie Oksana saw them off with teary eyes and the gift of her precious wedding quilt. Anna tried to refuse, protesting that the beautifully embroidered quilt was a family heirloom.

  “You’re the granddaughter of my dear, dear cousin Katerina. You are family.”

  The older woman kissed her on both cheeks before turning to Duke. With a mock scowl, she wagged an arthritic finger.

  “You. Get to work. Make some babies. Tell him what I say, Anya.”

  She did, with great reluctance, and wasn’t surprised by the grin that came crooked and slow and all male.

  “I’ll give it my best shot, ma’am.”

  The older woman was no more immune to the wicked delight in his blue eyes than the younger. Anna had to forcibly repress a flutter in the vicinity of her stomach. Auntie cackled and motioned for him to bend down before kissing him soundly on both cheeks.

  “Now go.” Her face fell into sober folds. “Find the one who killed Elena.”

  * * *

  The road leading down out of the mountains was as twisty and knuckle-whitening as the way up. Once they hit the small town of Maiaky, however, they picked up E-87 and a straight shot into Odessa.

  The air lost a little more of its nip with each kilometer. Not surprising, since they were headed toward a popular Black Sea resort city. Anna pulled up the unclassified DIA file on Odessa and scrolled through it, filling in Duke on the city’s turbulent history as they sped along the modern motorway.

  “Odessa started life way back in the day as a Tartar settlement, one of their few warm water seaports. The Lithuanians took control of it for several centuries, then the Ottoman Turks. After the Russians defeated the Turks in 1793, Catherine the Great granted Odessa an imperial charter. Many of the city’s most elegant hotels and private residences date from that golden era.”

  “From 1793?” Duke whipped around a slow-moving truck. “Hope to hell they’ve updated the plumbing since then.”

  Anna ignored the sardonic comment and continued scrolling. “Odessa was the fourth largest city of Imperial Russia after Moscow, St. Petersburg and Warsaw. During the Soviet period it served as one of the USSR’s most important ports and trade centers.”

  Duke was more conversant with the city’s recent history than its imperial past. “The Soviets established a major Navy base there, didn’t they?”

  “They did. Which made Odessa a prime target during WWII.” She scrolled up another page and grimaced at the grim statistics. “The Germans and Romanians captured the city in 1942 after a brutal, two-month siege. They rounded up and massacred an estimated ninety thousand civilians, most of them Jews.”

  Chewing on her lower lip, she skimmed the recap of the atrocities. Thousands upon thousands of men, women and children had been marched to fields outside the city and machine-gunned where they stood. Thousands more were herded into nine separate powder warehouses, which were then set afire. Untold numbers were deported to concentration camps and never heard from again.

  Anna dropped her hands to her lap and let the cell phone screen go dim. She was an intelligence officer. She read and analyzed reports every day that gave ample evidence of the seething hatred that drove human beings to commit the most despicable acts. Yet the massive scope of these atrocities was almost beyond comprehension.

  At least until she compared them to atrocities Nikolai Varno reportedly had a hand in. Varno didn’t shy away from murder, either, although on a smaller scale. Any means justified the ends in his view—including outfitting the widows of martyred subordinates with explosives and sending them into a Moscow subway at the height of rush hour.

  He’d used the same cold-blooded approach with Elena, Anna thought grimly. Exploiting her grief. Firing her with a desperate need for vengeance. Had he contacted other women widowed by the accident that took Marko’s life?

  The thought brought Anna upright in her seat. Swiftly, she cleared her phone screen and punched in the code for the secure military satellite link.

  “What are you doing?” Duke asked curiously.

  She held up a finger and listened for the tone signaling her to go ahead. “Condor Main, this is Condor Two.”

  When the 352nd responded, she was ready with her request.

  “Can you patch me through to JITF-CT at DIA headquarters?”

  The acronym stood for the Joint Intelligence Task Force—Combating Terrorism. DIA had set up the task force several years ago to better integrate the vast array of intel collected from such varied sources as prisoner interrogations, spy satellites and military attachés serving at embassies around the world. Driven by her sudden thought, Anna was desperate to get hold of someone in the task force.

  “Do you copy, Condor Main?”

  “I copy, Condor Two. JITF-CT at DIA HQ. Hang on.”

  In the few moments it took to make the patch, she ran through a mental list of the civilian and military analysts detailed to the DIA task force. To her relief, the one who came on the line was a Navy lieutenant she knew personally.

  “What can I do for you, Solkov?”

  “I need everything you can dig up on the explosion that took the life of a Ukrainian construction worker by the name of Marko Rushenko. The explosion occurred four or five months ago near the city of Odessa. He was working on a project to upgrade a feeder line for the Soyuz pipeline.”

  “The Russian natural gas line that runs through the Ukraine?”

  “Affirmative.”

  The lieutenant didn’t audibly suck wind, but Anna knew he wanted to. She would, too, if hit with a request like this.

  “We’ll have to tap into highly classified sources. And if we turn up any information, we’ll need top-level clearance to release it.”

  “I understand. What I want are the names and family data of any other men killed or injured in the same accident.”

  “Noted. I’ll get back to you if we can find the info and get the green light to release it.”

  “They’ll get the green,” Duke drawled when she filled him in on the other end of her brief exchange. “Although I suspect the Ukrainian agents meeting us in Odessa could get the information faster.”

  “Maybe,” Anna said with unshakable faith in the superior capabilities of the U.S. intel community, “and maybe not.”

  “In any case, that was good thinking.”

  She basked in the small glow of his approval for the last thirty kilometers before they hit the outskirts of Odessa. Using SatCom mapping directions, Anna guided them through the urban sprawl.

  * * *

  The half-light of early evening wasn’t kind to the Soviet-era apartment buildings ringing the outer city. The long, unadorned, eminently functional stretches of concrete looked like prison blocks. Obviously recent attempts to add color and small green parks did little to soften their bleak exteriors. Only after Anna and Duke had penetrated the outer rings did the elegance of Catherine the Great’s favorite seaside resort begin to emerge.

  The streets widened and became tree-shaded boulevards. Unadorned concrete gave way to crumbling, not-yet-restored 18th and 19th facades. These in turn led to palaces and public buildings meticulously returned to their baroque glory. At the heart of the city, Odessa’s famed Opera and Ballet House stood resplendent i
n gilt and white marble. Illuminated niches containing statues of the world’s most famous composers encircled the neoclassical structure. Riveted by its beauty, Anna flicked her thumbs again to bring up the building’s history.

  “It says here the acoustics are so incredible that the softest whisper can be heard throughout the horseshoe-shaped hall,” she relayed to a semi-interested Duke. “Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff conducted here. The great Enrico Caruso, among others, performed on stage, and Isadora Duncan danced here.”

  “I’ve heard of her,” Duke commented as he negotiated the traffic circle in front of the Opera House. “Isn’t she the one who was strangled when her long, billowing silk scarf got caught in the spokes of her Model T’s tires?”

  Leave it to a special ops type to have picked up that arcane bit of history.

  “I think so.”

  Anna craned around for a last glimpse of the building Forbes magazine listed as one of the most important sights in Eastern Europe. When she flopped back into her seat, her breath caught at the lavishly adorned stucco palaces that lined the boulevard spearing out from the theater. Painted pink and turquoise and pale yellow, they’d been lovingly, gloriously restored.

  At the very heart of the city was a larger-than-life-size statue of Catherine the Great. The empress dominated an elegant square and gazed toward the Black Sea, which could be accessed by what looked like a steep set of steps that seemed to drop straight down to the harbor.

  “Those are the Potemkin steps,” Anna informed Duke. “Once the formal entrance to the city for all visitors.”

  “Never mind the steps. Just get us to the hotel.”

  “It’s supposed to be right here, on the square.”

  Their instructions were to check in, and the agents from the Ministry of Interior’s Counterterrorism Division in Kiev would contact them at the hotel.

  Anna and Duke spotted their designated destination at the same time. He gave a low whistle. She gulped.

  “I don’t think we’re dressed for this.”

  It was all pink stucco and white marble columns, with elaborate pediments crowning every window in what looked like a mile-long facade. A half-dozen limos were lined up near the entrance. Doormen in white periwigs and frogged-and-braided blue coats stood ready to welcome guests.

  The bewigged doormen were too well-trained to show anything but welcoming smiles for the two scruffy tourists who pulled up in an open jeep with mud-coated wheels. Duke gave them the jeep’s keys but declined help with the luggage.

  “We’ve got it,” he said easily.

  His pistol was back in its concealed compartment. Anna knew he wasn’t about to let it out of his hands. He hefted the duffel and his backpack. She carried hers. The doormen held the door for them, and they entered a lobby screaming with marble and money. The crystal chandeliers alone must have cost a prince’s ransom.

  Although Anna guessed the average price of a room in Odessa was probably half that of a comparable room in Paris or London or Washington, the knowledge did little to ease her bureaucrat’s conscience. Duke might have been joking about being required to pay for the damage to the jeep caused by the logging cart. Her years working in Washington, however, had given her a front-row seat to the sordid spectacle of high-ranking elected officials being sanctioned for extravagant boondoggles made at taxpayers’ expense.

  Her first impression of the lobby they walked into did little to soothe the prick of her conscience. The men strolling the marble floors or occupying one of the massive leather armchairs scattered amid feathery palms looked as though the cost of a room was the least of their concerns. They were executives for the most part, some in three-piece suits, some in jeans topped by sports coats, but all exuding the assurance that they belonged to an exclusive club. The women accompanying them were young and sleek. Very sleek. Unlike the males, few if any of the females sported wedding rings.

  “What happens in Vegas,” Anna murmured, eyeing one tall, particularly attentive companion.

  “Or in Odessa,” Duke agreed dryly.

  The receptionist manning the marble counter greeted them with the same polite disregard for their casual attire as the doormen.

  “Good evening. May I help you?”

  “Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael,” Duke told him. “I believe you have a reservation for us.”

  “Yes, indeed, Mr. Carmichael. We have you and your wife in a lovely two-bedroom suite overlooking the square.”

  If the receptionist wondered why a married couple needed two bedrooms, he certainly wasn’t going to ask. With brisk efficiency he swiped their passports and took an imprint of Duke’s credit card before handing them the key cards for their suite.

  With a word of thanks, they made for the elevators. They’d discussed at some length the need to continue their cover during the drive into the city. Anna’s passport carried her own name. The agents they would meet with shortly knew their real status. She could have checked into a separate room.

  Duke had insisted they maintain the charade of a married couple, however. They didn’t know if Varno was, in fact, headed for Odessa. Or if he’d relayed information about the American woman who’d talked to Elena to other members of his cell. If he had, they might come looking for Anna. So Duke wanted to keep her close. A two-bedroom suite was as much distance as he would allow between them.

  She’d agreed to the compromise with a swamping sense of relief. The intensity of her response to Duke Carmichael had made her question whether she’d closed off too much of herself after Jeremy’s death. The crush of Duke’s mouth on hers, the feel of his arm banding her waist, brought needs too long dormant roaring back to life. The erection she’d glimpsed only this morning had added to the simmering and very volatile mix.

  That very impressive bulge told her it wasn’t all one-sided. She was having the same effect on him he had on her. Well, maybe not the same. With that lazy, come-hither grin and unshakable confidence, the man had probably racked up more trophies than a big-game hunter. Anna would just be one more to add to his wall.

  Still, between the hunger he roused and the urgency of their mission, she felt more alive, more in-the-moment, than she had in longer than she could remember. The realization both tantalized and disturbed her. Hopefully, their separate sleeping quarters would give her a breather from Duke’s overwhelming presence and help her decide how best to act—or not act—on the physical desire she couldn’t seem to suppress no matter how hard she tried.

  She was still wrestling with the conflicting emotions Duke roused when the elevator doors opened onto a hallway carpeted in royal-red. Sconces dripping crystal tears illuminated the corridor. Anna noticed Duke scoping out the security cameras mounted at strategic intervals. He also tested the crash bar on the stairwell as they passed.

  Once inside their suite, he gave another low whistle. The sitting room was larger than Auntie Oksana’s entire house. The furnishings blended exquisite antique with high-tech. Duke’s eyes lit at the sight of a 55-inch plasma TV hanging above a well-stocked minibar. Anna zeroed in on the view of the main square framed by a pair of French doors.

  “Ohhhh.”

  Enchanted, she nudged the doors open and stepped onto a balcony enclosed by a waist-high wrought-iron railing. Equally elaborate iron streetlamps lit up Odessa’s main square, while carefully placed floodlights illuminated the ornate facades of the palaces lining the plaza.

  The effect was magical. A visual masterpiece. One that must have delighted the sensual, hedonistic Catherine the Great, who’d indulged her love of beauty by taking dozens of handsome young lovers and amassing one of the world’s greatest collections of art.

  Duke was on the MilSat link when Anna went back inside. After confirming their arrival in Odessa, he listened a moment and nodded. “Roger that. We’ll stand by.”

  “Stand by for what?” she asked when he signed off.

  “The agents from Kiev have been delayed. They won’t get here until morning.”

  She shrugged to dispel t
he tiredness that dragged at her like an anchor. “Well, I guess we might as well go hunt up dinner.”

  Going out was the last thing she wanted to do right now. She was not only weary, but she also felt grubby beyond words. Duke, thank God, shared her sentiments.

  “I could use some downtime. Why don’t we clean up, then order from room service?”

  “Deal!” She grabbed her backpack. “Which bedroom do you want?”

  “Doesn’t matter. I checked both while you were on the balcony. One has a tub,” he related, manfully restraining a grimace, “the other a shower.”

  “You can have the shower. Right now I can think of nothing more seductive than wallowing in a tub of fragrant bubbles.”

  “Nothing?”

  An all-too-familiar glint came into his eyes, and Anna kicked herself for giving him the perfect opening line.

  “Don’t say it.”

  She hesitated for a few moments, then decided it was time to be honest.

  “As you might have noticed, I’m out of practice when it comes to sexual repartee.”

  “I don’t know ’bout that, sweetheart.”

  “Duke. Please. Take my word for it. I haven’t... I’m not... Oh, crap!”

  She blinked furiously to stem the tears that welled up without warning. She couldn’t stop them. She knew they were due to accumulated stress. Knew, too, they were nothing more than a release valve. All the rationalization in the world couldn’t stop her from being completely mortified, however.

  The tears surprised Duke almost as much as they did her. He recovered faster than Anna, though. The teasing glint evaporated, and his voice gentled.

  “Go take your bath. Wallow as long as you like. We’ll order dinner when you get out.”

  She fled before she embarrassed herself further. The bedroom door slammed behind her.

  * * *

  Way to go, Carmichael!