by Duffy, Sue
He flashed only a marginal grin her way. As soon as he took the turn and cleared the corner, Cass spotted the small, flat house ahead on the right, across a narrow street from the brick wall surrounding the school property. She checked and double-checked the photograph against the house. Even the oddly angled front walk to the door was the same. “Okay, I’m calling Ava.” She pulled the phone from her backpack. “But first, let’s circle the block and give this place a good look. We’ll need to tell her everything we can about it.”
One thought loomed above all others. Hans might be inside. The man who was her father, her real father. It was a transforming thought, but one she’d have to probe later. Then another thought. Who else was in there?
“Cass, hide your face,” Jordan warned as he pulled his hood over his head. “These people know us, remember? Good thing we’re not in my car.”
They were coming up on the opposite side of the school. An old two-story house rose above the wall, and a driveway ran from it through a side opening in the wall, now closed by a metal gate. “Go slow, Jordan. When you get even with the gate, stop. We need to see the grounds inside.”
“Okay, but you need to call Ava. It’ll take her team awhile to get here.”
They were creeping along the wall when a car suddenly appeared at the gate ahead, and then it opened. A black BMW sedan turned out of the property and headed away from them. “Two guys in the front, but I can’t see inside the back,” Jordan said.
They had been so startled by the car, Jordan had stopped abruptly in the street, then inched closer. When they pulled even with the gate, they were surprised to see a man just closing it from inside. He looked up and stared hard at them.
“Jordan, keep going, but not too fast. I need a good look in there.”
Jordan eased forward. As they cruised past the still-open gate, it was no longer the man attending it who held Cass’s attention. It was the figure running away from the house behind him. In the opposite direction. A man bent over and loping awkwardly. A familiar shape.
“Hans!” Cass cried, then covered her mouth fearing the man at the gate had heard her even through the closed windows.
Startled, Jordan stomped on the brake and turned to her.
“Go! Go!” she cried. “It’s Hans! Running to the other side!”
As Jordan gunned the car, Cass turned to the rear. The guy at the gate was no longer there. He was running fast behind them. “He’s chasing us!”
Jordan was forced to stop at the cross street fronting the compound and wait for traffic to clear. He couldn’t wait long, though. The man was almost on their bumper.
“Hang on!” he told Cass, and sped toward the far end of the wall. “You’re sure it was Hans?”
“Positive.”
“But there’s no way out on the other side.”
“He probably doesn’t know that. He’ll have to hide in one of the other buildings.” She pointed ahead. “Stop when you get to the front entrance. I’m getting out.” She looked quickly behind them. The man was running back the way he’d come.
“You’re what?”
She grabbed her backpack, pulled out the small handgun, and slid it into her coat pocket. “Right here!” she cried.
“Not without me.” Jordan angled dangerously toward the right curb, jumped it, and brought the car to a precarious stop. He grabbed Cass’s hand, and together they dashed across the street, dodging traffic like flags on a downhill course. At the main entrance, Cass was ready to scale the wrought-iron gate when Jordan stopped, steadied himself, then gave the rusted lock a mighty kick. The gate fell open, and Cass flashed a second of approval before they ran into the compound.
“There’s Hans!” She pointed to the figure lumbering toward a small cottage near the back wall.
“And there’s trouble,” Jordan said, swinging the other way. Their pursuer was streaking from the house in full chase with a gun in his hand. “He’s after Hans. I don’t think he sees us. Get back!” He pulled her against what appeared to be a classroom building. Then he ran toward a pile of debris nearby and pulled out a wooden board about three feet long. “Use the gun if this doesn’t work,” Jordan said, then took a position near the corner of the building concealing them. As the pounding feet grew closer, he took a batter’s stance and waited.
Seconds later, he stepped into the open and swung, bringing the full brunt of the board across the runner’s midsection. When the man doubled onto the ground, Jordan landed another blow to the back of his head and grabbed the gun from his hand. Holding it on the unconscious man, Jordan looked behind him. “No one else coming?” he asked Cass.
“Don’t see anybody. But we’ve got to tie him up.” She released the braided belt from her waist and strapped it around the man’s wrists, encountering no resistance. She noted the lump rising on his head, nothing she considered life threatening, then looked up at Jordan as if she’d never seen him before. “I didn’t know shoe salesmen could do that,” she said, tying off the last knot. She didn’t wait for a response before dashing toward the cottage. “Hurry!” she called over her shoulder.
Approaching the spot where she’d last seen Hans, she studied the brick dwelling with the windows almost completely covered by wild growth. She and Jordan found one door on the opposite side. It was open. She turned to Jordan. “Would you wait out here?” she whispered, handing him her gun. “Give me just a minute.” He nodded, comprehension clear on his face, and took a lookout position near the door.
Once inside, Cass saw that it was a studio with cobweb-laced easels stacked to one side and a few bare tables placed haphazardly about the room. The floor creaked beneath her next step, and she heard a stirring from behind a door.
“Hans, it’s Cass. You can come out.”
Something thudded to the floor behind the door as it opened slowly and a man stepped from what appeared to be a closet. “Cass?” His voice was pitched high in disbelief.
“It’s okay, Hans. You’re safe.” Though she couldn’t be sure of that. It was the shallow promise of one comforting another in an unpredictable storm.
“But how … how did you …” His pitiable face, his leaning body, the thick cording partially tied around his waist and restraining one limp arm—it was a sight too wrenching for Cass. She rushed to help him and untied most of his restraints. Then she embraced him gently, and he clung to her as if she were his last lifeline. He lowered his cheek to the top of her head and sobbed. All she could do was hold on.
Finally, he released her, and she led him to a dusty stool and made him sit while she untangled the rest of the cording. But now, he wouldn’t look at her, and she could see the shame bead up on him like a vile secretion. “You don’t know what I’ve done,” he said, his voice rasping.
“Yes, I do. You left a trail. That’s how we found you.”
He stared at her, his face pinched with a painful processing going on inside.
“That’s not all I know, Hans.”
Now the eyes riveted on her.
“Mom told me.” She searched his face. “Why couldn’t you?”
His body tipped forward, but he caught himself and turned away from her, silent for too long. “It’s best you ignore what you heard. Who would want me for a father?”
Cass made him look at her. “We all carry shame. Surely you know mine.”
He reached for her hand and drew it to his chest, holding it as if it were a prize. “You have no idea how much I’ve loved you. And how I betrayed you and your mother with my reckless—”
“Cass! Ava’s here!” Jordan announced from the door.
Hans dropped her hand.
“The FBI has been searching for this place,” Cass said. “Jordan and I just found it first.”
Hans stood and placed a hand on Cass’s shoulder. She knew it was to steady himself more than her. “It’s okay,” he said. “This is the right thing.”
He looked toward the door, then back at her. “I don’t know how you found me, but there’s no ti
me for me to ask those questions. Right now, I’ve got to tell someone what’s about to happen.”
“What do you mean?”
She could feel the shaking in his body, and once more she hugged him to her. Then Mark Delaney and an army of agents rushed the small studio.
“Wait!” she called to them, but nothing was going to stop their rapid containment of this man even though he’d given no sign of escaping. They clamped handcuffs on him and led him out of the building.
“Listen to me!” Hans cried.
“Stop!” Delaney finally told his agents, then faced Hans. Ava came up beside them, followed by Cass and Jordan.
“In my right jacket pocket! Get the flash drive! It’s names and locations of people about to blow this country up!”
Delaney thrust a hand into the pocket and retrieved the drive.
“They’re all waiting for his signal. Find a laptop. Pull up the names. They’re all over the country. A dam, a nuclear plant … you can’t waste a second!”
Delaney sent one of his agents for a laptop in his car.
Hans swilled oxygen through his gaping mouth. “That’s not all. A man named Cyrus Neale is going to blow up a tugboat near the Brooklyn Bridge!”
Delaney gripped Hans fiercely by both arms. “When?” he shouted.
“Now!”
Chapter 44
Evgeny hadn’t left the camper all day. He’d risked a few moments now and then to stretch his cramped legs, but never walked more than a few feet away. It was now mid afternoon, and he was beginning to doubt the relevance of the handwritten date. In a near-reclining position behind the wheel, he’d just straightened in his seat and was about to get out for another stretch when he spotted an oncoming black BMW with its turn signal blinking toward the heliport. The car was about to cross directly in front of the camper.
Sliding even farther below the wheel, he noted two men in the front seat and two or three people in back, but couldn’t see anyone clearly. He watched the car cruise slowly to the guard gate, stop for clearance, then proceed to a parking spot not far from the choppers. No one got out.
The longer they sat there, the more anxious Sonya became. “We shouldn’t be here, Ivan. You know they’re searching for us.”
“All they have found is Cyrus’s empty house and the bodies of Jeremy Rubin and his unfortunate brother-in-law. So relax, Sonya. We will be at sea shortly.”
The BMW was parked facing the river, just a few steps from Ivan’s private helicopter. From the back seat, where he sat with Sonya and an aide, Ivan leaned forward and spoke to his pilot, riding in the front passenger seat. “We will leave immediately afterward, Paul. You still anticipate no obstacles?”
“It is best that we depart before the skies fill with police and reporters.”
“Understood,” Ivan said, and clapped a friendly hand on his longtime compatriot’s shoulder.
The other two men in the car also had faithfully served Ivan for many years, believing in what he envisioned for Russia’s future.
“Sir, look there!” the driver alerted, pointing toward the river.
Ivan beamed with pleasure. “There goes a true hero. His memory will be exalted in the new Russia.” Ivan opened the back door of the car and got out. All but the driver followed. They moved toward the seawall of the heliport and stood silently as a massive tugboat plied the choppy East River, heading northeast toward the Brooklyn Bridge. Massed beneath a black tarpaulin stretched across the bow was the mother lode of explosives Ivan had smuggled to the New York docks, where a team of his countrymen had received, off-loaded, and transported them to Cyrus.
As the fateful boat passed, Ivan drew himself up straight and raised a salute toward the wheelhouse, hoping to catch Cyrus’s attention. As planned, the flag was rolled tightly on a staff near the helm. It wasn’t the white-blue-red bars of the current Russian Federation, but the gold-on-red hammer and sickle of the USSR.
Ivan felt an exhilarating rush as the minutes to detonation passed. In the final moments, Cyrus would unfurl the flag and leave no doubt that Red Russia had returned.
Sonya’s phone rang as planned. She confirmed the caller and handed the phone to Ivan, who answered jubilantly. “Cyrus, we see you! And we honor you!”
“And won’t Hans Kluen and that nervous little fellow Jeremy be surprised when they find out this is no demonstration,” Cyrus exclaimed. “No sirree! My boy deserves more than just a bunch of fireworks.”
“You are right, Cyrus. Your mission is to bring down the bridge.”
What are they doing? Evgeny wondered as he crept along the landside perimeter of the heliport. He could see four people assembled on the far side, gazing out at the river. He spotted the woman right away. Sonya Tretsky, he was sure. But there had been no vitals on the Architect, only a sketchy description from Jordan and the trawler captain. A couple of the men Evgeny now watched fit the stature, but all three men wore hats of some sort.
Evgeny inched as close as he could to the fence surrounding the heliport without drawing an inquiry from one of the guards. He could see only the hood of the BMW and the top half of the chopper. But those gathered at the seawall were in full view.
What was that? A salute? Evgeny thought he saw one of the men raise a hand to the brim of his hat as a tugboat passed by. Suddenly one small scrap of information Viktor had supplied about Cyrus Neale fell solidly into place, like the tumblers of a lock. A retired merchant marine. A man who knows boats. Certainly a tugboat. Was that Cyrus Neale passing in review this very instant? On his way to … what?
Evgeny looked upriver ahead of the tug. The bridge!
He felt the gun at his side. But the tug was too far away. There was no time. Only minutes before contact. Now the man in the wheelhouse stepped out and unfurled a flag, red with a gold—the Soviet flag!
“No!” Evgeny cried, but his voice sailed away with the wind. He lurched forward, about to race for the guardhouse, when he heard the wail of a siren. Then another. Evgeny looked far behind the tug to see two police boats screaming up the river. Two more came from the opposite direction, running head-on at the tug. Now a loudspeaker. “Stop your boat! This is NYPD. Stop your boat, or we’ll shoot!”
The air began to convulse with something advancing from the south, and Evgeny looked up to see two NYPD choppers swoop down on the tug. In seconds, one hovered just off the boat’s stern. The other flew past, banked into a U-turn perilously close to the bridge, then flew straight on at the bow of the boat. It hovered like a monstrous dragonfly directly in the boat’s path.
A flurry of movement at the seawall caught Evgeny’s attention, and he watched as the spectators dashed toward the BMW. Though he couldn’t see clearly, he heard doors open and close. Then four bobbing heads, three men and the woman, moved quickly to the chopper and climbed in. In moments, the rotors began their preamble to flight.
Evgeny looked back at the boat, at the Soviet flag waving defiantly, at the man darting from the wheelhouse to the tarpaulin across the bow, gun in hand. Evgeny thought he heard the man squeeze off one round before his body arched violently and crumpled to the deck. It had taken only a couple of well-placed shots from the forward chopper to drop him.
But the boat remained on course, heading for one of the neo-Gothic towers of the Brooklyn Bridge. Evgeny watched two men drop from the aft helicopter onto the tug. One charged the wheelhouse while the other rushed for the tarpaulin. Even before the officer jerked away the cover, Evgeny knew what lay beneath and why those aboard the other chopper hadn’t risked a hail of bullets to take down the tug captain.
About the time Evgeny heard the tug’s engines reverse, another sound erupted. The piercing whine of the Bell 429 snatched his attention from the drama unfolding on the river. He watched the chopper slowly rise from the deck, then he reached into his pocket.
So you came to watch the show, Evgeny called silently, and then fly off to gloat.
The chopper lifted into the wind and pointed its glassy snout toward the har
bor. It was well over the river and gaining distance when it exploded into an enormous fireball, spilling its remains to the deep.
Evgeny slipped the remote back into his pocket and returned to the camper. He was finished with it all.
He waited long enough to watch the BMW escape the heliport, tires squealing through the exit gate. There was no need to give chase. Let the driver go, Evgeny decided. He just watched his boss and all the others die. And now we both must run to ground.
Chapter 45
Melanie Thompson was irritated that her husband wasn’t answering his phone. She wanted him to start dinner before she got home. It was after five, and she still had to pick up Rudy from his music lesson at school.
She’d left the office a little early. A memo had crossed her desk that morning about the temporary closing of one of the gates to the power plant. A small inconvenience to most, a critical delay for her escape from the task that lay before her. She had spent the last hour cruising the facility, speaking to guards she knew well, eyeing the makeshift barriers that would facilitate construction of new guardhouses. Progress, she thought with only slight regret. Improvements to a doomed plant.
But when? She and Pete had been ready for some time and grew restless with each passing hour. They’d reviewed every orchestrated detail of their departure, even practicing evasive actions should that be necessary. They could vacate their rented house overnight and be on the next flight to Moscow. Then they finally would be home, though there was much work to be done there also, groundwork for the emergence of a new and indomitable Russia. She and her friends at the university had dreamed of such a revolution, ached to see their convalescing nation rise from its post-Soviet stupor and take its rightful place in the hierarchy of world power. At the top.