by Chris Allen
“Outsourced,” Davenport offered.
“Yes, outsourced.”
“Zolnerowich?”
“Yes. By now the hardliner Latushkin had been appointed head of the SVR and he handed the task to his mentor, General Zolnerowich. As you can imagine, Zolnerowich was only too pleased to accept. The story of his assassination was leaked to ensure that he could proceed with the task without any connection being traced back to him or to the government. Zolnerowich was funded to bolster the organization he had established some years before and, with Latushkin’s blessing, he was sent off to keep the United States and her allies in the Middle East by any means possible. He would be self-sufficient to ensure that he was distanced from the Kremlin. Of course, we now know that Zolnerowich exceeded his orders and has become a law unto himself.”
Zolnerowich was funded to bolster the organization he had established some years before. The name Renegade immediately flashed through Davenport’s subconscious. He didn’t share that thought, this was not the time, but he knew that he was right.
“And Helldiver?” he said.
“The perfect intermediary to ensure that the plan could be implemented by his father, albeit once removed. Helldiver is a favored son of Russia; an oligarch who enjoys the friendship and support of those in the highest levels of government and society.”
“An eccentric billionaire who can travel the world as he pleases, indulging his passion for wreck diving and living the high life, without interference,” Davenport added. “And this plan to destabilize the West?”
“When you wish to create fear and mistrust globally, you must first strike at the foundations of international alliances. Al Qaeda was defeated and a new enemy was required, one even more evil than Al Qaeda.”
“Islamic State,” Davenport said, barely able to believe what he was hearing. “How very like Zolnerowich.”
“Precisely, he’d been cultivating them for years; but of course that was not enough for Zolnerowich. He took it further, beyond his orders. An additional layer was required to cement Islamic State as the ultimate enemy. Without the endorsement of the Kremlin, he devised a plan to create fear and uncertainty in the skies, to remind the West of 9/11 and all that followed. This time however, they would attack the national carriers of Muslim nations who, in the eyes of the extremists, had not done enough to encourage global jihad. Under the premise that the extremists required funding, fighters and equipment, the hijackings were designed to coerce those governments into greater support of jihad while also creating fear and uncertainty across the world.”
“Meanwhile, the Russian government is progressing its expansionist agenda across Europe and reclaiming former Soviet territories while the US and her allies are overcommitted elsewhere and unable to do anything more than wave an angry finger.” Davenport’s memory of Zolnerowich’s final words to him that day in Aldershot came back to him as clearly as if he was standing beside the man once again and hearing them for the first time: “In twenty years, we will be reclaiming every inch of Russian soil back from the separatists and the West will thank us for it.”
“But, as you know, Reggie, government priorities change as quickly as they are implemented. Often without notice. Putin has now made his plans for Europe more than clear to the West, already showing NATO that he is not afraid to push the friendship, and he is fully committed to his plan to reinstate Russia as a superpower once more, restoring the balance that once existed during the days of the Soviet Union.”
“The new Cold War.”
“Of course, and so, despite earlier support for this Islamic State destabilization operation, Putin’s strategy has advanced well beyond that and the government is satisfied that their objectives have been achieved. The US and her allies are committed again to fighting the extremists and the conditions are set for a return of Russia to superpower status.”
“So this destabilization operation is no longer required?”
She nodded.
“Then why is Zolnerowich persisting with it, Asya? Flight 712 was brought down only last week. Required or not, this operation is still in play.”
Namdakov remained silent. Her expression told Davenport that there was more going on on the Russian side. More than she was prepared to say.
“Your government has tried to shut him down but he’s not toeing the line. Is that it?”
“General Zolnerowich and his son, Helldiver, are no longer in favor in the Kremlin,” she said. “He was told to close the operation down. He did not. Zolnerowich thinks he is above direction. He is not. He was told there would be consequences. I can tell you that in the past twenty-four hours there have already been consequences in the south of France. Zolnerowich has been recalled to Moscow. The son, too.”
“What has become of Latushkin?”
“Latushkin will be dealt with.”
“And the attempt on Helldiver in Hawaii. Your people?”
She nodded. “Although it was hastily arranged and I understand contractors were used. If it had been our own people it is highly probable that Helldiver would not have survived.”
“You said when we sat down that you considered our discussion could be mutually beneficial. You have trusted a great deal of extremely helpful information with me, Asya. You have taken me into your confidence and for that I am very grateful. So tell me, what can I now do for you?”
“You can stop Zolnerowich and his son, Helldiver. And we will help you do it.”
CHAPTER 25
Sheremetyevo International Airport, Khimki, Moscow Oblast, Russian Federation
Alex Morgan touched down at Sheremetyevo International Airport at 2240 hours on Aeroflot flight SU2473 from Nice. The flight had been a reasonably pain-free four and a half hours. He managed to get out of the house almost immediately in order to make the flight in time. Obviously that meant leaving Arena behind but he had no choice – he needed to get into Moscow well ahead of Helldiver’s arrival. Arena had arranged everything, including actively supporting Morgan’s argument to a very drunk Helldiver that it was necessary he went in first in order to ensure they had a foot on the ground and weren’t flying in blind. The arrangement was that Morgan would personally be standing on the tarmac at the arrivals hangar awaiting Helldiver’s private jet at midday the following day. If he wasn’t there then they could expect trouble and, if possible, abort. Helldiver had reluctantly acquiesced.
Unfortunately, Morgan wasn’t able to get any more than a few stolen moments with Arena before he raced to the airport. They’d managed to arrange for Arena to ensure that her controller made contact with Morgan in Moscow – personally if possible. Meanwhile, Morgan sent off a brief but crucial communiqué to Intrepid HQ, outlining what had happened and what he knew so far. As so often happened in the clandestine world, the long fuse of intelligence gathering inevitably resulted in an explosive period of intense activity to bring the issue to a conclusion. Traditionally, that had been the very moment when General Davenport would insert his agents. And that was where Morgan found himself once again, after months of supposed exile – less than twenty-four hours into his phase of the operation and already the lit fuse had begun its explosive trajectory toward the finale.
Sheremetyevo airport was pretty standard in terms of any recently upgraded modern airport. Morgan was taken from the aircraft to the terminal by bus, walked upstairs to the arrivals pier, through passport control and, having been cleared, moved through the terminal to collect his luggage. Everything was unremarkable. Morgan didn’t notice any of the tourist brochure minutiae common in airports these days; he traveled so often and to so many places that he only paid attention to things like passport control processes and staff, the general layout, notable RV points in case he had to meet anyone, suspicious people and exit routes. Otherwise, they were no more significant to him than a bus stop. Sheremetyevo was no exception. It was the history of the airport that came to Morgan. It had been built at the height of the Cold War in 1959 and still came with the inherent danger of falling into the hands
of the KGB that had routinely faced Western agents who had attempted to gain access to the Soviet Union through this portal during those years. Morgan found himself walking in their shoes, facing those same dangers – not at the hands of the KGB but its successor, the SVR. He’d already seen the extent to which SVR agents would carry out their orders with no apparent regard for the risk to themselves or their colleagues. The significance of the fact that Morgan himself had, as recently as a few hours ago, killed four of them was not lost on him. Nor was the highly likely possibility that he was known by the SVR to be on Helldiver’s payroll and therefore a person of some interest to them. The only information he’d received that had given him any solace was from Intrepid HQ: top cover had been arranged but he should proceed with reasonable caution on arrival in Moscow. He was to make his way directly to his hotel and he would be contacted first thing in the morning. That was it. Clearly something was going on but it was either too early to advise him with any certainty or the details hadn’t been sorted out yet. He would just have to grin and bear it, maintain the pretense of being Helldiver’s advance party and see what happened.
For the first time in a very long time, Morgan was wrestling with his conscience. Over the months of his self-imposed exile, he’d been harboring thoughts of turning his back once and for all on the path on which his life had led him as a soldier and, now, an agent. He’d even been giving serious consideration to convincing Reigns to join him. The idea held strong appeal to him, resonating with a deep-seated need to settle, somewhere, someday. Sooner rather than later. But that had all come to a screeching halt the moment he’d opened the door of his room back at the Château de la Lavande to find Arena standing there. Jesus. Ever since that moment, his thoughts had been consumed by Arena, all the while feeling that he was somehow betraying Beth.
His first priority was getting a taxi into the city and the Hotel Baltschug Kempinski. He made his way outside with his luggage, wrestled within the usual melee of the taxi network and found the ride Arena had pre-ordered for him. Pre-ordering was apparently the most efficient way to arrange a taxi when traveling to Moscow from the airport and, having done so, Morgan had to presume the driver could very likely be on the SVR payroll. Either way, as they spent the next forty minutes driving into Moscow, the guy who picked Morgan up was convincing enough in his guise as a professional taxi driver. Morgan soon discovered that Moscow was not a very hilly city and so the chances of seeing any major landmarks on the drive were not good – until you were basically driving alongside them, he thought, especially at this time of night.
When he arrived at the Hotel Baltschug Kempinski on the edge of the Moskva River in central Moscow, he found the behavior of the reception staff a little disconcerting. As he’d walked into the building while the porters retrieved his luggage from the cab, he was welcomed warmly by a young woman and a middle-aged man – until he mentioned his name. At that point there was a change, it was subtle but it was there, and it was the very thing that a secret agent was trained to observe when most people would not have noticed a thing. The eagerness of their combined welcome had not altered one iota, nor the breadth of their smiles, nor even the patter of their seamless transition to English when welcoming a foreigner. The shift was in their eyes and in their body language. It was nothing more than a minute tightening of the reins of personal comfort. It told Morgan that the staff had been ordered to look out for this man and to make a call the moment he arrived and certain people were to be informed. At this point, Morgan knew that all the desk staff wanted to do was check him in, get him seen to his room, make the call, and be done with it. And once they were done with it they’d be hoping that nothing bad would happen during their shift. But this was Moscow and anything could happen. All Morgan could do was go with it.
He could feel the eyes on him already – from across the lobby or across the river, he couldn’t tell. He just knew and he knew that the desk staff couldn’t be rid of him quick enough. It was obvious that the young woman had been dealt the short straw. She was to be charming to the late-arriving foreigner who, for whatever reason, was a person of interest to the authorities, while the middle-aged man, possibly her senior, would remain discreetly to one side, smiling when required, until Morgan had left the reception desk and then, Morgan guessed, the man would be the one to make the call. Morgan decided to make their job easier by being as swift as he could while registering his details. The closer the young woman got to handing him the access cards for his room, the calmer both she and the man became. They could see the finish line and Morgan was silently cheering them on.
The girl handed him the courtesy envelope for his room, the man waved over a porter, and Morgan turned and headed in the direction of the elevator with the porter eagerly trying to get in front of him in order to lead the way. By the time they’d reached the top floor and he was shown into a room alongside the premiere suite that Arena had arranged for Helldiver, Morgan was braced and ready for anything they could throw at him. He waited until his luggage arrived. He tipped both porters handsomely, closed the door behind them and then began the process of inspecting his room.
He’d no sooner taken off his jacket and was about to remove his tie when there was a knock at the door. He took a deep breath, stood slightly to one side with all his weight on his leading leg, flicked the room’s entrance light off and opened it.
The moment the door cracked and the light from corridor spilled inside, the gun appeared.
CHAPTER 26
There were two of them. The first was the rookie – whose sole purpose was distraction. He was to engage Morgan for the vital first seconds of the confrontation just enough to ensure that Morgan’s A-game couldn’t be fully deployed against the second man. The gun arm leading into the open door was the giveaway. All Morgan had to do was resort to a quick and dirty disarming technique that involved securing the weapon with the right hand and then, with a rapid grab, pull and twist, breaking the wrist, taking the weapon and following through to incapacitate the attacker. The proximity of the second guy meant the follow-through option was not available to Morgan; all he could do was make the most of breaking the rookie’s wrist as badly as possible and deliver a well-placed kick to the guy’s face before he bore the brunt of the second man’s attack against his exposed flank.
Then all Morgan could see was the barrel of a heavy caliber automatic coming straight for his face. The hand carrying it and the silhouette behind was equally heavy and Morgan knew that overcoming the second man was not going to be as easy as the first. A flat-footed kick to Morgan’s left side came dangerously close to breaking ribs, but he ducked beneath the weapon and came at the gun arm from the outside. The guy’s elbow was at Morgan’s head height, which meant he was at least six-five or six-six tall. Morgan got his right forearm up on the inside of the guy’s wrist and then slammed his left palm directly at the elbow joint, but he knew already this guy wasn’t going down easily and that the tried-and-tested maneuver had failed before he’d even thought to use it. His strike recoiled off the guy’s arm and the joint remained unmoved.
Suddenly the gun barrel was coming around again. Morgan and the second man were facing off within the confined space of the room’s foyer, standing awkwardly over the first guy, who was whimpering about his fractured wrist. Discarding any kind of finesse with his counter-attack, Morgan dropped into a crouch, keeping below the gun, and came up with all his weight under the second man’s ribs and right armpit, forcing him sideways and, inescapably, across the top of his whining comrade. The man stumbled and he and Morgan fell their way clumsily back into the suite. Morgan fell down heavily on top of the second man and was in the process of getting back on his feet when the rookie finally recovered and came in over the top, kicking wildly in manic retribution. Morgan couldn’t get any purchase on the floor, was copping blows left, right and center, was struggling to get clear of the two of them when he became aware of an even bigger commotion coming in through the open door behind him. Jesus! More of t
hem.
Two shots were fired from a silenced automatic. The rookie fell instantly. All Morgan could see now was the reaction of the big guy, his face just inches away, looking up from the floor, past Morgan, straight at whoever had just pulled the trigger. The eyes were wide with anger and frustration and as he began to mouth the word “No!”, Morgan was pulled clear by unseen hands and two more shots were fired.
Tumbling away from the body, Morgan made a grab for the big guy’s dropped automatic but a barked command from behind stopped him mid-reach.
“Nyet, shpion!” The voice was used to being obeyed.
Morgan got slowly to his feet, raised his hands in the air and turned to face the man behind the order. The man who had marked Morgan as a spy and killed the two men currently lying dead at Morgan’s feet. He was standing less than four feet away, pointing a silenced Makarov at Morgan’s face. Either side of him, four more men stood, all of them between Morgan and the door, all no doubt similarly armed and not the types to be negotiated with. One of them dropped back into the darkness of the unlit foyer and closed the door. Morgan knew what was about to happen.
What struck Morgan most of all was that they were in uniform, but not the type of uniform you’d necessarily recognize as one unless you saw a bunch of them together. They were all wearing leather jackets, all black and well-worn, with T-shirts just visible at the neck, jeans and heavy boots. None was the same when considered in isolation but together they were almost identical. Physically, all of them were distinctive by their ordinariness: about Morgan’s height, around six feet, medium build, neither slender nor heavy set. Their complexions were fair, almost pale, and they all wore their hair close-cropped, high and tight like US Marines. Only, these guys weren’t Marines. Not in this part of the world. Apart from the leader standing in the middle of the room, who had now leveled the barrel of the Makarov to point directly at Morgan’s chest, they’d all had recent military or paramilitary service. The leader also had at some point, that was a given, but most of his time had been spent in clandestine service – it was written all over him. He had that incomparable quality that said he was used to having ultimate control when on his turf and Moscow was very much his turf. Morgan was an outsider, a foreign spy, and maybe that was why he was the only one of the three original targets still on his feet, alive. Although how long that particular luxury would be afforded him he had no idea. As Morgan prepared to ask, the lead man returned the automatic to the holster under his jacket and took a step back. One of the troops remained by the door while the other three stepped forward, each removing a cosh from within their jackets. They closed in on Morgan.