War Plan Red

by Peter Sasgen

  Alex touched the corner of an eye. “I don’t know what to believe,” she added again after a long, thoughtful silence.

  Scott told her about his friendship and naval service with Drummond, and about Vivian.

  “Then you don’t believe the FSB report,” Alex said.

  “No.”

  “Then, what do you think happened to Frank?” The way she asked the question seemed to imply that she knew what his answer would be.

  “I think he was murdered.”

  “But the report said—”

  “I know what it said: suicide. But it’s bullshit.”

  “Who would murder him?” Alex said.

  “I don’t know. But I need you to help me find out.”

  They crossed Tverskaya Prospekt, an exclusive shopping street lined with expensive boutiques and hotels. Even so, Scott spotted a new McDonald’s restaurant going up next to a Prada store.

  She gave Scott a look. “How can I possibly help you?”

  “You were with him a good part of the time he was in Murmansk. Maybe there’s something you can remember that’ll help. Like his cell phone call.”

  “Forget that. I told you, it’s useless. Totally garbled.”

  “Did you know the sailor who died?”

  “No. All I knew was that he was assigned to the K-363.”

  “Then, how did Drummond know him? What personal business would a Russian enlisted sailor have had with an American naval officer?”

  “Beats me, Jake.”

  “Those are things we have to know.”

  “But how can you hope to find the killer if you’re here only to take Frank’s body back to the States.

  You don’t have time to investigate anything.”

  “I’ll make time.”

  “Jake, the ambassador wants Frank’s affairs wrapped up before the summit. And you know the Russians: how their bureaucracy moves at a glacial pace. The FSB’s not going to help you because they’ve already investigated and submitted their report.”

  “I’ve got a meeting tomorrow morning with the investigator who handled the case,” Scott said. “Yuri Abakov. Do you know him?”

  “I saw his name on the report and I gave a statement to one of his people, but I’ve never met him.”

  “Tomorrow we’ll try to find out what else Abakov knows.”

  “ ‘We’?”

  “You’re coming with me. I want him to know we’re working together.”

  “Uh-uh. I’m not getting involved, Jake. I’m the second science attaché, and my jurisdiction is limited to finding loose nuclear material, not investigating a murder.”

  “Then, you do think they were murdered. Right?”

  Alex said nothing.

  “You said Frank was a friend not just a colleague,” Scott said.

  Alex pursed her lips.

  “Well, he was my friend, too, and we owe him.”

  She started to say something, but he pointed. The Marriott Grand had appeared on the right. She pulled in under the arched portico. Scott got out with his things but, before closing the door, leaned back into the SUV and said, “Tomorrow, Lubyanskaya Ploshchad. Know it?”

  “Of course,” Alex said.

  “Good. Pick me up here zero eight hundred sharp.”

  “Jake, I told you—”

  “Do it for Frank.”

  4

  FSB Headquarters, Moscow

  O utside, a pair of guards in a glassed-in booth checked IDs. Inside, helmeted officers in battle dress armed with Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns strolled the remodeled former KGB headquarters lobby. The city and its entire security apparatus were on alert after the Chechen massacre at the concert hall. Everyone was suspect.

  Scott and Alex waited at the elevator banks. Alex wore a tailored black suit and white silk roll-neck top.

  A medley of gold bracelets glittered on her wrists. Light from the recessed ceiling fixtures illuminated her even features and flawless makeup. Her eyes sparkled, and she obviously enjoyed the attention her transformation had elicited from Scott.

  A ping, and a pair of elevator doors hissed open. Their escort, a young FSB officer, motioned them inside. The doors closed, the car rose, and Scott was struck by the irony that in another era he and Alex would have been riding this elevator to an interrogation cell in the basement from which few people had ever emerged alive. All he heard was the hushed sound of the car’s ascent, not the screams of prisoners undergoing torture. As if guessing what was on his mind, Alex gave him an almost imperceptible nod.

  They got off on the tenth floor, in one of the oldest parts of the three high-rises that made up the FSB

  headquarters. The hallways were floored in worn linoleum and illuminated by buzzing fluorescent lamps. Office doors had old-fashioned pebbled glass inserts, behind one of which was the blurred silhouette of a man gesturing expansively while haranguing someone unseen.

  “Please.” The escort led them through an open door labeled Investigations Directorate, into a tiny, over heated office.

  Yuri Abakov had on a ushanka hat, its ear flaps tied securely together on top. His pasty-looking face was expressionless behind a drooping black mustache. He looked up at his visitors from behind a worn wooden desk and, as if shooing a pesky fly, flicked a hand at the escort who departed without a word.

  “Inspector Abakov?” Scott said in Russian.

  He gave Scott a once-over, noting his leather bomber jacket. “Colonel Abakov,” he replied. Before Scott had a chance to correct himself, Abakov shifted his gaze. “Who is this?” he asked, as if Alex were incapable of speaking for herself.

  “Doctor Alexandra Thorne, Ph.D.,” she said. “I’m the second science attaché, United States Embassy, Moscow.”

  “I wasn’t told she’d be present for this meeting,” Abakov said to Scott. “Who authorized it?”

  “I did,” Scott said. “You have a problem with that?” Without waiting to be asked, he pushed a chair toward Alex and took one for himself.

  Abakov removed the ushanka from a head that was bald except for a fringe of short, dark hair, the tight skin reflecting light like a mirror. His expression had changed from boredom to one of outright annoyance.

  “You’re not in the States, Commander.”

  “Captain,” said Scott.

  “You have no authority here, so don’t think that just because you’re an American who speaks Russian, you can come into my office and start throwing your weight around like Bloody Harry.”

  “It’s Dirty Harry.” Scott put his orders on the desk, in front of Abakov. “There’s my authority. As you know, Colonel, I’m here to escort Admiral Drummond’s remains back to the United States. I was told that I would have full cooperation from the FSB. And from you. Dr. Thorne was Admiral Drummond’s liaison with the U.S. Embassy and the Norwegians. She’s agreed to assist me. And since I don’t have time to waste cutting through bullshit, I’d like to get started as soon as possible.”

  Alex’s knuckles went white on the chair arms.

  Color rose in Abakov’s face and spread across his bald pate. He rose from his chair behind the desk.

  Though he was several inches shorter than Scott, he had thick shoulders and huge, meaty hands that appeared capable of causing severe damage to whatever they grabbed hold of. A heavy vein started pulsing in his neck.

  “You Americans,” Abakov said, switching to very good English. “You think you own the world. You use your power to crush opposition to your capitalist policies and to force your values on the rest of the world. In Russia, if we resist, you threaten us and say that we are irrelevant. Everything you do is for the purpose of enriching American business. Everything you do around the world has strings attached.

  You are hypocrites!” Abakov’s voice rose until it boomed like rolling thunder. “You would like nothing better than to conquer Mother Russia so your business conglomerates can suck us dry! Your military too!”

  The door flew open and a man stuck his head in and looked aroun
d. “Yuri, I can hear you all the way down the other end of the hall. Is everything all right?”

  Abakov caught his breath. “Yes, go away.”

  The man looked around, shrugged, and left. Abakov, slightly winded, sat down.

  “Are you finished lecturing us?” Scott said.

  Abakov ignored this and read Scott’s orders while touching the pulsing vein in his neck.

  “What can you add to your report on Drummond’s death?” Scott said, as if Abakov’s outburst had not occurred.

  Abakov bristled. “Nothing. Everything is in the report. Admiral Drummond and another man were both found dead in bed together. Ballistics confirmed that the bullets in their brains had been fired from the gun we found in Admiral Drummond’s possession.”

  Scott waved that away. “I’m not questioning the basic facts of the case, Colonel. But allow me to explain something to you.” Scott told Abakov what he knew about Drummond and detailed their professional and personal relationship. He finished, saying, “I assure you, he was not a homosexual.”

  Abakov, a blank expression on his face, appeared unconvinced.

  “Now let me tell you something,” Abakov said evenly in English. “I’ve been an investigator for almost thirty years. I understand human nature. I learned to think not only with my brain”—he tapped his head with a thick finger—“but also with my eyes. Sometimes the truth is right in front of you and all you have to do is look at it. Sometimes it even jumps up and bites you in the ass. There in Murmansk, in that hotel room, was Admiral Drummond, dead, shot in the head. Lying next to him was the young sailor, Andre Radchenko, also dead. Admiral Drummond had in his hand the pistol used to kill the young man and himself. What the report doesn’t say is that the two were found lying very close together, embracing, you might even say. Each had a hand on the other’s genitals, more or less, rigor mortis being what it is.”

  Alex put a hand to her mouth.

  “Experience told me that these two had had a gomoseksualist—homosexual—encounter. But something went wrong. Perhaps they had had a lovers’ quarrel. It happens all the time. Or perhaps Admiral Drummond realized that one day he would return to his wife and couldn’t bear the thought of losing his young male lover.”

  “Nonsense,” Alex said. “None of that fits the Frank Drummond I knew. What you’ve described is totally out of character.”

  Abakov’s gaze fixed on Alex. At length he said, “Dear lady, you were intimate with Admiral Drummond?”

  “What do you mean by ‘intimate’?”

  “Did you have sexual intercourse with him?”

  Alex started. “Of course not. Our relationship was strictly business.”

  “Then how do you know he wasn’t gay or bisexual?”

  “A woman can tell.”

  Abakov shrugged dismissively. “Of course.”

  “I want to view Drummond’s body before it’s prepared for shipment to the States,” Scott said. “Alex?”

  She nodded faintly.

  “Can you make the arrangements, Colonel?”

  Abakov looked exasperated.

  “What’s the problem?” Scott said.

  “The problem, Captain, is that my department lacks manpower. The few men I have are overworked.

  Visiting a corpse uses up time better spent solving crimes. I myself have not been home for supper in a week and my children have forgotten what I look like. My wife is not, as you Americans would say, a happy camper.”

  “Sorry,” said Scott.

  “Sorry, yes.” Abakov pointed to a stack of case folders on his desk and on the floor. “The FSB has a backlog of these and not enough men to handle them.” He picked up a file and slapped it with the back of a hand. “Here, for instance. We’ve had to send a team to St. Petersburg to find an FSB officer who has been missing for several days. We have no idea what happened to him. On top of that, there was also a mafiya shoot-out in St. Petersburg in which a man ended up dead, another perhaps badly wounded, but we don’t know for sure. It appears the dead man was a member of Ivan Serov’s organization, which has links to Alikhan Zakayev, who we believe was behind the bombing of the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall. The pressure from the Kremlin, to say nothing of your Secret Service, to find Zakayev before the summit opens is unrelenting.”

  “He’s your number one suspect?” Scott said.

  “Yes. He’s a monster who enjoys killing Russians. Can you imagine killing a thousand innocent civilians? The sooner we find and capture him, the sooner we can end this nightmare of terrorism.”

  “Any leads on his whereabouts?” Scott said.

  “All we know is that where one finds Serov, one often finds Zakayev.”

  “Interesting. What do you make of the fact that Zakayev may have been in St. Petersburg?” Scott said.

  “At the moment, nothing. In any event, I am eager to wrap up this Drummond business,” Abakov said, shifting subjects. “After all, we don’t want something like this unfortunate incident in Murmansk to affect U.S. Russian relations.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Scott said.

  Abakov jammed the ushanka on his head and reached for the phone. “I’ll let the morgue know we are coming.”

  A 9mm slug had furrowed Zakayev’s left forearm just below the elbow. The girl had fussed over him until the painkillers made him drowsy and he fell asleep. He awoke hungry and in pain. While he ate, the girl demonstrated by poking a finger through a bullet hole in the sleeves of his cashmere topcoat and suit jacket, both stiff with dried blood, the track the bullet had taken.

  “Get rid of them,” Zakayev said. “Your fur coat too.”

  The girl tied everything in a bundle and took them into the work area of the car repair shop for disposal.

  He had no recollection of having been shot. Only later had he discovered that his clothes were wet with blood. After he’d been stitched up by one of his men, the pain had set in. He was familiar with bullet wounds: He’d been shot twice by Russian Spetsnaz in Grozny and had the ugly red scar tissue to prove it. There was no way to know for sure, but he wanted to believe that it had been Serov who shot him.

  It had been a setup from the start. No one could be trusted now, not even the Brotherhood. The girl was sure she’d shot Serov, but even if she had, he might still be alive and plotting another trap. Still, Serov would have a mess to deal with in the aftermath of the shoot-out that could only be cleaned up by bribing members of the St. Petersburg militia and editors and journalists at newspapers and TV stations.

  He would also have to deal with an FSB already on high alert for terrorist and criminal activity, scouring the city for the missing bull. The thought of Serov feeling heat from the authorities made Zakayev feel better.

  The girl returned and watched while Zakayev changed into a nondescript outfit that made him look like a uchitel—a teacher—perhaps from some small, provincial technical school. He shaved off his pencil mustache, donned a ushanka, and wound a wool scarf around his neck to complete the transformation.

  The girl, in boots, leather pants, and bulky sweater, would pose as one of his students.

  Zakayev heard the hiss and crackle of a transceiver. The man with the black headband who had savaged the bull entered the shop’s small office that had served as Zakayev’s temporary headquarters.

  “Anything?” Zakayev asked.

  “Not yet, General,” said the man. “There’s been no sign of Serov or his men. We checked everywhere, even the hospitals. Maybe he’s dead.”

  “You’ve done well,” Zakayev said. “But Serov is like a cat with nine lives. I have a feeling we’ll hear from him again.” He looked around the squalid quarters. “Tell the others we’ll be done soon.”

  The man and his crackling radio departed. The girl helped Zakayev pack a small black suitcase with wheels and a retractable handle. Inside were outfits he’d wear later. She had packed her own things in a red nylon backpack similar to those favored by college students the world over. When they were finished, Zakayev summoned his
men.

  His eyes roamed their faces. They had taken a blood oath to avenge the brutal slaughter of their families in Chechnya and to prove their unquestioned loyalty to him. They had fought at his side, shared the hardships and tragedies the war in Chechnya had unleashed, and together had killed scores of Russian soldiers.

  Zakayev recalled an incident during which he and his men had seemingly been driven mad by their unquenchable lust for revenge. He had sucked the coppery taste of blood from the stump of a tooth shattered by the butt of an assault rifle slammed against his face. He spat blood in the Russian’s face before driving the butt of his own assault rifle into the soldier’s guts, then watched the man choke to death on his own vomit. Zakayev, bleeding from his mouth, head swimming from the blow to this face, leaped over a crumbled wall that once had been part of a house in a small village outside Grozny and, with the girl at his side, took cover.

  Locusts shrilled in the midsummer Chechen heat. The landscape rose and fell in unruly heaps of green around decaying homes and farms. Dilapidated houses lined the town’s deserted main street. He saw punched out windows with torn curtains and, farther on, burned-out buildings and piles of rubble. A fire-blackened Russian truck lay upside down, its undercarriage looking like the exposed belly of a giant scorched bug. Six corpses lay scattered around it.

  The Russian Zakayev had just killed brought the total to seven. There were at least five more Russians trapped in the barn. The evidence of their crime was in plain view: On the side of the barn in which the Russians hid were the naked crucified bodies of a young Chechen woman and her infant. The Russian soldiers had raped the mother, then nailed her and the child to the side of the barn, driving long iron spikes through their hands and feet. The pale corpses hung, spread eagle, from the weathered planks.

  Zakayev and his men caught the soldiers standing around the barn laughing, smoking, drinking vodka.

  Hit by an RPG, their truck had roared into the air and crashed back to earth in a ball of flame. The dead lay where they had fallen, twisted, formless, some headless. The others had put up a brief firefight from inside the barn but knew it was hopeless.