by Peter Sasgen
“And you?” Zakayev said, looking at Litvanov’s grubby outfit.
“They don’t know who I am. They’ll think I’m your civilian driver.” He jerked a thumb at the girl.
“And her, they’ll just ignore because they’ll think she’s—he’s—with you.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, yes. The base commander’s a drunk and has no idea what’s going on under his own nose. They’re all a bunch of drunks. How do you think we walk off with goods to barter? Trust me on that.”
They stood in the alley by the bolted door adjusting to the dark, getting their bearings.
“This way,” Litvanov said.
Suddenly a pair of headlight beams shot into the alley blinding them. Litvanov threw up an arm. Frozen in the hard, brilliant light, it took a moment to react.
“Get down!” He grabbed the girl and they rolled for cover behind the concrete stairs at the entrance to the warehouse as automatic weapons stuttered and bullets snapped overhead, spanged off brick, metal, and wood. In the shattering silence that followed, Zakayev heard empty brass cartridge cases skittering and spinning over ice and stone. And the metallic slap of a round jacking into the chamber of an automatic pistol that he guessed was Litvanov’s.
Zakayev reached back and felt around blindly. The girl raised her head a fraction. “I’m not hurt,” she said. Then: “It’s him. Ivan Serov.”
Muzzle flashes; another burst of gunfire rattled up the alley.
Zakayev raised his head cautiously and recognized the dual nostrils of a BMW grille between the headlights. He guessed there were three shooters lurking behind the car, which was parked about twenty meters away with two wheels on the curb up against the wall of a warehouse. And one of them was Ivan Serov.
He understood now. Despite precautions they had been followed. Serov had set a trap and he had walked right into it: the narrow alley, the seawall, the harbor—a box, a killing ground. They were pinned down and cut off from the parked truck, their only means of escape. The alley was a stage, and the blinding klieg lights made it impossible for the actors to see the audience waiting for the performance to begin.
Another flash and stutter. Chunks of shattered brick and cement rained on Zakayev and the girl.
He was back in Chechnya. Russian guns cracking and popping all around him and his men. The dull thump of a rocket-propelled grenade exploding. The screams of the wounded and dying. The sharp, sweet smell of cordite mixed with the brassy odor of wet blood. His blood oozing from a horrid, searing wound on his hip turning the baked Chechen soil into red mud. They were low on water and ammo. And it was only noon. Hours to go before dark and possible escape into the hills. Litvanov, on his belly behind a large empty packing crate up against the warehouse, growled something that brought Zakayev back to the present.
“General! Who’s out there? What do they want?”
“It’s Ivan Serov and he wants me.”
“Fuck! You said he was dead.”
Zakayev said nothing.
Litvanov, flat on the ground, aimed and shot out a headlight. In response a white-hot muzzle flash bloomed in the narrow space between the car and brick wall of the warehouse. Bullets ravaged masonry, punched through windows and the packing crate, tearing out splinters of brick, glass, and wood.
Still flat and below the line of fire, Litvanov shot out another headlight. The glare they had been looking into dimmed but didn’t go out, and to make a run for the truck was suicidal: They would be perfect targets lit by the beams from the two remaining headlights. The only way out was to kill Serov and his men.
Somewhere in the distance a police car siren started hee-hawing insistently.
“Hear that?” Litvanov growled over his shoulder at Zakayev. It drew another burst of fire from the shooter hunkered between the car and the wall.
Zakayev waited until he saw the man’s outline back lighted from reflections off the BMW’s gleaming finish. He rested his cupped left hand, which steadied his right hand gripping the P7, on the top step.
When he had the man in his sights, he fired twice. The first bullet pierced the BMW’s windshield. The second bullet struck the shooter in the head like a trip-hammer. His body crashed against the car, then sprawled out into the street, weapon clattering after him.
The two remaining shooters crouched behind the car fired wildly, hosing down the street. Zakayev and the girl hugged the ground as bullets ripped overhead.
“Shit!” Litvanov scuttled backward from his hide like a crab until his feet contacted the base of the concrete steps opposite where Zakayev and the girl had taken cover.
More sirens. Somewhere a watchdog barked.
“Ali!” It was Serov. “I’m going to finish our business.” His voice resonated with loathing and resignation.
Zakayev looked around. The truck was too far away. Serov was too close. The police were getting closer.
“Ali? Do you hear me? We can’t sit here all night. I’ll make a deal with you. A mutually beneficial deal.”
Zakayev reached back and grabbed the girl’s arm. “Give it to me.”
“The girl can go free. But not Litvanov. He stays and we finish it.”
“How does he know…?” the girl said.
But Zakayev’s hand closed around the Czech grenade. A URG-86, it had a four-and-a-half-second fuse.
If he did it right, he could skip the grenade over the icy street and under the BMW.
He gave the pistol to the girl. “When I tell you, empty the magazine.”
“Yes.”
“Georgi,” Zakayev called. “Stay down but be ready to run.”
“What are you doing?”
“Do as I say.”
“Ali?”
He nudged the girl. “Now!”
She opened fire, the bullets ricocheting off the car and howling away into the night.
Zakayev pulled the pin on the grenade, released the spoon, and, with a delicate underhand toss around the staircase, sent it skipping across the icy street toward the car.
The pistol’s magazine ran dry. Zakayev hauled the girl down behind the steps as Serov and his man, ignoring the approaching police cars, opened fire with their automatic weapons.
A pinprick of light appeared under the BMW. A split second later the vehicle exploded in a huge ball of flaming gasoline. Red-hot shards of metal pinwheeled into the air and over the tops of the warehouses.
The deafening explosion rocked the confined space they were in. The searing fireball rolling out of the alley forced policemen jumping out of their cars with guns drawn to dive for cover.
Zakayev, ears ringing, staggered to his feet and saw a burning shell of a car and flames licking up the side of the warehouse and curling over the roof parapet where large pieces of burning wreckage had landed. A few feet from where Zakayev stood was a smoldering tire still mounted on an alloy wheel.
More police cars arrived, but the fire that had engulfed buildings on both sides of the alley kept the officers at bay.
Zakayev, Litvanov, and the girl dashed for the truck and piled in.
“We’ll take backstreets and work our way around the harbor,” Litvanov said. “The main streets will soon be blocked off by the police.”
A fire truck screamed by in the opposite direction, then another with police cars following.
Zakayev looked back and saw flames leaping skyward, turning the bottoms of low clouds over the harbor red.
“Anyone behind us?” Litvanov asked.
“We’re clear.”
Litvanov found the intersection he wanted and turned right to head north against the Tuloma River.
Hunched over the wheel, Litvanov blew through his teeth and said, “General, I thought Serov was dead.”
The girl, seated between them, said, “He is now.”
The truck ground north, toward Olenya Bay.
Paul Friedman, the national security advisor, signaled with a subtle toss of his head and thrust of jaw, that the president of the United
States was displeased.
Karl Radford entered the Oval Office and slipped into a wing chair beside the president. Friedman sat on a sofa, his knees pressed awkwardly together supporting a bundle of battered folders stamped Top Secret. The only sound in the Oval Office came from a ticking desk clock that had once belonged to Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. An inaugural gift from Radford to the president, a Nimitz admirer, it sat on a Duncan Phyfe end table next to a bust of Nimitz.
Friedman and Radford waited while the president read a document. Radford assumed it was the briefing summary he had prepared at Friedman’s direction the night before. Without looking up, the president, a handsome black man wearing a double-breasted charcoal suit, said, “Good morning, Karl.”
“Good morning, Mr. President,” said Radford.
The Nimitz clock ticked toward seven A.M.
The president finished reading. He put his elbows on the chair arms and made a steeple with his fingers. “This fellow, Scott,” he said, speaking to Radford over the steeple top. “I thought he had orders to escort Drummond’s body home, not open an independent investigation. I see here that you spoke to him.”
“Yes, sir. Last night.”
“What’s he up to?”
“Wants to prove that Drummond was murdered. He doesn’t believe the FSB report and wants to clear the man’s name.”
Friedman, heavyset with a head of thick, unruly hair that curled over his shirt collar, said, “I’m surprised you authorized his trip to Murmansk. Isn’t that risky?”
“If I had ordered Scott to stay out of Murmansk, it would only make him suspicious,” Radford said. “I felt a trip there would prove he’s on a wild-goose chase. After all, there’s nothing to see.”
The president said, “This science attaché, Dr. Thorne. What do you know about him?”
“It’s a ‘her,’ Mr. President,” Radford replied. “I was fooled too. She worked with Drummond, knows the ropes up there on the Kola Peninsula.”
“Can she be trusted?” the president asked.
“Scott vouched for her.”
Friedman said, “I read Scott’s file: It says he’s got a reputation for taking matters into his own hands.
Sounds like that’s what he’s doing now.”
The president collapsed his steeple. “What’s that all about, Karl?”
“Sir, Paul’s referring to a submarine recon mission Scott undertook a year ago for the SRO into the Yellow Sea. You may remember that your predecessor ordered a special-ops team into North Korea in preparation for a preemptive strike on the Yongbyon nuclear complex. The NKs stumbled on the op before we could execute. Scott almost lost his ship trying to save a SEAL team that the NKs had trapped. He had explicit orders that if something went wrong he was to pull out and leave the team behind but didn’t.”
The president nodded. “I remember. Pretty gutsy, I’d say.”
“But a direct violation of orders. We almost lost a Los Angeles–class nuke to the NKs. It would have been a propaganda coup for them if we had and a hell of a provocation too.”
“To say nothing of the NK ship he torpedoed,” Friedman added.
The president waved that aside and moved on. “I don’t want this Drummond affair blowing up in my face while I’m in St. Petersburg. I’m facing some difficult negotiations, and the Russians have been playing hard ball on every issue we need to resolve.”
“Scott will have departed Russia before you arrive, Mr. President. I guarantee it.”
The president erected his steeple again. “See that he does, Karl,” he said in a measured tone.
“Yes, sir.”
Friedman shifted the load of folders from his lap to the sofa. “Anything new on Zakayev? I see he’s not mentioned in the briefing’s threat assessment.”
“Our J-25 com intercepts have gone deaf,” Radford said. “There’s been no communications activity between Zakayev or his people for almost ninety-six hours.”
“A worrisome thing,” Friedman observed. He glanced at Radford, perhaps hoping the SRO chief would confirm this.
Radford said, “Zakayev’s being hunted all over Russia, so he’s probably hiding somewhere. If in fact he killed Drummond, he may still be somewhere between St. Petersburg and Murmansk. I expect he’ll surface soon.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” Friedman unloaded the folders onto the sofa and got to his feet. “And when he does, God help us and the Russians.”
The president collapsed his new steeple and frowned. “You’re overstating it, Paul.”
“Am I?” Friedman said, then, as if suddenly remembering who he was addressing, he softened his tone.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. President, but what I meant to say is that we underestimated Zakayev. The attack on the concert hall was a shock, something none of us could have ever imagined. We know Zakayev is unpredictable and, like a damned snake, can turn on us if he wants to. He’s proven it by turning on the Russians. He’s our creation and we’ve lost control of him. I still believe we made a serious mistake supporting him, using him to distract the Russians. And if they find out we did, it will destroy the summit and undermine our efforts to bring the Russians over to our side on a host of issues.”
“Your moral outrage is duly noted,” the president said. “But you’re raking over old ground. What’s done is done and we can’t change it. What we have to do is convince the Russians not to launch an all-out war in Chechnya and the Caucasus.”
“Sir, with respect,” Friedman said, “the Russians launched all-out war there ten years ago.”
“I’m talking about all-out war using nuclear weapons. They’ve threatened to go nuclear, and if they do it could ignite World War III.”
7
The Novy Polyarnyy Hotel, Murmansk
Y uri Abakov opened the window blind and looked out at the TV antennas and satellite dishes on the roof of the building next door silhouetted against a red glow in the eastern sky. Earlier a dull boom had rattled the windows.
“Is that a fire?” Alex asked.
“Looks like a big one in the harbor area,” Abakov confirmed.
Scott stood in the middle of the room surveying the bed, the greasy furniture, the soiled walls.
“I told you there would be nothing to see,” Abakov said, sounding slightly bored.
There was nothing to indicate that two men had died in the room. And no bloodstains on the floor or the bed. Scott peeled back the coverlet and sheets and discovered a cheap, thin mattress that looked new.
“Satisfied?” Abakov said.
Scott stood with hands on hips. A wild-goose chase, and he hated to admit it. Yet, something gnawed at him. Why here? Why with Radchenko? What was he overlooking?
Alex peeked into a corner of the room at what passed for a bathroom equipped with a chipped washstand and crazed china commode. A faded floral print curtain on a rusty pole offered little privacy.
“This place gives me the creeps,” she said.
“It’s not exactly the Sheraton Regis,” said Scott.
Alex went around the room looking, touching. She stood at the door and ran a hand over the rough woodwork. She worked the doorknob and Abakov took this to mean she was anxious to leave.
“If you are finished, I suggest we go,” Abakov said, closing the blind on the red-tinged sky. “We can conclude our business in Moscow tomorrow and then you can take custody of Admiral Drummond’s remains.”
“Scott, take a look at this,” Alex said. “These door moldings are new and freshly painted. The door looks new too. So does the lock and mortise.”
Scott examined the crudely executed carpentry where angles didn’t match and bent nail heads protruded from scarred wood trim.
“There’s a simple explanation,” Abakov said, rapping his knuckles on the new door. “The old one had been forced open and had to be replaced.”
“Forced open?” Scott said. “Why?”
“Admiral Drummond had taken the room for one night only. When he didn’t come down the
next morning to settle his bill, the porter became suspicious. He went up to check on Admiral Drummond, but when he didn’t answer the door, the porter broke it open and that’s when he found the two of them inside, dead.”
“Why did he break it open?”
“He said the chain lock was set. As you can see, it’s been replaced.”
“Did you see the broken door?” Scott said.
“No. The Murmansk police reported to me that it was smashed in when they arrived.”
“Smashed in?”
“The porter said he kicked it in.”
“I want to make sure I understand…. You were called by the Murmansk police?”
“After they discovered that one of the dead men was an American attached to the U.S. Embassy.
Admiral Drummond had nothing on him at the time he was found to indicate he was.”
“How long after the bodies were discovered did you arrive in Murmansk to take over the case?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Just curious.”
“Two days.”
“Did the Murmansk police take photos of the crime scene? Of the door?”
“Of the room, not the door.”
“So you never actually saw the bodies here. Just photos of them in the positions you described.”
Abakov hesitated before saying, “Yes.”
“I see,” Scott said.
He ran a hand over the ugly green wallpaper behind the door and felt a deep, round depression in the plaster that matched the shape of a doorknob. When the door was kicked in, it had flown back and hit the wall, the doorknob leaving its deep impression in the plaster.
“It took a lot of force to do that,” Alex said. “A lot.”
“Didn’t the porter have a passkey?” Scott said. “I mean, why break down the door?”
“It’s not my hotel,” Abakov said, apparently irritated at Scott’s discovery of his lack of firsthand knowledge of the condition of the bodies after their discovery.