Chapter 26
Lucas glanced about the room. The mass of people were thinning finally. Who knew when the bomb below would go off or when Alexei would make it go off? He still had to get to Elena and move her to safety before going after the traitorous bastard. It wasn’t his country that had been betrayed but he still felt outraged on the offended country’s behalf.
St George’s Hall was a beautiful room. Once the principal throne room, the Hall had been redesigned after the 1837 fire and was redone with white colonnades on either side of the room. The columns leading up towards where the throne would be on platform at the end of the Hall, had it not been removed to be replaced with a podium and microphone. Behind the Hall was the small Apollo Hall which connected the palace with the Small Hermitage.
The hall had been divided into two sides, left and right with long banquet tables, each spot at the table had the name of the nation the delegate was from.
Lucas spotted Ducane coming at him and turned to deflect the fist. Ducane wasn’t mucking about, his fists, his feet all were going for the most sensitive body parts. Lucas did the same, his fist connecting with Ducane’s nose and he heard the satisfying crunch. Blood poured from his nose. Ducane pulled the gun from his waist band and squeezed the trigger. Lucas dived for safety as the bullet ripped through his shoulder. He fell to the floor cutting his hands on broken glass. His shoulder burned like fire. He pulled a few pieces of errant glass out of his skin. Blood welled at each cut and his coat was already damp from his shoulder.
Ducane moved closer, the gun in his hand steady as he moved around the over turned table that was protecting Lucas and aimed his shot to kill. Lucas had no time to evade him and realized with clarity that he was done. He heard the shot echo through the Hall and for a second thought he’d been shot again. He looked up at Ducane, a neat whole in his head, blood dribbling out as he fell to the floor.
Lucas saw Elena approach, the Desert Eagle still in her hand. She seemed unaffected by the fact she had just killed someone, but then again the shock mightn’t of worn off yet and she would most probably break down later.
“Where is Alexei?” she asked, her eyes moving restlessly around the room. He could see the guilt in her eyes and Lucas knew she blamed herself. If she hadn’t told Fitzgibbon to warn Alexei, they might have prevented this situation. She looked down at him and saw the blood soaking through his jacket, she paled her eyes widening.
“Oh my God Lucas, you’re hurt!”
He was touched by her concern, he had never had a woman concerned about him like that before. He certainly hadn’t had one that shot someone to protect him either, it left him feeling strange or perhaps that was the loss of blood. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Alexei. His face was contorted with rage, his weapon in his hand. His raised his arm to point the gun at Elena.
“Elena!”
Lucas reached up and grabbed hold of her wrist and yanked her to the floor beside him as Alexei squeezed the trigger, the bullet whizzed above their heads finally coming to a stop when it hit the wall. The sound of the gun firing echoed through the hall piecing his ears. He didn’t have time to ask her if she was okay, since she was still moving and hadn’t said anything he assumed she was.
Alexei looked at his watch. “Any second now.”
Lucas and Elena shared a look before Lucas wrapped his good arm around her waist and rolled her under him. He barely had time to register how good her body felt beneath his before the ground below them started to shake. A loud groan reverberated through the room as the explosive converted into gas. The pressure causing a shock wave that rose up making the C4 discharge beneath them. Lucas prayed for a little luck as the floor above the device was torn up, bits of concrete and flooring flying in all directions from the velocity of the detonation.
Lucas kept Elena covered with his body, a hand covering his head for protection. Elena was tense beneath him, her fingers digging into his coat.
Lucas watched helplessly as several delegates and their guards unfortunately hiding on the platform directly above the bomb were thrown up into the air, pieces of their bodies hitting the roof. A hole was ripped through the wall behind the platform and the podium was catapulted into the small Apollo Hall. Large chunks of the concrete flooring were thrown through the exterior wall and out into the snow. Fires broke out around the point of impact and furniture exploded nearby, scattering the pieces to the far reaches of the room. The screams of panic and fear from the frightened delegates were barely audible over the ringing in his ears.
Tables were overturned by the force of the blast and one nearby exploded, a piece struck the crown of his head, stars burst in his vision as he felt the blow to the head, he could feel the resulting pounding and the trickle of warm blood right before the impact rendered him unconscious.
Dust and debris began to settle. The fire raged and was threatening to spread. The smell of death and smoke lingered in the air. Elena coughed, her hand a fist crumbling Lucas’s coat on his back. Her heart pounded in her chest and she struggled to breath, hindered by the hundred and eighty pound or so man crushing her into the floor.
“Lucas,” she said, not hearing her voice as she spoke. The bomb blast had shot her hearing, a constant ringing sound in her ear. Luckily her ear drum had not burst from the impact on her senses. Her mouth was dry and her throat was raw, probably due to the smoke and dust she was inhaling, she needed water. Slowly she began to hear the distant wail of a siren as several fire engines approached, the sound contorting painfully in her ear but there was no disguising the well known sound of help on the way. They would need to get here quick and diffuse the fire before it had a chance to spread through to the rest of the palace. It would take emergency crews a while to sort through the debris and body parts. The bomb had been planted directly under the platform at the end of the room where the President’s would surely have been had Lucas not warned them and been removed immediately.
Elena tired to move, nudging Lucas. She was worried he had not made it and was immensely relieved when she felt him move above her. She gently rolled him off her body and saw the goose egg appearing on his head where a bit of wood had hit him and sat up. His arm was still around her waist so she had to extricate herself. She looked around at the sight, the once beautiful state room now destroyed.
She felt something cold against her head and she heard the unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked, echoing throughout the Hall. She went still, her heart once more pounding in her chest stopped and she felt cold. A hand reached down and yanked her to her feet.
“Alexei?”
“Put your hands behind your back.”
His mouth was practically on her ear as he spoke. She shivered and wondered what happened to the Desert Eagle, where had she dropped it? She did as he asked and put her hands behind her back, he roughly brought her wrists together and she felt the steel of his handcuffs connect around each wrist. Oh God. What the hell was she going to do to get out of this? She looked down at Lucas who unfortunately was still unconscious. Please Lucas, she begged. Wake up. He didn’t, time for a new plan. She tried to think of one, looking about the room for a weapon. Not that it would do her any good now what with her hands behind her back. Elena cursed at the turn of events. She would just had to go along with him until he was distracted and then she would run.
By God would she run.
Alexei half carried, half dragged her out of the room. She stumbled a few times over debris as she tried to keep up with his long strides. Alexei immediately reached out and righted her each time. His hand remained like a vice on her arm.
Chapter 27
Director Vladimir Mishkin took in the devastation, he couldn’t believe his eyes. How could someone do such at thing to a National Monument for fuck’s sake? A major piece of history like the Winter Palace of all frigging places? He would find the bastard who did this and would kill him – slowly, painfully. The body count was going to be high. He could see the body parts strewn across the remains of St
George’s Hall. He saw movement and walked over to the survivor. His eyes widened when he saw a bloodied Lucas Gates and he bent down to help the man to his feet.
The American had more lives than a cat. That or he was one lucky son-of-a-bitch. He didn’t look too bad for what he had just lived through. He still had all his limbs and didn’t seem to be suffering greatly from the loss of blood caused by the gunshot wound on his shoulder.
When this was all over he and Gates were going to have a real long talk. Mishkin had heard from the FSB that an American had warned them to remove the President from the room due to a threat against his life and they had reacted in the way all good agents did in such a situation. They got the President the fuck out of there. Even if the informant turned out to be a nut case, it was better safe than sorry.
Lucas’s head swam as he was brought to his feet. His head pounded like a jackhammer and he could’ve done with a bottle full of Vicodin and several glasses of Scotch. His shoulder throbbed as he moved his arm and he gritted his teeth against the searing pain. His mind tried to make sense of the images surrounding his vision. Fire fighters barged into the hall with their hoses at the ready, the water spraying over the flames. He watched as medics entered with their medical bags and moved over to the visible bodies lying scattered about the hall. His memory came rushing back and he immediately looked about for Elena, God if anything happened to her he would never forgive himself.
“Good God! Do you destroy everything you touch?” Mishkin’s face was the color of a red delicious apple. Lucas wasn’t sure if it was the temperature in the room or if Mishkin was just plain mad. From the state of St George’s Hall he expected it to be the latter.
The words started off garbled but by the time he was done speaking the constant ringing had lessened and he could once again hear other sounds. He wasn’t sure that was a good thing if he was about to get a lecture from Mishkin. Lucas ran the fingers of his good arm through his hair as he took in the damage.
Oops.
He had meant to diffuse the bomb but having unsuccessfully accomplished that, had done the next best thing, called for an evacuation. He could understand Vladimir Mishkin’s anger. He would feel the same if someone failed to prevent a disaster at the White House.
“Mishkin are the President’s safe?” he croaked out as if he hadn’t used his voice in a while. How long had it been since the bomb went off? How long had he been unconscious and where the hell was Elena? He remembered rolling her beneath him for protection. She should have still been there when he recovered. Had she, finding him unconscious gone for help or had something else happened to her?
“A few cuts here and bruises there but they will live to tell about it, thanks to you.”
Lucas nodded, good to know, one crisis adverted. He caught the fleeting glimpse of Alexei and Elena exiting through a hidden door at the other side of the room out the corner of his eye, son-of-a-goddamn-bitch.
“Good. Give me your gun.”
He had expected Vladimir to protest, instead he passed over the Russian Federation’s Government issued pistol.
“May I ask as to why?” he politely enquired as if Lucas was merely asking to borrow a pen.
“I have something to do. I’ll see you later.”
He then began to run after Elena.
Chapter 28
Alexei pushed Elena down a hall and to the ground when he came to a dead end, a steel blast door blocking their exit. After going through the hidden escape door in St George’s Hall, Alexei had pulled her down a narrow staircase that had led down to the basement and back into the hidden tunnels under the palace. Adrenaline pumped through Elena and was the only thing keeping her moving. She was exhausted. It had been a long few days. She had tripped a few more times on the way since her arms were behind her back and she had no way to balance herself as she and Alexei made a swift getaway. She wasn’t exactly sure of his plan but knew she was his insurance. There was no other viable reason to keep her with him.
Elena was fuming. She had trusted this man, confided in him. She had gone past scared and annoyed to downright pissed off and she was now ready to let him know it. She didn’t plan on making this easy for him. Certainly not let him use her to make his escape. He was a traitor, of his country and of his friendship with Nikolai. The latter pissing her off the most.
It all made sense to her now. Nikolai had called on Alexei when he had discovered the plot to kill the Russian and American Presidents at the UN Summit. He knew it went high within the ranks of the Government and was unsure at who to trust. He had sorely misjudged his friendship with Alexei and had paid the price.
“It was you who provided the intel to Ducane wasn’t it? Zimtovich just worked for you.” He grunted and she took that as assent. “So this was your big plan all along? This is why you killed Nikolai?”
And she knew it was him – personally him. Nikolai trusted him as she had. They had been friends since the academy, been his best man at his wedding. The amount of times he had come to dinner, then working on a case with Nikolai while they had drunk Vodka. She felt sick, sick with grief, sick with anger, sick at herself for believing his lies.
“He trusted the wrong person.” Alexei said simply.
All those years of friendship had meant nothing to him, the bastard had waited for Nikolai in their apartment, she remembered Nikolai giving him a key for ‘just in case’. She could see him waiting in the dark, listening to the key in the door as Nikolai unlocked it and entered their home, waiting for him to come closer, revealing himself ‘the friend’ before taking Nikolai’s life away.
One thing made Elena smile though and that was Nikolai had outsmarted him, in truth had not fully trusted the man he had known for years. It must have been frustrating for Alexei not being able to find his carefully laid plans. After searching the apartment and realizing they weren’t there, how he must have sweated. Worried that Nikolai had passed them on to Vladimir after it became apparent that she had known nothing about them.
He had not guessed that Nikolai had made a copy of her wedding ring and had swapped them out one night while she had slept. Nikolai had had the last laugh and imagined him sticking it to Alexei from the grave.
“Why? What is this all about, your hatred of anything besides Russia?”
“At first yes, but then I found our President to be a spineless coward. Unable to stand up for what is best for this country, our country, he does not deserve to be called our President. It is time for a new President.”
Her eyes widened. “You wanted to kill Sergei Smirnov just so his opponent would become President? Was he in on this with you? Is that how far all this goes?”
“Yuri Volstov was always the better man, Smirnov should never have been made President. He is a weakling.”
So that was what it was all about. Alexei had constructed the entire thing. From beginning to end, from murdering Nikolai to arranging for Michael Ducane to slip through immigration and get in touch with Alvin Pochenchov. All for a man like Yuri Volstov. There was a reason that Yuri failed in the polls. His plan for Russia was barely two steps away from another communist regime.
“And raving psychotic,” she said.
Alexei slapped her across the mouth, splitting her lip and snapping her head back. She could taste blood in her mouth.
“When you back a political figure you go all out don’t you?”
Dimitrovich grabbed her hard, bruising her soft flesh as he brought her to her feet and through the blast door he just opened. She bit her bottom lip, determined not to cry out in pain and give him any satisfaction.
“So help me God, Alexei I will kill you.”
His thin restraint snapped and he pushed her head first against the wall. She was dazed as her head connected with the concrete. She blinked to clear her vision. Alexei turned her around slowly, keeping her against the wall unable to move away from him. His face close to hers, she felt the skin on her hands tear as they scraped against the concrete as he kept her pinned to the
wall.
“Really? From where I’m standing you are the dead one. Well at least not until I get out of here anyway.”
Elena spat at him. “You bastard.”
She struggled with him, surprising him. Her knee came up and connected with his groin. Alexei doubled over in pain, dropping to his knees, holding his family jewels in one hand, and grabbing her ankle in the other as she tried to get away. She kicked at him with her free leg, her thick leather shoes connecting with his ribs, his face anywhere she could get at him and felt immense satisfaction at the sound of his ribs crackling under the pressure. Her foot rammed his protecting hand into his bruised genitals almost causing him to throw up. He released Elena and she took off running in the direction he had been taking her, deciding not to turn back with him still there. She could her him screaming out, “Suka,” behind her.
Alexei cursed again, before gingerly standing up. He had underestimated Elena. She had always seemed weak to him, crumbling when she had found Nikolai. He had always thought of her as fractured. He would not make the same mistake again, he thought as he limped on after her, determined to kill the bitch.
Elena didn’t know where she was or where she was going. She only knew she had to get as far away from Alexei Dimitrovich as possible. If only she could find the exit and get topside, the area would certainly be crawling with emergency personnel.
Elena stopped when she got to a small circular room with five tunnels spouting out in different directions, she would have to choose. Which one was freedom? Would all of them take her away from this place? Away from Alexei? she wondered before making her decision. She stepped forward into the tunnel of her choice when she was grabbed from behind as Alexei emerged from another tunnel, Elena struggled with him causing him to lose balance and he backhanded her across the face, stunning her into admission. Tears burned in her eyes, once for the slap, the second because she had failed in getting away from him.
Russian Law (Law Series ) (Volume 1) Page 16