Just seconds later came a new sensation of movement, only this time Isphording was sure that the van was on the road again. Outside their armored box they could see nothing but darkness. The guard tried his cell phone but couldn’t get a signal and could only communicate with the two men in the cab by banging on the bulkhead that separated them.
For thirty-five minutes they could feel the motion as the van was moved out of the city. They could sense and hear the truck accelerate as it reached a highway, and later slow and twist around curves as it left the major thoroughfare. Not long after, all motion stopped. Wherever the Russians, Yuri Zayysev and the woman, Ludmilla, who’d pretended to be Kara, were taking him, Isphording assumed they’d arrived.
He and his guard waited in silence for something to happen. The minutes crept by slowly.
What the lawyer couldn’t see from the back of the armored van was that Linc and the others were waiting for Juan to arrive. As soon as he pulled his Mercedes SUV between the tractor trailer and Julia’s Volkswagen, Hali closed the big overhead door. Because of the overcast sky, the light coming through the opaque skylights cast the big warehouse in murky shadow. Hali snapped on a few overhead lamps, but it did little to soften the building’s gloomy air.
Cabrillo’s SUV was powdered with cement dust, and the chairman himself was grimy. He accepted a damp cloth from Julia to wipe the worst of the dust from his face. He also drank down a half liter of water. “So far, so good,” he congratulated his people. “Looks like no one had any trouble getting here, so let’s open this tin can and finish it. Linc, I couldn’t tell when I lowered the truck into the rig, which way is it facing?”
“It’s facing the rear doors.”
“That should make this a little easier.” Juan grabbed a Heckler&Koch MP-5 machine pistol from a workbench and slid the strap over his shoulder. He also palmed a pair of round grenades. They were dummy practice grenades but would look indistinguishable from the real things to the guards in the van. He passed around black ski masks to everyone and lowered his over his face so only his eyes and mouth were exposed. The others had also armed themselves with an assortment of pistols and machine guns.
Once everyone was ready at the rear of the trailer, he unlatched the door. He gave his people a five-second countdown and swung open the door with a jerk. All five of them swarmed up inside the trailer, jumping onto the van’s long hood, waving their weapons and shouting incoherently. The Swiss driver and the guard riding shotgun had service pistols in their hands, but through the bulletproof glass they were at a standoff. Before the driver could start the engine and try to drive out of the trailer, Juan leered into the windscreen and showed off the grenades.
He pointed at each man and then at the doors before pulling the pin from one of the grenades. There was no mistaking his intention.
The guards maintained their defiant look but knew there was nothing they could do. They laid the weapons on the dashboard and slowly reached for the door handles. As soon as the doors unlocked, a member of the team was ready with plastic-tie handcuffs, blindfolds, and gags. Hali yanked the key ring from the driver’s polished belt and tossed it to Juan.
The chairman climbed over the top of the armored van and jumped lightly to the floor of the trailer. On the fifth attempt he inserted the correct key into the lock, but before he turned it, he nodded to one of his men.
If anything went wrong there was no reason for Kara and Rudolph Isphording to be able to give the same description of Yuri Zayssev, so he had General Operations specialist Michael Trono call out in Russian-accented English, “To the guard in there with Herr Isphording. Your two comrades have already been subdued. They will not be harmed, and neither will you. I am going to open the door just enough for you to toss out your weapon. If you do not, I will be forced to use tear gas. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” the guard responded.
“Herr Isphording, how many guns does the guard have?”
“Just a pistol,” the lawyer replied.
“Very good. Has he removed it from its holster?”
“Yes.”
“That is very wise of you,” Trono said. “Herr Isphording, take the gun from him and move to the rear door. I am opening it now. Toss the weapon onto the floor.”
Cabrillo cracked open the heavy door, and a black revolver clattered off the rear bumper. Hali and Julia had joined them, their weapons at the ready. Juan nodded to them and heaved the door all the way open. The frightened guard sat on a bench that ran along one wall of the van. He understood enough of the situation to have already laced his fingers on top of his head. Hali cuffed, gagged, and blindfolded him while Julia helped the paunchy lawyer from the vehicle. The other two guards were shoved into the back of the van, and Juan locked them in.
Isphording saw five armed commandos, some wearing work clothes, others all in black. One had the curves of a woman, and he guessed it was Ludmilla. “Is one of you Yuri Zayysev?” he asked eagerly.
“Da,” one of the commandos answered. His work clothes were streaked with gray powder, and when he stripped off his mask, his face was still streaked with dust. His hair was red, like Isphording had been told to expect, and his beard had been trimmed to a ruddy goatee.
“Mr. Savich sends his compliments, Rudolph.” The man used the name Isphording himself had provided. “Of course, he couldn’t meet you in person, but you will see him soon enough. There is an office at the back of the warehouse. Ludmilla will take you there. We’ll leave here in a few minutes.”
Julia had taken off her mask so that the attorney could see that she was the woman he knew as Ludmilla, although she wasn’t wearing the disguise.
“Thank you.” Isphording pumped her hand. “And my wife? What about Kara?”
“Another team is fetching her now,” the woman called Ludmilla replied.
“Thank you,” the lawyer repeated. “I thank all of you for saving me.”
“You were not harmed?” Ludmilla asked as Isphording followed her out of the trailer. Linc had placed a stepladder at the rear door to make it easier for him.
“No. I am fine. A little frightened perhaps. Until you came on Friday I had no idea the Palestinians were after me. I’m grateful to you all.”
Julia gave him a smile. “You have Mr. Savich to thank. We are just doing as he ordered.”
“I knew he’s a powerful man, but I had no idea he could arrange something like this.”
“Here we are,” Ludmilla announced.
The office was spartan, just a couple of desks and filing cabinets and a worn vinyl couch under a frosted glass window. The floors were scuffed linoleum, and the room smelled of cigarettes. Curtains were drawn over the large piece of plate glass that overlooked the warehouse floor. Isphording collapsed onto the couch and accepted the bottle of water Ludmilla handed him.
A few minutes later Yuri Zayysev strode into the office. He’d left his machine pistol out in the warehouse, but he’d belted a holster around his lean waist.
“What happens now, Herr Zayysev?” Isphording asked.
“We’re waiting for some more of my people, and then we are leaving. The man who drove the truck thinks he might have been followed, so we’re hurrying our schedule. We don’t know if the Palestinians are on to us or not.”
“They haven’t operated outside the Middle East in years,” Isphording said. “They must truly be desperate.”
“A lot of money is unaccounted for since Yasir Arafat’s death,” Zayysev countered, “enough to make anyone desperate.”