“Why?” the Russian asked, a note of suspicion creeping into his voice. Perhaps he was remembering their last meeting.
“You have a security problem. One of your countrymen has brought in — specialists…I need your advice.”
“The same specialists responsible for the Dominion fireworks show?” The bombing in Virginia. Yeah, Vasiliev didn’t miss a beat.
“Da, Alexei. The same.”
“Then, if what you say is true…I agree with you, tovarisch. We do need to meet — perhaps at the bistro on Baker Street for lunch tomorrow? Ten hundred hours?”
Harry looked over at Han before responding. The Asian SEAL inclined his head, then nodded almost imperceptibly.
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Then I will see you there — one more thing.”
“Yes?”
He could hear Vasiliev clearing his throat. “Put a gun to my head again and I will kill you. And this time I won’t miss…”
The apartment complex had been a casualty of the 2008 collapse of the housing market. Half-completed, it had remained empty ever since. The owners hadn’t been able to raise the money to finance completion — and with Maryland’s real estate plunging through the floor, they hadn’t been able to unload the property either.
It had become a virtual no-man’s land, the habitat of drug addicts and the homeless.
“Target reacquired,” Yuri announced, closing one eye to focus down the scope of the Barrett M98B. Careful.
Slow, shallow breaths. The firing reticle centered on the black man’s temple, holding steady.
A couple hundred meters — just across the street, really. No crosswind. An easy shot.
The sniper rifle was set up well back of the window, resting on a pair of packing crates and stabilized by sandbags. As rock-solid as it got.
He saw the target’s hand move downward, beside his computer, to a phone on the desk. “Ready?”
Kalnins nodded, moving closer to the window on his hands and knees. Bracing himself, the Latvian aimed the laser microphone across the street, focusing on the window of their target’s apartment.
A couple moments’ delay and then the vibrations on the glass of the window came filtering back through the software on Yuri’s laptop, broadcasting once again as human voice.
“This is Carter. Yeah, I’ve been in the system for about seven hours, going over their user profiles. A lot of anomalies. This is going deep, Marika. A lot deeper than either of us thought.”
There was a thrill to being only inches away from one of the deadliest nerve agents known to man. A nervous, queasy thrill. Jamal al-Khalidi felt the beads of sweat trickling down his face and wished for a moment that he could wipe them away. The hazardous materials suit shrouding his body made that difficult.
Getting the HAZMAT suit hadn’t been much more difficult than any of the other equipment — with emergency services across the U.S. downsizing from lack of funding, he’d been able to pick one up online, the ad describing it as “gently used”. Americans and their semantics.
He picked up the rotary saw and consulted the schematics strewn over his lab tables one last time. The shell had been disarmed, the explosives rendered inert. The next step was to cut open the casing and extract the paper-thin metal container holding the powdered soman.
Jamal took a deep breath and moved to the table where the huge artillery shell lay, held in position by a pair of clamps.
What was it one of his classmates called it? The moment of truth. He took one final look around, assuring himself that everything was in place.
La illaha illa Allah, he breathed, whispering the essence of his creed. It might be the last time he said it in this life, before he repeated the words of praise and homage to Mounkir and Nakir. Muhammad rasul Allah…
A noise broke upon his reverie and his eyes flew open. Tarik Abdul Muhammad stood just within the formerly airtight door of the lab, arms folded easily across his chest. He was dressed in his street clothes.
“Ignore me,” he announced. “I am only here to observe.”
“B-but, shaikh,” Jamal stammered, “there is only one suit — if the saw pierces the metal containing the soman…it will be your death.”
The eyes of a prophet stared back at him. Calm, mesmerizing. Unrelenting. “Allah will guide your hands…”
The Mississippi. The Father of Waters, as it had once been called. It was a magnificent river. Korsakov dialed the number from memory, standing by the side of the Suburban.
“Are you sure?” he asked, turning back to Viktor. The boy nodded. They’d pulled off the road after his discovery, and now they stood in an alley overlooking the river.
Four rings and the phone picked up. “Yes?” a voice asked in clear, if accented, English.
“We have a problem,” Korsakov announced without greeting or preamble. They didn’t have time.
“I could tell that much from CNN.” There was sarcasm in the tones. “I brought you into this country because I trusted you to do the job, Sergei. Was my trust misplaced?”
The assassin took a deep breath. “Nyet. The contract will be finished as we agreed, but there is something you need to know.”
“And that would be?”
“As we speak, the target is within thirty miles of you. It is only safe to assume that the CIA officer is still with her. You may be in danger.”
A curse. “What do they know?”
Neither of them had the answer to that question. “Where are you now?”
Korsakov glanced over at Viktor. He could be signing their death warrant. “We’re in the city of St. Louis.”
“I will send my Gulfstream for you — be at the airport in five hours.”
“Spasiba bolshoi, tovarisch.” Thank you very much.
And it was done.
It was the first target. He was sure of it. Short, stocky, his deep tan hinting at his Mediterranean background. There was a military bearing to his gait as he walked across the street in the pale glow of the streetlights.
Yuri adjusted the magnification ring, enhancing the zoom as his reticule centered on the man’s face, watching him exhale, steam billowing into the cold night.
Caruso paused at the door of the apartment complex, unsure whether to go on in or not. Marika’s contact was Agency. His favorite people.
As it turned out, he didn’t have long to wait. Altmann materialized out of the twilight, a heavy jacket shrouding her lithe figure, a Ravens baseball cap pulled low over her eyes. “What are you waiting for, Vic? An engraved invitation?”
“They’re inside. Are you in position?”
“Almost,” the man called Kalnins whispered, pulling himself onto the top of the concrete wall that ran around the back of the apartment complex. He dropped down on the other side, unslinging the Uzi from around his neck.
From his position he could cover the maintenance exit from the building, as well as the fire escape. With a smooth practiced motion, the Latvian extended the weapon’s folding sheetmetal stock, bracing it against his shoulder.
“Ready.”
Four flights of stairs — the two FBI agents took them quickly, with Marika in the lead.
“I feel naked without my sidearm,” she grumbled, turning for the final flight. Caruso suppressed a smile. That was the way it was when you’d been in the field as long as Altmann. Things like wearing a gun…a badge — they were more than second nature. They were a part of you.