“Dr. Volodin is not very tidy for a brilliant scientist,” Rostov noted, standing just inside the door and letting his eyes play around the room. The office was a mirror of the man, furnished with a fine leather couch and a desk of rich mahogany — both covered with a thin patina of the glacial dust that seemed to coat everything in eastern Siberia. Microscopes, gas burners, and glassware of every shape and size occupied a row of metal tables running down the center of room. Several dark circles discolored the tile below the tables indicating mishaps with chemicals or even small fires. Computers and other scientific instruments both large and small occupied various stations along the sidewall opposite the mahogany desk, which seemed more fitting for a world leader than a cloistered chemist.
Three orange suits of thick rubber hung like skinned beasts on pegs along the far wall. Beside the suits, situated at waist height, ran a long window of reinforced glass looking into the pressure-sealed work lab complete with rows of stainless steel rabbit cages. But for all the cutting-edge scientific equipment, the most prominent fixtures in the room were the piles and piles of paper, some starting on the tile floor and reaching Rostov’s waist. One instrument that resembled a microwave had become home to a frayed stack of folders held together with several fat rubber bands. Volodin’s scrawled handwriting covered every scrap of paper in mathematical equations and drawings of chemical compounds. Oddly, a stack of neatly rolled woolen socks was stacked in the metal in-basket atop the doctor’s desk. A wicker laundry hamper sat off the end of the desk stacked with printouts of time sensitive e-mails and other important correspondence.
Rostov had been to the lab before and seen firsthand the scientist’s unorthodox and erratic behaviors.
“There is an extremely fine line between brilliance and madness,” he said, more to the stacks of paper than to Lodygin.
“A necessary risk, I suppose,” the captain said.
“I don’t remember it being this bad,” Rostov said, turning to shoot an accusatory look at Lodygin. This had, after all, occurred on his watch. “How long has he been living like this?”
Lodygin shrugged, affecting the narrow-eyed, deadpan drawl that made Rostov want to put a bullet in the back of his head. “To one degree or another… since well before I arrived, to be sure. The man’s methods are odd, there is no disputing that, but lately it has been difficult to tell where his mind is. But his methods produce results.”
“I’ll give you that,” Rostov nodded, beginning to pick through the piles of paper. “In a war, results are all that matters, I suppose…” He spun to face Lodygin. “But there are no results now that you have let him sell or destroy the entire supply of the gas!”
“There are other scientists in Russia,” Lodygin said, still unaware of how close he was to a concrete floor and a killing chair. “Might we not find someone else to decipher the doctor’s notes and manufacture more of the New Archangel without him?”
“Tread lightly there,” Rostov said, as he took a seat in Volodin’s chair and began to go through desk drawers. “The fewer people that know of this debacle the better. I am quite certain that I will be called back to Moscow at any moment.”
He flipped through the contents of the lap drawer, which consisted mainly of foil gum wrappers and broken pencils, preferring to think rather than speak any further to Lodygin. The man’s voice was like some toxic resin on his ears and it made him physically ill to listen to it for long. Or perhaps, Rostov thought, he was ill because he knew what his reception would be should he not have any answers before General Zhestakova summoned him to Moscow.
There were many in the Kremlin who had supported his idea to develop New Archangel — but in the end, all they would remember is that Rostov was in charge, and that he had failed.
The failure had not come because the gas was used against the United States. That had always been the idea. Even the use of cut outs in the form of radical Islamists had been discussed at length — on the right timetable, with the necessary backstops in place to keep blame from falling into Russia’s lap.
Captain Lodygin’s sullen voice pulled Rostov back to the present circumstance. “I’m certain there are other chemists who would do the job quietly… with the right… incentives.” The man spoke as if he relished the thought of applying said incentives, the more heavy-handed and cruel the better. “Do you wish me to begin at once?”
Rostov ignored him, removing a stack of shipping labels from the lap drawer, and ran a thick finger down the pages as he read the carbon copies of previous labels, ignoring Captain Lodygin. “This is interesting,” he said. “Volodin has been making shipments of what he labels “Vitamin supplements” to someone named Petyr Volodin in New York City.”
“A brother?”
Rostov shook his head, perusing the slips. “His son.” The consummate scientist, Dr. Volodin had even kept notes on his correspondence. Shipped eight canisters BGH to Petyr, the latest entry noted. Rostov flipped through the pages of the journal until he found another entry where Volodin had written out Binary Growth Hormone, rather than BGH.
Lodygin held up his mobile phone to show the Internet search image of a shirtless, muscular man with spiked black hair. He had a tattoo of a grinning skull on his belly and an eight-pointed star on the front of each shoulder, just above his chest.
The captain released a poisonous sigh. Rostov couldn’t help but wish he’d put the gas mask back on to hide his hideous grin. “Petyr Volodin is a marginally successful cage fighter who trains at a gym in Brighton Beach.” Lodygin sneered. “Apparently, he calls himself Petyr the Wolf.”
“He is Vory.” Rostov nodded at the star tattoos. “Those must be from time spent in a Russian prison,”
“It would seem so,” Lodygin said.
Rostov mulled this over. If the Bratva — the Russian Mafia — were involved in the theft of New Archangel, there was a chance the burden of blame would fall somewhere else. Rostov might actually be on the other end of the gun during that long walk down the dead-end hallway.
He glanced up at Lodygin.
“Brighton Beach, you say?”
The captain licked his lips as he perused the Internet information regarding Volodin’s son. “Yes. In New York City.”
Rostov thrummed his fingers against the counter, thinking of ways he might avoid a bullet. “We must send someone to visit this Petyr the Wolf.”
Chapter 9
There were countless times when Quinn and Garcia had been supremely content to sit together and say nothing at all. This was not one of those times. Thankfully, Quinn’s daughter jabbered away nonstop all the way to the dance recital in the backseat of the crew cab GMC Quinn had borrowed from his mother.
Outside the pickup, gray clouds loomed lower and darker than they had during the earlier motorcycle ride — threatening an all-out storm, just like Garcia’s demeanor.
Mattie had just finished telling them about a new boy from school named Zane who only ate peanut butter sandwiches, when they pulled up in front of his parents’ house. The story made Quinn wonder what kind of a father he’d be when she started dating. Luckily for the boys who were sure to fall in love with her, he probably wouldn’t live that long.
The front door opened as soon as they drove up. Kim walked out, making her way toward the driver’s side of the pickup, waving serenely at Jericho. She wore a zippered white hoodie jacket, open at the front despite the evening chill and threat of rain. Her blue Alaska Grown T-shirt was tight enough to show off her trim figure. Gray capris revealed the metal works of a high-tech prosthetic leg fitted to her above-the-knee amputation. The sniper who had shot her was dead, her neck broken by Quinn in Japan, but that didn’t excuse him from being the reason that sniper had come after Kim in the first place. Still, enough time had passed that Kim appeared to have forgiven him, or at the very least, nacred over any anger she still harbored like a pearl formed over a nasty irritation.