The needles in the VU meters of Zeitzev’s stereo were slammed so hard to the right they appeared to be stuck.
Raina’s long body arched in the chair against the pain that stabbed into her from the headphones. The precise frequency of fingernails on a blackboard had been screeching in her ears for over a minute now. Her entire body was vibrating. But it hadn’t moved since her pelvis thrust forward at the first chilling tone. The movement had hiked her dress up around her thighs, exposing her vulnerably opened legs.
“Best orgasm she’s ever had,” Zeitzev chortled.
“Yes, yes,” Kovlek slobbered. “But wait till she gets a taste of the microphone!” he roared, thrusting his groin forward, prompting vulgar laughter.
Raina couldn’t hear it. She had no thoughts, made no sounds, and saw only violent electronic patterns, as if her mind had become a television screen that had gone suddenly haywire. Her posture gradually became even more explicit, allowing the three Russians to glimpse tufts of pubic hair curling from beneath the lace edges of her lingerie. They were so consumed by their perversity that they jumped when the door opened, and Gorodin entered.
Zeitzev saw the disgust in his eyes and decided to take the offensive. “Why aren’t you on Churcher?”
“He’s tucked in for the night,” Gorodin lied.
His head snapped to Raina. The frequency in the headphones had just changed to an oscillating bass resonance, and her stiffened body had suddenly started to buck and gyrate convulsively.
Gorodin grasped the cord from the headphones and snapped it with his wrist, like a bullwhip, unplugging the jack from the amplifier.
Raina slumped into the chair as if it was her body that had been unplugged.
“She refuses to tell us what she and Churcher were discussing,” Zeitzev said defensively.
“She would have if this idiot had left her alone,” Gorodin snapped, gesturing to Kovlek.
“She’s my account,” Kovlek countered loudly.
“She was Theodor Churcher’s lover, and that makes her mine,” Gorodin retorted. “What happens between her and Churcher’s son is GRU business, not yours.” He swung a searing look to Zeitzev. “I told you it was classified!” he went on. “Contact Moscow Center! Ask Tvardovskiy for verification, if you wish. But I’d think twice before rousing him at this hour.”
The three men exchanged frustrated glances, itching to challenge Gorodin, but knowing better.
“Well, you’re not as stupid as I thought,” he said, sensing their capitulation. “Now, get out. I want to talk to her alone.”
Zeitzev thought for a moment, nodded to Kovlek and Vladas, and the three of them left the office.
Gorodin crouched, and untied Raina from the chair. She was barely conscious. Her complexion was waxen; her clothing soaked with sweat. He filled a glass with water from a pitcher on the desk, cradled her head, and poured some onto her lips, then gently onto her face.
“Can you hear me?” he asked.
Her eyes were open in a blank stare.
“Can you hear me?” he asked again a little louder.
She made a pained expression, and nodded slightly.
“I know who you are, Raina Maiskaya,” Gorodin said. “Your silence could inflict untold damage on your country. Do you understand?”
Raina nodded.
“Good. You are going home,” he went on. “You think about what I said on the way. It will be the most important decision of your life, and should you decide wrongly — the last.”
Nomyer sveedam namorye? the guard would challenge.
Nyet, sbalkonam, Andrew would reply.
Nyet, sbalkonam.
Nyet, sblakonam.
Nyet, sbalkonam.
Andrew had remained in the darkness, repeating the words. He was concerned that he might skew one of the sounds and change the meaning by mistake. He recalled the time he had said “conscientious,” and his listener heard “contentious.” Ironically, he was applying to Rice, his father’s alma mater, and the interviewer was impressed that Andrew had inherited the tycoon’s gall.
The Russian guard noticed Andrew approaching, turned his head slightly, and swept his eyes over him.
Andrew studied the stern marble-hard face in search of a crack, and decided the fair-skinned, blue-eyed, bow-lipped guard would look like a cherub if he smiled — but he didn’t. The rigid fellow personified the monolithic hold the Soviet Union has on its people, Andrew thought. And his admiration for Raina grew, strengthening his resolve to help her.
He was reaching for his wallet and poised for the guard’s challenge when the headlights of a car came from inside the grounds. The guard turned from Andrew, and rolled back the gates allowing it to pull forward, then stepped to the driver’s window and shone a flashlight across the faces inside.
Andrew was stunned as the light moved onto the ashen, catatonic mask between Gorodin and Zeitzev.
Raina’s head turned. She looked right at Andrew, right through him with her blank eyes.
Andrew froze, unable to move or utter a sound. He watched as the car roared off into the darkness.
The guard closed the gate, and turned to him.
“Yes, what do you want?” he asked in Russian.
Andrew eyed him for a long moment.
“Go to hell,” he said bitterly.
Andrew turned and walked away — walked along the welded sheets of steel. He was barely four years old when America’s thirty-fifth President went to Berlin, but he’d seen documentaries and news clips, and now, the distinctive cadence rang in his ears—“We don’t have to build walls to keep our people in.”
Chapter Thirty-three
It was a warm, humid Saturday morning in Pensacola. Lt. Commander Keith Arnsbarger was in his backyard, hitting grounders to his girlfriend’s eleven-year-old, when the Naval intelligence officer arrived and Cissy brought him out back. Arnsbarger hit the Little Leaguer one last big hopper, mussed his hair, and tossed him clothes and all into the pool.
Cissy was howling, and the kid was laughing like hell as Arnsbarger and the officer moved off toward an orchard of fruit trees. The brush-cut courier informed Arnsbarger he’d been dispatched to take him to a meeting with the director of Central Intelligence, who was arriving in Pensacola within the hour.
“Can’t make it,” Arnsbarger cracked. “The President’s on his way over to shag some flies. Baseball’s his sport,” he went on, assuming Lowell or another of his buddies was playing a joke.
Lowell was jogging on Coastline Drive, and well into the ten miles he ran every day when the officer dispatched with his orders caught up with him. The lanky Californian thought maybe he had overdosed on beta endorphins, and was as incredulous as Arnsbarger.
“Will you repeat that, please?” he asked. “You caught me in the middle of a runner’s high.”
He hadn’t expected any feedback to his response to the KIQ directive, let alone one as direct as a meeting with the DCI himself. It had been barely eight hours since the data had been transmitted to the NRO in the Pentagon. Lowell couldn’t imagine what, but he had no doubt something extraordinary was in the works.
The previous afternoon, during the short ride from the White House to his office, DCI Jake Boulton came up with a scenario to accomplish on-board inspection of the Kira. He met with agency strategists at Langley and ascertained from the ASW data on hand that if the Kira adhered to schedule, she would be leaving Havana in six days for Gulf oil fields to take on cargo. Details of his plan were solidified during the night. And the next morning, Boulton — who still held the rank of Rear Admiral, and never missed a chance to get back into a flight harness — departed for Pensacola in the pilot’s seat of a Navy F-14 Tomcat.