“She’s a black-projects scientist? She looks more like a fashion model,” said Jen. “She’s so pretty, I hate her.”
“She could be lying about all of this,” said Angel.
“You’re right. She could be the best actress in the world and be selling me a bill of goods. But I don’t think so. I asked her some very specific technical questions about EMP weapons as we drove back here a little while ago, and she answered them all accurately. In fact, she corrected me a few times.”
“If what she says is true, then…?” Buzz looked concerned as he chewed on the stem of his pipe.
“Then I’m thinking it’s about an EMP bomb, Buzz. You guys remember hearing about those Red Team security exercises against supersensitive facilities that I ran a few years back?”
“I heard your team gained access to a navy facility that stored nukes,” said Jen, smiling.
“We got into the facility, but not into the bunker where the nukes were. And we got into plenty of other places too. But we did it in a way that didn’t embarrass the local security pukes or the generals or admirals in charge. I always made sure that most members of my team got captured, looking foolish. And we focused on follow-up training. We didn’t want to tell them they were doing things wrong, but we tried to make them see what they were doing wrong.”
“So what does that have to do with Popov?”
“Not many people know this, but my Red Team gained access to a storage building at Sandia National Labs in Albuquerque. That building was full of nonnuclear EMP and directed energy weapons.”
Angel whistled a “holy cow” kind of whistle. “You actually got inside?”
Kit nodded. “We could have cleaned the place out, Angel. Taken whatever we wanted.”
“EMPs—Yulana’s specialty,” said Jen.
The group shared serious looks all around.
“So your mission will be to steal an e-bomb from Sandia,” said Buzz.
“That’s the best guess I have right now. Otherwise, why does Popov need me?” asked Kit.
“Why would he need an e-bomb?” asked Jen.
“Maybe he wants to sell it,” said Angel, twirling his green-handled screwdriver out of nervous habit. “Or he’s doing this for the SVR or GRU because they want our technology.”
“Popov has no loyalty to the Russian intelligence agencies. His biggest complaint in life is that he’s a millionaire, not a billionaire. He’s bitter that he didn’t become one of the new oligarchs of Russia. He wants money and lots of it.”
“But he won’t become filthy rich selling one or two American EMP bombs,” said Buzz.
“So how do you get rich using an e-bomb?” asked Angel, pointing the tip of his screwdriver at Kit.
“That, Angel, is the billion-dollar question.”
Kit ordered everyone to sack out for a couple of hours in the bunk room. He then set up his laptop in the common room. Using Darknet software, he attached a digital photo of Yulana to an urgent encrypted message and sent it to a friend in D.C. still assigned to the Activity; he asked the friend to fly to Albuquerque today with certain sensitive equipment and other items and to personally bring it to a private mailbox address. Since the man was like a brother to Bennings, Kit knew the delivery would be made.
He reclined on a sofa in the common room, but sleep eluded him. He spent a couple of minutes pressing the migraine pressure point on his hand; all of the recent stress and lack of sleep was like an invitation for a migraine to show up. Since meds didn’t work for him, all he had was the acupressure to try and keep a migraine from kicking in. He got up and crossed over to the acoustic guitar he’d spotted earlier in a corner of the room. He quietly tuned it and then played a muted rendition of Sleepy John Estes’s “Worried Life Blues.”
As he plucked the strings, he thought of his mom, of Staci, of Rick and Maria Carrillo. For Staci’s sake and in honor of the dead, he had to win, had to be the best he’d ever been, had to cover every base, every angle, had to become bigger and stronger and smarter than he’d ever been.
But something was bothering him, something lapping at his memory. What was it, what had he missed? A vague thought or notion, a suspicion about these recent events nagged at him like a pain that came and went, that the doctors couldn’t identify. What were the questions that he should be asking that he wasn’t? What was the obvious connection to Popov he hadn’t yet made?
Bennings mentally hit rewind. As he relaxed and free-associated, a question popped to the forefront: How had Popov learned of his successful Red Team penetration of Sandia? Only about a dozen people in the world could link him to that.
Many of the pricey high-rise condo buildings on an exclusive stretch of Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood, California, have a helipad on the roof. But in one particular building, access to the two massive penthouses was gained only via a private elevator. Visitors first had to get past the discreetly armed guards—former LAPD officers—in the lobby. After being buzzed through a heavy security door, a private elevator awaited. The elevator was controlled by an operator in the penthouse security station.
Mikhail Travkin’s condo took up one-half of the top floor, Viktor Popov’s the other half.
The evening had been mostly social until a few hours earlier, when Popov and Travkin sat down to business, accompanied by plenty of food and drink.
Now, in the wee hours of the morning, with the penetrating scent of eucalyptus from the branches sitting in a plastic bucket full of water, Popov and Travkin lightly dozed as buxom young masseuses rubbed down both men in Popov’s nearly authentic banya. Travkin called it a sauna, because he grew up in the United States, and a sauna was a sauna.
The soft chime from his small tablet phone awoke Mikhail. His thin lips curled into a snarl and he shook his head, squinting as he read a text message.
“Viktor, we must speak.” Mikhail turned to the masseuses and gestured for them to leave.
“What now, Misha? I was just dreaming something lovely.”
“Two of our men are dead, one is missing. At the morgue where Bennings’s mother is.”
“That’s not good news,” said Viktor sitting up.
“No, it isn’t.”
“Their orders were not to initiate contact with Bennings, not even to follow him. We don’t need to follow him, just make their presence known. Did they disobey orders?”
“Unlikely. I made it very clear they were to take no action.”
“So Bennings murdered them?”
“I believe so. Uncle, I have always taken your counsel, but this time, I ask that you take mine. We cannot afford this unwanted attention. Dead Russians point to us. Eventually, connections will be made by the authorities.”
“It’s not good, I’ll go that far.”
“That’s not far enough to go. The FBI, the police, the army investigators are closing in on Bennings. What happens when they catch him? Do you really think he won’t mention your name and that you kidnapped his sister?”
“Allegations are cheap, Mikhail. They can prove nothing.”
“Correct, you and I personally have nothing to worry about. Our deceptions, however, are something else. I’m ordering a team to take them all out—Bennings, his friends, the Petkova woman. It would have been nice to use the major, but the risks have grown too high.”
“We can still—”
“Uncle. The men are already in place. We can’t risk the whole operation based on the belief that Bennings will deliver. We thought he would stay docile because we held his sister. I can only deduce he is more callous than his evaluation indicated. We must do this, Viktor, to secure what has long eluded you, what has been denied you. Forget Bennings, we have Doctor Rodchenko. The end result for us will be the same.”