“If you want to see—”
“Shut up, you pathetic old man! You call me using my sister’s phone because you think that will intimidate me, make me afraid for her safety? Sosi hui, dolboeb,” spewed Kit, with utter contempt. Suck my d***, f***head. “If anything happens to my sister, if anyone so much as touches her from this moment on, I guarantee that you and your nephew, Mikhail Travkin, Travkin’s wife, Natalie, and his children, Petra and Ivan, your wife, your children, your children’s children, all of your soldiers, all of the computer geeks working out of those big RVs, and your analysts and special operators, like the people who robbed the armored truck… all of them will be killed. You and your family will be hunted to the ends of the earth by me or by others loyal to me, and your deaths will be brutally cruel.” Kit said it with a hate, a rage, a vehemence that came from a very dark place within him.
“I know what you want, Popov. I tortured Yulana into talking before I killed her. You want me to steal an EMP device from Sandia National Labs. That would be easy for me to do. Which model do you want?” Silence on the line. “Which one?!” demanded Kit.
“An RT-Seven,” said Popov.
“I could easily get an RT-Seven, so maybe we’ll make a trade. But let me think about it. Oh, and don’t call me. I’ll call you.”
Kit hung up. He let out a big exhale, and everyone just stared at one another. No one spoke for about a minute.
“Just to clarify, I would never harm a hair on the head of any wives or family members or innocents. But he would—look what he did to my mom and to Staci. So I talked strong to get his attention, using the kind of threats he would use if he were in my position.”
“Yeah, we understand that. But, Kit… he said you were out, that he didn’t need you. That means he has an alternate plan,” said Buzz.
“Could he have one of the old Russian EMP bombs?” asked Angel.
“Or maybe,” Yulana said, “he has built one. It’s possible to do it cheaply. If Popov has a weapons scientist, he could easily construct one. But it would likely be crude, not precise, and do more damage over a wider area.”
“Kit, it sounds like Popov was dead set on using you to steal an RT-Seven e-bomb, but you became so troublesome and problematic, he decided to move ahead without you,” said Buzz.
“We still have to stop him,” said Angel.
“Someone has to stop him.” Jen looked troubled.
“What do you mean, Jen?” asked Kit.
“We’ve just flown eight hundred miles away from a guy who most likely has an e-bomb, and who could detonate it at any minute. And we don’t know the target. I hate to say it, but we need to consider getting some agencies engaged in this.”
“You’re absolutely right,” said Kit. “I’ll call Padilla and brief her on most everything that has happened, leaving your names out of it. I’ll ask her to immediately get all of the appropriate agencies involved.”
“Where does that leave us?” asked Angel.
“Out of a job,” said Kit. “Buzz, Angel, Jen, I owe you a debt that will be hard to repay. But here is where we part company. One of the reasons I flew us all here was to get you three away from a number of crime scenes and an army of Russian killers. We are all very lucky to be alive after what happened at the safe house.”
“But we’re just getting started! We need to go after Travkin,” groused Angel.
“Angel, I’m so far off the reservation, the Feds may decide to wipe me. You three can simply no longer be involved with what I’m doing. You could lose your careers, be sent to jail, or worse.
“Yulana and I have loved ones being held hostage, so the stakes are different for us. I was hoping to find Staci first.” Kit looked downward and his voice choked a bit. “But I’ll proceed under the assumption that the Russians won’t harm her any further. Popov will take my threat seriously, at least until I’m dead.”
The choices and circumstances were rotten, and the looks on the faces of Buzz, Angel, and Jen reflected that.
“Regardless of what the Feds will do, Yulana and I are going to steal an RT-Seven from Sandia. I’ll set up a trade with Popov, except it won’t be a trade, it’ll be a trap.”
Kit’s team exchanged concerned, skeptical glances; they clearly disagreed with him on this point.
“You’re going to ask the secretary of state’s permission to steal a device?” asked Buzz.
“No. I won’t even beg forgiveness after I steal it.”
“Boss, that kind of crime gets someone locked up forever, regardless of how good the intentions might have been,” said Angel.
“Stealing an EMP weapon would be crossing a whole different kind of line. Even if you got Staci back, the SECSTATE couldn’t protect you. You’d never see another day of freedom,” said Jen.
“And if I don’t try, neither will Staci.”
CHAPTER 25
Mikhail Travkin stood with his uncle Viktor Popov on a corner terrace of Mikhail’s penthouse apartment, above the tantalizing backdrop of billions of dollars’ worth of West Los Angeles real estate. Traffic on the streets below had shifted into gridlock afternoon rush-hour mode.
“All of my fears about how this could go wrong have been realized,” carped Mikhail, pacing on the expensive outdoor carpeting. He internally berated himself for a series of blunders, and almost all of the mistakes had to do with his not standing up to his uncle on key decisions.
“All of your fears? What do you know of fear?”
“He knows about our entire organization. The hackers, the analysts.” In Travkin’s analytical mind, the percentage for success had taken a hit.
“He doesn’t know locations,” said Viktor.
“He’ll find out! He mentioned killing my wife and children and he knows their names! He knows that you wanted him to steal an EMP device! How has he learned so much so quickly?”
“Calm down and forget about him for now. Don’t answer if he calls. When we’re ready, we’ll talk to him. We can contract out his murder to the Haitians or a biker gang or—”
“Uncle, if he alerts the police or the FBI, the whole deception is not worth pursuing.”
“With what proof, what evidence can he give them? And he has no credibility; he’s a wanted man! Perhaps we can plant a large amount of cocaine at the aviation company in Chino. The police will easily convince themselves these killings were about a drug feud and that Bennings is more dirty than they already suspected.”
“He doesn’t need proof. Can’t you see that? All of the fingers would point to us if an e-bomb is detonated, and the full weight of the American system will crush us!”
“No, because we’ll be in Russia by then. When Bennings calls back, we set up a trade—his sister for the RT-Seven. After we have it, they will both be killed.”
“Please forget about the American bomb!”
“I can’t! If you’re going to fly over the Alps, do you want to do it in a Gulfstream Five, or in an ultralight plane you built in your backyard? Dennis will soon be in Las Vegas. After he certifies the operation there, send him to Albuquerque with his best men.”
“Have you lost your mind? Everything you propose is high risk, high profile.”
“Everything I propose?! Was it me who ordered thirty men to kill Bennings this morning?! It was your idea, your order, and you failed in the worst possible fashion! Don’t make me do something unpleasant, Nephew. I take your counsel from time to time. I don’t take your orders. I am the don, this is my maskirovka, and we will proceed as I say.”