Blowback (10 page)

The sharp slap
of the jump rope against tile drew her back to the manic rhythm of childhood and the grueling military drills their dad had put Marshall and Vanessa through. At ten, she'd worshipped him, and she'd been irresistibly drawn to the challenge. By thirteen, she hated him but pushed herself anyway, refusing to lose. Now she got it—her father had driven them the way he drove himself and his recruits. He'd done it believing that it would instill much-needed discipline, and, perhaps, save lives.

At this moment for Vanessa it was merely a way to sweat out insomnia at 0330 hours and still keep her focus on the CCTV images to be sure she didn't miss him—the Chechen.

Over the past three hours since the news from Zoe, she'd isolated an image of Arash and an image of the biker, but still nothing more on her target, the assassin. Her eyes ached from strain.

“A ghost just like his boss,” Vanessa murmured, breathing hard. But she was beginning to put together a few pieces: from her first glimpse of him in Vienna to the footage from the hotel, she guessed he was late twenties to mid-thirties, so born in the late 1970s to mid-1980s. And that meant he'd been a kid in the middle of the brutal fighting of the First Chechen War and barely out of his teens by the beginning of the Second Chechen War in 1999, when Islamic separatists invaded Dagestan and Russian troops entered Chechnya in response.

A logical place of first contact with foreign Islamic resistance fighters who joined the Chechen separatists.

“And a hell of a training ground for a sniper.” She'd surprised herself by speaking aloud, and a throaty assent came from Vasilias, who was hunkered down on the kitchen counter, studying her with improbable golden eyes. On the now-muted TV next to the cat, a very tall, very thin woman topped a lustrous chocolate cake with whipped cream.

So
maybe that's where the Chechen first met Bhoot,
Vanessa thought, doubling her speed as she counted out her last fifty jumps. Had Bhoot supplied Chechen rebels? Or was it possible he'd actually fought with the resistance in Chechnya like the legendary Saudi Emir Khattab, Ibn al-Khattab? If so, that gave her new places to look, old files to scour, to cover the First Chechen War in 1995 through Dagestan and the beginning of the long and bloody Second Chechen War in 1999.

She swung the rope toward her ankles and almost tripped as the new prompt box appeared on her secure screen.

Chris Arvanitis.

She slid into the chair and clicked to connect.

Just as Chris appeared full screen, Vasilias bounded onto her lap and off again, and Vanessa blurted out, “Shit.”

“Catch you in the middle of something?” Chris asked, eyeing her curiously.

Suddenly she felt too aware of the sweat running down her face, her damp blond hair clipped haphazardly into a ponytail, and her raggedy T-shirt that read,
If zombies chase us, I'm tripping you!

She met his gaze squarely. “Skipping rope with my landlady's cat. And you?” It was 2030 hours on the East Coast, but Chris looked as if he'd been up for days, his striking Greek features muddied by exhaustion. “Why aren't you at home with your family?”

“Who skips rope at three-thirty in the morning?” Chris asked, sliding past her question.

“Now you're checking my bedtime?”

“NSA is on your code. They've verified that it's classical Persian, and they suspect that it's from a classical Persian text, but—”

“I could have told them that much,” she said and groaned. “Jesus, have they tried testing for invisible ink? Seriously, they've got to think outside the box on this, and they have to do it fast!”

“They're going to pull in somebody from linguistics, a specialist in archaic Indo-European languages.” His brows pulled together over bloodshot brown eyes. “We're gambling on this having a full payoff, but we can't be positive—”

“The geo-markers are there, Chris. I know they are.” Vanessa spoke with an intensity that surprised even her.

He studied her silently for a moment, and she couldn't read him as clearly as she wanted. But then he nodded, his expression still thoughtful. “I may be crazy, but I'm counting on your instincts, Vanessa.”

“I am, I'm right.” But she felt a pang of apprehension—not for herself, for Chris. Was there more going on than the usual and relentless pressures at work? An Agency career was hard on a marriage and a family.

For a few moments, neither of them spoke and the silence lengthened.

Until, finally, he said, “You did your part of the job when you turned over the intel from the wife.”

“You telling me to let go of Bhoot?” she asked softly. “You know I can't do that.”

He took a breath, releasing it with a sigh. “You don't have a choice, Vanessa.”

She shrugged. “Go home.”

“Go to bed,” he countered.

After they disconnected, Vanessa sat staring blindly at the monitor. She had the nagging sense that Arash's code just needed the right eyes. She'd take reasonable odds the decrypt folks would break it—eventually. But would they do it quickly enough to get the op up and running to capture Bhoot if he showed in Iran? Operation Ghost Hunt was almost out of time.

As if she'd been startled out of a trance, she paused the CCTV footage, found the almost-empty glass of bourbon, and stood.

0400 hours. She stretched, rubbing bleary eyes. But just as she was going to call it a night, she dropped into her chair again and pressed play on the CCTV footage.

She was six minutes in when she found her Chechen.

She almost missed him, camouflaged as he was behind the fedora, sunglasses, and overcoat. The satchel over his shoulder.
I would have missed you
—
if you hadn't turned your face just enough to glance quickly at something in the window of an antiques shop. What are you looking at?

She caught the best frame and froze it, staring at the stark angles of his bones, the thin, flat line of his mouth. But mostly he presented as eerily ordinary. There was nothing to make him stand out. And that made him perfect for his chosen profession.

She sent the file Priority to Zoe at Headquarters—so the Chechen's photograph could be added to the standard watch lists for Interpol and Europol.

She stood abruptly, needing to move. A shadow flashed past, and she turned to see Vasilias spring out her open window.
Damn cat.
But Vanessa followed his instinct, ascending the short, narrow staircase from terrace to rooftop. Vasilias had vanished. Had he jumped the few meters from one rooftop to the next?

Vanessa perched near the edge of the roof and stared out at the now fading lights of Nicosia spilling into the distance.

She pictured the Chechen.
Where are you? Who are you hunting now?

Just as day
began to break, Pauk guided the Fiat over the ferry ramp and onto Cypriot soil. He'd studied satellite maps of Cyprus, had memorized the most efficient routes from Kyrenia, south across the island to Limassol and a new development of luxury condominiums, where he would begin to track his latest target.

Stuck behind commercial trucks, he followed the double lanes of debarking traffic from the harbor, where a Roman castle still stood sentry, into an old section of town.

Traffic was thinning, and he saw signs for the A1, the highway he would travel most of the way to Limassol, where the expat Russians lived. Since the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus to counter long-standing hostilities with Greece, the island had been divided into the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the Greek-controlled Republic of Cyprus. Near Nicosia, he would pass through one of the divided island's border checkpoints.

His long fingers brushed the top of his EU passport in his shirt pocket, an excellent forgery. He would pick up the necessary white visa form at Turkish Cypriot passport control.

Each new assignment came with certain, calculated risks. It was never his job to question his mentor's vast business dealings or to understand each move he made. It was simply Pauk's job to make sure all obstacles were cleared in advance. A point of honor. A point of life or death.

Vanessa braked
her gray convertible Renault directly in front of Café Kiji. Beyond the surrounding shops and restaurants, Larnaca Bay shivered metallic blue beneath late-afternoon sun.

After her almost sleepless night, she'd showered and dressed for a long day at her cover office in Nicosia. She was still at her desk at 1745 hours when a cable from Sid dinged her secure laptop.

HQS REQUESTS THAT PER PREVIOUS DISCUSSION WITH C/O VONN, C/O GROVES MAKE CONTACT WITH GZROBUST/258. ALTHOUGH R/258 HAS NOT YET PROVIDED INTELLIGENCE OF HIGH VALUE ON FINANCIAL DEALINGS AT HIS LOCATION, HE IS CLEARLY IN A POSITION TO DO SO, IF HANDLED AND MOTIVATED APPROPRIATELY. C/O VONN HAS MADE ARRANGEMENTS WITH R/258 TO MEET C/O GROVES. R/258 WILL BE AT IDEN A TONIGHT—REPEAT TONIGHT—AT 2000 HRS.

•   •   •

She'd changed quickly,
catching her hair up into a butterfly clip and applying a dash of makeup before slipping into a light mauve silk dress and black heels from her office emergency stash. And here she was—rushed but glad to be in action—about to meet her newest Russian asset.

Café Kiji offered valet parking. She dropped her keys in the young man's waiting palm.

Inside, Vanessa took in the manic scene. The large main dining room and bar, with its hum of electronic dance music and its neo-rococo designs, overflowed with the requisite diplomats, financiers, a generous sprinkling of air-kissing Eurotrash, and Mafia types from various corners of the globe. But no sign of her host Sergei Tarasov, otherwise known as GZRobust/258.

She pressed her way toward the bar, moving as quickly as possible. Even so, the British ambassador managed to clutch her arm, then a handshake with the Cypriot Minister of Foreign Affairs, and on to an air-kiss exchange with the Iranian rug salesman she highly suspected was up to no good.

Small world, smaller island.

That was one of the reasons for the meeting—a casual public introduction to Sergei would help serve as an inoculation. Future meetings would be clandestine, but if someone happened to spot them together, there would be a logical explanation: Sergei Tarasov was a Russian banker, entrepreneur, investor, and as far as most of her world knew, Vanessa Pierson was Vice President International of Entheo Venture Capital, headquartered in Nicosia.

She stepped up to the long bar, stainless steel framing solid blue-tinted ice and a mirrored bank of vodkas lining the wall. Although a chilled shot of Reyka was sorely tempting after the long day, she needed to keep a clear head. “Soda with a twist,” she told the bartender, scanning faces as she waited.

With no sign of Sergei anywhere in the main room, she took a sip of her soda and gauged the distance to the enclosed beach terrace: another fifteen meters of meet-and-greet. She turned sideways to ease through a huddle of Mafia types who were staring up at a huge and ornately framed copy of Ingres's
Grande Odalisque
hanging on the pink plaster wall. Two musclemen with bulges under their jackets stood conspicuously at the terrace entrance. No doubt several others kept watch on the beach.

Affluent Russians often employed a cadre of bodyguards, and Sergei Tarasov had reason to be vigilant. His uncle had been gunned down on a Moscow street in early 2010, a hit ordered by a Russian Mob boss involved in the trafficking of black-market nukes who was intent on laundering money through the Tarasov family bank, Troika.

Evgeni Tarasov's murder had been the key to turning Sergei, Vice President of Troika Bank, who had a wife and two children to protect. Sid's initial report to CPD read: “GZRobust/258 is highly motivated to cooperate.” But almost four years had passed since Sergei's recruitment, and he'd proved a disappointing asset. All of Sid's meetings with him had yielded only dribs and drabs, barely enough for the CIA to rationalize keeping the banker on their books. Vanessa held no illusions about this low-level asset handoff. But Sid had decades of field experience as a NOC, and he'd recruited and run dozens of assets. He was also smart. If he believed Sergei was holding high-value financial intel . . .

She needed Sergei to deliver—accounts, front companies, and, if possible, the names of the men behind them; men who financed the black-market proliferation networks that CPD was tracking under Operation Ghost Hunt. She also had the feeling her future at the Agency depended on a big win. So tonight, as Vanessa took over as his handler, she would see for herself what they had in Sergei.

Smiling coolly at yet another well-armed muscleman, Vanessa set her empty glass on top of a faux-Greek pillar and stepped through the terrace doors onto the enclosed slate patio. A cluster of partygoers stood taking in the view as the sun dipped like a huge copper spoon into the shimmering harbor. A deep voice rose above the general hum, English with a heavy Muscovite accent.

Sure enough, he's holding court.

She turned; he had his back to her. From pictures in his file, she recognized his broad shoulders, squat body, balding head. Sergei could pass for a boxer off his training. He shifted, and she saw him in profile, his blunt features and the shadow of beard. Huge Russian hands cuffed air, and the group laughed at a punch line Vanessa missed.

His arm was draped around a tall, slender young woman dressed skimpily in Russian haute chic: a strapless pink mini, a pink fur bolero jacket, and beaded-crochet headdress. She looked young enough to be his daughter. Sergei pulled her close and tight—from Vanessa's vantage point, aggressively so. The girl pushed free, her face blanched, her smile taut
. A lover's spat?

Hovering behind Sergei was a massively bulky guy with a cleft chin, wearing a tight black tee and gray jacket with conspicuous bulges. He had to be his personal bodyguard, the must-have accessory for a Russian businessman. In addition to Sergei's group, perhaps a dozen other people occupied the enclosed patio, but most were making their way down an ornate marble staircase to what appeared to be a newly renovated basement club.

Vanessa kept Sergei in her periphery. She made sure to stand in his sight line, giving him the chance to figure out who she was. It didn't take him long.

His eyes narrowed, and his body tensed. With a glance at his watch, he turned to his young companion, leaning close to whisper in her ear. He held up five fingers. Pouting, she shot him a scathing look with her kohl-rimmed eyes, almost shoving her drink into his hand. She then led several of her clubby friends back into the crowded restaurant, leaving Sergei alone with his bodyguard.

Vanessa's cue to move.

“Pozdravlyayu!”
She could speak basic Russian but not well, so she eased into her carefully memorized Russian spiel,
Congratulations on your restaurant. I'm Vanessa Pierson, and I have a venture capital firm in Nicosia—

“Speak English,” he snapped, with a dismissive flick of his hand.

She pulled up sharply. “Fine. English then,
Gospodin
Tarasov.”

Sergei waved off his bodyguard with a scowl. The man retreated.

“You know the work of Yiapanis?” Sergei asked brusquely, leading Vanessa to the spiral staircase, which was guarded by a slender bronze statue, a nude in the style of Modigliani.

“She's lovely,” she said, intentionally admiring the sculpture.

“And very expensive,” he snapped, his tone petulant.

With a quick, modulating breath, Vanessa returned her attention to Sergei. He slid his sunglasses off, revealing reddened eyes, more than a hint of Russian melancholy—and an emotion somewhere between vexation and exasperation. “I'm so glad you could be bothered to show up,” he growled under his breath.

Barely controlling her own impatience, Vanessa said, “It's a pleasure to finally meet you.” And in a lower voice, “Let's not make a scene. I'm here, and you're the one who missed the last few meetings with your former contact.”

“Our friend told me you were beautiful and young,” Sergei said, drinking too quickly from his glass as he began to descend the staircase.

Vanessa followed in spite of her misgivings. When they reached the basement, Sergei's waiting bodyguard lifted the thick red sash anchored between stanchions that served as gateway for his boss and Vanessa. The room was large, low-lit, and leaning toward bordello décor. It was also equipped with another full bar, as well as several billiard and poker tables, all new and apparently professional-grade.

Sergei shooed away a hovering waitress, then said, “But I didn't realize they were handing me off to a baby . . .
devka
.” He glared at Vanessa as he delivered the verbal slap.

So that was it? He hated that he'd been passed to a young handler, especially a woman?

But she believed there was more. According to Sid, the Russian mogul had recently been acting as balky as a spooked horse. Even as she watched, the skin around his eyes contracted and his lower lip pulled taut. Sergei was afraid.

As if he'd read her thoughts, he frowned at his now empty glass. “I see the news, the assassinations, and I hear things in my business, so I'm looking out for myself and my family, because you people obviously cannot keep me safe.”

“Did something happen, Sergei? Were you threatened?” Vanessa spoke under her breath, keeping her smile in place even as a tremor ran the length of her body.

He pushed his face toward hers. “I am Russian”—as though those three words explained everything.

“I know you love your family and your homeland,” Vanessa said, speaking urgently. “Don't forget we have the same objectives—we both love our countries, and that's why we're working together.”

Past Sergei's shoulder, the girlfriend was returning with her coterie. Vanessa's private window with the Russian was closing quickly.

“Here comes your friend,” she warned.

“Anya is not my friend—”

“She's your
daughter
,” Vanessa finished in a quick, low voice—just now registering it. Sergei had nineteen-year-old twins, a boy and girl. Both had fallen prey to the wilder hedonistic pleasures of Moscow.

Spitting out his words in a low growl so she felt the heat, smelled the vodka and bitterness on his breath, he said: “I take care of my own—what you pay is shit money to me. I haven't risked everything I have for shit. I do it for my family, for my country, to stop the Mafia from destroying Russia.”

Before she could respond, he snapped out a quick command in Russian to his bodyguard. Olaf—but she didn't catch anything else.

With a heavy grunt, Olaf stalked toward them, and Vanessa braced herself for the hard bounce.

Olaf pulled a cue stick off a rack. He hefted it the way a batter preps a bat.

Vanessa waited, her eyes on the huge man's every move.

Olaf inhaled loudly, and then he righted the cue stick and held it out to Vanessa like a knight's staff.

“You play?” Sergei asked.

Vanessa shrugged. “A little.”

When she still ignored the cue stick, Sergei growled, “Come on,
devka
, let's see who is better at this game, you or me?”

She met Sergei's eyes and saw their darkness. Only then did she accept the cue stick, and, with it, his coded challenge. “Sure . . .” She thought her voice sounded almost normal. “Stakes?”

“A friendly game,” Sergei said slowly. His smile, lips only, reminded Vanessa of a hungry python she'd met years ago in Brazil. “If you lose, you owe me nothing, a beer, a drink.” He waved his hand to indicate the bottles behind the bar.

“If I
win
?”

He pushed out his lower lip and nudged air with his chin. “You won't.”

“But if I do,” she insisted.

He lowered his voice so only she could hear. “Then I will give you what you want.”

Behind Sergei, his bored, rebellious daughter, Anya, stared through Vanessa for a moment while her friends talked and laughed and nibbled on bar garnishes.

Where was Sergei's son?
Vanessa wondered, sensing that the Russian and his daughter were both disturbed by Valentin's absence.

Sergei held out his hand, cupping a euro fifty-cent piece. He eyed her impatiently.

She reached into her small evening bag and retrieved a shiny Turkish lira. “More reliable than a euro,” she said, smiling coolly. Sergei's bodyguard caught the coin when she tossed it his way.

“Your call,
devka
,” Sergei said, not bothering to soften his tone.

“Heads.”

The bodyguard gazed down at the coin, and then he spoke too quickly in Russian for Vanessa to catch the words.

“Your break,” Sergei said, smirking. He racked the balls, arranging them properly, and gave the triangle a snap.

As Vanessa chalked the cue point and turned her attention to the table, a cocktail glass brimming with clear liquid appeared almost out of nowhere.

The waitress holding the drink nodded toward Sergei. “On him.”

“Jewel of Russia,” Sergei said, crossing his arms across his broad chest. “In Russia, vodka is water.” She accepted the drink and took a taste—finding it cold and dangerously smooth. She looked for a place to set it down.