Blowback (23 page)

The bore of the Dragunov
felt warm and true under Pauk's careful touch. The black steel gleamed from careful tending. He'd always admired the efficient mechanics of the weapon's short-stroke gas piston operation system. After a moment, he set it next to the scope and cartridge case laid out on the bed. Most of it was assembled and ready. He'd removed most of his maps from the walls, folding them into tight rectangles placed one on top of the other. He was quite familiar by now with the most likely locations where he would deal with his target. He was also prepared to encounter more intense security.

He turned, catching a glimpse of his reflection in the chipped and clouded mirror. He stepped closer, gazing dispassionately at his near-naked body, and the abstract pattern of scars that marked his back, ribs, and thighs. Some from the beatings after his mother died and he was taken away to the makeshift orphanage, some from the sicknesses because there was no medicine, others from fighting. But they were all from his childhood. Everything changed when he met his mentor. And when the last war ended, he left Chechnya for good and vowed he would never let anyone hurt him again. After that, the scars became remnants of a distant, ever-fading history.

He looked down at the fluid-soaked bandage on his upper thigh. He'd been taking antibiotics along with the codeine, but still the pain gnawed at him. If anything, it was getting worse day by day. But something else disturbed him more than the pain. Somehow, with this new wound, this new scar-to-be, he had become vulnerable again.

Voices drifted from the hallway, and he looked up, even though he had set the double chain locks and the dead bolt himself.

The room had only one small window, overlooking a trash-filled alley in Earls Court. Last night he stared, sleepless, out at the sickly strays—all the time missing Madame and her cats.

The voices passed, fading, and he breathed.

He wasn't used to being on edge. Everything felt different. He reached for his book on English gardens. He touched the photograph he used as a bookmark and pulled it free.

He'd captured it from the YouTube video—the woman from Cyprus, Vienna, Prague. Somehow she had managed to trespass into his mind. Was it possible he had dreamed about her, he a man who did not dream? The tips of his fingers went to his bandaged thigh. He felt certain he would encounter her again—and then he would deal with her once and for all.

After some time, Pauk realized he had been sitting on the edge of the bed, jaw clenched, hands made into fists. He steeled himself, returning the photograph to its place between the pages of the book. He had a job to do.

Vanessa took the stairs quickly,
descending from Westminster Bridge toward the large wharf complex and the entrance to the London Eye—the great iconic wheel turning slowly against steely river and leaden sky.

On time at 1300 hours, she strode into a brisk headwind that punched up the Thames and made her skin rise with goose bumps. She scanned the waterfront, dreading their initial interaction.
What to say first?
And where was Chris? Had his anger softened?

Thirty seconds later, she saw him near the ticket booth, waiting in the shadows.

And the answer was no—no softening; he stood so ramrod straight in his black overcoat he could have been a palace guard.

Shit.
She needed to start strong. She saw him tracking her approach, and she could read the offense in his eyes.

When she was almost to him, he began walking, taking her arm firmly, moving her toward the ride.

She glanced at him, revealing her surprise, and he held out two tickets. “You wanted to talk.” He made it sound like an accusation.

They took their place behind a family of Asian tourists in the queue, a short line for a Saturday. She assessed Chris with a quick glance. Fatigue still deepened the lines on his face, but his eyes were clear and the days-old beard was gone.

She knew he'd taken his own read of her. She couldn't help wondering what he saw. She'd taken efforts to clean up, look professional, and she certainly felt alert. But he gave nothing away as they inched toward the creeping progress of the Eye, where an attendant ushered them forward.

“Keep moving, step aboard the capsule, and catch the view of a lifetime!”

When it was her turn, Vanessa misstepped slightly, only to feel Chris steady her with the lightest push—away from the tourists (Vietnamese, she'd realized) to claim the other end of the capsule for themselves.

That was one advantage of the constantly moving Eye, Vanessa thought—nobody joining you once you were a foot aboveground. The disadvantage: She and Chris were now literally caged together.

They sat facing each other in an uncomfortably awkward silence.

However long the ride lasted, Vanessa knew she had to get Chris's attention fast—moving it away from what had happened between them—and refocused on what they could do together to get the Chechen and Bhoot.

She felt a fresh flash of shame for having betrayed Chris's trust with her lies.

The weight of the moment pressed down, along with the gravity of her agenda. She pushed through the silence. “For right now, I need you to put aside what just happened between us at Headquarters. I've got something we need to act on.”

He met her straight-on look with his own. He didn't say yes, didn't say no. He wasn't budging, but he was there, sitting across from her, and that meant this was the only open window she would get.

“Let's start with Vienna . . .” Vanessa kept her voice low so she wouldn't be overheard, but the tourists still hugged the other end of the capsule anyway, caught up in the view, their conversations loud and animated, and beyond them, London, in all its centuries-old layered complexity, reaching out in every direction.

“The Prater, September sixteenth, my asset was assassinated,” Vanessa said quietly. “On September fifteenth, fifty-five thousand euros are wired into an account at Troika bank. Another fifty-five thousand are deposited on September seventeenth. Both deposits flow from the same account set up by Bashir Group General Import-Export, Dubai, UAE. On September eighteenth, the entire hundred and ten thousand euros are wired to a separate offshore account.”

Without moving, Chris had gone still.
She had his attention.

“Prague, February third, my asset goes missing,” she continued. “Two days before, fifty thousand euros dump into our now familiar account; the second deposit, same amount, wires in on February fourth. Again, the balance is wired out, same destination, February fifth. Getting the picture? And the trail goes back even farther—to Amsterdam and Barcelona.” She paused for effect, leaning even closer—close enough to see his pupils dilate and contract. She dropped her voice to a whisper now. “There's more, but what matters—at CPD we've already linked Bashir Group General Import-Export as a suspected primary front company for Bhoot. And now, thanks to a brave Russian, we've linked payouts from Bhoot's front company to the hits on my assets and at least three others. There are probably many more if we start looking closely. My final questions, how the hell is Bhoot's batting average so high? How has he been able to target our assets so successfully?” She waited a beat, then said, “And those are all the reasons you need to take me with you to the meeting.”

His eyes widened and she kept quiet, waiting for his reaction.

“Excuse me—”

Chris looked up, startled, and Vanessa turned to see a teenage girl standing with camera in hand. A brazen hot-pink streak through her long black hair contrasted sharply with her shy smile. An even younger girl stood a few feet behind her. “You take our picture?”

Vanessa looked to Chris and shrugged—
They don't look like spies, they're kids.

While he obliged, snapping several photos of the giggling girls, Vanessa watched him, wondering where he stood. Had she persuaded him?

“Thank you, thank you!” Still giggling, the girls dipped and bowed to Chris—and Vanessa, too—before scurrying back to their group.

Chris took his seat again, remaining silent, pressing the tips of his fingers together. Vanessa couldn't read him.

But, finally, he really looked at her. “Ballistics came back: Vienna and Cyprus are a match.” It was a quiet statement that covered a lot of ground. His dark eyebrows knitted together. “But apparently one or two witnesses at Saint Hilarion Castle claim they saw a female shooter . . .”

“You know eyewitness accounts are notoriously unreliable when guns are involved.” She gazed at him evenly, aware that the tourists were stirring, their ride winding down, the ground coming at them. But then, abruptly, she pictured the hurt and betrayal she'd seen on Chris's face at Headquarters when he realized the extent of her relationship with Khoury and the depth of her lies. She took a deep breath. “But sometimes eyewitnesses get it right. Do you want to talk more about this now?”

He stared at her long enough she felt the urge to squirm. But then he shook his head. “No, not here. We will have that conversation, but it can wait for later.”

She reached out toward Chris to put her hand on his arm. They were close now, their heads almost touching. She said, “It looks like we have a chance to get Bhoot with Operation Ghost Hunt now that you have the facility location. But we can have his minion, too, the Chechen. We can get them both. And it's becoming increasingly clear that they're connected at the hip, and this hit man is
slaughtering
our people for his boss. The links are there—the money trail from Bhoot's front company, the dates of deposit. But what I can't figure out is, how did he know so much about three of my assets?” She tightened her grip on Chris's arm. “Is there a leak? Could there be a mole at CPD?”

Chris stood and Vanessa followed because they were almost on the ground. “I've got a lot to share with MI5, and I think they've got more to share with us. We need to take him down, and I can help you do that.”

The automated doors opened, and the teenage girls waved as their group stepped off. Vanessa went next, ahead of Chris. Solid ground felt good, and she kept walking in the direction of Westminster Bridge. She didn't slow until she reached the deserted alcove between the wharf and the stairs. She turned then to see Chris standing a few feet back, where he'd stopped.

When she reached him, he said, “There's something we need to get straight before the meeting. You are smart and driven, and you've had some luck and some successes. You've also had some tough breaks and close calls and downright fuckups.” He wasn't done. “And then you've had some very dangerous lapses in judgment.
You cannot be mixed up with David Khoury.
He is under intense internal scrutiny, security is investigating his family, they're tracking his movements—and I guarantee, if you don't walk away, that scrutiny will fall back on you.”

She met Chris's eyes and held his gaze, but her thoughts were scrambling. She thought she'd realized the extent of the trouble Khoury was in—but she was really only beginning to glean the depth.

“I thought you knew this,” he said, regretfully shrugging the statement away. “Since you don't—I have to be able to trust what you say. To make this job work, you never lie to me again.”

Her mouth dropped open. Even though she'd been trained not to reveal her true emotions, she failed in this moment. But she recovered quickly. She pursed her mouth and nodded to Chris. “Understood.”

Vanessa stared down
at the man who only vaguely resembled the Chechen—caught on camera by Saint Pancras station's CCTV as he entered the UK via the Chunnel more than twenty-four hours ago. The photo was time-stamped by Interpol and then passed on to relevant agencies. This time he wore a dark blue trilby and sported a mustache and goatee and stylish urban eye frames. The sleeves of his light blue canvas jacket were long enough to cover his wrists. He carried a zippered canvas bag. And he kept his chin tucked—his practiced casualness a posture designed to give away nothing.

But this time we got you,
Vanessa thought—in a second CCTV shot from Paris Nord and a camera angled from a distance so the photo showed two-thirds of his face, his hat and glasses off, head shaved clean. She recognized his high cheekbones, narrow, symmetrical nose, and pronounced forehead. She tried to read his face for suppressed pain, hoping she'd done him serious harm at the castle.

Was it really ten days since she'd tagged him from Vienna's CCTV? Her sense of urgency to bring him down had only intensified.

She blinked, looked up, handing both photos to Chris. The MI5 officers—Trevor and Howard—had been watching her. Now Howard shifted the focus of his pale blue eyes to the file beneath his hand while Trevor kept his attention on Vanessa—who had been introduced as Claire. The customary charade of first-name pseudos.

As far as Vanessa could tell, Chris was the only person in the paneled conference room using his real first name—and only because of his rank and the fact that he'd worked with MI5 before.

The surveillance photographs had been Howard and Trevor's biggest contribution so far—to this meeting organized because both MI5 and the CIA were interested in apprehending the Chechen. “He is quite likely responsible for the death of several of your assets,” Howard said, with British aplomb, while Trevor added, “And we have reason to believe that he is hunting a new target in London.”

Chris coughed. “So why isn't he in custody? Or is he?”

Neither MI5 officer spoke up immediately, and Vanessa said, “You
lost
him?”

Trevor frowned, and Howard said, “We believe we've found the hotel he used. We're checking into all sightings, watching all major hubs and routes out of the city. We may have news on his location any minute.”

Everyone was silent for an uncomfortably long moment. Then Chris cleared his throat to signal they were moving on, and he offered up the basic ballistics reports from Prague, Vienna, and Cyprus. “Both long-range rounds were 7.62×54R; the two close-range rounds were Russian-made high-velocity 9×19-millimeter 7N21. An unusual choice, and the link to a number of the other hits.”

And Vanessa superficially covered the financial data she'd shared with Chris. The line between sharing too much and not enough was razor-thin.

But she had to push the conversation forward—to get more from the Brits. What the hell was buried in their files? How could she get access to it?

Give some to get some . . .

“He follows a careful operational pattern, gentlemen,” she said, lowering her voice and using body language to pull in both operatives along with the metro police liaison to MI5, a heavyset man introduced as “Peter.” There were advantages to being the only woman in the room.

“We know from ballistics and other sources, instead of a single-shot bolt-action rifle, he's using a semiautomatic Russian sniper rifle, a Dragunov—probably because he learned to kill with one in Chechnya—as well as a Russian military-issue 443-Gratch, for close work. When he snipes, he almost always takes out each target with a single, very accurate, head shot from a range of four hundred to one thousand meters. And he's choosing public spaces—museums, parks, landmarks—locations where his target will be vulnerable and unprotected.”

She moved her focus pointedly to the file beneath Howard's spread palm. “Let's not forget that his targets all have links to Bhoot's black-market procurement network—the Dutch intelligence officer, the Spanish prosecutor, and our assets.” She spread her bare fingers wide. “These are intelligence and justice targets or targets who have actionable intel about Bhoot's network.”

“To put it plainly,” the man called Peter said, speaking for the first time since the meeting had begun, “this Bhoot is ordering the Chechen to take out any bloke who gets him in a lather.”

“That's about right,” Vanessa said. “We suspect the Chechen was in Vienna for less than forty-eight hours before he took out his target. If we're looking for a temporal pattern, it makes sense that he'd get in and out quickly. My guess, his window in country is thirty-six to forty-eight hours—that gives us at most twenty-four hours to find him in London.”

A woman's husky alto came from behind Vanessa. “Sounds like you're telling us we need to get moving on this.”

The men all stood. Vanessa turned, taking in MI5's Director-General, Alexandra Hall, who looked as if she were dressed for travel—neutral pantsuit, subtle makeup, and a recent visit to the salon, judging from the highlights and layers in her short cut. Vanessa came to her feet, too.

“Good to see you again, Madame Director,” Chris said, stepping forward to extend his hand.

Her expression softened, and she returned the greeting. “Christopher. Thank you for coming all this way. I wish the circumstances were less urgent. This is extremely important to us. Our PM and your president have requested that we work ever closer on these issues of concern to both of us. We have a shared agenda—we have a problem we both need to solve.” Her gaze settled on Vanessa, who stepped forward.

“It's an honor to finally meet you in person, Madame Director. I was just going over some of our intelligence and analysis—and stressing the need to move with some haste—”

“As I heard,” Hall said. “What you may not know is that we think we have identified the Chechen's next target.” She nodded to Howard, and he slid out the file he'd been harboring.

“Your Chechen seems to be staking out our MP Alfred Smythe.” She looked again to Howard. “Please share what we've got with our guests.”

It had not escaped Vanessa's notice that the file was very thin. So the Brits were sharing—but no doubt only a few of their toys. Certainly not all.

Howard pushed the file across the table.

Chris opened it, and now he tapped it toward Vanessa so she had a clear view. She studied the latest surveillance photo, time and date from the previous afternoon. This time the camera caught a man dressed sportily in a high-collar cardigan, black skinny-leg jeans, black MPTs, olive-green-and-black Polo cap decorated with the familiar pony logo and the numeral
3
, a black-and-white leather sports bag slung over his shoulder.

Vanessa studied the fit, athletic man who looked to be in his mid-thirties. It was him but not him, and his ability to shape-shift sent a chill through her body.

“That's from CCTV outside the Harbour Club in Chelsea,” Howard said. “Where the MP plays squash—”

“Every Thursday at four-fifteen,” Hall finished.

A detail the head of MI5 punctuated sharply and familiarly, Vanessa thought, taking a closer look at Hall. Why would she know the MP's schedule to the minute?

Chris pushed back in his chair. “I see a CCTV photograph taken outside a sports club with a large membership, where, what, a thousand or so men play squash. What makes you so sure he is after Smythe?”

Trevor gave a nod to Vanessa. “Claire has given us a good sense of the Chechen's patterns, and MP Smythe is a viable match—he's championing a massive bill in parliament: an antiterrorism bill that will greatly expand the government's power when it comes to surveillance and access to financial transaction records.”

Hall said, “A bill that would definitely not endear him to Bhoot. But we're not just betting on hunches. We've picked up more specific chatter from terrorist sites, and we had a tip from a usually reliable asset. And that's why we've had MP Smythe under protection.”

Vanessa frowned. “Had?”

MI5's Director-General looked at her Burberry wristwatch. “As of forty minutes ago, he's far from London but still safely under our watch. We're confident the immediate danger has been averted; however, we are as interested as you are in catching the Chechen, and ultimately Bhoot. Believe me when I say that is one of my top priorities. Bhoot and I are old enemies . . .”

Hall held her silence for several moments, her eyes on Vanessa. Finally, she said, “I'm going to share something with you—given the depth of Bhoot's awareness of top-secret intelligence activities, MI5 and MI6 have been concerned for some time about a possible security breach. Has it occurred to you that you may have been targeted by Bhoot because you've been a front runner in CPD's hunt for him?”

Vanessa remained silent, aware of the unusual nature of this interaction with Hall. How much did Hall know about the events of the past few weeks? How closely was she tracking Vanessa—a CIA NOC—and why? She sensed Chris next to her, registering it also.

“A security breach has occurred to me, yes,” Vanessa said slowly.

Hall nodded. “If it turns out this is the case, it is even more imperative that Operation Ghost Hunt is successful in capturing or eliminating Bhoot.”

Vanessa nodded. “I understand what's at stake, Madame Director, but I don't understand why you're telling me this now.”

Hall said, “I had the opportunity to work with your father on a sensitive operation many years ago. He did me a favor. I feel inclined to keep an eye on his daughter.”

Vanessa frowned, trying to absorb both text and subtext. But before she had the chance to formulate her next question, Hall glanced at Howard, and he took his cue almost seamlessly, pushing back from the table.

As he stood, he looked at Chris and said, “We have a hit man to track down, and you have urgent operations to conduct back on U.S. soil.”

Trevor and the liaison officer for metro police both stood, as did Chris.

Vanessa felt abruptly deflated. The meeting was over. She glanced to Chris and then back to Hall, who was nodding at them even as she backed toward the door. “Thank you both again for your cooperation. But if you will excuse me, I can't stay.”

“Good luck at the conference,” Chris said. It took Vanessa a moment to register that Hall would soon be addressing members of the international intelligence community at the Conference on Terrorism and Cyber Security in Sydney.

“Thank you, Christopher,” Hall said. “I'm on a plane in less than three hours, and I still have a rather unique gift to collect for my host. Trevor?”

Trevor, already up, moved with her toward the door. As she stepped out, he said, “The chap at the flea returned our call to say the map is ready and he will close his doors at six p.m.
sharp
.”

The door clicked shut behind the Director-General.

Chris pushed out his chair, and Vanessa stopped him with one arm. “It's still early, and we have more to talk about—”

“We're done here,” Chris said, gathering up his jacket. Vanessa heard the finality in his words.

After the briefest hesitation, she nodded. Her reconnection with Chris was still fragile, and there would be nothing gained by pushing for more time after they'd been as much as dismissed by the Brits.

As Howard gathered up the file, Chris said, “Will we have access to the
complete
file?”

Howard blinked. “I'm certain that can be arranged.” But his tone said otherwise.

Now Howard focused his pale blue eyes on Vanessa. “We have a full team tracking the Chechen. As the Director-General emphasized, it is one of our top priorities. The other is working with your agency to apprehend Bhoot.”

Vanessa nodded. But she couldn't repress a sigh of resignation even as a raw energy coursed through her. In her mind she saw the Chechen in all his guises, eerie in his ability to change his appearance. She couldn't shake the sense that he was here to do a job—a job he would complete very soon.