Black operator complete.., p.27
Black Operator--Complete Box Set (Books 1-6), page 27
Her eyes flicked open. “Cris, you came. I thought they were going to kill me.”
“Not a chance, not while I’m with you. We’re going back, Maria.”
“Back?” Her eyes had closed, but she was still conscious.
“First a hospital, and when they’ve fixed you up, we’re going back to the States. Back to Alex.”
“You won’t leave me?”
He said no, but before he got the reply out of his mouth, she lapsed into unconsciousness. He examined the wound and covered it with his coat, balled up to try and staunch the blood loss. Then he leapt into the driver’s seat and started the engine.
The Cayenne was fast, and he drove at an insane speed. Heading back toward Moscow, and it was a miracle he didn’t swerve off the road and turn the SUV into no more than a heap of wreckage. Moscow was eighty miles away, and he reached it in an hour. As he was rushing through the suburbs, he picked up the first cop, a blue light flashing behind him, and the wail of a siren. Then a second cop car joined in the chase, and he jammed on the brakes so suddenly they almost collided with him.
They jumped from the vehicles and came around to the driving seat, weapons drawn.
“Get out of the car now, or we shoot.”
He climbed out, hands in the air. “I have a woman in there. She is dying. She has to get to a hospital.”
A cop peered through the rear window, and then opened the door to look closer. “She looks familiar. Who is she?”
“Maria Tereshkova. She is…”
“I know who she is. I was going to vote for her. I…”
He stopped as another vehicle pulled up and blocked the cop car. A black UAZ Patriot, and with a sinking feeling, he knew he’d lost. Two people got out, FSB agents Konstantin Demidov and Lina Yezhov. This time, they both had guns drawn.
“Cris Rhodes, you are under arrest.”
The woman looked at the cop who’d recognized Maria. “This man will accompany us to headquarters for questioning. Who is in the car with him? Is that Tereshkova?” The cop nodded, “She will come, too. Help us put her into our vehicle.”
They didn’t move a muscle.
Both FSB agents stared at them. “You heard the order. These two people are fugitives. We’re taking them in.”
Another two seconds elapsed and no one moved, like it was a frozen tableau. Cris noticed the cops’ hands rested on their holsters. “She is a prisoner of the Moscow Militia.”
The woman looked scornful. “Moscow Militia? Do you know who you pissant cops are dealing with? We are FSB. This is out of your hands.”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
The cops had their guns out now, two against two. “I mean we are within the jurisdiction of the Moscow Militia. These people are in our custody.”
“This is outrageous,” she shouted, but they’d both noticed the cops’ guns and were wary, “I insist you hand them over to us at once.”
“If you want them, come to headquarters. You know where we are. Now get your vehicle out of the way, you are impeding police business. Mr. Rhodes, get Miss Tereshkova into our vehicle. We’re taking her to the hospital for treatment.”
The FSB agents stared, dumbfounded. “But…”
“I said go. Get out of our hair.”
They still didn’t move. The cop deliberately took aim at the front wheel of the Patriot and put a bullet in the tire. “Just in case you don’t understand, and try to continue interfering with police business, that’ll take you a half hour to change. Mr. Rhodes, get into our car. Now get it out of our way, before I place you both under arrest.”
Cris didn’t have the heart to tell them he’d already cost the FSB their spare tire. Then again, they could always bill the cost of a breakdown truck to the Office of the President. He gently carried Maria to their car, climbed into the back, and cradled her. The cops swung aboard, and the Patriot reversed out of their way, chewing up more rubber from the ruined tire. The cruiser tore away and picked up speed, leaving the FSB far behind.
The cop in the passenger seat looked behind at Maria and shouted to the driver, “Yuri, quick, get her to the hospital.”
* * *
She was in a high dependency room in the European Medical Centre, on
Spiridonievskiy Ulitsa, close to the center of Moscow. Wires and tubes sprouting from her body, and an impressive array of monitors displayed every little detail of her vital signs. It had been five days since the disagreement with the FSB. The cops who’d helped them had been as good as their word and rushed her to the nearest hospital. When he thanked them, the man who’d recognized her shook his head.
“Mister, whoever you are, we owe you our thanks. The people of Russia owe you their thanks. Without Maria Tereshkova, this nation is lost.” He looked around to make sure no one was listening, “I cannot say more. I am a policeman. I could lose my job.”
Cris shook hands with both of them, and now the long wait was about to begin. Would she live or would she die?
She was in the OR room for the rest of the day, and most of the night. The bullet had come close to shattering her spine, and the high velocity assault rifle round skimmed the edge of her heart. By sheer luck, she’d avoided a life-threatening injury, although the massive blood loss almost killed her. When he reached the hospital, the rear seat of the police cruiser was a pool of her blood, and she was almost floating in it. The hospital, with typical Russian bluntness, initially refused to treat her. But the cops were still hovering, and made it clear they’d create a lifetime of misery for them if they didn’t cooperate. They cooperated.
Her eyes had opened for the first time that morning, just for a few minutes. She’d reached for his hand, and then fallen asleep again. Now she woke up and smiled up at him.
“I’m alive.”
“You’re alive,” he agreed, “How do you feel?”
“I suspect I feel much better than those men who tried to kill me. What happened?”
“They won’t be trying anything again.”
Her eyes showed her relief. “They are dead?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you for saving me, Cris. What happens next?”
He had a loose end to tie up, and he could deal with it right away. But he didn’t mention it to her.
“Your bodyguard, the guy they killed. They’re burying him tomorrow. I’ll be going along. Poor bastard, he didn’t deserve that.”
“He was a good man.”
He nodded.
Not good enough.
She frowned. “Cris, I must go, too. Where is it?”
“The Cemetery Vagankovskoya.”
“Of course, yes. It would be.”
“It’s not a good idea. The temperature outside is twenty below, and the snow is coming down hard.”
She gave him a fragile smile. “I’m Russian, or did you forget? At twenty below, we don’t even consider it’s cold.”
He grinned. “Okay, I’ll fix up for a nurse to go with you.”
* * *
The weather was every bit as bad as he’d predicted. Thick, heavy flakes of snow fell, and they'd buttoned her into two coats. In addition, she wore a Russian fur hat, and the nurse had wrapped two thick blankets over her. Yet still she shivered, and when they lowered the coffin into the ground, the tears flowed down her face in a small stream. Afterward, he took her back to the hospital, and she stayed there for another two weeks.
The day before she was due for release, Rhodes waited in line at Sheremetyevo arrivals. He’d hired a black Mercedes E220 and explained to the company he’d be meeting his American boss, who wanted his driver to look formal. They fixed him up with a chauffeur's peaked cap and dark-gray jacket. Wearing dark glasses, he was as anonymous as any of the other limo drivers waiting outside the doors. The man appeared almost on schedule and saw the notice board he was holding up. Gave him a nod of recognition, and Cris carried the man’s cases to the car and put them in the trunk. Opened the rear door for the man, and closed it when he’d seated himself inside.
He drove away, heading toward the center of Moscow. Passed the outer ring road, heading for the city, but he didn’t go all the way. Turn to the passenger.
“I’m sorry. I need to make a stop. This won’t take a minute.”
He didn’t look suspicious. Probably assumed he needed to take a leak, after all, it was a green and wooded area. Just the place a man could be discreet, and he continued thumbing through a sheaf of papers he’d taken from his briefcase. Cris pulled in next to the Cemetery Vagankovskoya and stopped. He climbed out and opened the rear door.
“Get out.”
The man looked up. “Excuse me?”
“I said get out.”
The pistol that had materialized in the hand of the chauffeur persuaded him to do the right thing. Cris pushed him through the gate and into the cemetery. They passed snow-sprinkled trees intermingled with gravestones, and he kept him walking until they reached the place. A freshly dug grave he’d located the previous day. He told him to stop.
“They buried a good man in the cemetery a few days ago. A man who gave his life to protect your ex-wife, and the mother of your son.”
Vasily Tereshkova didn’t get it. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“Why did you persuade her to come back?”
“I didn’t.” He shook his head, and fear had begun to seep into his eyes, “Why would I persuade her to come back?”
“Because your Kremlin pals told you to do it. Otherwise, they’d have threatened to cripple your business and ruin your life. They wanted her back to kill her, and you knew that.”
“No, no, I didn’t know. How could I? You don’t have any proof. It wasn’t me.”
“I have a friend back in the U.S., and he works for the FBI. He got me a complete printout of every call you’ve made from your mobile phone. I know who you called, and one number told me everything I needed to know. You called a man in the Kremlin by the name of Vladimir Ushakov. He contacted Pavel Stolypin, and that was all the information they needed to make her a target. She nearly died.”
“It wasn’t me. It wasn’t me.” A look of cunning came into his eyes, “Look, we can fix this. Tell me, how much do you want?”
Cris put a bullet in him, first one in the belly, to give him a few seconds to experience the agony his ex-wife had gone through, and then another between the eyes, to finish him before his screams attracted unwanted attention. The body slumped into the open grave, and he kicked enough earth over it to cover it from a casual glance. Then he returned to the Mercedes and drove away.
It took them a week to negotiate the formalities and visas for a return to the States, and when they arrived, they went straight to Brighton Beach. The winter chill had moderated a little, and she’d wanted to stroll along the sand. She still limped, suffering from the soreness in her injured back. He made sure not to favor his wounds. She had enough to worry about. Besides, his macho pride made him insist they didn’t hurt. They did hurt. Hurt like hell, but what is a man if he can’t display a good chunk of macho pride on occasion?
He was walking a pace behind her and talking to the boy. She sounded relaxed and happy, for the first time in a long time.
“It’s over, Alex. We’re staying here, in America. We don’t have to keep moving, keep running. Isn’t that right, Cris?” she said, tilting her head around to look at him.
“That’s right. We’re here, and we’re staying.”
“The bad men aren’t coming after us?” the boy asked.
“Not any more. That’s all in the past.”
She flashed him a grateful smile, and they walked on. If she was aware of the Browning Hi Power he carried under his coat, she hadn’t mentioned it. In any case she wouldn’t have known anything about the mini Uzi. He was always careful to keep it hidden, wearing a winter coat that was full cut and loose enough to disguise the lethal and easily concealed weapon. Nor would she have known about the Desert Eagle .50 caliber he carried in a holster in the small of his back. Cumbersome and heavy, but if they came again, it had enough stopping power to bring down a horse.
She slowed and put her arm around him. “Thank God it’s all over at last. We’re safe.”
He smiled to himself.
She deserves a chance to relax and enjoy life with her son. Why would I give her reason to worry?
“We’re safe,” he agreed.
But as she went to adjust the boy’s woolen scarf, he swept his gaze around the almost deserted beach, like he always did, every few minutes.
If they come back, I’ll be ready for them. I’ll keep her safe.
BLACK OPERATOR: THE SIBERIAN ASSASSIN
By Eric Meyer
Copyright 2017 by Eric Meyer
Published by Swordworks Books
www.facebook.com/ericmeyerfiction
Prologue
They approached the long, forbidding border. A bitter cold night, and the tires of the black Mercedes stretch limo crunched as they rolled over the hard snow-packed surface. Ahead lay the multiple razor wire fences of the frontier once known throughout the world as the Iron Curtain. In Finland, they viewed the fence in simpler terms. On their side, friendly territory, on the other, a hostile land. Enemy territory. Ready to pounce and gobble them up should the present incumbent of the Kremlin get a sudden whim for territorial expansion. The woman in the back seat spoke to her bodyguards, Mikhail Dennikin and Nikolai Mironov. They were gazing ahead, looking intently for threats.
“What do you see?”
Mikhail grunted. “Nyet. Nothing. We’re looking good.”
She knew Cris thought of them as Laurel and Hardy. Mikhail, a Stan Laurel lookalike, long, lean and most of the time he wore a morose expression on his face. Nikolai was the opposite, her Oliver Hardy. A chubby man, inclined to fat, and his expression was most often one of puzzlement. He gave the impression of being a shambling, lovable teddy bear. He was anything but. They weren’t comedians, either of them. Both men had trained in the Russian military, and they’d come to her highly recommended. Tough and competent, expert with a variety of weapons, and she knew they’d give their lives for her. What more could a bodyguard give?
She smiled her thanks and looked at the man sitting beside her. Cris Rhodes, former DEA agent. The man who'd almost single-handedly kept her alive, and free from the slavering jaws of the Russian bear. He had a lean, spare physique beneath the thermal coat, essential against the bitter cold outside.
He was about medium height, lean, with clear blue eyes, and dirty blonde hair, a man who moved with the fluid grace of a panther. Although he rarely lost the dark shadows in the eyes that were the window to his soul. A soul she knew had been permanently damaged during a DEA raid on a Colombian trafficker’s compound. Cris witnessed the killing of scores of innocent bystanders, mowed down by the narcos as they made their escape. He couldn’t take any more bloodshed, and he left DEA. He met up with Maria Tereshkova by chance, and he’d stayed with her ever since, guarding her against those men who would kill her.
"It looks quiet, Cris, don’t you agree?”
He wasn't fooled by her apparent calm. She’d spoken in a low monotone, almost as if the grim-faced guards waiting five hundred meters ahead could hear her words. Fear lay close beneath the surface. She was gambling with her life coming back, gambling with all their lives.
He was also scanning the border ahead of them. "No lights."
"Excuse me."
"I’d expect to see security lights around a border crossing. Take a look. It's in darkness. Why?”
She stared into the pool of darkness for a few moments and nodded. "Maybe they had a power failure. It's Russia. It's nothing new."
“Almost Russia. We haven’t crossed yet. Are you still sure you want to do this?”
There was no hesitation. “I’m sure. I must.”
“You know they won’t give up. They’ll try again, they have to.”
She turned sideways to face him. “This time it’s different. I have insurance, something to guarantee they won’t dare touch me.”
“Insurance?”
“My supporters have gathered a stash of documents, detailing the financial affairs of the President and his closest advisors. I have them in a safe place, and if anything happens to me, they go public.”
His stomach lurched.
Doesn’t she understand?
“Maria, they’ll intensify their efforts to kill you and recover those documents. You’re holding a gun to their heads, you’ve made it worse.”
“Not so. I’ve made them aware of the substance of this material, and they were scared enough to promise to leave me alone. I’ll be safe, Cris, so relax.”
“I still don’t like it. Look at this, they could be waiting for you right at the border. A power failure is something of a coincidence, don't you think?”
She gave a non-committal shrug, and he smiled at the habitual gesture. She was a looker, no question, with an external fragility that made him feel like she needed someone to protect her from the blows life threw at her, someone like him. A closer glance perceived the inner strength. The way she held herself with the poise of a ballerina, and the eyes keen and intelligent, probing and analytical, fragile on the outside, and sprung steel close to the surface.
He leaned forward to speak to the two bodyguards, Nikolai and Mikhail.
"There may be trouble ahead. Make sure you’re ready."
Nikolai turned and gave him a nervous look. "Cris, those are Russian border police up ahead. We can't start shooting if we don't like what we see."
Sebastian Kennedy, sitting in the jump seat, grimaced. “He’s absolutely right. We can’t show any weapons; these people represent legitimate authority. Maria would lose her credibility if she was party to opening fire on uniformed troops.”
Kennedy was Maria Tereshkova’s newly appointed political agent. A Brit, she’d recruited him because of his experience in media, and because he wasn’t a Russian.
