Black operator complete.., p.36
Black Operator--Complete Box Set (Books 1-6), page 36
He put on a nervous grin. “When they told me what they were looking for, I said this would be the obvious place for her to hide it. She always had connections with this church.”
“You sold her out.”
“No! Please, you must listen to me. I didn’t know you’d be here, any of you. I just wanted to help them get the documents she’d copied on a USB stick.”
“They were her insurance, you bastard. Her leverage against the Kremlin, a way to keep her alive, and you were giving them to the enemy.”
“I didn’t know!” he squealed, “Honestly, don’t hurt me. I just wanted all this to end, and go home to England. How was I to know what these people were like?”
“You knew once they had the documents she was as good as dead.”
“No, no, we could have made a deal to keep her alive. They’ll listen to me. I know they will. Cris, just give me a chance.”
He shook his head in anger and disbelief. “It was you who told them when and where we’d be crossing the border.”
“I thought it was for the best,” he screamed, desperate to save his life.
Rhodes wanted to put a bullet in his head, but he couldn’t. Not in cold blood. Even if it was this coward who’d sold his boss to the Kremlin killers. He was about to slam the pistol on his head when he heard a shot, and then another. Along the passage, Katya stepped from the side room where he’d left Maria and the others. She saw Cris, and her gaze was cruel.
“Two of your friends are dead, and my militia are holding the others. Drop the gun, Rhodes, this is your last chance.”
“Maria, is she alive?”
A harsh chuckle, “She’s alive, yes, but not for long. Drop the gun.”
He stared at the muzzle of the pistol pointed at him, another GSh-18. The submachine gun was still in his hand, and he started to lower it to the floor. At the last second, he dropped flat and rolled to the side. Katya’s gun fired, and a bullet whistled past him. Sebastian screamed, and Rhodes aimed and fired the PP-2000 in a single, flowing movement. She dodged aside, into the robing room he’d vacated.
He kicked open the door of the room where they were holding Maria, aiming the machine gun at the four militiamen. For the second time, they lowered their guns. Mikhail was lying on the floor, and Peter was stretched out close to him, his face creased in pain. Yuri moved fast, grabbed a pistol from the floor, and looked at Cris.
“How do we handle this? Is she still out there?”
He nodded. “In the room across the hallway. Maria, are you okay?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, you’ll need this. Cover them. You, too, Yuri, I’m going to finish this.”
He knelt close to Schiller. “I need to borrow something, if you don’t mind.”
His lips twisted in a distorted smile. “I know what you want. Go ahead. They’re no use to me.”
He checked the pockets and found what he was looking for. Then he jumped to his feet and went across the hallway.
“Katya, come out. It’s over.”
“Fuck you. It’s over when Maria dies. If you think I’m coming out, you must be mad. I just used my cellphone to call for more troops. You’re screwed, Rhodes, you and that crazy woman Tereshkova. This time there’s no escape.”
“Let us go, and you can have it.”
A pause. “You mean that? You have it all?”
“Yes. It’s a small package that fits in the palm of your hand.”
“I know what a USB stick looks like. Very well, pass it to me, and I’ll give you five minutes to get away. After that, we’ll be coming for you, and I promise we’ll shoot to kill.”
“It’s a deal.”
The door opened a few inches. “Throw it in.”
“With pleasure.”
He pulled the pin, counted two seconds, and lobbed the grenade through the gap. He snatched the door closed and waited. The doors were solid hardwood, and although the explosion was so powerful it rocked building, the door held back the force of the grenade. He didn’t hear her scream and doubted if she ever did. He didn’t open the door, but when he looked around, Maria and Yuri had emerged to join him.
“Is that what I thought it was?”
“She’s gone, for good.”
She expelled a sigh of relief. “Thank God. It’s over.”
“No, it’s not over. There’s still Ushakov out there, and cops on the way. We have to leave, right now.”
“You know Mikhail is dead.”
“I know.”
A sigh. “This has cost too much. I wish I knew what to do, but I don’t. Cris, I just honestly don’t know anymore.”
“You need a rest. We’ll get out of Russia, and you can think it through. I’ll help you.”
“Thank you. How can we get out?”
“Same way we came in, across the border, but this time, we’ll make sure they don’t know our plans in advance.”
“And then? I’ll be out of Russia, with no way of fighting back against them.”
“What about me?” They looked at Yuri, “I don’t know where you’re going, but maybe you could use an expert hacker. I used to be the best.”
They looked at each other. “A hacker,” Maria breathed, “A man who can continue the fight from anywhere in the world.”
Cris nodded. “It makes sense. Yuri, you’re in.”
“Where exactly are we going?”
“Home, the United States of America. The greatest country in the world, and we have more computers there than you can shake a stick at.”
“I’ll need a high-end PC laptop. Very fast, with an ultra high-speed internet connection.”
“You may find a pilot useful, Rhodes. I know you can fly, but not like me. You know, fast getaways under fire, I’m your man, if you can get me fixed up. I’m not dead yet,” Schiller said.
He looked at Maria, who nodded.
“You’re on, both of you. Maria, let’s go. We still have a battle to fight. We’re going home.”
BLACK OPERATOR: THE MOSCOW ASSASSINS
By Eric Meyer
Copyright 2017 by Eric Meyer
Published by Swordworks Books
www.facebook.com/ericmeyerfiction
Prologue
They met on the outskirts of a small town named Glen Arbor. Set on the shores of Lake Superior, the picturesque place as you would expect of a resort town in winter, quiet and remote, without burying themselves in the middle of some sprawling National Park high in the mountains.
They represented a group called the Michigan Militia, rough men, tough, and many of them older, men with a mission. Cris and Maria had made the arrangement, using his knowledge and contacts to approach them, and promising her wealth to pay them an agreed daily rate in return for mounting an armed guard, a ring of steel around their hiding place.
They'd argued at first, and she'd insisted the threat was over.
“You know it’s safe. All the indicators say so, Cris.”
He nodded in agreement. The portents were good. Contacts in Moscow assured her that new orders had come down from the Kremlin. The hunt was over, period. They'd wearied of the chase, and shied from the negative publicity resulting from too many failures. The bodies of Russian Special Forces operators, SVR and FSB hitmen, and independent contractors were beginning to pile up, and awkward questions being asked. They'd decided it wasn't worth it. Warned her to stay away, and she'd be safe. He didn't believe it.
"Maria, they’ve said many things over these past two years, and all of them proved to be lies. Why would you believe them now?"
She said stared back at him, her pretty, pixie face relaxed yet eager for him to believe it. "Don't you see it makes sense, Cris? You've fought them off. Every attempt they've made to kill me, and you've won. You should savor your victory, and start to relax. Live your life, with me. For the first time, we can enjoy ourselves without fear of attack."
"I'll try," he replied, but he couldn't shake off the feeling of unease. The caution that had kept them alive during the long months of being hunted, and battling the different killers they'd sent against them.
She gave a decisive nod; "That's it, then. We can relax and live openly. Stop worrying about it."
"No." The way he said the single word was like a long statement brooking no room for argument.
"No?"
"That's right, no. It's too early, too soon. But here's what I will agree to. I'll find some people to look after us, and we’ll go somewhere remote, off the grid, with a bunch of men to patrol the perimeter and make sure we are safe. It's a compromise, Maria. Not everything you want, but at least you won't be looking over your shoulder every few minutes."
She didn't like it and argued at length, but in the end saw the logic and agreed. As a former DEA agent, Cris Rhodes had many contacts, both inside and outside the Agency. Both inside and outside the law. The men he contacted were on the fringes. The famed Michigan Militia, who vowed to keep the country safe from all those who would interfere with democracy, as laid down by the Constitution. The Constitution they swore to defend with their lives. But like most irregulars, they were always short of funds.
He called the local commander for Northern Michigan, Al Quinby. A weasel-faced, man with bowlegs, almost like he'd spent most of his life on horseback. Maybe he had, but Rhodes never saw him riding a horse. They met in a diner, and Quinby brought along his pal, a muscle-bound thug who claimed to earn his money as a fur trapper. He was a good old boy, and while they drank coffee, Stan Miles swigged can after can of Budweiser, although seemingly without effect. Both men carried AR-15 assault rifles openly, and Rhodes wasn't sure if that was legal in the state of Michigan. Then again, out in the boonies, who was there to argue with the Michigan Militia? A third man kept watch outside the door, and they'd introduced him as Mitch Mitchell. Cris shook hands, and said, "I guess Mitch is a nickname, because your family name is Mitchell."
He looked vacant. "Nope, that's all my mum could think of. My dad left the night before I was born, and I guess she couldn't give a damn what my name was. Thing is, she could write Mitchell, so that made it easy for her."
"Nice."
Rhodes gave up and entered the diner to speak with the other two men. They eyed Maria first, eyeing her slim, curvy body and pretty face. Everything about her screamed class, and he could see them working out how they could get into her panties, knowing they didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell. In the end, they got down to details.
"How many men?" Quinby asked suddenly.
"Twenty. I want all of them to be good with a gun, and we’ll rotate on and off duty every eight hours. That's eight men doing a shift and rest, rotating with the other eight, and for as a mobile reserve. Think you can do that?"
A shrug. "I can do anything. All I need to know is what you are paying."
He looked at Maria, and her return stare told him he could make any arrangement he chose.
"Two thousand dollars a day."
"You're kidding me. Five thousand."
Several minutes later, they agreed on four thousand a day, the contract to last for one calendar month. He did the math, working out that would stand her in at around one hundred and twenty grand and change. It would be worth it. Provided it kept her alive.
They were staying in a motel, and that night Al Quinby and Stan Miles brought around a minivan with darkened windows. They climbed in the back with their gear, Cris Rhodes, Maria Tereshkova, Peter Schiller, the pilot who'd flown them out of Russia, and Yuri Romanov. He was the hacker who'd help them escape from the gulags.
After driving several miles, they arrived at the cabin Quinby had put at their disposal.
"It's a militia safe house, and you can take it from me, nobody even knows it exists, so you'll be safe."
They went inside and unpacked. Cris and Maria shared a bedroom, and Yuri and Peter shared another. A third room was made available for the guards, more of a bunkroom, with rows of triple stacked beds. Yuri began setting up his laptop, with a cable fed through a gap in the planking to the outside to connect to his dish. He spent almost a half-hour tracking in on the satellite, before pronouncing himself satisfied. Al Quinby watched with interest.
"A satellite connection, isn't that expensive?"
"Not for me it isn't."
He looked puzzled. “We looked into that, installing a system for this place. The idea was to give us a connection that couldn’t be traced, and the price was astronomical.”
"If you hack into the system, it doesn't cost anything."
"You hacked into the system?"
He returned a flat stare. "Of course I hacked into the system. I'm a Russian. What else would I do?"
The wind sighed through the trees, and unusually for late fall, the temperature was almost mild. She was lost in thought, and he was watching the movements in the trees. The militiamen were doing their best, and although not all would have seen military service, most were silent as they patrolled the perimeter. He relaxed a fraction; confident everything possible had been done. They were off the grid, and they had protection. They had no reason to suppose the Russians had any way of knowing where they were. But they'd been in that situation before, and still they'd come. And Maria almost died.
Part of what she'd agreed to pay them was for the rest of the Michigan Militia to keep their eyes and ears open all over the state. That gave him a lot more confidence. If even a mouse showed its head out of its hole, they'd know about it. That was the theory. He watched two more militiamen emerge from the gloom, walk a few steps, and then disappear again. They were good, men who took their backwoods skills and survival training seriously. All were armed with semi-automatic or even automatic weapons. Legality wasn't their number one concern. Hitting power was, and if anyone came to challenge their view of America, they'd be ready for them.
"We just have to wait a little more time," he said, as much to himself as to her.
"And what do we do in the meantime? Stuck out here in the boonies, and if you think I'm going to learn how to fish in the lake, you can forget it. What else is there to do in a place like this?"
He looked at her. "I have a few suggestions."
She gave him a playful cuff. "Is that it, you have a one-track mind? You think we can spend the next month in bed, screwing like rabbits while the militia spend their time patrolling the woods."
"It's what they are paid for."
"I meant something more challenging."
"Getting you into bed wasn’t easy, not at first. It was a real challenge."
He dodged another blow. "I tell you what, tomorrow we’ll start survival training. Shooting, trapping, moving silently through the forest, just in case. We can even be separated, and you'd need to know how to navigate, how to aim and fire a gun…"
"I know how to aim and fire a gun."
He recalled she was right. She'd aimed the gun, fired a gun, and hit the target, which was an enemy.
"Okay, okay, and afterward, there’s still the nights."
This time she smiled. "We do what we do best. Cris, I feel a whole lot better. You know, I think we're going to be safe here, safer than we've been for a long, long time. Where do we start?"
He nodded his head in the direction of the bedroom. "In bed, right now. It's sack time."
The night had suddenly grown cold, and his newfound relaxation and sense of well being faded along with the afterglow of sex. Something wasn't right, and he listened keenly to what was going on outside. The wind picked up and whistled through the trees. Leaves rustled, and there was the occasional creek of the wooden cladding on the side of the cabin. Everything was noisy, and if they chose such a night to attack, they'd never hear them coming. They were relying on the Michigan Militia, and if they failed them, they'd be in deep shit. Deeper shit than they could imagine. Stuck out here, with nowhere to run.
* * *
Vladimir Ushakov was sitting behind his magnificent carved oak desk. The slim, fit Presidential aide always wore a look of supreme confidence on his handsome face. With good reason. He was a successful man, as testified by the tailored suit he wore, one of many. Power was one thing, but he felt the need to radiate power with his appearance. Her kept himself fit, working out in the Kremlin gym on a daily basis. His dark hair was always immaculately barbered, and he invariably wore a confident, easy smile on his lips, although not in his eyes. People said he was as cold as an Artic glacier, as cruel as a Siberian winter. He’d heard the gossip and did nothing to dispel their murmurings. Why should he, it was all true?
His office was inside the Kremlin, not too far from the office of the President. He was the President's gofer, a bit like the American President's Chief of Staff, but different. The Chief of Staff had a great deal of power, but it was limited by the President and the Constitution. Ushakov was under no such constraints. When his boss gave him an order, he was bound by a single instruction. Get it done. Nothing else mattered, his sole mission to expedite the President's orders, in any way necessary, and by whatever means. The man himself didn't want to know about the details. Only that the job was complete, in accordance with his instructions. Vladimir Ushakov was a faithful servant of the office of the President and rarely failed him. Except in a single matter.
His boss had badly wanted the usurper Maria Tereshkova killed. And he'd gone out of his way to make every effort to bring about that happy conclusion. Every time the men they'd sent had failed, and she'd escaped the bullet intended for her. Until now, when the President had called off the hunt. His only failure, and he hated to fail. Still, orders are orders. He turned over another document on his desk, read through it, and put his signature at the bottom. A man in Chechnya arrested for political agitation, and the local military commander wanted him condemned to death. He considered for a few seconds, and wrote a two-letter word at the bottom of the paper.
Da. Yes.
He picked up the next document and was interrupted by the buzzer of his intercom. "Yes? What is it?"
