Evil Deeds (Bob Danforth 1) (43 page)
Read Evil Deeds (Bob Danforth 1) Online
Authors: Joseph Badal
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, #Thrillers, #Spy Stories & Tales of Intrigue, #Espionage
His escape route out of the United States would have been trying even for someone in excellent health. West Virginia, then Mexico, Spain, and finally Belgrade. But Vitas realized he was in far from excellent shape. His fever would spike, then the chills would start, and then he’d feel the fever again. He stumbled on the tarmac at the small airstrip outside Belgrade. One of the pilots on his private aircraft caught his arm.
Vitas grunted at the man, pulled his arm free, and walked unsteadily toward the square block building that served as the flight center. Got to get some rest, he thought. But first I need to see a doctor. This leg is killing me.
He limped into the building and slowly made his way across a cracked tile floor toward the exit door on the opposite side. He had been here before and knew the structure was no more than ten meters across, but the walk to the exit door felt like a journey through a tunnel with no end.
“Artyan! Over here.”
Vitas looked around, trying to find who had called his name. There were only three people in the building, but their faces blurred as though seen through a distorted lens. It wasn’t until Luka, the President’s driver, slapped him on the back that Vitas recognized him.
“What are you doing here, Luka?” Vitas asked. “Some bigwig flying in?”
“No one bigger than you, Artyan. The President sent me to pick you up.”
“How the hell . . .?”
“Our Washington Embassy told us you would be on that plane.” He jerked a thumb toward the Gulf Stream resting on the tarmac. “I’m your welcoming committee.”
“Luka, I never thought I’d be happy to see your ugly face. Where’s your car? You must take me to a doctor.”
“What’s wrong?” Luka asked.
“I’ll have to wait for the doctor to tell me.”
Vitas couldn’t keep up. Luka had to keep stopping to wait for him.
“You look like crap,” Luka said. “Why are you limping?”
“It’s a long story, my friend,” Vitas said, not offering any further explanation.
Luka shrugged.
Vitas followed him through the terminal doors and slid into the front seat of the bulletproof sedan parked at the curb.
“You have a doctor you want to see or will the President’s physician do?”
“Sounds fine.”
Vitas closed his eyes and pressed the side of his face against the car window. The glass cooled his cheek. While they drove along Belgrade’s rutted roads, the only sounds were the thump-thump-thump of the tires.
How do I tell the President I failed? Vitas thought. A spasm of pain suddenly shot into his thigh, and he rubbed the swollen area around the wound, noticing that his pant leg was damp. “That Danforth bitch,” he murmured.
“What was that?” Luka asked, taking his eyes off the road for a moment.
“Nothing!” Vitas said, bringing his hands to his face and rubbing his weary eyes.
“That stink? What is it?” Luka asked, wrinkling his nose.
Vitas ignored the question. That’s one of the reasons he needed to see a doctor. He’d noticed the odor coming from the wounds in his leg for the past three days.
The sun’s upper edge peeked over the eastern hills. Michael got his first real look at one of the results of the Serb government’s ethnic cleansing campaign. Thousands of people spread before him in a valley bisected by the road. Their crying and wailing sounded like thousands of bleating lambs. Gaunt, dirty, and dispirited, possessing only what they could carry, they formed a human river from one end of the valley to the other, waiting to be processed through to an uncertain future in Macedonia.
Michael ordered the supply vehicles to line up in a muddy field fifty yards off the road. He split his unit into four-man teams, with each team guarding one of the twenty two-and-a-half-ton trucks. He anticipated a riot when the starving refugees discovered food, water, medicine, and other supplies had arrived. But they surprised him by queuing up in an orderly manner.
After each truck was emptied, it returned with its guards to headquarters to be reloaded.
As the sun rose higher, the temperature grew so hot that he told his men to shed their fatigue blouses. He shed his blouse as well. He looked at the refugees’ faces while they waited for food and water. Their expressions didn’t change at all, even when they received supplies. Michael realized he was staring at despair.
“Let me through. I must see the American officer.”
The strident yell reached Michael where he stood in the back of a truck. He saw two of his soldiers holding an elderly man by the arms. He looked at Hunter, the Red Cross representative, and said, “I’m going to find out what the commotion’s all about. Be right back.” He jumped down from the back of the truck and walked over to his two soldiers and the man they’d detained.
“What do you want?” Michael asked the elderly man.
“I have important information. But I will only give it to an American officer.”
“Search him,” Michael ordered.
“He’s clean, sir.”
“Okay, let him go.”
“Are you an officer?” the man asked, looking at Michael’s olive drab T-shirt.
“Yes,” Michael answered. “A Captain, United States Army.”
“Can we talk away from the others?”
Michael followed the man for a few yards. “This is far enough. What do you want?”
“What would you say if I told you I had two hundred pages of signed eyewitness accounts of atrocities committed by the Serbs?”
“I’d say I would take you to my superior officer and let him deal with it. But first, who are you?”
“Stefan Radko.”
Michael felt a sudden excitement rush through him. “How do you spell your last name?”
“R-A-D-K-O. Radko.”
“Do you have a daughter named Miriana?” Michael asked.
Stefan’s eyes widened with astonishment. “How do you know my daughter’s name?”
“We met in the United States. Are her mother and brother with you here?”
“She is alive? Miriana is alive?”
Michael smiled. “Yes, she’s very much alive.”
“Where is she? Is she well?”
“She’s in the Washington, D.C. area. And, yes, she is quite well.”
“How can we see her? We must find a way–”
“I’ll take you to someone who knows about those things,” Michael said. “You can discuss it with my commander when you hand over the information you said you have.”
Radko nodded.
Michael watched the man’s eyes narrow. A cunning, almost feral look came over his face. “There is a price for my information,” Radko said.
Michael remembered Miriana had said her father was a sonofabitch. Now he decided to see how big an SOB he really was.
“I’m a soldier, not a deal maker,” he said.
“It is not money I want,” Stefan replied, a hint of impatience in his tone. “I want my family taken away from here. And I do not mean put into a refugee camp. I want us to be taken to America and reunited with Miriana. That is my price.”
“Where’s the rest of your family?”
“About a mile north of here.”
Michael paused for a moment. Then he told Radko to wait, and walked back to the truck where Hunter distributed supplies to refugees. He pulled the Red Cross leader aside. “I need to go up the road. Why don’t you come with me? We’ll bring one of the loaded trucks along. Could take a little pressure off this site.”
“Okay,” Hunter said. “Give me a minute to tell one of my people.”
While Michael waited for Hunter to return, he looked up at the soldier standing in the truck’s cargo bay, rifle slung over his shoulder. “Kennedy, toss my fatigue shirt down here.”
“Sure thing, Captain,” the soldier said, reaching for Michael’s shirt and tossing it down to him.
When Michael had it on and buttoned, he walked back toward Radko. He thought about Colonel Sweeney’s warning, but he figured that as long as he didn’t actually cross over into Serbia, he’d be okay.
“Are you ready, Mr. Radko?”
Instead of answering, Stefan gaped at Michael. He seemed to be staring at Michael’s fatigue shirt. At the name strip sewn over the pocket.
“Well, well, you have come back to us, Artyan. What has happened to you? You look
siv
. Are you not feeling well? Please sit.”
Vitas glanced around the President’s large office, with its Oriental carpet and expensive-looking furniture. He sat in a leather chair across the desk from the President and thought about how nice it must be to give orders to others who have to do the dirty work.
“I feel as gray as I look, Mr. President,” Vitas said, in a slow, weak voice.
“Can I offer you some tea?”
“
Da, molim
. I would appreciate it.”
The President nodded to an aide who immediately left the office to fetch it.
“Luka tells me he took you to my doctor yesterday. What did that quack say?” the President said in a solicitous tone.
“Oh, you know doctors! He took some blood and said he would have tests done. He insists I have an infection of some sort. He gave me a shot and some salve to put on my leg.”
“Good! You must do whatever the doctor tells you to do. He has always kept me healthy and strong.”
“Yes, sir.”
The President looked at him sternly and suddenly changed his tone. “What do you have to report from America?”
Vitas gulped. “I found the Gypsy girl in the United States and questioned her,” he said. “She never implicated any others in the General’s kidnapping.”
“What was the Gypsy girl doing in America?”
“The CIA had her under protective custody.”
“Bastards! What did you do with the Gypsy girl?” the President asked, a leer on his face.
Vitas opened his mouth to answer, but the aide returned carrying a brass tray. While the aide place two glasses of tea on the desk, the President paced the room, his hands clasped behind his back. By the time the aide left, Vitas had decided to tell the truth – with only a few embellishments.
“Well,” the President said, “what about the Gypsy?”
“She escaped.”
The President’s eyes became slits, boring into Vitas. “She’s alive?”
“Yes, Mr. President. But–“
“No buts, Vitas,” the President boomed. “What about the man who planned the kidnapping?”
Vitas hung his head like a shamed schoolboy. “I had him – Robert Danforth. His wife, too. Tied up in their home. I was about to kill them. But a CIA assault team stormed the house. I had to leave them.” He glanced at the President, hoping to see some sign of understanding.
The President’s face reddened. Vitas thought the man’s eyes might pop out of his skull.
“Twice you failed me,” the President roared. “You didn’t kill the girl. You didn’t kill this man Danforth. I asked you to bring me vengeance, and all you’ve brought is excuses!”
Vitas swallowed. The next few moments would decide his fate. “I had to get out of there. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you the best news. You can exact revenge in a way worse than death for the Gypsy girl and Danforth.”
The President looked skeptical. “There’s nothing worse than dying,” he said.
Vitas knew that to be false. He had put many victims through pain so severe they begged for their own deaths. But he didn’t think this was the time or place to debate the point. “Yes, Mr. President,” he said. “Except for one thing: the vicious murder of a loved one. You see, the Danforths’s son and the Gypsy girl’s lover are one and the same man. He is an American soldier. The American press has reported that his unit, part of the 82nd Airborne, is with NATO forces in Macedonia right on our border.”
A light seemed to go on behind the President’s eyes. His complexion lost some of its lurid redness. “Who exactly is this man?”
Vitas surpressed a smile. “Michael Danforth, an Army Captain.”
“You aren’t making this up, Vitas?” the President asked suspiciously.
“No, Mr. President. It’s the truth.”
“So what do you propose doing?”
“Excuse me if I am being presumptuous, Mr. President. But I suggest you send a SPETSNAZ unit to snatch young Danforth. We will claim we found him on Yugoslav soil, then execute him as a spy.”
The President put his hands to his head and rubbed his temples with his fingers. He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I have a better idea. Why just kill him? We’ll kidnap him and let his parents and the girl know that we have him and that he’s being tortured. But officially we’ll deny it. We can make them suffer forever.”