Russian Law (Law Series ) (Volume 1) (17 page)

He
knew she would say that. Frankly he thought it was just an excuse on her part.
Fear of the unknown. His sister had never been much of an adventurer. In this
day and age of email and airplanes keeping in touch was easy. She was just
scared and refused to admit it to herself.

“You
could if you were willing to take the leap.”

Elena
crossed her arms under her breasts in a defensive gesture and glared at him.

“Don’t
start Dmitry.”

Dmitry
knew he wouldn’t be able to get through to her. She had built up a nice wall
around her heart and would most likely die before she would listen to reason.
Her Russian stubbornness really came out when she was cornered. He decided to
let the subject drop right after he got the last word in. 

Dmitry
shrugged. “Fine. Be an ostrich. The only one you’re hurting is yourself. I just
don’t want you to look back one day and say ‘what if’. I loved Nikolai Elena
but your life shouldn’t end just because his did.”

Chapter 18

Lucas
could smell
lavender. He slowly opened his eyes and blinked the cobwebs away. For a moment
he forgot where he was, he could feel the kink in his neck and attempted to
dislodge it. He wondered how long he had been asleep. His eyes felt gritty and
he raised his hand to his face and rubbed at his eyes to remove the sleep
before sliding his hand over his jaw. He felt the stubble poking his callused palm.
He looked over at Dmitry who amazingly looked as if he had slept for eight
hours, only the creases in his clothes and the five o’clock shadow darkening
the bottom on his face was any indication that that was not what had happened.

Elena
stood beside her brother. They were both at eye level now that Dmitry was
sitting, her light hair hung loosely about her shoulders. She was dressed in
dark blue jeans and a white fitted top, her delicate feet were bare and he
could see the light baby pink nail polish on her toenails. She was where the
lavender smell was coming from, another left over item from an ex-girlfriend
Dmitry neglected to throw away, that or he liked the scent which was currently
growing on Lucas as was the person who was wearing it.

“What
time is it?” he croaked. His mouth was dry from sleep. He ran his tongue over
his furry teeth. He really needed to spend some time on hygiene.

Dmitry
and Elena both looked over at him.

“Ten
thirty,” Dmitry replied after consulting the time and date in the taskbar of
his computer.

He
had had a good six hours sleep. He felt somewhat refreshed and the rest will be
solved by a hot mug of strong coffee. 

“We
thought it best to let you sleep,” Elena said.

Dmitry
rolled his eyes and discreetly pointed at Elena, indicating that it was in fact
her
that thought it best. The thought of Elena caring about him sent his
stomach into flips. It had been some time since anyone besides Jim or Maggie
had cared for his well being.

“Big
momma bear this one,” Dmitry said nodding towards Elena. “She wouldn’t let me
disturb you.”

Lucas
was wide awake now and got to his feet in one swift motion. “You found
something?”

Dmitry
nodded, looking pleased as punch. “I did indeed.”

Lucas
walked over to them trying to avoid smelling the alluring lavender. He frowned
at what he saw on the computer screen. There were several windows open on the
desktop and what he was seeing was a bunch of squiggly lines and Russian
characters. He knew he wasn’t the brightest bulb in the box but what the hell
was he looking at?

“Is
that everything?”

Elena
nodded. “Dmitry uploaded all the data about an hour ago.”

Lucas
once again took in the computer screen. Dmitry clicked the mouse a few times,
changing the image on the screen into a clockwise position and altering the
contrast of the pixels. Lucas soon recognized the image as a blueprint of an
old building set out in a long rectangle.

“Do
either of you recognize that building?” he asked of them.

Elena
and Dmitry both looked at each other and nodded.

“Well?”
he demanded, impatient now knowing that he was missing something.

“The
Winter Palace in St Petersburg,” Dmitry finally said.

Lucas
frowned, why put the detailed plan of the palace on a crystal for safe keeping.
Why was it so important, he assumed you couldn’t just get it anywhere but then
wasn’t it a tourist spot, famous for being the last residence of the royal
family or something? He never had been good at history. He was a ‘right now’
man.

“I
don’t get it. What would be the point of blowing up the Palace?” he wondered
aloud.

“Millions
of people visit the palace and connecting State Hermitage Museum every year. It
could just be the volume of people. You’ve said before Ducane has killed
before,” Elena pondered.

“I
just don’t feel like we’re on the right track,” he said.

Dmitry
asked the question they were all thinking. “Then why would Nikolai go to so
much trouble as to put it on the crystal?”

They
all stood there in silence until Lucas broke it, he squinted his eyes at the
scribble on screen. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing to tiny lettering.

Dmitry
used his mouse to make it bigger.

“It’s
a date, 7
^th
of November.”

Elena
frowned. “That’s today. Whatever Nikolai knew was going to happen is occurring
now.”

“What
else do you have?” Lucas asked Dmitry.

Dmitry
clicked his mouse button. He quickly sorted through the rest of the data he had
collected from the crystal. “Besides the map? An itinerary does that help? I
can’t make out any more.”

Lucas
frowned. “An itinerary?”

Dmitry
nodded.

“Zimtovich,”
Elena said softly. He could hear the disappointment in her voice. “That
bastard. He was selling information.”

Lucas
didn’t feel the need to comment, he had already figured that out long ago. What
he couldn’t wrap his head around was what it all meant. What did one get when
they added a schematic to a museum, an itinerary, a few dead Russians, a known
terrorist or two and a weapons trader. Frustrated he said, “For what though?”

Elena
turned to her brother. “Could you find out where this year’s UN summit is being
held and when?”

Dmitry
nodded. “Sure just give me a minute.” He pulled up
Google.ru
, Russia’s
Search Engine and started typing into the search field.

“What
are you thinking?” Lucas’s eyes didn’t leave her face. He could tell she was
onto something, her body practically vibrating with excited energy.

She
looked up at him. “I should’ve picked up on it before but my mind was locked on
Moscow.”

“What
are you talking about?” Lucas asked.

Elena
huffed out a deep breath. “Remember when you asked me why red flags didn’t come
up when Ducane entered the country and I replied that it was impossible to
monitor everyone at the moment?”

“Yeah
something about Grand Central Station and the UN Summit,” he replied, still
unsure as to what was going through her mind.

She
rolled her eyes at what he had taken away from their conversation. God that
seemed like so long ago rather than just the day before yesterday. So much had
happened since that time in her office.

“Yes,
delegates from all over have been flying into Moscow and St Petersburg for days
now, you were lucky to get a seat when you did.”

Lucas
thought about that. Luck wasn’t quite what he would call it but then it had led
him to Elena so it wasn’t all that bad. He heard Dmitry cuss. He was beginning
to remember the word. It seemed a favorite of Elena’s and apparently Dmitry’s.

“What?”
he asked.

Dmitry
turned to him. “The UN Summit is being held on November 7
^th
at four
pm at the Winter Palace in St Petersburg,” he announced. “It’s quite the
fanfare. The annual peace conference coincides with the anniversary of the
revolution.”

Lucas
couldn’t believe it, it was now all falling together thanks to Nikolai Nagregor
getting them the information from beyond the grave.

Way
to go out with a bang!

He
could visualize Nikolai standing there, confronting his assassin, gun in hand
saying, “Yippee ki-yay…”

“We
have to get there, what’s the fastest way to St Petersburg?” Lucas asked the
natives, slowly the pieces of the puzzle were coming together, unfortunately
not quick enough for his liking.

This
was why Michael Ducane was here and it made Lucas sick to his stomach. How many
people would lose their lives if he failed today? Hundreds? Thousands? People
who were trying to make the world a better place. That was the kicker and that
was why Ducane needed the Government mole, with such a high profile event,
security would be crawling all over the Palace. It would be hard to smuggle in
a bomb without the proper help.

Elena
answered, “Fly but I wouldn’t recommend it. SVR will be all over us.”

“That’s
not all Lucas,” Dmitry interrupted them, his voice foreboding.

Lucas
let out a long suffering sigh. Could things get any worse?

“What
is it?”

“Check
out who will be at the summit.”

Lucas
and Elena moved closer to the computer screen, Lucas only realizing now he
couldn’t read the Russian letters, so instead he watched Elena’s face frown as
she read. Dmitry put his finger on the screen, pointing to where she needed to
read. Lucas watched the blood drain from her face. Shell shocked she looked
over at Lucas who was preparing himself to catch her should she faint. He
figured a light wind would knock her off her feet.

“Well
who is it?”

“Sergei
Smirnov,” she whispered.

Lucas
raised an eyebrow, whoever this Sergei Smirnov was he was in big fucking
trouble.

“Our
President,” Dmitry elaborated. “And he won’t be alone, your President will also
be there. Air Force One just touched down in St Petersburg earlier this
morning.”

Fuck.
Lucas remembered Jim telling him about the President visiting but he hadn’t realized
it was so soon. This was not good. He had to talk to Fitzgibbon, let him know
what was the fuck was happening. Maybe he could do something from his end. Jim
was after all rather resourceful and hoarded favors like some people collected
baseball cards. He would have a contact somewhere that could surely warn the
Secret Service.

“We
have to get to St Petersburg.”

Elena
nodded. She had obviously been thinking the exact same thing. “We’ll have to
leave right away it takes approximately four hours by train from Moscow.”

Lucas
did the math in his head they would barely have enough time.

Dmitry
turned back to his computer and deftly brought up the railway’s website. He
typed quickly on the keyboard, found the tickets he was after and clicked on
‘buy now’ with his mouse.

“You
can’t use a credit card Dmitry, who knows how far SVR have gone with their
man-hunt,” Elena warned. “They might have flagged your information as well as
mine.”

“No
worries Elena,” Dmitry said as he continued to fill in the pertinent information
using aliases for Elena and Lucas. “I’ll just use the dummy account I set up,
untraceable even by the Russian Government.”

There
was a hint of pride in his voice, no arrogance, just fact. Dmitry knew he was
good and had the skills to back up the claim.

“Dmitry,
why do you have a dummy account?” Elena couldn’t help but ask. Her hands once
again going to her hips and her eyes narrowed. Oh boy. She certainly looked
pissed. Lucas would hate to be in Dmitry’s shoes right now. He had seen many
women pissed. Most of the time at him but the way Elena was looking right now
was way past his experience. She practically had steam coming out her ears.
This could turn into a long discussion. Lucas placed a gentle hand on her arm.

“Another
time?” he said and was relieved when she nodded. “Go get your things ready.”

Elena
went to retrieve her purse from the kitchen. Lucas gave Dmitry a level look,
the entire family was growing on him, he thought. God he had no hope.

“You
do realize you’ll be revisiting that subject when this is all over don’t you?”
he asked.

Dmitry
nodded solemnly. “You’d think she’d be happy since it’s come in handy in this
instance.”

“Women
Dmitry,” Lucas said, as if that was the explanation. “You can never really tell
with them.”

“Don’t
I know it, if it’s not a girlfriend it’s Elena. I get no peace. You have any
sisters?”

“No,
I’m an only child.”

“Lucky
you – some of the time, she can really be a blessing but she can also be a -”

They
broke off as Elena came back into the room, she sent Dmitry a glare who
promptly turned back to his computer and pressed the print button and announced
he was done.