The 14th Colony: A Novel (20 page)

Conversation came through his headphones.

“The target is Zorin’s ahead,” Cassiopeia reported, staying with Danish. “But he’s close to the Mongolian border. They want the plane taken down before he crosses.”

The other fighter slid beneath them and dropped off a mile or so to port. He scanned the instrument panel, looking for a way to shift flight control to the rear cockpit. But he could not decide on the right switch. The jet shuddered as the nose dumped downward. He knew what was happening. The pilot was preparing to attack.

He watched the LCD display as the onboard systems searched. They were flying nearly due south and losing altitude, finally leveling off around ten thousand feet. He searched the sky, hard with stars, and saw the other fighter with Cassiopeia now about two miles off the port wing. He scanned south, his pupils dilated to their fullest, and caught twin pinpricks of light winking on and off, marking the outer edges of another aircraft. The specks grew larger as they drew closer.

Zorin’s plane.

More talk filled his ears.

Numbers flashed on the LCD, then locked on the panel. He didn’t need to read Cyrillic to know that the onboard radar had acquired a target. Before they’d left the ground he’d counted six hard points on the underbelly, none of which held air-to-air missiles. But the jet did carry two 30mm cannons.

“They’re waiting on orders from the ground,” Cassiopeia said in his ear.

He could just let this happen and be done with it. That would certainly end things. But something Zorin said back in the basement kept rattling through his mind. About when the USSR fell.
“No one gave a damn. We were left on our own, to wallow in failure. So we owe America. And I think it is time we repay that debt.”

We?

Was Zorin the only threat?

Or would killing him just empower the next guy?

Both jets flattened their approach and eased closer, centering the target for a quick kill with the cannons, which should draw little attention from snoopy radars. The outline of the aircraft ahead signaled Learjet or Gulfstream. Enough well-placed thirty-millimeter rounds would easily take it down. He decided to do something. But there was one problem. He had to disrupt both fighters simultaneously.

“Scan the instruments in front of you,” he said into his mike, keeping to Danish. “Is there one marked override? Control override. Something like that.”

“At the top right. It says
REAR CONTROL
.”

He spotted the switch, protected by a red guard. Doubtful that anyone here knew he could fly a high-performance jet, so he flicked open the plastic shield and decided,
What the hell, go for it.

The instant the switch engaged the stick in front of him bucked alive. The pilot immediately realized the problem, but he gave the man no time to react. He rammed the stick forward, then banked hard for the other fighter. They plunged across the sky and dropped altitude, his body thrust against the seat straps. Vibrations and a jarring series of snaps accompanied the sharp roll. The other fighter thundered past them, just below, the wake from the afterburners causing enough turbulence that the other pilot had no choice but to veer away.

Both planes were now in a retreating fall.

Neither one of them could take a shot.

He assumed Cassiopeia was not happy, since she was now hurtling through the sky in a series of steep twists and turns while her pilot regained control. Malone pulled his jet up in a steep climb, the engine sucking turbocharged air, climbing like an elevator, clawing for altitude. It would be only another moment or so before his host retook the controls. He arced over the top in perfect loop and started back down toward the other jet. He scanned the instruments and saw that the radar lock was gone. Lots of angry talk between the pilots filled his ears, and no knowledge of a foreign language was required to understand its gist.

These men were pissed.

He relaxed on the stick and allowed his body to resettle into the seat. Off the starboard side the other jet eased up, wingtip-to-wingtip. The tautness in his body relaxed. The flight controls were stripped back to the forward pilot.

Zorin’s plane was gone.

“I assume that was necessary,” Cassiopeia asked. “I came close to dumping my guts.”

“I enjoyed it,” he told her.

“You would.”

“I couldn’t allow them to shoot.”

“And I suppose you’ll explain all of that later?”

“Every detail.”

He heard more chatter between the pilots and the ground. He imagined there might be an even more physical discussion on the matter once they landed, which was fine.

“They’re not happy,” she said.

“Where’s my friend?”

“Across the border. They’ve been ordered not to pursue.”

Which made him wonder.

How much did the Russians know?

Only one way to find out.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

W
ASHINGTON
, DC

Luke had tried to coax Anya Petrova to talk more, but her silence remained unbroken. She sat calmly, her hands bound behind her back, duct tape binding her midsection to the chair. The blue-black bruise on her face had to hurt. But her eyes stayed devoid of expression, pressed into a steady, impersonal gaze, nothing about them giving off the look of someone trapped.

He stayed across the room, out of range, sunk back in one of the club chairs that faced the windows. He liked this spot, perhaps his favorite in the world, the place where he always unwound. The whole apartment was like a sanctuary to him. Petrova being here actually violated his “no women” rule. Sure, he dated and had his share of overnight visits, but never here, always at their place, a hotel, or out of town. He wasn’t sure why or how the rule had developed, only that it had, and he went out of his way to respect it. Not even his mother had visited, only Stephanie that one time just before Utah.

Normally he enjoyed the silence, but today the lack of noise seemed unnerving. He wasn’t sure what they planned to do with Petrova beyond squeezing her for information. She was a foreign national and their operation was off the grid, so their legal options were limited. His threat to her about prison was no more than that. Even worse, she could turn out to be one tough nut to crack. Luckily, all of those decisions rested with the White House, but time was running out on Uncle Danny.

A knock broke the quiet.

He stood and answered the door, expecting to see Stephanie. Instead, the SVR spy from the car, Nikolai Osin, stood outside, along with two other men. None of them appeared happy.

“I am here for Anya Petrova,” Osin said.

“And how did you know she was here?”

“Your boss told me. I told her that we would handle Ms. Petrova ourselves. Since no one wants an international incident from this, she agreed.”

Osin glanced past him, toward Petrova. “What did you do, beat her?”

“I assure you, she gives as much as she gets. You don’t mind if I check out your story for myself, do you?”

He’d deliberately not invited any of them inside.

“Do what you like, but we are taking Ms. Petrova with us.”

He glanced over and noticed that Anya was not all that thrilled. Still, why look a gift horse in the mouth? She was leaving, which was a good thing by any definition. Clearly, though, she had no love for her savior.

He found his phone and dialed Stephanie’s number. She answered immediately, he listened for a few moments, ended the call, then gestured for them to come inside.

“She’s all yours.”

*   *   *

Stephanie had never been fired before. There’d been many threats throughout her government career from both attorneys general and presidents, but none had ever manifested itself into an actual dismissal.

Until today.

Bruce Litchfield had obviously received the blessing of the incoming administration to do as he pleased. No way he would have been so bold without that okay. She could hear the new AG designate as he dismissed Danny Daniels as a man who, in only a matter of hours, would no longer matter. That was a big mistake. She’d learned that Danny would always matter, regardless of his political status. He believed in what he did and stood behind those beliefs—and politics be damned. He was a man she respected and admired and the new administration could take lessons from him.

She filled a doorway about a hundred feet from Luke Daniels’ apartment building, the wind whooshing by in chilly gusts. The four-story, redbrick building stood surrounded by a brown landscaped lawn and tall trees bare to winter. It sat off a busy boulevard in northwest DC, and no one had paid a visit during the past fifteen minutes. Except one car. A black Cadillac sedan. From which Nikolai Osin and two other men had emerged.

Luke had just called and she’d told him that he was to cut Anya Petrova loose and let Osin take her. She knew that Osin would play his part to perfection, which was why she’d made a call to him just after leaving Anderson House, explaining exactly what she had in mind. Her cagey colleague had complimented her on the plan and said he would head directly for the apartment and lay claim to their problem.

Anya appeared in the front door of the building, flanked on either side by two men in dark overcoats. Osin followed them into the early-afternoon sun. She watched as the entourage headed for the Cadillac, then drove away, disappearing down the short drive, past a tall hedge. She imagined Anya Petrova to be, at best, confused.

Luke stepped from the building.

She fled her shady hiding place and found the sun.

Luke walked across the front parking lot with the bouncy gait of an athlete and said to her, “You just let that happen?”

“I made it happen.”

“Care to explain? ’Cause it took a lot to corral that woman.”

“Fritz Strobl told me something interesting. Brad Charon was once the society’s Keeper of Secrets.”

She recounted what she’d learned.

“We created the post long ago,” Strobl said. “It was formally abolished in the mid-20th century, or at least that’s what I thought. About ten years ago I discovered the position still existed as part of the historian’s duties.”

“What does this have to do with the woman we have?”

“She knew Mr. Charon had held the Keeper position. Only a handful of individuals, high in the society’s leadership, would know that. Even I didn’t. Yet she did.”

Which raised a whole new set of questions, the most critical of which was, “Why is any of this important?”

“She wanted to know the current historian, and threatened to kill me if I did not tell her.”

“Strobl told her the man’s name and where to find him,” she told Luke. “He lives in Maryland, outside Annapolis.”

“And did dear ol’ Fritz mention why Petrova was so damn interested in the society’s long-lost secrets?”

“He told me he honestly doesn’t know. And I believe him.”

He pointed a finger at her. “I smell it. You have a plan, don’t you?”

“I do, but I have to warn you first. An hour ago, the acting AG fired me. I no longer have a job, so whatever we do from this point on is without sanction.”

Luke smiled. “Just the way I like it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Zorin decided on some rest before he began the serious task of planning what would happen once he made it to Canada. Fatigue melted through his bones, seeping into muscles. He wasn’t a young man anymore. Luckily, he had several hours of quiet time to rejuvenate.

Strangely, he’d been thinking of his mother. Odd considering she’d been dead such a long time. She’d worked her whole life as a farmer, and he could still see her kneeling in the rich black soil, the sun hot on her back, working the rows of cucumbers, tomatoes, and potatoes that sometimes swayed and rippled in the wind like waves of water.
Models of tidiness and efficiency,
was how Moscow described them. His mother simply called them her own. He’d loved the fields, the air there never thick with soot, coal, chemicals, or exhaust. Perhaps that was another reason he’d fled east to Siberia, where the same smell of cleanliness could still be found.

His mother had been a kind, gentle, naïve woman who never considered herself a Soviet. She was Russian. But she was smart enough never to be a troublemaker or instigator, keeping opinions to herself and living a long life, dying simply of old age. As a boy he’d gone with her to church because he’d liked the singing. He’d realized then that he was an atheist, a fact his mother never knew. Which was good, since God had occupied a large part of her life. Persistent, careful, hardworking, and loyal, that had been his mother.

And her humming.

That he’d enjoyed.

One of her tunes had stayed in his mind. A song from her childhood, the words of which she’d taught her sons.

A hare went out for a walk.

Suddenly a hunter appeared

And shot the hare.

Bang, bang, oh, oh, oh,

My hare is going to die.

He was brought home

And he turned out to be alive.

He’d loved that rhyme, and like the hare he, too, had gone out for a walk, one that had lasted for more than twenty-five years. He’d been figuratively shot and left for dead. But like the hare, he, too, was coming back alive.

He’d often wondered how he ended up such a violent man. Certainly not because of his mother. And his father, though once a soldier, ultimately proved weak and dependent, lacking in courage.

Yet violence was no stranger.

He’d killed and harbored no remorse. He’d ordered the death of the American back at the dacha without a moment’s hesitation. If he ever possessed a conscience, all semblances of it were gone.

Like his brothers.

Who married, had children, and died young.

And his own wife and son.

Dead, too.

Nothing remained for him save for Anya. But there was no love between them. More companionship that they both seemed to need. How was she doing in America? Perhaps he would find out soon.