Another Way to Kill Page 7

  “It might make it more complicated for somebody,” Dane said. “We take what little victories we can get.”

  ALEXANDER ARKADY arrived the next afternoon and unpacked his bags. He opened the hotel room window to let in the sea air and took a deep breath. Moscow may have been home, but even somebody as patriotic as he had to admit the world offered many glorious places to visit, and that the blue sky and ocean before him sure beat the overcast drabness of Moscow.

  He left the window open to let the air circulate through the room while he went to the casino. He was not good at table games of any kind, but he did enjoy slot machines, and played a succession of them to break almost even. The newer video machines were not as fun as the mechanical one-armed bandits he remembered from his youth, but they helped pass the time nonetheless.

  He stood and watched a busy craps game, staying well back from the fray and clinking the coins in his hands. A young woman was throwing the dice and having a grand old time as others at the table bet on her outcomes. Words like “hot table” and “let it ride” and “hard eight” came his way, but Arkady didn’t understand the lingo.

  “Some game,” said a man who came up beside the Hawk.

  Arkady turned. The man beside him was Cavallos.

  “Keep an eye on room 2112,” the Russian said. “Surveillance only.” Arkady passed Cavallos a duplicate key card to Trent’s room.

  Cavallos took the key and melted back into the casino traffic.

  Arkady went back to the slots. Putin had, without argument, granted permission for Cavallos and his wife to relocate to Russia at the close of their assignment. Perhaps he’d been more pleased at not having to pay the full twenty million, or he liked the idea of the pair’s being at his beck and call. As long as they completed their mission, they could settle down. Neither al-Qaeda nor anybody else would dare to move against them on Russian soil.

  Arkady returned to the slots and played until he lost his money. Easy come, easy go. There was always more money somewhere.

  He checked his watch. He and Trent had scheduled their preliminary getting-to-know-you dinner for that evening; he had two hours. The Texan might be a bore but Arkady would still go through the motions. If he had to pull a takeaway to make Trent nervous, he’d have to know when to start and, more important, when to stop. It was a lot to go through for just a performance, but he needed Trent to lower his defenses.

  JOHN BLAZE sat in a bar staring into his Scotch. Tonight was finally the night. He’d watched Trent the night before but found no opportunity to make a move. Now both Trent and Arkady were present and accounted for, and he had his action plan. A re-fabricated door card that would spoof any lock waited in his wallet.

  The past couple of days had offered little joy because of his foreboding about the job. Now he could get to work and find another place to unwind, perhaps find another Countess Fromme to impress.

  He finished his drink and left the bar, making the rounds of the restaurants on the pretext of looking for a friend. Helpful hostesses offered to assist but he politely declined. When he spotted Trent and Arkady dining at the steakhouse with no documents present at the table, he knew the perfect time to strike had arrived.

  His shoes tapped on marble tile as he headed for the elevators. Stepping in with a trio of tipsy women laughing about a private joke, he made his way to the twenty-first floor and entered the quiet hallway.

  In front of the elevator was a small sitting area.

  A woman, alone, occupied a seat, reading a magazine. She had short hair and wore a blue cocktail dress that fit tightly over her svelte curves. She paid him no attention.

  Blaze gave her a quick glance as he turned right and walked down the hall. He took out his wallet and removed the copied door card. When he reached Trent’s room, he slipped the card into the lock and waited. Presently the red light on the door unit turned green and the lock clicked. Blaze entered the dark room and shut the door behind him, throwing the secondary hook lock as an extra hedge of defense against Trent’s sudden return.

  A pocket pen flash led the way to the room’s electronic safe, which sat on the carpet near the dresser, bolted to the floor and the wall. Almost as easy to pick as the door, Blaze thought, grinning as he got to work.

  From under his jacket, Blaze removed a rectangular leather case about six inches long. He unzipped the case and removed a plastic rod with a wire at one end that had a USB port attached. Next, Blaze took out his iPhone and plugged the USB into the side. The phone screen lit up. He removed a side panel near the top of the safe with a small screwdriver, also taken from the leather case. He slid the plastic rod into a hole, stopping halfway. The phone screen showed a series of numbers cycling like one of the slot machines in the casino. Blaze left the phone, went into the bathroom and splashed some water on his face. No matter how many jobs he pulled, he always ended up soaked with sweat. He already felt his shirt sticking to his torso. Blaze returned to the safe. One number on the readout had stopped at five. Three more numbers to go.

  THE WOMAN in the hallway sitting area, Roxana Cavallos, took out her cell and called her husband.

  “Somebody not Trent is in Trent’s room.”

  “Be right up.”

  Roxana replaced the phone in her purse, wedging it next to a silenced 9-millimeter Walther P-5 pistol.

  BLAZE WIPED his face with a towel and took deep breaths as the numbers on the iPhone screen continued to cycle. The second number, four, solidified; two remained.

  ROXANA STARTED tapping her feet with eyes fixed on the length of the hallway. The camera in the upper corner above the elevators meant that overt action against the intruder when he reappeared was out of the question. If Marco didn’t get here, she’d have to let him go, and that could wreck the whole job.

  The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Marco Cavallos stepped out and said, “Let’s go.”

  Roxana rose from the chair and the two of them moved down the hall.

  Roxana took out her P-5 as Cavallos removed the duplicate key card handed to him earlier by Arkady. They reached 2112. No light spilled from under the door. Cavallos slipped the card into the slot. The lock clicked. Cavallos pushed the door open but it jammed, caught on the secondary hook.

  “Back,” Roxana said. Cavallos complied. Roxana raised her pistol and fired. The doorframe splintered at the base of the hook and she shoved open the door, the P-5 leading the way. Cavallos followed with his own silenced Browning in his right hand.

  THE NUMBERS on the display showed three with one to go.

  Blaze wiped his face again.

  Not much longer. He took a deep breath and willed the software to go faster.

  The door lock clicked; it started to open, stopping solidly on the secondary hook. Blaze jumped back from the safe, drawing a .25 Beretta from under his jacket. A silenced shot shattered the doorframe, breaking the hook loose, and the door swung inward.

  The light of the hallway outlined the two new arrivals, and Blaze recognized the woman. She braced against the wall and leveled the snout of the P-5 but he fired first. The little .25 popped twice. The woman screamed and recoiled back, her male counterpart stepping in front of her. Blaze tightened his trigger finger but the automatic in the other man’s hand thumped first. The first round tore through Blaze’s chest; the second snapped back his head. Finally, he collapsed onto the carpet.

  CAVALLOS KNELT beside his wife. She pushed up from the floor.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Your face.”

  “Bits from the wall.” She found a bathroom towel to wipe the cuts. Both .25 slugs had missed but gouged the wall.

  The iPhone plugged into the floor safe beeped. Cavallos punched the four numbers into the keypad and wrenched open the door. He took the items inside, mostly papers and a laptop. The laptop rode in a carrying case, and Cavallos jammed the papers inside the case as well. He threw the case over his shoulder.

  Cavallos and his wife beat it, using the stairwell, which didn’t have th
e camera coverage that the elevators had. Roxana kept the blood-spotted towel against her face. They entered their floor and Cavallos led his wife back to their room.

  She sat on the bathroom counter while he examined the cuts on her face.

  “No stitches needed,” he said. He dipped cotton balls in some alcohol and cleaned the cuts, his wife wincing, then he applied three small Band-Aids and she went to lie down.

  Cavallos picked up the carrying case and told her he was going downstairs to see Arkady and Trent.

  THE QUIET trickle of water from the steakhouse fountain couldn’t overcome the buzz of conversation.

  Trent waited nervously at the table, a glass of ice water and a Jack and Coke in front of him.

  He kept going over in his head how not to act too desperate. If he looked desperate, and talked desperate, he’d look weak and Arkady would pass. He’d seen such rookie mistakes a hundred times. He’d even done it himself, in his salad days. The Russians didn’t need to know how badly he needed the business.

  When the man in black with the pronounced nose approached the table, Trent, all smiles, rose with an extended hand.

  “Hello, Alexander, it’s great to finally see you.”

  “Mr. Trent, good evening.”

  Trent didn’t break stride. He waved over the passing waiter and Arkady ordered coffee. They sat down.

  “You want to spice that joe with something stronger?” Trent asked.

  “I don’t drink alcohol.”

  “I started sneaking Dad’s whiskey when I was ten and we were fishing on weekends.” Trent let out a low laugh and hoped it didn’t sound forced. It sure felt forced. “I hear you’re an excellent fisherman yourself.”

  Arkady’s coffee arrived. The Hawk finally cracked a smile. “My best catch was a seven-pound bass my president and I caught while on a U.S. visit. He didn’t catch anything near that size, so he ‘borrowed’ it for a photo op.”

  Trent suppressed a laugh when he realized Arkady was no longer smiling.

  “Bet it tasted great.”

  “There is no better seafood than fresh-caught bass.”

  “Well I hear the salmon at this place is good,” Trent said, consulting the menu. “The sky is the limit, anything you want.”

  Arkady examined the menu, flipping pages. “You fish when not working?”

  “Oh, when Dad died I pretty much gave up fishing. I got into model railroading after that.”

  Arkady lowered the menu, eyebrows raised. “Really? I have a railroad set at my home. Wonderful pastime.”

  “When you visit my place in Texas, I’ll show you mine. I have a room with three train layouts. I get lost in there for days.”

  Arkady smiled and his eyes genuinely lit up.

  Trent kept his cool and returned his attention to the menu. “The sirloin sure sounds nice.”

  “I may just try the salmon you speak so highly of, Mr. Trent.”

  “Please, call me Theo.”

  Arkady lowered the menu to lean forward a little. “I think we’ll get along just fine, Theo.”

  “WELL HE sure cracked the ice fast,” Dane said.

  He and Nina sat in a corner booth of the steakhouse with a view of Trent’s table.

  “I’m stunned,” Nina said. “That’s the Hawk.”

  “Who?”

  “Alexander Arkady, Putin’s Mr. Fix It. All the dirty jobs go to him. Colder than Butte, Montana, in the dead of winter.”

  “Did you work with him?”

  “Yup.”

  “Better put a bag over your head.”

  “It’s been long enough that he won’t recognize me.”

  “Wanna bet?”

  “Well, you might be right. His crew had a nickname for me.”

  “Dare I ask?”

  “Let’s save that for the exciting climax, dear,” Nina said.

  “What are they talking about?”

  “Whatever it is, you can bet Arkady’s on a mission. And that means he doesn’t have anybody’s interest in mind but Russia’s.”

  “Which means Putin.”

  “Yup. Pooty-Poot is up to no good, as usual, and your country is dumb enough to let him get away with it.”

  Dane said, “I’m not.”

  7

  When You Anger Your Country

  THE FOOD arrived and the strong aromas awoke an appetite Trent didn’t realize he had. He cut into the fillet with gusto as the waiter refilled Arkady’s coffee, and brought Trent another Jack and Coke. “Tell me more about your device,” the Hawk said.

  “Basically, my weapon sends a concentration of focused energy at a target,” Trent said. “Your people worked on particle-beam technology in the ’70s and ’80s, right?”

  “It was unstable and too expensive. How is direct energy different?”

  “We’re not using electromagnetic fields to produce the energy burst,” Trent said. “That’s where your instability came from. Too much juice and not enough control. It would spill instead of flow. What my system uses is similar to a buildup of pressure followed by a release.”

  “I don’t understand,” the Russian said, and chewed a small piece of salmon. His eyes stayed focused on Trent.

  “Say you have a pipe controlling the flow of water or steam. Steam might be a better example. The steam needs to vent. If something blocks that ventilation, pressure builds. Eventually the pipe or a blow-off valve lets go and you have to plug the rupture.

  “My DEW works the same way. The exact system is classified but when the weapon is activated, the stored energy builds to a level where it finally shoots out at a target. Inside the machine we have six lasers that concentrate into one beam, like the Death Star in Star Wars.”

  “I don’t watch movies.”

  Trent laughed. “I’ll show you how it works in a video. You can’t see the beams, but I can describe it. Now, this weapon will give you an incredible advantage on the battlefield. You already know, I’m sure, that the U.S. Navy has a similar weapon on some ships, but this will be one you can deploy on the ground.

  “We’re talking speed-of-light engagement,” Trent continued. “For the first shot, the energy needs to build up, takes a few seconds. Follow-up shots are faster. You can operate with two guys in a truck, but we’re working on a movable platform and, of course, making the components smaller.”

  “What about collateral damage?”

  “Almost none. When you have a pinpoint beam, there’s no missile or shell to go astray. Cheap, too. About a dollar a shot. Have you seen the cost of a missile lately?”

  The Hawk shrugged.

  “The beam, by the way, is really slick. Three nanometers in diameter.”

  “I have no idea what a nanometer is.”

  “It’s one billionth of a meter. Very thin. Like I said, aim at the target, hit only the target.”

  “What range?”

  “About a mile.”

  “That’s not terrible.”

  “Not as good as we’d like, but the science, right now, says we can’t go any further without creating the instability of the old particle beams.”

  Arkady nodded. Trent chewed his steak and looked over the Hawk’s shoulder at a tall man coming quickly to their table.

  “Who is this?”

  Arkady turned to look. “Marco?”

  Cavallos, carrying the laptop case, pulled an empty neighboring chair over and sat down. He placed the bag on the table and turned to Trent.

  “Be more careful,” Cavallos said. Then to Arkady: “Somebody broke into the room and started cracking the safe.”

  “And?”

  “The thief is quite dead.”

  Cavallos glared at Trent once again before leaving. The bundle remained on the table.

  Trent’s appetite vanished. He put down his fork. “What does—”

  Arkady waved off the comment and ate some more. “This is what happens when you anger your country, Theo.”

  “THAT WAS interesting,” Nina said.

  “Marco C
avallos,” Dane said. “Reporting to your Russian friend, how nice.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “He and his wife are freelance do-anything mercenaries who ran with Spanish anarchists way back when. Sort of the bad-guy version of you and me, except the woman doesn’t talk as much.”

  She kicked him under the table. Dane stifled a groan and ate a piece of steak.

  “I think something awful has happened to our friend Blaze,” Dane said.

  Nina sipped her wine. “Uh-huh.”

  “Shame. Two mil would have been nice.”

  “Should we find out what makes his murder worthwhile? Maybe blow up some laser guns?”

  “Sure,” Dane said.

  TRENT, SHAKEN by the news, was in no shape to finish the dinner meeting.

  Arkady paid the check and, holding on to the laptop case, led Trent back to his room. The Texan stood frozen in the hall. Arkady led him fully into the room and shut the door. Trent leaned against the bathroom doorway.

  “Here’s what happened,” Arkady said. He moved around the room with ease, almost ignoring the dead man on the floor and the blood soaking into the carpet. “Our friend had a partner. They cracked the safe and one shot the other, escaping with your documents.”

  The blood drained from Trent’s face. “But—”

  “It has to be reported that the documents were stolen. Your government has to believe it was a successful robbery. Then they will hunt for the other thief.”

  “But—”

  “Trust me, Theo. This sort of thing is my job. Now, pick up the phone and report this. I’ll come see you in a few hours.”

  Trent moved on weak knees to the bed. He kept his eyes purposefully away from the dead man. Sitting on the bed, he was at least shielded from the body.

  “Don’t take too long, Theo,” Arkady said as he slipped out.

  WITHIN MINUTES of his call to the desk, security flooded Trent’s room, everybody excited and speaking hurriedly in French, with Trent in a corner giving a statement to the only member of the security staff who spoke English. When the police finally arrived, he gave his statement again, seeing Arkady in his mind’s eye as he spoke, following the Russian’s coaching to the last word. He even started to believe it himself.