That Time in Moscow Read online

“Wolfgang, let’s go!”

  Edric appeared from his bunk room, dressed in a premium business suit, matched with leather shoes and gold cufflinks. Lyle was similarly dressed. But when Wolfgang stood, he saw Megan appear from the bunk room, and the breath caught in his throat. She wore a conservative women’s pantsuit with a white blouse and no jewelry, yet somehow, the fitted garment made her look more glamorous than a ball gown would have. She’d pulled her hair up into a bun and applied only a little makeup, all to downplay her appearance, he figured.

  It wasn’t working. At least, not with him.

  “Carry the bags,” Edric said, motioning to the stack of suitcases near the door. They contained clothes for appearance but housed Lyle’s laptops and the communications equipment they would need. If the Russians searched the bags and found anything, it could be dismissed as equipment for Wolfgang and Kevin—the banker’s security detail.

  “How’s it feel doing the grunt work?” Kevin asked as he and Wolfgang scooped up bags.

  During their last two missions, Wolfgang had assumed primary roles alongside Megan, leaving Kevin to perform backup functions. Kevin wasn’t pleased with the arrangement and wasn’t shy about saying so.

  “Oh, you know me, Kev. Happy to save the world in any capacity.”

  The airlock on the door hissed, then swung open, and the automatic staircase descended toward the tarmac.

  Wolfgang stumbled back, the air frozen in his lungs as a gust of Russian wind tore into the plane. It wasn’t just cold—it was hard and sharp, like a baseball bat being rammed down his throat and smacked against his lungs. He gasped for air and swallowed, then watched as Edric ducked through the door and stepped down the stairs as if he were disembarking onto a Caribbean island.

  “Holy cow,” Wolfgang muttered. He glanced at Kevin and knew his fellow operator wanted to make a snide comment but was too busy recovering from the cold himself.

  They stumbled after the others, down the stairs, and toward the stretch limousine waiting twenty yards away. It was black, built out of an elongated Hummer, and its tires were caked with packed snow and ice. Exhaust fumes gathered beneath the rear bumper.

  “Put the bags in the back,” Edric said, motioning without meeting Wolfgang’s eyes.

  He followed Kevin to the rear, while the limo driver hurried to open the door for Edric, Megan, and Lyle.

  Wolfgang fumbled with the bags as his fingers turned numb. Even through his thick cotton pants and his favorite peacoat, the wind sliced through him as though he were naked. “I take it back,” he said. “Grunt work sucks.”

  Wolfgang hurried to shut the rear door, but Kevin stuck his arm up and blocked it.

  “Are you screwing my sister?” Kevin’s eyes were as cold as the wind, and his tone cut just as much.

  Wolfgang blinked. “What?”

  “You heard me. Are you screwing my sister?”

  “No.” Wolfgang dusted snow off his shoulders and turned toward the limo door.

  Kevin caught him by the arm and turned him back. “I’m watching you, Wolf. I see the way you look at her. You’re a good operator, and you cut me a break back in Paris, but you leave my sister alone, you hear? Back off.” Kevin slammed the rear door, still glaring Wolfgang down, then walked past him and slid into the limo without a word.

  Wolfgang was stunned. For a moment, he forgot about the cold and thought about Megan. The depth of her grey eyes and the way her mouth twitched when she tried not to smile. Kevin was Megan’s half-brother, and while they shared nothing in the way of resemblance or personality, it was no secret he was protective of her.

  He can back off.

  “Wolfgang! Get in here.” Edric shouted from the limo.

  Wolfgang shrugged off Kevin’s aggressive warning and ducked inside the car. The interior was warm, with plush leather and a minibar with thermoses of hot Russian tea. Edric, Megan, and Lyle sat in the rear, stiff-backed and indifferent to their security detail. Wolfgang shut the door behind him and found a seat across from Kevin. The bigger man avoided his gaze as the limo slid into gear and turned toward Moscow.

  4

  In his imagination, Wolfgang pictured Moscow as something of a winter wonderland. It wasn’t. What should have been white was grey, and what should have been grey was black. Snow mixed with mud, oil, and debris piled up next to the buildings, and the sky was glum with not only clouds but the smog of automotive and industrial fumes.

  The only splashes of color came from the occasional nightclub or bar that flashed past the limo on the way into the heart of the city. There were plenty of tall buildings, all rising out of the muck and reaching into the cheerless sky like fingers of a desperate humanity starved for sunshine.

  The streets themselves were crowded, as Wolfgang would have expected in any city this size. Cabs, buses, and the occasional brave motorcyclist wound their way through the heart of the city, impervious to the time of day or temperature. Wolfgang wondered what it must be like to live in a place like this—so cold and crowded and stained by decades of controversial history.

  Only, to the Russians, it wasn’t controversial history, he realized. It was simply their history, and much like Americans, they probably didn’t overthink it. This was home, cold or not, crowded or not.

  Wolfgang leaned back in his seat and indulged in a brief smirk. He’d had similar thoughts about Cairo only a few weeks prior. It was the polar opposite of Moscow in almost every way, yet people there also called it home. He wondered if a Russian or an Egyptian had ever visited Saint Louis and asked themselves, “Why would anyone live here?”

  The limo swung and glided down the big streets like a yacht, slowly winding its way deeper into the city until at last it slid to a stop under the portico of the Hilton Moscow Leningradskaya, towering twenty-one floors above street level. Edric flashed Wolfgang a look that said “showtime,” and Wolfgang nodded. As soon as the Hummer stopped, he pushed the door open and stepped out, flinching in the blast of bitter wind before stepping to the side and waiting for Edric, Megan, and Lyle to climb out. They each waited without so much as glancing his way, and Wolfgang helped Kevin unloaded the luggage while the others hurried inside.

  As Wolfgang towed the baggage into the hotel, he tipped his head back to glimpse the towering spire that jutted from the top of the building. He’d read about this building in one of Megan’s travel books. It was built in 1954, one of seven sister buildings constructed during that time in the Stalinist neoclassical style—a mixture of 1930s American architecture and Russian neoclassical architecture that was already a fading memory.

  The hotel, now renovated and operated by Hilton, was an homage to another time—a dark time, when the iron fist of the Communist Party held Russia in a death grip both colder and more deadly than the wind that now whipped through his coat.

  “Wolfgang! Let’s go,” Kevin called from the steps.

  Wolfgang hurried to follow. Edric checked them in to their suite, and the five of them piled into the elevator. Wolfgang sucked in deep breaths of warmer air and glanced at Edric. Before he could speak, Edric shook his head once and tilted his head toward the ceiling of the elevator. Wolfgang shot a quick look up and saw a security camera poking out of the woodwork, staring down at them like an eagle eying its lunch.

  Crap. Is the entire hotel wired?

  The elevator dinged to a stop, and they piled out onto dense red carpet. Their suite was just as fancy, featuring two rooms with giant king beds and a small sitting area in between. None of them spoke as they shut the doors, then Lyle knelt beside one of his bags and unpacked. A moment later, he opened what appeared to be a shaving kit, but after removing a razor and a cloth, he exposed some manner of electronic device housed inside that featured a switch and a row of lights. Lyle flipped the switch, then worked his way around the room, holding the device close to lamps, furniture, and wall molding.

  Edric held a finger to his lips, and the group waited while Lyle conducted a ten-minute sweep of the suite, then returned and offer
ed a nod. “It’s clean.”

  “Very good,” Edric said, walking to the minibar and pouring himself a glass of brandy. “Go ahead and unpack.”

  Lyle was already setting up computers on the table in the middle of the room, arraying laptops around himself and connecting them with wires. Wolfgang recognized some of Lyle’s gadgets from previous missions, but conspicuously missing were Lyle’s big screens, heavy-duty listening and communicating equipment, and boxes of “special purpose” gadgetry.

  Wolfgang settled beside Lyle and watched as he input passwords into the computers, instantly converting them from innocent bankers’ laptops into custom-programmed espionage processors.

  “Do you use the hotel Wi-Fi?” Wolfgang asked.

  Lyle chewed the tip of his tongue. “Any network I link into can be used to track our location, so I piggyback onto cellular networks, which is actually more difficult to pinpoint since the devices are made to be mobile. With a little IP scrambling, we can stay hidden to the casual observer.”

  “What about the intentional observer?”

  Lyle shrugged. “Best way to hide from a bloodhound is not to wake him up.”

  Wolfgang wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but decided not to press. Lyle needed to focus. Instead, he got up and walked to the window, pushing aside the curtain and staring out at the streets of Moscow. They stretched away as far as he could see into the Russian horizon.

  Megan stepped up beside him, a drink in one hand. She pointed directly ahead. “There’s the Kremlin. You can’t see it at night, but it’s just on the other side of those buildings.”

  “It’s crazy,” Wolfgang said, “to be this close.”

  “Russia isn’t the Soviet Union. A lot has changed. And a lot hasn’t, I guess.” She took a sip of her drink, then turned away, leaving Wolfgang standing alone.

  “We’ll sleep in shifts tonight,” Edric said. “Just to be safe. Wolfgang, you’ll take the first—”

  “Guys!” Lyle called from the computer, his voice an uncharacteristic shout. “We’ve got a problem.”

  Wolfgang and the others rushed back to the table, where Lyle leaned close to his primary computer screen.

  “I logged into the secure server, just to check, and there’s an email from the CIA. Sparrow wants to meet . . . right now.”

  Edric scanned the screen, and his brow furrowed into a frown.

  “What do you mean, right now?” Kevin asked. “The meeting was supposed to be tomorrow morning.”

  “Something went wrong,” Edric said. “Sparrow moved up the timeline. Lyle, are there any other messages?”

  “That’s the only one. We can reply, but there’s no guarantee anybody will see it before Sparrow’s deadline.”

  “Shit,” Edric muttered. He stepped away from the computer and took a sip of his brandy.

  The room fell silent as everybody watched the tension play across his face.

  “We can’t go,” Kevin said. “If the five of us leave now, we’re certain to attract attention.”

  “Not only that,” Megan chimed in, “we don’t have enough intelligence. If the CIA is going to move it up on us like this, they owe us more details. I say we email them back, then wait for a response.”

  Edric scratched his cheek, then checked his watch. “No. We can’t afford to wait. If Sparrow is under pressure, that probably means Koslov is under pressure, also. The CIA may not have additional details. The only way to be certain is to talk to Sparrow.”

  “It could be a trap,” Wolfgang said. “What if the Russians busted Sparrow and now they’re setting us up?”

  “That’s doubtful,” Edric said. “Sparrow would have some kind of coded passkey—a word or an expression used to let the CIA know everything was kosher. Something he wouldn’t have used if he were under duress.”

  “What if the Russians flipped him?” Lyle asked.

  “If they flipped him, there would be no reason for him to advance the meeting and spook us,” Edric said. “He’d just wait until tomorrow.”

  Everyone exchanged looks, then Edric set down his glass. “Wolfgang, you’re coming with me. The rest of you stay put. Lyle, we need some coms.”

  Edric moved to his suitcase and stripped out of his business suit, quickly changing into a warmer and more flexible outfit suitable for an evening surfing the Moscow bars.

  Wolfgang and Megan moved toward him as Lyle shuffled through his bags to find the communications gear.

  “I don’t like this,” Megan said, lowering her voice. “We’re going in blind. We need to wait.”

  Edric shook his head. “We can’t afford to wait. If Sparrow is in trouble and we miss him tonight, we may not make contact tomorrow. If that happens, we have zero chance of completing our objective.”

  “I realize that, but—”

  Edric held up a hand. “I’ve made my call. You, Kevin, and Lyle remain here. Wolfgang will be my backup. Two of us leaving the hotel shouldn’t raise much attention.”

  Edric pulled a heavy overcoat around his shoulders, nodded to the onlooking Charlie Team, then turned to Wolfgang. “You ready, Sunshine?”

  Wolfgang followed Edric into the blustering Moscow night, walking two blocks before Edric hailed a cab and told the driver in broken Russian to take them to the Red October district. Wolfgang flashed him a curious glance, but Edric waved him off. The cab driver took off, bolting into traffic and yanking them through turns between sips from a water bottle. Wolfgang caught a whiff and guessed that whatever the driver was drinking, it wasn’t water.

  Fifteen minutes and two near-death experiences later, the cab slid to a stop, and the driver muttered something in Russian. Edric handed him three one-thousand-ruble banknotes and waved away the change. The driver rocketed off only a millisecond after the door shut behind them.

  Wolfgang started to speak, but Edric held up a finger. “Don’t talk. Just listen. I brought you because you think better on your feet than Kevin does, and because I need Megan at the hotel to get everybody out in case things go sideways. Sparrow’s message stipulated that we meet him in the Red October district at one a.m.”

  Edric gestured ahead, and as they walked, Wolfgang saw through the darkness to the towering bulk of a red brick building sitting on a slight rise directly ahead. Another ten yards, and Wolfgang realized that the slight rise was actually an island situated in the middle of the Moskva River with bridges connecting it to the rest of the city. At the southern tip of the island, lit by powerful spotlights, the statue of Peter the Great shot out of the river and reached for the sky.

  Wolfgang remembered it from reading about Moscow on the plane and realized they must now be in downtown, with the Kremlin only a stone’s throw to the other side of the island. His stomach twisted into a knot, and Edric nodded at him once as if to say he knew what Wolfgang was thinking.

  “Stay loose and alert. Sparrow is meeting us at a nightclub called Bar Gypsy. It’s on the island.”

  Edric paused at the edge of a pedestrian bridge sheltered by the shadows of an apartment building and reached into his pocket. He passed Wolfgang an earpiece, and they slid the tiny units into place while making a show of rubbing their hands and glancing around as if they were lost tourists.

  Edric whispered, “All channels, this is Charlie Lead. Com check.”

  “Charlie Eye, online,” Lyle said.

  “This is Charlie One,” Megan said.

  “Charlie Two, loud and clear,” Kevin said.

  Wolfgang hesitated, still rubbing his hands together for warmth. His official call sign was Charlie Three, but he could hear the tension in his teammates’ voices.

  He grinned at Edric. “This is Sunshine, ready to rock.”

  Edric flashed a brief smile. “Copy that, Sunshine. Let’s roll.”

  5

  Wolfgang followed Edric across the bridge while looking down at the black depths of the Moskva River. Chunks of ice dotted the water, crashing into one another as they slowly churned downstream. He shivered and looked
back up. The lights of the Red October district were bright now, shining from rows of brick buildings as the faint beat of nightclub music made its way through the walls. He thought about being inside, in the warmth, and walked a little quicker.

  Edric led the way, stepping off the bridges and waiting for traffic to clear before leading Wolfgang onto the island. They turned left, moving toward the statue of Peter the Great, and the music grew steadily louder. Tourists and locals alike stood close to the buildings, leaning over and talking quietly while they smoked. He caught the scent of marijuana and wondered how the hell a person grew weed in a place like this. Was it trucked in? From where?

  Edric nodded at a tourist who asked him for directions, then shrugged and said, “Ya ne govoryu.”

  The tourist scowled and stumbled on, clearly drunk enough to pass out at any moment.

  Ahead, Wolfgang caught sight of the backside of the statue, and just before it, bright disco lights blasted from the dirty windows of the last building on the island. The music was loud now, and more tourists gathered at the end of the island, walking in and out of the nightclub through a door guarded by a burly man in a thick coat—who was also drunk. Over the door in large, multi-colored neon lights were the letters: GYPSY.

  “Once we’re inside, we split up,” Edric whispered. “Stay close enough you can see me, but not so close that Sparrow will put us together.”

  “How will you find him?” Wolfgang asked.

  “Prearranged activity signals. Just follow my lead.”

  They approached the door, and Wolfgang fell back a couple paces, allowing a young couple to slide into line ahead of him. The guard glanced at Edric’s fake ID only momentarily before waving him through. The couple did the same, then Wolfgang flashed a smile and withdrew his fake Canadian passport.

  The guard peered down at him, his eyes bulging and watering. He swayed on his feet a moment, and Wolfgang choked on the blast of vodka fumes assaulting his face. The guard waved him through without so much as glancing at the passport.