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  • • •

  A crash, a woman’s cry. Sergei froze inside his study. Only for an instant, and then he dropped his cell phone onto the desk, yanked the drawer open, gripped his loaded Makarov, finger on the trigger.

  “Vse ponyatno, boss—”

  At the all-clear from Olaf, his bodyguard, Sergei peered out into the living area of his penthouse. The maid, a tiny woman in a pink uniform, stared dolefully at shattered crystal now covering the marble floor, all that remained of the Swarovski vase she’d demolished. A melancholy Olaf stood just a few feet from the maid.

  Sergei eyed him sharply. Then, with a controlled breath, he shut the door. Olaf was trustworthy but sometimes a bit dull. Still, Sergei couldn’t imagine replacing him, so Olaf would be on board, along with his daughter and several of her school friends, when Sergei sailed his yacht out of Cyprus later that day. Sergei’s gut snarled that it was time—time to get off the island, time to lay low and protect his family.

  He stared down at the pistol. It felt cool and satisfying in his grip. He pushed it into the black leather document bag, a gift from his wife, Zoya, purchased at Harrods. A Raf somebody, she’d said, as if that explained all. Knowing Zoya, she’d spent at least five hundred pounds on it, maybe a thousand. She wasn’t a bad wife, just boring. But she heard things, kept her ears open, and spoiled the twins, Anya and Valentin. Their son’s latest fiasco, a Moscow Yauza street-racing disaster. The Porsche 911 Turbo transformed into twisted metal and abandoned while Valentin limped away to his favorite after-hours club.

  It was Zoya who warned Sergei to take extra precautions because she had a bad feeling—Remember what happened to Litvinenko.

  And Sergei did, all too clearly. The poor bastard was poisoned with radiation.

  For an instant, the black heat churned in his belly. How he hated the men who bought and sold Russia, men who would kill their own mothers.

  “Rossiya-Matushka,” Sergei muttered.

  He strode to the wall behind the desk and carefully lifted a small Kandinsky canvas from the wall. He ran his thick fingers quickly over the previously hidden digital pad inset in the wall. A soft click, and he opened the customized safe. He slid out one of five mahogany trays, removing only a thumb drive. He concealed it inside the zipper compartment of Zoya’s bag. Already, the bag was heavy from the Makarov.

  A package that should make the hungry American spy very happy.

  He closed the safe, entered the locking code, and repositioned the small abstract oil painting so that it was perfectly framed. For several seconds, Sergei let his eyes, his soul, dive into Wassily’s image: a dark galaxy where richly colored “planets” orbited the vastness of space, a balance that confounded him with its delicate chaos.

  • • •

  Pauk pulled himself to attention in his seat behind the steering wheel of the Fiat. The Russian was on the move. Minutes before, the muscle-bound bodyguard had appeared on the deck of the penthouse, just as he had done twice yesterday, strutting around with his holstered Sig. Revealing his boss’s routines. Might as well post a neon sign: We’re going somewhere in the Mercedes!

  Pauk glanced at his watch at the same time he turned the key in the Fiat’s ignition. A throaty rumble as it sparked to life. He’d parked one street over from the penthouse, on a slight rise, where he had a clear visual horizon.

  The heavy garage door began its slow rise. Pauk watched now through the scope. Sure enough, out rolled the black armored Mercedes SUV. From the quality of the ride, the tension on the shocks, Pauk had gauged it fortified with two extra tons of metal, ranking it close to NIJ-IV standards. It would provide some protection against armor-piercing bullets.

  Windows darkly tinted, the driver not even a shadow behind the wheel, the Mercedes cruised out of the cul-de-sac. He sensed his target in the backseat, directly behind the driver. Pauk shifted the idling Fiat into gear, following, staying parallel to the other vehicle. He kept the windows open just a few fingers’ widths, the air-conditioning off, to maintain connection with his target. The hot, dry air outside held still, unmoved by even light breezes.

  As the Fiat dogged the Mercedes north through the city, Pauk maintained a comfortable distance between his vehicle and the Russian’s. They were heading for the now-familiar A1, a straight sixty-kilometer shot to Nicosia. If the Russian planned to drive beyond Nicosia, they would pass through the Metehan border checkpoint, crossing from the Republic of Cyprus to the TRNC, or Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

  Sure enough, forty-five minutes later, Pauk caught his first glimpse of the metal canopy of Metehan up ahead. And the beginning of the line of vehicles, bicycles, and pedestrians.

  Yesterday, the Russian had arranged to depart the island on his fifty-one-meter yacht, the Anastasiya. Pauk had witnessed every tedious minute. It didn’t take high-tech gear to get most information—a simple phone call to the Limassol Marina, inquiring about a berth to accommodate a fifty-five-meter yacht. “Berths of that size are limited of course,” the woman had told him, “but you’re in luck, one opens up tomorrow.”

  Pauk slowed the Fiat to join the checkpoint queue.

  The Russian imagined this to be his last day on the island. Actually, Pauk thought, without any particular emotion, it will be your last day in this life, Barany, old goat.

  Vanessa broke stride, tugging the vibrating burn phone from the pocket of her sports capris. Sergei. Breathing hard from her run, she stared down at the screen: New text message.

  Her body tensed. What would he throw at her now? She brushed the sleeve of her sweatshirt across her forehead, licking salt from her lips. She rubbed one hand against her hip, feeling the keys to the VW. Even her fingers were sweating.

  She nudged the screen prompt impatiently with her thumb, scanning the message:

  queens window 1315

  Damn!

  She hit reply.

  hold off!

  Even as she pressed send, she began jogging in the direction of her apartment. She would cut back to pick up the Station’s VW—but only after she retrieved her Five-Seven pistol from the lockbox in her office. She didn’t believe for a moment that Sergei would comply with her orders to hold off. After all that had happened, she wasn’t meeting with a reckless asset without carrying protection. She would deal with the fallout if she had to, but after Vienna, she wasn’t taking any chances.

  • • •

  Pauk grunted softly as the Russian’s Mercedes followed the roundabout, accelerating onto the highway. He checked his iPad’s GPS, and Google Earth opened automatically, recognizing his location. As he drove, he identified upcoming exits on the map. The closest, an access road, led into the mountains through a Turkish military base, and, beyond that, it reached a dead end at a landmark: Saint Hilarion, Crusader castle.

  • • •

  Within fifteen minutes of receiving Sergei’s message, Vanessa nodded casually at the checkpoint guard as he handed back her passport. Acutely aware of the pistol tucked under her seat, she rolled forward onto Turkish-controlled land, revving internally, grateful for the relatively short line of cars. Sweat dripped down her ribs beneath her T-shirt, but she ignored it. On the most uneventful day, border control was frustrating, but today it was torture.

  When she’d first arrived on Cyprus, a friend showing her the ropes had summed it up: “The Turks and the Greeks hate each other, but they’ve gotten used to all this.”

  Another two minutes and Vanessa guided the VW onto the highway, speeding north toward Saint Hilarion and the Queen’s Window. She hated that Sergei had cut himself off, disregarding instructions, calling shots on his own. At least he’d picked a fairly remote location, a famous Crusader castle on the island’s Turkish side. She’d been to the tourist landmark almost ten years ago while visiting Cyprus on her honeymoon with her ex-husband, Jonah. A short-lived, ill-considered marriage in response to the emotional turmoil following
her father’s death.

  Normally, her ops tradecraft would have been spotless—driving a rental car, following SDR, and meeting in a contained environment. She could usually at least control these aspects of the clandestine meeting, if not the asset himself. Well, this time she’d managed to salvage one out of three. Unfortunately, there was no time for SDR, and Sergei had chosen the environment. The highway rose toward the stark, jagged Five Finger Mountains to the north.

  Damn it, Sergei, if you let me do my job, I might be able to keep you safe.

  • • •

  Pauk could see nothing beyond the slow, belching bus, but so far, there had been no possible exits from the highway. So unless the Russian’s Mercedes had suddenly turned into a spaceship, he was still just ahead of Pauk.

  Behind the Fiat, a line of vehicles stretched several miles on the congested highway. A flagman wearing an orange hazard vest waved the cars onward.

  As if there was anywhere else to go, Pauk thought, nosing his Fiat toward the cloud of bus exhaust.

  • • •

  “B’lyad!” Olaf punched the leather steering wheel with the heel of his hand, honking at the crawling line of vehicles ahead.

  Sergei, in the passenger seat, snorted. Here he was in his $500,000 Mercedes, stuck behind an ancient truck filled with sheep! Such was life, he thought, shaking his head sadly. Come prepared with the latest S600 Guard and God sticks you behind barnyard animals.

  He was glad to soon be rid of the burden of working with the Americans, at least for a while. For years now he’d kept a sharp eye on currency transfers through his bank, paying special attention to accounts exhibiting suspicious patterns.

  There were rumors of a very powerful and ruthless man who ruled over the international arms black market, and Sergei knew his American spy and her CIA wanted to get their hands on him.

  Well, I, Sergei Tarasov, might be handing the devka just what she wants so desperately.

  Sergei glanced at the black bag near his feet. He’d been in banking long enough to see when clients were trying to hide something, and he knew the American forensic accountants and investigators who tracked daily transactions worldwide through SWIFT—well they would be able to follow the trail into places he could not.

  There are always more thieves—catch one and another takes his place. But at least I can do my part to bring down one.

  • • •

  Vanessa kept her eye on the continuous line of traffic snaking uphill in the distance. She could just make out the point where vehicles were beginning to break away and pick up speed. As far as she could gauge, she had another eight to ten minutes before the logjam eased. She also knew she would reach the access road to Saint Hilarion at just about the same time. She could try to make up time, but the road—twisty, narrow, and rough—traversed a Turkish military base. Not the place to attract unwelcome attention.

  Glowering so intently at the cloud of black diesel smoke enveloping the Mercedes, Olaf almost missed the turnoff. But Sergei yelled to him that he should turn, and, at the last minute, Olaf managed to cut hard onto the smaller, rougher access road. For the next kilometer, the Mercedes shuddered across ruts and washboard gravel, the road rising, twisting, and narrowing.

  After they’d traveled most of three kilometers, Sergei saw the large black-and-white signs designating the beginning of a no-stopping zone. Here, trucks and jeeps from a Turkish military convoy haphazardly lined the road. Near a makeshift village of scattered cottages, Turkish soldiers in camouflage, packing weapons, clustered in small groups, smoking cigarettes or just kicking dirt. Judging from their bored, stupid expressions, it was an exercise. This time they are only playacting at war and terror, Sergei thought.

  He glanced down again at the black bag. Perhaps it would have been wise to hide it in the security compartment of the Mercedes. Too late to second-guess himself.

  A sharp report sliced the morning stillness. Then another. Then continuous—the unmistakable din of gunfire. Sergei’s heart stammered, reacting as if he’d been caught on a street in Moscow ducking a burst of semiautomatic fire. That’s how it had been back in the 1990s, when so many died. Even now, knowing the gunfire was almost certainly the product of a military drill, instinct screamed at him to have Olaf speed off the road and take cover. With trembling hands he reached for the pack of cigarettes tucked into the Mercedes’s ashtray. Hopefully those stupid sukas were aiming away from the road!

  A dusty beige Fiat raced past, and Sergei pushed up his chin in an ugly gesture. “B’lyad! What’s your hurry? Eventually we all end up in the same place!”

  • • •

  Pauk passed a landmark sign, and he slowed the Fiat on the approach to the castle. From this distance, it reminded him of the castle at Disneyland Paris.

  So the Russian was meeting someone, because he certainly wasn’t sightseeing.

  And Pauk was arriving just minutes ahead of his target. No way to select the best location for a kill shot. He would just have to improvise.

  Was the Russian’s associate here already? No way to know.

  Pauk counted sixteen tourist vehicles parked along the road and at the dead end near the visitors’ center. He nosed the Fiat around the curve and braked facing the direction he’d just traveled.

  Get in, get the job done, get out.

  He opened his door to the stutter of gunfire echoing from the surrounding mountains. A few tourists stopped and craned their necks or peered around anxiously. But most visitors, like Pauk, ignored the noise.

  Outside the car, he hitched his satchel easily over one shoulder. No one would guess he was packing the disassembled body of his customized Dragunov sniper rifle along with the Mark IV scope and the suppressor. The hollow-point rounds fit in a special ankle holster he had designed for efficiency and easy concealment. In twenty seconds he could assemble or disassemble his weapon—in the dark, in frigid temperatures, in drenching rain. He glanced back to the road, scanning for a first view of the Russian’s black SUV.

  Walking briskly for about fifteen meters, Pauk stopped to quickly study the tourist map posted outside the visitors’ center. It revealed the layout of the thousand-year-old castle: ramparts, restored buildings, and ruins. A primary trail led up the mountain to the middle and upper wards, barracks, chapel, and the royal apartments. A secondary trail cut through a tunnel, offering an alternate, longer route. There were other tributaries. A tower marked the distant apex of the mountain.

  Where was the Russian heading? He wore his fat like a wintering bear. Certainly not to the tower at the top.

  A group of old women in hiking boots walked ahead of Pauk. They carried cases and easels. Artists, he thought, knowing that his sharply opinionated landlady, Madame Desmarais, would add “Amateurs!” He tugged his green cap low over his face, joining, and soon passing, the group. He would find a place to watch and wait, and then he would track the Russian.

  Almost without any conscious effort, his mind had already factored wind speed and direction, egress—and soon it would add the effect of distance and visibility. Calculations he would check on the Mark IV’s MILDOT reticle in order to choose the most efficient point for the shot.

  He glanced down the trail toward the parking area. Ah, yes, the Russian had brought his old-dog bodyguard, and they were both headed toward the same trail where Pauk now walked.

  • • •

  Sergei gazed up the craggy slope at the ruins of the castle and sighed. Olaf strode ahead on the trail, but already Sergei needed to stop to catch his breath. Sweat trickled between his shoulder blades. Where had Sergei the Strong gone? He would have to get back to his training again—those eight-mile runs in the morning before the heat. Yes, when this was over . . .

  He’d been puzzled at first by the handful of people scattered among the rocks and tough vegetation. Then he realized they must be artists, painting this formidable landscape. He w
ould like to try his hand at painting the castle someday, when he could finally leave his family business to younger, stronger men.

  He’d chosen to meet the American at the Queen’s Window because, on an off day like this, he reasoned traffic would be light, hikers would be lazy. But it was too far up the mountain. It had seemed much closer when he’d brought his son here three years ago.

  There were some who might condemn Sergei as a traitor. But those same men had sold Russia for scrap, and now they were dividing up the spoils among themselves. He dug his hand into the bag, his fingers grazing the cool, smooth body of the Makarov. At least they would never call Sergei Tarasov a coward.

  At 1321—already six minutes behind Sergei’s abruptly appointed meeting time—Vanessa accelerated the VW along the final approach to the castle and the foreboding sight of upthrust granite and the ancient stone fortress sheltered within and among the rugged scarps.

  She slowed as she entered the parking area far below Saint Hilarion’s highest tower—passing a beige Fiat 500 that could have been the car driven by her pursuer on the old highway. But then she noticed a second Fiat, this one yellow and white, and she reminded herself just what a common make and model it was, especially on the island.

  She pulled the VW parallel to a battered Peugeot, braked, and then backed neatly into one of the few parking spaces left in the lot—already sliding her FN Five-Seven from beneath her seat. This time, she wasn’t taking any chances.