Firebird Page 14

  His eyes stayed on hers, neither confirming or denying. “Your silence tells me what I need to know,” she told him. “And my guess is that an investigation exposing any international problem right now could have a major impact on the Presidential election.”

  She saw the spark leap deep in his eyes. “See, this is why I didn’t want to tell you,” he said with a flash of irritation. “You’re jumping to conclusions.”

  “But I’m right.”

  “The next administration,” he said slowly, “will determine U.S. international policy at a time when Russia has reached a critical crossroads in technology, economy, leadership. Organized crime, the military, the new KGB. Add in splinter groups, Stalinists, oil barons, the oligarchs, the current contingent - every group is jockeying for a piece of a pie that includes billions of U.S. dollars and an enormous stockpile of weapons.”

  He looked into the distance. “We’re in a shadow war, Alexandra. Iran, Yemin, Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, and now Syria… Russia considers itself a major player in these countries, and it’s a huge source of tension in our relations. An international incident could jeopardize everything we’ve built.”

  “And everything we hope to build.” She looked up at him. “What do you think is going to happen?”

  He shook his head. “It’s just a feeling, nothing more. Too many years in Washington surrounded by conspiracies, maybe. But Fraser – an expert on Russian intelligence – is suddenly dead. An active network of Russian spies has been uncovered, we have an upcoming Nuclear Summit in St. Petersburg. Cryptic cables have been intercepted. Something big is going to go down. I just don’t know what. Or when. Or where. My money’s on D.C. or New York, but I can’t rule out any public place right now.”

  “And you have to know what’s going to happen so you can stop it.” Her eyes widened. “You’re going to help me because you think Eve may have discovered something connected to your investigation.”

  He regarded her with an expression she couldn’t read. “Someone is planning something – and it’s possible your sister forced his hand.” Then, “I can tell you this. My investigation involves a man from St. Petersburg - and Charles Fraser.” Garcia looked out across the black water. “There are some powerful people involved. And Eve played in the big leagues. She knew them all very well.”

  “A man from St. Petersburg? One of your players is a Russian?”

  She watched him turn back to her, his eyes questioning. “Now I know this is an offer you can’t refuse, Garcia,” she said slowly. “Because the third name Eve revealed in her recording was ‘Ivan’.”

  CHAPTER 19

  “I only ask to be free.”

  Charles Dickens

  BRIGHTON BEACH, NEW YORK

  The man who called himself Ivan sat on the sagging bed, his worn duffel bag by his side, staring out the dingy, half-open window at the lights on the almost deserted boardwalk. Only hookers and drunks out at this hour, he thought. Although it was too dark to see, he could hear the faint sigh of violins from the nightclub on the corner, and the distant crash of the waves against the sand.

  The scent of stuffed cabbage drifted on the cold night air, and he breathed it in with a long sigh. Almost home, he told himself.

  Over the years he’d come to love New York City but always tried to avoid the midtown area. He knew too well the dangers of predictability and recognition.

  But here, in the old Russian-Jewish enclave of Brighten Beach, he felt like a different person. He could pull a dark cap low over his forehead, shuffle the shadowed streets in his shapeless jacket, eat alone in the Russian restaurants in the old neighborhood called Little Odessa, bake in the 10th Street Bath Club and think about nothing.

  Whenever he could, he disappeared from Washington. He donned thick glasses and dressed in his old Yankees sweatshirt, rode the B or Q-train to Brooklyn, strolled the miles of boardwalk, stopped in Nathan’s or ate a “best knish in the world” from his friend Albert. The first Russian emigres who’d settled Brighton Beach decades earlier had lined the old boardwalk with their restaurants, cafes and clubs.

  Whenever possible he would listen to the Russian music in one of the countless nightclubs, and spend the night here, in this seedy boarding house walk-up he rented just off the boardwalk.

  He smiled with dark humor as he looked around the small attic room with its bust of Lenin’s head and the black and white framed photograph of Rasputin, his wild eyes burning.

  For a few hours each month, he had no urgent meetings, no demands, no beepers. He had no roof, or ‘krysha’, as a Russian would say. Here, he was totally on his own. It had suited him, all these years, to be forgotten. He took a deep breath, enjoying the heady sense of freedom.

  Freedom...

  Until now.

  Now someone knew who he was.

  He stood up and paced the small room restlessly.

  Just days earlier, the Washington Post had reported that a Justice Department team was investigating a major Russian intelligence operation. Ten of his fellow countrymen and women already had been arrested for allegedly stealing U.S. arms reduction information in advance of the upcoming summit in St. Petersburg.

  And after decades, a new, younger Control had tracked him down in the mountains of Vermont. His safe place! He felt, suddenly, trapped - as if both sides were closing in on him.

  But not here. No one knew who he was in Brighton Beach. Just another old Russian, shuffling along the windy boardwalk.

  Tomorrow, he would meet with Panov. Tomorrow, he would demand answers.

  But tonight… tonight belonged to him.

  He moved back to the open window and stood, inhaling the scents of sharp air, sea and sand.

  Tonight, he was still free.

  CHAPTER 20

  “For I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.”

  Robert Frost

  THE POTOMAC RIVER

  In a back booth by a window at the all-night diner at the end of the pier, his coffee cold and forgotten, the man called Panov kept watch on the Vaya con Dios. Now that the rain had lessened, he could make out two figures moving across the misted deck.

  Nothing was going according to the plan.

  The woman was full of surprises. She’d fought him off in Maine, survived the fall on the cliffs. He’d expected her to return to New York after leaving the island. Yet here she was, back in Washington too soon, talking with a Justice agent. About what? What had her sister told her? Given her? Damn the bitch! After all the years of planning, all the work, she could ruin everything they’d worked for…

  He couldn’t let that happen.

  He slipped his cell phone from his pocket and searched for the two small photographs he’d taken earlier in the week. There. A tiny girl with red curls, on a swing near Washington Square. And a skinny kid with spiked hair and big eyes, standing by a Jeep in Maine.

  He smiled, nodded, and looked once more at his watch.

  He had to get back to New York. It was time to give Prince Ivan his instructions.

  He lit a cigarette and dialed his cell phone as he watched the shadowy figures part and come together against the flickering sky.

  * * * *

  The Vaya con Dios rocked in the river’s current.

  “Ivan…” repeated Garcia. “Your sister overheard Charles Fraser speak to a Russian visitor late one night about a threat from someone named Ivan? That’s it?”

  The skepticism in his voice infuriated her. “There’s more,” said Alexandra. “My brother-in-law has photographs of Eve in St. Petersburg, giving an envelope to a Russian official.”

  His head came up. “You’ve seen these photos?”

  “Yes. It looks bad, Garcia, as if - ”

  “As if she’s passing secrets? That’s ridiculous! Any first year law student could have such photographs dismissed before breakfast. Christ, Eve could have been sharing a damned recipe. She never would have betrayed her country.”

  “Of course not. But if you could i
dentify the Russian Eve met in St. Petersburg, we could prove her innocence! Or he could be –”

  “Your mysterious Ivan? I’ll have to see those photographs, Red.”

  Alexandra looked away. “It gets worse,” she said quietly. “There are sexually explicit photographs as well. Of Eve with Charles Fraser.”

  “Eve and Fraser? Together?”

  “Yes. Someone tried to blackmail her. Someone set her up! He’s got to be the person who killed her, Garcia. And every instinct I have is telling me that this man called Ivan holds the key to Eve’s death.” Her gaze met his, angry and demanding. “Is Ivan the Russian you are investigating?”

  His eyes narrowed. “I have no idea who your Ivan is. As far as I’m concerned, without a photograph he’s a ghost. But -”

  “But you believe me,” she whispered.

  “A beautiful woman with secrets. Sex, damning photographs, blackmail… This has Bogart and Bacall written all over it.”

  She pulled the blanket from her shoulders and tossed it on the deck. “I’m out of here.”

  “Do you know what a mole is, Red?”

  A small wave hit the boat. Grasping the railing for balance, she made an effort to keep her voice steady. “Espionage. You’re talking about spies. Seriously?”

  He nodded. “The word was coined during World War II. A ‘mole,’ in British Intelligence, was someone close to the top who sabotaged missions and blew operations.”

  She gestured for him to continue, anxious to know more.

  “In Cold War parlance, a mole became a spy working for an enemy country who buried himself deep within a community - often in a highly sensitive political job - waiting to be activated at same future date. The deeper he was buried, the safer his cover. Hence the word ‘mole’ - or ‘sleeper’, if you will.”

  “Aldrich Ames,” she said softly. “Robert Hanssen.”

  “Exactly. Ames betrayed over 20 Western agents, most of whom were shot. Hanssen tipped the Soviets to a secret FBI tunnel beneath their D.C. embassy, and God knows what else. But moles are extremely difficult to unearth - pun intended.” He gave a wry smile. “Most people don’t know that even in the post-Cold-War world, we continue to be the target of very aggressive Russian espionage. Russia has three times as many spies working in the U.S. now as they did during the Cold War.”

  “I’m guessing they’re after high-tech information now.”

  “Mostly. And much of the intrigue now takes place right here in Washington. Since the Cold War ended, Soviet agents - often disguised as businessmen - have been actively trying to steal national security secrets. They’ve bugged IBM, MIT, the National Security Agency, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee…”

  “And now, even the State Department,” she added, her thoughts on her brother-in-law.

  There was a note of dark irony in Garcia’s voice. “Some of them hold relatively unimportant jobs. One agent was the chauffeur for the Joint Chief of the Navy. A Soviet spy was the piano tuner for Nelson Rockefeller.”

  “But we all play the game,” she said softly.

  Garcia’s smile was grim. “Si. A primary task of any clandestine intelligence service is to establish moles within the enemy’s inner sanctum, agents in a position to warn of changes in plans or intentions. Most of the mole rumors, of course, have swirled around the CIA and the KGB.”

  “But the KGB no longer exists.”

  “Post-Glasnost, the old KGB simply re-opened for ‘business abroad’ as the Foreign Intelligence Service, the SVR.” His eyes glinted at her. “Nothing more than an old dog with a few new tricks. And now there’s the FSB, Federal Security Service, as well. Still very active, and highly professional.”

  “The Cold War is long over, Garcia.”

  He shrugged. “The ruins of the Berlin Wall have been auctioned off, sure. But the sad fact is, Red, the human impulses that made the Cold War possible are still kicking. Nuclear, economic and technological espionage cases are epidemic. And those rumors of moles within our government are still very much alive. Charles Fraser was an expert on Russia and nuclear affairs. He was also the President’s spy hunter.”

  And there was the connection. “I had no idea.” Shock shimmered in her voice.

  “Few did. The President called him ‘Jesus’ behind closed doors - after James Jesus Angleton, the CIA’s most famous mole-hunter.”

  “Anthony told me about Angleton.”

  “Your brother-in-law probably knows a lot more than I do. For years, in the sixties, Angleton searched for a mole code named Sasha.”

  “Anthony said no mole was ever unearthed.”

  Garcia shrugged. “The CIA has continued to lose its own critical agents under mysterious circumstances for years. We’re still losing agents today.”

  “So you believe those rumors?” She could hear the doubt shimmering in her voice.

  “Charles Fraser did. Just think of the damage someone close to the President could do. Presidents listen to their good friends, their advisors. And what if that trusted advisor is a mole? He could influence opinion, delay documents, conveniently misunderstand urgent information. He would have access to our spies, our secrets. And we become nothing more than marionettes dancing on a damned chain.”

  Garcia looked away, suddenly grave. “Charles Fraser was convinced that there’s been a mole ‘in place’ in a very high position in Washington for years, Alexandra.”

  “You think that man, the mole, planted the listening device found at State.”

  “I’m certain of it. My team’s been investigating a major spy network here on the East Coast for months.”

  She gazed at him. “What drives a person to become a spy?”

  “MICE.” He managed a fleeting smile. “Motivation, Ideology, Coercion. And Ego.” He looked away. “That’s what Charlie Fraser was looking for.”

  Something was off, in his voice and eyes. “Oh, God” she said, suddenly understanding. “Fraser died without identifying the mole.”

  “He knew, Alexandra. He was supposed to meet with the President’s top advisors, the FBI and folks from the Senate Intelligence Committee to brief them, but… he died just a few hours before the meeting.”

  “The car accident,” she murmured, suddenly understanding the note she’d found hidden in her sister’s bedroom. “Charles Fraser was murdered? You’re investigating his death.”

  I know what happened to Charles Fraser. The words in the note she’d found in her sister’s nesting doll, summoning Eve to the river. Should she tell him? Not yet. Not until she knew if she could trust him.

  Garcia gave her a strange look. “Standard ops when a senior Presidential advisor dies so mysteriously. Especially one with so many foreign connections. I can tell you that his death has increased the intensity of the mole hunt.”

  “And this is where your mysterious Russian comes in?”

  He scowled down at her. “I can’t tell you any more. That’s a fact.”

  “But Eve’s secret, and her death, could be connected to Fraser’s death. That connects us. We need each other, Garcia!”

  “What you need is to go home to your kid and forget about all this. Where the devil is that damned taxi? I’ve had dates end faster than this!”

  She felt the anger burn through her. “The hell I will! With you or without you, Garcia, I’m going to find out the truth about my sister’s death. I let her down while she was alive. But I’ve been given a second chance. I’m not going to blow it. Not this time. And that’s a fact for you!”

  “So you’ll do it alone?” he murmured. “Against all odds, an art curator figures out who murdered her sister. And then what? What will you do? Have you considered that if Eve died because of something she knew – then someone will do everything he can to stop you? You’re putting yourself in harm’s way, Chica. And you could be in for an enormous world of trouble.”

  The sudden warning in his voice surprised her. “I have to do this,” she whispered. “Not just for Eve. For me.”

  H
is eyes glittered at her. “But it scares you, doesn’t it? If you go forward with this, you could be falling right back down into that black rabbit hole.”

  Oh, yes. I’m scared. “That’s my business, Garcia.”

  Exasperation flashed in his dark eyes. “And my business is to find the answers. That’s my job, Alexandra. Not yours.”

  “Oh, damn, I should never have –” She stopped. “Shut the front door! You’re going to help me?”

  A ghost of a smile touched his lips. “I wouldn’t have told you everything I just did if I wasn’t going to help you. But it’s not that simple. You’ve got to stay out of it, Red. You’re far too reckless for your own good.”

  “Reckless!” She thought of her quiet, controlled life in New York. “The most reckless thing I’ve done in months is buy Hagen Daz instead of no-fat yogurt!”

  He stared at her. “You are in way over your head, Alexandra!” The dark eyes softened. “It’s time you tell me, Red.”

  She lifted her face to the sea wind. “Tell you what?”

  “Whatever it is you’re hiding from me. That phone call you mentioned?”

  I hardly know this man, she thought. But there was something about him... She made a decision. “If Eve was murdered, Juliet could be in danger as well. My own child could be in danger, because the man who attacked me in Maine called me. Menacing, horrible. He called me ‘Shura,’ a childhood name given to me by my Russian grandmother. He knew about that, knew about Juliet. And the bastard mentioned Ruby.”

  “Hijo de la puta!” His face was hard as granite as he reached for his cell. “He threatened you? No way I’ll let –”

  She held out her hand to stop him. “I’ve taken care of it, Garcia. My daughter is with her nanny and a New York City cop. I sent them out of Manhattan. They’re in a safe place.”

  “You’re sure?”

  She closed her eyes, willing back the fear. “Olivia calls me every few hours. I’m sure.”

  He leaned closer. “You should be with your daughter,” he said slowly, fury still scraping in his low voice.