Brian Drake - The Glinkov Extraction

She updated Ray, left him to his solitaire, and took the elevator to the basement.

The overstuffed envelope had been scanned for explosives, cleared, and placed on a table in a small examining room with one of the fluorescent lights above flickering and making a clicking noise with each flash. Susan opened the package with her thumbnail and took out the stack of papers. Many were paper-clipped or stapled together. Most of the writing was in English, but pages in Russian had attached translations. There were some pictures. As she read the first couple of pages, her heart started racing. This was the mother lode.

Her cell phone rang. She dug it out of her pocket.

“Yes?”

“You should have the package by now.”

“Mr. Olinov, I really need to see you.”

“That is impossible. I’m at the airport now.”

“Where are you going?”

“I cannot tell you. It’s for my own safety. You have what you need to finish your investigation. Do it in memory of me.”

“Mr. Olinov—hello?” She ended the call and found the man’s number in the Received call list. She clicked it and waited but only his voice mail answered. She left a message. Please call me back. I have questions. But she ended the call again and figured that was the end. Do it in memory of me. Wherever Yuri Olinov was going, he expected a one-way trip.

Her hand was shaking when she put away her phone.

“WAS IT a note from a secret admirer?” Ray said.

“Better,” Susan said. She told him all about it. He came over to her side of the desk to get a better look. Susan’s excitement overflowed. Her eyes were brighter, the earlier impatience at not being able to see Brody gone, zeal in its place. The muckity-mucks were still in Brody’s office, anyway, but at least now they had something solid to go over that wasn’t yesterday’s news.

“Look at this,” Susan said. “A rundown on Russian organized crime in New York. I bet our own people don’t have some of this stuff.”

“We need a translator for these pages.”

“Flip them over. It’s been done.”

Ray did, read and whistled.

“But does anything specifically mention Zubarev?” he said.

“Not that I’ve seen so far, but there is this little gem.” Susan showed him a piece of paper with a woman’s picture pinned to a corner. The photo showed an unsmiling brunette with short hair and a thin neck. “Siyana Antonova. Top assassin in the outfit. We need to talk to her.”

“You want to try and interview an assassin?” Ray said.

“Not interview her,” Susan said. “Bring her in.”

“We’re gonna need some help.”

Susan tapped the page. “We already have her address. We can call for back-up along the way.”

“But Brody—”

“Is still in his meeting.” Susan gathered up the pages and jammed them back into the envelope and the envelope into a desk drawer, which she deftly locked. She rose from her chair and lipped her automatic to her belt. “Are you coming?”

She started for the exit with Ray at her heels.

“WHAT’S YOUR theory?” Ray said as Susan drove.

“Olinov sent is that information for a reason,” she said. “It ties in with Zubarev. Somehow. My thinking is Shishkin Pavlovitch, the local boss, sent Siyana Anton-whatever her name is to kill not just Zubarev, but that other couple too.”

“Where’s Olinov now?”

“On a trip he doesn’t expect to come back from.”

Ray went silent for a moment. Then: “This could be a trap.”

“That’s why we called for back-up.”

Ray had requested an FBI SWAT team as soon as they hit the road. Normal protocol called for agents to file a formal request for such help and plan the arrest of high-threat suspects over a period of days, with surveillance covering the suspect up until the last second. Ray had made his request from the field, calling it urgent, which meant they had no time for the normal formalities. The SWAT team would be there, but not necessarily when they arrived.

“I don’t like this, Susan.”

“We need to know what this woman knows. She’s the key. I know it.”

Presently Susan slowed the car for the turn from Allen Street onto Grand and parked curbside, the car not straight with the rear end sticking out a little. Susan and Ray exited the car. Across the street was a four-story apartment building. Susan consulted her notes. The hideout where Siyana Antonovna lived was in the basement. The agents waited for a break in traffic and dashed across, walking around the side of the building looking for any basement access. There was none.

They worked around the back of the building, which was a narrow alley with the next building right behind, and stopped at a gated door. Enough dust and debris covered the concrete in the alley, with a clear path from the door to the middle of the alley, to show that the door was accessed regularly. Susan turned the knob. Locked. An electronic keycard censor sat to the right.

Ray said, “We need to spoof that card reader or—”

“Nuts.”

Susan pulled a folding leather pouch from her jacket and extracted a pair of lock picks. She knelt before the door and started working the knob while Ray stood look-out.

The locks popped and Susan held the door open with her foot while she stowed her pics. No alarm sounded. Stairs went down. Susan moved forward and waited by the steps, taking out her automatic. Ray communicated with the SWAT commander.

“Team’s still on the way,” he said, as Susan started down. Guns out, they stopped on the landing, looking at the hallway at the bottom of the steps.

Susan dropped into a squat and examined as much of the hallway as she could. It was short with another door on the left side. Script on the door read AUTHORIZED PERSONAL ONLY.

“Come on,” Susan said.

She started down the steps.

IT WAS a Spartan existence, but Siyana had everything she needed and nothing she didn’t.

The concrete floor got a little cold quite often so she tempered that with throw rugs; the living room was a hair smaller than the bedroom as well, and a window might have been nice, but for somebody like her, who needed a low profile and often used windows to the disadvantage of her targets, not having them was something she could easily live with. Plus, it meant one last thing to keep clean.

Siyana was lying in bed, staring at a spot on the ceiling. She had no plans for the day except to rest after so much activity. And then the red light started flashing. The red light was part of a panel on her nightstand and triggered by an electronic trip wire in the stairwell. It meant somebody had broken through the door.

She threw off the covers and turned on the monitor atop the panel as she pulled on jeans over her pajama pants, tossing her top in exchange for a T-shirt. As she threw on a leather jacket with a pistol in a concealed pocket and other goodies in other pockets, the view screen showed the man and woman infiltrating her space.

She cursed. The whole building was owned by her boss, every other floor empty. It was her own personal sanctuary but now she’d been discovered.

Siyana made a stop at the closet nearest the door for a submachine gun and let herself out.

She advanced down the hallway, the lights on either side providing plenty of illumination and she stopped at another panel to take care of that issue. She slowed her breathing and listened to the hesitant footsteps down the length of the hallway that grew louder. She opened the panel and put a hand on the lever revealed behind the cover. She pulled the lever and the lights went out.

Total darkness. The woman down the hall let out a yell and said somebody’s name. Siyana, the enemy’s position visual in her mind, let the submachine gun rip. The muzzle flash filled the black void. Siyana’s ears rang with the piercing echo of the salvo, but she didn’t keep up the rate of fire for more than a second. Then, following a routine she had practiced many times, she turned and ran, headlong into the void, for her alternate exit. The other end of the hall was outlined in a thin strip of Christmas lights so she could see the goal. The small green glow appeared quickly. A glance back. Bouncing flashlight beams. Two of them. Holy shit had she missed? Siyana stopped, turned, fired another burst. A fast sprint for the door now, her lungs straining.