Adrian Magson - Execution

‘Leave it.’ Symenko could read the signs well enough; Preshkin had pushed too far ahead and got jumped. He swore, drawing surprised looks from the men in his car. But he had good reason: they were now running blind with only a vague idea where the fugitives might be. But what if they had a car nearby? Then all his fantasies about catching foreign spies — and one clearly traitorous former FSO officer — would be so much dust.

He turned and looked into the back of the Mercedes, at a man sitting scrunched between two of his men. All was not yet lost. He had an ace up his sleeve.

‘Well, Bronyev,’ he muttered, ‘it looks like you may have an opportunity of redeeming your failure to have spotted the treachery in your colleague, Balenkova.’

‘What do you mean?’ Bronyev was angry, but powerless to do anything. As an FSO officer, he had a high degree of leeway over other departments. But Symenko outranked him and his own position had been further weakened, as had been pointed out already back at the embassy, by his claim that he had no inkling of Katya Balenkova’s plan to defect. He had tried arguing that it was not so far a proven defection, but that had carried no weight. If anything, it had made his situation worse.

‘You worked with Balenkova. She knows you. Trusts you.’ Symenko showed his teeth in a nasty grin. ‘Of course, if I hadn’t been told different just a short while ago, I’d even believe you were shtupping her on the side. But that’s not likely, is it — eh? You know why?’

Bronyev made no answer, his face blank.

‘She doesn’t like men, does she?’ Symenko continued. ‘I bet you didn’t know that, did you?’

‘No.’ Bronyev shook his head at a hard elbow in the ribs from the men on his left.

‘No. I thought not. It seems your former colleague has a bit of history in that direction. I’m amazed she was allowed to continue serving. Still, we’ll soon have her back. Then she’ll find out what being a minority really means.’ He tossed a mobile phone into Bronyev’s lap. It was Bronyev’s own. ‘Call her. Tell her to come in. We’ll talk. . give her a chance to explain herself. No doubt she was overcome by foreign agents and has had no opportunity to break free. That kind of shit. I’ll leave it to you — you know what to say.’

‘She won’t talk to me. Why should she?’

Another elbow in the ribs from the man on his left made him grunt. In spite of his position, Bronyev turned his head and stared at him. The man was big and solid, with a broken nose. A professional FSB bruiser. ‘You do that again and I promise you your nose will be even less attractive than it is now. I’m an officer of the FSO who has done nothing wrong, so accord me some respect.’

The man looked back at him and sniggered, his breath sour with the smell of onions. Then he followed it up with another dig of his elbow.

Symenko opened his mouth to tell his man to back off; he knew just what members of the FSO were capable of, especially at close quarters. He’d seen plenty of their kind in his time, passing through this city with powerful and important men. And Bronyev was right — he had done nothing wrong.

He was too late.

Without a flicker of warning, Bronyev rammed his own elbow upwards at an angle, using his torso to gain full torque and pushing his bunched fist with his free hand for maximum effect. The result was catastrophic for his attacker; his nose, already badly abused, took the full force of Bronyev’s blow, which snapped his head backwards into the roof of the car. A rush of blood sprayed down the front of the man’s jacket, but he was beyond caring, and lolled loosely in his seat like a stringless puppet.

Bronyev didn’t stop there. Sensing the man on his right beginning to move, he thrust his hand down between the man’s legs and grasped a handful of his testicles, and squeezed.

The man froze, eyes going wide.

‘Enough,’ said Bronyev softly, eyes on Symenko. The captain looked stunned by the speed of his reactions. ‘This is unnecessary and you know it, captain. I have it within my right to report you and your men for brutality against a fellow officer.’

Symenko nodded. ‘Yes. Of course. I was about to stop him.’ He glared at the man on Bronyev’s right, who stopped wincing long enough to signal that he was not moving.

‘Good.’ Bronyev released the man and picked up the phone. He hit a speed dial number and waited while it rang out.

‘It’s Bronyev, my colleague.’ Katya had switched on her mobile as they approached the end of the street. Seconds later it had buzzed. She had taken it out and was staring at the screen. ‘They’re using him to try to get to me.’

Harry looked past her and Clare, and saw Rik jogging along the street towards them. He was moving easily and had clearly suffered no damage.

They were standing beneath some trees on the edge of a small park not far from Riesenradplatz and the giant wheel. Between them lay the dual carriageway that was Ausstellungsstrasse, running east-west and connecting to the Praterstern gyratory. It was wide and too well lit, and still busy with traffic — an enormous gulf if the Russians had men staking out the most obvious points to watch.

‘Can you trust him?’ Harry asked.

‘I don’t know. I think so, but. .’ She shrugged. ‘He will be under pressure to help them. I’ve put him in a terrible position.’

‘Forget it. It’s done. He can’t do anything for you now.’ He was aware that it sounded harsh, but he knew what the situation would have been like had their positions been reversed. The man commanding the pursuers was responding with whatever he had to hand in order to reel them in; and that included leaning on Katya’s former colleague.

A few minutes ago he had called the number of the taxi company on the card from the amusement arcade. Then he had tried Richoux one more time. Still nothing. The lack of response wasn’t good news; local assets like Richoux were chosen for their knowledge, contacts and reliability, in case an operative needed help on the ground. That help ranged from the provision of equipment, like guns and a safe place to stay, to simple background information on a place or a person which only a local resident could pick up. If an asset was indisposed for any reason, there was always a backup message to explain it. Going off-line in the way Richoux had done meant that he had been intercepted and blown.

End of game.

‘Can they lock in on your mobile?’ He was aware that some phones had anti-tracking devices. He’d never seen the point, since software development invariably put the ungodly just one shade behind the good. But using a mobile that was open to triangulation or tracking the signal would be a sure way of being caught very quickly. And Katya’s colleagues would almost certainly have a search going on right now for her signal.

‘No. The risk is too great for FSO protection officers. All our phones are fitted with blocking software.’ She looked at him with a faint smile. ‘Don’t you have it in your department?’

‘I don’t have a department. Life’s much simpler that way.’

As Rik joined them, a light coloured Mercedes cruised to the kerb and stopped. It was a taxi. The driver looked across at them with a questioning lift of the head. Stopping for an unknown pick-up on the edge of a park was a risky business in any city, even Vienna. But taxi drivers have to make a living, too.

Clare stepped into the light, her arm through Katya’s. The driver nodded and beckoned them aboard, listened to the destination Harry gave him, and set off for the Praterstern and the south.

The area known as Favoriten was a mixed residential and commercial zone, the cultures of its residents leaning heavily in favour of Turks, Croatians and Serbians, all workers who had populated the area over many decades. The safe house had been chosen, Harry guessed, for this very reason. In an area where incomers were frequent and varied, and their backgrounds often too obviously tragic to question, nobody would pay much attention to a few more moving among them. Hopefully, it would only be for one night, before moving out again the following day.