Peter Kirsanow - Second Strike

“It will be available in the hour.”

The patrician terminated the call and went inside.

Bor was disappointed but not especially surprised that Garin had been able to defeat the two Zaslon operators. His ability to do so underscored why he remained a threat to the operation. The patrician, who was well familiar with Garin’s capabilities, knew it as well. That was why he didn’t hesitate to approve the payment of five million dollars.

Bor stood on the rear lawn of the house that would serve as a base of operations for the foreseeable future. The volunteers were inside, under the supervision of an SVR agent from the consulate. The friend to whom Bor had referred on the call was resident not of the state of Georgia, but of the Republic of Georgia. He was Nikoloz Abkashvili, the billionaire head of a Georgian Mafia group whose interests spanned parts of Russia, Western Europe, and North America. Abkashvili occasionally provided certain services requiring Russian deniability to the FSB and SVR, both at home and abroad. In return, the SVR refrained from killing him and permitted him to conduct his affairs with minimal interference. The SVR also compensated Abkashvili, not lavishly but appropriately. Five million dollars was appropriate for the elimination of Mike Garin on US soil.

Bor keyed the number for the man who likely would be handling the assignment, Levan Bulkvadze, Abkashvili’s captain in the northeastern United States. Bulkvadze, a former member of the First Special Operations Group of the Georgian Armed Forces, was tough and smart—smart enough to assemble a sufficient number of men with the requisite skills to take out a man like Garin.

“Who is this?” Bulkvadze’s voice was steeped in hostility.

“It is I, Levan.”

“My friend.” The tenor of Bulkvadze’s voice changed from hostile to obsequious. “It is good to hear from you. You are well?”

Bulkvadze, who was engaged in enterprises ranging from arms trafficking to industrial espionage, knew enough not to mention names or other information useful to electronic eavesdroppers. For that reason, Bor would tolerate a sentence or two of inane chatter.

“I am well. And you?”

“Well also,” Bulkvadze said, knowing the brief exchange was the limit of Bor’s patience.

“Meet me at our usual place at nine P.M.”

“I will not be late,” Bulkvadze said superfluously. No one displeased Bor by being late.

Bor ended the call. He went inside to inform the SVR minder that he would be gone for a while and then drove the Caprice to the Russian embassy on Wisconsin Avenue to retrieve the five million dollars in cash before meeting Bulkvadze at the Mayflower.

Garin would soon be on his way. Bor was sure of it. Even if Bulkvadze’s men couldn’t kill Garin, they would at least delay him long enough for Bor and the volunteers to accomplish their mission.

The traffic along Wisconsin Avenue was light. Bor arrived at the consulate and was met by two attractive and efficient-looking women who had no idea who he was but who had been told to provide him with everything and anything he needed, and more specifically, to be sure he was given a large leather satchel in the office of the resident.

The two women escorted Bor to a conference room where a short, thin, severe-looking man with ice-blue eyes sat next to a mahogany desk on top of which lay the satchel. Upon seeing Bor, the man rose to his feet.

“Taras,” he said, one of the few people in the world who knew Bor’s first name, and one of the fewer still who dared call him by it. “It has been quite a long time.”

“Vadim,” Bor said, embracing the smaller man. “I am happy to see you here, someone I can count on.”

“I am also.”

Vadim Stepulev was a former Spetsnaz comrade of Bor’s, now a high-ranking SVR agent. Though one of the smallest operators, he had impressed Bor as one of the more proficient. On a cold, rainy night several years previously, the two had been trapped on a hilltop in Chechnya, surrounded by two dozen Chechen rebels. They had emerged from the hilltop after a harrowing firefight in which they had suffered grievous wounds but had slaughtered all of the Chechen fighters. They emerged having forged a lifelong bond.

Bor pointed to the satchel.

“Yes. That is it,” Stepulev confirmed. “I counted it myself.”

Bor turned to the efficient-looking women. “Would you please excuse us?”

The women smiled and vanished from the room. Bor turned to Stepulev and said quietly, “I would like to catch up a bit.”

Stepulev understood. Every room in the embassy had a camera and a highly sensitive microphone that recorded everything 24/7. Stepulev produced two Macanudos from the breast pocket of his suit jacket. “Let us go for a stroll.”

Minutes later, the two men were walking casually down Tunlaw Road out of range of the embassy’s video and audio devices. Neither was under the illusion that they were not, however, being watched—either by long-range surveillance equipment or by agents somewhere along the street—probably both. When either spoke, he did so quietly with a hand holding a cigar obscuring his face.

“What do you know of the operation, Vadim?” Bor asked.

“Very little, other than my limited role and that the operation is very important.”

“It is.” Bor nodded. “Yet it is being handled amateurishly.”

“But you are involved, Taras. If you are involved, it will succeed. I was briefed throughout the first part of the operation. That was not your fault, Taras. Political considerations produced bad judgments. We should not have given any role to the Iranians regarding Omega. From what I have seen, you performed your part brilliantly.”

“Bad judgments are being made again and they will jeopardize the mission. I informed them at the outset that an impediment needed to be removed before we embarked on the second phase of the operation. That impediment still remains.”

“Garin,” Stepulev said flatly.

“Yes, Garin.”

“Formidable,” Stepulev acknowledged. “Where is he now?”

“On his way here. If he is not here already.”

“How do you know?”

“I know, Vadim. I am certain.”

“You have beaten him before. For nearly two years you were an Omega operator and he never discovered who you were until it was too late.”

“I deceived him; I did not beat him.”

“Do not take this the wrong way, but you and he are remarkably alike, my friend.”

“That is what I have been told,” Bor replied with a grimace.

Stepulev chuckled darkly. “Then perhaps we should be worried after all. I presume arrangements have been made to eliminate him?”

“They were unsuccessful. He killed two Zaslon Unit men hours ago.”

“By himself?”

“By himself.”

Stepulev was silent. The two men turned onto Fulton and walked to the next block.

“What is the next step?”

“The five million dollars is for Abkashvili’s man,” Bor replied. “I am meeting Bulkvadze shortly.”

“I figured as much. How many of his men do you think it will take to eliminate Garin?”

Bor contemplated the question. “Enough,” he said simply.

“More than two; that is clear.”

“I will insist he uses more than two.”

“You are not confident they can do the job.”

“They must do the job,” Bor stressed. “If they do not, I assure you, Vadim, the mission will fail.”

“Nothing is guaranteed in this business, especially when the stakes are so high. But if you desire near certainty, may I make a suggestion?”

“We have no more Zaslon operators here right now, Vadim. That is why I’m using Bulkvadze.”

“Let me show you something,” Stepulev said as they returned to the embassy.