Jerome Preisler - Net Force--Attack Protocol

Cosa stared out the window. Again he remembered the helicopter and the fire and the carnage of last summer’s strike. But all that was mere prelude. An opening move. Drajan Petrovik, the Wolf, had spawned an electronic hydra, and it was a deadlier creature than America realized. Still growing, spreading , through the country’s digital infrastructure, it would soon lock its jaws around the very heart of Western power.

Chimera...

Chimera was the game changer. The great realigner. Once it started nothing would be the same. There would be before, and there would be after. And the motherland would stand alone in the new world order.

The antiques shop was on Eighth Avenue and Twenty-Sixth Street in Manhattan’s Chelsea district, an amalgam of restored row houses, tenements, factories, and warehouses a short distance from the Hudson River and the High Line park.

Walking crosstown, Sergei Cosa reached the shop at 7:48 p.m. and entered with his key, hearing the chimes jingle softly as he opened the door. He did not reach for the overhead light switches but instead moved carefully toward the counter and turned on a standing brass boom lamp alongside it.

In the lamp’s muted radiance, he could see his way around the shop without drawing attention from the street.

The place was tiny, with framed vintage travel prints on one wall, shelves displaying cobalt and Depression glassware on another, and only a few choice items of furniture arranged on the sales floor—a mid-nineteenth-century military campaign chest, a rosewood Napoleon III escritoire, an ornate Victorian corner chair, an Italian Chippendale dining table, and, in the back opposite the entrance, a large oak wardrobe with mirrored doors that covered nearly the entire wall.

Cosa sat down on the corner chair and waited, checking his wristwatch only once. At eight o’clock on the dot, he saw a tall, exceedingly thin man peer through the front door’s glass.

His hair cut short, his sunken eyes a pale, almost transparent shade of blue, Grigor wore a heavy wool sport coat that hung loosely off his arms and shoulders and looked almost too large for his frame. Cosa thought he resembled a cardboard skeleton, a two-dimensional Halloween cutout, something made to dance on strings and frighten the neighborhood children.

“Right on time,” he said.

“In fact, I was early and decided to enjoy the fresh air—it’s a nice evening,” Grigor said. “I was right outside when you arrived twelve minutes ago.”

“Really? I didn’t notice you out there.”

“No one sees me unless it’s my wish,” he said. “You know that.”

Cosa regarded him from under his shaggy brows. Grigor did not exaggerate. He could stalk a ghost undetected.

“Yes, it’s partly the reason we’re here,” he said and nodded toward the armoire. “Come with me.”

Grigor bowed his head slightly in deference, waiting.

A moment later Sergei strode to the rear of the shop, where he pulled open the armoire’s double doors to reveal a large entryway behind it. Stepping through, he reached through the opening for a wall switch, spilling light over an office with an oak rolltop desk, some chairs, and little else.

He went to the desk, slid out a drawer, got his smartphone out of his pocket, and dropped it inside. Then he looked around at Grigor.

“Yours, too,” he said. “And whatever weapon you’re carrying.”

Grigor’s phone was already in his hand. He deposited it in the drawer, reached under his jacket, and a slipped a matte black Walther P22 Q from a concealed carry holster underneath it.

Cosa watched as he set it in alongside the phones. Then he shut the desk drawer, turned to a plain door to the left, opened it, switched on more lights, and stepped onto a spiral staircase winding down to the basement.

Grigor followed silently behind.

Years ago, Cosa had received a tour of the property from an acquaintance who dealt in real estate. Its history as a Prohibition-era speakeasy run by Owney Madden, the notorious racketeer and bootlegger, intrigued him, and he had purchased it through cutouts.

With his minimal restoration, the saloon looked just as it had almost a century before—brick walls, exposed pipes and ducts, a well-stocked mahogany bar with stools and hanging globe lights. There were small round tables and chairs around the room and comfortable divans against the walls.

“Would you care for some Pálinka ?” he said, going around the bar counter.

Grigor noticed the absence of a label on the bottle. “Well, now...this looks like some fine moonshine.”

Cosa grinned slightly at his Southern drawl. He could replicate regional dialects in a snap. “The only spirits worth the name are made in home distilleries. But I think you know its origin. I’m stocked by the owner of a guesthouse in Darjiu. Hardly Kentucky, like your accent.”

“It’s Western Tennessee. There’s an Appalachian twang,” Grigor said. “Still, I’m glad you’re amused.” He nodded toward the bottle. “And yes, I’ll have a drink, thank you.”

Cosa took two tumblers off the rack, poured them nearly full, brought them over to a table, and motioned for the other man to sit. Then he settled into the chair opposite him.

“Prostym udovol’stviyam,” he toasted, raising his glass. “To simple pleasures.”

They clinked and drank the colorless plum brandy, Cosa taking a moment to enjoy its sweet, strong kick before he spoke.

“First things first,” he said. “I’m pleased that you’ve completed your assignment.”

“I love the ocean blue,” Grigor said. He’d switched voices. “It’s going to be an interesting cruise.”

“Is this Gelfland now?”

“Yes...and you should have been there when I spoke to him in his own voice,” Grigor said, back to sounding like himself. “The looks on their faces—I always enjoy that part.”

“I’m sure.” Cosa drank. “In all frankness, I hadn’t expected you to get the job done this quickly.”

“I can’t help it. I’m gifted.”

Cosa was silent, his hand around the tumbler of Pálinka . “I leave for Crimea very soon,” he said. “I thought it best that you know.”

Grigor looked at him. “Respectfully, I’m surprised.”

“Why is that?”

“One gets used to the bright lights of America.”

Another silence.

“You aren’t wrong,” Cosa said after a moment. “My status here has its creature comforts...but that’s not the point. To stay is to put the mission at risk.”

“And the mission is to dim those Western lights.”

“Exactly.” Cosa drank. “I want to make sure all our recent business has been put to rest. And discuss your new assignment.”

Grigor nodded, waiting.

“Let’s begin with the Ilescu family,” Cosa said. “They’re clumsy Romanian hotheads. But I needed them to distribute Zolcu’s white plastic last summer, and knew they could do it quickly. And I knew they had contacts with other organizations. Bratva, the Asians, the Macheteros. The black gangs and what’s left of the Italians.”

“They did the job,” Grigor said.

“Yes,” he said. “But they also created a mess for us. Giving those brothers cards.”

“The Waleks.”

“Yes.”

Grigor shrugged. “I cleaned it up to the best extent possible. It was shortly after Manhattan went dark, and the city was hot with investigators. I couldn’t move their bodies from the apartment without undue risk.”

“Understood,” Cosa said. “But did you notice there was almost nothing about them in the press?”

“They were nobodies. Clowns.”

“Still, two dead men. Someone must have put a hold on the story.”

“You think it was the police?”