Don Pendleton - Extraordinary Rendition

“What?”

“Two members of the interception team were spared, sir. Something about separate cars. They were together at the airport, though, and saw a woman give the man a ride. The chase began from there. They were delayed, but followed from directions they were telephoned. When they arrived, the rest were dead, sir.”

“Most unfortunate.”

“Indeed.”

“But you, of course, are doing everything within your power to redeem the situation?”

“Absolutely, Senator.”

“I would expect no less. What progress, then?”

“So far, sir, none.”

“An unknown man and woman, lost somewhere in Moscow,” Astapkovich said. “Two out of millions.”

“If they’re still inside the city, sir.”

“Again, why fly to Moscow, if your target is Saint Petersburg?”

“Some kind of misdirection, possibly.”

“If so, Major, it’s working.”

“Not for long, sir.”

“Do I have your word on that?”

“You do!”

“Then I shall leave you to it. Thank you for your time. By all means, hurry back to work.”

TARAS MOROZOV kept his rugged face deadpan, emotionless, while Leonid Bezmel glowered across his desk. If looks could kill, he thought.

“I’ve just had Sokolov back on the line,” Bezmel declared. “Third time tonight, so far. The bastard never sleeps.”

“He’s worried,” Morozov replied.

“With reason, I suppose.”

“After that business with the FBI, I’d say so.”

“He bloodied them last time.”

“And they’ll be hungry for revenge.”

“We should have stopped this agent at the airport, Taras.”

“Yes.”

“Instead, he killed four of our men and made us look like idiots.”

“We would have had him,” Morozov said, “if the woman hadn’t intervened.”

“Would have is just another word for failure.”

It was two words, but Morozov didn’t think it wise to interrupt his boss with grammar lessons.

“I will find them,” he declared.

“Personally?” Bezmel asked.

“If that is what it takes.”

“Then, I’d suggest you do it soon. We’re to be graced with Sergei Efros helping us, first thing tomorrow. Gennady thinks that Spetznaz reject can accomplish something we cannot. In Moscow!”

“Maybe he intends to gas us,” Morozov said.

“I wouldn’t put it past him. I want someone covering him every minute he’s in town. If he breaks wind or eats a bag of pretzels, I expect to hear about it as it happens.”

“That’s no problem,” Morozov replied with utmost confidence.

Gennady Sokolov insulted him and all the Brotherhood by sending a man of his own to hunt the targets they were seeking. What could one damned Special Forces failure do that Morozov’s own army could not?

“We profit from Gennady’s business. There’s no doubt about it,” Bezmel said. “But in his agitation, he forgets about respect. I cannot reason with him in his present state. You must prevent Efros from running roughshod over any of our friends, especially official ones.”

“I will,” Morozov promised.

“I’ve been thinking that we might divert him toward Shishani and the Obshina. It does no harm to us, if he harasses them. And who knows? We might even benefit.”

If the damned Chechens killed him, for example.

“Won’t that agitate Gennady even more?”

“Perhaps. But he can’t blame us for whatever happens, and he’ll be in a forgiving mood when you produce this Cooper for him.”

“And the woman,” Morozov said.

“I’m not forgetting her,” Bezmel replied. “After we find out who she’s working for, maybe I’ll let her work for us. Pick out the worst whorehouse in town and make a reservation.”

“It’s my pleasure,” Morozov agreed.

And smiled, for the first time that night.

THE MEN’S CLUB known as Paris Nights stood eight blocks northeast of the Kremlin, on Nikolskaya Street. Its conservative marquee headlined singers whose names meant nothing to Bolan.

“So, this is the place?” he asked.

“Shishani’s primary casino,” Pilkin replied.

“It doesn’t look like much.”

“Just wait until you get inside.”

She’d given him the rundown on Russia’s gambling situation while they drove across town to their target. In the heady days after communism’s collapse, in the early 1990s, wide-open casino gambling was only one aspect of capitalism eagerly adopted by the former Soviet Union. The industry grew by leaps and bounds—an estimated thirty-five percent each year, with no federal laws to control it. Reported income from gambling topped six billion dollars in 2005, with few observers publicly willing to speculate on the extent of skimming.

Then, a reaction set in from the Russian Orthodox Church, conservative politicians and reformers outraged by rising crime rates coupled with reports of families left destitute by compulsive gamblers. In October 2006 the Russian Parliament had taken the first step toward strict limitation of legalized gambling, dictating that any licensed casino owner had to hold at least thirty million in liquid assets. Minimum sizes were decreed for gambling halls—eight hundred square meters for a full-fledged casino, one hundred for a slot-machine joint.

If that wasn’t enough to torque the shorts of big-time gamblers, a new law also mandated removal of all gambling facilities to one of four designated “uninhabited” areas by July 2009. Henceforth, players would have to seek their pleasure in Kaliningrad, in Krasnodar’s Azov City, in Siberia’s Sibirskaya Moneta, or on Russky Island in the Kara Sea, offshore from Vladivostok.

Faced with those restrictions, mobsters did what they had always done throughout recorded history. They went underground.

Granted, they didn’t burrow very deep. Club names were changed. Some neon signs came down. Proprietors dismissed the sidewalk barkers they had used to virtually drag new players off the streets in better days.

But play continued, at a price.

The same police who took bribes to ignore drug trafficking and prostitution willingly accepted more to let casinos operate with near impunity. On rare occasions when a raid was forced by public pressure, ample warning would be given to permit removal of incriminating evidence. The overzealous beat cop who had walked into a Mob casino unannounced and caught two judges shooting craps was reassigned, then fired and prosecuted after kiddy porn was found inside his locker at the station house.

“Do you have any specs on club security?” Bolan asked.

“All the usual,” she said. “Alarms inside and out. Full video surveillance on the players and employees. There will certainly be guards, but I can’t say how many, or how heavily they may be armed.”

“Shishani won’t send two or three to guard his gold mine with slingshots,” Bolan said.

“It may be too risky.”

“I didn’t say that. Those alarms you mentioned. Do they sound for an unannounced raid?”

“I assume so,” Pilkin said.

“So, there’ll be exits for players and staff, besides coming out through the front door.”

“I’ve heard rumors of tunnels,” she said.

“Should be doable,” Bolan declared. “While the players and dealers bail out, I can handle the watchdogs.”

“We handle them,” Pilkin quickly corrected.

“You know we’re not making arrests?”

“Understood.”

“So, we smoke the place.”

“And blame Bezmel, yes?”

“That’s the plan,” Bolan confirmed. “If we can’t leave a message here with one of his lookouts, we’ll phone it in and spoil his beauty sleep.”

“Too bad,” Pilkin said. “Aldo needs all that he can get.”