Betrayal (35 page)

‘What are you talking about? I … I’ve committed no crimes,’ he protested.

The man reached for something on the ground at his feet. Masalsky heard the faint rasp of metal on concrete, and felt a shiver of fear run through him when he saw a set of bolt cutters gleaming in the harsh light.

‘We’ll see, my friend,’ he promised. ‘We’ll see.’

In the accommodation block, Miranova and her fellow agents were hard at work trying to piece together the sequence of events during the attack, while also following up on reports from their field teams as they continued the search for Masalsky. Hastily set-up workstations, phones and cables trailed everywhere.

Next to this hive of activity, Drake felt every inch the proverbial fifth wheel. He was also increasingly aware of his growing fatigue, and the pain from the numerous injuries he’d taken during his fight with Anya. His shoulder felt as though someone had wedged a red-hot knife in it, and his back was starting to stiffen up after his tumble down that hillside.

Despite his protests, Miranova had insisted he be examined by one of the field station’s medics, perhaps sensing that his injuries were more extensive than he was letting on. Thus, for the past five minutes he’d endured being prodded and poked by a gruff-looking man who hadn’t even bothered introducing himself.

However, even Drake was unwilling to put up with any more as the man withdrew a syringe from his kit.

‘No painkillers,’ he said, shaking his head. A shot of morphine was great for unwinding after a tough day, but he wasn’t prepared to take anything that could compromise his awareness or his decision-making ability.

The medic looked him up and down. ‘Not painkillers – antibiotics. You are cut to shit,’ he explained. ‘This will stop infection.’

Before Drake could protest further, the man jammed the needle in his forearm and depressed the plunger. Drake winced as the unusually large needle was withdrawn. He felt as though he’d just been shot with horse tranquilliser.

The man spared him only a brief, disparaging look before packing up his gear and moving on. No doubt there was plenty of work for him tonight.

No sooner had he departed than Mason arrived to take his place. He might have spoken better English, but Drake would have taken a hundred needles over a conversation with him at that moment.

‘I need to talk to you,’ he said, his voice quiet but urgent. ‘Right now.’

Drake didn’t look at him. ‘This isn’t the time, Cole.’

He could guess exactly what his friend wanted to say, but this was neither the time nor the place to be having that conversation.

Suddenly he felt Mason’s hand on his shoulder, strong fingers tightening their grip to send a renewed wave of pain flooding through him. It was a silent but very effective way of getting his attention.

‘Make time, Ryan,’ he advised, the tone of his voice making it plain he wasn’t going to be put off. ‘Or we do this right here in front of your new buddies. Your call.’

Swearing under his breath, Drake looked around for somewhere that might allow some measure of privacy. One corner of the room had yet to be taken over.

Shrugging out of Mason’s grip, he retreated as far from the centre of activity as he could, then rounded on the older man. ‘Make it quick.’

‘Don’t give me that shit, Ryan,’ Mason hissed. ‘This is getting out of control. You had intel that could have prevented a major terrorist strike, and you chose to sit on your fucking hands. Do you have any idea the kind of shit this puts us in?’

‘It was my decision, Cole.’

‘Fuck you!’ Mason snapped, jabbing a finger at him. ‘You really think the FSB would make that kind of distinction? We’re both in this up to our necks. You had no right to make a decision like that on my behalf.’

‘So what would you have done?’ Drake hit back. ‘Go running to Miranova and tell her an Agency operative was behind this, but we chose to keep it to ourselves until now? Do you think for one second she wouldn’t have thrown us both in jail?’

Mason sighed and shook his head in dismay. ‘Ryan, for Christ’s sake listen to yourself. People,
real people
, are getting killed over this. And for what? Anya isn’t going to be saved; not by you or anyone else. She made her choice when she shot up that freeway in DC. Now she’s made herself an enemy of the FSB
and
the CIA. How much longer are you going to keep protecting her? How much more are you prepared to give up for her?’

Drake clenched his fists as pent-up frustration threatened to boil over. ‘I don’t need a moral lecture, especially not from you, Cole. Let’s not forget why you’re here.’

‘I know exactly why I’m here,’ Mason assured him, his voice dangerously cold now. ‘And it’s not to become a martyr. You’re going to get us all killed if you don’t give this up.’

He’d heard enough. ‘If you haven’t got the nerve for this, then piss off back to DC. Otherwise, shut the fuck up and do your job.’

Mason took a step towards him, and instinctively Drake felt himself tense up, his body readying itself for a physical confrontation.

The bleep of Drake’s cellphone was the only thing that seemed to break the spell. Scarcely aware of what he was doing, he fished it out of his pocket and glanced at the screen. It was Frost.

‘What is it, Keira?’ he snapped, still glaring at Mason.

‘Good evening to you too,’ Frost countered. ‘Who took the jelly out of your doughnut?’

Drake was in no mood for her attempt at humour. ‘Things aren’t going well here.’

‘Then maybe this’ll make you feel better.’ She paused for a moment, as if to let the tension build up. ‘I think we’ve found your missing man.’

Anya said nothing as she listened to the screams echoing from down the corridor, instead concentrating her attention on field-stripping and reassembling her M1911. It was hardly a vital task, but it at least kept her mind occupied.

There was certainly nothing around here worthy of her attention.

Thirty years ago the hardened concrete aircraft shelter in which she now sat had contained Soviet fighter-bombers, intended to launch ground attacks against a possible US invasion from Turkey. Now it was nothing but a cavernous, draughty expanse of crumbling concrete and rusted pipework. Another decaying symbol of a forgotten time.

Her Lada 4x4, which had barely been up to the task of getting here, looked faintly ridiculous parked in such ominous surroundings. Outside the rusting steel doors a frigid wind sighed past, carrying with it stinging pellets of freezing rain.

The other four men in the derelict room seemed untroubled either by the cold or by the sounds of Masalsky’s torture, celebrating their success with a crate of beer as they recounted their exploits during the attack on the FSB compound. They were still pumped up after the short but intense action, filled with adrenalin and endorphins that made them giddy and excitable.

She had often heard combat described as a drug, and in truth she had once felt much the same way. There had been a time long ago when, flushed with the enthusiasm and misplaced confidence of youth, she’d even sought out the thrill that came from living on a knife edge of survival, like a junkie endlessly searching for a more powerful hit.

It hadn’t taken her long to discover just how misplaced that confidence had been.

‘So I turned the corner and I came face to face with this big fat fucker,’ said Goran, a wily little Serbian mercenary who had become one of the most outspoken members of the small group. ‘I raised my weapon to fire. And you know what he said to me?’

Aside from alcohol and violence, the thing he loved most in the world was the sound of his own voice. He was easily as old as Anya, yet he spoke and acted like a boisterous teenager, boasting about everything from the men he’d killed to the women he’d bedded.

He took a long drag on his cigarette, as if he thought it would build the tension.

‘“Wait”,’ he finally said. ‘Can you believe that? “Wait!” As if we could sit down and talk things through.’ He shook his head. ‘Stupid asshole. I dropped him a second later.’

His story was accompanied by raucous laughter from Branka, a fellow Serb who looked so much like Goran that the two men could have been brothers. They might well have been for all Anya knew. She had little inclination to learn more about them. All she knew was that when they were together it was virtually impossible to shut them up.

The other two men were decidedly more reserved. Dokka, a big Chechen guerrilla fighter who had served in both wars against Russia and had the scars to prove it; and Yuri, a Ukrainian who shared some of Goran’s outspoken personality, but who often found himself at odds with the two Serbs.

Having finished his tale, Goran took a long pull on his beer and then turned his attention to Anya. ‘And what about you,
maco
? You must have some stories to tell.’

Anya didn’t look up.
Maco
was a Serbian term of endearment that loosely translated as ‘kitty cat’, though in a cruder sense it could be interpreted as ‘pussy’. It didn’t take much imagination to guess the association in his mind.

He’d started calling her by the new nickname within an hour of meeting her and, wary of destroying her tenuous position within the group, she had tolerated it as she’d tolerated so many other things in life – with brooding silence.

‘Not really,’ she evaded as she started to thumb rounds back into the weapon’s magazine. She never knew when she might have to use it.

‘Come on, don’t be so fucking dull!’ he taunted. ‘You were in there on your own, surrounded by FSB. And you came out alive. Tell us how it happened.’

Goran’s exposed arms and hands were covered with tattoos; everything from numbers to crucifixes to pictures of naked women. He didn’t need to tell anyone where he’d got them from. Anya knew that the numbers and obscure symbols formed a complex code explaining which Russian gulag he’d done time in, and even which cell block.

She glanced up at him, her blue eyes like pools of ice in the gloom. ‘Things went as planned. Nothing more.’

She saw a brief flash of anger in his eyes. She was embarrassing him by refusing to play along with his game, by leaving him hanging. And she guessed Goran wasn’t the kind of man who appreciated being embarrassed, least of all by a woman.

Quietly Anya pushed the magazine back into the port on her M1911, applying a little more pressure until she felt the click of the locking pins engaging. If Goran tried to make a move, she would be ready for him.

Then, as quickly as it had come, the anger vanished. He smiled and inclined his bottle to her in a mock toast.

‘That’s what I like about you,
maco
. You’re so cold when you do this shit.’ He took another drink, then glanced at Branka and switched to Serbian, thinking she couldn’t understand him. ‘I guess she saves all her warmth for the bedroom. Maybe I’ll find out?’

Anya felt herself tense up, even though the rational part of her mind warned her to show no emotion. She couldn’t help it – she’d listened to just about enough of his crude banter over the past few weeks, and was approaching the limits of her patience.

Ten years ago she’d been in command of one of the most formidable paramilitary groups on the face of the earth, equalled by none. Now here she was in a derelict aircraft shelter on an abandoned airfield, taking abuse from a man she could kill a dozen times over with her bare hands.

Just for a moment her eyes reflected her thoughts, her anger, her pain, her years of pent-up frustration and impotent rage straining to break free, held in check by nothing more than her iron will. It was only a glimpse, a snapshot, a lightning flash in the darkness that illuminated the world as it was, but it was enough for Goran. The smile faded; the fire of his bravado seemed to flicker out.

He glanced away, unable to hold her gaze.

The screams were cut off abruptly by a single gunshot that reverberated around the cellar like the pealing of thunder, signalling the end of Masalsky’s ‘interrogation’.

Turning around, Anya watched as Atayev emerged from a doorway on the far side of the shelter and strode briskly towards them, removing a pair of work gloves and tossing them aside. Next he unzipped the overalls, stained crimson with Masalsky’s blood, and stepped out of them to reveal civilian clothes, still clean and neat. Only the tiny splash of blood on the left lens of his glasses gave any hint of what he’d just been involved in.

‘Did you get what you needed?’ Anya asked, rising to her feet.

‘After a fashion.’ Atayev patted his jacket pocket, bulging with the square frame of the video camera. Anya had no desire to view its contents. ‘He was more stubborn than Demochev. Took some persuading.’

Anya said nothing to this. She had seen men take pleasure from inflicting pain and suffering, had even been on the receiving end more than once herself, but Atayev was different.

His actions weren’t an outlet for some inner perversion or the festering legacy of past abuses. They were a rebirth, a renewal. When he removed his bloodstained overalls, he was shedding another piece of his previous life, coming one step closer to his transformation into something new, something better.

He seemed to sense her disquiet. Reaching up, he removed his glasses, took a handkerchief from his pocket and carefully wiped the blood away, looking almost self-conscious now.

‘It bothers you,’ he observed coolly. ‘What we do.’

‘Torture is a poor tool for any soldier,’ she said, deciding to be honest.

‘But I’m not a soldier.’ He replaced his glasses and ran a hand through his receding hair. ‘And neither are our enemies.’

Anya nodded, reluctantly acknowledging his point. It still didn’t change how she felt.

‘If you want to leave, I won’t hold it against you,’ Atayev prompted. ‘You’ve already done more than I would ask of anyone.’

‘You know why I’m here,’ she replied. ‘I’ve come too far to turn back now.’

He smiled and laid a hand on her shoulder, and for a moment she saw a flicker of the husband and father he’d once been. ‘I’d hoped you would say that.’

‘There’s something I must ask you,’ Anya said, lowering her voice. ‘When I encountered Drake tonight, he believed I’d tried to contact him before the attack in Washington. I did no such thing, which means someone else did. Someone who knew where I would be.’