Spy Catcher: The J.J. McCall Novels (Books 1-3) (The FBI Espionage Series) (31 page)

Chapter 2

Monday, November 9th—Surveillance Detail

Russian intelligence officers burned the D.C. streets, trying to get in the black—the unseen. Their mission was obvious: Exploit the operational standdown to provide support to Lana Michaels and extract her from the United States. The Gs were vigilant, determined to prevent it—and few were better than Jiggy Jazz, and Money T.

“Jazz, do you read me?” He clung to the bumper of his new target—the stout, weasel-like counterintelligence line chief, Yuriy Filchenko. Jiggy smelled the burn of Filchenko's tires across the asphalt through a slight crack in his window. The force of the fall wind pulled his Malibu toward the median line, but his tight grip on the steering wheel kept his car steady until he could grab his radio. “I've still got the eye on Filchenko. This is four days in a row, guys! I’ve spent forty minutes outside Potbelly’s while he scarfs toasty sandwiches. Then he gets back in his car and drives in circles, as if his steering wheel only turns in one direction. Could’ve at least offered me a cookie.”

Jazz laughed. He was assigned to cover Lana Michaels’ father, Aleksandr Mikhaylov, one of the most senior Russian officers serving in Washington. “Jot that down. We’ll note it in our justification to get him declared persona non grata.”

A clearing in the silver sky exposed a sliver of blue as Jiggy eased his foot off the gas pedal. He hooked a sharp left onto K Street, the Wall Street for D.C.’s lobbyists, replete with charmless, dwarfed concrete boxes that stretched from downtown to Georgetown. 

“Now, we’re back on the road driving in circles. Just turned onto 17th Street. We usually head north. This is a new route from yesterday and his driving’s erratic.”

“Something tells me he’s lost and can’t drive a stick. What's your twenty?” Jiggy asked.

“I'm heading west on Wisconsin. Traffic’s crawling up ahead,” Jazz replied. “Looks like Mikhaylov’s going back to home base. Same route.” 

“Keep me updated. I’m gonna need Dramamine if he loops around this block again. All these one-way streets are throwing him off. Maybe I should pull up beside his car and give him a Welcome to Washington tip—don’t fuck with the Gs.”

Both chuckled.

As Jiggy trailed Filchenko onto the cramped 17
th
Street, his stomach rumbled. The early morning start left him little time to eat breakfast. He scanned the food trucks lined along the northbound curbs next to the Ellipse, the circular tree-lined field of grass that crowned the south side of Presidential Park and afforded a direct-view of the White House. Thought he might pull over and grab a street dog and a bag of chips to hold him until he could eat real food after his shift.

When he stopped at the D Street red light, he glanced out the driver-side window, froze, and did a double take. The man's face, the beige Toyota Corolla with diplomatic plates, it was him—Boris Gusin—the Russian signals intelligence officer serving under diplomatic cover as a Third Secretary. The Gs called him Goose. He dropped a handful of quarters into the parking meter, which immediately struck Jiggy as odd. Russians were notorious for racking up parking fines and not paying the tickets. They considered free parking anywhere in the region, metered or not, a diplomatic privilege. The hair on Jiggy's arm stood on end. Goose was up to no good.

Chris Johnson and Lana Michaels were the first case agents assigned to cover him and they often debated about whether Goose was truly an intelligence officer. Lana said he was a nobody, but Chris finally convinced her he must be in a technical operational line—a signals collector, an eavesdropper, roughly analogous to the American NSA contingent. His job was identifying and decrypting U.S. government communications channels and exploiting the information collected to the advantage of the Russian government—the more secure the network, the more damaging to U.S. national security, the better.

Gripping his cell phone, Jiggy glanced down to check the time, wondering what the hell a signals collector would be doing at the Ellipse before noon, no less? The lookouts hadn't called him out. How'd he get out of the gate without anyone noticing?

The light turned green and Jiggy didn't budge. He'd gotten lost in his thoughts, wondering whether he should break coverage on Filchenko and pick up Goose. The horn blared in the car behind him, jarring Jiggy out of his daze. He threw up his middle finger and grabbed his radio.

“Jazz, this is Jig, do you copy?” he asked.

“Yeah. What's going on?”

“I'm breaking coverage. Filchenko's lost…but I’ve spotted Goose dropping money into a parking meter near the Ellipse.”

Jazz paused. “That’s against Embassy rules, isn’t it?”

“All day, every day. That’s why I’m staying with him. Going on foot.”

A lengthy silence fell between them. “While I’ll admit that something’s off, I gotta advise you not to do it, Jig. We’re under strict orders.” 

“I know,” he said, letting the static crackle in the void. “I’ll consider myself advised. I’m shadowing him on foot until he leaves the area so I’ll be going radio silent. Text my cell to contact me.”

“Roger that, but if something goes wrong the only pedal you’ll be pushing is on that 21-speed Trek collecting dust in your living room.”

“It’s probably nothing,” he lied. “I’ll be in and out in no time.”

“You’ve been warned,” Jazz said. “I’m riding this out with Mikhaylov. Hit me up when you figure out what's going on.”

Jiggy called an audible and hoped he wouldn’t live to regret it. Filchenko would spend the rest of his morning finding his way back to the compound; following him would be a waste of time. He pushed Jazz’s lecture from his mind and made the command decision to break off and pursue Goose. His gut feeling solidified his resolve.

Jiggy hung a right at the first corner near Constitution Hall. Nothing but rows of metered spaces. He grunted, parked in the empty one closest to 17
th
Street, and emptied his cup holder of all the change. After loading the meter, he scrambled through the rush hour traffic toward Goose's vehicle, pulling his hoodie over his head. He slipped on his sunglasses to conceal as much of his face as possible. He'd been assigned to cover Gusin before; Jiggy feared Goose might recognize him. He didn’t want to risk it.

Once next to Goose’s car, he peered into the passenger windows.

A red-bottomed cooler with a white lid and square handle rested on the back seat. A thin silver wire hung out of the rear corner. Looked like an antenna…which were usually attached to receivers. Why would he keep a receiver in a cooler?

“That's no picnic lunch,” Jiggy mumbled under his breath. He picked up his pace, scanning from left to right before he spotted Goose resting on a park bench, holding a newspaper with one hand and fiddling inside his bulky jacket with the other. He bobbed his head to the music presumably pumping through the buds plugged in his ears. As Jiggy passed Goose, his eyes traced a thin, coated wire protruding from Goose’s sleeve. Why would he conceal electronics equipment beneath his clothes?

After circling the walking path once, Jiggy found a park bench within eyeshot of Goose. He pulled out his cell phone and began to send a text just as his phone rang. Jazz's number flashed on the caller ID. He rolled his eyes. The next time he saw Jazz, he’d explain the difference between a text and a phone call.

“I told you to text me!” Jiggy whispered.

“I lost him,” Jazz said. “Mikhaylov's in the black.”

“What? What the hell happened? You said he was running the same route.”

“Yeah…the son of a bitch pulled up to the embassy gate, waited long enough for me to break coverage. Then he threw the car in reverse and took off toward Wisconsin.”

“Damn! He's probably making the drop as we speak,” Jiggy whispered.

“Probably. If Michaels shows up in Moscow, I’ll never live this down,” Jazz said. “What's going on with Goose?”

“He’s wearing headphones, fidgeting with electronics inside in his jacket, and he’s got a possible receiver in his cooler. He’s targeting something. I mean this area is pretty target rich. The question is what…and, more importantly, how?” he said as he scanned the area. He gulped hard when his eyes locked on the White House grounds.

“You might want to find out who his new case agents are. There may be a clue in his file.”

“Will do. See you back at the command center.”

After Jiggy hung up, he immediately scanned his contacts to find her number. Only took twenty seconds to figure out J.J. was the only agent who’d have the balls to take on the case in the
current environment
. He glanced at his target once again; Goose appeared in no hurry to vacate his position. If she and Tony joined him at the Ellipse, they could confirm his well-founded suspicion. An intelligence officer engaging in signals collection activity a few hundred feet from the White House? He was operational. The question was: what was he targeting?

Chapter 3

Monday, November 9th—FBI Headquarters

J.J. could hardly believe Jiggy’s tale—the Russians monitoring U.S. government communications from the Ellipse? Maybe even the White House? Jiggy rambled as he detailed the chronology of the events leading up to his presence in the park.

“The M.O. looks familiar. This whole situation takes me back a few years—1999 to be exact.”

J.J.’s forehead wrinkled in confusion. Took her a moment to catch his reference. The case. The thumb in the eye of the U.S. government delivered by a couple of quarter-sized electronic listening devices found in a State Department conference room. Doors down from the Secretary’s Office. And inside the walls of the very Agency whose existence allowed for the Russian diplomatic presence in the United States, no less. The story was all over the news.

“199— You mean the— get out! But…how?”

“How in hell should I know? I drive cars for a living,” he said. “I, uhh, hesitated to call. I’m sure you’re on ice because of the stand-down.”

“You got the memo, huh? I wish I was on ice,” J.J. said. “The water’s hot as hell over here and Director Freeman’s got more eyes on me than a two-headed spider. I can’t step a toe out of line or the CIA will roast my head on a spit.”

“What gets me is the Russians don’t give a shit about a memo,” Jiggy said. “The Bureau is the only one playing by the freakin’ rules.”

J.J. agreed. Bad guys didn’t care about the concept of “fair.”

“Listen, I hate to put you in a compromising position, but…”

The pits of her arms began to burn; his lie made her itch. She smirked and shook her head. “Give me a freaking break, Jig. You knew exactly who you were calling.”

He chuckled and continued, “All right, all right. You got me. But if I’m correct about the similarities, this discovery could be the beginning of something big.”

J.J. quieted and sunk into her thoughts.

“Hello?” Jiggy said.

“I can’t do it. My job’s on the line, and I’m not sure whether I want to lose it yet.”

“Then don’t think of it as an investigation. Think of it as an…exchange of ideas,” he said.

J.J. remained silent.

“C’mon, wasn’t it you who told me ‘Do your duty and damn the consequences’?”

Ugh. General Patton. She hated when her motivational speeches came back to bite her in the ass.

“That was low, Jig. All right. All right.”

“Great! But you need to get down here now. Gusin's still in the area so try not to draw attention.”

“This is me you're talking to, Jiggy. Low key is my middle name.”

J.J. hung up, swept back into the office, and interrupted the mumbles. “Uhhh, sorry to break this up everyone, but Tony—we’ve got some important business to attend to,” she said, cutting her eyes to signal that he shouldn’t question her in that moment. His twisted expression revealed his confusion; however, he didn’t say a word.

“Since we’re still an analytical working group, when are we going to prioritize and conduct our analyses?” Gia asked.

“I'll email you all tonight. By then I’ll have more direction.” J.J. expected that if events unfolded as she anticipated, the cases would prioritize themselves.

As everyone gathered their things to depart, Gia lingered awkwardly, waiting for Tony until she finally realized he wasn’t leaving. A few moments later, she drifted out of the door.

Tony eased beside J.J. and in a hushed tone asked. “What’d Jiggy want?”

J.J.’s eyebrow lifted. “He was following the new counterintelligence line chief, Filchenko. The guy gets lost and Jig runs into Gusin at the Ellipse with equipment and a possible receiver. He wants us to go check it out.”

Six’s glance volleyed between Tony and J.J. He tilted his head to one side, pursed his lips, and said, “Wait. Gusin’s a radio intercept guy, right?”

Tony looked surprised at his interruption. “What? You put your hearing aid in? We were havin’ a private conversation here,” Tony snapped. “As a matter of fact, he leads the entire signals group, the most senior guy in Washington.”

“You’re not going down there to conduct an operation,” Six ordered, drawing side glances from his colleagues. His expression grew serious, his voice stern. “Or do I need to define ‘stand-down’ for you? Too many lives are at risk for you to run out playing Dirty Harriet because some signals guy landed in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Oh really?” Tony snapped, sneering at Six and defending J.J. “This…from Shaft?”

“Okay, you two. Watch it or I’ll take you both to the principal’s office,” J.J. said, locking eyes with Six. “We’re not conducting an investigation at this stage. We aren’t making any arrests. We’re only talking to the Gs. If I recall correctly, Title 18 gives me the authority to do so on behalf of the American people without regard to any of this political bullshit.”

“And you wonder why you can’t get a promotion,” Six barked.

His words stung, especially coming from someone who knew first-hand how she’d suffered under Jack Sabinski’s reign, but she bit back. “And
you
wondered how I could question your loyalty.”

Six’s eyes widened. He opened his mouth to speak, but remained silent.

“Okay. Okay. Now, who needs a trip the principal’s office?” Tony said. “Let’s get outta here, J.J. Time’s a’ wastin’.”

“I’ll be right behind you,” Six said. “Somebody’s got to protect our interests.”

J.J. rolled her eyes. “You’re an American citizen.
Our
interests are
your
interests,” she growled before mumbling, “asshole.”

“I heard that!” Six said.

“Uhhh, I don’t want to intrude,” Walter piped in. “But if signals intelligence is involved, as the only NSA rep in the group, I may be able to help.” 

“Good thinking! You’re in,” J.J. said, a slight smile emerging from her scowl. Walter might have more balls than she gave him credit for. “We’ll walk. It’s only a few blocks away.”