The 14th Colony: A Novel (23 page)

“It was tough on all of us. I’m sorry it turned out the way it did.”

She genuinely believed he meant that. This man was no hardened killer. For him to pull the trigger meant that there’d been no choice, and there had not been.

“I’ve decided that I don’t want to live my life without you.” She’d told herself to be honest with him and, for once, not mince words. She was hoping he would return the favor.

“That makes two of us,” he said. “I need you.”

She realized what it took for him to make that admission. Neither one of them was a clingy personality.

“Can we forget about what happened,” she said, “and pick up where we left off?”

“I can do that.”

She smiled. So could she.

They both still wore Russian flight suits. She unzipped hers, wanting to be rid of it. “I’m assuming we have to be stuffed into another fighter and flown across the Atlantic?”

“That would be the fastest way.”

“And what do we do once we get there?”

“Find a man named Jamie Kelly, before Zorin does the same.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

A
NNAPOLIS
, M
ARYLAND

3:20
P.M.

Stephanie admired the house that belonged to Peter Hedlund, the current historian for the Society of Cincinnatus. As explained, the colonial brick mansion had been built in the mid-1700s, and a succession of owners had kept it standing. Most of what was now visible came from a mid-20th-century remodel. She loved the artful mix of marble, walnut, and plaster, along with the careful blend of bold colors, all of which reminded her of the house she and her husband once owned, which had sat not all that far away.

Annapolis was familiar territory. Though currently only the capital of Maryland, for a short time after the Revolutionary War it served as the national capital. Always compact, less than 40,000 people living there, and it had not grown much since her time here back in the late 1980s. Fritz Strobl had called ahead and alerted Hedlund to their visit. She and Luke now sat in a lovely study with a brick hearth, in which burned a crackling fire. Hedlund had already listened to their purpose for being there, and had agreed to everything she’d asked.

“My wife is out for a few hours,” he told them.

“Which will make this easier,” she said. “The fewer people here the better.”

“Is this woman dangerous?”

“Definitely,” she said. “But I don’t think she’s coming here to harm you. She’s after something specific and we need to find out what that is. You don’t happen to know, do you?”

She watched carefully, gauging the man’s consideration of her question. Strobl had offered little to nothing about Hedlund, which could have been evasive or simply meant that he did not know. She was opting for the latter, hoping the answers she sought rested with this man.

“I realize that I also have the ceremonial title Keeper of Secrets,” he said with a smile. “But I assure you, that’s a holdover from a long time ago when there really may have been secrets. Today our society is a philanthropic, social organization that, to my knowledge, is totally transparent.”

Hedlund had already showed them his private library, a separate room devoted to early American history, especially the first fifty years of the republic. He told them that he’d been collecting colonial history books all of his adult life, delighted when he became the society’s historian.

“Did you know Bradley Charon?” she asked.

Hedlund nodded. “Brad and I were close friends. When he died, which was so sudden and unexpected, I was heartbroken. The plane crash came out of nowhere.”

“Did you know he kept a secret library?” Luke asked.

The younger Daniels had stayed uncharacteristically quiet for the past hour or so.

“I only knew of his collection that he kept at the estate, in his study, similar to mine. But all of those books came over to the society at his death. Thankfully, he had the foresight to gift them to us in writing. What with all the probate fighting, we would’ve never seen those volumes again. They’re now all safe, at Anderson House.”

She told him what they’d found at the Virginia estate.

“I would like to see that hidden room,” Hedlund said.

That would have to wait. She checked her watch, wondering what was happening in Russia. She desperately wanted to know. She’d forwarded all calls to the White House so Edwin Davis could handle them while she dealt with matters here. She’d briefly told Edwin about being fired and he sympathized, but she knew there was nothing he could do. She and Edwin decided the best course was simply to plow ahead with what was happening both here and overseas. Something big was up, something the Russians themselves were not sure about, since Osin’s aloofness at the Charon estate had quickly been replaced by active cooperation when it came to Anya Petrova.

The doorbell rang.

She signaled for Luke and Hedlund to flee upstairs. Both men retreated from the study. She stood and smoothed out her blouse and pants, catching her breath, regaining control.

The bell rang again.

She stepped from the study into a marble-floored entrance hall. Two oil paintings of Annapolis dominated the dark-blue walls. At the front door she opened the latch and smiled at the woman who stood out in the cold on the front stoop.

“Are you Mrs. Hedlund?” Anya Petrova asked.

“I am,” Stephanie replied.

*   *   *

Luke listened to what was happening below, safe inside one of the upstairs bedrooms, whose door opened to a second-floor balcony that overlooked the entrance hall.

At no time had Anya Petrova ever seen Stephanie, or even known that she existed, which was why the ruse would work. It seemed the fastest way to find out what this was all about. True, there was danger, as there was no telling what Petrova might do, but that was why he was here.

To keep an eye on things or, more accurately, an ear.

*   *   *

Stephanie invited Petrova inside and closed the door to the afternoon chill.

“What happened to you?” she asked her guest, pointing at the bruise on the woman’s face.

“I’m clumsy and fell. It looks worse than feels.”

“Are you Russian? I hear the accent.”

Petrova nodded. “I was born there, but I live here now. Is your husband home?”

She shook her head. “I’m afraid not.”

“When does he return?”

“I have no idea.”

That lie was designed to force Petrova’s hand and not unnecessarily place Peter Hedlund in any jeopardy, though it would have been preferable for him to have handled this conversation.

“I come long way to speak to him. I must ask questions. About Society of Cincinnatis. He is society historian, is he not?”

Stephanie nodded. “For some time now.”

“Does he have library here, in house?”

She pointed down the short hall that led off the entranceway. “A lovely one, with many books.”

“May I see it?”

She hesitated, just enough for Petrova to not get suspicious. “Why do you want to?”

A look of irritation flooded the younger woman’s face. She’d wondered how much patience Petrova planned to show. They’d disarmed her at Anderson House, but there’d been the matter of her car and the fact that she may have also carried a backup weapon.

Petrova reached beneath her jacket and removed a small-caliber revolver. “I want to see books. Now.”

If Luke had not been upstairs, ready to act, she might be concerned. Anya Petrova cast the wary look of someone to be feared. Which made sense, as she was a product of a place where fear had evolved into a marketable commodity. Her words came simple and direct, with not the slightest hint of false bravado. Just matter-of-fact. Their meaning clear.

I. Will. Hurt. You.

“I,” Stephanie started, feigning concern, “have never had a … gun pointed at me before.”

Petrova said nothing.

Which spoke volumes.

Time to concede.

“All right,” Stephanie said. “Follow me … to the library.”

*   *   *

Luke watched through a cracked-open door as Stephanie and Petrova left the entrance hall. He should head down and find a closer vantage point from which to listen but, before he did, he ought to make a quick check on Hedlund. Their host had fled into another bedroom at the end of the second-floor hall. He crept down a carpet runner toward the half-open door, careful that nothing betrayed his presence.

At the door he stopped.

He heard a voice from the other side.

Low and throaty.

He carefully peered into the bedroom and saw Hedlund sitting in a chair, staring out the window, talking on his mobile phone. Odd, considering what was happening below. Earlier, Hedlund had appeared straight up, genuinely surprised, willing to help.

“It has to be that,” Hedlund said. “We thought all of this was long forgotten, but apparently we were wrong. It’s starting again.”

A few seconds of silence passed as Hedlund listened to what was being said in his ear.

“Nothing here to find. I made sure of that years ago,” Hedlund said.

More silence.

“I’ll keep you posted.”

He heard a beep as the call ended.

“Nothing here to find”
?

This just kept getting better and better.

Which meant Stephanie could have a real problem on her hands.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Zorin dozed in and out, restless though the flight across the Atlantic had been smooth. He’d managed a couple of hours of fitful sleep, grateful that the two pilots stayed forward and to themselves. He’d utilized the desktop computer and found an appropriate landing spot, a national park on the north shore that should offer plenty of privacy. Weather would not be a problem. Northern Canada was having a mild winter, little snow had fallen, the skies tonight were moisture-free. The jump would still be tricky, but he could handle it. If all went as planned, he’d be about forty kilometers northwest of Charlottetown, the island’s capital, where the university was located. He’d found the college’s website and learned that Jamie Kelly still worked there part-time. More checking on the Internet had also yielded a home address.

Fool’s Mate.

He’d been piecing it all together for over ten years, extracting bits and pieces from old records. But his talks with Belchenko had been most productive, even though the archivist had always thought the whole thing nothing more than wishful thinking.

He knew that was not the case.

The tall man who entered the apartment was in his sixties, with thick gray hair brushed straight back from a noticeably ashen face. He wore rimless glasses, the dark eyes intense but also full of weariness. Four aides accompanied him. They quickly searched the other rooms, then retreated outside, the door closing behind them. The apartment was a KGB safe house, kept under constant surveillance. Tonight it played host to Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov.

No introductions occurred. Instead Andropov sat at the head of a wooden table where a cold supper had been laid out, along with glasses filled with vodka. Zorin sat at the table, too, as did three other KGB officers. Two he knew. One was a stranger. He’d never before been this close to Andropov. Like himself, this man came from humble beginnings, the son of a railroad official who worked as a loader, telegraph clerk, and sailor fighting in Finland during the Great Patriotic War. Afterward, he’d begun a steady climb up the party hierarchy, eventually becoming chief of the KGB. Last November, two days after Brezhnev died, Andropov had been chosen the nation’s fourth general secretary since Stalin.

“I plan to do something extraordinary,” Andropov said to them in barely a whisper. “I will say tomorrow that we are stopping all work on space-based missile defense systems.”

Zorin was shocked. Ever since March, when Reagan announced America would develop a strategic defense system, all Soviet research efforts had been redirected. To aid that effort all intelligence operations had likewise been refocused, the idea being to learn everything possible about SDI.

“Mr. Reagan thinks us an evil empire,” Andropov said. “I will show him that is not the case. We will tell the world we are stopping.”

No one said a word.

“I received a letter from a ten-year-old American child,” Andropov said. “She asked me why we want to conquer the world. Why do we want a war? I told her we want neither. I plan to tell that to the world tomorrow. After that is done, I will be entering the hospital.”

Zorin had heard the talk. The general secretary had supposedly suffered total kidney failure, his life now sustained only by dialysis. Characteristically, nothing had been said publicly. For Andropov to mention it himself seemed extraordinary.

“I tell you this for a reason,” Andropov said. “You four have been personally selected by me to carry out a special assignment. I have come here, tonight, to instruct you myself. This is a mission that I personally conceived. Each operation will carry a name. I chose those, too. From chess, a game I love. Do any of you play?”

All of them shook their heads.

Andropov pointed around the table and said to them each, individually, “Absolute Pin. Backward Pawn. Quiet Move. Fool’s Mate.”

That had been August 1983, the first time Zorin had ever heard those words. He’d not known their meaning, but quickly learned.

Absolute Pin. A king cornered so tightly that it cannot legally move, except to be exposed to check.

Backward Pawn
.
One pawn behind another of the same color that cannot advance without the support of another pawn.

Quiet Move
.
Something that does not attack or capture an enemy piece
.

Fool’s Mate
.
The shortest possible game. Two moves and over.

“Each of these assignments is vital to the others,” Andropov said. “Once brought together, they will change the world.”

“These are totally independent operations?” one of the other assets asked.