Arkangel, page 16
On the screen, the footage from the burning monastery vanished and was replaced with a photo of a yellowed page.
Elle stood with the others and drew closer. If she squinted, she could just make out the phantom image of a splayed book and an outline of a cathedral. They looked like they were hovering over the page. Past them, in the center of the photo, the image of a large compass glowed. Scribbles of writing surrounded it, a combination of Nordic runes, old Latin, and even scientific nomenclature.
Monk whistled his appreciation and clapped Jason on the shoulder. “Kat did really good.”
Jason frowned and shook out of his grip. “I don’t know what any of this means, but on the way to Sergiyev Posad, we can try deciphering it.”
“It’s a start,” Gray admitted. “Let’s just hope our enemies haven’t also figured this out.”
Bishop Yelagin faced the table. “Once we’re in Sergiyev Posad, I should be able to get a small group onto the grounds of the Trinity Lavra without raising attention.”
Sister Anna added her support. “I know several of the nuns at the convent in Sergiyev Posad. Friends, who have no love for Archpriest Sychkin. They can offer additional cover for your group—as few people take heed of us.”
“You’ll need to be discreet with your friends,” Gray warned her.
She gave a bow of her head.
Gray faced the group. “Then we should all get moving before anyone—”
It was too late.
An explosive blast shook the building.
Elle ducked, and Tucker shifted over to shadow her. Dust filtered from the ceiling. Gunfire erupted overhead—at first a few shots, then a furious barrage.
Tucker whistled to his dogs, who burst in his direction.
He then faced her. “Time to go.”
14
May 11, 10:17 P.M. MSK
Moscow, Russian Federation
Seichan crouched on a landing in the apartment building’s stairwell. Moments ago, through a narrow window, she had spied the smoky passage of a rocket-propelled grenade. She hadn’t seen it strike, but she had heard its blast.
She grimaced.
I’m too late . . .
The echo of gunfire reached her, too, muffled by the cement-block walls of the building.
She stared up the steps.
I had hoped for more time.
Earlier, while in the security nest at the Apostolic Nunciature, she had kept a continual watch on the CCTV cameras that surrounded the embassy. Nothing out in the streets had rankled her suspicions. All had seemed quiet.
Then the low static that had filled her left ear for hours suddenly went silent.
The noise had come from a radio transmitter that she had planted in the lobby of the neighboring apartment building. She had secured it shortly after arriving at the embassy. She had also hidden a camera there, but its signal had failed to penetrate the electronic buffer that protected the embassy. Still, the radio proved powerful enough to transmit to her earpiece.
She hadn’t told anyone what she had done, not even Gray. When the two had reached the embassy, they had found Monk’s group already inside—along with a bishop and a nun from the Russian Orthodox Church. Gray may have been willing to hear them out, but she couldn’t stomach the sight of them.
Not after what happened at the monastery.
Furious, she had left the conference room and commandeered the embassy’s security office. Before that, though, she had snuck off to the apartment building and planted her devices. She was certain, if there was an attack on the embassy, it would come from that site. The building towered over the squat Nunciature. Its windows offered hundreds of potential roosts for snipers.
To help monitor the building, Seichan had chosen the lobby to serve as her canary in a coalmine because if Valya attempted a siege, she would surely jam local communications to delay any response from the Russian authorities.
So, when Seichan’s radio went silent, she knew something had gone wrong. She had immediately snuck off to investigate, to confirm the threat. With all the surrounding CCTV cameras still showing nothing, she couldn’t be certain the sudden silence from the radio wasn’t just a malfunction.
Even when she had reached the building’s lobby, she had spotted nothing unusual. A few people had been watching a television in the corner, smoking cigarettes and cigars. A bored deskman worked on a sudoku puzzle.
She had discreetly recovered her radio and found that it was still operating, confirming that its signal was being jammed. She considered trying to contact Gray, but such efforts would also be blocked by the interference.
Even if it wasn’t, she might not have alerted him.
If Valya had found their group, that meant someone in the embassy had alerted her to their presence. It was why Seichan had gone off on her own to investigate, not even alerting Kowalski. She feared the open radio would reach Yuri Severin, whom she didn’t fully trust. Above all else, she couldn’t risk forewarning Valya. Seichan’s best chance of eliminating the threat was to act quickly and get a jump on the woman.
Plus, there was another reason she had come alone. This battle was a personal one. It always had been. Valya carried a grudge against her, for Seichan’s betrayal of the Guild, for the death of her brother. Likewise, Seichan had her own reasons to hunt the woman down. Valya had kidnapped her in the past, tortured her, and threatened her unborn child. And then there was the woman’s latest attack: bombing the Smithsonian Castle. Seichan took this personally, too. If Sigma were disbanded, it would strip her of her home, her future, all that she had painstakingly built.
But worst of all, just hours ago, Valya had come close to killing Gray, which would have left Jack fatherless.
Seichan slipped two knives into her hands, from the bracers of blades sheathed around her wrists and ankles.
And no one threatens my son.
Trusting Gray and the others to deal with the siege, she continued up the stairwell with one goal in mind.
Someone needs to cut the head off this snake.
By now, Seichan had reached the building’s fifth floor. She had checked each level, still finding nothing out of the ordinary.
But now with the attack underway . . .
The door banged open above her. It was followed by a rush of boots down the steps. It could have been a panicked apartment dweller, fleeing the nearby firefight.
But she knew it was not.
She recognized the determined cadence in those steps. She stopped halfway up the next flight of stairs and flattened against its inner railing. The footfalls rapidly approached. She heard a grunt from the landing overhead, then a shadow swept along the wall across from her, cast by the someone descending the neighboring flight of steps.
When the figure reached a position directly above her, she burst up and stabbed her blade between the steel balusters of the railing. She aimed for the top of the man’s boot. She severed his Achilles tendon with the razor edge of her knife.
A sharp cry of surprise burst from him. Pain and a flopping foot sent his body tumbling headlong. He crashed hard onto the next landing.
Seichan leaped to meet him.
Before he could get up, she landed on his back—where the tube of an RPG launcher was strapped. The man fought to free the arm pinned under him. His hand was in view, clutching a Russian MP-443 Grach, a standard military-issue sidearm. She plunged her second knife into the back of his hand, severing a finger. The weapon skittered off across the tile floor.
She held the other knife to his ear, while leaning tight to the same lobe.
“Ne dvigaysya,” she whispered coldly, intimately. She was fluent in Russian, a necessity in her former profession, where many mercenaries were from Slavic countries. “You don’t want to feel this blade’s kiss.”
The man cursed and bucked under her.
So be it.
She kept her knife at his ear, but she flicked the other blade and sliced off his opposite ear. He hollered, but she pressed her forearm against the back of his neck, throttling the noise to a gurgle.
She needed him cowed, more fearful of her than even pain could achieve. She kept her voice cold. “You think your boss Mikhailov is a cruel nadsmotrshchik. Trust me, comrade, I am the one who gives that kúrva nightmares.”
She had no need to pretend, to fake this threat.
I was a monster.
“You’re going to tell me where she is,” Seichan promised him.
He tried to deny her.
She shifted her knee to his neck and showed him she was not lying. Her vision narrowed as she let loose that monster. The Guild had taught her well, where pain and terror resided in a body. She used her knives until the man mewled under her. His blood spread wide across the tiles.
“Stoy . . .” he pleaded with her, his voice a croak of agony.
“Tell me.”
“Fifteenth floor . . . 1509 . . .”
She retrieved his Grach and pointed the pistol at the back of his head. He did not even try to move. She breathed heavily, a slight tremble in her arm, as she fought the monster inside her.
Finally, she scowled, reversed the weapon, and struck him hard behind his remaining ear. Bone cracked, and he slumped limp into the pool of blood. She stripped him of his radio, then grabbed the RPG launcher and slung it over her shoulder.
She stared at the Grach in her hand.
Her breathing remained hard.
I won’t be that monster.
Still, she leaned down and sliced his other Achilles tendon, hobbling him, making sure he was no longer a threat.
But I won’t be a fool either.
15
May 11, 10:25 P.M. MSK
Moscow, Russian Federation
How did Mikhailov find us?
The question burned brightly in Gray’s mind, but the priority was to get everyone to safety. With the first rocket blast, Gray had burst to his feet—or tried to. Pain shot up his left leg from his ankle. He caught himself on the table’s edge.
On the far side, Monk and Jason gathered Bailey and the two members of the Russian Church. A pained glance to Gray’s left showed Tucker rushing out of the conference room, guarding over Dr. Stutt, flanked by his two dogs. The former Army Ranger had reacted with lightning reflexes, protecting the charge given to him, likely feeling responsible for hauling Elle here, for putting her in danger again.
Tucker’s instincts—while well-intentioned—were going to get them both killed.
Monk spotted this, too. “I’ll fetch them.”
“No.” Gray pointed to the others. “Get everyone to safety.”
He headed toward the door, pulling free his SIG Sauer. He cursed himself for not warning Tucker of the team’s contingency plan. Beyond the embassy’s grounds being considered sacrosanct territory of the Holy See, the building’s history had its own secrets—known only by a handful of the staff.
And certain members of the Vatican intelligenza.
Father Bailey strode quickly to the room’s back wall. He pushed on a panel, and it popped open, revealing it to be a secret door, similar to the one that hid the embassy’s communication hub. But this panel didn’t open into a room. Behind it was a steel vault-like door.
Bailey reached for its electronic lock, which glowed an angry red, and swiped a black titanium card across it, a gift from the ambassador. The lock flashed green, and the large bolts that sealed the door slid away.
Bailey swung the door wide, exposing stone steps heading down. Lights flickered on. The staircase led into the labyrinthine tunnels beneath Moscow, the same maze where the cache of books had been discovered. The Vatican’s century-old building, prior to being gifted to the Holy See, had been the Markin Mansion. As with many places of prominence built during that volatile period, it had incorporated a secret back door, taking advantage of those subterranean tunnels to use them for their original purpose—as a means of escape in times of emergency.
Like now.
“This way!” Bailey urged his two colleagues.
Gray reached the main door and called back to Monk and Jason. “If I’m not back in ten, lock that hatch. We’ll regroup at our secondary safehouse.”
Monk did not look happy with this plan, but they had civilians to safeguard. “What about Kowalski and Seichan? I can’t reach either of them on the radio.”
Gray headed out. “I’ll check on them, too.”
By now, the fierce firefight had died to sporadic bursts. The all-out assault had turned into a siege as assailants set about clearing the building, surely hunting for Gray and the others. From the sounds of battle, the Italian security guards continued to engage the intruders.
Hopefully, their efforts would buy Gray enough time to collect the others and retreat below.
He paused at the stairwell up to the main floor.
Tucker’s trail was not hard to follow. Gray heard gunfire echoing above, accompanied by savage growling. In the past, Gray had witnessed Tucker’s lethal efficiency—and that was when he only had Kane.
Now with two dogs . . .
No wonder the Ranger set off on his own with Elle.
Gray edged upward, climbing through a choking pall of smoke. Upon reaching the rear lobby, he saw four bodies sprawled across the floor. Beyond them, the door out to the parking lot had been hit by a rocket blast. The exit was blocked by a pile of rubble.
Gray turned and headed for the main floor.
A deafening barrage of gunfire burst ahead of him. He didn’t know if it was Tucker or other defenders of this castle. Smoke grew thicker. Fires glowed in the distance.
Taking advantage of the momentary cover, he ducked into the next hall, intending to check on his other teammates. The hallway ended at the embassy’s security nest. He sidestepped another two bodies—a guardsman and a combatant in black body armor. The floor was slick with blood, challenging his bad ankle.
Ahead, the door into the security room was ajar.
Had the others abandoned it?
He crept low and nudged it open with a palm, while keeping his SIG trained forward. A gunshot rang out. A round ricocheted off the doorframe and buzzed his ear. Gray ignored it and dove low, knocking the door wider. He slid on his shoulder across the floor and aimed his pistol where he expected the sniper to be from the bullet’s trajectory.
But the shooter had already moved, anticipating this.
A large shadow loomed farther to the right, limned against the row of static-filled security monitors. A huge gun reflected the meager light.
Gray shifted his aim.
A harsh voice called to him, “Don’t shoot.”
It wasn’t a command, only an urgent warning.
Gray forced his finger to relax on his gun’s trigger. He recognized the accent and the scarred profile as the man leaned down.
“Yuri . . .”
The Russian security chief helped him up. “I retreated here when all hell broke loose.”
Gray gained his feet and searched around. “The others?”
“No sign.”
Needing some intel, Gray crossed to the bay of CCTV monitors. They all ran with static. Valya had knocked out all the exterior cameras.
What about those inside?
He flipped switches to the interior cameras. Many of them were also down, but a few screens showed views of the mansion. Smoke obscured several of the cameras, but he caught sight of a large form shambling down a staircase from the third level.
Kowalski . . .
The view also showed what awaited him below.
Oh, no . . .
10:28 P.M.
Kowalski leaned a large palm on the wall, struggling to stay upright. He clutched his Desert Eagle in his other hand, but it felt like an anchor. His vision remained watery. His hearing was muffled, as if he had been dropped down a well.
And I almost was.
While spying upon the neighboring apartment building, he had spotted the smoky blast from an RPG launcher. As the grenade rocketed his way, he dove for cover. Fire and glass exploded behind him, blowing out all the windows along this side of the embassy. The blast threw him hard against the wall. Between the concussion of the detonation and the blow to his head, he passed out for several breaths. The world had gone dark, then returned, all muted and wobbly.
He had gained his feet and stumbled away from the spreading fires, intent to join the others and, if possible, get a little payback.
As he descended, he rubbed blood from an eye, squinting through the stinging smoke. The arm holding up the Desert Eagle slowly sank.
Still, he noted the smoke stir near the bottom of the steps. He caught the glimpse of a figure in body armor. He fired before the assailant came fully into view. His Desert Eagle’s fifty-cal rounds needed little precision. It was a weapon meant to inflict maximum damage.
The weapon blasted and bucked in his hand.
The body below got knocked back, wafting the smoke enough to reveal the ruins of a successful headshot.
Unfortunately, the fierce recoil of his handgun ripped the weapon from his weakened fingers. The Eagle fell and toppled down the steps—landing at the toes of a second man in black armor who appeared from the stairwell’s opposite side.
An assault rifle pointed up the steps.
Kowalski had nowhere to go.
He raised his empty hands and flipped the guy two birds.
“Screw you.”
The bastard savored his kill. “Nyet, screw—”
A large shadow struck the man from the side, taking him down hard. A bloodcurdling cry erupted from him. The shadow thrashed atop him, ripping into his throat until that scream became a gurgle, then silence.
“RELEASE,” came a familiar command.
Kowalski stumbled down the rest of the steps to meet Tucker. Kane leaped off the dead man, tossing his furry head, shaking blood from his muzzle. Behind him, Elle Stutt stayed close, her eyes huge. Marco kept tight to her side.
Kowalski struggled to clear his addled head. “What’re you—”
“They’ve got the exits covered on the first floor,” Tucker warned. “With heavy fighting. But there’s a second-story balcony on the side of the building, over an alley, with a fire escape leading down. This way.”
