The Sniper and the Wolf

4

“It was Hagen?” Gil said in disbelief, talking to Pope on a satellite phone from the tarmac in Bern, Switzerland, where he had just deplaned from an Aeroflot DC-10. “Chief of Staff Hagen?”

“Ex—chief of staff,” Pope reminded him.

“I knew Lerher had a hard-on for me, but what the fuck did I ever do to Hagen? He burned me after Earnest Endeavor. Remember?” Operation Earnest Endeavor was the rescue of a female POW in Afghanistan, which Gil had orchestrated against the president’s specific orders to the contrary. As a means of “punishment” for acting without authorization, then — White House Chief of Staff Hagen suggested that the president award both Gil and his fellow operative, Green Beret Daniel Crosswhite, the Medal of Honor. The public award ceremony — while an effective political gambit for the president — had revealed Gil’s identity to the entire world. Not only did this end his career as a SEAL Team VI operator, but soon it led a band of Muslim assassins directly to his Montana doorstep, very nearly costing both him and his wife their lives.

“Hagen’s a sociopath,” Pope said. “An egomaniacal power junkie, and he blames you and me for his dismissal from the White House.”

“But how’d he get hooked up with Lerher? Lerher wasn’t stupid enough to throw in with a jerk-off like Hagen.”

“I don’t think they were directly linked,” Pope said. “I tracked Hagen down by phone a little while ago, and when I dropped Lerher’s name, it genuinely confused him.”

“You talked to Hagen?”

“Yeah. I told him you’re coming after him. Hopefully that’ll keep him out of our hair long enough for us to get things figured out.”

“How did you know it was Hagen who ghosted the op?”

“I didn’t, but he seemed a logical suspect. Have the Russians told you anything more about what Yeshevsky was doing in Paris?”

Gil glanced over at Dragunov, who stood near the nose gear of the DC-10, also talking on a satellite phone. Five rough-looking Russians in street clothes stood off in a tight group, smoking and talking. “If they know, they’re not telling me, but they definitely want to find this Kovalenko and punch his ticket.”

“What’s their next move?”

“I’m waiting to find that out now. Dragunov’s on the phone with the GRU. His team is standing by here.”

“Spetsnaz?”

“Yeah, and one look at these guys,” Gil said, “tells you they’re heavy pipe hitters. Dragunov says they’ve seen a lot of combat against the Chechens.” “Pipe hitter” was a Special Forces term referring to an operator willing to do whatever it took to accomplish a mission.

“I’ve done some research on Dragunov,” Pope added. “It looks like he killed one of his own men a few years ago for lagging behind on a mission in Chechnya. And he’s not your run-of-the-mill Spetsnaz operator; he’s a member of Spetsgruppa A — the Alpha Group. He doesn’t mess about, this one.” Spetsgruppa A, an elite subunit of the Spetsnaz, often operated quite separately from the rest of Russian Special Forces, answering directly to the Kremlin.

“Well, I don’t intend to hang around long enough to get to know him. He’s got his team here, so he’s not going to need me.”

“Hanging around might be the best way to find out what the hell Lerher was up to, Gil. I checked, and the agency has him listed as being on vacation all this month.”

“That’s doesn’t mean shit. They take their people off the books all the time.”

“But that’s not what this is,” Pope insisted. “The personnel office genuinely believes Lerher’s on vacation, which means he was either acting independently, or he was part of an unsanctioned operation. If there’s a shadow cell operating inside the CIA, we have to expose it.”

Gil glanced again at the Spetsnaz men. “These guys are all wired for sound, Bob — chain-smoking and hypervigilant. I don’t like it.”

“Is Dragunov chain-smoking?”

“No. He seems to have his shit mostly together.”

“Well, maybe that’s why he wants you along. Maybe he needs another level head.”

Gil chuckled. “Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s rainin’, old man.”

Pope laughed. “I wouldn’t do that, but we need to figure out what Lerher was doing in that apartment with the Chechens.”

“I don’t like operating in the blind, Bob. I’m not an espionage guy. I need a well-defined target.”

“Suppose I can give you one.”

“What, a target?”

“The yacht that Yeshevsky took to Marseille is slowly making its way back to Athens. It’s called the Palinouros, currently anchored at Malta. It belongs to a Turkish banker with loose financial ties to Chechen terrorists, but the owner’s not aboard. He’s at his home in Istanbul.”

“So who’s aboard?” Gil asked.

“Good question. Maybe your Spetsnaz friends would be interested in helping us find that out. The GRU has resources in Rome they can bring to bear on a seaborne operation of this nature. And Dragunov has operated with the Black Sea Fleet.”

“Yeah,” Gil said dryly. “He mentioned that.”

“If you’re not interested, Gil, you can ditch the Russians and head for our embassy. I’ll make sure you’re brought home ASAP. It’s your call.”

Gil glanced over at the Spetsnaz men. One of them caught his gaze and grinned mischievously.

“You there?” Pope asked.

“I’m thinking, damn it.”

The grinning Russian came over, shaking an unfiltered Russian cigarette from a crinkled pack and offering it to Gil. “Brody,” he said pointing at himself.

“I’m Gil.”

“Vassili,” Brody said with a chuckle. He had pale blue eyes and a narrow face, the youngest of Dragunov’s men at twenty-five. Gil accepted the smoke, and Brody lit it for him from the end of his own cigarette. Gil took a deep drag, and the unrefined tobacco hit his central nervous system like a truck. Brody saw his eyes start to drift and laughed, clapping him on the arm, saying something over his shoulder that made the other four men laugh with him.

“Are you there, Gil?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” he said, letting the dizziness pass. “Go ahead and upload the intel on the Palinouros to my phone. I’ll have a talk with Dragunov and see what he can put together. If his people are game, we’ll take the yacht and gather whatever intel there is. But after that, I’m done. I’m not chasing all over Eastern Europe so these yahoos can get me killed.”