Rasputin's Shadow

71

With a comms bud in one ear and a helmet and earplug in my hand, I trotted off along T Street, away from the hotel’s entrance, leaving the limo parade and the attendant media bustle behind. I had the massive curving facade of the hotel beyond the landscaped green to my left, a tall office building looming over me to my right.

The roads had all been cleared of parked cars, and despite the hubbub behind me, the street ahead had an eerie, empty feel. I passed the office block and banked onto Florida Avenue, where I encountered the first police roadblock. It consisted of two patrol cars blocking the road, with four officers directing the few cars that had ventured this far to turn back. I surveyed the wide intersection, but couldn’t see anywhere that Koschey and his vehicle could be lurking, so I kept going.

I turned off Florida onto Nineteenth Street, with the hotel still to my left. Its loading bays were there, underneath the large elevated deck where the pool was. There was a lot of activity there. Catering trucks and other suppliers were parked in the half dozen bays, with a lot of staff milling around. A lot of mouths to feed in there. I was approached by a couple of cops and showed them my creds.

“Anything to report?” I asked them.

“It’s all good here,” one of them said.

I checked the bays as I passed them, but I couldn’t see anything out of place. There were too many people working the loading area for Koschey to risk using it as his approach.

I got back on the street and advanced north on Nineteenth, the hotel’s rear elevation curving away from me. The street was pretty and lined with lush trees. To my right was a series of three- and four-story redbrick town houses and small apartment buildings. No cars parked on Nineteenth, no cars moving, either.

Larisa’s voice came through my earbud. “Reilly?”

“Where are you?”

“Moving northeast on Columbia,” she said.

I called up the map in my mind’s eye. We were moving in parallel up the two angled, intersecting roads that flanked the hotel.

“Trade building clear?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. “I spoke to the guard at the gate, in Russian. Everyone left early to avoid the traffic and no one’s been in all afternoon.”

“Okay. Nick?”

Aparo came in. “So far, so good.”

“Copy that,” I said.

I was starting to wonder if I’d gotten it wrong, and was uncomfortably conflicted about how I felt about that. Despite all indications to the contrary, my gut said that Koschey was around, and I wanted him to be here. I wanted to take him out of the game and put Sokolov’s machine back in its box.

I could hear some sirens in the distance, and glanced at my watch. Five to. The president was about to arrive.

I reached a T intersection, where Vernon Street went off to the right. There was another white squad car parked there, blocking the street, two uniforms beside it talking to a woman and a kid. To my left was the edge of the school, a three-story redbrick structure built on a brick podium with stairs leading up to it. A sign told me it was the Oyster/Adams Bilingual School. It looked deserted.

“Falcon arriving at Roadhouse” a voice announced in my comms. “Repeat, Falcon arriving.”

OUTSIDE THE HILTON’S ENTRANCE, Everett watched as the police squad cars that had been escorting it peeled away on Connecticut Avenue while the rest of the presidential motorcade pulled into the hotel’s circular driveway.

Secret Service agents quickly slipped into their positions as the two massive armored Cadillacs rolled to a stop outside the lobby. More agents spilled out of the support vehicles that formed the tail end of the convoy.

Everett’s entire body tightened up as he watched the president emerge from his limo. The crowd beyond the cordon clapped and cheered wildly, and the president and his wife, who was there alongside him, waved back and smiled graciously. Everett couldn’t stand it. He was on edge, standing there helplessly, willing them to move on, wanting them to head inside despite knowing that they weren’t necessarily any safer there.

He saw Romita in the scrum. He was, as always, totally focused, overseeing the president’s transfer, issuing crisp orders and asking for updates over the comms. Romita looked his way and their eyes met. Romita was radiating confidence. He acknowledged Everett with a quick nod, like “Everything’s under control.”

Somehow, Everett didn’t feel as confident.

MY STOMACH TIGHTENED AT hearing the Secret Service code names for the president and the hotel. I pictured him getting out of his limo, surrounded by armed agents whose instincts and training had primed them to shoot to kill.

Not ideal. Not in these circumstances.

Aparo’s voice came through my earbud. “I’m done with my sweep. All clear.”

“Okay,” I replied. “Get back to the command unit. Stick with Sokolov.”

“Roger that.”

Two possible angles of attack left. Larisa’s side. And mine.

I went up to the cops with my creds out.

“Everything okay here?” I asked.

“Nothing to report,” one of them said.

“No one’s gone through,” I asked. “No black Suburbans or some other SUV in the last couple of hours?”

The other cop laughed. “Black Suburbans? You kidding me? That’s all you see around here.”

I felt a flush of worry. “You let any through?” I asked.

They glanced at each other questioningly, then shook their heads. “Nope. A couple of locals, family cars, no SUVs though.”

“Okay.” Then I added, “Stay sharp,” somewhat pointlessly.

I started to head off when I heard the woman say, “Well, make sure you let me know if you need any more pills or if I can get you a cup of hot soup or something.”

I don’t know why, but that made me stop in my tracks.

I turned to hear the cop reply, “We’ll be fine, but thank you. Very kind of you.”

I approached them again. “I’m sorry, what was that about?”

They looked at me curiously.

“The pills? The soup? You feeling okay?”

They all did a double-take, like this was such a weird query.

“Talk to me,” I prodded.

“We’re fine,” the cop said. “It’s just, maybe an hour ago. We both had a dizzy spell.”

“Nauseous,” the other cop added. “Felt like my head was going to cave in.”

“I think you boys have been standing out here too long without anything to drink,” the woman said. “And you too, young man,” she added, addressing her son. She looked up at me. “Sammy here fell off his bike earlier.”

“Mom,” the boy groaned, like she was embarrassing him.

My mind was hurtling elsewhere. “When was this, you said? An hour ago?”

“Around then,” one of the cops said.

“Any cars drive by at the time?” I asked, my pulse rocketing.

“I can’t remember,” he said. “We were both kind of out of it. Not for long, but-”

“Didn’t that minivan drive past then?”

“I can’t remember.” He smiled sheepishly at me. “I was busy trying to hold it together.”

My whole body went rigid. I turned away from the cops and hit my comms. “Leo, you there?” I hissed. “Leo.”

It took a couple of seconds, then his voice burst back. “Reilly?”

“Leo, that thing you used on the Russian at your apartment, when he came for you. You said it fogged his mind and made him feel sick? Can the machine in your van also do that?”

“Yes,” he said. “There are five different presets I’ve programmed into the control screen on the laptop. One of them is that one.”

My heart was like a battering ram in my rib cage. “Did you tell Koschey about the different settings? Does he know what they are?”

“Yes,” Sokolov said.

I was already sprinting away from the cops, heading up Nineteenth, my fingers tight against the helmet.

“He’s here,” I blurted into my mike. “Nick, you copy? Koschey is here and he’s gonna use it.”