The Silenced

Chapter 4

Their flight out of Newark International Airport, just outside of New York, had been delayed on the tarmac because of bad weather. So by the time they touched down in Los Angeles, Petra was ready to rush down the aisle and rip the aircraft’s door open herself to get out.

The minutes they’d lost had been more than just the hundred and twenty they’d spent sitting on the ground. The delay had caused them to arrive in the late afternoon, when the freeways of Los Angeles turned into parking lots.

She swore under her breath.

“What is it?” Kolya asked from the window seat next to her.

“Not important.”

Because of the near debacle in Hong Kong, and contrary to the precautions they’d taken since they’d left home on their mission, she had decided to keep Kolya close. At least this way he was with her at all times.

She knew it was a huge risk. Dombrovski had been very adamant during their training. “Never give him any means to know who you are. Constantly change your identities. Travel alone. And always assume he is looking for you.”

And looking for them he was. If Dombrovski’s own murder back home hadn’t been enough proof, losing Luka in Bangkok was. Luka had been closing in on one of their targets, Petra just ten minutes behind him. But by the time she reached his position, he was dead. Their team of four suddenly down to three.

She sent up a silent prayer that this break in protocol didn’t lead to a similar disaster.

Taxiing to the terminal at LAX seemed to take as long as the flight, but finally the plane slowed, then stopped. A second before the engines died and the seatbelt tone went off, Petra was up and moving down the aisle, bag in hand. She got to within two rows of the front door before an overweight man in an ugly brown suit stood to open one of the overhead luggage compartments, blocking her way.

She glanced over her shoulder. Kolya hadn’t done as well as she had. The boy was strong and had some useful talents, but, like in Hong Kong, his youth often denied him the experience she desperately needed him to have.

A minute later Petra was walking rapidly through the concourse. Koyla caught up to her just as she reached the escalator to the baggage claim area. As they rode down, they both scanned the crowd standing near the bottom.

“There,” Koyla whispered, looking toward a man holding a sign that read PEGGY ROBERTS.

“You know what to do,” she said.

He nodded, then moved off the escalator in the direction of the nearest carousel.

Petra went to the left through the crowd, her eyes searching for any signs of trouble. They were so close. This had to be it. Here they would uncover the information they needed. She was sure of it.

She found a spot near a group of French tourists. They were slowly gathering their luggage and arguing about the location of the bus to their hotel. She watched as the throngs of recently arrived struggled with one another in attempts to locate their appropriate carousels, then secure spots where they could wait and silently hope their luggage would be the first to come down the chute.

Despite the size of the crowd, Petra did her best to check every face, sometimes taking in several people in one quick scan, sometimes lingering several seconds on a person who, for any number of reasons, required more attention.

The driver holding the ROBERTS sign continued to stand near the base of the escalators, his gaze flicking from one person to the next as passengers descended from the terminals above. He had the bored look of someone who had done this a thousand times before.

Kolya, on the other hand, looked anything but bored or inconspicuous. He had done as instructed, and was standing near one of the carousels, but he seemed more interested in the man with the ROBERTS sign than in the bags circling on the never-ending conveyor belt. The luggage was where his focus should have been, creating the illusion that he was just another generic member of the masses.

Petra swore under her breath, but knew there was little she could do. Kolya had not received the several years’ worth of training that she and Mikhail had. He was new to the art of deception, his only education coming sporadically when Petra or Mikhail found time for a little instruction.

Because of this, she had tried to minimize Kolya’s involvement, keeping him busy with the things he was good at, or at least could handle. Like driving or acting as communications point. Bringing him along on this trip to Los Angeles was taking a chance, she knew, but the alternative would have been to leave him with Mikhail in New York. And while Mikhail liked the kid well enough, his patience level with Kolya had dipped even lower than hers. If things got too involved, she could just stick Kolya in a motel room somewhere, as she had done when she and Mikhail had gone on their unsatisfying hunt for David Thomas.

No, not unsatisfying. Bitterly disappointing.

Mikhail had tracked down Thomas’s last known address to a house in Clifton, New Jersey. But they arrived to find the Englishman had been missing for a week.

And they all knew “missing” in this case could mean only one thing. The man was dead.

Just like Freddy Chang in Hong Kong, or Stacy McKitrick in Bangkok.

Chang’s body had been fished out of the East Lamma Channel the day after Petra and her small team had arrived in Hong Kong. And in Bangkok they had at first lost Luka, then McKitrick herself had turned up dead on a walkway along one of the old city canals.

So close.

Perhaps Thomas would turn up in the Atlantic at some point, but even if he did, it didn’t matter. Dead was dead, and of no use to her. She needed at least one person from her photograph to be alive. She couldn’t question a corpse.

But now with Thomas sharing the same fate as most of the others, the list of possibilities had been reduced to two names: Kenneth Moody, last known location Philadelphia, and Ryan Winters, last known location Los Angeles.

At least one of their two targets had to still be alive. If not …

Petra wouldn’t even let herself think about it. She and Kolya were here in Los Angeles pursuing Winters, and Mikhail was back on the East Coast hunting down Moody. They were doing everything they could. Thinking more was just wasting energy.

She did another quick sweep of the baggage area, decided their arrival had gone unnoticed, then walked over to carousel number two and tapped Kolya on the shoulder. Without waiting for a response, she walked over to the man with the sign.

“Ms. Roberts?” the man asked.

“Yes,” Petra said with a slight Southern twang. “I’m Ms. Roberts.” She had worked very hard at perfecting an American accent, and had done well enough to fool most people.

“Great,” the man said, his smile more functional than earnest. “My name is Frank. No bags?”

“Just what we’re carrying.”

This didn’t seem to surprise him. He’d undoubtedly seen it all in his job. “Would you like to wait here while I get the car?”

“We’ll come with you.”

Frank drove them to the San Fernando Valley and dropped them off at the Days Inn in Studio City. Kolya and Petra found the dark gray Buick Lucerne that Mikhail had arranged for them parked near the back. No paperwork, no way to trace the vehicle to them. If they were being tracked, the trail would end at the motel.

“Keep to the speed limit,” Petra instructed, not wanting to draw the attention of the police.

Once they were back on Ventura Boulevard, she entered their destination into the GPS mounted in the dash, then examined the route. Laurel Canyon Boulevard was a mile to the east. From there it would be a quick drive into the hills to Winters’s house. She guessed ten minutes tops.

Above them, the sky had turned a deep blue, but few stars were visible through the haze of the city lights. Just like Moscow, Petra thought.

The pay-as-you-go cell phone she’d acquired in New York buzzed in her bag. “What happened?” Mikhail asked before she could say anything. “You were supposed to call hours ago.”

“Our flight was delayed after we’d already boarded. If you had checked our status online, you would have known that.”

Mikhail was silent for a moment. When he spoke again, his tone had softened. “Where are you?”

“We just retrieved the car from the motel.”

“No problems?”

“None. Anything on Moody yet?”

“I found someone who remembered him. A neighbor. Said he thinks Moody moved to New York, but he wasn’t sure.”

Petra frowned. “Keep looking.”

“What do you think I’m doing? Sitting in a bar getting drunk?”

Petra closed her eyes. “Of course not. I know you’re doing your best. But we can’t afford to lose another chance.”

“We’ll find them.”

“We found Chang and McKitrick and Thomas, too,” she reminded him.

“I meant alive.”

“Have you heard from Stepka?” Petra asked.

“No. You want me to call him?”

“I’ll do it.”

She hung up. Stepka’s role in the operation was that of technical support. Dombrovski himself had ensured that Stepka got the best training available. Something the young man would undoubtedly use to make millions once their mission was finished. He was based out of a Moscow apartment. A significant amount of their funds had been used to equip the space with the best computers and communications gear.

Petra calculated the time difference. Moscow would just be waking up, which, knowing Stepka, meant he was starting to think about going to bed. She made the call.

“Yes?” Stepka said in typical hurried fashion.

“It’s me,” Petra said.

“Hold on.” The delay was only a few seconds long. “Where are you?”

“Los Angeles. Heading to the address you found for Winters.”

“Excellent.”

“Have you made any progress on the other matter?” she asked.

She had tasked Stepka with trying to find out who had been hired to erase the people she and her team had been trying to find. If they could figure that out, they might be able to get one step ahead of them. That could very well be the difference between failure and success.

“I’m still working on it.”

“Work faster,” she told him. “We need to know.”

“I’m doing what I can,” he insisted.

“If Winters and Moody are dead, too, then the only lead we’ll have left is whoever’s doing the killing.”

“I know!”

“We can’t afford to—”

“Petra,” Kolya interrupted.

She put her hand over the phone. “What?”

“We’re almost there.”

Winters was home.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t alone.

His house was located where Laurel Canyon began its rise into the Hollywood Hills, several blocks south of Ventura Boulevard. It was one level, and impressive: a dark wooden roof, outer walls painted creamy yellow, window frames and front door a bright, glossy white, and a wide grassy front lawn. Back in Moscow it would have been something only the very rich could afford, but by American standards, she had no idea where it fell on the monetary status scale. In the driveway were two sedans, a Mercedes and an Infiniti.

As Kolya drove the sedan leisurely down the street, Petra took another glance at the house. Through the front window, she could see the dark shapes of several people. She told Kolya to keep driving, then instructed him to turn down the next street and park. She opened the glove compartment, but it was empty. A bit more anxious, she slipped her hand under her seat and dug around until her fingers touched a hard object wrapped in what felt like cloth. She pulled it out.

It was a canvas bag, the kind someone would use at a grocery store. From within she pulled out the Baby Glock subcompact pistol Mikhail had arranged to be waiting with the car.

“You think you’re going to need that?” Kolya asked.

“I hope not,” she said, then slipped the gun into her bag and climbed out of the car. “Keep the lights off and the engine running. I’ll be back soon.” She closed the door silently behind her.

Night had descended in full over Los Angeles. But while the lights along Ventura Boulevard had been bright enough to leave little hidden, up here in the hills the streetlamps only cut ineffectual holes in the darkness. Despite this, Petra proceeded with caution, taking the relaxed pace of someone out for an evening stroll. She noted lights on in most of the houses she passed, but she was the only one out.

Then, two houses down and across the street from Winters’s place, she spotted a man leaning against a tree.

He wasn’t exactly hiding, but close enough. He had positioned himself in such a way that the tree blocked the light from the nearest streetlamp, creating a dark shadow that all but enveloped him. His short height made her think that he might be a teenager, but her gut said no. In her mind, a giant sign hung above him, reading DOESN’T BELONG.

Without missing a step, she continued down the sidewalk, one arm wrapped around her chest as if she was fighting off the cool night, the other draped at her side, her hand resting near the opening of her bag inches from the grip of the Glock.

When she’d closed to within ten feet of the man, she glanced at the ground pretending to check her footing. She stayed that way until she was abreast of him, then looked back up, her gaze swinging to the left like one might naturally do. She stopped abruptly, her eyes wide, staring at the man.

“My God, you scared me,” she said.

“Sorry,” the man said, not moving from the shadow.

Up close, the darkness did not mask him completely, and she could see he must have spent a lot of time in the weight room. No doubt, she guessed, to compensate for his lack of stature.

“It’s okay.” Petra let out a nervous laugh. “It’s just you’re kind of hidden there.”

The man smiled without showing his teeth, but remained otherwise silent. His attention seemed to be focused more on the house across the street than on her.

“Nice night, huh?” Petra said.

He responded the same way he had before.

After a moment, she smiled and started walking off. “Have a good evening.”

At the next block she turned left. As soon as she was out of sight, she stopped and turned around. She almost expected to see him standing behind her, but the sidewalk was empty.

He was a watcher, not a local. And by the bulge Petra noticed under his jacket, an armed watcher. But was he watching to make sure no one got in, or that no one got out?

Or was he with the group inside? Standing guard in case …

In case someone like me shows up, she thought. She closed her eyes and swore under her breath. Like the others, Winters would soon be a dead end. If they hadn’t been delayed in New York, they wouldn’t have gotten stuck in traffic, and it was possible they would have been able to get to the house first. Winters would have been theirs.

She pulled out her phone and called Mikhail.

“We’re too late,” she said.

“What happened?”

She told him what she’d found.

“He’s still alive, though,” Mikhail said. “There’s still a chance.”

“The only chance I see involves a high percentage of bullets aimed at my head. Is that what you want me to try?” When he didn’t answer, she said, “Have you made progress on Moody?”

“A little. I traced him from Philadelphia to an address in Manhattan, but he’s not there anymore, either. I’m trying to figure out where he went next.”

Petra wanted to scream, but instead she said, “Get us on a flight back tonight.”

She disconnected the call, then stood there for several moments thinking. Maybe Mikhail was right, and Winters wasn’t yet a lost cause. At the very least, pictures of those who had him could be very useful in identifying who the killers were.

She traded her phone for the palm-size digital camera in her bag, then, keeping low, moved back onto Winters’s street, crouching behind a parked car to mask her return. She was only there a few moments before the watcher stepped away from the tree and started crossing the street. He was tilting his head the way a person did when he was listening to a receiver in his ear.

She shot off a couple of pictures, then turned the camera on the house. The front door was now open, and standing just inside was a large man in a suit that did little to hide his bulk. He stepped aside so that another man, this one only slightly smaller than the first, could pass through. Two others appeared in the doorway. Neither was in the same size class as the two behemoths. One looked to be in his late thirties or early forties. He was thin, but walked with a confidence that made Petra think he was in charge. The other man looked pale and nervous. Petra estimated that he was in his mid to late sixties, the right age to be Winters.

The one in charge had a hold of the other guy’s arm and was helping to keep him from collapsing. Once they were outside, one of the big men took over, lifting the man so that his feet barely touched the ground as he walked him toward the Mercedes in the driveway.

When the car door opened, the dome light came on, illuminating the older man’s face.

Winters. Definitely.

Even from this distance, she could see fear on the man’s face. She touched the zoom, took one more picture, then slipped the camera back into her bag.

Once Winters was shoved into the back of the silver sedan, Petra retreated to the next street down, then sprinted back to the Buick.

“Go!” she yelled as she jumped back into the car. “We have to follow them.”

Kolya pulled the car onto the road. “Follow who?”

“A silver Mercedes. They have Winters.”

Kolya turned onto Winters’s street just in time to see the taillights of the Mercedes turning two blocks away.

“Hurry,” Petra said. “But for God’s sake, don’t let them know we’re here.”

They followed the Mercedes south on the 101 freeway into Hollywood and then downtown. There it finally exited onto a side street.

“Not too close,” Petra said. Unlike on the freeway, they could be easily spotted now.

“I know,” Kolya shot back. “But I don’t want to lose them, either.”

They were surrounded first by skyscrapers, then by squat storefronts with signs mostly in Spanish. After a while, these gave way to warehouses and manufacturing plants, most with no identification at all.

It was quiet here, almost deserted. The buildings that didn’t look abandoned were shut down for the night. But it wasn’t only the buildings that looked abandoned. The roads, too, were nearly deserted. Petra was sure they would be spotted at any moment.

“Slow down,” she said.

“Trust me,” Kolya told her.

He immediately turned right onto a side street. As soon as they were out of sight of the Mercedes, he flipped the Buick’s headlights off, then executed a quick one-eighty. A moment later they were back on the main road, the Mercedes’s taillights fading in the distance.

“Don’t lose them,” she said urgently.

“Which is it? Don’t lose them or slow down?”

Petra didn’t answer.

They raced forward, closing the gap by a third before Kolya eased back on the accelerator. Ahead, red brake lights shone brightly in the otherwise dark, empty night. Kolya let the Buick coast to a halt in the darkness near the curb.

After half a minute, the brake lights dimmed as the Mercedes crept forward several feet, then turned off the road. A second later it slipped behind a building, but it didn’t completely disappear. The brake lights had come on again, and the red glow leaked back to the street. It stayed like that for half a minute, then everything went dark.

“There was a parking lot about half a block back,” Petra said.

“I saw it,” Kolya said.

“Take the car there and wait. If the Mercedes comes back out, duck down and make sure they don’t see you.” Petra opened the door and climbed out.

“How long do I wait?”

“You have something better to do?”

“No. I was just … I mean, what if you need help?”

“I won’t.” Petra hesitated in the opening. “If I’m not back in two hours, go to the airport and call Mikhail.”

“What about you?”

“If I’m not back by then, I’m dead.”