“Don’t tell me what to do, Gabriel. I’m the chief of Special Ops, not you. You’re nothing but an independent contractor. Therefore, you report to me. And I am telling you to get into that car and come with us to the airport.”
Eli Lavon carefully removed Navot’s hand from Gabriel’s arm. “That’s enough, Uzi. He’s not getting on the plane.”
Navot shot Lavon a dark look. “Thanks for the support, Eli. You Wrath of God boys always stick together, don’t you?”
“I don’t want him to stay behind any more than you do. I just know better than to waste my breath trying to talk him out of it. He has a hard head.”
“He’ll need it.” The rain was now streaming off the brim of Navot’s hat onto his face. “Do you know what’s going to happen if I get on that plane without you? The Old Man will line me up against the wall and use me for target practice.”
Gabriel held up his wristwatch so Navot could see it. “Five o’clock, Uzi. Better be running along. And take Eli with you. He’s a fine watcher, but he’s never been one for the rough stuff.”
Navot gave Gabriel a Shamronian stare. He was done arguing.
“If I were you, I’d stay away from your hotel.” He reached into his coat pocket and handed Gabriel a single key. “I’ve been carrying this around in case we needed a crash pad. It’s an old Soviet wreck of a building near Dinamo Stadium, but it will do.”
Navot recited the street address, the building number, and the number of the apartment. “Once you’re inside, signal the station and bar the door. We’ll put in an extraction team. With a bit of luck, you’ll still be there when they arrive.”
Then he turned away without another word and pounded across the rain-swept square toward his car. Lavon watched him for a moment, then looked at Gabriel.
“Sure you don’t want some company?”
“Get to the airport, Eli. Get on that plane.”
“What would you like me to tell your wife?”
Gabriel hesitated a moment, then said, “Tell her I’m sorry, Eli. Tell her I’ll make it up to her somehow.”
“It’s possible you might be making a terrible mistake.”
“It won’t be the first time.”
“Yes, but this is Moscow. And it could be the last.”
Navot’s transmission appeared on the screen of the London ops center at 5:04 Moscow time: LEAVING FOR SVO… MINUS ONE… Adrian Carter swore softly and looked at Shamron, who was turning over his old Zippo lighter in his fingertips.
Two turns to the right, two turns to the left…
“It seems you were right,” Carter said.
Shamron said nothing.
Two turns to the right, two to the left…
“The French say Ivan is about to blow, Ari. They say the situation at Nice is getting tenuous. They would like a resolution, one way or the other.”
“Perhaps it’s time to let Ivan see the scope of the dilemma he is now facing. Tell your cyberwarriors to turn the phones back on in Moscow. And tell the French to confiscate Ivan’s plane. And, while they’re at it, take his passport, too.”
“That should get his attention.”
Shamron closed his eyes.
Two turns to the right, two to the left…
By the time Ivan Kharkov emerged from the airport conference room at the Côte d’Azur International Airport, his anger had reached dangerous levels. It exploded into mild physical violence when he found his two bodyguards dozing on the couch. They stormed down a flight of stairs together, Ivan ranting in Russian to no one in particular, and climbed into the armored Mercedes limousine for the return trip to Saint-Tropez. When the car was two hundred feet from the building, Ivan’s phone rang. It was Arkady Medvedev calling from Moscow.
“Where have you been, Ivan Borisovich?”
“Stuck at the airport, dealing with my plane.”
“Do you have any idea what’s been going on?”
“The French are trying to steal my plane. And my passport. That’s what’s going on, Arkady.”
“They’re trying to steal more than that. They’ve got your children, too. It’s part of some elaborate operation against you. And it’s not just going on there in France. Something’s happening here in Moscow, too.”
Ivan made no response. Arkady Medvedev knew it was a dangerous sign. When Ivan was merely angry, he swore violently. But when he was mad enough to kill, he went dead silent. He finally instructed his chief of security to tell him everything he knew. Medvedev did so in a form of colloquial Russian that was nearly indecipherable to a Western ear.
“Where is she now, Arkady?”
“Still in the apartment.”
“Who put her up to this?”
“She claims she did it on her own.”
“She’s lying. I need to know what I’m up against. And quickly.”
“You need to get out of France.”
“With no plane and no passport?”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Throw a party, Arkady. Somewhere outside the city. See if anyone shows up without an invitation.”
“And if they do?”
“Give them a message from me. Let them know that if they fuck with Ivan Kharkov, Ivan Kharkov is going to fuck with them.”
61 SHEREMETYEVO 2 AIRPORT, MOSCOW
They arrived at intervals of five minutes and made their way separately through security and passport control. Uzi Navot came last, hat pulled low over his eyes, raincoat drenched. He walked the length of the terminal twice, searching for watchers, before finally making his way to Gate A23. Lavon and Yaakov were gazing nervously out at the tarmac. Between them was an empty seat. Navot lowered himself into it and rested his attaché case on his knees. He stared hard at Chiara for a moment, like a middle-aged traveler admiring a beautiful younger woman.
“How’s she doing?”
Lavon answered. “How do you think she’s doing?”
“She has no one to blame but her husband.”
“I’m sure we’ll have plenty of time for recriminations later.” Lavon checked the departure board. “How much longer do you think Shamron is going to hold the plane?”
“As long as he thinks he can.”
“By my estimate, she’s been in the hands of Arkady Medvedev for two hours now. How long do you think it took him to tear her bag apart, Uzi? How long did it take him to find Ivan’s disks and Gabriel’s electronic toys?”
Navot typed a brief message on his BlackBerry. Two minutes later, the status window in the departure monitor changed from DELAYED to NOW BOARDING. One hundred eighty-seven weary passengers began to applaud. Three anxious men stared gloomily through the window at the shimmering tarmac.
“Don’t worry, Uzi. You did the right thing.”
“Just don’t ever tell Chiara. She’ll never forgive me.” Navot shook his head slowly. “It’s never a good idea to bring spouses into the field. You’d think Gabriel would have learned that by now.”
There was a time in Moscow, not long ago, when a man sitting alone in a parked car would have come under immediate suspicion. But that was no longer the case. These days, sitting in parked cars, or cars stuck in traffic, was what Muscovites did.
Gabriel was on the northern edge of Bolotnaya Square, next to a billboard plastered with a dour portrait of the Russian president. He did not know whether the spot was legal or illegal. He did not care. He cared only that he could see the entrance of the House on the Embankment. He left the engine running and the radio on. It sounded to Gabriel like a news analysis program of some kind: long cuts of taped remarks by the Russian president interspersed with commentary by a panel of journalists and experts. Their words were surely laudatory, for the Kremlin tolerated no other kind. Forward as one! as the president liked to say. And keep your criticism to yourself.
Twenty minutes into his vigil, a pair of underfed Militia officers rounded the corner, tunics glistening. Gabriel turned up the radio and nodded cordially. For a moment, he feared they might be contemplatinga shakedown. Instead, they frowned at his old Volga, as if to say he wasn’t worth their time on a rainy night. Next came a man with lank, dark hair, and an open bottle of Baltika beer in his hand. He shuffled over to Gabriel’s window and opened his coat, revealing a veritable pharmacy underneath. Gabriel motioned for him to move on, then flicked the wipers and focused his gaze on the building. Specifically, on the lights burning in the ninth-floor apartment overlooking the Kremlin.