Mitrokhin had called him two minutes earlier. He had been in the elevator with both of the British headhunters. They were headed to the tenth floor. Mitrokhin was on his way up via the stairs. The plan was for him to wait in the stairwell until the British were inside the room, and, once they were, he would make his way over.
Stepanov was in room 1020. Timoshev and Kuznetsov were in 1022. They had no idea that he was here, nor did they know about the miniature camera that he had installed outside their room while they had been glad-handing the Security Council at the Kremlin that evening.
Stepanov had told Mitrokhin that they were standing down, and that he was not to engage either man. Mitrokhin had asked him to repeat the order, but had not questioned it. He was well trained and loyal, although Stepanov knew that he would be as confused and disappointed as he was. They were abandoning two patriots to their fates. None of it made any sense. He trusted that Primakov would explain himself at Yasenevo.
Stepanov was alone. The room was as neat and tidy as when he had checked in earlier. The bed was still made, the sheets undisturbed, and the glasses on the bedside tables still wore their paper tops. Stepanov’s pistol—an MP-443 Grach—was on the bed, together with his shoulder holster. Mitrokhin carried his own pistol. There were also two SR-3 Vikhrs, short-barrelled carbines fitted with suppressors. The SR-3 was a Spetsnaz mainstay and offered all the firepower they would have needed to take the British agents out.
The feed from the camera was displayed on a screen that had been installed on the bureau where the television used to be. Stepanov saw motion on the screen, and, as he watched, two men came into view. They exited the elevator lobby, made their way down the corridor and paused outside the door to 1022. The man whom Stepanov had seen that afternoon knelt down and started to work on the lock. He was efficient, and it didn’t take him long; he stood, opened the door slowly and carefully, and went inside. The second man followed.
The curtains were drawn and the room was dark. Pope pulled out his supressed Sig and took a moment to allow his eyes to adjust; it was a suite, with a bathroom off to his left and a sitting area ahead and to the right. The bedroom was ten paces ahead of him. He could hear the sounds of breathing, the rhythmic ins and outs suggesting that Timoshev and Kuznetsov were fast asleep.
Twelve pulled his own pistol and, before Pope could stop him, stepped around him and went farther into the room. Pope could see the shape of two people in the king-size bed. Twelve aimed the pistol at the nearest body and pulled the trigger twice. The body jerked, enough to wake the second sleeper, but too late. Twelve aimed and fired two more times. The second body spasmed and then it, too, was still.
Pope wanted to curse, to rail at Twelve for his presumption, but he gritted his teeth. Not now. Later. He switched on the bedside lamp, took out his phone and took quick photographs of the man and woman so that their identities could be confirmed later. He nodded to Twelve, and they made their way back to the door. Pope reached for the door handle, pulled it down and checked that the corridor was empty. He stepped outside, held the door for Twelve, then closed it with a quiet click. They made their way back to the service lift.
“What the fuck?”
“I was following orders,” Twelve said.
“Not my orders. I told you I was the senior—”
“No, not yours,” Twelve said. “Control’s. The job’s done. Take it up with him if you have a problem.”
Twelve stood quietly and, as Pope looked at him in the mirrored wall of the car, he thought he saw a smile playing at the corner of his mouth. Pope intended to take it up with Control. It was all he could do not to punch Twelve out.
They went down to the staff entrance and made their way to the men’s room. They changed back into their street clothes, took the hotel uniforms with them and then exited onto the street. Twelve zipped up his jacket and headed south, crossing the road and slipping into a side street. Pope found a taxi and told the driver to take him to Domodedovo. He was booked on the 07.15 JAL flight to Narita where he had a connecting ticket on the Emirates flight to Heathrow. He would have a few hours to kill at the airport. He doubted that Timoshev and Kuznetsov would be found in time to trace either him or Twelve before they had left, but he knew that he would have to be careful. He would only be able to relax once he was on his way.
62
The taxi pulled up in the drop-off area outside the terminal at Vnukova International Airport. Milton paid the driver, stepped out of the car into the early morning chill, and held the door for Ross.
“Ready?” he asked her.
“How long do we have?”
“The flight leaves in an hour. Plenty of time.”
They made their way into the terminal. It had been a busy few hours, and there had been no time for much more than a few snatched moments of sleep. A small team had been assembled to put together their legends and itinerary. The embassy’s travel department had assessed their options for getting to Komsomolsk-on-Amur. The city was in the Russian Far East and was not a simple task to reach from Moscow. It was possible to take a train, but the eight-thousand-kilometre journey would have taken six and a half days, and they knew that they didn’t have the luxury of time. Driving was out of the question for the same reason, and it had been decided that they had no choice but to fly. SAT Airlines flew direct from Moscow to Komsomolsk, but that route was only twice-weekly and the next flight was two days away. The best that they could do was to fly on an Aeroflot 777 to Vladivostok, put up with a twelve-hour layover and then take the Aurora flight to Komsomolsk. It would take a day to complete the trip. They would be in time to make the meet with Anastasiya Romanova, but there would be precious little time for preparation. Ross had asked if that would be a problem; Milton said that it wasn’t ideal but assured her that they would be able to manage.
Their new legends had them as a married couple: Richard and Amy Burns. They were photographers visiting the Far East after being commissioned by an architectural magazine to shoot the Neo-renaissance buildings that were still present in the city centre. The legends were impressively thorough, especially given the limited time the staff had had to adorn them. They were presented with phones that had been carefully preloaded with evidence to back up their stories: there were full email histories, including copies of the correspondence with the commissioning magazine, and photographs from the other stops on their trip, including touristy shots that showed them standing outside the Kremlin and St Basil’s Cathedral and the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg. Their contract with the magazine was given extra ballast thanks to payments that had been made into their fake bank accounts to represent their fee and expenses. They knew it was possible that the authorities would access their accounts if they conducted a full check, and, if they did, they would find transactions that evidenced the couple’s flight from Paris to St Petersburg and then on to Moscow, payments for their hotel stays, and the meals and drinks that they had enjoyed.
Their legends were tested for the first time as they passed through security. An officious-looking functionary examined their passports and tickets, asked cursory questions about the nature of their trip, and then waved them through. The guards at the security booth were similarly inquisitive, and asked Milton to open their carry-on after it had slid through the scanner. He did, taking out the cameras that the embassy had provided. The guard insisted that he hand them over, and Milton made a show of his anxiety as the woman roughly examined the kit. She grunted her satisfaction, dumped both cameras on the metal bench and left Milton to repack them.