He glanced at the man. “Luke, nothing will go wrong if you follow my orders.”
Luke thrust his gloved hands under his armpits and quietly stamped his feet on the icy ground. “Your orders?” Though barely audible, his tone was unmistakably sarcastic. “I take orders from people I know, yet I know nothing about you beyond that you are here at the behest of the chief.” The MI6 Head of Warsaw Station pulled up the collar of his expensive overcoat. “Poland’s my patch. I resent your presence here and I resent your intended course of action.”
Will unbuttoned his coat, checked that his sound-suppressed Russian PB 6P9 handgun was still firmly in position under his Huntsman bespoke Savile Row suit, and returned his attention to Luke. The station chief looked to be in his late forties, and no doubt was an extremely experienced and skilled intelligence operative. “I’m here to do my job. Nothing gets in the way of that.”
Luke frowned. “Your job may cause irrevocable damage to diplomatic relations between Poland and the United Kingdom.”
Will shook his head. “It won’t come to that. Even if things go wrong, no Poles will be killed tonight.”
Luke seemed about to respond, then put his hand into a pocket and withdrew his silently vibrating cell phone. Its screen was flashing to show he had an incoming call. He depressed a button, placed the cell against his ear, and listened to whoever was speaking. Ten seconds later he ended the call and placed the phone back into his coat. “Still nothing out of the ordinary at the embassy.”
Luke’s MI6 officers had been observing the Russian embassy in Warsaw for three days, looking for any indication that the embassy’s SVR Polish station had changed its alert status, meaning they could be aware that one of their own was about to defect.
Will felt uncertain and tense. Russia’s foreign intelligence service, Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki, would do everything they could to stop an SVR traitor getting into Polish hands, including killing the defector and any Poles who were here to meet him. He checked his watch and exhaled slowly, his breath steaming in the icy air. It was nearly 2:00 A.M. In the distance, a port foghorn droned, its noise echoing off the nearby buildings. As the sound abated, he asked, “Do you know anything about the Polish operatives who are out to play tonight?”
“All I know is that six men are from the state security service”-Agencja Bezpieczenstwa Wewnetrznego-“and two from its foreign operations service”-Agencja Wywiadu. Luke’s expression seemed bitter. “In all probability, I’ve worked with some of the men you’re planning to render unconscious tonight.”
“One of the two AW men will be the defector’s handler.” Will rubbed fingers through his short, dark hair. “You’re certain your team’s hidden from them?”
Luke shrugged. “I can’t be certain of anything. But I got all twelve of them from London. They arrived this morning. They’re MI6 Q operatives.”
Men who knew how to stay hidden. Q operatives were all former British Special Forces.
Will asked, “What are the Poles wearing?”
“Windbreaker jackets, jeans, and combat boots.”
“And our men?”
“Similar, but just before the green light’s given they’ll don black baseball caps so that they’re distinguishable from the Poles.”
“What weapons do the Q men have?”
Luke muttered, “Silenced pistols and tranquilizer guns.”
“That’s all? I asked for them to be armed with suppressed semiautomatics.”
“And I decided to ignore your request.” Luke shook his head. “We shouldn’t be doing this to the Polish operatives. This is their country, and the defector’s coming to them. Bloody hell, I liaise with the Polish intelligence services every day. The moment we got the tip-off, I should have been tasked to use my influence with the Poles to see if they could share the defector’s intelligence with us.”
“Impossible. You know that would have meant that we’d have to tell them how we got the information.”
Luke sighed. “So you decided to turn everything on its head, overrule my authority, and construct a kidnap operation.”
“Not kidnap, a sleight of hand.”
Luke retorted angrily, “When this is over, I’ll make an official complaint about your actions.”
Will grabbed Luke’s jaw. “I’ve had enough of your crap!”
The shock on Luke’s face was vivid.
Will held him firm. “We’re not here to snatch the defector from the Poles. We’re here because you told the Russians about the defector. And because of that, we had no choice other than to come here to protect the Poles and ensure they got their man.”
Luke’s eyes were wide with fear. He tried to speak.
But Will squeezed harder. “Save your breath. You’ve been under investigation for weeks, your burst transmissions monitored by GCHQ. But rather than have you lifted, we wanted to let you continue speaking to the Russians, with information that we fed you. False information, of course. But when you told the SVR about the defector’s use of the exfiltration route, matters had to be accelerated.” He pulled Luke’s head close to his. “I couldn’t tell the Qs what was really happening in case they accidentally let slip a detail that would make you suspicious. It’s a real shame that you underequipped them.” He smiled, though he felt nothing but anger. “I’m told that money was the reason behind your treachery. Pity really. I’d have had more respect for you if you betrayed us for other reasons. Still, doesn’t matter now because you’re fucked and we’re fucked.”
Will thrust Luke’s head back.
Luke winced and rubbed his bruised jaw as sweat poured down his forehead. “I. .”
“Shut up!” Will pulled out his Russian handgun and placed its nozzle against Luke’s head. “Is there anything you want to say to me?”
“My family. .” His voice trailed.
“I’ll make sure they’re comfortable, are looked after, and are told that you were killed in the line of duty. No one needs to know.”
Luke closed his eyes and quietly said, “That’s kind of you.” He bowed his head. “Pull the trigger.”
Will hesitated.
“Pull the trigger!”
Still, Will did nothing.
“Please! I can’t face the disgrace.”
“You’re already disgraced.” Will gripped his gun tight, but his trigger finger was motionless. Even though he was under orders to kill the traitor, something was holding him back.
Luke opened his eyes, raised his head, and looked at him with wet eyes. “Do you pity me?”
Will felt confused, no longer angry. “Perhaps.”
Luke nodded slowly. “I don’t deserve your pity.” His tone strengthened. “Men are going to die tonight because of me. Do your duty! Pull the trigger!”
Will sighed, knowing Luke was right, and spoke with a genuinely bemused tone. “Why did you do this?”
Luke shrugged. “The world’s full of self-seeking charlatans. I’m just one of many.”
Will frowned. “And men like me have to clean up your mess?”
“It appears that must be the case.”
“I wish I didn’t have to keep doing that.”
He shot Luke in the head.
Will stood alone, facing the fog-covered Baltic Sea. Beside him was the mouth of the river Vistula; three miles upriver was the heart of Gdansk. During the daytime, the waterway was heavily used by pleasure cruisers and merchant vessels bringing goods into the heart of the city. Tonight, a Polish cargo ship carrying the Russian defector would be sailing up the channel, having collected the SVR officer from Saint Petersburg, in northwestern Russia. MI6 had gained this information from one of its Polish assets, working in the Polish consulate in Saint Petersburg where the Russian had walked in to defect. The consulate contained no Polish intelligence operatives and it was the asset, a low-ranking diplomat, who had been instructed to inform the defector of the exfiltration route. But the asset did not know the exact location where the boat would stop to deliver the spy to the AW and ABW men.