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“What?” asked Fisher.

“First we make promise that you don’t die using my guns. Second, money is for rental. Not keep. Ammo is yours. No return if you don’t use it all, but guns and pistols come back to me. Understand?”

“We’ll make all the arrangements,” Fisher said.

“Do you have any frangible rounds?” Briggs asked. “Such as the Reduced Ricochet, Limited Penetration round?”

Bab frowned and looked at Fisher. “Where you find him?”

“He’s okay,” said Fisher. “Whatever you have will be fine.”

“Yes, I have good bullets for you. And oh, yes, here, Kobin was very specific.” She crossed to the front of the van, opened the passenger’s side door, then produced two pairs of trifocals, older multivision models without sonar to be sure, but classified trifocals nonetheless. Along with them, she had a pair of OPSATs—again, dated ones, but lo and behold, OPSATs.

“Where the hell did you get those?”

“Old Third Echelon dead drop in Grozny.”

“How do you know about Third Echelon?”

She waved him off, as though the question bored her. “Do you want fancy watch and binocular or not?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Briggs, collecting the gear.

“So, we have deal?” she asked, proffering her hand to Fisher.

“Okay.”

Fisher took her hand. She squeezed his tightly and jerked him down toward her face. “Come on, just one kiss.” She puckered up and pulled him closer.

Fisher tugged back, and she smacked him across the face before he could pull free. He turned away, his cheek smarting, as she and her grandsons broke into a fit of laughter. “Just kidding!” she said. “Pick pistols and rifles you want. Do you need explosives? I have some.”

Maybe she had more than that, Fisher thought. “If you have access to a dead drop, then maybe you’ve got more of our old gear? Sticky cams? EMP grenades?”

“No, sorry, already sold.”

“Sold?” Briggs asked, his jaw going slack.

“It’s no worry. Most clients use spy gear to catch cheating wives.”

The two grandsons nodded over that.

“All right, let’s see what you’ve got,” said Fisher, his eyes riveted on a .40-caliber SIG P226 tac ops edition not unlike his SEAL pistol. He placed the gun in one of his own bags, then picked up a Glock 19 for his secondary. Briggs chose a Beretta 92FS and a Smith & Wesson M&P Shield as his backup. The world-famous Dragunov was, of course, also coming along for the ride. Selections made, Fisher and Briggs collected magazines and ammunition.

Briggs took one look at the ammo and whispered to Fisher, “Are you serious?”

“Just take it,” Fisher ordered.

Their ammo had come unboxed, stored in plastic bags, and was the cheap reloaded crap most discerning marksmen would avoid.

The entire exchange took no more than another three minutes, and when they were finished, Fisher returned to Bab and said, “I’ll give you a kiss on the cheek if you really want one.”

She blushed. He’d called her bluff. She shouted for her grandsons to get back in the van. They did.

Drawing in a deep breath, she closed her eyes and presented her cheek. He gave her the customary three kisses on alternate cheeks, then said, “Bolshoe spasibo.”

“You’re welcome,” she said, opening her eyes. “You seem like good man. Do good things with my guns, not bad ones.”

“Okay.”

“And thank you for peanut butter. At my age, not many things make me excited. American peanut butter is one.”

“Glad we could help.”

Back in the SUV, Briggs brought their OPSATs online, and Grim, who had already booked her room in the hotel, received a rather surprising call from Fisher, who told her to boot up her computer, that he and Briggs were checking in.

“Where did you get those OPSATs?” she asked, her voice coming through their subdermals.

“At the Russian Flea Market,” answered Briggs.

“And let’s just say closing down 3E was a better idea than we thought,” said Fisher. “It seems some of our dead drops have been compromised.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Tell that to the babushka we just met.”

“Wow.”

“So, we’re armed and ready to move in once the sun goes down. Got anything else?”

Grim spoke quickly: “I walked the entire hotel. I haven’t pinpointed their room or rooms yet. Video showed what appeared to be five people in all with Nadia, but that’s not to say they don’t have more posted here.”

“Hey, Sam, it’s Charlie. I’ve got eyes on their security cameras. Thing is, they’ve only got cameras in the lobby, main entrance, and parking lot. Just two more on the exterior of the building. Nothing in the hallways, rooms, or elevators—so we’re blind there.”

“We need to mark one of the guards and tail him back to their rooms.”

“I’m ready when you are, Sam,” said Grim.

“On our way.”

17

JUST after midnight, when the last guest had retreated from the hotel’s brick paver terrace, Fisher and Briggs ascended into the pine trees growing beside and overshadowing the building. The hotel reminded him of one he’d stayed at while visiting the Grand Canyon as a kid, nestled in the forest and with balconies that afforded the place a motel/alpine ski resort facade. A row of steeply pitched dormers covered in bright green shingles crowned the roofline, their windows glowing.

From this vantage point they had an excellent view of three sides of the building. Charlie covered their blind spot via the security cameras, but what made the job more challenging was the lack of a rooftop entrance.

Charlie, however, had already keyed his way into the hotel’s registration system. They’d run all the names of the guests through the SMI, not expecting to encounter red flags since the FSB and SVR had assumedly taken care of all that, their rooms permanently booked. A map of the hotel appeared in Fisher and Briggs’s OPSATs. The highlighted vacant rooms were clearly marked on every floor. They were close enough to descend and cross from their trees directly onto the roof. From there, they could reach a balcony, pick the lock or cut the glass, and get inside.

However, this would be anything but a routine rescue. They had unfamiliar weapons, no Kevlar protection, and outdated trifocals and OPSATs whose custom batteries said they had approximately 51 percent worth of charge, but you never knew. And Briggs had twice reminded Fisher about their questionable ammo, which had probably been reloaded by a couple of dedicated Russian college students in their basement shop and sold for extra money.

Shoving his trifocals down over his eyes, Fisher zoomed in on a man who’d just left the main entrance. He came down the short flight of steps, slowed as he reached the terrace, then reached into his suit pocket to fish out a cigarette. No, it wasn’t a real cigarette but one of those electronic versions: he was trying to quit. The Bluetooth receiver in his ear caught Fisher’s attention. Fisher and Briggs were wearing their subvocal transceiver patches on their throats—the SVT patches were easily smuggled past customs in Turkey as “Band-Aids”—and thus Fisher immediately called in this guy.

“I have him, too, Sam,” said Briggs.

“Could be just some assclown playing on his cell phone and smoking,” said Charlie. “But if I can get a better look at his face, we’ll run him through facial recognition.”

“Patch into my trifocals,” Fisher ordered him.

“Gotcha, Sam, okay, zoom in some more.”

“Zooming.”

“Tell him to say cheese.”

Fisher did. Only in Russian. Charlie liked that, said he’d captured an image, and began running it.

“Grim, come down to the lobby,” Fisher ordered.

“I’m already here but can’t talk.”

“Okay. Stay put. Let’s see where he goes.”

“Hey, Sam, Charlie here. There’s a fat old Russian bastard trying to hit on Grim.”

Fisher stifled a laugh. “Keep an eye on her.”