Now, as the sun seemed to be close to making an appearance, she kicked the bed and watched as the colonel’s eyes opened, his expression changing from erotic dream to bound reality.
“So, it’s come to this,” Colonel Reed said.
She shrugged. Her gun was in its holster under her arm. “You told me a bunch of crap I wanted to hear last night. Now you’re going to tell me the truth about why you sent Jake to Svalbard. First of all, how did you find the MiG crash location?”
He told her about the snow having melted and someone seeing the wreckage from the air.
“But how did you get involved?”
His eyes shifted to the ceiling. “Can I take a piss? I really gotta go.”
“Go ahead. Who’s stopping you?” No smile.
“Wow. You’re cold.”
She simply stared at him.
“All right,” he said. “A guy approached me. He knew I knew the captain who never returned from there.”
“Steve Olson.”
“Right.”
“How’d he know you knew him?”
“He…was in the game years ago.”
“At the time of the crash.”
“Right.”
“Russian.” She was guessing.
He hesitated and she got her answer.
Toni was still confused, though. “Tell me about the virus and why this former KGB officer would want to get you involved.”
“I didn’t say he was KGB,” he reminded her.
“KGB, GRU, military officer. But this sounds like KGB. Why’d he need you?”
“He has no former resources.”
“And you do.”
“Well, he knew I had military and Agency contacts. Figured I could help because of that.”
Something was not adding up here. “Why didn’t the Russian just send a crew to Svalbard to get what was there?”
“I’m trying to tell you,” the colonel said emphatically. “He needed my resources.”
“Bullshit! He’s still under surveillance by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. How high up was he?” She knew by name, face and reputation most of the old guard from the KGB and the newer SVR.
He let out a deep breath of air and shook his head side to side. “Jake mentioned how relentless you were.” He hesitated and then said, “He was in the First Chief Directorate.”
“Which department?”
“A.”
“Let me guess. The disinformation department. And you believed anything that came out of his mouth?”
“He wasn’t trying to sell me a damn bridge. I knew the man. And I checked him out. What he knew was confirmed by my sources.”
Who in the hell was feeding Colonel Reed information from the Agency? That wasn’t important right now. For now she needed to find out what Jake was into. “Tell me what you know about the virus.”
He explained all he knew about the virus, including how it had been modified by the Soviets. As far as he knew, the Russians still had other samples of the virus in labs outside Moscow. Didn’t know how secure those samples were, though. While he talked, Toni could tell one thing for sure — the man was telling the truth.
“So you were just going to turn this deadly virus over to the Russian?” she asked him.
“Of course not. I knew that Jake would find the metal box if it was there. I bet on it. I also bet that there was no way Jake would turn over the virus to anyone but the Agency. Why the hell do you think I chose him to go there?”
She leaned back into her chair, her eyes concentrating on his, but her mind spinning. Damn it. The guy made sense. If you had to choose a man you could trust, then Jake was that man. He couldn’t and wouldn’t turn it over to anyone. She thought about possible Russians who could know about this from the old First Directorate. Time to play a little poker.
“When’s the last time you heard from Jake?”
“Yesterday. We talked by SAT phone.”
“While you were in Stockholm?”
“Yes.”
“So you saw Victor Petrova.” A guess, but an educated one, since she had heard the little dwarf had retired there years ago. Judging by his reaction, she was right.
“How the…”
“Hello. Who the hell do you think I work for, Colonel Reed? So that little midget hired you. What’s Victor up to these days? About three feet?”
“About that.”
They stared at each other for a minute, neither saying a word, but Toni considering what to do with the good colonel. She felt like sticking him on a damn plane and flying him back to Camp Springs for debriefing.
Jimmy McLean and Velda Crane had spent the last evening keeping track of Gary Dixon, who had not left his hotel since he got there. He had eaten dinner there with the Russian, an expensive steak from the money on the debit card Jimmy had given him, and then three pints of Guinness at the hotel bar before locking himself in his room. All of this was verified by Jimmy on his laptop. He loved it. Everything was electronic. Nothing was secret anymore. There wasn’t a hotel in Europe that still used the basic key and lock. Jimmy had been able to get a digital photo of the Russian and had sent it to London for possible identification. Of course Velda had also planted a bug in Dixon’s room, which had produced hours of snoring and farting and not much else.
Now, Jimmy clicked through his computer looking for any information that would help him understand what that little troll was up to in Oslo. So far nothing. There was a knock on his door just as his cell phone rang. Looking through the peep hole and seeing the top of a head, he let in Velda and then flipped open his phone and gestured for Velda to take a seat.
“Yeah?” Jimmy said in the phone. It was an analyst at MI6 headquarters. He listened for more than two minutes without saying a word.
“Are you sure?” He smiled at Velda, who had taken a flying leap onto his bed.
“We’ll stick with him,” Jimmy pledged. “Thanks. We will.” He clapped the phone shut and threw it to a chair.
“What’s the word?” Velda asked. “The muckity mucks have a plan?”
Jimmy plopped down into a chair. “They identified that man from last night eating dinner with Dixon. The Russian. He’s a guy named Victor Petrova, a former KGB officer in the First Directorate.”
Velda scooted her little legs over the side of the bed. “Department A?”
“Yep. Disinformation.”
“Wonderful. Where do we go from here?”
Jimmy rolled his eyes up in thought, recalling the conversation. “There’s more. London decided they needed to coordinate with the Americans. Make sure we weren’t stepping on toes. International coordination.”
Velda seemed to sense what was coming, her head shaking side to side.
“It’s complex,” Jimmy said. “They have some assets in place. This is big. Really big.”
Suddenly an alarm sounded from the laptop and Jimmy turned to look at the screen.
“Dixon is on the move. Let’s go.”
17
The train slowly pulled out of the Gallivare, Sweden station. Jake and Anna sat together in a second class section, with Kjersti facing them and across the aisle six rows forward. They had decided to split up. They were all dead tired. Kjersti was already dozing off and Anna had her head against Jake’s shoulder. The train was less than half full, so the two of them had no one else across from them or directly behind them.
He squeezed down on Anna’s hand, wanting to tell her what he had found out about the box. But this was not the right time or place. At least he was no longer shaking. Perhaps he had simply been tired and his body was reacting appropriately. But he had to admit that, at the time, he thought it had been some kind of reaction to the old Soviet virus.