Grigoriyev pushed his way over to the end of Jon’s bed and lifted the clipboard hanging off the end. He scanned the page, then handed it to Barron. “What’s it say?” Kyra asked.
“Gunshot wound to the leg,” Barron said. “Looks like whoever shot him treated him on site with some coagulant, the Russian equivalent of QuikClot. Surgeons here sewed that up. But…” He paused. “They tortured him.”
“Hurt too,” Jon muttered.
“What did they do to him?” Cooke asked. Her voice was cold, venom in her tone like Barron had never heard.
“He’s been treated for dehydration and pinpoint burns, probably from electric shocks,” he said, reading off the paper. “Kathy… they crushed his knee.”
Kyra looked down at the sheet. Jon’s right leg formed a strange angle under the white cloth. “Didn’t work,” he muttered. “Asperger’s gives me a low pain threshold. I kept passing out. So they gave me painkillers to keep me awake, but I couldn’t feel anything so I didn’t care what they did. Drove ’em crazy.” He laughed quietly.
“I don’t know what they’re giving him, but whatever it is, I want some,” Barron said. “That must be some quality stuff, and judging by the drip rate, he’s getting plenty.”
Cooke did not smile at the joke. “Director Grigoriyev,” she said, “I expect you to help us evacuate this man to the United States immediately, where he can receive proper medical attention under the supervision of our own doctors.” Her voice left no doubt that she was not asking a question.
Grigoriyev nodded. “We will move him to our best hospital. Our surgeons there will examine and treat him until an arrangement for a medical flight can be made,” he said. “If you are satisfied, I need to find General Lavrov.” He stared at Kyra. “And you are coming.”
“No, she’s not,” Barron objected.
“I need her there,” Grigoriyev said. “Lavrov ordered her execution because she is a witness to his illegal arrests of Russian citizens. When he sees that she is with me, he will know that I have the evidence to remove him from command of the GRU. If she is not there, he might not believe that she lives and will resist arrest.”
“He might resist anyway,” Barron told him.
“He might,” Grigoriyev conceded. “But if she comes, he might surrender.”
“I’ll go with her,” Barron replied. “That’s not a request.”
“That will be acceptable.”
“Clark, I’ll stay here with Jon,” Cooke said. “Director Grigoriyev, I do not speak Russian. I will need an officer who speaks English to help me coordinate the medical flight and other arrangements.”
“I believe Colonel Sokolov speaks English. He will help you.” The FSB director put his hand in his coat and felt the sidearm he was carrying. “Now, we go to Khodynka.”
The hour had passed and Sokolov still had not called. Had the man forgotten? Lavrov doubted that. Even if a soldier could forget a direct order so easily, the colonel had always been an efficient officer, a man who paid attention to the details. He would have remembered. Something was amiss at the Aquarium, but there were no sirens, no alerts. The general stepped outside the hangar and looked past the line of barracks to the old headquarters. The skyline of buildings looked like they always had in the dark.
Lavrov pulled out his own cell phone and dialed the number to Sokolov’s office. There was no answer. He tried the GRU operator and had him connect the call to the interrogation room. That phone stubbornly continued ringing until Lavrov disconnected. What is going on over there?
“General Lavrov.” The crew chief approached, saluted, then nodded toward the Mi-26 helicopter. “Maintenance is finished, the tank is full, and the cargo loaded. We will tow it out and it will be ready to travel once your pilot arrives and performs his preflight check”
“Very good.” Lavrov said. “The pilot… he should have been here by now, correct?”
The crew chief wiped his greasy hands on a rag. “He was due five minutes ago. No one has called to explain the delay—” He stopped, looked out into the darkness, and pointed. “Maybe that is him.”
Lavrov twisted his head, following the imaginary line from the crew chief’s finger out onto the tarmac. A line of cars was crossing the runway in front of the boneyard. “No,” Lavrov said. “There are too many cars.” He stared at the approaching convoy, then turned back to the hangar. Whoever was coming was no friend.
I have friends of my own here, he thought.
“There.” Grigoriyev’s driver pointed to the open hangar. “There is a transport still inside.”
Grigoriyev answered nothing. The driver accelerated a bit, closed the distance to the metal building, and finally stopped, parking the car to block the Mi-26 from being towed outside. The other four cars fanned out, parking in a staggered formation behind the director’s vehicle.
Lavrov looked out through the helicopter’s windshield and counted a dozen men stepping out of the cars, none wearing a military uniform. Grigoriyev. He saw the old FSB director dismount and stand, hands in his overcoat, his breath visible in the cooling air.
There was a woman with them. Lavrov cursed. Stryker. Grigoriyev had stopped the colonel from carrying out his orders. This would be a problem.
The general turned to the Spetsnaz squad standing behind him, carbines suspended from their vests. “You understand the orders?” he asked. The Special Forces soldiers nodded in silent agreement. “Very good.” Lavrov turned and walked down the cargo ramp.
“Arkady!” Grigoriyev called out. “We must talk.”
There was no answer before the GRU chairman came around from behind the transport. He approached the FSB chief and stopped, making a show of counting the men behind him. His eyes lingered on Kyra. “Why are you here, Anatoly?”
“I am here to arrest you.”
“I think not.”
“You are a traitor to the Rodina, Arkady. You have sold yourself to the CIA for money and you killed Stepan to cover your perfidy. I do not care that you tried to extort the Americans for more money, but you made illegal arrests and executions of Russian citizens to prove your leverage. Your CIA ‘source’ was actually a dangle that you swallowed. The people you expelled were just common diplomats. The CIA cadre here in Moscow remains intact, while you have given the U.S. government an excuse to expel our officers from Washington, including our ambassador, and move against every intelligence operation we are running on their soil. You have left us at a severe disadvantage that will cripple us for years and the price you paid for this failure was the blood of loyal Russian citizens. Therefore, you are charged with treason and murder,” Grigoriyev said.
“The president will not agree—” Lavrov began. He shook his head slightly, a laugh of derision escaping him.
“I saw the letter, Arkady… the letter which you burned. And he will see it.”
Lavrov’s eyes narrowed. “It was a falsehood, created to implicate me. I burned it so that would not happen.”
“Or so there would be less evidence of your treason.”
“Less evidence?”
“Your Colonel Sokolov tells me that you took the quarter-million euros that were recovered with the note, which Miss Stryker admitted under questioning was meant for you. Why would you do that, Arkady, unless you considered it payment due for services rendered?”
“Money recovered from spies is put to other purposes. You know that,” Lavrov protested.