Just after touching down, the SEALS quickly extricated from the Seahawk with their gear and pushed their way to the hatch leading to the hangar bay.
Watching this unfold, Rita tightened her grip on the back of the captain’s chair. “Refueling should take only a few minutes, sir.”
“Just like a NASCAR pit crew,” the captain said, loud enough for others in the CIC to hear, bringing a number of smiles and chuckles.
They all watched in anticipation as the helo refueled, the wind whipping the craft and occasional salt spray flying up to greet them. Once they were topped off, the ground crew released the chains and chocks and the helo lifted back off the deck, immediately turned toward the west and rose up away from the rough seas toward home.
Rita breathed a sigh of relief. “Sir, we have a briefing,” she said to the captain.
Commander Wockovich looked confused, but he got up and followed her out of the CIC.
After she closed the hatch, she said, “We need to talk.”
The two of them wandered down the passageway, over knee knockers, through multiple hatches, until they came to the group of officer staterooms. They went into her private stateroom — something they never did because of the potential appearance of impropriety.
Rita paced back and forth in the small stateroom, unsure of how to broach the subject.
“Spit it out, Rita,” the captain said. “What’s bothering you?”
She turned to him. “This whole mission, Randy. Something isn’t right.”
“No shit. The Russians are fucking with us.”
She turned to him and said, “Are they trying to get us to shoot at them?”
The captain said, “I’ve asked Fleet that question, and they have no clue. They did assure me that the CIA was working it, and the president is involved.”
Rita shook her head. “That doesn’t instill confidence, Randy. We now have a SEAL team aboard. And they would only be involved if our government decides to board the Russian ship.”
“Do we have another choice?” he asked. “It’s not like we can just lob a missile at her.”
“What about divine intervention?” She hesitated, but he wasn’t getting her idea. “Perhaps this storm will sink her.”
“That would be sweet,” the captain said. “But not something we can depend on.”
She knew that. But a girl could hope.
Aboard the Russian merchant ship, Dmitri Vladimirovich Samsonov sat in his private stateroom reading the secure communication that just arrived by satellite communication. It was a file on Commander Randy Wockovich, the American captain of the U.S. Navy Guided Missile Destroyer that had been shadowing them for the past couple of days. The commanding officer of the USS John M. McGrath (DDG-129) had been playing the game perfectly, Dmitri thought. Stay out of visual range with limited communications. But, what the captain did not know, is that this Russian merchant ship was equipped with highly sophisticated radar. Dmitri’s men had even detected the arrival of the helicopter in this massive storm. What would be so important to risk lives with a flight like that? Time would tell.
Now, he wondered about the name Wockovich. Was this captain of Russian heritage? No. He was more likely Polish. But it didn’t matter. The man’s Naval heritage was impressive. His ancestors had served with distinction in both world wars. His brother was an admiral in the Navy, and even his sister was a captain. The only blemish on the man’s record was the incident with his previous ship, where it had collided with a civilian craft by Puerto Rico. Normally, this would not lead to command of the newest destroyer in the fleet, but perhaps to early retirement. Maybe this would make the man cautious. Dmitri smiled with that thought.
27
Feelings were for high school girls and European men in skinny jeans with man buns. For Karl Adams, he had always found a way to bypass the urge to let emotions control his actions. Yet, he was struggling with the Maya issue. On one hand, he had spent a lot of time with her over the past few months, from Murmansk to Aruba and now in Venezuela. Logically, he knew he should not trust her. Yet, a part of him reasoned that she could still be on his side. The nagging issue for Karl had to be the words of his father — never trust an agent developed by another Agency officer.
The night before had been both pleasurable, with the relationship he had with Maya in their shared bed, but also disturbing due to the street protests and riots that had scared the capital city. Daylight exposed the true nature of the so-called freedom-loving rabble-rousers. They continued to leave trash and used signs behind on the streets as if they owned a forest to produce these signs. The sidewalks smelled of urine and feces.
Karl was alone as he wandered down the main shopping street a block from his hotel. He had gotten a message from the Agency to meet with the Agency station chief at a coffee shop — an odd place to remain anonymous, Karl thought, but he didn’t make the rules. He still didn’t know enough to decide what orders he could ignore.
His phone had flashed an image of the station chief for less than thirty seconds over breakfast at the hotel. The biggest problem had not been selling Maya on a ruse to allow Karl to go to the meeting. No, she was still asleep upstairs in their room. Karl’s problem was shaking the Russians and the Venezuelan intel officers, which he knew were somewhere behind him.
A block from the coffee shop, this became a non-issue when an old van pulled over to the curb and two men jumped out. Karl was about to draw his weapon, but then he saw the station chief sitting inside the van. When the station chief said his name, his real name and not one of his fake names, he relaxed somewhat and got into the van with the men. The van pulled back out and cruised somewhere in the downtown region of Caracas. The windows were tinted nearly black from the outside, but Karl could still see the city slide by from inside.
“Karl Adams,” the man said brusquely. “Same side.”
If these men were the bad guys, they would have taken his gun, Karl thought. The CIA station chief in front of him had long scraggly hair, mostly gray, with an equally disheveled beard that needed a trim. The guy looked like a crazy physics professor contemplating a replacement for the Big Bang Theory.
The two men who had hauled him into the van slipped to the far back seats of the van, trying to look menacing, but unfortunately failing.
“I was expecting coffee,” Karl said. “Maybe a doughnut.”
“You just ate a full breakfast at the hotel,” the station chief said.
Now Karl was a bit disturbed. He had not caught someone watching him. At this point, Karl thought it best to let the station chief talk.
“I’m thinking about kicking you out of the country,” the professorial station chief said.
“Why?”
“You were sent here as an unknown,” the station chief said. “Somehow you were compromised even before you hit the shore.”
Karl shook his head. “The Russians have no clue who I am. Nor do those with SEBIN.”
“They might not know you more than the man from Murmansk, but they know that you are probably an Agency asset. That’s enough.”
Karl glanced about the inside of the van. “And they damn sure know everyone in this vehicle. They probably even know they have to special order micro-sized condoms online.”
The station chief said nothing for a long minute. Then he smiled and said, “I knew your mother. We worked together once in the Middle East.”
Where was this going? “And?”
“And you have that same indignant demeanor,” he said. “She didn’t take shit from anyone.”
Karl had not really known his own mother as anything other than a distant aunt, but he had heard similar stories about Toni Contardo growing up. Of course, his mother, or real aunt, had never told him his mother was a CIA officer.