“You’re so eloquent about these things,” Mike said.
“Nielson is eloquent about these things,” Adams said. “I’m from the Teams, remember? The list starts: My wife, sure… ”
“My toothbrush, maybe, my knife, never,” Mike finished. “And you’ve been through how many of those wives?”
“Enough that I’m glad to be out of the States,” Adams admitted. “They can get my pension but they can’t touch what I’m making over here.”
“Then let me just suggest that you’re out of your league, Master Chief,” Mike said with a sigh. “Except, maybe, on one question: Think I should talk to Kiril about this?”
“No,” Adams said. “I already did.”
“Thanks,” Mike said.
“I told him you weren’t nearly the cockhound everybody made you out to be. Hell, you hardly knew where to put it. There was no way that Gretchen was going to go for a guy as bad in the sack as you are.”
“Let me repeat my thanks,” Mike said, chuckling.
“He was really weird about it,” Adams said, frowning. “Resigned, maybe. He just said that his fate would be decided. What’s this I hear about him being sent off?”
“Isn’t happening,” Mike said. “They’re talking about sending him off to the Legion and me hooking up with Gretchen. I’m putting my Kildar boot on that. He marries Gretchen.”
“Ain’t like you’re short on pussy,” Adams admitted.
“Eloquence, thy name is Ass-boy,” Mike said. “But, to reiterate, pussy is not the issue. However, changing the subject, we may have helo pilots.”
“That would be great,” Adams said, nodding. “We’re seriously fucked without pilots. I mean the bad kind of fucked. Not the fucking Gretchen kind of fucked.”
“Pierson said that quote some candidates end quote are on the way,” Mike said, shaking his head at Adams’ aside. He knew the approach, it was the specialty of the Teams. Call it “tough love.” As in “go cry in somebody else’s beer.” On the other hand, Adams didn’t actually have to deal with the management of the Keldara’s morale. “So, so far the rest of us are on track. Sucks to be you, though,” he added with a grin.
“You want this girl alive or not?” Adams grumped.
“Be nice,” Mike said, taking another sip. “That’s why I detailed you to it. But the most important thing is getting the package. And that means getting eyeballs on the target and into commo with Katya.”
“She in place, yet?” Adams asked.
“Should be.”
Chapter Sixteen
The first thing Dmitri told her was: “You’re going to need to change clothes.”
Katya didn’t see what was wrong with her clothes. She’d carefully chosen them based on her cover as a new hooker in the trade: hip-hugger jeans, a tight, low-cut blouse, black patent leather high-heels and a fake fox coat. All of the clothes were well worn, the coat actually a bit ratty. Most of what she had packed in her small bag was the same.
“The Chechens, well… ” Dmitri had sighed and shrugged. “They move the whores, they use the whores. But if you look like a whore they’re going to make your life hell.”
Katya didn’t know what Dmitri’s connection to Russian intel was. The one thing she’d insured was that he did not know she was “connected.” Another agent had handed her off to him without any suggestion she was working for Russian intel. What she had come to realize was that he was an expert in the trade. He’d treated her with polite disinterest, not even trying to cadge a “freebie.” And he knew all the guards at the crossing points. So by the time they reached Gamasora she’d changed.
Full coverage sweater, slightly tight but not even vaguely sexual, a skirt she’d picked up on the road that hung to well below her knees, flats, the hardest to find. Her makeup was dialed way back. She looked… drab.
Looking at the women of the town, many of them in Islamic dhimmi scarves that covered their hair and ears with skirts that went all the way to the ground and heavy coats that gave little if any indication of their figure, she had to admit she looked more the part.
“You’re not going to get as much for me looking like this,” Katya pointed out.
“The buyers know what they’re looking at,” Dmitri replied as they pulled into the town. “This isn’t a market, it’s a trading point. You know you’re headed for Turkey on this route, right?”
“Yes,” Katya said then shrugged. “Turkey or Europe, what’s the difference. A whore is a whore.”
“With your looks you’d do better in Europe or the East,” Dmitri said then shrugged in return. “But if you want to go to Turkey, that’s nothing to me. I already have you contracted to Georgi Torshin so I’ll just drop you and be gone.”
Dmitri pulled the antiquated Lada to a stop in front of a coffee shop and gestured at the door. “Last stop. For me, anyway.”
Katya was glad for the rest. The roads to Gamasoara had been atrocious and the Lada had apparently lost all of its springs decades ago. She felt as if her teeth had been rattled loose by the long journey. But they were finally at the area of operations. Now to see if she could find the target.
She got out, grabbing her bag, and, head down and posture slumped, followed Dmitri into the café. She still was cataloguing her surroundings. The café had a small stream behind it and a patio to one side. In fact, it was practically identical to the one in Allerso. However, the design was so common in this region it wasn’t particularly surprising.
The town was a bit larger than Allerso, maybe a thousand people. She wasn’t sure what the local industry was but it didn’t appear to be booming. Most of the people in the town seemed to be selling things to each other, most of it old and worn. There were two food vendors on the street and they didn’t seem to be doing much business.
The interior of the café was hot and stuffy, the windows and doors closed against the late fall chill. All of the patrons were male and most of them watched her as Dmitri led the way to the back of the room. They had the look that said “Islamic” to her, automatically. She had never really understood how you could spot an Islamic, or an American or a European, immediately. Jay had explained some of it to her. Islamics followed certain laws that affected their dress and demeanor to a degree most of them didn’t realize. For example, when you had to regularly take your shoes off for prayer it just made more sense to step down on the backs so you could slip them on and off like slippers. But when you did that you had to shuffle as you walked or they’d slip off. Thus Islamics tended to shuffle their feet and take small steps.
There were a thousand such minor cultural clues about personal behavior and body language that subconsciously, to most people, screamed what culture a person derived from. The job of a spy, or an actor, was to learn them and copy them slavishly.
“I will see where Georgi has gone to,” Dmitri said as soon as she was seated. “He is usually in here this time of day. Talk to no one.”
Dmitri went to the counter that served the café and it quickly became obvious that something was wrong. Not quite an argument but Dmitri was clearly unhappy when he came back to the table.
“Well, there is a problem,” he said with a sigh as he sat down with two cups of strong coffee. “Georgi is dead.”
“How?” Katya asked, wide-eyed. She was playing the biggest innocent a new whore might be and wide-eyed was the right reaction to sudden news of death.
“Heart attack,” Dmitri spat. “There is a man called Yaroslav has taken over his business. He will come.”
“Do you know him?” Katya asked, nervously. Again, the nervousness was right for the character. Of course, there was some true nervousness to it. Things were going wrong, which was always bad for a mission. The intermediary, Dmitri, and the primary, Georgi, had been carefully chosen. Georgi normally held his “girls” for a few weeks, setting up someone to move them to further down the line. He also was reputed to be easy with his girls’ time as long as they brought in a few rubles while they were waiting. Katya needed that time, and the freedom, if she was to have any chance of finding the target.