He suddenly realized he had spent too much time with this Libyan popinjay.
"I don't give a shit what you do," Kazakov said. "Someone just invaded your country-it seems like the perfect time to do just about anything you wish to do. Use your armed forces, track those commandos down-you know they're not going to walk out of the damned desert, so track their aircraft down-and then destroy whatever base they came from with everything you've got. You'll be totally justified in whatever action you take-and you might even earn a bit of respect from your enemies. Now, stop bothering me-and you place those missiles where I tell you to place them, or the next biochem warhead you hear about will be falling on your head." He slammed the phone down so hard, his teacup rattled in its saucer.
Zuwayy was dangerous, even unstable, Kazakov thought. He was a warmonger, ready to lash out at anyone, for any reason or no reason at all. He hoped Zuwayy would keep it together long enough, until the delicate negotiations with the Central African Petroleum Partners were concluded. Libyan forces were just a subtle threat to Egypt, and vice versa-neither country had any semblance of a real fighting force. But if anyone tried to attack Libya, the rockets were in place and ready to completely wipe out any opposition and guarantee that no outside forces were going to interfere.
In any case, Kazakov was going to get enough of a foothold in the African oil market to force out the other companies and eventually take over. He didn't have the power he had just a few short months ago-but it was just a matter of time. Once firmly in place in Africa, with the money pouring in, he could move back into the vast untapped oil resources in the Caspian Sea region again.
He was so engrossed in his own heated thoughts that he did not notice Ivana Vasilyeva standing beside his desk, staring at him. Her full red lips were parted as if she were panting heavily, and her eyes were wide and glassy. He smiled at her.
"You speak to other men, even this king of Libya, as if he were a street sweeper who had just soiled your shoes," Vasilyeva breathed. Her left hand drifted up to her breast, and her fingers teased a nipple underneath her sweater. "You are an extraordinary man. I am pleased that you have chosen me to be by your side."
He stood, walked over to her, reached behind her head with his left hand, and yanked her chin upward by pulling her hair. Her left hand did not move from her breast, so he fondled her right breast until her nipple sprang to life. "I keep you here with me because of your contacts in the Russian government and army," Kazakov said. He looked into her eyes as they grew wider, as if in fear, but her breathing was becoming heavier, more excited. "I also keep you here because you can kill faster and more efficiently and in more ways than I."
He pushed her aside roughly, then took his seat once again. "Stop this foolishness and straighten up, Major," Kazakov ordered her. She stood before him, watching him with half-closed eyes, her expression contrite yet inviting at the same time. "I do not believe for one moment that you get orgasmic just by watching me yell at a strutting simpleton like Zuwayy. He is not one-tenth the soldier or leader you are-if he was, I would send you to Tripoli and have you assassinate him immediately. He is a bug to be squashed as soon as he fulfills his part, which is to force either a settlement or a war between the central African oil cartels and us. Your job is to watch my back and collect information, not to play with yourself in my office. If I need a whore, I'll call one."
"I am here to do whatever you wish, Pavel-"
"I am Comrade Kazakov to you, Major," he corrected her. "And there should be no doubt in your mind that you are here to do whatever I wish, or else your fate would be the same as your last boss, General Zhurbenko-thirty years at hard labor in Siberia. But you are a highly trained soldier and a keen tactician, not a zblidavattsa. If I ever get another indication that you fancy yourself as anything else but my chief of security and my aide-de-camp, you will find yourself digging coal in Siberia beside Zhurbenkoor at the bottom of an Icelandic fjord."
"Yes, Comrade Kazakov," Vasilyeva said. But her eyes blazed as she went on, "But now I wish to tell you something."
"You do so at your own peril, Major."
"Very well," she said. She took a bold step forward; Kazakov's eyes warned her away, but he knew it would take more than a stare to make this woman back off. "You say you chose me, Comrade. But now I tell you this: I chose you as well."
"Zasrat mazgi? Oh, really?"
"Yes, Comrade," Vasilyeva said confidently, with only a hint of a smile on her beautiful but army-hardened face. "I chose General Zhurbenko the same way: He was a man that could get me the things I wanted-power, prestige, money, land, and status. If I had to let the old bastard feel me up or be his min 'etka every now and then, it was all part of my plan to get what I wanted.
"I feel the same way about you, Comrade-you are a man that can get me what I want. You have the poweryou still have the power, even here, in exile in Iceland. I can dedicate myself to a man such as you."
"Frankly, Major, I was not too impressed with how well you protected your other mentor."
"I noticed your power the moment I first met you in the general's car. I knew you were the one for me, the man with even more power than Zhurbenko, the one who could get me the things I want," Vasilyeva said. "Besides, he gave me to you-it was clear he no longer needed me. It was easy to switch loyalties. If the general showed the same loyalty to me when your plan started to become exposed, I would have used my powers to protect him as well-but he decided to be a good soldier and take his punishment, protecting his wife instead of me. That will cost him his life." She stepped closer to him again, and this time he saw something more sinister in her expression-not just confidence, but a warning as well. "I have given myself to you, Comrade. I am yours. Betray me, and I will bring you down like I brought down Zhurbenko. Remain loyal to me, and you can do with me as you want-anything you want-and I will do anything for you."
Pavel Kazakov had to suppress a thrill of dread that came over him again. The old feeling had come back-the feeling of impending danger. Every time he had listened, the feeling had saved him. Every time he ignored it, failed to break off his plans, run, and protect himself, he went down in disaster and defeat.
But before he could respond, she reached out to him, took his hands, and placed them on her breasts. Her eyes were demanding, commanding, riveting-and irresistible. She had always been irresistible. This wasn't loyalty, and certainly not love-this was plain old-fashioned ambition, desire, and a willingness to do anything, and allow anything to be done to her, to get what she wanted.
Of course, he failed to listen to the danger signal. He was helpless to heed it now.
"Well," he said with a smile as she reached behind her neck to unzip her sweater, "if you put it that way, Major…"
Zuwayy slammed the phone down hard. "Saghf tarak khord!" he cursed. "That bastard! How dare he order me around like a child!" But Kazakov was right about one thing: This was a good opportunity to lash out at someone and prove he wasn't going to be pushed around. And he would be fully, completely justified in doing so.
He dialed a special secure pager number, then sat and waited. Several minutes later, a call was put through to him: "Speak."
"This is Ulama al-Khan, Majesty," Khalid al-Khan, the chief justice of the Egyptian Supreme Court and the leader of the main opposition party, responded. "God be with you."
"And to you, Ulama," Zuwayy said. This guy had to be the biggest idiot in all of Egypt and probably all of northern Africa, Zuwayy scoffed to himself. Khan saw himself as an Islamic holy man, a true believer who fancied himself a spiritual master and leader. He was so zealous in his beliefs-and so enamored of himself-that he couldn't see danger when it was right in front of his face. His ambition would quite possibly drive him into the Presidential Palace-but he had no concept of how to lead a government, except to send out his henchmen in the Egyptian Republican Guards and assassinate a political enemy. He truly believed that God would absolve him of all his sins, no matter how heinous his crimes.