Red Ice Page 4

  McCorkell had been keen to explain. “He used his money and power to interfere in a lot of other states’ affairs—Georgia, Nigeria, Chechnya—where his influence and activities ranged from political campaign donations to attempted coups and orchestrated election results. In Chechnya’s elections a few years back, he shipped in busloads of illegal voters from across the borders, and we know how that worked out: You seen Grozny? Looks like Berlin circa 1945. United Nations still call Grozny ‘the most destroyed city on Earth.’ And then there was Nigeria; well, you know all about that … But you know what? He always stayed out of Moscow’s politics.”

  “And that’s it? That was his saving grace, that he stayed out of politics at home?” Hutchinson had shaken his head. “There has to be more to it.”

  McCorkell continued, “He helped them out economically—and not just through his corporations and taxes. Take Georgia. Remember when he put those Umbra security forces in? Partly to aid the passage of his oil and gas pipelines—”

  “And curry favour with the Russian government.” Hutchinson nodded his head. It still wasn’t enough. McCorkell could see that too, couldn’t he?

  “Stirring the pot like that sure helped the Russians out.”

  Hutchinson had paced McCorkell’s Eisenhower Executive Office Building (EEOB) office next door to the White House. Their celebratory drinks remained largely untouched atop McCorkell’s desk, so he took the single malt and sipped at it. There was something they were missing. Babich had an ace in the hole, and despite being incarcerated for all this time, Hutchinson had no doubt it was one of those get-out-of-jail-free kind of gigs. He’d gone all this time without his government stopping him, as they’d done for so many other oligarchs who’d outgrown what the Kremlin considered acceptable, yet they hadn’t moved on him until the writing was well and truly on the wall in international jurisdictions.

  “I don’t buy it either,” McCorkell had said eventually, and as if reading Hutchinson’s mind: “Why have they let him get so big for so long? He must have a few tricks up his sleeve. He has to.”

  “Like?”

  “He was one of their top security advisers before the fall, a rising star in their intel community, better regarded than his colleague Putin, but he’d made the wrong alliances in the last days of Yeltsin. The answer’s gotta be wrapped up in there somewhere.”

  “He knows … what? What’s he know?”

  “Information is power…”

  McCorkell was grinning, enjoying watching the younger man think it through. Hutchinson snapped his fingers. “He knows every little secret the current Russian leaders have? All the details of how they ascended to power?”

  “And how they keep power.”

  “That’s what it’s gotta be. Right?”

  “It’s information we kinda know their regime has killed for, many times,” McCorkell had said, draining his drink and looking out at the sun setting over the Capitol. “But then, why would they wait around if there’s a fear he’d spill the beans one day?”

  “They thought he’d never need to, as long as he was left to do his thing. He’s never used it, all this time…”

  “Never had to.”

  “Until now.”

  “Until now.”

  Hutchinson couldn’t rest, couldn’t quiet his mind. But now they’re turning against him … Thing was, with this kind of power, why would Moscow risk this guy not rolling over in some kind of bargain? Babich was undoubtedly smart, as good an intelligence operator as any, so he’d protect his life with some kind of fail-safe back-up plan should the day come when the authorities came gunning for him. Well, that day was here. Did he know that? Hutchinson looked over to Babich, sitting, eyes closed, easy smile, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Didn’t he realise the gravity of his situation? What could make such a man so calm?

  9

  PARIS

  Fox couldn’t really see the police Renault amid the debris of the Yop truck, but he caught glimpses of it behind the traffic.

  Gotta warn Renard—he reached awkwardly for his iPhone, still in his back pocket, swerved to avoid an oncoming car, and the mobile fell to the floor.

  One of the two inbound cop cars drove up on the pavement, scattering a tour group, and launched off the gutter to cut in front of him. But Fox was too fast. He was already past them, just a flash of metal grinding along their front bumper. One of the cops jumped out, pistol drawn, and Fox swerved quickly to avoid the shot.

  The other cop car was trapped by the oncoming tunnel traffic, but the Peugeot had gained on him; a black panther hunched low to the ground, it chewed up the distance on the flat run.

  Fox flashed his lights on and off and raced northeast, weaving through the other cars on the road, but he was followed closely by the unshakable black sedan. He scanned the split roads before him and took the tunnel that led into the business district of La Defense. Blue lights followed him in—the cop car was back.

  Inside the tunnel, cars yielded to Fox’s high-beam and urgent speed. A taxi tried to jump into Fox’s wake but was pushed back by the cop car, the taxi then ricocheting off a concrete barrier and into the path of a jack-knifing truck.

  The Peugeot had gained on Fox and was hitting his bumper, trying to spin the Golf out. Fox floored it, struggling to keep ahead. The speed, the bumping, the neon overhead lights strobing like a flickering reel-to-reel projector movie … The light of the tunnel’s end loomed up ahead, his foot was flat to the floor, the sedan bumped him again.

  The two cars shot out of the tunnel, the road ahead mostly clear.

  Fox glanced across at the merging traffic on a ramp to his right—looked back—and jerked on the steering wheel quickly to avoid an almost-stopped Citroën. The cop car flanking the Golf slammed into the Citroën’s rear, spinning it into the path of the Peugeot, which finally screeched to a stop. The cop car, the Peugeot and the Citroën were locked into a mess of bumpers as Fox drove on.

  He looked behind—the Peugeot’s passenger window slid down and a swarthy guy in dark glasses watched the Golf disappearing. The cops were getting out of their car and approaching the Peugeot cautiously, hands on their holstered side-arms.

  Fox turned off the highway, leaving the carnage behind him. Several blocks, side streets and turns later, when everything seemed quiet around him, he found a turn back onto his chosen path.

  Minutes later, he had settled into a more sedate pace, happy to see other Golfs on the road and no cop cars or black Peugeots behind him. He reached down into the passenger-side foot-well for his iPhone. He had people to warn.

  10

  PARIS

  Boris Malevich drained the last of his takeway coffee and scanned the building’s doors from across the street. He checked his watch. Forward intelligence, weeks’ worth of telephone transcripts and hacking of the reporter’s online diary, had placed Renard here today, ready to meet up with a contact in just over an hour. Having watched him enter Le Figaro this morning, Malevich was satisfied that those who’d planned this op knew what they were doing. Then, watching the busy Saturday morning start to take shape, he began to have doubts, uncertainties that centred around what those in Moscow couldn’t control. With nothing to do but stay here, wait and observe, he worried: What if the reporter had taken another exit from the building instead of the one he was watching? What if he didn’t take his car—which Malevich had his other unit covering—to his meeting? What if Renard had left while he was sipping his cold coffee and looking around for cops? What if they’d missed him altogether?

  Stupid. This thinking was stupid and this operation was stupid. He should have kept more of the guys here with him. Moscow had sent ten men, and he had just two here to assist him, covering the rear of the news building and watching the reporter’s vehicle; a couple of thick-necked guys Moscow had sent to do the heavy lifting work. Eight others had been sent away to Renard’s farm near Giverny to clean up a loose end. His case officer had insisted it wou
ld take that many men.

  But still … eight men for Lachlan Fox … Just to kill another soft target, a reporter like this Renard. They needed eight men to make sure he was dead? And he was left with just two to shadow the French journalist, to potentially move and obtain what had been described to him as ‘the most valuable item Russia could ever have.’

  Really? That was all?

  He looked at his watch again—the farmhouse team should check in at any moment. He had no way of contacting them—they were under strict instruction not to use mobile phones while their mission was underway—but he had thought they would call in their success and meet up with him soon. Until he had ten men here, he would continue to worry. That was justifiable, yes?

  Better to have three vehicles following Renard and the document than two. He texted his two men here, requesting an update. One thing put him more at ease. This time, at least, he had them to do the killing.

  11

  HIGH OVER THE MED

  The cabin lights went out and the plane was dark, except for the weak daylight filtering through the small oval windows. Hutchinson walked up into the cockpit, all smiles now they’d made it through the turbulence—until he realised the pilots’ mood hadn’t changed.

  “What’s up with turning the cabin lights off?” Hutchinson asked, peering out at the heavy cloud around the windows, condensation streaking and snaking along the glass. “We’re coming out of it, yeah? We’re—we’re good now, yeah?”

  The pilots took a while to answer as they were each preoccupied with flight controls. Hutchinson noticed the LCD screens in front were blank.

  “All electronics are down,” the pilot said. “Major failure. GPS, comms, radar, fly-by-wire … You name it, if it’s electric it isn’t working.”

  “Why?”

  “No idea. We’re flying by analogue instruments now.”

  “All comms are down?” Hutchinson asked.

  “Yep.”

  The co-pilot was scanning the radio bands. He shook his head, kept flicking switches, kept calling to towers that should be contactable and muttering expletives.

  “What could do that?”

  “Serious fucking bug,” the pilot replied. The co-pilot looked across at him. “Or some kind of interference … Though that’s unlikely.”

  Hutchinson looked back down the cabin at Babich. He didn’t look perturbed, like he knew exactly what was going on.

  “We should pull in asap,” the pilot said.

  “What?”

  “We should land,” the pilot replied. “Asap.”

  “Where?”

  “Airfield in Corsica is the closest,” the co-pilot said.

  Great. Fucking great.

  “Can we make it there okay?”

  “All mechs are working fine and we’ve got the fuel,” the pilot said, looking him in the eyes, unable to hide his own alarm. “I’d feel a lot better if we were on the ground—I’ve never experienced this kind of system failure outside the sim.”

  Fuck. Something was going on. But what other choice was there?

  “Head for Corsica,” Hutchinson said.

  “Copy that,” the co-pilot said, and he started finalising the course projection.

  “And we’ve got a sat phone back there,” Hutchinson added.

  “Worth a try,” the pilot said. “Bring it up and we’ll run through it.”

  Hutchinson walked to the back of the cabin to get the gear. He could feel Babich’s eyes on him, intent. As if the fucker had never been asleep at all. As if he hadn’t a care in the world. Oh, how he’d love to share the load, give the motherfucker something to think about.

  “Holy shit!”

  The pilot’s voice barely preceded the violent jerking of the cabin—Hutchinson just managed to grab hold of a seat as the aircraft levelled off again. He looked up the aisle, Babich was looking back at him.

  The Russian smiled.

  12

  GIVERNY, FRANCE

  The winding gravel drive crunched under the low-profile tyres as Fox steered the Golf towards the side of the rustic doublestorey farmhouse. All looked quiet, normal, exactly how he’d left it earlier this morning. The white-walled building with its blue timber shutters, orange-clay tiled roof with brick chimneys bookending the ridge was a picture-perfect place in the country. An illusion now though, just another piece of normality that he’d leave behind because of what he did. Everything stemmed from the U-turn he took a few years back, long after he’d renounced this kind of life and moved to an island in the Indian Ocean—a speck of tranquillity that taunted him as he looked at where he was—on the run, again.

  His heart was still beating fast from the car chase, but there’d been no sign of the Peugeot since way back at La Defense, forty minutes ago. He’d passed a cop car just as he exited the Normandy highway and he’d sat a little straighter behind the wheel, made sure he was not speeding. He’d checked the rearview mirror, expecting them to do a U-turn and pursue him, but they kept driving. The sick sensation in his stomach had remained, would until he knew his friends were safe. Part of him wanted to grab his friends and just leave, take the easy route; run. But maybe hiding out here at the farmhouse was the better option? It was remote, a needle in a haystack, just another plot amid the endless farms that dotted the region. Nobody beyond Renard knew they were here.

  Renard. Lachlan tried his friend’s number again: maybe he’d switched it off on the drive to Dijon? He left a message as he sped up the driveway:

  “Renard, it’s Lachlan. Listen … There was a car following me this morning and it—it didn’t feel right so I put my foot down: it chased me. Had a bit of an incident with the cops in the process of escaping Paris, but I lost them all—I think. So keep an eye out, yeah? I’m just pulling into the farmhouse … Call me when you can.”

  Brujon, Renard’s border collie, followed the car. He was a spritely black and white blur, far too much energy, a cunning genius and escape artist extraordinaire. Fox saw Gammaldi at the window in the kitchen—giving him a thumbs-up and huge grin—and he felt some of his tension disappear.

  He drove slowly under the stone arch that linked the barn to the house, pulling around the back. The walled courtyard garden was bordered by the vines of the neighbouring farm, separated from them by acres of barley that formed a waist-high sea, swirling in the breeze. He pulled up close to the kitchen door and killed the engine.

  About a year ago he’d been chased across Nigeria. And only six months ago he’d been locked away in a Pakistani prison. The last few days he’d been enjoying getting to know Giverny and the surrounding countryside. He’d been planning to visit Monet’s studio with Kate, but it looked like any relaxation was over.

  Kate … He’d brought her to France, thinking it would give them a break from the Babich trial. Not that they were witnesses, but Fox had played a pivotal role in bringing the men into custody and he’d made some powerful enemies in the process. Kate had been dragged into the whole mess too. For six months they’d been protected by the FBI back in the States, but it was driving him stir-crazy—he had to get out, be on the frontline, get a real feel for the story. He’d told Kate where he and Gammaldi were heading.

  “Paris?”

  “Just a quick trip; a week or so.”

  “I’ll come.”

  “It’s safer for you here,” he’d told her, but she’d have none of it. She’d learned of Renard’s family house and soon both their bags were packed and his investigative work was fast being redefined as a tourist trip.

  “Can’t we go to Normandy?” she’d said in bed that night. “I want to see the landing beaches—don’t you? To walk on Omaha Beach where my grandpa landed, to see the skies where your grandfather flew. Can we? We can arrange a side trip from Paris, or from Renard’s, rent a little place, lay low in the countryside?”

  They’d spent a few enjoyable nights in the house, talking around the dinner table, sharing stories about the S
econd World War and memories of family. His grandfather had flown Spitfires in the Battle of Britain, while Kate’s grandfather had been in the Canadian Army.

  He’d felt free, just the other day, walking the beach with her, almost normal. By the time they returned from Normandy he could see that something in Kate had changed, as if seeing that haunting moment of war’s legacy had brought her peace.

  And now he was going to shatter that peace.

  Alister Gammaldi came out the kitchen door. Fox’s best friend since they were teenagers, built like a rugby back-liner: thicknecked with wide, muscular shoulders, his black hair cropped close to his skull, dark crescents under his eyes from hitting the calvados hard the night before. Gammaldi sniffed the air around the car, the smell of hot brakes lingering.

  “Broken her in, hey?”

  “Hire cars,” Fox said, glancing through the back door and out through a front window. He couldn’t see anything, couldn’t hear anything. He was sure he’d lost them.

  “Fastest cars in the world?” Gammaldi ventured, getting the groceries out of the boot. “Only cars where you can select reverse from drive while doing two hundred on the freeway?”

  “Yeah, something like that,” Fox said. “You haven’t seen or heard anything?”

  “No,” he said. “What is it?”

  “Don’t know,” Fox replied, checking a sightline through the open door into the kitchen. “Just a car that followed me; lost them back in Paris in a tangle with some cops. Where’s Kate?”

  “Still sleeping, I guess.”

  Fox got the newspaper out. Babich’s face stared up at him.

  “You should forget about him,” Gammaldi said, looking at the front page, too. “Piece of shit’s gonna rot in an Italian cell; then, if he makes it out alive, he’ll be in a federal pen back in the States or some Siberian Gulag.”