Agent Counter-Agent (17 page)

I got to my feet, and he got up, too. We stood across the room from each other, our eyes locked in a hard stare. My left arm was beginning to ache terribly.

"You made a big mistake, Dimitrov," I said. "You picked AXE to humiliate."

"I demand to be turned over to the police," he said. "I have surrendered to…" He lowered his hands slowly, then suddenly reached into his pocket, and a tiny Derringer appeared in his hand.

I squeezed the trigger on the Luger, and this time the gun fired. The slug caught Dimitrov just above the heart and hurled him back against the basin. His eyes stared wide at me for a moment, and then he grabbed spasmodically at the towel dispenser beside him. As he fell, the cloth towel came out of the dispenser in a long sheet, half-covering his inert body.

"Your Kremlin bosses can think about this one the next time they dream up a grand plan," I said to the corpse.

I stuffed the Luger back into its holster. I was just putting Hugo back in its sheath when two policemen charged through the door, their pistols drawn. They looked at Dimitrov and then at me with dark scowls.

"Qué pasa aquí?"
shouted one.

I showed him my I.D. "Call the chief of the Security Police," I said. "Tell him the Russian conspirators have all been apprehended."

"Si, señor Carter," the man said.

I left the room and made my way through a mob of curious travelers to a nearby counter where I could place a call. I'd made a mental note of the location of the underground headquarters of the KGB, the bizarre laboratory where a fantastic experiment had been performed on a human guinea pig — me. Hawk would want to get over there to take over from the CIA man and to tell the police what had happened. He'd be sure the press got the story right.

I got a phone from the ticket agent but paused for a minute before dialing the number. I didn't like missions that ended with onstage performances. There would be more security meetings, and I'd have to give my story to a lot of people. I didn't need any of that just now. What I needed was an evening with a girl like Tanya Savitch. I was haunted by the sight of her lifeless body, still beautiful in death. KGB or not, she'd been very special.

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Well, maybe if I got lucky, there would be another brunette with deep blue eyes and a sensual, purring voice. And maybe she wouldn't be an enemy agent, and I wouldn't have to kill her. That was something to keep me going during the next few weeks of bureaucratic hassles.

I picked up the receiver and dialed Hawk's number.

"WE WILL BURY YOU!"

The Communist threat had never seemed so real! AXE had barely assigned Killmaster to his new mission when the message came from "the spoilers" — they were threatening to deal a death blow to American international influence.

It was clearly a job for Nick Carter — the most lethal of his career. For AXE's top Killmaster was destined to play the lead in the diabolical plot.

What had they done to him? Had they really turned AXE's most valuable agent against the very powers he was sworn to protect?
It wasn't until Nick came under the spell of the sensuous Russian operative that he began to understand how he was being used. But was it too late? Did his mind already belong to the KGB?