First Team (36 page)

Guns began walking back toward the car, angling up the slope. He was just about back to the roadway when an old jeeplike vehicle pulled alongside and stopped. Two men got out; he stopped for half a second before realizing he was undoubtedly staring at members of the Russian Federal Border Service in civilian dress.

As nonchalantly as possible he continued across the slope. The men shouted at him. Guns looked up at them and waved, not sure exactly what to say or do until one of the men reached beneath his jacket and unsnapped the flap on his holster. Guns gestured meekly and began climbing the slope.

The man asked in English what he was doing with the binoculars.

Guns looked at them in his hand, trying to come up with an explanation that would make sense. Before he could find one, a voice on the road above began speaking in a jovial French.

“Permit me to introduce my colleague, Dr. Miles from the University of Paris,” said Massette, switching to English as he spoke to the two Russians. He pattered on about ornithology and the presence of a rare wren native only to these hills. Massette’s performance was aided by a bird book which he produced from his pocket, and within a few minutes he was quizzing the Russians about possible sightings. They were FSB agents, more dangerous than border guards, but he was so convincing that the conversation continued for more than ten minutes; had the Russians not been en route to an appointment they undoubtedly would have adjourned to the nearby inn, picking up the first round.

“Good thinking,” said Guns when they were back in the car.

“I learned with the French that bird-watching is a very valuable hobby,” said Massette. “As long as you take it to extremes.”

~ * ~

orrine watched from the hilltop as the train rounded the bend and headed into the long tunnel. She put the glasses down, then checked the map. The train would change engines at a small yard about fifteen miles from here. Guns and Massette were supposed to cover the switch but had been delayed at the border crossing; Corrine had to decide whether to stay with the train and lose it as it went into the yard, or leave so they could circle northeast to get to the only point where the yard itself would be visible.

Given that the yard was the most likely place for something to happen, she opted to leave. She pulled out her phone as she walked back to the car, telling Massette and Guns what was up. Massette complained that the line to the border wasn’t moving.

“Don’t sweat it,” she told him. “Call me if anything happens.” She clicked off the phone. “We’ll go to the yard at Kadagac in their place,” she told Rankin.

“Your call,” he said.

Corrine glanced at him, unsure whether he was questioning her decision or not.

“My call,” she said, her voice a little sharper than she intended.

~ * ~

uns let Massette drive after they got over the border, thinking it might get him to stop complaining about the guards who had held them up for a twenty-dollar bribe before letting them pass. Massette was outraged that anyone would sell out his duty so cheaply.

In fact, the men had been persuaded to
do
their duty for that fee; getting them to do something illegal would have cost a bit more. Since joining the Team and watching Ferguson, Guns had come to understand how money lubricated nearly everything; he tried not to get too cynical or angry about it. Ferg had told him it was simply a fact of life, there to take advantage of.

“You missed the road,” said Guns, as Massette blew by the turnoff. “The train line’s down there.”

“We’re so far behind,” said Massette. “They’re past the tunnel. They should be changing engines in the yard by now.”

“Yeah, but we were going to follow the line.”

The older man didn’t bother answering. He also didn’t bother turning back. Guns wondered if he ought to tell him to turn back and what to do if he wouldn’t. He decided he was being ridiculous—and as he thought that, he saw the line again through the front corner of the windshield. As Massette had predicted, the train was long gone.

~ * ~

he train moved slowly into the far corner of the yard, shunted there by an ancient switcher engine. At least two platoons of soldiers were deployed to guard it, ringing off the area.

Rankin and Corrine watched from a hill nearly a mile and a half away as the cars were pushed onto the new line. A row of freight cars as well as two small sheds blocked their view as a pair of American-made SD40s painted bright red began trundling toward the Y-shaped exit the train would take.

“We got a problem,” said Rankin. “We’re missing a car.”

“What? They’re all there.”

“One of the boxcars they tagged along at the end. It’s gone.”

“Shit. Are you sure?”

“I can’t see too well. Wait.”

Rankin pushed forward against the steering wheel, angling the glasses against the windshield. Impatient, Corrine opened the door and ran down the gravel embankment to the train line where they’d parked, standing on the rail and peering into the yard.

The boxcars had been unhooked from the rest of the train and were being towed to another track by the switcher. The cars with the waste remained on their own under heavy guard.

She looked to the left, scanning the yard for the missing car.

Rankin got out and climbed on top of the car to use his binoculars.

“Anywhere?” she asked.

“Can’t see it. Why would they take an empty freight car?”

“Maybe it wasn’t empty,” she said.

And now she realized how they did it—material was loaded surreptitiously at Buzuluk in what was supposed to be an empty car tagged on to the end of the train for transport. That was why the Russians couldn’t figure it out—the containment cars all made it. The waste that was being stolen wasn’t in the cars.

“We’re going to have to find it,” she told Rankin.

“We have to stay with the rest of the train,” he said. “Otherwise, we can’t be sure.”

She pulled out her phone, wanting to get the unpleasant task of telling them that she’d screwed up over with quickly.

That was what it was, she knew—they’d missed the decoupling and screwed up.

“They’re moving.”

“Shit,” she said. She was sure she was right—but what if she were wrong? The meter that had recorded the discrepancy was farther south.

What should she do?

Play it safe. She had to.

“Come on,” she told Rankin. “They’re moving. Let’s go. The others will have to look for the car.”

~ * ~

10

CHECHNYA, NORTH OF GROZNYY

 Ferg and Conners hadn’t gone to jail—they were merely staking out the road to it, waiting for the man in the yellow sports coat.

Though it rolled off the tongue easily, Ferguson had not chosen the name “Novakich” to spread around Groznyy simply for its phonetic value. It belonged to one of the people who had worked with Jabril Daruyev on the Moscow dirty bomb plot. Novakich had not been heard of in several years, and according to Corrigan the Russians believed he was dead—which ought to make Ferguson’s inquiries all the more interesting to them. If American agents were poking around looking for Novakich here, sooner or later the Russian FSB would want to see what Daruyev knew about him. Ferguson wasn’t sure the FSB officer assigned to find out would be Sergiv Kruknokov—the man in the yellow sports coat—but he hoped so; he already admired the agent and would enjoy outsmarting him once more.

If things went the way Ferg wanted them to, the inspector would have the man taken from the jail to be interviewed in the city. At that point, they would ambush the vehicle and take the prisoner themselves. They had taken both the truck and the car they hired earlier, stashing the truck in a wooded copse a short distance away while using the car for surveillance on the hillside dirt road.

“What if they bring a truckload of troops for escorts?” Conners asked, as they watched the road.

“First of all, they never do that,” said Ferg. “Troop trucks and convoys are too obvious a target. They move them in cars, with only two guards. The escort runs five minutes ahead and back.”

“What if you’re wrong?”

“Then I kick Corrigan’s ass,” said Ferguson. “We position the truck to cut them off and blow it up with one of the rockets. There’s a spot on the road where we can do that back by that creek.”

“Won’t stop them five minutes.”

“That’s all we need. Five minutes.”

“What if they resist? “

“We hope they don’t,” said Ferg.

“What if they do?”

“Then we deal with them,” said Ferg. “You’re beginning to sound like Rankin.”

“Me? You’re the one who’s blowing up allies.”

“Since when are the Russians our allies.”

“The Chechens sure as hell ain’t.”

Ferguson laid his head back on the seat rest. “Ah, don’t worry, Dad. We’ll give him back when we’re done. I’m betting Yellow Jacket’s smart enough to play it cool.”

“ Whiskey, you’re my darlin
’,” sang Conners, changing the subject.

They sat in the car all night and through most of the next day. Finally, around 3:00 p.m. a familiar-looking Lada came out from town. Ferguson was surprised to see that the inspector was alone.

“You sure it’s our guy?” asked Conners.

The lone occupant of the car wore a yellow jacket, but of course Ferguson had no way of knowing until he uploaded the plates to Corrigan to check. Still, he cursed; the agent was obviously going to interview Daruyev in prison. The analysts had told Corrigan that the FSB didn’t trust the security system at the prison—like most Russian jails, it was essentially run by the prisoners and could best be described as ridiculously lax—and so routinely took people outside to talk to them.

“Fuckin’ Corrigan owes me one,” said Ferg.

“So now what?”

“Plan B.”

“Which is what?”

“I make a few phone calls, then get out the laptop and see if the printer I’ve used twice in its life will actually work. Then we talk about how safe it is to cut up the explosives in a mine.”

Conners whistled.

“And in the meantime,” added Ferguson, “you teach me more Irish drinking songs.”

~ * ~