Spy Catcher: The J.J. McCall Novels (Books 1-3) (The FBI Espionage Series) (47 page)

Chapter 34

Wednesday Afternoon—Surveillance Detail

The hardened knot in Hopper’s stomach had tightened enough to tether the U.S.S. Enterprise to the Boston Harbor. Parked inside his FBI-issued Malibu, he waited to commence the op: Installing the GPS in Filchenko’s car. He hoped the bold move would lead them to Lana Michaels. A few minutes passed when he was startled out of his thoughts by the sound of footsteps passing him. The afternoon K Street lunch crowd wore three-piece Jos. A. Banks specials and trudged through the sea of brake lights in the stop-and-go traffic, seeking food and respite from their mind-numbing nine-to-fives.

A lot of lives hung on the success of this operation and, by the minute, he’d grown more painfully aware of how little operational experience he had. He found himself questioning the soundness of Kyle’s judgment—pitting Hopper, an agent five minutes out of Quantico, against a Russian intelligence officer who was probably recruiting his hundredth asset while Hopper was at prom getting laid in the back of his father’s Cadillac Seville. He gripped his steering wheel and tried to settle his nerves, arriving thirty minutes early to give himself time to mentally create worst-case scenarios and develop responses to each. Faked his brain into believing he was more prepared and acutely aware than would bear out in reality.

He marveled at the silver Toyota Camry identical to Filchenko’s car, even down to the sun-faded Little Tree car freshener hanging from the rear-view mirror, his diplomatic license (hidden under the fake D.C. plate), and the black scratch on the left rear bumper, sitting on the flatbed. So thoroughly executed, that if the op went bad, the key would open the doors and start the car.

The Special Projects group had pulled off a major coup in less time than his kid took for a mid-day nap. The parking garage attendants, both with dark skin, curly black hair, and blue vested uniforms eyed him suspiciously even though their boss advised them the FBI would be hanging around for a couple of hours. He glanced down at his watch. 11:15. They should’ve been out the gate five minutes before. Hopper picked up his Motorola.

“Hopper to Blue Team. Hopper to Blue Team. I’m in position. Looks like we’re running a little late here. Did the lookouts call out the targets yet?”

“Negative, Hopper,” replied Cham, one of a handful of female Gs on the team. “I’ve got binoculars in one hand and the radio in the other, standby,” she said. Only minutes passed before she said, “I’ve got eyes on…wait a minute. The target vehicles are approaching the gate.”

“Rabbit 1 and Rabbit 2,” Kyle said over the radio. “Looks like we’re about to get this party started.”

“Uhhh, shit…Blue Team, we’ve got a problem,” Cham said. “A big one.” 

“What’s going on?” Kyle asked.

“Rabbit 1, uhhh, Filchenko and Mikhaylov are out the gate, as expected, but…” She paused for a moment that seemed like an eternity. “They switched cars! I repeat they switched cars. Mikhaylov is driving Filchenko’s Camry. Filchenko’s in the burgundy Honda Accord. And they’ve both switched routes. Jazz and Jiggy have the eye. Stand by.”

“Damn Russians and their monkey wrenches! Everything is riding on this op. The hell we can’t finish it,” Kyle barked. “Jiggy. Jazz. You stay on ‘em. My guess is they aren’t going to switch routes, even if they switch cars. Hopper, get over here. We need to talk.”

“Copy that,” they each replied, one right after the other.

Hopper stashed his radio under the seat and scrambled out of the car, padding toward the garage where the flatbed was tucked away on the second level.

Panic collapsed on him, the weight suffocating. 

He had no idea how they’d wrangle themselves out of this jam. Not in this world or any other would a silver Camry ever substitute for a burgundy Honda Accord.

Hopper yanked open the door to Kyle’s car and slipped inside, his breathing slightly heavy from the jog. Kyle tightened his lips and slammed his hands against the steering wheel.

“Monkey wrench, huh?” Hopper said.

Kyle nodded. “Sons of bitches. Trying to give me a fucking heart attack,” Kyle said. “Goddamned stand-down’s got us paralyzed, can’t move left or right without the fear of setting off the next Cold War. But we don’t have time to reschedule the op for a second attempt.”

“The op is blown,” Hopper urged. “You’re not still going to try to go through with it, are you?”

Kyle grunted, frowned, and snatched up the radio. “Blue Leader to Cham. What’s your twenty? You still on the same route?”

“Roger that, blue leader. Except Lana’s father is taking Filchenko’s route,” she said. “Traffic’s clear. We’re doing thirty-five down Wisconsin. ETA 11:45. Stand by.”

“Shit!” Hopper checked the time. “11:35. Only ten minutes away.”

Kyle’s mind was stirring, evident from the creases in his forehead. He ribbed his scalp with his fingers and expelled a hard breath. “Screw it. Help me get this car off the flatbed.”

“You’re not…you’re going through with it? How the hell are we gonna pull this off?”

“We’ll improvise,” Kyle said.

“No disrespect, Kyle. And I know I’m new…but unless the guy is color blind and a complete idiot, a burgundy Honda will never equal silver Toyota. If he so much as glances over his shoulder while the car’s gone, we’re neck-deep in an international scandal.”

“Listen, Junior. In apprehend and arrest, you ask for permission. In life and death, you ask for forgiveness. When catching an agent killer, you do what you need to do to get that bitch off the streets. Comprende?”

“Si, senor.” Hopper nodded, feeling a new kind of green. “So, what now? We’re just going to plant the one tracker?”

“No, we’re still planting two,” Kyle said. “While you help me get this car off the flatbed, you’re going to think of a way to keep Mikhaylov from noticing that his car’s missing for twenty minutes.”

“Twenty minutes? Excuse my language but…are you fucking kidding me?” Hopper was on the brink of a major flip out. “Didn’t you get the memo? This isn’t Filchenko, the new guy. I’m now going up against one of the most senior officers in the residency. He was trained to look out the window…every twenty seconds. What the hell am I gonna tell him? I’m Houdini and
Abracadabra
I made your car disappear?”

Kyle shot him a blank expression.

Hopper rolled his eyes and slapped his hand against his thigh. “Oh wait. Let me guess…improvise.”

“Cannon and Slicer are already inside,” Kyle said to Hopper. “The minute you sit down, they will signal me. Whatever you’ve got planned, that’s when your clock starts.”

• • •

Irving Street…

Santino’s eyes were cold, empty, devoid of any of the affection he’d shown her just a few minutes earlier. For the first time, Lana feared for her life. How could she know he’d forgotten his wallet? She scrambled to center her thoughts. Devise an approach. A lie wouldn’t work, not on Santino. She needed a truth that wouldn’t get her killed.

“You forgot this.” She held out the billfold in her hand with a cheesy grin. “Tough to buy groceries without money.”

“You heard me! What the fuck are you doing in here?”

She started folding his jeans. “This place is a sty. I don’t understand how you rest in here. When’s the last time you cleaned?”

“Oh, you want to know the last time I fucking cleaned. I’ll tell you!” He snarled and jutted his arm out, snapping his fingers around her neck with the quickness of a cobra strike. “I’ll clean this room up with your face if you don’t tell me what the fuck you’re doing in here.”

Lana struggled to breath, tried to release herself, but he had the strength of ten men. It was like trying to push over an oak tree with her hand. She thrashed as tears drifted from her eyes. “Don’t do this. It’s not what you—,” she strained to speak. “Let me explain.”

Santino glared at her, his nostrils flared. He slammed her on the bed; her body bounced like a rag doll. He snatched the Sig Sauer from the small of his back and cocked the gun while pointing it at her head. “Two seconds. Say what the fuck you gotta say so I can end this.”

“You’ve got to calm down and listen to me,” Lana said, desperate to find the words that would save her life. “I wasn’t doing anything to hurt you. Think about it, Santino, you’re all I have. Without you, I can’t leave this country. I can’t go home. I can’t do anything without you!”

He froze for a second then lowered the gun to his side. “Then why were you snooping through my shit?”

“I hesitated to tell you because…I felt…stupid,” she said. “I didn’t want you to think I was some crazed stalker.”

“Too late now.”

“I was checking to see if there was any evidence…of other women.”

“Get the fuck outta here,” Santino said. “You haven’t seen anyone here, have you?”

“Yeah, but you leave every day for hours at a time,” Lana said, sitting upright. She shook her head and covered her face with her palms. “I’m so embarrassed, going through your stuff like a teenager. This isn’t me. I don’t know…I was afraid this would happen.”

Santino de-cocked his gun and sat next to her on the bed. “You were afraid
what
would happen?”

“I came here to lay low until I could get out,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting
…
you know, us—this.”

“Hey, me either,” Santino said. “But you don’t need to worry about me seeing anybody else. You’re the first since…”

“Rosa?” she asked to his surprise. “I saw the newspaper article.”

He leaned forward, elbows to knees. “Yeah, it happened the day after we got engaged. I, uhh, I don’t really want to…listen, I think all this being cooped up is makin’ us both a little crazy. Get your hat and sunglasses and we’ll both go to the grocery store.”

Lana nodded without argument. She’d barely dodged another bullet and the next one might land in the back of her head if she didn’t tread carefully. “You’re always right,” she said, stroking his ego. “Neither one of us would do well in jail.”

“Once we get the package tomorrow, we’re half way home. I can get the hit over with Saturday and head to New Jersey while you’re tossing down the Stoli on the way to France. Be nice to return to the real world, huh?”

“I guess,” Lana said in a melancholy tone. She looked up at him and smiled in the way an angry dog bares his teeth before the bite. “But whatever will I do without your hand around my neck?”

She shook off the incident with the knowledge that tomorrow she would have her passport. Then the noose she’d fashioned from her duplicity would tighten around Santino’s neck and she’d be one step closer to home.

Chapter 35

Wednesday—Surveillance Detail

Hopper tightened his tie and brushed the car dirt from the side of his pant leg and sleeve as he prepared to enter Potbelly’s. His idea was ludicrous, bonkers, so far left field that Headquarters would blast it out of the sky like a homer out of Fenway, resulting in a one-way trip to the unemployment line with a pink slip if he failed. But the situation was dire. He was at the bottom of the 9
th
with the score Russians—one, FBI—zero and only one at-bat remaining with two men on base.

With lives hanging in the balance and an agent killer one passport away from Moscow, only an insane idea would finish the job.

The line inside Potbelly’s snaked half-way around the store, as usual. The main reason Filchenko spent forty-five minutes at the stop was the twenty minutes it took to order and pay for his meal. With the shop sitting on the corner of 19
th
and L and walls of glass exposing both streets, taking the car while he stood in line was too risky. Lana’s father could glance over his shoulder at any moment. No, Hopper lurked in the background until Lana’s father arrived at the cash register. As his target dug into his pocket and pulled out the bills, Hopper quickened his pace, slipped beside him, and held out a twenty for the cashier.

“My treat,” Hopper said with an easy smile as Lana’s father sized him up from head to toe. Hopper purposely dressed in the standard FBI uniform, a clean-cut, black suit, Ray Bans, beige trench coat. Didn’t have to be a genius to figure out where he worked or why he was standing there.

“I wondered when one of you would show up.” Mikhaylov snatched his food from the counter, but all the seats were taken except one near the rear of the restaurant with a cup resting on it. Cannon had saved it for Hopper and shifted a different seat as Hopper approached the cash register.

“I think this one’s okay,” Hopper said, speeding up his pace toward the seat so he could take the seat facing the door. “Looks like someone just forgot the cup.” He grabbed it and tossed it in a nearby trashcan.

“I prefer to face the door,” Mikhaylov said, placing his food on the table and waiting for Hopper to switch seats.

Hopper sat down and with his hand gestured for his target to do the same in the seat opposite his. “Trust me, if anything happens in here, you want the guy with the gun facing the door. Please sit, I won’t be here long, and your sandwich is getting cold. They’re so much better warm.” Hopper watched Cannon jump up and head out the exit. Seconds later the flatbed had pulled up outside.

The clock had started.

Lana’s father hesitated for a moment and finally took his seat.

After introducing himself, going through an excessively lengthy explanation of his counterintelligence duties as an FBI agent, and making small talk about the weather, Hopper finally paused long enough to give Mikhaylov the opportunity to speak. “So, now that I’ve told you who I am, who are you?”

“I’m a diplomat of the Russian Federation. I have immunity and nothing to say to you, so why are you here?”

Hopper shrugged. “To be honest with you, I don’t have a clue. I’m fresh out of Quantico, and some prick supervisor who calls me ‘Junior’ ordered me to come down here and talk to you—of all people.” Hopper’s brow furrowed as he shifted in his seat. “I mean, you’ve got more experience in your pinky than I have in my entire career. What the hell did they really expect me to do? Recruit you?”

Lana’s father arched his eyebrow and chuckled. “You don’t enjoy counterintelligence work?”

“I requested something more exciting—criminal division, terrorism, organized crime, anything but this. Yet they send me here to work counterintelligence. Gotta love the Bureau,” Hopper said flippantly, tightening his lips to feign regret of his brutal honesty. “Sorry. I mean no disrespect to you or anything. This work just isn’t for me. The faster I rotate off the squad, the better. Six more months and I’m done with these lame ass assignments.”

“You remind me a little of myself when I was your age. Young and cocky,” Mikhaylov said, already making short work of his sandwich and chips. Hopper watched him bite large chunks from his sandwich. “Sounds like you’re out to satisfy your adolescent cowboy-and-indian fantasies. Intelligence work is challenging, some of the most difficult you’ll ever do. Trust me.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” Hopper deadpanned, looking down to mark the time. Ten minutes left. He glanced over Mikhaylov’s shoulder and then reached in his trench coat pocket and pulled out a pen and small notebook. “So, if you’ll bear with me for another couple of minutes, I need to check a few more boxes for the file, and I’ll be out of your hair.” 

Mikhaylov chuckled at Hopper’s droll frankness and unenthusiastic demeanor. The look on his face suggested he was intrigued by what Hopper might ask, so he allowed him to proceed. “Okay. Ask away.”

“Question number one—are you an intelligence officer for the Russian Federation.”

After drawing back his head in feigned surprise, he said, “I’m a diplomat. The Russian Federation has no intelligence officers operating in the United States.”

“Okay,” Hopper said, scribbling feverishly on the small sheet. He quickly shifted his eyes from the notebook to the watch and back. Three more minutes. “Yes, intelligence… officer… for the…. Russian …Federation. A…very…senior…one,” he dragged out as he scribbled on the paper.

Mikhaylov froze and chuckled. Then he took the next to last bite of his sandwich.

“Are you currently operating moles or illegals in the United States?” Hopper asked.

With his jaw stuffed with his sandwich. “What’s a mole…or illegal?”

Hopper began to scribble again, speaking with each word he wrote. “Operates…moles…AND…illegals…in…the…United States,” Hopper said. “No wonder you’ve been in the U.S. so long. You’re really good at this. Just a couple more and I promise I’ll let you go."

Hopper saw the flatbed pull up. Two minutes early. He was thankful because Mikhaylov had just swallowed his final bite and, according to the report from the Gs, would be rushing to hit two more cover stops before returning to the embassy—or attempted to conduct his operation.

“Next question,” Hopper began, “do you know where your daughter is located?”

Mikhaylov froze in silence, his face reflecting more anger than annoyance. He reached for his soda and knocked the cup over, spilling the contents all over the table and onto Hopper’s lap.

“My apologies,” Lana’s father said. “Let me get you a napkin.”

Hopper blurted out, “No, that’s o—“

Too late.

Mikhaylov turned to grab napkins from the counter and saw his car being lowered and detached from the flatbed. He turned around, shot Hopper a scowl, and then jetted outside to catch the truck operator, bumping chairs and tables along the way.

Hopper scuttled out behind him, his mind racing, trying to devise a Plan B. Plan A was screwed, and he’d been outed in the worst way. By the time, Mikhaylov reached the door, the flatbed had sped off, screeching through the yellow light ahead before disappearing into the next block.

Mikhaylov ran to his car and peered inside the passenger window. Furious, his eyes protruded and his face reddened. Hopper didn’t know what to say. What to do. How could he make this right? This was their last chance to find Lana and he was on the edge of blowing it.

“What the fuck did you do to my car?” Lana’s father screamed. “Your Secretary of State will hear about this!”

“It’s my fault,” Hopper said, stopping his target cold in stunned silence.
Think fast. Think fast.
“I told them this stupid plan wouldn’t work, that you were too good of an officer to fall for it, but they wouldn’t listen to me. I’m Junior, remember? But if you report this, my career is over. I’ll be chasing truckloads of Tide washing powder from Baltimore to Jersey for the next 25 years. Didn’t you make mistakes when you first started out?”

Mikhaylov’s breathing calmed. “So, you put a tracker on my car and you think I’m just going to let you get away with it?”

“No, no. But…if I make this right, will you please consider not reporting this…
unfortunate
incident?”

He pursed his lips and turned away from Hopper appearing as if taking a moment to gather his thoughts. Hopper knew he’d be running behind schedule if he held him up much longer. “Make it right?! How?”

Hopper wanted to kick himself for not asking where in the car they had planned to install both GPS units. If he picked the wrong one, he was dead meat. He eased to the front, dropped to his knees, and reached beneath the bumper. If they wanted Russian intelligence to find the GPS, that was the most logical position. He ran his fingers from front to back. Nothing.

“It’s gotta be here. Let me check the back.”

Mikhaylov tapped his foot impatiently as Hopper moved to the back of the car. On his knees again, he ran his fingers from left to right when his fingers finally moved over the square hard-plastic object. He breathed a sigh of relief, pulled it out, and held it in his hand.

“I found it,” Hopper said. “I removed it. No harm, no foul, right? Please?”

Lana’s father shook his head and let out an impatient sneer. “Rookie mistake. Don’t let it happen again or your career will be over as fast as this conversation, do we understand each other?” he asked. He opened his driver-side door and stuck one foot inside. “Try anything like that again, and I will not be at all charitable. Now I’ve got to return to the embassy.” He slipped inside and drove off.

As soon as the coast cleared, Kyle sprinted across the street, huffing and shaking his fist. “What the hell happened? You pulled the device. Fucked up the entire operation!”

Hopper tried to catch his breath. “Listen, I almost had—,”

“I never should’ve trusted you,” Kyle barked. “If Michaels gets away with this or kills another agent, I swear to God you’ll be taking squirrel bite reports in Duluth by the time I’m through with—“

“Will you shut up? You love the sound of your own voice, don’t you?” Hopper yelled. “Give me five seconds to explain what happened before you go jumping off the cliff!”

Kyle’s snarl loosened and released as Hopper detailed the events inside the store. “I almost had him, playing the disgruntled, disenchanted new guy with a shit assignment and a prick boss and he was going for it…until he spilled his soda on me. Saw the tow truck when he grabbed napkins to clean up the mess. I had to do something drastic.”             

“Son of a bitch!” Kyle said. “When he ran out here, I just knew the op had gone to shit. That was some pretty quick thinking, Junior.”

Hopper raked his fingers through his hair to relieve the tension. “If he believes I pulled out the only tracker. It still may work…maybe.”  

Kyle offered Hopper a fatherly pat on the shoulder. “You either made the smartest move of your career…or you ended it. Unfortunately, we won’t find out until tomorrow.”

“Thanks for the confidence boost.”

“Shake it off and get back to the office,” Kyle said, his voice more calm and soothing. “You’ve got a shitload of paperwork to do.”