Oceans of Fire (46 page)

It was one of the first sentences Aleksandr had heard him utter. He was obviously a man of few words. “That’s a good question. I can’t quite figure him out. We grew up and were trained together. He went one way and I went another. We’ve met a few times since and battled it out, both licking our wounds afterward.”

“Would he protect you?” Jonas asked.

Aleksandr’s first thought was to deny it, but who really knew what went on in the mind of Ilya Prakenskii? He often did the unexpected. There were always larger-than-life rumors about him. He was nearly a legend in some places in Russia, his name whispered rather than spoken aloud. “I don’t know. Why would he? He shot me once and he cut me another time, put me out of commission for a couple of months.”

“Is he good enough to wound you without seriously harming you?” Jonas asked.

“Depends on what you mean by seriously harming me. I wasn’t exactly feeling wonderful after he shot me.” But he had known Prakenskii had chosen not to kill him. Prakenskii just didn’t miss. He hit exactly what he was aiming at every time. Had he been going for a kill, Aleksandr would have been dead. “He deliberately missed.”

“And you deliberately missed him.” Jackson made it a statement.

Aleksandr was uncomfortably aware of Jonas glancing at him in the rearview mirror. He didn’t have answers they wanted. Something deep within him made him spare Prakenskii. Or maybe it was misplaced loyalty. Or possibly it was Prakenskii‘s magic. That was still a difficult fact for Aleksandr to swallow. Could Prakenskii have been manipulating him just as he was certain the man had manipulated Sylvia?

He swore. “I don’t know. It just doesn’t fit with every thing I know about Prakenskii. I can’t see him getting involved with terrorists. There are stories about him I know aren’t true, but many are, and some worse than anything told. Nikitin sent him to meet a group of terrorists who were believed to be placing bombs along the railroad tracks. Bombing the trains is a tactic used to make a political point. That was in the early days when Nikitin didn’t know Prakenskii very well and had no idea about his views on terrorists. All of the terrorists were armed, all were well trained and seasoned. I saw photographs of the scene afterward. They were all dead and they’d died hard. He walked away without a scratch.”

“It’s a wonder Nikitin didn’t have him killed,” Jonas said.

“I thought that at the time. I worried about him.” Aleksandr rubbed the shadow on his jaw. He let out a slow breath, weighing how much he should say. Abigail trusted Jonas implicitly and it was obvious Jonas trusted Jackson. “I’ve heard a very soft rumble about an antiterrorism unit formed. Several countries are rumored to be participating. The information is collected in one clearinghouse”—he hesitated again—“much like Interpol, and once it is determined they have found a terrorist cell a hit team is sent in. The team members are totally anonymous; they go in quietly, get in and get out. They execute everyone on-site. My understanding is they are totally anonymous so that they can operate in safety, as the terrorists would certainly go after their families.”

Jonas looked at him with flat, cold eyes. “How are they going to get information if they don’t take at least one prisoner?”

Aleksandr shrugged, returning the expressionless gaze.

“Damn it. You know a hell of a lot more than you’re willing to admit.”

“I’m telling you there’s a possibility this team exists and that Ilya Prakenskii is a part of it. When I saw those photographs, it occurred to me that Prakenskii would be a perfect recruit for such an international force.”

There was a small silence. Jonas broke it first. “And it follows that if he were on that international force and was here, he’d be working undercover. That’s where you’re leading with all of this, isn’t it? You’ve suspected for some time, but you don’t know.”

“No, I don’t know. If I’m wrong and he’s really Nikitin’s muscle, I’ve wasted several opportunities to kill him.”

“And if he is following a cell of terrorists and he’s come here, then that means my county has a major problem.” Jonas hit the steering wheel with the palm of his hand. “And if he’s undercover, he handed me Chernyshev because he found out Chernyshev murdered Danilov. Chad Kingman was worthless to him.”

“And he got us out of his way.”

“Does he have backup?” Jackson asked.

“I doubt it. I’ve never known him to work with anyone. He wanted me to get Abbey out of the bar the night we went to the Caspar Inn. She challenged him to a game of truth or dare and he was very uncomfortable.” Aleksandr peered out the window. “We must be getting close. We don’t want them to see us if they have a guard.”

“Don’t worry. I know the area,” Jonas said. “Let’s say, just for the hell of it, that you’re right and Prakenskii is on some hotshot international antiterrorist team that he can’t admit to. He wouldn’t be out at sea watching them make the drop, would he?”

“No, he wouldn’t.” Aleksandr’s voice was grim. His gaze was already searching the high places above them. “He’ll be sitting up somewhere above that cove with a scope and a rifle and he’ll take them all out.”

Jonas pulled the car into a tangle of overgrown brush on a small side road. “We walk from here.”

“I’ll go high,” Jackson said. “You’ll have to give me a few minutes to work my way into position, especially if I have to worry that he’s out there.”

“In my country, a knife blade is often coated with poison so a single cut, even a shallow one, will kill you.” Even with the cover of the brush, Aleksandr crouched down and kept his voice low. “Prakenskii can attack with equal skill with either hand. I’ve seen few expert enough to go up against him in close fighting.”

“I’m not hunting him,” Jackson said. “I’m protecting you and Jonas.”

“If you have to shoot, he’ll see the flash and track it right back to you.” Aleksandr didn’t know how to shake the deputy up, to make him aware just how dangerous Prakenskii really was. Jackson’s eyes were black, flat and cold and empty. There was no expression on his face and nothing the Interpol agent said seemed to alarm him. Aleksandr recognized the look all too well. When Aleksandr looked in the mirror, those same dead eyes stared back at him.

“Jackson knows what’s he doing.” Jonas handed him night glasses. “You might need these.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m going to hit them with the light when they’re all well away from the boat,” Jonas said, holding up a powerful floodlight. “Wait for me to identify myself and tell them they’re under arrest.”

“I have no problem with that.”

“Let’s go, then,” Jonas said.

Jonas knew the terrain, so Aleksandr dropped back to allow him the lead. They stayed in the shadow of the foliage, keeping out of the moonlight as they made their way over the uneven ground to the fence. They went over the wire one at a time, keeping their actions slow and fluid, trying to blend with the moving shadows. The wind accompanied them, riffling the vegetation, keeping it in constant motion to help confuse the eye of any watcher.

Jonas crouched low as the ground began to swell, moving faster now to cover more terrain and get into position. Aleksandr split off and went left as they dropped down on the other side of the small hill. The cove came into view, nestled between two rising cliffs. Windswept cypress covered the tops of both cliffs, although one rocky shelf fingered out toward the sea, sheltering the cove from prying eyes. The entire area was wild with an explosion of flowers and shrubs and trees. Waves washed up onto the sandy, rock-strewn shore. Twisted pieces of driftwood lay scattered across the sand, taking on dark, malevolent shapes. The boom of the sea was loud and echoed through the small well-protected cove. White water sprayed high along the sides of the cliff.

Aleksandr hunkered down, crawling as close to the edge of cover as he could get. Two boulders crowed together just at the vegetation line and he used them to his advantage, lying flat behind them, the hole between them perfect to see through. He had a good view of the cove and the sea. The idea of Prakenskii lying in wait with a scope and rifle somewhere up above him gave him an all too familiar itch between his shoulder blades. He didn’t move, didn’t make the mistake of looking for more cover, but kept his eyes trained on the sea.

Minutes passed. Fifteen. Thirty. An hour. The night air was cold on his skin. He glanced again at his watch. He might be wrong. There was every chance that they were in the wrong cove. Or that it was the wrong night, that he’d completely misread the signs. He remained still and was grateful for Jonas’s professionalism. The sheriff didn’t make a sound.

The wind grew stronger, ruffling his hair and the grasses surrounding him. He heard a soft song, feminine voices riding on the sea breeze. The words were incomprehensible, but the notes slipped into his mind in warning. He slid his gun out with a slow, careful movement and eased it into the wide hole between the two rocks. He had a good angle on the beach and could cover almost all of the shore.

Aleksandr felt the wind touch his face, and he strained to see past the long plateaus of rock. The sound of an engine carried over the boom of the sea. He let his breath out slowly and slipped his fingers inside his shirt to warm them.

The Zodiac swept into sight, coming in fast, rolling over the waves and straight toward shore. Aleksandr lifted the night glasses to his face, focusing on the incoming boat. There were four men, two standing and two seated. He recognized three of the men with AK-47s nestled in their arms. They’d been sitting at Nikitin’s table at the Caspar Inn. The fourth man was a stranger. He held what appeared to be a small suitcase. The driver took the boat right up onto the sand, riding a wave as far up the shore as possible. Two of the men jumped out and dragged the boat farther up onto the beach.

The others leapt clear and began hurrying toward the cover of the denser brush. Aleksandr kept his eye on the man with the suitcase. He was the last to get out of the boat and lagged behind the other three men, who now had the AKs up and ready for action as they fanned out and moved up the sand toward the wilder terrain. They were obviously protecting the man with the suitcase.

Aleksandr willed him to move away from the boat. Every few steps he halted and looked around, clearly wanting the others to reach the brush before he ventured too far from the safety of the boat. The three men were within feet of cover. Aleksandr swore to himself. Jonas was going to be forced to hit them with the light and the man with the suitcase was still too close to the Zodiac and could possibly escape.

The wind shifted slightly. He heard the catch in the voices of the women. Alarm. It was the only warning he had. The man with the suitcase sagged to the ground, lay sprawled only feet from the boat, the case beside him in the sand. Staring through the night glasses, Aleksandr saw the stain spreading out like a halo around his head.

Even as Jonas hit the other three men with the floodlight, temporarily blinding them, a second man went down and then the third without a sound. The remaining man threw himself to his right, but Aleksandr knew it was too late. Someone had to be using a Russian-made VSS Vintorez sniper rifle with a silencer and subsonic rounds. The range of subsonic rounds wasn’t nearly as far as regular ammunition so if the sniper was Prakenskii, he had to be concealed on the finger of rock just above them.

The sniper had fired one, two, three, four rounds, just that fast. Squeezing the trigger, moving to the next target, and repeating the action. Four quick rounds and four lay dead in the sand. There were no flashes to give his position away. The sound carrying across the water wasn’t that of a gun, but more like a soft rat-tat-tat that was nearly lost in the boom of the ocean and the shift of the wind. Aleksandr kept his glasses trained on the four men lying in the sand, but none of them moved at all. Four shots. Four kills.

Aleksandr could hear Jonas swearing a blue streak. “What the hell am I going to do with this mess now? Damn it.” He raised his voice. “Damn it! You just can’t do that kind of thing in the United States! I would have arrested the bastards. They’ve got the evidence on them. Now if I find anything to connect you with these kills, I’m going to have to charge your ass with murder.”

Silence met the outburst. Jonas didn’t move. He stayed away from the light, obviously waiting for a signal from Jackson. It was a long time coming. The deputy had to work his way around to the finger of rocks where the shots had come from. It occurred to Aleksandr that while they waited to ensure they were in the clear, they were giving Prakenskii time to get away. He had to make his way through the brush in silence, avoiding Jackson, avoiding leaving a trail, and make his getaway.

There would be no evidence. There was never evidence of Prakenskii‘s passing. Just the dead bodies left behind. Aleksandr was certain the shooter was the Russian, but he would be long gone and impossible to find. Even if Jonas got lucky and got his hands on the man, there would never be proof. They wouldn’t find the rifle. It was probably already in the sea. There would be no residue, no sign of him. That was Prakenskii. The phantom, more legend than real.

The owl hooted. Once. Twice. Three times.

Jonas swore again. “Jackson can’t find him. We have no idea if he’s around so I’ll go out and examine the bodies for signs of life. You stay out of sight and shoot the son of a bitch if he kills me.”

The wind rushed in off the sea. Aleksandr felt the light touch of reassurance. “He’s long gone.” How the Drake sisters knew and could convey the information to him, he wasn’t entirely certain, but he knew Prakenskii had melted away into the night.

Jonas came out of the brush cautiously. “You’d think one of the Drakes would be able to track him if he’s really like they are. They always seem to know when there’s trouble with each other.” He made his way down to the first body. “I’d say he was dead. He shot him in the left eye. Each kill was made that way. This guy’s good.”

He raised his voice. “Jackson, we’ll need to work the crime scene. You have a camera on you? We’ll have to do it from a distance. I don’t want to go anywhere near that bomb.”