The Cold Edge (17 page)

Anna rolled onto her back and started to snore. She had taken a sleeping pill, so he knew she would sleep through the night.

“What's that noise?” Jenkins asked.

“Nothing.” He struggled with his thoughts of what he should tell his old friend. Could he explain that he had been duped? They all had been suckered.

“What's wrong, Jake?”

“Nothing. Do you have your people in place in Oslo?”

Now Jenkins took his time to answer. “We have assets in place there, with more to come. It's taken us a while to get a team of scientists together with the expertise needed to inactivate the flu virus. You understand.”

Yeah, he understood. He understood that his friend's efforts would be nothing more than a drill—an exercise—for possible future breaches of security. Maybe the American government would be able to work out better protocols because of this. Right. That was a fantasy.

“No problem. Make sure they get there within twenty-four hours.”

“One question, Jake.”

“Shoot.”

“Why the crazy route? Why not just a direct approach to Oslo?”

“Well, that was smart on my part wasn't it,” Jake said, sarcastically. “Your people aren't ready for me anyway. I'd be sitting in Oslo holding my dick waiting for your scientists to arrive. Besides, some bad-ass folks seem to want this. . .virus even more than us. And I have a feeling they're willing to do damn near anything to get their hands on it. Anything else you can tell me?”

“We've tracked down Colonel Reed.”

“Yeah?”

“He's in Oslo. It took us some time, but we back-tracked some calls he made to your SAT phone.”

Great. Did Jenkins know more than he was telling him? “I was just going to call the colonel.”

“No need,” Jenkins said. “He's with. . .our people there in Oslo.”

“So you're on the same page. Did he explain anything about his contacts?”

Jenkins explained everything they knew, including the involvement of the Russian, Victor Petrova.

“I'm familiar with Petrova,” Jake said. “He was one of the most manipulative bastards in KGB disinformation. And that's saying a lot.”

“We tried turning him in the height of the Cold War,” Jenkins admitted. “He strung us along like Gepetto. Then pulled the rug out from under us and a couple of our agents were killed.”

Jake remembered that. It happened right around the time he had switched from being an Air Force officer to joining the old CIA. “What's he up to now?”

“Mostly running one of the most successful criminal organizations in Europe. Headquartered near you in Stockholm.”

“Right. I could run down there and have a little talk with the little man.”

“No use. He's not there. We've been checking into he and his men since we heard Colonel Reed had been in contact with him, but they've all disappeared. Poof. Gone.”

In Oslo, Jake guessed. Waiting for him to deliver his package.

“Sounds like we're running right into him. You want me to keep going to Oslo?”

“It's as good a place as any to stop this.”

“Not really,” Jake said. “Might be better to go to some remote military site or isolated airfield. Less exposure there.”

Hesitation on the other end. Heavy sigh. “You might be right. But for now we're going where the players are. I'll let you know if that changes.”

Jake hung up and thought for a moment. He didn't have to play by their rules anymore. Maybe he should just scoot off somewhere. Change the plan to suit him.

In the bunk above, Anna's snoring had calmed. Must have rolled to her side. He looked at the SAT phone in the near darkness and wondered if he should call Colonel Reed. No. He was too pissed off at the man. He'd probably go off on him and wake Anna.

Instead, he got up and went to the door. The train rocked gently back and forth as he turned to look at Anna sleeping in the upper berth. Then he slipped out the door and locked it behind him. He considered going for a drink, but the bar would be closed by now. Maybe he needed a drink. Needed to understand what was going on. Perhaps he should tell Anna what he had discovered. No. She shouldn't know at this time. His discovery could make this case even more dangerous, for greed had always brought out the worst in people.

Jake found himself wandering down the aisle, shifting with the rock and roll of the train. As he came back down toward his berth, he noticed the door next to his cracked slightly and then Kjersti appeared before him, wearing only a long shirt that barely covered her bottom. She nodded her head for him to come inside, which he did.

What the hell was he doing? He was with Anna, but now he found himself in a sleeper car in Sweden with a beautiful intelligence officer from Norway. He couldn't say he wasn't turned on by her—she was as hot as they came—and he had already caught a quick glimpse of her breasts as she woke in the chopper on Spitsbergen. In fact, she and Anna were so similar in physique they could have easily passed for twins. But something had pulled he and Anna apart over the past few months. The drinking had been part of it, he was sure, but there was more. Her work had become a problem, making her take sleeping pills just to be able to get enough rest to function the next day. So was her taking of pills any different from his drinking?

He glanced between the drawn curtains at the countryside. But they were so close to the ocean, all he saw was the lights of a large ship in the distance.

“What's keeping you awake?” Kjersti asked.

Jake turned to see her sitting on the lower bunk, her bare legs crossed, shoving her shirt even higher on her thighs. She wasn't leaving much to the imagination. And Jake had always had a vivid imagination. It must have been more chilly than he thought in the sleeper car, because her nipples were as hard as that metal box in the other compartment.

“I don't know,” Jake said. “How ‘bout you?”

“Everything. Nothing.” She smiled at him and turned her eyes away coyly.

Jake moved and leaned against the bathroom door. “What's the matter?”

“I'm just waiting for the Swedish police to haul us off.”

“Not gonna happen.” Jake explained how his unnamed friends had made sure that nobody was looking for them.

“Wow. You do have friends in high places. Anna said you were well connected.” Her eyes went from his eyes to his groin area and then back again. “What's going on in Oslo?”

He wasn't sure how much to open up to her. “Well, our scientists are on the way. Hopefully they'll get there before us and we can get rid of this damn box. Part of me wished we had just left it up in the Arctic. But I know that someone would have gone for it and found it. If the money is right, or the ideology, then almost anything is possible.”

She uncrossed her legs and Jake could see she was a natural blonde. Moving to the edge of the bed, she stretched her legs out toward him. “Can we stop this?” she asked breathlessly.

“Stop what?”

“This pretense. This playing around the issue. This cat and mouse game. I need a man, and you are all man. Just fuck me and do it fast. I am so hot for you.”

“What about Anna?”

“God. If she was here, I'd do the both of you. I'm not trying to steal you from her. I just want your cock. Just tonight.” She pulled the shirt over her head, exposing a perfectly naked body.

Jesus, was he being tested now or what? She was going to finish with or without him, as she played with her breasts with one hand and put the other between her legs.

Unsure what to do, Jake heard movement out in the hallway. Since the policeman incident, Jake had armed himself with one of the 9mm handguns. He thought about pulling it now, but instead went to the door and peered through the peep hole. Nothing.

“What's up?” Kjersti said. She had gotten out of the bed and now stood behind Jake, her bare breasts pressing against his back. “I was hoping something was.” She reached around to the front of his pants and he turned away from her.

“Something is going on,” Jake whispered. “I'm sure of it. Someone is checking compartments down on the end, working their way this way. Get dressed.”

Disappointed, Kjersti did as he said while he watched through the door peep. Nobody was in view yet. But someone had a pass key and was checking each compartment. He was stuck. He couldn't go next door to Anna to warn her or they would see him.

Quietly, he unlocked the door.

“You have a small mirror in your purse?” Jake asked her.

Without answering, she produced a small round mirror, which Jake used to check the hallway. Two men. Down the end of the sleeper compartment. One man quietly entered a room, while the other kept watch on the hallway, switching his gaze from one end to the other, a pistol in his hand. Jake closed the door quietly and told Kjersti what was happening.

“Are they police?” she asked him in a whisper.

“No. They aren't announcing themselves. They're looking for us, though. Have to be.” Jake thought about the box in his compartment, stuffed in his backpack. And Anna in her pill-induced state would not hear them enter.

They had just a few minutes to come up with a plan. The men were getting closer. Based on their progress and their pattern, they would check Jake's room first. He pulled his gun and handed it to Kjersti. Then they listened and waited.

Just as the first man opened Jake's door, he opened Kjersti's door and rushed the men, pushing one man into the other and the three of them crashing into Jake's compartment. In the chaos, the man dropped his gun and flailed at Jake.

Kjersti followed the scuffling men, Jake's gun pointed at all three of them.

Jake smashed his fist into the gunman's face, knocking him out, his body going limp. By now the man with the pass key had recovered to his knees and pushed his hand at Jake, catching him on his right side and bringing a sharp pain.

A knife.

Standing a few feet apart, the man made another lunge for Jake when he suddenly dropped to the floor at Jake's feet, a knife sticking out of the side of his neck. Jake thrust his foot into the man's face, sending him crashing backwards into the outer wall.

With quickness now, Jake and Kjersti pushed the knocked out man into the compartment and closed the door. His adrenalin raced through his body. The man against the outside wall quivered in concert with the spurting blood from his neck. Jake swiftly pulled a plastic bag from the garbage can and wrapped it over the head of the stabbed man to contain some of the blood, then pulled the knife out of his neck and wiped it on the guy's shirt. But the room was a mess, with blood all over the place.

Anna, still in a daze, rolled to her side. “Jake, what's going on? Who are they?”

“That's what I plan on finding out. You two get the bags and put them in Kjersti's room. Stay there while I clean up this mess and find out what this asshole knows.”

They both did what he said within a couple of minutes. Kjersti stepped back in and handed Jake his gun, which he shoved into the holster under his arm.

Alone now, Jake sat on the bed and thought it through—figuring out the approach he would take with this man.

First, he bound the man's hands behind his back and his feet together, then strapped a line from his hands to his feet. He shoved a wash cloth in the man's mouth. Then Jake clicked on the overhead light, found two towels in the bathroom, wet them down and soaked up the blood. It took many trips back and forth to the narrow shower, washing out the towels and soaking again until the majority of the blood was gone.

When the bound man started to stir, Jake hurried and pulled identification from each of the men. He read the passports and driver's licenses; both men were from Stockholm. He turned off the light, leaving the room lit only by a small reading lamp on the lower bunk.

The man's eyes opened and gazed up at Jake, who loomed over him. “Wakie wakie time, motherfucker,” Jake whispered loudly.

Grunting something through the rag, the man tensed his muscles against the restraints. He was strong, but Jake had him bound tight.

“This can go one of two ways,” Jake said. “You tell me what I want to know, or you die like your friend there.”

The man twisted his body and saw his friend's head in a blood-splattered plastic bag with more dark blood soaking down the man's clothes.

“You understand your situation?”

The man nodded his head.

Jake pulled the rag from the guy's mouth and said, “Good. Now. . .who sent you?”

“Fuck you,” he said. Too loudly.

Jake punched him in the sternum, taking his breath away, and shoved the rag back in his mouth. The man gasped for air and finally settled down.

“That wasn't very nice,” Jake said. “I asked you a simple question and you say that to me. What happens when we get to more difficult questions?”

The guy's eyes shifted wildly at Jake. He wanted to kill him, Jake knew that much. Good. The feeling was mutual.

“Answer my question,” Jake said, and then took the rag out of his mouth again.

“We were looking to rob some people,” he finally muttered, his English perfect.

“Come on. The couple down on the end have a shitload of money and the woman more jewelry than a movie star. You have no bag of goodies collected. You were looking for someone. And I'm guessing that was me.”

The man glowered at Jake but said nothing.

“Okay.” Jake shoved the rag in and then rolled the man to his stomach. He found a point under the man's right ear and applied pressure, bringing excruciating pain to the man. He struggled beneath him until Jake let go. As the guy relaxed, Jake knuckle struck him in the right kidney, making him gasp for air.

While the man squirmed in pain, Jake thought about their current route and situation. The train wouldn't stop for another hour, until they reached the port city of Gavle, Sweden. Then they would have another three hours until Falun. Plenty of time.