It was nearly midnight when Claire left home, heading to the office. Scotty knew, from his time as the DDO, where she was going at that late hour: to headquarters to monitor an operation going down somewhere on the other side of the globe.
When she walked through the door to the Ops Center, the door alarm let the supervisor, a man some years older than Windstrum, know that someone with authorized access had entered. The midnight shift had assumed their watch, and people were busy manning their respective workstations. When he saw that it was Windstrum, he hurried over to greet the DDO.
“Mrs. Windstrum, I didn’t expect to see you this early,” he said, raising his clipboard and flipping up a page. The supervisor studied the page for a moment and then looked back at her.
“Ma’am, your office requested coverage of the team commencing at 0400. They aren’t expected to leave Checkpoint Echo until 1300 their time, which would be five o’clock this morning our time.”
“I know the details,” she said, too embarrassed to acknowledge the mistake she had made about being early for surveillance coverage of the operation about to go down in Saint Petersburg. Claire had confused the start time of NEEDFUL QUEST with coverage of another op that had been approved by the director. “I’m just looking for a cup of coffee. Don’t you keep a pot on somewhere in here?”
“Oh yes, ma’am,” he exclaimed. “Just wait here for a moment.”
The supervisor left and returned a few minutes later with a cup in his hand. He gave it to her and made a brief comment.
“You can take the cup with you, if you want, Mrs. Windstrum,” he said, hoping that she’d take it and leave. The “eyes only” Ops Center Activity Report they were required to send to the Office of the Director of Central Intelligence showed that the bulk of operational activity during a twenty-four-hour period occurred mostly during the midnight shift. That night didn’t portend to be any different, and even though she was DDO and in charge, the supervisor didn’t need her hanging around. She’d just be a distraction.
“Thank you. I’ll be in my office. Call me if anything happens before five.”
“Yes, ma’am, will do.”
She left and minutes later the supervisor was on a secure comms link talking to the controller of a Predator drone that was circling high above a residential compound in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan. A CIA special activities team was on the ground monitoring the compound from a safe distance. The drone strike, which could only have been approved by the director, was authorized to take out a “priority-one” Taliban target—a leader notoriously known for killing entire families that he believed had been collaborating with US forces operating in the region. The duty supervisor needed to make sure the strike was recorded and available for the director’s Friday morning staff meeting.
Claire walked down the hallway toward her office, which wasn’t far from the Ops Center. She reached the door and pressed several numbers on the cipher lock. She heard the lock click and pushed open the door. Claire turned the lights on and walked through the reception area into her office. She flipped the light switch and walked over to her desk. Once there, Claire sat down, placed the coffee cup near the computer, and then turned it on. She took a sip of coffee and waited for the computer to boot up.
Several minutes after logging into the CIA’s secure communications network, Claire was reading correspondence from the field and occasionally sipping the lukewarm coffee given to her by the duty supervisor. She was particularly interested to see if there was anything in from Moscow Station, but there wasn’t, not even a thank you note from Brandson for the birthday message she’d sent to him. She read the latest intel report from the Ops Base in Kandahar confirming that the target would be at the safe house as originally reported. Claire looked at her watch and knew that the strike would take place within the next thirty minutes, and that she’d see the results at the director’s morning staff meeting. Time passed slowly from then on. Having finished reading most of the ops traffic, she got up and walked over to an office couch. It was 0300 when she sat down. Claire closed her eyes for a moment and awoke a few hours later to the ringing of the telephone.
***
At the farmhouse in Western Russia, Mike could tell that Rick was a bit antsy. Nina’s situation was probably still on his mind. He was walking and talking to each SEAL, going over the details of their assigned duties, and reviewing the escape routes they had outlined during previous discussions. The morning passed slowly, and they consumed several pots of coffee. As noon approached, they made ready to leave.
“Go get the van, Ron. It’s that time,” Mike ordered. “Everyone else, check and double-check to make sure we don’t leave anything behind.”
Later, as the team walked out of the house, Mike and Nina made one last walk-through. It took several minutes, and Rick was hoping that Nina would take advantage of the time she had with Mike to discuss her security situation, but she didn’t. The house was clean, and they walked out. Ron drove up with the van, and they all got in. It was twelve noon as he drove away heading to Echo, the warehouse located in the Kirovskiy District of Saint Petersburg.
***
The old man who had visited the Shamrock Pub the night before was a poor, homeless, cud who eked out a living by begging theater patrons for money. Once or twice he had even attempted to rob an unsuspecting couple using a toy pistol. It was midmorning as he passed by a street newsstand and saw a paper headlining the news of a prominent TV executive being murdered. He recognized the picture of the executive as being the same as the picture in the wallet that he still had. He paid for a paper and read the story. The passage he read about a reward being offered got his attention. The old man pulled the wallet out and looked at the RT News photo ID. It was the same man. He thought about the events of the night before; the flashback was surreal.
When he saw them near the bus stop, the old man had decided to approach the men to ask for money. When he got close to the bench, he was surprised by the one man offering him money to stay and speak with one of the others until the theater performance was over. He gladly accepted the offer, and after they left, he sat next to the man and looked closely at his face and then touched him. He felt cold skin. The old man was a former army soldier and knew what it felt like to touch a dead body. It scared him to know that he was sitting beside a dead man. He got up quickly and kicked something on the ground in the process. He looked down to see a wallet. He picked it up and hurried off toward the Shamrock, in desperate need of a drink.
The old man folded the paper and set about to find a policeman, which he did in very short order. He showed the policeman the headlines and began telling him the details of what had transpired the night before. The policeman cautiously listened to the old drunk who spent his time hanging around Theater Square begging for money. He was leery of the tale being told by the old vet.
“How about that?” concluded the old man. “And, there’s a reward being offered for information leading to an arrest.”
“Do you still have the wallet?” the policeman asked.
“Yes I do,” the old man said, taking the wallet out and handing it to the policeman.
The policeman opened the wallet and looked at the photo ID. Then he looked at the money compartment. It was empty.
“I think they robbed him,” the old man said, watching the policeman as he folded the wallet and put it into his pocket.
“You may be on to something. Come on. You’re coming with me to the station.”
“Will I get the reward money?” the old vet asked.
“That’s not for me to decide, and nobody’s been arrested yet.”
When they arrived at the station, the policeman called main headquarters to contact the detective investigating Alexander Brzezinski’s death. The detective was the one who had gone to the RT News station to talk to Nina Lubikov and, later, the one who had discovered Brzezinski’s cell phone in her apartment. When he examined the phone, which wasn’t password protected, he discovered a photo image of the young RT News personality. He became curious about their relationship and informed the apartment manager to keep an eye out for Miss Lubikov and to immediately call him with any news about her being back at the apartment.
When talking to the detective, the policeman related the details of the story the old vet had told him, and within an hour of the call, the detective was sitting at the suburb police station. During his questioning of the witness, the old man once again described the people he had seen the night before. The detective had brought Brzezinski’s cell phone with him and showed the picture of Nina Lubikov to the old vet.
“Is this the woman you saw in the van?”
“Yes it is. Now will I get the reward money?”
***
The information the detective acquired from the old veteran, plus the additional information he’d received from Nina Lubikov’s apartment manager about her leaving the building with a black man, was sufficient evidence to bring her in for questioning. He called the dispatcher and had a BOLO issued for her arrest.
***
It was 1245 when Ron drove the van into the warehouse. It was about the same time that Allison heard the BOLO transmission being broadcasted over the Saint Petersburg police net.
“All call, be on the lookout for Nina Pukhova Lubikov, a blond-haired woman, possibly driving a large beige van. Two males, a black man and a white man, may possibly be with her. Approach with caution. Lubikov is wanted in connection with a recent murder.”
Allison fretted about the BOLO and what to do about the information. She looked at her watch; it was time to update the team. She took out the ops phone to called Nina.