CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

 

 

 

Saturday, June 16

Helsinki, Finland

 

 

Unlike his flight to Malta, Payne was fully awake for his trip to Finland, if only to sort through everything that had occurred during the past thirty-six hours.

Shortly after documenting the ancient tunnel system on video, they had sealed up the historic site with sheets of opaque plastic before meeting Galea in the waiting van. Thrilled to get away unnoticed, he had dropped them back at Jarkko’s yacht just before sunrise. Then they had sailed the boat back to sea for some much needed rest.

As always, Payne had taken first watch while the others got some sleep. He had been on duty for roughly an hour when Raskin had startled him with a new ringtone: the classic Johnny Rivers song, Secret Agent Man. Played at full volume on his phone, the tune had practically sent Payne diving to the floor for safety, but all was forgiven once Raskin had revealed the reason for his call: the Russians had found his digital breadcrumbs.

The beauty of Raskin’s trap had been its simplicity. By faking a chat transcript from the beginning of the week and inserting it into a real message board, it had created the illusion that a negotiation had been conducted prior to Volkov’s appearance in Malta, thereby lowering his suspicions and convincing him that it was a legitimate transaction. Based on everything they knew about Volkov, he would leap at the opportunity to get revenge in person, but just to make sure, they had added the name of one of his fiercest rivals to the mix to guarantee his presence.

Unbeknownst to Volkov, Payne and Jones had known Kaiser for years and had been given his blessing for the ruse. Truth be told, he was almost as eager to take out Volkov as they were, and they were more than happy to get his help with weapons and logistics.

A former supply sergeant in the U.S. military, Kaiser had started his operation in Kaiserslautern, Germany—hence the nickname—servicing the nearly fifty thousand NATO personnel living in the Kaiserslautern Military Community. Since the majority of the residents were Americans, he had realized that he could make great money by providing them with illegal exports from the States.

His business had blossomed from there, eventually turning into a criminal empire that extended all the way across Europe and into Russia. His most trusted smuggler on the Baltic Sea was a Finnish fisherman by the name of Jarkko, who had been with him for over a decade and had made a fortune in the process. Kaiser trusted him so much that he had given his name to two of his colleagues who were looking to smuggle an American historian named Allison Taylor out of Saint Petersburg before heading to Greece to look for treasure.

That was when Payne and Jones had first met Jarkko.

And it had happened in Helsinki.

Memories of Allison slowly became thoughts of Marissa as Payne stared out the window at the city below. He had purposely kept her and Ulster from this part of their plan. Not only for their safety—he didn’t want them anywhere near Finland when this confrontation happened—but because he wasn’t sure how she would react to his role in the upcoming battle.

To guarantee their security, he had flown them to Switzerland, where they would be protected by armed guards at the Ulster Archives while they searched for potential leads on the location of the Maltese treasure. Armed with new evidence from the Order’s secret tunnel system, he hoped they would be able to find something of value in the Archives’ files, much like Ulster had done with Cassar’s portfolio.

Of course, Payne realized if his confrontation with Volkov didn’t go as planned, the treasure hunt would be over, as would his life.

“There it is!” Jarkko said from the seat behind him. “Suomenlinna!”

“Wow,” Jones muttered. “It’s bigger than I thought it would be.”

Jarkko snickered. “Jarkko hear this before.”

Payne shifted his focus from the city to the north to the water beneath his plane. Scattered across the mouth of the harbor were dozens of brown islands, most of them small and uninhabited like rocky icebergs that never moved, but his gaze was drawn to the southeast where he spotted a stone bastion emerging from the Baltic Sea.

Spread across six islands, Suomenlinna was a massive sea fortress built by the Swedish crown in 1748 AD, back when Finland was still a part of the Swedish kingdom. Its original goal was to protect Helsinki from Russian expansionism, but it fell to them in 1808 AD, paving the way for Russia’s occupation of Finland the following year. Isolated from Helsinki proper, Payne hoped that the island stronghold would protect innocents and help Jarkko defeat Volkov and his men, finally claiming a Finnish victory against Russian forces, as was its original intent.

Thankfully, they wouldn’t be alone in their battle with Volkov. Kaiser was so excited about the possibility of eliminating his rival that he had flown to Helsinki on Friday morning before he had even received confirmation that Volkov’s hackers had found the digital breadcrumb.

In his business, it was tough to know whom he could trust, so Kaiser had assembled a crew of his most loyal men. He had posted some on the ferryboats that serviced the complex to keep track of passengers and potential threats. He had kept a few on the island docks to monitor smaller boats, while several more patrolled the outer paths of the island with their eyes on the sea. He had dealt with Volkov long enough to know that he would come fully prepared.

As expected, Jarkko was able to help as well. Not only with men from his own network of smugglers—which was based in Helsinki and was far more vast than he had ever let on to Payne and Jones—but also with personnel on Suomenlinna. That was the main reason he had selected this island fortress as their battleground. He had sailed past it thousands of times on his way in and out of the harbor and was quite friendly with the Suomenlinna staff. He knew visitors would be long gone by 9:00 p.m. And thanks to the short northern nights, the sun wouldn’t go down until long after Volkov had fallen.

That is, if things went the way they hoped.

 

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Even with a sneak attack, Volkov realized he was at a slight disadvantage. He had roughly a day to plan an assault on an island fortress in Helsinki, where he would be facing a Finn, two former special forces operatives, and a horde of Kaiser’s faceless thugs.

But thanks to Blokhin and his team of hackers, Volkov felt confident that he could pull it off. Not only could they erase his presence with their digital tricks, but they could also give him something that the other side didn’t have: a squadron of remotely piloted drones.

The idea had come to Blokhin shortly after seeing the name “Suomenlinna” in the digital text that he had decrypted. He had remembered reading an article about a test that the Finnish postal service had conducted in 2015 where they had used drones to deliver packages of varying shapes and sizes between Helsinki and the island fortress, and he felt they could do something similar.

Having served as a test pilot for Volkov during the past year while working out the networking kinks, Blokhin knew that his boss owned several drones for aerial surveillance, and he suggested that this might be a good time to use them.

Volkov heartily agreed and added them to the rest of the equipment that he would be exporting from Russia via the Baltic Sea. He had no idea what the other side would be bringing, but he planned to exceed them in every way.

He would bring more men.

He would bring more weapons.

And he would bring down his opponent.

In his mind, this would be his best victory yet.