“That I can do.”
• • •
Titov changed intoa suit and tie, then left in the Jeep: they all agreed there was a small risk, but he had good identification. They smuggled the couch cushions from the Jeep into the motel room, so if he was stopped, he’d look and sound like an ordinary American with a black Jeep, a common car in snow country.
And it worked smoothy enough. Titov left the car in a crowded parking garage at the airport, after wiping everything in the interior that might hold a fingerprint. DNA, he couldn’t do anything about. If things worked well, he’d recover the car and drive back to his apartment in Chicago. If it didn’t, he’d be in Moscow, or dead, and the car would be irrelevant. Still, the loss would sting: he liked the car. A lot. He would not get anything like it in Russia.
The deal at the Enterprise location was purely routine. Titov got a modest-looking red Ford SUV, checked the mileage and, satisfied, hurried back to the motel. When Abramova let him into the room, she’d already packed the clothes and gear bags and Nikitin was on his feet, one hand on a wall, practicing walking.
“Not bad for twenty-four hours,” Titov said.
“Less than that. I would appreciate it if we could find a place to hide for a while,” Nikitin said.
“We can do that, no problem,” Titov said.
• • •
Abramova and Titovmade three trips to the parking lot, hiding the rifle case, the spotting scope, and the tripod between bags. When they were ready, Titov said to Abramova, “I’ll help Lev. You go ahead, make sure the hallway is clear.”
Abramova nodded. Her PLK was on her belt, under her sweater, and she put her hand on it as she stepped into the hallway. She sensed—maybe heard—somebody to her left, looked down the long hallway and…
A woman, she thought a desk clerk, was just turning the corner, followed by a hard-looking thin man. She thoughtsoldierand her hand gripped the pistol, and then a third man, tall, dark-haired, the nemesis, the man who’d been in the street, shooting at them as they were fleeing the assassination scene—he was right there, coming around the corner.
She’d seen him in the Wagoneer’s big wing mirror, was for a split-second uncertain about that, but then he made a move for his pistol but Abramova already had hers in her hand and she yanked it from under the sweater and fired a blizzard of bullets down the hall, driving the three people back around a corner and she thought she’d hit at least one of them and probably two.
Then Titov was there with Nikitin, Nikitin’s gun in his hand, and he shouted, “Take him,” and Nikitin said, “I can go,” and Nikitin stumbled toward the exit and Titov opened fire down the empty hallway, chipping away at the corner as Abramova dropped her magazine and slapped another into place and began shooting. Then Titov was gone and she backed after him through the door to the parking lot,shooting as she went, and then she was outside and into the front passenger seat, struggling to pull the door closed as Titov accelerated out of the lot, around the corner of a motel building into a side street and right away from the motel. Abramova was kneeling on the front seat, looking out the back, reloading, said, “I see nobody…I see nobody…nobody following…”
Titov drove hard for a block under the interstate highway, then made a right turn and slowed, went two more blocks, took a left into a side street, and then kept heading north, Abramova still kneeling on the front seat, looking for pursuit…
There was none.
Abramova buckled into the seat and said to Titov, “You did well, Melor. Welcome to the team, huh?”
12
Stepping back: Lucas and Sherwood spent a frustrating hour and a half checking motels along the south edge of I-494.
They’d almost finished when St. Vincent called: “We got the right house, but they’re gone. Couple of bloody sheets on the floor and some medical litter. We’re definitely looking for a black Jeep, and a neighbor tells us that he spoke to a man living here and he thought the guy was an American. Sounded like he came from Iowa. He only saw that one person.”
Sherwood put the phone on speaker and said, “Probably a sleeper, somebody who’s been living here for years, brought in to back up the team. That’ll make them harder to find, with that guy fronting for them.”
“Yeah. We’ll get the neighbor to talk to an artist, get a facial image done, but the neighbor said he was an average-looking guy. Noparticularly notable facial characteristics,” St. Vincent said. “What are you two doing? Still checking motels?”
“Yeah. We can’t tell from the maps whether there are thirteen or fourteen motels on this strip, on this side of the highway. We’ve done eleven. Absolutely nothing,” Lucas said. “Two more and we punt.”
“Might as well finish up,” St. Vincent said. “If you’re interested, we’ll have another briefing at three o’clock, put together everything we know.”
“We should be done here in half an hour,” Lucas said.
• • •
The La Quintawas the twelfth motel, a sprawling place with two long wings and parking scattered around them. A diner occupied a connecting lot with even more cars. They went inside to the motel’s front desk, where they were met by a tall balding man and a short chunky woman. Lucas identified himself and the man said, “Well…uh, we did have a woman here early this morning with an accent. Quite pretty, but she wasn’t blond. She had brown hair. Reddish-brown.”
“Well-dressed?”
“Nicely dressed, I guess. A businesswoman. She took the room for a week. She has family here…”
“See her car?”
