The Kill Switch

“And something tells me you want those days.”

“Only a few. We’ve got a friend I’d like you to meet.”

“I’ve got enough friends. Why is this one so special?”

There was a pause, one that took too long. He understood. While the call was encrypted, Tucker’s room could have been bugged—probably was bugged, knowing the Russians. Any further details would require additional precautions.

He couldn’t say such subterfuge didn’t intrigue him.

He also suspected this lapse in the conversation was a test.

Tucker proved his understanding of the need for privacy by asking another question. “Where?”

“Half a mile from your hotel—a pay phone on the northeast corner of the Grey Horse Apartments.”

“I’ll find it. Give me twenty minutes.”

He was there in eighteen, stamping his feet against the cold. Using a prepaid calling card, Tucker dialed Sigma’s cover trunk line, then waited through another series of encoder tones before Crowe’s voice came on the line.

The director got straight to the point. “I need you to escort a man out of the country.”

The simple sentence was fraught with layers of information. The fact that Crowe didn’t think their friend was capable of accomplishing this feat on his own already told Tucker two things.

One: The man was of high value to Sigma.

Two: Normal travel options were problematic.

In other words, someone didn’t want the man leaving the country.

Tucker knew better than to ask why this target needed to leave Russia. Crowe was a firm believer in the need-to-know policy. But Tucker had another question that he wanted answered.

“Why me?”

“You’re already in-country, have an established cover, and your skill set matches the job.”

“And you have no other assets available.”

“That, too—but it’s a secondary consideration.”

“Just so we’re clear, Director. This is a favor. Nothing more. If you’re trying to court me to join—”

“Not at all. Get our friend out of the country, and you’re done. You’ll make twice your usual retainer. For this mission, I’m assigning you an operations handler. Her name is Ruth Harper.”

“Not you?” This surprised him, and he didn’t like surprises. “Director, you know I don’t play well with others, especially those I’ve never met face-to-face.”

“Harper is good, Tucker. Really knows her stuff. Give her a chance. So will you do it?”

Tucker sighed. While he had little trust in government agencies, Crowe had so far proven himself to be a stand-up guy.

“Give me the details.”

3

March 7, 8:07 A.M.

Siberia, Russia

The door to Tucker’s private berth on the train slid back, and a head bearing a blue cap peeked through.

“Papers, please,” the train porter ordered, tempering his KGB-like request with a friendly smile. The sliver-thin young man could be no more than twenty, his coal-black hair peeking from under his crisp hat. He kept the buttons of his uniform well polished, clearly very proud of his job.

Tucker handed over his passport.

The porter studied it, nodded, and handed it back. The man’s eyes settled nervously on Kane. The shepherd sat upright in the seat opposite Tucker, panting, tongue hanging.

“And your animal?” the porter asked.

“Service animal.”

Tucker handed over Kane’s packet, courtesy of Painter Crowe. The papers certified his furry companion was a working dog, adept at sensing Tucker’s frequent and debilitating epileptic seizures. It was a ruse, of course, but traveling with a seventy-pound military war dog tended to raise unwanted questions.

The porter reviewed the papers and nodded. “Da, I see. My second cousin suffers same sickness.” His gaze returned to Kane, but with more affection and sympathy now. “May I pet him?”

Tucker shrugged. “Sure. He doesn’t bite.”

Not unless I tell him to.

Tentatively, the porter reached out and scratched Kane under the chin. “Good doggy.”

Kane regarded him impassively, tolerating the familiarity.

Tucker resisted the urge to smile.

Satisfied, the porter gri

“I like him very much,” the young man said.

“I do, too.”

“If there’s anything you need, you ask, da?”

Tucker nodded as the porter exited and slid the door closed.

He settled back, staring at the Russian scenery passing by the window, which mostly consisted of snowy trees and Soviet-bloc-era buildings as the train headed out of Vladivostok. The port city marked one end of this route of the Trans-Siberian Railway; the other was Moscow.

Not that he and Kane were traveling that far.

For reasons Crowe hadn’t explained, Tucker’s target wouldn’t be ready for extraction for a week. So after completing his final two days with Bogdan Fedoseev, Tucker had boarded the famous Trans-Siberian Railway and settled in for the five-day journey to the city of Perm. Once there, he was to meet a contact who would take him to his target, a man named Abram Bukolov.

Tucker still had no idea why the man needed to leave Russia in such a clandestine ma

Abram Bukolov was the owner of Horizon Industries and arguably the country’s pharmacological tycoon. A frequent face on magazine covers and television shows, Bukolov was to prescription drugs what Steve Jobs had been to personal computing. In the years following the breakup of the Soviet Union, the pharmaceutical industry in Russia disintegrated into disarray and corruption, from the quality of the drugs themselves to the distribution networks. Thousands were thought to have died from tainted drugs or faulty doses. Through sheer force of will and inherited wealth, Abram Bukolov slowly and steadily bent the system to his benevolent will, becoming the keeper of Russia’s pharmacy.

And now he wanted out, all but abandoning a multibillion-dollar empire he had spent his entire adult life building.

Why?

And what could possibly drive such a man to run so scared?

According to the encrypted dossier sent by Painter Crowe, the only clue lay in Bukolov’s mysterious warning: The Arzamas-16 generals are after me . . .

The man refused to explain more until he was safely out of Russia.

Tucker had studied the rest of the files for this mission over and over again. Bukolov was a well-known eccentric, a personality trait that shone in every interview of him. He was clearly a driven visionary with a zealous passion to match, but had he finally snapped?

And what about these Arzamas-16 generals?

From the research notes included in the dossier, there was once a city named Arzamas-16. During the rule of Joseph Stalin, it was home to the Soviet Union’s first nuclear weapons design center. The U.S. intelligence community simply referred to it as the Russian Los Alamos.

But it was only the first of the many naukograds, or “closed science cities,” that popped up across the Soviet Union, secured by ironclad perimeters. In such places, top-secret projects under the aegis of the best Soviet scientists were conducted. Rumors abounded during the Cold War of biological weapons, mind control drugs, and stealth technology.

But Arzamas-16 no longer existed.

In its place, the region had become home to a couple of nuclear weapons test facilities—but what did anything like that have to do with Abram Bukolov?

And who could these nefarious generals be?

It made no sense.

He glanced over at Kane, who wagged his tail, ready for whatever was to come. Tucker settled back, deciding that was probably the best course of action from here.