Red Templar

The younger one snickered. “We have people in Sofia who do that.”

“We’re just here to accompany you, Brother Dimitrov. The best thing would be to come peacefully.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” answered Dimitrov.

“Yes, you can, priest,” said the younger one. He took a weapon out from under his coat. It was a Veresk, an older Russian-made version of an Uzi, which explained the long coat.

“Put that away, Kostya,” said the older one, taking out his own weapon from under his jacket, this one a much more discreet Yarygin nine-millimeter. He held it loosely in his hand. “Please, Brother Dimitrov. I would like to do this without any unpleasantness.”

“I’m afraid I can’t accommodate you,” answered the monk. The younger one made a threatening gesture with the little submachine gun. The monk wondered for a brief moment which it would be. He decided on the older one. An object lesson for the young man in the leather coat. He took his hands out from between the bell-like sleeves of his robe. In his right hand he held the other weapon his father had taken from the NKVD agent just after the war. The Korovin.25 he’d given the American had been the NKVD agent’s backup gun, worn in a concealed holster on the hip. The other weapon, worn in a shoulder holster, was a Tokarev TT-33, a rough knockoff of the classic Browning.45 and just as powerful. The monk pulled the trigger twice, hitting the older man in the chest and the belly. The older man looked surprised, vomited blood and slid to the floor. The one the older man had called Kostya lifted the Veresk and frantically squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened.

Dimitrov turned the old Tokarev on the boy in the coat and waited while he flipped off the safety. Killing the young man would serve only to prolong things. Eventually they’d find him, torture him, and in the end they would kill him anyway. Brother Theodore Dimitrov took the last long seconds to speak to his God, and then the church filled with the screams of the boy and the thunder of his weapon and then there was nothing.

6

“We have-?como se dice? una cola-a tail?” Eddie said.

“We’re being followed?” Holliday answered, startled. He looked in the rearview mirror of the stodgy old Moskvich he’d rented in Istanbul. There was no traffic behind them on the narrow coast road running along the rocky cliffs that dropped down to the Black Sea. To the left of the deserted old highway there was nothing but scrub forest and wooded hills.

“Si.” Eddie nodded. “I have been watching.” He spoke softly. In the backseat a less flatulent Genrikhovich was asleep again. “Three of them. A red BMW, an old KrAZ truck with a. . thing on the front, and also there is something that looks like one of those old ZiL limousines El Comandante used to drive around in. Black and very big.” The tall Cuban shrugged. “No estoy seguro. Maybe a Chaika.”

“I don’t see anything,” said Holliday, checking the mirror again. The highway was still empty. The very fact that Eddie had seen three vehicles of any kind was reason enough for suspicion.

“They keep back most of the time and they. . ?cambiar de posicion?”

“Switch places?”

“Si, that is what they do. Switch places to try to make it seem like they are not together. An old trick of the Seguridad del Estado in my country when they followed dissidents.” He laughed quietly. “Three men, three different hats. ?Muy estupido!”

Holliday looked in the mirror again. This time he saw the BMW. He wasn’t much of a car buff, but it looked like one of the bigger models from the eighties or early nineties.

“Shit,” said Holliday. Eddie checked the side mirror.

“Si.” Eddie nodded. “Una mierda grande.”

Holliday dropped his foot down on the gas pedal. The Moskvich responded with a shudder and a grudging acceleration that took them up just barely past one hundred kilometers per hour. It wasn’t going to be the car chase from The French Connection; that was for sure.

The big BMW accelerated until it was fifty yards from their rear bumper. The narrow highway began a sweeping series of easy S curves. On the left the wooded hills closed in, and on the right the ragged cliffs looked steeper. Holliday became acutely aware of the single 3-shaped guardrail bolted to wooden stumps that was the only thing between them and a long swan dive into the surf five hundred feet down.

There was a flicker of movement in the side mirror. The large black car Eddie had spotted was pulling out from behind the BMW and passing. It stayed in the other lane, surging forward, speeding past the Moskvich through the turn, ignoring the risk of oncoming traffic. It was a big, bullying ZiL, just as Eddie had thought. It pulled in front of them and took up a station fifty yards ahead, matching the BMW, which was still behind them. Holliday had seen two men in the car, both hard-faced men wearing black.

“It’s a squeeze,” he muttered, thinking about the third vehicle-the truck.

“?Que?” Eddie asked.

“They’ve got us boxed in,” said Holliday. “The truck will come up and push us off the road and over the goddamn cliff.”

“Goddamn,” said Eddie, looking to his left at the rusty old guardrail.

“Goddamn right,” said Holliday.

Right on cue a giant green truck appeared, rumbling up behind the red BMW on their tail. It was a monster, and the “thing on the front” Eddie had described was a double-bladed snowplow, one blade forward and the second blade angled to one side. The enormous vehicle sounded like a tank, big puffs of sooty exhaust bellowing out of the high stack that jutted over the cab.

“This is not good,” said Holliday, his heart pounding like a trapped animal in his chest.

“Dame la pistola,” said Eddie quickly, his voice urgent.

Behind them the truck downshifted and there was a bellowing roar as it pulled out into the left lane. “What?!”

“?Dame la pistola! Give me the gun, mi amigo! And roll down your window, por favor!”

The noise and commotion woke up Genrikhovich in the backseat. He struggled sleepily into a sitting position. “Shtaw?” he mumbled, blinking. Holliday dug into his jacket, handed Eddie the gun, then rolled down the window. Eddie rolled down the window on the passenger side. The muscular Cuban put a meaty hand on the Russian’s head and pushed him back down.

“Lazeet salyetch!” Eddie ordered. Genrikhovich acted predictably, fighting against Eddie, who forced him down again.

“Chto za huy?!” screamed the Russian, trying to pull himself up again. “Chyort voz’mi!”

Eddie twisted around in his seat. “Lazeet salyetch, yob Tvoyu Mat!” He let go with a left cross that caught Genrikhovich on the point of his chin, dropping him to the floor of the car. The massive truck pulled up beside the Moskvich. Eddie gave Holliday an evil grin, eyes flashing. “Yo disparo; lo lleve a. I shoot; you drive.” Eddie began humming “Auld Lang Syne,” the tune for his Young Pioneers farewell campfire song. He flipped off the safety and pulled back the hammer of the pistol to full cock. The Cuban was definitely pissed.

The high-wheeled truck began to make its move, the giant gleaming side of the plow sliding toward the side of the Moskvich like a massive ax blade as the KrAZ turned in toward them. Ahead of the Moskvich the ZiL slowed, boxing them in tightly, while the BMW moved even closer behind them. At the last second Holliday made his move as well.

“Hang on!” he yelled to Eddie. With the snowplow blade less than a foot away, raised at eye level, Holliday simultaneously jammed his foot down on the brake pedal, twisted the wheel toward the flimsy guardrail and dragged up on the handbrake between the two front seats.

It was a classic bootlegger’s turn, but done on a front-wheel-drive vehicle. The rear wheels locked, the back end slewed out and the front end ricocheted off the guardrail with a tearing clang as the front bumper tore away. Instead of doing a complete one-eighty turn, the Moskvich turned broadside to the BMW, offering Eddie a sight line through the car’s windshield. He raised the heavy little Korovin.25 and pumped half the clip at the car behind them.