crazy ideas. The rest of his colleagues might be right. What if he got himself into another mess like before, and was fired? What would his family think? What would he do?
His cell phone rang.
Paul didn’t recognize the number but decided to answer anyway. “Paul Schmidt, special agent, FBI.”
“Sounds impressive,” Joan Cortez chuckled. “Special … huh?”
“Aw … doesn’t mean much. The government gives titles instead of more money.”
“And you fell for it?”
“Yup.”
“Listen, I got some … well, I guess you could say it’s good news.”
Paul sat up straight in his chair. “Yeah?”
“Good for you, not so good for the local guys.”
“About El-Amin?”
“Right. We can’t find any criminal background on him in the U.S. Not even a parking ticket. But if we go international, well, you get a little more.”
“What?”
“He’s dirty.” Joan cleared her throat. “He’s well funded and linked into an international criminal net.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“You must know of these criminal organizations, networks, which operate in all kinds of shit that’s illegal? One day it’s drugs, the next day financial thefts, a little terrorism and weapon smuggling thrown in.”
“Yeah?”
“Well, in addition to these disappearing young men, we-ICE-think there’s a lot more going on. We don’t know what, but a guy like El-Amin is intriguing.”
“Where can I find out more?”
“Can you meet me tomorrow, in private?”
“Sure, but what’s the problem?”
Joan waited to respond. “I’ve got to be careful. This is much bigger than my pay grade allows me to tell you. And the shit’ll hit the fan if anyone knows I’m cooperating with you.” She paused. “You’ve gotta keep this between us.”
“Joan, I’m in the same predicament. I suspected there was more to these disappearances than simply recruiting for Shabaab.”
“Meet me at Mears Park in St. Paul tomorrow. One o’clock?”
Eleven
Vladimir Zagorsk hurried along the corridor inside the building known as Corpus 6. On one side of him, glass windows looked into a giant steel room. The Model UKZD-25 dynamic test chamber, where small bomblets were detonated, was the largest and most sophisticated in the world.
In spite of the cool temperature, he sweated. Would he be able to do this one more time? If he were caught he could be executed. And although he had a plan to screw the hated Arab who’d buy this, Vladimir’s government wouldn’t show him any mercy.
He carried a small briefcase with a laptop computer inside, of which most of the interior had been removed to make enough room for the material. To cover his theft from the floor above and allow him to escape unimpeded, he’d stenciled the words, “International Science and Technology Center, Moscow” on the side of the case.
How ironic, Vladimir thought. The center was partially funded by the U.S. Department of Defense-just where this bundle could end up and cause a great deal of trouble.
He forced the thought out of his mind. He needed the money.
One of the 150 scientists who still worked at Vector, Vladimir had easy access to almost all of the forty buildings in the complex. Like many of those others, he was underpaid and the health risks jeopardized the survival of his family. They lived sixteen miles away in Novosibirsk. They’d been offered government housing in Koltsovo, like the other scientists’ families, next to Vector. His wife refused, scared to live anywhere near the complex-he didn’t blame her and never argued about it.
The Arab, who’d contacted him seven months ago, offered more cash for one shipment than Vladimir earned in five years. Normally, he’d never even considered stealing anything from the complex, but his family’s struggle was more than he could bear.
Luckily for him, something had gone wrong for the Arab after the first package, which required another shipment.
Vladimir worried about the contents of the briefcase, glad he’d sealed the protective container around the laptop. A feeling of guilt hummed through his mind at the thought of how destructive it could be, until an image of his son replaced it. Nicky had a chance to get a United States’ visa and get out of this hell. That took lots of extra money for the paperwork and even more for the requisite bribes. If he and his wife were stuck here, at least their son could get out.
He left the corridor and slowed down for the stairs. They had been constructed by gangs of prison laborers who intentionally made each step a different size. The rumors said they built them in the hopes some of the scientists from the state would fall and die.
He reached the bottom, took a glance backward at the squat, ugly brick building with windows rimmed in concrete. Ahead, he had two outer security barriers to get through. The first would be easy-he’d paid Fedor enough to look the other way. The second one worried him.
Although Vladimir worked as a scientist in the complex, leaving with a computer case would certainly raise some eyebrows.
He looked off into the distance to the birch and silver pine forests at the edge of the complex. Too pretty, he thought, to surround something as sinister as what went on inside Vector. The tiny green leaves of the Aspens popped out in profusion with the spring warmth. He smelled fresh air. It may hit thirty Celsius today, he’d heard. Of course, that also brought the mud and melting show in Novosibirsk.
As Vladimir approached the final security barrier, he hoped the guard would be weak. He stopped at a small office, didn’t recognize the man behind the desk. Vladimir could feel his insides constrict. He forced himself to breathe evenly.
“Papers.” The man ordered.
Vladimir set down the briefcase carefully and pulled out his identification and the fake authorization he prepared earlier.
The security guard ran his eyes over the papers quickly. Then he stopped on the second page. “Hmm.” Without moving, he looked up at Vladimir and then his eyes fell to the briefcase. “ISTC out of Moscow, huh?”
Vladimir could tell the truth for this, which made it easier. “It’s the special packing materials. You can imagine how careful we must be.”
“Of course, of course. But I wasn’t notified of this.”
Vladimir thought his bowels would let go right there. Now was the point of no return. If it worked, he’d save his family. If not, he could be shot. He reached into his jacket and removed the envelope with rubles and handed it quickly to the guard. Vladimir held his breath.
The man set down his pencil and took his time peering inside the envelope. He nodded once. Slowly, his eyes rose to look into Vladimir’s face. Without saying a word, he waved his hand toward the exit.
Vladimir jumped through the door.
Outside, he gulped clean air and hurried past the razor wire surrounding the complex. Above him, sandhill cranes on their migration to North America swam in the warm spring air, happy to be free of the long winter. They stopped momentarily in the field, just long enough to rest and peck for corn.
When he arrived in Lenin Square, the main center of Novosibirsk, he took a cab to the train station. He walked across the large plaza. Ahead of him rose the imposing station. Square, painted turquoise green, the columns and arches shone bright white. He entered under the largest arch.
He boarded the Turkistan-Siberian train to take him south, ultimately to the Caspian Sea where he’d handoff
