out the weapon and nodded toward some of the men. One of them hit Will on the back of the head with sufficient force to send him to the ground. Immediately after his face hit the road, a boot stamped on his neck and held him still. Hands rummaged through his overcoat and suit pockets. He had nothing in them except his wallet and passport. Both were removed.
There was more rapid talking. The man with the gun moved in front of Will, crouched down, and tossed his passport and wallet onto the ground so that both were inches from his face.
Will looked at the man and spoke through gritted teeth. “Do I pass the test?”
The man said nothing for a while before nodding. “He had to be sure you were the right person and that you weren’t being followed. You’re in the outskirts of the village of Dalnik. Wait here.”
The boot on Will’s head was removed. All of the men entered two of the vehicles, then quickly sped away, leaving Will alone on the ground with the third empty SUV beside them, its engine and lights still on. Will hauled himself to his feet and picked up his ID and wallet. He looked at the area ahead of him that was illuminated by the vehicle’s headlights. It was now very quiet, very still. The freezing fog was everywhere. He brushed ice from his clothes but kept his eyes on his surroundings, waiting, urgently trying to identify a new shape or movement. After taking two steps forward, he stood still for ten minutes, listening, watching. He moved forward again until he was standing fully in the headlights of the SUV and remained there for another fifteen minutes. The SUV behind him idled almost silently; fumes from its exhaust wafted through the air and mingled with the fog that now almost encapsulated him. He was exposed to anything around him, and he hated being this vulnerable. But he knew he had to remain calm. It was very cold now, cold enough to make every intake of air cause pain in his lungs.
The village of Dalnik sounded familiar, and he tried to remember why, something he’d learned about a long time before, maybe at school. It came to him. In 1941, Nazi-allied Romanian soldiers had rounded up twenty-five thousand Jews in Odessa and made them march along the twenty-mile road he’d been driven along to get here. Three thousand of them, mostly the elderly, children, and the physically and mentally handicapped, couldn’t walk fast enough so were shot or hanged along the way. Those who made it here alive were herded into four warehouses, probably located very close to where Will was now standing. The Romanian troops made holes in the buildings big enough for machine guns, locked the doors, placed their guns into the holes, and opened fire. Later they set the buildings ablaze and tossed grenades into them to make sure no Jew survived.
He heard a sound and looked quickly in the direction from which it had come. There was nothing else at first, but then he heard what sounded like a footstep crunching over the icy ground, followed by another, then another. He waited. The noises stopped. The motionless fog blanketed everything. Nothing else could be seen. All was quiet again. Then there was another crunch over ground, followed by another.
Then he saw him. At first he was just a dark shape, but as he drew nearer, Will could see that it was a person who was taking careful, deliberate steps toward him. He was thirty feet away, his face was still hidden in the fog, and he was holding something. It was almost certainly a pistol, and it had probably been pointing at him since he arrived here. The man stopped far enough away for his features to still be hidden. He raised his weapon high so that Will could clearly see that it was aimed in his direction, held it with two hands, and suddenly walked quickly toward him. Within a split second, Will saw that the man was tall, athletic, middle-aged, and clean-shaven, had groomed short blond hair, and was dressed in a windbreaker jacket, jeans, and hiking boots.
Sentinel.
He came to within ten feet, stopped, and barked in a well-spoken English accent, “The service had better have a damn good reason for calling this meeting.” He kept his gun pointed at Will’s head. “You’ve got ten seconds to persuade me not to pull the trigger.”
Chapter Six
The first minutes of daylight showed woodland dotted with red berries, snow-covered ground, and snowflakes falling serenely from the sky. Traces of the fog were still there and gave the place an eerie presence. Turning from the view, Will glanced around the large room. Six large windows surrounded what looked like a well-used spacious family kitchen. That was as it should be, for Sentinel’s safe houses would all have been outfitted to look like genuine homes.
Sentinel was standing in the center of the room speaking rapid Slovene into his cell phone. He finished the call, poured black coffee into a mug, and sat down at the kitchen table.
Will joined him.
Sentinel withdrew three handgun magazines from his trouser pocket and carefully removed the bullets, resting each on its percussion cap on the table, until ten of them were lined up vertically. He took out another magazine, reached behind his back, withdrew a Sig Sauer P229 handgun, and slammed the fresh magazine into the weapon. Placing the muzzle of the gun against one of the bullets, he tapped the projectile over, then did the same with three more. He looked at Will with icy blue eyes. “I’ve now got two hundred and seventy-six assets. One hundred and eighty of them are Russians who operate inside their country, seventy are Ukrainian, Belarusian, Latvian, Estonian, and Finnish men, like those who grabbed you from the base of the Potemkin Stairs, and twenty of them are Western European support agents-mostly wealthy individuals, arms dealers, and forgers-who I use to finance and supply my operations when MI6 is unable to help me. But at the forefront of them all”-he looked back at the bullets-“are my Russian agents, my tier-one intelligence producers. There were ten of them, and now I have six. They all risk their lives for me so that the West can benefit from their intelligence about Russia. Do you know why they do that?”
Will said nothing.
Sentinel smoothed his fingers over the four prone cartridges and closed his eyes before opening them again. For the briefest moment his face was filled with sadness. His expression became cold. “They do it because they love Russia and hate the people that run it.”
Will nodded.
Sentinel looked at the bullets. He pulled back the workings of the Sig Sauer, chambered a round, put the gun onto the table, and muttered to himself, “Bastard.”
“You didn’t suspect him?”
“I had no reason to. I’ve been investigating the deaths, but so far found nothing. I’d concluded the killers were SVR or FSB.”
“How does Khmelnytsky know the identity of your agents?”
Sentinel stared at him.
“Did you make tradecraft mistakes? Perhaps you were followed by Razin to your agent meetings.”
Sentinel remained motionless.
“You can trust me.”
“Trust?” The room reverberated with the volume of Sentinel’s voice. “I don’t trust anyone, and I’m not about to start doing so with someone I’ve only known for a few hours.” He spun the gun so that its nozzle was facing Will. “Do you work in the service’s Russia team?”
“No.”
“Security Department?”
“No.”
“Then what’s your fucking interest in my business?”
Will ignored the question. “You need to set up a meeting with Razin so that I can kill him.”
Sentinel laughed. “Have you read his file?”
“Of course.”
Sentinel’s expression changed. “Then you’ll know that it’s more likely he’ll kill us.”
“I’m prepared to take that risk. Are you?”
Sentinel placed a hand over the gun. “How long have you been in the service?”
“Long enough not to have to prove my worth by answering questions like that.”
“We’ll see.” Sentinel spoke fast. “I’ve no idea how Razin knows the identity of my other agents, nor do I know how Svelte found out he was a traitor.” He raised his voice. “I made no tradecraft mistakes.”
Will held his gaze. “Razin’s command of Alpha gives him a very powerful weapon, but he’s going to need
