And yet at the same time I truly hoped I’d get a chance to meet Amanda’s strange crew again. I hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to Jason.

  I breathed a sigh of relief as the Osprey separated from the mid-air fuel tanker. Bubba’s voice came over my earpiece.

  “Thanks, Frank, and have a smooth trip back to Incirlik. Next time I’m there, I want more of that Turkish coffee you fed me.”

  I felt a vibration from my communicator, and dug it out of my backpack.

  NATSAT Confidential Field Communications

  -- Encoding session verified --

  << Message Received >>

  Mission Update: Rendezvous with special agent Anya Fitzsimmons outside of Novoshakhtinsk, Russia. She will guide you to the compromised nuclear arms depot. Logistics data being sent to the SF comms sergeant.

  I wasn’t the only one receiving a message. Bubba had pulled his communicator out of his backpack, and a moment later the pilot’s voice came over the intercom.

  “Insertion reroute from HQ. Scratch Poltova insertion, I’m dropping you boys off just outside of a mining town called Novoshakhtinsk. It’s about three hundred miles southeast of Poltova.”

  Bubba looked up from his communication device. “HQ says we’re supposed to take our cues from some female spook who’s going to guide us into the target. The spook has a vehicle and supplies, including armaments.”

  Clean chuckled. He was opposite me in the cargo hold, our knees only a couple feet from each other. “I hope she’s cute,” he replied. “I’m always turned on by a woman with a gun.”

  I lay my head against the back of the seat. I couldn’t imagine what kind of woman would be leading a group of Special Forces commandos into an area known for its instability. But if she was anything like that Amanda woman, the last thing Clean would be thinking about was how cute she was.

  We’d barely put our feet to the ground when a young woman, practically a teenager, stepped out from the forest near the drop-off point. She wore a head covering, but other than that she was dressed in western clothes: blue jeans, hiking boots, and a flannel top.

  She didn’t even make eye contact with us as she walked past and muttered, “The name is Anya. Follow closely.”

  The captain gave the team a nod and signaled for us to move.

  Anya led us to a warehouse that held a white four-wheel-drive and a crate of supplies. She handed out western clothes to replace our Pakistani garments. “These outfits will blend in much better in Ukraine.”

  As Anya handed me a shirt and a pair of jeans, I noticed her eyes. They were a vivid purple.

  I gasped with recognition. “You’re the vampiress from that party in Virginia.”

  She smiled, revealing perfectly even, pearly-white teeth. “You must be Jeremiah.”

  Nate, looking amused, motioned for me to close my mouth, which I now realized was hanging open. I snapped it shut, feeling embarrassed.

  Some of the men had already begun changing, never mind the presence of the beautiful young woman. Feeling strangely shy, I walked to the opposite side of the SUV to change. But just as I was pulling on my jeans, Anya joined me, and I felt myself blush.

  She spoke to me in a language that sounded vaguely Russian. “Does anyone here speak Chechen? How about Arabic?”

  I peered into her mind, searching for words in the same language, but I knew I was botching the grammar. “Speaking Chechen I can it. Better much at Arabic.”

  “That’ll do. You sit in the front with me.” She shouted to the rest of the team, “If we go through a checkpoint, some of the locals might give me a hard time because I’m a girl. If you hear yelling, don’t worry, it’s mostly a bluff. Our cover is that we’re going to the funeral of a family elder. That should carry enough weight that they won’t delay us too much.”

  Bubba was studying a map. “How long do you think it’ll take us to get there?”

  “It’s five a.m. now. With the checkpoints we’ll likely hit, I figure it’ll be sometime past midnight before we actually get there, so we need to get started right away. We don’t want to hit the depot during the daytime. We’ll never get past the front gate.”

  Captain Richter stomped his boot. “You heard the lady. Let’s get our asses in the truck.”

  I checked my handgun and knife before climbing into the passenger seat. I tried to act casual when Anya sat beside me in the driver’s seat. Something about her gave me a tingle of excitement. But I had to keep my head on straight.

  As we started off, I leaned back and just watched as the pre-dawn blacks, blues, and grays slowly turned into the multi-colored landscape of Ukraine.

  We wound through thick forests and wide-open expanses of farmland. We occasionally passed a village, but they were small, the largest of them probably housing no more than a few hundred people. The only slowdowns occurred at the checkpoints that Anya had anticipated. But she exuded confidence as she handled the questions from the militants who had taken over the routes.

  I listened carefully, breathing in the words to improve my grasp of the language. Between checkpoints, I also practiced my Chechen with Anya, and made great progress. I learned from her that she’d been raised in the US and came from a military family. She was seventeen and had been recruited to help the intelligence agencies with special missions. But she was being really elusive about the details, so I peeked into her thoughts. And what I saw… I didn’t understand.

  I picked up an image of a woman who glowed with immense power. She, too, had lavender eyes.

  “You’re reading my thoughts, aren’t you?”

  Anya had just spoken in my head. And then she pushed me from her mind. Just as with Omar and Ramai, her mind was now a blank. All I could sense was an emotion: irritation.

  I’d gone too far by prying into her private thoughts.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  She didn’t say a word.

  I settled back in my seat and concentrated on the road ahead. Soon I sensed another checkpoint coming over the next hill, and I picked up snatches of thoughts from the unseen men who lay in wait.

  “Anya, stop,” I said. “Pull over—now!”

  She slammed on the brakes. “What?”

  We’d stopped beside a field that had recently been plowed. I unbuckled my seatbelt. “Do you have a basket or anything I can carry dirt in?”

  Nate leaned forward from one of the rear seats. “What’s wrong?”

  I looked back and saw a small cardboard box of supplies. “Empty that thing and give it here.”

  Nate did as I asked.

  “What are you doing?” Anya asked. She was looking at me as if I’d lost my mind.

  I opened the door, stepped out, and started scooping soil into the box. When I was done, I got back into the car, the box of reddish-brown dirt on my lap, and ignored the curious stares. They all thought I was crazy. I just prayed my plan would work.

  I motioned for Anya to continue down the road, and with a shrug, she did.

  We crossed over the hill. The checkpoint lay directly ahead. Anya slowed and rolled down her window.

  A heavily armed militant looked suspiciously at our SUV and its occupants, and I sifted through his thoughts.

  “What is your purpose for coming to Izyum?” he asked Anya.

  Anya gave her well-rehearsed response. “My great-uncle Alexander has passed, and we are traveling north to attend his funeral.”

  Although this explanation had worked thus far, this militant looked unsatisfied. And in his mind I saw the text he’d gotten only an hour earlier.

  Предупреждение!

  Женщина сопровождение неверных, чтобы причинить неприятности.

  Держите их, пока не дойдем.

  I let my mind match the patterns with colors, then deciphered their meaning: Warning! A woman is escorting infidels to cause trouble. Detain them until we arrive.

  The soldier raised the muzzle of his AK-47. “Get out of the car!”

  Other soldiers emerged from their station and surrounded us.

  I leaned over Anya, holding out the box of dirt, and spoke in Chechen. “What is the meaning of this? Do you know who this woman is? She is the daughter of Sergei Tupalov. He personally asked me to bring soil from Chechnya so that his uncle Alexander’s burial can be capped with the soil of our home.”

  The man’s muzzle dropped just a bit, and uncertainty crossed his face. “Sergei Tupalov sent you?” He leaned closer to the car and studied the box.

  “Yes, of course.”

  One of the other soldiers yelled, “Vokkaco ʙoxurg dinam doxkovaʹlla vac.”

  He who obeys the elder will not regret it.

  I got the sense this was a common Chechen proverb.

  The militant with the rifle stepped back and gave us a bow. “You have my condolences for the death of a great man’s uncle. I wish I could escort you personally, but we are expecting trouble and none of us can leave our post.”

  The other men stepped aside, and Anya started forward once more.

  As we left the checkpoint behind us, Anya said, “Who the hell is Sergei Tupalov?”

  “He’s a Chechen leader. Many of these guys think of him as a national hero.”

  Nate asked, “How the hell did you know that?”

  I shrugged. “Just lucky, I guess.”

  As the rest of the team ate canned sausages with beans, I rummaged through the supplies and was surprised to find fresh eggs. Soon, fifty feet from some unnamed river west of a city called Kharkiv, I began putting together something I hadn’t made in what seemed like ages.

  Clean watched with interest as I lay out a sheet of cardboard and kneaded together the ingredients to what I hoped was going to be an authentic New York–style danish. Using a large can of vegetables, I rolled out the dough, folded it over, and rolled it flat again. My goal was to get some nice fluffy layers just like I’d been taught to when I’d worked in the Paryzers’ factory.

  Nate had picked some blueberries, and when I asked for some, he happily obliged. I sliced a section of dough, rolled it to the proper thickness, put the blueberries in the center, and sprinkled some sugar on top. I then folded over the dough, encapsulating the fruit, crimped the danish shut with my fingers, and put it on a metal tray. I repeated the process with the rest of the dough, then put the tray near the fire.

  Soon, a delicious aroma filled the air. That brought everyone over to admire the golden-brown pillows of baked goodness, some of which were leaking just a little of their purple contents.

  Using a pair of pliers, I lifted the tray from the fire and set it on the ground.

  “Those look amazing,” said Anya. “How’d you learn to make them?”

  “Sorry,” I said with a grin, “that’s Top Secret.”

  “Hey, look what I made,” Clean said, holding up a piece of metal. It looked like he’d cut apart a can and refolded it flat. “Since I’m the only one with a spatula, I get first dibs.”

  He scooped up one of the danishes onto a cardboard box top, then handed me the “spatula.” I smiled and served up the rest of the danishes. They gobbled them down, making moaning noises, but when I tasted it myself, I wasn’t impressed. It was good—but nothing like I remembered.

  Clean wrapped an arm around my shoulder. “Jeremiah, I’ll marry any woman you can teach to make that for me.” As I chuckled, he added, “Hey, I want to ask you something in private. Let’s go take a leak.”

  We rose and moved some distance away.

  “What do you know about this Anya chick?” Clean asked softly.

  I shrugged. “Not much. I saw her once at a party near Langley. That’s it. Why?”

  “She gives me the willies. There’s something not quite right about her.”

  “I figured you’d think she’s a hottie.”

  “Oh, she’s a hottie, that’s for damn sure. But those eyes… I swear, when she looks at me, I feel like she’s wondering if I taste better raw or medium-rare.”

  I laughed. “Clean, you’re nuts.”

  But he wasn’t amused. He pulled out a ragged metal file from his pocket. “Then explain this,” he said. “I took a whiz in the woods earlier, and I found her out there chewing on this. A metal file, Jeremiah. Later she went back to the car and stowed it under her seat.”

  I put my hand on Clean’s shoulder. “She’s different, I’ll grant you that. But I don’t think she’s trouble. I have a sense for these things. Besides, she’s trusted by the CIA, too. They wouldn’t set us up with a psycho.”

  “They set us up with you.” Clean frowned, not entirely convinced.

  I shrugged. “Put that file back where you found it. If the girl likes to chew on metal, I mean… that’s a little hot, isn’t it?”

  Clean frowned again, then smiled. It seemed that last argument carried some weight.

  “Yeah,” he said, “you’re right. It is kinda hot.”

  She’s Not What She Seems

  “What do you mean, non-lethal rounds?” Clean sputtered. “You ever get tagged by one of these? Sure, they might hurt, but they ain’t gonna stop one of those jihadi types or a crazy Russian.”

  We were several yards into the edge of a thick forest, minutes away from our destination. After the team had covered the vehicle with a tarp and covered the tarp with foliage, Anya had passed out gun magazines—with rubber bullets.

  “Hold your complaints—I’ll explain shortly,” Anya said.

  She passed each team member a suppressed MP5 submachine gun. It was surprisingly heavy for being so compact. Then she slipped a black miniskirt over her pants, which she proceeded to wriggle out of. I had no idea why she was changing clothes, but I didn’t mind getting a look at her shapely legs.

  Finally she turned to us. “The depot is supposed to contain a bunch of loose ordnance from the Cold War. Everything from plastic explosives, which are rumored to come out of here by the truckload, to huge quantities of black powder. I don’t need to tell you that one spark would be all we need to end this mission on a very sour note.”

  Clean frowned.

  “My informants tell me the bunker is guarded by no more than a dozen rebels,” Anya continued. “I’ll lead the way. They won’t be expecting someone like me to cause any trouble.” She wiggled her hips. “Little do they know, this kitten has claws.”

  Clean remained quiet as she turned and waved for us to follow. She noiselessly scampered up the tree-laden hill while the rest of the team marched along, making more sound than the phantom-like presence that led the way.

  As we crept uphill along a barely noticeable trail, I couldn’t help but admire Anya. I was pretty sure she could read minds: she certainly could project her voice into my head–which was something I had no idea how to do. Yet for someone who wasn’t physically intimidating, she had some real spunk. She couldn’t have weighed more than 120 pounds or so, yet she hadn’t been rattled when Clean, who was easily twice her size, confronted her. The girl gave off the same air of confidence as Amanda had, and that had certainly had its effect on the rest of the guys.

  I put on a burst of speed and tried to keep up with the mysterious girl.

  “…this kitten has claws.”

  Her quip echoed in my mind and it both worried and intrigued me.

  But now that we were heading into danger, I was just happy to have her on our side.

  “Trust me, I know what I’m doing,” Anya said. And before anyone could argue further, she moved ahead—onto the exposed downward slope of the hill overlooking the ravine that held our target.

  Clean blew out a breath. “I can’t believe that crazy girl is going there solo and I don’t even have a rifle to cover her with.”

  “I feel your frustration,” said Captain Richter, but HQ told us to follow her guidance. That said, if you see her get into a struggle, I don’t care what she says, you’ve got permission to take out whoever’s in the way.”

  Clean spit on the ground and pulled out his MP5. “I’d like to, Captain, but these slugs aren’t worth a damn beyond seventy-five feet.”

  “Then I guess if it comes to that, we’ll have to race down this damned hill like a bunch of maniacs to save her ass.”

  I pulled out a pair of binoculars and watched Anya’s descent, then panned my gaze to the storage depot. On the surface, it looked like a tiny military outpost illuminated by floodlights. But it was situated against a cliff face on the far side of the ravine, where it backed up against a vehicle-sized door leading underground. Two armed soldiers stood guard at that door.

  This whole situation had me unsettled. The trees around us were deathly quiet. No crickets chirping, no branches rustling. And when the back of my neck tingled, I knew something wasn’t right.

  “Sir,” I said, still watching through the binoculars, “Anya is now waving at the guards. She looks like she’s calling to them.”

  I extended my senses into the minds of the guards, and sensed their confusion. Nobody was supposed to be visiting this place.

  “Sir,” I said, “she’s about twenty feet away and they haven’t pulled their weapons yet.”

  Not yet, but I had a feeling they soon would be. One of the guards was busy admiring Anya, but the other one was suspicious—and fidgety.

  I bounced on the balls of my feet, wondering whether I should get ready to sprint to her rescue.

  I muttered aloud, my voice full of worry. “She’s within an arm’s length of them, and they’re talking.”

  “Oh man… this is gonna be a mess of trouble.” Nate fidgeted next to me.

  “She’s—”

  I stopped short. Anya had moved suddenly, touching both men on the shoulder, and as she did, a purple light flashed from her fingers. The two guards stiffened, then collapsed like rag dolls. Anya turned and waved for us to approach.

  “Report, Samuelson,” the captain barked.

 

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