The Silent Sisters (Charles Jenkins #3)(55)

He’d lost a back tire.

They would not outrun anyone on three wheels.



Alexander Zhomov took aim at Maria Kulikova. He fired just after the old man had yanked the door closed. Zhomov stepped over Helge Kulikov and pulled on the door handle. The door rattled but did not open.

He walked back to the two bodies on the ground and wrapped Helge Kulikov’s hand around the pistol, a cheap and readily available weapon on Moscow’s black market. The fingerprint evidence would support that Kulikov had shot his wife’s lover, then turned the gun on himself. Documents within the FSB would confirm Helge had recently spoken to Sokalov of an FSB officer having an affair with his wife, and Helge’s desire for retribution.

Zhomov pulled his MP-443 Grach from its waistband holster at the small of his back as he moved around the side of the building, though with caution, uncertain if the old man who had saved Maria Kulikova was armed. When he reached the building corner, the only car in the parking lot lurched forward and spit gravel. He fired at the back window and heard it explode, then lowered his aim to the tires and gas tank, emptying the clip as the car pulled away.

He hurried back to his Mercedes, hidden in the forest, shouting at Sokalov to get in. “Do you know the old man in the bar?”

“No,” Sokalov said, rushing to the passenger seat as Zhomov slipped behind the wheel.

“We will know soon enough. I shot out the back tire. They will not get far.”

Zhomov threw the car into drive and sped to the double-lane road.



Kulikova sat up in the passenger seat and turned to the rear. Wind whistled in from the destroyed back window, and Jenkins could smell the burning rubber as the car thumped down the asphalt. “Chto s mashinoy?” she asked. What’s wrong with the car?

“On prostrelil zadneye koleso,” Jenkins said. He shot out a back tire. Then, “Ty govorish’ po-angliyski?” Do you speak English?

“Yes,” she said.

Jenkins pulled the mask from his face and tossed it in the back seat.

“Charles Jenkins.” Kulikova looked surprised, but Jenkins didn’t have time to explain.

“We won’t get far. The tire will come off and we’ll be on the rim. We can’t outrun them. I’m looking for a place to ditch the car and buy us some time. Our only choice is to hide in these woods.”

She looked out the windshield. “Turn,” she said. “Here, Mr. Jenkins. Turn!”

Jenkins did as she instructed, a hard right turn past signs for Moscow State University.

“You are well known by the FSB, Mr. Jenkins, particularly within the Counterintelligence Directorate. You have been put on a kill list.”

“So they tell me.”

“You are aware, then, that the president has begun a relentless campaign to find the seven sisters—a special division within the directorate with a singular purpose to find the remaining sisters. You should not have come back.”

“Too late for that.” Jenkins fought to control the steering wheel. The smell of burning rubber intensified. “Who got shot back there?”

“I believe one man worked within the FSB. The other was my husband, Helge.”

“I’m sorry,” Jenkins said. The woman stared out the windshield, intensely focused given her circumstances.

“Turn here,” she said. Jenkins drove onto the campus grounds, the car thumping and banging as they passed tall buildings and near-empty parking lots.

“The man doing the shooting, is he part of the group tasked with finding the seven sisters, Operation Herod?”

“No. That man is Alexander Zhomov, one of the most celebrated torpedoes in the history of the Kremlin.”

Jenkins knew the term meant “assassin.” “What is his involvement in this?” The car thumped as if he had driven over a speed bump, then it dropped. Sparks showered the road. “We’ve lost the tread. We’ve got to ditch the car now.”

“The parking lot.” She pointed to a lot in front of a multistory building, and they slowly rolled in. “Drive around to the back of the building.” Jenkins followed her directions, parking the car behind a blue garbage dumpster. “Hurry,” she said, pushing from the car.

“Where?” Jenkins said.

“We don’t have time for questions. Now it is my turn to lead and for you to follow. If you wish to live.”

Jenkins rushed to the back of the car and popped the trunk, nearly gagging on the intense smell of burning rubber. Heat radiated from the tire rim.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “We don’t have time.”

He opened the suitcase and pulled out a plastic ziplock bag in which he kept over-the-counter medicines like ibuprofen, aspirin, and cold medications and emptied the contents. Then he removed the false wall.

“Mr. Jenkins, we have to go. Now.”

Jenkins grabbed the passports, corresponding credit cards, rubles, and American dollars, crammed them into the plastic bag, zipped it closed, and shoved the bag into the interior pocket of his jacket.

“Go,” he said.

She hurried forward, behind the buildings, which Jenkins deduced to be dormitories and classrooms. He looked behind them for headlights. Trees lined the campus streets, which would help to hide them, but not for long. The sidewalks were vacant.

The woman crossed an inner courtyard surrounded by buildings and kept moving, as if she had a purpose.