Near Dark (Scot Harvath #19)(75)

Harvath was starting to get the impression that Simulik didn’t care for the United States and had probably felt this way for a long time. There were plenty of older people in the former Soviet satellites, as well as Russia itself, who still pined for the “good old days” of communism. Harvath was always tempted to ask them what they missed the most—the breadlines or the gulags.

Simulik could call what he was doing, assuring the “survival of Lithuania,” but the truth was that the only survival he was interested in was his own. Harvath figured that over a single lunch hour he could probably uncover enough banking irregularities to show that the VSD Director was dirty. He made a mental note to encourage Landsbergis to do just that. He might even rope in Nicholas. This guy needed to be ousted.

He was about to lay into him, when the man turned to vent his rage on his deputy in Lithuanian.

“You lied to me. You knew he was coming here to accuse me of this. You are actively conspiring with the Americans against your own country. This will not be allowed to stand. You are finished. Do you hear me? Finished.”

For Harvath’s benefit, Landsbergis addressed his boss in English. “You’re the one who is finished, Andriejus. You sided with the Russians and sold out an ally. That will not play well. Not with our government and not with our people.”

“And you contributed material support, Lithuanian support, to a rogue operation against the Russians, which they could use as a justification for war against us.”

“I say we take our arguments to the Parliament and let the chips fall where they may.”

“Thankfully, that is not going to be necessary,” said a new voice in the room.

Harvath and Landsbergis spun to see a man with jet-black hair and a perfectly pruned Vandyke standing in the doorway.

Sergei Guryev had joined the conversation.





CHAPTER 35


With Guryev was the aforementioned red-bearded thug Kovalyov, as well as the other two goons who had presumably held Luk?a down while he was being tortured. All of them had weapons, and all of their weapons were pointed at Harvath and Landsbergis.

“Hands,” said the Russian, in perfect English. “Let me see those hands. Nice and high.”

Harvath and Landsbergis did as he commanded while his men streamed into the room and disarmed them.

“You took your time getting here,” Simulik complained.

“Quiet, Andriejus,” Guryev shot back. “Don’t forget, you work for me—not the other way around.”

Harvath was glad to have the confirmation, but it came with a downside. Admitting that the VSD Director worked for them meant that Guryev and his crew weren’t about to let him go.

If anything, they were going to take him back to Russia and finish the job that had been started before he had escaped. Unless, of course, he was worth more to them dead than alive. If that was the case, he could be seconds away from being executed.

“I cannot tell you what a strange and unexpected pleasure this is,” Guryev said, turning his attention to Harvath. “You killed several friends of mine back in Russia. I am looking forward to returning the favor.”

“I killed a lot of Russians while I was there,” he replied. “So you’ll forgive me if I don’t remember them.”

“Americans—always making jokes.”

“I wasn’t joking.”

Harvath knew he was in trouble and shouldn’t have been kicking the hornet’s nest.

His opponents were not typical Russian muscle—the sides of beef normally seen rolling with Moscow gangsters. He could tell by their eyes that these men were not only intelligent, but also switched on. They were probably ex-military, possibly even ex–Special Forces operatives, Spetsnaz.

He needed to come up with a way out of this. Quickly. Think, he exhorted himself.

Scanning the room, he looked for any advantage. He and Landsbergis had been positioned up against the wall—there was no cover or concealment. There were, though, multiple items he could turn into weapons.

From the highly polished pair of scissors or the brass inkwell on the desk, to the martini pitcher and nickel-plated cocktail picks behind it, his choices were broad. The challenge was getting to just one of them without being riddled with bullets. What he needed was a distraction.

But when Guryev next spoke, he realized that wasn’t going to happen. “My President wants you dead or alive. He prefers alive, of course, because you killed his son and he’d like the pleasure of killing you himself.

“Escaping from Russia, as I said, you killed several of my friends. These men were highly skilled, which tells me I need to be very careful with you. So, while I’d like to deliver you to my President alive, I think dead is a much safer option.”

Harvath smiled. “Then you’re even more arrogant than Director Simulik.”

The Russian smiled back. “That’s a very high bar. You’ll forgive me if I disagree.”

“If your President had wanted me dead, he could have killed me when he murdered my wife and my colleagues. Instead, he brought me all the way to Russia. Why do you think that was?”

“I cannot possibly know the President’s mind.”

“Exactly. Which is why you’d be a fool to assume you can now.”

Guryev’s smile broadened. “Does banter like this normally work for you, Mr. Harvath?”