Page 91 of Dangerous Secrets

They were speaking softly, calmly.

“They’re talking about books,” Alexei’s voice sounded clear as a bell in his ears. “Nothing important. Worontzoff just made a joke about Arabs being late. Used a term for Arab that is very politically incorrect.”

It was almost completely dark, which helped their concealment. The floodlights were on a timer, which hadn’t been changed since summer. They would be turned on in an hour. In an hour and a half, Charity would be safely out of the way and everyone in the mansion would be in restraints. Or dead. Nick didn’t much care either way, as long as Charity was safe.

Nick and Di Stefano held their position, barely breathing. Every once in a while Alexei would give them the gist of the conversation going on in the study.

With a loud clanking sound, the big front gates started opening, exactly in time for a black Mercedes with tinted windows to pass through them and drive up to the front steps without slowing down. An act of pure arrogance.

Two men got out, the driver and a passenger. Nick stared hard at the man who emerged from the passenger side. He’d studied the fucker’s file until it was burned into his brain.

He looked older than the pictures in the file, thinner. There’d been some plastic surgery done. The nose was narrower, cheekbones higher. His hair was pewter gray instead of midnight black.

But Nick would recognize him anywhere.

Omar Al-Hammad, the man who’d masterminded the attack on Paris, once Osama bin Laden’s right-hand man, now head of a terror franchise all his own.

Di Stefano clicked once on his lip mike. Nick could almost feel the tension of the invisible team.

He watched Al-Hammad climb the big granite stairs, the driver right behind him, carrying a large suitcase. Big, beefy guy. Clearly a body-guard doubling as driver.

A few minutes later, they were walking into the study and Nick and Di Stefano bent over the small screen, watching as if lives depended on it. Which they did.

Vassily gotup to greet the Arab. Luckily, there would be no niceties, no pretense at social politeness. This was a business transaction between two men and two organizations that wantednothing to do with each other, besides exchanging money for a commodity.

This suited him. The quicker this was over with, the faster he could be with Katya. He felt her presence very strongly, even if she hadn’t arrived yet.

There was power in this room, great power. In the hidden history of the world, what happened tonight in this small town in northern Vermont would change the course of human affairs. Vassily felt that fate had deemed that he should live, though he should have died a thousand times over in Kolyma. A powerful force had led him to this point, and to his reclaiming of his lost love.

From this day forward, there would be no more pretence. He and Katya would be reunited and rich and powerful. No one would ever—could ever—harm them, ever again.

Nick and Di Stefanowatched it all on the small screen. Worontzoff limping across the study to greet al-Hammad, whose bodyguard was wheeling in a large suitcase. Worontzoff stopped right in front of him and gave a brief nod.

Nobody offered to shake hands.

Al-Hammad was followed by his bodyguard. The man was carrying. The bulge under his left armpit was clear. Nick could only imagine that Worontzoff’s bodyguard, Ilya, was also carrying. It was entirely possible that if Worontzoff had tried to have al-Hammad disarmed, a firefight would break out. Both Ilya and the bodyguard looked tough and proficient.

Mutual assured destruction. It worked. For fifty years it kept the US and the Soviet Union from bombing each other into oblivion.

There were six men in the room. Worontzoff, al-Hammad, his bodyguard, the courier, Arkady, and Ilya.

“I don’t think we need to waste time,” Worontzoff said and al-Hammad nodded. “You go first.”

Al-Hammad looked at his bodyguard. The big man lifted the huge suitcase on to Worontzoff’s desk and opened it. It was filled with bricks of dollars. Everyone in the room froze.

Hell, even Nick and Di Stefano froze.

The camera was at floor level, but the suitcase was so packed with money, it overflowed. The big bodyguard picked up one banded brick and rifled through it. Nick could clearly see Benjamin Franklin’s likeness. One-hundred dollar bill denominations. Nick tried to think how much money could possibly be contained in that big suitcase. Millions and millions.

“Twenty million dollars,” al-Hammad said, his voice tinny in Nick’s earbud. Well, that answered that question. “What does it buy me?”

Worontzoff nodded and the man called Arkady walked over to a large container. It had a complicated closure system, but finally he opened it and lifted the lid.

He stepped back and gestured with his arm at the contents. “A canister with one hundred kilos of cesium 137. Given the temperature, it is currently in a liquid state. There is enough cesium in this canister for one huge dirty bomb or several smaller ones. You can irradiate central Manhattan, say the Wall Street district, or several military bases, as you please. We have more than one hundred other canisters, ready for shipment.”

A wintry smile creased al-Hammad’s lips. “Excellent.”

Nick and Di Stefano exchanged grim, startled looks. This was way worse than Nick’s worst imaginings. Thank God they were here and were going to stop the transaction. The mere idea that one hundred canisters of cesium 137 were back in Russia, waiting for shipment to terrorists, was terrifying.

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