Page 115 of Denied Access
Asymmetrical eyes.
CHAPTER 67
AFTERyou.”
If walking through the metal detector had made him anxious, preceding Ilya Lebedev into the elevator was enough to make Rapp want to claw his eyes out. He complied with the instructions anyway. His Hezbollah financier persona would not have known who the Russian assassin was and would have had no reason to feel uneasy. Also, Lebedev had spoken in Arabic so there could be no misunderstanding.
Perfect Arabic.
Stan Hurley was a cocky son of a bitch who disparaged a whole lot more than he praised, but even Hurley held a grudging respect for the Russians. Stansfield took things a step further. He’d once told Rapp that Americans too often characterized Russian intelligence officers as thugs and this arrogance could be deadly. The Russians were better at the espionage game from a fieldcraft perspective and possessed linguistic capabilities often lacking in their counterparts.
Apparently, these capabilities also applied to their Vympel assassins.
“Have you ever been to the Lubyanka before?”
Rapp eyed Lebedev as he decided how to respond.
If he’d had any doubts about the man’s identity earlier, they were now gone. Up close, he could better see the resemblance between the man standing before him and the photo from Lebedev’s personnel file. His cropped hair was now graying at the temples and his features were more weathered. Rapp had put the man in the picture as in his early twenties, but this version of Lebedev was closer to forty. Still, the clefted chin and crooked nose remained the same. As did his eyes. His right one appeared to be open wide in surprise, while the left looked sleepy in comparison.
This was the man who’d murdered Greta’s grandparents.
“Of course not,” Rapp said.
“That’s strange. You look familiar.”
“We Arabs all look the same.”
He’d hoped the scorn he’d heaped onto his reply might discourage further attempts at conversation.
It did not.
“This building has a long and bloody history. Countless political prisoners were brought here. Many never left. The prisons once housed in the basement have been closed, but some of the features used to disorient detainees remain. Would you like to see one of them?”
“No. I would like to conduct my meeting with Lieutenant General Petrov and then leave your cold, Allah-forsaken country.”
Rapp had delivered his remarks with the intention of prompting a reaction from the Russian. In this he succeeded, but it wasn’t the one he’d imagined. The Russian’s bellowing laugh filled the elevator’s tight confines.
“You are an interesting man. It takes courage to insult my country to my face. Courage or perhaps madness. Are you sure we’ve never met?”
Tendrils of uneasiness snaked from Rapp’s stomach. Lebedev certainly could have marked him in the same instant he’d made the Russian, but the human mind tended to see what it expected. There was no reason for Lebedev to associate the Hezbollah financier standing nextto him with a man he’d glimpsed for a fraction of a second back in Switzerland. At least for an ordinary person there would be no reason.
Assassins were not ordinary people.
When Rapp remained silent, the Russian shrugged. “No matter. I’ll show you anyway.” Without breaking eye contact, the Russian tapped a button adjacent to the lit one indicating which floor the elevator was traveling to. Rapp couldn’t read the Cyrillic adjacent to the button, but he assumed it served an administrative function like closing or holding open the elevator’s door.
The elevator shuddered to a halt.
Then the opposite wall slid open.
“Isolating the detainees was of paramount importance,” Lebedev said. “Special alcoves were built into the prison’s hallways so that guards could push detainees into them at a moment’s notice to shield them from other people. Flashing lights mounted to the walls illuminated every time a prisoner was transported from their cells. Even the elevators were carefully designed to prevent occupants from gaining a sense of where in the building they were being held. Half floors like this allowed guards to seclude prisoners from the building’s population and ensure they never saw a random human face. Once a prisoner entered this building, time and space ceased to exist.”
Stale, cool air flowed into the elevator.
Meeting Lebedev had not been part of the plan. Rapp was sharing a cramped elevator with the man who murdered the grandparents of the woman he loved. A man who was taking perverse pleasure in detailing the dark building’s gruesome history. The assassin seemed determined to provoke a response.
Rapp obliged.
“Is this supposed to impress me?” Rapp said. “A dirty building that was once a prison? Have you ever been to Lebanon? This place and all its sordid history could not hold a candle to the killing houses back home. Once-beautiful structures now filled with shit, blood, and corpses stacked from floor to ceiling. If you’ve never visited Martyrs’Square in Beirut, you have no real concept of suffering or death. Now be a good dog and take me to Petrov. He and I have business.”
