Objekt 825 (Tracie Tanner Thrillers Book 9) by Allan Leverone (year 7 reading list txt) 📗

side, making it an uncomfortable perch. Still, it was marginally better than having to stand for hours at a time in order to conduct her surveillance. Thanks to the height of the now-nonexistent windows, that would have been Tracie’s only option absent the desk.

For the remainder of the morning and into early afternoon, she kept eyes on the admin building and surrounding area. A sentry’s post similar in size and design to the one she’d snuck past on the outskirts of Objekt 825 had been constructed at the east side of the parking lot, closest the building.

Since she began her surveillance, everyone entering the office complex, without fail, had checked in with the armed guard inside the sentry’s post. They’d displayed what Tracie assumed to be identification badges before being waved on. Based on what she’d seen, sneaking past the guard would be virtually impossible, as the length of walkway between the parking lot and the building’s entrance offered nothing in the way of cover.

That’s a problem, she thought, flexing her right foot absently. The concussion and severe gash to the side of her head weren’t the only injuries she’d suffered last month during her desperate attempt to stop the radicals bent on detonating a Russian tactical nuclear device. She’d also sprained her ankle badly.

That particular injury had been healing nicely in the time since, but all the hiking she’d done to get to this point, most of it through loose, sandy terrain, had come at a price. Now the joint throbbed painfully. It was nothing more than an annoyance—so far—but Tracie feared that if she were forced to run, her weakened ankle might not hold up to the strain.

Inside the canvas equipment bag she’d worked so hard to carry were some protein bars and water bottles, and Tracie munched on one of the bars without taking her eyes off the building. She considered whether it would be worth the effort of changing locations tonight under cover of darkness, trying to find a spot behind the complex from which she could observe it and maybe locate a second access point, one not quite so well-protected.

But that possibility seemed unlikely in the extreme, and not just because it would make no sense for the Soviets to post an armed guard outside one entrance while leaving a second unprotected. The administration building seemed to have been built almost flush against the side of the steep hill covering the operational portion of the submarine base.

Tracie doubted there was even enough room for a rear entrance.

She was considering alternative methods of entry—there didn’t seem to be many—when a Volga motored down the road from the direction of Sevastopol, moving quickly, and then entered the lot. Over the course of the morning, multiple automobiles had come and gone, and Tracie paid particular attention to each, hoping to learn whatever she could about the facility from every new arrival.

The car nosed into a parking space and a large man climbed out.

A man wearing a suit.

A man with long silver hair, reaching almost to his shoulders.

And he was holding an object in his arms roughly the size and dimensions of a shoebox, if the man buying the shoes wore about a size 21.

Lukashenko, Tracie thought. I’ll be damned, Stallings, you’re right again.

She knew she should long ago have ceased being amazed by the insight and sheer intelligence savvy of the wily old CIA Director, but at times like this he almost seemed to have a sixth sense. He’d known exactly where to send Tracie, and been right on the money as to when The Weasel would show up.

She shook her head and smiled, and waited to see what would happen next.

She didn’t have to wait long.

Before Lukashenko had made it halfway to the sentry’s post, a man exited the administration building at a fast walk and hurried to meet him. Tracie guessed the man was in his mid-fifties, and was dressed in a Soviet naval uniform. From a distance she couldn’t be positive of the man’s rank, even with the binoculars, but her most likely guess was captain.

Which made him most likely the base commander.

Well, aren’t you important for a Weasel, Comrade Lukashenko, she thought as she watched the officer stride past the guard shack without a glance in the sentry’s direction. The officer extended his hand and Lukashenko pumped it vigorously, a wide smile creasing his face.

Tracie thought about Aaron Stallings’ description of the cold-blooded killer as salesman-like when he wanted to be, and it looked like that description was spot-on.

The two men stood in the parking lot and appeared to be chatting amiably. Then the base commander—as Tracie was by now almost certain that’s who he was—gestured toward the admin building like the lord of the manor greeting his dinner guests.

Lukashenko nodded, and as they moved across the parking lot, the base commander veered toward one of the parked vehicles. He shrugged out of his uniform coat and tossed it onto the passenger’s seat before continuing toward the office complex.

The two men strolled past the guard shack without Lukashenko or the commander showing any identification—first time that’s happened today, Tracie noted—and a moment later they disappeared inside the building.

And the first tiny seeds of a plan began growing inside Tracie’s mind.

18

 

June 24, 1988

2:00 p.m.

Objekt 825

 

“Welcome to Objekt 825,” the commander said as he extended his hand. “I am Aleksander Morozov.”

Andrei shook it firmly while introducing himself. He had committed Morozov’s name to memory immediately upon receiving this delivery assignment from his handler, although he saw no need to mention that fact to the commander.

The most enjoyable part of his job was convincing—or better yet, forcing—men and women to share state secrets and commit treasonous acts against their countries, but that great pleasure accounted for but a small percentage of his time