The Oslo Affair (Shadows of War, #2) by CW Browning (read after .txt) 📗

slid the bolt home, then turned to cross the sitting room to a window overlooking the harbor. The lights of the palace glittered across the water and he sighed in contentment. It was a beautiful view, even if the palace itself was symbolic of everything decadent and corrupt in the West. After enjoying the view for a moment, he turned to switch on the lamp on the desk and froze.

“Good evening, Comrade Grigori,” Vladimir said calmly. He was seated in one of the armchairs with his legs crossed and his gloves laying across his knee. He’d unbuttoned his overcoat and looked completely at home. “You look well.”

“As do you, Comrade Lyakhov.” Grigori found his voice and began to remove his gloves. “I had no idea you were in Stockholm.”

Vladimir raised one eyebrow just a bit and a faint smile toyed with his lips.

“Didn’t you?” he asked, watching as Grigori tossed his gloves on the table and began removing his coat. “I’d have thought Comrade Yakov would have told you. You do know he’s here, yes?”

“Yes.” Grigori pulled off his coat and tossed it over the back of the love seat. “Please. Remove your coat and make yourself comfortable, my old friend. If you took the time to break into my room, you might as well take the time to remove your coat.”

Vladimir smiled and stood up to shrug out of the heavy garment.

“I’m afraid Yakov is getting sloppy in his aging years,” he said, carefully laying his coat over the back of his chair. “He’s not the ghost that he once was.”

Grigori shot him a glance under his brows and walked to a long console on the other side of the room where a bottle of schnapps sat with two glasses.

“No, he’s not,” he agreed. “When did you know he was there?”

“The first night in Oslo.” Vladimir seated himself again. “It wasn’t until the third night that I realized you were there as well.”

Grigori grunted and held up the bottle questioningly. “It’s not vodka, but it’s tolerable.”

“Thank you.”

He poured schnapps into both glasses and turned to carry them over to Vladimir, offering him a choice of glass. Vladimir took one and Grigori carried the other over to a chair and sat down.

“It wasn’t anything personal, you understand,” he said, sitting back.

“If I thought it was personal, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Vladimir replied dryly. “You would have disappeared in Norway.”

That drew a smile from the other man and he chuckled.

“You haven’t lost your fire, have you Vlad?”

Vladimir held up his glass. “I hope I never will.”

Grigori sipped his drink, then sighed and stretched his legs out. “Why are you here?”

Vladimir looked at him, surprised. “Why, to help you catch a traitor, of course.”

“And how do you propose to do that?”

“I don’t propose anything. I have done it already.”

Grigori frowned and stared hard at him. “What do you mean?”

“You were in Gamla Stan this morning,” Vladimir said, crossing his legs again and sitting back comfortably. “You saw him with your own eyes. Comrade Niva met with a British agent. Now, unless he was authorized to do so by Moscow, I believe that’s grounds for treason, don’t you?”

“You were there?” Grigori asked quickly. “How do you know this?”

Vladimir shrugged. “Because I, also, have been trying to find the traitor in our midst.”

“You?” Grigori scowled. “Impossible.”

The smile that crossed Vladimir’s face was chilling. “Is it?”

“I would have been informed.”

“Would you?”

Grigori stared at him for a long moment in silence, then sipped his drink. It was true that the left hand often did not know what the right was doing. It was like that in Moscow, especially when suspicion mounted within their own ranks. Vladimir could very well have been instructed to hunt for the traitor while he was going about his own work. Furthermore, Grigori would not be surprised to find that he had been told to observe Vladimir as a fail-safe.

“We have no way of knowing that Comrade Niva arranged that meeting today,” he said finally. “We only have the evidence that he was in the same tavern as a British agent. We didn’t see them talking, unless you were inside. Were you inside?”

Vladimir shook his head. “No. I was in the building across the street.”

“There. Then all we have is that Niva was in the same place as a British agent. It is enough to allocate more manpower to watch him, but not enough to bring him back to Moscow. However, it will make Moscow happy that progress has been made.”

Vladimir reached into his suit jacket and pulled a folded piece paper out of the pocket. Leaning forward, he tossed it onto the table between them.

“Take a look at that, and then tell me if you don’t have enough to bring him in.”

Grigori frowned and leaned forward to set his drink down and reach for the paper.

“I retrieved that before it could be destroyed,” Vladimir continued, sitting back in his chair again.

Grigori unfolded the paper and read the short, handwritten message, his face impassive.

Instruct agent to meet at Den Gyldene Freden in Gamla Stan at eleven o’clock.

“As you can see, it is handwritten. I believe you’ll find it matches Comrade Niva’s handwriting perfectly.”

“Where did you get this?” Grigori finally asked.

“Where the facilitator left it, in a trash receptacle across from the hotel where Niva is staying.”

“And the facilitator?”

“I never saw his face. He had his back to me. Niva passed him the paper in the street and continued into the hotel.” Vladimir shrugged. “I can tell you he is of medium height and was wearing a long, dark coat and a hat.”

“Which is unhelpful.”

“Precisely.”

Grigori folded the paper and slid it into his pocket.

“Do you know anything about this Englishwoman?” he asked. “Did you see her before this morning?”

Vladimir sipped his drink, his eyes resting on Grigori’s face thoughtfully.

“I would think you know more about her than I do at this point,” he said. “It’s unlike you not to observe an enemy agent when you have the chance.”

Grigori was surprised into