Chapter 36 - The Baltimore Shadow
Four hours later, the blizzard had swept eastward, turning the industrial shoreline of Baltimore into a graveyard of rusted shipping containers, decaying cranes, and freezing grey fog.
We had commandeered Henderson’s backup operational vehicle—a sterile, unmarked black Ford F-250 hidden in a staging barn two miles from the bridge. Inside the glove compartment were three foreign passports, eighty thousand dollars in untraceable cash, and an SVR tactical tactical transponder with direct access to Pier 14.
My mother sat in the passenger seat of the truck, clutching Clara against her chest inside a heated shipping terminal office I had temporarily breached and secured with deadbolts. Clara was sleeping fitfully, her bandaged arm resting on a pile of wool blankets.
"You can't go in there alone, Maya," my mother said, gripping my forearm with surprising strength. "Richard won't be alone. If Moscow sent an extraction team to maritime waters, they’ve deployed an amphibious Spetsnaz unit. They will kill you before you get within fifty yards of the slipway."
"He had a second device in her, Mom," I said, my voice dead, hollowed out by an icy fury that chilled me more than the freezing rain outside. "What did he put inside my daughter?"
My mother looked down at Clara, her lower lip trembling. "When Clara was four... before the arm fracture... Richard took her to an ENT specialist for chronic ear infections. He said she needed synthetic tympanic grommets to prevent hearing loss."
I closed my eyes. The room seemed to tilt.
"A biological auditory bug," I whispered. "Every word I’ve spoken in my own home for the last three years... every classified phone call I took in my private study while holding my daughter... they heard it all."
"Richard isn't just a courier, Maya," my mother whispered. "He’s the primary recording device. And now he’s trading those audio archives for a new face and a billion rubles in an offshore account."
I checked the magazine of my stolen HK416 assault rifle, racking a round into the chamber with a crisp, metallic clatter. I strapped two extra magazines to my combat belt, slipped a suppressed tactical pistol into my thigh holster, and adjusted my night-vision goggles over my helmet.
"Stay here," I commanded. "If I am not back by 0400 hours, you take that truck, drive directly to the front gate of Fort Meade, ram the barricade, and show them that brass key. Do not talk to the guards. Do not talk to the FBI. Demand an immediate closed-door audience with the Director of Naval Intelligence."
"Maya..."
May you like
"He hurt my baby, Mom," I said, stepping toward the heavy steel exit door. "And now he’s going to pay the bill."
***
