Page 15 of Denied Access (Mitch Rapp #24)

That said, even Rapp knew the name Ohlmeyer had just rhetorically tossed onto the table.

The damage done by Alexander Hughes rivaled the havoc wrought by Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, the American husband-and-wife spy team who provided the Soviet Union with the means to construct their first atomic bomb.

While Hughes hadn’t upended the world’s nuclear strategic balance, his espionage had hamstrung British and American intelligence efforts for a generation.

Hughes had been a CIA officer assigned to the Berlin Operations Base, the most important intelligence posting during the Cold War.

Hughes had used his access to funnel sensitive information to the Stasi and the KGB.

Information responsible for decimating American and British espionage efforts in East Germany and the Soviet Union.

The total butcher’s bill was difficult to calculate, but even conservative estimates put the number of executed Russian CIA agents at close to a dozen.

To make matters worse, Hughes was able to escape to East Germany before his espionage was discovered.

He accepted a job with the Stasi, then thwarted justice a second time by fleeing to Moscow after the Berlin Wall fell.

Once in Moscow, he resumed his espionage activities against the United States, this time in the KGB’s employ.

Alexander Hughes was definitely a man who needed killing.

But was Rapp the person to pull the trigger?

“My taskings come from my handler,” Rapp said, “not you or anyone else. Unless you’d care to explain exactly what this has to do with Greta, I’m leaving.”

Rapp got to his feet.

The lone bodyguard moved closer.

Rapp locked gazes with him and the man stutter-stepped.

It was apparently not lost on the guard that the same Beretta that had been pointing at him through his sedan’s windshield was still holstered at the small of Rapp’s back.

Rapp felt a bit of sympathy for his fellow shooter, but only a bit.

To paraphrase another Hurleyism, people who played stupid games won stupid prizes.

“Two days ago, a message arrived at the doorstep of my house in Zurich. An unmistakable message.”

Rapp remained standing, but he changed his focus from the bodyguard to Ohlmeyer. “I’m listening.”

“An intricately wrapped gift box like the sort you might receive from a designer store. My wife, Elsa, is fond of such stores and I am well acquainted with their appearance.”

“Did Elsa open the box?”

Ohlmeyer shook his head. “Thankfully not. I saw it first and something made me pull on the scarlet ribbon tied in a bow across the top. Maybe it was curiosity or the compelling nature of a length of satin just waiting for a tug. Or perhaps it was the dregs of the intuition that kept me alive during my early days in East Germany. You’re too new to know this just yet, but once that instinct has been awakened it never fully goes to sleep. ”

Rapp was indeed relatively new at this game, but he was not new to killing. Stan and Irene had kept him busy. Very busy. And while Rapp wasn’t the type to keep notches on his Beretta’s pistol grip, Hurley had once let slip that Rapp was the most successful graduate of the Orion program to date.

Men in Stan’s line of work only measured success one way.

“The box,” Rapp said, not bothering to hide his exasperation. “What was in it?”

Ohlmeyer held eye contact with Rapp for a beat before looking at a point somewhere over his shoulder. The banker’s facial muscles contracted, pulling his still-handsome features into a mask of rage. “Two things. An old friend’s head and a piece of stationery.”

“What was on the paper?”

“A handwritten message and a series of numbers. The message said that the next box I received would hold the head of someone who was even dearer to me.”

“Greta,” Rapp said.

Ohlmeyer nodded.

Rapp processed that scene in his mind’s eye.

Hollywood had done its part to desensitize the average moviegoer to violence, but there was something horribly effective about presenting an adversary with a companion’s head.

Perhaps that was because, setting the visceral nature of the act aside, it was the ultimate degradation of a person.

A separation of their most recognizable feature—their head—from the body that had kept them alive.

It forced a victim’s friends and family to associate a final image with pieces of a whole rather than the personage.

“Who was the victim?” Rapp said.

“Someone who began as an adversary before becoming a compatriot, and finally, a friend. The head in the box belonged to Felix Bauer. We first met on the Cold War’s battlefield.”

“He was Stasi?”

Ohlmeyer nodded, a slow, ponderous movement as if the weight of his head had suddenly grown too heavy for his neck to bear.

“After a fashion. It’s more accurate to say that he was my counterpart for the Stasi.

An East German banker who facilitated the East German intelligence service’s operations against the West. Over time, he became disenchanted with the communists and their Soviet puppet masters. ”

“So he defected?”

Another nod. “He escaped to West Berlin and brought with him a treasure trove of information in the form of financial documents and other insights into how the Stasi and KGB were operating.”

“And you think Alexander Hughes had him killed? Why?”

Ohlmeyer shrugged. “As to your first question, most certainly. The series of numbers annotated to the stationery corresponded to an offshore bank account. Or to be more accurate, a former offshore bank account. The account that held the not-inconsiderable funds the Stasi and KGB had jointly deposited in exchange for the classified information Hughes passed to them.”

Rapp was beginning to understand where this was headed. “I take it Mr. Hughes was never able to access these funds?”

“Correct. Felix Bauer brought the account information with him when he defected, and I used it to drain his funds. To put it mildly, Hughes was not happy.”

A hiss originating from across the room became a gurgle as the steward added a final mug of steaming brew to the trio resting on the gilded, silver tray. Apparently, Ohlmeyer was expecting a quartet of visitors.

“How much did Hughes lose?” Rapp said.

“The current value of that account would be somewhere in the neighborhood of five million US dollars. Hughes was a shrewd investor.”

Rapp sucked in a breath. Five million dollars was certainly reason enough to carry a grudge, but something else about this entire affair didn’t make sense. “But that was what, ten years ago? Why would Hughes suddenly start settling old scores now?”

“I do not know. I was rather hoping you would put that question to him.”

“What about Greta?” Rapp said. “How does she play into this?”

Ohlmeyer shrugged. “I haven’t the slightest idea. She’s important to me; maybe that is reason enough for Hughes to target her. Either way, a credible threat has been made against her life, so I’ve taken steps to protect her. She’s being moved into hiding as we speak.”

Rapp didn’t respond, but judging by Ohlmeyer’s reaction, the set of his jaw still said plenty.

“Let me explain,” Ohlmeyer said, holding up a liver-spotted hand. “I did this not as leverage against you but as protection from you.”

Rapp leaned toward the banker. “If you think I’d ever—”

“I don’t. At least not intentionally. But you have been in this business long enough to know that the notion that someone can hold out indefinitely against torture is rubbish.

Make no mistake, the task I’ve laid at your feet is not insignificant.

The odds of you making it into Moscow, interrogating and killing Hughes, and then escaping undetected are not great.

I’m asking you to do this because I believe the risks are worth the reward, but I didn’t live to old age by placing my fate in the hands of chance.

I’m prepared to weather the storm if you’re captured and must give up what you know about me. My granddaughter is not.”

Rapp slowly leaned back in his chair. While he still thought what Ohlmeyer had done was underhanded, he understood the banker’s reasoning.

He might have suggested something similar to insulate Greta had Ohlmeyer bothered to consult him.

Then again, he hadn’t exactly consulted Ohlmeyer before he’d begun to date his granddaughter.

“You understand,” Ohlmeyer said.

The banker’s words were phrased as a statement rather than question. Rapp’s role as a clandestine operative necessitated subterfuge and he normally prided himself on his ability to mask his emotions.

Normally.

When the subject matter was Greta Ohlmeyer, the word normal no longer applied.

“Who else are you asking for help?” Rapp said, gesturing toward the silver tray laden with coffee cups. Ohlmeyer smiled.

“I’m glad thoughts of my granddaughter haven’t completely blunted your instincts.

I don’t believe in playing fair. You are my best option to unravel this plot, but I would not trust Greta’s life to a single man.

And before you ask, no, I will not tell you anything about the people I’m about to meet any more than I will discuss you with them.

Now, I’m afraid the time for choosing is upon you, Mr. Rapp. Will you help my granddaughter?”

In the year or so since Rapp had graduated from Hurley’s version of the Farm and begun to work operationally, he’d learned a great deal about himself and his enemies.

He’d also discovered quite a few things about his supposed allies.

He trusted Irene Kennedy, and Stan Hurley had begun to grow on him, but the job gone wrong in Paris had only reinforced something he’d instinctively known from the beginning of his clandestine career—there was just one person on whom he could completely rely.

Himself.

Technically, Rapp shouldn’t be agreeing to undertake an operation without permission from Kennedy or Hurley.

Technically.

His final set of instructions from Hurley came to mind.

At the time he’d issued them, Hurley had been driving Rapp away from a Paris hotel in which Rapp had just killed four men, one of whom happened to be a French intelligence officer and another the presumptive director of the CIA.

That the American, Paul Cooke, was a traitor and had been plotting with the others to kill Rapp made the choice to engage in the unsanctioned assassinations a no-brainer, but Hurley had known that the deaths would hit the international press with the subtlety of a nuclear blast.

Accordingly, Stan’s final instructions had been both simple and unambiguous.

Lie low for a while.

To Rapp’s way of thinking, this meant that he was off the government clock until such time as Hurley, or more likely Kennedy, rescinded those instructions.

While Stan had been direct from the standpoint that he expected Rapp to remain off the grid, he hadn’t specified what Mitch should do during his vacation.

Or what he shouldn’t do.

With this in mind, if he decided to take a sightseeing trip to Moscow and drop in on Alexander Hughes, Rapp couldn’t imagine that Hurley would object.

Actually, he could very much imagine Stan objecting.

Loudly.

But what Hurley, Kennedy, or even Thomas Stansfield would think of his choices didn’t much matter to Rapp.

This wasn’t about spies, national secrets, or old grudges.

Greta had been there for him when he was at his most vulnerable.

If someone was foolish enough to threaten the woman he loved, he intended to help them see the error of their ways.

Permanently.

Rapp turned from the tray of coffee mugs to Ohlmeyer’s expectant blue eyes. “I’m in.”

“Excellent. First-class tickets on Emirates airline to Moscow are waiting for you at the airport. I took the liberty of purchasing them under your French legend. I’m certain you and Mr. Hughes will have a productive conversation and that you’ll be reunited with my granddaughter in no time.”

Rapp wasn’t so sure.