Top Secret Twenty-One (24 page)

“Vlatko wanted the van.”

“And the identity. If you don’t have a stooge to bring airborne poison into a building, you might come in as an HVAC tech. I’m sure Vlatko learned from Rangeman. He’ll be smarter if he attempts to use the polonium again.”

“Are you going to call this in to the police?”

“I’ll have someone make an anonymous call from a phone card. I don’t want to be involved.”

We walked the short distance to the Porsche, Ranger made a U-turn back to Dr. Martin Luther King Boulevard, and we headed for the beach.

“The trade show is at the Roland Atlantic Hotel,” Ranger said. “It gets a lot of the smaller conventions. There are seven hundred attending this one. Approximately half are from overseas. There’s a large bloc from Eastern Europe. I combed through the registration list and came up with several possible targets for Vlatko. He could also be here to take out someone who looks benign but is secretly an enemy of the state.”

“The eye patch puts him at a disadvantage,” I said. “There
aren’t a lot of men walking around who look like they’re seventeen and only have one eye. I doubt the woman in the consulate would have remembered him if he hadn’t had the eye patch. Maybe you should be working with the police to find him.”

“If the police arrest him he’s inaccessible to me,” Ranger said, “and I don’t trust the system to permanently lock him away. It will be hard to tie him to the Rangeman incident, since the only witness is dead. If they catch him with the polonium he could be charged as a terrorist, especially if I testify against him. For obvious reasons, I’d prefer not to do that. I’d rather not have my black ops history made public. If they suspect him of murdering Volkov but can’t prove it, he’ll have his visa revoked and he’ll come back under a new identity to kill me and everyone associated with me.”

“So we’re on our own.”

“More or less. I have an FBI contact I trust. He’ll be working with me. And I have Rangeman.”

THE ROLAND ATLANTIC
was toward the end of the vast Atlantic City boardwalk. It was an older hotel that had been expanded, given a fresh coat of badly applied stucco, and painted to resemble a birthday cake. The interior décor was also birthday cake with a splash of Easter basket.

Ranger parked in the ten-tier garage that was attached to the hotel by a pedestrian bridge on the third floor and a covered walkway going directly into the ground-floor casino. He called Jose and Rodriguez and told them to find him in the garage. Minutes later, they parked beside him. Jose and Rodriguez stayed in the garage, and Ranger and I took the elevator and entered the hotel directly into the casino. It was almost noon on a Monday, and the gaming area was packed. Most of the people were senior citizens. More women than men. The younger crowd would come out at night.

The noise from the slots was deafening, the flashing lights were seizure-inducing, and the amount of fat ass hanging over the chairs attached to the slot machines was horrifying. Because smoking was now prohibited, the overriding smell was that of whiskey slopped onto the Pepto-Bismol pink, Gulden’s mustard gold, and poison green carpet.

“Unzipping that body bag didn’t bother me,” Ranger said, “but I’m going to have nightmares over this casino.”

“What are we looking for?”

“Nothing special. I wanted to see the space.”

We moved from the slots to the tables, mentally cataloging exits, making note of the bars and dining areas. We took the escalator to the second-floor lobby. Check-in desk. Concierge station. More slots. Another bar. A restaurant advertising an all-day breakfast buffet and Bingo. The ballroom, conference meeting rooms, and a pedestrian bridge to the conference center were on the mezzanine level. The ballroom was empty of people but filled with round tables and chairs. It was set for a wedding party. White tablecloths with huge pink bows and pink and white artificial flower centerpieces, a two-foot riser with a long decorated table for the bridal party, a smaller round table next to the riser. The smaller table supported a massive wedding cake that was being cooled by a standing fan.

“This is so romantic,” I said to Ranger. “Does it give you ideas?”

He wrapped an arm around me, dragged me close against him, and kissed me on the forehead. “Yes, it gives me ideas, but not about marriage. Mostly about setting fire to this atrocity.”

“It’s not that bad. It’s sort of growing on me.”

What was really growing on me was hunger. I hadn’t had any lunch, and I was ready to kill for a chunk of the wedding cake.

“I want to see the meeting rooms and the conference center,” Ranger said. “And then we need to look at the mechanicals.”

“I’m thinking what we need is the all-day breakfast buffet.”

Ranger glanced at his watch. “You have thirty minutes.”

I went for the good stuff first. Waffles, bacon, sausage, home fries, scrambled eggs, slices of ham, and a sticky bun. Ranger went with fresh fruit and a whole-wheat bagel with smoked salmon.

I cleaned my plate and pushed back from the table.

“You still have ten minutes,” Ranger said.

“I’m stuffed. I can’t eat any more.”

“Then let’s move. I have a lot of ground to cover.”

I tagged after Ranger, up the escalator to the mezzanine. He looked in every meeting room and crossed the bridge to the convention center.

“Why do we need to see all this?” I asked him.

“The trade show opens tomorrow at eight o’clock and ends Thursday at five o’clock. We think Vlatko is going to attempt to kill someone at the trade show. My best chance to catch Vlatko will be when he’s in this building occupied with his assignment. I have blueprints of the building, but I need to see some of the public area for myself.”

“This is a big building. How are you going to find him if he’s in an air duct somewhere?”

“Assassins only crawl around in air ducts in the movies. He’d be making a lot of noise and he wouldn’t fit. And after he dropped the polonium, there’d be the risk of self-contamination if he couldn’t get out fast enough. He’s going to use his disguise to get into a room or to gain access to the air handler that services the room. That’s assuming he’s going with the airborne polonium again.”

“I get the value of polonium at Rangeman. He wanted to infect everyone who worked for you. Why the polonium here? Why doesn’t he just shoot his target?”

“There are advantages to something like polonium. It kills slowly, so there’s not likely to be an immediate investigation. In fact, the death might not even be ruled a homicide. And if polonium is suspected as the agent of death, it sends a terrifying message to whoever else is involved.”

We pushed through the double doors leading to the convention center and walked out into what looked like a food court with slot machines. The food vendors were shuttered. The slot machines were open for business. We took the escalator down to the cavernous first level and saw that hotel employees were setting up partitions and folding tables in numbered stall areas. Cases of booze were being wheeled around on hand trucks and deposited in stalls.

“Hard to believe this room would be involved,” I said to Ranger. “It’s so big. Vlatko would have to have a ton of polonium to do the whole space, and I don’t see how he’d be able to target just one stall.”

“I’ve been told that Gardi carried enough polonium to infect all of Rangeman and everyone in it, if it had been properly disseminated. The total volume of this room plus the second-level food court is more than the total volume of Rangeman, but Vlatko could probably dump enough contaminant into the system to make a lot of people sick.”

“Do you think that’s his goal? To make people sick?”

“No. I think he needs to eliminate someone.”

We left the convention center, and I recognized one of Ranger’s men loafing against the side of the building. He was dressed in tan shorts and a powder blue three-button knit shirt, and he looked like a rhinoceros dressed up for a golf date.

“Clever disguise,” I said to Ranger.

“It gets better. I have a man on every exit, and I think Ramon is wearing a hotdog suit, handing out coupons to Good Dogs.”

We walked the boardwalk to the casino entrance, cruised past more slots, and Ranger steered me to the bank of elevators going to guest rooms.

“I’m told I have a room on the seventh floor,” he said.

“How do you know all this stuff?”

He pointed to the earbud in his ear. “I can hear, but I’m not sending right now. Tank is at Rangeman coordinating efforts with my FBI contact. Hal is in the room, coordinating here at the hotel.”

“Is your FBI contact onsite?”

“No, but he has men here. They’re working their way through the hotel, floor by floor, checking all the air handlers.”

“This is a big operation.”

“Bigger than I would like it to be, but public safety is involved.”

“Out of morbid curiosity, what happens if the FBI does the takedown on Vlatko?”

“They talk to him, and then they accidentally turn him over to me for safekeeping.”

“And he’ll escape from you, never to be seen again.”

“This isn’t going to help my karma,” Ranger said.

We took the elevator to the seventh floor, walked to the room at the end of the hall, and Ranger rapped twice on the door. Hal opened the door, and we stepped into a one-bedroom suite decorated in the same birthday cake style as the rest of the hotel. Pink and green wallpaper. White and gold furniture. Pictures of big pink flowers on the walls. Pink sateen bedspread that would discourage an erection from the most manly of men.

A dining room table seating six was positioned in front of the wet bar. On the table were stacks of files, a MacBook Air, a small printer, and rolls of blueprints.

A slim Hispanic guy in jeans and a T-shirt was at the Air.

“Ryan hacked into the hotel’s system,” he said, handing a paper to Ranger. “I have the room numbers you wanted.”

Ranger took the paper, selected a file from the stack, and went to the couch. “Has Viktor Volkov registered yet?”

“No, but he has a room reserved.”

“With the help of the FBI we’ve designated seven men as
being possible targets,” Ranger said to me. “All but General Semov have checked in.”

“Is he the guy getting the white glove treatment from the consulate?”

“Yes. He has the entire tenth floor. High security.”

“Why is he so special?”

“He went to soccer camp with the Russian president. He’s powerful. He’s rich. He’s ruthless. Some say he’s too ambitious.”

“Who would want him dead?”

“The list is long, and it includes his best friend, the president. It’s whispered that the president is worried about job security.”

“So is Semov at the top of our list?”

“He’s at the top for motivation but near the bottom for being realistic. He’s constantly surrounded by his military aides. It’s like Fort Knox on the tenth floor.”

“What about the ventilation system?”

“Every floor has a mechanical room with air handlers, and the polonium would have to get placed in the air handler for that floor. It’s not difficult to do. You can accomplish it with a screwdriver. Ordinarily it wouldn’t be a problem, but as of a couple days ago, the tenth floor has been sealed. An HVAC tech would have to be thoroughly vetted and then have a guard with him. I don’t think Vlatko’s cover would stand up to that kind of scrutiny.”

“Why is Semov here?”

“He’s been invited to give the keynote speech at lunch tomorrow. He owns a distillery in Moscow.”

“So who’s number one if it’s not Semov?”

“I don’t have a number one.”

“They have cameras all over the place in these casinos. Do you have someone watching the monitors for a guy with one eye?”

“The feeds are being watched at Rangeman.”

“And nothing?”

“Nothing.”

“Maybe we should go downstairs and circulate,” I said to Ranger. “We could mingle. Keep our eyes open.” Have a gelato.

Ranger stood and stretched, his black T-shirt rode up, and I caught a glimpse of two inches of brown skin and hard abs and almost had an orgasm.

“Babe,” he said. “Are you okay?”

“Yep. Why?”

“You sort of moaned.”

“Gas.”

“Understandable.”

We took the elevator to the lobby and looked in at the bar. Filled with men speaking Russian.

“Jackpot,” Ranger said. “Go do your bimbo thing.”

I sidled up to a couple men but didn’t get much response. I tried my luck at the other end. Nothing happening. I went back to Ranger.

“No one wants to talk to me,” I said.

“Maybe it’s because you’re wearing a T-shirt advertising beer and these men all make vodka.”

I looked down at my shirt. “This was supposed to be my day off. I wasn’t dressing for success.”

Ranger slung an arm around my shoulder. “Let’s see what they’ve got in the hotel shopping arcade.”

Three stores. One selling magazines and candy. One selling beachwear. One selling bimbo clothes. Perfect.

“We just need to swap out the T-shirt,” Ranger said. “The jeans are good.”

“They fit better before lunch.”

Ranger pulled a white T-shirt off the rack. “Try this.”

It was a stretchy little job with a low scoop neck, cap sleeves, and
HOT STUFF
spelled out in rhinestones across the boob area.

I tried it on and it fit okay. I had a little cleavage that was all my own. I wasn’t sure I lived up to the message.

I peeked out of the dressing room at Ranger. “What do you think?”

“I’d give you the keys to my car.”

“You do that all the time anyway.”

“Ever hopeful,” Ranger said.

I marched over to the bar and got into a conversation with one of the men.

“Nice shirt,” he said. “Is it truly?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m smokin’. Are you one of the vodka people?”

“Yes. I’m a very big vodka man.”

“I have a friend with the trade show. He has a patch over one eye.” I covered my eye with my hand. “Like this,” I said. “Do you know him?”

“I don’t know this patch.”

I moved down the bar to another Russian.

“Howdy,” I said. “Do you speak English?”