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“This is going to be close,” he said, flooring the accelerator.
The van shot forward, chewing up the ground between us and the chopper. To our left, a dozen or so police vehicles were speeding round the perimeter of the park, trying to reach us. Behind us, cops were clambering over the one that had blocked the gate and running in our direction. West was right, this would be tight.
The pilot set the helicopter down a hundred yards ahead of us, and I saw a man in a dark suit open the side door. His face was covered by a ski mask. He beckoned to us.
“Thank all that’s good and holy!” West declared.
We seemed to cover the distance in an instant. West stepped on the brakes. The van shuddered to a stop a few feet clear of the rotors. I jumped out and turned to face the oncoming cops, rifle in hand.
“Get Alekseyev,” I yelled. “I’ll cover you.”
“On it,” West shouted back as he ran to the rear doors.
I opened fire on the first police vehicles as they tried to cross the grass, slowing them down. West appeared moments later, dragging Alekseyev. I emptied my magazine, but it was no use. There were too many of them by now, a police convoy racing over the grass toward us.
I grabbed Alekseyev too and joined West in forcing the reluctant SVR director forward.
West and I hurled him into the chopper, but before I jumped aboard I asked the man in the ski mask, “Who sent you?”
I’d been stung by an impostor before.
“Erin Sebold,” he replied. “She said I should tell you the Red Man used to bake great bread.”
The roar of engines was loud now as the cops drew closer.
“All good?” West yelled above the sound of the rotors.
“All good,” I confirmed, jumping in.
He climbed aboard and the masked man gave the pilot a thumbs-up. We rose into the sky with such speed I was knocked into the seat next to Alekseyev’s.
“Enjoy your flight, Director,” I said, settling back and breathing a little more easily as a small army of angry, frustrated cops stared up at us getting away.
Alekseyev’s trademark scowl was gone. He looked smaller somehow. Broken and defeated.
CHAPTER 105
AMERICA HAD NEVER looked so beautiful. Manhattan was gleaming in the sunshine. The chopper had delivered us to the CIA Gulfstream jet that had whisked us out of Moscow. The sleek aircraft began its descent into Teterboro Airport, New York at 2 p.m. local time. As we descended toward the city, even the East River shone like a magnificent ribbon of mercury.
Alekseyev was sitting opposite me. We had taken off his gag but cuffed his arms and legs. He had his hands on the walnut-veneer table between us. The cuffs clanked and clattered every so often as he moved his wrists. He had slept for much of the nine-hour flight, or at least pretended to.
I hadn’t needed to make any such pretense and slept soundly for the first five hours before I woke to take the second shift watching him. West slept just as soundly as I had for the remainder of the flight.
“I underestimated you, Mr. Morgan,” Alekseyev said.
They were his first words since we’d left Moscow.
“It’s a common mistake,” I responded coldly. “People only realize the truth when it’s too late.”
I leant across the aisle and gently shook West awake. He rubbed his eyes, peered out of the window and beamed when he saw New York’s distinctive skyline.
“Boy, it’s good to be home,” he declared.
“Some vacation,” I said.
“Hey, anything that gets me stateside is alright with me.”
A few minutes later we were on the ground, taxiing to our stand. When the aircraft had come to a halt, our pilot, who had introduced himself only as Bobby, emerged from the cockpit in the same black sweatpants and T-shirt he had been wearing when we boarded.
