Second Shot by Cindy Dees

Author:Cindy Dees [Dees, Cindy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-02-16T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 18

SHE SWORE UNDER HER BREATH. AN AMERICAN HAD HIRED IBRAMOV to take her out? Or was Anatoly lying? Maybe he hoped to finger a high-level US government official as a gambit to get her to kill him for the Russians? It was the sort of ploy Yosef would pull.

Always with these guys, it was a game within a game.

Anatoly purred. “I gather from your surprise that you’ve heard of him or her? Perhaps you know the identity of Scorpius?” It was an obvious attempt to take control of the conversation. “My government would be eternally grateful if you find this person and eliminate him or her. We would be happy to make a sizable contribution to your retirement account, should you do this. Enough to see you safe and comfortable throughout your old age. It’s the least we could do—”

She waved the pistol at him in a gesture to silence him. “Where is Ibramov now?” she bit out.

“I’m sure I don’t know. I don’t keep track of part-time contractors like him when they are not working on my clock.”

Which was a lie. The Russians, and the Americans for that matter, kept extremely short leashes on their wet-work operators. People like Ibramov and her could not be allowed to run around randomly killing anyone who pissed them off or someone they were paid to off. They had to keep their noses clean enough so they could do their government’s work successfully.

“Who usually hires Ibramov when he’s off your clock?”

“The Chechnyans,” Anatoly said promptly.

Another lie. Yosef had mentioned that Ibramov was shacked up with the Bratva in New York, not Chechnyans.

She let the lie slide. Let Anatoly think he was pulling the wool over her eyes.

“Tell me something, Mrs. Warwick. Why did you kill my man in the zoo?”

Interesting. Did he already know she’d killed the sniper, or was he fishing to find out if she’d done it? Not that she particularly cared either way. She shrugged. “He tried to kill me. And speaking of which, did you order him to take me out after you left the meeting with Yosef?”

Anatoly frowned. “I did not.”

“Did someone in your government order the hit on me?”

His frown deepened. “Definitely not. He worked directly for me and would have informed me of such an order from anyone else.”

“Well then, you had a rogue agent on your hands. As I was leaving the zoo, he took a shot at me that would have killed me if not for a gust of wind and a bit of luck.”

Anatoly stared at her hard. “So you’re saying he shot first?”

“I am. If your people examine the northwest corner of the bear house, you’ll find a chip taken out of the stucco from the bullet that barely missed my head. After he took that shot, he fled into the woods on the gravely mistaken assumption that he could get away from me after trying to kill me.”

“Foolish boy,” Anatoly commented dryly.

“Indeed.”

“You are in luck, Mrs. Warwick. Because I happened to have a backup man in the zoo who witnessed the exchange between you and my .

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