Sometimes you just know something is wrong.
It's an irking feeling in the bottom of your stomach, ready to consume your body and drop you like a sack of potatoes. I felt that growing in my stomach as I walked the cold streets of Moscow, coming from food shopping on this Saturday evening, two days after the biggest heist of my life.
But somehow I knew that was not what this was about. As I walked through the city sidewalks with white shopping bags in either hand, my eyes were on a swivel. Every reflection in every storefront was a possible give away. I didn't need to see someone following me to know it was happening. It wasn't Ashton; his observance was silent. If he wanted me to know he was watching, it had a different air to it; the feeling that he had your back. Instead, I was experiencing the type of pressure you only felt when there was a gun to the back of your head.
This person couldn't have much experience. Or, if they did, they were a ruthless killer who ended every person who discovered them. That was the only explanation for how they made it this far with their unmasked gaze.
My suspicions were only confirmed when on two different roads, I caught the reflection of a tall, thin, grey-haired man wearing black glasses and a thick, dark grey wool coat. Either he had forgotten all of his training with age, or he just didn't give a fuck.
It was definitely the latter.
He wasn't Russian either. There was a gold band on his left finger when he adjusted his sunglasses, showing me he had to be Western European at the very least. If not, he was one hundred percent American. This hand to be Jacs Klein's handler. It's been three weeks since he was killed and five days since his fingerprints were found at the scene of a professional hit.
The news had blamed the sniper on a politician against the Kremlin. They even had doctored video where there hadn't even been a camera in the first place. It was all government propaganda but I'm positive they were still looking for the real killer. If the Russian government ran those prints through the system, some US intelligence agent somewhere would have seen them and it would have set off all kinds of alarms.
There was no way to know whether or not the hand had been discovered or if Ashton and I had become suspects but it was fair to say the Americans found me. They weren't tailing Ashton; they were tailing me. There was as no evidence of my involvement in any crimes, I was sure of that, but my face was all over my government IDs. All it took was one glance through the right system for a CIA agent to notice me. If what Jacs had said was right, every operative in the Eastern hemisphere knew what I looked like.
It had been years since I had to consciously remind myself to breathe. I suppose there's a first for everything, though. My heart was pounding in my chest as I tried to keep my face calm, cool, and collected. In a perfect world, I could turn down a few alleys and lose my tail.
Sadly, that's not how this worked.
Either I would lead the CIA straight to my apartment if they hadn't already been there, or I would give up my cover by disappearing in alleyways. The only option was to lose him in the crowd in the most organic way I could. It would take a lot more time, but it was worth it.So my feet casually carried me down different blocks, stopping at different storefronts to browse. Most took a long time, forcing my tail to enter the store with me. But on the last one, which was farthest from my home, I entered the coffee shop, waited for the mid-fifty-year-old to follow, and then ducked out from a table in the corner where he hadn't even seen me, to begin with. I hailed a cab back to a block from the apartment but the whole time my nerves were building.
If Ashton wasn't home I was screwed. I couldn't ask him to come home; that would be too suspicious if we were being wiretapped.In the worst-case scenario, I would have to wait and that was a luxury I couldn't afford. Ashton and I needed to leave as soon as we could before we both ended up dead or worse. A black sight is a place I never want to see in my lifetime.
Lord knows there was one somewhere in the Nevada desert with my name on it.
It was almost a guarantee our apartment was bugged by now. I couldn't imagine the CIA wasting valuable time to figure out if I am who they think I am. If we weren't careful they would find out who Ashton was too.
But for the pessimist I was, I couldn't help but see the bright side. I had the data.
They could chase me out of this country and follow me to the ends of the earth but they'll never get that memory chip.
The cold wind hugged my body as I got out of the taxi with the grocery bags. Like a bad habit, I relentlessly scanned up and down the empty sidewalks of the less busy section of Moscow. Content with what I had seen, I headed into the apartment complex with my head tilted down slightly.
In a few minutes, I would know my fate.
I just hoped I wasn't already too late.
