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“It’s me, Rube”
“Hang on, Sa squelch as Rube engaged what Sam assumed was some kind of encryption device “How are you?”
“Great Thanks for this I owe you one”
“No, you don’t”
Haywood and Sam went back twelve years, since Safacility in the wilds of the Virginia countryside near Willia Haywood, a case officer in the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, was going through covert operative training Sam was there for the saned to put DARPA’s best and brightest through the kind of real-world scenarios CIA officers experience in the field The idea was siineers could understand what field as really like—hands on and up close—the better they would be at creating gadgets and tools that es
Sam and Rube had instantly bonded, their friendship ce, and they’d stayed in touch ever since,trip through the Sierra Nevada
“Everything I’ to tell you is unclassified—at least officially”
Sa his call, Rube had in turn overne said ASAP”
“Yeah The nauy you call Scarface used a pretty heavily backstopped credit card attached to dummy accounts to rent the boat in Snow Hill, so it took a little digging His naoriy Arkhipov Ex-Russian special forces, spent tiht-hand uy named Kholkov, left the army in ’94 and went freelance Arkhipov you’re familiar with, but I’ll e-mail you a picture of Kholkov If you haven’t seen him around yet, you will As far as we can tell they’ve worked for just one man since ’05, a real nasty piece of work named Hadeon Bondaruk”
“I’ve heard the name”
“I’d be surprised if you hadn’t,” Rube replied “He’s the kingpin of the Ukrainian h society He throws parties and hunt weekends at his estate several tiuest list to the überwealthy—politicians, celebrities, European royaltyHe’s never been charged with a crime, but is suspected of dozens of murders—mostly other crime bosses and enforcers who for whatever reason made him mad Other than rumors there’s not much out there about his past”
“I love gossip,” Sam said “Let’s hear it”
“Ruhters in Turk that whole Russian-Iranian borderpatrols and convoys, never leaving anyone alive”
“A real Samaritan”
“Yeah So, what’s your interest in him?”