Page 5 of Dagger’s Shield

I had spent my days tracing Hellmer Privatbank’s dollar and euro transfers through the larger banks that had cleared them. Every transfer I traced ended in an account that belonged to a shell company.

Dagger read every file the allied agencies held on Vasiliev’s years in Russian intelligence. The files gave him the man’s postings, his ranks, the officers he had served beside, and the men who had given him orders. He read the debriefs of every defector who had ever mentioned him. He compared photographs across thirty years. All of it stopped in 1991. The bank was founded in 1988, while allied services still watched him, and not one file mentioned it.

His money ended in shell companies, and his files ended in 1991. Both trails were dead.

That left the surveillance. Allied services had watched Vasiliev for thirty years, and somewhere in their photographs had to be the people he worked for.

Before we quit for the night, I sent a request to every agency, asking them to send all the footage they had on him.

3

MAËLLE

The following day, the doors of the command center opened, and Blackjack and Beacon walked in. Both looked rested and tanned after taking leave at Blackjack’s parents’ place in the Bahamas.

The two of them ran K19 Genesis Consortium now. Blackjack had come up through the Army Rangers, then K19 Security Solutions, the firm that had merged in to form it. He’d designed the architecture of the rebuild. Beacon was the other half of the partnership—her salvaged files and networks gave the new firm its spine, and her refusal to let Minerva die gave it a reason to exist.

“Welcome home,” Dagger said when they approached our table.

“I’d say it’s good to be here, but I’d much rather our headquarters relocate to a warmer spot. One with a sandy beach and an ocean doesn’t sound too bad,” said Blackjack.

“You’re the boss now, right?”

He chuckled. “Co-boss, and somehow, I don’t think moving the entire team away from Onteora is practical.”

Within a few minutes of their arrival, the rest of the team joined them. Kingston Black, code name Reaper, was Blackjack’s brother. He and his wife, Charity “Amaryllis” Beaudoin, were both former US intelligence agents. Devin “Hornet” Zak and his wife, Kima, code name Delfino, had risen through the ranks of MI6, eventually being recruited into Unit 23, SIS’ most elite and secretive team of operatives.

Rovena Basha, code name Magnolia, had a similar background. She’d originally been with Albanian intelligence, then did a stint with a UN coalition to fight human trafficking.

Lyra and Henry took seats in the rear.

Everyone in the room, including Dagger and myself, was considered among the best covert operatives in the world. It wasn’t a distinction any of us took lightly.

“I thought it would be a good idea to get caught up,” Beacon said, standing at the front of the room with Blackjack after the rest of us took our seats. “Shall we start with Briggs?” she asked.

Reaper and Amaryllis gave an update on Jason Briggs, the retired three-star general they’d been tracking since long before the bombing. What they’d learned amounted to very little. “He’s lying low and has been,” said Reaper.

For years, defense companies had paid Briggs, and he’d directed Pentagon contracts worth billions to them in return. Eleanor Aldrich, Horatio’s daughter and Lyra’s sister, had uncovered it when she was at the CIA. Her own director had ordered her to end the investigation, and when she refused, the agency shut it down. She’d resigned, went dark, and she and her siblings had formed the Minerva Protocol.

She didn’t live to see it through. Briggs, meanwhile, hadn’t been so much as indicted. Now, he advised the Pentagon on Russian affairs and lived in a sixty-million-dollar mansion.

“Let’s see if we can rile him up with a visit,” Blackjack suggested. “Poke the bear, as it were.”

“Roger that,” Reaper responded.

“Add Bogdanov to your list if he isn’t already on it,” said Dagger.

Denis Bogdanov was the man Briggs had been photographed handing a manila envelope to. His records said he was connected to Russian foreign intelligence. His records also said he wasn’t Russian. Both could not be true.

Beacon had been looking at her mobile, but raised her head. “Good thinking, and take Magnolia with you. If Briggs so much as changes barbers, I want it photographed.”

“One more thing,” Blackjack said. “Connect with Sundance once you’re there. I made contact last week. He’s in.”

Zion Mills, code name Sundance, had spent his FBI career in the organized crime unit. I’d never worked with him, but Reaper had vouched for him weeks ago, and in our world, that carried more weight than any résumé.

After the three headed out with Blackjack’s okay, the briefing turned to us. Dagger and I filled them in on what little I’d discovered about the shell company accounts as well as the intel he’d gathered on Vasiliev’s activity with Russian intelligence.

“The surveillance images we requested have begun coming in. My plan is to start sifting through those,” I said.