Enemy of the Alien Bride Lottery by Margo Collins (sight word readers TXT) 📕

work immediately, searching our files for the Russian with the distinctive ear?”

“I have to admit the thought had crossed my mind, yes.”

Instead of answering his own question, Stallings hoisted himself out of his chair and moved to the rear of his study, where what appeared to be a custom-made redwood bookshelf lined the wall. Beneath the shelving, from approximately waist height to the floor, were a series of doors, cabinets the CIA director had never accessed in her presence.

Now he pulled on one of the doors. It swung open to reveal a metal filing cabinet. She could only guess whether filing cabinets were hidden behind each of the doors or just this one.

Stallings eased the cabinet out on a rolling track and began picking through it, mumbling to himself as he did. She could not hear his words, but he was clearly thumbing through file tabs, looking for something specific.

“Ah,” he said after a moment. “Here we go.”

He lifted something out of the cabinet, then rolled it back into its enclosure and eased the redwood door shut. Then he turned back to his desk and slid an eight by ten photo across the desk toward Tracie.

On it was a man with a badly mangled ear, an ear that looked exactly as Carson Limington had described it.

12

 

It was a candid shot, a snap of the man walking while looking at something to his left. In the photo his silver hair wasn’t as long as described by Carson Limington, barely reaching the tops of his ears, affording the viewer a good look.

“This is exactly what Limington described to me,” Tracie said softly. “Except, according to Limington, the man’s hair reached almost to his shoulders, completely obscuring his ears.”

“That’s because this photo was taken a couple of years ago, before he’d completed the process of growing his hair out to cover the damage.”

Tracie looked at Stallings quizzically. “You just happen to have a picture of the guy we suspect of stealing classified material and attempting to murder an American citizen stored behind your desk? What else do you have locked up back there, Jimmy Hoffa?”

“I can’t reveal where Hoffa’s buried, not even to you,” Stallings answered with a sardonic smile. Tracie thought he was kidding but wouldn’t have bet money on it.

“I’ve kept this picture handy,” he continued, “because I came to suspect within the last few months that you and I might soon be having a conversation about this man.”

Tracie pursed her lips. “So, he has done it before. This is not the first time the guy with the funky ear has persuaded an American to sell out his country.”

“Not even close. His name is Andrei Lukashenko, but he’s known in intelligence circles as ‘Laska.’”

“Laska is Russian for ‘The Weasel,’” Tracie said.

“That’s right.”

“I’ve heard of this guy, but I wasn’t sure he was real. I thought he might just have been a rumor, a made-up boogeyman.”

“He’s very much real.”

“How many times has he done what he did with Carson Limington?”

“Over a dozen that we know of for sure. The total is probably much higher, as he operates not just in the United States. He’s stolen or purchased classified material in Great Britain, West Germany, France, you name it. Virtually every country outside Soviet control has been victimized by The Weasel, and in all of them he has left a trail of corpses in his wake. To the best of our knowledge, Carson Limington is the first victim he’s left alive.”

Tracie whistled softly.

“Again,” Stallings continued, “those dozen are just what we can confirm. As you might imagine, governments are understandably reluctant to share the news they’ve been burned regarding the loss of state secrets. The total could easily be three times higher than the twelve or so that we know about.”

“How the hell does he manage to do it over and over again? How’s he so successful?”

“I’m going to take a wild guess and say your new friend Carson Limington described Lukashenko as initially very friendly. He probably compared him to a salesman, easy to talk to and persuasive, a smooth talker.”

She nodded. “An insurance salesman was the exact comparison he made.”

“There you go. That’s part of how he does it. He also does his homework. When the Soviets target a piece of classified intel they want, Lukashenko researches the organization in possession of that intel, in this case Marine Technix Corporation. He digs until he finds someone desperate, either with money problems, or alcohol issues, gambling, whatever. Then he approaches the person he’s selected and handles that man or woman like an con man working a mark.”

“Which is exactly what he is.”

“Correct. But it’s not just a matter of doing his homework and buttering up his victim. When the time comes to close the deal, The Weasel is ruthless. He never leaves the mark alive, obviously killing in an effort to protect himself. Mr. Limington is extremely fortunate to still be breathing, even if he is doing so in custody.”

“You said you recently came to suspect we would be having this conversation. I’m guessing you received intel that he was back operating in this country.”

Stallings nodded. “We’ve been keeping tabs on Lukashenko as much as possible for some time now, but it’s not easy, as you might imagine. We’ll nail down a location on him, keep eyes on him for a while, and then he disappears and goes underground for long stretches of time. About six months ago we learned he was stationed at the Soviet Embassy here in D.C., ostensibly employed as a driver for their diplomats.”

“Obviously he was doing a lot more than driving.”

“We knew all along he was working on prying classified intel out of American hands. The obvious problem is that we had no idea what that intel might be, or precisely