Part 14 – The Man
Eunice Wong returned the next morning at seven. Irina had been out on her run and was ready to talk. The relief of telling what happened to her in Kashmir had been immense and somewhat cleansing. She slept deeply and there were no nightmares this time. She did feel better.
She was making cheese omelets when Eunice knocked. She led her back to the kitchen and indicated the teapot. “It’s ready, please pour yourself a cup.” Irina turned back to the stove.
“You sound, umm, upbeat,” said Eunice while pouring.
“Thanks to you and my finally letting someone else know about Kashmir.” Irina shook the skillet and then flipped half the eggs over some cheddar cheese from Wisconsin she had purchased at G.U.M. in the Imported Foods Department. She cut the omelet in half and served it up on two plates. From the oven, she took a plateful of toast and sat it between the two of them.
“Good, that’s a beginning.” Eunice started eating.
“What do you want to know about today?” Irina put some jam on the buttered toast.
“You told me you were re-assigned to Central City to teach after Nadia was born.”
“Not much happened. It was quiet and peaceful…almost boring.” Irina sipped some tea.
Eunice looked at her. “You told me you took a woman lover!”
“Yes, but I probably would not have let even Jack touch me after Kashmir. I was an emotional wreck and I was angry to the point I might have killed anyone who looked at me the wrong way. When I arrived there, the superintendent was interested in bedding me and chased me relentlessly. I had the feeling if I did not give in, he would take me by force. Of course, I would then kill him. Not a good way to start a new job for the KGB.”
“Would he really? Didn’t he know about Kashmir?”
“No one did, just those in charge including Andropov.” Irina forked another bite of the omelet into her mouth. “Unfortunately he died before I could repay his kindness.”
“Did you tell your lover?”
“No, she thought it was about my leaving Jack and my daughter.” She put her fork down. “I will be honest. She asked me to be her lover. She said she found no one at the city who she wanted to love, but me.” Irina had a small smile on her face. “Viktoria saved my life. She made me realize I was worthy of love and caring.”
“What about the superintendent? Wasn’t he angry and caused trouble?”
Irina laughed, “No, because the fool thought homosexuality was catching and decided there were easier women to screw at the city. He left us alone.”
“Where is she now?”
Irina didn’t answer right away as she finished her omelet. Then she looked directly into Eunice’s eyes. “Dead. I had her buried in a special military cemetery here in Moscow. A man who was jealous of my position at Central City killed her.”
“What was your position?”
“I was a Lt. Colonel and the Superintendent of Central City.”
Eunice realized that Irina had moved up in the KGB hierarchy, actually running the spy city. “Why would he do such a thing?” Eunice put jam on a piece of toast.
“He was a misogynist pig, so I killed him. I don’t know if his body was ever found.”
Eunice stared. “When was your lover killed?”
“While I was with my father and Mikhail Gorbachev just before the break-up of the USSR in 1991.”
“Ah, Grigor told me a little when he and I went to lunch.” Eunice sipped the rest of her tea. “Tell me, was it true, Gorbachev proposed a special business venture he thought you could handle?”
Irina chuckled. “Yes and it turned out to be profitable in many ways.”
“How is that?”
“The deal was the Russian government would funnel a certain amount of dollars to a bank account I would set up. I would pick a team of ex-KGB employees, not criminals, but men and women who were loyal to our country. There were many. I would set up organizations outside Russia to rob other criminals of their money and send it home.”
Eunice stood. “Let’s go to the living room. I have a feeling this is going to be interesting and long. My thin boney butt is not ready to spend the morning on these chairs.”
“Give me a moment to clean up and I will be with you.”
Later, Irina settled herself down on the sofa. “I take it you are now ready to hear about The Man?”
“Fire away,” answered Eunice. She opened her notebook.
“I found ten people I knew I could trust. They were team members from my days of training at the Academy and in Central City. I set up three operations in Germany, Rumania, and Spain. Each one was for a specific reason: Germany would give me access to the northern part of Europe, Rumania the eastern half and middle east; while Spain was known for its smugglers and there were many ‘loose lips’ in the provinces to provide names and locations.
“The money was spent in setting up those sites. However, we had to earn money to keep us going…become self-sustaining. Gorbachev made that clear before I took the job. So contacts were made and I learned that The Alliance had a bank in Prague that they owned…top to bottom. Since they were a target for us, I decided to rob their bank.”
“My goodness,” Eunice’s eyes widened.
Irina’s eyes sparkled as she began telling of The Man’s first strike. That had been a fun day with huge profits.
Irina was dressed as a wealthy woman who was looking for a new bank to deposit her inherited money. She wore an expensive black Chanel suit with solid gold Rolex watch, gold bracelet, necklace, and earrings. Her nails were a bright red, matching her blouse and lipstick. She had her hair piled high on her head and wore four-inch heels. She knew she made an imposing sight. She also had a hat on that hid her face. Her men had cased the bank and noted where the cameras were positioned.
She introduced herself to the bank’s manager as Magda Zolova. “I am here to make a deposit in your bank.”
“Yes, Madame, please take a seat. How much?”
“If I am pleased with how you run this bank, it will be somewhere around fourteen million dollars.”
The man swallowed. “I think you will find we run an efficient, financially solvent, bank with assets of one billion dollars.”
“My, that’s a lot of money to have in your vault.”
“No, no Madame, it is spread in real estate, bonds and other items.”
“So you keep only a little cash?”
“Oh we have about a hundred million in liquid assets here most of the time.” He went on about the videos, guards, and safety precautions throughout the bank.
“I would like to see for myself.” She stood. He followed and then led the way.
“So you robbed the bank?” Eunice jotted notes down.
“Two days later.”
The bank was getting ready to close. The security guard was ready to lock the front door. The two tellers had counted the cash and were ready to take it to the vault There was just one customer left and he was putting cash into his wallet.
Just as the guard was reaching for the lock, five masked men pushed the door open. The guard fell to the floor and was fumbling for his gun when he was killed and the door locked. The tellers froze as the one customer turned, dropping to the floor with his hands covering his head.
The five robbers spread quickly through the building. A tall skinny man ran for the manager’s office, burst through the door, firing two shots. The manager was in the act of pushing a button to notify not only the police, but also The Alliance. He was half a second late.
The bank was looted within minutes of nearly three million in cash in the vault along with a hundred million in negotiable bearer bonds. The Alliance was hard hit.
The five robbers were gone in less than ten minutes.
“The manager...why did you kill him? He didn’t see you, did he?”
“Yes and no. Yes, he saw me, but did not know it was Magda. He was a member of SD-7. I didn’t want him giving any kind of description; especially if he had any suspicion Magda was involved.
One of my team members was an expert in computers and finances. I gave him instructions on how to move any assets he could find in their other bank. I moved it all into a Swiss account. Then I moved it later to Russia via the Bahamas. My men scooped up the liquid assets. We got nearly three million in cash and close to a hundred million in bearer bonds from the vault as well as some loose bonds which I later burned.
“The Alliance took a big hit with that robbery. I managed to get the negotiable bearer bonds hand delivered to my father via a member of the team who was able to move from country to country without suspicion. The cash I kept to run my organization.
“Three million meant another four areas to set up and money to run all of them. So in less than four months we were in business.”
“The Alliance never suspected?”
“Never! I gutted them five times over the next nine years. However, they were a powerful group and had huge investments all over the world. I didn’t want to get them too interested in me, although they certainly became more and more so as the years passed. By the time they suspected The Man, it was becoming evident they needed to be destroyed.”
“Tell me, Grigor mentioned you personally had to eliminate three or four competitors. None of them were The Alliance then?”
“No, there were two Russian crime leaders: FTL, K-Directorate. One was located in Taipei where I ran an experimental lab, another in Egypt, and another in Spain. I personally eliminated the FTL leader. He found out about me after capturing one of my men who being tortured told him about me. Fortunately, it was not one of my team leaders, but an underling.
“The man had the balls to tell me he was taking over, but before he could demand any more, he and his two bodyguards died.”
Eunice stared. “Three men…just like that?”
“I could not afford to let a man tell me he was taking over my organization.” Irina was not smiling. “It was unfortunate for him that he did not know me. However, “she smiled., “I let his driver live. I wanted him to spread the word that The Man was not to be crossed or challenged.”
The other woman jotted some notes. “Wasn’t it dangerous when you personally were in charge of jobs?”
“Of course, but these became addictive because of the danger involved. It was like having an adrenaline rush. I went on several jobs. I never failed to end the lives of those who would prey on my country. I sank a ship in the Mediterranean that was on its way to the Black Sea and would be delivering enough heroin to addict half the population. That cargo was worth nearly a half a billion dollars.
“I blew up the ship and its contents when I learned the destination. That was the first time I began to suspect Khasinau was becoming a little too enamored of money. He wanted me to keep the filthy drugs and sell them. I had to make him leave the ship while I set the charges.”
“Any victims?”
Irina stared at the doctor. “The Captain. He was stubborn. The rest of the men were put on lifeboats and sent away before the ship went down.”
“Did you ever hear of Sydney while you were The Man.?”
“I didn’t know it was her, just that SD-6 had a female agent who was one of the best they ever encountered. K-Directorate hired Anna Espinosa, a Cuban who was trained in Russia as an assassin and agent. They were out to get as many of the Rambaldi artifacts as was everyone else who knew there was a powerful secret yet to be revealed. Anna clashed with Sydney three maybe four times.
“I didn’t know Sydney had become an agent for Sloane’s SD-6, but Sark, one of my lieutenants, did…in Moscow. I ordered him to kill K-Directorate’s immediate boss if he did not agree to my terms. Sydney saw him have the man killed. Then one of the outside guards saw her and fired at her. She barely escaped, but Sark saw it was a woman.
“Then Khasinau, who had a mole in the CIA’s Los Angeles office, was told that Sydney Bristow and Jack were double agents. Jack killed the bastard. That ended our having inside knowledge about CIA activity.
“I still did not see Sydney until my men caught her and put her into the back room on Khasinau’s orders. He didn’t know for sure except she looked a lot like I did when I was young. I had brought him to my apartment one day and he caught a glimpse of a picture I had. So he put her and the picture together and knew she was my daughter.”
“My dear,” Eunice said, “wasn’t that a shock?”
“Yes, but what was worse, I had to shoot my own daughter whom I hadn’t seen for twenty years.” Irina stared at Eunice. “It was the worst thing I’d ever done, but it was to save both our lives.”
“Did Sydney find out?”
“Yes, but I’m sure she had many angry moments before I was able to tell her why.”
Eunice looked at her notebook. “So we’re up to the point where you saw her next?”
“Yes, in Barcelona. I’ve told you about that, but needless to say, she was shocked by my killing Khasinau.”
“Why did you?”
“He was becoming greedy and wanted to run the organization. He also knew Sydney was a double agent. He was dangerous to her safety.”
“Are you sure,” Eunice said.
Irina smiled enigmatically, “He made a deal with Sark, but the young man was loyal to me for the time being. He told me what Khasinau planned, so I killed him and disappeared from the crime scene. No one but Sark knew where I’d gone.”
“Where did you go?” Eunice was not familiar with everything having to do with Irina.
“I turned myself into the CIA.”