all be booted out of Moscow and not let back in!”
“Well, I didn’t get a chance to look at him closely. Maybe he was a Chechen.”
“I am sure he was! Young, insolent.”
Grigoriev decided to interrupt the argument.
“Tell me about the trigger device.”
“Sir,” the precinct head interjected, “we actually picked it up at the scene.”
He handed out a plastic bag holding a smashed box half the size of a matchbox.
“Is this it?” Grigoriev asked warily, looking at the splintered pieces of plastic.
The three witnesses replied simultaneously.
“Yes.”
“That’s it.”
“He was about to blow us all up. How did we manage to stay alive?”
“Because we stood up to him.”
“Yeah, were it not for us, there would be nothing left here,” the fat one said assuredly. “Everything would be blown up.”
The precinct head could not hold his indignation and said firmly, “The act of terror was prevented by our officer. It was he who stopped the terrorist on her way into the subway. He’s here.”
Panteleyev pointed out a plain-looking sergeant holding a crumpled hat in his hands. Grigoriev was suddenly interested.
“How did it all start?”
“I was checking papers. Stopped the suspicious-looking individuals. So I wanted to check her papers, too.”
“Because she looked like she was from the Caucasus?”
“Um, yeah. She was dressed strangely, eyes shifty. I came up to her, she started screaming. I pulled the trigger from her hand, and then… then the panic started. So she disappeared.”
Oleg Alexandrovich pulled the case of the trigger device apart without taking it out of the bag. A simple design; a power source, a button, and a switch. No remote control.
“Were there two of them?”
“She had a helper,” the policeman nodded assuredly. Otherwise, I would have handled her.
“What kind of car have they driven away in?”
“I didn’t see that.”
“Have you noticed the car?” Grigoriev asked the civilian witnesses.
“No, we haven’t.”
“Everyone was lying face down. There could be an explosion.”
“The Chechen and the Shahid woman ran over there, behind the kiosks,” the guy in the flowered shirt said.
Grigoriev turned to Panteleyev.
“If the presence of an explosive device is confirmed, our office will take over the case. Get the witnesses and the officer to our office for some Identikit work. And have your people canvass the area. Someone might have seen something coming home from work or looking out the window. In other words, the usual. Got it? Any additional information, contact me directly at this number.”
The colonel took a business card from the breast pocked of his impeccable suit.
“We’re working on this already,” Panteleyev replied uncertainly, putting away the card without looking at it. He looked unhappy, staring into the asphalt under his feet. It was clear that the head of the precinct didn’t like being ordered around by the feds.
“That’s good,” Grigoriev smiled condescendingly. “When you’re done, report.”
Oleg Alexandrovich noticed first lieutenant Burkov standing nearby in a tense pose and took him aside.
“What have you got?”
“Broad strokes, Oleg Alexandrovich, it’s like this. There was a Shahid woman, her bomb didn’t go off, and her accomplice helped her escape.”
“Broad strokes I already know myself. Give me the details! What kind of car did they have?”
Burkov, guilty expression on his face, spread his hands. “None of the merchants had seen the escape car. They’re scared out of their minds, some are in shock.”
“Bad business, Yuri,” Grigoriev signed.
Burkov took out a cigarette and a lighter.
“Put it away!” the colonel ordered quietly, but firmly. “You and I represent an important government organization before the ordinary citizens. By our appearance and actions, they judge the entire Service. Look at yourself. Crumpled pants, stained tie, and about to smoke. No smoking in public! Better yet, quit altogether.”
The first lieutenant crushed the cigarette in his hand, embarrassed, and started looking around for a place to toss it. The colonel reassuringly patted him on the shoulder.
“Keep the office’s image in mind. And one more thing. This is a busy place. Someone definitely saw the terrorists leave. Maybe even remembered the license plate number. Keep working the scene, and I’ll head back. Have to look at everything together. I have a feeling that those airplanes and today’s events are links in one chain. And that chain isn’t complete yet. You find out anything, call me.”
Chapter 4
August 31, 8:11 PM
Riga Overpass
Andrei Vlasov drove onto the Riga overpass and immediately found himself in a standstill traffic jam. Cars barely moved; drivers looked down, bewildered. Between the Rizhskaya metro station and the Krestovsky shopping mall, several cars were on fire. A thick column of black smoke rose up into the sky.
Andrei stuck his head out of the car’s window. Up ahead, a young woman driving a Toyota Corolla looked this way and that and kept asking, “What is this? Why are they on fire?”
“An act of terror, dammit,” a tired-looking cabbie cursed. “A bomb.”
“Maybe an engine shorted out and went up in flames?” Andrei made a guess.
“An engine fire? Are you freakin’ blind? Look at it!”
Vlasov looked and froze.
On a square in front of the metro station, people were wounded. The lightly wounded, their clothes torn, tried to help themselves and others. Some barely moved, but there were dead, too. Immobile bodies broken by explosion left no hope for an alternative outcome.
“What a nightmare,” the Corolla girl moaned, rolled up her window and tried to drive between the lanes.
Vlasov got out of the car. His eyes kept stumbling on the details of the horrible
