toward which the means of his wealth was working. He would not fail.
He would change the world.
The clearing of a throat broke him from his introspection. He swiveled in his chair again, facing the interior of his office, and steepled his fingers.
Trofimov frowned as he looked over his guests. These men were, truthfully, really more employees than guests, but he prided himself on his cultivated manners, and so he treated them as if they weren’t simply hired help. Yuri Trofimov might be nouveau riche in the eyes of what passed for aristocratic society in this part of Florida, but manners were as important to him as all the rest, the trappings and the plans and the plots and the schemes. He was a rich man, first and foremost; he could afford himself a few affectations, could allow himself a few indulgences and even pretenses.
“You just gonna sit there mooning all day?”
Trofimov’s frown deepened as he focused on the speaker. Gareth Twain lounged insolently in the nearest padded office chair. Trofimov spared him a withering glance and then scanned the other visitors to his high-rise office. He had taken little notice of them when they filed into the room; now he supposed he would have to deal with them.
One of Twain’s people, an agitated Korean, paced back and forth by the door. In the lounge chair on the facing wall, cigarette smoke curling up to the ceiling, Mak Wei watched with feigned indifference. Mak was yet another Chinese operative late of the People’s Liberation Army. Trofimov had enough information on Mak and his handlers to know that the Chinese had tried more than once to mount plausibly deniable operations on American soil. Trofimov also gathered that several of Mak’s predecessors hadn’t fared well, either failing in their missions directly and fatally, or failing only to return to China to face the wrath of their superiors. Trofimov hadn’t bothered to look too deeply into this; it would have nettled Mak to discover the probing, anyway, and the man was touchy enough at the best of times. Trofimov supposed he didn’t blame him, given just how notorious the Chinese government was when it came to operations of this type.
The shaven-headed Twain, who looked and dressed like a surly stevedore, was head of the many mercenary forces in Trofimov’s employ. He performed his work well, and always did as asked with no complaints and no argument. Trofimov imagined he could tell Gareth Twain to drive to the nearest elementary school and shoot dead every child on the playground, and Twain would merely quote a price before calmly leaving to perform the deed. It wasn’t clear to the businessman exactly why Twain did what he did, or what the man cared about. Perhaps he cared about nothing; perhaps he had no goals save the earning of money through the relative ease of his casual brutality. It didn’t matter to Trofimov—though Twain’s arrogant, cavalier manner irritated him. The big, ruddy, bullet-headed Irishman seemed always to be laughing at him, and at everyone else he met. Trofimov imagined that this was because, in his mind, Twain was picturing the murder of every human being he encountered. The Russian could live with that. The money he paid Twain kept the man in check, or at least directed his madness toward the targets of Trofimov’s choosing.
The slight, dark-haired, sallow-skinned and physically gaunt Mak Wei was more of a mystery personally, but his personal motivations were irrelevant. Mak was a Chinese operative, and thus he did as he was told. His goals were the goals of his government. In this case, Communist China wanted very much to see the power of the United States diminished, so much so that it was willing to risk running black operations such as Mak’s current mission. The agent was funneling Chinese equipment and munitions to Twain’s mercenaries, and providing Chinese security personnel of his own to augment Twain’s forces. Both men, working in concert, pursued the goals Trofimov set for them. Mak was smart enough to know that Trofimov’s master plan was sound but, more important, he knew he had to allow for a certain degree of distance between his government and Trofimov. That meant that whenever possible, he would defer to Trofimov so that his government wasn’t directly involved in the violent actions that resulted.
Trofimov had first made contact with the Chinese through diplomatic back channels years before. Communist China was the last of the truly powerful, centralized command nations. If the world were to have a new superpower, it would have to be China; only China was poised to fill the vacuum that would be left by a faltering United States. At first, Trofimov’s overtures were rebuffed. As he grew in power and influence, however, China’s government began to take notice. Eventually they had assigned Mak Wei to Trofimov, and a very profitable alliance was born. Through Mak, the Chinese supported Trofimov’s efforts. When America ultimately fell, it was the Chinese who would benefit. Trofimov knew that the gratitude he hoped would be shown him by the resulting Chinese superpower wasn’t guaranteed. That didn’t worry him, however. His own power would be as great, if not greater, once America fell. He would be in a position to command China’s respect, if not its thanks. The world order that emerged would be closer to the one he desired, and that was really all that mattered to him. In this manner, Mak and his government were also “useful idiots,” after a fashion. The difference was simply that they weren’t stupid like the peace protesters Trofimov used so easily.
Trofimov finally spoke. “You requested this meeting, Gareth. You tell me what it is you want.”
“It isn’t what I want,” Twain said. “It’s a new wrinkle. A new problem.”
“Then tell us what it is,” Mak Wei said quietly, breathing out a plume of blue-white smoke, “and we can all address it that much more efficiently.”
“You’ve met Kwok Sun.” Twain jerked a thumb toward the man by the door. “Poor bugger’s gone and lost his brother, hasn’t he?”
“Lost him? How?” Trofimov asked.
“Jin was assigned to that bunch out in Wisconsin,” Twain said, “handling the PAAC splinter bunch.”
“They turned on him?” Trofimov asked.
“Nah, nah.” Twain shook his head. “He was ambushed. They moved on the funeral like you wanted. Full kit, armed to the teeth. Only, somebody was waitin’ for them. Shot down every one of the civvies, then ran down Kwok Jin and plugged him.”
“How do you know this?”
“Paid me an informant in the police department out there.” Twain grinned, as if this were the most brilliant maneuver ever conceived. The man’s mannerisms were that of a much less professional killer, and Trofimov knew this for the ruse that it was. Gareth Twain was cunning, vicious and completely pragmatic. He liked to be underestimated. It was habitual with him, Trofimov was sure.
“You are saying your men were intercepted by law enforcement?”
“Are you kidding me?” Twain was suddenly indignant. “First, they wasn’t my men, except for Jin. Second, no cop or even Fed, hell, not even a Royal loyal would ha’ done as this fellow did. Shot them all down without so much as even a by-your-leave, no warnings, no ‘Stop, police,’ or whatever the hell else. Just bang-bang-bang, you’re all dead, and Bob’s your uncle.”
“Spare me the colorful argot,” Trofimov said. “You forget that I know you’re not quite the Irish rube you pretend to be.”
Twain frowned, but wisely said nothing.
“This is an unfortunate complication,” Mak Wei put in, sucking the last of his unfiltered cigarette down to his stained fingers. “It could indicate that we—that you, Trofimov—have finally raised the attention of some governmental or legal entity. The operation could be in danger.”
“Not buyin’ it,” Twain said. “You know who I think it is? I think it’s the Mob. Some competing ‘interest,’ and the kinds
