Liberation Day Read online

  Ahead, he could see the home sitting alone against the skyline. Constructed of stone and stucco, it managed to pull off warmth and wealth simultaneously, Thorn guessing the pairing to be a pretty accurate depiction of who he’d soon meet.

  Keeping his gaze focused for any signs of life, he walked forward in a slow and unassuming manner. With the exception of two older model cars parked outside there appeared to be nobody nearby, though he knew from years of experience that that didn’t mean somebody wasn’t watching.

  Going right for the front door, Thorn exhaled and knocked on the dark-stained oak. Two minutes of complete silence passed, punctuated by his knocking a second and then a third time. He waited a full five before cursing under his breath and giving up on the door. He considered peeking in a few windows before dismissing the notion and turning back towards the gravel drive.

  He made it over thirty yards before the door burst open and an elderly woman with water dripping from her snow white hair leaned out, waving a hand overhead at him. “Wait. Wait!” she called, her accent thick. “I’m so sorry, I was in the bath and hurried as fast as I could.”

  “Oh, no, ma’am,” Thorn said, turning and trotting back towards the house, his steps quick shuffles just shy of a full jog. “The fault is mine for showing up unannounced.”

  The woman smiled, displaying a grid of uneven teeth. “Nonsense. It’s not every day we get visitors here. Please, do come in.”

  Thorn accepted her invitation and stepped inside onto a stone foyer. The home smelled of rich wood and baked bread, the style older but very well kept.

  “Now, what can I do for you, young man?” the woman asked, taking up a towel from the back of a chair and going to work on her wet hair.

  “First let me ask, is this the Chekov home?” Thorn opened.

  “Why it most certainly is, and has been for over twenty years now. My name is Sonia Chekov.” The last sentence was delivered with no small amount of pride, her smile growing even larger.

  “Thorn Byrd, very pleased to meet you,” Thorn said. “The reason I’m here today is I was hoping to speak to Yuri. Is he home by chance?”

  The woman bobbed her head, the movement so oversized Thorn could see the top of her scalp. “He is indeed. He’s down by the pond feeding the ducks.” She patted at Thorn’s arm and said, “A habit he picked up in D.C. and never quite broke himself of. Is he expecting you?”

  “No ma’am, I’m afraid he isn’t. I know it’s very rude of me to show up like this, but I was hoping for just maybe a half hour of his time.”

  “He should be back up to the house in a little while. I suppose you could go down to the water and talk to him now if you’d like.”

  “That’d be excellent,” Thorn said, a touch of relief finding him. The conversation he was about to have could be awkward at best, confrontational at worst, and being able to have it in private made things much easier.

  At once he was shown to the back door and pointed towards a pond a short distance away. Thorn thanked Sonia for her kindness and walked along a narrow footpath, careful to remain visible the entire time.

  As he drew closer he could see a small, elderly man throwing handfuls of pellets across the water, a gaggle of ducks scurrying after them. Thorn waited until he just forty yards away before throwing a hand in the air and saying, “Hello, there!”

  The man looked up from the ducks, startled, before chuckling. “Why hello there to you too. I’m sorry, I didn’t see you.”

  “Nothing to apologize for, sir,” Thorn said, drawing close. “I’m the one that showed up here this morning uninvited and unannounced. You had no reason to be looking for anybody.”

  He walked up and extended his hand. “My name is Thorn Byrd.”

  Chekov tossed the remaining pellets from his hand, rubbed it along the thigh of his pants and returned the shake. “Yuri Chekov, glad to meet you.”

  His accent was every bit as thick as his wife’s, the same good nature on display as well.

  “And you as well Mr. Chekov.”

  “Please, call me Yuri.”

  “Very well, Yuri,” Thorn said and paused for a moment. “Now, I know how this is probably going to sound, but I was hoping I could ask you a few questions.”

  Chekov’s eyes widened a bit, deep wrinkles forming along his forehead. “I’m sorry you came all this way, but everything I did for the consulate has since been declassified. You could have looked it up from your computer at home.”

  Thorn smiled lightly, shaking his head. “No sir, that’s not what I came out here to talk to you about. I was wondering, do you happen to own a helicopter?”

  Laughter escaped from Chekov’s lips and he waved his hand towards his home. “I know we are not a poor family, but I assure you I have nothing as large or expensive as a helicopter.”

  “And this home,” Thorn asked, “is it the only one you own?”

  The smile faded a bit from Chekov’s face. “It is. What is this about? Helicopters and homes and such?”

  It was the moment Thorn had been concerned with since departing hours before, knowing the next few minutes could determine how things played out in the coming days or if he was back to square one. Exhaling, he said, “I work for a company, not government affiliated, that is conducting an investigation. Last night we took an image of a man climbing into a helicopter outside a private home in Massachusetts who bore a striking resemblance to you.”

  All friendliness bled away from Chekov as he turned his back to Thorn and began digging through a bag of duck feed. “I’m quite certain I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Thorn waited a few moments to see if Chekov would say anything else, but the seasoned diplomat held his tongue.

  “Yuri, why do I have the impression that while you may not be involved, you’re not surprised to see me here today?”

  Without looking up, Chekov tossed a handful of pellets into the water. Thorn could see the color had drained from his face.

  “I’m very sorry you feel that way.”

  Thorn paused a bit longer before starting to back away. “My apologies for disturbing you.”

  Chekov nodded in his direction, but stayed silent as Thorn withdrew.

  Allowing himself to put some distance between them, Thorn paused and turned, backing away slowly. “Mr. Chekov, do the cities of Boston, Liverpool, Genoa, Hamburg, Vladivostok, and Nagasaki hold any special significance to you?”

  Stopping mid-toss, Chekov turned his head to Thorn. He licked his lips several times, his body rooted in place. “What?”

  Fishing the pictures from his back pocket, Thorn stepped back over the ground he’d just traveled, dropping them down atop the feed bag. “Somebody in Massachusetts with a strong likeness to you is targeting those cities. That someone did this to my friend and I can only assume he plans to do even worse to the citizens of those towns.”

  A shadow of melancholy crossed Chekov’s face as he stared at Thorn before sliding his gaze down to the pictures. All pretense of the ducks faded away as he reached down and took up the photos, looking at each one in turn.

  By the time he was done and raised his gaze to Thorn, a bit of moisture had crept into the corners of his eyes.

  “He’s doing it. He’s really going to do it.”

  A ripple passed through Thorn as he ventured a few steps closer. “Who’s going to do what?”

  Dropping the pictures back down on the sack, Chekov motioned to a split top wooden bench nearby. He remained silent until he was seated, Thorn drifting over and posting up on the opposite end of it.

  For several minutes Chekov simply sat and stared out over the water, his mouth opening and closing in a few false starts, before he began.

  “For the longest time we thought he was dead.”

  Several questions came to Thorn’s mind, but he pushed each one away, content to let Chekov tell his story.

  “It was the spring of 1942. My father was a Russian diplomat stationed in Germany at a time when it was fooli
sh to think Germany would be diplomatic about anything.

  “One afternoon our family was picnicking in a park when my brother Anton rose and said he had to use the restroom. It was the last time my parents would ever see him, the last time I would see him for a very long time.”

  Again, Thorn waited in silence.

  “Fast forward thirty-five years,” Chekov continued. “I was a brand new diplomat to the Russian consulate in America. One day, an appointment is set for me to have a private meeting with a man named Bern Gold. I was told he could be a large political contributor so I took the meeting.”

  He paused just a moment, glancing to Thorn before again shifting his attention forward. “It took only seconds for me to realize I was staring at my brother Anton. Of course, I was overjoyed to see him, greeted him as such, wept tears of happiness at our good fortune.”

  Again he paused, the old man seeming to draw further inward with every word he said. “That afternoon as we sat and talked it became very apparent that the man in front of me was no longer my brother. Gone was the young, happy, strapping boy of our youth and in his place was a bitter, angry, crippled man in a wheelchair.”

  “Bitter and angry about what?” Thorn asked, keeping his voice to a whisper.

  Chekov sighed. “That day in the park, my brother was abducted by Hitler’s SS. It did not matter that he was Russian or the son of a diplomat, to the local soldiers he was nothing more than a non-conforming youth. Like all the others, he was packed on to a truck and sent to a concentration camp. Kaiserwald.

  “All told, he spent two and a half years there. It was one of the smaller camps in the war and located far to the east in Latvia, so they were one of the last to be evacuated.”

  Pieces began to shift together, working their way into what Thorn already knew. Gaps still remained, but he couldn’t dispel the feeling that he was much closer to answers than he had been an hour before.

  “That list of countries certainly fits with the participants of the Second World War, but it represents both sides. What could he have to gain by targeting all of them?”

  Chekov rubbed his hands along his thighs and sighed again. “Like I said, the man that sat before me was bitter, filled with rage. He was angry at the Axis for what it did to him and he was angry at the Allies for not stopping it, for waiting to the very end to help them.”

  Thorn nodded at the explanation, the data fitting in a twisted sort of way. “What’s he planning to do?”

  “Bear in mind this was all a long time ago, but he called it Liberation Day.”

  Thorn let the words hang for several second, knowing Chekov would explain in his own time. Almost a full minute passed before he began again.

  “Several of the men from Kaiserwald banded together to plot revenge on everyone they felt had wronged them. They took up posts around the world with the intention of getting back at every last person they held responsible.”

  It was not the first time Thorn had seen what misplaced anger could do, his entire time in active duty spent battling just that.

  “Why Liberation Day?” Thorn asked.

  “He said waiting for their day of liberation was the only thing that kept them going while they were inside, and that planning Liberation Day kept them all going now on the outside.”

  Thorn processed the information, his mind trying to grasp the enormity of what he was being told. “Get back at them how?”

  “I don’t know,” Chekov whispered, turning to face Thorn while shaking his head. “I really don’t.”

  Thorn met the gaze, forcing his outward appearance to appear neutral. “So your brother just walked in one day, thirty-five years after last seeing you, and told you all this?”

  “He didn’t so much tell me as he tried to sell me on it. At that time, my family still had considerable stock in the Russian shipping industry.”

  A low whistle slid from Thorn’s lips. “He wanted to bring you in.”

  Chekov nodded his head. “I told him he was crazy and sold every last holding I had in Russia. As I sit here now, I have never been back.”

  Thorn cast a glance over at Chekov to see two fat tears slide silently down his cheeks.

  “And as bad as this sounds, I’ve spent every day since praying that my brother and his plan were both dead,” Chekov whispered.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  The moment the plane touched down at Hanson Air Force Base, Thorn’s cell phone began vibrating against his leg. The number was one he didn’t recognize, ignoring it as he thanked Thompson for his help.

  It rang again.

  Thorn bypassed it a second time and drove from the base, thanking the guards at the exit station and easing back into midday traffic.

  The third time it rang, Thorn fished it out and answered.

  “Where the hell have you been?” barked Billy Turner.

  “Upstate New York,” Thorn said. “I was on a plane with my phone turned off. What’s going on?”

  “How fast can you get over here?”

  “Twenty minutes?” Thorn said, computing the route in his head, looking out at the traffic around him.

  “We’ll be waiting,” Turner said and hung up. Thorn stared at the phone for a moment in confusion before dropping it on the dash.

  The drive took only seventeen minutes, the lunch traffic a bit lighter than Thorn expected. He pulled up to the main gate outside of Turner’s and was motioned through by Melvin without so much as a second glance, a smirk crossing his face as he noticed the splint still in place.

  Thorn felt his insides tighten as Turner and Cardoza were both waiting for him by the garage, both still wearing the same clothes as the night before. Behind them the garage door was shut tight.

  Thorn parked the Explorer and climbed out.

  “I’m guessing it was important?” Turner said by way of an opening.

  “Extremely,” Thorn said. “This thing is a lot bigger than just some guys moving in on your docks.”

  Turner shot a look to Cardoza, both looking grim.

  “That’s why we called you,” Cardoza said.

  The feelings of anticipation and dread climbed a bit higher in Thorn as he glanced between each of them. “What have I missed?”

  “You have a weak stomach?” Turner asked.

  Thorn had seen things that no person should ever have to, the kind of things that one wouldn’t think humans capable of doing to one another. “Not at all.”

  “Come with us,” Cardoza said, leading the crew inside.

  A putrid smell was the first thing to hit Thorn, a sheen of moisture coming to his eyes. For a moment he paused just inside the door to let his eyes adjust before stepping forward and taking stock of the situation.

  Lined before him were six men, all seated in a row, each tied down to a steel chair. All six were in various states of disarray, physical violence worn plainly on their features. Of the half dozen two were unconscious, the others avoiding eye contact.

  “You guys have been busy,” Thorn said, scanning the group before looking to Turner and Cardoza. “Who are they?”

  “Four boats tried to get away last night,” Turner said. “Fifteen men in all. We gleaned through them and took care of the ones that didn’t know anything. No need to bother sweating the minions.

  “These guys were a little higher on the food chain.”

  Again Thorn looked at each of the men in turn. “They look like they wish they were dead right now.”

  “Yeah, and how’s your friend?” Cardoza asked.

  Knowing the implication that was being made, Thorn turned his attention back to Turner and Cardoza. “Commenting, not condemning.”

  Both men nodded slightly, openly surveying him, trying to decide some unspoken question between them. Sliding the photos from his pocket Thorn stepped forward, holding them at arm’s length.

  “Any bastards that would do this to a woman deserves whatever he gets.”

  Once more the two exchanged a glance, both nodding.

  “
Good man,” Cardoza said.

  “Please don’t take this the wrong way,” Thorn said, “but I was just handed a ton of new information.”

  He let the statement end there, hoping it would be picked up that he had precious little time and needed to be back on the road soon.

  “That’s why we called,” Turner said, looping out around the line of prisoners and walking along behind them. “When we first got them back here, they all tried the tough guy routine.

  “We beat them with fists. Not a word. Whips. Nothing. Once

  my friend over there went to work though, they couldn’t talk fast enough.”

  As he talked a thick, bullish man with a bald head and red beard stepped from the shadows into the open. Around his neck he wore a welder’s apron, the front speckled with blood. In either hand he carried a blowtorch and pliers, both also stained red.

  Moving slowly behind them Turner extended a finger, pointing out various body parts among the captives. “What you smell is charred flesh and what you see are fingers, ears, and noses removed with pliers.”

  Thorn gave no outward reaction as he looked at the group, having seen much worse in his day.

  Turner continued his march along the line, stopping halfway down to run a knuckle along the back of one man’s skull. At the touch of his hand the man cowered in his seat, squirming as much as his bindings would allow.

  Clearly whatever had happened in the previous hours had left a mark.

  “What have you found out?” Thorn asked.

  “Bits and pieces at best,” Cardoza said. “None of them know too much, just enough to paint a jumbled picture for us.”

  Turner started on the far end, returning the same way he’d just come. “This guy here said that yesterday teams were dispatched all over the world to pick up shipments.”

  He moved forward to the second man in order. “This one said that the guy he works for found some plant in South America called Brugmansia and was trying to weaponize it.”

  The heels of his shoes clicked against the floor as he continued onward. “This third guy took it a little further and said the plant wasn’t that bad as a plant, but their boss figured out a way to vaporize it so it was lethal.”