Objekt 825 (Tracie Tanner Thrillers Book 9)

and plodded around the front of the Town Car, his hands numb from shock and terror. Hell, his entire body was numb. His teeth were numb.
At least now you don’t have to try to sneak past Cripe into the lab, he thought, just before puking up the remains of the chicken sandwich he’d eaten hours ago for dinner, as well as some undigested whiskey and plenty of that fucking stomach acid that had been trying to escape for the last two hours.
The mess splattered the side of his car and Carson moaned. His eyes had teared up, either from tossing chunks or from the knowledge he was utterly, completely, spectacularly screwed, or maybe from both. He had bent down as he threw up, and now he straightened, more or less, and glanced through the Russian’s closed front window to see the man staring back at him, his eyes dark and dead, like a shark’s.
Somewhere in the midst of his fear and hopelessness, Carson noticed with something resembling satisfaction that while most of the vomit had come to rest on his own car, he’d sprayed a wide area, and plenty was even now sticking to the side of the Town Car.
He opened the door to squeeze into his little Toyota, ignoring the almost overwhelming urge to smash his door into the Lincoln, knowing without a doubt that if he did so, some early-morning commuter would find his cooling corpse lying in his own puke next to his car.
From the open window of the Lincoln came a clearing of the Russian’s throat, followed by the words, “Oh, and one more thing.”
Carson raised his head, wiping his mouth on his shirtsleeve as he did to remove a stray bit of puke. “What more could there possibly be to say…”
For the second time in a matter of moments the words trailed away, as Carson once again found himself staring down the barrel of that damned big black gun.
“Only this,” the Russian replied. “Goodbye, Comrade.”
Fear and adrenaline exploded inside Carson and he reacted without conscious thought, jerking himself backward as somewhere in the far reaches of his brain he registered the sound of a sharp, staccato roar and a flash of intense yellow light.
But only for a split second.
Then everything disappeared.

4
 
June 13, 1988
11:50 p.m.
I-264 Commuter Park and Ride lot
Southeast of Norfolk, Virginia
Andrei Lukashenko hadn’t been blessed with an abundance of patience. He had many good qualities—or at least he thought he did, and his opinion was the only one besides that of his KGB bosses he cared about—but his tendency to fly off the handle at the slightest provocation had cost him more than his share of friends over the years.
So when that pasty-faced American neudachnik lost his dinner all over the side of the Lincoln, Andrei went from calculating and coldly professional to furious and homicidal in near-record time. There hadn’t been the slightest possibility of Limington leaving this parking lot alive from the moment Andrei had taken possession of the Marine Technix prototype device, but executing him instantly morphed into a highly satisfying personal moment, whereas until ten seconds ago would have represented nothing more than the predictable end of this business transaction.
He couldn’t deny, though, a touch of grudging admiration for Carson Limington, once he got past the teary eyes and the whiny insistence Andrei return the device he’d worked so hard to get his hands on. And the puke, of course. The moment he’d caught sight of Andrei’s gun for the second time, he’d reacted much more quickly than Andrei would have predicted, nearly escaping the head shot entirely.
Not that it would have mattered. Even if the shot had whizzed harmlessly past Limington, the kid would have had nowhere to go. He wouldn’t have had time to climb into his car and drive away, so his only option would have been to run. And even given the parking lot’s poor lighting, Andrei knew he could have centered his next shot right between Limington’s shoulder blades.
Andrei guessed he’d put the kid’s lights out for good, despite his impressive reaction to seeing the gun. He wasn’t about to take any chances, though. If there was one thing in this world Andrei Lukashenko prided himself on, it was his professionalism. He’d executed more Westerners than he could count over the years—mostly Americans and Brits, although he’d done a couple Frenchmen and the odd Italian as well—and he had never left a victim behind without a double-tap to the cranium, followed by two fingers to the jugular to ensure the subject had moved on to whatever awaited him—or her—in the next world.
The pasty-faced scientist would get the same treatment.
With the momentum he’d established from his desperate surge backward, Limington had been kind enough drop to the ground in the vicinity of the Town Car’s rear wheels. This offered Andrei plenty of room to exit his car without having to climb over the motionless—and now bleeding—body.
He gave a brief glance at his driver’s side door and shook his head in disgust. The evidence of Limington’s intestinal distress was splattered all over the paint, tiny chunks of unrecognizable material even now beginning to dry to a sticky, nasty mess. There was blood spatter, too, of course, but Andrei didn’t concern himself with that. It would disappear once he washed the vehicle, which he would do the instant he returned to the Soviet Embassy following the successful conclusion of tonight’s mission.
The real reason he’d climbed out of his car was to finish off Limington, and now he turned his attention to the figure sprawled on the narrow strip of pavement between the two cars. He’d fallen backward, but had spun in a kind of half-twist as he dropped to the ground. Whether from the impact of the 9mm slug or as an extension of his panic-induced attempt at escape, Andrei did