Free The Kremlin Phoenix by Stephen Renneberg Page A

warehouse, and the
entrance disappeared in a wall of flame. Windows blew out of every building
within fifty meters and every cop in the street was blown off their feet.
    Harriman hit the pavement hard,
feeling a wave of heat wash over him. For a moment, he was stunned and deaf,
then through unfocused eyes, he caught sight of the warehouse. It was a blazing
inferno that had completely swallowed the two ESU men and their car.
     
    * * * *
     
    Nogorev’s ears rang from the blast,
but the concrete road barrier had deflected the shock wave, saving him from the
worst effects of the explosion. He stumbled to his feet, trying to clear his
head as he staggered the last few meters to the back of the warehouse and the
rusted old metal ladder that reached to the ceiling. Every window at the back
of the warehouse had blown out, and air was now being sucked in to feed the
flames engulfing both the Buick and the Chevy.
    He fell against the ladder, then
forced himself to climb two rungs at a time. When he was halfway up, he glanced
over his shoulder without slowing. The burning cars blocked the warehouse entrance
as flames climbed the front wall. Soon the entire warehouse would be ablaze,
threatening adjoining buildings. Through the roar of the fire, he heard men
yelling, and hammering at the padlocked front door.
    Nogorev climbed to a precarious
metal catwalk suspended beneath the rafters, then staggered along it to a
rusted metal door. He pushed it open, tumbling out onto the roof where he fell to
his hands and knees, gulping down fresh air. After a few seconds, he climbed to
his feet and stumbled across to the edge of the roof, where he threw himself
across onto the adjoining building, landing heavily.
    Overhead, the beat of approaching
rotors grew louder. A searchlight flicked on, dazzling him in its brilliance,
and a loud speaker blared down at him from above. “STAY WHERE YOU ARE! THIS IS
THE POLICE!”
    He shielded his eyes with one
hand as he fired a short burst at the light with the machine pistol. The searchlight
winked out, plunging him into darkness again. He fired a second burst,
shattering the pilot’s window, forcing the police chopper to bank sharply away.
    Nogorev sprinted across the second
building’s roof to its fire escape, blinking hard to regain his night sight. He’d
carefully researched his escape route, rehearsing it several times until he
could run it almost blind. He leapt onto the building’s old iron fire escape
and clambered down, crashing into the railing several times and jumping the
last few meters into the dark alley. Hiding in the shadows, he heard the beat
of the helicopter’s rotors approaching again, this time with a sniper in the
open side door. He started running, staying in the shadows close to the wall. Halfway
down the alley two street thugs appeared as silhouettes out of the shadows. The
glint of a blade in the hand of one of the thugs caught Nogorev’s eye.
    “Hey motherfucker! I’ll take your
wallet, or I’ll take your life!”
    The other man laughed and sucked
hard on his joint.
    Nogorev didn’t break stride. In
one fluid motion, he brought the machine pistol up and fired a short burst into
each man. He cursed silently, knowing the muzzle flashes might have given him away,
but as he ran on, it became evident the chopper hadn’t seen him fire.
    At the end of the alley, he
stopped and changed ammo clips. The sound of rotor blades continued to fill the
air above while the growing number of sirens told him police were coming from
everywhere.
    Nogorev checked there were no
police in sight, then ran to the manhole in the center of the street and used
the hook to haul up the metal cover. Before he’d killed Goldstein, he’d spent
over an hour forcing the manhole cover open, coating the edges with grease to
ensure it would come away easily. Now his preparations were rewarded as the
cover slid easily aside. He quickly climbed down into the narrow shaft and pulled
the cover back into place