Coercion Read Free Page A

had let it slip that he was piloting a helicopter to Novosibirsk early in the morning.  Then, as if prompted by the Devil’s own cue, Foreign Minister Sugurov had called his Chief of Staff: he needed Andrey in Moscow.
    “We’re in luck sir.  Leo is here with me and he happens to be flying to Novosibirsk in a few hours.  If I go with him, I can catch the early flight from there.  That will get me to the Ministry by ten.” 
    Leo had choked on his drink as he heard those words.  That was six hours ago.  He still tasted the vodka.
    What Leo had not let slip was how or why he was flying.  That story could never just slip out.  The truth was, he had used rank, intimidation, and lies to gain the use of a military helicopter to smuggle a briefcase of God-knows-what to a dead-drop in Novosibirsk.  He was playing messenger for his merciless masters.
    Leo suspected that his masters had many clever ways of circumventing Soviet security, but he had few details on how they worked or even what they wanted, and he didn’t care to speculate.  One bugbear, however, managed to gnaw at his dreams: In all likelihood, there were dozens if not hundreds of slaves like him out there, a plague of conscripts secretly ravaging Russia—perhaps even the world.  Who were they?  What did they want?  Where would it end?
    Although Leo had no clue who his masters were, he knew they expected him to be alone in the helicopter.  They would likely interpret Andrey’s presence on this secret mission as an offensive maneuver, and act accordingly.  If it were not so serious, the outlandish coincidence would almost be funny.  Leo wasn’t laughing.
    Gazing through the helicopter windshield toward the black horizon, thinking about the void that occupied the place where his future had been, Leo was ready to be honest with himself.  He had gotten drunk and let his plans slip because subconsciously, he wanted Andrey to probe.
    Leo had kept his dreadful secret for a year, but he would not be able to hold it together for much longer.  The stress of constantly deceiving everyone he loved and continually betraying everything he believed in was killing him : cancer of the soul.  Ironically, in some regards it wasn’t killing him fast enough.  Not knowing who his Masters were, what they had in mind, when they were watching him, or where this would lead, was literally driving him mad.  He did not want to go out that way.  If only he could find some release, some way to share his pain…
    Leo wiped his eyes.  As much as he had longed to do so, he had not told his wife the truth about Maya’s death or Georgy’s imminent peril.  He knew Oxana would not be able to handle it.  She, like everyone else, still believed that five-year-old Maya had died of a rare heart condition.
    Leo’s was in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t situation.  By withholding such crucial information from his wife, he was choking off the intimacy that fed their marriage.  Yet all he could do was watch in helpless horror while it slowly suffocated before his eyes.  The only alternative was to tell Oxana the truth.  But then she would share his hell and Georgy would lose his mother.  That was no alternative at all.
    Leo was desperate for the opportunity to win back his life and his wife’s heart.  He needed to find a way out.  If anyone could contrive a solution to his predicament, Leo thought, Andrey Demerko could.
    Andrey was the best strategist Leo knew, and a powerful operative as well.  Even with Andrey’s help, however, he feared the situation was hopeless.  Leo was no fool himself, and he couldn’t even fathom how to begin to fight.  The problem was the absolute anonymity of the powerful people who controlled him.
    How do you attack an invisible enemy?   Sure, he could try to uncover them, but how could he possibly avoid all the conscripted eyes and wary ears while scouring the darkness for his masters?  How could he wipe them all out before they