Читать книгу Head Of The Snake - G. Rehder - Страница 7

Chapter 3

It was early October, and Andre had been missing for about three months. There had been no ransom demands, and all the contacts Joseph Lehan knew globally heard nothing about his location or his demise.

The last three people who had seen him alive, Andre’s new Russian Security team, were immobilized in the attack when he disappeared. They could give no helpful information or even indicate the basics of what had happened, let alone where Andre may be. Fortunately for them, after questioning by the county sheriff in Alaska and the intervention by William Patrick, they were allowed to leave the country and return to Moscow the next day.

The vehicle they were in when the attack occurred belonged to Andre’s good friend William Patrick, a wealthy Alaskan investor. Andre was en route to a meeting at Patrick’s hunting lodge on Lake Louise about the Blue Boulder Mining project at the time of the kidnap.

Andre’s disappearance was kept private and out of the media. The county sheriff didn’t even know a person was abducted out of the Humvee. All he was told was that three Russians, who had enemies, seeking revenge, made an unsuccessful attempt on their lives. The Humvee was towed to Patrick’s grounds and was searched by a private investigative team that Patrick had brought in.

Under the hood, they found three spent canisters that had residue of chloroform inside. They had been remotely discharged into the cab of the vehicle. The automatic door locks had also been bypassed to be controlled remotely. Whoever perpetrated the crime were professionals and caught the four occupants completely off guard, one of them never to be heard from again.

Since then, security had become a top priority for Lehan. He had taken steps after Andre’s disappearance to make sure the fate that befell his boss and friend would not be repeated on him.

He wanted to expand the Sarnev Security apparatus to cover all the companies offices globally. He had tasked Maria Simpson, his new personal assistant, with the project.

Prior to Andre’s disappearance, each division had their own security structure; if he put it all under one umbrella, it would give it unity, and more important to Lehan, he would have a better opportunity to track down the man he felt was responsible for Andre vanishing off the face of the earth, Jason Orr.

Maria spoke to and interviewed many heads of global security groups. After much consideration and discussions with Lehan, they both concurred to create their own security company. Not only would they save on the fees these companies would charge them, but they would be able to sell the services they developed after it became well established.

Maria had been impressed with a couple of people that were ex-Israeli special forces. They were now independent contractors who were looking to expand their small operations on a worldwide front. Katzi Bar-Lev and Havar Fromer had a team of one hundred and fifty men and women that they directed from their base of operations in New York City. They had many lucrative contracts in place with corporations up and down the East Coast of the United States.

They specialized in personal protection, anti-terrorism, and more importantly, cybersecurity. They employed a variety of ex-military and law enforcement personal with unique backgrounds and locations. They also had skilled technical staff that worked in the cyber section of their company. Its name was Masada Security, and as they both told Maria, this was just their beginning.

“We want to be the best and the biggest. We just need the capital to grow it.”

Maria checked on their backgrounds and references and found their reputation impeccable.

Lehan followed Maria’s recommendation and agreed to hire them to improve the islands security and Sarnev’s travel program. That would include a wide range of travel operations to keep him and his division heads safe worldwide during their frequent travels. Depending on the quality of the job they did on these fronts, Lehan would expand them into the protection of their offices and operations globally.

A huge task, Lehan told them, “You will have financial resources that you have not even imagined, but I demand results.”

Bar-Lev and Fromer told Lehan they were ready for the challenge. They had contacts all over the world. It would not be a problem.

Lehan felt he had waited a respectable period before calling all the Sarnev International global division heads to Andre’s estate and company headquarters in Bermuda.

There was a lot to discuss. William George from George, Franklin, and Pauly, Sarnev’s legal firm, with Sarnev being the firms only client, had been on the island for over a week. He had been going over all the legal aspects for Joseph Lehan to take the helm of one of the wealthiest corporations in the world.

For Lehan, Andre’s wishes under these circumstances were clear. He would become the acting president and CEO of Sarnev International until Andre was either located or the proof of his death was confirmed. Documents that stated such had been notarized and kept in Andre’s personal safe on the island in case of this very occurrence.

In preparation for the meeting, George had prepared briefs and documents for all the division heads to read and sign. They would all acknowledge Lehan’s new position. Lehan was confident there would be no dissent. He had files on all the board members with information he knew they would not want to be made public.

The new course of the company was also on the agenda. Lehan was anxious to implement ideas he had presented to Andre that Andre was reluctant to employ.

Sarnev International had division offices in Edmonton Alberta, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Cayenne, French Guiana, Johannesburg, South Africa, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Bern, Switzerland, London, Moscow, Hong Kong, Beijing, Tokyo, Brisbane, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, and Kabul, Afghanistan.

Seventeen Division heads would all be at the estate at the same time, a first in the company’s history. All seventeen heads would be picked up by the fleet of Sarnev jets that were stationed in strategic locations around the world. Most being on the East Coast and Kindley Field Bermuda.

As the division heads arrived on Bermuda, they would be driven from Kindley Field to the estate by Security Details. They would pass through the double-gated entry where they would be searched, then body scanned before entering the walled compound. There would be no exceptions as per security protocol that had been in place for over a decade. Bar-Lev and Fromer were impressed by this procedure.

“I can improve on it a little, but it is basically sound,” Bar-Lev told Maria Simpson.

Viktor Bardzecki had just landed at Kindley Field in Bermuda with his fellow passengers on the Sarnev Cessna, Fredrick Haus, Bern Division, and Simon Percy, London Division. Viktor had been seated the whole time while in the air, except to rise to make a vodka, which Percy had lost count of all the way from Moscow. He was nervous—more than nervous, he was fearful. He had the feeling he would never see his beloved Moscow again.

*****

The disappearance of Andre Sarnev should be blamed on him; after all, it was his personal security team that had failed to keep Andre out of the hands of the kidnappers. What was so disconcerting to him was that Lehan had not thrown any blame his way, not yet, which was uncharacteristic of Joseph.

Their car moved into the gated entrance, and all three men were asked to exit. Their bags were brought into the glass-fronted security building as they stood waiting by the side of the car for their belongings to be searched inside. After their bags were returned to the car, they were escorted in, and each man went through a body scan. Bardzecki’s wide girth filled the scanner’s inner chamber to capacity.

All three men were cleared and reentered the vehicle and were driven inside the compound to the underground garage beneath the seven floors that made up the main estate. There were three attendants waiting for them to carry their luggage. They would follow them up to the fourth-floor living quarters after the three took the passenger elevator up.

Each man was familiar with the estate and its luxurious accommodations a five-star hotel would be put to shame. There were two basement floors that housed the working area and staff for the estate, also what was called the war room that could accommodate up to fifteen working cubicles and a military-grade computer system that monitored Sarnev Internationals global operations.

There was a central control room that watched every inch of the estate through a massive camera system. It was always staffed with no less than two security personnel. There were some exceptions to what they could see—bathrooms and the private living area of Joseph Lehan, who would soon move up to the fifth floor to occupy the now vacant and opulent living area of Andre Sarnev.

Bardzecki was shown to his room on the fourth floor. He had an Atlantic-side view, but he barely looked out the window. His focus was on the credenza that held the bar. He found what he was looking for, a bottle of the Jewel of Russia Vodka. Since it was 1700 hours, he smirked at the thought of Percy telling him it was too early to drink when he got on the jet. Since it is now late afternoon, he said out loud, “I have a double, maybe triple, you pompous Englishman.”

He grabbed a glass and poured it full then sat on a couch facing the southwest, wanting this day to end. He had only eaten some pastry on the plane. His stomach growled as he emptied his glass. He called the kitchen and ordered dinner—a rare steak would be good. The meeting was scheduled for 1000 hours the next morning, plenty of time to drink and sober up by then.