at his watch. He wore an Ironman digital to work to appear folksy, a subtle but important manipulation. His Patek Philippe was at home. As was his custom, he started the briefing without small talk, indicating with a twirl of his index finger that the director of the Central Intelligence Agency was on the clock.
Director Motley cleared her throat.
“Thank you for meeting with us, Mr. Pyne. As you know from the President’s Daily Brief, an American citizen named Hanna Hastings was abducted in Romania. Evidence suggests that her captivity was at the direction of a senior Russian intelligence official named Aleksandr Zharkov and that she has been transported to Medny Island, a remote island in the Bering Sea off the Kamchatka Peninsula.”
Rodriguez was handling the visual elements of the presentation, using a laptop to advance the PowerPoint slides on the large LCD screens that lined the walls.
“How confident are you that this individual is on the island?”
“Based on IMINT and HUMINT, our confidence is high,” Motley replied, not giving up anything that would lead to further questions about the source of the HUMINT, a source Vic had been reluctant to reveal.
“But no SIGINT corroboration?”
Vic winced in his seat, but Motley remained unfazed.
“Correct, sir.”
“Go on.”
“We believe that Aleksandr Zharkov, deputy director of Directorate S in Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, is also currently on the island. He is the son of a well-known member of Russian organized crime in Saint Petersburg. I know that you are aware of the recent attack on a Montana ranch owned by the Hastings family. That was an attempt to kill one of our personnel and was carried out by members of Ivan Zharkov’s crime syndicate.”
“Who is that?” Pyne interrupted.
“James Reece, sir,” the director answered.
“Great. That guy should be in prison. Only reason he’s not on death row is because of that stunt in Odessa. Go on.”
“After the hit in Montana failed, Director Zharkov kidnapped Hanna Hastings in Romania in an attempt to lure her brother and possibly James Reece to Russia to look for her.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Here is a psychological profile on Zharkov,” Director Motley said, pushing a file to Pyne.
“CliffsNotes version, please. I have a country to run.”
“He’s a serial killer. He kills to fulfill an abnormal sadistic psychological gratification; thrill seeking and sexual. In Zharkov’s case it was brought on by finding his mother after her suicide.”
“This is giving me a headache. What’s his endgame?”
Rodriguez advanced the slide to a screen shot from the Dark Web.
“What the hell is this?” Pyne asked.
“This,” Motley continued, “is from a site on the Dark Web. For five hundred thousand dollars U.S., one can apply to hunt a person on Zharkov’s island.”
“What?”
“He imports prisoners from Africa. They become the prey. The website describes them as the worst type of criminals. Zharkov has taken care of the judge and jury parts. For half a million dollars, you get to be the executioner.”
“And you are telling me he wants to bring in some bigger game?” Pyne asked.
“That is correct, sir. He was using Hanna Hastings as bait and it worked. Two days ago, Ms. Hastings’s brother, a former Navy SEAL, contacted Aleksandr Zharkov via the Dark Web. His last communication indicated he was booking a human hunt in Kamchatka. Apparently he does not trust us to get his sister out. He has not been heard from since. He had a TS/SCI clearance and there are a few things in his head we would prefer the Russians not access.”
“Fucking SEALs,” Pyne said, rolling his eyes. “If they are not writing books, they’re causing international incidents.”
Director Motley ignored his sophomoric comment and continued: “In coordination with [XXX] and the Joint Staff we’ve developed two courses of action for your consideration and would like to brief the president as soon as possible.”
“What are our options?”
“Mr. Rodriguez will walk you through plans, sir.”
“Thank you, Director.”
The acoustics of the room were unusual, and Vic felt like his voice sounded louder than the situation dictated.
“Mr. Pyne, we briefed the Joint Staff this morning and they have moved assets into place to facilitate multiple COAs if the president decides to move forward with a hostage rescue mission to return Ms. Hastings and her brother to the United States. As you know, we have successfully extracted [XXX] [Redacted] [Redacted] with SDV assets.”
“The nuclear physicist last year. I remember approving the mission.”
Vic bit his tongue, knowing the president approved the mission, not his chief of staff.
“Yes, sir. This mission would use that same profile but instead of