Frank looked at Anna with a half-smile. "You guessed right. Someone will propose awarding you a medal from Vasilev. He may not necessarily agree, but since he's in Paris, he will definitely summon you."
As Frank and Anna discussed the next steps of the plan, Jack glanced at Bryan, who only shrugged innocently.
They had definitely found the right person for this job. Only someone like Frank—who had navigated the complex web of Cold War espionage—could have orchestrated such an intricate setup.
—
Late at night, inside the safe house, Jack ate a small portion of vegetable salad before gathering his gear to set out. This mission didn't require as much time spent in hiding as the last one, but the extraction afterward would take a while. Cutting down on unnecessary food intake would help avoid complications.
Everyone else had their own tasks. After handing Jack a few bullets with red-tipped rounds, Bryan also left quickly.
Anna had already gone ahead earlier. She was likely waiting anxiously in her downtown apartment for orders from the FSB.
At around 3 a.m., Jack carried his TAC-50 and stealthily infiltrated the under-renovation observation deck.
Frank had assured him that work had halted due to funding issues and that no one would disturb him. Still, Jack carefully searched the place from top to bottom and set up simple sound traps at several entry points.
Once everything was ready, the long wait began. The morning weather was excellent. Technically, Paris had a temperate oceanic climate, with mild winters and summers, but autumn and spring tended to have frequent rainfall.
Yet today was a clear, crisp autumn day. Jack wondered if Frank had factored this into the plan as well. Given the old spy's meticulous approach, it was entirely possible.
Meanwhile, two kilometers away at the Russian embassy, Anna sat on a bench in the third-floor hallway, working hard to control her breathing and heartbeat.
When Frank had explained the entire plan, she had experienced a fleeting moment of wanting to abandon it altogether. She even suspected that the whole ordeal was an elaborate conspiracy—that from the moment she unknowingly drank drugged tea and was kidnapped, she had been caught in an intricate web of deception.
Everything seemed too unbelievable. At her most vulnerable moment, a dashing figure had suddenly appeared to shield her, like a scene from a scripted hero-rescues-beauty story.
She admitted that, under the influence of the drugs, she had felt a momentary flutter of emotion. But which agent hadn't undergone training to resist narcotics?
She had originally intended to play along, but then that guy had unexpectedly exposed his own identity. From that moment on, everything spiraled completely out of her control.
Anna kept reminding herself that this could all be an elaborate trap, yet her rational mind told her otherwise.
She was just an insignificant pawn. No one would sacrifice the lives of so many wealthy elites just to set a trap for someone like her.
When she had followed Jack into the auction hall with the "Blotched Viper" in hand, she had deliberately confirmed the identities of those inside the VIP booths. While she hadn't recognized all of them, a few familiar faces had no traces of disguise.
She knew that the conversation between Jack and Frank that followed had been partially staged for her to overhear. She also understood that Jack had been giving her a lifeline, a way out. So, midway through, she had unhesitatingly grabbed onto that straw of survival.
Once again, things had unfolded beyond her expectations. She had been prepared to offer everything, only to be thoroughly rejected by a certain infuriating man.
And what she had considered an impossible dream—freedom—turned out to be a mere afterthought in Frank's grand scheme. In his plan, she wasn't even the primary beneficiary.
Long ago, Anna had told herself never to trust men again, never to trust anyone. She could only rely on herself.
But relying solely on herself had led her nowhere. She had simply moved from one cage to another.
"General Vasilev wishes to see you."
A man named Chenkov appeared before her.
Anna looked up at him. This was the man she had once pinned her hopes on—the one who had lured her into the FSB with a false promise. He was also the man she had originally planned to seduce.
The only thing she had absolute confidence in was her appearance. She could see the desire hidden beneath his cold facade—the kind of hunger that wanted to devour her whole.
He certainly wouldn't complain about her being "too skinny" or having "sharp bones." This was the figure every woman dreamed of.
As the image of another infuriating man suddenly flashed in her mind, Anna quickly pulled herself together. She smoothed out the wrinkles in her dress, stood up, and followed Chenkov without a word.
Inside a modest lounge, a small table sat in the center with a chessboard already set up. A nearby ashtray held a smoldering cigar.
Anna instinctively glanced at the west-facing window and noticed that the red curtains had been drawn, but the window itself remained closed.
Vasilev, with a cigar between his lips, acknowledged her presence with a slight nod toward the seat opposite him, indicating for her to sit.
"The last time we met, I invited you to a game, and you declined. This time, you won't refuse me again, will you?"
Anna forced a smile and took the seat across from him.
The last time she had seen this general, he had been pointing a gun at her head one moment and, in the next, bizarrely inviting her to play chess. She had only dared to answer "maybe next time" by resigning herself to fate.
Thinking back, she glanced once more toward the window. Vasilev seemed to misinterpret her hesitation and nodded to Chenkov.
"Open the window."
Anna froze for a moment. She hadn't expected her one and only assigned task from Frank to be completed so effortlessly—without even needing to fake a cough from the cigar smoke.
Vasilev was in an unusually good mood today. His important guest had been delayed by Paris's notorious traffic, giving him a rare opportunity to relax.
Wherever he went, his subordinates always prepared a smoking lounge and a chessboard for him. But he rarely used them—partly due to lack of time and partly due to the scarcity of worthy opponents.
The girl before him, however, seemed like a promising player. Stubborn and unwilling to lose. He only hoped her chess skills were as good as her file claimed.
"I must admit, at first, I didn't have much hope for you. A girl who's too beautiful always turns into a liability. That's why we usually only recruit average-looking ones."
Vasilev rubbed his grizzled chin. His olive-green eyes, aged and slightly cloudy, had the unsettling, lifeless stare of a dead fish, making anyone he looked at feel deeply uncomfortable.
Anna didn't respond. She wasn't sure how to. Instead, she focused on the board and made her move.
Vasilev continued talking to himself. "Your superiors recommended you for an Order of Excellence. If you manage to beat me today, that medal is yours. What do you think?"
"I'll do my best," Anna replied, forcing herself not to glance at the window again. She struggled to concentrate on the chessboard in front of her, but it was difficult.
As time slowly ticked by, she started to doubt her own reality. The past few days felt like an illusion—like a dream too fantastical to be true.
Was this all just a hallucination? Was she still under the effects of the sedative, imagining this entire series of bizarre events because she longed so desperately for freedom?
Was her real self still trapped under the weight of some disgusting, obese billionaire?
"You don't seem to be in good form today. If this is all you've got, that medal is slipping further away from you..."
Even Vasilev's voice began to sound distant and distorted.
"…General!"
A few warm droplets suddenly splattered onto her face.
Anna snapped back to reality—just in time to hear the delayed whistling sound of a bullet cutting through the air.
"Swish!"
______
(≧◡≦) ♡ Support me and read 20 chapters ahead – patreon.com/Mutter
For every 50 Power Stones, one extra chapter will be released on Saturday.