Lost Identity Read online

  Lost Identity

  By

  Karl Braungart

  Book 1

  The Remmich/Miller Series

  Copyright © 2021 Karl Braungart

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN 13: 9780985219376

  Dedication

  This novel is dedicated to the US Army for teaching me to identify and use personal values, especially the desire to become better educated, to plan, and for helping me to develop those values and skills to accomplish my goals.

  In the US Armed Forces, I learned that with group effort, we are and will remain a nation that exemplifies a thriving democracy.

  Acknowledgments

  A book takes many hands touching it before it’s ready for publication. Two people especially deserve acknowledgement. David Aretha at [email protected] did an excellent job of editing and my wife, Sandy, was not only my biggest cheerleader, but also spent many hours reading and editing.

  I also want to thank Micah at 100 Covers for her and her team’s patience, skill, and experience in helping me to craft a cover that I feel represents my genre as well as my book itself.

  (Legal) Disclaimer

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Principal Characters & Locations

  Paul Stanley Remmich – American citizen, grew up in England. West Point graduate. Stationed at 32nd Security Intelligence (S-2), Hindenburg Kaserne, Würzburg, Germany.

  Eric Miller – West Point graduate. Works in US Army military intelligence. Stationed at 32nd Security Intelligence (S-2), Hindenburg Kaserne, Würzburg, Germany.

  Lilly van Horn – Paul Remmich’s girlfriend. Manages Schiller Hotel in Amsterdam, which is owned by her parents.

  Candice Harper – Graduated from USAF Academy ’97. Employed by DELTA Airlines. Eric Miller’s girlfriend.

  Lieutenant General Ed Sutherland – Graduated from Citadel Academy. Commander, V Corps at USAREUR (United States European Command), Patch Barracks, Stuttgart.

  Major General Gerald Elliott – West Point graduate. Stationed at Patch Barracks, Stuttgart, Germany (G-2).

  Colonel Joseph Collins – Commanding officer at 32nd Security Intelligence, Hindenburg Kaserne, Würzburg, Germany.

  First Sergeant Ed Randolph – Head of non-commissioned force at 32nd Security Intelligence (S-2), Hindenburg Kaserne.

  Master Sergeant Terry McClain – Security office assistant at 32nd Security Intelligence (S-2), Hindenburg Kaserne.

  Diane Elliott – General Elliott’s wife. Lives in Stuttgart.

  Julia S. Mitchell – Secretary of State, Washington, DC.

  Andrew Black – CIA director, Washington, DC.

  Oskars Linkov – Russian ambassador in Washington, DC.

  Yury Nikulin – Russian spy.

  Arif Yildiz – Major, Iraqi Tariq’Allah and chargé d’affaires in city of Istanbul, Turkey.

  Adnaw Alzuhari – Captain, Iraqi secret service. Works for Major Yildiz.

  Tara Yako – Iraqi secret service. Works with Alzuhari.

  Faisal Mustafa – Iraqi chief of dental surgery at Leighton Barracks.

  Iyad Aboona – Iraqi secret service. Works for Major Yildiz.

  Leighton Barracks – CIC (Army Counterintelligence Corps) offices, Würzburg, Germany (S-2).

  Patch Barracks – V Corps, USAREUR, Stuttgart, Germany (G-2).

  INSCOM – (US Army Intelligence Security Command), Ft. Belvoir, VA.

  Hindenburg Kaserne – 32nd Security Intelligence offices (S-2), Würzburg, Germany.

  Table of Contents

  ChapterTitle

  1The Meeting

  2Planning

  3They Listen

  4The Luncheon

  5Days Later

  6The Transfer

  7The Longest Ride

  8Midweek Arrival

  9The General Upstairs

  10They Look West

  11The Invitation

  12Barhopping

  13The Fix

  14His Return

  15And Something More

  16Snack Bar Revelations

  17The Comfortable Chair

  18Resignation

  19New Beginning

  20The Search Begins

  21August Formula

  22Confrontation

  23Operation Find

  24Luck

  25Ring Exchanges

  26Another Tactic

  27The Tests

  1

  The Meeting

  The two men placed their semiautomatic pistols under the car seat and got out. They entered the living quarters for the United Nations International Military Institute (UNIMI) in Stockholm, Sweden, with confidence. Because false ID cards hung from lanyards around their necks, a security guard passed them through without question. After the guard station, they got on an empty elevator. When the door opened on the second floor, they stepped out into the flow of soldiers; some dressed in civilian clothes, some in uniform. The intruders were dressed as civilians, and both had olive skin. The tall one had a black mustache, and both had dark, coarse eyebrows. They turned to the left, the busy corridor helping them blend in with the crowd. Because they also modeled a clean-cut military appearance, other soldiers would assume they were army officers from the Middle East. Luckily for them, socializing in the corridors rarely occurred, so no one questioned them. When they got to room 207, the taller one stood alongside his partner, blocking others’ views. The shorter, stocky one deftly jimmied the lock and opened the door. They entered, locked the door, and waited.

  This week, ten military officers were participating in a program designed to teach them to minimize the threat of war through negotiation with foreign rebels. The idea was to reduce killings and destruction. Captain Eric Miller, a tall, clean-cut Black man, stood behind the lectern, presenting his thoughts, followed by various solutions. When he finished, the group exchanged theories. This type of self-teaching was routine at UNIMI. Unfortunately, and to Miller’s displeasure, four disagreed with Miller, while three agreed and two abstained. The four Middle East soldiers didn’t like the solutions, believing they were harsh ways to negotiate. They appeared to feel as if the harshness was directed toward them. Miller didn’t back down from his assessment. He knew his West Point background gave him insights some of the other soldiers lacked.

  The class ended at 4 p.m. Miller headed to his small, one-bedroom apartment, which was not much bigger than a good-sized hotel room. It had amenities but wasn’t somewhere he’d want to live indefinitely. Graduating was the goal.

  He entered the apartment, flicked the wall switch, and let the door close. He stopped in his tracks, seeing two men sitting in the side chairs. The taller one with a heavy mustache appeared older, while the other was clean-shaven but shorter. He instinctively looked for weapon bulges inside their clothing but saw none. “Who are you?”

  Rather than answer him, the older one said, “We came to offer you a proposition, Captain Eric Miller. Are you interested?” Surprisingly, he even recited Miller’s military serial number.

  Maintaining his composure, Miller aggressively answered the man’s question with a question. “What do you want?”

  The younger man said, “We want to make you a proposition, but we can’t explain here. You have to come with us for a little while.”

  They stood up, and Miller could see that the older man was a few inches taller than his partner, but both were significantly shorter than him. He said, “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me more. What is this about?”

  The shorter man smiled and said
, “You are in no danger. We only need one hour of your time, and then you can come back. You can even follow us in your car.” He described their vehicle, a Volvo. “I will flash my headlights for you.”

  Miller chuckled quietly, thinking that if they intended him harm, they were nuts to let him drive his own car. “Okay, let’s go.” He was starting to believe it was all a trick set up by the UNIMI managers. He knew they planned test scenarios to test a student’s response. Besides, these men had official-looking lanyards and IDs hanging from their necks. They couldn’t be villains, he thought, but he’d be ready if they were.

  They went downstairs, and the two men went to their car. Miller went to his dark blue Saab a short distance away and unlocked the trunk. Out of sight of the men, he casually lifted the spare tire cover to get one of his 9mm Beretta pistols. Sitting in the car, he checked the magazine to be sure it was fully loaded. The weapon disappeared into the inner breast pocket of his winter jacket. When he drove out onto the street, the lights of the other car flashed. He followed them until they parked in the back of a large building. There were two vehicles parked next to each other. Nothing unusual. It looked like an embassy building, but its nationality couldn’t be identified.

  The men were now wearing heavy overcoats, which they didn’t have on before. Miller wondered if they had armed themselves as well.

  They entered a separate building from the central section. The shorter man opened the door to a room furnished like a living room, with a sofa in the middle facing them and several chairs and tables around it. Miller noticed Iraq’s national flag hanging flat on the wall above a photo of Prime Minister Jalal Masum.

  “Okay, I did my part by following you. Now, tell me what this is all about. Why am I here?”

  “Captain Miller, we know that you are connected with military intelligence, and can obtain classified documents,” said the shorter man. “My associate and I work for a government committee based in Baghdad.” He walked past the sofa to stand near the wall with the flag, his hands folded behind his back. He looked at Miller and said, “We have been informed the US Army headquarters in Stuttgart is going to receive some vital information about a scientific discovery. The United States has not shared this knowledge with any other country. Our country knows about it, wants it, and we want you to get it for us.”

  The taller one walked behind the couch and lifted a large, heavy duffle bag. He opened it and struggled to turn it upside down. Tens of thousands of dollars dropped onto the cushions and the floor. The shorter man rifled a wad of $50 bills and said, “We are offering this money to you.” He let it drop to the floor, adding, “We will pay half now, and the remaining half when we receive the information. The information we seek is a scientific research project developed in the United States. It deals with the production of energy by combining certain natural resources.”

  Miller, still thinking it was a joke or test of some sort on the part of the UNIMI managers, dutifully played along. “How am I going to obtain this discovery?”

  “When you leave UNIMI for good, any duty station they assign you to will have access to the information. We know that you are a military intelligence officer, so you will not have any problems. You have access to all documents, correct?” Miller was silent. “I must tell you, however, that if you refuse us, you face death. We cannot have our plan discovered.” As he said this, the younger, shorter man removed a pistol with a silencer from the side of his waistband.

  Miller quickly rejected his assumption of a UNIMI setup. Still wearing his winter coat, he gripped both zipper sides of the jacket. He looked thoughtful, as if considering their offer. The taller, older one motioned toward the pile of money with his left hand, and the shorter man’s eyes followed. As the two looked down at the bundles of cash, Miller stepped to the side and quickly pulled the 9mm out of his coat’s inner breast pocket. The short thug with the silencer looked up and turned as Miller fired two rounds in quick succession. The penetrating bullets made the man lose balance, and he fell back against his partner. They both dropped to the floor. Miller could tell by the pulsing blood that he had hit the carotid artery. The second wound, in the man’s abdomen, also bled profusely, his shirt growing redder by the second.

  The taller man grabbed the pistol and tried to get up but slipped in the pool of blood. His gun accidentally fired, shooting into the ceiling. Another shot hit the door frame.

  Miller pulled the trigger again, but his aim was off as the man kept slipping in his partner’s blood. The bullet grazed the man’s free arm. The guy groaned from pain as Miller turned around and raced out of the open door before the killer could get off another shot.

  Once out of the building, he got into the car and quickly drove off the premises. While heading back to UNIMI, he checked the rearview mirror often. No one appeared to be following. At a red light, he rested his head against the steering wheel and breathed deeply, trying to understand what had just happened.

  Damn. Damn. Damn. As his heartrate slowed he became pissed off at himself. How stupid was he to go along with these guys?

  A car horn interrupted his brooding, and he quickly drove ahead to return to the apartment. He needed to alert his superiors.

  2

  Planning

  Yury Nikulin is a ruthless spy. He manages and works with a crew that cleans offices at night. The team walked out of the rear entrance of the Dirksen Senate Office Building at 4:00 a.m. Two of his men pushed a large, square canvas cart that was too heavy and bulky for one man to maneuver. Another cleaner pushed a lighter cart. The trash bags were spread wide open at the top, concealing anything under them. The fourth man handed a clipboard to the night guard with a page indicating the offices cleaned. The man skimmed the contents of each cart and signed the paperwork for their release; all he saw were the contents of the opened bags revealing paper debris. The group moved to the dock and secured the bags with ties.

  Hours before, an argument arose between Nikulin and a coworker who, like him, was a secret agent. The two were vying for an espionage position that would release them as janitors. Both were qualified and their ambassador had briefed them on the new assignment in DC. Although Nikulin had tenure, his competitor had worked in the nation’s capital and knew the territory well. During work, they argued. At break time Nikulin casually offered to buy drinks and snacks from the machines. Callous and ambitious, he had a plan to ensure his own success. Stopping briefly in the hallway along his way back to the team, he twisted off the cap and poured the powder from a capsule into one of the juice bottles, shook it, and replaced the cap. The capsule contained a deadly substance he kept in his wallet in case of enemy capture, but it would serve this purpose equally well. Returning, he put the bottles and snack bags on a windowsill, except his and the other man’s drink. He pretended to twist off the caps of both bottles. Minutes later the coworker was dead. Fortunately, the other men hadn’t liked the agent either, so they had no qualms in helping the manager dispose of the body. They lowered him into a cart and covered his body with plastic bags filled with paper debris.

  Their van backed into the loading dock and stopped at the hydraulic lift used for heavy objects. When the carts were on, one of the men pushed the button to lower it. They wheeled the carts to the van and put them inside. The heavy one needed four men to lift it into the vehicle.

  During the ride back to the office warehouse the vehicle stopped in a secluded and dark section of North Capitol Street in DC. After emptying his pockets, they leaned the coworker’s body against a tree. Nikulin kept the wallet to dispose of elsewhere. He also wanted to get the dead agent’s cyanide from his wallet to replace the one he’d used. Twenty minutes later, a right turn onto I-295 south got the remaining crew to their headquarters.

  ***

  Nikulin made a right-hand turn out of the embassy of the Russian Federation onto southbound Wisconsin Avenue NW. He had already changed his clothes at the embassy.

  It was 6:55 a.m. This was the assignment he wanted. After all,
he had been trained by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, better known as the SVR. Its name in Russian is Служба Внешней Разведки Sushma Vintner Rusedski. It is also the successor to the KGB. The loss of his cohort was of no consequence to the embassy. Many immigrant workers were found dead in the nation’s capital. It was survival of the fittest.

  Before being assigned to the Russian embassy in the United States, he was a scout who followed other counterintelligence spies throughout Europe for information for the SVR. Several years had passed since then. In between Europe and now, he supervised the cleaning of congressional offices. He used this time to also snoop around for essential government documents. Now the ambassador didn’t have to choose who he believed was the one qualified to pursue a more intricate espionage campaign.

  As Nikulin reached the middle of Wisconsin Avenue in Georgetown proper, he ground his teeth in frustration. Cars coming north wouldn’t yield to let anyone come southbound. It reminded him of Moscow’s motorway madhouse. A minibus stopped to unload passengers in the northbound lane. He raced through.

  He sped through a yellow traffic light at the end of Wisconsin Avenue and turned left. The speed limit sign posted twenty-five miles an hour. He turned right onto C Street and drove until he reached the US Department of State building. Two DC cops patrolled the front grounds, and one man dressed in civilian clothing strolled by the building’s sign, talking on his cell phone. Since it was early, Nikulin found a place to park at the end of the street. He got out and put coins into the meter, although paying was not required until eight o’clock.

  Nikulin opened the passenger-side door and leaned in. He inserted a thin memory card into a remote radio receiver and compact recorder before putting the unit between his shirt and undershirt. Then he put a wireless, flesh-toned plastic bud into his right ear. He turned on the remote and adjusted the volume. A listening device had been planted in one of the building’s conference rooms behind the chair railing. Walking away from the car, he flung his right hand backward toward his shoulder and pressed the car’s remote-control button. There was a slight beep from the horn. He liked these American rental cars.