Page 1 of Special Agent Anastacia

Prologue

When the army tank arrived in their small Ukrainian village outside of Mariupol, her parents, fearing for Hanna’s safety, had shown their fifteen-year-old daughter a hiding place they’d built inside the house. A place she was to flee to in case they were attacked.

Her father had worked on it for days, making the tiny room invisible to anyone who didn’t know it existed. Unfortunately, there would only be room for one person.

Being that both her father and mother were heavy-set and carrying extra weight from all the wonderful meals her mother cooked, they’d never fit in with her. But as they’d explained often, it was not for them that they had decided to cut off a part of the kitchen area to make the space. It was for the daughter they both adored more than their own lives.

At the time, she’d dismissed the idea that things could deteriorate to where they’d actually need it. After all, those horrible images she saw on her phone and she heard the adultswhispering about, happened to others. Right? Never to her. Little did she know her secure world was a ticking time bomb.

Today, that time bomb had finally exploded. Her parent’s apprehensions had been real. That morning, everyone on the street had seen the lone army tank enter their small dirt road with only six houses. They watched as one of the soldiers entered three of the houses with the inhabitants inside where the sounds of the gunshots were heard distinctly.

That’s when her parents had forced her unceremoniously into her hidey hole with her new kitten. Her mama’s voice had broken into sobs, but she’d forced out words for Hanna to remember. “Go now, myla dytyna,darling child, be safe and remember my sister, your aunt Diana. She’s ready to care for you.” Holding her face, mamo placed a hard kiss on her mouth and then followed with words never to be forgotten. “We love you more than you’ll ever know.”

Her father had hugged her so long that her mother had forced him to stop. “Enough, Tato. She needs to hide now.” Fear ripped her voice to shreds. Her arms tugged at her daughter. “N-ow!”

Hanna clung, refusing to let go. Her young arms held his body, while they both cried so hard, they literally shook with emotion. “No, Taty, no. Please, Mamo. Let me stay with you. I’d rather die than hide away.”

“Don’t be foolish, my girl.” Voice hard, her mother slapped her face to get her to stop and listen. Shaking her… fury in her tone, she barked out the words, “Dying would be the easy part. It’s what many of the young girls suffer before they’re killed that we worry about.”

“Here, take Daria and keep her safe.” Coming to his senses, her father shoved the pretty kitten into her arms and forced her into the dark cavern, his gruff tone convincing her to swallow the scream. When they disappeared behind the closing door, prayers for their safety filled her soul.

No sooner had they shut her in, she heard one of the soldiers enter their home. She heard her parents begging for their lives, only to be shot in mid-sentence while the killer laughed.

Without thinking, she opened her wall closure in time to see the man strutting out, his Russian uniform filthy and tattered, a huge spider-like tattoo covering his wrist, and a half-smoked cigarette being spit from his mouth. With her brain not functioning, she rushed to her father’s side. Without making a sound, she swallowed the disbelief coloring her ordeal. A noise made her look up. There stood another soldier, a young man, whose horror of the bloody scene matched her own.

Frozen, unable to move, she watched as tears filled his eyes. Then his trembling finger rose to his lips where he made the sign for her to be quiet. Stumbling, cursing, she heard him being sick outside the door before he joined the other man on the road.

That devil had gone to the tank and had come back with a boxful of bottles filled with gas and cloths. Watching from behind her mother’s lace curtains, she saw him light another cigarette. The sickened, younger soldier – who’d pretended Hanna wasn’t there – pointed to her house and spoke loudly, “All clear in there.”

“Yes. Because I shot the rubbish.”

“What are you going to do with that?” Obviously untutored in how the Russian army sometimes worked in these situations, the younger officer pointed at the bottles.

“Fuck, idiot. I’m going to burn the place to the ground so the trash can’t come back and live here again.”

Hanna watched an excruciating expression fill the arguer’s face. She listened, understanding the Russian words clearly.

“Why bother? Mariupol is in ruins and only the outskirts have a few miserable peasants living in scattered areas. We’ve completely destroyed the beautiful city. Can’t we just leave things as they are? Do we have to annihilate everything?”

“Yes, dummy. Yes. It’s our orders. You’re new and haven’t seen any action yet. What… they train you for two weeks, give you a gun, and send you to help the rest of us who’ve fought for months? Just do as I say, idiot.”

“No. I didn’t want this war. I tried to leave, and the government forced me to choose between jail and the army. Now I wish I’d chosen jail.”

“Wah wah! Quit crying baby. Do as I say. Take these bottles and throw a few inside the house over there.” He pointed to where Hanna still watched, glued to the scene as if her body had lost it’s ability to work.

Her savior childishly shook his head, words trembling, spittle flying. “No. I won’t. Look, let’s not this time.”

His comrade heaved his own burning bottle over to the house across the lane and kicked a small box filled with bottles toward the man in shock. “Get to work and quit grumbling. In case some are still alive, it’s better to watch them burn than let them kill our comrades later.”

Seeing only stubborn refusal, the older soldier lifted another bottle, puffed at his cigarette so the glowing ash turned hot enough to light the fuse, and went to throw it toward Hanna’s house himself. Just as he lifted his arm, a shot rang out. Before the soldier’s body hit the ground, the bottle dropped uselessly in the dirt and the flame expired.

Hanna watched then as the boy who’d shot his own partner, lifted his face to heaven and screamed like a madman, as if giving God hell for having placed him in such an agonizing position. The horrific cries of unbearable pain for what he’d done drove him to lift his gun one more time. Hand shaking, eyes clenched, he aimed it at his head and again pulled the trigger.

Squeezing the kitten so hard it wriggled and mewed in protest, Hanna dropped to the ground and saw no more.

Chapter One

Anastacia arrived early to the Los Angeles International airport and found a parking space in the P7 section. Having had a meeting at the Bureau before driving to pick up her cousin arriving from Poland, she undid her holster. Then she stored both her gun and it’s holder in her middle console.

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