Stealing People

by Robert Wilson

  ‘You’ve told me about all the other ones.’

  ‘They didn’t matter,’ said Boxer. ‘I told you about them because I could see why and how they were coming to nothing. I couldn’t speak to you about Isabel because, although it was good and intense, so much of it was a mystery to me. I didn’t understand how she could love me and why I loved her. All I knew was that it started the moment I first saw her. And I think you know what I’m talking about.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you’ve never spoken to me about Marcus,’ said Boxer. ‘You’ve asked me whether you should talk to your colleagues about his criminal life, but you’ve never told me anything important like … why you love him, or he you. And I don’t need to know, because as soon as you put it into words, it doesn’t sound like anything special. Along the lines of “He’s everything to me.” We just don’t have the vocabulary for it. We need poets, and even then it’s not quite ours, it’s still theirs.’

  ‘What about now? Do you want to talk about Isabel now?’ said Mercy. ‘It’s what people do. Talk them back into life. To make it feel as if they mattered.’

  ‘The thing about her, the most important thing, was that for the first time I’d met someone who had the capacity to make things better. And I think it was because she understood where I was coming from after years living with Frank D’Cruz.’

  ‘Did she know … anything?’

  ‘About what I’d done?’ said Boxer. ‘No. She knew I’d probably killed people in war and she knew there was something dark locked inside me. I wouldn’t have wanted her to know about it, though. I mean the really black stuff.’

  ‘You told me once she’d seen into Frank D’Cruz and hadn’t liked it,’ said Mercy. ‘Did that scare you, that she’d see inside you and run a mile?’

  ‘Frank was in love with himself. It was all about him. When she got inside, there was nothing there. He had to get what he wanted. Nothing else mattered. Not Isabel and not his second wife, Sharmila, either.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Isabel knew I loved her. That was the big difference.’

  ‘You know what I always felt about Isabel?’ said Mercy. ‘We spent an evening talking together that time when we thought that Amy had been murdered in Madrid. She wanted to know about you. And I did my best … not knowing what I know now. But I left her the following morning feeling that there was something missing in her.’

  ‘Missing?’

  ‘What it was, I’ve no idea. I’d have had to spend more time with her.’

  ‘Yes, there probably was something missing,’ said Boxer. ‘For a start, she had no sense of belonging anywhere. Half English, half Portuguese. A diplomat’s daughter. Then married young to Frank and living a weird life in Bombay before pitching up here. She always said the anonymity of London suited her.’

  ‘She’d have recognised the same in you,’ said Mercy. ‘In a lot of us. That’s why we’re here.’

  ‘Maybe that was the attraction. We both had something missing and thought we could provide the vital piece for each other,’ said Boxer. ‘Don’t all lovers think that?’

  ‘You’ve always known what’s missing,’ said Mercy.

  ‘My father, you mean?’

  Mercy shrugged, hands on the steering wheel: obvious.

  ‘Yes, I think that was what I hoped she would do,’ said Boxer. ‘Heal that particular wound.’

  ‘And what would you do for her?’

  ‘I’d have loved her,’ said Boxer. ‘But you’ve got me thinking now. Maybe that was the mystery that I wanted to solve but never could. What did she want? What was missing?’

  They pulled up outside Mercy’s house. She fixed him, arms braced against the steering wheel.

  ‘What are you going to do about the baby?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Have you thought about it?’

  ‘Not beyond the fact that he’s going to have to stay in hospital for another couple of months at least.’

  ‘Maybe you should spend some time thinking about that. It being a more positive thing,’ she said. ‘You know what I mean? A reason to keep living.’

  They got out of the car and went into the kitchen. Boxer checked his phone, saw the text from Martin Fox with Marat Zarubin’s number, called him from the living room.

  ‘Hello, Charlie, what you want?’ said Zarubin, cheerful; it was just before seven o’clock there.

  ‘You ever come across a guy called Conrad Jensen or his daughter Siobhan?’

  ‘I do business with Conrad. He write computer programs for me,’ said Zarubin. ‘Why you ask?’

  ‘Did you tell him anything about me?’ said Boxer. ‘What I did for you?’

  ‘We talk about my son being kidnapped, that’s true,’ said Zarubin. ‘He wanted to know every detail.’

  ‘Did you tell him how you got the lead to the Ukrainian gang who did it?’

  ‘A friend of mine in Moscow.’

  ‘That wouldn’t be Boris Bortnik, would it?’

  ‘That’s right. It was him. He work for mafia group in Moscow. They have contacts in Kiev. He found the gang. Better than police. I never bother with police now.’

  ‘And you gave Jensen Bortnik’s contact details?’

  ‘He asked for them.’

  ‘You might want to warn your friend that people might come looking for him.’

  ‘Why’s that, Charlie?’

  ‘Did you tell Jensen I tracked down the Ukrainian?’

  ‘Yes. I’m sorry, was that wrong thing to do?’ said Zarubin. ‘I only tell Jensen because I trust him. We work together for years. I tell him it’s private … not for broadcast. I say you don’t do it for money. I tell him about the LOST Foundation. I think maybe he get worry about making so much money.’

  ‘Making money … how?’

  ‘Energy. I don’t know how, but he has very good connections in Lukoil, Rosneft and Surgutneftegas,’ said Zarubin. ‘Russian government looking to diversify, so they like Mr Jensen very much. Make his life easy.’

  ‘Was there ever any relationship between Jensen and Sergei Yermilov?’

  ‘Yermilov is very dangerous man,’ said Zarubin, without thinking, knee-jerk.

  ‘Did Jensen know him?’

  ‘Of course. Yermilov very close to the president. Nothing happening without him knowing. He’s friend with the president’s banker,’ said Zarubin. ‘What this all about, Charlie?’

  ‘You don’t talk to anybody about this, Marat. And don’t talk to anybody about me again,’ said Boxer. ‘You hear me?’

  ‘I hear you,’ said Zarubin. ‘One thing, Charlie, Mr Jensen, he know you already. He know the name Charlie Boxer, he know what you do, kidnap consultant, your career in army, everything, before I talk about you.’

  Boris Bortnik was on his way back to his flat near the Tretyakovskaya Metro on Boshaya Ordynka. He had been to his favourite nightclub, Soho Rooms, where he was always guaranteed to find the best women. One of them was with him now. He didn’t know her name. They’d had something to eat and drink, but he hadn’t got round to asking her name. They were alone in the back of the limousine. The driver and bodyguard were shut away in the cockpit. All that came through the heavily tinted windows was a dim version of Moscow by night. No noise penetrated the cabin. The only sound was the heater blasting hot air against the outside temperature of -18°C.

  They were on Bolshaya Pirogovskaya, heading for Zubovskiy and the bridge across the Moskva river. The girl had been fellating him expertly. She had just removed her underwear and was now straddling his legs and lowering herself down on to him. The car slowed and stopped. Bortnik didn’t care. He was concentrating. What broke his concentration were the two sharp thuds that penetrated the heavily insulated unit where he was sitting. They were recognisable to him as shots from a silenced firearm. Panic shot through him.

  There was a gun in the armrest and he ripped it open, throwing off the girl just as the car door opened and a Makarov pistol with a fat suppressor
attached swerved into his line of vision. The girl was squeaking with fear, legs flailing, dress around her waist, crabbing across the floor, pressing herself against the far door. She’d heard of this sort of thing happening from other girls. Never to her.

  ‘Hands,’ said the voice behind the Makarov.

  Bortnik showed his hands. The girl started screaming, which was too much for the gunman, who shot her twice in the chest.

  He leaned in and pulled Bortnik from the car, walked him to another vehicle in front, past his dead bodyguard and driver slumped into each other, past the roadblock that had been set up and the blue flashing lights of a police Lada. They laid him across the back seat of a black Toyota Land Cruiser, frisked him for weapons, took his mobile phone and the other contents of his pockets, wrapped some tape around his eyes, wrists and ankles and rolled him into the footwell. They climbed in, rested their feet on his trembling body. The car pulled away.

  No words were exchanged between the four men in the car. Occasionally the men in the back would grind their heels into whatever body part they thought would cause most discomfort to Bortnik below them.

  The journey took more than forty minutes and Bortnik thought they must be going to the very outskirts of Moscow, or even leaving the city. Finally the car pulled up. The men grabbed him by the ankles and hauled him out so that his face smashed into the ice. They dragged him over the snow and ice and down some steps into an enclosed room, where they gave him a severe kicking on the concrete floor. They left him bleeding in the brutal cold of the unheated room.

  Bortnik tried to gather himself. Tracks of blood from his bleeding head and face had already frozen on his skin. He was shivering uncontrollably. The alcohol in his system from a night’s drinking was making him feel the cold more profoundly. He was finding it difficult to focus. The only reason he could possibly be in this position was because of a rival gang, but he couldn’t think what he’d done to warrant such action. Killing three people in the process. This had the stamp of Solntsevskaya. Only they could have such control over the Moscow streets.

  Half an hour leaked past. The cold seemed to be more intense. Just as he’d got to the point where he was fighting to stay awake, the door to the cellar opened. There was the sound of gas. A lighter flickered and the roar of space heaters filled the room. The relief was immediate. His chest loosened. His muscles creaked back into life.

  They cut the tape around his ankles and wrists, stripped him naked and strapped him into a metal chair bolted to the floor. They tore the tape from around his head and he shuddered under the bright lights of the grim room. He was aware of people but not of how many.

  ‘We can make this short,’ said the voice, ‘or very long, protracted and extremely painful for you.’

  Bortnik nodded, gasping against the pain as his returning body heat enlivened his bruises and wounds.

  ‘You received two payments, one of two hundred thousand dollars and another of fifteen thousand dollars from a company called Sunbeam International Ltd into a company owned by you called Kaluptein in the British Virgin Islands,’ said the voice. ‘We want you to tell us who paid you that money and what for.’

  The heat in the room had defrosted the blood tracks on Bortnik’s face and he stared at the drops striking his bare thighs as he tried to marshal his thoughts to develop some kind of negotiation.

  ‘I’m willing to tell you what you want to know,’ he said.

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘In return—’

  ‘There’s no “in return” in this case,’ said the voice, and Bortnik heard the roar of the space heater behind him get a little closer. ‘You don’t talk and you’ll get this.’

  The space heater was put near his leg; the room immediately filled with the smell of singed hair. He yelped as it started to sear the flesh on his leg. Then it backed off.

  ‘You understand,’ said the voice. ‘You are not in any position to negotiate. You are only in a position to persuade us to give you some mercy.’

  Bortnik didn’t want to, but he started crying. He wasn’t sure whether it was emotional, because he’d never been one to express or feel anything other than extreme lust. He put it down to the thaw induced by the space heaters.

  One of the men in the room stood in front of him and beat him about the head until he brought himself under control.

  ‘I was asked,’ said Bortnik, ‘to supply research on Sergei Yermilov.’

  ‘How did you accomplish that?’

  ‘I found someone close to him and paid him.’

  ‘Name?’

  Bortnik named Irina Yermilov’s younger brother, Anatoly Drugov. He’d stayed with them in Weybridge and hated Sergei only marginally less than Irina did herself.

  ‘How do you know Drugov?’

  ‘I was friendly with Irina’s old tennis coach. He knew him. I asked for an introduction.’

  ‘What else were you paid for?’

  ‘They wanted a bilingual English/Russian-speaking special forces guy who was prepared to work in a team and kill on foreign soil,’ said Bortnik, and named him too.

  ‘Was that it?’

  ‘Then he called me later and asked for someone who would carry out a small hit, not significant,’ said Bortnik. ‘That was the fifteen thousand.’

  ‘And who paid you this money?’

  ‘His name is Conrad Jensen.’

  ‘Did you ever meet him?’

  ‘No. We were supposed to meet in Dubai one time in November last year, but he pulled out.’

  ‘Do you know why he wanted you to research Sergei Yermilov?’

  ‘I thought perhaps he might want to kill him, but he never told me.’

  ‘Does that mean you had permission from a higher authority to conduct this research?’

  ‘Of course.’

  One of the men left the room. The others stayed behind and smoked, passing a bottle of vodka between them. Ten minutes later, the man returned and nodded. Two of the men put their cigarettes into the corners of their mouths and reached down for the space heaters, while another stuffed Bortnik’s socks into his mouth and taped it shut. Bortnik’s eyes grew wild as the men settled the space heaters in front of him. They turned them up and the blue gas flames shot out towards Bortnik, who struggled violently in his immovable chair. The men in the room smoked and watched and sipped on the bottle of vodka they passed from hand to hand.

  24

  06.45, 17 January 2014

  unknown location, London

  Amy Boxer came to in the dark, confused by a dream where she’d been on a beach, a man walking towards her but never getting any closer. She’d started walking and then running towards him because she had a great need to see his face, but as hard as she ran, the man’s features never became any more distinct than a blur.

  ‘You’ve been dreaming,’ said a voice from the darkness.

  Siobhan.

  ‘You’re watching me.’

  ‘My favourite pastime.’

  ‘What it is with you?’

  ‘That kiss …’

  ‘Shut up about the kiss. It was nothing. You were just drawing me in to fuck me over.’

  ‘That might have been the idea … then.’

  ‘And look where I am.’

  ‘But it’s changed. I’ve changed.’

  ‘Yeah, right. That’s why we’re walking off into the sunset.’

  ‘Would you like that?’ asked Siobhan. ‘I’d like that.’

  She sat next to Amy, whose wrists were secured by cuffs threaded through the metal bed head. The only light was from a crack under the door. Siobhan’s features were black; only the outline of her hair was visible.

  ‘Where am I?’ asked Amy.

  ‘London.’

  ‘Is Marcus here?’

  ‘Yep, he’s fine. Still out of it. You were drugged and moved out of the warehouse. Got to keep ahead of the game.’

  ‘And the hostages?’

  ‘Not here. And before you ask, I don’t know where they ar
e. Nobody does.’

  ‘Can you release one of my wrists?’

  ‘Don’t have the key,’ said Siobhan, stroking her leg.

  ‘Don’t do that,’ said Amy. ‘It’s not fair.’

  ‘Fair?’ said Siobhan, suddenly flaring. ‘What’s fair? Nothing’s fucking fair in this world. You think it’s fair that I was born like this?’

  ‘Easy up, Siobhan. I just meant you’re taking advantage of me. It wasn’t a comment on … the world.’

  ‘You think I wanted it to be like this?’

  ‘I don’t know. You brought me in.’

  ‘It was the plan. It was my job in the plan.’

  Silence while Amy weighed that line for tone.

  ‘What?’ asked Siobhan.

  ‘You’re lying,’ said Amy. ‘I know you a bit by now, Siobhan, and you’re fucking lying. What’s it all about?’

  Siobhan’s black outline stared down at her.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I persuaded Dad it was a good idea.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I like you. Thought we could get to know each other under more … relaxed circs.’

  ‘Relaxed?’ said Amy. ‘So why did Conrad want my dad to come looking for him?’

  ‘You’ve asked me that before.’

  ‘And you didn’t answer me.’

  ‘Because I don’t know. He doesn’t tell me everything. Most of the time he tells me shit. He wanted him involved … that’s all I know.’

  Silence.

  ‘So they bought into your idea of bringing me in?’

  ‘Dad did. As usual, having come round to it, he thought it was his idea.’

  ‘And where’s your father now?’

  ‘Look, stop trying to find things out,’ said Siobhan. ‘I know what you’re doing. Be a bit more subtle, for fuck’s sake.’

  ‘OK, so what else?’ said Amy. ‘If you don’t have the key to these cuffs, who does?’

  ‘A guy downstairs … with a gun,’ said Siobhan. ‘Tell me about your boyfriend.’

  ‘I don’t have one,’ said Amy.

  ‘Would you like one?’

  ‘Not any old one,’ said Amy. ‘I’d like to choose.’

  ‘Do you think you could choose me?’