by Ryan Schow
“How so?”
“You never know what she’s going to do,” Isabelle turned and said with a warning in her eyes.
“Well, let’s kick that donkey in the balls when the time is right,” Leopold replied. “As for your sales pitch, you telling me everything she doesn’t do is starting to make me feel—”
“Taken advantage of?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“I assure you, this weapon will be enough for you,” she said. “Your give was not what my ask would have been, but I appreciate your tenacity. As I said, we’ve had her for nearly a quarter of a century, which means we’ve put a tremendous amount of work into her. Should the situation require it, you will see just how special she is.”
“I understand,” he said, ready to see what his millions procured.
“You don’t understand, Leopold,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at him once more, “but you soon will. And then you’ll realize it was not you who got the short end of this stick. It is us who must bear that brunt.”
And now he knew his timing wasn’t just right, it was fortuitous.
Isabelle opened a locked door to reveal a young girl with a shaved head and eyes that looked like a doll’s eyes. The girl stood, arms at her side. She faced the two of them, awaiting instructions, or orders. She didn’t say a word, let alone look at Leopold. Her attention was on Isabelle.
“From now on, your name will be Kiera and you will go with this man. His name is Leopold, and he’s purchased you. You will come home to us after you do what is needed of you under his charge. Do you understand?”
The girl dropped her chin ever so slightly, her lips never having moved.
Looking at Leopold, Isabelle said, “Oh, and one more thing. She doesn’t speak. She understands everything fine, but she will not and does not speak.”
“Any particular reason?” he asked, getting red in the cheeks and on the back of his neck.
“I told you, she is both stubborn and reserved.”
“Can she fight? Kill? Understand complex directions?”
“She’s yours now,” Isabelle said. “Perhaps you should ask her yourself.”
“Well?” he asked, looking at her. Kiera slowly dipped her chin, an affirmative nod. Looking back at Isabelle, Leopold said, “If you’ve fucked me on this—”
“I assure you,” she said with a grin, “that is not the case. And even if it were, there’s not a thing you could do about it. Now let me see the give, then you can have the ask.”
He handed her the money, which she scrutinized thoroughly, and then she closed the briefcase and nodded for Kiera to join Leopold.
“Does she have any clothes?” Leopold asked.
“Everything looks like what she has on. If you want to dress your doll, take her to the store and buy her some clothes.”
To Kiera, he said, “Let’s go.” Kiera fell into step behind him and Isabelle showed them out.
“My number is now open for you to call anytime,” Isabelle said when they were at the Range Rover. “Not to trade recipes, of course, or plan a family picnic. It is open for questions about Kiera and emergencies only. We are not your asset, nor is it our promise to be at your beck and call. I want to stress that to you, Leopold. So truthfully, I only expect to hear from you when you are dropping off or picking up.”
He raised his nose at her, let the grin spread across his face, and said, “I feel like I’m getting fu—”
“You’re not,” she said, this time stern. “But if you say that to me one more time, you will not leave this property alive. I will keep my asset and your money, and you won’t know how your brains left your head or got splattered all over the ground behind you. Are we clear?”
“Is it strange that you saying that kind of turned me on?”
With a huff, she turned and left. He and Kiera got in the Range Rover and headed back to his plane. When they returned to his estate, Cira introduced herself to Kiera, then took her shopping for clothes and food. Meanwhile, he prepared himself for a call to Halden Barnes.
When Barnes’s line rang through, the man answered. Lately, the texture and tone of his voice concerned Leopold, and rightfully so. Nearly a month had passed since Kaylee had been taken, and only recently had they discovered the country she had been taken to Russia. As of that moment, all they had was a contact and a broad location.
“We think we’ve located her,” Leopold said, happy to finally give Halden some good news. “At the very least, our contact seems to have confirmed proof of life just one week ago.”
“Really?” Halden asked, perking up. “Oh, thank God! How can he confirm this?”
This was where things got tricky. Kaylee Barnes had been swept up into an international sex-trafficking network. Where they’d found her wasn’t the worst part of the world, but the more she was run through sexually, the less valuable she would become to traffickers. The bad news, beyond the mental and physical abuse, was that no one talked about old merchandise. It was only because of her current status that his hacker, Codrin Pichler, had even found her. Someone had bragged online about “doing a white billionaire’s daughter from America.” That was the thread they’d pulled that had turned their attention to Russia.
As with any missing person case, time was a formidable enemy, but the possibility of further abuse was an even greater adversary. If people didn’t keep talking about her, they’d never find her. As much as he felt obligated to tell Halden this, he kept it to himself, and he compartmentalized his innermost fears.
“Our contact is sure he saw her at a coffee shop with a man he seemed to recognize,” Leopold lied. “Long story short, we tracked this man down, and we now have a point of contact along with proof of life.”
“Where is she?” he asked, breathless.
“Saint Petersburg, Russia.”
The tension flooded back into his voice, the texture of grief as well. “When will you be heading there?”
“We’re fueling the jet as we speak. This is not a guaranteed extraction, though. We still need to find her and confirm her identity. She may have been passing through, or this may be where she’s staying. We might not even have the right girl. The point is, we won’t know for certain until we’re boots on the ground.”
“Will you be going?”
“Not personally. But I have several assets. People trained to do things I cannot do, and quite frankly, things I cannot stomach as a normal man.”
“Are you sending a recovery team or a hit squad?”
“We’ve already gone over this,” Leopold said with a sigh.
“Well, go over it again!”
“Both.”
“I just wanted to hear you say it again.”
“Wish us luck, Mr. Barnes. I’ll be in touch when I hear anything.”
“Good luck,” he said, a sadness in his voice, the spike of hopefulness and rage flattening back out.
Chapter Sixteen
ATLAS HARGROVE
Current time. Atlas had never been on a private jet before. He’d never known or spoken to a billionaire either, but things were looking up. Sort of. Now, in the dead of night, as he approached Leopold Wentworth’s big shiny craft, he felt the less-than-subtle push and pull of his emotions. His first thought was, What am I doing here? His next thought was clarifying. Whatever I do from this point forward, I will be doing for Alabama.
With Cira walking next to him, as well as two beefy guys and the bald girl, he felt like his entourage was complete. The feeling passed quickly. Even though this was rock star travel, he was no rock star. He was a killer. A murderer. Officially in for life, but unofficially slated for a body bag and an early exit.
He slowly ascended the jet’s steps, making his way into the Gulfstream, where he felt like neither a prisoner nor a celebrity. He barely even knew his role anymore. Savior? Assassin? Search and rescue?
“What do you think?” Cira asked him.
“Reminds me of my first Honda Accord. Unless I get dry roasted peanuts. If that’s the case,
then it won’t remind me of an Accord.”
She scoffed at the comment, which was no surprise. Ignoring her, he took in the well-appointed surroundings, as well as the private plane’s layout. He’d made the snarky comment about his Honda, but what he was seeing was more like something out of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. He hated that show, but only because he knew he’d never be rich, although now, arguably, he was famous—but for all the wrong reasons.
There were ten or eleven very plush seats in different configurations, as well as a couch. He walked to the very back of the jet, slipped off his shoes, and stretched out on the couch. Cira followed him with a frown, then stopped to stand over the top of him. He smiled. She did not. Instead, she glared down at him, especially his feet, which were now just old socks he’d brought out to air dry.
“What?” he asked.
“If you break this forty-million-dollar jet into its singular components, that couch is worth more than your life.”
“That’s not saying much these days.”
“Yet you’re lying on it like you’re about to pass out in a frat house.”
“I’ve spent countless days sleeping on a concrete floor, naked, using the same sock I wipe my ass with as a pillow. My life is meaningless. So when you think you’re insulting me to make a point, please understand, this is a bed to me, not a couch. And I don’t give a shit how much it, or anything else in this airbus costs.”
Her pinched glare tightened even further. “You’re like a dog we found in the street,” she said. “Now that you’re in nicer digs, perhaps you could refine your ways. Even if you simply make a half-assed attempt to appear cultured.”
“I didn’t come looking for you,” he said, closing his eyes. “Don’t forget that.”
“You need to get into a seat and buckle up for takeoff.”
“No, you need to,” he said, his eyes still shut. He made no move to get up, and he didn’t even look for a seat belt. Behind closed eyes, Atlas could almost feel her shaking her head in disgust.
“Suit yourself,” she snapped.
“I am,” he mumbled, curling up and turning away from her.
He heard her walk away. By then he was already feeling himself drift off. When the jet taxied down the runway, turned around, and rapidly accelerated for takeoff, he told himself to relax, to just breathe. He also reminded himself that whatever giant pile of crap he was about to step into was bound to be worlds better than sleeping on that floor, existing in endless darkness, and awaiting his inevitable death.
Despite his innumerable injuries, he fell asleep fast, waking some time later, when he was properly rested. When he opened his eyes, he looked at the seats across the aisle and saw the beefcake who he assumed had pulled him out of NorCal. Boris. He was reading a magazine, or maybe he was just looking at the pictures. Either way, Atlas sat up, looked over the scant set of passengers, stretched, then melted back into the couch and yawned.
Cira glanced up from her seat. “Thank God you’re awake,” she said. “The snoring was getting obscene.”
“My cellie doesn’t complain,” he said.
“You were in solitary.”
“Where exactly are we going,” he asked, “and are we there yet?”
“You know where we’re going, and no, we’re not there yet. When we get there, though, you’ll phone your initial contact.”
“Name?”
“Codrin Pichler.”
“Profession?” Atlas asked.
“Hacker by night,” Cira answered, “gangly Romanian kid by day. He’s eighteen and far beyond his years.”
“Why am I calling him?”
“Because he has your secondary contact’s information,” Cira said. “Codrin’s the one who found him after our detective told us Kaylee had been shipped to Russia. Codrin monitors sex-trafficking back doors for us, and he thinks he found her. Rather, he’s got a contact who thinks he was with her.”
“With her?” She nodded. “I’m meeting with a pedophile?”
“Is that going to be a problem?”
“Not for me,” Atlas said, suddenly awake. “But for him, I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a big problem.”
“If he was with her,” she said dismissively, “do what you want to him when you’re done.”
“Those are my rules of engagement?”
“You have no rules of engagement, Atlas. Find the girl, recover her, tie off all loose ends. By whatever means you make that happen is up to you.”
“You realize you’re talking to a former cop, right?”
“Look at my face. Do I look like I’m about to lose sleep over the law? Besides, you’re a former cop, but a current criminal. A murderer, last time I checked. I thought Leopold made your ROE clear.”
“More or less.”
“When it comes to business, take him at his word,” Cira said. “He doesn’t speak in euphemisms, metaphors or similes. That means there is no such thing as more or less. It either is or it isn’t.”
“What about informal conversations?” he asked. “How is Leo the Lion, then?”
“You might never have an informal conversation with him.”
“Why is that?”
“Because he probably doesn’t like you, and he won’t bother to get to know you if he doesn’t like you.”
“But we’ve never met.”
“He knows you through me, and I don’t like you.”
“Is it because your hair is pulled too tight? I’m pretty sure it’s cutting off the blood supply to your brain and making you uptight.”
With a sarcastic grin, she said, “Cute. What are you, fifteen?”
“More or less.”
Chapter Seventeen
ATLAS HARGROVE
They landed at Saint Petersburg’s Pulkovo Airport at FBO Pulkovo 3, the city’s finest terminal when it came to private jets. There was no way to operate in relative anonymity, but in Saint Petersburg, “private” meant as close to private as possible. As Atlas slipped his shoes back on, Cira showed him a set of papers, along with a small package.
“Fake ID, credit card, burner phone,” she said, handing him the packet as well as a small phone. She then said, “There are clothes for you in the bathroom.”
“Really?”
“You can’t go anywhere looking like that.”
He changed into jeans, a T-shirt and boots, as well as a trucker’s cap that would cover his face for the cameras. Surprisingly, everything fit.
“There are a few cameras here and there. Don’t let them capture your eyes or nose if you can help it. Since you have no luggage, try to ‘be on your phone’ until we’re in the car.”
Much the same way she told him to take Leopold at his word, he would take her at her word. He followed her instructions to the letter. He adjusted the hat’s plastic strap, worked the stiff bill for a few minutes into a nice C shape, then slid it over his head and pulled it down low.
“One good look from any camera and you have to assume it’s over,” Cira said. “You have to start thinking like that.”
“Am I in any of the international databases?” he asked.
“Not the international ones, no,” she said. “At least not that we can tell. But think of this as a long-term project where if there’s ever a reason to upload your face into the database, you don’t want them having history that will lead back to you, or us. Especially us.”
“You’re talking about a tremendous amount of data that must be stored,” he said. “I’m not the best at IT stuff, or whatever, so this is new to me.”
“Do you even have a clue as to how today’s surveillance networks function?”
“Is that necessary?”
They got off the plane, went through what Cira called regular protocols when entering a foreign country, then caught a passenger van out front. “Call Codrin now,” Cira said. “He’s on speed dial. Number three.”
“What’s one and two?”
“One is me, and two is Leopold,” Cira said. “By the way
, Leopold said you can only use number two if everyone else is dead.”
“Where to, ma’am?” the van’s driver asked in broken English.
Obviously, the driver recognized the language and sought to either improve his conversational skills or win them over for a larger tip or a longer ride. When he smiled, it was the worst smile Atlas had ever seen.
“Russians smile when they’re lying to you,” Atlas said to the man after remembering something Jade had said when they’d first met in Belarus.
“And Americans smile when they’re being friendly,” he replied, the same stupid smile fixed to his texturized face. “I am trying out my American words and expressionisms.”
“Expressions.”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’m trying out my Russian,” Atlas said as he stared at the man, completely expressionless.
“Quit dicking around and make the call,” Cira snapped. To the driver, she said, “If we sit here, can you start the meter?”
“I must drive,” he said, no smile this time.
“Then just drive somewhere so we’re not wasting your time,” she said as politely as possible. He nodded, and they took off, driving slowly at first, the van keeping up with the flow of traffic.
Atlas dialed the number. It rang several times, and then the boy answered in Romanian.
“You’re my contact,” Atlas said, not sure what else to say. Was there a secret password? A coded handshake? He didn’t know and no one told him.
“What is the password?” Codrin asked in as sad of English as the van’s driver.
“Give me the damn location,” Atlas said. “That’s the password.”
The boy was chewing noisily on the phone. At that response, the chewing slowed down, almost like a wet, contemplative munching.
“That is not the password I was expecting.”
“I’m afraid it’s all you’re going to get. Now stop chomping in my ear and give me a name and location.”
“Saint Petersburg State University,” he finally said. “Across the Neva River from Saint Isaac’s Cathedral.”