“How are you going to prove all this shit anyway?” he complained. “Your word against mine.”
I gave one of my less pleasant smiles. When I spoke, it was without a trace of humor in my voice. “I don’t need to prove it, do I? You could say you were using the money to open orphanages all over Central Asia. But Tynaliev didn’t get to where he is—and remain there—because of his trusting, open nature. He’ll smell the lies on you reeking like a long-drop toilet in the summer. See where that gets you. Especially when I tell him you and your friends are planning to wage jihad in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. He’ll think, better safe than ousted. And that involves you arriving in paradise ahead of the queue.”
I gave him a moment to wonder exactly how Tynaliev might express his displeasure, and put the fork on the bedside table. For the moment it had served its purpose.
If I’d been in Bishkek, I would have been able to interrogate him properly, find out the names of his fellow conspirators, their plans, their contacts in the country. In Dubai I had no authority; in fact, I’d probably broken more laws than Kulayev.
But it all suddenly became irrelevant.
Because my phone rang to show that I had a text message. From Natasha. I read it, twice, wondering how the case had taken a sudden left turn, then stood up and headed for the door. Kulayev watched, rattling the cuffs that chained him to the bed.
“You going to take these off?”
I didn’t bother to answer, just patted him on the cheek and flashed him the smile that always spells trouble.
“Don’t go away now; we haven’t finished our little chat.”
I pulled the room door shut behind me, took the stairs two at a time, headed out into the heat and waved down a taxi.
The real shit was about to start.
Chapter 22
My taxi switched from lane to lane as the driver did his best to earn the hundred-dirham tip I’d promised him. I reread Natasha’s text: “In Dubai Mall. Being followed. Come now, please.”
What was she doing shopping when I’d specifically told her not to leave her apartment? I realized the answer was simple: she knew nothing about the threat she faced from the Chechen gang. Surely I had been overcautious in telling her to lock the door? No one knew she was in Dubai, no one knew about the ten million dollars. While I negotiated some kind of deal with Tynaliev, what harm could a little shopping do? Well, I was sure she realized now that she’d stepped into a problem that could potentially kill her.
The cars and trucks in front of us made bewildering lane changes, all without using their indicators, squeezing into the tightest gaps while traveling at high speed. The general rule seemed to consist of a single attitude: I’m important, so fuck off out of my way. I braced myself against the dashboard, gritted my teeth, convinced that my next moment might be my last.
The silver spear of the Burj Khalifa did its best to stay away, looming above the skyline but never growing nearer. Thirty agonizing minutes passed before we drove into its shadow, taking the turn-off for the giant mall. I was out of the taxi before we’d stopped, throwing notes onto the driver’s lap and pushing my way through the crowds.
As I raced into the main entrance, I realized I would have to appear calm, ordinary, invisible. I stopped at a barrow stall and bought a baseball cap with the inevitable I LOVE DUBAI written across the front, pulled the brim low to at least obscure my face from the CCTV cameras. I stood away from the eager shoppers surging through the mall and texted Natasha. “Where?” I made my way toward the escalators and was rewarded with a reply: “Top floor. Bookshop. Bathroom.”
It was a sensible place for her to take cover, assuming her pursuers were men, but it meant I’d draw attention to myself if I tried to get her out. I studied one of the maps, worked out the least complicated route and took the escalator up. No one walked up the escalators, so the journey to the top floor seemed to take hours, the tension inside me rising with each step. It’s one thing to read thrillers, quite another to find yourself trapped in the middle of a real-life one.
I couldn’t help noticing everyone around me seemed spellbound by the size and luxury of the mall, mouths open as if this was the height of civilization. Surely they couldn’t all afford ten-thousand-dollar handbags, watches or shoes? I couldn’t help a sardonic smile at the thought that one of the people who could afford such things was the very person who’d begged me to come and take her away.
When you’re in a hurry, the escalator you take is always as far away from your destination as possible. So when I reached the top floor of the mall, I discovered that the bookshop was a good ten minutes’ walk away. I kept my head down, checking my phone for new messages and doing my best to show as little of my face to the cameras as possible until I reached the shop.
Two security guards stood at the entrance, which might be good or bad for me, depending on how things turned out. They didn’t look like they could outfight me, all smart uniforms and ornate badges, but I didn’t want to draw attention to myself.
I wandered through the door and into a world with more books than I’d ever seen before. In Bishkek there’s not a lot of money around for light reading, escapism and entertainment. Our bookstalls tend to focus on school textbooks and language-learning guides. We probably know enough about violence and corruption without reading about it.
I checked my phone again: no message. I keyed in “Here” and waited for a reply. Nothing. It was time to find the ladies’ bathroom and hope that Natasha was safely locked in one of the cubicles. I could hardly ask where it was, so I took a guess that the men’s toilets would be nearby. Eventually, after wandering for several minutes toward the far end of the store, past the coffee shop and endless rows of manga comic books and expensive figures of monsters and Star Wars characters, I spotted the universal symbols for toilets.
I called Natasha’s number, but it went straight to voicemail. There was no help for it: I was going to have to go inside. Over the years I’ve learned the one thing you mustn’t do is to look hesitant; if you look as if you belong there, then people assume that you do. That obviously wasn’t going to work here. I’d just stride in and brazen it out as a simple mistake if it became a problem.
The bathroom was immaculate, as I’d expected: mirrors spotless, surfaces wiped. An Arab woman wearing a hijab stood at one of the sinks, washing her hands. She looked up as I entered, her mouth opening to scream. I put a finger to my lips, holding up my gun to ensure her silence, then turned her face away, to give her as little opportunity to identify me as possible. I knew I only had a few seconds to check the cubicles, so I kicked the doors open, aiming the Makarov at the rear of each stall. The crash of my boot slamming each door open echoed like a gunshot off the tiled walls. Each stall was empty: no sign of Natasha, no hint where she might be. I turned as I heard the door to the bookshop swing open, in time to see the Arab woman disappear. With the clarity that an adrenalin rush brings on, I noticed that she’d forgotten her handbag, one of those festooned with logos, studs and sparkles. Expensive, I thought as I followed her out.
One of the security guards was already on his way toward me, looking suitably tough. I made sure he was unarmed, waited until he was within reach, then hit him between the eyes with the butt of my gun. I didn’t stay to watch the look of surprise on his face morph into unconsciousness, but grabbed him as he fell and propped him against a pile of books labeled CURE YOUR INSOMNIA. Perhaps my method was a little severe.
I walked, not fast but briskly, as if slightly late to meet my wife at one of the expensive shoe stores. I kept hold of my gun but let it hang loosely by my side. Virtually nobody looks at the hands of a passer-by, and if I was lucky, the woman in the bathroom hadn’t seen me for long enough to pick me out in a line-up or on a CCTV tape.
I was making my way through TRUE-LIFE CRIMES when the first shot rang out. The head of a life-size cutout of some famous author exploded into pieces, while the second shot punched its way through a pile of his latest novel, scattering paper
confetti into the air.
People started screaming, and there was a stampede toward the exit. I dropped to one knee, crouched and tried to spot the shooter among all the chaos. For a moment I couldn’t see anything, then saw him, maybe ten meters away. It was the young guy who’d put a gun in my back the day I arrived in Dubai. That now felt like months ago. His face was scarlet, running with the sweat of fear, his eyes wide, trying to see me in the stampeding crowd. For a few seconds I felt sorry for him, overburdened with a responsibility he clearly couldn’t handle, out of his depth. Then he fired again, and I saw a woman in Western dress, mid-thirties, stumble and fall, her mouth torn open with pain.
I had no choice. He was only a boy, but a boy with a gun. I took off the top of his head with a single shot, the bullet smacking into his right temple. I watched his eyes go puzzled, as if asked to solve a complicated question of geometry, and then turn blank. His brains spattered out in a thin spray that painted the walls behind him with red ink. He fell back and slithered down the wall, suddenly boneless, a marionette whose strings had all snapped in one instant. All promise unfulfilled, all ambition ended.
I knew that later on, in dreams, I’d see his face, all blood and shattered teeth, mouth open in surprise, accusing me of overreacting. But right then I had other things on my mind; guilt would have to wait.
In the chaos it was easy enough to slip the gun back into my pocket, palm the boy’s wallet and mobile phone, and join the crowd. Once I was outside the bookshop, I looked around, hoping to catch sight of Natasha. Security guards were already running toward the scene, but so far I hadn’t seen any police. It was only a matter of time.
And then I spotted her, being hustled toward the escalators by two burly bearded men. One of them held her by the arm, while the other pressed his hand close against her back. Holding a gun, I assumed.
I pushed my way through the crowd that had gathered to stare at all the commotion, elbowing men aside, ignoring the protests and complaints. By the time I reached the escalators, I could see Natasha one floor below me. There was no way I could push through the people already on the escalator, so I perched myself on the handrail and slid down past them. I did my best to ignore the sheer drop of four floors to my right; if I lost my balance, the marble floor below would take care of all my problems. I didn’t think Tynaliev would bother about having my body brought home.
I half-leaped, half-stumbled off the handrail and turned the corner into trouble. Two more bearded men stood in my way, and unlike the kid lying dead in the bookshop, I could tell these were professional.
I feinted a sidestep to the left of the man nearest to me, then kicked out at his kneecap. The shock of the contact jarred my entire body, but I felt his knee twist in a direction nature had never intended, heard the grunt of pain, watched him stagger back and into the path of his colleague.
A lethal-looking bowie knife with a grooved edge clattered to the floor, metal against marble creating a harsh ringing sound. As the man fell, I took another step forward, kicked the knife away from his grasp, brought my elbow up into his face, felt his face splinter with the blow. Then I was moving forward, relentless, my fingers locked around each other to form a single fist.
I didn’t need to aim; my movement forward and the other man’s momentum brought him straight into a terrible blow that snapped his neck back as if he’d been in a head-on collision. His eyes rolled up, then he was on his back as I jumped over his body and ran toward the next downward escalator.
Move fast enough and you’re past the passers-by around you before they’ve had time to realize what’s going on, let alone react. But I knew I had very little time before extra security and the police would seal off the entire mall. So I pushed and shoved my way down, leaving a string of complaints and cries of pain in my wake.
My fight with the two men, however brief, had given Natasha’s kidnappers extra distance, and they were now out of sight. Their obvious destination was the car park, where they would have a getaway vehicle primed and pointed at the exit.
I knew that I needed to delay any pursuit, so I snapped off a couple of shots at the high-priced stores in front of me. I aimed high, to avoid hitting anyone who thought their platinum credit card made them immortal. The crackle of safety glass windows crumpling into pieces was immediately followed by the sound of people rushing in every direction, closely followed by their screams. I could only hope the added confusion would put time on my side, time I badly needed.
As I reached the car park level, I caught sight of Natasha being pushed into the same black Prado that Saltanat and I had seen earlier. Even before its doors were shut, the car raced toward the exit. My gun was in my hand, but in real life no one has ever managed to blow out a tire of a moving car with a single shot. And I didn’t dare fire into the car for fear of hitting Natasha. I watched the car disappear for the second time that day and knew what my next move should be.
Chapter 23
I tried calling Saltanat but her mobile was switched off. As my taxi stop-started in the traffic, my options didn’t look great. Without Natasha to give me the access codes, the SIM card was worthless to Tynaliev. Giving the card to the Chechens in exchange for Natasha was suicidal for both her and me. The only viable plan was to find Natasha, rescue her from a gang of terrorist thugs and then somehow get her back to Bishkek to face her lover’s ire. If only all jobs were that easy.
The only lead I had was waiting for me back in the Denver Hotel, handcuffed to the bed and nursing a sense of grievance. Perhaps I’d have to use the fork under the fingernails for real this time.
As we pulled off Sheikh Zayed Road and onto Bank Street, the traffic slowed down, crawled, stopped. In the distance I could see flashing blue lights, could hear police sirens wailing almost loud enough to drown the call to prayer. After ten minutes during which we’d moved less than ten centimeters, I gave up, paid the driver and stepped out of the air-conditioned chill and into the heat.
As I walked up toward the port, I saw that the police cars were all parked by the side street where the Denver Hotel made tourists as uncomfortable as possible. As I turned into the street, I could see that the management had taken their policy to a new level. The top two floors appeared to have been completely burned out, with soot and smoke stains smeared across the already grimy facade. For a moment I wondered if the Filipino Golden Fork restaurant next door had had some sort of major crisis with the grilled chicken adobo, but while that would account for the smoke and bitter smell, it didn’t explain the shattered window frames.
A police tape separated the hotel from the rest of the street, and a uniformed sergeant barred my way as I tried to get through. I explained I was staying at the hotel, needed to collect my passport and belongings.
“No point going in,” he said. “All ashes by now.”
Before I could reply, two ambulance men appeared from the lobby, carrying a stretcher with an all-too-ominous shape. A charred arm hung down below the blanket, as if trailing a leisurely hand in some cool lake. A third ambulance man carried part of a metal bedframe, to which the dead man was still handcuffed. It had to be Kulayev, but I decided to keep the information to myself.
I’ve seen the victims of fire-bomb attacks before; if you’re very lucky, or the arsonists very incompetent, you might be able to get an identity from dental records. Usually you just have to rely on learning who hated the victim, then track them down.
A corporal approached the sergeant, and I did my best to make myself invisible.
“Looks like a petrol bomb, Room 503. The desk clerk says the room was rented to some Kyrgyz guy. We didn’t find a passport. Strange he was handcuffed to the bed.”
“Pervert, most likely,” said the sergeant. “Maybe a lovers’ quarrel. They can get very nasty.”
“No passport, though. Don’t you think that’s odd, Sergeant?”
Akyl Borubaev’s passport was tucked away, safe in my pocket. And if the authorities thought I was dead, that might work to my advantage.
No one goes hunting for a man if they think he’s in the morgue.
As I watched, one of the ambulance men stumbled, and the arm hanging from the stretcher gave a languid wave, the sort that dictators give to the public from behind the bulletproof windows of their luxury limousines. There are times when murder switches from tragedy to comedy, all part of some meaningless cosmic joke. And then the thought of the victim’s terror, the pain tearing through them, the sense that everything so far amounts to nothing all return, and the smile turns back into a snarl.
I walked away, not wanting the sergeant’s attention to focus on me. I didn’t know who had killed Kulayev, but he hadn’t died smoking in bed. Someone entered the hotel, with or without the knowledge of the desk clerk, walked up and picked the lock of my room. Maybe they were hoping to find clues or even discover me napping on the bed, ripe for killing.
When they found Kulayev there, they had immediately been forced into a hard decision. Why was he there? What had he said? Who had he betrayed? Kulayev would have told them he’d given nothing away, begged them to believe him, sworn his fidelity to the group’s ambitions. But then he would say that, wouldn’t he? Perhaps they’d argued among themselves, perhaps one even tried to defend Kulayev as he sat on the bed, listening to his fate, pleading his cause.
I hoped that one of his former colleagues would have had the compassion to simply shoot Kulayev in the head and end the debate. Better a few seconds of terror and then nothingness than seeing the others leave, the door ajar, the mattress already starting to smolder and give off thick fumes, the frantic struggle to escape, skin fraying against the unforgiving handcuffs. The heat getting closer, the air hard to breathe, choking as his feet began to burn, the roast-meat stink of flesh starting to cook. I wouldn’t wish death by being burned alive on anyone.
With Kulayev now officially unable to supply me with any useful information, I realized I had no alternative but to call on Saltanat’s information. I wondered why I was so reluctant, decided it was because, though I might have loved her, I didn’t trust her. And with Tynaliev hovering above this case like some angel of death, I couldn’t afford to let romance fuck me over.
A Summer Revenge Page 9