In the Crosshairs: Russian Historical Thriller (Nikolai Volkov Book 2)

by Julia Gousseva

  A more likely scenario was that she would also file a report with the police, and weeks would pass before anybody got access to the mailbox. Nikolai pushed the key in again and tried to turn it to the right. Nothing. He tried again. After the third attempt, the key turned and slid out of the lock. Nikolai took it and stepped outside, trying to look relaxed and casual.

  Marina was reading a bulletin board outside the post office.

  “Not good,” Nikolai said. “Forty-two mailboxes still left, and we can’t go back until the end of the shift. But you did a great job distracting her.”

  Marina glanced at her watch. “The shift ends at eleven thirty. I’ll go to the store across the street and find some more things to mail to myself.”

  Nikolai smiled. “I hope they need extra care and attention from the clerk.”

  “You can bet on it. Let’s meet here at noon. For sure, there will be a different clerk here by then.”

  Marina wasn’t at the post office when Nikolai got there at a quarter to noon. He glanced at the counter. The purple-haired girl was gone. She was replaced by an older man in a gray short-sleeved shirt. The line at the counter was long, so the man was busy.

  Nikolai stepped over to the mailboxes. Forty-two more mailboxes to check. He put the key into the top mailbox in the far right corner and tried to turn the key. It turned quickly and easily, with a soft metal sound. Nikolai pulled open the door, reached inside and got out a cardboard box. It didn’t have any writing or any postal marks on it. As Nikolai had suspected, Grisha was using this mailbox as storage, not as a place to receive mail. He probably felt it was more private than a box at a bank. Nikolai peeked into the mailbox. Nothing else. With the cardboard box in his possession, Nikolai quickly closed and locked the mailbox, walked to his car, and turned on the ignition.

  In the rear-view mirror, he spotted a light brown sedan. He dialed Marina’s number.

  “I’m on my way,” she said.

  “Thanks but no need. I opened the mailbox.”

  “What did you find?”

  “A box. I’m taking it to Karina’s apartment right now. She should be the one to open it.”

  “Right, of course,” Marina said.

  “But I need your help with something. And it’s urgent.”

  “What is it?”

  “Do you know any officers currently on patrol in this area?”

  “I can find some pretty quickly,” Marina said. “What do you need?”

  “I need to lose a tail. A light brown sedan,” Nikolai said. “Have your officer buddy make a traffic stop. Tell them a citizen reported the vehicle driving erratically. Possibly, an impaired driver. According to the citizen.”

  “Give me a few minutes.” Marina clicked off, and Nikolai started driving. The sedan was a few cars behind him. Nikolai kept moving forward in his lane until he saw the flashing lights of a police car, quickly approaching the sedan from behind. A few minutes later, the police car was behind the sedan, pulling it over. Nikolai sped up, took a sharp right, and a few minutes later parked outside Karina’s apartment building.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  “Can you stay here while I open it?” Karina said when Nikolai handed her the box. “I’m nervous.”

  “You sure you want to open it now? It may be better if your family members are with you.”

  “No. I don’t know what I will find, and I don’t want to feel embarrassed in front of them.” She looked up at Nikolai. “With you, it’s different. You aren’t family.”

  “All right.”

  Karina took the lid off. The first thing that Nikolai saw was a stack of papers that looked like bank deposit slips.

  Karina started looking through them. “They are spaced in two-week intervals, and the amounts aren’t large. All of them are from Roman’s corporation. It’s Grisha’s salary, isn’t it?”

  Nikolai nodded. “It must be.”

  Karina’s eyes filled with tears. “The last one is dated the day before he died.”

  She set the slips aside and pulled out two manila envelopes. “There’s nothing else in the box. Just these envelopes.” Karina hesitated, then picked up the top envelope, opened it, and pulled out a stack of printed papers. She quickly leafed through them, then handed them to Nikolai. “It’s Grisha’s will and some other legal papers. Can you look through them and tell me what you find? I’m too nervous to read.”

  Nikolai read through the pages. All Grisha’s possessions were to go to Karina in the event of his death. There was also a generous life insurance policy, purchased for Grisha by Roman’s corporation. In the event of Grisha’s death, the money would also go to Karina. Nikolai thought about this for a moment but discarded any suspicions of foul play on Karina’s part.

  He told Karina what he found. She nodded. “That’s what we have agreed upon. There’s nothing strange or bad here. These are just copies. But Grisha was cautious and meticulous. He liked to make copies of important documents. I just never asked him where he kept them.”

  Karina picked up the second envelope and handed it to Nikolai. “Please open this one. This must be the one with something bad in it. I’m nervous.”

  Nikolai unsealed the envelope and pulled out the contents. A few photos fell out showing a beachfront house with an attractive yard and palm trees in the background. There was also a printed page that looked official. Nikolai examined it closely. It was a copy of a property ownership deed, typed in English. The address was in Cyprus.

  Karina leaned in to see. “What is that? Whose house is this? Where’s the name of the owner?”

  “Right here.” Nikolai pointed to a line in the middle of the page.

  Karina read the name and looked at Nikolai, her expression puzzled. “Who is Eduard Kolyanin?” she asked. “And why does Grisha have his documents?”

  She picked up the next paper. It was a photocopy of a passport.

  “That’s Leonid.” She pointed to the picture and looked through the pages. The passport was stamped multiple times with exits and entries in Cyprus. She looked at the name.

  “Eduard Kolyanin,” she said quietly. “Leonid is using a fake name? But why? And he’s never mentioned going to Cyprus.” Karina looked up at Nikolai. “This is really bad, isn’t it?”

  Nikolai nodded quietly and picked up another page. It was an international driver’s license, also in Kolyanin’s name but with Leonid’s picture.

  “And what’s this?” Karina picked up a newspaper clipping. It was an ad for an agency that offered assistance in applying for passports and other travel documents and guaranteed fast service. The other item was a brochure advertising a real estate agency specializing in properties on Cyprus. Next to it was a brief article about the fire in Eduard Kolyanin’s summer house, the same article Nikolai had read earlier.

  For a few moments, Karina looked at the papers without saying anything, then she looked up at Nikolai.

  “Leonid bought this house using a fake name, didn’t he? And that’s what bothered Grisha,” she said. “But why would Leonid do this? And what was Grisha planning to do with all these documents?”

  “A better question would be where Leonid got the money to buy this expensive property.” Nikolai wanted Karina to have a chance to think about it and make the connections herself. He hoped that the shock of the discovery would be slightly diminished if she had a chance to figure it out for herself instead of hearing it from Nikolai. Karina was a smart woman but the disbelief, the grief, and the shock were clouding her judgement and making it harder for her to see what Nikolai was clearly seeing.

  “I have no idea where he got the money,” Karina said. She kept looking through the papers. There was a newspaper article about the fire that killed Eduard Kolyanin. She read it and set it aside. Another clipping was a report about an attempted kidnapping of a young boy. Karina read it as well and handed it to Nikolai. Nikolai recognized the name as that of Denis’s son. Folded in the article was a smaller clipping, with an update from the police chief nam
ing Eduard Kolyanin as the suspect.

  “But this attempt happened after Eduard Kolyanin died in the fire,” Karina said. She looked at Nikolai, her expression of shocked realization. “So, it was not Eduard Kolyanin who kidnapped the kids. It was Leonid, wasn’t it?” She shook her head and went silent for a moment, as if coming to terms with the truth, then spoke up again, her voice hoarse. “My brother-in-law is a criminal and a child abductor. And Grisha figured it out. Of course. That’s what they were fighting about. You don’t think...” she started, then paused. “There was never an attempt on Roman’s life, was there?” she said quietly. “Leonid is behind Grisha’s murder, isn’t he? It was never about Roman. Leonid wanted to silence Grisha.”

  “I’m sorry, Karina,” Nikolai said.

  Karina did not say anything. She just sat on the floor, looking at the newspaper picture. With the windows closed, the apartment was quiet. Very quiet. Too quiet for a place where two young boys lived.

  “Karina,” Nikolai said, a terrifying thought forming in his mind. “Where are the boys?”

  “At my neighbor’s.”

  Nikolai felt relief wash over him. “That’s good but maybe we should go get them. I want to make sure I can watch them.”

  “She’s right across the hall.”

  Nikolai followed Karina out of the apartment. She crossed the small hallway and rang the doorbell. The neighbor, the same woman Nikolai had seen before with Karina, opened the door and invited them in.

  “Thank you for watching the boys, Natalia,” Karina said. “We came to get them.”

  “Come in,” the neighbor said. “They’ll be right back. They ran downstairs for a minute.”

  “Downstairs?” Nikolai asked. “Where? And why?”

  “A kid came up. He lost his poodle, and the boys are helping him look.”

  “What kid?” Karina asked.

  Nikolai did not wait for an answer. He rushed down the stairs, out of the building, and into the yard. A boy of about twelve sat on the edge of the sandbox, a small stack of ruble bills in his hands. He was counting them.

  “Somebody lost a poodle around here,” Nikolai said. “It wasn’t you, was it?”

  The boy shook his head. “No, but I tried looking for it. The three of us helped.”

  “Did you find it?”

  “No, but the man said that he’ll keep looking later.”

  “What did the man look like?”

  “I don’t know.” The boy shrugged, then looked up at Nikolai and smiled. “He must really love the poodle. Look at all this money!” The boy pointed to his stack of ruble bills. “He gave it to me and asked me to get those two other boys to help me. He said they are really good at finding lost dogs.” The boy paused, then spoke up again. “He’s funny-looking, that man.”

  “How so?”

  “His hair. It’s really red.”

  Red hair. Just like Grisha’s hair used to be. And just like Leonid’s hair.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Nikolai sensed some movement to his right. It took him a few seconds to react, and it was not fast enough. A light brown sedan was pulling away from the curb. Two boys were in the back seat. They were facing backwards, fear and panic written all over their faces.

  Nikolai ran to his parked car. “Wait! Wait for me!” Karina’s desperate scream pierced the air. She was running towards him. Moments later, with Karina in the passenger seat, Nikolai was chasing the sedan down the street, through two intersections, and into the tunnel.

  “It’s Leonid. Where is he taking them?” Karina said, her voice trembling.

  Instead of responding, Nikolai maneuvered around a parked delivery truck and sped up. The traffic was getting heavier. A block ahead, the light turned to red, and everything slowed down. Nikolai was inching his way towards the sedan. And then, with a loud metal screech, a car stopped a few cars ahead of Nikolai, hitting a car in front of it. Other drivers stopped as well. Some started getting out of their cars to check on the accident. Nikolai’s lane was blocked. The fender bender now separated him from the brown sedan.

  Karina jumped out of the car and ran towards the sedan. “My kids!”

  Nikolai ran after her, his right hand in his pocket on the Makarov. He was almost at the sedan when the light changed, and the sedan surged forward, leaving Karina and Nikolai behind. The cars were honking now, the sound bouncing off the concrete walls of the tunnel. Traffic was crawling around stopped cars.

  Feeling defeated, Nikolai ran back to his car and got in. By the time he navigated his way around the accident and out of the tunnel, the sedan was gone. Nikolai sped up.

  A large sign listing a number of upcoming exits flashed by them. Nikolai cursed under his breath. There was no way to know which exit Leonid took, but the airport exit was probably the best guess. It was obvious that Leonid would try to get out of Russia. But what about the boys?

  Then, Karina’s phone buzzed. She picked up and listened for a few tense minutes, occasionally sobbing.

  “It’s Leonid. He wants to talk to you.” Karina handed him the phone.

  “I said this to Karina, and I will repeat the same to you. I will not harm the boys if you do exactly what I tell you. Stop following me. Don’t call the police and don’t even think of getting me detained at the airport. Once I’m out of the country, I’ll tell you where the boys are. But not before then.”

  Leonid hung up.

  “I don’t believe him,” Karina said. “We need to find them. Something really bad will happen if we don’t get them soon.”

  “We need to stop him,” Nikolai said. “From here, there’s only one way to get out of the country.” He moved over to the right lane and headed towards the Sheremetyevo Airport. At that moment, Karina’s phone beeped with a text message.

  “Turn around, turn around,” she said as soon as she read the message. “We need to go to the address in this text.”

  “What does it say?”

  “It says, ‘I know where they are’” and the address. And the word ‘now’. Let’s go!” Karina read the address to Nikolai. “If you don’t take me there, I’ll go by myself. Plenty of taxis in this area.” Karina was already reaching for the door handle.

  “Stop!” Nikolai said loudly.

  The last thing he needed was for Karina to get herself into a dangerous situation. The address could be a trap. Perhaps, Leonid was counting on Karina going there alone. Nikolai could not let her do that. He needed to make sure Karina was safe even if it meant letting Leonid escape. There was no choice. It was possible that this decision was exactly what Leonid was counting on.

  “Stop!” Nikolai said again.

  Startled, Karina sat back.

  “Read the address to me.”

  Nikolai listened as Karina read the number and the street name.

  “It’s not that far. Let’s go.” Nikolai had been to the airport many times, and he knew the surrounding area quite well. He knew the road, but the house number was farther than any address Nikolai had ever been to. He pulled off the freeway and turned onto the old highway that soon became a narrow rural road, then downgraded into a dirt road. No houses were in sight. He slowed down but kept driving through what looked like a forest road, trees on both sides. He drove for about a kilometer more and came to an old gate. It was open.

  “That’s the number! Right on top of the gate!” Karina said. “It’s here!”

  Nikolai glanced at the rusted number above the gate, drove inside and followed the road until he saw a small house ahead. It was about a quarter of kilometer away. He pulled over and parked. Karina jumped out and rushed towards the house. Nikolai had to grab her arm to stop her.

  “Let’s think first,” Nikolai said. “We don’t know who wrote that message and why, and that puts us at a serious disadvantage and possibly in danger. We need to look around and figure out what we see.”

  “All right,” Karina said quietly.

  “I need your help, Karina,” Nikolai said. “Can you do what I’m abo
ut to ask you? It’s important.”

  “Yes, yes. Of course. What should I do?”

  “I need you to wait here, and I’ll walk around and check things out. I will be back in a few minutes.”

  Before Karina could object, Nikolai took a few more steps forward. The small house was now in full view. It looked old, nineteenth century, with small windows and a tiny porch. The paint was peeling, and he could see dark spots of rot on the wood. The place certainly did not look inhabited. It would be a perfect hideout, or a perfect place to keep hostages, especially if those hostages were two young boys.

  Nikolai squatted and stayed there, looking and listening. A bird flew by, fluttering its wings and chirping. Something rustled in the grass, probably a squirrel or a garden snake.

  Next to the house was an old Lada, all rusted, its wheels gone. On the other side of the house was a pile of junk: a wooden barrel, some large plastic bags filled with what looked like leaves, a small bathroom sink, and a few broken bookshelves.

  Behind the house was another structure, probably a shed or a workshop. A heavy padlock hung on its door. Judging by the tall grass in front of the door, it had not been used in a long time.

  Nikolai changed his position slightly and kept waiting and thinking what to do. Who sent the message and why? Did this person want to help Nikolai? Was that an old enemy of Leonid’s? Somebody who wanted to detract attention from themselves? Or somebody who wanted to harm Nikolai or Karina?

  Nikolai took a few more moments to take in what he saw in front of him: the house, the pile of junk, the old Lada, the shed in the back. It all looked innocent, and that concerned him. In Chechnya, many things that looked innocent turned out to be deadly: bread loaves, baby strollers, toys, pets. Nikolai had seen more than one soldier lose vigilance for a moment and die.

  Nikolai took the safety off his Makarov and took a few more steps forward. “Hello? Anyone here?” he called out.

  No answer. Not that he expected one.