by Jenni Wiltz
Beth and Marya screamed in unison.
“Don’t move!” Viktor cried, pointing his gun at Natalie. Constantine saw Viktor’s finger waver on the trigger and leapt at him, fingertips outstretched. It was not enough.
The gun went off, a bright muzzle flash shooting like a star.
Chapter Forty-Eight
July 2012
Moscow, Russia
“There,” Liliya said. “You’re in.”
Vadim held the phone between his shoulder and his ear and watched Liliya’s password-breaking program disappear from the screen. In its place, he saw a version of the FSB data warehouse that he’d never seen before. It was organized in color-coded layers, with two layers visible above his own security clearance. “Where did you learn to do that?”
“Where do you think?” she snapped. “In prison.”
“Thank you, Liliya.”
“I didn’t do it for you.”
“I’ll get her back. I promise you.”
He heard Liliya sniff and try to cover it up with a cough. “I’m standing at the door with a pistol. I will shoot anyone who comes through it without my daughter. Do you understand me, old man?”
“I understand. Liliya, I’m so sorry.”
“You have five minutes before they find you and cut off all access. Don’t speak to me again unless you have my child.”
The line went dead. He tried to take a breath but it felt as if his lungs were full of water. I am drowning, he thought. If he lost Marya, it meant he lost Liliya, too. They had never been demonstrative with their feelings but their bond remained solid, like the foundation of a house. You could not see it for all the rugs and furniture and carpeting, but without it, everything fell apart and sank into the earth. He could feel her anguish; it was closing in on him, too.
He turned his attention to the screen and clicked on the security level above his. A directory opened up, filled with folders he had no time to search. He swore out loud. He could never look at all of these files in five minutes. It was hopeless.
He closed that directory and moved on to the highest level of clearance—the level only Starinov and his chosen directors had access to. He’d memorized the file number assigned to Rumkowski’s collection of documents. He typed it in and clicked on the only result.
The folder contained dozens more documents than he’d ever seen, all labeled with numeric codes. He clicked wildly, opening as many as possible. Once the reports began to open, however, he saw one name that told him exactly what Starinov was after.
“Holy Mary, mother of God,” he breathed. Like the pen, the tsar’s account was just the decoy. It was never about the money, he realized. Starinov was after something much more valuable.
Chapter Forty-Nine
July 2012
Moscow, Russia
The bullet sliced through the air inches above Constantine’s fingers.
“No!” he shouted. Helplessness and horror burned his heart like acid as he crashed to the floor at Viktor’s feet. He rolled, flopping over his injured shoulder just in time to see the bullet hit its target. But it wasn’t Natalie whose eyes flew open with shock and pain; it was Yakov.
Constantine watched, confused, as the Vympel man turned a questioning gaze on Viktor’s smoking pistol, then toppled backward and collapsed to the floor. Ivan drew his gun and trained it on Viktor. “What the fuck did you do that for?”
Viktor swung his gun toward Ivan. “I didn’t want that to happen. But Yakov was going to shoot the only person who can give us the password. Lower your weapon.”
Ivan glared at him. “How do I know you won’t kill me next?”
“Do you think I want to even the odds here? I need you alive.”
“Damn right you do.” Ivan lowered his gun.
Constantine scrambled over to Natalie, who lay crumpled on the floor where Yakov had thrown her. He picked her up and carried her to the settee. “It’s okay,” he said, pushing her hair out of her face and rubbing her wrists gently. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
He poured more vodka from the decanter into her glass as held it to her lips, pouring just enough for her to swallow. A faint pink flush returned to her cheek and Constantine pressed his lips to her forehead. “Grigori,” Natalie whispered. “I led them right to him.”
“It’s not your fault,” he said, pressing her head into his neck. “He knew that.”
Viktor caught his gaze over her head. “What the hell did she do to him, anyway?”
Constantine looked down and saw Natalie’s right hand. It was spattered with red and clutched tightly around something. He pried it open gently and found a diamond brooch with a long, sharp pin coated in blood. He took it from her and held it up.
Viktor whistled. “I didn’t know she had it in her.”
“Are you kidding?” Beth said. “Nat’s put herself in the hospital three times, and that’s just when she was angry with herself. Do you really think this is the worst she can do when she’s mad at someone else?”
In Beth’s lap, Marya fidgeted and turned her head, casting a glance across the room. She caught sight of the bloody body on the floor and gasped, then began to wail uncontrollably. “I want to go home!” she cried. “I want to go home!”
“Hush, sweetheart,” Beth soothed. She pressed her cheek to the girl’s head, offering what little comfort she could with her hands tied behind her back. It didn’t help—Marya’s piercing cries echoed painfully in their ears.
Viktor winced and pressed his forefinger to his temple. “God, that noise,” he said. “Either you shut her up or I will.”
Beth struggled against her bonds. “Untie me and I might have more luck.”
“Not a chance. Right now, your job is to make that girl shut up, and by all accounts you’re failing miserably. Ivan, why don’t you try?”
The blond man knelt over Beth and gripped Marya’s chin. Jerking it towards him, he growled in her face. “If you don’t stop crying, I will kill your whole family. I’ll skin them alive while you watch and I’ll tell them they’re dying because you couldn’t keep your mouth shut.”
Marya’s face turn turned white, the irises of her eyes entirely visible against her wide eyes. The girl gasped and hiccupped, but held back her cries.
Ivan caressed her cheek with the muzzle of his gun. “You’ll be quiet now, won’t you, little girl? Nod if you will.” Marya nodded and Constantine felt his gut churn. That poor child would remember this day for the rest of her life and there was nothing he could do to help her.
“Well,” Viktor said. “Let’s get back to business. Have a quick look at our golden goose, will you, Con? Make sure she isn’t hurt.”
“I’m fine,” Natalie said. “I can speak, you know.”
“I know, darling, but it’s so much easier when you don’t.”
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Constantine asked her, pointing at her dress. It was torn and spattered with bloodstains. One tear, at the shoulder, was obviously from where she’d ripped the brooch free to stab Yakov. But the other…the other had split her dress down the front, exposing her bra and something sparkling wedged between it and her skin. “How did that happen?” he asked, pointing at it. He looked at her face but she wouldn’t meet his gaze.
Christ, he thought. It was Viktor.
He pictured Natalie on her back, struggling beneath Viktor’s iron-strong grip as he tore at her clothes. He imagined her screams, like Lana’s, ignored by all who heard them. His body reacted before his mind could warn him to back down. He sprang to his feet, hands curled into fists that ached to pound Viktor’s bones to pulp.
“I recognize that look,” Viktor said, raising his gun. “Don’t do anything stupid, Con.”
The last thing he wanted was to be reminded of their former closeness. Enemies were supposed to look different, speak a different language, and wear different clothes. They weren’t supposed to be behind you in the trenches, aiming a gun at your head the whole time. “Good God, Viktor, I trusted
you with my life. Vadim did, too.”
“Vadim is a relic. Refrigerated and dry like week-old borscht.”
“Then why bother betraying him?”
“Because he never saw what I was worth! No one did.”
“Jesus, Buddy, take a hint,” Beth said.
“Enough! I want those letters, Con, and I want them now.”
“You’ll get them. But you don’t need Marya or Natalie’s sister. Let them go.”
“No.”
He held up his hands. “Fine. You win, Viktor.”
“Oh, is this the conciliatory phase of the negotiation now? You forget, Con, I went through every FSB training class you did, and you were never any good at negotiating. You’re a bad liar, and negotiating involves lying to people.”
“Negotiating is about compromise.”
“Not if you want to win!” Viktor yelled. “And I always want to win.” He slammed his fist against the mahogany desk. The noise startled Marya, who fidgeted in Beth’s lap and let loose a whimper.
Viktor’s heated gaze settled on the girl. “Not again! Ivan, for the love of Christ, I don’t care how you do it, just make sure I don’t hear one more word out of her!”
“As you wish.” Ivan pulled his gun, pointed it at the girl’s forehead, and pulled the trigger. The bullet shot through Marya’s head and knocked her body to the floor. Beth screamed as blood and brain matter splattered on her neck and face. She jumped to her feet, knocking the chair backward. Ivan pressed the smoking barrel of his TT to her forehead. “You’re next.”
“Beth!” Natalie cried, jumping up from the settee. Constantine put out his arm to hold her back. She struggled against his grip, eyes flashing from the little girl’s lifeless body to the gun at her sister’s head.
“How could you?” Beth screamed. “All you had to do was untie me, and I could have held her!” Tears streaked through the dirt and grime and blood on her face, creating shapes that arched and forked like lightning strikes.
“It is done,” Viktor said. “Let it be.”
“Let it be?” he yelled. “That was Vadim’s granddaughter, you bastard.”
Viktor raised his right shoulder in an elegant shrug. “And what is the likelihood Starinov would have released her? We’d have carted her all around Moscow and she’d have ended up dying anyway.”
“She was a child, Viktor, not a disposable Mafiya thug.”
“Oh, spare me the conscience, you bloody hypocrite! We killed hundreds of people in Chechnya, surely some of them children, and you didn’t bat an eye. Do you think our reports on Chechen positions didn’t lead to bombing raids? Do you think women and children didn’t die when our rockets obliterated the villages their generals tried to hide in? A soldier either feels guilty all of the time or none of the time. I happen to be the latter. What the hell are you?”
“He’s a better man,” Natalie said. “And you know it.”
“You bloody fucking pillocks! None of you understand a goddamn thing! I can’t wait to be rid of you!” Suddenly, his thick brows drew together. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a vibrating phone. He gulped when he saw the number on his screen.
“Shut up, the lot of you,” he growled. “It’s Starinov.”
Chapter Fifty
July 2012
Moscow, Russia
“Well, ladies and gentlemen,” Viktor said, putting away his phone. “It appears we’ve been given a change of venue. Probably a good thing, too,” he muttered, glancing from Yakov’s body to Marya’s. “The cleaning crew will arrive soon and we want to be well out of their way.”
Constantine felt Natalie’s small, warm hand slip into his and he squeezed it, tracing out two words in English on her palm. Be ready. Her eyes flickered to her sister. Constantine inclined his head slightly, giving her permission to go to her. The two women were better off together. He didn’t think Viktor would risk killing either one of them just yet.
“We’re going to go to the elevator like one big happy family,” Viktor said, pistol in hand. “Down to the garage and into the G55. Con, you’ll go first, hands on your head. Ivan will follow and shoot you if you do anything he finds disagreeable. Ladies, you’ll follow Ivan. If you try to run, I’ll shoot you in the leg. It won’t be fatal, but it will hurt like hell.”
“Wait,” Beth said. “We need to bring some of that vodka, for Natalie.”
“I’ve already got some in my purse,” Natalie said. “May I have it back?”
Viktor grabbed the bag from the mahogany desk and tossed it to her. “By all means, take it and drink absolutely everything in it once we’re in the car. I don’t want to hear any more of this avenging angel rubbish.”
“Is it because you’re scared of the angels or of me?”
“Both,” Viktor said. He nudged Constantine’s arm with his gun. “Go.”
They proceeded out of the blood-spattered office and Viktor closed the door behind them. He could hear Natalie whispering a prayer, the traditional Psalm 23. He put his arms on his head and marched back down the marble hallway, pausing at the elevator. Ivan reached around him and pressed the “down” button with the muzzle of his gun.
When the elevator opened, Constantine moved all the way to the back, knowing Viktor would never allow him to remain there. It was standard Stealth procedure: get into the elevator first, wait for your enemy to follow, grasp the handrail in back and use it to balance yourself for a kick, striking your opponent above his ear, preferably with steel-toed boots.
“Goddamn it, Con,” Viktor barked. “How stupid do you think I am?”
Constantine tried to look chagrined. He moved forward and stood next to the control panel as the rest of the group filed in. Viktor placed himself at the rear, with the women in front of him, facing the doors. Ivan stood in front of them, his gun jammed into Constantine’s back. When the polished metal doors closed, Constantine could see each of their reflections. He watched Natalie take her sister’s arm and squeeze it. She knows, he thought. I don’t know how, but she knows.
Ivan punched the button for the garage and the elevator descended. There was a pause as it landed on the correct floor and settled. Then, in the space of a single breath, the doors slid open and Constantine ducked.
From the ground, he snatched Ivan’s ankle and jerked him to the floor. The Vympel man hit the ground heavily, head slamming onto the grooved metal strip separating the elevator shaft from the concrete garage floor.
“Run!” Natalie cried, shoving Beth forward out of the elevator.
Viktor raised his gun and aimed at the fleeing women. Constantine reached for Viktor’s legs, pulling hard enough to force his shots off course. Then he catapulted to his feet, grabbed Viktor’s head, and slammed it into his upraised knee.
He wrenched Viktor’s gun from his hand and used the butt to whack Viktor’s skull as hard as he could. Beneath him, Ivan rolled into his feet, trying to rise, but one kick to the head left the man motionless. “That was for Marya,” he said.
Then he heard a terrified scream from Beth. He sprinted around the corner to see Natalie wrap her arms around her sister, shielding her from the two men firing on them from the guard station. Constantine fired back, catching one guard in the chest. The other ducked back into the booth.
“Natalie!” he yelled, sprinting to catch up to the women. “Jump the gate and run. The car is thirty meters down the driveway, parked on the frontage road, unlocked.”
Her frightened eyes met his. “What about you?”
“I’m right behind you. I just need to borrow something. Go!” He pulled her to him for a quick, fierce kiss and then shoved her toward the gate.
He made for the booth, swiping the M2 from the dead guard’s hand and rolling past the entry, aiming his shots inside. He waited for the grunt that indicated a hit and rolled in the opposite direction, spraying the booth with more fire. There was another grunt and then silence.
Constantine popped out of his crouch and approached the booth. The guard’s feet wer
e outstretched in his field of vision, but he didn’t know if the man was incapacitated or luring him into a trap. He aimed at one of the feet and shot. The bullet went straight through—no movement, no groan, no nothing. He wiped the sweat from his brow and went into the booth.
It held just what he’d expected. He shoved Viktor’s bureau-issued Walther into his waistband and grabbed the SR-2 from the gun rack beneath the monitor bay. Clutched in the dead man’s grip was an M2 pistol. He took it, along with the clip on the dead guard’s belt.
He hesitated once, pausing long enough to look back over his shoulder. Before that morning, he never would have believed he could leave Viktor behind. But everything was different now and he had only himself to blame. He vaulted over the garage gate and ran toward Natalie and the Volga.
*
“Where was Viktor going to take us?” Natalie asked. She sat beside him in the front seat with Beth perched in the back, leaning forward to look out the front window. The women made an eerie sight, both of them spattered with blood and streaked with tears.
“I don’t know,” Constantine said. He pressed the gas pedal, urging the Volga toward the Transportnoye Koltso. He glanced from mirror to mirror, waiting for the armor-plated Mercedes to come flying up behind him. “But as long as we’re in Moscow, Starinov will keep sending Vympel after us.”
“What do we do?” Beth asked. Her voice was hoarse with fear and unshed tears. When she brought her hand up to grasp Natalie’s headrest, he saw it shake. “Should Nat and I go to the embassy?”
“No. They’d send you to the airport with an armed escort, but all Starinov has to do is wait until they put you on the plane and then pull it off the runway.”
“So we’re sitting ducks.”
“Wait.” Natalie reached out and put her hand on his arm. “Can we get to London? If we unlock the account first, it’s all over. Starinov won’t have a reason to hurt anyone else.”
He smiled at her. “I asked Vadim to arrange a flight for us before I came after you.”