by Tara Wylde
“Is that the doorbell?” Storm calls from somewhere in the house. Judging by the faintness and the direction, she’s in the music room.
“I’ve got it!” I call back, cupping a hand to my mouth to make sure she can hear me. Instinct – and a sneaking suspicion of who it might be – is telling me to keep her away from the door.
The dogs are sitting at attention to the right of the door, in the opening to the front room, as I arrive in the foyer. Through the six-foot windows in the sitting room to the left, I can see a black Range Rover parked in the circular driveway.
Damn. I was hoping to have a little more time to prepare. Either a member of the Volkov family just happened to drop in at Murphy’s in the last couple of days, or there was a reward that Finn didn’t tell me about and he called them.
Doesn’t matter – might as well get it over with. I don’t like pussyfooting around.
I suck in a deep breath through my nose, letting it out through my mouth before grabbing the huge iron handle. The thick mahogany slab swings open to reveal three men and a woman, all in their twenties, standing on the marble pad at the top of the steps.
Two of the men are tall and thick-necked, wearing dark street clothes. To their right is a young woman who’s built like a professional wrestler and has spiked hair dyed a fluorescent shade of green. Her red-rimmed eyes tag her as an amphetamine user, most likely meth.
The third, in the center, is shorter, with a $300 hairstyle designed to make it look like he just got out of bed. He’s wearing the vest and pants of an expensive designer suit, but not the jacket, and the sleeves of his shirt are rolled up to the elbow, revealing ropy forearms covered in tattoos. His beard is much longer than mine, and blonde.
He’d barely reached puberty the last time I saw him, but there’s no mistaking those eyes. Even if I didn’t recognize him, the stench of Sobranie cigarettes, and, of course, his tattoos, are more than enough to confirm my suspicions: this is Arkady Volkov, all grown up, and his little friends.
A grin that would do a used car salesman proud spreads across his face as my eyes meet his. There’s nothing in his expression to indicate he recognizes me, though I’d be surprised if he did. He hasn’t seen me in almost twenty years, and I didn’t have a beard in those days.
“Can I help you?” I ask, knowing full well what they’re here for.
“I hope so,” Arkady says. No hint of an accent, despite his name and family, because he was born and raised in America. “We were wondering if you’d seen this young lady?”
He pulls a 5x7 photo from his vest pocket and holds it up for me to see.
It’s Storm’s face, and yet not her face. The haunted look in her eyes makes my stomach clench. She looks almost nothing like the woman who’s in my house right now, playing piano, oblivious to what’s going on outside the front door.
She looks defeated. Hollow. Less, somehow.
“Who is she?” I ask casually, deliberately not answering his question.
Arkady’s grin widens. “She’s a friend of ours. Went missing from Long Beach up the coast here a little over a week ago. We’re really worried about her.”
“Worried,” I say. “Really.”
I see a flash of anger behind Arkady’s eyes, but his grin stays in place.
“Frantic,” he says. “She went sailing in that wicked storm we had, and no one’s seen her since.”
“Why would she go sailing in a storm?”
His smile falters a bit. “She was… upset. Had too much to drink at a party. Have you seen her?”
I suppose I’m not going to get any more of the story out of him, and to be honest, I don’t really care. Time to end this.
“We both know I’ve seen her,” I say evenly. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. Just tell me how much she owes you and I’ll pay it. Then you can be on your way and we can all get on with our lives.”
Arkady’s smile evaporates, and with it goes my notion of resolving this easily. I thought – hoped – that this was just a simple debt. Now I can see there are emotions involved.
God damn it.
“This isn’t about money,” Arkady says. “Like I said, she’s our friend, and we’re very worried about her.”
“She’s fine. So, if you’re not looking for money, I guess you can go now.”
His sudden scowl tells me everything I need to know about this new, grown-up Arkady: he doesn’t like being told what to do, or dismissed. That will actually work in my favor.
To his right, I see the green-haired girl’s eyes light up. She pulls her hands from the pockets of her skin-tight jeans and shifts her weight subtly to the balls of her feet. She’s positioning herself to move quickly.
“Look, friend,” Arkady says. “This doesn’t have to get ugly. Just tell me where she is and that can be the end of it.”
“That’s not going to happen,” I say. “But this is still the end of it. Just go on your way and forget my address.”
I can practically smell the tension in the air now as all four of them start to fidget noticeably – no doubt they’re all regular drug users, the girl more so than the others. And I’m sure I’m not the only one who senses it.
Arkady clears his throat. “I’m going to try to be patient with you,” he says. “You obviously don’t know who I am.”
“I know who you are, boy,” I say calmly, putting emphasis the last word. “Arkady Volkov. Son of Josef Volkov.”
His face goes slack as his minions glance at each other in confusion.
“Come now, Arkady,” I say. “You don’t recognize your Uncle Nikolai?”
His only answer is the blood rising in his cheeks.
“I guess not,” I continue. “Although I shouldn’t be surprised. You didn’t even have hair on your balls the last time we met.” “I look him up and down. “I assume you’ve grown some since then?”
“My father doesn’t have a brother!” he snaps with unmistakable contempt.
It’s exactly the response I want. The worse he reacts, the easier it will be to end this.
“Josef and I don’t share blood, it’s true,” I drawl. “But we were close as brothers, once. He’ll tell you the same himself.”
Judging by his expression, this is too much for him to process. He shakes his head as if to clear it.
“Look, old man,” he snarls. “I don’t care who you think you are. We’re going to search your house for the girl. Get out of the way.”
I cross my arms over my chest and tilt my head as I would to a child.
“Little Arkady. Still a spoiled little vyperdysch.”
His male companions both try to hide a smirk, which confirms that they’re Russian. Vyperdysch literally translates as someone who was farted into being. It’s meant to describe a person who thinks he’s important but isn’t.
Arkady looks confused instead of outraged. That means he never learned his mother tongue, which means Josef indulges his boy far too much. That gives me even more leverage.
“I’m warning you,” he growls. “Move.”
Enough of this. My glare is a clear warning to them all.
“No, little boy,” I say coldly. “I’m warning you. Leave now. Forget the address.”
What happens next is exactly what I expect: Arkady scowls furiously and reaches to grab the collar of my shirt with his left hand. Before he can punch me with his right, I grip his left thumb in my left palm, then close my right hand over it and squeeze. This puts agonizing pressure on his thumb joint, driving him screaming to his knees on the marble steps.
As the two goons behind him step forward, I drive my Nike into the inside of the closest one’s right knee, causing him to buckle to the ground but not doing any permanent damage. I let go of Arkady’s thumb to intercept the haymaker from the second goon, then drive my right knee up into his balls.
In less than three seconds, the three men are down.
I turn to my left just in time to see the blade of a stiletto flash in the green-haired woman’s right
hand. There’s no way I can get a hand up in time to stop her from driving it into my abdomen.
Chapter Fourteen
14. STORM
I’m just about to scream when I see the dogs explode through the front doorway like bullets. My heart hammers against my ribcage as I watch Samson’s jaw clamp down on the woman’s wrist. Delilah runs head-first into the woman’s groin, knocking her backwards off the steps onto the concrete below.
From my vantage point between two spindles on the staircase above the foyer, I can only see what’s happening from a downward angle, but it’s enough. Once the woman is down, Delilah leaps onto her chest, growling like the engine of Nick’s Corvette. Her mouth opens to expose all her vicious fangs, and for a moment I’m positive she’s about to rip out the woman’s throat.
Then I hear Nick say something that sounds like “shtoy” and Delilah instantly hops off the woman just as Samson lets go of her wrist, which I’m amazed to see isn’t bleeding.
“None of you is seriously hurt,” I hear Nick say. “That’s out of respect for your father, Arkady. I strongly suggest you ask him about Nikolai Chernenko before you think about any sort of revenge.”
Bile burns the back of my throat as I see Arkady climb shakily to his feet. The look of rage in his eyes is enough to chill my soul as my mind flashes back to the afternoon at the pier. The shooting. The storm.
“This isn’t over, old man,” he growls, holding his left hand in his right.
“The next time I see any of you will be the last time,” Nick says simply as he turns and walks back into the foyer, the dogs at his heels. He swings the huge door shut.
The sound of it closing echoes ominously through the huge foyer.
The certainty in Nick’s final words to them keeps me from descending into panic. I focus on my breathing, trying to bring my heartrate back down to normal.
He stopped Arkady. He protected me. Everything is going to be all right.
For now, anyway.
The dogs look up at me, whining, and Nick’s eyes follow them. He sees me before I have a chance to announce that I’m there. I must look a mess because, for the first time ever, I actually see alarm in his face.
“It’s okay.” He darts up the staircase towards me. “It’s over.”
I hear the big SUV screeching away in the driveway, but I wonder.
Nick reaches the landing at the top of the stairs and drapes an arm over my shoulders. I can smell the musk on his shirt. It’s oddly comforting, but I realize I’m still trembling.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper. “I didn’t want you to be involved in this. I’d never want to put you in danger.”
He turns me to face him, his hands on my upper arms.
“Arkady Volkov is a punk,” he says sternly, like he feels the need to convince me. “You never have to be afraid of him again.”
“You don’t know him,” I say. “He’s not a boy anymore – ”
He wraps his arms around me and pulls me into an embrace, enveloping me. I lay my face against his shoulder just as my tears begin to flow.
“Shhh,” he soothes. “He’s gone. It’s over. Trust me.”
“I do trust you,” I say, trying to hold back my sobs. “But he’s a monster…”
Before I know what’s happening, Nick’s lips are pressing against mine. Suddenly my tremors stop and I’m kissing him back fiercely. It gives me the strength I need to get ahold of myself.
Nick ends the kiss and holds me at arm’s length again.
“Better?”
“Better,” I say.
“Good. Now let’s go down to the kitchen and get some coffee. We have a few things we need to talk about.”
“I do owe Arkady money,” I say, blowing the steam over the rim of my cup. “Almost $50,000.”
Nick shakes his head. “That’s nothing to him. He wants you, not the money.”
“I know. When I found out that… I was responsible for the debt, I went to Arkady to ask how I could repay it. I didn’t have fifty cents, let alone fifty grand.”
Nick doesn’t ask for details on the debt, and I don’t offer them. I’m not ready for that just yet.
“At first, he seemed nice,” I say. “Talking about how it wasn’t my fault, that he wasn’t a bad guy, just a businessman. Friendly, you know?”
He nods.
“Then he offered me a job waiting tables at his strip club in Manhattan. I wouldn’t get paid – except for tips – because my wage would go toward the debt. I didn’t see any other way out of it, so I agreed.”
Remembering those early days makes me shake my head.
“Arkady only wanted me to work a few nights a week, and I could keep my tips. I could still teach piano during the day, so everything I got in cash from the patrons was like free money. It was a win-win.”
“Except it didn’t work out that way,” Nick says. It’s not a question.
“No. Pretty soon, he was acting like I was his girlfriend, or one of his – I don‘t know, his stable or something. Always pawing me when he brought his friends to the club. It was worse when he was drunk. Once night he just stuck his hands right up under my blouse, with everybody watching.”
I swallow hard, the tears close again. “I thought I was such a grown-up, working out a deal with him that could actually benefit me, too. How stupid could I be?”
Nick puts a hand on mine. “You weren’t stupid, Storm, you were naïve. They’re two completely different things.”
“I don’t know about that,” I say with a weak smile.
“I do. But go on.”
I sniff back the tears. “Pretty soon, my stomach would freeze up just at the sight of him. I’m not religious, but I prayed every night before my shift started that he wouldn’t come in, that he’d somehow forget about the club forever and just leave me alone. Then one night he came in with a group of his friends, as usual. Only this time…”
My voice trails off. How did he fool me? What the hell was I thinking?
Nick gives my hand a squeeze. “Keep going, Storm. You can do it.”
“This time he was nice,” I say with a smile, mocking myself. “He was respectful, introduced me to his friends. They seemed nice, too. Then, at the end of the night, Arkady asked me to come to a party at a house in Long Beach that Saturday. The day of the storm.”
Nick nods. “You wore a black cocktail dress, if I recall.”
I smile sheepishly. “At first I thought I was there as his guest, but soon I realized that wasn’t the case. Stupid, really, to think he would bring me to a party. After a couple of hours, and a lot of drinks, I finally figured out what he wanted from me.”
Nicks eyes close.
“Let me guess,” he says softly. “You were the only woman there, surrounded by men.”
Hot tears sting my eyes at the shame the memory brings back. How could I have been so blind? Arkady wasn’t looking for a date, or a waitress. I was supposed to be a party favor for his friends.
“I overheard him telling a buddy to ‘get ready,’” I say, my voice trembling. “I wasn’t sure what he meant. Then I heard the word ‘bitch’ and the word ‘pay’. Then the other guys started looking at me like I was a piece of meat on the grill. One of them even grabbed his crotch and started rubbing it, right in front of me.”
As I say it, I see the cords on Nick’s neck tighten and his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows hard.
“I managed to slip away from them,” I continue. “They were all downing vodka shots, one after the other, and I said I had to go to the bathroom. I got out through the kitchen at the back of the house and onto the shore. Once I got there, I pulled off my shoes and just ran.
“But Arkady and the two men that were with him here today caught up to me by the pier behind the house, just as the storm was starting to kick up.”
“You got the catamaran free.”
“They were between me and the house, so the only way off the beach was the water.”
I’m sobbing now, remembering
the stab of panic, the feeling of hopelessness.
“I didn’t know how to sail a boat. But I was desperate.”
“Of course you were.”
“Luckily, it was only secured by a couple of knots that were easy to untie, and the mainsail was down. Arkady kept yelling at me from a distance to get back in the house. I think he was afraid to get too close to the water because of the wind.”
Nick smiles grimly. “Little vyperdysch can’t swim, I bet.”
“Next thing I know, there’s this huge gust of wind and the sails fill up, and suddenly I’m headed out to the open water at what felt like fifty miles an hour. Then – then the shots started.”
This time I squeeze Nick’s hand. He squeezes back.
“I dropped flat onto the deck,” I say. “I heard the cracks as the bullets tore into the hull, again and again and again. I remember wondering which would be worse: getting hit by one, drowning in the ocean or going back to the party and being passed around among Arkady and his friends.”
Nick puts an arm around my shoulders and pulls me close, laying his warm lips against my forehead. His strength helps calm my shakes.
“Pretty soon I had no idea where I was, and the storm was throwing me around like a rag doll on the deck. I went below because I thought I might have a better chance, but just keeping myself from being tossed overboard was exhausting. And I was shivering so hard it felt like my body was trying to shake itself apart.
“When I finally heard the dogs barking, I thought it was some kind of hallucination. Then I saw you. Then I was in the water, and that’s the last thing I remember until I woke up in bed here.”
I feel a warm weight in my lap. Looking down, I see Delilah’s big, soft head resting there, her eyes gazing up at mine.
“You saved my life, girl,” I sob.
“If I recall correctly, I was the one who jumped into the roiling Atlantic,” Nick says, frowning.