by Mari Carr
“Are there any shots of her face?” Walt asked, suddenly anxious and antsy.
“Here.” She clicked, opening a still of the woman. “This video is from Krakow. I checked and though they’ve been running facial recognition for hours, the team in Budapest hasn’t identified her yet. This one, where she’s blonde, this is from here in Odessa.”
Jakob straightened. “Admiral Varda.”
Nikolett had been watching them, and the instant Jakob said her name she came over, dropping down beside Annalise.
Annalise had the still images of the woman’s face up on screen—neither of them a front-facing image, but there was enough to see that they weren’t the same person.
“Okay, the walk is something, but… They look nothing alike,” Walt said.
“Yes, they do,” Annalise assured him. At the same time Nikolett said, “Makeup.”
Walt looked again. The shape of the eyes was different, wasn’t it? He peered closer. The blonde version had almond-shaped eyes, while the brunette had rounder eyes. The blonde’s nose was skinnier, her lips full.
But the closer he looked, the more he saw. Comparing the actual size of visible sclera of the eye, as well as the curvature of the lower lid…those were the same. Her nostrils were the same too, they just seemed skinnier on the blonde.
“Vadisk,” Nikolett barked. “Run this woman’s face against passport control for the past—” Nikolett looked at Annalise.
“Six, to be safe.”
“Six months,” Nikolett finished.
Leonid was on his feet. “What have you found?”
It was Annalise who answered. “The footage you provided shows a woman who is very, very similar to, if not the same person, as one of the persons of interest we have in relation to the case in Krakow.”
Leonid’s cheek twitched. “A serial killer took my sister.”
“Facial recognition running,” Vadisk said. “Six months’ worth of passport photos isn’t a small number, but it’s a hell of a lot better than trying to check against all of Europe.”
“Show me,” Leonid demanded.
Walt followed after Annalise as she took her computer to the table, stepping back so other people could crowd around her as she played the videos, pointing out the similarity in the way the woman held herself, her gait, if not the stride length of her steps thanks to the difference in footwear.
Annalise was still talking when Vadisk shoved to his feet. “Got her.”
The air went perfectly still, as if everyone in the room held their breath for one frozen, tense moment.
“Ava Chapman. British citizen,” Vadisk said.
“Where is she now?” Leonid snarled.
Vadisk clicked. “She rented a private residence in Teplodar. Four-month lease that ends in two weeks.” Vadisk grabbed his phone off the table. “She has a flight booked to Paraguay five days from now.”
Before Vadisk was even finished talking he, Jakob, Maxim, Leonid, and the bodyguard were all in motion, headed for the door. The conversation had switched from English to Ukrainian, and Nikolett was quick-fire translating for Jakob.
Less than five minutes later, the suite was empty.
Walt stared at the door, shocked at how quickly things had happened.
Nikolett was at a computer. “We will watch. Vadisk is wearing an advanced comm system.” A second later, a video feed popped up. All they could see was the front window of a car that seemed to be racing through the city traffic.
Nikolett straightened, looked at Annalise. “What is the likelihood she’s still alive?”
Annalise shook her head. “I don’t know, but it’s not good. The killer has a flight booked. She’s ready to leave the country.”
Nikolett looked grim. “Then we’ll hope they are there in time to recover her body.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
The ride to Teplodar was quiet, tense. Jakob’s memory flashed back to times he’d sat in tanks and vans, trying to calm and focus himself before an op. He was riding in an elegant, expensive SUV, Vadisk in the front passenger seat, Leonid—the car’s owner—beside him, Maxim on the third row bench seat.
Leonid’s bodyguard, whose name Jakob still didn’t know, was driving, though that term was far too sedate for the way the vehicle had whipped through traffic, finally leaving the elegant city of Odessa behind.
As they barreled by the Baraboi River, Jakob understood why their killer had chosen this location. It was close to the city of Odessa, but it felt like a ghost town.
In the front, Vadisk said something to the bodyguard, who nodded. After checking his phone, Vadisk turned around to look back at Jakob and the others. He spoke first in Ukrainian, and then repeated it in English for Jakob.
“We are less than five kilometers away. No one, not our people or his,” Vadisk nodded at Leonid, “have been able to get detailed schematics of the house. Our Turkish friend,” code for the Ottoman admiral, “sent help,” the janissaries, “but they are hours out.”
“Blind and weaponless,” Jakob murmured.
“There are rifles in the trunk,” Leonid replied in English. “Hunting rifles.”
“Better than nothing,” Maxim said.
“Once we go in, we use Ukrainian. We know she speaks English.”
Jakob nodded once. He would be left out of the communications because he didn’t speak the language, but he could handle it.
“Did you serve?” Maxim asked him.
Jakob twisted in his seat to answer. “Not directly. Intelligence.”
There was a beat of silence as everyone processed that. Leonid repeated Jakob’s words for the driver, who grunted.
Vadisk, Maxim, and Leonid all nodded.
The car turned off the road into a seemingly abandoned residential area. The houses were far apart, the trees and vegetation between them overgrown. The car slowed, and the pre-action silence descended once more.
“My sister is the priority. We get her out safe…alive.” Leonid’s voice was fierce and…scared. Jakob remembered how he’d felt when he knew Annalise was gone. Knew she was in danger.
The driver pulled the car to the side, wheels half on the greenery that made a narrow strip between the edge of the road and the half wall that marked the front boundary of a two-story house that was barely visible through the untrimmed trees that crowded the front lawn.
Vadisk checked his phone and opened his door.
“Wait.”
Everyone looked to Leonid.
He was frowning, looking through the front window. “When we find my sister, I will help her. I have…enemies. And I taught my sister how to fight. Survive. She would not have expected betrayal from a woman, but she will think you are enemies.” He looked from Vadisk to Jakob to Maxim. The driver was frowning back at his boss, who said something quickly to him. The bald man’s eyes widened, and he nodded empathetically.
“Who will she think we are?” Vadisk asked with what might have been resignation in his tone.
“Solntsevskaya Bratva.”
“Layno,” Maxim cursed.
That sounded enough like the Polish word for “shit” that Jakob was fairly certain of the translation. And he heartily agreed with the sentiment.
“When we find her, I will approach Zasha.” With that, Leonid opened his door.
Ten minutes later, rifles had been dispersed to Leonid, Maxim, and the bodyguard. Jakob and Vadisk were unarmed, but he didn’t mind. He was better in hand-to-hand combat.
The fact that Leonid had a weapon would be concerning if they didn’t find his sister alive. In his grief, mistakes might be made.
The house Ava had rented was fifty meters from where they parked. The whole road seemed deserted, no doubt because the city of Teplodar was originally created to provide housing for workers at an atomic thermal power station. However, development of the station was postponed after Chernobyl and completely halted in the nineties.
Using hand signals, Maxim, who had taken point, split them up. Vadisk, Leonid, and
the guard were going around the side to find alternate entrances, while Jakob and Maxim were taking the front door.
The two-story white house was blocky in the way of Soviet buildings, and like the houses around it, there were signs of neglect. The overgrown foliage, the rutted gravel driveway that was more weeds than rock. But there was a car parked just in front of the small stoop. Ava was here.
Jakob snuck forward, using the untamed bushes and tall grass in what may have been a well-landscaped yard. Crouching down next to the car, he quietly unscrewed the valve stem and depressed the valve, air whooshing around his fingertip. He could have knifed the tires—he had a long matte black knife in a holder on his back—but if they were wrong and Ava wasn’t here, it would be better to do something that wouldn’t raise the alarm. One flat tire would be enough to slow down her getaway.
Maxim seemed to understand because he watched Jakob, and then nodded.
It felt as if hours had passed, but in reality he knew it was less than two minutes before he and Maxim rose and ran at a crouch around the car and up the front steps. Jakob flattened himself beside the door and gingerly tested the handle. Locked.
Maxim passed Jakob the gun, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a set of lock picks. Forty seconds later, they were in, the door swinging open with a loud, rusty squeal.
But that sound was drowned out by the screams that echoed up from somewhere deep in the house.
Jakob checked the urge to run in, waiting instead for Maxim, who could see into the house, to raise two fingers and do a quick double point. Jakob slid past him, pressing the rifle into his hand even as he drew his knife, holding it in a reverse grip, the blade along his forearm.
The house was far nicer than the outside would have suggested, with pleasant furnishings and clean, if well worn, floors. Jakob didn’t bother to stop and check the rooms. He wasn’t law enforcement, not really, and his training had focused on getting the job done, no matter what it took, and with little to no regard for his own safety.
The scream had been muffled, which meant interior room or the second floor. Vadisk and Leonid passed by an open doorway ahead and on the left. They were being more methodical in their search, but everyone was headed to the stairs.
In a quirk of construction, the foot of the stairs were toward the back of the house, closer to where Vadisk and Leonid were. Maxim was behind him, and when Jakob looked back, he saw Maxim half turned to cover their rear, gun in place with the butt against his shoulder, but the barrel pointed down.
Jakob headed for the stairs, planning to follow Vadisk and Leonid—the bodyguard had taken position in an opening where he could see the stairs and the back of the house.
He passed the opening to a dining room and a small door to an under-stair closet as another scream echoed through the house.
He paused, head swiveling. The sound had come through the small door.
Not upstairs…but down. In a basement.
Jakob raised a hand, forming a fist. Everyone stopped, and he leaned in to the door.
He could just faintly hear voices. One rose in volume, though not enough for him to make out the words, and then there was another scream.
It didn’t sound like a scream of fear, but more like one of rage.
Jakob started to ease the door open. Leonid tried to knock him out of the way, but Vadisk grabbed him, slapping a hand over his mouth. For a moment, Leonid’s eyes were wild, and Jakob’s heart went out to him. Vadisk held the other man easily—a testament to exactly how strong he was—and whispered something in his ear.
Jakob shot a glance at Maxim, who nodded.
Resettling his grip on the hilt of the knife, Jakob went through the door, as a vision of Annalise and Walt, the way they’d looked last night as the three of them had come together, flashed through his mind. He’d been in dangerous situations before, even faced down death, but it had been easier back then. Because he’d never felt like he had so much to lose.
There was a tiny landing, really more of a wide step, just inside the door, then stairs so steep they were almost a ladder. Lights were on in the basement, illuminating a section of the gray concrete block floor and walls.
Jakob went down two more steps, until his feet were nearly in the light, then stopped. Bracing the hand not holding the knife, he leaned as far as he could, taking a quick glance at the room and silently jerking back up before processing everything he’d seen.
Two women, one medium height with hair a color somewhere between brown and blonde, the other dark haired…and locked in a cage. Ava held what looked like a spear, but it might have been a knife taped to the end of a broom handle. Zasha, the woman in the cage, was bloody, her clothes ragged and each slice in the fabric rimmed in blood, some of it old enough to have dried black.
Was Zasha…holding a knife of her own?
Ava was standing to the side of the stairs, which meant she would most likely see any movement. The best option would be to have Maxim shoot her.
Both women were panting, Zasha occasionally letting out a little sound of pain.
Jakob looked back and held up two fingers, hoping the others, who were crowded above him, Vadisk still in the hallway since there was so little space, could see.
Jakob held up one finger, and then changed it into a gun.
Target one, neutralize by gunshot.
Maxim nodded, but Leonid vehemently shook his head, pointed at the rifle he held, pantomimed using a sight, then shook his head again.
Jakob nodded once, fairly certain that Leonid was saying they weren’t precision rifles. He didn’t want to risk his sister.
There was enough space between them, and they were close enough, that it would take only a mildly adept marksman to hit Ava without getting Zasha…unless the rifles were loaded with buckshot. Leonid called them hunting rifles. They might have scatter-shot cartridges.
Jakob gritted his teeth in frustration, and then tucked his knife back into his scabbard. This was going to have to be a surprise attack.
Repositioning himself so his hands were on the walls of the stairwell, his feet braced on the narrow step, Jakob looked over his shoulder, hoping they could read his expression, then jumped.
His palms skidded down the walls, controlling his descent to some degree. When he hit the ground, he rolled, not away from, but toward Ava.
An enraged scream was all the warning he got before the makeshift spear stabbed the floor where he would have been had he rolled the other way. Bracing his elbows, Jakob swept out one leg, taking Ava down at the ankles.
She fell, but held on to her weapon. Jakob saw the blade flashing in the too-bright light, and brought his arms up in time to protect his head. In his peripheral vision, he saw Maxim and Leonid hitting the ground. Maxim raised the weapon and snarled, “Stop.”
But Ava was in midfall, and the business end of her spear was headed right for Jakob. He saw it coming, and though it felt like it was happening in slow motion it was only a fraction of a second before the blade came down. He felt the knife bite into his arm, felt the thump as it hit bone.
Grabbing the shaft of the weapon, Jakob gritted his teeth and held perfectly still, half-sprawled on the floor, stuck that way since, until he was in the presence of a medical team, the knife needed to stay in place.
The woman in the cage snarled something, and then to Jakob’s alarm, she raised her own weapon, an exact copy of the knife currently embedded in his arm. She seemed to be planning to stab through the bars into Jacob’s foot, which rested against the cage.
Jakob made a noise that might have been a yelp of alarm—though he would deny it—but Leonid dropped down, straddling Jakob’s legs, his hands raised, a steady stream of words falling from his lips.
Jakob could no longer see the woman, but he heard her gasp, heard the soft sob as she said her brother’s name.
Maxim had Ava on her stomach, arms behind her back.
“Stop!” she demanded, sounding panicked rather than angry. “I have to finish. You
don’t understand.”
The bodyguard produced a pair of handcuffs, passing them to Maxim, who locked them around the English woman’s wrists.
“Keys,” Leonid snarled. “Where are the keys to the cage?”
“No, no, no.” Ava shook her head as Maxim hauled her to her feet.
Vadisk was standing off to the side, speaking quietly into a phone and staring at the far corner of the concrete room.
“The cage isn’t part of my mission. She was being difficult. She stole my instrument and hurt me. I had to control her so she wouldn’t hurt me!”
“Fuck you, you fucking bitch,” Zasha snarled. Her voice was a cracking rasp, and now Jakob could see her lips were cracked. She needed water.
Leonid snapped something to his bodyguard, and then walked over to where Ava stood.
The room seemed to get twenty degrees colder. Or maybe that was shock as blood started to soak the sleeve of Jakob’s shirt.
“Where is the key?” Leonid asked quietly.
Ava shook her head, eyes filling with tears. “Please leave. You’re not allowing me to do this properly.”
“I have never hit a woman before.” Leonid’s words hung heavy, punctuated by the rasping breath of his still-caged sister. Then he drew back his arm and backhanded Ava across the face. “But you are not a woman. You are a monster.”
Maxim released Ava, who crumpled to the ground, utterly silent and with a faraway look in her eyes. Leonid’s man returned, holding a bottle of water and a crowbar.
Vadisk hung up the phone, and then came over to Jakob. Without a word, he hooked his arms under Jakob’s. Jakob tightened his hold on the spear to make sure it didn’t shift, then nodded that he was ready.
Vadisk hauled him to his feet.
Jakob ground his teeth together, swore a blue streak in the silence of his head. Out loud, he said, “Ouch.”
“Your doctor is on his way. Actually, both of them. Maybe Dr. Fischer can figure out…her.” Vadisk took the knife from the holster at Jakob’s back and cut away the heavy-duty tape that bound Ava’s weapon to the end of the pole. Jakob blew out air in relief as the weight and pressure of the pole torqueing the knife was eliminated.