Maksimenko ignores her begging gaze. He places the handcuff key on the bed, away from her shackled right hand, yet close enough to reach it if she makes a strong enough effort, even if at the price of badly chaffing her wrist.
He can still hear Fedorka’s cussing when he shuts the door from outside.
“I love you too,” he says to himself with a self-loving smile.
29
Premier Palace Hotel, Kiev
From all the hotels in Kiev, Tarasov didn’t pick the Premier Palace Hotel because he desired all the extravaganza that the best hotel of Ukraine offered, neither to enjoy the marvelous view over the high-rise buildings of Kiev’s downtown from the room. With the curtains carefully pulled close to deny any insight to the room he and Nooria occupy, he couldn’t enjoy the view anyway.
He put himself in the SBU’s shoes, thinking that if he were to watch out for a renegade army officer crazy enough to show up in his home town, he’d look for him in the cheaper hotels and railway station rest rooms where all staff had already been alerted and briefed about his appearance and personal details. The Spirit of the City of Screams might have made him bigger—not as big as the Top and the Colonel’s Lieutenants, though still much above his former height—but his face didn’t change much. Tarasov had no doubts that many people had unexpected visitors leaving his photograph and a telephone number behind, should a taxi driver or hotel employee recognize him.
His other, even more important reason was that he knew the building inside out. For Tarasov, who had been with the Ukrainian Spetsnaz for several years before he was deployed to the Zone, being prepared for anything that might happen to rich and important people was part of his daily training — rescuing hostages, smoking out terrorists, locating and disarming bombs. The Premier Palace Hotel was one of the high-profile locations for which such plans were prepared and rehearsed regularly. He knows exactly which plans SBU commandos would follow if they’d come for him and where they might make a mistake. Keeping this in mind, Tarasov picked two adjacent rooms where he knows that the posh-looking ceiling is only half inch thick plaster, with an air-condition maintenance shaft running directly above. It could be made easily accessible with the fire axe he already took from the emergency case in the staircase, while the Top feigned an argument with a hotel employee to distract the attention of any security guard who might be watching the corridor through the hidden CCTV.
Hearing a faint knock on the door, Tarasov immediately removes the lock card from its wall case. The lights in the room go out at once, including TV and hair dryer.
“Hey!” Pete says from his chair in front of the TV. “I was watching this!”
Tarasov signals him to stay put. He quickly removes the key card from its holster to switch off all lights in the room and takes the clothes hanger that he had already placed close to the door — even the most heavily armed commando would be helpless if unexpectedly choke-held with that.
After a heartbeat another knock comes. This time it is someone drumming the rhythm of the Garry Owen song with his fingers on the door.
“Come in,” Tarasov says switching the lights back on. Nooria’s hair dryer starts buzzing again.
“Boo!” The Top emanates the strong smell of liquor as he steps in and fakes a frightening gesture. “Gotcha!”
“In high spirits, I see.”
Hartman collapses into a chair. “Jesus! In the end I was prepared to make Custer’s last stand and die with my boots on. That Aussie son of a bitch almost won our drinking competition.”
“Is he in business?”
“Bet he is. He’s an oddball, though. Most hunters brag about what they bagged. Sawyer was bragging about what he didn’t.”
“Like what?”
“Among else, he mentioned gonorrhea in Warsaw and HIV in Cape Town.”
“Gospodi, Top, how much did you drink?”
“More than necessary, less than enough… anyway, tonight he’s on the hunt again. Masha is the name of the game, or Natasha or whatever… eyes of a cat, body of a panther! I could have taken her friend, a certain Katya but she was looking too KGB to me.”
Hartman hiccups and makes a face as if he had already regretted his decision.
“I hope those hookers will not distract him from the trip tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry. I’d say he’s the kind of fellow who wouldn’t miss a boar hunt, not even for the sake of a dozen top models begging him for sex. And Jesus, the women here must all be top models because the way they look—good God!”
“Is the hotel bar still open?” Pete asks, amused. “I could use some company myself.”
“Over my dead body,” Hartman grumbles. “Anyway, what’s the plan for tomorrow?”
Tarasov pulls the table closer to the Top’s chair and unfolds a map he took from the lobby, found among brochures promoting the sights of Kiev and Ukraine. It has the logo of Chernobyl Tours on it, an agency that organized tourist trips into the Zone before it became off-limits. “We’ll drive to a village called Prybirsk. Dytyatki would be even better, but it used to be the main entry point to the Zone and the army still maintains a big outpost there. I’m not too eager to run into former comrades. So, Prybirsk is where we’ll meet Sawyer. I hope he won’t be too exhausted tomorrow morning to drive there by his GPS.”
“Why can’t we drive together?”
“I don’t want to get him into any trouble, should we run into any on our way to the Zone. Once we’re out of the Big Land—we’re in it together.”
“Sensible.”
“Look. There’s an abandoned railway yard close by but already on the Zone’s rim. Trains no longer stop there but the rails run through the Zone for a few kilometers. The entry point is heavily guarded, but with a little bit of luck we should be able to get through.”
“We’ll need more than a little luck.”
“Exactly. We’ll also need to be on time and catch freight train 314. It goes daily between Kiev and Chernokhov, passing through the entry point at Prybirsk at nine in the morning.”
The Top hiccups. “By train to where no trains go? That doesn’t give me anything.”
“We’ll hijack one. Once inside the Zone, we jump off and follow the old railroad north-west until here.” Tarasov points at a position on the map. “We’ll go through the Tuzla tunnel, cross a river and arrive at the western edge of the Swamps. That’s where the real Zone begins.”
“And once there?”
“We’ll find my friend. He can be very elusive but I know of someone who keeps track of him.”
“Fine with me,” Hartman says and hiccups once more.
“First phase—let’s all go to sleep.”
“No way for me to sleep with the Top,” Pete scowls. “He’s snoring like a bear.”
Hartman grins. “Don’t even think of sleeping alone and sneaking away, you little rascal!”
“Sorry, little brother,” Nooria says. “You can’t stay with us either.”
Pete sighs. To stretch his legs, Tarasov walks over to Nooria and caresses her freshly washed hair. As he lifts a strand of her long hair, he smells a spicy and sweetish scent coming from her neck. It seems to go directly into his blood, invigorating his body, making all his exhaustion vanish and filling him with burning desire all over.
“What’s this?” he asks sniffing.
“I mixed my own perfume,” Nooria says with a mischievous giggle. “You like it?”
“If I like your perfume?” Tarasov asks taking a deep breath with trembling nostrils. He points to the door. “You two! Get out of here! Now!”
Sharing a grin, Hartman and Pete hurry out. They have barely closed the door when Tarasov lifts Nooria from her chair, tears off the bath robe from her naked body and tosses her onto the king size bed. Nooria is still giggling when Tarasov jumps after her with his clothes barely removed. After a heartbeat, her giggle turns into a moan. She moans louder and louder while letting the desire she stirred up in her man’s body take her with the vigor of a st
orm, screaming with desire as she becomes one with the waves of its force.
30
SBU headquarters, Kiev
“Emission approaching,” Captain Maksimenko says looking at his watch. The elderly woman wearing plain civilian clothes and standing at the far corner of the plain office in the SBU headquarters looks at him with surprise.
“What do you mean, Captain?”
“Making people wait is a perfect way to weaken their resolve,” Maksimenko cheerfully replies. “We’re into something big tonight, Alyona Ivanovna. Just wait a little longer.”
Although the blonde woman waiting outside is used to wait for anyone with just a little more power than ordinary citizens, be it at the local municipality, the train booking booth or a bank clerk’s desk, having to spend two hours on a vacated corridor of the SBU’s grim building has taken a toll on her.
Realizing that her son is to be questioned by the SBU instead of the police was a surprise bad enough. First, she had hoped that ten minutes after her son, who is now nervously shuffling his feet on the wooden bench beside her, had told what he saw they would be soon on their way home with a handsome check in her wallet. As time passed and nobody came to see them, she was hoping that they will get away without too many formalities. After one hour, she wants to leave, thinking that if her son’s information is not urgent for the SBU then they could come back any other time.
The guards abruptly refused them to leave. By now, mentally exhausted and nervously, she feels as if she has volunteered for imprisonment. The thought that the SBU can prove anyone guilty of anything makes her anxious.
“Anhela Kirillovna?”
The sight of the one-eyed officer who at last opens an office door and calls out her name doesn’t reduce her anxiety. When she arrived with her son, she expected that the SBU would be grateful and friendly for providing them with information about a wanted criminal. But now she feels as if she were the criminal herself, waiting for interrogation.
The officer repeats his call.
“Anhela Kirillovna, come in. And this young man is…?”
“Vladimir Alekseyevich Hrabko,” the boy respectfully replies.
“We call him Vova,” his mother adds.
“I am Captain Dmitriy Maksimenko, Security Service. Please be seated.”
Without any apology for making them wait, Captain Maksimenko shows Anhela Kirillovna and Vova to sit down in two chairs standing in front of his desk. Expecting only Captain Maksimenko, she frowns when she sees an elderly female agent with short, grey hair being present as well. To Anhela Kirillovna, she has SBU written all over her wrinkled face as she leans against the wall next to a large photograph of a heroic monument. It shows the profile of a Soviet soldier from the Great Patriotic War, chiseled into a huge grey boulder. The inscription below says, ‘Defenders of Sebastopol — we will never forget you’.
“So, Vova… out of curiosity, you checked up the home page of the police. Then your mother saw there’s a reward for providing law enforcement agencies with any hint about the whereabouts of those wanted criminals. Is that correct?”
“It is, Captain Maksimenko.”
“Anhela Kirillovna, you have the right to stay here while we question your son but please don’t answer any questions for him. Clear?”
The woman nervously nods.
Vova looks around, apparently disappointed at the total lack of anything that would resemble the world of secret services as he had seen in the movies. The Captain’s laptop is the only high-tech appliance in the room, and even that is standing next to a desk lamp that might have already stood on the same desk back in times when the building still housed the KGB.
“So, it is you who saw the criminal?” Maksimenko asks the boy.
Vova looks at his mother for encouragement before replying. Feeling his gaze, Anhela Kirillovna stirs. She had spent the last few moments looking at a plastic bucket with a mop inside, standing in the far corner behind the desk, and had contemplated if the cleaning utensils are still used to mop up blood from the floor like she saw in movies featuring KGB interrogations. She quickly nods.
“Yes, officer.”
“Call me Captain Maksimenko, Vova. Did you ever want to do something for our Motherland?”
“Yes, Captain Maksimenko.”
“Molodets. Do you know that the man you have recognized is a dangerous criminal?”
Vova nods with a shadow of fear in his eyes.
“Don’t worry, Vova, you are safe with us. We need your help, though.”
Before he can continue, the door opens and Agent Fedorka rushes in. Maksimenko glances at his watch. Save for the neatly applied bandages on her wrists, the agent is tidy and her white blouse under the dark grey uniform jacket is perfectly ironed. No one could guess that just fifty-five minutes ago she had still been handcuffed to a bed, bathing in her own and Maksimenko’s sweat who now gives her the stern look of a superior officer.
“We have been waiting for you, Agent.”
“Apologies, Kapitan. I burned my wrists when making tea.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Was it hot?”
“Very.”
“Anhela Kirillovna, according to our protocols, minors are to be questioned by female agents. Female perception, I guess.” Maksimenko gives the mother a faint smile and turns to Fedorka. “Good that you’re on time. I was about asking Vova to identify the suspect.”
Vera nods. She looks into the boy’s blue eyes.
“I am Agent Fedorka but you can call me Vera. And I can call you Vova, right?”
The boy nods.
Her mother, who compared to the beautiful agent appears like a rain-soaked little sparrow, studies Fedorka with narrowed eyes. Feeling the elderly female agent’s look on her, she quickly looks elsewhere and tries to make the appearance of a good citizen who has nothing to hide. Even so, the gaze from the grey-haired agent’s dark eyes makes her feel guilty for crimes nobody could ever know, including her — except the SBU.
“Vova, you are a very brave boy. That man wants to hurt people, like your mother and children like you.” Before she continues, Fedorka assesses the effect of his words on the boy. Vova looks genuinely scared. “Will you help us to find this man?”
“Yes, Agent Fedorka.”
Maksimenko turns his laptop towards the boy. The screen shows the home page of the Ukrainian police with the photographs and description of the country’s ten most wanted criminals. Maksimenko points at one of them.
“Is this the man you saw?”
“No.”
Satisfied that the boy didn’t say yes over the photograph of a well-known mafia boss, Maksimenko now points at Tarasov’s file photograph.
“Was it him?”
“I don’t know” Vova stammers. “I think so, sir.”
“He didn’t look like in this photograph?”
“Yes he did, but he was… different.”
“In which way? Did he wear a moustache or beard?”
“I couldn’t see his face well enough in the darkness because last week Sergiy and Oleg were throwing stones at the lamp and the lamp is broken now…”
Maksimenko and Fedorka exchange a glance.
“Sergiy and Oleg, they are your friends, right?” Fedorka softly asks. “We will need to talk about this with them. What they did was wrong.”
“But maybe we’ll skip that if you help us by answering our question properly,” adds Maksimenko and smiles at the boy.
“He was… tall, very tall. And he had a face like… that one.”
The agents follow the boy’s outstretched index finger.
“Vova, this is very important,” Maksimenko says with a hint of impatience in his voice. “Please, if you want to help us catching that man, behave seriously.”
“Otherwise, he might even come for you, Vova. Maybe for your mother too!”
Seeing that Fedorka is bound to scare her son beyond measure, Anhela Kirillovna opens her mouth to protest. Then she feels the grey-haired agent�
�s gaze upon her once more and prefers to stay quiet.
“But he was looking like that!” Vova exclaims.
“You mean, like that Black Sea Fleet marine on the Sebastopol monument?”
“Vova, little Vova,” Fedorka says with a voice sweet like honey. “Tell us the truth. You don’t want Sergiy and Oleg go to the prison for breaking that lamp, do you?”
“But I am telling the truth!” the boy proudly says. “He had a big, strong chin like in the photograph and his face was very hard, like made from stone and he looked sad, too.”
“Nonetheless you recognized him.”
“Yes, because I remembered him. I met him once. He was wearing a uniform like Agent Maksimenko but with more medals on his chest, and even then he was taller—”
Hearing this, the Captain’s eye flutters. Looking at Fedorka, he can even recognize a faint shadow of amusement in her face.
“—and he told me that they don’t shoot at people in the army, and I believed him because my parents always tell me that our army is no good and just a waste of money…”
Vova’s mother whimpers. Covering her mouth with her palm, she looks at the grey-haired agent who hardens her gaze under the black eyebrows.
Maksimenko nods in satisfaction. “Thank you, Vova. That was all we needed to know.”
“Can I go now?”
“Yes, Vova,” Fedorka says with a warm smile. “You have been very helpful.”
Relieved, the boy jumps up from his chair but now it’s his mother’s turn to ask a question. She clears her throat before beginning to talk.
“About the—I mean, the reward… the cash…”
Unseen by Anhela Kirillovna and her son, Maksimenko gives Fedorka a wink from his eye.
“Oh yes, I think you deserve it. If I’m right, it is fifty thousand hrivnya, yes?”
“Yes. Quite a lot of money,” Fedorka says, still smiling.
Anhela Kirillovna’s look turns greedy.
“Is it in cash, or…”
“I am sorry,” Maksimenko says and closes his laptop. “You didn’t provide us with anything new.”
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Northern Passage s-2 Page 19