“Agent Gates?” he asked him. Lucas nodded and introduced Elena before explaining that they were here to see Ivan Anisimov.
“Now, you’re sure you want to see him like this? The decedent has already been identified. He’s not a very pretty sight.”
“That’s all right,” Elena said. “Believe me, I’ve seen worse.”
“Okay, then. You’ve been warned. Follow me.”
Chapter 15
Elena followed the attendant into the chilly viewing room. Directly ahead were the stainless steel body drawers, and she recalled how she’d always thought they looked like over-sized filing cabinets. It was probably true in a way. Bodies were stored there until either loved ones or the state had them removed for burial.
The attendant moved over to drawer number sixty-one and opened the small door, pulling out the attached platform with Ivan’s body lying on top.
“I’ll give you a minute. I’ll be right over there,” the attendant informed her, and she nodded as he moved away to the other side of the room to a work desk, where he promptly sat down and began sorting out some documents.
She looked down at the remains of the man she’d known for years. She could hardly believe it was the same person. Ivan had never let anything get him down. When he had failed at something—and he had often—he’d just gone out and started something new. He never had a whole lot of luck but it had seemed things were working out for him this time around with this new business venture of his with Dmitry. Tears stung her eyes and she fought to keep them at bay.
She remembered Ivan as a little boy, when he and Dmitry had done everything together including playing tricks on her, reading her diary and then blackmailing her with the contents. It wasn’t until Ivan developed a crush on her at sixteen that the teasing stopped. From that moment, Ivan started following her around like a puppy dog, much to Dmitry’s embarrassment. A boy of fourteen really couldn’t understand his friend’s fascination with his sister.
The even scarier thing for her was that this could have been Dmitry lying lifeless on the cold steel platform. A warm tear spilled over onto her cheek and she wiped it away carelessly. She would find the bastard who’d done this to Ivan. He would not get away with taking a good man’s life. Maybe this was acceptable in America, but she had her own laws to obey and allowing a murderer to go free just wasn’t one of them.
Lucas remained silently behind her, a steady rock in a raging river. She sensed his inner strength and his body heat seeped into her, warming her chilled one.
“There’s a Russian Proverb. You don’t get good apples from a bad tree,” she said softly, her voice not quite steady. “But Ivan tried so hard to rid himself of his parents’ stigma. They weren’t very good people, constantly on the wrong side of the law, backing communist regimes. They weren’t well favored and died when Ivan was quite young.
“He always made me smile. Even when I was infuriated with him, I’d end up laughing because of his antics. I loved him like a brother.” She turned toward the attendant. “Are there forms I have to fill out to have him shipped back to Russia?”
The attendant looked up from his desk and nodded. “Yes. You will be the one making all the arrangements?”
She nodded. “I’m the only one in the country with ties to Ivan. I’ll be happy to pay the fees for him to go home.”
She placed a hand on Ivan’s cold one. He hadn’t deserved any of this.
“Okay, let me get them ready and we can have him shipped by the end of the week.”
The attendant left the room in search of the forms. Lucas stepped forward and placed his hands on her shoulders, lending her silent support. She leaned her back against his chest, amazed at how natural it felt, then closed her eyes and allowed herself to experience his nearness. She breathed in his subtle scent, a mixture of soap and manliness. Her body was never her own when he was near. She’d never felt like this before. Not even with Nikolai.
“I’m so sorry, Elena,” he said into her hair. His hands moved from her shoulders and wrapped around her small frame, placing his chin on her shoulder. “You know you can always cry around me. I don’t care. In fact, I kind of like it.”
His breath tickled her neck and a shiver shot down her spine. She struggled to keep her breathing even. “Easy for you to say. You’re not the one making a fool of yourself.”
Lucas smiled. “I don’t know about that. I’d say being halfway frozen and naked on a boat would constitute as an embarrassing moment. I was hardly at my full glory.”
Elena giggled as she remembered the time he spoke of. They had been fighting for their lives aboard Alexei’s boat on the choppy river when Lucas had gone overboard. With the chilly November climate, he almost froze and caught hypothermia, and to save his life she had stripped him down to his underpants.
“You were wearing boxers.”
“Still, it wasn’t my finest hour.”
She turned in his arms and burrowed her head into his chest as the first waves of sobs hit her. She gave into them and wrapped her arms around him, holding onto him as tightly as she could. So much was changing; so much had already changed and she was still trying to catch up.
She felt like she was drowning in the tidal wave slowly wreaking havoc on her life. It was hard seeing someone she cared about dead, especially when she didn’t have many friends left in the world. Someone she’d known most of her life who was now nothing more than skin and bone, slowly deteriorating into something unrecognizable. No light. Nothing that made them who they’d been. Everyone seemed to be dying around her. First Nikolai, and now Ivan. Then there was Alexei’s deception. It felt like a plague even though she knew that neither death had been her fault.
Lucas pulled her in tighter to him as he had done once back in Moscow. It was the only time she had felt completely safe. It had been the first time in a while that she had felt like everything was going to be all right and now he was doing it again. She was stunned at how he could comfort her so much by doing so little. She had missed the feeling, amazed that she could miss something she had never thought about before but she did—a lot. She could feel contentment rising within her.
“This is not how I wanted you to see America,” Lucas said, breaking into the silence that had stretched between them as she’d struggled with her feelings. She hadn’t minded it. She and Lucas had come to a point where any quiet times were comfortable between them and neither of them felt the need to fill the empty space.
Of course he would say that. For the past eighteen months he had made subtle and not so subtle hints to have her visit America. At the time, she’d been dealing with her volatile emotions and had declined his offers.
She melted into him, her lips pressed against his chest, muffling her voice. “Don’t worry. I won’t let this spoil my perception.”
“Good.”
“I’m happy to be here, Lucas.” She closed her eyes, savoring how complete she felt enclosed in his arms. Soon it would be over and she’d be left cold. “I know that may seem strange with all that’s going on, but I am happy to see you again.”
He pressed a light kiss into her hair. The motion brought back another wave of bittersweet memories for her. He’d done that before and her heart ached. She took a step back, away from his warm and comforting body, and stared into his blue eyes.
His lips curled slightly. “Me too, Elena. Me too.”
Chapter 16
Elena stepped through the kitchen door Lucas held open for her. They had finally returned home after dealing with the paperwork to ship Ivan’s remains back to Russia. Home. How weird to think of Lucas’s house as her home. She must be more tired than she thought. She would soon be finding herself on a plane with Dmitry heading back to the mother country.
The thought of returning to Russia should’ve made her happy. Back to her safe little world where she felt comfortable. Back to…what? For months, she’d been on the verge of making the move, only fear and panic holding her back. Her heart thumped, knowing soon she
would have to confront Lucas and hear him out. Did she have the courage to hear him say what they had was now in the past? That she’d waited too long, and he’d grown tired of waiting? She swallowed around the lump in her throat.
“How’s pizza sound?” Lucas’s voice interrupted her increasingly worrying thoughts. She returned her focus to the present and noticed Dmitry had joined them.
“Delicious. I’m starving,” she replied. Her stomach growled to prove her point. The last time she had a chance to grab something to eat was at breakfast. The day had gone fast and she’d been busy. After viewing Ivan, her body had rejected any idea of food and it wasn’t until now that she felt hungry again.
Lucas nodded. “All right, I’ll go order a couple for dinner.”
He leaned his hip against the kitchen bench beside the wall mounted phone and lifted the handset while she listened to Dmitry reiterate his day’s events.
“Here’s what I got,” he said. “The company that paid for the tickets was a dummy corporation. I did trace the credit card used back to the source…and get this. It’s a government issued card. In fact, a DoD issued card.”
She raised an eyebrow. “They used a government credit card? How stupid are they?”
Lucas shrugged. “Paper pushers, all tax-deducible when it’s for work. This is America, after all.”
Dmitry sat down, the motion tugging at his shirt, revealing his white bandage. She gasped, her eyes widening as she took in her brother’s wound. “Oh my God, you’re hurt. What happened?”
A wave of panic flowed through her before she tampered it down. Her hand trembled as her mind began imagining the worst. She had to get a grip. It was no good worrying about something that hadn’t happened. Her brother was still alive. She refused to think of the alternative as she probed at his bandage and tried to determine if he had been injured anywhere else and wasn’t telling her.
Her brother brushed off her concern. “It’s just a little bullet wound.”
“Just a…?” She huffed out a breath and muttered, “Men.”
Her heartbeat returned to its regular rhythm, knowing Dmitry would only make light of his wound if it wasn’t life threatening.
Her brother glared at Lucas as she fussed over him. “You said women dig a scar.”
She turned narrowed eyes towards Lucas, then straightened her body and placed her hands on her hips. “You did, did you?”
***
Lucas grinned at Elena. He was used her mood swings by now, and nothing would ever make him fear her. She might send him to the dog house but he knew ways of making her forgive him. “I did. But I said women, Dmitry, not your older sister. That’s a whole other kettle of fish.”
“Relax, Elena. I’m fine.” Dmitry batted Elena’s hand away from him, sucking in a breath as she once more probed at his injury. “I also uncovered the name of the man who murdered Ivan.”
Elena sat heavily in the chair she had recently vacated and stared at her brother.
“Good job. How’d you manage that?” Lucas asked, while waiting on hold to order the pizza.
“The age of technology, my computer illiterate friend,” Dmitry said, then stepped back to the computer and sat down in the chair where he had spent the entire day.
After finalizing the order, Lucas hung up the phone and followed Elena and Dmitry.
“The warehouse didn’t have any cameras, but the one several feet down did,” Dmitry was saying to Elena when he reached them.
“The same camera that will be the final nail in your coffin.”
Her reply had Dmitry wincing. “I take it things didn’t go so good at Langley?”
Lucas stopped behind Elena and rubbed her tense shoulders. “It’s a work in progress. So stay low,” he warned. “The Secretary of Defense has a hard on for you. Show us what you found.”
Nodding, Dmitry typed something into the computer. An image appeared on the screen of a couple of men exiting the warehouse rapidly.
“This was just after I escaped. I did get one slightly better shot of my mystery benefactor, and I was right when I figured he’d given me a fake name. I ran his picture through your DMV and got this—”
Dmitry brought up a copy of a Virginia driver’s license, registered to Sean Michael Henry. Lucas retrieved his cell phone and pressed speed dial number four. “Is that address current?” he asked, while waiting for his call to be answered.
“I don’t know. I’m having some trouble doing what I want. Your computer isn’t exactly state of the art, Lucas. I’m working as fast as I can.”
“Oh, here. I just remembered,” Elena said, unzipping the carry-on bag she’d brought and pulling out a MacBook Pro that appeared to be brand new. She handed the computer to Dmitry, ignoring his glare which showed how annoyed he was that she hadn’t thought of this before. Then she dug into her bag and retrieved the travel power convertor that would allow Dmitry to plug the Russian cord into the American outlet.
“Well, this should certainly help,” Dmitry snapped.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he replied grudgingly. “So just how bad is it?”
“Real bad. Keep out of sight, okay? I don’t need anything else to happen to you.”
“What about Ivan?”
Elena gave him a brief nod, telling him silently that everything had been sorted. Ivan was on his way back home to Russia. “I’m so sorry, Dmitry.”
Dmitry stood and hugged his sister. “I know. I’m sorry too, Elena. I never wanted to involve you in this.”
“I’m glad you did. Whenever you have problems, I’m supposed to help you out. Particularly problems like this one. Don’t ever think not to tell me.” Without warning, she slapped the back of his head.
“Ow, what was that for?”
Elena glared at him. “For not wanting to tell me. If Lucas hadn’t called, I wouldn’t have been here to help you, you chicken-shit.”
Dmitry caught Lucas’s gaze, sending a sarcastic thank you glare his way. Lucas stared back at him, unfazed. For blood thirsty Russians, these two were kittens.
Forty minutes later, the three of them were finishing off one large supreme and one ham and pineapple pizza. “After dinner, I’ll continue researching Sean Henry and why he wants Sundown. I’ll also see how he came to be involved with the government,” Dmitry said. “He doesn’t seem the type to me. He had no problems shooting Ivan and had no remorse after.”
Lucas thought about that. He knew many people within the government who would take a life for the security of the nation and those were men in low positions. No accounting what the big boys would do. “He’s probably just a muscle man, you know, hired to keep the power player’s hands clean.”
Dmitry nodded, agreeing with him. “I’ll dig deep. See if I can locate bank statements that can tell me who’s footing the bills. For what he tried to pull off, he would need a man with deep pockets backing him. Maybe I’ll get lucky and find the ring master in this circus.”
“Just make sure you get some sleep, Dmitry,” Elena said, speaking up for the first time since they’d sat down to dinner. “I don’t like to see you so tired.”
He rolled his eyes. “It will take as long as it does, Elena, but I promise I’ll try my hardest to get some rest.”
Chapter 17
Elena left Dmitry to his hacking. The less she knew, the better she felt. She’d never liked her brother’s hobby or business venture—however he chose to see it. She’d always known it would lead him into trouble. He had an unnatural talent for delving into the world of cyberspace but she couldn’t complain too much since it had saved her ass more than once.
She made her way down the hallway of Lucas’s home. The house was predominately male. No woman had ever stayed long enough to leave a mark. Dark colors greeted her in chocolate, black, and forest green. She could see some work had been done recently. The smell of freshly painted walls assaulted her as she continued down the hall.
She felt Lucas’s presence before she heard him. He wrapped
his big hand around her arm and catapulted her into the nearest room which just happened to be his bedroom, then pinned her with his gaze, not allowing her to break contact. She swallowed nervously at the fierce look on his face, her mouth suddenly dry. He crossed his arms over his broad chest and leaned back against the closed bedroom door.
She was trapped.
“We’re going to finish that talk we started in the car,” he told her, and the expression on his face told her it was non-negotiable.
She let out a deep breath and sat on the edge of his massive king sized bed, creasing the black and white swirled design duvet. She wasn’t looking forward to this talk. She shifted around, getting into a comfortable position buying herself some time while her incoherent thoughts flitted about her mind. She waited for him to start, not quite understanding why he was so mad at her if the look on his face was any indication. She glanced away, cowardly preparing herself for the confrontation.
He let out a deep sigh. “We shared something special at the airport, or at least I thought we did. Was I wrong?”
She jerked her head up to meet his eyes. Did he remember the airport? She sure did. That day had haunted her for eighteen long months.
“No, it’s just—”
“What?” he interrupted. “Why have you stayed away? Have you changed your mind about us? If so, you should’ve said something instead of leaving me in the dark, wishing…wanting.”
“Me? I haven’t heard from you in over a month.”
He blinked in surprise, then his face morphed into a frown. “The last time I called, I got the sense that I was crowding you so I thought I’d back off and give you the time I promised. You’re important to me, Elena. I didn’t want to screw up and push you away…or worse, have you run from me.”
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