Red Sparrow

by Jason Matthews

  Ustinov grunted something at her and reached out his hand. The revolving pink lights against the all-red background of the room turned into double pink dots, then triple dots, revolving around one another in their respective paths across the room. Dominika was overloading on the lights and the colors, and Ustinov continued beckoning for her. His guttural obscenities came out as slashes of dark orange, elemental, brutal; they somehow slid beneath, not over, the pink dots.

  Dominika looked at him from under half-closed lids and wondered whether she should lick her lips for effect. As he revolved like a Bundt cake in a microwave, Ustinov’s eyes never left her. Dominika knew she had to simultaneously obliterate his body as well as his head, he had to want her to stay with him. A week, two weeks, two months. Any amount of time would satisfy the requirements, the longer the better, they said. They had told her the sidewalk outside Ustinov’s apartment was stained with the tears of his one-night stands.

  Ustinov was slowly revolving toward her. When he came even with where Dominika was kneeling, he put his arms around her waist, threw her on her back—she registered the tug of tearing panties—hunched over her like a gargoyle and began making passionate, if feral, love to her.

  In the red light, Ustinov’s clenched teeth—normally white and even—appeared blue and black-rimmed. Dominika threw her head back and closed her eyes. She felt Ustinov’s hot breath on her breasts. The pink sparks of light flowed over her quivering legs, their bodies, and the mirrors. She lifted her buttocks and rocked her pelvis to meet each of his lupine thrusts, clapped her hands around his arms and concentrated on making him lose his sanity. Ustinov pulled his head back in a paroxysm of impending meltdown. Dominika involuntarily huffed as he began moving harder and faster. Apart from the red light, and his blue teeth, and his grunting, Dominika was surprised to feel her own body—her secret self—responding; the bitter-tongue lift from the Benzedrine had arrived. She looked past his chin at the glass ceiling but she could not see any celestial bodies. Where were the stars?

  What she did see was an Angel of Death. First she saw a reflected blur on the glass ceiling panels. The blur became a shadow gliding toward the bed, across each mirrored panel like poured black mercury, reflected a hundred times. Dominika felt a pulse of air as the apparition floated above Ustinov’s head. The gangster’s eyes were sightless with passion. He sensed nothing. A sprung steel wire flashed across Ustinov’s throat, drawing tight with a musical zing, cutting into his flesh. Ustinov’s eyes snapped open, and his hands scrabbled at the wire garrote now cutting into his windpipe. With his fingers digging at the wire, Ustinov’s face hung suspended inches from Dominika’s. Her mouth was frozen in a silent scream. He looked at her uncomprehendingly with red-rimmed eyes, a vein on his forehead bulging, his fingers trying for purchase on the wire. His mouth sagged open, a black thread of his saliva falling on her cheek. Ustinov’s body began convulsing. He shook side to side like a fish trying to throw a hook. Dominika registered that he was still inside her; she pushed at his chest, turned her head to avoid his spittle and blood, and tried to slip out from underneath him. But he was a big man, suddenly very heavy, and she couldn’t move. Dominika could only close her eyes, cross her arms across her face, and feel Dimitri Ustinov’s life ebb out of his body. She could feel blood, from the wire cutting his throat, dripping onto her neck and breasts. Ustinov was making a gurgling sound and started going limp, his breath bubbling through the blood, blue-black in this light, of his severed windpipe. Dominika felt a tremor pass through his body, his feet drummed on the bed quickly two or three times, and then he was still. The bed revolved in the pinky silence.

  Nothing happened for another terrifying minute. Dominika opened one eye to see Ustinov’s face hanging above hers, eyes open, tongue visible in an open mouth. The indistinct black figure loomed over them both, unmoving, speckled by the pink dots. Were those black wings behind his shoulders, or just the reflection of the mirrors? The tableau of three motionless bodies revolved endlessly around the room. As if in a coordinated action, Ustinov slipped out of her and the black figure with a single movement dragged the body off her. It rolled off the bed onto the floor. The killer ignored the corpse, reaching over to the controls to stop the bed. Dominika made to get up, but the figure in black put his hand on her shoulder and pushed her gently back onto the bed. She was trembling, naked, and covered in blood. Her breasts were wetly black with it. The bedclothes were a tangle, but she gathered them up and tried wiping the gore off her body.

  She would not look at the man, yet somehow knew he was not going to harm her. He stood at the foot of the bed, motionless, and Dominika stopped trying to sop up the blood and held the blood-black sheet in her hands. Her breath was ragged with fear and shock. The man was studying her foot, visible from beneath the sheet. He reached for her and she began to withdraw it, then out of some primal instinct kept it still. The man stroked the top of her foot lightly. Most people shake hands, but with Matorin, it was a little different.

  =====

  Formally, Sergey Matorin was an SVR staff officer with the rank of major assigned to the Executive Action Department (Department V). Informally, he was a chistilshchik, a “mechanic,” an executioner of the Russian secret service. In the KGB years, this department was known variously as the Thirteenth Department or Line F, or simply as mokroye delo, “wet work.” During the height of the Cold War, Line F had managed kidnappings, interrogations, and assassinations, but in the new SVR such things were said not to be even remotely contemplated or condoned. Granted, fractious Russian journalists were found shot in Moscow elevators, or regime critics succumbed to high concentrations of radionuclide polonium in their livers, but that had nothing to do with the modern Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. The age of the “umbrella pokers” had passed.

  During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Matorin served as a team commander in the elite Alpha Group of Spetsnaz, at that time under the command of the KGB. A screw came loose during Matorin’s five years in the valleys of Afghanistan, and the threads were permanently stripped. His eight-man team had followed orders, but Matorin didn’t much care about command. He was essentially a loner who liked to kill people.

  He was hit during combat by a metal splinter that blinded his right eye, leaving it an opaque milky white. Tall, whip-thin, his face pocked and scarred, Matorin wore his gray hair plastered over a cadaverous skull. This and a sharp hook nose gave him the appearance of an undertaker. After the withdrawal from Afghanistan, on rare occasions he was seen in SVR headquarters ghosting through the offices of Department V. Younger officers stared in fascination at this throwback Polyphemus. Older employees turned away and crossed themselves.

  Even though he was now deployed on occasional “special tasks,” Matorin missed the action of Afghanistan. He thought about it often. He had the ability to go back there in his mind, to see the sights, to hear the sounds, to smell the smells. Certain moments would spontaneously trigger his memories. These unexpected trips were the best, the most vivid, including the music. He could hear perfectly the staccato notes from the rubab and the crescendo beat from the tablas.

  Matorin stroked Dominika’s foot just as he had stroked the foot of the pegged-out Afghan bint that one afternoon in the Panjshir Valley. His team had rigged a canopy over the blades of the Mi-24 helicopter and tied down the corners so there was a large shaded area for the men to sit. Earlier they had gunned a group of muj on the road, landed to collect booty, and found the girl hiding among the rocks by the roaring river.

  She was about fifteen years old, dark hair, almond eyes, her clothes worn and dusty, the usual filthy camp follower. Every Soviet military man serving in Afghanistan had heard stories about what Afghan women did to Russians taken prisoner, so there was no love lost for the girl. She was straining with the cords around her wrists, but the double loop around her neck threatened to strangle her if she struggled too much. She swore and screamed and spat at the eight Alpha Group commandos who stood in a circle around her.
Matorin squatted between her widespread legs, secured at the ankles, and watched her struggle. He reached out and held her sandy foot and caressed it. At the touch of the infidel the girl screamed and bellowed and called out to the hills, to her fellow fighters, to come to rescue her.

  She needn’t have objected to someone simply touching her foot. There was more to come. In the next fifteen minutes Matorin had carefully sliced off her clothes with a short sheath knife and had unwrapped her hijab. She lay supine in the dust, under the canopy that billowed gently in the wind. A soldier poured water over her face, washing it clean, but she spat back at him, thrashing her body against the cords. Matorin reached behind his back and unsheathed a Khyber knife, two feet long, the edge of the elegantly curved, T-shaped blade bright silver from constant honing.

  Lying flat behind a boulder a hundred meters up the rocky slope, an Afghan teenager put down his AK-47 and peeked around the rock. He could see the big mottled-green helicopter—he knew it only as “Shaitan Arba”—on the ground, its stationary rotors drooping with their own weight. He saw a circle of figures beneath the billowing canopy. Over the faint roar of the river and the wind in the rocks, the boy heard another sound from the valley floor: a shrill keening, a young woman’s screams, which went on and on. The boy uttered a prayer and slipped away. He knew there was something down there that was more terrifying than just infidel Russians.

  Matorin got his nickname that day from his men, at least the ones who could continue watching him use his knife. “Khyber” looked down at Dominika with his poached-egg eye, took his hand off her foot, and said, “Get dressed.” She had an appointment with Uncle Vanya.

  USTINOV’S RUSTIC PTÉ

  Caramelize chicken livers, pancetta, and garlic, then deglaze pan with brandy. Hand-chop mixture with parsley, capers, shallots, lemon zest, lemon juice, and olive oil into a coarse texture. Add additional olive oil. Serve on toast with lemon.

  5

  After the murder of Ustinov, Uncle Vanya had summoned Dominika to Yasenevo. She was escorted to the executive elevator bank of SVR headquarters. The SVR shield of Star and Globe hung inside the elevator. Dominika still had a copper taste in her mouth, still felt the slippery sensation of Ustinov’s blood on her body. For a week she fought down the recurring horror, tried vainly to sleep, resisted the crawly impulse to physically slough the skin off her breasts and belly. The nightmares had faded, but now she was sick, and depressed, and livid at the way she had been manipulated. Then Uncle Vanya had sent for her.

  She had never been to Yasenevo, inside SVR headquarters, much less on the executive fourth floor. It was deathly still; no sound came from any of the closed doors visible down the corridors. She was walked past airbrushed official portraits—each one discretely spotlighted—of former KGB directors lining one side of the long, red-carpeted hallway that led from the elevator to the executive suite: Andropov, Fedorchuk, Chebrikov, Kryuchkov. Berlin, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan. On the opposite wall hung the portraits of the new leadership of SVR: Primakov, Trubnikov, Lebedev, Fradkov. Chechnya, Georgia, Ukraine. Were they all in heaven or hell? The old boys’ eyes followed her as she walked down the hall.

  To the right were the imposing doors of the Director’s office. To the left, identical doors led to the First Deputy Director’s office. Dominika was shown in. Uncle Vanya sat behind a large desk of polished, light-colored wood. A heavy piece of glass covered the top of the desk. Apart from a red leather blotter in front of him, the desk was clean. A bank of white telephones squatted on a credenza behind the desk. The large office, carpeted in a deep blue, had a comfortable couch and chairs at the opposite end, next to three picture windows that had a magnificent view of the pine forest. It was a brilliant winter day and sunlight streamed into the office.

  Vanya motioned Dominika to take a seat. He looked at her closely. She was wearing a dark blue skirt and crisp white shirt nipped at the waist by a narrow black belt. She looked as beautiful as ever, but she had dark circles under her eyes and was noticeably pale. Using her on the Ustinov thing had been an inspired move. Too bad the experience for her had been so… extreme. It was her bad luck that the urgent order from the Kremlin to settle Ustinov’s hash had coincided with her departure from ballet school and her father’s death.

  Neither of them spoke. According to the report, she had performed creditably, had charmed the pants off Ustinov, so much so that he had dismissed his security detail and thus given Matorin the opening to get to the target. Even though she had not had hysterics, he gathered it had been a little rough for her. Matorin was a bit much for the uninitiated. She would get over all that.

  “Dominika, I commend you on your excellent performance in the recent operation,” said Vanya. He looked evenly at his niece from across the desk. “I know it must have been difficult, a shock.” He leaned forward. “It’s over now, you can forget the unpleasantness. Of course, I don’t have to tell you about your duty, your responsibility, never to mention this to anyone, ever.”

  Her mother had told her to always be careful around him, but she was wound up. Throat tightening, Dominika looked at the yellow haze around him. Her voice quavered. “You say ‘unpleasantness.’ I watched a man murdered a foot from my face. We were naked, he was on top of me, as you well know. I was covered in his blood, my hair was matted with it. I can still smell it.” She saw her uncle’s eyes and felt his unease. Be careful, she thought, there was an undercurrent of anger there too. Her voice soft again: “Just a little favor, a simple matter, you said, I’d be helping you out.” She smiled. “He must have really done something, that you had to kill him.”

  Damned impertinence. Vanya was not about to discuss politics, nor Putin’s toxic narcissism, nor the necessity of making an example of Ustinov for the benefit of the other kulaks. No, he had summoned his niece for two reasons. He wanted to assess her state of mind, to judge whether she could keep her mouth shut, whether she could put the incident behind her, recover from her trauma. And depending on the answer to the first question, he would have to consider two further options.

  If Dominika rose from her chair, unhinged and refusing to listen, she could not leave the headquarters building alive. Matorin would solve the problem. Dominika might not realize it, but she was an eyewitness to a political assassination that Putin’s enemies would love to document for the world. If that happened, he, Egorov, would be forfeit. Right now certain State organs were covering Ustinov’s death as a grisly murder at the hands of a business rival. Everyone knew the truth; this had been expected. But if his twenty-five-year-old niece with Fabergé-blue eyes and a 95C bosom subsequently stood up and told what she had seen, and from what vantage point, the opposition press would never stop.

  If, however, she seemed under control, he would take steps to ensure her continued discretion. His political well-being hinged on her future good behavior. He had already decided that he would accomplish this by bringing her inside, into the Service, under the permanent discipline and supervision of the Center. There would be no difficulty doing so. A job in records, in the archives. She would be accounted for, engaged in training, learning procedures and regulations. They could keep an eye on her. Depending on her performance—he did not expect much—she could be given a clerical job in one of the departments, an ornament in the outer office of some general. Later, perhaps, she could be assigned abroad, buried in a rezidentura in Africa or Latin America. After five years—by that time the directorship would be his—she could even be cashiered for cause and kicked out.

  Vanya spoke softly. “Niece, it is your duty to be always loyal, to do your utmost, to serve your country. There is no question of your discretion. It is absolutely required of you. Is this going to be a problem between us?” Vanya looked at Dominika steadily as he knocked the ash off the end of his cigarette.

  It was the exact moment where the next part of her life would be decided. The usual yellow halo around Vanya’s head had grown darker, as if suffused with blood, and the timbre of his voice
had changed, taken on an edge. In a telepathic flash Dominika realized it, remembered her mother’s whispers. Zaledenet, she thought, summoning control. Become ice. She looked up at her uncle, whom she was beginning to detest, and also beginning to fear. Their eyes met.

  “You can depend on my discretion,” she said woodenly.

  “I knew I could,” said Vanya. She was a smart girl, he could see her instincts at play, she had sense. Now to put a cube of sugar on the teaspoon. “And because you have performed so well, I have a proposal.” He leaned back in his chair and lit another cigarette. “I am offering you a starting position as a staff member of the Service. I want you to join me in our work here.”

  Dominika willed herself to remain expressionless, and was satisfied watching Vanya’s eyes searching her face for a reaction. “In the Service?” she said. “I have never considered it.”

  “This would be a fine opportunity for you right now. Steady employment, start accumulating a pension. If you belong to the Service, I can continue to guarantee your mother can keep her apartment. Besides, what else would you do, look for a job as, what, a dance instructor?” He crossed his hands on his desk.

  Dominika mentally marked the spot on Uncle Vanya’s shirt where she would plunge the pencil lying on his desk. She lowered her eyes and kept her voice calm. “Helping Mother would be important,” she said. Vanya made an Of course gesture with his hand. “It would be strange to work here,” she added.