The Throwaway

by Michael Moreci

  Maybe, Mark mused, their contrast was something he could use against them. He was sure to pocket that idea for later consideration.

  “Where would you like to go today?” Oleg asked after Mark failed to respond to his introduction.

  “Home would be nice,” Mark snapped.

  Oleg’s smile widened. “But you are home.”

  Mark grimaced. “Right, right. Well, you know, it’s been so long since I’ve been in my native country. Why don’t you show me around, catch me up on everything I’ve missed?”

  “A sight-seeing tour sounds most appropriate,” Oleg agreed. “Alex will get the car, and we will meet you in the front.”

  Alex nodded dutifully and was off, walking with a hurried step toward the front doors. Mark continued to study the lobby, following the staff as they went about their routines. There had to be a service entrance, some way to breach the building’s inner workings. Mark had worked as a server in a couple hotel restaurants during and even after college, and he knew hidden behind the hotel’s walls was usually a labyrinth of storage closets, machinery rooms, kitchens, and whatever else supported the business’s continuous operation. If Mark could get lost in that labyrinth, maybe he could find an exit that wasn’t covered in cameras and prying eyes. Mark made a mental note of everything he observed, and as he continued to scan the bustling area, he felt Oleg’s eyes on him. The man hardly even blinked. Mark tried not to let on that he noticed Oleg’s watchful eye, but he found it difficult not to be distracted by the Russian agent’s intense glare. His gaze bore into Mark, and being a practiced judge of character, it didn’t take him long to understand just how seriously Oleg took his job.

  “Damn it,” Mark grumbled to himself. He knew he was being monitored, knew he was being imprisoned. What he didn’t know—or expect—was having a stone-cold FSB agent on his ass the entire time.

  Escape was going to be even more difficult than he thought.

  * * *

  It took Mark two weeks to earn even the slightest bit of Oleg’s trust. Alex was just Oleg’s chauffeur and gopher. It was Oleg calling the shots—all the places they went, the amount of time they stayed, the routes they took to and from everywhere. Mark literally couldn’t take a leak without Oleg hovering over his shoulder. And that was in the two rare instances Oleg let him out of the car.

  Those first fourteen days, Mark was under house and car arrest. Sure, they visited tons of historic Russian landmarks, and Mark learned all about them from the confines of the back seat of an Audi A8. He saw the grand tower of the Kolomenskoye estate, he witnessed snow falling on the Kremlin’s golden domes, and he felt an unusual awe at the splendor of the Red Square as the lights turned on to counter the setting sun. They cruised by the childhood homes of historical figures and rolled through the downtown nightlife scene. Lunch was eaten every day at noon sharp; Oleg picked a location, and Alex dutifully ran inside to snag their orders. And while he was gone, Oleg turned and stared at Mark, wordlessly.

  “This is the most awkward thing I’ve ever experienced in my life,” Mark said on the third day.

  Thankfully, Alex was a surprisingly effective—and enthusiastic—tour guide, narrating the history of his country with genuine pride and passion. Sometimes he managed to wrangle Oleg into the conversation, though the big, weird Russian interjected into Alex’s narration only when a historical detail or fact needed correcting.

  At the end of each day, without another word spoken between them, Oleg escorted Mark back to his apartment. And why would Oleg speak to Mark? He was just biding his time until word came down for him to deliver a bullet into the back of Mark’s head. That’s all Mark could think about on their silent elevator rides up to the apartment. Would this be the day Oleg plastered his brains on the carpet outside his room’s front door?

  For fourteen arduous days, the routine remained static. The door to Mark’s apartment would unlock at 9:00 A.M., and no matter what time Mark arrived in the lobby, whether 9:03 in the morning or 2:27 in the afternoon, Oleg and Alex were waiting for him. Without fail.

  But on the fifteenth day, things changed. Oleg loosened the reins, and Mark took advantage.

  “Where would you like to go today?” Oleg asked when Mark stepped out of the elevator and into the Palace’s lobby. It had taken every ounce of Mark’s willpower to drag his body out of the apartment; he didn’t want to hear Alex extol the splendor of another Russian administrative building, and he certainly didn’t want to drive by the Kremlin for the millionth time. But as bleak as the prospect of cruising through Moscow under the eyes of his future killers was, staying locked in his room, alone with his thoughts, was even more depressing.

  “I could not give a shit,” Mark answered. “How about the gulag? Can Alex find fun things to say about the gulag?”

  Oleg snickered. “Due to your obedient behavior, I’ve been instructed to allow you the privilege of leaving the automobile today. Now,” Oleg said, straightening—his momentary smile had left him feeling too at ease, apparently. “Where would you like to go?”

  Leniency was the last thing Mark had expected, and he never even considered life beyond his apartment and the Audi. But now, he was being given back a modicum of the freedom that’d been taken from him. And he had no idea what to do with it.

  “I—I have no idea,” Mark stammered. “Are there options?”

  “Moscow,” Oleg grumbled. “We stay in Moscow. We can visit our Museum of Modern Art. It is enjoyable, I’m told.”

  Mark groaned. “Hell no. I’ve been cooped up for two weeks, and you want to take me to a museum? I thought I was being given a reward, not more punishment.”

  Oleg nodded. “I share your feelings on museums.”

  “I want to eat in a restaurant. Like, a good restaurant. The best.”

  “You will have to ask Alex. I do not dine out.”

  Alex knew exactly the place, a steakhouse that he admitted he’d never be able to get into without the power of a celebrity by his side. At first, Mark had no idea what Alex meant, then he remembered that he wasn’t Mark, he was Pyotr, master spy. He wasn’t as enthused by his celebrity status as Alex was, but he let the conflicting feelings pass. If he was going to be saddled with this fictional life, he might as well make the most of it. For now.

  With a heavy foot, Alex practically raced to the steakhouse, drumming his thumbs on the steering wheel the entire time. Oleg cautioned him to slow down, but they were already pulling up to the restaurant’s valet stand, nearly skidding to a halt. Oleg growled his disapproval, and Alex mumbled something in Russian. An apology, Mark assumed. Apparently, not every FSB agent possessed Oleg’s superhuman self-discipline.

  Inside, the maître d’ greeted Alex and Oleg with the kind of disregard Mark had come to expect in an exclusive establishment. But then, he saw Mark. Just a whiff of Mark’s fame turned his attitude on a dime, and without hesitation, he led Mark, Oleg, and Alex to a table, chirping effusively in Mark’s ear. Mark didn’t understand, but the tone told him everything he needed to know. He smiled and nodded, realizing that the maître d’ was parading him through the entire restaurant, showing him off like a prized poodle in a dog show. All eyes jumped from their meals and drinks straight to Mark and followed him on his tour around the room; he could hear the whispers and murmurs growing, and he knew every word was about him. While the attention gave him no pleasure, it did give him an idea. Maybe, Mark began to consider, he could use this attention to his advantage.

  Before Mark could settle into his seat—with Oleg and Alex positioned close at his sides—a waiter swooped to the table with a robust sampler platter balanced on his right hand: beef and fish tartare, roasted vegetables, salmon, and a loaf of rye bread. He slid the platter onto the center of the table and then cheerfully said something before disappearing as quickly as he arrived.

  “Drinks,” Alex interpreted. “He said he’ll be back with drinks.”

  “Nyet,” Oleg said. Mark needed no interpretation.

  Before t
he waiter could return with drinks Oleg had forbidden, Mark was tugged on his shoulder. He startled a little, unnerved by actual human contact, but he turned to see an elderly couple at his side, all smiles, holding up a camera and beckoning him into a photo op. Oleg grabbed Mark by his wrist, firmly, as Mark tried to get up from his seat.

  “Oh, come on,” Mark said with a smirk. “They just want to meet their national hero. That’s what I am, right?”

  Mark greeted the couple with a toothy smile, pumping each of their hands before throwing his arms around both their shoulders and pulling them into a perfect photo.

  As the couple scurried away, Mark scanned the room. He saw people with their phones out, snapping photos. He saw people with eager expressions on their faces.

  This was exactly what he wanted.

  Mark beckoned them all in, gesturing people from all around the room to come close. What they just saw, Mark making that couple’s day, he was ready to do for everyone in the room. Mark was open for business.

  “What are you doing?” Oleg growled into Mark’s ear. He had his hand wrapped around Mark’s bicep, squeezing it like a balloon he was trying to pop. Mark wasn’t fazed.

  “I’m a people person,” Mark chirped. “This is what I do.”

  Before Oleg could say another word, he was separated from Mark by the fan club crowding around their spy hero. Mark shook every hand shoved in front of him and kept his mouth shut. He nodded and smiled, but he didn’t expose his total inability to speak their language. All the while, he eyed Oleg and Alex, paying special attention to the space growing between them. Mark began to backpedal as he smiled and shook hands, inching his way toward the door. Oleg and Alex were out of sight, and Mark was a breath away from racing out the front door when someone grabbed him from behind and halted his escape attempt.

  “You’ll never get away,” a woman’s voice whispered in his ear in a thick Russian accent.

  Mark turned and caught a brief glimpse of the woman before she ordered him to turn back around. Whoever she was, she was disguised in a black hat, big sunglasses, and a scarf that wrapped around her neck and covered her chin and jawline.

  “Oh yeah? And who the hell are you?” Mark asked.

  “A friend trying to help. Don’t do anything foolish—I can get you out.”

  Mark’s breath caught in his throat and he felt his body buckling in on itself. Mark had no shortage of determination and will-power; like he used to tell Sarah, his greatest strength was that he was too stupid to know when to quit. What Mark didn’t have was hope. It had been squeezed out of him little by little during his captivity in Russia. Mark would never stop trying to get away from his captors, but he had no illusions about the futility of his efforts. He was just a man in a cell, pounding his head against the concrete wall. Eventually, something would break, and it wouldn’t be the wall. But now, now he had this soft whisper in his ear, this one word. Out. The slightest opening, that’s all Mark needed—it was all he ever needed. Hope came racing back into Mark’s life so strong that it almost knocked him over.

  “What? How?” Mark asked, breathlessly. “And who are you?”

  Mark felt the hold on his arm release, but when he turned around the woman was gone. With a frenzied glance, he searched the room, and by the time he spotted the mystery woman, she was ducking out the front door.

  The crowd behind him beckoned, but when Mark turned around, Oleg was standing on his toes. Rage burned in his eyes. Alex stood at his side, and his expression nearly equaled Oleg’s in its fury.

  “We are leaving. Now,” Oleg commanded.

  Before Mark could say a word, Oleg and Alex were using their bodies’ momentum to push him out the front door. Mark stumbled backward, nearly tripping over his own two feet. The crowd watched him go, all of them sharing the same disappointed and confused expression on their faces. But Mark didn’t care. All he could think about was the daylight he saw in front of him—the tiniest sliver of light poking through the end of a very dark tunnel. And Mark was ready to drive straight through it.

  But first, there was hell to pay.

  The moment Mark stepped outside, he was propelled forward with so much force that had it not been for the sleek sports car parked outside the restaurant, he would have gone flying into traffic. His body crashed into the car, hard, slamming the passenger door shut just as it was opening. Before Mark could even push himself upright, a hand grabbed his head and shoved it onto the car’s roof. The right side of Mark’s face was plastered against the cold metal, and when he tried to resist, he felt his left arm curve at an unnatural angle behind his back. Through a clenched jaw, he howled in pain.

  “Do you think this is a game we’re playing?” Oleg snarled into his ear. “Just because I can’t kill you—not yet—doesn’t mean that I can’t make your final days very, very uncomfortable.”

  With that, Oleg wrenched Mark’s arm farther back, twisting his elbow to its breaking point. Just a little more torque, Mark knew, and it would snap.

  “Do not fuck with me, Mark Strain,” Oleg said. “I will break you. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Mark panted, the searing pain in his arm nearly rendering him unconscious.

  “I can’t hear you,” Oleg whispered, his acidic words laced with sadistic glee.

  “YES!” Mark screamed.

  “Very well,” Oleg said, and released his hold. Mark dropped to the ground and cradled his searing arm. He had disliked Oleg from the moment they had met, this joyless, morose, hulking Russian who made Mark’s bleak existence all the more dire. When he figured out Oleg would be the one to turn out his lights, Mark started to hate him. But now—now, Mark wanted Oleg dead. And he wanted to kill the sadistic bastard with his own two hands.

  “Pick him up,” Oleg ordered Alex as a valet pulled the Audi to the curb. “He’s pathetic.”

  Alex, with what was the gentlest of care in comparison to Oleg’s manhandling, helped Mark to his feet and into the back seat of the car. The door shut behind him, and Mark fought off the urge to lie down until the agonizing pain subsided. But he refused. He wouldn’t give Oleg the pleasure of thinking he’d hurt him.

  Alex pulled the car away from the curb and they drove down Sadovaya Street—a six-lane artery that cut through Moscow—in silence. All the while, Mark considered what the mysterious woman had said to him, how she had a way to break him out of this prison. But how? And, more important, when? Mark’s life was subject to the longevity of a timer that had been fixed the moment he set foot in Russia. He didn’t know when it would expire, but he did have a feeling that after today’s episode, it would be ticking away at a more rapid clip. The woman had to have been following him; it couldn’t be a coincidence that she happened to be at that restaurant. Maybe he needed to take the first step, and she’d see him through his escape. She warned him not to do anything stupid, which is what the restaurant stunt was. But he couldn’t just sit on his thumbs and wait—wait to be rescued, wait to be killed. That wasn’t Mark’s way.

  But without warning, Mark’s thoughts on making his escape came to a sudden, abrupt end. And they were snuffed out by a sudden feeling of sharp pressure that came piercing out of his shoulder. His body jolted forward and, in his disorientation, Mark thought he was experiencing a lingering effect of Oleg’s manhandling. But then he saw the blood. Dark crimson stained his shirt, and he felt more blood dripping over the contour of his chest. Pressure turned into pain—scalding pain.

  Mark’s heart started to race. His breathing became short and labored as the entire world went nearly silent. Though faint, Mark could hear the delicate sound of glass cracking and the air being split right above his head. To Mark, the noise sounded like a bottle rocket streaking across the car before it penetrated its target. It wasn’t until he looked up and saw Alex’s blood and brain matter splattered all over both the windshield and the side of Oleg’s face did he realize what was happening:

  They were under attack.

  14

  For a momen
t, Mark’s life shifted into slow motion as he pieced together everything around him. His hand, which had been gripping the pain in his shoulder, was soaked in blood; the car was swerving out of control; Alex’s brains were sprayed everywhere; and Oleg, trying to grip the steering wheel, was turned back toward Mark and screaming at him. He was mouthing words right at Mark, but he couldn’t hear a syllable that was being yelled in his direction. Mark was in shock, and it wasn’t until he closed his eyes and reopened them after a long pause that the world came rushing back to his senses.

  “GET DOWN!” Oleg was shouting over and over as Mark regained his clarity. “GET! DOWN!”

  Mark snapped back to life and did as he was told, but his attention was diverted when the Audi smashed through the barrier dividing the directions of travel on Sadovaya Street; the car leapt into oncoming traffic, and Mark saw, through the bloodstained windshield, a semi-truck barreling right in the Audi’s path. The truck blared its horn, and Oleg jabbed the wheel, slicing them out of the truck’s way—just barely—but the sudden movement shot the car into the path of a coupe driving in the middle lane; the coupe T-boned the Audi, catching it on the passenger-side quarter panel. Mark’s head whiplashed, smashing against the window with such force that a spider web splintered in the glass, cracking out from the point of impact. Cars honked, tires screeched, and Oleg bellowed something in Russian. The bodyguard tried to steer them away from danger, but he struggled to maneuver around Alex’s slumped corpse; within seconds, Mark felt the Audi suffer two more collisions that sent the car spinning counterclockwise then clockwise again. Mark looked up just as they jumped a curb and was unnerved by the sound of metal scraping against concrete—the tires, Mark assumed, had been blown out, leaving nothing but the rims, and they howled from the undercarriage. Oleg shoved Alex’s body aside and spun the wheel to the right, but the mangled car wouldn’t respond. Propelled forward by the collisions that’d driven them off the road, the Audi smashed headfirst into a metal light pole that, finally, brought it to a stop. It was the last thing Mark remembered before blacking out.