by Tim Heath
“So what are you proposing, exactly?”
“Sign these documents––I’ve had it put together by our usual lawyer,” which meant that even Foma’s own lawyer was in on Matvey’s secret. Did the lawyer know Foma wasn’t actually dead? He let it drop. “It’ll be discoverable in one of your offices, maybe the lawyer himself has a copy; it doesn’t matter. All it states is that in your prolonged absence, Andre will have complete control across the group on top of what role he already plays.”
“So it is handing over my empire!”
“No, it’s keeping it within the family. With you gone, three-quarters of your empire is in free-fall––the share price is plummeting by the day,” which was a huge exaggeration. There had been a seven per cent drop over the last three months.
“Well, then, let me come back, and I’ll sort it all out myself! I don’t know why I still have to be hidden!”
“We aren’t there yet, that’s why. I’ve not been elected President. If you come back now, showing your face, saying it was all a charade––before I’ve won––everything we’ve put together, all that we’ve worked for will have been for nothing. Your apparent death was what finally closed down Volkov and her Games. That was too strong a group to be left as it were. It had to be destroyed, and that is what your fake death managed to do for us. You should be proud, not many of us get to achieve so much in death!” Matvey laughed, but Foma couldn’t see what was funny about any of it.
“So, I just sign these papers and what? I get to keep everything?”
“You certainly won’t lose anything, which if you leave things as they are, is sure to happen very soon. Think about it.”
It was true. Foma knew how things worked. You take out the top guy from any situation––whether through natural causes or induced––and sooner or later, people move in for the spoils. Hell, he’d done it plenty of times himself. The thought that his own empire would soon become a target like that, picked off and grafted into other men’s portfolios, was something he was keen to avoid.
“Okay,” he relented. “Give me a bloody pen, and I’ll sign your pissing forms. But mark my words, Matvey,” and he squared up to him at that moment, “as soon as you’re in Office I’m out of here, and taking it all back. It’ll be like the second coming. I’ll rise from the dead.”
“That you will,” Matvey chirped, handing Foma a pen.
Five minutes later, his face set, Matvey was walking away from Foma, climbing the stairs back to his living and working space, clutching the forms that would give his son permission to take the reins of Foma’s remaining $8 billion empire. Everything was already in place with the lawyers, they just needed the signed paperwork.
It was a week into February when Alex finally noticed the man who was following him––the man had been outside Alex’s home that morning and pulled away from the offices of MI6 as Alex had later left for lunch. The camera the man held told Alex his shadow was more journalistic in nature––what Alex had seen of the man himself fitted that hypothesis––so Alex was sure he wasn’t in any immediate physical danger.
Alex confronted the man the following morning, slipping out from a fire escape at his apartment building and running around the block to approach the car from the other side, tapping on the window and nearly giving the car’s occupant a heart attack. Clearly, the game was up.
Alex got into the passenger seat.
“Who are you and why have you been following me?” Alex said, calmly though there was authority there.
“I’m a freelance journalist, that’s all,” the man said, his hands coming up in front of him, open, empty. He wasn’t a threat.
“Why me?”
“You’ve been around the Russians. It was an obvious choice.”
“Sorry?”
“I got word of a possible government link to the Russian elections.”
“From whom?” So he didn't deny it then.
“A credible source.”
“Who?”
“Come on, Alex, you know how it goes.” So the journalist knew Alex’s name, but that wasn’t overly difficult to find out. Alex was probably registered to his apartment in a dozen places, for starters.
“Well, I don’t play by those rules.”
“I’m not playing,” the man said, confidence growing the more they talked.
“What’s the rumour?” Alex was almost sure he knew what was coming next.
“The West wants their man in the Kremlin.” Alex smiled as if the idea was fanciful. The bluff seemed to work, whatever reaction the journalist had been trying to provoke apparently hadn’t happened. He looked a little deflated.
“You know that would be lunacy, right?” Alex offered. He had the journalist scrambling now.
“Doesn’t change what I’ve been told.”
“You need to check your sources,” Alex said, content his work was done, and he started to get out of the car.
The journalist, as if getting desperate, as if trying to coax something more out of Alex, anything, called out:
“I know about Kaminski.” Alex froze, momentarily, though carried on, turning around as if the name meant nothing.
“Who?”
“You know exactly who I mean.” This time Alex couldn’t get away with playing dumb.
“Kaminski,” Alex repeated as if trying to recall where he’d heard the name from, though fooling no one. “Look, mate…” he started, before the journalist handed him his card.
“It’s Wilson, Wilson Manning,” Wilson said, Alex taking the card, glancing at it for a few seconds. Everything seemed to check out.
“Look, Wilson,” Alex continued, “if that’s who you’re looking at, there’s nothing to say. He’s a nobody.”
“He? I’m not talking about Dmitry,” Wilson said, glancing up at Alex, whose face suddenly showed he didn’t understand anything that was being said. “Oh my God, you don’t know, do you?” Wilson said.
“Sorry?”
“Call me!” is all he added, pulling away, the door slamming shut as he moved back down the road. Alex looked at the card again––there was no newspaper mentioned––then he remembered the guy was freelance. He slipped it into his pocket, concern rising in him for the first time. What didn’t Alex know? What was he missing? He hated being in the dark, especially in regard to a journalist who would no doubt be selling his story to the highest bidder the moment he got the chance.
Monaco
Andre Filipov had planned to spend the morning fishing, taking a crew with him but not his father, who was speaking with his campaign team in Moscow and due back only later that day.
The yacht had been an indulgence Matvey had allowed himself following the death of his wife, and Andre’s mother. Father and son had bonded more as a result of their joint trips than in all the years before her death.
A storm had hit the coast the previous month. On that day though the sun was shining brightly, if not overly warm, as Andre navigated his way out of the small harbour where they kept the boat moored. The crew––two cooks and one deckhand––were below deck. Andre wanted to eat whatever he caught for lunch while out on the water. He was able to pilot the yacht himself, and it could be put on auto-pilot too, if required.
They’d not gone long when they’d struck something in the water. It turned out to be a significant piece of driftwood. While Andre’s initial inspection showed there to be no apparent damage, five minutes later the crew came running to him and they informed him the yacht was taking on water and Andre should turn back to get it seen to.
While not a new vessel, it was far from old. Its original cost, and repair, was nothing for such men, though it held sentimental value.
Andre swung back around and made the harbour easily enough. The yacht was winched up thirty minutes later so that it was then possible to see the decent-sized crack about twelve inches below where the boat sat in the water. The leak had been spotted around the ceiling of the lower deck. Andre cursed his luck. There would be no fishing
after all that day. He enquired when a repair might be possible with the office at the harbour––it looked like three weeks’ time, since it was only February. Most engineers were further south still. They promised to call him later with a firm date.
It was later that evening when Matvey had arrived home from his trip to Moscow, that Andre made mention of the damage to the yacht. It was one of those things, Matvey had said. They would get it repaired.
Matvey then dropped a bunch of papers onto the table, changing the subject away from their joint plaything, a smile broad and proud across Matvey’s face.
“You’re now in active control of the entire Polzin empire, son, congratulations.” Andre looked puzzled. Matvey had not said anything to Andre about what he had suggested to Foma, hoping to surprise his son once it was all finalised. He’d apparently been successful in that regard.
“What?” His son could hardly believe it.
“It’s the best thing to do, as things stand. The empire would have got picked apart if we left it as it was. I don’t want that to happen, not when you are so well placed to step in and tide things over.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. It’s all here.”
Andre picked up the paperwork.
“You’re now worth around $10 billion, son, in your own right. You’ll be catching me up in no time at this rate!”
“That’s fantastic news!”
“It means you can pick up the cost of the repair on the yacht now, right?” Matvey joked as he left Andre to go and get something to drink and adequately celebrate. This was a big day in the Filipov household, and that had to include a vintage bottle of something.
7
Vauxhall House––London, England
Anissa had been working through everything she had on file regarding the Games, mainly working on the video footage. There was plenty of it, though she knew she would recognise whatever it was that was nagging her when she found it.
One digital file was used exclusively for news coverage––and there was plenty of that type of material bearing in mind the people involved were such global names. Even if some were not household names, within their own sectors they were all giants. You couldn’t be that rich and have zero coverage. Matvey Filipov was probably the least recorded one of them all, though that was changing fast with all the coverage surrounding his challenge for Presidency.
Anissa had watched all three of the televised debates, but that showed her nothing that she was currently after. She then started working on the news clips, though stopped. They didn’t feel right either. Finally, she began working through a series which had been aired the previous year on the BBC’s news channel, and immediately sensed she was getting closer. The series was looking at Britain’s most affluent Russians and had been shown as part of the build-up to Putin’s visit to the capital the previous year. She’d watched most of the series live, missing the last one when the Russian President was actually in town. It was during that trip––yet another unsolved mystery that she hoped to one day pin on someone––when their own Deputy Director General, Thomas Price, had been murdered.
She strongly suspected the Russian President was somehow behind it, though there was no direct proof of that, and the little information they did have, actually gave Putin something of an alibi.
The series turned to Dmitry Kaminski, profiling the man and his wealth, talking about his political ambitions, though not a lot had been made of that at the time if they actually had known. It wasn’t many months after the show aired when Kaminski had announced his candidacy in the Russian Presidential race.
Then the face Anissa knew she had seen before and had been searching suddenly appeared on the screen. Anissa froze. She skipped back the recording thirty seconds and let it run for a second time, pausing it as the wording was running across the bottom of the screen. In the centre of the screen, the camera had been watching Dmitry Kaminski standing next to a female Anissa had known she’d seen before the moment she met her. The ticker read: Dmitry and Belarusian wife Anastasia Kaminski on a recent visit to the Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital.
Making sure that there had been no grave mistake by the BBC––it would have been highly embarrassing for them if it had been––Anissa ran the names from the screen through Google. She was hit by pages full of results––Anastasia was undoubtedly the wife of Presidential hopeful Dmitry Kaminski, and they’d been married for some years. “Damn,” she said under her breath, “I hope for God’s sake you didn’t know about this before you got involved, Alex.”
Five minutes later Anissa felt she’d calmed down enough to call Alex. She caught him at home, and when she immediately asked if he was alone, he confirmed that he was, a little taken aback by Anissa’s tone and urgency.
“Tell me you didn’t know who Anastasia really was before you got involved with her?”
“Sorry?” Alex said, rocked by what Anissa had just said.
“That she’s married.”
“I really don’t think that’s any of your business, and no, of course, I didn’t know that,” he said.
“Jesus, Alex, are you serious? She’s Dmitry Kaminski’s wife, for God’s sake. They’re married––happily so, reportedly. Well, obviously not, if you are involved with her. But this is bad, Alex. You really didn’t know?”
“Who do you think I am?”
“Okay, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to accuse you.” But he was taking it all remarkably calmly for a man who apparently didn’t know. She’d just turned his world upside down––the woman whom days before Alex had told Anissa he loved, Anissa now telling him this woman had been lying. Yet he was calm. He did know.
“Are you sure?” he said as if an afterthought.
“Yes, Alex, it’s readily available information for anyone doing a simple check. It’s no big secret. There are pictures all over the web.”
“Leave it with me, and don’t mention it to anyone. I’ll speak later, okay?”
“Sure,” she said, the call ending. The last thing either of them needed was word getting out. She wouldn’t be telling anyone, and closed down all the search windows on her computer, deleting her search history as a final precaution.
Alex dropped his phone down next to the computer, the screen showing the same images that Anissa had obviously found. Why he’d lied to her, he didn’t know.
It hadn’t taken long for him to join the dots. I know about Kaminski the journalist had told him. The line playing over and over in Alex’s head. He? I’m not talking about Dmitry…you don’t know, do you?
You don’t know.
Well, now he did. He’d actually gone straight ahead and typed in the name Anastasia––adding Kaminski after the only name he knew his girlfriend by––dreading what was about to come up, wishing for the results to come back empty but the dozens of pictures that filled his screen only confirming what he had feared.
He felt so foolish.
Yet, he had fallen for her in a way he’d never done for anyone else. He was sure she felt the same––it couldn’t have been an act, she couldn’t have just been pretending––though that thought festered. Was she just pretending? Was it a setup from the start? Yet, nothing felt staged. They hadn’t got together at the conference, which might have made more sense if she had been a plant from the beginning. And she’d made no apparent effort to hide her identity, nor had even changed her name. Alex had deliberately decided not to ask her about her past, not yet anyway.
Would it have mattered if he had? Initially, maybe. He might not have opened his heart to her in the way he had done recently, becoming vulnerable with a woman for the first time in a long time.
You don’t know.
Now Wilson Manning knew about his affair. Wilson must have photographed her leaving Alex’s apartment after one of her visits when he’d been parked outside waiting for Alex. He must have recognised her immediately, working in the press corps as he did. He would undoubtedly have come across her.
Ale
x felt stupid and exposed. If the story broke, he would be finished. He could forget about being considered for the DDG post, he would be out of a job entirely. And what would Kaminski do? Nothing provoked a man more than jealousy. How had he been so stupid? Alex knew how: she had two long legs, looked stunning, and pronounced his name in just the right way to raise his pulse. Every single time.
Alex shut down the computer. He’d had enough of looking at Anastasia arm-in-arm with Kaminski, reports calling them both a charming couple. He picked up his phone and dialled the number straight from the card that lay on the desk.
“Okay Wilson, you have my attention. When can we meet?”
Monaco and Moscow
It was a new day in Monaco. The day after Matvey had handed Andre the papers which gave him legal control over the remainder of the Polzin empire. Andre had previously controlled some of it––$1.7 billion worth having been signed over to his name two years before, a move that had earned Andre a place within the Games. He’d since repaid over a quarter of that amount back to Foma, and planned on settling the rest as soon as possible. Now he ran the whole group.
Matvey had told Andre to leave Monaco that day, to touch base with the Moscow offices and to start getting the Polzin empire back on track. Around $600 million––eight per cent of the share value––had been wiped off the group’s share price in recent weeks, as rumours spread that the man behind it all was no longer around. Andre’s emergence would go some way to stop the slide, as well as ward off any would-be vultures from tearing apart what remained of the empire.
Andre took the family jet and landed in Moscow at two in the afternoon local time. A number of the Polzin company headquarters were based in the Russian capital, and Andre worked the meetings across three of these firms with efficiency and urgency. By the close of trading that day––stock prices levelling out throughout the afternoon and even rising before the close of business––Andre’s involvement within the group was proving positive news. He’d already taken over and increased profits in some of the other businesses within the Polzin brand, so while no word was given regarding Foma himself, the news of Andre’s hands-on involvement was well received.