Ilya hooked his fingers through the wire and pulled. A section of mesh came away from the posts, bending upward like a stiff curtain. He had been careful to make the cuts in an inconspicuous place.
A moment later, he was under the boardwalk. Ilya replaced the mesh, then moved into the darkness, walking between the dunes that had gathered against the columns. He had come to know this area well, especially the length of sand that stretched between the ramp and the rear of the club, only a few feet from the spot where a body had been found two weeks before.
As he made his way toward the club, he thought again of his role in the order of the world. Each act of justice, the cabalists taught, brought the universe one step closer to its original perfection. Reaching into his pocket, Ilya locked his fingers around what he carried there. He was no tzaddik. He knew that now. But he could restore the balance of the world in a small way. Tonight, he suspected, was the evening in which all debts would be repaid at last.
43
When Powell and Wolfe arrived at the club, a line of patrons was already standing at the door that faced the street. The crowd consisted mostly of Russians, both young and old, dressed for a night out in backless tops and gold lamé. Wolfe herself was wearing an attractive blouse of silky material, loose enough to conceal the belt of medical elastic that secured her pistol around her waist.
They went down a corridor lined with plastic foliage and streetlamps, then climbed a flight of stairs to the main dining room, a dimly lit space with mirrored pillars and brass railings. Their table was deep in Siberia. The dance floor was empty, the girls offstage for a costume change.
Once they were seated, Powell donned his earpiece. He saw that he was not the only man in the restaurant with such a device in his ear. As Wolfe ordered a bottle of wine, he spoke softly. “Command post, we’re here.”
“Copy that,” Barlow said. “We’ll be ready in five. You’ll know when we’re in place.”
Powell looked around the club’s darkened interior. His own service pistol was riding in a canted holster high up on his waistband, its weight undeniably comforting. “Any issues so far?”
“Negative. A few lamps on the boardwalk have gone out, probably a wiring problem. We can work around it.”
Powell wanted to know more about this, but before he could ask, he saw Sharkovsky and Misha seated in the corner, backs to the wall, a carafe of vodka between them. As he watched, Misha drained his glass. Because of his bad knee, which had been shattered by a bullet a year before, Misha had a tendency to drink. Powell spoke low into his headpiece. “I’ve got eyes on primary and secondary targets.”
Even as he said this, the lights went down, and the club was flooded with music. A spotlight flung a colored circle onto the stage. Through a curtain at the rear of the room, eight women filed into view, each wearing a headdress of leaves and vines. As they began to dance, their movements stiff and mechanical, Powell saw that they were always aware of Sharkovsky’s eyes.
He glanced at Wolfe. On the way to the club, she had applied makeup, giving her face more color than usual. When their wine was poured, Powell was surprised to see her take a sip. “I thought you didn’t drink.”
“I don’t,” Wolfe said, blushing slightly. “But if we don’t drink a little, we’ll stand out. Besides, I’m worried.”
Powell responded by taking a sip of his own. Looking around the room, he observed several other members of the bratva. In a low voice, he forwarded their positions to Barlow, who relayed the information to the tactical units that were assembling on all three doors. What he did not mention was that the crowd was making him uneasy. There were too many people here.
Wolfe, who had continued to take quick, nervous sips from her glass of wine, nudged him gently on the shoulder. “Check it out. Don’t make a point of it, but our man’s getting a call.”
Powell turned to see Sharkovsky studying his cell phone. Frowning, the vor put it to his ear. There was a pause as he listened to whoever was on the other end, replied, then hung up. He said something to Misha. When Misha responded, the old man only shook his head.
Barlow’s voice came over the earpiece. “The wire just picked up a call. It’s Ilya.”
Powell looked across the room at the two men, who continued their conversation beneath the deafening music. “What did he say?”
“He wants a meeting. He’s waiting at the aquarium up the boardwalk, ready to make the exchange.” Barlow paused, as if covering the microphone with his hand, then came back on the line. “I’m sending a team after him. Keep calm. Just tell me what the target is doing.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Powell saw Sharkovsky and Misha rise from their table and make their way across the club. He noticed that Misha’s arm swing was clipped on the right side, his forearm close to the body. “They’re heading for the western end of the floor. Secondary target has a concealed weapon.”
“Don’t let them out of your sight,” Barlow said. “Wolfe, stay in position. Keep tabs on the others. Powell, attach yourself to the primary target and feed us whatever he does. Move.”
Powell was already on his feet. As he rose, pulse accelerating, he felt the vast machine of the raid preparing to reconfigure itself, ready to move on his word. He whispered instructions to Wolfe, then crossed the dining room, his eye on the two men, who were heading for the stairs that led to the floor below. Powell stood aside for a waiter, who squeezed past with a tray of caviar and butterfish, and forced himself to wait. He counted to five, then went downstairs.
On the ground floor, a headless mannequin stood guard by a sofa. A corridor was set at right angles to the stairs. Powell peeked around the corner in time to see Sharkovsky and Misha disappear into a room at the end of the hallway, closing the door behind them. He tried to remember the plan of the club. “They’re in the office on the north side of the ground floor. I can’t see inside.”
“Copy that,” Barlow said after a pause. “Watch the door. We’re on our way.”
“Okay.” Powell drew his gun. His mouth had gone dry. Listening to the dull thump of the music overhead, he wondered what the two men were doing. Ilya had called with the offer of an exchange, but the aquarium would not be as secure as the courthouse, so they would be sure to arm themselves accordingly—
Half a minute went by. He was about to speak into his headpiece again, asking what was taking the unit so fucking long, when a pair of muffled blasts exploded from behind the closed door.
“Shit,” Powell said. “Command post, I have shots fired downstairs. Do you copy?”
Without waiting for a response, Powell forced himself to move toward the source of the shots. Halfway down the corridor, a second doorway opened into the hall. Leading with his gun, he swung inside and saw a disused kitchen piled high with rusty appliances. He ducked into it, crouching in the protective well of the doorway, only a few steps from the door of the office.
Leveling his gun at the closed door, Powell waited for it to open. He was terrified, but this fact seemed insignificant. He hoped that the momentum that had brought him this far would not abandon him yet.
44
Ten minutes earlier, a busboy had emerged from the service entrance of the club, which faced an alley below the level of the boardwalk. Propping the door open, he went down a concrete ramp to a shed with a corrugated metal roof. This shed adjoined the vacant space beneath the boardwalk, which provided a convenient home for the club’s fleet of Dumpsters.
Unfastening a padlock, the busboy slid open the door of the shed and wheeled out the nearest Dumpster, which was empty. As he did, it seemed to him that the alley was darker than usual. Glancing up, he noticed that the streetlamps on the boardwalk overhead had gone out.
He was about to go back for the garbage when a shadow detached itself from the rear of the shed and pressed a small hard object against his side. Before he could react, he felt white lightning flow through all the nerves of his body, then slumped, twitching, to the ground.
Ilya held the stu
n gun against the busboy’s side for five seconds. Although the victim was paralyzed, he was still conscious, his eyes looking reproachfully at his assailant as he was hauled into the depths of the shed.
Propping him up in a seated position, Ilya removed the boy’s apron and tied it around his own waist. Then he headed for the door of the club. A few minutes earlier, he had cut the electrical wire strung between the street-lamps, aiming with the laser penlight through a gap between the shed and the boardwalk.
He entered the club, leaving the door open. Through a brightly lit doorway in the hall, he could hear the voices of kitchen staff. He moved silently past this door, not pausing, and was not observed.
Rounding the corner, he found himself in a corridor on the ground floor. Up ahead was a disused kitchen. To his left, a flight of stairs led to the dining room. The office was to his right.
He knocked on the closed office door. “Open up. I need a case of Stolichnaya—”
There was the sound of a man rising from his desk. A few seconds later, the door opened. To his mild disappointment, it was not Sharkovsky, but the restaurant manager, a tough old crook who had run various clubs and restaurants in Brighton Beach for twenty years. When the manager saw his face, his eyes widened. Before he could close the door, Ilya reached through the gap, set the stun gun against the manager’s sternum, and pressed the button.
A blue arc jumped between the electrodes at the business end of the gun. The manager convulsed, froth spraying from his lips, and fell to the ground. Ilya stepped over the body into the office and closed the door.
Taking the manager beneath the arms, Ilya stuffed him into the corner. The manager glared at him, eyes rolling in his frozen face, as Ilya bound him with a few twists of wire and sealed his mouth with tape.
Ilya took off the apron. Going to the other side of the office, he rolled back a corner of the rug, revealing the gun safe in the floor. He opened it and reached inside, pulling up the rack of weapons. It took him only a second to select a revolver, which he slid into the empty holster in his waistband.
After filling his pockets with moon clips, he sat down at the desk. He was about to reach for his phone when something else occurred to him. Looking at the computer, he saw an email inbox in one window. He scrolled through the most recent messages until one caught his eye. Although he had never seen the sender’s name before, he knew exactly who it was from.
He closed the program and turned off the computer. Taking out his phone, he dialed a number. After a few rings, a familiar voice answered, disco pounding on the other end. “Yes?”
“It’s me,” Ilya said quietly. “Do you want to give it another try? Or are we done?”
After a long pause, Sharkovsky said, “You suka. You’re working for the police.”
“No. If they’re watching you, it has nothing to do with me. But my offer still stands. Eighty thousand and my bag in exchange for the package. Meet me at the aquarium in ten minutes. If not, I’m coming after you.”
Ilya switched off the phone. Then he rose, turned off the lights, and withdrew into the corner by the door. As he loaded the revolver, he could see the whites of the manager’s eyes, which were rolled up to meet his own.
A minute passed. Another. Leaning against the wall, Ilya remained perfectly still, his breathing slow and even, and when he finally heard footsteps in the hallway outside, his pulse quickened only slightly.
The door opened, casting a trapezoid of light. Ilya pressed himself against the wall, retreating before the door as it swung inward. The lights came on, revealing the manager on the floor, gesturing frantically with his eyes.
Sharkovsky’s voice sounded low and bewildered. “What the fuck is all this?”
The door swung closed. As it shut, Ilya came out of the corner, handgun raised. When Sharkovsky turned, Ilya could feel the old man gathering his resources swiftly, like a fist. Misha, by contrast, radiated a diffuse, nebulous rage, and Ilya saw at a glance that he was drunk.
“Up against the wall,” Ilya said, the revolver held in a combat stance. “Both of you.”
The two men began to turn. Ilya took a step forward, the sequence of motions clear in his head. Disarm them, get them on their knees—
With startling speed, Misha went for the gun in his belt. Ilya had been applying two pounds of pressure to the trigger, but had not been expecting such a reckless move, and it was only reflexively that he fired.
The first gunshot caught Misha in the chest, while the second took away most of his lower jaw. He fell to his knees, dead before he hit the floor, and toppled sideways. One of the pictures on the wall, the framed photograph of a line of dancing girls, had been struck by the second blast. It hung askew, dangling from a single fastener, then fell off and shattered.
Sharkovsky looked down at Misha’s body, shirt speckled with the other man’s blood. “Stupid, going for his gun like that.”
“I might have done the same.” Ilya forced the old man against the wall and frisked him, the ringing in his ears beginning to diminish. “I want my bag and books. I know you have them here, so don’t lie to me.”
“Why would I lie?” Sharkovsky gestured toward the desk. “They’re in the drawer on the right. As for the cash—”
“You can keep it.” Ilya went to the desk and opened the drawer, keeping the revolver trained on Sharkovsky. As the old man had said, the bag with his books was there. Ilya slung it over his shoulder, where it hung beside the tube secured beneath his clothes. “It was never about the money—”
He broke off. A sound had come from the hallway outside. It had lasted for only an instant and had been cut off at once, but he recognized it. It had been the feedback from a police radio.
Sharkovsky turned to Ilya. “Looks like someone is here, suka. Friends of yours?”
“No,” Ilya said, his mind working furiously. He could not leave the old man behind. To get the answers he needed, he had to walk out of here with Sharkovsky alive. “The truck in the parking lot. You have the keys?”
Sharkovsky’s visible eye blinked once. In the corner of the office, the manager began to howl against his gag, flailing helplessly on the floor. The paralysis had worn off. “Yes, I do.”
“Good.” Keeping his eye on the door, Ilya motioned with the gun. “Let’s go. You’re coming with me.”
45
Powell crouched on the threshold of the disused kitchen, his pistol raised, eyes on the office door. Thirty seconds had passed since he had heard the twin blasts of the revolver. At last, Barlow’s voice came over his earpiece: “We’re on the move. Wolfe, I want you downstairs.”
“Already here,” Wolfe said. Powell turned to see her standing two yards away. Her blouse had come untucked from when she had drawn her pistol from its concealed holster. Their eyes met as she spoke again into her headpiece. “I’m with Powell. We’re covering the office door.”
“Maintain your position,” Barlow said. “We’re taking the service entrance now.”
Even as these words went over the air, there was a commotion in the kitchen. Within seconds, the corridor was filled with members of the assault team, four men in hardshell vests and web gear, shotguns loaded and racked. A fifth man had been left behind to secure the entrance. Barlow stood at the head of the group, his radio in a harness across his chest.
Powell fell back as the unit took up position in the hallway, guns leveled at the closed door. “What about upstairs?”
“We’re doing this in stages,” Barlow said. “We secure the ground floor first. Then—”
Barlow broke off as a squawk of radio noise burst from the epaulet of the agent at his side. The agent silenced his mike at once, but all eyes went to the office door. Barlow, furious, whispered, “If anyone else makes the least fucking bit of noise, I’ll send him straight to hell.”
He turned to the unit commander. “We’re going in. Take the fucking door down.”
The commander nodded, then signaled to the team. Two members of the unit stacked themselves o
n the knob side of the door, while a third covered them from across the hall. The breacher, a sledgehammer in his hands, listened at the door, watching his commander for a signal.
A second later, before any of them could move, the door swung open on its own.
The unit pulled back, their guns trained on the opening. Powell raised his own pistol, watching as the door opened all the way, revealing two figures on the threshold. One was Sharkovsky, his features drawn tight against the bones of his face. The other was a man whom Powell had never seen at close range. He had changed his appearance since the day of the courthouse, his hair shaved and bleached. His left hand was looped around the strap of a bag over his shoulder. With his other hand, he was pressing a revolver against Sharkovsky’s skull.
“Ilya,” Powell said, unable to contain himself. “Or should I call you the Scythian?”
At the sound of his name, Ilya turned to face Powell, his eyes taking in the situation. He spoke quietly in English. “Who are you?”
Powell raised his badge, which hung from a lanyard around his neck. As he did, he suddenly remembered the thousand grenades that were stored somewhere on this floor. It was unlikely, yes, but if a gunshot struck one of the crated rockets, each of which carried a booster charge, the ensuing string of explosions would blow them all to pieces. “Alan Powell. Serious Organised Crime Agency. You want revenge, I know, but if you cooperate, we can take it further—”
“Stand back,” Ilya said flatly. “All of you. If you don’t lower your guns, he dies.”
Barlow kept his pistol raised. “How do we know that you won’t kill him anyway?”
In response, Ilya only pushed the gun harder against the old man’s head. Feeling the pressure, Sharkovsky took a gasping breath, saying, “You stupid fuck, give him what he wants. He’s already killed one of my men.”
Powell glanced into the office, but was unable to see past the doorway. “Misha?”
“He would have done the same to me.” Ilya scanned the room. “I came here to kill this man, but if you do as I say, I will let him go. If not—” He shoved the old man a step forward.
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