‘Like it?’
He gestured towards the rocky mound rising above the rooftops. ‘The Parthenon, up there, on the Acropolis. The moon came out for you, just as I promised.’
‘It was OK.’
‘Only OK?’
Tatiana shrugged. ‘It’s a floodlit ruin on a hill. What more do you want me to say?’
Vladimir’s laughter was affectionate, not mocking. He whispered in her ear, ‘Beautiful women do not have to think of smart things to say. OK is fine.’ He squeezed her hand.
His compliments, his charming words, were unsettling her. They were unwelcome. The last thing she wanted was to find herself feeling sympathy or affection for this man. Half teasing, half serious, she said, ‘You promised you would take me shopping tomorrow and let me buy lots of things.’
Women! She’d journeyed to the cradle of civilization and all she could think about was shopping. He patted her arm. ‘Tomorrow you shall go to the Kolonaki, all the exclusive shops are there, and you must buy whatever you want. And we’ll dine at Milton’s. I think you’ll like that. It’s modern and international and very stylish.’
Tatiana glanced over her shoulder, caught the guard, Grigori, staring at her hips and thighs. She sensed a growing boldness in him. He made her uneasy, even a little afraid. He gave her a respectful nod, then directed his gaze over the crowd. Grigori and Yegar were walking behind them, and there were two guards in front and one on either side, keeping the crowd at bay, always alert and watchful, ready to protect them from harm. Wherever they went they were always surrounded by these huge and powerful men; men who could absorb terrible beatings and still kill with a blow. What woman would want to spend her honeymoon under the constant gaze of these great brutes? It was torment enough spending it with a man she felt no affection for, a man she had little in common with, apart from language and a background of ruthlessly acquired wealth. Who better than her to understand Vladimir’s fears; the fears of a man who must have made many enemies in his struggle to become obscenely rich?
They were emerging from the Plaka now, strolling along a broad pavement beside a road where the traffic was heavy and fast moving. She could see Hadrian’s Arch up ahead and, just beyond it, the Temple of Zeus. She thought them even worse ruins than the Parthenon, up there, above the city. Why, she wondered, did people flock from all over the world to stare at rows of flaky old columns, the decaying remnants of buildings that no longer had roofs or walls?
Two black limousines swept past, indicators flashing, and drew up beside the kerb, a dozen yards ahead.
Vladimir muttered, ‘Thank God. My feet ache like toothache,’ then quickened his pace, limping ahead of the guards, craving the comfort of a seat in the air-conditioned car.
‘No, Mr Dvoskin, no!’ the guard called Boleslav roared.
Tatiana felt an arm encircling her waist, tugging her from her husband’s grasp, holding her back. She suddenly found herself face down on the pavement, covered by the huge and hard body of a guard. Cheek pressing against cool stone, she peered out from beneath a massive shoulder, but could see only running legs and scrambling feet.
A voice shouted, ‘These are not our cars, Mr Dvoskin! These are not—’
A door swung open, a gun barked, a pair of legs buckled, then her husband dropped into her field of view. Tatiana screamed, tried to struggle free, tried to rise and go to him.
Grigori growled in her ear, ‘Don’t move. There’s nothing you can do.’ Then his entire weight bore down on her, imprisoning her, squeezing the breath from her lungs. His arms encircled her face, his huge hands covered her head. She could see nothing now, but she could hear feet scuffling, the sound of someone being dragged along the pavement, frenzied shouts, more gunshots. Then car doors slammed, engines roared, tyres screamed on tarmac.
The crushing weight lifted from her. Tatiana felt a hand beneath her arm, helping her to her feet. She teetered along the pavement on her high heels, then dropped to her knees beside the bodies of two men. Her husband was lying on his back, mouth hanging open, eyes half closed. The guard called Boleslav was sprawling, face down, on top of him, his body perfectly still. Hysteria gripped her. She began to whimper her husband’s name, ‘Vladimir, Vladimir,’ began to pat his cheek in a futile attempt to rouse him. Grigori crouched down beside her, laid his fingers on Vladimir’s throat for a moment, then gently drew them down the lifeless face and closed his master’s eyes.
‘Your husband is dead, Mrs Dvoskin.’ He whispered the words in her ear. ‘There is nothing you can do.’ He reached out and laid his hand on the neck of the guard, feeling for a pulse. ‘And so is Boleslav.’ He helped her to her feet, retrieved her bag and handed it to her.
Two black limousines, the cars Boleslav had phoned for, drew up beside the kerb. Vladimir’s enemies, listening and waiting, must have intercepted his call and rushed there in their own cars. Four of the guards encircled the bodies, standing with their backs to them, looking out over the gathering crowd. Grigori keyed numbers into his phone, then muttered, ‘Send police, an ambulance. There’s been a shooting, beside Hadrian’s Arch. Two men are dead.’
Overcome by shock and fear, tears streaming down her face, Tatiana began to shake uncontrollably. There were flashes from amongst the crowd; opportunists were using cameras and mobile phones to record the scene. A hand touched her arm. As if from a great distance, she heard Grigori say, ‘Could you get into the car, Mrs Dvoskin. We must take you back to the ship.’
‘My husband. I ought to stay with him, go with him when they take him away.’
‘Stanislav, Yegar and Dimitri will remain here and deal with the authorities. Vasila and I will take you back to the Empress. You will be safe there.’
‘The police will want to talk to me.’
‘Then they must visit the ship.’ She felt his hand grip her arm and draw her towards the car. ‘Come, I have to take you to a place of safety. It’s not easy to protect you here. God knows who is in these crowds.’
Vasila opened the rear door of one of the limousines. She lowered her head, climbed inside and moved over to the far seat. Grigori settled himself beside her, Vasila sat next to the driver, doors slammed and they sped off, merging with the flow of traffic, heading for Piraeus.
Samantha tossed the blonde wig on to the bed and peeled off the gauze cap. When she shook out her hair the relief was immense. She could hear Annushka singing a popular song in the shower across the landing. She was probably enjoying a fleeting moment of happiness at her escape from the secure unit. The girl’s smart but rather inane chatter, her irrepressible I-know-everything attitude, were becoming tiresome.
The so-called safe house was a tiny mews flat in Chelsea. Its one external door opened on a narrow flight of stairs that led up to some modest accommodation above what had once been a coach house and was now the garage: just a kitchen, tiny sitting room, bedroom with twin beds, a cramped bathroom. She’d already checked the bedroom door. It had a lock and the key was in it. When they’d settled down for the night, she’d lock them in and remove the key.
Annushka’s red bag was lying on her pillow. Samantha opened it, found the brown leather diary and leafed through its tiny pages. Here and there Annushka had scribbled times and near illegible notes and initials, but it would require much more than a quick glance to make any sense, discover patterns, in the entries. The monogrammed white mobile phone was half hidden beneath a card of contraceptive pills. Once again, nothing happened when she switched it on: no icons, no low-battery symbol. Its batteries were completely exhausted. A careful search didn’t reveal a charger, it couldn’t be used to make a call, so she dropped it back, picked out a purse and clicked it open: half a dozen banking cards, about £٢٠٠ in notes, a bunch of keys and some small coins were making its red leather bulge.
There was a faint bleeping. Samantha lifted her attaché case on to the bed, raised the lid and snatched up the encrypted phone.
A cold and commanding voice demanded, ‘Where are you?’
/> ‘In London.’
‘In the flat?’
‘Yes.’
‘And your friend is with you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Things went smoothly?’
‘Yes.’
‘And no one was harmed?
‘No.’
‘Good. I have some news for you; for your friend, really. Her father is dead. Murdered, in Athens, about a couple of hours ago: a drive-past shooting. No doubt the media will be reporting it in the morning. Have you learned anything?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Keep me informed.’ There was a click and the faint hissing of the encryption faded. Samantha switched off the phone, dropped it back in the case, then took the gun from the pocket in the lid and slid it under the pillow of the bed nearest the door.
CHAPTER FIVE
Annushka kept stealing glances at Samantha across the two-seater breakfast table while she ate her kippers and toast. The table was hinged to the wall between the refrigerator and the door. When raised and in use it took up much of the free space in the tiny kitchen. She sipped her coffee, then said, ‘You look quite different without the wig and tiny spectacles.’
Samantha smiled.
Annushka buttered another slice of toast. ‘Where did you find the kippers?’
‘In the freezer. It’s small but well stocked.’
‘Reminds me of Martha’s.’
‘Martha’s?’
‘Martha Hemmingway School for Girls. I go there. They serve kippers for breakfast on Fridays.’
‘Do you like it?’
‘The breakfast or Martha’s?’ Annushka picked up her knife and fork; she ate and drank with enthusiasm. Her blue eyes were clear and bright, her long blonde hair was uncombed, her pert and pointed breasts were thrusting at the wool of her red jumper.
‘Martha’s.’
‘It’s OK.’ She bit into the toast and forked up some more of the kipper. ‘Sending me there was one of Father’s better ideas. The teachers know their subjects, they’re patient and there’s plenty of them; one to one if you’re finding something difficult. Discipline’s sensible, food’s not too bad, we each have our own room, the girls are pleasant, and there’s a swimming pool and good sports facilities.’ She reached for another slice of toast. ‘Most of us share the same problem.’
Samantha raised an eyebrow.
‘Dumped there by divorced parents rich enough to afford the fees.’ Annushka frowned. ‘I’ve forgotten your name. I’m sorry . . .’
‘I didn’t tell you my name.’
‘May I ask what it is?’
Samantha smiled. ‘It’s best you don’t know.’
‘I’ve got to call you something.’
‘Then call me Georgie.’
‘Short for Georgina?’
Samantha nodded.
‘Are you a very heavy smoker?’
‘I don’t smoke. I never have. Why?’
‘Your voice, it’s so husky and whispery: a heavy smoker’s voice.’ Annushka laughed. ‘But it’s jolly sexy; I should think it very useful if you’re trying to seduce someone.’
‘Not so good if you want to be assertive, but I’ve learned to live with it.’
Annushka bit into her toast and chewed while she stared across the table at Samantha. ‘And your hair’s fabulous,’ she went on. ‘You look heaps younger. The blonde wig made you look a bit like Gerda Lundgren, our games mistress. She’s Swedish; plays for the other side.’ Annushka picked up her cup. ‘Are you into men, or do you play for the other side?’
Samantha smiled. ‘I’m a widow.’
‘A widow!’ Annushka gulped at her coffee. ‘You’re rather young to be a widow.’
‘I’d been married only six months when my husband died. A sniper’s bullet. He was a doctor, attending a patient on the Gaza Strip. We lived in Jerusalem.’
‘You’re a Jew, then?’
‘My husband and my father were Jewish. I’m not.’
Annushka was eyeing her steadily over her cup.
‘My mother was Irish,’ Samantha explained. ‘Catholic, very devout. I was baptized by the Bishop of Dublin, confirmed by the Patriarch of Jerusalem, educated by nuns.’
Annushka nodded. ‘My grandmother’s religious. Russian Orthodox. She has a little dacha outside Moscow. You can’t see the walls for icons. When she lights candles, the gold and silver gleam. I like to go there. My father, my mother, me: all godless. We are Lenin’s children.’
‘Your father seems to have forsaken Lenin and pursued wealth.’
Annushka’s expression soured. ‘Men like my father are ruthless and greedy. They become rich by using their cunning to exploit the knowledge and skills of others. And there were many desperate people for my father to trick and exploit when the Soviet Union fell.’
‘In the West we call them entrepreneurs.’
‘I’ve done economics. I know how capitalism defines such men. I still think that cunning people who plot and scheme, who use the labour and talents of others to make money, are parasites.’ She frowned at Samantha for a long moment, then asked, ‘Can you tell what I’m thinking?’
Samantha laughed. ‘Of course not.’
‘It’s your eyes: they’re such a vivid green, so calm and still. They scare me a little.’
‘Are you always so open and direct?’
Annushka shrugged. ‘It’s just the way I am. I suppose we’re all a bit like that at Martha’s. We say what we think, and if we want to know something we just ask.’ She rattled her cup down on its saucer. ‘Thanks for the breakfast.’
‘You’re welcome. I think it’s the first time I’ve cooked since my husband died. If you can call boiling kippers in a bag cooking.’
‘I’m honoured. Don’t you do domestic stuff?’
‘I don’t cook, I don’t clean, I don’t do washing and ironing. I mostly dine out and I have a friend who attends to household matters.’
‘She lives with you, this friend?’
‘It’s a he, not a she, and no, he doesn’t live with me.’
‘Cool.’ Annushka seemed to approve.
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ Samantha said. ‘I’ve been wondering how to say it while you’ve been having breakfast, but there’s no easy way, so I’m just going to come out with it.’
Annushka shrugged, as if urging her to go ahead.
‘I’m sorry to have to tell you that your father died last night.’
‘My father’s dead? How? Where?’
‘A drive-by shooting, in Athens.’
The girl closed her eyes and her body became very still. After a moment her mouth and chin began to tremble. Samantha reached over the table and laid her hand on hers. Annushka snatched her hands away and pressed them into her lap. Her head drooped. She was weeping.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Samantha whispered.
Annushka nodded, sniffed loudly, then looked up. ‘His new wife, Tatiana, was she . . .’
‘The only information I have is that your father was killed. I think I’d have been told if your stepmother had been harmed. It should be on the news channels by now. Do you want to switch on the television?’
She shook her head. ‘How do you know this?’
‘The people who engaged me to protect you keep me informed.’
‘What people? And why do I need protecting? I keep on asking, but you tell me nothing.’ Tears were trickling down Annushka’s cheeks. Her face was white with shock, but already her mouth had stopped trembling and that brash assertiveness was creeping back into her voice. Loretta Fallon had been well briefed. The girl had inherited her father’s toughness.
‘I told you when I took you out of the secure unit,’ Samantha reminded her. ‘You need protecting because you’ve become a threat to the comfortable lives of rich and powerful men.’
‘Me, a threat? I’m not a threat to anyone. My father was a threat to many people, but not me. Who have I harmed?’
Opening with something she was certain of,
Samantha said, ‘You’ve been having an affair with Alexander Fairchild, your boyfriend’s father.’
Annushka was taken aback. She drew a breath, then demanded, ‘So what? And Vincent Fairchild isn’t my boyfriend. He’s one of several boys I know. He’s not what you’d call a boyfriend. And how do you know I’m involved with Alexander?’
Samantha ignored her question. ‘We’re splitting hairs. The bottom line is, you’ve been having sex with his father, a government minister, the Foreign Secretary no less, on a fairly regular basis.’
‘Has Alexander been talking about me?’
‘The last thing he’d do is talk about having sex with his son’s underage girlfriend.’
Annushka seemed mollified. She stared at Samantha for a moment, then asked, ‘Has his wife found out?’
‘Not as far as I know.’
‘Then so what? I don’t see what harm’s been done.’
‘He’s the Foreign Secretary. He’s been conducting an amorous liaison with an underage Russian girl.’
Annushka’s expression was still uncomprehending.
Samantha went on. ‘It’s a security risk: indiscreet talk, the possibility of blackmail.’
‘That’s stupid.’ Annushka’s tone was scathing. ‘We never did any serious talking, it was just flirty, intimate stuff. He said nice things to me and I teased him a little, but that’s about all. We just made love. We never did anything else together, never had a meal, except when we were at a wedding or a party, and then he was always with his wife, so that doesn’t count. Does he know other people know?’
‘He may have been informed and warned. If he has, he’ll be very concerned about the possibility of exposure and what it would do to him.’
‘Alexander would know I’d never do anything to harm him.’
‘He might not be so sure. He could be very worried. If the affair became known, he’d lose everything.’
‘He should have thought about that before he kissed me and put his hand on my leg. And I still don’t see how all this is a threat to me.’
‘He might not be prepared to take the risk. The government might not be prepared to face the fallout from a scandal. Remember, you were picked up by the police, but they didn’t charge you. No documents, no paperwork, no records. They locked you away in the secure children’s home until they could decide what to do with you. They even removed the other girls from the wing. You were there on your own. You were probably in considerable danger.’
Dark Powers Page 6