“Where is she? I demand to see her,” the man said. He had a thick accent, perhaps Georgian. He might be a member of Dato’s crew, or he might not. He might be carrying a gun under his trench coat, or he might be a regular civilian.
Artur had no way to tell from his vantage point in the last row of chairs, and he wasn’t about to take any chances, not when his daughter waited just beyond the emergency room doors. In less than a heartbeat, Artur was on his feet. “Stay here,” he hissed at Maya.
“What’s going on?”
“Trouble,” he said. “Keep your head down.” He pushed her low in her chair and walked nonchalantly around the perimeter of the rows of chairs, casually approaching the desk, hoping to get close enough before he caught the man’s attention.
The nurse, a stout, gray-haired woman in her early fifties, murmured a response to the would-be mobster and gestured toward the chairs in the waiting area.
“You have to let me see her! She’s my wife.” The man’s voice was louder now. He hit his fist against the desk for emphasis, and the nurse hopped back.
“Sir, sit down now, or I’ll have security escort you out,” the nurse warned and nodded in the direction of a burly guard.
The man looked up and caught Artur watching him. His eyes darted from Artur to the security guard and back. With an evil glare in Artur’s direction, the man raised both hands and backed himself toward the first row of seats in the waiting room. “I don’t want any trouble.”
Artur returned to stand by Maya, not taking his eyes off of the man in the trench coat. Pensively, almost obsessively, he fingered the special pen in his pocket. Stroking the warm, sleek, deadly metal soothed him, restored a semblance of a sense of control.
“What’s wrong?” Maya asked.
“I don’t like the look of him,” Artur whispered. “I thought he might have a gun.”
“Don’t be silly,” she scolded, matching his quiet tone. “This is an urban hospital. Everyone goes through the metal detectors when they come in. Didn’t you notice them?”
Artur had noticed them, but he also knew there were plenty of ways to sneak deadly weapons past the detectors. He should know. He was carrying his own. “I guess this whole thing with Inna has me shaken up. You’re right. I’m not thinking rationally,” Artur said. He sat down next to Maya as if he were a regular man, a worried father, not a master spy trained to see artifice and threat in everyone and everything around him.
“Just tell me when I can see my wife,” the man said to the nurse, a quiet demand, but not as threatening.
“The doctors will let us know,” the nurse answered.
“I’ll be back in an hour,” the man said, rising. Artur’s suspicions spiked as he headed in the opposite direction away from the doors. He didn’t turn his head, didn’t look at Artur. Was he what he claimed, a concerned husband? Or had the Georgians sent him? Or perhaps the Directorate?
Whatever the case, the man would be back again later. Artur wasn’t about to chance that he would get to Inna. He slipped his cell phone from his pocket.
“What are you doing?” Maya demanded, on the alert as ever for any offense.
“Calling Victor,” he said.
“You can’t be serious! You can’t plan to work tonight.”
“I need to check in. I had a business meeting earlier that got interrupted by … events.”
“I see,” she said coldly. She snatched a magazine from the table beside her. Angrily, she snapped the pages as she opened and turned them, but Artur had no patience for her pique. He needed to call in reinforcements.
NICK
AFTER HIS VERY brief and uninformative interview with the cops, Nick had taken up a seat at the bar at Troika and nursed a beer. He didn’t need to hang around, but he wanted to see how the night’s drama played out. He couldn’t help feeling that Aleksei was guilty of something. Nick hoped if he waited around long enough, he would find a clue as to what.
From his perch, Nick watched the comings and goings, the various parties, the games of flirtation. Troika attracted a mixed crowd of older, Russian glitterati in their furs and jewels, and younger, upwardly mobile professionals, like Aleksei and Katya, all looking to show off their success or hook up. Troika, Nick decided, was a scene for the wealthy of Brighton Beach, and the clientele seemed to party hard, downing a lot of liquor.
Nick supposed the alcohol may have flowed a little more generously than usual tonight. In order to prevent a mass panic and stampede out when rumors of a violent crime and police presence had started to spread, Aleksei had announced that there had been an “incident,” that everything was now under control, and that drinks for the rest of the night were on the house. Even if they had come to flaunt their wealth, the patrons were happy to be cheap. They ordered extravagantly and, Nick noticed, tipped little.
The waitstaff looked more than a little morose. He couldn’t blame them. For the bad tips and the prospect of a police investigation into their immigration status, they had his sympathy. He remembered well waking up with nightmares that the Americans would change their minds and send him and his aunt back to Russia, where the rest of his family had been murdered.
Their blood was on Artur’s hands. For that, Nick would have his revenge.
“Long night.” Aleksei slid onto the stool beside him. He made an exaggerated yawn.
“Did you talk to the police yet?” Nick asked.
“Not yet,” Aleksei said.
Nick stuffed his hands in his pockets and for the hundredth time that evening tried to hide his irritation with Katya’s husband. As far as Nick could tell, Aleksei had done everything possible, short of calling a lawyer—something he could never justify when he had both Katya and Nick immediately on hand—to delay responding to the investigators’ questions.
First he had to do damage control and see to the patrons, Aleksei had said. Then he had to close and lock up the club. And then he had to dismiss the staff. Hours later, he still had not closed the club nor dismissed the staff.
He had, of course, been faultlessly polite to the officers and provided them with a bottomless carafe of coffee and cookies, a quiet room, and opportunity to talk to the various waitresses and cooks, most of whom barely spoke English.
“I’m sure I won’t have anything useful to say. I wasn’t here when everything went down,” Aleksei said, as if excusing his tardy response to the police. “I don’t know why this can’t wait until tomorrow. I’m beat.” He tapped on the counter, and the leggy bartender hurried over in her skimpy uniform. An eye-catching brunette in her early forties, she poured Aleksei a shot of vodka, which he downed in a single swallow. He slapped the glass back down on the counter, and she immediately poured him another while Nick watched with disgust and burgeoning dislike. Was Aleksei trying to get drunk before he went to talk to the police?
“I’m sure they need to cover all of their bases. What happened here wasn’t exactly your average night.” Nick tried to sound sympathetic, friendly, when what he truly wanted was to throttle Aleksei and thunk his head a few times against the bar. A normal man would be concerned for his sister, might be calling the hospital for news, would certainly want to get to the bottom of what had happened to her—or to any patron for that matter—especially when a crime had been committed in his place of business.
Aleksei’s recent delays, coupled with his earlier obstruction of their arrival, only made Nick certain that Aleksei had some inkling of what had happened and an investment in covering it up. Like father, like son.
“You might be able to help them in other ways, you know,” Nick said.
“What do you mean?” Aleksei asked, and Nick noticed not even the slightest hint of a slur in his words, although he reeked of alcohol. Nick guessed the two shots Aleksei had just tossed back were not his first. He motioned to the bartender for yet another, and Nick suspected Katya’s husband—to add to all of his other prize attributes—might also have a drinking problem.
“Have you given them access to
the surveillance video?” Nick asked.
“No, they didn’t ask for it. They don’t have a warrant.”
“If they don’t have a warrant yet, it’s only a matter of time. This is a murder investigation. Sooner or later, they’ll ask to see what was caught on camera.”
“Not much,” Aleksei said. “We don’t have any cameras in the private rooms upstairs.”
How convenient. “What about the back stairs or hallway?”
“Nope.”
“That seems unusual.”
Aleksei only shrugged. “I guess I’ll give it to them now. What can it hurt?”
Nick took a swig of beer and regarded Aleksei. What was he hiding? What did he know? Was Aleksei in this on his own, or was Artur also involved?
“Heard anything yet about your sister?”
“The doctors won’t tell us anything, and they won’t let anyone see her, or else she doesn’t want them to. She’s an odd duck.”
“How do you mean?” How could Aleksei be so callous toward his own sister?
“Never mind,” Aleksei said.
Nick couldn’t shut off the stream of questions that came to him about Inna Koslovsky. He didn’t know if she would consider dating him after what had happened to her tonight, and he found himself feeling sorry for her in so many ways—for what had happened, for her brother’s lack of empathy. But what did Aleksei mean she was odd? Was there something Nick was missing, perhaps something Katya in her glow of optimism had neglected to tell him? Had Inna also inherited her father’s legacy of betrayal and deceit?
“You can’t throw a comment like that out there and not follow up,” Nick said. “Not after Katya has been singing your sister’s praises for weeks.” Nick motioned to the bartender for a shot.
“Pour me another one, too,” Aleksei said. This time his words ran together ever so slightly.
The bartender shook her head. “Your wife wouldn’t like it.”
“But I’m your boss,” Aleksei said with a winsome smile that had the woman smiling back.
“That you are,” she said and filled his glass.
“Svetlana, you’re a gem,” Aleksei said.
The bartender clucked her tongue. “Now you sound exactly like my ex—right before he traded me in for a younger model.”
“Sveta, sweetheart, you know I’d never do that to you.”
“You mean ‘never’ as long as I look good in bootie shorts,” she said, “and keep the vodka flowing.”
Aleksei raised his glass to her wit and then knocked back the shot. “Leave the bottle,” he instructed her as she moved on to serve the other patrons.
“Look, here’s the thing,” Aleksei said, leaning closer, confiding, as he poured Nick a finger of vodka and refilled his shot glass. Aleksei’s hand wobbled. “Inna seems okay. All put together on the outside,” he said. “She puts on a good show. But inside she’s a mess.”
“Aren’t we all?” Nick asked.
Aleksei raised his shot glass as if in agreement or salute before tossing it back. Without pause, he poured himself yet another finger, this time sloppily. Vodka sloshed over the rim of his glass and left a small pool on the bar. Nick figured he merely had to wait Aleksei out if he wanted information. With any luck, the Stoli would loosen his tongue.
“This is different. She’s also a little…” Aleksei whistled and waved his finger in a circle by his temple. “Unstable. Came back from her fancy college and had a breakdown. Hallucinations or something. Panic attacks. The works.”
Nick sipped from his glass, and the vodka burned his throat going down. “What happened to her?”
“No idea. Maybe nothing. Maybe the pressure of working with Papa.”
What exactly did Inna do for dear Papa? Nick’s resolve to meet her grew.
“Inna was seeing a shrink. Taking meds. Getting better. But this new crisis will set her back. Poor, poor Inna,” Aleksei said with drunken tenderness, even as he smiled with quiet revel. “Guess Papa won’t hand her the business now.”
“He should give it to you. You’re the oldest,” Nick said, testing for Aleksei’s reaction.
“He should!” Aleksei nodded his head with vigor. He clasped Nick’s forearm in a gesture of solidarity, then shook his head and pulled his hand away. “But he won’t. He thinks I’m a fuckup.” Aleksei hiccupped. “Can’t be trusted with anything. Only thing I ever did right, s’far as he’s concerned, was marry Katya. But I’ll show him. He’ll see.”
“See what?”
“See my success!” Aleksei pounded his chest with his fist as if making a pledge. “I don’t need his business. I have plans he doesn’t know about.” He raised his index finger to make a point then brought it to his lips. “I’m going to make a killing in Brighton Beach.”
“How?” Nick asked.
“Shhh,” Aleksei said. “It’s a secret.”
More secrets in a family that must be brimming with them. What was Artur’s true “business,” and how involved was Inna? He hadn’t considered that she might be privy to her father’s secrets.
“Aleksei! There you are!” Katya headed toward the bar, slightly breathless, her curls bouncing with each step. “The police are waiting to talk with you.”
Aleksei slid off the stool. As he moved toward Katya, she wrinkled her nose and frowned. “You’ve been drinking,” she accused. “Aleksei, how could you? On tonight of all nights.”
“Tonight of all nights required a drink,” Aleksei said. “Right, Nick?”
Nick gave an abashed smile. He had a beer bottle and a shot glass standing in front of him, and he had certainly done his share to encourage Aleksei to drink more—even if Aleksei had required very little nudging.
“He hasn’t talked to the police yet. We can’t let them interview him in this state.” Katya shot Nick a reproving glance, and he hunched his shoulders, feeling vaguely guilty for disappointing her. “Sveta, do you have coffee?”
“Yes, coffee,” Aleksei agreed. He plunked back down on his barstool, dropped his head into his hand, and passed out. Sveta swiftly poured a mug and brought it over. The coffee spilled onto the saucer as she placed it in front of him.
“Aleksei, wake up.” Katya gently slapped at his cheek. “Bozhe moy, what am I going to tell the police?”
“The truth,” Sveta said quietly.
Katya brought her head up abruptly. “The truth?”
Sveta clicked her tongue. “Katya, you’re not naïve. You’re a lawyer. In Manhattan. A smart woman. You know the truth about your own husband.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Katya sank onto the nearest barstool. She looked vaguely ill, and Nick wondered what she knew or suspected. She wouldn’t meet his eye.
KATYA
THE TRUTH ABOUT her husband, Katya thought. What was the truth? Sometimes she felt she hardly knew him.
The truth was that their marriage was a hollow shell, but it had taken her a year to figure it out and another year to decide what to do.
She hadn't asked the right questions when they got married. From the beginning, she had been too dazzled—by his looks, his success, and most importantly his seeming devotion to her. Their wedding day had seemed like a dream come true. She, Katya Gendler, had been chosen by the handsomest, wealthiest man she had ever met, a man who willingly and ostentatiously showed everyone how much he absolutely adored her.
A man who, when drunk on their honeymoon, had told her that she made his life… tolerable. In vino veritas.
Her marriage, likely the best thing that had ever happened in her life, had been slowly falling apart, the cracked pieces slipping through her fingers from the very beginning—no matter how hard she worked to hold him.
Her mother had predicted this. From the moment Aleksei had stepped into Katya's life, Mama had taken the stance that Katya had won the love lottery and had damn well better clutch her winning ticket with a death grip. Her mother warned her constantly that Aleksei was such a catch that another woman would steal him away fr
om her if she wasn't careful to be a good wife to him, if she didn't stop working so much, if she didn't start spending more time with him.
But Katya wasn’t ready to give up her work or cut back. She needed it, needed the escape, the sense of competence. She loved working with legal contracts, where everything was set out in black and white, all the rules and expectations, so unlike her life where whatever she did was never enough.
She wasn’t a good enough daughter. Or a good enough wife. Or a good enough lover. Or a good enough sister.
Katya wished she could have a stiff drink, but she needed to stay lucid. Somebody had to. What her mother didn’t understand was that Katya had never had a hold on Aleksei, despite his declarations.
She had no proof, but she suspected he might be having an affair. Or considering one. He had been cagey and secretive lately, staying out late more and more, purportedly with Mikhail. He claimed he was playing cards with his buddies, and Katya wasn’t sure what she feared more—the prospect of another woman or of his gambling away their future.
Work filled the hollowness, sort of. She lived for the scraps of praise, the little victories, but law was a chew-you-up-and-spit-you-out profession. She was a good lawyer, but not a star, and the work—mostly close examination of clauses and loopholes—wasn’t going to change the world or make it better. She slaved hundred-hour weeks for the chance to become a partner, something that lately she wasn’t sure was all that important to her anymore, even if the money she socked away with every paycheck made her feel more secure.
There was more to life than working. She wanted more than what she had.
She eyed Aleksei. He slumped on the barstool near her, his head pillowed by his forearms on the bar. He had started drinking the moment they had entered Troika and found the chaos of a full-blown murder investigation, and had only stopped now, when he had passed out.
The truth was Aleksei had a drinking problem. The truth was Aleksei might have a gambling problem, too. The truth was Aleksei wasn’t really grown up or responsible enough to own a business, although he owned the nightclub and several small pharmacies in Brighton Beach. The truth was Katya had spent the last few months agonizing over how to win back and keep his love.
Kings of Brighton Beach Bundle Page 5