He stares at me resolutely. “Sophia, we’re not equipped to go after Bekami!”
“I don’t care!” I shout. Shots sink into the garden wall with piercing thumps. The guards are so confident they have adequately outmaneuvered us that they are now stepping out from the cover of cypress trees, advancing. “I’m going to find Bekami, and when I do, I’m going to kill him.”
A torrent of gunfire explodes from the bushes to our right. Todd fires back methodically, dropping a guard with a single bullet. “My orders are to retrieve and return you.” He fires two more shots. “Safely.”
“You killed Abramovich, Aksel. His men will track you down, torture you, kill you—”
Aksel leans forward and kisses me. When he looks at me, his familiar vibrant eyes penetrate my very core. He speaks with a defiant confidence. “So they’ll try.” He tightens his grip on my hand, intertwining his fingers into mine. “And they’ll fail.”
Aksel glances left, aims his rifle toward the atrium, and fires off four consecutive rounds—the roof shatters; sheets of glass rain down on the two guards.
Another has come up on our left. Todd swings his rifle fast around, whipping the barrel across the attacking guard’s neck. The man collapses to his knees, unconscious. Todd shoots a second approaching guard.
A third leaps over the wall and wraps his arms tight around Aksel’s neck. Aksel lurches forward and hurls the man’s body over his own. With a thud, the man lands on his back. His eyes roll into his head.
Aksel picks up the man’s rifle, unclips the magazine, and throws it like a javelin into the cypress trees.
We are no longer being fired at.
“I am doing this,” I say, standing.
Aksel wipes his bloody mouth with the back of his hand. “Then I’m coming with you.”
Todd watches me with the same impossible-to-read expression as my father. He disassembles his rifle into three parts and slides them into a chest holster under his shirt. He looks at his watch and back to me. “We have fourteen minutes.”
CHAPTER 61
In a wooded grove at the edge of the estate, we reach two motorcycles. Aksel and I climb aboard one, and Todd takes the other.
“He was driving a silver Maybach. New. Four-door,” I recall, hoping I’m right.
“It left as we were coming in,” Aksel says, confirming it.
Todd switches on an earpiece. “We’ll see if we can get an eye on him.”
Aksel places his hand on mine, squeezes, and revs the engine. Moments later, we are careening down steep, tree-lined streets toward the sea. I tighten my arms around Aksel’s stomach and burrow into his back. There remains a dull pain thudding in my forehead and a throbbing in my neck, but Aksel is somehow … here.
We are in the hills of Üsküdar, rising above the water. Ruthless oligarchs control this south side of the Bosphorus in a violent state of corrupt stability, a facade of prosperity, my father called it. Now I know why Todd and Aksel are eager to get out.
In minutes, we reach the terraced hills leading down to the water and soon skid onto a crowded street, deftly merging into the late-afternoon traffic.
Below us, the Bosphorus laps serenely at a gravel-sand beach. Northwest, four kilometers away, against a backdrop of a sapphire sky pierced by beams of rose light, gleam the minarets of Hagia Sophia.
Aksel levers up and down, switching gears, swerving between cars, staying close behind Todd.
In the middle of a crowded intersection at the entrance to a souk, Todd turns his motorcycle so swiftly he appears to skim the pavement. Without braking, Aksel downshifts and follows Todd’s hairpin turn like there is water beneath us, not concrete.
Todd waves us forward. “There is a silver Maybach at Çengelköy Pier.”
I point in the direction of the fishing docks.
Todd motions to us. “You stay north, and I’ll hit from the east. Do not engage. Understood?”
Aksel nods. Todd looks at me, revving his engine; he doesn’t accelerate until I have nodded too.
At the Kuludar roundabout, Todd exits first and we stay on Yalibou Road. Colorful Turkish rugs flash by as vendors close their market stalls. Salty wind from the sea whips my hair, and I push my cheek against Aksel’s back.
Minutes later, we reach Çengelköy Pier. Traffic funnels into two lanes. Aksel snakes between cars and parks beside an old Renault.
Five years ago, Çengelköy was a small fishing pier—now, it’s one of the busiest ferry terminals in Istanbul.
Engage? We’ll be lucky to find him.
I count quickly. Nearly five hundred people are converging in a twenty-meter radius.
Swinging my legs off the bike, I survey our surroundings. Hundreds of cars are packed in line like tinned herring, waiting to drive onto the ferry.
We move discreetly, searching the area for Bekami.
Overhead, an intercom blares in Turkish. Aksel looks at me quizzically.
“Boarding,” I translate.
Commuters, scattered around the terminal, begin to congregate at the entrance to the pedestrian ramp. Others step back into their cars to drive onto the ferry.
I spot the Maybach first—a radiant diamond among all the older Turkish cars. I grab Aksel’s shirt, pull him behind a Renault van, and point in the direction of the Maybach.
For a moment, nothing happens, then the driver’s door opens, and Bekami steps out.
“That’s him?” Aksel glowers at Bekami with unreserved rage.
“Kranker Typ,” I say under my breath. Which causes the corner of Aksel’s lip to curve upward, ever so slightly.
Shielded by the Renault, we watch Bekami, Louis Vuitton briefcase in hand, stroll casually to the passenger line, demarcated by swags of rope.
Like a film reel, I see it unfold: Bekami will return to CNF headquarters victorious, having secured a nuclear weapon while thwarting American intelligence operators. In a few months, he’ll detonate the Koshelek …
The automobile ramp lowers. The pedestrians clump together, waiting for the ferry master to unhook the rope and usher them onto the deck.
But why did Bekami come here? Çengelköy Ferry only shuttles north, to European Istanbul. CNF headquarters are—or were—set up here, in isolated pockets along the south shores of the Black Sea.
Bekami’s eyes sweep over the cars. His silver Maybach gleams lonely amid all the rusty Renaults, Fiats, and Peugeots. Why isn’t he in it, like the other drivers, waiting to drive up the automobile ramp onto the ferry? And where is Todd?
Bekami steps onto the pedestrian ramp. People follow, obstructing my view.
I have three options: I can board the ferry and follow him, I can wait for Todd, or I can end this now.
I ease my hand into the small of my back. My fingers touch the outline of Todd’s Smith & Wesson 686.
I’ve held this gun before. It’s the same make as my father’s—accuracy and power.
Discreetly, I raise the revolver to the open van window.
Although my whole body trembles, I keep my hands steady. I slide my left hand beneath my right. Cradling the grip of the pistol in my palm, I absorb the cool metal into my skin.
The blood on my wrists and hands has dried into cracked rows along the creases of my skin. My palms flake crimson.
Aksel’s voice is concerned. “Sophia, you don’t have to do this.” His large hand wraps over the top of mine. I know what he isn’t saying: Do not engage.
“I’ll do it,” he says.
But he is wrong. I have to engage—I have to end this. Here. Now. No one is going to do it for me. Bekami forfeited his life when he took mine, three kilometers from this pier. And again, when he killed my father.
Vendetta.
Bekami is not going to hurt anyone else. Not now. Not ever.
I hold Todd’s pistol in my hand—taut but loose.
I force my breathing into a steady rhythm: inhale … hold … exhale …
I no longer feel pain. Or anger. Only a heightened alertness. If
I want to hit him accurately, I have to control my heartbeat, like my father has been teaching me for years.
With my finger on the trigger, I stare at Bekami. I recall his features: coal-black eyes, manicured hands, the smell of sweat and Yves Saint Laurent cologne. I feel his slithery hands on my neck. I feel the burning of the rope tying me to the copper pipe. His crass voice. His oily lips against my skin …
My father is right. He won’t haunt me any longer. I am stronger than him, stronger than any of them.
I close my eyes. Open them.
Bekami pulls something small and metal from his pocket. He is holding the briefcase in one hand. Though I’ve been watching him for ninety seconds, I’ve been so concentrated on the Louis Vuitton in his right hand, I hadn’t noticed the second, smaller briefcase he’s been carrying in his left.
A tattered leather briefcase, the same color as his pants.
“No …,” I gasp.
Rapidly, I calculate the terminal occupancy: three hundred people now loiter within a hundred-meter radius, some buying last-minute tickets at the kiosk, others jogging toward their cars. Some have begun driving up the ramp. The rope is lowered; the deck is filling with people; the ferry is filling with cars.
… A diversion …
Of course.
Bekami casually steps out of line. He isn’t going to the other side of Istanbul. He isn’t going to Europe. And he has no intention of staying on the ferry.
A glance at the sea confirms this. A dark blue cigarette boat circles in the water, halfway between the ferry and an idling, glimmering yacht.
To escape, Bekami only needs a way to occupy the Turkish Coast Guard, who monitor water traffic out of the Bosphorus Strait to the Black Sea. If Bekami can reach the open waters of the Black Sea, he can travel anywhere undetected … Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, Georgia … We’ll never find him.
Bekami sets the tattered leather briefcase down, so discreetly he barely bends his knees. He steps in front of it, wedging himself in between a group of chatting Turkish men, and proceeds back down the ramp.
“Todd’s here,” Aksel breathes.
At the far end of the pier, Todd speeds toward the ferry on his motorbike, weaving between the rows of cars filing up the ramp.
My eyes flash from the tattered leather briefcase to the Maybach to Todd.
“Todd, NO!” I sprint for him. “Todd!” I scream.
“Sophia!” Aksel grips my forearm, yanking me back. But I pull loose and run.
“We have to stop him!” I shout to Aksel.
Bekami must hear my screams. He looks over, expectant almost.
Todd reaches the swags of rope partitioning the line to board the ferry.
Bekami steps off the ramp and down the platform onto the dock. He carries the Louis Vuitton briefcase securely in his left hand; a silver detonator is snug inside his right.
Aksel mutters into a mouthpiece.
The cigarette boat speeds toward the pier.
Todd drops his bike at the edge of the pedestrian ramp and runs onto the ferry.
I look between the Maybach and Bekami, knowing what’s coming. Bekami planned this expertly. Timed his diversion perfectly.
Aksel leaps over the metal barrier and races for Bekami. A man inside the cigarette boat raises a submachine gun and aims it at Aksel.
Bekami steps carefully off the pier and onto the boat. Teetering briefly, he sets the fragile briefcase down and turns.
He looks straight at me with a proud, silky smile on his face—a look that says I won.
Triumphantly, he thumbs off the cap on the silver detonator.
Without remorse, I raise the Smith & Wesson, take aim at the center of Bekami’s forehead, and I pull the trigger.
Twice.
CHAPTER 62
Then everything explodes.
The blast crushes my eardrums.
In an enormous plume of smoke and heat, I am launched through the air.
When I come to, my skin is on fire. Hot pieces of metal gash my forearms like fiery embers; they singe my shirt, engulfing the pavement and every nearby surface.
Choking on the smoke, I roll onto my stomach. The air is so dense I can’t see.
I push my palms against the ground. It is hot and littered with shattered glass and debris. “Aksel?” I cough out, stumbling upright. A woman is screaming beside me, clutching her daughter. I reach for them as they disappear through the smoke.
I put my hand on a car to steady myself, but the metal’s heat scorches me. Stepping over cinders and shoving aside burnt wreckage, I make my way over to the dock where I last saw Aksel, where I last saw Bekami.
Suddenly, an arm coils around my waist. “We need to get out of here,” Aksel warns in my ear.
“I want to see him,” I say desperately, turning to look over my shoulder. “I have to see Beka—”
“He’s dead, Sophia. You killed him.”
A coolness has hit me with Aksel’s embrace. I realize Aksel is soaked. His wet, burned clothes, blackened with oil and soot, cling to his body. But my attention immediately diverts to Aksel’s left, where he is holding an equally wet, battered figure.
Todd’s head rolls forward, limp, onto his chest. I gasp, reaching forward to help hold his weight.
“This way.” Aksel nods.
As the smoke thins, the sensations hit at once: sunlight, voices, sirens.
People run in every direction. Already, bodies are being pulled from charred vehicles. By the time we clear the wreckage, several bystanders are pointing at us emerging from the rubble.
Somehow, Aksel manages to carry Todd while running alongside me; he has an arm solidly locked around Todd’s knees, with Todd’s body draped over his shoulder.
“We need a car, Sophia!” Aksel shouts.
Our motorcycles are somewhere in the rubble, but with Todd’s condition, they are useless. We move out, searching for a car not blocked in.
Near the ticket kiosk, I find an old Fiat. I take off my tattered sweater, wrap it around my fist, and punch through the glass. Reaching through the shattered window, I unlock the door and drop into the seat.
I reach under the steering column. “Hand me your knife.”
Aksel props Todd against the car and reaches into his boot, handing me his Ontario knife.
I pop open the panel under the steering column and fumble around for the wires. I clamp the green ignition wire between my teeth, peeling off several centimeters of insulation.
A policeman runs toward us. Lifting a baton from his holster, he waves it wildly.
I strip the red battery wire and the brown starter wire and twist the two together. The lights on the dashboard switch on.
I pull out the choke once to give it some gas. I take the brown starter wire in my left hand and the red and green wires in my right. With my left foot, I engage the clutch, hold only the insulation, and then push both wires together.
In my side mirror, I see Aksel bodycheck the approaching policeman, launching him backward into a row of scooters.
The ignition growls. The engine rumbles. I press on the gas, revving to keep it alive.
Aksel shoves Todd into the back seat and clambers in after him, their two muscular bodies propped up by the narrow confines of the back row.
Another policeman draws closer. A third is behind him. “Durmak!” he yells. Halt!
I shift the car into first gear and whirl the steering wheel hard to the left. I accelerate but the car whines and doesn’t move.
“What’s wrong?” Aksel asks.
“No steering.” I grab Aksel’s Ontario off the front seat, jam it into the column’s metal keyhole, and twist hard. There is a loud crack as the spring unloads and the wheel breaks free. The policeman is two meters away. I palm the wheel hard to the left and accelerate.
From the rearview mirror, I watch the policeman shout into a radio.
Swerving onto Yalibou Road, I grab a half-empty liter of seltzer water from the floor and toss it to Aksel. My head i
s unsteady from the explosion. My ears ring. A thin film of ash and soot covers my shredded clothes.
I failed. After everything … I failed.
“You couldn’t have prevented that explosion, Sophia,” Aksel says, as if I had said the words aloud. He grimaces. “Nobody could have.”
“You saw?” I ask.
“Todd did. He must have realized it the same time as you; he looked between you and Bekami, grabbed the three women standing nearest to him, and dove off the deck into the water right as the blast hit.”
“And the women?” Tears flood my vision, and I wipe my eyes with my sleeve, but then soot gets in my eyes and I have to blink rapidly to flush it out. Blocking the images I just witnessed, I force my breathing to steady, my tears to stop.
Aksel wriggles out of his shirt and tosses it in a heap on the seat. It’s a shredded, ashy mess. He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I pulled them out of the water first, but went back in for Todd. He was barely conscious when I reached him.”
“So, the Koshelek,” I finally say. “What do we do about that?”
“You do nothing,” a gravelly voice mutters from behind me.
“Hey.” Aksel turns his attention to Todd. He has his arm around the back of Todd’s neck, holding him steady as I careen through the streets.
I glance at Todd. “What will you do?” I turn the car hard right. “Bekami dropped that weapon in the cigarette boat before the blast hit. Whoever was in that boat has it now.”
Shivers spread down my limbs. I know I need medical care. Aksel too. Our skin is rosy pink, marked with streaks of black, but our injuries are minor compared to Todd’s.
I downshift and exit west on the Kuludar roundabout. “So, what will you do?” I ask Todd again.
“We find it.” Todd’s words are labored. I push down harder on the accelerator. How? I want to ask. Because I killed Bekami. And what if that was a major mistake? With Bekami gone, how is Todd going to find it?
Aksel’s forehead is tight, watching Todd. He’s ripped his shirt in sections, poured the seltzer water onto each section, and is using the strips to wrap Todd’s temple.
“And if you don’t?” I prompt.
Girl from Nowhere Page 28