A Spring Betrayal

Chapter 25

We lay fully clothed on the double bed, having checked into the Roza Park Hotel and demanded a suite. I’d produced my police ID, which got a favorable discount as well as the promise that we had the best room in the place. We’d walked up the stairs, holding hands, locked the door behind us, decided it was time to talk.

“I never thought I’d see you again,” I said. “Not after you killed Sariev and disappeared.”

“No?”

“I thought you’d decided ‘Mission Accomplished’ and gone back to your life.”

“I knew I couldn’t stay in Bishkek, not then. I didn’t know what had happened to you, and murdering a serving police officer wouldn’t have gone down well with your people, would it?”

“I don’t think too many people were upset by Sariev taking the long trip. They probably had a ‘free beer all night’ celebration in every bar in Bishkek,” I said.

“Were you angry with me?” she asked, her eyes never leaving my face, searching for signs of hesitation.

I thought about it for a moment.

“Hurt. Confused,” I said. “Scared you might kill me. Afraid you might leave me. Which you did.”

“But I’m back now,” she said, and kissed the corner of my mouth. Her breath was sweet on my face. I pulled her toward me, but she put her hands on my chest, laughing, fending me off.

“We’ve got work to do,” she said, and walked toward the bathroom. “I need to shower. I might even save you some hot water.”

I emerged from the bathroom to find Saltanat already asleep, fully clothed, on top of the bed. I lay down beside her and drifted off into that aimless half-sleep that you fall into in the middle of the day.

It was still light when Saltanat shook me out of a confused dream about being trapped in a maze of thorn bushes. My mouth was dry, sour, and I regretted the absence of a toothbrush.

“We have to go back to Bishkek,” she said. “I’ll tell you about it on the way.”

I winced. I love my country as much as the next Murder Squad detective, but that doesn’t mean I want to bounce up and down for hundreds of kilometers on twisting mountain roads twice a week.

We took the stairs down to the hotel lobby, handed the key in to reception. Outside, we stopped to savor the sunshine’s warmth, the pale blue sky above us.

“The iPhone is state of the art,” Saltanat said. “The e-mails and contact numbers are all encrypted, impossible to crack, supposedly.”

“So what did you find?” I asked.

“All incoming calls were from a blocked number,” Saltanat answered. “And any attempt to reopen any sent or received e-mails automatically deleted them.”

“So we’ve come all this way for nothing?” I said.

“Not quite,” she replied. “He managed to trace the blocked number.”

I raised an eyebrow, not liking the idea of Uzbek security operating on Kyrgyz soil.

“It’s a Bishkek number, and we’ve located an address.”

“And a name?”

“Not yet. That’s why we have to go back to the city, stake the place out. Once we know the name, you can start kicking down doors.”

I was about to suggest that perhaps with her contacts, she could find a way of getting me on a plane without my name getting flagged and a squad car waiting to arrest me.

But then the shooting started. Again.