A Spring Betrayal

Chapter 32

I looked over at Otabek, who was concentrating on his pizza.

“So?” I said, once again unsure if Saltanat shared everything she knew, or if I was just a useful sidekick. “You know about this all-powerful pervert?”

“Let me tell you about Morton Graves,” Saltanat said, “and then you’ll have some idea what we’re up against.”

She screwed up the bank statement and placed it in the ashtray in front of us, using her lighter to set fire to one corner. I watched as the paper started to char, smolder, then burn, the flame eating the numbers, until black ash remained. Otabek stared at the flames, drank the rest of his milk, taking huge gulps. The pizza had vanished, so I guessed feeding him hadn’t been a priority for Morton Graves.

Saltanat ground the ashes into powder and looked across at me.

“We don’t want to be caught with any evidence of breaking and entering, do we? And it’s not as if having a bank account is illegal.”

“Even a rich man’s bank account?”

“Especially one of those,” Saltanat replied.

“So who is this man?”

Saltanat sipped at her beer, lit another cigarette, offered me her pack. For the ten thousandth time, I decided I was going to give up and shook my head.

“Morton Graves is an American citizen, although he hasn’t lived in the States for over twenty years. He’s been here in Bishkek for the last ten years, and his visa application describes him as a ‘businessman and entrepreneur.’”

“And you know this, how?” I asked.

Saltanat looked at me with the pitying glance she saved for my more foolish questions.

“Telepathy? Astrology? Educated guesses? If your ministry had any more leaks, you’d run out of buckets. And we like to keep a friendly eye on our neighbors.”

I nodded. Central Asia isn’t noted for principles before payments, and most upright citizens would dip their beaks if it meant a few som in their pockets.

“He has businesses here?”

“And Almaty, Tashkent, even Dushanbe; he’s a big player in the region. He’s a major investor in telecoms, cotton in Kazakhstan, a private bank in Uzbekistan, hotels, supermarkets, a couple of restaurants, precious metals, anything that wets his palm.”

“Drugs? Heroin, krokodil?”

Saltanat shrugged, took another mouthful of Baltika, watching the bubbles simmer in the glass, tracing the condensation with a single scarlet-tipped finger.

“Rumors, but no one’s ever proved anything. And if he’s connected to the drug trade, then it would have to be with the consent of the Circle of Brothers. Payoffs, a quiet word in the right ear at the right time.”

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a lot of the criminal gangs in the former “stans” grouped together in a loose collective called the Brothers’ Circle. Each of the countries has their own crime boss sitting at the table with their foreign counterparts, doling out territories, alliances, joint operations in information, not just in Central Asia but in Europe, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East, the UAE in particular. Drugs are the big money-spinner, but they branch out into robbery, prostitution, counterfeiting, smuggling, anything else that can make money and isn’t legal. Devotion is absolute: break the rules and the only question is just how long it will take you to die, and how painfully. Even the Russian gangs admit to being lightweight in comparison.

The Circle’s possible involvement wasn’t the best news I’d ever heard, especially since I’d been involved in the assassination of Maksat Aydaraliev, the local crime boss in Bishkek. If Graves was linked to the Circle, he probably wasn’t a very nice man.

I looked over at Saltanat, felt the weight of the iPhone in my pocket, the weight of its contents heavy on my conscience.

“I suppose Tynaliev knows who he is,” I said. “Maybe even does business with him?”

“You think you’re being set up by him?” Saltanat asked.

Now it was my turn to shrug. I thought about the films I’d seen, gaping mouths with screams torn out of their throats, the eyes filled with dread, knowing there was no help or hope left. I saw how the knives filleted slices of flesh, rivulets of blood spilling over the chains and leather straps that held the children down. The weeping, the pleading, and then, finally, resignation, eyes filming over as death approached.

“It doesn’t matter. Only one thing does.”

I wasn’t surprised at the anger in my voice. I could see the masked man smiling, enjoying the degradation, the terror, the despair. The glint of camera lights off the blade, and then the blood.

“I want the bastard who did all this. Not to send him to court so he can buy his way out. Not to a comfortable cell with three meals delivered a day.”

I paused, wondered about another cigarette, decided against it. I stood up, wincing at the pain in my shoulder. Somehow that didn’t seem important. In fact nothing seemed important, except for one thing.

“I want him under the ground. And I want to be the one who puts him there.”

“How are you going to do that?” Saltanat asked. “He’s got connections from here to Moscow, maybe even further.”

“First of all, I’m going to rattle some cages, give our Mr. Graves something to worry about. Push a few buttons, stir the shit, watch what happens.”

I took the iPhone out of my pocket, dialed a now-familiar number.

“He’ll kill you,” Saltanat warned.

“Not if I kill him first,” I said, rewarding her with a smile that stopped somewhere south of my cheekbones.

The phone rang and was answered.

“I imagine that so far this evening has cost you some time,” I said, “trouble, and perhaps even a little expense.”

There was only silence at the other end of the phone. The silence when the wolves are about to attack the sheep, when the farmer’s finger tenses on the trigger.

“We’ve both learned something tonight. You’ve learned I’m not in this for the money, and I’m not an amateur.”

“And what have you learned?” The Voice, dark, menacing, storm clouds looming over the Tien Shan mountains.

“I’ve learned who you are, Mr. Graves. Where you are.”

I paused for effect. Saltanat stared at me, perhaps wondering if I’d lost my senses.

“And most worrying for you, what you are.”

And I listened as the phone went dead.