Private Moscow

Chapter 33

I kneed the driver in the gut and he tumbled forward and rolled off me. I snapped to my feet and aimed a punch at his head, but he turned and I caught his shoulder. He fell backwards and I ran into the alleyway to see the Dodge’s burning taillights arc round the corner and vanish north on Beekman Street. I had no hope of catching the assassin, but the getaway driver was still within my reach.

I ran into the building to find him on his feet, sprinting along the corridor. He burst through the fire door leading inside and bounded up the stairs. I raced after him and shoved the fire door so hard the sound of it crashing into the wall startled the man. He glanced down at me from one flight up, and redoubled his efforts. I bounded up the steps two at a time, and pushed myself off the wall when I came to the first landing. The driver was a little over a flight above me, and I could hear his labored breaths between his pounding steps. He was getting tired and I was gaining on him.

We ran on, climbing the stairs at a punishing pace. My legs burned and my lungs screamed at me to stop, but there was no way I was giving in. This man was a living connection to the assassin who’d murdered my friend. I pushed myself on and finally closed the gap when we reached the landing between the seventh and eighth floors.

He glanced over his shoulder, saw me coming and tried to lash out with a kick, but mistimed it, so I sidestepped his attempt and surged forward, grabbed him around his midriff and put my bodyweight against it. He toppled over and hit the deck and we got right to it.

I drove a fist into his face as he tried to get up, and he went down again, but he wasn’t out. He sprang to his feet and caught me with a knee to the ribs that knocked the wind from my chest. I stepped back and he scrambled up the steps. This was no street brawler. Some of his moves were Krav Maga; others were aikido. Not the repertoire of a political activist.

I raced on, following him up the stairs, and when he reached the eighth floor he yanked the fire door open and sprinted into the carpeted corridor beyond. I chased him through one of the hotel’s executive floors and he tried to block the corridor by pulling over marble-topped tables and pot plants. I jumped the obstacles and followed him into a stairwell on the other side of the building. As I bounced off the bannister, I heard a voice yell, “Jack!”

I glanced over the rail and saw Justine a long way down.

I sprinted on. We were near the roof now, and I heard the metallic rattle and clang of the stairwell door opening. I ran up the last flight and burst through the metal fire door onto a wide, flat roof.

A blinding flash and an explosive ringing in my ears told me I’d been hit, even before the pain started, and as I staggered forward, I turned to see the driver wielding a chair, taken from a stack behind the stairwell. He swung again, but I jumped out of range. I slipped on a layer of ice that lay beneath the soft powder covering the rooftop, and my sudden stumble saved me from another blow. As the chair whipped over my head, I powered forward and tackled my assailant. He fell backwards and dropped the chair as he hit the deck. I punched him in the ribs and the second time I did it, I felt something crack, and he yelped in pain.

I swung again, but he kicked me, catching me in the chest. I staggered back and he got to his feet. I grabbed the chair and drove its legs forward. One of them struck him in the face like a pool cue and his nose gushed blood. He pulled his mask off and I saw the mess he was in. His face was bloodied and he’d lost a number of teeth. His eyes were rolling and he was having trouble focusing.

“It’s over,” I said.

He wiped his bloodied face with his hand and I noticed the scar of an old bullet wound on his cheek. This was a man who’d survived being shot in the face.

“It’s never over,” he said with a grotesque grin. As with the assassin, there was no mistaking this man’s Russian accent.

He fumbled in his pocket for something, and, thinking he was going for a weapon, I lashed out with the chair. One of the legs caught him on the ear and he dropped whatever had been in his hand as he stumbled. I looked down and saw something small and black in the snow. A plastic square about the size of a book of matches. The driver was looking at it too. He tried to lunge for it, but I hit him again and he fell back.

“Give up,” I said.

He reached a decision and suddenly ran away from me, toward the giant rooftop skylight that hung over the bar.

“No!” I yelled.

He jumped, sailed through the air and crashed into the skylight. The glass shattered, the frame splintered, and I ran over and watched him flailing as he fell nine stories and smashed into one of the ornately decorated banquet tables far below.