Private Moscow

Chapter 49

“Who pays for this?” I asked, gesturing at the huge dining hall.

Leonid, Dinara and I had settled into our rooms. I’d found my holdall on my bed. Leonid had retrieved it from the office where I’d left it when we’d stopped off en route to the US embassy from the airport.

My little room reminded me of a priest’s cell. There was a single bed, a battered old closet, a window that overlooked the snow-covered grounds, an ancient radiator that was scalding hot, and a small sink. The bathroom was shared with eight other residents. I’d taken the opportunity to shower and change immediately, and had emerged feeling much more myself. Dressing in a black sweater and jeans, I’d joined Leonid and Dinara for lunch in the vast dining hall.

“Each according to his means,” Leonid replied. “Everyone gives what they can, and we get money from charity and families, and the government gives a little and the police pension some more. Piece by piece a community is built. Some of the men and women here have jobs, and they pay more.”

He looked at his former colleagues. There must have been over one hundred of them tucking into a rich beef stew with dumplings and potatoes.

“Everyone wants this place to stay open, so we all pay what we can,” Leonid remarked.

“We?” Dinara asked.

“A small contribution buys a lot of goodwill,” he replied.

“I never thought you were sentimental,” Dinara said.

“Not sentimental. Just good old-fashioned self-interest,” he objected, but I could tell he was lying.

His admiration and love for the place was palpable, and with good reason. There was a sense of camaraderie and community that was one of the things most often missed by former cops or service personnel. As I looked at the people seated at the long tables that were spread across the hall, I noticed that no one was being left out. Every single resident was talking to someone and there was no one who didn’t seem to belong.

“Otkrov’s story has found some admirers,” Dinara said, showing me her phone.

She swiped through a number of Russian news sources and a couple of small American ones that had run variations of Otkrov’s sensational allegations that Private was engaged in assassination. “Murder Detectives on the Rampage,” said Citizen’s Bulletin, an alternative news site, and I felt my anger rise as I scrolled through the tawdry article. I’d spent years building Private into the world’s number one detective agency, and all my efforts were being jeopardized by a single, unfounded allegation. If the mainstream media picked up the story, Private could be in real trouble.

My satellite phone buzzed and I pulled it from my pocket and answered.

“Jack, it’s me,” Justine said. “We heard what happened. Are you OK?”

“I’m fine,” I assured her. “You seen the stories about Private?”

“Yes,” she said. “People are just waking up here, so...”

“It’s going to travel further,” I finished her hanging sentence.

“Probably,” she replied. “Our client list makes us newsworthy, and even if the allegations aren’t true, they’re sensational, which is what counts nowadays.”

I couldn’t let anonymous lies threaten everything I’d built.

“Talk to Rafael. See what he can do to shut this story down,” I suggested. The First Amendment protected free speech, but there might be something Private New York’s attorney could do to stop the spread of fake news. “And ask Mo-bot to check the server logs of Otkrov’s blog. See if she can find out who published the article.”

“Will do,” Justine said. “We got a hit on the driver who threw himself off the roof of the Beekman Hotel. His name was Major Ivan Shulgin. He’s a former officer with the First Guards Tank Army. I’ve emailed you his details. His service record fits the profile of an SVR asset.”

“Thanks,” I replied, grateful for our first solid lead.

“Are you sure you’re OK, Jack?” Justine asked. “These are serious people.”

“I’m safe,” I assured her. “I’m with Leonid and Dinara.”

“Dinara?” she asked.

Was that jealousy in her voice?

“Yeah,” I replied. “We’re with friends.”

“Make sure you come home in one piece, Jack,” Justine said. “I’ll do my best,” I replied. “I’ll be in touch,” I added, before hanging up.

“Everything OK?” Dinara asked.

“Looks like the guy from the hotel was SVR,” I replied.

I considered the revelation in light of everything that had happened. If our information was correct, I’d fought and chased a highly trained Russian intelligence operative.

“I think we need to know why we were hired to investigate the death of a customer-service supervisor,” I said. “My guess is our client knew Yana Petrova was Otkrov. I want to find out how he came by that information and what he knows about her killer. I want to meet Maxim Yenen.”