Rasputin's Shadow

17

The concierge came striding out of the elevator toward Sokolov, moving purposefully, a walkie-talkie in his left arm, his right arm extended, his index finger jabbing aggressively at the Russian.

Sokolov faltered back, panicking.

“Sir?” the man bellowed.

The woman. The damn woman in the elevator. She must have called downstairs and ratted me out.

He swung a glance down the corridor behind him, but there was no movement coming from the far apartment.

“Sir!” the concierge called out as he came right up to him.

Sokolov pulled out his gun and waved it wildly at the concierge, cupping its grip in both hands.

“Stop right there. Don’t come any closer. I’ll shoot.”

The concierge stopped in his tracks and held up both his hands in front of him, open-palmed and defensive.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, take it easy, all right? Take it easy.”

Sokolov took another step back, up against the wall, his eyes jumpy as they scoured the corridor in both directions. “Dmitry Rogozin, from the Russian consulate. What apartment is he in? I know he’s on this floor.”

“Sir, calm down-”

“Which one?” Sokolov yelled as he stabbed the air with the handgun.

“Sir, you should know I’ve already called the police.” He held up his radio. “This thing’s live. They can hear everything we’re saying and they’ll be here any minute now. So maybe you should think of getting the hell out of here before it’s too late.”

“Shut up and tell me where he is,” Sokolov barked as he reeled under what the concierge had just told him. Was his radio really live? Would he have called the police already?

He stormed right up to the man, waving the gun excitedly just inches from his face. “Tell me where he is!”

“Sir, you’d better get out of here,” the concierge insisted, his tone steady, his gaze leaping from the gun to Sokolov’s eyes and back.

Sokolov was finding it harder to breathe. What good would it do anyway? Through the turmoil in his mind, he managed to see that even if he knew what apartment Rogozin was in, the Russian would never open his door. Sokolov would have to shoot his way in, and then what? The police would probably be there before he could force him out and he’d end up with a pointless, zero-sum hostage situation, with Daphne still held captive and him ending up in custody or dead.

He took one last look down the corridor, then blew past the concierge and rushed to the elevators. He found one of them there, its door blocked open. He didn’t really understand why that was, but when he got in, he saw a set of keys in the control panel and realized the concierge had locked them open while he investigated what the stranger was doing there.

Sokolov turned the key, pulled it out, and hit the lobby button.

Less than twenty seconds later, he was scurrying up Thirty-sixth Street, his hands in his pockets, his hat pulled right down over his face, hugging the buildings and hoping no one was coming after him.

KOSCHEY DIDN’T HESITATE, DIDN’T FLINCH.

Four pulls of the trigger, in quick succession. Four head shots, one after the other. The whole thing was over in less than four seconds.

He didn’t even bother to stop and check the bodies. There was no need. He knew the damage his bullets would have made, given where he’d placed them. He’d done it many times before, and his aim had never let him down.

He didn’t stop there.

He strode up to the receptionist’s desk, stuck the gun right in the terrified man’s face, its suppressor barrel pressed against his forehead. Koschey brought his other hand up to his mouth simultaneously, his extended index finger positioned in front of his pursed lips.

“Shhhh,” he told the receptionist. Then he moved the finger away from his own face for a more severe “Be careful” gesture.

The man responded with some rapid-fire nodding.

“Room number?” he asked.

The man’s eyes widened, like he wasn’t sure.

“Room number?” Koschey repeated.

“Nine.”

Koschey rewarded him with a third eye.

Then he looked around, made sure the small lobby didn’t have any security cameras-he didn’t expect any in a dive like that-and walked out.

He hadn’t anticipated running into any law-enforcement officers there. That had surprised him. Up until then, it had all gone flawlessly.

The Virgin Atlantic flight from Heathrow.

Breezing through immigration at JFK on the fake Croatian passport.

The Chevy Yukon SUV that had been left for him in the blue garage at Terminal 4-not a rental, nothing that could flag up the fake ID he’d used to come into the country, not in this day and age when you were fingerprinted and photographed at immigration.

The gear that had been placed for him in its trunk.

The address he’d inputted into his Nexus phone.

All flawless.

Then he’d spotted the two operatives and decided they would need to be eliminated. Then the two cops and the two detectives had arrived, further complicating matters. Fortunately, the cops had been dismissed, or he would have had to deal with them, too.

Unforeseen complications-nuisances, really. He knew that killing them would raise the stakes and make things harder for him. American law enforcement officers didn’t hold back when they lost one of their own. Four would make them go ballistic. Koschey knew that.

It didn’t bother him.

Besides, he was pretty sure that before he was done, there’d be other reasons for them to go even more ballistic.

And that didn’t bother him either.

But that would come later.

Right then, he had more work to do.

DAPHNE SOKOLOV WAS HUDDLED in a corner of the small bathroom, shivering.

Her day had turned into a personal hell before it had even begun. She couldn’t understand why this was happening to her. She’d worked through the night at Mount Sinai. It had been a decent shift, with all the patients under her care doing well. Then she’d signed out and left the hospital, anticipating a hot cup of tea and some thyme honey on toast with Leo before he set off to work. Then the insanity had plowed into her life.

The stranger-Russian, she knew-who had intercepted her as she walked to the bus stop, told her he had a gun in his pocket, told her to stay quiet and do as he said if she wanted to see Leo alive again, and forced her into the car that had been trailing just behind them.

The nylon handcuffs with which they’d tied her hands.

The big Band-Aids that locked her eyelids shut.

The sunglasses-they had to be, that’s what they felt like-that they then slipped over them.

The drive, to a destination she couldn’t see.

And, finally, being dumped here, in this grimy, windowless bathroom, of some hotel, she assumed from the look of the place, her eyelids mercifully liberated, her mouth incarcerated in their place, the Band-Aids swapped for a strip of duct tape.

She’d been in there all day, a day that had grown more terrifying by the minute, especially after one of her captors had returned from somewhere where things had gone badly wrong.

He’d come back all shaken and frantic, rambling breathlessly as he tried to tell his partner what had happened.

She’d understood a lot of it. Living with Leo for so long, she’d picked up more than a few words. And what she’d understood had terrified and confused her even more.

The Russian had, it seemed, taken someone he considered his superior to their place. To meet Leo. That, already, stunned her. What did this have to do with Leo? They were supposed to bring Leo back, then the Russian’s superior, whom he referred to as Yakovlev, had crashed out of a window-their window-and fallen to his death. Pushed out by Leo, the Russian believed. Pushed out? By my Leo? The Russian had described Yakovlev’s corpse in grim detail to his compatriot, and although the sight had spooked him, what terrified him even more, it seemed, was how their boss would react to this news.

Their boss, whom they referred to only as kuvalda-the Sledgehammer.

The Russian had finally calmed down and mustered up the courage to call his boss and inform him about what had happened. He’d been given a severe dressing-down-the Russian had recounted it to his partner, word for word. They were told to wait there for further instructions.

That had been hours ago. They hadn’t spoken much since-at least, not in a loud enough voice for Daphne to overhear what was being said, especially not with the TV on. But one thing was clear. They were both clearly terrified of what that failure would mean for them.

Then came the knock at the door.

Daphne froze-as did the two men. She could feel it, even with the door between her and them. She heard a few whispers. They hadn’t been expecting anyone.

She felt a surge of hope. Had the police found her? Was she about to be rescued?

She struggled against her bonds, desperate to at least be able to rip the tape off her mouth, to be able to scream out that she was in there, held prisoner by these two thugs. But it was no use. Her hands were tied firmly behind her back, the clasp hooked into a water pipe that ran along the bottom of the wall.

She calmed down and listened again.

She heard movement in the room. One of the Russians-the one who’d been with Yakovlev-must have gone up to the door of the room. She heard him ask, “Who is it?”

Then came a flurry of chaotic, frenzied sounds.

First, a sharp crack, like something had just punched through the door.

Then a thud, big and dull, something falling to the floor.

A loud crash immediately followed it-a destructive crash, like a door being bashed off its hinges.

Then a brief yell, a metallic snap, another thud.

Then silence.

Daphne’s pulse soared. She was being rescued, she was sure of it. It was the police, or the FBI-had to be. They’d stormed in and incapacitated her kidnappers. Leo must have told them what had happened, and they’d tracked the men down. She was going to be all right. She was going to be reunited with Leo, and everything would be back to normal again.

She kept her eyes trained on the door, her mouth straining against the duct tape, her heart racing in anticipation, waiting for a hero cop to swing it open and untie her and take her out of that horrible prison.

The door did swing open. Only it wasn’t a cop.

It wasn’t anyone she knew. Just a tall, slim man with a bushy goatee and glasses.

And from the look on his face, she knew he was no hero.