She now regretted having manipulated him into
paying up, the other day. Sure, it had been her money, but Markov was not
someone who liked to be made a fool of. She had heard rumours that he once
killed a man, but had always assumed they were just that – rumours. He and his
macho friends liked to boast and flash their big guns at one another, but
despite a quick temper, which seemed hard-wired to his fists, she had never
imagined him capable of beating someone to death – let alone his own family.
Now she knew differently, and in her current predicament, that knowledge was
deeply unsettling. Surely the sack was a good sign though - it meant that he
didn’t want her to know where they were going - which presumably meant that he
intended to let her free at some point. But then again, what difference would
it make? She already knew who he was, where he lived, and quite a bit about his
various business interests. What could be so secret about the location used to
intimidate her? Unless of course the sack was just a ruse to increase her level
of fear and disorientation. Could that be it? He just wanted her to be
terrified? This might explain why he wasn’t talking to her now; he would know
that these thoughts would be running around in her head, driving her crazy. Is
that all this was? Just payback for putting him to sleep like a baby in front
of his idiot bouncer. It seemed over the top, even for Sergei, but what else
could he want from her?
Through the cloth, her eyes registered nothing but
the periodic flashing of passing street lamps and the occasional headlight
beams of oncoming vehicles. Gradually these too died away into a rolling monotonous
blackness. The road had changed too – rougher surface and more winding - a
narrower country lane perhaps.
After maybe half an hour, the van made a sharp
left and started to rattle along what felt like a dirt track pitted with ruts
and deep pot holes. Each time the wheels hit such a depression, the van bounced
noisily, flinging her against the hard metal floor. Her whole body now ached in
sympathy with the painfully throbbing jaw.
Finally, they came to a stop, and the side door
slid open, letting in a blast of cold wind and the overpowering stench of a
sewage treatment plant. She was dragged roughly from the van and made to walk
across twenty or thirty yards of what felt like muddy gravel. Through the weave
of the sack she could see the quivering beam of a flash-light on the ground
below. A clink of chains was followed by the grating of rusty hinges, as some
large wooden door shuddered open in front of her. A hard push from behind sent
her stumbling into the dark dank space beyond. The odour of old straw mixed
with that of the sewage. She was out of the wind now, and the space echoed like
a large wooden shed or barn. Suddenly her feet were kicked away from under her
and she crashed to the ground. A pair of hands were rolling her face-down into
the dirt, pinning her by her shoulders, while something was tightened around
her ankles – it felt like another cable-tie. The hands were gone - footsteps
moving away - the door was being closed - again the rattling of chains -
footsteps in the gravel outside getting fainter – now nothing but the wind
gusting around the building. She was alone, she was scared, and she thought of
Doug. He would have tried calling her by now, but the phone had been in her
handbag – now with Markov. Would Doug call the police, or would he just assume
she had ditched him yet again? She hoped the former. But even if he were to
call the police, how would they find her? She knew Markov had several
properties in London and Colchester, but had never heard mention of anything
out in the country.
The ground was cold. Sitting up, drawing her knees
to her chin and then straightening her legs, she found she could shuffle
backwards across the dirt floor. After a dozen such moves, her back met with a
solid wooden surface she took to be the wall. Pushing with her legs, twisting,
and using her tied hands as leverage, she struggled painfully into an upright
position. Swivelling her feet from side to side, and shifting her weight from
toe to heel, she gradually made her way sideways along the wall and towards the
door. An acute pain stabbed her in the back as it caught on something sharp.
Feeling with her fingertips, she realised it was a thin nail protruding from
one of the wooden slats. Something the size and consistency of a large
cockroach, crunched under her foot. She hated bugs even when she could see
them. The sound of the wind grew louder and a cold draft chilled her hands. She
had reached the door. Pushing against it with her shoulders, it gave a little,
then stopped with a clank of chains. She felt through the gap with her fingers,
finding the cold metal links and following them to a heavy padlock. Hearing
footsteps approaching in the gravel outside, she shuffled quickly away from the
door and sat back against the wall. The chains rattled, cold air rushed in and
a light was clicked on.
“There you are!” came Markov’s menacing voice. “You wonder what you doing here,
yes?”
Hands were fiddling with the sack around her neck, and at last it was yanked
off. Nadia blinked, looked up at the Russian’s ugly face and then glanced
around. Behind him, a short, stocky, oriental-looking man with an ominous bulge
under his jacket was pulling the door closed. The place was a large wooden
storage shed with a solitary hay-bale at the far end. A single bulb dangled
from the vaulted roof, swinging slightly with the draft and causing the men’s
shadows to dance erratically on the walls and floor. Markov reached down and
ripped the tape viciously from her mouth, taking with it a thin layer of skin.
He leant over and peered at her face for a few seconds then grabbed her chin
and squeezed. She winced.
“Not broken – yet!” he said. “Now listen to me. I ask questions and you answer.
Any funny business - I hurt you. When I get tired, my friend here hurt you too.
Understand?”
Nadia nodded, looking over at the other man who was now standing sentry-like in
front of the door with arms folded and feet apart. He was obviously trying to
look hard and cruel, but something in his eyes and general demeanour told Nadia
he wasn’t entirely comfortable in the role.
“Why you go to Dmitri house?” asked Markov suddenly.
“Sergei, Dream-Zone is dangerous. Two people have committed suicide, and we
think Dream-Zone made them do it!”
He slapped her hard across the face with the palm of his hand. “You lie. You do
deal with Dmitri to double-cross me and take money for yourself.”
“I don’t care about the money. You can have that lousy ten grand back if you
want, but don’t risk exposing thousands of innocent people.”
The hand twitched, but remained at his side, the man behind shifting nervously.
“No, you lie!” he shouted, kicking her hard in the thigh with the toe of his
boot. “What you tell police?”
“Nothing!”
This time he backhanded her across the other side of her face, his ring tearing
at the skin of her cheek. “What you tell police?” he said again, raising his
voice.
“Nothing! Really! Just that he was a friend who had some computer games we
wanted to borrow. The police here are stupid. They wouldn’t understand anyway.”
Markov had never been able to tell when she was lying. He studied her face for
a few seconds, scowling. She felt a trickle of warm blood run down her chin.
“You not mention me?” he asked, lowering his voice to a snarl.
“Of course not Sergei! Dmitri was a creep. I wouldn’t say he deserved to die,
but I won’t lose sleep over it.”
He looked at her for a moment. “If you lie, you will not live to regret it.”
Standing up straight, he paced around the shed, his fists clenching and
unclenching rapidly.
“Even if Dmitri did want to double-cross you, he’s dead now - and you already
have Dream-Zone - so what do you want from me?” she asked, wishing she had a
hand free to rub her leg.
“Because it’s locked!” he yelled. “I tell him put encryption on Dream-Zone for
one-time demonstration. If Wong like it, he pay me and we give password. If
not, I sell to competitors.”
“So Wong hasn’t seen it?” asked Nadia, confused.
“Wong see demonstration and like it. He pay money – lots of money - and I send
him password - but now password no good. Bastard try double-cross me!”
Nadia was beginning to feel a posthumous fondness for the poor Dmitri. It all
sounded rather too clever for the man she had known, but it at least meant that
Dream-Zone would be safely inaccessible for the immediate future.
“I swear I had nothing to do with that.”
“Maybe not, but now you do!”
“What do you mean?”
Markov pulled Nadia’s phone from his pocket and pointed the camera lens at her.
The loud synthesised click-clack of an old-fashioned camera shutter rung round
the shed and a pleased expression appeared on his face. “Look!” he said,
turning the screen towards her. She looked a mess. A dark purple bruise was
blossoming across her chin, onto which a surprising quantity of blood had
leaked from the jagged gash in her cheek. The skin around her mouth was specked
with red from where the tape had been wrenched off, and the smudged make-up,
combined with dirt from the sack, exacerbated the whole sorry state.
“It’s not the best portrait I’ve ever had!” said Nadia, wondering where this
was all leading.
Markov looked at the photo again and sneered. “You think this is bad? You
better wish your friend Richards can send clean Dream-Zone file in next
twenty-four hour or you never look this good again.”
“What makes you think he’ll do that? He knows that I worked for you, you know –
that I lied to him.”
“I see you two come out of police station - I see how he look at you - I know
that look. When I send this, he do anything I want.”
“Okay, even if he does want to save me, what makes you think he’ll be able to
break Dmitri’s code?”
“Then he make new Dream-Zone file – just like stupid Indian friend.”
Nadia thought hard. This was not going well. She was fairly sure Doug would try
his best, but twenty-four hours was not very long and Markov was looking
desperate enough to do just about anything. In fact, she had never seen him so
desperate. “You know it’s only a matter of time before the police catch up with
you for killing Dmitri,” she said, spotting a flicker of uncertainty on his
face.
“Quiet!” he shouted, slapping her again, but this time not so hard.
“He was a regular at the club,” she continued, “there’s even a photo of you and
him on his Facebook profile.” This was a guess, but it seemed plausible, and
judging by the increasing tension in Markov’s posture, he had bought it.
“Surely you don’t want to add kidnapping to manslaughter! Whatever Wong has
paid you, it isn’t worth that. Just apologise and give him back the money. I’ll
pay you the ten grand back and more if you’ll just let me go. It’ll give you
time to buy yourself a decent alibi.”
Markov was staring at her intently, deep in thought.
“It’s not as simple as that – not anymore,” he muttered in Russian. “Your
boyfriend has twenty-four hours! Now – you stay quiet or I get more tape?”
She shook her head in defeat.
Alone again in the cold, smothering darkness,
Nadia’s thoughts returned to the one person in the world she hoped still cared
about her, and to her surprise, found herself overwhelmed by deep and
comforting feelings of love. Channelling this unexpected emotion, she sent a
silent, heart-felt plea out into the night.
“I seriously think you
should stay away from that Cindy – Nadia - whatever her name is,” said Brian,
placing two new pints on the already crowded table between them. “She has
friends who kill people with their bare hands for Christ’s sake!”
“He’s not her friend, she just … made some bad decisions in the past,” said
Doug, not entirely convinced.
“You’re thinking with your cock again,” said Brian.
Doug ignored the comment and took a long swig of beer. He was tired and still
shaken from the sight of Dmitri earlier that day. He was also concerned at his
inability to reach Nadia since she had dropped him off. Her mobile seemed still
to be switched on, and he was certain she wouldn’t ignore him again – not now –
not after what they had been through. Maybe she had left it in the car, or was
just taking a long bath or something. The image of the Russian’s face returned
to haunt him. He pulled out his phone and checked for messages:
Peter Sawyer has just started following you on
Twitter.
“Ha!” said Doug, “What’s the old fart up to now?”
From his phone, he logged into his Twitter account, and clicked the link to add
himself to Peter’s list of followers – a list, as it turned out, of one. It had
been Kal who had persuaded him to register for the micro-blogging service some
weeks earlier, waxing lyrical about its ability to “wire-tap the collective
consciousness” as he had put it. Doug had played with it a couple of times at
the beginning, but had not logged in since Kal’s death. He read a couple of
Peter’s latest tweets.
“He’s off his rocker!”
“Who’s that?” asked Brian, staring disapprovingly at Doug’s phone. “You know in
some cultures, it’s considered rude to invite one’s friends to the bar and then
ignore them while checking email.”
“It’s Peter. You remember – the guy who came to Kal’s funeral – the brother of
the guy Kal was emailing.”
“Oh yeah – what does he want?”
“He’s just got himself a Twitter account and he’s blurting out all kinds of
gibberish – one here looks to be about quantum physics – another one just says
‘sewage treatment!’ and this …” Doug frowned.
“What is it?”
“There’s one here that says ‘Help Nadia!’ - posted an hour ago.”
At that moment, the handset started to vibrate and bleep loudly. “Ah – speak of
the devil! It’s a picture message from Nadia. Thank God for that!”
“She sending you dirty pictures already?”
Doug smiled at the thought. “Hope so,” he said, waiting for the picture to
download. The image started to build across the screen.
“What’s up?” asked Brian. “You look white as a sheet!”
Doug passed the phone to him and took another drink.
“Oh fuck!” said Brian. “And there’s a message: Check email – 24 hours or she
dies!”
“Let me see!” said Doug grabbing the phone back and quickly switching to email.
There was one new message from an unknown sender and it had a large attachment.