Last Snow (48 page)

“Tell them he’s all right,” the voice said. “I’ll bring him out in a minute, just be patient.”

He felt ill and exhausted, as if he’d just returned from a fifteen-round boxing match where his midsection had been systematically
pummeled by Lennox Lewis. Pulling the towel off his face he looked up and saw Kharkishvili grinning down at him. Kharkishvili handed him a glass of water.

“Drink, my friend. After puking up your guts for twenty minutes, you’re seriously dehydrated.”

Jack drank the water, feeling better with each swallow; however, his head thundered and his throat ached. He handed back the glass, which Kharkishvili refilled from a nearly full pitcher.

“What happened?” His voice was a thin, ugly rasp, as if his throat and vocal cords had been seared.

“Poison,” Kharkishvili said. “You were poisoned.” He refilled the glass, handed it back. “Good thing I was in the kitchen when it happened, I’ve had some experience with poisons.” He chucked darkly. “You know, in my line of work—which, I assure you, the less you know about the better for both of us—you need to know many ways to skin a cat.” He waved a sausagelike hand. “The important thing is I got you to swallow water with sugar and salt, which caused you to expel everything in your system.”

“I don’t remember.”

“You wouldn’t, you were raving but not, fortunately, unconscious.” Kharkishvili nodded. “Now drink up and return fully to the land of the living.”

A sudden fear pierced the slowly dissipating fog in his mind. “Alli was eating the same food I was, is she all right?”

“Perfectly. She’s outside, everyone was evacuated while we interrogated the kitchen staff. Please keep drinking.” Kharkishvili refilled his glass. “It wasn’t the food that was tainted, it was your fork.”

“How?”

“Arsenic, an old but reliable methodology.”

“Who, the sous-chef?”

Kharkishvili shook his head. “One of the assistants, we have him in custody.”

Jack drained his glass; he was feeling better with every moment that passed. “How long ago was he hired?”

“I inquired of Magnussen; he was hired six days ago.”

Kharkishvili was proving to be a good man. Jack’s brain, which had felt as if it had been encased in jelly, was functioning again, enough, at least, for him to remember his conversation with the president, who had assured him that, the sanction canceled, no more government agents were in the field.

“I want to speak with him,” he said. He rose, took two tottering steps, and sat back down.

Kharkishvili frowned, making him look something like the ogre in the story of Jack and the beanstalk. “In your condition I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

“Please have Ivan Gurov come in, then bring the poisoner here,” Jack said, a certain snap returning to his voice. “We don’t have time to worry about my condition.”

Kharkishvili nodded and left.

When, in due course, Gurov poked his head in the doorway and asked how Jack was feeling, Jack said, “Ivan, the assassin who followed us here, the one you blew off the road, do you know anything about him?”

“I checked with Passport Control at Simferopol North. His name was Ferry Lovejoy.”

“A government-assigned legend.”

“Ah, yes.” Gurov nodded. “A false name to go with the false papers the American government gives its agents overseas. But, no, I checked with FSB in Moscow. Neither Mr. Ferry Lovejoy nor anyone matching the surveillance photo I took of him is in their database.”

Jack’s mind was working at such speeds that he felt momentarily dizzy. “It’s now more imperative than ever that I speak with my would-be murderer.”

“Mr. Kharkishvili has him outside.”

“Good. But first, please have Alli come in, would you.”

While Kharkishvili went to fetch Alli, Jack put a hand on the porcelain sink and levered himself up. For a moment he stood swaying slightly. He spent his time slowing his breathing in order to get his heart rate back to a normal level. All the while his mind was running full tilt. He now had almost all the pieces to the puzzle, though there were still important gaps to fill in. He hoped he could do that before the deadline of tomorrow night, or was it already tomorrow? He glanced at his watch, but his fall had shattered the crystal face and it had stopped working.

He pulled out his cell phone and that was when he saw that there was one voice mail message. It had been flagged
URGENT
.

A
LLI EMBRACED
him. “Are you all right?” She had arrived before he could pick up the message.

“I’m fine.”

“Then what are you still doing in the bathroom?”

He smiled. “It makes an excellent interrogation cell.” He pulled her closer to him. “Now, listen, in a moment Kharkishvili is going to bring in the man who tried to poison me and I’m going to talk to him. You’ll watch him, listen to him, assuming he says much of anything, which is doubtful. That shouldn’t matter to you, you’ll evaluate his facial and body movements, which will tell me a lot. Okay? Think you’re up to it?”

“Of course I’m up to it.” Her eyes were large and liquid. “I’m just . . . I can’t believe you’ll trust me with this.”

Jack brushed back the fringe of hair from her forehead. “It’s not my trust you can’t believe, Alli, it’s your trust in yourself.”

A moment later Kharkishvili appeared with a slight, dark-haired young man who Jack recognized as one of the kitchen assistants.

“This is the sonuvabitch,” Kharkishvili said, manhandling him
through the doorway. “His name is Vlad, so he says.” He glared at Vlad. “He’s Ukrainian, that much is for certain, the accent is unmistakable.”

“Sit down.”

When Vlad made no move, Kharkishvili pushed him roughly down onto the closed toilet seat.

“You can do whatever you want to me, I’m not going to talk,” the young man said.

Jack ignored him. “Vlad, I’m going to tell you a story. This happened a long time ago, in seventeenth-century Italy. A Neapolitan woman named Toffana marketed a cosmetic, Acqua Toffana. It was a face paint that, as was the custom of the time, made women’s faces very pale, almost white. This Acqua Toffana proved astoundingly successful among the married women of the area, who were counseled by Toffana herself to make sure their husbands kissed them often on both cheeks while they were wearing the makeup. After six hundred of these unfortunate men died, turning their wives into rich widows, the authorities finally discovered that the main ingredient of Acqua Toffana was arsenic. It was the arsenic that gave it its white color.”

He shrugged. “But being an expert poisoner I suppose you know the history of arsenic. However, not expert enough, it seems, because I’m still here.”

Slouched on his uncomfortable plastic seat, Ivan looked at him, trying to seem bored. As befitted his profession he had a thoroughly unremarkable face, except for his eyes, which, when Jack looked closely, were yellowish and slippery as oil. They stared out at the world with what seemed a false stoicism, as if they were lying in wait for the enemy to appear.

“Who do you work for?” Jack said. He waited for an answer, but Vlad said nothing. His surface was as bland, as blank as the surface of polished marble, calm and curiously unconcerned by his incarceration.

“I know it’s not the United States government, Vlad, so do you work for the FSB?” Jack paused again to allow Alli to make her assessment. “Perhaps it’s the Ukrainian Security Service who employs you.”

Another pause; the silence from Vlad was deafening.

He leaned in suddenly, careful not to block Alli’s view. “I know you and Ferry Lovejoy work for the same firm.” He knew no such thing, but he wanted to observe, and wanted Alli to observe, Vlad’s reaction.

Vlad’s brow furrowed convincingly. “Ferry . . . ? I’m not familiar with that name.”

Jack smiled, using his teeth. “You work for Alizarin Global, so did Lovejoy, but he’s dead now. Ivan Gurov blew him off the road to this manor house, didn’t he?”

Kharkishvili grinned wolfishly. “Absolutely.”

“Is that supposed to frighten me, because—”

“Okay, we’ll dispense with the formalities,” Jack said, standing up. “I have neither the time nor the inclination to interrogate you further, so I’m going to hand you over to the Russians, Vlad. Let them deal with you. Believe me, whatever information you have they’ll squeeze out of you.”

Jack made a motion with his head and Kharkishvili hauled Vlad to his feet.

A look of contempt hardened Vlad’s face. “You won’t hand me over to the Russians, you won’t be allowed to do it.”

“Allowed?” Jack said, pouncing on the word. “By whom? Who do you work for, who inside AURA?”

“It’s Andreyev, isn’t it?” Alli had stepped up to stand beside Jack. “You’re taking orders from Vasily Andreyev.”

Vlad spat onto the floor. “Vasily Andreyev is an old fool.”

Kharkishvili cuffed him hard in the back of the head.

“Manners,” Jack said, but Vlad had already revealed as much as he was going to. “Take him away,” he said to Kharkishvili.

When he and Alli were alone, he said, “Tell me what you observed.”

Alli considered. In that moment Jack saw no trace of the overprotected, narcissistic young woman who had been abducted at the end of last year.

“I’d say he definitely works for a private company.”

“What seemed to frighten him, anything?” Jack asked.

Alli’s face tensed in concentration. “One thing: being turned over to the Russians.”

Jack nodded. “That was my impression also, which tells me that the company he’s working for isn’t American, or at least not primarily American.” He gave her an encouraging smile. “Okay, what else?”

“I got the feeling that he doesn’t know Ferry Lovejoy, whoever he is.”

“The assassin who Ivan Gurov killed.” Jack had come to the same conclusion.

Also, who or what was going to stop Jack from handing Vlad over to the Russians?

“And what’s the deal with this mysterious company that sent them?”

“I’m not sure,” Jack said, “but I intend to find out.”

D
YADYA
G
OURDJIEV
parked his comfortably rumpled Zil outside the front door of the manor house just as the first pallid streaks of dawn light cracked open the black-and-blue dome of night. Getting out of the car he shivered in the damp chill air and steeled himself for what was to come.

Magnussen, Glazkov, and Malenko had emerged to welcome him, but not, predictably, Kharkishvili. Though clearly startled by his unplanned visit they nevertheless were warm in their greetings.

As he walked into the entryway he felt himself transported back to the past, back to when he became aware that Oriel Batchuk was
spending an inordinate amount of time at Nikki’s house. That, in fact, was why he had come over unannounced that night, he had hoped to surprise Batchuk and, in front of Nikki, tell him in no uncertain terms to stay away from her and from Alexsei. Batchuk had easily seduced Alexsei with his power, privilege, and his ability to obtain for him the plum cases that had advanced his career, and would continue to do so. By virtue of Batchuk’s magnanimous helping hand the couple had moved out of Alexsei’s cramped one-bedroom into a spacious, light-filled two-and-a-half-bedroom in a luxurious building within walking distance of Red Square. Gourdjiev had also taken note, not without some alarm, that Alexsei had begun wearing made-to-measure British designer suits and Nikki was dressing in the latest Western fashions.

But that night Batchuk was nowhere to be found, instead he walked in on a screaming fight between Alexsei and Nikki. At first no one answered the door, but when he became insistent Nikki opened the door a crack.

He was stunned to see her looking disheveled, her face pale, her carnelian eyes fever-bright. There was a snarl on her lips that she was too upset to hide or modify as she stared out at him. She hadn’t wanted to let him in, had begun to close the door on him when he’d planted his foot on the lintel. Then he’d leaned into the door and pushed it open, stepping inside.

At once Alexsei rushed out of the bedroom where, it seemed, their argument had escalated into a full-scale battle of harsh words, hurled invective, insults, and accusations.

“It’s him, isn’t it!” Alexsei shouted. “How dare you let him in?” When he saw that it was Gourdjiev standing in the entryway, he turned away, but he was hardly mollified. “Now you call your father to take your side.”

“I didn’t call anyone, Alexsei.”

“Liar! You call Oriel all the time!” he shouted as he whirled around.

“He calls me,” she said, “it’s not the same thing.”

“It is if you accept the call.” Alexsei’s lips were drawn back from his teeth.

“You’re making something out of nothing,” Nikki said.

“Do you deny you see him during the day?” he snarled. “Go on, deny it, it would be just like you. Deny it and I’ll have my proof of what sort of woman you are, because I’ve seen you two.”

“You’ve been spying on me?”

“I saw the two of you having lunch, bent over the table together, your foreheads were practically touching, I saw it and there were other prosecutors there as well.”