Zhukov's Dogs (12 page)

Of course they’re on the same floor as the study. Fantastic
. We lingered on the stairs for a minute longer in case they decided to abruptly change rooms on us again. I gestured for Val to follow as I stood up and climbed the rest of the way to the second floor.

The door to the study was on the far end of the hall and, fortunately, in the opposite direction of the one the governor and his wife occupied. It was unlocked, too. Val found the light switch while I headed straight for the desk. It was far too neat of a workspace; not even the slightest sign of wear was present to suggest the governor did any actual work here. I retrieved the box tucked in my bag and set it in the center of the perfectly polished desk.

When I turned to receive praise for my success, or at least flash a triumphant grin, I saw Val was no longer in the room with me. The door to the hall stood wide open. My first instinct was he’d left me to be caught. I knew Val wasn’t my biggest fan or anything, but I didn’t think he hated me enough to have set this all up.

The loud creak of a stair echoed down the hall. I raced out to see my deserter-companion climbing the stairs to the third floor. Quickly, I turned off the light in the study and shut the door behind me on the off chance the governor stepped out of his room. By the time I reached the stairs, Val was already halfway up. I took the steps two at a time and seized him by the arm.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded.

“Go wait outside, Nik.”

“Are you trying to get caught?”

“It’ll only take a minute,” he said a fraction too loud.

I threw my free hand over Val’s mouth before he could wake up the whole damn city. He shoved my hand away and twisted his arm out of my restraint. I tried to grab onto him again, but Val flew the rest of the way up the stairs with no regard for the noise his steps made.

I threw my hands up and chased after him, grumbling to myself, “Unbelievable.”

Val slowed down when he neared the end of the hall. I caught up with him as he stopped in front of a closed door. He held his hand out toward me and said, “Give me the knife in your pocket.”

“What for?”

“Just give it to me!”

I put a finger to my lips and urged him to lower his voice. “Keep it down. How about you tell me what you want it for, and
then
you can have it.”

“It’s none of your… Fine. Forget it.” His hand dove into his jacket and pulled out his cheap pistol. I lunged to disarm him, but Val threw open the door and rushed inside. I ran into the room after him without second thought. Yellow lights from the factories across the canal seeped through gauzy curtains and illuminated the large bedroom just enough so everything was outlined, including a boy who sat up in bed when the door hit the wall. Val raised the gun to fire.

“Wait! Don’t!” shrieked the boy.

I threw one arm around Val’s shoulders and lunged for his wrists with the other. Val fought back, thrashing and cursing out loud as I forced his aim away from the boy. The lamp near the bed switched on. I looked at the terrified teenager Val almost killed.

The fear in the boy’s face faded into confusion and then, for some reason, amusement. “Val?”

Val only responded by spitting in his direction.

“Charming as ever,” the boy said with a small laugh. He rose from bed and tied his robe shut, way too calm for someone who’d just had a gun pointed at him. “What are you doing here? Did you miss me that much?”

“Screw you!” Val shouted. Somehow he gained a sudden burst of strength and almost broke out of my restraint. I barely managed to hold him back. Val was determined to kill this guy. But why?

Quickly I looked the boy up and down for anything which might make sense of it all. I remembered the governess saying something about a son, but at the time, I’d thought very little of him. Looking him over now, I thought even less of him. Nobody should be able climb out of bed with brown hair impeccably coiffed and no signs of drowsiness in their expression. I could spend three weeks on paid vacation and not look half as polished.

A cursive monogram on the pocket of his expensive robe read:
T.G.
Tristan Granne? That explained Val’s brash behavior. This was the Tristan that Tibbs mentioned on the train earlier.

Tristan smiled at us, flashing his perfectly straight teeth as he tucked his hands into his pockets. That pretentious certainty we weren’t going to hurt him was really getting under my skin. I would shoot him myself if he didn’t stop smiling soon.

“Who’s your new friend?” Tristan asked casually. “He’s cute.”

The comment caught me completely off-guard. Val took advantage of my stupor. He ripped his wrist out of my hand and pointed the gun at Tristan. Val’s finger closed around the trigger as my arm went around his throat. It wasn’t enough to stop Val firing, but it did throw his aim off. The bullet struck the wall above the bed.

Tristan screamed like he’d actually been shot. His faultless facade crumpled into trembling terror as he ran from the room. “Help! Somebody help!”

Long and loud, as though he’d just heard the best joke of his life, Val laughed. I shoved him away from me and pulled the gun out of his hands, putting it into my bag before he tried anything else stupid. “What the hell was that?”

“We should probably run,” Val said, waving a hand to fan himself as his laughter subsided. He went to the window and opened it up wide enough for us to fit through. Feet thundered down the hall. I ran over to the door and shut it, locking it to bide time, then rushed back to join Val at the window. It was a long way to the ground, but what other choice did we have?

Bullets pierced the door as I followed Val onto the steep slant of the roof. Almost immediately, Val’s footing slipped and naturally, because he hadn’t caused me enough trouble or pain, he grabbed my arm as he fell. It was a bumpy slide, roof shingles scraping and bruising, and then all at once dropping out from underneath me as I fell from the third floor to the second. I sat up in time to see where the roof dropped off again. Beyond that, all there was left was the ground.

The second my feet hit the faux grass, I looked up. Val flew from the roof after me and landed, feet first in a well-maintained flowerbed, before staggering forward into a hedge shaped like a bear.

“They’re over here!” yelled a suit from the corner of the house. He was joined by three others. I ripped Val out of the hedge and shoved him toward the fence, taking off after him in a dead sprint.

“Don’t worry.” He laughed. “They couldn’t hit us even if we stood still.”

I didn’t want to test the theory. Val reached the fence first and started climbing. He didn’t get to the top quite as fast as before, I noted. The wound on his shoulder was slowing him down. From the top of the fence, I spotted the two suits who had stood guard at the front gate. They ran along the outside of the fence to cut us off. As close as they were, there was no way they’d be able to miss. I jumped from the fence, already reaching for my gun when Val grabbed my wrist and started running straight at them.

The suits looked just as confused as I was. Val laughed as we plowed between them, knocking them off balance. We were heading right for the canal when he shouted, “Jump!”

I’d have rather taken my chances against a hundred armed suits than jumped into the murky water. It was freezing. Ten times colder and twenty times slimier than it looked. I kept getting shoved underwater by the swift current, caught in twisting torrents which threw me in one direction then another.

When my head broke the surface, I gasped in rancid-smelling air which burned my nose. I scanned my surroundings for Val, or at least a way out of the canal, only to be forced back under as I started to call his name. The mouthful of water I got was even fouler than the air. I would have choked if a sharp change in current hadn’t slammed me against the wall and knocked the breath out of my lungs. My fingers dug into the uneven cement, and I pushed off of it, breaking the surface again.

I hacked up the water in my lungs and opened my eyes in time to spot a set of stairs past the bridge ahead. Swimming was not one of my strengths, but I somehow managed to reach the ledge and haul myself up onto the concrete. I scooted back to lean against the uneven wall. My teeth chattered in my head—hell, my entire body shook—and there wasn’t enough Listerine left in the world to get the taste of the canal water out of my mouth. Soaked to the bone, bruised, and battered, I came to the conclusion that I truly, truly hated Seattle.

I startled as a set of hands grabbed onto the ledge next to me, and Val struggled to pull himself out. As much as I wanted to shove him back underwater, I heaved him out of the canal with what energy I could spare.

Val sprawled out across the stairs and stared up at the distant ceiling of the underground. He coughed and rolled over to spit in the canal. When he sat up, he pushed the sopping bangs out of his eyes and shook his head slowly. He spat into the canal again before saying, “We can’t stay here. Granne’s men will come down the river looking for us.”

“Great,” I mumbled.

“Oh, don’t bitch. At least we’re alive.”

I snorted in response. I was too mad to even speak to him anymore. Val got to his feet and held his hand out to help me up, like it would somehow make up for everything he’d just put me through. Had I not been frozen and exhausted, I might have been stubborn enough to refuse.

We climbed the stairs and walked through the city without a word to each other, our wet shoes squishing with every step. The few people still on the street this late looked either homeless or too drunk to stagger home. They curled around broken streetlamps and tucked themselves in the corners of shop doorways, faces hidden from sight. All cities had their bums, so I didn’t pay much mind to them. The further we walked, though, the more people I saw sleeping outdoors or wandering aimlessly down dark streets.

I knew that for the sake of my mission, I needed to understand the way the city worked. Was there a reason for all the people in the street? Were they there by choice? Even though I was less than thrilled with how he’d mucked up things at the governor’s home and dragged me along for an impromptu swim, I needed Val to explain.

Before I could let go of my stubbornness, Val cleared his throat. I looked over to find him staring at me. He turned away and mumbled, “Yeah, there’s a lot of them.”

“Why are there so many?”

“Times are hard, Nik. Not everyone down here is healthy enough put in the long factory hours.” Val let out a heavy sigh and looked up at the ceiling as he added halfheartedly, “And, of course, there are those who’ve just plain given up.”

I scowled. “Given up?”

“Don’t sound so offended.” Val lowered his voice as we walked past three women sleeping in a drugstore alcove. One of them lifted her head and stared at us until we were around the corner. He continued, “Living underground in a city with no sun, no prospects, and an oppressive douchebag for a governor makes people depressed… Me and the others, we’re trying to change all that. Make life easier.”

“One broken Fabergé egg at a time?”

“That was just for fun. We’re a lot more organized when it comes to the real deal,” Val said with a grin. I waited for him to elaborate on exactly what “more organized” entailed, but he didn’t say anything more.

The silence that settled between us, and the cold wind which swept behind me, reminded me why I was mad at Val in the first place. The cupboard, Tristan, and the unpleasant swim through the canal. By the time we reached the monorail station and collapsed on a bench to wait for the train, I was fuming. I removed my bag and peeled my coat away from the rest of my body, dropping both on the end of the bench with a loud, soggy plop. To my right, Val snickered.

“What about this do you find funny?” I asked.

“There’s something in your hair,” Val said. He reached over and worked a slimy brown weed, a gross souvenir from the canal, out of my bangs. He held it up with small smile. I wasn’t amused. Val tossed the weed onto the tracks, and silence settled between us once again.

If he thought I was going to ignore what happened, he was sorely mistaken. A breeze blew through the station and sent shivers up my spine. I folded my arms over my chest to try and trap in what warmth I could as I asked, “What was that back there?”

Val said nothing. I glanced over and saw him staring at the weed on the tracks, eyes unfocused. The guy was lost somewhere in his own head, and the longer he stayed silent, the more impatient I became. I swung a leg over to the other side of the bench, turning toward him. “Hey, I’m talking to you! What the hell happened to just leaving the governor a surprise?”

“That was the plan,” Val said, still refusing to look at me.

I didn’t care the conversation was making Val uncomfortable. I’d just put my life on the line because of him, so I deserved an explanation. “Yeah? Well, then why’d you go off and try to kill his son?”

“Tristan… Tristan used to be one of us,” Val admitted. It surprised me he was opening up without a fight. His throat bobbed as he swallowed hard, and his fingers drummed on the underside of the bench. “We trusted him. None of us suspected he was spying on us for his dad.”

“Funny. You don’t strike me as a very trusting person.”

The drumming of his fingers paused. Val opened his mouth, suggesting he was about to say something, only to reconsider at the last minute and shut it again. It took several seconds to finally get the words out. “That’s his fault.”

The deliberate avoidance of eye contact, the idle fingers, stiff shoulders, and weighty implication carried in those three words told me one thing. Val was gay. He looked at me out of the corner of his eye, probably expecting some kind of reaction other than the indifference I exhibited.

A small number of the dogs I worked with were gay, if not openly then presumably. Personally, it didn’t bother me. Amongst the older generation of officers, though, there had always been a certain stigma associated with homosexuality in the military, which kept anyone from really talking about it.

“Don’t worry,” Val said, waving one hand at me dismissively while the other began tapping on the bench again. “You’re not my type.”