David Duffy - In for a Ruble

She’d leaned forward, pushing the gun in my direction at the start, but she backed off, resuming the impassive state, finger relaxed on the trigger guard, off-kilter grin on her face. She didn’t react to my question. The answer wasn’t important—to her or to me.

I went back to English. “You strung Andras along while he worked his way through ConnectPay’s system and into the BEC. You got him to steal the three million in August. Had him make it look like Uncle Efim was cheating his partners, right?”

The off-kilter grin widened.

“You waited to see what happened. Nothing did. So you hit them again for five mil at Thanksgiving. Still nothing. You were frustrated. You were setting your uncle, dad, and stepdad against each other, but they weren’t biting, or so you thought. You were impatient. Plenty was happening, behind the scenes, you just couldn’t see it. Your uncle traced the hack—to Andras’s dad. They started digging into his company, his family. Karp came over to New York. He already knew Uncle Walter, of course, and he got him to put a bug on the computers at the Leitz office.

“Something else you didn’t know—your father was running his own scam. He’d figured a way to rip off BEC clients, starting with ConnectPay, in a way they wouldn’t notice—and couldn’t do much if they did. Only he wasn’t cutting in his partners. He was going solo. Uncle Efim discovered that scam when he was looking for your thievery. I’ll ask again—when was the last time you talked to your father?”

She shook her head.

“You can’t hide, Irina. A week ago, two? At Christmas? You were in Moscow at Christmas. You must have seen him.”

She nodded hesitantly. I had her attention now

“I hope you said an affectionate good-bye. They pulled his body from under Moscova ice three days ago. He had a fireplace poker through his chest.”

“NO! YOU LIE! CHEKA PIG!” She flipped onto her knees, leaning forward, pushing the barrel toward me. No more than six feet away.

CRACK!

She jumped.

I dove.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Two handguns, two shotguns. More shots. Then silence.

I looked up from the floor. Irina knelt in the chair, swinging the twelve-gauge wildly, her finger on the trigger, wrapped tight. She fought the urge to go the window. I kept my mouth shut and body still, hoping she’d forget all about me.

Quiet outside, except for the whistling wind. A minute passed, then three, then five. Irina was fixated on the front door. I thought again about making a lunge for the gun, but I wouldn’t get halfway there.

Another five minutes passed. She unbent her knees and flopped back into her chair. The shotgun stayed steady. When she got settled, I worked myself ever so slowly back up to the ottoman. She watched me from the corner of her eye. When I got seated, she swung the gun over to let me know not to move again.

Voices outside, stamping feet. The front door swung open and Efim Konychev walked in. He flicked a switch, and I blinked in the light. He was wearing an overcoat and carried a large automatic in his right hand. His left shoulder was soaked in blood, but he wasn’t showing any pain. Irina swung the shotgun halfway between us.

“Hello, Irina,” he said. “Not a very welcoming reception. Those men are dead, by the way. What’s the matter? You don’t love me anymore?”

Behind Konychev stood Karp, holding a shotgun of his own. He closed the door as his eyes swept the room, taking in the layout, the girl, the gun, and coming to rest on me.

He grinned.

Konychev did his own survey of the room.

“I’ve seen you before.” He spoke Russian.

No benefit in bringing up where.

“I remember,” he said. “Tverskaya. You were passing by. You have a talent for being in the wrong place.”

“A lying, fucking zek, ” Karp said. “I told you about him.”

“He’s that one?”

Karp nodded.

“You’ll take care of it,” Konychev said.

“He’s dead.” Another grin.

Foos listens to a bluegrass song about dealing cards with death—the joker’s wild, the ace is high. Irina was the joker in this game, maybe my ace in the hole and my one hope for coming out alive, if I played her right.

“Where’s your boyfriend?” Konychev asked.

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

I felt a twinge for Andras.

“Think I give a shit? Where is he?”

“Ask him.”

He stayed with her. “Call him.”

“You can’t tell me what to do.”

“You and he have caused a great deal of trouble with your stupid games.”

“You had it coming.”

Most kids would have sounded petulant, not to mention terrified. She didn’t. She sounded vengeful—and mean.

“Get her phone,” Konychev said to Karp.

Irina raised the twelve gauge. “Don’t.”

Karp and his boss stayed where they were.

“Don’t bother,” I said. “Kid doesn’t have a phone. Have a good trip to Jersey, Fish Face?”

Karp glared. Konychev contemplated. I think Irina almost smiled. She didn’t like Karp any more than I did.

Konychev took another look around the room. “Where are the servers?”

Irina shrugged. “Not anywhere you’ll find them.”

“They’re no use to you,” he said.

“You want them, I have them.”

“Irina, what are you so angry about? What have I done?” His voice was all saccharine now. Irina wasn’t buying any of it.

“I WILL NOT BE TREATED LIKE A STUPID GIRL!”

“Irina…”

“I know exactly what you’ve been doing. And with whom!”

The joker was taking the shape of a jealous queen.

“Enough! Where are the servers?” Konychev said.

“She doesn’t have them,” I said. “You fucked that up too, Fish Face. Stupid pizda .”

Karp’s eyes told me I didn’t have long to live.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Konychev said.

“What I said. You need better help.”

“You have them?”

“That’s right.”

“I don’t know your game, but you’re bluffing.”

“No bluff. I’m going to reach very slowly into my jacket for some papers.”

Karp raised his shotgun until it was pointed squarely at my head. Hope filled his face.

I pulled my jacket open in slow motion while I extracted the Kinko printout. I tossed the folded pages across the room. They landed at Konychev’s feet. Shotgun steady, Karp knelt and picked them up.

Konychev grabbed them. His face darkened.

“What do you want?”

“Take Fish Face and beat it. I’ll be in touch.”

“I don’t think so. I credit your industriousness. But you’re compromised like everyone else. You tell me where to find the servers. I make sure no harm comes to your lady friend.”

“Lady friend?”

“The charming U.S. attorney who has been my hostess these last few weeks. You can’t protect her. Not if you’re dead. Karp will take care of her as soon as he’s done with you.”

No time now to think about how he came to have that information. I could only hope there would be later. Or that it wouldn’t be necessary.

“Maybe he’d like to watch,” Karp said.

“Maybe he would,” Konychev said.

“Suppose she already has them?” I said.

“That would be unfortunate.”

I sat on my hand.

“We seem to have arrived at a temporary stalemate,” he said. “But we have two guns, she has one, you have none. You have no friends here. Any way this plays out you lose.”

I did have that joker. Time to put it into play.

“Let’s go back to Sunday. Batkin’s house. Who were your men shooting at?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”