David Duffy - In for a Ruble

“Sure you do. So does Irina. You weren’t trying to kill him, were you?”

He caught it. So did she. She straightened in her chair.

“You wouldn’t murder Batkin, however much you might want to. He told me the same about you. The Kremlin won’t allow it. You two have a deal—Kremlin enforced. You’re not dumb enough—or angry enough—to buck that. Your men were shooting at Irina. You’re on tape cursing them for missing her. Fuck that up too, Karp? You’re building quite a track record.”

I glared at him to make the point. He glared back with an intensity that told me I was on the right track.

“I heard the tape, just this afternoon. You don’t mince words, Efim Ilyich. ‘ We won’t get another shot at that used-up cunt. I should have finished her when I did her old man. She’s just an old whore anyway. I’ve had more fun in a brothel. ’”

Irina said, “Efim?” Her voice was barely audible. Beneath the word was a tone of steel.

Konychev said quickly, “Irina, you have no idea… Don’t listen to him. He’s only…”

“STOP!”

“Has Uncle Efim told you about what happened that night on Tverskaya?” I asked.

“What?”

“The girl in the car. Tamara Konycheva, your cousin. I was there, like he said. I saw her. Three bullet holes in her back.” I looked at Konychev. “You were having a good time in the back of that Mercedes. She get you off before she bought it?”

“He’s lying, Irina! He doesn’t know anything.”

The shotgun swung in his direction.

“She was dressed for a night on the town, Irina. Dress, makeup, plenty of cleavage. How old was she, Konychev? Fourteen? Thirteen? What’s too old for you, by the way?”

“You bastard… You told me…”

“Nothing’s too young for Uncle Efim,” I pressed. “You know that, Irina. This isn’t the first time he’s cheated on you? He keeps saying you’re the only one, but he keeps sticking it in younger girls, doesn’t he? How many times has he lied to you?

“You bastard. You fucking bastard.”

She said it to me, but she meant it for him. I kept my eye on her trigger finger.

“Irina don’t listen. He’s manipulating you. You know I love you.”

“SHUT UP!”

The shotgun wavered. Karp moved.

“DON’T!” I yelled.

The gun steadied—on Karp. “Back off, fucker,” she said.

Karp took a step back.

“Is… Is it true?” she said. “Was Tamara in the car?”

“Irina, he’s only trying…”

“IS IT TRUE?”

“It’s on Ibansk.com,” I said. “You follow that, don’t you, Irina? Posted yesterday. Ivanov says Tamara was the girl in the car.”

“IS IT TRUE, YOU BASTARD?”

“Irina, listen, I can explain. That’s not what this is about.”

“Tell me she wasn’t there.”

“Irina…”

“NO! Tell me she wasn’t there. TELL ME!”

“She wasn’t there.”

He wasn’t convincing. She wasn’t buying.

“Bastard! Lying bastard!”

“If you don’t want to talk about Tamara, how about her father?” I said.

Two heads swung toward me. Karp didn’t budge. He was looking for an opening.

“I told Irina how his body was pulled from the Moscova three days ago. Fireplace poker through the chest. By the time that happened, he was happy to die. He’d been tortured, Irina, until he begged for it to end. Uncle Efim pulled your dad’s fingernails out one by one. No more of those, he went on to his teeth. He enjoyed it, your uncle did. So did Karp here. He did the dirty work. By the time they finally ran him through, there wasn’t much of a man left.”

“Irina…,” Konychev said.

“Is it true?”

“I said, don’t listen.”

“BULLSHIT!”

I’d finally broken her shell. She wasn’t just angry anymore. Horror, real horror, terror mixed with fear, twisted her pretty face. The tough-girl façade fell away for good, leaving a broken, terrified teenager in its place.

I pressed on.

“You were there, weren’t you, Irina? There was some kind of fight. You got swiped with that poker. Hurt like hell, didn’t it? You were trying to protect your father, and Uncle Efim didn’t care who he hurt. You were already an over-the-hill, trash-heap tart to him anyway.”

“You said… You said it would be okay. You said nothing would happen. You said you needed to talk to him, business to clear up. YOU SAID YOU WEREN’T ANGRY ANYMORE!”

“Right before he pushed you out the door and started in on the fingers,” I said.

“Irina, he’s lying. He wasn’t there. He doesn’t know. He’s making it all up. He wants to use you against me.”

“IS IT TRUE?”

It’s hard to watch anyone’s world collapse in on itself, harder still if the person crushed is still in her teens. I shoved those thoughts aside and detonated another explosion.

“You shot your credibility on Tamara,” I said to Konychev. “She was probably waiting for you back at your place.”

“IS IT TRUE, GODDAMMIT?”

The shotgun slipped. Karp moved. Konychev too. Not fast enough. The gun came back up. The blast caught him square in the chest.

I lunged for Karp. I heard the pump and a second boom. My shoulder exploded in fiery pain.

Konychev fell against me and we went to the floor. Karp was on me in an instant. I tried to roll away, but he had me pinned. No chance against his strength. He pulled my lame arm. I flipped on my back. Pain clawed everywhere. I reached for the knife at my waist. Karp, sensing something, pulled in the other direction. I couldn’t quite get there. Another crack of the pump, another boom. Karp’s grasp loosened. I thought she’d shot him, but grabbed the knife anyway. He yanked my bad arm again as I got hold of the handle.

My shoulder popped. I fought the wave of pain, rolled and swung wildly. The knife buried itself in something. Karp howled and let go. I got my head up. Irina, fumbling with the box of shells in her lap, tried to reload. Karp was standing, knife shaft deep in his thigh. But he had his shotgun. I was looking into the barrel of eternity.

Joker’s wild, ace high. He held the twelve-gauge ace.

“Die, zek. ”

In that instant they say you have, I saw Aleksei and Victoria and my own dangerous arrogance and the inevitability of the game. I’d been lucky before, but…

BOOM! BOOM!

Two more blasts. The first—half of Karp’s chest exploded over me. He was still standing, still holding the shotgun, still grinning. The second blew out his remaining guts. The body weaved, blood spewing, until it keeled over, dead eyes filled with hatred.

I rolled left, out from under. Pain burned everywhere. Irina fumbled with her gun. I had to get to her… A cold wind blew through the room.

“NOBODY MOVE!” a voice shouted.

I wondered who he was yelling at and kept crawling.

“STOP!” the voice yelled.

“TURBO, STOP!”

A different voice. Victoria’s. What was she doing here?

I kept crawling.

Irina rotated the shotgun, barrel up. Beria appeared behind her.

“No!” I tried to croak.

“TURBO!” Victoria called.

Irina worked the barrel around.

“Irina! No!” I cried. It came out a whisper.

She had the stock on the floor, between her feet, the barrel under her chin.

I pulled myself up. It seemed to take an hour. I used everything I had and lunged.

“TURBO, STOP!”

I grabbed at the gun stock as the room exploded. Beria vanished, along with Irina. I fell where her feet had been, thinking in one more blind instant whether it was worth it to still be in the game.

“You gonna open that package or not?”

Victoria’s temperature was rising. Foos shook his head and moved a bishop.