David Duffy - Last to Fold

The timer chimed. I took out the chicken and sprinkled some chopped parsley over the top. No fresh vegetables, so I resorted to frozen peas.

Victoria said, “What was… Petrovin doing here, if I’m not being nosy?”

So that was the exchange at the elevator—he was reminding her of his assumed name. “He had information for me. Something I asked about. Also, I think he wanted to tell me a story. He’s looking for help.”

“You going to give it to him?”

“Maybe. Turns out I have an interest in the same matter.”

“What’s that?”

“Do U.S. attorneys ever take time off, quit for the day?”

“Not this one. I’ve got a lot riding on the thing we’re working on—Barsukov’s money laundering operation. It’ll be my first big case if I can bring it, and it’s not white collar—it’s big-time organized crime. Petrovin… well, for one thing he’s Russian. Y’all are hard to read, if you don’t mind my saying so. For another, he plays his cards close to the vest. I’m not always sure what he’s up to. That makes an insecure country girl like me nervous. There—I’ve said it.”

I could have taken issue with every adjective—insecure, country, nervous—but I didn’t bother. She was trying to fool herself, trying to fool me, trying to charm, and succeeding, as she well knew, on the one out of three that mattered most.

“Your new friend Barsukov is applying heavy pressure to some of his old friends—including me—to keep his laundry running. That’s what Friday night was all about.”

“That’s why he beat you up?”

“That and the old scores I just told you about. Rislyakov had a database—the identity info he hacked from T.J. Maxx and the code that makes all the transactions make sense. Lachko thinks I know where they are.”

“Do you?”

“Maybe.”

“No bull.”

“I have an idea.”

“If you’re withholding evidence…”

“I’m not, at least not yet. If I find it, you’ll be among the first to know. Dinner’s ready.”

I quartered the chicken and put out two plates on the counter. We ate mostly in silence. I had a glass of her wine, which was nothing like Giancarlo’s Barolo. Something else to study up on.

“That was an excellent chicken,” she said, pushing the plate away. “You’re a good cook, among your other talents.”

“You haven’t begun to explore my talents.”

“I’ve learned humility ain’t one of them.”

“I have others.”

“Sugar, I’ll be honest. I’ve liked you from the first time I saw you—I have no goddamned idea why—and I’m hotter than the Texas Playboys to do something about it. But, like I already said, no hanky-panky with criminals. Deep down I really am a cautious country girl, and I still have no idea where you stand or what game you’re playing. If I end up having to come after you in a professional capacity, make no mistake, I’ll do that as hard as I know how. I don’t want my heart broken at the same time.”

I reached across and took her hand. “Vika…”

“Vika?”

“Sorry. Russian nickname. Just slipped out.”

“That’s okay. I never had a nickname. Didn’t like the obvious candidates.”

“We give everyone nicknames. I won’t break your heart. You can trust me because I know how it feels. I just told you the story. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.”

The Chekist replayed the tape one more time. Just a fragment of sound, less than a minute, before the fire consumed the microphones. The flames whooshed and roared and popped. He could hear Kosokov shouting, the words impossible to make out. Then that other noise—squealing, high-pitched, rising in volume.

Now he realized after all these years, it was the girl. She must have been there the whole time. It was her in the horse stalls, not rats. He’d almost shot her. How the hell had he missed?

How had she survived the inferno? The only answer was the old shelter. Somehow she’d had the sense to seek protection there. Maybe that’s what Kosokov was yelling. He’d never know for sure. One more thing that didn’t matter.

She was alive, she was here, she knew who he was. That did matter.

She would have to be dealt with.

Before anything else went wrong.

I woke feeling born again, just like they sing about in those gospel songs, although my particular form of rebirth probably wasn’t what they had in mind. A little after six o’clock, and I lay there watching her chest rise and fall under the sheet.

I don’t know whether it was the nickname or what I said about heartbreak, but I’d led her to bed without resistance. It was far from my best night, which she more than made up for with her own intensity and tenderness, a combination that took us places where I could leave the pain of my injuries far behind. She’d undressed herself, then me, then used her breasts, eyes, thighs, lips, hands, and teeth to work both of us into a white-hot heat, on the edge of ecstasy, before we wrapped ourselves together and plunged. Sometime later, we broke the surface of reality, panting and sweating, partly sated, knowing there was more to come. We lay quietly, her head on my chest, holding each other close, saying nothing. I dozed until I felt her restless hands start to work, and I responded with mine, and without a word we carried each other a second time to the door of oblivion. I slept through the night, visiting no netherworlds for the first time since Saturday.

“Okay, give.” She was looking at me from her pillow, smiling.

“What?”

“How’d you get the funny name?”

I laughed. “ That’s why I finally got you into bed.”

“You think it’s your shaved head and hairy chest? I’ve been wondering about this ever since I read your immigration file.”

“Talk about privacy.”

“Don’t change the subject.” She doubled the pillow under her head and waited. Her big eyes were green pools I wanted to jump into.

I caressed her cheek. She knocked my hand away. “Get on with it.”

“My grandfather, Turba Petrovich, he’s the culprit. One of the original Chekists. Ardent Bolshevik. Knew Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Bukharin, the whole gang. He worked with Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Cheka.”

“But that means he helped create the Gulag!”

“Yes. Grandpa Turba was one of the officers who oversaw the construction of the camps—and became an early victim of his creation. He was caught in one of Stalin’s purges, when Comrade Yezhov took over the NKVD from Comrade Yagoda in 1937. Grandpa was taken away on Christmas night, although it was no longer called that, and sent to Norilsk, where he died four years later. But what goes around comes around, as you Americans are fond of pointing out. Yezhov was arrested in 1938 and shot in 1940, after Lavrenty Beria took over the Cheka. I hope my grandfather at least knew he outlived the man who caused his downfall.”

She was looking at me, dark eyes wide with interest. I reached for her cheek again, but she pushed my hand away. “None of that. Keep going.”

“While he was still on the rise, Grandpa Turba and Grandma Svetlana gave birth to their only son. Nineteen twenty-six; revolutionary fervor was morphing into Stalinist zeal. Turba believed Stalin was a great man doing great things for his country, including pulling it into the modern age. Industrialization was the big thing—railroads, factories, dams, electricity—Stalin was building the new Russia. A lot of people were caught up in the excitement, and they demonstrated their enthusiasm with names for their children. Some kids got lucky—Len, for Lenin, is a perfectly serviceable name. Or Ninel, Lenin spelled backward, for a girl. Even Engelina or Melor, shorthand for Marx, Engels, Lenin, and October Revolution.