Christopher Reich - Rules of Vengeance

His fortune secure, he moved laterally into politics. A native of St. Petersburg and a former judo champion (weren’t they all, these days?), Timken allied himself to that other son of the north, Vladimir Putin, and rode the diminutive former spy’s coattails to power. It was a meteoric rise. A seat in the Duma. An appointment to the cabinet. Then the move to counselor, and a voice in making the really big decisions.

For the past three years Timken had served as first aide to the president, where his primary function was to hold hands with the myriad Western oil companies brought in to modernize Russia’s aging infrastructure and exploit the nation’s vast oil reserves. His work had met with so much success that he was a front-runner to succeed the president when he stepped down in two years’ time.

“What did we give her?” asked Shvets, eyes drilling the monitor.

“Cyanide.”

“We still use that?”

“Nothing works as quickly. Once the scent fades, it is almost impossible to detect in the blood. It will appear that Timken had a heart attack. Who will doubt it?”

Shvets angled his head to better view the writhing coils of flesh. “How will she administer it?”

“You do not wish to know.”

“Go ahead.”

The driver explained briefly. For once, Shvets had no comment.

Since the eleventh century, Mother Russia had been a land ruled and divided by clans. Stretching over eleven time zones and incorporating over fifty ethnic minorities, Russia was simply too large a landmass for one man, or one family, to govern. Ivan the Terrible relied upon his feudal lords to see his will carried out. Peter the Great, on the caste of noblemen called Boyars. Each granted his supporters large tracts of land in exchange for fealty and in doing so united their aims with his own and guaranteed their loyalty.

It was no different in the twenty-first century.

On the surface, Russia appeared as monolithic as ever. The new, modern Russia was a Western-style democracy boasting a popularly elected president and a bicameral legislature. But appearances were deceiving. Just below the surface, the country was a caldron of competing interests. In place of warlords, there were mafia chieftains. In place of Boyars, there were CEOs. Land was no longer the favored asset, but money, preferably shares of large corporations built on the plundering of Russia’s vast natural resources: oil, natural gas, and timber. And knee-deep in the intrigue was the nation’s intelligence service, the FSB, fighting with everyone else for the president’s favor.

Russia was, and would always be, a country ruled by clans.

Rapacious was the head that wore the crown, and no one was more so than Sergei Shvets, chairman of the FSB. Shvets had long ago set his sights on the pinstriped ermine of the Kremlin. Nothing short of the presidency would do.

On this cool, rainy morning in Moscow, three men stood in his way. One lay comatose in a London hospital bed. Another was touring a natural gas facility in Kazakhstan and was due back later that night. The third, Lev Timken, first aide to the president, was about to die.

Shvets watched as his agent uncoupled herself from Timken and placed her head between his legs. Timken’s mouth fell open, and Shvets could hear the man’s howls even with the volume turned off. Timken arched his back, his eyes bulging in ecstasy. The woman raised her head from his lap and kissed him on the mouth, lifting a hand to massage his cheek.

Shvets shuddered, imagining the capsule entering his own mouth, his teeth gnashing down on it and releasing the poison into him.

Timken pushed away the nude woman and struggled to stand. The woman remained on her knees, watching as Timken collapsed to the floor and lay still.

Sergei Shvets tapped his driver on the shoulder. “Yasenevo,” he said.

He looked out the window as they drove.

One down.

Two to go.

The Ristorante Sabatini sparkled like a gem beneath the cloudless Roman night. Rows of tables dressed with white tablecloths bathed in the glow of fairy lights strung overhead. Across the Piazza Santa Maria, the façade of the Basilica di Santa Maria dominated the square. At 11 p.m., the open-air restaurant was packed. Boisterous conversation mingled with the chink of cutlery and the bustle of waiters rushing to and fro to create a convivial, energetic atmosphere.

Yet even among the ranks of satisfied diners, one group appeared to be enjoying themselves more than the others. There were eight persons in all, three men and five women. The men were tanned and elegantly attired, by age and comportment successful professionals. The youngest was forty-five, the oldest sixty, but all were boyishly exuberant in the Italian manner. The women were much younger, barely out of their teens, and beautiful, notable for their sharply tipped, decidedly un-Roman noses and generous, proudly displayed breasts.

A waiter snaked through the crowd and handed a note to the man at the head of the table. “Dottor Lazio, from a friend at the bar.”

Accepting the note, Dr. Luca Lazio tried at first to read it without glasses, failed, and then fished a pair of bifocals from his silk blazer and tried again. Lazio was a fifty-year-old Apollo, his feathered hair a shade too black, his chin a shade too tight. His green eyes quickly abandoned the note and turned toward the interior of the restaurant, where the bar was crowded with clients. Making his apologies, he rose and walked inside.

Seated at the bar, Jonathan watched Lazio approach. Though exhausted, he felt a surge run through his body at the sight of the man who might be able to get him a step closer to Emma. He rose from his stool, and Lazio stopped dead.

“Not who you expected,” said Jonathan.

Lazio wrinkled the note between his fingers. “‘An old friend’ is not exactly what I would have called you.”

“You’re still practicing.” It was a statement, a reminder of a service rendered.

Lazio shrugged, acknowledging the debt. “I haven’t had a drink since we saw each other last. I thank you. Again.” Lazio reached out to give Jonathan a belated hug and a kiss on each cheek.

Lazio was one of the corps of doctors who revolved in and out of the missions run by Doctors Without Borders around the world. Six years earlier he’d worked under Jonathan’s supervision at a camp in Eritrea. When several of Lazio’s patients died of suspicious causes, Jonathan discovered that the Italian doctor had been operating while drunk. He had suspended the doctor pending an investigation. In the meantime, word leaked to the local tribespeople. A mob got up, captured Lazio, and was very nearly successful in administering a punishment of its own. Jonathan had intervened and personally shepherded Lazio onto a plane back to Rome. Grateful for his life, the Italian had promised never to drink again. Given all the circumstances, it was the best outcome Jonathan could expect.

“I’m glad to see you’re recovering,” said Jonathan.

“What are you doing in Rome?” Lazio searched up and down the bar. “And where is Emma? I thought you two only took vacations in the mountains.”

“We make an exception now and then,” said Jonathan. He didn’t add anything about Emma.

“If you don’t mind my saying, you look like you could use some mountain air yourself.”

Jonathan glanced at himself in the mirror behind the bar. He’d been driving for hours and his eyes were sunken, rimmed with circles. “I’m fine.”

“And so,” said Lazio, “tell me, is this a coincidence?”

Jonathan finished his beer, then shook his head. “I called your wife and told her it was an emergency. She told me where I could find you. Apparently she thinks you’re with some fellow doctors from the hospital.”