Eric Lustbader - Last Snow

He turned back into the hotel room, away from the glare of the headlights, and sat back down at the dingy desk and the endless lines of information scrolling across his laptop’s screen.

Why wouldn’t he forgive Nina, she was all he had.

But Nina was beyond his forgiveness, Jack had shot her through the heart before she’d had a chance to poison everyone at the inauguration with the vial of anthrax given to her by Morgan Herr. This, then, was Dennis Paull’s dilemma as he sat scrolling through the so-far innocuous mountain of electronic data: He was indebted to Jack McClure for saving Edward Carson, but he hated Jack for killing Nina.

RHON FYODOVICH Kirilenko had just enough time to swing by his office and pick up the photos his assistant had pulled off the CCTV cameras at Zhulyany Airport before transferring to a waiting FSB vehicle that took him, at reckless speed, to board his scheduled flight to Simferopol.

While his driver was weaving through the clogged arteries of Kiev he studied each of the three photos. The first was of the three people: Annika Dementieva he could see clearly enough. Behind her, his face partially obscured, was a man who looked vaguely familiar. Kirilenko spent several fruitless minutes trying to place the visible features before moving on. The second photo was of the young girl, who bore no resemblance to anyone in Kirilenko’s memory bank. He studied this photo in a rather abstract manner; for the life of him he couldn’t figure out what she was doing with the two adults. To his knowledge, which was extensive to the point of encyclopedic, Annika Dementieva had no sisters, and the girl was too old to be her daughter. So who on earth was she? Sighing in frustration he turned to the third and last photo, which was a full-face shot of the man. Almost immediately a galvanic shock rode up his spine. He knew this man, he worked for the President of the United States. What the hell was he doing with Annika Dementieva?

Kirilenko stared out the window, seeing nothing but his own muddled thoughts. He knew his duty was to inform his superior of this shocking development, but something—a stubbornness, resentment, a feeling of being at once played and betrayed—stayed his hand. He was tired of being manipulated. Bad enough to be fucked over by the Americans, that kind of treatment was a given, but to be fucked by his own people, who had to know they were throwing him into an international arena filled with land mines, was more than he could tolerate. But there was something else—something deeper—at work in his mind. He was finally in possession of information not available to his superiors; now, fate had given him a modicum of power, and he was not willing to part with it so quickly. Shoving the photos away, he resolved to keep his own counsel until he could determine just what was going on.

IT WAS too bad for Kirilenko that he wasn’t carrying the only copies of the photos his assistant had taken off the airport CCTV. Twenty minutes before he’d arrived, Oriel Jovovich Batchuk, standing in front of Kirilenko’s desk, confronted his assistant. He received the latest oral report from a young man he’d found it ridiculously easy to suborn, with half his mind still chewing over his disturbing conversation with Gourdjiev.

When it came to the subject of Annika there could be no equivocating, no ending, no exit for either of them. No matter how hard either of them tried to fight it their roles were set in stone, there was no reversing position, no going back. But the knowledge of what had happened, of what could never be changed, was a hateful thing, a spider spinning its malevolent web in his mind. And this was because of one simple fact he’d never uttered to anyone, but which he suspected Gourdjiev knew: Even if he possessed the impossible power to change the past, he wouldn’t. He did what he had to do, something a man like Gourdjiev could never understand, let alone condone. Batchuk was a man who could not afford to second-guess himself; rather, he preyed on others’ not wanting to know, not wanting to see the truth about themselves or those whose acquaintance was politically or financially important to their careers; preyed on people afraid of conviction, of being wrong, who would rather close their eyes and listen to his guidance. Gourdjiev had done that once—only once—to his unending sorrow, a situation Batchuk could read on his face every time they met.

A certain silence made it clear that Kirilenko’s assistant had finished his oral report. Nodding, Batchuk ordered him to make copies of the photos. He took them without comment and, turning on his heel, left.

He was already on his cell phone as he descended in the elevator and exited the huge, intimidating lobby of the FSB building, striding through the slush of Red Square.

GENERAL BRANDT, seated next to President Carson and across a gleaming marble table from President Yukin, received Batchuk’s call at a most inconvenient time. Nevertheless, seeing who was calling, he excused himself, went out of the room and partway down the corridor, out of earshot of the various Secret Service personnel from both sides who were flanking the door like sphinxes.

“There’s been a new development,” Batchuk said without preamble. “Annika Dementieva isn’t moving on her own. I’m looking at a photo of her from one of the closed-circuit cameras at Zhulyany Airport. She’s with two other people, one of whom is the American Jack McClure.”

“President Carson’s Jack McClure?” the General said, and almost immediately regretted the stupidity of the question. Of course it was Edward’s Jack McClure. “I don’t understand.”

“Carson is playing you,” Batchuk said tersely. “He’s got an agenda he’s keeping from you, which means he no longer trusts you.”

The General gave an involuntary glance over his shoulder, toward the silent bodyguards and closed door that led to the negotiating room, where Carson was even now locking horns with Yukin. “But that’s impossible.”

“Nothing’s impossible,” Batchuk said with unconcealed fury. “Clearly. This is on you, General. McClure is your mess, I suggest you clean it up with all the haste you can muster.”

“I can’t imagine what Carson is playing at, putting McClure into the field, and with Annika Dementieva, no less.”

“It doesn’t matter what either of them are up to. McClure needs to be extinguished, expunged, immolated. Do I make myself clear?”

“Perfectly.” The General was too taken aback to be off ended by Batchuk’s taking control. They were facing a mess, he’d trusted Carson, and in doing so had allowed matters to get out of control. They were all finished if McClure remained alive, of that he was absolutely certain.

“Don’t worry,” he said, gathering himself. “McClure won’t live to see another sunrise, that I promise you.”

EIGHTEEN

“WHO’S HUNGRY?” Jack said as they entered the echoing Arrivals hall at Simferopol North Airport.

“I am,” Alli said immediately. “I’m starved.”

“Good, so am I.” Jack led them over to a crowded cafeteria-style coffee shop with food that looked as if it had been prepared last week. Nevertheless, they loaded up their plates, paid for the food and drinks, and took their trays to the lone empty table near the checkout, a location lousy for a peaceful meal but ideal for watching passengers as they stumbled off their flights.

They dug into leathery pirogi, cabbage rolls, and pungent kovbasa , washed down with glasses of cherry-red Crimean wine. While he ate Jack kept one eye on the waxing and waning stream of humanity. From the other side of the table Annika watched him. He knew what she was thinking: If they were hungry why not just go into Alushta, where they’d have their choice of restaurants with food better than what they were eating now? She said nothing, however, doubtless waiting for him to provide an explanation.