by Ryan Schow
“How long have you been doing this?” Atlas asked, chilled by the comment.
“Since the company opened in 2007. We try to save the ones we find alive.”
“Do you find dead ones often?”
“Their little bodies just give out from the abuse sometimes. And like this, some of them are casualties of the rescue.”
“Why are you doing this?”
From her abundantly ample bosom, Bronya withdrew a worn photo of a young mother and her enchanting young daughter. Atlas studied the photo, recognized the features of the woman, and then the child.
“Yours?”
“She was once. And you? Do you have children?”
“This is a rescue mission,” he said. “Which means none of them are mine.”
She looked at the shot, stabbed, and beaten man hunched over in his own pond of blood on the floor.
“It would seem there are some strong emotions involved.”
He nodded at Kiera, who was spattered with blood.
The Russian woman blanched. “That is one terrifying-looking young lady,” she turned and whispered to Atlas in confidence.
“You have no idea.” Returning to the former subject, he said, “What happened to your daughter? Has she gone missing too?”
“Not missing. Not for very long. I did find her, though,” Bronya said, her tone and expression changing, growing a bit tense. “After they used her body for sex, they used her in an online snuff film. We found her torso in one place, her limbs in another, and her head in a third location. These girls are my life now. My purpose. I try to save them before their bodies give up the fight and they’re thrown away like garbage.”
Speaking about her daughter somehow renewed the horror she no doubt carried deep inside herself. Atlas understood. With Alabama still missing, anything was possible. But this wasn’t about him, he thought. This was about the children, and Bronya’s little girl. Her response to her own personal tragedy was to help other children; his was to kill three junkies, then go to work for a guy like Leopold. Suddenly he felt his face flush and he wavered uncomfortably.
“Are you okay?” she asked, concerned.
He needed to steady himself and refocus. The last thing he needed to lose was the full measure of Leopold’s resources. If his detective could find Alabama, or even drag up a single clue—since Foster Truitt had told him no clues had surfaced in months—it would be worth the killing, this freaking nightmare…all of it.
“My daughter was taken, too,” he admitted softly. “Four years ago.”
“Did you find her?”
He shook his head, slowly, solemn.
“I’m sorry,” she said, cupping his cheek. “If you don’t mind, we need to get these kids to safety. Right now we’re in their place, but we need to be in our place. It is very dangerous to be here right now.”
“Where are you taking them?” Cira asked from behind him.
“We have doctors, counselors, clean beds, showers and food,” the Russian woman said, returning to her earlier professionalism.
“I want your cell phone number,” Atlas abruptly said. “A way to reach you, just in case.”
She gave it to him without hesitation. He entered the number into his phone, then immediately sent her a text. To his relief, her phone beeped. She looked down at the text, then back up at Atlas.
“That’s my name and number in case you need to call me for any reason,” he said. She smiled then put the phone away. “Now, Bronya Kotova, please tell me how I can help you and your team.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
ATLAS HARGROVE
The one comfort in sleeping in a bed next to a same-sex stranger on a brisk Russian night was that you didn’t get cold. Atlas woke up with Kofi lying against him. At first, he was dreaming he was with Jade, that she was treating him like a pillow. Then he started to stir. Was that her arm draped across his back? No. It wasn’t Jade. And it wasn’t her arm. Atlas heard the heavy snoring and realized he was in bed with a man. Kofi. Not Jade. He sat up, rubbed his eyes, yawned.
The bad mood was back.
In the bathroom, he took a cold shower, then got out of the dinky enclosure, knocking his knee on the toilet bowl. Staggering back on uneven flooring, he just about rolled an ankle before catching himself.
“Just stop,” he muttered to himself. “Get it together already.”
“Morning,” Kofi said, rubbing his eyes. Apparently, the door’s lock was broken.
“It is morning,” Atlas yawned.
“Sleep okay?”
“Sure.”
After Kofi showered, they went downstairs, climbed in the car and headed over to Cira’s.
“Where did you get this thing?” Atlas asked, looking around the car.
“I got the keys.” He shrugged. “They came with the car.”
The vehicle was extra small, so again, the two men found themselves sitting entirely too close to each other. Turning towards the side window, Atlas fought for calm as he watched the passing scenery. “This really is a beautiful city. It’s a shame that when I leave, I’ll have seen nothing of significance.”
“One day you should come back and see the Winter Palace,” Kofi told him. “And if you can get to the Hermitage Museum, or the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, you’d find this city has a soul so deep it will take your breath away.”
Atlas turned and snapped. “Now how in God’s name am I supposed to do that?”
Kofi shrunk away from him and said, “What’s your problem?”
“Do you even know who I am?”
“We’ve only just met,” he said. Then: “We’re here.”
Atlas looked out the dusty window and saw they’d reached their destination: Hotel Astoria. Without a word, he squeezed out of the car and gazed up at the structure’s flat façade.
The mud-brown bricks and the line of blood-red awnings were one thing in terms of recognition; it was an entirely different thing to turn and look out into Saint Isaac’s Square. The Monument of Nicholas alone grabbed his attention.
Something in his heart stirred. Was he bumping against the soul of Saint Petersburg, as Kofi suggested?
The gorgeous nineteenth-century statue featuring Tsar Nicholas I mounted on a horse on a tall, ornate pedestal was simply hypnotic.
Behind him, he heard Kofi arguing with an angry valet over his choice of parking. Atlas didn’t care. Maybe this was because he was finally seeing this city as something more than a killing field, or the place where a billionaire’s kidnapped child had lost her innocence.
Beyond the statue of Tsar Nicholas I, across the square, stood the famed Mariinsky Palace. When they’d first arrived, he’d read in a booklet that the palace was built in the mid-eighteen hundreds and was the current seat of the city parliament. He hadn’t cared then, but now he felt something different. He wanted a sense of history, perhaps. Or maybe he just wanted a distraction, something to pull him out of this dark, impossible world he was living in.
An imposing tour bus drove by, crop-dusting him with exhaust fumes. Plugging his nose, he stepped back on the sidewalk, bumped into a woman who cursed him under her breath, then found himself looking directly across Voznesensky Avenue. Standing tall above the large open park, framed by a long line of mature trees, stood Saint Isaac’s Cathedral. The sight of it was staggering. With the neoclassical structure’s glowing gilded dome, the famed support columns, and several of the twelve statues of angels in view, Atlas’s intrigue in the museum intensified. Could he just walk across the street and go there now?
A chatty throng of European tourists marched past him. He barely noticed. A flock of blackbirds was startled into flight, dozens of the birds flying in front of the cathedral. Still, he was not distracted. Rather, he was wrapped in a shroud of awe. Was this what Cira felt when she looked upon this city’s historical sights? Was this why she longed to be here so much? He was about to leave Saint Petersburg and never come back. Did he want to leave? A part of him ached to stay another day
or two. He’d missed so much in life already. Was there a way to swing that? Sadly, he didn’t think so. Atlas didn’t have his freedom. He was still a prisoner. In this life, he would always be a prisoner.
Kofi finally walked away from the angry valet. “It’s incredible, isn’t it?” he said, suddenly beside him.
His trance broken, Atlas turned and took in the sight of the man. Had he misjudged Kofi the same way he misjudged Saint Petersburg? Cars and buses drove through the square in a constant flow, the drivers missing all the beauty he was seeing. Kofi was right. He needed to see more. The Winter Palace, the Hermitage, Catherine’s Palace, Peterhof, Fontanka. For some reason, he was thinking a slow boat ride down the Neva River would be nice. According to the same travel booklet he’d read, some locals called Saint Petersburg the Venice of the North because of its many canals and canal walks. But he wouldn’t get to see any of that. Because his life sucked ass and he was a three-time loser.
“Do you have a family?” he asked Kofi.
“Two kids. My oldest realized our financial woes and took responsibility for our shortfalls. He’d heard me and my wife talking about not having enough money for food, water, and heat. We were trying to decide which service to give up.”
“Wow, I didn’t realize you were going through this.”
“We are all going through this.”
“I didn’t know.”
“When my thirteen-year-old son left home, he wrote a note saying he hoped with one less mouth to feed that we would be able to afford all of the services. He was living in a landfill before he died.”
“How did he die?” Atlas asked, reeling from the admission, and feeling bad for having ever been rude to the man.
“He was beaten to death,” Kofi said with dry eyes. “They say drug dealers were responsible for this, but it could have been by the police, too. They have a reputation in Ukraine for abusing children in exchange for information.”
Atlas didn’t know what to say. All these people, all these sad stories of kids.
“I see you struggling for words,” Kofi said. “There are no words to put this burden in my heart to rest. But I see by the look on your face that you understand such a burden.”
“I do,” Atlas admitted. Kofi really didn’t know anything about him.
“Astoria Restaurant is very formal, but let’s go see if we can get some food inside,” Kofi said. He held up a credit card. “While Leopold is paying the bill, we should eat whatever we can, while we can.”
“You won’t have to pull my arm for that,” he said, realizing right then how hungry he really was.
The two men strolled into the hotel’s first-floor restaurant and tried to buy something resembling a pastry. The pretty hostess said they were not ready for breakfast yet but hinted that they might be able to purchase some small delights. She couldn’t stop staring at all the abuse on Atlas’s face. He smiled in return.
“What is your signature dessert?” Kofi asked. Turning to Atlas, in English, he said, “I have a sweet tooth I have long since neglected.”
“We have the Diana Vishneva,” the hostess said, “but I’m not sure the chef will have time for that.”
“Is that a dessert, or a person’s name?” Atlas asked in Russian.
“Both. It’s sugared cranberry, baked apple with cinnamon, yogurt mousse spheres with cranberry filling, caramelized puff pastry, and cranberry mousse rounds served with dulce de leche.”
“Can you box us three of them?” Kofi asked. The attractive woman smiled uncomfortably, prompting Kofi to sweeten the deal. “We will pay a premium if you can make that happen.”
At double the price, they managed to purchase three such desserts, then called Cira and said they were coming up with breakfast.
“I’m about to check out,” she said.
“We’ll meet you in the lobby, then,” Kofi replied.
By the time Cira got downstairs, both men had already finished their food. Kofi offered Cira her dessert, but she said, “Is that…sugar?”
“Yeah, but don’t judge it on that alone,” Atlas said.
“No, thanks.” She used her cell phone to call one of the two meatheads. “We’re ready when you are.” She listened to the man say something, and then she spoke. “Our ride will be here shortly, so maybe you could get the lead out of your ass and get down here.”
Kofi offered to split the dessert with Atlas, but Atlas saw how much Kofi had enjoyed the treat.
“I’m full,” he lied. “Why don’t you eat it?”
“If you insist,” he said. That was the first time he’d seen Kofi smile.
When he got into the retired tourist van turned van for hire, Cira took the front seat, Kofi sat next to the two meatheads and Atlas climbed in the back row and sat next to the silent, seemingly undisturbed Kiera.
He didn’t look too hard at the girl. She officially scared him. Within the last eight hours, she’d butchered a man, sobbed over a dead child she’d somehow connected with, washed about a gallon of blood out from underneath her nails, then managed to grow another one thirty-second of an inch of hair. He was impressed. He was also embarrassed. She had also kicked his ass twice, laying him out like a basic bitch both times.
He didn’t want to admit it, but his chin had hurt all night and the muscles in his jaw had been so stretched by her punch, they felt sprung. Even worse, his teeth weren’t lining up right. They would be just fine in a few days. Hopefully.
“Still looking for your sister?” Atlas turned and asked the mute. Clearly, he didn’t believe her cover story. He couldn’t help himself.
Predictably, she refused to look at him. He narrowed his eyes, let an obvious frown fill the air between them.
“You have a loose end,” Cira turned and said to Atlas once they were on the move.
“Excuse me?” Atlas asked.
“The professor you didn’t kill filed a police report, said a foreigner stabbed him with a pen, then took his wallet. They have the pen, and most likely your prints, if you left them.”
“I didn’t. Aren’t we on the way out of town?”
“No, Atlas. We’re not on the way out of town. I just said you have a mess you need to clean up first.”
“So we’re going to kill him, then?” Kofi asked. “The professor?”
“No, she’s saying we should kill his landlord,” Atlas mumbled sarcastically before catching himself.
“That’s good,” Kofi replied. He dug in his bag for a moment, then turned and handed Atlas a grenade he’d apparently been hanging on to. “Here, you can use this.”
“Are you kidding?” Atlas said, astounded. “Where did you even get that?”
“Try to see if it works first,” Kofi said, like the hand grenade was a cell phone app or a remote control rather than a small bomb meant to turn men into blasted meat. “If it’s a dud, then use my suppressor.”
He took the grenade, turned it over in this hand. “How old is this thing?”
“I had two.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the first one worked.”
Eyes wide open, floored that anyone would communicate that way, Atlas said, “Did anyone else understand that?”
Everyone started to nod, to which he slowly shook his head like he didn’t get it.
He tried to hand the grenade back to Kofi. “I’m shooting him. That’s more…humane than…than, blowing him up.”
“Is it?” one of the meatheads challenged. Not Boris, the other one.
“Oh, Cousin It finally speaks,” he said. Atlas tried again to hand the grenade back. Kofi wouldn’t take it. He simply folded his arms harder and pretended Atlas wasn’t there. He thought about pulling the pin and tossing it in the Ukrainian’s lap just to see what he’d do.
“What, are you ignoring me now?” he asked instead. Glancing over at Kiera—who was also ignoring him—he said, “You two clowns are cut from the same cloth.”
“No, they aren’t,” Cira replied. “Not even close.”
“The grenade has been a paperweight for me for years,” Kofi explained. “I’m tired of looking at it, and I can’t just throw it away—”
“This is a fine way to dispose of it,” Atlas quipped.
“So you finally agree,” he said, delighted.
Atlas caught and held Cira’s eye. She leveled him with a look, his defiant nature clearly getting under her skin.
“Does anyone find this completely asinine?” he asked. Again, everyone shook their heads no. “What the hell is wrong with you people?”
“You are soft in America,” the meathead who wasn’t Boris said.
“We’re sending a message,” Cira said.
“Which is what exactly?”
“If you mess around with children, we’ll blow you up in your own bed.”
Now he thought about it, really let this line of reasoning ruminate in his head, and then slowly he found himself agreeing with them. “I think I actually get that,” Atlas admitted.
“I told you he’d use the grenade,” Kofi told Cira with a look that was almost a smile.
“So you’re on board?” Cira asked Atlas.
“Yeah, I guess so.”
A few of them started to laugh (not Kiera), but it was Boris who laughed the least. He said, “It seems the cop isn’t as squeamish as we thought.”
With their moods sufficiently elevated—granted this happened at Atlas’s expense—Cira glanced back at him with bright eyes. Shaking his head, feeling separated from himself and reality, Atlas forced a smile.
Was he really going to do this?
Apparently, he was.
Chapter Twenty-Three
ATLAS HARGROVE
When Atlas had asked Leopold if he was going to be an assassin or if he was going on a rescue mission, the mystery man on the other end of the phone had said, “Both.” So yeah, he’d done both. He’d rescued some kids, and he’d killed some cockroaches, but now he was about to take things to an entirely new level. In his mind, this was both reckless and unacceptable. In his benefactors’ minds, however, this was a cruel necessity. He was starting to catch on.
