by Ben Muse
The kitchen staff had set up a table of light hors d’oeuvres to snack on as we left Foggy Harbor. Little white placards sat in front of the platters to help idiots like me discern what I would be eating. I started with a prosciutto crostini topped with a lemony fennel slaw and moved on to spiced beef empanadas with lime sour cream. They were fantastic and rivaled anything the top chefs at Ashmore could have created. Anna suggested I try the blinis and bitokes, both of which were tasty.
“You like Russian food?” she asked.
“This is my first time trying it, but it’s fantastic.” I noticed the boat had moved ever so gently away from our slip. The small Azipod propulsion systems nudged us away laterally and out into the deeper waters of the harbor. In about five minutes, the captain would execute a ninety-degree turn, bringing the bow of the yacht around to face the harbor entrance.
As my father and Sergei talked, I chatted with Anna and Viktoria. Dmitri sat in the shade on a padded couch, close to the hot tub.
“So, Chase, I understand you were released from prison just this morning?” Viktoria said, apropos of nothing. Why, yes, thank you for bringing that up, Viktoria.
She took a sip of her vodka tonic and smiled. I got the impression that this is what passed as amusement for her.
“That’s right,” I said, somewhat uncomfortably. “I served seven years for manslaughter.” Anna turned away and stood by the deck railing.
Viktoria continued, “That must have been very hard on you. Locked away, your freedom gone.” Her eyes bore into me.
“It was, but I’m out now. What’s done is done.”
“Tell me, Chase, what kind of future does an ex-con have in America?”
“I’m not sure, Viktoria. America is the land of second chances. Ask me this question a year from now.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t be so rude and condescending, Viktoria.” Anna turned and stared right through her, the demure demeanor exhibited earlier, long gone.
“I don’t believe anyone was talking to you, Anna. Don’t you have some contracts to look over?” she said dismissively.
“I work for your husband, Vicky, not you.”
“My name is Viktoria, you sniveling little brat. You should be respectful to me, or I can make life very difficult for you, perhaps even convince my husband to get rid of you once and for all,” she said icily.
“Shall I call Mr. Durov over now so you can have him fire me?” Anna said, matching Viktoria’s coldness. “What do you think, Vicky?”
It was time to put up or shut up for Viktoria, and her body language suggested she would be doing the latter.
“Chase, I’m sorry for the pointed questions. It is how I am. I do not, how do you say, beat around the bush. Please excuse me, but I must go freshen up,” she said as she walked to the stairs.
After Viktoria left, Anna said, “Sorry, Chase. She is so hateful sometimes.”
“You have nothing to be sorry about, Anna. You and Viktoria must be very close in age?”
“I am four months older. He found her in a Moscow strip club two years ago. Wife number three for him. Despite his choice in women, he is a great boss to me.”
“Mr. Durov must have his hands full with her,” I whispered, as I drew closer to Anna.
She laughed, “In more ways than one, Chase. Their marriage has special arrangements. I would be careful, though; she likes younger men. Especially the handsome ones.”
“Don’t worry, I make it a habit to not flirt with the wives of my father’s friends. In fact, it’s been awhile and I’m not even sure if I remember how.”
“Judging by how you’ve been flirting with me, I’d say your skills haven’t eroded.”
“Are Russian women always this direct, Anna? How many shades of red is my face?”
“You are very funny, Chase Hampton. However, Mrs. Durov was right in one regard. I do have some contracts to look over. Will I see you at dinner?”
“Of course. I haven’t had a decent meal in forever, and I would hate to miss out on your company.”
“Wonderful, I look forward to dinner, also.”
I watched her as she walked over to my father and Mr. Durov, said something, and gracefully made her exit. She turned and smiled shyly at me before disappearing down the stairs.
Chapter 10
This freedom thing was feeling good, I thought, as I took my seat next to Anna at the appointed time of seven p.m. We were dining aft, on the salon deck in the formal dining room. There were five of us for dinner with Dmitri being the only one not present. I wondered if he was seasick. The Anchor Management was big, but the ocean frequently brought the stoutest of men to their knees.
Mrs. Durov did not speak to me during dinner, although I did catch her staring as we dined on chilled jumbo shrimp with a tangy remoulade and Beluga caviar with toast points. Dinner was Wagyu steaks and Maine lobster tails with herbed butter, fresh asparagus, pureed purple potatoes, and bacon and blue cheese cookies. I contrasted that with Ashmore’s version of surf and turf: bland tuna salad and questionable beef stew. Things were definitely looking up. To cap the dinner off, Chef Louis personally wheeled out plates of popular Russian treats. Bird’s milk cake, Tula gingerbread, and something called chak-chak, which resembled a pile of Lincoln Logs drizzled in a syrupy sauce. Anna beamed like a kid in a candy store when she saw this.
“It is so nice to have a reminder of home. Chak-chak was my favorite dessert as a little girl,” she said, thanking my father and Chef Louis for the gesture.
“You are welcome, Anna,” said my father. He gave me a quick look that said, Hey, dummy, put two and two together.
“You don’t live in Russia?” I asked.
This brought a laugh from Mr. Durov. “I’m afraid Anna is more Americanized than most American women,” he said.
“I live and work in Wilmington, Chase, handling Mr. Durov’s American interests,” she said. “I’ve been here since 2006.”
“I plucked Anna from Columbia Law School and have kept her here since,” said Mr. Durov. Dad had done his homework, and once again, I had been left in the dark in regards to his planning. He’d probably reserved the church where Anna and I would be married. I was not under the illusion, however, that Ms. Petrov would see a paroled ex-con as boyfriend material, much less husband material.
“How often do you go home to visit your family, Anna?”
“I have not been back to my home of Korolev in many years. My parents both live in Wilmington, and I have no desire to go back. Mr. Durov is correct in that I have been Americanized. I very much like my Bath and Body Works, five dollar lattes from Starbucks, and mild Wilmington winters.”
After dessert, we lingered over our coffees, and by eight fifteen the “defections” (pun intended) began. First, the Durov’s excused themselves, and my father was quick to follow. Something about a watched romance never boils, or something as such, I imagined him saying under his breath.
“So, Anna, what plans do you have for the rest of the evening?”
“I have a briefcase full of work calling my name. What about you?”
“Not sure. Not used to having free time.”
“Are you always this funny, Chase?” she said, punching my arm lightly.
“I . . . I didn’t mean that to be funny,” I said, getting my own joke. “I will probably go to my room and marvel at my mattress thickness.”
She grinned. “I look forward to relaxing tomorrow. I have this project that must be completed tonight. Perhaps tomorrow you can give me a tour of this magnificent boat?”
“I think I can fit that into my busy schedule. Can I walk you to your room since we are both heading the same way?”
“I would like that very much,” she said.
We finished our coffee and walked back downstairs. She smelled fantastic. Lavender, if I had to guess, but it had been awhile, and my olfactory system was going haywire with all the new smells.
“Goodnight, Anna. Don’t work too hard.”
“It’s
my nature,” she said.
“All work and no play makes for a dull day.”
“Oh, Chase, I do not work all the time. I love to play,” she said seductively. “Good night.”
Back in my room, I considered my options. It was too early for bed so I decided on a quick cardio workout with the free weights. I found a pair of Nike athletic shorts, a gray t-shirt, and Under Armor cross-trainers in the closet. Before I left, the phone rang.
“So, what do you think about Anna?” my father asked.
“I think she is very beautiful and probably not interested in me. Why are you playing Cupid?”
“Who, me? I’m just trying to sell a boat.”
“Right, sure.”
“I understand Mrs. Durov asked some pointed questions during sail away?”
“Yeah, she’s just so warm and cuddly,” I said snidely.
“Don’t worry about her. She’s just a very bored rich girl. I think Sergei is already tiring of her.”
“What does Mr. Durov do that would afford him the means to buy a fancy yacht?”
“His company mines rare earth elements.”
“Sounds kind of deep.”
“Your sense of humor has gotten worse over time, I see,” he deadpanned. “You ever heard of lanthanum or erbium?”
“No, but they sound like something straight off the periodic table.”
“Correct. They are just a couple of the seventeen chemical elements found in the periodic table that Sergei’s firm mines. These seventeen elements are important to our modern way of living. They make computers and smartphones smaller, and power hybrid cars. They also help in the medical and dental fields, among numerous other uses. It’s quite a lucrative business, but the mining isn’t easy. They’re called rare earth elements, but they are plentiful in the crust of the earth, just not in large, concentrated quantities. Sergei plucks these metals as well as gold and silver from ocean depths of over four thousand meters.”
“So, a bottom feeder in love and business.”
My father rolled his eyes. “Sergei is a former Russian nuclear sub commander who discovered his skill set and the private sector were a perfect match. He’s made billions.
“So, Anna works in Wilmington managing what exactly?”
“She runs his legal department for his American portfolio. Homeland security, rightly or wrongly, has a hundred-mile no-mining zone off the coast. There are rumblings of a big find somewhere off the coast of Virginia, but the environmentalists are rattling their sabers, so I expect them to tie this issue up in litigation.”
“Which means Anna will be very busy running point as Mr. Durov seeks permission to mine?”
“Correct.”
“Does she have a boyfriend?” I hated derailing the conversation for something so trivial, but we both knew this question would come up.
“So, we get to the real question. No, she doesn’t have a boyfriend.”
“And you know this how?”
“I have my ways.”
“I’m giving her a tour of the ship tomorrow, unless we somehow get lost and have to call for help.”
“Maybe you two should get lost. Goodnight son.”
He hung up, and I left the room to sweat. In the gym, a flat-screen TV mounted on the wall displayed our trip information. We’d been underway for three hours and forty five minutes, knocking out one hundred ten miles and leaving us five hundred ten nautical miles from Nassau. The ship was moving at twenty knots and estimated to arrive Friday afternoon at three.
After I finished with the weights, I decided a thirty-minute hot-tub soak on the sun deck was in order. It would be a solo celebration to cap off my first day of freedom. Normally at this time of the night, I would be reading Steinbeck or Hemingway in my dimly lit cell with Sam’s snoring rattling the walls.
I went back to the room and changed into a pair of dark-blue swim trunks and a white, terry cloth robe that had a replica of the ship embroidered on the front. I left the room, stopped at Anna’s door, and contemplated knocking and asking if she wanted to take a break and go for a dip. The idea sounded a little forward and desperate when I ran it through my head a second time, so I walked on.
There was a chill in the air, fifty feet above the water on the sun deck. It was mid-March after all, at night, and we were in the open Atlantic moving at almost twenty-five miles an hour. Perfect hot tub weather. I grabbed an Evian from the fridge behind the bar and tossed my robe on the L-shaped couch. The temperature extremes on the surface of the eight-person, LED-lit tub caused steam to emanate off the water. I slipped in with just my head above the frenetic surface, and powerful jets pounded me from all angles as I sat facing the front of the boat, a three-quarter moon overhead in a clear, starlit sky. I slid off the seat and fully submerged myself, then surfaced and ran my hands through my hair. It was time to relax, reflect, and think about the future.
My first thought was that there was no way my father was involved in something that could harm the country. Self-absorbed and a narcissistic? Yes. Traitor to his country? Not a chance. He certainly didn’t need the money either. Maybe Special Agent Brighton Jenna would shed some light on the FBI’s thinking when we met.
“Is there room for two in there?” I heard from behind. The jets from the tub made it hard to hear, and I hoped it was a certain Russian female, but instead it was Viktoria Durov. She had on the same terry cloth robe, except hers was pink. She was standing by the vacant bar. In her right hand, she held a long-stemmed glass.
“Good evening, Mrs. Durov. I believe we can make room for you,” I said. This had trouble written all over it in big Cyrillic letters.
“Thank you, Chase. If I am intruding, I can leave.” She walked over to the tub.
“No, not at all. I was just relaxing after my workout.”
“Ah, a workout. Perhaps I will visit the gym tomorrow.”
She sat her glass down on the edge of the hot tub next to me and, as I watched, slowly disrobed, making it a point to shake her breasts as she pulled the final sleeve free of her arm. Her dark-colored bikini left nothing to the imagination. Say what you will about her icy personality—she was a beautiful woman and had been blessed with nice assets. Shy and bashful were two words absent from her dictionary, as evidence by the show I was witnessing.
“Will Mr. Durov be joining us?” Please.
I tried not to stare as she climbed the stairs to the top of the tub. She held out her hand for me to help her in, and I obliged. As I took it, she slipped something that felt like paper into my hand and winked as I guided her in.
“Sergei is already asleep. The flights across the Atlantic take so much out of him. Alas, it will just be me. I hope this does not make you uncomfortable.” She put her finger to her lips and then pointed to my hand as she said this, as if to say read it and do not speak. I unfolded the small piece paper, curious as to what could be so secretive. It read:
Saturday 11:00 AM
Rm. 627 Coral Towers, Atlantis
Per Schmidt.
Fold and hand back to me with my drink
Ears everywhere
“Would you mind handing me my drink, Chase?”
“Of course,” I said as normally as possible, while inside I quietly freaked out. Per Schmidt. I refolded the note, put it between my fingers and her glass, and handed it to her. She deftly took it and caressed my fingers as she kept her gaze centered on me. I was seeing Viktoria Durov in a new light. She was sitting perpendicular to me and slowly turned in my direction, all the while running her foot up my leg and resting it on the seat directly in front of my crotch. She had big, blue eyes and full lips. A bead of sweat broke on her forehead, and the swell of her breasts was just visible above the surface of the roiling water.
“Chase, whatever shall we do up here? Two young, healthy people in the prime of their lives. I saw how you were looking at me at dinner.” She slid next to me and put her lips to my ear. In her deep accent, she whispered, “Perhaps under different circumstances, we could p
lay, but for now I need you to tell me this is not appropriate; offend me if you must. See you Saturday. Don’t be late. And tell your father and Anna that I came on to you. It will get back to Sergei. Be careful what you say; there are listening devices on the ship.” She kissed my cheek, and I pushed her away. Okay.
“Mrs. Durov-,” I said, raising my voice.
“Please, call me Viktoria,” she purred.
“Mrs. Durov, I think you’re beautiful, but you’re also married. As much as I’d like to, I think we need to stop.”
“Come on Chase; it’s just sex. I’m not asking for a commitment. You won’t regret it.”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t be doing this,” I said indignantly.
“Fine, I doubt you could satisfy me anyway. You’ve been away so long, you probably don’t even remember how to use it.” Sticks and stones . . .
She exited the hot tub in a huff and quickly put on her robe before storming off. So much for a leisurely, welcome-back-to-civilization kind of weekend.
Chapter 11
Muted booms woke me from an otherwise shallow, fitful sleep. Listening devices and a Russian woman working with the FBI had me twisting and turning all night. I rolled over in the mostly dark room and glanced at the clock. It read 9:04 so I tossed the covers back, stumbled groggily to the window, and raised the privacy shade to see if we were engaged in battle with the Bahamian Navy. Blinding sunlight assaulted me, and I lowered the shade halfway.
After I brushed my teeth, I threw on some shorts and a t-shirt and went to investigate. Perhaps Super Agent Viktoria Durov was leading an FBI raid on the Anchor Management. I discounted that immediately. Outside, the booms were louder, and I climbed stairs in search of the source. The staff I passed weren’t panicking, so I assumed there was nothing to worry about.
I heard laughter as I reached the sun deck. My father, Sergei, and Anna were on the helipad, each holding expensive-looking black shotguns and wearing headphones and black sunglasses. A man in khakis and a blue polo sat behind a squat, stainless- steel trap thrower.
