As they turn a corner at the top of the high ground, Kat sees in a side mirror the massive white protrusion of the crashed airliner, two helicopters overhead and three launches with British police in wet suits.
Luxton reads Kat’s confusion. “There’s been a deal,” he says. “Yulya, Sayer, Russia, the United States, whatever. The British clear up the mess.”
They’re traveling on a wider road now, parallel with the coastline, under a canopy of trees. Sunlight through leaves dapples Luxton’s face.
The vehicles turn left through a black metal gate in a high brick wall and past a lodge house. They drive along a narrow road of yellow asphalt through parkland of uncut grass; past a large, old, red brick house with high bay windows, narrow chimneys, and a carriage driveway; on past clusters of outlying sheds, houses, and stables; then around to a paddock where horse jumps, freshly painted in bright yellows, reds, and blues, have been pushed to the fence to make enough space for the helicopter to land.
It’s coming down as they pull up. The rotor blade noise sends pigeons flying out from the woodland. Roth cuts the car engine, gets out, and opens Kat’s door like a chauffeur. “This way, ma’am,” he says.
As soon as Luxton’s out of the car, he runs toward the helicopter. Liz, Grachev, and Yulya are still on board. There’s the atmosphere of one of the RingSet camps—once inside, no need for cuffs. Whether victim or executioner, you are a player in a written master plan. They’ll take you when they want, and no one will stop them.
Kat walks over to her father, who’s leaning heavily on his car’s roof, his sleeve ripped and hanging like a rag.
He looks up at her. “Are you okay?”
She nods. “And you?”
His breathing is short and shallow, and his skin stretches tight across his face. He lifts his hand to check a cut above his right eye, then wipes saliva from the edge of his mouth.
“It won’t be natural causes that kill us today,” he says, managing a smile. His concentration wavers, and his eyes move beyond Kat; she turns to find she’s facing Nate Sayer.
The two men gaze at each other, eyes flickering between mistrust and a broken friendship.
Sayer doesn’t move forward, just stands, his hands clasped in front of him, his head slightly lowered, his eyes flitting onto Polinski’s and off again, not wanting to hold his gaze. He doesn’t look at Kat at all.
“I’m not proud of what I did, and what I’m still doing. But it’s keeping us all alive,” he says.
“The day they took me in Lancaster—” Polinski’s voice is raw and weak. He steadies himself against the car.
“I guided them there, John. If I hadn’t, they’d have killed you.”
Polinski says nothing. His head drops, drained of strength.
“After all we’d done together . . .”
Sayer’s expression hardens. He steps forward, takes Polinski’s elbow. “You were going too far. You knew it, but you couldn’t stop yourself.”
“Too far for whom?”
“You were my best friend, but—”
“Too far for whom?” Polinski repeats, shifting his weight, clutching Sayer’s shoulder and wincing as pain shoots through him.
Kat puts her hands on his other arm. “Dad, don’t,” she whispers, her eyes darting angrily at Sayer. “Back the fuck off, Nate.”
At the edge of the woodland, the engine of a backhoe starts up. It sends a young pheasant into the air.
Yulya jumps down from the helicopter. She arches her back, fingers hooked into her belt.
She’s wearing a red shirt, faded blue denim jeans with a wide belt, and knee-length leather boots. She walks toward Kat. The way the sun catches her face makes crow’s-feet crinkle across her face—youth, elegance, malice, and hardship, all mapped onto the skin of a beautiful woman.
Her eyes are alert, but gray and flat. Kat’s seen the look in Dix Street on people who measure their self-confidence by how much they can destroy.
Yulya flips the butterfly safety button of a Beretta 9mm, the same weapon carried by the gunmen at the Kazakh embassy. She slips out the magazine, the extended version that carries 20 rounds instead of 17, checks it, and pushes it back in again.
Grachev gets out on the other side of the helicopter and walks to the fence on the far side of the paddock. The pilot stays in the cockpit. Sayer’s face is dull, eyes drifting toward Yulya.
Across the paddock, Kat catches Grachev’s expression, nervous, helpless, maybe. He makes no effort to stop what happens next.
Yulya’s eyes linger on Polinski and Sayer, but it’s Kat who interests her. She grips Kat’s shoulder, backhands her viciously across her face with her pistol. “I should have done it before,” she says. “That’s for Alex.”
She punches the gun into Kat’s stomach. “For Vadim.”
Kat puts her hands up in front of her to break the fall, but Yulya kicks them away, and Kat goes down. Yulya squats beside her, pulls her head up by the hair, puts her mouth close to Kat’s ear and whispers, “Marcel Lancaric. Remember him?”
She pushes Kat’s head back down. Her forehead hits a stone embedded in the soil, and she feels the blood damp in her hair. The sharp edges of Suzy’s ring bite into her thigh through the jumpsuit. Her cheek throbs like a chain’s cut across her jaw.
Yulya turns Kat onto her back as if she’s a corpse and presses her knee into her stomach. Her expression is hard and functional, with no humanity, no conscience.
Kat strikes with both hands. Yulya blocks her, lands a blow on Kat just below her left temple, but when Yulya goes to strike again, Kat shifts enough to kick her behind the knee.
Yulya stumbles, and Kat scrambles to her feet. Yulya’s raising her gun hand, steadying herself, eyes on Kat, satisfaction rippling down her face.
There’s more than six feet between them, good for a clean shot, but too far for Kat to defend herself.
“Get back down,” says Yulya.
Far away, Mason and Roth lift Dane’s body down from the jeep and carry it to the edge of the woodland. The backhoe jerks backward, and its serrated blade cuts into the ground and tips damp soil aside.
Grachev walks a few steps across the paddock, leans on the fence.
Kat’s down, as Yulya commanded. The grass is damp, smelling of horse manure. Yulya’s shadow falls across Kat. The Beretta in her right hand targets her. It could be now, Kat knows, or it could be that Yulya wants to keep playing until she breaks Kat.
The biggest loss a psychopath can suffer is control, whether physical or psychological. Kat doesn’t plan to let Yulya keep it.
“What does soo-ch-car mean,” Kat says conversationally. “I’d really like to know. Is it Russian?”
Yulya’s forefinger tenses inside the trigger guard.
“See, it’s one of the last things Marcel Lancaric said to me before I shot him.”
“It means little bitch,” Yulya says quietly.
“That’s right. That’s what he called me. I said it was because of you that I was killing him.”
The muscles around Yulya’s brow tighten. But if Kat’s read her right, Yulya won’t kill until she’s regained the ground.
“He also said you thought you were a hot babe in bed. But guys say it’s like screwing a beached whale.”
“Shut up,” whispers Yulya.
“So that’s why he never let you fuck him.”
Grachev takes his hands off the top bar of the fence, lets them hang.
“You are an idiot,” says Yulya. “Just like your sister.”
Her face is smooth and stiff, not yet ready to pull the trigger. Kat moves an inch on the ground. “That’s funny,” she mocks. “That’s exactly what Marcel said about you. Yulya Gracheva was so dumb she––”
The shot comes, but not from Yulya.
SIXTY-SIX
Friday, 4:03 p.m., BST
The bullet strikes the fence post next to Kat, sending wood splinters into the air. The second one splits a stone near Yulya’s feet, throwing sparks.
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As Sayer stops firing, Grachev puts three rounds through the open helicopter door, hitting the pilot, then shifting his aim slightly to let off two shots at the backhoe driver, who must have been at the very limit of his range. The driver slumps over the wheel.
Mason, pulling his pistol from his holster, moves for Grachev.
“Leave him, Sergeant,” shouts Sayer. Confusion crosses Yulya’s face.
“Drop it, Miss Gracheva,” says Sayer. “If you kill her, I’ll make damn sure your whole world dies.”
Yulya doesn’t move. Nor does Sayer. If Yulya shoots, Yulya dies. The call is hers.
Mason’s next to Sayer, covering Yulya. Roth has stayed on the other side of the paddock, his carbine checking everyone.
“Hand over Suzy’s file,” says Sayer to Kat. “If you don’t, Mason will search you for it.”
Kat reaches to the small of her back, tears off the tiny package that she taped there in Tappler’s kitchen the evening before.
“It’s not all there,” she says, holding it out. “Water damage.” Sayer takes it, unwraps the polyethylene, pulls a cell phone from his pocket, slips in the SIM card, turns it on, and walks over to Grachev. He shows Grachev what comes up on the screen.
Grachev nods.
Yulya rests her weapon on her folded arms. Mason offers Kat a hand and helps her up from the ground. A cluster of midges fly into her face, and she swishes them away.
Grachev walks over to Kat, his limp from the bombing noticeable, and takes her out of earshot. He leans his rifle against a fence post. “We have the copy in your Internet file. The FBI has the two copies you gave to Bill Cage. Tell me there are no more copies.”
“There are no more copies,” mimics Kat.
“Thank you.”
“Well done, Max,” says Kat dryly. “Good work for a cop whose sister tried to kill him.”
Grachev’s tone becomes soft, persuasive, frustrated. “You will do now what you refused to do on Monday when I talked to you in the park. You are still alive because Nate Sayer is here. He has stopped Yulya from killing you. I don’t like Nate, but I have an agreement with him; think of it as an agreement between Russia and the United States. Yulya lives, and you and our father live. We keep the SIM card. Sayer’s vehicles have diplomatic clearance to go to Heathrow airport. From there, you will go to Washington. This time, do exactly as I say. I’m asking you to save our father’s life.”
“You’re evil, Max, like her.”
“I have a duty to my family, to my country, and to what is right. If you ever find a situation when these three duties agree with each other, let me know.”
He begins to walk toward Yulya. Kat catches him by the shoulder, pulls to spin him around. “What are you saying, Max? You doing it to please Mommy? You can’t just—”
“That’s the arrangement,” says Grachev. “In better times, maybe later, I can get to know you as a sister to love and admire, but not now. It is impossible.”
“Kat, drop it.” The interruption comes from Sayer. “For Christ’s sake, just this once, drop it.”
“No, she won’t drop it.” Even breaking with fatigue, John Polinski’s voice commands. “She’s my daughter. We see things through.”
Grachev picks up his rifle and walks toward the line of cars. After Polinski’s outburst, no one is speaking. Grachev’s engine fires up in the silence. As he pulls away, his window comes down, and he glances at Polinski, then Kat. He doesn’t look at Yulya. Then he is gone, down the long driveway.
Kat moves to her father and takes his hand. Sayer joins them. “Who picks up the pieces, John, when people like you and Kat see things through?” he says, his voice soft but angry. “Who makes the compromises? People like Max and me. That’s who—when the idealists are saving the planet.”
Polinski shakes his head. “Who was it who said bad deeds carried out by good men are all the more evil, because they know better and do it anyway?”
“You never looked deep enough to see the damage,” answers Sayer.
Polinski doesn’t reply. His balance goes, and he stumbles. Sayer catches him by one arm, Kat by the other.
So Yulya goes free. There’s something crazy about the past few days, and she’s just going to watch Suzy’s killer, with Suzy’s History Book, sashay out of it all. But there’s something sane about what Sayer’s telling her. Her dad’s alive, and Yulya was going to kill him. On the surface, it’s a good deal. The only thing is that Kat’s working out a way to make sure it doesn’t happen like that.
“Nate’s right, Dad,” she says with a forced smile. “Let’s call it a day.”
Polinski’s eyes drop to the ground. His hand grips Kat’s.
Kat looks across to Sayer. “I’ll ride with you. Dad and Mike can ride together.”
SIXTY-SEVEN
Friday, 6:15 p.m., BST
They leave Yulya at the paddock and hit heavy Friday-evening traffic heading south along the expressway to London in a two-car diplomatic convoy, American flags flying on the hoods. Sayer’s in the backseat of the lead car with Kat. Mason’s driving. Polinski and Luxton are in the car behind, driven by Roth.
There’s a lot to say, but no conversation. Kat tries to read Sayer’s face, but he’s giving her nothing. Kat’s calculating. She reckons she’s got until London. After that, it’ll be too late.
They stop at a mall. Sayer buys Kat, Polinski, and Luxton towels and fresh sets of clothes. They don’t shower, but in the mall bathrooms, they dry themselves and change.
“Mason was only half right,” says Sayer after they set off again. He holds up the bag with the cartridge case Kat found in the marshes. “It’s not a 7.62. It’s a 9mm, from a Russian sniper rifle called the VSS. It’s silenced. Pretty rare gun, based on the 7.62, but ramped up to take the 9mm round.”
“Yulya’s?” asks Kat.
“No evidence of that. It’s not the most accurate long-range weapon in the world. Five hundred meters, at best. But it packs a wallop. The slug’s designed to go through body armor, but it doesn’t mushroom and disfigure like a normal bullet. They started using it in Chechnya. Made forensics and body identification easier, apparently.”
“Who pulled the trigger?”
“It doesn’t matter. Like I said, you’ve got to stop.”
“Have you got the weapon?”
“No. And stop asking. Stop thinking.”
“Max and Yulya get away?”
“Max is clean. He was working with me. The Russian government will handle Yulya.”
“You and he cut a deal?”
“He saved Yulya. I saved you and John.”
“And those people held in Kazakhstan with Dad—”
“Shit happens.”
“And the lies? Are you going to live with all the fucking lies?”
His eyes flit out to the road, then back at Kat, brow creased. “Sergeant, pull over at the next stop, will you?” Mason pulls in. The second car follows. Sayer gets out. “Come with me, Kat,” he says.
He walks up a grass bank to a field. Sayer rests one hand on a fence post, waiting for Kat to catch up.
“I couldn’t say this on the boat when I wanted to, so I’ll say it now.” He jabs his finger against Kat’s shoulder. “The next time you fuck with my marriage, I’ll hang you out to dry.”
Kat knocks his hand away. “Suffered some collateral damage, did you?”
“Nancy’s in Washington,” says Sayer, his tone quieter.
“Good for her.”
“It’s what you said to her that sent her.”
Kat shrugs. “She won’t leave you, if that’s what’s worrying you. That’s what she told me, anyway.”
“The house there was broken into.”
Kat turns her head toward the field, lets her eyes follow a path toward a copse of trees.
Mercedes Vendetta, thank God for him, has done what she asked and broken into Sayer’s R Street house.
“Anything taken?”
“They only did the safe. And only you
know what’s in there.”
“I seem to remember it was insurance. If you go down, others go down with you.”
Down the bank, Mason’s leaning on the hood of the car, eyes alert toward the expressway. Roth has gotten out of the second car. He watches inward, toward the field.
“John’ll go down,” he says. “I did bad things for him, even if he didn’t know it. Suzy, too. Or her reputation. She worked closely with John.”
“Others?”
“Others, too. Powerful people.”
“Who?”
“Doesn’t matter to you, Kat, because it won’t get you Suzy’s killer.”
“I did it, Nate. I had your safe broken into.”
Sayer’s eyes flare. He’s guessed or he wouldn’t have wanted to have talked to Kat away from the car and Mason.
“I don’t have to give those files to anyone,” says Kat. “Or maybe I do. It’s your call.”
“How? Who? Was it Cage?”
“It was private. You’ll never get to it.”
“Without me, you’d have been dead. John’d be dead, too. And this is how you repay me?”
Vendetta’s still free, or Sayer wouldn’t be so rattled. He’ll piece it together sooner or later. But what’s he going to do? He’d have to deal with Vendetta himself. And Kat can’t imagine Sayer walking down Dix Street.
“No one needs to go down,” she says.
“And?” Sayer swallows and calms. He drums the fence post with his fingers and keeps his eyes on Kat, who says nothing. “You want Yulya?”
“Yes.”
“I can’t help you.”
“I don’t want help. Take Dad with you,” says Kat. “Get him checked by a doctor. Take care of him. Protect him. Let Mike go. Just don’t stop us.” She holds out her hand, palm flat. “And leave the shell casing with me. It’s the only evidence I have.”
Sayer gives her the plastic bag with the casing. Kat pushes it into her pants pocket. He turns his back to her, goes down the bank, talks to Mason, who opens Luxton’s door, and points up to Kat. Luxton gets out and walks toward her.
The History Book Page 28
