by Rob Sinclair
My heart was now pounding violently, uncontrollably, in my chest, a response to the oxygen-depleted blood but also through sheer panic. I knew that any second it might shut down altogether. But Lena’s grip on my neck seemed to only get tighter still, her long, manicured nails digging into my skin.
She let out a long scream. Somewhere between fury and ecstasy. She panted heavily, staring deeply into my eyes.
My whole world was turning into one big white mess. I was on the brink.
And then she let go.
She stood up off me. I coughed and spluttered, gasping for air. But I didn’t get a chance to recover. The men hauled me from the chair, threw me to the floor and pinned me down. My arms were held, a knee placed into the back of my neck. Even if I’d had the strength to resist, I wouldn’t have been able to throw them off me.
‘You don’t want to talk to me?’ Lena said, her words slurred she was so out of breath from exertion or the thrill. ‘Well, this is what you get, Carl. Just remember where you are. I’m in charge here.’
A loud cracking sound rang out. At first I mistook it for a gunshot. The pain that came searing across my back told me exactly what it was. I gritted my teeth. The knee that was on my neck pushed down harder, my airway becoming restricted once more.
I heard another crack, then another, as a thick leather whip was lashed against my back. I only had on a simple cotton shirt. It didn’t offer much protection.
When the fourth crack came I thought that I could actually feel the flesh on my back splitting wide open. I grimaced and shouted out. The pain was immense.
Lena was speaking to me again, but I couldn’t focus on her words any more. It had been weeks since they had hurt me physically. Her viciousness was so out of the blue. I tried to take my mind somewhere else, like I’d done all those weeks before. I tried to think of Angela. Tried to picture her face. Her hazel eyes. Her silky brown hair. Her smile. Her warm, supple body next to mine. But the sound of the whip, the smell of the dank floor, the pain consumed me.
I started to count the lashes to focus my mind. I squeezed my eyes shut on the tenth strike. My body was tense and unmoving, paralysed by the searing pain ripping through me.
I managed to get to eighteen before I lost count. After that my brain finally succumbed and, as it had so many times before, it took me away from that place.
Chapter 23
The missing contents from the safety deposit box held no emotional value for me. Just a few IDs, a wad of cash, a spare handgun and some bullets. Under normal circumstances their loss would have been merely inconvenient. With cash I could have re-acquired the weapon and IDs in a matter of hours. But these weren’t normal circumstances. The absence of any of my possessions was disturbing.
‘How could my account have been closed?’ I said, unable to hide the agitation in my voice.
The manager’s face remained steadfast. ‘I’m sorry, but that’s not for me to answer. Our role is merely security and administration.’
‘Security? What about my things! They’re not very secure now, are they?’
The manager frowned, looking put-out by my apparent criticism. It was the first emotion he’d shown since revealing to me that my possessions were no longer being safely kept on his premises.
‘I hope you’re not suggesting that something untoward has happened here.’
‘That’s exactly what I’m suggesting.’
‘I’m sorry, but if you’ve given your code to a wife or girlfriend then that’s nothing to do with us. We can’t control that and our clients don’t expect us to.’
Nobody else could have known my passcode. Not even Dmitri, who had been here the day that I acquired the box.
‘Who has access to the boxes?’ I asked.
‘Only me,’ he said. ‘Nobody but me.’
‘Do you keep logs of all customer visits?’
‘Of course,’ he said, his face crinkling, offended that I should ask such an obvious question.
‘And the log shows that the box was opened and the account closed four weeks ago? Somebody actually came here to close the account?’
‘That is the only way to close the account. They need the code to verify their ID. Then I have to make sure the box is empty so I can re-set it.’
‘Do you keep security tapes?’ I asked him, standing up and pacing, trying to figure out what was going on.
‘Sir, this is getting a little out of hand,’ the manager said as he stood up from his seat, holding his ground, trying to even the playing field a little. Though he was still six inches shorter than me. ‘I’m afraid that if you don’t have a valid code for a box currently in operation then there’s nothing more I can do for you.’
I stared at him blankly. I didn’t know what else to do or say.
‘I’m going to have to ask you to leave now,’ the man said.
I knew that I could cause a scene if I wanted to. Grab the little turd by his neck and squeeze what I needed right out of him. But he was right. It wasn’t his problem.
‘Please,’ I said, trying to sound sincere. ‘This is very important to me. I think someone may have stolen that code. I just need to find out who it was.’
The manager remained standing, though his shoulders slumped a little as the chances of the fight that he’d readied for faded.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Complete customer discretion and privacy is absolutely fundamental to us. There’s nothing I can do.’
‘Look, at least take a look at the tapes from that day. I don’t have to look with you. Maybe my memory’s just got the better of me. Just take a look and then tell me whether it was me or someone else who closed the account. If it was me then fine. If not then we can talk about what to do next.’
‘Even if it wasn’t you, there’s really nothing more that can be done. It’s just not the way we operate.’
‘Please, just look?’
The manager um’d and ah’d but then relented and sighed as he walked off towards the door that led to the main customer area at the front of the bank.
‘Please take a seat for a moment,’ he said as he opened and went through the door.
I didn’t sit.
He was gone for only a minute or so. When he returned, his demeanour had softened somewhat. I didn’t like it.
‘Just a few more minutes, sir,’ he said, sitting down again. ‘Then we’ll get all of this sorted.’
‘What did you do?’ I asked.
The manager shook his head, questioning what I could mean.
I walked over to the door and pushed it open just an inch or two. I spotted one of the tellers, a young lady, phone receiver pressed to her ear. She looked over in my direction, then quickly looked away again when we made eye contact. She was speaking quickly into the phone, but I couldn’t hear any words from where I was.
‘What did you do?’ I asked the manager again.
‘Please. Just come and take a seat. We’re going to get this sorted for you.’
‘Who is she calling?’ I said, raising my voice.
‘Please, just stay calm.’
‘The police?’
The manager sighed. ‘They can help you solve this,’ he said. ‘If you think you’ve been robbed then they can help you more than I can.’
I wasn’t going to hang around and argue the pros and cons of that one. I pushed open the door and walked out into the front of the branch.
The manager shot up out of his seat. ‘Sir. Please. Wait!’
But I was already halfway to the front door. The two tellers watched me, goggle-eyed, as I stormed through. I got the distinct impression from their faces that the police hadn’t been called for my benefit. Maybe it hadn’t been the police that they called at all. For all I knew it could be the Bratva enforcers that were about to descend on me.
The manager caught up with me just as I reached the door. I turned to face him, my anger rising at the thought that this weasel of a man might have been trying to dupe me.
‘I don’t kn
ow who you called, or why,’ I blasted. I towered over the manager, who seemed to cower away with every irate word that I spoke. For all of my faults, intimidating was something that I excelled at. ‘And I don’t actually care who you called. But I can assure you that if you do anything to make my life harder, I’m going to come back around here, tear off your balls and feed them to you. Do you understand?’
The manager murmured and nodded.
‘So maybe you’ve got another phone call to make.’
I turned and left. I wasn’t sure whether the manager actually would make that call. But if he didn’t, I was sure I could handle whatever came of it.
What worried me more was that four weeks ago someone had walked into that branch with a code that only I knew and had taken my things. Had they done it because they thought I was dead, or at the least would never be getting out of the gulag? More importantly, just who the hell had it been?
Regardless, I desperately needed funds and I debated for just a few seconds whether I should go back to the bank and rob it. Perhaps take some of my frustrations out on that smarmy manager. But that would have been a step too far. I didn’t have a problem hurting people who deserved it, but I didn’t really want to hurt a civilian who was just doing his job. Plus, I saw no point in adding more people to the ever-lengthening list of those who were currently after me.
What I needed was to call my bank back in England and get some money wired over to me in Omsk. Some money transfer shops had specific wire terminals where you could do that. The good thing about modern technology was that I could access my money almost anywhere. I didn’t have a debit card or a cheque book because I didn’t ever want to carry my real ID. But I could access the cash from almost anywhere using money-transfer companies. Although expensive they’re quick and reliable, with locations everywhere that I’d ever needed. Western Union alone has more than four hundred thousand branches worldwide.
And one of those is in Omsk.
So the plan was simple: I would head to the Western Union and get what I needed. At least with cash I could still move around somewhat freely. Given time, I could even re-acquire ID and some more ammunition.
I had been to the Western Union once before and I knew how to get there from where I was. At a brisk pace I could walk there in fifteen minutes. But the weather had turned: a snowstorm had arrived and would make the walk tough going.
After heading east from the bank, I turned left at the next crossroads, feeling the bite of the wind as I came around the corner. The gloomy stone and brick buildings on either side of the road created a wind tunnel effect and the snow-filled air howled past my ears, the large flakes smacking against my skin. Within seconds, my entire face stung and I was covered in white. My clothes flapped against me as I battled against the force of the wind. I had to lean my body forwards to avoid toppling over. The temperature had dropped again too and I wished I’d taken the time to acquire some more appropriate clothes – a hat, scarf, gloves at least.
I noticed two other pedestrians on the other side of the road struggling like me, but other than that the street was deserted. For obvious reasons, I guessed. The snow was thick and heavy, the temperature probably ten below zero already with nightfall still two hours away. The couple on the other side turned into a sheltered ally. I carried on regardless, dragging myself along the now abandoned street.
After a few more strained steps I noticed two figures up ahead, emerging around a corner. They were walking towards me on the same side of the street, about a hundred yards away. It looked like a man and a woman, judging by the size difference and the attire; the man wore a long, dark parka, the woman a bright-red puffer jacket with brown boots that went up to her knees. They were still too far away for me to make out any detail through the wall of white that was coming down, but I could see that they were both hunched into their thick coats, even though they, unlike me, had the wind against their backs.
They were ten yards away from me before I could finally make out their faces properly. I wasn’t surprised in the slightest. I stopped walking just as they both looked up at me.
‘Logan,’ said Mary, not a hint of warmth in her greeting.
Chris stood next to her, no emotion on his face. He drew a hand from his parka to reveal a black Walther handgun, the barrel pointed at my chest.
‘Just the man we’re looking for,’ he said.
Chapter 24
Since that first beating at the hands of Lena I’d suffered three more days of abuse from the guards. Then I’d been given a simple choice. It wasn’t too hard a decision to make. I would play along with her games. I didn’t want to go back to those early days of torture. Once upon a time I’d been trained to withstand such ordeals, but that didn’t mean I wanted to. And I didn’t want to be that man any more – the JIA’s machine. I wanted to feel like a human. To be treated like one.
And as long as I co-operated with Lena, it seemed that wish would be granted. Plus from what I could gather I’d already talked, I’d already given them so much information about me, so what would I be fighting for? Of course, a big part of me felt like a traitor. A traitor to the JIA and to Mackie and to the life I had led for so many years. But then, Mackie and the JIA had left me to torture and abuse. And if Lena was telling the truth, my being here was the JIA’s doing in the first place.
I was sitting in the interrogation room. Lena was opposite me. My neck still ached when I breathed and my body was covered in ugly gashes and sores. But in the last few days my relationship with Lena and her treatment of me seemed to have moved on. My shackles were off. The conversations were becoming relaxed and open.
I knew what they were trying to do. Despite the obvious threat of violence that never went away, they were trying to make me feel like they were the good guys. I found it hard to resist because so much of what I was being told made sense. And because I was developing an unspoken attraction to Lena. Not just physical either, but an attraction to who she was and what she had to say. I knew that was wrong, I hated myself for it. And yet I was struggling to fight it: in many ways, I simply didn’t want to fight it any more. I liked the way Lena and the men who gave me meals and took me to and from my cell were treating me now.
I still didn’t know how much information I’d inadvertently given Lena in the dead period. I could glean bits and pieces from the questions she asked and some of her responses to me. But I knew that she only ever let on to me what she wanted to. I still tried to resist talking about myself, about the agency, but it was becoming harder and harder to do so.
And it wasn’t just me doing the talking. In turn, Lena was becoming more open. She talked to me about her life and the things she’d seen and done. Like we were comparing notes as to who had the most messed-up existence.
When it all boiled down, I could see a lot of myself in Lena. A lot of the things I’d gone through she had too.
‘Aren’t you wondering why no-one has come for you?’ Lena said.
‘Who says they haven’t come? For all I know they’ve been scouring the earth for me.’
‘Oh, come on, do you really believe that?’ she scoffed. ‘Everything happens for a reason. You being here. Your people not being here.’
‘What are you trying to say?’
‘If you get out of here at all, it’s not going to be because of them. It’ll be because of you. Remember what I told you before? About the choice you have to make? Well, that’s your way out of here.’
‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ I said, steadfast.
We were both silent for a few moments. Usually Lena would continue to push her agenda onto me, twisting and turning the conversation in the direction she wanted. But on this occasion she didn’t. And I wasn’t sure whether that was good or bad.
‘Tell me more about Angela,’ Lena said. ‘What was it about her that you liked so much?’
It was the first time Lena had ever mentioned Angela – at least that I could recall. It took me by surprise. But then that was the game Lena e
njoyed so much.
And it was impossible for me to answer the question. Because I didn’t know. My attraction to Angela Grainger had been a natural instinct. No thought or premeditation had gone into it. Perhaps that was why the bond had been so inexplicably strong.
‘I barely even knew her,’ I said in response, wanting to play down my still burgeoning feelings for the woman who had betrayed me.
‘That’s right,’ Lena said. ‘You really didn’t. Given the way she used you. Do you really think she felt the same way about you?’
That was the thing. I had separated my relationship with Angela into two. On the one hand, there was the person I fell for. I remembered the way we had talked for hours, the intimate times we spent together, even the lovers’ quarrels that we’d had in our brief time together. And then there was the other person. The one who’d used me to get her revenge on the man who’d killed her father. The one who’d shot me and gone on the run. The two sets of memories, the two sides I’d seen of her, didn’t go together at all.
‘I understand why she did what she did,’ I said.
And my words, to some extent, were true. Angela had wanted to avenge her father’s death. I could abide by that. But could never agree with the means by which she achieved it: the whole concocted scheme to kidnap Frank Modena, which had seen innocent people killed.
‘Ah, yes. And so we return to the subject of revenge once more. It really is such a central part of your life.’
Lena, of course, was right. It had driven me from when I was a teenager trying to get to grips with a cruel world, through to me tracking down Youssef Selim and putting a bullet in his head.
‘Why do you want to know about Angela?’ I said, deflecting Lena’s comment.
‘Because it seems so strange to me that a man like yourself could have fallen so deeply for somebody. Not only that, but to have been so blinkered as to her true intentions.’
