“You need a visa.” Johnny shook his head. “I forgot about the visa.”
“It’s the adrenaline. Look at me. I forgot about the boomerangs. I forgot about the angel.”
“So what are you saying, you fly back to Takaoka and get on the ferry? That doesn’t make sense. You’d be two and a half days behind.” It was a stupid thought, a stream of consciousness. He regretted even suggesting it.
“No ferries. And no commercial planes.”
“Then what? You have a private submarine?”
“No. But I have a friend who has a private plane.”
A flash of envy passed through Johnny. Simeonovich. The man with all the toys. The man Nadia wouldn’t trust when she went to Ukraine to dig into Bobby’s background. First, he was Russian, and Russians and Ukrainians had a history of adversity. Second, he was a Russian oligarch. Apparently one of the more honorable ones, but he himself had admitted to Nadia that by American rules of law, all oligarchs were criminals without exception. It was impossible to conduct business in the countries that comprised the former Soviet Union without offering bribes.
“So what, you’re going to trust him now?” Johnny said.
“To some degree, yes. I have no choice.”
“You’re kidding me. With this?” Johnny looked around to make sure no one was listening. Leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “You’re going to trust a guy who lives for money with the formula?”
“I’m not sure I’ll need to go that far for him to help me.”
“You think he’s going to let you fly in his plane from Tokyo to Kyiv and not expect you to feel some obligation toward him?”
“He has an office in Tokyo but the odds his plane is here are zero. No, I think he’s going to charter a plane for me to get to Kyiv. Then let me use his plane from there.”
“And you’re comfortable with this? Because before, you weren’t too keen on confiding in him.”
“The thought of owing him doesn’t bother me so much anymore. I like him. I . . . I trust him.”
Johnny noted the slight hesitation in her voice and her choice of verbs. “You sound as certain as Bobby was that he saw Eva. You expect him to do this for you without knowing what you’re after?”
“I must sound pretty arrogant right now, huh?”
Johnny shrugged. It wasn’t so much arrogance as it was feminine confidence, the kind a woman projected when she knew a man held a fascination for her, and was prepared to do whatever was necessary to get her. Whatever that meant. Johnny wanted to tell her she was making a mistake. That a man who measured his happiness by counting dollars, euros, or rubles would inevitably let her down. If she brought Simeonovich closer, he would find out about the formula and choose it over her. But there was no sense in doing so. Johnny would only sound like a jealous fool.
“It’s not about humility or arrogance,” he said. “It’s about Bobby, and it’s about the formula. You have to use all the resources at your disposal. All of them. If you have access to a private plane, and you trust you can handle the man who’s lending it to you, you have to go for it.”
Nadia considered his statement and nodded.
“Back to the original question,” Johnny said. “You’re waiting for fifty minutes to go by because of the time difference. Where are Simeonovich’s headquarters? Moscow?”
“Forty-six minutes. But who’s counting. Yeah, Moscow. Moscow is five hours behind Tokyo. So it’s 4:14 p.m. He prefers not to get personal calls until 5:00 p.m., when his workday is done. Everything rolls to voice mail before then. Thus the wait. I could call his business and have him interrupted, but I know the man. It will work better if I’m patient.”
“What if he’s somewhere else? In the UK or the US?”
“He knows the time changes. He’ll still know I respected his schedule.” Nadia shrugged. “What can I say? He’s a billionaire. He’s eccentric.”
“Self-important.”
“Semantics. In my experience with the super rich, as an analyst for hire, once a man’s net worth goes north of a hundred million dollars, inhibitions melt away pretty fast.”
“The emperor sheds his kimono.” Johnny recalled using the line with Nakamura. Sounded like emperors were stripping all over the place.
Nadia managed a laugh. Her eyes went to her watch again, then to Johnny, the food on the table, and back to him. They lingered on him. Johnny felt helpless when she stared at him, like he did in the courtroom when he was waiting for the verdict on an impossible case, one where he didn’t have a chance to impose his will on the final outcome.
“I better eat some of this fast and get to my room,” she said. “I want to be packed and ready to go. Just in case he says yes.”
“Sure.”
“I’m sorry to rush through dinner like this.”
Johnny barely heard what she said. He was coming to grips with what they weren’t discussing. That she needed him to go away now.
“I know it’s presumptuous of me,” Nadia said. “I mean, it’s nuts, right? I’m just assuming he’s going to charter a plane for me . . . ”
Her eyes were alive now, similar to how she’d described Bobby’s voice on the phone. And Johnny would not be part of it. If she was successful in getting Simeonovich to help her, he was not invited. Their unspoken understanding was that he would be going back to New Jersey. Johnny wouldn’t dare suggest tagging along. She appreciated him, maybe even loved him in a platonic way. But she needed more help than he was capable of providing. The man who could provide it wouldn’t want him around, and Nadia understood the reality of the situation. In addition to that, she genuinely didn’t want Johnny to lose his job by extending his vacation, especially not if she had an oligarch at her disposal.
The waiter delivered the bill on a tray. Nadia and Johnny had an understanding that she was paying his expenses for the trip. Johnny still tried to pay for the meal out of pure chivalry, but Nadia grabbed the tray with the bill from his hands. Johnny knew that her checking account was temporarily flush from the fat fee she’d earned from the securities analysis she’d performed for Simeonovich. Johnny watched her stack some yen on the tray to cover the bill and the tip.
People didn’t touch money in public in Japan. When a person needed to hand currency to another, he used an envelope. Money was considered filthy, both literally and figuratively. The Japanese were right, he thought. Money was a filthy thing, especially when it came from Russia. Johnny didn’t trust the bastard. Not one bit. They had no rule of law in Russia. Why would anyone trust a man who knew how to manipulate the law to his own benefit?
They left the restaurant and rode the elevator together.
When they got to Nadia’s room, she looked at him. Her eyes turned large and moist.
“You’re too good to me, Johnny Tanner,” she said. “I’m never going to be able to thank you properly for everything you’ve done for me. For Bobby and me. For us.” She kissed him firmly on the cheek.
Johnny went back to his room and called his credit card concierge to check the flight schedule from Tokyo to the New York metro area. He didn’t need to wait for Nadia to tell him what Simeonovich would say. They both knew the outcome of her call just as surely as they knew what had just transpired in front of her hotel room.
She’d given him the big kiss good-bye.
CHAPTER 29
THE CO-CAPTAIN OF the Gulfstream G550 emerged from the cockpit every half hour to see if Nadia needed anything. The sleek jet seated nineteen people, but she was the only passenger.
“Will we be stopping to refuel?” Nadia said.
The co-captain was an American in his fifties, with a gray crew cut and a lean physique. His military looks inspired confidence. He shook his head. “Nope. The G550 has a range of six thousand, seven hundred fifty nautical miles. The flight from Tokyo to Kyiv is about five thousand miles.”
Simmy had purposefully chartered a jet that could cover the distance non-stop. He didn’t want her to waste any time. Nadia pictured him telling his assistant—the condescending one with the sculpted cheekbones that she’d met on his yacht less than a month ago—to make sure she chartered a plane that met all of Nadia’s needs. A warmth spread over her body.
The co-captain said, “I’m guessing you didn’t make the charter yourself?”
“How can you tell?”
He chuckled. “The same way I can tell whoever chartered this plane is very fond of you. Kind of obvious.”
Nadia lowered her voice to make her next question sound more discreet. “How much for a jaunt like this?”
He shrugged. “Figure about ten thousand per thousand miles.”
“Fifty thousand?” Nadia swallowed. “That much?”
“Unless your friend is a good client. Then he has his own contract, his own rate. It’s negotiated.”
“My friend has his own plane. It just wasn’t in Tokyo.”
The co-captain smiled. “Good news then.”
“What’s that?”
“Your friend loves you. It was at least fifty grand.”
Nadia had called Simmy at precisely 5:00 p.m. Moscow time. It was his private mobile phone. Only his most trusted friends and associates had the number. He answered the phone without emotion, then turned enthusiastic as soon as he heard her voice.
Nadia explained the urgency of the situation. Bobby was in danger on a ferry headed to Vladivostok. Nadia needed to get to Kyiv to investigate some matters and get to Vladivostok before Bobby arrived. She had approximately fifty-seven hours before Bobby arrived and the clock was ticking. He’d offered to help her before. She hadn’t accepted. Now she needed his help. In the most grandiose, inappropriately expensive way imaginable.
It was a preposterous request. And yet Nadia was certain he would say yes. First, she’d saved him tens of millions of dollars with her analysis by preventing him from overpaying for a company whose books had been cooked. Second, fifty thousand dollars to him was the equivalent of fifty cents to her. It was a mercenary’s observation, but it was the truth. Third, he wanted her and Nadia knew it. A woman knew a man’s intentions based on the look in his eyes, his body language around her, his manner of speech. Whether she was an object of temporary fascination or something more serious, she had no idea.
But the prospect of either one thrilled her as much as telling a Russian oligarch about the existence of a formula scared her. Oligarchs became who they were because of their insatiable appetite for wealth. A radiation countermeasure would be worth billions. If he learned of its existence, could she trust him not to try to acquire it for himself?
No. And yet, now she had no choice.
Before offering to arrange transportation from Tokyo to Kyiv, he’d asked only three questions.
“Are you in danger?”
“Yes. Someone tried to kill me today.”
“Is Bobby in danger?”
“Yes. The same people tried to kill him. He’s following one of them into Russia.”
“Will you tell me the complete truth about what this is all about if I meet you in Kyiv?”
“No.”
“No?” His voice rang with disbelief.
“No. I’m going to tell you the truth now. I need to investigate a few things in Kyiv as soon as I get there. And I need your help to make the necessary arrangements ahead of time. Otherwise I won’t make it to Vladivostok in time.”
She gave him a brief summary of everything that had transpired in Japan. She also told him about the origins of a potentially revolutionary formula, her discovery that it was only partially complete, and the e-mail that had led them to Fukushima. She told him about Eva, too. She had to. Eva was the focal point of her investigation. She was the reason Nadia was going to Kyiv. Nadia told him everything he could possibly want to know. Except for one thing.
“Are you going to tell me what this priceless formula is about?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“When I’m done with my investigation in Kyiv.”
“I’ll be accompanying you personally during your investigation.”
“Then you’ll have to know earlier so our meetings make sense. I’ll tell you all about it during the drive from the airport.”
“You’re going to trust a Russian?”
“Yes.”
“I’m so happy to hear you say that. It means two things.”
“What’s that?”
“You are an American after all.”
“And?”
“There’s hope for us yet.”
He told her he was taking his private plane to meet her in Kyiv.
When she arrived in Kyiv at 5:15 a.m. on Monday, he was waiting for her at the terminal in Boryspil Airport. He wore a tan suede jacket over a black mock turtleneck. A day’s growth on his beard added mischief to his appearance. He’d appeared freshly shaved in his pinstripe suits when she’d met with him before. His transformation left Nadia wondering how he looked in pajamas.
He kissed her on both cheeks and escorted her to his Range Rover. It was the white one in front of the two black ones surrounded by six soldier types with crew cuts and cinderblock shoulders. He held the rear door open for her and climbed in beside her. One of his men took a seat behind the wheel and drove them out of the airport.
“I left the limousine at home,” he said. “I hope this is comfortable enough. Given we’re going to be asking some questions in some questionable neighborhoods, I thought it best to take the vehicle that commands the most respect. You probably drive one of these yourself in New York City, don’t you?”
“Range Rover? Me? Oh, sure.”
The closest she’d come to Range Rovers was on the Triboro Bridge heading in and out of Manhattan, when they passed her with an implied sense of superiority. But when she climbed into the plush leather cabin, she had to admit she could get used to driving in the fast lane.
“You said someone tried to kill you. And your boy has taken off in pursuit of them. Tell me everything.”
Nadia told him about what happened in the Zone of Exclusion without getting into details about why they were there. She saved that part for her discussion of the formula, which she suspected was imminent.
“Did you find Ksenia Melnik?” Nadia said.
“The woman that worked at the Division of Nervous Pathologies in Kyiv,” Simeonovich said. “Yes. My people found her.”
“Where is she?”
“I will tell you. And I will take you to her if you like, although I think you’ll change your mind about wanting to see her. But first, you must fulfill your promise to me. You must tell me what this precious formula is about.”
Nadia felt her temperature rise. The magnitude of her imminent revelation hit her. She realized for the first time that she feared she might be on the verge of betraying all mankind. The formula could theoretically be used to save a nation’s population after a nuclear attack. In a nuclear exchange, one group of people could heal while another died. She was about to reveal the possible existence of such a formula to a Russian. Her ethnic distrust, planted by her immigrant parents, had been reinforced by headlines during the Cold War. Ronald Reagan’s bluster about the evil empire. Stories of oppression behind the Iron Curtain. Was she about to make one of the biggest errors in judgment in mankind’s history?
No, she decided. Men had tried to kill her and Johnny. One of them was holding Genesis II hostage. Those men were also Russian. They were unequivocally evil. If Bobby made a mistake and revealed himself, they might have the entire formula in their possession, if it existed. Simmy was an international business figure with a reputation for integrity, at least where Russian oligarchs were concerned. Aligning herself with him to fight the other Russians was a no-brainer.
�
�You had me look into records at the Division of Nervous Pathologies,” Simeonovich said. “The radiation research center. That was a strong hint. An ambitious man might draw some earth-shattering implications from that alone.”
“Even a man blinded by his ambition is right once in a while.”
He chuckled. “Are you saying I’m driven only by money?”
“No. I’m saying even you’re right once in a while.”
“American women. Are they all so insolent?”
“No. Just the ambitious ones.”
Nadia turned sideways to face Simeonovich. She described the formula in detail, including her visits with Eric Sandstrom, the radiobiologist at Columbia University. She told Simeonovich about Dr. Arkady Shatan and the treatments he administered to Eva and Bobby. There was no reason for Nadia to hold back. If Simeonovich had found Ksenia Melnik, he knew that she’d worked for the brilliant, reclusive, and dead former Soviet scientist.
Simeonovich glanced at Nadia occasionally, but mostly stared at the seatback in front of her. He listened without interruption and maintained a stoic expression until she finished speaking. When she was done he glanced at her casually, as though she’d just finished giving him the weather forecast.
“Who else knows about this?” he said.
“Johnny Tanner knows everything,” she said. “He’s on his way to the States. And the people who fought us and took Genesis II hostage probably know something.” Nadia remembered Victor Bodnar. Nadia didn’t know how much the old thief knew, but it was irrelevant. He was in Riker’s Island prison and going to stay there for ten years.
“Anyone else?”
“No—” The memory of a flying boomerang popped into her mind. “Wait. There’s the angel. He may or may not know about the formula, but he was following us for a reason.”
“Angel?” Simeonovich appeared confused. “What angel?”
Nadia rolled her eyes. “Oh my God. I forgot to tell you about the angel.” She recounted how two boomerangs saved their lives.
The Boy Who Glowed in the Dark (The Nadia Tesla Series Book 3) Page 14
