by Tom Cain
Carver had seen a TV show once about a British prisoner of war who pretended to go crazy, so that the Germans would hand him over to the Red Cross. But by the time he was finally free, it was too late; the pretense had become reality. He had truly gone mad. Carver was like that prisoner. When the cuffs were taken from his wrists, he made no attempt whatever to resist as his hands were secured to the arms of the chair. He did not want to give Zhukovski or his men the slightest excuse to press the white button that had so completely enslaved and unmanned him. Just the thought of what it would be like to squirm and jerk against his restraints, the imagined pain that would cause, was enough to leave him in a ferocious sweat. The final straps were tightened without any further bolts of electricity. He almost wept with gratitude.
There was a smooth efficiency to Titov’s actions. His normal twitchiness had been replaced by the calmness of a man who took deep comfort and satisfaction from his labors. But he had not finished his handiwork. First, he reached behind the chair and picked up the headphones, which he placed over Carver’s ears. There was no sound, simply a muffling of the world around him, as if he had stuck his fingers in his ears.
Next, Titov grabbed the roll of tape. He pulled out a strip about four inches long and tore it off with his teeth. Then he leaned forward and pulled on Carver’s eyelids, forcing them down.
As soon as Carver realized what Titov was doing, he immediately closed his eyes. He wanted his captor to know that he was cooperating. He was doing everything he possibly could to be good.
Carver felt the sticky grip of tape on his right eyelid, then a jerk as it was pulled up, and a second grip as Titov smoothed the other end of the strip onto his forehead. His eye was open now, wide open. And he could not blink. Then Titov did the same thing to his other eye. He took a step back from the chair, placed himself directly in Carver’s line of vision, and took the dreadful black box out of his trouser pocket. He held it up next to his grinning face in his left hand. He stretched his right arm out in front of him and raised his index finger. He looked at the box. Then he turned his head and looked at the finger. And then he winked.
Carver heard the muffled sound of laughter. At the edge of his vision, he could just see Dimitrov and Rutsev doubled over. But Carver didn’t care about them. His full concentration was on Titov’s finger as it slowly, ostentatiously rotated in the air, swooping from one side of his body to the other, closing in until it was just inches from the black box and its gleaming white button.
Carver’s taped eyes widened even further. His gagged mouth emitted a pathetic, wordless whimpering. His sweat was slick against the back of the metal chair. Titov let him suffer, relishing every second of Carver’s terror. Then he put the box back in his pocket and turned away.
He was leaving the room! The torment was over!
Carver saw Titov walk out of his field of vision. He saw Dimitrov pick up the black computer case and take it with him as he too departed. He heard the slamming of the door and the clicking of the bolts. For a few moments Carver just sat there, naked, cold, and immobile in the silent solitude of his gleaming cell.
Then, without warning, the white box on the wall opposite him burst into blazing light, a white-hot glare that burned into his defenseless, wide-open eyes. At the same time, the headphones burst into life and his ears were pounded with a deafening burst of white noise, like the static of an untuned radio. The noise exploded in his skull, filling his brain with a random roar that had no structure or meaning, nothing that his mind could grasp or comprehend. The light attacked him like a blowtorch. And there was absolutely nothing he could do.
The noise and the light would go on forever and he could not turn them off. He could not close his eyes. He could not block his ears. He could not move any part of his body. He could not even hear himself when he screamed.
79
Gstaad is the Saint-Tropez of ski resorts, a beautiful old home for crass new money, a place where age and cash meet youth and beauty, then make a deal that suits them both. Back in the seventies and eighties, Arabs awash with petrodollars swapped sand for snow and rushed to Gstaad. Now it was the Russians’ turn.
The very smartest hoteliers, desperate to preserve at least the illusion of class and exclusivity, had tried to exclude Moscow’s oligarchs and mafiosi, wringing their hands, bowing apologetically, and explaining that the best suites in high season were booked up months, even years in advance. But someone had to buy the jeroboams of vintage Cristal champagne at 7,500 Swiss francs a pop, down in the GreenGo Club beneath the Palace Hotel. Someone had to send their sable-coated lovers teetering, around the jewelers and antique shops. And no one did that quite as willingly, exuberantly, and downright flagrantly as the winners in Russia’s new gangster economy.
Even the Russians, however, tended to go elsewhere in September. Many hotels closed down for a three-month break between the end of the Alpine summer and the first heavy snowfalls of winter. No one came to Gstaad to see the leaves turn red. So Zhukovski’s arrival had not gone unnoticed.
His name was not in any telephone directory or on any property register. But Thor Larsson had only sat down in his second bar of the evening when a big, bearded German Swiss in an immaculately clean and well-pressed pair of workman’s overalls overhead his question to the bartender and growled, “Zhukovski? That Russian? He’s got a big place in Oberport, right out on the edge of town, up there in the forest, heading out toward Turbach.”
That had been three hours ago. Now Larsson was sitting in his scruffy old Volvo, looking down at the shadowy bulk of the chalet, set on the side of a steep hill like a Heidi house on steroids. The main entrance was at the back of the property, up by the tree line. That made sense, Larsson, thought. You’d walk through the chalet to the main reception rooms at the front, with spectacular views down the mountainside, looking right across the whole valley in which Gstaad lay.
There was a large circular driveway and parking area by the door. To the left of the property, a drive made its way downhill, curled around, and then led to a garage directly underneath the ground floor. So a chauffeur could leave his employers by the main entrance, then drive on to take the cars out of sight. And that, Larsson felt sure, was the way Carver had been brought in. It didn’t seem too likely that there’d been a butler waiting to greet him at front the door. Carver wouldn’t be leaving by the front exit, either: he and Alix saying a polite farewell to Yuri Zhukovski, then heading on their way. When you looked at it like that, it was obvious this meeting was going to turn sour.
Even so, Larsson had great faith in Carver’s powers of survival. He clung to the image of him dashing from the chalet, guns blazing and in need of a quick getaway. When that happened, he’d be waiting, engine running.
It was past midnight and he was sitting alone in the darkness, waiting for something to happen, though he didn’t know what or when. The Grateful Dead were playing on the stereo. He had a stone-cold slice of pizza and an even more frigid cup of black coffee. All things considered, it was just like home.
80
Yuri Zhukovski took his time. Three hours passed before Alix heard his footsteps coming up the stairs, then striding down the corridor. She’d been listening to the men drinking downstairs, bragging to one another and singing the filthy locker-room songs they’d learned back in the old Soviet days. At one point the partying stopped, there was a tramp of feet across the flagstone hallway, and then, a little later, a muffled crackle coming from somewhere deep in the belly of the building.
Was that gunfire? Alix tried to pretend that there might be some other explanation, but she could not escape the obvious conclusion: Carver had been shot. She closed her eyes and prayed.
Please God, let him live. Don’t take him from me now.
The men had returned to the living room, the brays of their boastful laughter even louder than before. Finally, the party had broken up. A few moments later, the door to the bedroom banged open and Yuri stood before her, silhouetted against the light from
the corridor, one hand holding the computer case.
Alix patted the bedspread next to her. She was arrayed there for his pleasure, on top of the bed, leaning against a pile of snow white pillows in a short, satin nightdress the color of café au lait, trimmed with lace and cut high on the thigh. She had one knee up, the other leg stretched out in front of her, revealing a pair of tiny matching panties.
“Come here, my darling,” she purred. “I’ve been missing you.”
Yuri placed the black bag on the floor, took a few steps into the room, then stood quite still in the middle of the carpet. She knew he must have been drinking with his men, but his voice betrayed no trace whatsoever of drunkenness when he replied, “No. You come here and prove how much you’ve missed me. Prove it on your knees.”
Afterward, she helped him out of his clothes, nuzzling against him, dutifully arousing him as she led him to the bed. But now that Yuri’s immediate physical needs had been satisfied, he seemed more interested in discussing the pain he’d inflicted on Carver.
“We let him stay there for an hour or so,” he was saying as they slipped under the covers. “Then Kursk and his boys burst into the room and dragged him out of his chair. He was totally disoriented. It was obvious that he was completely unable to see, he’d been looking into that light for so long. He was waving his arms around in front of him like a blind beggar.”
Somehow Alix managed to give a little titter, as if amused by Carver’s degradation. Yuri seemed encouraged by her appreciation.
“They led him out of the room, into the garage. Then they put him up against a wall and he stood there, cowering like a whipped dog, looking around with his pathetic staring eyes, still taped wide open. I must say, it made me feel quite nostalgic, just like the old days. And the fascinating thing was, his hands were free. He could have taken the tape off his eyes, closed them for a bit, but he just couldn’t figure it out. I was glad. I wanted him to see what was happening. I wanted him to know.”
“I want him to know too,” said Alix, nibbling Yuri’s ear and wrapping her thighs around his.
“Still, after a while, I ordered Titov to tear off the tape, to see what would happen. Carver blinked a few times and shut his eyes. When he opened them again, he was crying, weeping quite pitifully. Kursk slapped him a few times and that seemed to wake him up. That was when he realized where he was, standing up against a wall with four men pointing guns at him. And then, then—and I must say, this was, perhaps, the most satisfying moment of all—he tried to stand up straight, die like a man . . . and he couldn’t. He fell over. One of the men had to go over and drag him up again, just prop him against the wall. . . .”
Alix had been trying not to listen. It was just too painful. So it took her a few seconds to comprehend what Yuri was saying. He was describing Carver’s death. Her prayer had gone unanswered. It felt like a knife to her heart. She couldn’t breathe. She gasped for air.
“Are you all right?” asked Yuri.
She nodded and smiled apologetically. “Sorry. I’m fine. Tell me the rest of the story.”
He took one of her breasts in his hand and gave the nipple a contemplative stroke with his thumb, his eyes fixed on her face, his expression impassive as she gave a little gasp.
“So as I was saying,” he went on, “the men were all armed with their guns. But the guns were loaded with blanks. So they fired a volley at Carver and he was huddled up against the wall and it took him a second to realize that he was still alive. And then he wet himself all over the floor, like an animal. So naturally I made him get down on his knees and crawl through his own urine. It was really quite satisfying.”
Carver was alive! It was all Alix could do to stop herself rolling off Yuri and simply flopping over on the bed, overwhelmed by relief. Yet that joy was mixed with a bitter shot of anger and shame at the ordeal he was enduring on her account.
“Where is he now?” she asked, raising her head from Yuri’s chest.
“Back in his favorite comfy chair,” Yuri replied.
Alix knew what that meant. Yuri had taken her to see the basement torture chamber the day before, when it was being prepared. It was a test of her loyalty and a warning against betrayal. The unspoken message was clear: You too could end up in that chair.
She tried to keep her voice calm. “Will he survive the night?”
Suddenly Yuri’s eyes turned hard and suspicious, with a new intensity that seemed to cut through the semidarkness of the bedroom.
“Why do you ask? You seem concerned for his safety.”
Somehow, Alix forced a laugh. “Of course I am! I do not want him to die just yet. I want a long, deep sleep. Maybe in the morning I will have a little breakfast in bed. Then I will have a bath, get dressed . . .” She lay back down again so that she was whispering into Yuri’s ear, “In my sexiest new clothes. . . .” She paused again. “And then I want to go downstairs and watch him die with my own eyes, right in front of me.”
Yuri gave a sharp, almost cackling laugh and slapped Alix hard on the rump. “You are a bad, bad woman. That must be why you make me so hard.”
Hating herself for her complicity, Alix let him screw her and pretended to enjoy it. Then she remained motionless and silent until he fell asleep. She was tempted, oh so tempted, to kill Yuri there and then, press a pillow against his smug face until he suffocated. But there was just a chance he might wake up and fight back, and she could not afford to be defeated now.
There was a gun in the bedside table, on Yuri’s side of the bed. Slowly, hardly daring to breathe, agonizingly aware of every sound, Alix slid the drawer open and removed the pistol. It was a SIG-Sauer, like the one Carver had used. The two men in her life had that in common, at least.
The glowing red numbers of the digital clock on the table gave the time as 4:01.
The master bedroom suite had his and hers walk-in closets. In Yuri’s, she found a pair of jeans and a belt and stuffed them into a laundry bag, which she hung over her left shoulder.
Would Carver be in any fit state, mentally or physically, to get dressed and make a run for it? Could he fight his way out if they were discovered? Alix longed to see and hold him again. But that ache of anticipation was undermined by an equally powerful fear of what she might find. Part of her wished she could just run away and hide from the strain of multiple deceptions and the pummeling of repressed emotions. But there was no point trying to close her eyes and wish all this away. Life was as it was. She just had to deal with it.
She pulled on a robe and tiptoed barefoot back across the bedroom to the door, turned the handle with painstaking care, and, never taking her eyes off the bed, opened the door a few inches. Just enough to see into the hallway.
It seemed clear. The men would be upstairs, Kursk in his own small room, the others in an attic dormitory. They would not believe that Carver could possibly escape. Even so, knowing Kursk, there was bound to be a man standing guard somewhere. For all his crude brutality, Kursk was very seldom inefficient and never, ever careless.
The ground floor was completely unoccupied, though the air was still heavy with the stench of stale smoke and spilled alcohol. If there was a guard, he would be downstairs, in the cramped control room next door to the main chamber.
Standing by the heavy door that led down to the basement, Alix thought back to her side-arm training, almost a decade ago. She checked the magazine and made sure that a round was chambered. Then she stepped down the stairs, holding the gun out in front of her, clasped in both hands, ready to fire at any moment.
There was no one in the basement corridor. She stepped noiselessly across the bare concrete floor to the door of the control room. Now she held the gun in her right hand, behind her back. With her left, she eased the door open. If there was anyone inside, she planned to tell him she wanted to see the Englishman suffering. The men all knew she was back in Yuri’s good graces. They would want to indulge her for fear of angering him.
The door swung into the room. Alix slipped in after i
t, side-on, trying to conceal her handgun. She needn’t have worried. There was a guard in the room, Rutsev, but his piggy, round head was slumped against his chest and the only sound in the room was the slow, even snuffle of his breathing. In the quiet room, with no reason to believe that anything could happen, he had succumbed to the effects of all the vodka he had consumed that night.
Alix wondered what to do next. She could not allow Rutsev to wake up and sound the alarm. But there didn’t seem to be anything in the room that she could use to tie him up or gag him. There was no alternative. She would have to shoot him while he slept.
She held out the gun, barely a hand’s breadth from his head, trying to keep it from trembling, trying to summon up the will to kill another human being in cold blood. She thought of all the times his lecherous eyes had played across her body, the hands he had let slide oh-so-accidentally across her ass and breasts. It wasn’t enough. And then, for the first time since she had entered the room, her eyes were caught by the glow of a TV monitor.
She turned her head and saw Carver, his limbs and body bound, his mouth and eyes forced open, the earphones clamped to his head. It was the absolute silence and stillness that shocked her most of all. He must be undergoing agonies beyond all comprehension. Yet there was no sign whatsoever of his suffering. Even the ability to communicate his pain had been denied him.
Alix couldn’t take her eyes off the screen. For all the horror, there was something mesmerizing about the sight of such pure, unrelieved torment. For ten long seconds she stood there, unmoving, then she tore her gaze from the monitor, spun around, and put two bullets into Rutsev’s skull without an instant’s hesitation.
A stew of blood, brain, bone, and hair sprayed against the bare gray wall behind him, heavy drops of thick red matter clinging to the rough surface of the concrete before they spattered onto the floor. Once again, Alix had killed a man. But this time she did not double over in shock. This time she barely even looked at the remains. Seconds later, she was sliding open the bolts on the white cell door.
