Master

by Catherine Taylor

  “All for you, Lena,” he whispered.

  Stepping down as far as he dared, Jahn braced himself, took a deep breath and bolted straight for the open door.

  Getting past the first two men was easy, but he already knew there would be others. There were at least another ten, milling about at the line of cars out front. Jahn had barely a few seconds to assess the situation, before they were shouting at him, running to surround him, brandishing machetes and baseball bats. Only two held up guns. Several feet from the building he stopped and raised his hands in the air.

  Their abuse was furious, but he stayed in one spot, turning to watch as they circled him, until he was facing the building.

  Gregor emerged, talking with another. He froze and his face became savage as he saw Jahn.

  “That’s him.” He shouted. Pulling his gun out, he pointed it at Jahn. “You fucking cunt. Throw the bag and gun on the ground slowly.”

  Jahn nodded and slipped the back from his shoulders, placing it on the ground beside him. With his left hand, he pinched the gun out with his fingers, glancing at his watch, and threw it onto the ground, and then he grinned.

  “You got something to laugh at, arsehole? Gregor demanded, striding towards him.

  “Yeah,” Jahn replied. “Boom.”

  The first blast shook the ground and belched out a massive ball of fire that devoured every man in the immediate vicinity of the building. Enough energy was expelled to launch others through the air, including Gregor and Jahn. The big man’s body shielded him but he still went down hard, grimacing as he was flooded in a wave of heat. Lying flat, facedown, he covered his head, yelling as the heat penetrated his thick, padded clothing, his body feeling as if it was about to be roasted. Debris and spears of glass rained down on him, sharp shards embedding in him.

  The subsequent blasts lacked the ferocity of the first, but dealt their own carnage. Some of the men were crushed as huge blocks of concrete rained down on them, the ground trembling as they hit. The night was lit up and filled with the screams of injured men and the continual thunder of destruction.

  Keeping down, Jahn snaked forward away from the building, his hand finding his gun. The air was stifling, thick with dust, making it hard to breathe, but providing a good cover.

  He crawled fast and had made some distance when a massive boot came down on the hand holding the gun. Yelling in agony, Jahn rolled to his side and winced to see the rabid face of Gregor. The gun was kicked away.

  “You’re going to fucking die, cunt.”

  He stopped yelling, panting at his pain, staring at the insanity in Gregor’s face, and looking at the gun pointed at him. When the shot rang out, Jahn instinctively flinched, but felt nothing. It was Gregor that dropped the gun, teetered and then fell to his knees. A blossom of red appeared at the right side of his shirt and bloomed into a dark stain.

  His face was agonised and glazing over, and he fell forward on hands and knees. Jahn slid away from him, tossing his head around to see the source of the shot. Everywhere, the gangs of youth, from his neighbourhood, were spreading out, overpowering by sheer numbers, their bald rivals who had escaped the blast.

  Jahn sat up, and lay his injured hand in his lap, removing a large triangle of glass from his leg. His face was contorted in pain, but he managed to grin as Danil came running up to him.

  He had a gun pointed at Gregor, but Jahn grabbed his wrist, pushing the gun away. “No, I want him alive.”

  “He tried to kill you,” Danil insisted.

  “But he didn’t, and I need him to be able to talk.” He released Danil and smiled. “But thanks for showing up.”

  The young face contorted in anger. “They killed Karl, but not before they hurt him. I think he had to give you up before he died. They hung his body from a building down the road, a message to all of us. We were waiting for them.”

  Jahn bowed and shook his head. “I’m sorry, Danil.”

  “We saw them drive in here, like they owned the place. We weren’t going to sit back and do nothing. This is our war now.”

  “No, Danil,” Jahn glared at him. “After tonight, there will be no war. I’m removing Sergei Novikov from the equation.” He nodded towards Gregor who had fallen onto his side, and was struggling to breathe. “And he’s going to help me find him.”

  The distant sound of sirens reached their ears, and Jahn ignored his pain to get to his feet. “Militia will be all over the place soon. Help me get this arsehole into one of those cars, preferably one with keys in it.”

  Danil was only too happy to manhandle Gregor, but Jahn eased him off. “Remember, I want him alive.”

  Half dragging him, half carrying him to the car, they got him inside. Jahn could see Gregor’s back from where the blast had ripped away the back of his shirt. The skin was stark white in places, blistered and peeling in layers. A blackened, bleeding hole in his side showed where the bullet had entered. It gave Jahn some satisfaction as he added to his torment by binding his hands behind him with plastic ties. Gregor groaned but offered no resistance.

  Slamming the door shut, he turned to Danil. “I wish I could thank you more, but I have to go. I don’t know how long that prick will last.”

  Danil followed him around to the driver’s seat. “Take care, Jahn.”

  For a moment his eyes were drawn to the apocalyptic scene beyond. Parts of the building were still falling down. Among the rampaging youths, bodies lay on the ground. He thought of Dylan and Karl and Andrei, and his throat grew dry.

  “Take a good look at this, Danil. This is what I have to live with for the rest of my life. I’ve killed men I never knew, and innocent people have died because of me, including Karl.”

  “I don’t know,” Danil shrugged. “Karl was already wiping himself out on drugs, before you came along. He gave them all up, when you started kicking the ball around with us. He wanted to be like you.”

  Jahn sighed as he got behind the wheel. “Please, Danil, find a better role model than me.”

  “It won’t be easy,” Danil grinned.

  He lingered until Jahn was gone, but as several headlights appeared in the distance, he joined his fleeing companions, taking a final look at the destruction.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  There was something incredibly peaceful as the sun silently brought its light into Natasha’s apartment. Oleysa stretched and yawned, putting her empty cup down on the table and grinned at Natasha.

  “I need to get some sleep.”

  “You’re welcome to use the couch,” Natasha said, with a yawn of her own.

  Oleysa shook her head. “You’ll need that, and besides, I want a shower, clean panties and my own bed. I can get a taxi home.”

  Natasha smiled. “Thank you for what you did for them.”

  “They look good together, and he needs someone like her. Now, where do I get a taxi?”

  “Just go down the street to the main road. There’s a taxi stand around the corner.” Natasha walked her to the door. “Look after yourself, Oleysa.”

  “Always,” she grinned, waving back as she headed to the stairs.

  Upon reaching the lower floor, she was startled as a door flew open and an old woman came out into the hallway, glaring at her.

  “What the hell do you think you are doing in here?” She yelled, her old face was wrinkled in anger. “You don’t live in this building. This building is for the tenants only.”

  Olyesa stared at her. “Shut up, you crazy old bitch, you’ll fucking wake everyone.”

  “Nobody is allowed in here. You get out of my building, you dirty girl. You don’t come around here. This building is for tenants only. You don’t live in our building.”

  When it was obvious the woman wasn’t going to stop raving, Oleysa hurried on, chuckling to herself as she listened to ongoing spiel behind her.

  The air was cold outside and Oleysa pulled her coat around her, as her heels clicked along on the pavement. The street was void of people, and she wondered how many taxis woul
d be around at this time of the morning.

  At least the walk would give her time to think about her strange night. Regrettably, it hadn’t ended as she had hoped, with Jahn in her bed. Men like him didn’t come along every day, and he really was that good. She smiled at how, even now, she felt excited by him.

  Something moved to her side, and her mouth fell open as her arm was crushed in a vice like grip. In a split second she was pulled into the dark of a thin alley between buildings and slammed against a wall. A hand went over her mouth, and the strength behind it, made her instinctively still.

  Her frightened eyes travelled up to look at the face of the man holding her. The ice blue eyes puzzled her with their familiarity, but everything else was wrong. Where the black hair should be, there was a receding shadow above an older face. The nose was sharper and the lips thinner. His mouth was curled in a cruel sneer.

  “You make a sound, whore, and I’ll use this to shut you up.” He held up a straight razor.

  She nodded, feeling the terror flow through her veins. There was no chance of escape. The thin gap between buildings was barely accommodating them.

  “I have some questions for you. If I don’t like your answers, you’re dead.”

  He removed his hand, but stayed close enough for her to feel his breath. His eyes raked over her, and his contempt was obvious.

  “Where has he gone?”

  It was a question that terrified her, because she had no ready answer. She looked up at him, pleading. “Please, I want to answer anything you have for me, but I don’t know. All I know is that he went to find Victor Makarov and was going back to his place, which I truly don’t know where it is.”

  “I would say it is the apartment block that blew up this morning.” His eyes bore into her. “Who is the fat girl?”

  Her dislike of this individual was growing, but right now she had her own survival to think of.

  “Lena Petrenko, Makarov’s granddaughter.”

  Her answer seemed to please him. “He’s not as stupid as I thought. That was a smart move. It worked. Why does he still have her?”

  “He likes her. He wants to protect her”

  Instantly his face changed. “She’s nothing. You, I can understand. You’re a whore, but what would he see in her?”

  Oleysa trembled under his anger. “You would have to ask him.”

  “I intend to.” He calmed a little. “I have a lot to ask him. What has he said about his political loyalties?”

  She frowned at the strange question. “Nothing to me. Lena would be the one to ask.”

  He nodded thoughtfully. “How long has he had her?”

  “Just over a week.”

  Again, he became angry. “A week? How the fuck can she mean anything to him? He was just fucking her, wasn’t he?”

  “I don’t know,” Oleysa began to weep. “He took her as a prize from the fights. I don’t know what happened between them.”

  “He took her as a hostage to get to Makarov,” he raged. “And now you’re telling me he likes her?”

  Oleysa’s mind raced to think of anything to calm him. “He went after her when one of Sergei’s Novikov’s men took her. He put his life on the line for her.”

  For a moment, the man just stared at her. “Novikov, Sergei Novikov. A criminal, a purveyor of filth like you, whores and drugs. Why would Novikov want this fat slut?”

  “Jahn killed his son who tried to kidnap Lena.”

  A cold, cruel stare edged across his face. “His name is Damyen. Damyen Kravec, the brother of Taras Kravec, sons of Pavlo Kravec, the traitor. It is a Ukrainian name, not some fucking idiotic Baltic title.”

  “He never told me his real name,” Oleysa whimpered.

  “Why would he?” he sneered. “You’re a dirty, filthy whore.”

  Before she could respond, the razor sliced deeply across her throat. He stood back against the other wall and watched her slide down the wall, her mouth open in the gurgle of a scream, her eyes wide in terror as her life drained from her. He wiped blood from his face as he waited for her to die, and stripped the splattered parka from his body, turning it inside out.

  When she stopped moving, he carefully stretched his leg over the pool of blood and moved on, stopping at the corner of the building and peering out. The street was still empty, and his eyes shifted to the building that Oleysa had come from.

  * * * *

  Jahn sat back against his door and stretched his legs to the passenger seat. He yawned and looked back over the seat to the unhappy face of Gregor.

  “I can sit here all day. Lena is safe, and I could do with some sleep. You, on the other hand won’t make it, not without some medical attention.”

  Gregor breathed heavily, his face trying to hide the extent of his pain. “Either way I’m dead.”

  “You betrayed one boss and he was half a decent man.”

  “He was weak and stupid. He had an idea that he could take Lena away and they would end up together. I wouldn’t have cared less, until I knew it was you who killed Pavel.”

  “The son of your real boss, who was planning to take her away too and make some movies with her, none that had a happy ending. So why didn’t you just follow Andrei and pick me off when I met up with him.”

  Gregor smirked. “He was scared and cautious. Wouldn’t let me take a weapon, even searched me before we went. Said he wouldn’t put Lena’s life in danger. It didn’t surprise me when he came back and said that you two had been together. The bitch was always a slut. Did she tell you how many men she fucked? She didn’t even care what scum she slept with.”

  Jahn grinned. “I’ve probably fucked over a hundred women. Does that make me a slut?”

  “Were any of them black?”

  “I don’t give a fuck what colour they are.”

  “And that’s the difference between you and me. I give a fuck about Ukraine, about keeping it pure. Lena’s spawn was black, a mongrel. Vera was right to kill it. That’s one thing I can’t fault Makarov on, even if he is raping this country.”

  Jahn glared at him. “Lena’s baby is dead?”

  Gregor grinned. “Makarov enjoyed telling her. It made me sick when I heard what she had done. I thought she was better than that.”

  The memory of the scratches on Makarov’s face suddenly made sense, and he replied icily. “You fucking cunts. That girl never hurt anyone, and you’ve all fucking tortured her, over what? Racial pride, money, greed and fucking corruption. And these girls you kidnap? They’re white, pure as you call it…”

  “They’re whores and sluts, the ones that get pregnant, like Lena, with fucking foreigner’s bastards. They are good for fucking and profit, and nothing else.”

  Jahn sighed deeply. “So the world is going to look prettier with a whole lot of bald headed cocks like you? Well I happen to like diversity, but right now I have a plan that needs your input. So what’s it going to be?”

  When he didn’t answer, Jahn suddenly rose up and landed a punch in his guts. Gregor’s face went from smug to severe anguish, a whimpering yell which gradually subsided to sobs.

  Jahn watched him impassively. “Now your time is shorter. In a few hours you’ll be dead.”

  Gregor breathed slowly. “How do I even know you will take me to a hospital?”

  “You don’t, but helping me out is the best chance you have, and if you don’t help, I can make your death extremely agonizing.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “First you can tell me if you have seen this girl.”

  Jahn got out the photo of Marisha and held it in front of his face. Gregor studied it and nodded.

  “Yes, I’ve seen her. She’s at Novikov’s place. He’s taken a fancy to her.”

  “What’s her name?”

  Gregor frowned, “I don’t know, Maria or something.”

  “Try again,” Jahn growled.

  His face screwed up in deep thought. “Marisha. Her name is Marisha.”

  “That hospital is lookin
g closer,” Jahn told him. “The next correct answer may get you there. Where is Novikov?”

  “There is a building, near the night club, an old apartment block which is converted into his home and where he conducts business.”

  “We going for a drive and you’re going to point it out to me. If I’m satisfied, I will drop you off at the hospital. If you are lying to me, mine will be the last face you will ever see.”

  * * * *

  Natasha watched Lena breathe, and was satisfied that she had settled into an untroubled, deep sleep. Yawning, she quietly took an unused pillow and carried it out to the lounge, tossing it onto the couch.

  Going to the window, she drew the curtains, shutting out enough light to darken the room. Her body fell to the couch, and she curled up onto her side, closing her eyes, yielding to that wonderful feeling that sleep was only seconds away.

  A minute later, her eyes were open and alert. The voice had been distant and familiar, but it was its abrupt cessation that had woken her. The old woman on the lower floor had always been loud and cranky. She cared little that she was disturbing everyone else, but over the years she had proven to be a reliable watchdog. No strangers entered the building without being subjected to her attack and nothing shut her up.

  Natasha leapt from the couch and hurried into the bedroom. Very carefully, she reached far under the mattress and withdrew her gun. Back in the lounge, she dropped the magazine out and checked that it was loaded, before quietly going to the front door.

  For a long time she just listened, but there was nothing but silence. Slowly, she removed the chain, and turned the deadlock to stay open. Keeping hold of the handle, she opened the door quietly, and only enough to peer down the hallway.

  Her mind was racing. She knew the best idea was to lock the door and be prepared for any intruders, but Lena was fast asleep. The thought that she would be subjected to some violent invasion didn’t sit well. The girl had been through enough.

  She grinned to think that maybe she was being cautious for nothing, but too much time with Jahn had rubbed off on her. Nobody should know of her place, and Jahn would usually be aware if they had been followed. Unfortunately, he had been too preoccupied with Lena.