by Nora Roberts
“No problem. Do you need anything else?”
“I’d like my laptop. I should have asked you before, but I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
“You’re not going to be able to e-mail anyone, go into chat rooms, post on boards.”
“It’s not for that. I want to study, and research. If I could have my computer, some of my books …”
“I’ll check it out.”
That had to be good enough.
When night fell, they put her in a car with John and Terry. Griffith and Riley drove behind; more marshals took the lead.
As they sped along the expressway, it occurred to her that only twenty-four hours ago she’d put on her new red dress, her high, sparkling shoes.
And Julie, eyes bright, voice giddy, had sat beside her in a cab. Alive.
Everything had been so different.
Now everything was different again.
They pulled directly into the garage of a simple two-story house with a wide, deep yard. But for the car, the garage stood empty—no tools, no boxes, no debris.
The door leading to the interior boasted a deadlock.
The man who opened the door had some gray threaded through his dark brown hair. Though nearly as tall as John, he was more filled out—muscular in jeans and a polo shirt, his weapon holstered at his side.
He stepped back so they could enter the kitchen—bigger than the one they’d just left. The appliances more modern, the floor a buff-colored tile.
“Liz, this is Deputy Marshal Cosgrove.”
“Bill.” He extended a hand and an encouraging smile to Elizabeth. “Welcome home. Deputy Peski—that’s Lynda—is doing a perimeter check. We’ll be keeping you safe tonight.”
“Oh … But—”
“We’ll be back in the morning,” John told her. “But we’ll get you settled in before we go.”
“Why don’t I take you up, show you your room,” Terry suggested, and before Elizabeth could agree or protest, Terry had picked up her suitcase and started out.
“She looks younger than I figured,” Bill commented.
“She’s worn out, still a little glazed over. But the kid’s solid. She held up to two hours with Pomeroy without one fumble. A jury’s going to love her.”
“A teenage girl taking down the Volkovs.” Bill shook his head. “Go figure.”
SERGEI VOLKOV WAS IN HIS PRIME, a wealthy man who’d come from wretched poverty. By the age of ten he’d been an accomplished thief who’d known every corner, every rat hole, in his miserable ghetto in Moscow. He’d killed his first man at thirteen, gutting him with an American-made combat knife he’d stolen from a rival. He’d broken the arm of the rival, a wily boy of sixteen.
He still had the knife.
He’d risen through the ranks of the Moscow bratva, becoming a brigadier before his eighteenth birthday.
Ambition had driven him higher until, with his brother Mikhail, he’d taken over the bratva in a merciless, bloody coup even as the Soviet Union crumbled. It was, in Sergei’s mind, a moment of opportunity and change.
He married a woman with a lovely face and a taste for finer things. She’d given him two daughters, and he’d been amazed at how deeply he’d loved them from their first breath. He’d wept when he’d held each child for the first time, overcome with joy and wonder and pride.
But when, at last, he’d held his son, there were no tears. That joy, that wonder and pride, were too deep for tears.
His children, his love and ambition for them, pushed him to emigrate to America. There he could present them with opportunities, with a richer life.
And he’d deemed it time to expand.
He’d seen his oldest child married to a lawyer, and had held his first grandchild. And wept. He’d set up his younger daughter—his artist, his dreamer—in her own gallery.
But his son, ah, his son, his businessman with a degree from the University of Chicago, there was his legacy. His boy was smart, strong, clearheaded, cool-blooded.
All the hopes and hungers of the young boy in the Moscow ghetto had been realized in the son.
He worked now in his shade garden of his Gold Coast estate, waiting for Ilya to arrive. Sergei was a hard and handsome man with shocks of white waving through his dark hair, thick black brows over onyx eyes. He kept himself rigorously fit and satisfied his wife, his mistress and the occasional whore.
His gardens were another source of pride. He had landscapers and groundskeepers, of course, but spent hours a week when he could puttering, digging in the dirt, planting some new specimen with his own hands.
If he hadn’t become a pakhan, Sergei believed he might have lived a happy, very simple life as a gardener.
In his baggy shorts, the star tattoos on his knees grubby with earth and mulch, he continued to dig as he heard his son approach.
“Chicken shit,” Sergei said. “It’s cheap, easy to come by, and it makes the plants very happy.”
Confounded, as always, by his father’s love of dirt, Ilya shook his head. “And smells like chicken shit.”
“A small price to pay. My hostas enjoy, and see there? The lungwort will bloom soon. So many secrets in the shade and shadows.”
Sergei looked up then, squinting a bit. “So. Have you found her?”
“Not yet. We will. I have a man checking at Harvard. We’ll have her name soon, and from there, we’ll have her.”
“Women lie, Ilya.”
“I don’t think she lied about this. She studies medicine there, and is unhappy. Her mother, a surgeon, here in Chicago. I believe this is also true. We’re looking for the mother.”
Ilya crouched down. “I won’t go to prison.”
“No, you won’t go to prison. Nor will Yakov. I work on other avenues as well. But I’m not pleased one of my most valued brigadiers sits now in a cell.”
“He won’t talk.”
“This doesn’t worry me. He will say nothing, as Yegor will say nothing. The American police? Musor.” He dismissed them as garbage with a flick of the wrist. “They will never break such as these. Nor would they break you if we were not able to convince the judge on the bail. But this girl, she worries me. It worries me, Ilya, that she was there and lives. It worries me that Yakov had no knowledge she and the other were there.”
“If I hadn’t been delayed, I would have been there, and would have stopped it. Then there would be no witness.”
“Communication, this was a problem. And is also been dealt with.”
“You said to keep an eye on him, Papa, to stay close to him until he could be disciplined for stealing.”
Ilya shoved up, yanked off his sunglasses. “I would have cut off his hand myself for stealing from the family. You gave him everything, but all he thinks of is more. More money, more drugs, more women, more show. My cousin. Suki.” He snarled the word for traitor. “He spits in our faces, again and again. You were good to him, Papa.”
“The son of your mother’s cousin. How could I not do my best? Still, I had hopes.”
“You took him in, him and Yakov.”
“And Yakov has proven himself worthy of that gift time and again. Alexi?” Sergei shrugged. “Chicken shit,” he said with half a smile. “Now he’ll be fertilizer. The drugs. He was weak for them. This is why I was strict with you and your sisters. Drugs are business only. For drugs—that is the root—he steals from us, betrays us and his own blood.”
“If I’d known, I’d have been there, to watch him beg like a woman. To watch him die.”
“The information on his arrest, on the deal the bastard made with the cops, only came to us that night. He had to be dealt with quickly. I sent Yakov and Yegor to check his house, to see if he was there. So perhaps he was dealt with too quickly. Mistakes were made, as the Americans say. You’ve not been one to whore with Alexi in the past. His taste was always less refined than yours.”
“I was to stay close,” Ilya repeated. “And the girl, she was intriguing. Fresh, unspoiled. Sad. A little sad. I liked her.�
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“There are plenty of others. She’s already dead. Now you’ll stay for supper. It will please your mother, and me.”
“Of course.”
6
TWO WEEKS PASSED, THEN THE START OF ANOTHER. ELIZAbeth could count on one hand the number of times she’d been allowed to leave the house. And never alone.
She was never alone.
She, who’d once longed for companionship, now found the lack of solitude more confining than the four walls of her room.
She had her laptop. They’d blocked her access to e-mail and chat boards. Out of boredom and curiosity, she hacked through the blocks. Not that she planned to contact anyone, but it gave her a sense of accomplishment.
She kept that small triumph to herself.
She had nightmares, and kept them to herself as well.
They brought her books, and music CDs. She only had to ask. Devouring the popular fiction and music her mother so strongly disapproved of should have given her a sense of freedom. Instead, it only served to highlight how much she’d missed, and how little she knew of the real world.
Her mother never came.
Every morning John and Terry relieved the night shift, and every evening Bill and Lynda relieved them. Sometimes they made food; breakfast seemed to be John’s specialty. For the most part, they brought it in. Pizza or burgers, chicken or Chinese. Out of guilt—and partially out of defense—Elizabeth began to experiment in the kitchen. Recipes were just formulas, as far as she could see. The kitchen a kind of laboratory.
And in experimenting, she found an affinity. She liked the chopping and stirring, the scents, the textures.
“What’s on the menu?”
From her seat at the table, Elizabeth glanced up as John walked in. “I thought I might try this stir-fry chicken.”
“Sounds good.” He got himself coffee. “My wife does stir-fry to trick the kids into eating vegetables.”
She knew he and his wife, Maddie, had two children. A seven-year-old boy, Maxfield, named for the painter Maxfield Parrish, and Emily—for Emily Brontë—age five.
He’d shown her pictures, the ones from his wallet, and told her funny little stories about them.
To personalize himself; she understood that. And it had, but it also forced her to realize there were no funny little stories about her as a child.
“Do they worry about you? Being in law enforcement?”
“Max and Em? They’re too young to worry. They know I chase bad guys, and that’s about as far as it goes right now. Maddie?” He sat with his coffee. “Yeah, some. It’s part of the package. And it can be tough on her, the long hours, the time away from home.”
“You said she was a court reporter.”
“Yeah, until Max came along. Best day of my life, that day in court. Even though I could barely remember my own name with her sitting there. Most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. I don’t know how I got lucky enough to talk her into going out with me, much less marrying me.”
“You’re a very solid man,” Elizabeth began. “Physically attractive. You’re kind and have a broad worldview, varied interests. And the fact that you’re in a position of authority, carry a weapon, can be attractive to a woman on a visceral level.”
His eyes laughed at her over his coffee. “You’re like nobody else, Liz.”
“I wish I were.”
“Don’t. You’re a stand-up girl, scary smart, brave, compassionate—and you have varied interests as well. I can’t keep up with the variety. Science, law enforcement, health and nutrition, music, books, now cooking. Who knows what’s next?”
“Will you teach me to handle a gun?”
He lowered his coffee. “Where did that come from?”
“It could be one of my varied interests.”
“Liz.”
“I’m having nightmares.”
“Oh, honey.” He laid a hand over hers. “Talk to me.”
“I dream about that night. I know it’s a normal reaction, an expected one.”
“That doesn’t make it easier.”
“It doesn’t.” She stared down at the cookbook, wondered if her world would ever be as simple as ingredients and measurements again.
“And I dream about going in, to do the lineup. Only he sees me, Korotkii. I know he sees me, because he smiles. And he reaches behind his back, like he did that night. And everything slows down when he takes out the gun. Nobody reacts. He shoots me through the glass.”
“He didn’t see you, Liz.”
“I know. That’s rational and logical. But this is about fear and emotion—subconscious fears and emotions. I try not to dwell on it, try to keep busy and occupied.”
“Why don’t I contact your mother?”
“Why?”
The genuine puzzlement had him biting back an oath. “You know we have a psychologist available for you. You said you didn’t want to talk to one before, but—”
“I still don’t. What’s the point? I understand what’s happening, and why. I know it’s a process my mind has to go through. But he kills me, you see. Either at the house because in the dreams he finds me, or at the lineup because he sees right through the glass. I’m afraid he’ll find me, he’ll see me, he’ll kill me. And I feel helpless. I have no power, no weapon. I can’t defend myself. I want to be able to defend myself. I don’t want to be helpless.”
“And you think learning to shoot will help you feel more in control, less vulnerable?”
“I think it’s one answer.”
“Then I’ll teach you.” He took out his weapon, pulled out the magazine, and set it aside. “This is a Glock 19. It’s standard-issue. It holds fifteen rounds in this magazine.”
Elizabeth took it when he offered. “It’s polymer. I looked it up.”
“Of course you did.”
“It’s not as heavy as I thought it would be. But it’s not loaded, so that accounts for some of the weight.”
“We’ll keep it unloaded for now. Let’s talk about safety.”
She looked up, into his eyes. “All right.”
After some basics, he had her stand, showed her how to sight, how to grip. And Terry walked in.
“Jesus Christ, John.”
“It’s not loaded,” Elizabeth said quickly.
“I repeat, Jesus Christ.”
“Give us a minute, Liz.”
“Oh. All right.” More reluctant than she’d imagined, she gave the gun back to John. “I’ll be in my room.”
“What the hell are you thinking?” Terry demanded the minute Elizabeth left the room.
“She wants to learn how to handle a gun.”
“Well, I want George Clooney naked in my bed, but I haven’t attempted kidnapping. Yet.”
“She’s having nightmares, Terry.”
“Crap.” Terry wrenched open the refrigerator, got out a Coke. “I’m sorry, John, this all seriously sucks for that kid. But letting her handle your service weapon isn’t an answer.”
“She thinks it is. She doesn’t want to feel defenseless. Who can blame her? We can tell her all day long she’s safe, we’ll protect her, but she’s still powerless. It’s not just about what we tell her, but what she feels.”
“I know that, John, I know. I understand she’s scared, and
