“Do you understand me?” Rina said. “You all seem to think I’m joking.”
“Nobody’s going anywhere until we have a look at where Vlad might be. That’s why I came all this way. Never mind what’s-her-ass.”
Rina smiled a little.
Ravkin and Anastasia returned with steaming mugs. Stiletto took his tea while the others had coffee. Ravkin and Anastasia pulled chairs closer to the couch.
“What do you know for sure?” Stiletto said.
“Vlad is not being held, officially, anywhere in Moscow,” Ravkin said. “He might be in some mob hideout somewhere. I have contacts looking into that.”
“Any of those contacts arrested tonight?”
Ravkin shook his head. “No.”
“Why are the two of your still on the street?”
“Nobody knows about this place” Ravkin said. “Not even Vlad. This is my safe house.”
“I’ve made it clear to Rina that I’m here to get Vlad out, if he’s still alive,” Stiletto said. “Our mutual friend asked me to get you out as well, and whoever was with you. I don’t know exactly how, or what to do with you once we reach the States. You’re doing something illegal. You can’t just claim asylum.”
“The Cabal will take care of everything.”
“You have enormous faith in them.”
“They’ve delivered for us. This present situation notwithstanding.”
Anastasia said, “Are you ever going to tell me who you’re talking about?”
Stiletto looked at Ravkin, who nodded and told the story of the Cabal and his connections to Number One. Anastasia listened without interrupting. When Ravkin finished, she seemed a little less pissed off.
“Did Vlad know?” Rina asked.
Ravkin shook his head. “Just me.”
Rina nodded.
Ravkin looked at Scott. “The U.S. will do whatever I tell them once they see the intelligence I’m bringing.”
“Which is what?” Scott said.
“Evidence of the conspiracy between Putin and the mafia. We were planning to use it when the coup took place. It made the case for what we needed to do. Now that information can be used to save me, Anastasia, and Vlad’s family.”
“Hell,” Scott said, “it might even save me. Where is this information?”
“In the cloud. No hard disk or documents. You need a password to access it and your people can have that when we’re safe on U.S. soil.”
“If you’re bluffing they’ll send you back.”
“It’s not a bluff.”
“We’re waiting to hear from your contacts, correct?”
“Yes,” Ravkin said.
Stiletto downed what remained of his tea. “Then we better get some rest. Or try to. I’ll probably sleep like a log after all I went through getting here.”
SCOTT LAY on the cot in the small room at the very end of the hall.
Ravkin finally talking about the Cabal seemed to put the women at ease. Anastasia in particular had calmed. Some off the stress had gone out of Rina’s eyes. He hoped beyond hope that there was something of Vlad to bring back. Perhaps he’d only have the kind of scars that would heal over time.
He rolled onto his side and shifted to get comfortable. The cot was narrow and the springs on either side of the frame dug into him. It sure beat sleeping in the mud, however.
And then there was Ravkin’s revelation about the cloud. Scott wanted that to be true. It would indeed help his case when he returned to the U.S. He’d still be in debt to the Cabal, but, like his boss, there would be ways to help on the sly.
That was his last thought before he dozed off.
THE LONE bathroom across from his room was about the size of a closet, but Stiletto showered in the morning and stepped out with a towel around his waist.
He almost collided with Anastasia Dubinina. She wore a bathrobe and carried a towel. She didn’t smile as he said good morning and excuse me and when he cleared the door, she slipped in and quickly shut the door.
Stiletto dressed in his room and went out to the living room where Rina and her daughter sat on the couch with breakfast and Ravkin handed him a mug of tea.
“I have news,” Ravkin said.
Stiletto joined him at a wobbly table near the kitchen area where instant oat meal cooked on the hot plate. The maple syrup flavoring filled the room. Ravkin’s lap top computer sat on the table.
“One of my contacts reported back. We might have a lead on Vlad.”
Stiletto sipped his tea. English Breakfast. Dark and very heavy. “Where?”
Ravkin opened an email. Stiletto examined the Cyrillic lines but couldn’t decipher them. It was a short email, only a few lines.
“One of my people at FSB,” Ravkin said. “I asked who might be a likely candidate for holding Vlad, and he came back with one name.”
“Which is?”
Ravkin used the touchpad to highlight the name. He said, “Leonid Pushkin. He’s a mid-level boss, but he has family connections in oil and farming. He could be somebody that squires away a high-value individual like Vlad.”
Stiletto drank some tea while Ravkin dished up oat meal.
“I passed Anastasia in the hallway,” Scott said. “Does she ever smile?”
“She used to,” Ravkin said.
“What happened?”
“What always happens in our line of work? The man she was seeing got killed in the line of duty.”
“How?”
“Undercover in the mob.”
They finished breakfast and Stiletto asked to see a picture of Pushkin and whatever else Ravkin could access. A simple internet search turned up a picture and details on Pushkin’s only alleged source of income, a dance club called Pulse. News stories detailed renovations and the grand opening. Lots of neon, fancy outfits, and smiling faces. Pushkin had two gold teeth.
“We pay Mr. Pushkin a visit,” Scott said, “and ask him a few questions.”
Out the corner of his eye, Stiletto saw Rina watching them while Xenia watched a cartoon.
“I’ll need to stay here,” Ravkin said. “You and Anastasia can go.”
“Why can’t she stay? I don’t like the idea of doing this sort of thing with somebody who might go a little too far.”
“Oh, she will,” Ravkin said. “But she needs to get out of this place more than I do. She’ll go, as you Americans say, bonkers before the rest of us.”
“All right,” Scott said. He scooped the last of the oat meal into his mouth. “Just make sure she’s OK with it. How are we fixed for weapons?”
“You have your pistol.”
“I was thinking something that could provide a little more persuasion should the need arise.”
Ravkin smiled and there was a gleam in his eye. “I think I know just what you need.”
ANASTASIA OPENED the bathroom door a crack to let out the steam and wiped the mirror with her towel. She wore her robe, belted tight, her hair till wet. The eyes that looked back at her in the mirror showed the strain she felt inside, the dark circles under them not helping her appearance one bit. She was glad for the shower, though. Small comforts mattered.
She thought about the American. He didn’t seem arrogant and seemed genuinely interested in helping. She wondered if his devotion to Glinkov might mean she and Ravkin were expendable, but dismissed that thought as quickly as it came. Whoever Ravkin was working for wanted all of them out; that was why they helped Stiletto get into Russia. All backs would get scratched. The only problem was she didn’t know what she would do outside of Russia or where she would go.
How did Glinkov and Stiletto meet? What made Vlad contact him? Obviously, he had his good points. She decided to try and find out what they were. There was no reason to keep being sour about the situation when there might be some light at the end of the tunnel.