“The planning for the Repina operation was flawless, its execution precise, the results exceedingly satisfactory,” said Putin. Gorelikov bowed again, slightly.
“Thank you, Mr. President,” he said. Dominika’s mind reeled. The Repina operation? What is this? Was she assaulted? Or simply framed in some false scandal? Then she knew. Blokhin. That’s why he came to New York. Repina was getting too loud, raising too much money, and attracting too much attention. She’s gone.
This was a crushing shock, to find out a full two days after the act. She had been traveling the entire day after and hadn’t seen any news reports—perhaps the New York authorities had held the news of the murder for a day. And it was no mystery that the assassination was not mentioned in the SVR news roundups stacked in her Line KR in-box. What would they say? We report the unfortunate demise of activist Daria Repina, who passed away from unspecified causes in New York City, once again exposing the unchecked violence in American cities, and the lawlessness inherent in American culture? The news would break in Moscow soon enough, but Putin’s control of the Internet and television would distort the reporting and the Moscow militsiya would disperse mourners before serious demonstrations could coalesce, while Putin sanctimoniously called for bogus investigations.
Dominika swayed on her feet, telling herself to stay in control, to remain impassive. She felt faint and pinched her wrist to clear her head. She did not have to obsequiously applaud this kind of murder, but neither could she show revulsion, which would be considered a fatal weakness. Gorelikov was speaking again and Dominika forced herself to concentrate. They had killed Repina.
“I must highlight that Colonel Egorova’s performance in support of the MAGNIT operation was brilliant. Without her operational acumen we would not be congratulating ourselves. I commend her highly.” Dominika could see only the lanky body of Daria Repina on the stage pacing back and forth, railing internally against this man with a wry smile of satisfaction on his face standing a meter from her.
“I am aware of Colonel Egorova’s performance and contribution,” said Putin. “Her diligence is constant affirmation of my decision to appoint her Chief of Counterintelligence in SVR. I am confident that she will attain to the Directorship of the Service.” He looked slyly at Dominika, judging her reaction to essentially being told that she one day would be Director. She nodded her head in thanks. You bastard. Putin was pleased. Gorelikov was pleased. Benford would be pleased.
“Thank you, Mr. President,” said Dominika, fighting to conceal her rage. “I will try to continue to be worthy of your trust.” Such verbal pap, thought Dominika, the Russian version of small dogs lying flat in the presence of an alpha dog. But zlodey, you hellkite, you do not know that I am inside your house to bring it down, to rid the Rodina of you. What do you think of that? Can you read my thoughts?
As if he had heard, Putin gave her his trademark watery smile, like slivers of ice in warm beer. “I have designated a dacha on the compound at Cape Idokopas for your exclusive use. The weather on the coast is mild well into October.”
Through her fury, she was caught unawares. It was something. Even as Dominika thanked the president anew, she calculated furiously. A gosdacha, short for gosudarstvennaya dacha, was a State-owned vacation home on a lake or river, or in the cool piney forest, parceled out to functionaries to reward diligence, productivity, or loyalty. This particular dacha, however, was more than a three-room birch-plank cottage with a garden plot outside Nizhny Novgorod. This was one of the luxury hillside concrete villas within Putin’s seventy-hectare complex on the Black Sea coast, on wooded Cape Idokopas. The presidential residence there, an Italianate château as big as Buckingham Palace, was said to cost a billion dollars. Being given this sort of dacha on this particular compound signaled patronage on a grand scale.
Dominika knew this was all a sticky spiderweb. Gorelikov’s medal was presented to him today with her present for two reasons: Putin was establishing that Gorelikov was senior, and that men gave important medals to other men, a Slavic reminder of her subordinate gender. Everyone knew the president greatly preferred the company of men—the siloviki comprised only men, but Egorova was edging toward becoming a potential insider. The second reason was this was a medal for eliminating a dissident, a look inside the furnace. Kill as I command, and you will be rewarded. There was still another nuance: though a handsome reward, the villa carried with it the hint of setting up one’s mistress in her own residence, connected to the master’s manor by a secret garden path. As the levsha zhena, the left-hand wife, you are expected to be ready for the tsar, bathed and perfumed, on satin pillows, your ruby fruit wet and swollen, waiting for the discreet scratching on the garden door, day or night.
He expected her to be his left-hand wife. Dominika swallowed the familiar rage in her gut that joined the anguish in her heart for Repina. All the villas and all the ribbons in the world could not lessen what this queer little blond schemer was doing to her Russia as citizens waited for their delinquent pension checks to buy bread. Putin and his inner circle—Does this include me, am I now a silovik, wondered Dominika, as a luxury dacha recipient?—had starved the country. And no end in sight, she thought, to this corruption, and no end in sight to my life as a spy. She wondered whether General Korchnoi had felt the same, committed to this mortally dangerous work, strangely fueled by midnight adrenaline, yet trapped with no way out. God, how she needed Nate right now.
This all skittered through her mind in a second. Putin was saying something, and she struggled to focus.
“We now must wait for fortune to smile on MAGNIT,” said Putin. “In the meantime, Colonel, I want you to renew the liaison relationship with the Chinese MSS general; what is his name?”
“General Sun,” said Dominika.
“He claims his service has a counterintelligence problem, and they want our assistance. I don’t trust them at all. See what he has under his fingernails, find out what he wants from us. We don’t need any surprises from Beijing. Men’she znayesh’, krepche spish’,” said the president. “The less you know, the more soundly you sleep.”
“Yes, Mr. President,” said Dominika.
“And now lunch,” said Putin. He led the way down a parquet-floored corridor with white walls picked out in gold leaf, and onto a broad sunny terrace ringed by a heavy white balustrade. At the center of the terrace, under a billowing canopy, was a table set for three, with sparkling crystal and elegant plates with blue and gold borders. On each plate was a ramekin, swaddled in a nest of snowy linen. Dominika could smell the heavenly aroma of crabmeat and Imperial sauce. The tops of each ramekin were baked golden brown, and the sauce still bubbled around the edges.
“Crab Imperial,” said Gorelikov. “Marvelous. We used to eat this in Odessa as students.”
“Try a forkful, and see if this is not better,” said Putin. The delicate crabmeat melted in Dominika’s mouth. An ice-cold Vernaccia was the perfect wine, and she accepted a second glass. But the image of Daria Repina floated in front of her: the sun went behind a cloud, and the piquant Imperial sauce in her mouth turned to copper.
Dominika would add this news about the murder to her thermos concealment for tomorrow’s personal meeting, but she would withhold Blokhin’s name. He was hers, and she vowed to kill Sergeant Iosip Blokhin herself someday.