He needed the key. The key he’d hidden years ago when he’d first come to Moscow and taken the grand tenth-floor apartment overlooking the river. It was the key he’d told himself he’d never need.
Ernie pulled books from his shelves. He’d amassed a collection of political history and theory, but had hardly read any of them. But books helped sell the image, and made people think he was a savvy political operator, a high-flying Ann Arbor alumnus who had his finger on the pulse. He tossed the heavy books on the Persian rug he’d bought in the Novopodrezkovo Market, and for the very first time, he saw it with a stranger’s eyes. It was covered in stains, tiny droplets spilled during his many vodka-infused rants against how unfair life was. The dark reckonings he held with himself in the early hours, when no one but the witches and wolves were around to hear.
You’re losing your mind, he told himself. Lost. Past tense, he thought.
He turned from the shelves to an armoire he’d picked up in an antique store on Year 1905 Street. He pulled out the drawers and emptied the contents everywhere. He’d already wasted so much time and was getting desperate. He’d made a cursory search of the apartment and had given up, telling himself he could break into the safe without the key. But when he’d gone to his little bolthole, he’d found the safe impossible to crack and it had chewed up his drill. He’d returned to his apartment, convinced he’d be walking into the jaws of death, but he’d found nothing out of the ordinary, and had resumed his desperate search for the key.
He got on his hands and knees and rummaged through the contents of the drawers, but there was no sign of the key. Frantic, Ernie sat up, ran his fingers through his hair, and dragged them down his face.
“I wasn’t expecting to find you so easily,” a voice said in English.
The words were like nails on a chalkboard and sent a shiver down Ernie’s spine. He turned to face the speaker, and that’s when he caught sight of it. A flash of brass, the key taped to the underside of one of the compartments that housed the drawers. His heart leaped. That’s where he’d put it all those years ago. He could escape. If he could just get past death’s messenger, he could flee.
The man standing in the doorway wore the dark green urban combat uniform of Russian Special Forces. It was common to see such soldiers around Federation House, but what was uncommon was the ski mask covering his face and the tactical vest protecting his torso. Ernie was surprised not to see a gun in the man’s hand. Instead, he caught the glint of piano wire looped at either end around the man’s gloved hands.
Ernie slowly got to his feet. This man was a trained killer, but so was he.
Older, out of shape, and carrying the weight of drunkenness, he thought.
He was dead either way, but if he fought, at least he’d have a chance, and it was better to die with hope.
“I thought you would have run,” the masked man said. “But then, according to our intelligence reports, you have become ineffective. Careless.”
Ernie felt the embers of pride flare. He was many things, but he wasn’t careless.
You missed your chance to escape because you forgot where you hid the key, he told himself. You’re a drunk. That’s as careless as it gets.
He flushed with embarrassment.
“Will the Ninety-nine claim credit for me?” he asked.
The masked man shook his head. “You are no billionaire, Mr.... What shall we call you?”
“Fisher,” Ernie said.
“Fisher,” the masked man sneered. “You will just be another statistic. A miserable drunk who took his own life. No credit will be claimed.”
The embers of pride rose into a fire of indignation. He would not die here in his own apartment at the hands of this arrogant man.
Ernie rushed at the masked man and launched a side kick at his ribs, but his leg was too slow, and his opponent stepped in and wrapped the piano wire around Ernie’s neck. He tried to get a hand between the coils, but he wasn’t fast enough, and the metal snapped tight and bit into his Adam’s apple. The pain was excruciating, and Ernie fought it with everything he had. His arms and legs flailed wildly, but they found no purchase and slowly the pain gave way to numb realization.
There was a noise in the distance. Raised voices and a crash, but the sounds must have been from the memory of a dream, because nothing in Ernie’s reality changed, and a moment later his world turned completely dark.
Chapter 44
Dinara had picked the locks on the main entrance to get us into the building, but Ernie Fisher’s apartment on the ninth floor was more challenging.
“I can get it. I just need a few minutes,” she said as she crouched over a mortise lock that was designed to be impossible to pick.
I could hear the sound of sirens getting closer, and guessed it was the police responding to Leonid’s call.
Dinara was making fine adjustments with her lock-picking tools. “If I can just...” There was a faint snapping sound. “Damn!”
She pulled out a broken single hump Bogota pick, and looked at West and me with pure frustration.
“Stand back,” I said, and when Dinara stepped out of the way, I aimed my heel at the lock and kicked hard.
The lock popped, but a full-length security bar prevented the door from opening.
I was convinced I heard movement inside the apartment. “Come on,” I said, and West and I put our shoulders to the door and barged with our full combined force. The security bar made a terrible noise as it tore away from the screws embedded deep in the frame.
We burst into the grand apartment and I immediately saw the place had been turned over, and on the far side of the apartment Fisher was hanging by a window that overlooked the Moscow River. A length of piano wire was attached to a curtain rail and the other end was lost in the folds of his neck.
Dinara and West rushed over and started trying to get Fisher down. I was about to join them when a noise caught my attention. I ran into a large kitchen and saw an open door on the other side of the room. I crossed the white tiled floor and approached the door, which led to a metal fire escape. I could hear footsteps echoing off the walls and pulled the door wide. When I stepped through and glanced down, I saw the fire escape was built into a well that cut through the heart of the old building. Tiny balconies joined every apartment to the stairs that ran all the way down to the ground. Many of the balconies were cluttered by washing lines, toys, garden furniture and junk, which would have made escape a nightmare if there ever were a fire. I could see no sign of the source of the noise, so I looked up.
There, frozen almost directly above me, standing next to the balustrade that marked the edge of the roof, was a masked man in special forces gear. We stared at each other and I recognized his eyes. It was the man who’d murdered Karl Parker and Elizabeth Connor in New York.
He drew a pistol and opened fire, forcing me back into Ernie Fisher’s kitchen. Bullets flashed off the metal fire escape like tiny bolts of lightning and the thunder crack of the shots echoed around the well. A moment later, the shooting stopped.
“What the hell is happening?” West yelled from the living room, but I didn’t hang around to answer.
I ran outside and bounded up the fire escape, racing to the roof. When I reached the top of the stairs, instead of being confronted by the formidable assassin, I found nothing but footsteps in the deep snow. I followed them to the rear of the building and, concealed in a thick drift, I discovered an anchor and tactical rope that vanished over the low concrete barrier that marked the edge of the roof.
I glanced over and saw the assassin completing his rappel down the side of the building. He landed on an unmarked gray van and, in one fluid move, rolled off the roof and slid through the open passenger door onto the front seat. He slammed the door, and the van drove away. I considered the rope and wondered whether there was anything to be gained by following him down using a makeshift abseiling loop. Could I make it down before the van reached the end of the alleyway?