“Thanks,” I replied, grateful for our first solid lead.
“Are you sure you’re OK, Jack?” Justine asked. “These are serious people.”
“I’m safe,” I assured her. “I’m with Leonid and Dinara.”
“Dinara?” she asked.
Was that jealousy in her voice?
“Yeah,” I replied. “We’re with friends.”
“Make sure you come home in one piece, Jack,” Justine said. “I’ll do my best,” I replied. “I’ll be in touch,” I added, before hanging up.
“Everything OK?” Dinara asked.
“Looks like the guy from the hotel was SVR,” I replied.
I considered the revelation in light of everything that had happened. If our information was correct, I’d fought and chased a highly trained Russian intelligence operative.
“I think we need to know why we were hired to investigate the death of a customer-service supervisor,” I said. “My guess is our client knew Yana Petrova was Otkrov. I want to find out how he came by that information and what he knows about her killer. I want to meet Maxim Yenen.”
Chapter 50
“Let’s arrange the meeting from the car,” Leonid said, getting to his feet. “We also have some other business we need to attend to.”
Dinara was bemused until he added, “Murder. Abduction.”
She rose hurriedly. “Of course.”
In the turmoil of their arrest and securing Jack Morgan’s release from police custody, Dinara realized they’d done nothing more about the previous morning’s shooting and attempted kidnapping, other than giving statements to the police, explaining how Leonid’s car came to be riddled with bullets and stuck on a highway.
“I would like to pay our friends at Grom Boxing a visit,” Leonid said.
“I’ll come with you,” Jack said.
Leonid hesitated. “These men don’t take well to outsiders.”
“Doesn’t sound like they took too well to you either,” Jack shot back.
Dinara’s limited dealings with the owner of Private simply hadn’t prepared her for the sheer presence of the man. He wasn’t particularly tall or broad, but there was a quiet assuredness about him, as though he could handle anything the world threw at him. There was no sense of him being a stranger in a foreign land. He was taking everything in his stride and behaving with the confidence of a local investigator. Dinara wondered just what it took to shake Jack Morgan.
“I’m not sitting this out when two of my team have been attacked,” he said.
Leonid shrugged. “As stubborn as a Russian,” he joked.
“And then some,” Jack responded.
They went back to their rooms to get their coats and gear. Leonid was at the end of the corridor, in what Dinara mockingly called the suite, because it had two windows. Dinara and Jack had rooms opposite each other, and there were another five on the wing, all of which were occupied.
“Do you need a gun?” Leonid asked Jack.
“What’s the law say?” he replied.
“As a visitor, if you get caught...” Leonid did a swift intake of breath and held his hands out as though he was being cuffed. “Long jail time.”
“Pistols are prohibited in Russia, unless by special decree, or an award from a military or federal authority,” Dinara said as she grabbed her coat and a Makarov pistol from her overnight bag. After the incident on their way to the airport, there was no way she was going back to the gym unarmed. “My license is signed by the Prime Minister himself.”
“I only have one from the Minister of Internal Affairs,” Leonid responded as he left his room.
“Then I’d better let you carry the hardware,” Jack said, pulling on his coat as he joined them in the corridor.
Wrapped up for the freezing weather, they left the Residence and took the old SUV across the city to Grom Boxing. It was a little after 4 p.m. when they arrived and there were a handful of vehicles in the parking lot. Leonid reversed into a space near the door.
“For a quick escape,” he explained as he got out. He leaned down and placed the keys on top of the front tire. “In case something happens to any of us. The others can still get away.”
“I thought I was paranoid,” Dinara said.
“Preparation prevents desperation,” Leonid responded flatly. “Come on.”
He led Dinara and Jack inside. Once again, the lobby area was deserted, but Dinara heard the sounds of men training in the gym beyond. She looked at Jack and Leonid, and both men nodded, so she pulled open the door and went inside.
There were a dozen fighters in the gym, along with the large trainer, Makar Koslov, and Erik Utkin, the Black Hundreds organizer. Every single man in the place stopped what he was doing and stared at the visitors. The man closest to them, a lean fighter who’d been using a heavy bag, was the owner of the snake and dagger tattoo Dinara had seen during the highway attack. She was convinced she saw a flicker of shame in his eyes and she caught him glance uncertainly at Erik Utkin. The older man strolled over casually.
“Why would you come back?” Utkin asked in Russian. “You know who I am. We found my wallet outside in the snow.”
Jack couldn’t understand a word, but Dinara would never have known by the way he carried himself.
“That’s real interesting, Erik,” Jack said, striding forwards. “But what I want to know is who’s going to compensate my colleagues for the losses they’ve suffered?”
“Ah, Yankee Doodle,” Utkin sneered. “Thinking you can come in here, like some buck rooster with a puffed out chest and a big, empty ego.”
Jack and Utkin met near the ring and the fighters clustered round. If Jack was afraid, Dinara didn’t pick up the slightest indication.
“I’m guessing that since you’re the one doing all the talking, you’re the one calling all the shots,” Jack replied. “So you’re the one responsible for what happened to my associates.”
“American asshole,” Utkin jeered in Russian, and the fighters laughed.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that,” Jack said. “You carry on impressing your little boys here.”
Some of the men must have spoken English, because Dinara felt them bristle at Jack’s remark.
“I’m betting that since you’re willing to abduct and kill people in broad daylight for simply coming here and asking questions, you’ve got some big things to hide,” Jack said, and Utkin’s mood changed instantly.
He looked beyond Jack to Dinara and Leonid. “Like I said before, why would you come back?” he asked in Russian. “It’s going to cost you and your American friend your lives.”
Chapter 51
The guy stank of villainy. I’d encountered enough of it in my life to be familiar with the smell. Everything about him, from his oozing, showy confidence to the arrogant way he assumed he had the upper hand, from the court of minor league villains who surrounded us, to the tacit admission he’d been behind the abduction and murder attempt.
I couldn’t understand what he’d said to Dinara and Leonid, but I sensed menace in his words. Equally, he hadn’t understood my true purpose. I’d played up being an arrogant, loud-mouth American because I’d suspected it would provoke a reaction, and it had. We now knew beyond any doubt that Erik Utkin and some or all the men in the room were involved in serious criminality they were willing to kill for.
I sensed movement to my right. One of the boxers came for me, a fit, muscular man about an inch shorter than me. He’d been on a heavy bag when we’d entered, and was marked with the dagger and serpent tattoo Dinara had recalled seeing during her abduction.