Birth of an Assassin Page 10

  “No problem.”

  Short, and not so sweet. He made his way back down the stairs, one-step at a time and slowly. The meeting hadn’t been what he’d call inspiring. Mitrokhin had finished with the right words, so going over his head could make things worse. Now he’d left himself with no choice. He had to count on the captain.

  Chapter 17

  Adrik drew the car up alongside the 3-meter wall that surrounded the Serbsky Institute.

  “I think I’ll just wait here, Otto,” he said.

  “Afraid of the big ‘Yellow House’ are we, Adrik?”

  “What, no, I…”

  “Every time we come here, you make the same nervous apologies.”

  “Well, let’s face it, you’d have to be mad to want to go into a place like that.”

  Otto laughed. “One of these days you will come with me.”

  Adrik didn’t answer and Otto grinned. He knew Adrik was scared shitless of going in. In case they might just hang on to him.

  Otto heaved his great frame from the vehicle and leaned back into the car. “I don’t know if you’ll be hanging around here, but if not I’ll be back in about an hour.”

  Adrik nodded. Otto turned and sighed forlornly. Of course he understood how Adrik felt, coming to a nut house: who would do that out of choice?

  But Otto loved his mother. She’d always showered him with love. When his father had forced him into early enlistment, he’d missed her with physical pain. It wasn’t long after that he was told she’d been hospitalized. He’d lost her.

  “Live with it, Otto,” his father had told him. “She’s got some form of mind contamination. And if you think I’m putting up with a diseased woman...”

  He’d always admired his father – even now, but to have done that…

  “I’ll not tell you where she is,” he said when Otto had asked. “I mean, why? Do you want to end up like that yourself? Let me give you a hint of how I feel about it. DO NOT ask again.”

  He went through the institute gates and tried to turn his thoughts. He didn’t want to think back. But he couldn’t stop himself. He was 25 years old when he saw her next, and that was after his father had died. When he passed away, Otto searched every institution he knew of. He whittled his way through various psychiatrists, and finally tracked her down to the Serbsky Institute in Moscow.

  He brooded, almost wished he could have stayed in the car with Adrik. The shitty corridors of this large cream shoebox of a building were horrible and he had no words to express how much he hated them. Against his better judgment, he thought of that first time he’d found her here.

  *

  Inmates had jittered and made signs at him as he made his way through the corridors. “Please help me,” he heard from some and, “They have me here because of my political beliefs,” from others. They’d reached out to him as he passed, and his insides had quaked. With the stench of piss and shit everywhere, revulsion filled him. But he’d felt no compassion for these people. He hadn’t given a fuck about them. Only his mother mattered.

  “This way,” the nurse had said. “She’s through here.”

  He found her in a large open room. She sat on the only piece of furniture in it. The chair was pushed back against the wall and she rocked slightly, staring blankly into nothingness. Spittle leaked from her mouth and she was barely recognizable as the woman he loved. Her long, luxurious, oily-black hair had been shaven to the skin. Her teeth had somehow been removed and her formerly full face had caved in because of it. Like a corpse, she was yellowed and sunken. Only 47 years old and she looked twice that. He’d wished he hadn’t found her and cried bitterly – in front of those sadistic bastards that called themselves nurses.

  More like prison guards. And in reality, that’s what they were. Soviet dissidents ended up in places like Serbsky, out of harm’s way. In mental hospitals where they could be abused and broken. Somewhere to extinguish credibility. He’d seen those inmates beaten, teeth punched or kicked from their faces. And if they still didn’t bow to the might of the people, enforced lobotomy wasn’t unheard of as a final step.

  With desperation, he’d hoped his mother hadn’t suffered such cruelty.

  *

  And now, somehow, she’d made it through to 60. Why, oh why had she lasted this long? All those years, and still she rocked on that old wooden chair and stared at nothing. How could life be this cruel?

  He remembered the first time he’d visited the asylum in full Spetsnaz uniform. After calling several of the nurses together, he said, “I know you all have military connections. On that basis, I won’t explain this uniform. Each of you has some sort of responsibility to my mother. The good news is you’re about to receive an extra income. The bad news: if you don’t look after my mother properly and see she gets the kind of care and nourishment she needs, I may have to call on my KGB colleagues. I hope we all understand what that could mean.”

  Memories dissolved as he entered the large open room. On his instructions, her hair had been left to grow. But now it was too long and no one had shown it a comb. Still she rocked, gazing into nothingness with the expression of a lunatic on her face.

  The burly warder turned to leave but Otto grabbed his arm. “We have an agreement. Next time I come here, I expect my mother to be presentable. Look at her, her hair hasn’t had attention for who knows how long. She needs a bath and a change of clothes. She looks like she’s just puked down them.”

  “I err…,” the nurse spluttered with a voice too high for his size.

  “Fuck you and your errs. Why do I pay you people so much? I’ll say this once. If I’m not satisfied with the way she looks next time I come, I’ll personally see to it that you have teeth to match hers. And each time after that, I’ll take you a step further down that road. Clear enough?”

  “Yes, Captain. I’ll see to it myself.”

  The nurse left and Otto looked at his mother. His heart brimmed. The only woman he’d ever loved – could ever love. He got down on his heels, and took her hand. No sign of recognition, but at least she didn’t pull away.

  “Hello, Mother, how are you today?”

  *

  Otto left his office to go to the North Port. He vented the frustration he felt about his mother on the most offensive remarks about the Jew he could bring to mind.

  Adrik tried to appease him. “Let it wash over your head. Let him go, for fuck’s sake. All you seem to do is get yourself wound up. He’s given us the route. We’ll make a fortune from it. Let him transfer.”

  “No, definitely not, fucking arrogant little bastard. ‘With my credentials, I know I can make the case.’ Who the fuck does he think he is? You should’ve seen him. No, he stays.”

  Adrik sighed. “But he’s just another Jew.”

  Otto shouted, “No, he’s not just another fucking Jew. As far as I’m concerned, he’s all Jews.” His face stretched as his heart pumped furiously. “He’s all things I hate about the bastards. Everything has just dropped into his lap as if he had a God-given right to it.” His thoughts turned to the race collectively. “Money, power, you name it. If it’s worth having, it comes to them like flies to horseshit. He stays here under my control. For the minute, he’s untouchable. But when I’m ready…”

  Otto stepped out onto the sidewalk and couldn’t believe what came into view. A beggar, in Dzerzhinski Square, how could this be? The plaza was thinly populated; Otto crossed it with his head tucked down, and charged forward like a raging bull. His lips tightened into a straight line and he glowered at the scrounger as he slapped his gloves in the palm of his hand.

  His victim was mid-sized, a physical appearance that put him in mind of Kornfeld. He wore a scruffy old brown army bomber jacket and olive-green, knee-holed trousers. The clothes changed color as Otto’s vision reddened in fury. As he reached the vagrant, he let his huge frame loom over him. The route might be compromised if he arranged a fall for the Jew bastard, but this look-alike – that was something else.

  “Tell m
e you’re not begging, not here, and not in army clothes.”

  The beggar tried to straighten himself. “I’m sorry, sir, but…”

  Futile words, Otto had no interest. He needed, wanted, to vent his festering anger. He threw an ungainly punch that thudded into the victim’s head. The man went over. Otto’s knee came up, and unless there were pencils in the beggar’s jacket, ribs were surely broken.

  The man hit the concrete forcefully, writhed in pain, and wrapped his arms around his broken body. He curled into a ball, and coughed slavering bubbles that streamed down his chin. Passersby stopped and looked on sympathetically as he lay there and cried, but Otto glared and they hurried on their way.

  “Do you want him arrested?” Adrik asked lazily.

  “No, we don’t have time,” he answered, and leant over the vagrant. “By now, you Kozel, I hope you will have guessed. I don’t want to see you here again.” The sarcasm in his voice changed to a snigger.

  He walked away, pulling on Adrik’s sleeve. “Right, next stop North Port.”

  *

  Stefan Polanski rubbed a hand over the side of his face, pushed a foot against the top of his desk and balanced his chair unsteadily on its back legs.

  “Sounds great, Otto, like one of those ‘can’t go wrong’ deals. Remind me, what’s in it for me?”

  Otto sighed and raised an eyebrow. “Same conditions as when we set you up here. I’ll help you get the operation up and on its feet. When I’m happy it’s right, you take over. After that, you pay the usual percentages. Any hassle from the law and I’ll take care of it.”

  “I’ll have to move three, maybe four of my men to seduce the girls, and as many again to smuggle them from Moscow to Rostov. It’s going to spread me a bit thin here.”

  “Well, either you want it or you don’t want it.” Irritation tweaked.

  “No, you’re right. I want it.”

  With the details in order, Otto and Adrik left.

  “Worked out well,” Adrik said.

  “Really – ‘it’s going to spread me a bit thin here’.” He mimicked the voice of a spoilt child. “What do these fucking people expect from us?”

  “Don’t worry about what he said. As long as he does the job, then it won’t be long before we have another income. Talking about money, do you have any visions about us ever spending what we’ve made?”

  “Yes, no problems there, my friend. I see us in our little businesses for… oh, I don’t know, three, maybe four more years – and then we’re out. We’ll just about be ripe for defection. We’ll go West where the better things in life are more readily available. That’s why we use that Jew-boy accountant, Bernstein. The money’s invested in so many countries we can get our hands on it wherever we are.”

  Chapter 18

  Otto fell back into his leather chair. “For two months I’ve pushed my work onto Kornfeld,” he laughed, “and now Stefan is almost running the operation alone. This could be the fastest venture we’ve set up yet.”

  “Maybe, but Stefan hasn’t needed that much assistance.”

  Otto frowned. “No, Stefan’s ability to organize and handle feminine flesh never came into question. That’s why we took him on in the first place.”

  Adrik chuckled. “I did like the name you gave the club in Balashikha: The Red Lite. Ha, if the authorities realized you’re taking the piss with the…”

  “Double entendre,” Otto finished for him. “It was the perfect site to centre the shipments. Right in the middle of the target area. And the authorities there are always up for a few extra rubles when need be.”

  Adrik pulled out a bottle of vodka.

  “No, not now, Adrik. Time to pick up our percentage. Put that away until we get back from North Port.

  *

  Stefan was packing personal stuff.

  “What’s this, a moonlight flit?”

  He looked up and grinned. “Hello, Otto. No, Balashikha has turned into a boom business and needs my attention full time. I’m moving into The Red Lite.”

  Otto took his dues and left with a smirk on his face. “Just goes to show, I thought I’d have to use pressure to get Stefan to move to Balashikha. I can hardly believe he’s doing it without being asked.”

  “Yes, I think the operation has turned out bigger than expected. But, let me guess, now is the time for Irishkov to arrange another transfer.”

  “Uh-huh, you’re beginning to catch on. As you say, the operation is big and we’re too close to it. I’ve already had a word with Irishkov and he suggests West Africa is reasonable at this time of year. The wheels are in motion, so now we just wait.”

  Before arrangements could be confirmed, a man called Vladislav Nabokovski sent Otto a letter. Someone delivered it by hand. The contents – a summons to a meeting. A summons, cheeky bastard. Nabokovski was a high-ranking mafia official who, even by Otto’s standards, was the dregs of pond life. But he couldn’t be ignored. Otto had shared a deception with him once before and knew he’d make a worrying enemy.

  And because he knew that, worry worried him now. But the mafia couldn’t know about this latest venture – could they? No… Then what else would this gangster want to talk to him about? Worry bounced around until he convinced himself it was overreaction… But he should speak with Adrik.

  *

  “…And that’s all I know to date,” he said, bringing Adrik up to speed.

  “Slow down, Otto, you’ve no idea what he wants yet. But let’s assume the worst. Somehow, he’s learned about the trade in peasants and wants a piece of the action.” He paused. “No, the worst, he knows about it and wants all of the action. I suppose it does have to be connected to the trafficking. Our other ventures in this country are too long established for him to go after them. But whatever it is, we’ve come up against shitheads like him before.”

  “Maybe, but these people are an organized mob… We’ve never gone head to head with anyone that big.”

  “Just another gang – and how many of those have we retired? And Nabokovski isn’t the whole of the mafia, just a little cog. Worst case, Special Forces will deal with them.”

  And that’s why Adrik was so great to have around.

  “You’re right. We meet with him later today. We’ll see what he wants; and if we don’t like it, we deal with it.”

  *

  They sat at a sidewalk table in Moscow’s Arbat Street. Otto sipped vodka, sneaking a look over his glass to weigh up Nabokovski. He was adorned in a blue Armani suit with a dark blue chalk line running through the cloth, single-breasted, wide lapels and, at a guess, pure wool – nice. A white silk shirt, laced at the neck with a blue tie a smidgeon lighter than the suit, to be fair, beautifully complemented the ensemble. Yes, it was chic.

  Nabokovski leant forward and slammed his empty glass onto the table. Otto was faced with a clean-shaven head that reflected the glare of the midday sun. His smooth and perfumed skin smelled expensive. Otto swallowed his vodka, leaned back, and looked under the table. Italian, patent leather shoes – the man did know how to dress. But he also noticed that the shoes were tiny. Otto smirked: “You know what tiny shoes mean,” he thought.

  “Yes, tiny feet.”

  Shit, he’d thought that one out loud. Quickly, he tried to pass it off as a joke and gave a broad grin. Nabokovski answered with a smile – an ugly smile, but a smile. This time he kept his thoughts to himself, and decided that Nabokovski could wear the most expensive clothes in the world, but he’d still look like a bag of shit. Medium to tall in height; as wide as a house and facial features that would disgust a gargoyle. He had slatted, ice-blue eyes that dressed a mean, severe face. A bent nose twisted over and bared most of an inner nostril. To describe him as gross would be unfair; he was worse.

  The man who sat next to Nabokovski was another story. Tall and good looking, spiked blond hair, a big man who stood even higher than Otto and Adrik. Easily two metres – and well shaped. Dressed head to toe in black, he initially seemed to have all the attributes Otto w
ould admire. But the continual boast of how he ran dozens of self-procured girls in the South Port area was too much. Otto hated him, an arrogant bastard with a confidence that no one could live up to. His name was Boris.

  Nabokovski spent the time giving audience. He had heard of the trafficking and wanted it – and made unreasonable demands. There were no angles of leeway for mutual agreement. Who the fuck did he think he was, giving out orders like an el-supremo? Otto’s mind became set and the decision was now cast in stone. Fuck him.

  “For your own sake, Otto, give way to my demands,” he continued. “You have no choice. Kick against us and I can put together a team nearly as big as the whole of Osnaz. The offer for the operation is excellent. Accept and you walk away a rich man. Refuse and you might not walk away.”

  Now he’s threatening – a gangster, for fuck’s sake. How could he match an army? But childish argument wouldn’t solve anything. Fob him off for now and pull together a strategy later.

  “Vladislav, I’m willing to sell you part of the business and work with you, but I won’t let you take the whole operation. It really is as simple as that.”

  Boris cut in. “From the South Port area alone I can have thirty men descend on your club in Balashikha. And we have a list of those who work there. They would all die.”

  “So you know of the club. Thank you, I’ll enjoy finding out how you learned about that. But I must say that an assault would be unfortunate for your people, Boris, whether you bring thirty or forty – trust me.”

  Otto hadn’t wanted to enter into silly arguments, but his distaste for Boris sucked him in. Whatever else came out of this gathering, Boris had to go.

  “And,” Otto continued, by now calmness having deserted him, “do you really think we’re so stupid as to not be ready for such possibilities? To play a dangerous game I use dangerous people. I can only advise you not to turn this into a war.”

  Nabokovski stood up. “This is tedious, enough of the cat-fight. Otto, Adrik, I’ve given you an option, the only option, and I’ll give you time to think it over. Please don’t come to the wrong decision. And don’t think for too long.”