Crossing the Line (28 page)

Aleksei told Katya to sit in the lounge and produced a lopsided cake she knew he’d made himself. She hugged him so hard he protested he couldn’t breathe.

“You haven’t tasted it yet. It’s probably inedible.”

“I love you for doing this,” she whispered.

The smile on his face broke her heart.

He lit candles and was halfway through singing “Happy Birthday to you” when his father walked in.

“What the fuck?” Aleksei snapped. “How did you get in?”

“Not tired of the whore yet, Aleksei? Go and make tea, Katusa. With jam for me. My son likes his unsweetened, but I expect you know that. Oh cake. Cut me a slice, Aleksei.”

“You don’t get to eat Katya’s cake.”

Katya headed to the kitchen. She could still hear them from there.

“Have you got a key?”

“Yes.”

“You won’t be taking it with you when you leave. What’s so important you couldn’t tell me on the phone?”

“Abkhazia.”

Aleksei groaned. “I’ve already said no.”

“I’m talking big money here. Really big money.”

“How much do you need? You can’t wear more than one Rolex at a time.”

Petrenko laughed. “You have three cars. You can only drive one at a time.”

“Fuck off.”

“You remember my friend who lives in Sukhumi, the one who used to work in the Institute of Physics and Technology?”

“The lunatic who stashed away something for his old age when the research facility closed down?”

Katya’s heart thumped hard.

“That’s the one,” Petrenko said.

“I thought the senile old goat had forgotten where he’d stashed it.”

“He’s remembered.”

“How do you forget where you’ve hidden half a kilogram of high grade uranium?”

Katya only just held in her gasp.

“Where had he put it?” Aleksei asked. “On top of his closet? In a hole in the garden? I’m surprised he’s still alive.”

“Well, he is. Where’s that tea?”

“Nearly ready,” Katya called back.

“It’s more than half a kilo. It’s nearly two kilograms. Do you know how valuable that is? This is the big deal, Aleksei. This is the one that puts me where I belong.”

“It will put you in jail. Why now?”

“It takes a while to find the right people for a deal like this. It’s also not easy to get the stuff out.”

Katya walked in with the tray, her heart pounding. Sukhumi was the capital of Abkhazia, one of Georgia’s breakaway republics. The whole area had a reputation for being able to supply radioactive sources almost to order. The job she’d been offered in Minatom involved working with the IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, to search the republics for abandoned hardware that used radioactive material; items such as radio thermal generators and thermal emission devices.

“No tea for you?” Petrenko asked.

Katya shook her head.

“Is your violin here?”

She nodded.

“Play it.”

“Try saying please,” Aleksei snapped.

She could still hear them arguing when she went to get her new instrument.

“Why do you want to get involved with this?” Aleksei asked. “Don’t you have enough to occupy you? I could get you more business.”

“I don’t need you to find me work. I’m doing
you
the favor here. I’m offering you part of the deal. I’ve arranged to get the material to Batumi. From there it will be picked up by a courier and taken to Turkey. I need someone to help me handle the buyers.”

“I’m not interested,” Aleksei said. “How many times do I have to repeat that?”

“Do you think this is success?” Petrenko shouted. “Your little house, your little boat and your little whore? You work with me and you could buy the jet you rent, get a place on Fisher Island, a home in the Caribbean.” He stared at Katya as she walked in. “A less awkward woman.”

“Maybe I already could. Maybe I just don’t want to. The way to succeed in this country is to stay in the shadows. I pay taxes, I invest in legitimate business and I don’t do anything to draw attention to myself. You’re crazy getting involved with uranium.”

“Don’t you fucking call me crazy. You think you’re better than me, with your English accent and your Harvard degree? Where do you think the money came from to buy them in the first place?”

Petrenko’s face was red, the veins in his forehead bulging.

“What shall I play?” she asked.

“The Swan,” Petrenko snapped.

Katya looked at Aleksei but he showed no reaction. She put the violin to her shoulder and began. The pair sat in glowering silence. She had only part of her mind on the music, the other part on what she’d overheard. Maybe they were testing her.

As the final note died away and she lifted her bow from the strings, she was astounded to see tears glistening on Petrenko’s cheeks.

“My wife’s favorite piece. She played it well, didn’t she, Aleksei?”

“She has a rare talent.”

“I wish you’d stuck with the violin. Your mother was disappointed when you gave up. That’s always been the trouble with you; no drive, no ambition. If you couldn’t be the best immediately then you didn’t want to try.”

“And what exactly are you thinking about?” Aleksei’s expression darkened.

“Violin, ice hockey, chess. The time, energy and money expended on your whims, I—”

“I don’t think you’re being very fair,” Katya interrupted.

Petrenko rounded on her. “What the fuck do you know?”

Don’t yell at me, you prick.
“What the fuck do you?” she snapped back. “You sent him to school in a strange country and didn’t even take him there or collect him at the end of term. He was awarded prizes but you were never there to see it. He won fencing and shooting competitions but you never watched.”

“It’s difficult to get permission to leave prison to take your kid to school,” Petrenko said.

Shit. Open mouth, stick foot in and ram it down throat.
“I didn’t know you were in prison. It doesn’t change the fact that if your children aren’t good at the things you want them to excel in, it doesn’t make them failures or lacking in ambition. How can you say Aleksei has no drive? I might not like how he makes his money, but he works hard and seems pretty good at it. At least he’s not a thug. Not everyone has to wear their wealth on their hands and wrists.” She stared at the jewelry on Petrenko.

There was silence for a moment before Petrenko turned to a blank-faced Aleksei. “Are you being led by your dick? You let her speak to me like that?”

Aleksei walked over to Katya and for a moment she worried he’d hit her, but he stroked her cheek with his fingers and gave her what she thought was a genuine smile. But he had so many smiles it was hard to be sure.

“What do you think about this uranium deal?” he asked.

No point pretending she hadn’t heard. “Don’t touch it. You’ll get radiation sickness and die.”

He turned to Petrenko. “She knows what she’s talking about. She’s a chemist. I’m not interested.”

“I can’t believe you’re listening to her. Her sister fucked me in more ways than one and she’s doing the same to you.”

“What did she do that was so bad?” Katya knew this had to be the performance of her life.

“She betrayed me.”

“Was she sleeping with someone else? It’s okay for men to be unfaithful but not women?”

“She was working for the FSB,” Petrenko said. “She made me look a fool. I wish she was still alive so I could kill her all over again.”

The words hit her like knives. She had no hope of hiding her distress. “You said that before but you’re wrong. She was a secretary at Almaz-Antei.”

Petrenko laughed.

“She didn’t work for the FSB. Whoever told you that lied,” she insisted.

“They were in the same office as her. I think they’d know.”

Oh Christ.
Her shock was no act. “But-but my father used to drive her to work sometimes.” He hadn’t. “I saw her office. I met her boss.” She hadn’t.

“Then she lied to you as well.”

Katya tried not to overdo the dramatics. “It can’t be true.”

“She told me herself—eventually.” Petrenko smiled.

She let out a little sob. “Why did you kill my family as well?”

Petrenko waved his hand. “I know nothing about that.”

“You told me they died accidentally,” Aleksei said.

“That’s what the police said, but it’s not true. Another car pushed my father’s car through railings and into the river.”

“Why would I want to do that to your family?” Petrenko asked.

Vindictiveness? Spite? Fun? Katya didn’t think he needed a reason. “The night before the accident, my father came home and told me he finally had the name of the person who’d killed Galya and he’d bring him to justice. I thought you found him first.” A lie. She’d given her father Petrenko’s name.

Petrenko shook his head. “Not me.”

For the first time Katya began to think maybe he hadn’t been involved in her parents’ deaths. What was the point denying it when he’d as good as admitted having Galya killed?

“So Little Miss Detective, how did you find out I’d come to Miami?” he asked.

“I didn’t.” Katya wasn’t falling into that trap.

“You’re fucking Aleksei to get at me.”

“What I think about you has nothing to do with Aleksei. I had no idea he was your son. How could I have known? I didn’t pursue him. I ran from him, not to him.”

“What do you plan to do now you know? Kill us both?” Petrenko laughed.

“Only you. Aleksei is worth saving. You’re not.”

Katya felt as though someone else had been speaking for the last few minutes. What the hell was she doing? Her heart raced. She’d gone so far over the line she was in a different country.

Petrenko stepped right up to her, put his face next to hers. She could feel his breath on her lips, taste his cigarettes but she didn’t move a muscle.

“Are you FSB?” Petrenko asked.

“No.” She stared straight into his eyes.

“Would your answer be different if Kirill asked you?”

“If Kirill were here I’d say whatever you wanted, but you wouldn’t know whether it was truth or lies.”

Petrenko stared at Aleksei. “Get rid of her, or I will.”

“You touch her or tell Kirill to touch her and we’re done.” Aleksei’s voice was quiet and calm.

“You put this whore over me?” Spittle flew from his lips.

“Get out of my house and don’t come again unless I invite you.”

Petrenko slammed out.

“You are FSB.” Aleksei sounded pissed off rather than angry, but her heart still hiccupped.

“A Fucking Stupid Bitch. Satisfied now?”

She took a deep breath. “No.”

He groaned. “You found out what you wanted to know.”

“I didn’t come looking for you,” she said.

“I know. Now will you drop it?”

“I want to know who betrayed her.”

Aleksei shook his head. “It could have been anyone, for fuck’s sake. Why do you have to know?”

“Because I want to punish them.”

He laughed and took hold of her jaw with his hand. “Your mouth is going to get you killed.”

She squirmed out of his grasp. “Do you think I care?”

“Maybe you don’t, but I do.”

She sighed. “I almost believed you then.”

“I’ve just told my father to fuck off. What else can I do to make you believe me?”

He licked his finger, ran it round her lips, and slipped it into her mouth. Katya wrapped her tongue around it and sucked hard.

A groan slipped from his lips. “I was going to take you upstairs but I can’t wait.”

He pulled his finger from her mouth and stared at her.

“Think we can go slow?” she whispered.

He laughed. “No.”

“Try.”

Aleksei gave a long-suffering sigh, cupped her face and kissed her, a sweet gentle press of his mouth against hers. He trailed his tongue along the line of her lips, then back again and slipped his hands to her neck. Katya felt as if every molecule of her body had been set alight. He explored her mouth slowly, circling the tip of his tongue inside her cheeks, drifting along the curve at the top of her mouth until he began to slide it back and forth in an imitation of sex.

Katya moaned low in her throat, her fingers clutching his shirt as she pressed herself against him. She could feel the hard ridge of his cock rise against her belly and her panties dampened. How could she want him so much? He was everything that was bad for her, up to his neck in illegal things, the son of a man she loathed, but she didn’t want to give him up. Yet the moment she’d opened her mouth to Ethan, that’s what she’d done.

“Katya.” He breathed her name into her ear, slipped his hand up her dress under the edge of her panties.