Crossing the Line (29 page)

One touch and she came, colors erupting in her head, a rainbow explosion that stole her vision and the breath from her lungs. Slow an impossible concept, they were both too greedy. Aleksei was pulling her dress off as she struggled to unfasten his buttons. Clothing ripped, they fell and tussled on the floor, unwilling to stop kissing as they fought to get each other naked. Aleksei tasted sweet and strong and sexy. His desire and desperation fed her own until they were wrapped naked in each other’s arms, still kissing, rocking together , stealing quick gulps of air, legs and arms so entangled they could have been one organism.

“I have a nice bed upstairs,” he whispered.

“Too far away.”

Aleksei smiled. “I’ll have one put in every room.”

They lay on their sides, Aleksei at her back, his hand between her legs and the muscles of her sex clenched.

“Again?” he whispered.

“Sometimes I think you only have to look at me.”

She felt him smile against her neck, then he switched them over so he lay on his back on the floor with her sitting astride him. His hands settled over her breasts as he stared into her eyes.

“We only kissed,” he said. “What happened?”

She laughed.

“Katya, while I still have some sense in my head, we’re both clean. I know it’s a bit late to be saying that now but you’re taking the pill, we don’t need condoms. You’re the first woman I’ve ever done this with.”

She widened her eyes. “I took your virginity?”

He mock-frowned. “You know what I mean.”

She nodded. “No protection.”

“You feel perfect. I’m glad I waited.”

“The first for me too,” she said.

The smile on his face hit something deep inside her. She pushed up on her knees, wrapped her fingers around his cock rubbed her thumb over the silky head and guided it to the opening of her body. She lowered herself slowly onto him, drawing in a deep breath as she sank down and all the time stared into his eyes as he stared into hers. Aleksei wrapped his hands around her hips and tugged to bring her down hard and she cried out at the sharp jolt of pleasure.

Yet even at that moment of physical union, guilt swirled in her head. He wouldn’t want her when he knew what she was, what she’d done.

“Katya, stop thinking. You worry me.”

She contracted her muscles around his cock as she pulled up and his eyelids fluttered.

“Oh shit,” he gasped. “Do that again.”

“Can’t. One off.”

He laughed. “Christ, I l—”

She closed her eyes.
Don’t say it.
She started to move up and down slowly but couldn’t keep from moving faster, lifting her hips to drive down harder. Aleksei gasped and panted beneath her, his hips bucking into her downward thrust as they raced toward orgasm. The sound of their bodies slapping together echoed around them. It felt so good, it drove every other thought from her head.

Katya called out his name as she came, and when she opened her eyes to see the way he looked at her, she knew all was lost. Their bodies taut at the moment of release, they came apart in juddering groans. She felt the wet rush inside her and slid down into Aleksei’s arms.

“Happy Birthday, little cat,” he whispered.

He held onto her so fiercely, tears sprang into her eyes.

“I don’t want to lose you,” he said.

“I don’t want to lose you either.”

But she knew she would.

* * * * *

Viktor seethed—furious with Aleksei and livid with Galya’s little sister. At that precise moment he wasn’t sure which of the two of them pissed him off the most. He needed Aleksei’s help on this uranium deal. His son had the sophistication he lacked. Aleksei was highly intelligent and sharp, but no matter what that little whore said, he lacked ambition. Together they’d make a good team, brains and brawn, but Aleksei had kept him at arm’s length since he’d arrived in the States.

His son might pretend he had principles, refusing to take even an occasional line of coke yet he was happy to accept the benefits that came from doing business with drug dealers, happy to launder money that ended up supporting terrorists.

As for Katya Mazarov, he wanted to wring her neck or fuck her brains out, the few she had. Actually he wanted to do both. How dare she speak to him like that? If he hadn’t wanted to upset Aleksei, he’d have already had Kirill pay her a visit. Maybe he should reconsider and get rid of her. What could Aleksei do about it? Family was family.

He tapped on his driver’s shoulder. “Take me home.”

Viktor needed to work off his bad temper. Beth would have to do.

When Tom walked into Ethan’s office and told him about the uranium, Ethan could hardly believe it. The Vekua Institute of Physics and Technology, now in the breakaway republic of Abkhazia, had once been the center of atomic bomb development. After the Second World War, German scientists, captured by the Soviets, had been taken there to work on uranium enrichment. When Abkhazian separatists drove out the Georgians in 1993, the scientists working in the institute fled, and by all accounts left behind a quantity of uranium–235. By the time Minatom got there four years later, the uranium had gone. Where to, was anyone’s guess. Either the Abkhazians still had it or they’d sold it to terrorists. Or the people who worked in the institute had not fled empty-handed. Unfortunately, what Katya had told Tom made all too much sense.

“We already know Abkhazia is linked to missing weapons-grade uranium,” Tom said. “In fact the stuff missing from there is the only weapons-grade fissile uranium officially unaccounted for.”

In the past five years, smugglers had been caught more than four times with uranium. One guy had hidden it in his baby’s pushchair, the child riding on top. Enrichment material rather than weapons-grade, but Ethan always wondered about the ones who got away.

“Could this be a set up?” Ethan asked.

“It’s too elaborate. Why invent an interest in uranium to trick her?”

“If we act on this and it’s a ruse, they’ll kill her.”

“But—”

“I’ll look into it and talk to Frank. Don’t repeat this conversation, Tom.”

Ethan checked if Frank was in and headed to his office.

Luisa jumped up when Ethan came into the room. “Has Rico asked you about the bowling?”

“Can’t make it.”

“You can’t just sleep with me and dump me,” she snapped at his back.

Ethan turned. “I’m not having this conversation.” He slammed the door.

Frank raised his eyebrows.

“Don’t ask. This is more important.” Ethan ran through everything and then waited while Frank spoke to Kelso, his contact in the CIA.

It quickly became clear the CIA knew more about this than they were prepared to reveal.

They’d jumped on a runaway train.

* * * * *

Katya had a department meeting that afternoon about maintaining consistency in assessment and marking schemes. She glanced through the handout. How complicated did marking have to be? On a scale of one to ten, how well did the student play the violin? Wasn’t that enough? No, she had to take into account dyslexia, dyspraxia, physical disadvantage, ethnicity, social deprivation, sexuality, and it went on and on. She groaned quietly. Halfway through the session, the door opened and Ethan came in.

Her stomach no longer fluttered for him, nor did her heart beat faster. She kept her gaze down as he quietly took a seat next to her.

As the concluding comments were being made for the third time, he wrote on her notepad. “Stockroom in ten minutes.”

He was alone when she went in. As she closed the door, Ethan moved to lock it.

“I didn’t think I’d see you again,” she said.

“It would look strange if I disappeared after telling everyone I worked here.”

“Where’s the friend to hold your hand? Are you worried I’ll try and unzip your pants?” She waited for him to speak but he just stood there. “What’s the matter, Special Agent Roberts? Come to ask me if I’m telling the truth about the uranium?”

“I wanted to explain.” He stepped closer and she took a step away.

“Explain what?”

“Why I brought Lindy and Tom. I broke the rules. I got involved.”

“You aren’t involved. End of story.”

“No it’s not. I can’t believe I’m standing here like this. I shouldn’t be anywhere near you.” He lifted his hand to her face and twisted his fingers in her hair. “I don’t want you to do this. I don’t want to lose you.”

Too late.
She grabbed his wrist and pulled his hand down. “You can’t lose what you don’t have. You have two faces, one for your colleagues and another for me. What are you going to do? Be good Special Agent and squeeze every last drop of blood from your
stukatch
? Lie and tell me that I mean something to you?”

Ethan swallowed.

“Don’t bother answering. Whatever happens I get fucked and maybe I have two faces as well.”
She retreated until her back was against the door.

Ethan followed. “I know this is wrong but I can’t help it.”

She bristled. “What is
this
you think we have? It was a day in Paris, that’s all.”

When she tried to leave, he put his hand against the door.

“I don’t know what to do,” he said.

“Don’t keep telling me you shouldn’t be doing this, that you don’t know what to do. It’s not my problem you don’t know what you want. Your loyalty shouldn’t lie with me.”

“I know what I want, that’s my problem. When I think about you, I ache. When I look at you, my heart jumps. I want you to be part of my life.”

She froze.

“I want to take you to Sanibel. I want to look for turtles with you. I want us to lie in my hammock and stare at the stars. I want your face to be the last thing I see before I go to sleep and the first thing I see when I wake up.”

Her heart ached as if he squeezed it in his fist. The right words, an ocean too late.

“Yesterday I was desperate for you to say you wouldn’t work with us, because once this starts there’s no going back. After what you told Tom, I’m even more afraid for you. At some point you’ll be asked to wear a wire and if Kusmin or Petrenko find it, they’ll kill you.”

She looked into his eyes. His gaze didn’t waver.

“I don’t want you to die,” he said.

“You don’t know me,” she whispered. “You don’t understand.”

“I’m trying to. I know you’re stubborn and brave.”

He’d lied from the moment they met. But he was just doing his job. She understood that. He might not be lying now but it was too late.

“Did Tom tell you I found out someone inside the FSB betrayed Galya?”

“No.”

Her shoulders slumped. “He was so excited about the idea of terrorists getting hold of weapons-grade nuclear material he hardly listened to anything else.” She sighed. “It would take a lot more than Petrenko talked about to make a nuclear bomb.”

“We don’t know his buyer doesn’t already have more. And they don’t care whether the bomb is clean or dirty. In the current climate, even an unsubstantiated rumor about nuclear material falling into the wrong hands is the stuff of nightmares.”

“Will you try to find out who betrayed Galya?”

“Yes.”

“It may not be important you, but it’s important to me.”

“It’s not a priority for the Bureau,” Ethan admitted.

“You think this is a trap?”

“All they need to hear is that someone is talking about the uranium and they’ll look at you. The danger’s ongoing because we have to know dates, names, meeting places. We need the supplier, buyer and those in between. We can’t afford to let this sort of material fall into the wrong hands.”

“I’m not stupid. I know if it’s true about the uranium, you have to find those who stole it and those who want to buy it. It’s already in the wrong hands. But I’ll never uncover enough. You’ll always want more. Weeks, months, years maybe, listening and repeating. Petrenko neither trusts nor likes me. Aleksei trusts no one. One day I’ll make a mistake and I’ll die.”

Ethan took her hand. “One strike. One attack to pull them down. Maybe the uranium deal is it. This could be over in weeks. In a way, it could be the best thing to have happened. Unraveling Aleksei’s money laundering activities could take months. Could you persuade him to help his father?”

Something went cold in her then. Was the talk of Sanibel supposed to make her think he’d be there for her when Aleksei wasn’t? Another lie? “I told Aleksei it wasn’t a good idea. Why would I change my mind? He said he thought Petrenko was crazy. Aleksei is not the bad man here.”

“If you denied we’d asked you to persuade Aleksei to do this, we’d avoid the charge of entrapment.”

“Not such a good man then,” she said.

“I have to do the right thing. If we can get Aleksei into custody over the uranium, we can persuade him to cooperate with us over the money laundering. Then he’d be the one in the witness protection program and not you.”

“He won’t talk,” she said. “He could be laundering money for any of the big Russian gangs. The
Dagestanskaya
or the
Solntsevskaya
. You know how many there are. Maybe he works for the Colombians. They won’t let him talk.”

“That’s our problem, not yours. But what
is
our problem is that I don’t want this to be snatched moments in a storeroom. You mean more to me than that.”

You’re lying.
“Prove it. Find out who betrayed my sister.”

She could use people too. The difference was that she felt terrible doing it.

* * * * *

Ethan looked up when Lindy slipped into his room. She closed the door.

“I’ve just spoken to Revnik. He says there was a case last week in Moscow that matches the other murders. I’ve asked him to print details.”

“Thanks.”

“Is there a problem?” she asked.

“No. Don’t discuss this, please. Not even with Tom.”

Tom wasn’t under suspicion but Ethan didn’t want Lindy to talk to anyone. He’d had an email from Eric Ford, a Legat in Moscow. Petr Revnik’s wife and children were not in the city. The neighbors didn’t know where they’d gone. The ailing mother was a fabrication. Eric’s sources told him there’d been a series of murders over a number of years where women had been left mutilated and their body parts rearranged. None for the last six months. So why had Revnik said that to Lindy? Eric was also checking the names Ethan had given him.

When Ethan’s phone rang he recognized Brannon’s voice and his jaw twitched.

“What can I do for you?” Ethan asked.

“It’s more what I can do for you. It’s about the knives. I figured I wasn’t going to be allowed to follow this through, but I don’t like loose ends.”

“Go on.”

“We have an almost unblemished reputation for keeping things secure. I had every box in property and evidence checked and found nothing. So if the knives and pillowcase weren’t misplaced then someone took them. I started by talking to Gabriel Rosenberg, the control clerk. He’s two years away from retirement and off sick since the day the evidence went missing.”

Which was suspicious.

“He’d had a heart attack so that was strike one but he made a comment about the case looking like clear-cut self-defense and so at least it didn’t matter the stuff was gone. I’d hardly got back to the station before I had a call from Gabe’s wife to say he was back in the hospital and wanted to speak to me. Then I got the truth. He’d been approached in his home by two men offering increasingly larger amounts of cash for him to produce the evidence in the Novikov murder case. They’d said they’d stay with his wife while Gabe went to collect their parcel and he knew he had no choice. When one of the men took out his wallet, Gabe caught sight of a Miami-Dade chauffeur license. Part of the number was 93. They sounded like Russians. Back at the station, I checked and came up with a name, Sergei Placek, and a photograph. I’m emailing details.”