Domino (The Domino Trilogy) (37 page)

“We only ask questions when something looks interesting to us.”

His flinty eyes hardened. “Are you implying that I am not interesting, Ms. Delaney?”

I didn’t respond. Instead I just drained my bottle of water and then tossed it into the wastebasket hidden behind the bar. Finally, I offered him something to chew on. “I already know everything about you,” I said. “At least, I already know everything I want to know. The rest kind of seems irrelevant right now.”

That surprised him. He guzzled the rest of the Jameson and proceeded to chew on the ice cubes. “Do you really consider yourself such an expert?”

“I’ve seen everything I need to see. I’ve drawn my own conclusions.”

“What makes you think your conclusions are correct?”

I stared
Bluschencko down hard, studying the web of broken capillaries that decorated his nose. He was a hard man who liked to drink, I could tell, probably starting with cheap Soviet whiskey back in the day; now his tastes were more refined. “I am seldom wrong.”

“But there is always a first time, no?” He settled back in his seat. “I suppose you’re waiting for me to tell you my plans myself. How naïve of you to think I would fall for such a trick.”

My heart sank. This would be a lot harder than I’d anticipated. Still, I had to try. “Of course I’m not,” I backpedaled, not taking my gaze from his. “But what makes you think I’ve figured you out so easily? I’m just a college kid who writes articles on the side. Surely you’re smarter than I am.” A not-so-subtle massaging of his ego---but then again, Russian mafia types tended not to do subtle. Growing up under the drab monotony of Communism gave them a taste for the garish and over-the-top. Or so I’d read, anyway.

That pleased him. “You are a savvy young woman, Ms. Delaney,”
Bluschencko replied, running a fat fingertip along the rim of his highball. The fine cut crystal sang out a sharp note; he tossed it into the wastebasket hard enough to shatter the glass in a small explosion, a small-yet-shocking show of power. “I think perhaps you will go far under my jurisdiction.”

“Your jurisdiction?”

“Perhaps that’s not the best choice of word. My English, sometimes it is lacking. Perhaps a better term would be to say that you shall go far in my enterprise. As my property, of course.”

Hannah sucked in her breath beside me. I cast a sidelong glance at her to make sure she was all right---she was conscious for now, but her left eyelid was drooping, and the left corner of her mouth was set at an odd angle, as if numb.
“Your property? Funny, I don’t recall either of us consenting to be bought.”

That last remark was a calculated risk, I knew. But I had to find out how exactly Hannah and I had fallen under
Bluschencko’s radar, and why.

“I do not ask for consent,” he replied, meeting my gaze. “I take what I want, and use it how I please. This is how we do things in my part of the world. It is good business. You Americans, you do not understand, and never will, so I will not bother to explain beyond this.”

He expected me to let things go at that, but I wouldn’t. “Try me. You might be surprised.”

“In my business, Ms. Delaney, I offer the finest specimens that money can buy to my clients. I obtain my product from the far corners of the globe---Europe, Asia, Africa, South America. I’d mostly stayed out of the American market, simply because most American women are not up to
my clients’ tastes. Too independent, too common, too cheap. And very often these days, too fat. What is it with so many fat girls in your country? And most of the thin girls have had too much plastic surgery and look like silly plastic dolls.” He gazed at me expectantly, but I had no answer for him, so he just rambled on. “So when my scouts stumble upon a fine quality specimen from America that shines with rare natural beauty, I must act quickly.”

“Your scouts?”

Bluschencko’s shoulders relaxed and he settled back into his chair, gearing up to tell a long tale. I’d finally managed to break through the veneer and gotten him to talk. “I have a network of business associates throughout the world who assist me in my many lines of trade,” he explained. “In the United States I am mostly focused on importing and exporting of  fine art and other assorted, ahem, goods. But my business associates in Cleveland tipped me off when they encountered Hannah at an art function there several months ago. They sent me photographs of her, and I was intrigued.”

“Intrigued how, exactly?”

Bluschencko nodded in Hannah’s direction. “My scouts happened to be in attendance at an event Ms. Greeley here was helping to administer thanks to her role at Art News Now. Such a lowbrow publication would normally not be on our radar, but a business associate of mine owned the banquet hall where the event took place, and tipped me off that there might be some art there that would be of interest to our enterprise. Midcentury modern Russian lithographs, if memory serves?” He glanced at Hannah, looking for confirmation, but she gave none; I noticed that she’d closed her eyes and appeared to be asleep. I gave a silent prayer that her concussion wouldn’t keep her that way permanently.

“At any rate, my scouts went to evaluate the art. It turned out to be a big disappointment---no surprise there really, since Cleveland isn’t exactly a good place to locate quality art---or quality anything else, for that matter. But Hannah---Ms. Greeley---was another story.”

He paused and looked around the room, as if he’d grown bored with his own story. I had to tread carefully here; if I played my cards right, I’d get him to reveal exactly what had attracted him to Hannah---and subsequently, to me---I’d be able to convince him to get Hannah the medical care she desperately needed, perhaps even get her to safety. “Go on.”

“Ms. Greeley has a certain
je-ne-se-quoi
quality about her, one that is rare for her Midwestern surroundings. A country-club manner in a 7-11 world, if I may be so poetic about it.”

I chuckled.  

“Hannah had poise, finesse. Fine features, a luscious complexion, refined manners. Not only that, she carried herself like a sophisticated virgin, if there is such a thing. A sensual ice queen, an innocent of sorts. That’s what attracted my scouts. Because my enterprise has clients that will pay top dollar for that quality---especially if it’s genuine. Unfortunately, we discovered after we put Ms. Greeley under surveillance that her feigned innocence was not real. Far from it.”

I was grateful that Hannah had lost consciousness and couldn’t hear that last bit.

“I was about to give up pursuing Ms. Greeley’s particular product potential when my surveillance scouts stumbled upon you, Ms. Delaney. For you had all the qualities that Hannah had, plus more. And in your case, your innocence was genuine.” He paused, cleared his throat. “Until the day before yesterday, at least. We did not get to you fast enough, it seems. Someone spoiled you before we could.”

“I assume you’re referring to Peter
Rostovich.”

He gave me a single nod. “Indeed. And how ironic it is that a former business associate of mine would get in the way of your profit potential.”

“What is---or was---my profit potential?” Although I already had some idea.

“I
once believed that you had a great future serving one of my most particular clients in Sevastopol. However, now that things have changed, I have different plans for you.”

“Such as?”

He raised one eyebrow. “Patience, my dear. All will be revealed once we arrive at our destination. We will take off in a moment.”

Suddenly I felt sick to my stomach.
I had to get Hannah out of there and to safety right away. I wasn’t sure she’d make it through a long flight with her injuries.  “I have to make a request, please,” I said. For the first time in the whole ordeal, I realized how truly frightened I was. Up to now I’d mostly felt numb, focused only on getting through one moment to the next; now that I was secured in a relatively comfortable place I understood just how precarious my own existence---and Hannah’s---had become.

Bluschencko
gave me a quizzical look. As his captive I wasn’t in the position to make any requests whatsoever, of course. But he seemed impressed by my mettle. “Oh? And what is it, pray tell?”

“I would like for you to let Hannah go. She needs a doctor. Or---”

He blinked. “And if I don’t? What could you possibly do to me if I refused?”

“Nothing.” It was the truth. I was powerless, completely at the mercy of this criminal mastermind. It was true that I’d managed to manipulate him a little, but that hardly made much of a difference in my circumstances.

“Then why should I grant your request?” He twisted one of his platinum cufflinks around and around in a circle, toying with it as he toyed with me.

“Because you can.”

His eyes twinkled at this. I’d taken a gamble of appealing to his grandiose sense of power, and it seemed to have worked. “You are asking me to be merciful, then?”

“Yes. Again, because you can.”

“Hmm.” He mulled this over for a bit, pursing his fleshy lips. “If I do this, it will complicate matters for you considerably.”

“I can live with that.”
“Perhaps you should question what that means before you agree so readily.”

“All right, fine. How would it complicate things?”

He gave me a slow smile, and ran his palm back and forth across his shiny bald pate. “I am not in the habit of granting requests without something in return. If I choose to help you in this matter, then you in turn will have to do something for me.” He paused.  “Something beyond what I already had planned for you, of course----and my plans for you are quite extensive as it is.”

His plans for me
. I could only imagine what they were. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. His words hung in the air between us for a moment as my mind raced with the possibilities. But this wasn’t about me anymore---it was about Hannah, and quite possibly her survival. What I wanted at this point was irrelevant. For the first time in my life, someone else’s well-being depended entirely upon me, and above all I was a person who believed in doing the right thing. I was a journalist---or wanted to be, at least---and we were supposed to be about ethics and the truth.

And sometimes we were willing to go to extensive---even dangerous---lengths to learn the truth. “I will do anything you say.”

“Good girl.” He pulled a mobile phone out of his lapel pocket, dialed a number, and spoke something in another language to whoever picked up. “I will have my people come and retrieve Ms. Greeley very shortly. She will receive very good care. She will also remember nothing about this ordeal. I have people who can ensure that she will develop a very strong case of amnesia.”

“What if it doesn’t take?” I asked against my better judgment.

He narrowed his eyes at me in irritation. “If by chance it doesn’t, and she reveals anything about what has happened, then I will kill her myself. And you, too.”

I shuddered and said nothing more.

THIRTEEN

The flight to Sevastopol lasted thirteen hours. The private flight attendant served our meals without saying a word; she became skittish and fearful after three more of Bluschencko’s masked lackeys came and retrieved Hannah shortly before takeoff. I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or a bad sign. I of course knew that it was even odds that Bluschencko would not keep his word about handing Hannah over to a physician; he could just take her out somewhere and have her shot, then dump her body in an alley somewhere, and I wouldn’t know the difference until it was too late. But it was a chance I had to take, for Hannah’s sake. I didn’t want to risk her dying of a brain hemorrhage or something in the middle of the flight. Still, I wondered what our flight attendant---a slight, ballerina-like woman who had the trademark high cheekbones and fair hair of the Russian steppes---knew. Though she had been professional, even chipper, when we first boarded the plane, her eyes had the dead, defeated look of someone who had long been a prisoner.

It was hard to feel like a prisoner on a luxurious Learjet, even when one of my fellow passengers carried an automatic rifle
and a Sig Sauer, wore a bandolier, and made it clear he would use it if I made even one false move towards the bulkhead door. Even so, the passenger chairs were comfortable, the liquor flowed freely, and the food was of exceedingly high quality, if a bit strange. Our lunch, served shortly after takeoff, consisted of sour cream, pickled herring and potato latkes for Bluscencko, a club sandwich for me, and Beluga caviar for both of us. I’d tried to refuse the caviar, but the effervescent crime boss had insisted I eat some, so I gulped it down and chased it with a shot of Finlandia vodka---something I hated even more than raw fish eggs.

“
These things, they are acquired tastes,” Bluschencko had said when he saw my pained expression after downing the priceless caviar and booze. “And you must acquire a taste for a great many things if you are to be successful in my enterprise.”

I didn’t question what that meant.
Bluschencko’s remark reminded me too much of what Rostovich had said back at the gallery, and the memory brought me pain. Not because the two men were so similar in that context, but because it served as a reminder that I probably would never see Rostovich again.

But was that really such a bad thing? Look what my association with
Rostovich had done for me so far, for Chrissakes. And yet, I longed for him the same way an addict craves his next fix. I knew he wasn’t good for me, but hell, I wanted him anyway.