Good As Gone (25 page)

A few blocks away, we hailed another taxi. We’d looked through each of the files I’d filched and found that a number of the children were clustered together in the Podil district, also known as Lower City, one of Kiev’s oldest and poorest neighborhoods. That seemed like the obvious place to start.

The taxi dropped us off in front of a run-down apartment building, the address at which three of the alleged victims were listed as living. The newer files had contained no photographs to go with the children’s names. All we knew was that two of the victims living in this building were girls, ages seven and nine. The other was a boy, age five. It was noted that both girls spoke English; the boy did not.

Outside the cab, I glanced about.

“There looks to be some kind of a playground round back,” I said. “Let’s check that first. I’m sure we’ll fare better in a place with no parents around.”

It wasn’t much of a playground. A pair of swings with worn chains, a set of monkey bars that probably wouldn’t withstand forty pounds, a big red plastic slide cracked down the middle. The only thing that looked remotely fun for a kid was the dirt. But even that was rock hard now in the dead of winter.

“No one here,” I said, not terribly surprised.

I looked over at Ana, whose gaze seemed locked on the small enclosed perch at the top of the slide.

“Yes. There is,” she said quietly.

I followed her eyes to the top of the slide and squinted, trying to see inside the uncovered window. There was a flash of color—a kid’s winter jacket, probably—and I knew that Ana was right.

“Shall we?” I whispered, but Ana was already moving toward the center of the playground. I considered remaining behind; a woman might relate better to a child. But then I remembered I had Lindsay Sorkin’s photo in my jacket.

“Dobry den,”
Ana was saying to the little girl when I arrived. I assumed she was speaking Ukrainian, though I knew nothing of the language.
“Me ne zvaty Anastazja. Yak vas zvaty?”

The little girl didn’t respond.

“Do you speak English?” Ana said.

The girl made the slightest incline with her head.

“What a relief,” Ana said to her. “Because my Ukrainian is terrible.”

“It is not so bad,” the girl said without inflection.

Ana’s face lit up. It appeared as though she was genuinely pleased with the girl’s appraisal of her Ukrainian.

“Really?” Ana said. “Because I am from Poland and I studied only Russian in school. Ukrainian, I had to learn all on my own.”

The girl said, “My mother came from Poland.”

I felt an instant wave of hope. The seven-year-old on our list was Dorota Wojcik—a Polish name, Ana had assured me.

Ana said, “That is terrific, to make a friend from Poland all the way here in Ukraine. Tell me, what is your name?”

The girl glanced at me and said, “I am not supposed to talk to strange people.”

Ana tried to make a joke out of it. “Oh, that is my husband, Simon,” she said. “He is not strange; he just
looks
strange.”

The girl’s lips slowly turned up.

“My name is Dorota,” she said.

“That is a beautiful name,” Ana remarked. “If Simon and I ever have a little girl, we are going to name her Dorota. Right, Simon?”

“Of course,” I said. “You’ve been saying it for years.”

“So,” Ana said to Dorota. “Simon and I are in Kiev searching for his niece. She became lost more than a week ago, and her parents are very sad. I was wondering if you would take a look at a picture of her and tell us whether you have seen her. Would that be okay?”

The smile disappeared from Dorota’s face.

“Please,” Ana said. “It will only take a moment, then we will leave you to your playing.”

The girl searched Ana’s eyes for any sign of treachery. Then she searched mine.

Finally, the girl nodded.

“Thank you,” Ana said, turning to me for the photo. When I handed it to her, she carefully unfolded it and set it on Dorota’s lap. “Her name is Lindsay. Lindsay Sorkin. She is about your age, maybe a year younger. She comes from a state called California, far away in America. It is where Hollywood is located, where they make all the best movies.”

Dorota stared hard at the picture, tracing Lindsay’s face with her thumb.

“Have you seen her?” Ana said. “Have you seen this little girl?”

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the little girl nodded her head.

My heart began to pump so hard and fast it felt as though it were going to break through my rib cage.

“You
have
seen her,” Ana said with delight. “Where did you see her? When?”

“Yesterday,” Dorota said. “In the afternoon.”

I looked down and saw that my fists were clenched. I bit the inside of my mouth until it was raw.

“Where?” Ana nudged her. “Where did you see Lindsay, Dorota?”

Dorota took a deep breath, glanced over at me again.

“On the television,” she said.

Dizziness swept over me; I thought I might fall. Sweat began to pour from my temples despite the brutal cold. I’d felt as though we were close, so close. It now felt as though Lindsay had been taken all over again. I suddenly realized I was really no closer to finding her than I had been in Paris the morning I met Davignon and Vince and Lori Sorkin. Lindsay, I was convinced, would never be found. Like my daughter, Hailey. Mankind, in its most abhorrent form, had eaten up these girls, swallowed them whole. These children had succumbed to the worst the world had to offer.

Ana was asking the girl more questions but I could pay no more attention. I needed to get to a hotel and drop onto a bed, sleep for as long as was possible. My ears ringing, I began to walk away, just as it started to rain. A cold drizzle quickly became a freezing torrent by the time I reached the fence.

I heard Ana’s footsteps behind me, heard her calling my name, but I couldn’t stop, couldn’t so much as turn around. For the first time in forever, I actually felt tears running from my eyes.

Ana caught up with me and matched me stride for stride, saying nothing as we made for the street. Then I heard the unmistakable patter of tiny footfalls and I felt sorry for turning away from little Dorota Wojcik. She was seven years old, possibly a victim herself. It wasn’t her fault.

“Ana!” the girl cried from behind us.
“Proshu!”

Ana and I turned at the same time.

“Go home, Dorota,” Ana said, not unkindly. “It is raining; you will catch cold.”

The girl froze. She wiped her eye, then turned around, only to spin back again.

“The girl you showed me,” Dorota said desperately. “I saw her not only yesterday, but the day before.”

Ana sat on her haunches to face the little girl.

Sadly Ana said, “On television, yes?”

“No,” Dorota said, shaking her tiny head in the cold rain, and I saw that tears were streaming from her eyes as well. “I saw her here. In Kiev.”

Chapter 45

Night draped itself over northern Ukraine, and with it came temperatures well below freezing, and a heavy snow blown almost horizontally by a violent wind. Ana and I had the taxi drop us off several blocks from the address Dorota had given us.

The girl
had
seen Lindsay Sorkin. Alive and in the flesh. Dorota had been at a two-story duplex in the Svyatoshinsky district of Kiev for a “session,” which she reluctantly described as a clothes-off photo shoot with Dmitry Podrova and two of his Russian associates. As Dorota was being escorted out by Dmitry, one of the Russians opened a bedroom door, and Dorota glimpsed a young girl tied up and gagged on a cot in the corner of the room. Dmitry quickly slammed the door shut and hollered at the Russian for being so careless. Dmitry then turned to Dorota and asked what she had seen. Nothing, she’d assured him. If she had seen something, Dmitry told her, and she spoke about it to anyone, he would kill her in her home while she slept. Then he would kill her baby brother.

“Do you think Lindsay is still in there?” Ana said as we watched the duplex from across the street.

I couldn’t speak. Dorota’s story continuously played out in my head and I thought I would be sick. Both Ana and I were a bit stunned that the young girl remembered the address—not only the street name but the number outside the door—and before we left, I’d asked the girl how.

“I always remember the bad things,” she’d said. “The bad things are easy to remember. The bad things you even remember in your sleep.”

“Do you think Lindsay is still in there?” Ana said again.

Again I didn’t answer. Truth was, I had no idea. The Podrova brothers knew we were in Ukraine, searching for the girl, knew by now that their attempt on our lives on the train from Odessa had failed. They would have moved her. But then, these men had been able to act with impunity for so long. Most of the police were on their payroll. Those who weren’t didn’t have the resources or manpower to conduct a proper investigation. Their egos could have driven them to leave the girl right where she was. There was only one way to find out.

I glanced at my watch. It was just after midnight.

“Time to go in,” I said. “I need you to remain here as a lookout.”

Ana didn’t raise a fuss. She knew too well that if someone snuck in behind me I was a dead man.

I moved down to the end of the block and crossed the street against the driving snow. I then moved behind the row of houses as silently as possible so that I could approach the duplex from the rear. With the wind biting my face, I wasn’t sure if Ana was safer outside or whether she should have come with me after all. The Podrova brothers would probably have guns, lots of them. But at least she wouldn’t freeze to death.

When I finally reached the rear of the duplex, I let fly a sigh of relief. The duplex was nothing like the fortress into which Kazmer Chudzik had turned his Pomerania lake house. I stared at the window leading to the right side of the basement and thought entering should be no bother at all.

Only there was a good chance—if the basement was used for nefarious purposes—that the door leading up to the rest of the house would be locked, even dead-bolted. I’d have to find another way in without making much of a racket.

I stepped around to the side of the house and spotted a window that opened onto the first floor. Not perfect by any means, but it was the best entrance available outside of ringing the doorbell.

The first thing I did was quietly remove the screen and set it down in the snow. Breaking into a home wasn’t all that difficult. Go on the Internet and you’d find all manner of forums discussing the fine art of burglary—but all of it was for shit. Criminals weren’t especially adept at breaking into houses. They were often far too concerned with making an escape. Law enforcement, on the other hand, didn’t have to worry about getting away; we just needed in. And if we were fast enough, making noise didn’t matter so much. You just needed to be able to get the drop on your targets. Problem here was, there was probably more than one of them and I was alone. And I wasn’t here to make an arrest. Later, with or without Lindsay, I’d need out every bit as much as I now needed in.

There were no lights on downstairs, just one dim lamp on the second floor. So I took out my Glock, turned it around, and used the handle to break a hole in the upper right corner of the window. I was satisfied that the noise level was low enough, especially with the wicked wind blowing against the house. I reached in and unlocked the window. Slid it open and quickly climbed in.

I was in a downstairs bedroom that held only a cot. Could well have been the room Dorota described. Only Lindsay wasn’t here. There was a small amount of what looked like dried blood on the sheets and I instantly felt as though I might drop to my knees. But a set of footsteps pounding down the stairs gave me the adrenaline rush I needed. I ran to the closed door, pressed up against the wall next to it, and waited.

Three seconds later, the door swung open and a man swept in. I grabbed the guy from behind, put him in a choke hold, but didn’t squeeze, as I didn’t want him passing out. If no one else was in the house, I needed him conscious. He could be my only source of information as to Lindsay’s current whereabouts.

He struggled. I pressed the barrel of my gun to his temple and suddenly he wasn’t struggling so much.

“Don’t gamble your life away by lying,” I said quietly. “How many people in the house?”

“Just me,” he said gruffly, struggling for breath.

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

His cologne flamed its way up my nostrils and threatened to make me sick.

“What’s your name?” I said.

“Dmitry.”

“Where’s Viktor?”

“Out,” he growled. “At a party.”

In the full-length mirrors that made up the closet doors I saw his eyes darting around the dark room, searching for a weapon. Finally, he threw his arm forward and swung his elbow back into the right side of my ribs. I’d been expecting it and the blow had little effect, except to loosen my grip. He pulled away from me, but as he turned to swing at me, I struck him across the face with my Glock.

Dmitry fell backward onto the cot.

I grabbed him by the shirt, lifted him, threw his body hard up against the wall, then I used the Glock to break his nose. Slammed it again against the lower half of his face. Blood spewed from between his lips. He spit, and several crimson teeth shot out of his mouth.

“Another move like that,” I warned him, “and losing a few teeth is going to be the least of your worries.”

He didn’t say anything.

I pressed the barrel of the Glock into the flesh next to his left shoulder and told him I’d squeeze the trigger if he failed to provide a single accurate answer. He knew I wouldn’t kill him until I had the information I needed; that would have been counterproductive. But it was clear that he believed that I’d cause him a whole hell of a lot more pain.

“Where’s the American girl?” I said.

“Not here,” he said, his head trembling from the blows he’d taken. “Not in Ukraine. Not anymore.”

“Who has her?”

Dmitry tried a smile but it was difficult to pull off with a broken face.