Watchlist (27 page)

Arkady Chernayev was the richest man in Russia, perhaps in the world. He divided his time between his estate in Knightsbridge, London, and a mansion on the outskirts of Moscow. Not to mention a dozen other properties around the world, several private planes and three obscenely large yachts. Chernayev had gotten rich in the oil business during the free-for-all in the last days of the Soviet Union.

“No, not boss.” A scowl.

“Ruslan, you’ve done private security work for him. Don’t even bother trying to deny it. My sources on this are impeccable.”

Korovin looked away, then busied himself by sectioning a herring with the delicacy of a cardiac surgeon performing a coronary bypass. He placed each slice of herring atop squares of black bread, then looked up. “That was long ago,” he said finally, his expression hardened. “Why is this so important to you?”

“Because if Chernayev is behind this, which I’m beginning to believe, I think he’s channeling money or explosives or both to a dangerous fanatic named Devras Sikari. The point of contact for their interests was Tampa, Florida.”

“Then let’s say, for the sake of argument, that you are correct. This is why you wanted a weapon? Because you think you will shoot your way in to Chernayev’s dacha? Do you know how many bodyguards this man has surrounding him at all times? And just one of you?”

Middleton shrugged, said nothing.

“And for what? You plan to
kill
Chernayev and hope to survive?”

“Kill him? No, of course not. I need to talk to him. Can you tell me anything about him?”

“He’s grown reclusive. He had some financial problems.”

“The richest man in the country?”

“Not any more. Wealth comes and goes like the tide, my friend . . . but he’s on the rebound now, we hear. No one knows what his good fortune is. I can’t give you first-hand knowledge . . . Tell me, what is this about?”

Middleton had a thought—Sindhu Power. Lowering his voice, he went fishing. “Because of the copper bracelet.”

A nervous smile flitted across Korovin’s face, then disappeared. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

“I think you do.”

Korovin snubbed out his cigarette, then slid another one from the pack and lighted it. When he next spoke, it was through a mouthful of smoke, his voice muzzy. “The copper bracelet,” he said. “This is nothing more than what we call
skazki.
Folk tales. What you call old wives’ tales. Stories told by frightened old men to inflate their own importance.”

“Try me,” Middleton said.

“No. The copper bracelet is no more. That snake was killed long ago.
Decades
ago.”

“Amuse me.”

“It originally described some old scientific process. But then the name came to refer to a cult. A cult of madmen—fanatics, as you say—that rose from the ashes of the Second World War. You know of the Norsk Hydro plant?”

Middleton shook his head.

“This was a factory in Norway jointly owned by Norsk Hydro and I. G. Farben.”

“The giant Nazi corporation.”

“Yes. It was destroyed by the Allied forces and the Norwegian resistance movement. One of the most remarkable sabotage acts of the war.”

“What did the factory make—weapons?”

“In a way, yes. The copper-bracelet system produced heavy water. It was a revolutionary way to produce nuclear material.”

Middleton thought immediately of Felicia’s insights and her encrypted message to him. Heavy water. Sikari’s patents.

“The Nazis needed it to make an atomic weapon. But once the factory was destroyed, the Nazi atomic bomb program was ended. The story, Garrold—the
skazka—
is that the plant may have been destroyed, but some of the records of the technology survived. A group of Russians and Germans—successors to the Nazis, you could say—have been hoping for someone to reconstruct the science behind it.”

“Connection to Chernayev?”

“None that I’ve ever heard of.”

“Well, I need to find out. How can I reach him?”

“I—” Korovin fell silent as the doddering old waitress approached. She said something to him in a quiet voice.

“You will please excuse me,” Korovin said, rising from the table, his knees cracking. “There is a call for me on the house phone.”

Ruslan Korovin followed the waitress across the dining room and into the small antechamber next to the kitchen. There, in an antique wooden booth, an old black phone was mounted on the wall. Korovin picked up the phone, heard nothing. He depressed the plunger a few times, then turned to the waitress and said, “The line is dead.”

“Yes,” the waitress said. Her voice sounded strangely deeper, stronger. “It is dead.” She slid a latch on the kitchen door, locking it.

Suddenly she lunged at him, vising his neck in the muscled crook of her elbow. Korovin struggled, gasped, but this woman—who was surely not an old woman, he now knew—had overpowered him. She twisted his head one way, his torso another.

There was a terrible loud snap and Korovin sank to the floor, and the last thing he saw was the copper bracelet on his attacker’s left wrist, barely visible under the dainty ruffle of her sleeve.

7

LISA SCOTTOLINE

D
evras Sikari needed time to think, and when, as now, he wasn’t in his beloved Kashmir, he would come here to his second favorite place in the world—his colonial farmhouse in rural Pennsylvania.

Specifically, to the chicken coop.

Sikari was sitting in his director’s chair in the pasture, watching his chickens enjoy the sun. He loved his little farm, some ninety acres, with its backyard quarter horses and tiny flock of pullets, and though he was Indian by-way-of Belgravia, he felt his most relaxed in this unlikely spot. Here he could shed his dinner jackets and Hermés ties, take off his clothes like so much costuming, and finally become himself. It made little sense, even to him. Sikari wasn’t raised in the country, but to him, this farm was home away from home.

The air had a raw October nip, but his baggy jeans and old flannel shirt kept him warm, with a waxed jacket still dusty from the morning’s ride. When he crossed one leg over the other, a red cashmere sock peeked from the top of his scuffed Blundstones. In his hand was a Phillies mug with bad coffee, which he had brewed himself. His housekeeper could make coffee the way he liked it, but it was her day off, so Sikari was stuck with his own swill. He took a sip and it tasted bitter and now, cold. He shook his head at the irony. He had patented a formula that would stump most nuclear physicists, yet he was defeated by Dunkin’ Donuts.

SQUAWK! went one of the hens, startling Sikari from his thoughts. His attention shifted back to the brood.

“Settle, Yum-Yum,” he said softly, though the pullet only blinked in response, a flash of a perfectly round, golden eye. Yum-Yum was an Araucana, an ill-mannered bird with brilliant plumage of russet, rich brown and flecks of black. Sikari kept three Araucana, because of their unusual greenish-blue eggs, and he also had a pair of brown Sussex’s that reminded him of England, as well as some docile Bard Plymouth Rocks, a spoiled American breed, and a dramatic black-and-white Wyandotte named Princess Ida. All of his hens had been named for his private passion, the operettas of Gilbert & Sullivan, though the Bard Rocks looked so much alike that he simply called them the Women’s Chorus. His farm manager tolerated his naming the hens, thinking Sikari an eccentric multimillionaire, which suited his purposes. His staff believed he was an international reinsurance executive, and he paid them well enough to ask no questions.

Sikari eyed the chickens and the sight cheered him. Some of them clustered together on the soft dirt around their coop, roosting together wing-to-wing, their feet tucked under them and their chubby feathered breasts forming a scalloped edge. Others were lying flat on their sides, their heads resting in the dirt as if it were an earthen pillow, their yellow feet splayed out straight. Sikari had never known that chickens did such a thing. The first time he’d seen them lying down that way, he’d thought they were all dead. It made him think again of Kavi Balan, and for a moment he watched the chickens without really seeing them, deep in thought, his coffee forgotten.

Sikari had to deal with the fact that things had not been going well for him. Everything had been in place—the geology, the personnel, even the Scorpion—but Middleton was still alive and Kavi Balan was dead. That alone was a major disruption. Sikari had been grooming Balan to be his number one, but now his plans had gone awry, the past nine years wasted. The situation was unstable, which threatened his future and his fortune, and stole his peace of mind. He had been mulling over the solution, but had yet to come to a final decision. Time had passed without him acting, but he trusted that his path would become clear, in due course. Sikari was a deliberate man, and that was one of the reasons he was so successful. Put simply, he planned, where others did not. His modus operandi was goal-oriented behavior, whether his goal was losing weight or building weapons of mass destruction.

He always reached his goal.

He took a sip of cold coffee as Princess Ida blinked herself awake and rose to her feet, stretching one yellow foot out behind her, then the other. Sikari smiled at the sight of his poultry diva, craning her feathered neck to stretch it out, too, making herself taller and more powerful. Princess Ida was the dominant hen, and he watched her ruffle her wing feathers, then settle them back into place, the simple motion bringing Yum-Yum, Peep-Bo, and the Women’s Chorus to their feet, where they all began scratching and pecking at the brownish grass, following Princess Ida’s lead. It reminded Sikari that all of nature had a pecking order, which insured stability.

He thought to himself,
Stability will be restored once my pecking order is restored. That’s all. It’s that simple.

It made his decision for him and there was no time to delay. He set his coffee mug on the ground, reached into his moleskin pocket, extracted his cell phone, then pressed one letter. When the call was answered, he said into the phone, “Come to the coop. And bring your brother.” He closed the phone with a snap and re-pocketed it, his gaze falling on Princess Ida.

The hen looked back at him, with approval.

Ten minutes later, his twin sons stood before him, with identical half-smiles, and as always, the sight pleased him. They were part of the plan, too. He couldn’t say exactly that he loved them, for he traveled too much to know them, but he liked the notion that he had two such bright, active, good-looking sons. They were six feet tall and with their curly dark-blonde hair, round blue eyes, and confident grins, Archer and Harris were almost impossible to tell apart. They couldn’t have looked more different from Sikari, but of course, he wasn’t their biological father. He had bought them as babies on the backstreets of Prague; he had no idea where they had come from and it didn’t matter anyway. He had told them, his farm staff and the tutors who home-schooled them that he was their godfather, a dear friend of their deceased French parents because he knew that passed for exotic here in the boondocks.

“Aren’t you two cold?” Sikari asked, because neither wore coats. They were dressed in a way that people used to call preppy: turtlenecks, khaki pants and navy crewneck sweaters.

The boys shook their heads. “No, Dad,” they answered, almost in unison. They were more than each other’s best friend; they were so close they were almost the same person. It was the way Sikari had wanted it, essential for what would be expected of them someday. They had been trained in the martial arts and were both remarkably gifted, schooled especially in geology and the sciences; their IQs tested even higher than his. They both were slated to enter Harvard next year, but that would change now. College couldn’t teach them what he could; he could offer them the world, literally. They’d be too young to succeed him, even in ten years time, but Balan’s death had left him with no choice. Sikari would be around to guide them for the next thirty years or so and if he started grooming them now, they’d be ready ultimately to take the helm.

The problem was, he only needed one of them.

He had known this day would come, which was why he had bought twins, so he’d always have a back-up, the heir and the spare. But now he had to choose one and he wasn’t sure how. They were doppelgangers and their temperaments were the same, as far as Sikari could tell.

“When did you get home, Father?” Archer asked, his tone casual, and duplicate sets of blue eyes looked at him.

“This morning. You boys were in the gym. Listen, we have a problem.”

“What?” Archer asked.

Harris cocked an eyebrow. “Arch did it,” he said, and the twins laughed, echoing each other.

Sikari smiled, for show. “Listen to me. This is serious. You have been preparing for this day your whole life. You just didn’t know it.”

The two boys fell silent and blinked at exactly the same time, which Sikari found eerie. They’d had their own language as toddlers and he’d always wondered if they were talking about him.

Princess Ida began to peck at Archer’s loafer, but the boy didn’t notice.

Sikari said, “I need one of you to succeed me in the family business, when the time comes. But I need only one of you. I assume you both want to ascend.”

“Of course,” they both answered, and suddenly neither looked over at the other, their gaze fixing on Sikari.

“So how do I choose between you?’”

Archer smiled crookedly. “Whoever can catch Princess Ida gets the job.”

“Great idea!” Harris clapped his hands together, like punctuation at the end of a sentence. “How about it, Father?”

“Ha!” Sikari laughed, and this time it was genuine. They had no idea of the enormity of the position they were vying for. It was like drawing straws to become President of the United States. For some reason, the absurdity of the notion appealed to him. He smiled to himself. “But nobody can catch Princess Ida.”

“I can,” Archer said.

Harris gave him a playful shove. “So can I, you loser.”

Archer’s mouth dropped open. “I’m the one who catches them at night.”

“Not without my help,” Harris shot back.

“Whoever catches her first then,” Sikari said, standing up. He had no better way to choose between them and it may as well be arbitrary. If the twins were that much alike, either would do. He raised his right hand. “When I say ‘Go.’”

Archer and Harris planted their feet in the dirt and bent their knees slightly, a perfect footballer’s stance. The chickens reacted instantly, sensing something afoot. Princess Ida flapped her wings, signaling to the Women’s Chorus, and Peep-Bo and Pitti-Sing clucked loudly, rousing from their dirt baths and scampering around.

“Ready, steady, go!” Sikari said, bringing his hand down.

“On it!” Archer cried, taking off, but Princess Ida ran full tilt toward the chicken coop, with Harris sprinting after them both. The clever hen veered to the left before she reached the little door to the coop, which sent Archer crashing into the wall, and Harris gave chase, bolting after Princess Ida, his legs churning and his arms pinwheeling comically. The speedy hen dodged this way and that, half-running and half-flying from the boys, squawking loudly in alarm and protest, refusing to be caught.

“Go, Ida, go!” Sikari heard himself shout, lost for a moment in the spirit of the contest. It charmed him to see these two strapping young men laughing and running, prime specimens in the fullness of their youth and promise, their golden hair blazing in the sunlight, and Sikari found himself wishing he had been a real parent to them.

“BAWKKK! BAWWKK!” Princess Ida screamed, as the two boys chased her toward Sikari, and he stepped back so they wouldn’t barrel into him. The twins ran neck-and-neck next to each other, their faces alive with the thrill of the battle, and just as Sikari was about to shout again, he noticed Archer’s expression darken as if a storm cloud were passing over his features. In one unexpected movement, Archer raised his right arm and whipped it backwards into Harris’s neck.

“No!” Sikari heard himself cry, and the sound was drowned out by a sickening guttural noise that emanated from Harris’s throat. The boy’s eyes widened in shock, his hands flew reflexively to his crushed Adam’s apple, and bright red blood spurted in an arc from his gaping mouth.

Sikari couldn’t believe his eyes. He was accustomed to violence, but not here, not at home, not now. He couldn’t process what was happening. He watched in horror as Harris crumpled to the ground, his legs bent gro - tesquely under him, his face crashing into the dirt. Instinct drove Sikari to the stricken boy’s side and he threw himself on the ground calling, “Harris, Harris, Harris.” He turned the boy over by the shoulders, but Harris was already dead, his eyes fixed at the sky, his mouth leaking his life’s blood. Cradling Harris, Sikari looked up in shock and bewilderment. Above him stood Archer, with Princess Ida tucked under one arm.

“I win,” Archer said simply, and Sikari found his voice.

“Why?” he asked, hushed.

“Because I’m stronger, smarter and better than him. And because my time has come.”

“But . . . He was your brother.”

“So? Don’t worry, Father. I can handle the responsibility. I know what’s required of me. I know everything.”

“What? How?” Sikari asked, astonished.

“I’ve been through your papers. I’ve hacked into your computer. I even broke the code on your passwords. I know everything I need to know. You understand what that means?”

Sikari understood, but he went for his holstered Berretta a split-second too late. The last thing he saw was the tip of Archer’s loafer, kicking forward to drive his nose into his brain.

Devras Sikari realized that his successor was now in place and that the new king was smarter, stronger, younger and even more ruthless than the old one.

And as he died, he thought: What have I unleashed upon the world?