American.”
“That’s not an answer. You were just kissing an American ten minutes ago.”
“That’s nothing. I would’ve gone down on a toad to get that bastard.”
Gage glanced toward Ninchenko. “I think I made a mistake about her.”
Alla kicked at Gage, who skipped back a step. “You bet you did. Wait until my father gets ahold of you.”
“From what I hear Petrov Tarasov doesn’t have a daughter anymore.”
“Who are you?”
“Graham Gage. I’m a private investigator from San Francisco.”
“Whose side are you on?”
“Not Matson’s,” Gage said. “He’s trying to frame a friend of mine and I’m here to stop him. Where were you heading?”
“The U.S. embassy.”
“A little late in the day.”
“So what. They’ll open the door for me.”
Gage shook his head. “Not over a lovers’ quarrel.”
“It’s worse than that,” she said.
“How much worse?”
Alla shrugged. “How do I know you won’t send me back?”
“You can trust me on that. I’m not letting you go at all. Tomorrow you’ll be on a slow boat to Istanbul.”
Gage tensed, expecting her to kick at him again, or push off against the tailgate in a final attempt to flee. Instead she asked, “What about Stuart?”
“He’s next. I’ve already got him, he just doesn’t know it. He has something other people want and I need to stop him from turning it over.”
Alla laughed with frustration and disgust. “You’re about six months too late.”
“What do you mean?”
“What do I get?”
“What do you want?”
“The whole truth and to see that son of a bitch hung by his heels in Shevchenko Park.”
Gage glanced over at Ninchenko to see whether his picture of Alla had also turned inside out.
Ninchenko raised an eyebrow in response, then asked Alla in English, “What was your fight about the other day?”
Alla’s eyes widened. “It was…” She hesitated and looked back and forth between Gage and Ninchenko. “Why should I trust you two?”
Gage pointed back toward the street. “You notice anybody out there that wants to stop him besides us?”
“How do I know you don’t want to steal it?”
“Because I could’ve done that in California.”
“The fight?” Ninchenko asked again.
“It was…” Alla looked back and forth between them. “It was about what he’s really doing here. Before we came, he said he wanted to make an investment. But that’s not the truth, or at least not the whole truth. The investment had already been made.”
“Is that what the meetings in London with Gravilov were about?”
She drew back, then smiled as if Gage had walked in on her in the shower. “Have you been living in my flat and I somehow missed it?”
“No, just close by.”
“I wish I knew you were there.” Her smile faded. “This would all be over by now.”
“Unfortunately, your background suggested that you were carrying on the family business, or at least working for Gravilov.”
“He tried to recruit me to spy on Stuart. One Ukrainian to another. I didn’t want his money…that fucking gangster.”
“Does Gravilov know who your father is?”
“I don’t think so. I didn’t want to get caught in a crossfire between him and my father’s people so I used my ex-husband’s last name when he came by.” Alla looked down and sighed. “How did I get into this mess? All this time I thought Stuart was different, but he turned into the same kind of predator I was trying to escape from.”
“People fall in love with the same person over and over again,” Gage said. “It’s just the names that change.”
Alla looked up at Gage. “You must know my ex-husband.”
Gage shrugged. “Just a guess.” He circled back to the fight. “What investment?”
“Stuart, Gravilov, and Hadeon Alexandervich built a plant in Dnepropetrovsk, to manufacture missile guidance systems.”
Gage caught his breath. He felt as if life had been fast-forwarded and he’d blinked at all the wrong times. Rage mushroomed inside him, at Matson for his treason and at himself for failing to recognizing what Matson had been up to.
“Stuart got caught sending over military-grade video amplifiers, so Gravilov suggested that he manufacture them over here.” She emitted a bitter laugh. “Stuart liked to brag that SatTek can drop a missile into a coffee cup, but he never seemed to grasp that it’s people, not coffee cups, who get blown up.”
“How far have they gotten?” Gage said, keeping his voice steady, concealing his anger.
“They’ve already built fifteen hundred.” She glanced over at Ninchenko. “Stuart ordered the parts, mostly through intermediaries in Taiwan and Singapore, and shipped them over. Gravilov and Stuart fronted the money.” She glanced over her shoulder. “A FedEx box from Germany arrived at the hotel.”
Gage tensed as he said the words, “MMIC controller chips.”
Alla nodded. “The last five hundred. They were repackaged in Munich to disguise them as computer components. Gravilov’s bodyguard snatched them right out of Stuart’s hands and headed for the plant. All that’s left is to embed the software.”
“How do you know-”
“I studied engineering in college. I understand the process better than Stuart does.” She shook her head. “Putting weapons in the hands of these people is lunacy…sheer lunacy.”
Alla glanced in the direction of the restaurant. “Now what?”
Gage looked at his watch and asked Ninchenko, “What’s Matson doing?”
Ninchenko passed on the question, listened for a moment, then answered. “He’s still at the bar.”
“How’d you get Matson to tell you all of this?” Gage asked her.
“I told you what I’d do to a toad,” she said, unsmiling, “so use your imagination. And it didn’t hurt that Stuart has painted himself into a corner. Gravilov gave him a down payment of five million dollars for the software and Stuart’s afraid that if he hands it over, he’ll never get the rest of the money and they might even force him to give the five million back. He knows he’s already lost his investment in the plant.”
“Where’s the software?” Gage asked.
“Stuart told them it’s with his lawyer in London, but it’s really on his laptop. The idea is that he stays in Ukraine until the payment is wired into his account. Then he gives them the software and they’re supposed to let him leave.”
“Supposed to?”
“That’s what’s got him worried most of all.”
Gage looked at Ninchenko, who shrugged his shoulders as if to say, Use your best judgment. Then back at Alla. “Would you go back to him if I asked you to?”
She shook her head. “If they don’t let Stuart leave, there’s no way they’ll let me. Why not just kidnap him and the laptop?” She jutted her chin toward the restaurant. “I’ll make sure he cooperates.”
“Things have gone too far. We need to disable the devices so no one can ever use them.”
Ninchenko held up a finger and again listened to his phone. “Matson has looked at his watch a couple of times.”
Alla peered up at Gage. “You seemed to be good at following people. How good are you at rescuing
