murdered. Both these criminals have confessed to their crimes! They have shown no evidence of innocence or remorse. What more is needed?”
“I agree,” the goateed suddya said. “The evidence is overwhelming.”
“And I,” the hatchet-faced suddya said.
The judges began to confer among themselves. They talked and nodded their heads.
Iryna turned toward Scorpion. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t hold out,” she said.
“Did you tell them about my code name, Scorpion?” he whispered to her.
“Gospadi!” she cried, looking away. “Is that what you think of me?”
The three judges passed around a paper. Each of them signed it in turn.
They were going to execute both of them, Scorpion realized. For him it was foregone, but there might still be a chance for Iryna.
“We have concluded-” the hatchet-faced suddya began.
“Podazhdite!” Scorpion cried out. Wait! “You’ve got it backward. She didn’t seduce me! I seduced her! I killed Cherkesov! It was a Western plot. Iryna,” nodding at her, “tried to stop me. I forced her to come with me after the assassination. I did it! She is innocent!”
“ Tak, you admit you killed Cherkesov?” the hatchet-faced suddya said.
“I did it!” he said, looking at Iryna. “She had nothing to do with it.”
“Why? What was your reason?”
“I was paid.”
“But by whom? Who wanted Cherkesov dead?”
“An international conglomerate who thought Kozhanovskiy would be more sympathetic to their interests. Everyone here knows that Kozhanovskiy wanted to be closer to the West.”
“An American company?” the goateed suddya put in.
“An international company, but yes, of the West,” Scorpion said.
For a moment no one spoke.
“He’s lying. He’s trying to save her,” Kulyakov said, looking at Scorpion.
“That’s stupid,” Scorpion said. “If as you contend, she brought me into this, if I’m about to die because of her, why would I want to save her? I’d want to see her dead!”
The hatchet-faced suddya stared at Scorpion for a long moment. No one in the room said anything. He turned and whispered quickly with the other judges. The goateed judge was disagreeing about something. Suddenly, there was a stir.
Two Black Armbands came into the room, their hands on their gun belt holsters. Someone followed them in, followed by two more Black Armbands. The hatchet-faced suddya was about to object to the interruption when he saw who it was. Scorpion recognized him instantly. Heavyset in a dark suit, bald, horn-rimmed glasses.
Gorobets.
“Vybachte,” Gorobets said in that same soft voice. “Excuse the interruption.”
“The sud is honored, Minister,” the hatchet-faced suddya said.
Gorobets walked over to the bench and, leaning over, spoke with the three judges. Once, he turned to look back first at Scorpion, then at Iryna. He and the judges spoke for another few minutes, then Gorobets turned to leave. He glanced again at Iryna and fixed Scorpion with a long hard look. Then, without a word, Gorobets and his Black Armbands left the room.
“What happened?” Iryna whispered to Scorpion.
“Whatever they planned just changed. You’re a hot potato,” he whispered back.
The three judges talked among themselves, one and then another glancing over at Scorpion and Iryna. They seemed to have reached a decision. The hatchet-faced suddya marked something on the paper and signed it. He turned the paper so the other two judges could initial it, then turned back to Iryna.
“Iryna Mikhailivna Shevchenko. Based on the prisoner known as Scorpion’s confession and additional information that has come to the attention of this sud, we find there is insufficient evidence to hold you for the assassination of Yuriy Dmytrovych Cherkesov. You are free to go, but with the understanding that if additional evidence should be found, you may be charged in the future. You may go.”
Iryna came and stood next to Scorpion.
“This is not an open sud, Iryna Mikhailivna. Leave at once!” the hatchet-faced suddya demanded.
“What are you going to do with him?” she asked, indicating Scorpion.
“Take her out!” the suddya ordered.
Two guards came and grabbed her.
“ Nyet! He’s doing it for me, you fools! He is innocent!” Iryna cried out, looking at Scorpion as if to memorize his face as two guards dragged her out of the room.
The hatchet-faced suddya stared coldly at Scorpion.
“Mikhail Kilbane, also known as Peter Reinert, also known as the foreign agent Scorpion, the sud sentences you to death for the murder of Yuriy Dmytrovych Cherkesov. Sentence to be carried out within twenty-four hours. The sud is concluded,” he said, picking up his papers.
The three judges stood and filed out of the room.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Boryspil
Kyiv, Ukraine
He sat shackled on the floor of his cell, waiting for his execution. They had left the light on, and a guard peered in through the peephole. He no longer thought of escape. Even shackled and with his groin aching, he might be able to take a couple of the guards out, but they knew how dangerous he was. They would come with more than enough men to subdue him. In the end he would only hurt a few brutes.
He hadn’t thought it would end this way. With so many questions unanswered. What had happened with the war? No one seemed to act as if they were at war, and he hadn’t heard any explosions or sirens. Had he managed to stop it or was he buried so deep behind Lukyanivska’s thick walls that missiles had hit the city and he hadn’t heard them? Had Akhnetzov gotten through to someone in Russia? What had happened with YouTube? Why did everyone act as if no one knew anything about it? How had they managed to track him and Iryna to the TV station? Who had betrayed them?
What of Iryna? He had tried to save her, but it was whatever Gorobets said to the judges that did it. Why would Gorobets want to save her? Was it because she was too much of a hot potato for them? The daughter of Artem Shevchenko, founder of the Rukh, was that it? At least she was safe-for the moment. She cared for him. Maybe even loved him. He’d seen it or something close to it in the last desperate look she had thrown at him when they dragged her from the courtroom. He wished he could see her, touch her.
For a moment he allowed himself the fantasy of the two of them on his sailboat, the Laawan, named for the friendly west wind in Arabia, its sails bellied with a fresh breeze somewhere in the Cyclades islands, say the ink- blue waters between Syros and Paros. He pictured how she would look in a bikini, the sun warm on their skin, the blue of the Mediterranean for as far as they could see, the two of them digging into a freshly grilled sea bass hot from the galley, washed down with a good Batard-Montrachet grand cru wine.
He’d almost pulled it off, he thought. He cast his mind back over everything that had happened. Where had he screwed it up? What had he missed? How had the SBU known they were at the TV station? Who tipped them? Akhnetzov? The station manager, Korobei? Why? They wanted the show to take place.
He was sure they hadn’t been followed from the Central Station. It wasn’t the SVR. He’d taken care of Gabrilov, and anyway, he’d gotten past the SVR’s part in this. Unless there was another player in the game. But who? He’d stayed away from the CIA’s Kiev Station, and in any case, the Company wanted him to stop this thing. And what about that YouTube video he’d posted? Even if the CIA was involved, they would have wanted it to be seen. It would have either defused the crisis with Russia or proven that the U.S. was in the clear and had had nothing to do with it.
Unless there was another mole inside Kozhanovskiy’s office.
