Cologne. A familiar cologne.
She flipped on the light. The intruder screamed.
“Walk this waaaaay, talk this waa-aa-aay!”
It was Michael. He was signing Aerosmith. He was listening to one of the girls’ iPods and he hadn’t heard her calling his name. He hadn’t heard a thing.
“Hey babe!” He leaned against the counter, pulled off his headphones. His eyes focused on the. 25. “Man,” he said, smiling. “Am I that late?”
Abby shook. Her eyes filled with tears of relief. She let herself slide down the wall to the floor.
The girls were fine, she was fine, Michael was fine. Everything was just peachy.
“So, I guess a blow job is pretty much out of the question,” Michael added.
Abby wanted to shoot her husband anyway.
ELEVEN
Aleks watched. from his vantage, in the darkness behind the house, he could see through the dining-room window, into what he imagined was the living room. Shadows danced on the walls.
He turned, and once again scanned the yard. His eyes played over the shapes. A pair of three-wheel bicycles, a swing set.
The sight filled him with a longing he had long ago relegated to that part of his heart he reserved for weakness. He tried to imagine how Anna and Marya looked when they were infants, as toddlers, taking their first, tentative steps around this yard.
He slipped to the other side of the property, assessed the structure. It was a two-story colonial, well tended, but not landscaped beyond the prestige of the neighborhood. A single pin oak graced the side yard, a tree that would one day begin to finger its massive roots into the cellar, if it had not already.
When he and Kolya had arrived there had been three lights on in the back of the house – one on the first floor, two on the second. He waited, observed. He had learned stillness in his many years in the forest, observing birds of prey eyeing their quarry. He could remain in one position for hours if needed.
He climbed the tree next to the south side of the house, and slipped onto the upstairs porch. He stepped up to the window. At first he thought the room was dark, or that heavy drapes had been pulled, but as his eyes adjusted he saw there was a dim light coming from the room.
A light snapped on in the window to the right of the bedroom. It appeared to be a bathroom. Frosted glass prevented him from seeing in. He turned back to the bedroom window.
Nothing inside the room stirred.
Within seconds, Aleks had the window raised. He slipped silently into the house. Except for the sound of the television below, the house was quiet.
He stood at the foot of the beds. The two little girls slept in the darkened room, in the hands of angels. They had not awakened, were unaware of his presence. The room was filled with plush animals – ducks, rabbits, teddy bears, turtles. On one wall was a long low table, a pair of bright plastic chairs. Above it was a large corkboard, collaged with a menagerie of Sesame Street characters.
In the dim light Aleks could only see their small forms beneath the covers.
Suddenly – noise behind him. Metal brushing metal.
The door opened. In a blur Aleks had the Barhydt out of its sheath, open, at the ready.
In front of him, in silhouette, a small figure.
Aleks flipped on the overhead light, and saw it was a woman. She was waif-like, in her late forties, south- east Asian. Aleks looked at the beds. He backed across the small room, slipped the covers down. The twins were Asian, too.
The girls were not his tutred.
He looked into the woman’s eyes. There he saw pain, as well as fear and something that looked like understanding. She did not move. Aleks closed his knife, sheathed it. He put a finger to his lips. The woman nodded.
“This is not Anna and Marya,” Aleks said softly. “I have made a mistake. If I have frightened you, you have my deepest apologies. You are in no danger.”
Moments later he was out the window, down the tree, across the street, and into the waiting car.
Aleks now knew where he had to go. He knew where his daughters lived.
A town called Eden Falls.
TWELVE
Two hours later Aleks stood near the bank of the East River, in the shadow of the massive United Nations Building. A chill had fallen over the city, a wind that whispered that spring had not fully arrived.
He took out one of the disposable cellphones, tapped the number written on the cocktail napkin. After two rings, the woman answered. They chatted for a minute or two, dancing the dance. Finally, Aleks asked. Moments later, after what might have passed for coquettishness in the woman’s experience, she gave Aleks her address. He committed it to memory, signed off. He then snapped the phone in half, threw both pieces into the river.
As he walked toward the avenue, and a cab stand, he felt the heft of the Barhydt on his hip.
Jilliane Murphy was the woman’s name. She said she would make tapas, and open a good bottle of Barolo. She said that from the moment they met on the plane, she had known he would call.
It had been a mistake to let her see the marble eggs on the plane. This Aleks knew. What he did not know was whether or not, when she moved the papers from the seat next to his, she had seen the name Viktor Harkov, or the address of People’s Legal Services. The lawyer’s murder was bound to be all over the news very soon.
As Aleks slipped into a cab on First Avenue, a Yankees cap pulled low on his head, he gave the driver an address eight blocks from Jilliane Murphy’s apartment.
He lay back his head thinking about the next day. His heart began to race. He was going to meet his daughters, a moment about which he had dreamed for four years.
But that was tomorrow.
Tonight he was really looking forward to the Barolo.
THIRTEEN
Whiskey dreams were the worst. in this version Michael was in his underwear, in public – so far, the standard horror show – but this dream was not about being in such a state in a junior-high classroom, locker combination unknown, surrounded by cheerleaders. It was not even the nightmare he used to have where he was in court, sans suit, standing in front of a jury populated with octogenarian garden club ladies. No such luck.
This dream had him running down the street in Astoria, chasing a scantily clad Gina Torres. Behind him was Abby who, for some reason, was carrying an AK-47.
He opened his eyes.
Gina Torres?
His heart suddenly leapt into his throat. He hadn’t. He wouldn’t. He didn’t. Did he?
Pulse racing, he bolted upright, felt around the bed. Empty. He glanced around the room. His own bedroom. He had overslept, but that was the good news.
Thank you, Jesus. Put it on my tab.
Gina Torres. He had seen her at the bar. That much he remembered. And he remembered how good she looked, although that was a given. And that he’d kissed her.
