Letting herself into Room 416, Villanelle opens the valise, takes out a packet of surgical gloves, and exchanges a pair for the leather ones she’s wearing. Then, from a sealed polythene bag, she takes a micro-transmitter the size of a fingernail, and a pinch of Blu-Tack. Placing this in the pocket of her parka, she leaves the room and takes the stairs up to the fifth floor, where she seems to straighten a picture on the wall outside Room 521. This done, she continues upwards to the sixth floor, where the stairs terminate in an exit to the roof. It’s unlocked, and stepping outside she conducts a quick reconnaissance of the area, noting the placement of chimney stacks and fire-escape ladders. Then, without hurry, she returns to the fourth floor.
Back in her room she switches on an iPod-sized UHF receiver, and inserts one of the in-ear headphones. Nothing, as she expected, just a faint, ambient hiss. Pocketing the receiver, leaving one ear-bud trailing, she takes a waterproof case from the valise. Inside, each component lying in its bed of customised foam, is the weapon she ordered from Konstantin: a polymer-bodied CZ 75 9mm handgun and an Isis-2 suppressor. Villanelle prefers a lightweight action on a combat weapon, and the CZ’s trigger-pull weight has been adjusted to two kilos for double-action firing, and one kilo for single action.
Hotel-room assassination, she knows, is a complex science. Taking down the target is easy; it’s doing so swiftly, silently and without collateral damage that’s difficult. There must be no recognisable gunshot report, no scream of alarm or pain, no bullets smacking through plasterboard partition walls, or worse, through the guests on the other side of them.
So after attaching the suppressor, Villanelle loads the Czech handgun with Russian-made Chernaya Roza—Black Rose—hollowpoint rounds. These are constructed with an oxidised copper jacket whose six sections, on impact, peel back like petals. This slows penetration, initiates a massive and incapacitating shockwave, and causes enhanced disruption of tissue along the wound path. For a 9mm round, the Black Rose’s stopping power is unequalled.
Villanelle waits, her breathing steady. Visualises and re-visualises the coming course of events. Replays every conceivable scenario. Through the headphones, she hears hotel guests bid each other goodnight, snatches of laughter, doors closing. It’s more than an hour and a half before she hears what she’s been waiting for: voices speaking Russian.
“Come in for five minutes. I’ve got a bottle of Staraya Moskva. We need to run over arrangements for tomorrow.”
Villanelle considers. The drunker they all are, the better. But she can’t leave it too late. She hears murmurs of assent, and the sound of the door closing.
Again, Villanelle waits. It’s past 1 a.m. when the security team finally, and noisily, leaves the room. But how drunk is Kedrin? Will he remember the wide-eyed young woman he met at the Conway Hall? She picks up the hotel phone and dials Room 521. A slurred voice answers. “Da?”
She answers in English. “Mr. Kedrin? Viktor? It’s Julia. We spoke at the lecture. You said to call you later. Well… it’s later.”
Silence. “Where are you?”
“Here. At the hotel.”
“OK. I gave you my room number, yes?”
“Yes. I’ll come up.”
She puts on the parka. The valise is now empty except for a clear plastic evidence bag. Opening this, Villanelle shakes its contents into the valise, which she then stows in the wardrobe. The evidence bag goes into the inside pocket of her parka. Then, after a last look around the room, she leaves, holding the CZ 75 by the suppressor so that the body of the handgun is up her sleeve.
Outside Room 521, she taps lightly on the door. There’s a pause, and it opens a few inches. Kedrin is flushed, his hair awry, his shirt open halfway to the waist. His eyes narrow as he examines her.
“Can I come in?” she asks, tilting her head and looking up at him.
He bows, semi-ironically. Ushers her in with a vague, sweeping gesture. The room is similar to Villanelle’s own, but larger. An ugly gilt chandelier hangs from the ceiling. “Take off your coat,” he says, sitting down heavily on the bed. “And get us a drink.”
She slips off her parka and drops it into an armchair, the CZ 75 concealed in the sleeve. A side table holds an empty bottle of Staraya Moskva vodka and four used glasses. Villanelle checks the fridge. In the freezer there’s a plastic half-bottle of duty-free Stolichnaya. Uncapping the bottle, she pours a liberal amount into two of the glasses, and meeting his gaze, hands him one.
“A toast,” he says blearily, his eyes dropping to her breasts. “We must have a toast. To love. To beauty!”
Villanelle smiles. “I drink to our ruined home…” she begins, speaking Russian. “And to life’s evils, too…”
He stares at her for a moment, his expression at once surprised and melancholy, and continues the Akhmatova poem. “I drink to the loneliness we share.” He throws back the vodka. “And I drink…”
There’s a sound like a snapping stick, and Kedrin is dead. Blood jets briefly from the entry wound beside his left nostril.
“… I drink to you,” murmurs Villanelle, completing the couplet as she pulls the bedclothes over him. Quickly, she pulls on the parka and makes for the door. As she’s leaving the room, she finds herself face to face with one of Kedrin’s pet thugs. He’s broad-shouldered, scowling, and smells of cheap cologne.
“Ssshh,” hisses Villanelle. “Viktor’s sleeping.”
The eyes narrow in the skull-like head. Some instinct tells him that something is wrong. That he’s fucked up. He tries to look past her, and realises far too late that the Glock 19 that he collected from the driver this morning is in his shoulder holster, not in his hand. Villanelle puts two rounds through the base of his nose, and as his knees go,
