“Big fan of yours, too,” Harry said, looking into his coffee cup. Harry had a problem with guys who were taller, better built, and better looking than he was. Couldn’t help himself. Harry looked a little like Bruce Willis, Concasseur looked like Daniel Craig. What are you going to do?
“Bit of good news. I was able to learn the name of the troublemaker,” Concasseur said. “Chap who’s actually ordering these hits on Hawke and his son. One of my men got a photograph of him leaving his apartment. There are also photographs of the exterior of the Tsarist Society. And some interior shots I grabbed secretly when I stopped by there for a cocktail. You’ll find all the other relevant information in the satchel. Pair of SIGs and some rubles as well.”
“We need to have a serious conversation with this dude,” Stoke said. “Does he speak English?”
“Yes.”
“How’d you get his name?” Harry asked.
“One of his colleagues is a friend from London days. Vaz values money more than his life. It was expensive information. Sometimes the deeply ingrained Russian culture of corruption works against them.”
“Tell me about it,” Harry said. “What’s our guy like?”
“Your man is an extremely successful automobile salesman named Viktor Gurov. Ex-Mafyia hit man. Now owns half the Mercedes dealerships in town, meaning he had half the competing dealers murdered. Not a high- ranking Tsarist, however, more middle management. He doesn’t get his hands all that dirty anymore, but his nickname at the club is ‘the Executioner.’ I’ve had a tail on him for the last few days. You’ll find his typical schedule in the envelope with the photos.”
“Why’s he picking on our mutual friend?”
“He’s the bastard son of the chap Hawke killed. Korsakov, the late Tsar. This fellow worshipped his father, as do most members of the bloody Tsarists. But with Viktor, it’s personal, too. His mother, a woman named Gurov, was simply one of Korsakov’s legion of mistresses and courtesans. She, like many such women, turned up dead in the snow in Gorky Park.”
“All that makes our job a lot easier,” Stoke said to him, smiling. “Thanks.”
“Not at all. I would do anything for Alex Hawke. His courage got me through some extraordinarily tough times once. I am forever in his debt.”
Stoke said, “Buy you a drink?”
“Thanks, no. I think the less time we’re seen together, the better. But I am always available to you, of course. I gave you a number. My private mobile. Call it twenty-four hours a day. Cheers, then. Cheerio.”
The man stood up, nodded a friendly good-bye, and left the bar.
“Now what?” Harry said, downing his vodka.
“I got an idea.”
“Just now?”
“No, dude. Stayed awake all night flying across the ocean while you were sleeping like a baby. Thinking it up. Working it out. Fine-tuning all the details.”
“Yeah? Is it any good?”
“Nah, it sucks.”
“Seriously.”
“Unless you got a better one, I guess we’ll have to wait and find out, won’t we, Harry?”
Thirty-four
The Pushkin Cafe was one of the most popular restaurants in Moscow. Viktor Gurov, a corpulent, balding, well-dressed man, was frequently to be found there, a habitue, not for the food, but for the women. The most beautiful women in the city congregated at the bar there, many of them prostitutes, some of them just lonely, or merely alcoholics. Viktor didn’t particularly care one way or the other, though he had a predilection for bosomy blondes. Hell, he’d fuck a Muscovy duck if it had big breasts and blond feathers.
He’d found one tonight, a little number named Natalya Litvinova, a plump little duckling who fit the profile perfectly. She was, she’d told him after joining him at his table for a bottle of champagne, a famous movie star. She named a couple of films he’d never seen (who went to movies?) and he pretended to have been deeply impressed with her theatrical credits. He did not have to pretend to be deeply impressed with her cleavage; it was a showstopper.
He sat back and regarded her, sipping his champagne and licking his protuberant, rubbery lips. The night held great promise.
“Will you walk me back to my hotel?” she asked, returning from the powder room a little while later.
“Of course, my dear. The streets are not safe for a beautiful woman alone at this hour.”
“So kind, Viktor. My brave protector. Shall we go?”
He fished a tightly rolled wad of cash out of his pocket, peeled off some rubles, stuck them under the ice bucket, and said, “After you, darling girl.”
She was staying at the nearby Sofitel, not even a four-star hotel and certainly not known as a haven for movie stars, but Viktor was far beyond caring about how many stars her hotel had. He was proud of his small joke, and was thinking of mentioning it, but decided against it. She was a bit wobbly, but that was all right. Women were less fussy about some of his more exotic sexual demands when they’d had half a bottle of champagne and a few large brandies.
“What floor?” he asked as the elevator doors slid closed.
“Twenty-second,” she said, eyes on the ceiling, humming some unrecognizable American pop tune. Viktor pushed the button, then leaned back against the wall as the lift rose, eyeing the tops of her wobbly breasts beckoning from the deep V of her silk dress. Undressing her mentally, excitement brimming in his brain, Viktor literally licked his fat lips.
He followed her down the hallway, worried she’d topple off those stiletto high heels, but liking the way her plump buttocks moved under the tight grey silk dress. She paused at one door, squinted at the number, shook her head, and moved on to the next. She couldn’t seem to get the passkey card to work and finally handed it to her escort, saying, “Here’s the key to my heart. See if you can make it work.” Cute, right?
“I’d rather have the key to your snapper, honey,” he said, opening the door and stepping aside. Natalya gave him her tried-and-true evil eye, her well-practiced “Dick Shriveler” look, but this lout didn’t even seem fazed by it.
She entered first and he followed, expecting her to turn the lights on. She kept moving into the room and Viktor paused, moving his hand up and down on the wall beside the door, vainly searching for the light switch. He found it, but it seemed to be covered with some kind of tape.
“Who needs lights,” he said and moved in her direction, her curvaceous silhouette visible at the end of the bed. She saw a pair of handcuffs dangling from his right hand.
“I do,” someone said.
The door behind him suddenly slammed shut, and he heard someone shoot the bolt. A high-powered beam of light exploded in his face, blinding him, and he covered his eyes with both hands. The light had come from a flashlight across the room, under the window.
“Lights, camera, action, that’s what I need, baby,” he heard the unseen voice boom in English. An American Negro, by the sound of him. He’d been set up by this bitch. Thank God he wasn’t wearing his gold Rolex with the diamonds, the one all the Tsarist assassins got after ten kills.
The room lights snapped on.
“Drop your hands, Viktor. Toss the cuffs over here; you won’t be needing them. Take two steps forward and empty your pockets. Throw everything onto the bed.”
There was a huge black man seated in an armchair beneath the big window, facing him. He had the flashlight in his left hand and a long-barreled revolver in his right, pointed at Viktor’s face. He knew the gun well, a. 357 magnum with a noise suppressor.
Viktor reached into his pockets and did what he was told. Car keys, his wad of cash, his leather gloves, pack of smokes, pack of condoms, some loose change from his trousers.
