Beloved Enemy (21 page)

Scheiwold spread his hands. “I don’t see how I can help you.”

In one motion, Jack grabbed the doctor’s wrists, pinning them to the desktop.

“Listen to me, Herr Doktor.” He pierced Scheiwold with his gaze. “I know what you do and I know who you do it for. I’m not interested in your client list; I’m only interested in finding Pyotr Legere. I know you worked on him, possibly this morning. It would have been a rush job, we both know that.”

“Legere … Legere…” Scheiwold said, as if trying to place the name.

Jack looked around the room. “This office must have cost a small fortune. How much do you take in a year?” Scheiwold made no move to answer, but then Jack hadn’t expected him to. “No matter. It must be quite a bundle, what with your legit and not-so-legit
clients
.”

He turned Scheiwold’s hands so they were faceup on the desk. “You have long, slender fingers, the better to manipulate your instruments.” He nodded. “I’m wondering how you’d make a living if you didn’t have use of those talented fingers.”

Scheiwold made a bleating sound in the back of his throat. He struggled to free his hands, but Jack pressed down even harder.

“What would a plastic surgeon with no fingers do with himself?” Jack stared into Scheiwold’s face, which was now sheened with sweat. “Not a pretty future, is it, Herr Doktor?” He nodded. “So, your call: what’s it going to be?”

*   *   *

When Annika stepped into the suite’s salon, Rolan whirled around so fast, droplets of blood whirled outward in a series of concentric arcs, spattering the walls and a print of ancient Trabzon. Two people who had been husband and wife, who had once loved each other; but that was a long time ago, in a lifetime that seemed, at this moment, to be very far away.

“Rolan,” Annika said, her voice pitched deliberately low.

He stalked toward her, shoulders hunched, staring at her from under his lowered brow. “You see how it is. Life has no meaning.”

“Rolan, stand down.”

“One act is as senseless as the next. I kill that man, I walk toward you, one act follows the other, there is no difference between the two.”

She could smell him, his rich animal musk rising above the sickly sweet odor of Fareed’s blood. He smelled like nothing she had ever encountered before, and for an instant fear rippled through her because she knew he was capable of anything

“I’m damned if I do, Annika, and damned if I don’t. Where is the difference? Except I can’t … not … do … it.”

“Rolan.” She held out an open hand, as if it were a peace offering. “Give me the knife.”

He glanced down at it for a moment. “I want to keep it.”

She could understand the request; she could accept it. She nodded. “Clean it before you put it away.”

He went past her, into the bedroom, crossing to the bathroom. She heard the water running, then the shower. Good. He needed to scrub himself clean of Fareed’s blood. Fareed. She looked at what was left of Iraj’s trusted driver. Maybe not so trustworthy now. Fareed was grotesque, he no longer looked human, which, she supposed, was the point. At least, that was what Dr. Karalian had told her.

“If Rolan kills,”
he had told her one baking hot afternoon in the valley,
“he will make certain his victim is no longer human.”

Annika was shocked despite herself.
“How can you know that?”

“Your husband no longer considers himself human.”

Now she was even more shocked.
“But that can’t be!”

“He told me so himself, Ms. Dementieva. Those were his own words.”
Karalian’s face softened with compassion.
“You see, his essential dilemma is that he knows what’s happened to him, he’s aware of how
changed
he is. That’s the true horror of his life now, because he cannot help himself.”

“So he’ll kill and keep on killing?”

“I don’t know that, though it seems clear that your grandfather does. How he knows this is entirely beyond my ken, but my history with him makes it impossible to gainsay him. When my wife was pregnant with our first child, he called me to congratulate me on the birth of my son. Not ten minutes after I hung up, my wife went into labor and five hours later gave birth to our son, Nator. Two years later, Illyusha called again, warning me not to get my wife pregnant again. Fool that I was, I didn’t listen. Our daughter, Lila, was born with Alexander disease, a neurodegenerative condition that’s fatal.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Karalian had given her a wan smile.
“Thank you, but feeling sorry is the one unalterable condition of my life. That’s the main reason Illyusha brought Rolan here to me. He knew I would give him the best care. Also, that I wouldn’t condemn him out of hand.”

“He means to use Rolan.”

Dr. Karalian had nodded.
“This is my surmise, though he has not confided in me.”

Dyadya Gourdjiev had not confided in her, either. But, looking at what Rolan had done with such ease, she understood that her grandfather meant Rolan to be the hammer of God, the instrument of his revenge. And now that the monster had been unleashed, she was to be his guardian.

*   *   *

“You wanted to see me, sir?” Nona said, sticking her head in the doorway.

“Nona,” Commissioner Dye said, “come on in.”

When Nona was seated across from him, he said, “How’s the Herren case coming? The senator is understandably anxious for a quick resolution.”

“Understood,” Nona said, “but I’ve been in the department for more than a decade and I’ve yet to encounter a triple homicide that leads to a quick resolution.”

Dye nodded. “Senator Herren wields a lot of weight in this town of heavyweights.”

“Let him solve the murder, then,” Nona said dryly.

A twitch at the corner of the commissioner’s mouth was all she received in return. “You know, my job is more political than procedural.”

“That’s why you get the big chair, sir.”

Dye grunted. “Herren’s put my nuts in a vise. Don’t make me regret promoting you.”

“Is that a threat?”

Dye leaned forward. “Nona, do you
want
my nuts in a vise?”

She rose. “A quick resolution. Got it, sir.”

Just before she reached the door, Dye said, “Nona, I understand you’ve been nosing around the Paull murder.”

She stopped in her tracks, took a breath while she thought,
What the fuck?
then faced him without expression. “I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t pull that shit with me.”

“Okay, what d’you want?”

“I want to know what you think you’re doing?”

“McClure’s a friend of mine.”

“A fact that will get you in trouble.” Dye stood up. “I don’t want you in trouble, Nona.”

“Am I? In trouble, I mean.”

The commissioner came around from behind his desk. “You’ve got a high-profile triple murder to solve. That’s more than enough on your plate.”

“My own time, sir.”

“Even worse.” As he lowered his voice the tone became more intense, every word hammering home. “The tension in this town is palpable. I’ve received some calls from people I’d rather not hear from, especially when they’re voicing complaints.”

“This sounds like some terrible cliché.”

“This town is one immense cliché, Nona. There is an immutable hierarchy, rules that are set in stone, one of which is Metro doesn’t stick its snout in the feds’ business. I shouldn’t have to remind you of any of this.”

“Jack helped me out when no one else would. I owe him.”

“Dear God, Nona, I don’t doubt your good intentions. But the fact is we’re both new to our jobs. The last thing either of us needs is for homeland security and the Company to bust our humps.”

“I understand, but—”

“I went out on a limb naming you chief of detectives,” Dye pressed on, overriding her. “There were doubts, some objections. People are waiting to use the least excuse to wag their fingers in my face and say, ‘I told you so. Fire the bitch.’ Whatever you’re doing that relates to Paull and McClure, stop, now. Am I making myself clear?”

“Like crystal.”

Dye’s face darkened. “I don’t care for your tone,” he said.

“Neither do I.” Nona stepped out into the deserted corridor.

*   *   *

Zurich’s Old Town, where Jack was headed, straddled the Limmat river, important in the south valleys, where in convenient stages it fell off, for hydroelectric power. Jack was taking no chances on Scheiwold calling Legere after he had left the doctor’s office. To that end, he had pulled out the telephone cord and had taken the battery out of his and Greta’s mobile phones, after tying them both up.

The taxi crossed over the Schanzengraben canal, which bordered the Old Town and which had been dredged to aid construction of one of the city’s three great fortress walls between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Scheiwold’s receptionist had booked Pyotr Legere into the Schloss Schnee. The hotel, used by the surgeon for his patients’ postsurgery recovery, was more restful, not to mention discreet, than a hospital. It stood a block from the lake, the glittering opera house, and Bahnhofstrasse, Old Town’s main thoroughfare, with its bustling shoppers, old-world trams running on a spiderweb of overhead lines, and, at night, lights twinkling like a constellation of stars.

Schloss Schnee was a modern building sheathed in glass and steel, an all-suite hotel, stocked with every imaginable luxury. Dr. Scheiwold had called the concierge before Jack had left his office, and the dapper young man had anticipated Jack’s arrival with a cup of freshly made hot chocolate, topped with whipped cream.

“Herr Legere is in the spa,” the concierge said as Jack sipped the rich, dark liquid chocolate. The concierge gestured as a lithe blonde, who might have been Greta’s younger sister, appeared. She wore a sea-green sheath dress that hugged the outline of her well-toned body. “Hanna will guide you to the spa.” He smiled, gave a little bow, and, Jack could swear, almost clicked his heels. “I wish you success in all your endeavors, Herr Griffiths.”

Setting his cup onto the top of the concierge’s counter, Jack followed the
Schöne
Hanna to the elevator bank, where they descended two levels, then down softly lit corridors. The odor of rose essential oil could not quite hide the chlorine smell.

They entered the spa through a wide rosewood door. Jack was surprised to find it deserted. When he remarked on the fact, Hanna told him that when Dr. Scheiwold’s clients requested spa time, the area became theirs exclusively, in order to maintain their anonymity.

“Most of them choose to come here because they don’t want to be seen until the bruising is gone and their cheeks and brows are sheened to perfection,” she concluded.

“Is that what happened to you?” Jack asked.

Her laugh was like the tinkling of bells. “My genes are better than that.” Her smile was as warm as buttered toast. “You should see my mother.”

She led him past a fully equipped gym, beyond which was a steam room, sauna, a rubdown room that smelled powerfully of wintergreen liniment, and a small but cozy lounge, equipped with a half-fridge, healthful snacks, tall glasses, and two plastic pitchers, one filled with ice water, the other with iced tea. Several paces on, he could hear the velvety echo of water lapping against tiles.

“Three pools,” Hanna said, “one cold, one warm, one hot.”

“Where is Legere?”

“Right in here.” She gestured. “Our tanning salon.”

Jack almost tripped at the threshold, the toe of his shoe stubbing against the marble sill, his balance tipping so precipitously he surely would have fallen had not Hanna caught him. He was aware of her strength as he righted herself.

She peered at him, frowning. “Are you all right, Herr Griffiths?”

“Perfectly.” But when he nodded, the vertigo overcame him again and he was obliged to grab hold of her to keep his balance.

“Herr Griffiths, you look unwell.” Hanna led him over to one of the tanning beds. “Why don’t you sit down?”

“Legere. Where is he?” Jack was dimly aware that he was slurring his words.

“Right over there, in the tanning bed across from us.”

Jack turned his head, or at least tried to. Dimly aware that his body was acting as sluggishly as his mind, he said, “Maybe I should sit down.”

“Considering your condition, I have a better idea.” Hanna smiled her buttered toast smile as she lifted the lid of the coffin-like tanning bed. “Here we go,” she said as she gave Jack’s shoulder a push.

It wasn’t much of a push, but to him it felt as if an avalanche had landed on him. His body canted over. He tried to right himself on his own, then, as he was going over, reached out for Hanna, but she had moved away and all he grasped was dead air.

He fell into the tanning bed at an angle, and Hanna, lifting his legs by the ankles, put him completely to bed. He stared up at her impossibly beautiful face. He willed himself to get up, but the flat of her hand on his chest settled him in place.

“I wish you success in all your endeavors, Herr Griffiths,” she said, echoing the concierge, as she lowered the lid and snapped it into place.

A moment later, humming like a swarm of wasps, the UV lamps came on.

F
OURTEEN

“W
HAT PRECISELY
is going on?” Iraj Namazi said into his sat phone. “Why aren’t they convinced McClure is the mole?”

While he listened to the voice on the other end he watched three Egyptian kites wheeling high in the sky. He thought they must have spotted a dead animal—that’s what they liked best, dead meat. Just like us humans, he thought.

“Who is this Jonatha Midwood?” he asked, hearing her name for the first time. “We don’t want her mucking around in our business.”

The kites were lowering, like storm clouds about to release their rain. He sat in his car, fifteen miles from the hotel, ten miles from nowhere. He didn’t like Trabzon, a mixture of the touristic and the postmodern ugly. It bore no resemblance to Trebizond, the capital of the ancient Greek Byzantine Empire and, in its day, the most important trading hub linking the Eastern and Western worlds. How the mighty had fallen, he thought, as he watched the kites land and begin to feed on whatever poor animal was lying on the side of the road. Trampled by history, he thought sourly. A state into which he fervently prayed to Allah he would never fall. He longed to return to Fez, which he had made his home for the past year.