Body Checked (Center Ice Book 1) (10 page)

“Okay, you can stop there.” I hold up my hand.

“I appreciate the effort, but this doesn’t confirm anything about whether Sergei and Vladimir have actually been in contact, while our surveillance is giving us reason to believe they have. The contracts you photographed also lead us to believe they have. No offense, Miss Pereira, but he’s probably not going to give you the details straight. He has no incentive to, especially when you so freely provide him with . . .” She clears her throat. “What he wants.”

I wish I could slap that look off her face. If only it wasn’t a federal offense. “But the contracts
did
help,” I say.

“Some. Both of the men listed on them are in our database of potential members of organized crime groups, and they have a criminal history, but we still don’t have anything solid connecting them to Vladimir Drakonov or the Bratva.” She shuffles through the papers. “The photographs you took were a good start. But it’s simply not enough.”

Not enough. I have a sinking feeling what might be coming next.

“We need you to take more risks. Reach further to see what you can dig up. Establish yourself as a confidant for Sergei, and not just a—a lover.” The word sounds so foreign in her mouth, she might as well be speaking Coptic. “We need something that can give us probable cause to search the Eagles plane, or pull a warrant on Sergei’s financial dealings. A warrant for a wiretap on his phone, even—that’d be the best of all. Push harder.”

Push harder. I try not to laugh. I get no complaints from Sergei in that department.

“I’ll try, but . . . this already feels too risky as it is. The Bratva’s dangerous, right? Sooner or later, they’re going to catch on. I—I already feel like I’m being watched.” I swallow. “Tailed, even.”

Frederica laughs to herself. “Oh, Miss Pereira. You didn’t think that we might be conducting surveillance on you?” She takes a sip of her usual murderous coffee-like concoction, gaze never leaving mine. “It’s standard procedure. As our confidential informant, you agreed to all such precautions. Any time you’re with Sergei Drakonov, we’ve got eyes and ears nearby. To keep you safe, of course.”

Right. I’m so certain it’s for
my
safety. It makes me feel a little better to know the cars I thought were tailing me might very well have been FBI surveillance teams. But it also makes me angry. I’m irritated that I have to have them mixed up in my personal life like this—so closely bound to my relationship with Sergei. And I’m flat-out pissed off that the only time the FBI—
my employer
, I might add—has shown any interest in me is when I’ve managed to turn CI for them.

My thoughts turn over Todd’s pitch to me at school the other day, and for the first time, I allow myself to seriously consider a career beyond the one I always thought I’d have, fighting crime, kicking ass, taking names. And why shouldn’t I? It’s not like they’re exactly letting me do any of those three things for them. Or when they do, they don’t trust me to do it the way I think it should be done.

“Get us something we can use to get a warrant,” Frederica says. “Or you’re going to start playing this our way. Understood, Miss Pereira?”

I grit my teeth as I stand up. “Perfectly.”

It’s only as I’m leaving the hideous FBI headquarters for the day, hands curled tight into fists, that I realize something. She said the FBI was always watching when I was with Sergei. That it was standard.

But some of the times I thought I was being followed, Sergei wasn’t around.

As soon as I’m done with the FBI for the morning, I head to the gym and wallop the shit out of the punching bags and kick stands. I don’t follow any particular style, even though everyone at the gym assumes I’m all into Brazilian jiu jitsu or capoeira or some shit. I mix in a little bit of everything. Krav Maga, when I can find a partner for it; more frequently, it’s aikido or kickboxing or anything I can practice more or less on my own. Better not to depend on others. Besides, I don’t want to be too in the habit of pulling my punches if I ever really need to defend myself.

Monique, Beth, and I spend a late night at Monique’s penthouse reviewing vocab lists and idioms for our upcoming Literary Translation midterm after another Eagles game (which they win, four to one). Between late nights and physical exertion with Sergei, my extra gym time lately, and stress, I’m exhausted. My thoughts are all coiled tight with nerves, and I can’t seem to uncoil them, no matter what I do. Even Monique’s stories of her parents chewing out Todd Beckwith for screwing up their flight reservations can’t cheer me up. Sergei’s massive grin on TV when he scores, raising both hands in the air, tossing his helmet high, gives me a temporary jolt of elation. But it’s gone as quick as it came.

“You want me to walk you to the Metro?” Monique asks, as I pack up my study notes. Which is a joke—the Green and Yellow line entrance is right outside her complex’s door.

“Just watch me from that sweet-ass balcony of yours,” I tell her. “I’ll give you a little wave.”

I shuffle across the Navy Memorial, reach the Metro escalator, and glance toward the top of Monique’s building. Sure enough, she’s standing on her terrace in her pajamas, one hand raised in acknowledgement. I salute her in return, then head down into the station. Please, oh, please don’t let me have missed the last train.

Fortunately, there’s a Yellow line train in just two minutes. I take it one station down and change to a Blue train to head toward Capitol Hill. I board the last car of the Blue train because it’s completely empty and sink into the closest seat with a sigh of relief. I pull out my phone, swap to the Russian keyboard, and send Sergei a quick congratulations on the win.

The train stops, and three men fitting various descriptions of “burly” get on. I shove my phone back in my purse and fold my arms over my chest, not making eye contact, trying to watch them via their reflections in the train car glass. All three of them are white with ruddy complexions, wearing black leather jackets; two have sunglasses on, and the third is smoking an e-cigarette. A matching tattoo like rays of sunlight peeks out of the collars of the back of their necks.

“
Privyet,
Jael,” the widest and tallest of them says, and positions himself directly in front of me.

I spring to my feet and dive for the Emergency call box right by the doors, but the other two have moved to pin me in. Vape grins wide at me, each of his teeth either blackened and stained or covered in gold plating. Fuck. They reek of nicotine and mildew, and no small amount of cheap vodka, either. I run through my mental catalogue of martial arts styles, but there isn’t much a single girl of average height can do against
three
guys this size, no matter how skilled she is.

Big & Tall pushes his glasses up to the top of his bristly short hair, revealing a crooked nose and bloodshot eyes. “
Dumayu, shto u nas vznaimnoye znakomstvo.
”

I furrow my brows and squint at him, pretending I don’t understand Russian.

Big & Tall sighs, and turns toward the other two. In Russian, he tells them, “I told him she wouldn’t understand. That Seryozha doesn’t tell her about any of this.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Vape tells him. “Whether she knows about the shipment or not, she can still warn him.”

Shipment?
I think. Sergei—
Seryozha
would be his nickname in Russian—certainly hasn’t told me about that. He’s right. But the more I can get them to say . . .

The third guy, with what looks like acid burns mottling his right cheek, clears his throat. In thickly accented English, he tells me, “We are not to be hurting you. Only want . . . message. You give to friend Sergei.”

Vape nudges Burns. “Tell her not to talk about the shipment.”

“She doesn’t know about the shipment,” Big & Tall retorts. “Shut your
blyad
whore face.”

Burns toys with a signet ring on his left hand. “Give Sergei words about his agreement,” he tells me in English. “With our friend. He will know who is this friend.”

“I don’t know anything about an agreement. A friend,” I say.

Burns chuckles to himself. “Is not good when brothers, they make the fighting. They should stick together.” He leans closer, his leather jacket billowing open, so that I can’t mistake the gun nestled against his torso. “Thick as blood.”

My pulse is thundering in my ears. I barely feel the movement of the train. There is nothing but these goons’ hot stench and their sneering faces, not touching me, yet still painfully close to me.

The train pulls into the next station, and they back away from me. “You see?” Burns says, walking backward as they exit. “We did not hurt you.”

The train doors close, and they’re gone.

But the real message they wanted to send to Sergei and me is perfectly clear.

They didn’t hurt me this time. But if they wanted to, they could.

Instead of going in to work the next Friday, I call Frederica, using the main house line from the rowhouse whose basement I’m renting instead of my own cell phone.

Call me paranoid. I think I’ve earned the right.

She’s not nearly as concerned by the appearance of Vladimir’s goons as I’m hoping. In fact, she thinks I should use their threats as an excuse to push Sergei to tell me the truth. Deliver their message, choke up in tears, beg him to tell me what’s going on. “Act like you’re shaken,” she says.

I
am
fucking shaken. And afraid to leave my basement. I move a cardboard box of old textbooks in front of the sole window that peers out onto the feet of everyone who walks by.

“Does this mean I’ll be getting more surveillance from the Bureau?” I ask. “Maybe some physical protection?”

Frederica just laughs. “What? Don’t be silly. That would look suspicious. In fact . . . I think we’ll scale back your current surveillance.”

Wonderful. I start digging around for my old keychain of pepper spray, and pray it still works.

“We’ll put you on telework leave until this is over, of course,” Frederica continues. “I mean, if they’re watching you, the last thing we need is for you to be seen going in and out of our headquarters.”

Another shrill laugh. I thank her as quickly as I can, and hang up.

I head to the gym, hoodie pulled tight around my head and baggy sweats concealing my movement, and work through my moves until I’m too sore and exhausted to be scared any longer. I imagine all the punching bags bearing the various Bratva goons’ faces—and Frederica’s face a few times, too, for good measure. Only a few more hours until Sergei is back in DC. Whether it’s due to Frederica’s coaching or not, he and I need to have some serious words about Vladimir Drakonov.

Sergei greets me at his townhouse in a sexy, muscle-baring black tank and track pants. “Are you going for the Gopnik style?” I tease him, with a poke to the ribs. Gopniks are the Russian dudes who run around in track pants, gold chains, and permanent sneers—kind of like Jersey mafia style, but with a lot more vodka.

“I think I’m missing about twenty miles of gold chains for that,” Sergei says. He lets me inside and presses his palm to the small of my back. “You look incredible.”