The Lion in Russia

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Pussycat Death Squad The Lion in Russia

Smashwords Edition Copyright December 2012
Roslyn Hardy Holcomb

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Holcomb.

Cover Artist: Whit Holcomb

This e-book is a work of fiction. Though it
might refer to historical events and actual places might be
mentioned, the names, characters, places and incidents are either
made up by the author or used in a fictitious manner. Any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business
establishments, or locales is completely coincidental.

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The character, Cesaré Shahidi is used with
permission from Lisa G. Riley.

Chapter One

The White Stripes, “Seven Nation Army”
pounded through the massive speakers. Vries could feel the famous
guitar riff thrumming through her chest as though the bassist was
picking out the rhythm on her ribcage. She moved with the beat of
the music shaking her hips, feeling the silken
swish
of her
vintage Pucci maxi skirt against her legs with each step she took
in the platform heels. She made a striking figure and she knew it.
It was her job to always stand out in a crowd, to draw attention
wherever she went. A role that oddly enough lent itself even more
to her more lethal vocation.

The spotlight did a great job of concealing
that which she didn’t want seen. The standing-room-only crowd
parted for her as it did only for major stars. And Vries had been a
star for more than twenty years. A nod here and a smile of
acknowledgment there. Even brief kisses in greeting were not enough
to dissuade her from her goal. She spotted her target almost by
accident. The tall man with the thick mane of graying hair would
probably blend in almost unnoticed were she not deliberately
looking for him. Years of experience had given her almost a sixth
sense for these things.

She made her way across the large room until
she was standing nearly directly behind him. Smoothing her damp
palms over her skirt she continued moving to the beat. This was
always the worst part of any assignment, the moments right before
the strike when she had time to question herself and her technique.
Aside for his name and photograph she had no idea who this man was.
She preferred it that way, it left her with fewer doubts. She
trusted her handlers to only give her targets that needed killing.
Still she wondered about the morality of what she was about to do.
Of course, there was little room for that kind of thought in this
world of
realpolitik
. Eliminating the bad guys by legal
means was both time-consuming and messy. Thousands could die and
billions of dollars be wasted trying to eliminate one bad man. This
method was more efficient and saved lives and money. And she knew
that afterwards, the doubts would go away, and she would feel
nothing but pride in a job done well.

After a few seconds she reached up to remove
her signature platinum afro pick from her mammoth Afro. She
automatically checked the safety lock on the mechanism and glanced
down briefly to ensure she’d filled it properly. Then she sidled up
behind the man. It only took a moment for her to jab the pick into
the back of his hip with a smooth, practiced motion. The man
reacted quickly to what she knew to be a sharp, but momentary
prick. She smiled apologetically; the music was much too loud to
allow conversation, so she gestured toward her oversized designer
bag as the culprit. He waved it off as inconsequential, not knowing
as she did that he was a walking dead man.

The slow-acting poison would take nearly a
week to kill him, but kill him it would. Its effect would mimic
that of a heart attack. He probably would never remember their
meeting at this Paris fashion show, and if he did, no one would
ever connect his death to such a brief encounter. Continuing on her
way she returned the Afro pick to its customary place in her hair
and made her way backstage. She was due to strut down the catwalk
in less than ten minutes. Vries St. John was on.

***

Vries slumped down in one of the comfortably
padded chairs in her boss’s office. Lelia Assad McBride generally
worked out of her home. Vries assumed it was part of keeping her
clandestine operations secret. Lelia’s husband, Patrick McBride had
some type of hush-hush job at the Pentagon. On paper at least Lelia
was a stay at home wife and mother. Vries, of course, knew
differently. She stretched out her legs, encased in white patent
leather go-go boots across the arm of the chair. The soft dove gray
and eggshell white used in the room was very restive, and the chair
she reclined in was covered in plush charcoal gray chenille. Too
cozy for words. Jet lag was really doing a number of her and she
dozed lightly as she waited for Lelia to show up for their
appointment. Just as she drifted into deeper slumber Lelia came
into the room. Vries came awake and immediately sat up in the
chair. Even dressed casually in a cerulean blue silk blouse and
well-tailored charcoal gray wide legged trousers Lelia McBride
commanded immediate respect. She moved like a soldier, but with a
feminine grace that Vries wondered at.

“Hello Vries,” she said in softly accented
English as she took a seat behind her elegant ivory and glass desk.
“So sorry for the delay, but I had to drop the boys off at school
myself this morning.”

Vries nodded and stifled a yawn. “That’s
okay, I was just wondering why this meeting had to occur
face-to-face. Usually we make do with emails and couriers.”

“This assignment is too top secret for our
usual communication methods.”

Vries raised her brows, but didn’t speak,
though she wondered what type of assignment could be even more
secretive than the ones she’d been doing for this woman for half a
decade.

Lelia placed a folder on her desk in front of
Vries. “This is your new target. It’s a departure from your usual
type assignment.”

Vries took the folder and opened it slowly.
She wondered if the gray color was chosen to match the décor.
Knowing Lelia it probably was. As she stared down at the photo she
felt as though an icy hand had suddenly clutched her heart.
Breathing was almost more than she could do and she thought for a
moment she would faint for the first time in her life. After taking
some deep steadying breaths she raised her gaze back up to meet
Lelia’s. “You’ve got to be kidding? I can’t do this.”

“So you do recognize Lyov Azhikelyamov. Or
the Anglicized, Leo Azhikelyamov. I had wondered. Rumor has it that
you are lovers. I pay little attention to tabloids, but to hear
them tell it you are a daughter of Satan.”

Vries looked back down at the photograph.
Leo’s phenomenal good looks came through even in the
one-dimensional picture. His translucent gray eyes were punctuated
by the sharp slash of his high cheekbones. His lashes and brows
were a bit darker, giving character to his face and making his eyes
really stand out. His thick ash blonde hair swept across a high
forehead, the silver strands she knew to be there looking more like
artful highlights than indicative of him aging well into his
forties. She doubted that the billionaire ever bothered to have it
done.

“No, he’s not my lover, but I do know him.
After all, I just signed another contract with his company. Or
rather, his ex-wife’s company. I should think it would be bad form
to sleep with my boss’s ex-husband. Pasha is Russian, but I doubt
she’s
that
Russian.”

Lelia leaned back in her chair, her perfectly
arched brows raised in inquiry. “So you’ll continue to be La Luz de
un Girasol? Last time we talked you said they thought you’d gotten
too old.”

Vries shrugged. At thirty-five she was
considered washed up by many in the modeling industry, but
fortunately for her she was as popular on the runway as she’d been
when she first started at the tender age of fifteen. Print work
wasn’t as plentiful and she had planned to retire after New York’s
Fashion Week in the spring. She’d only stayed this long to provide
a cover for her clandestine work. The renewal of her contract with
the House of Girasol came as much of a surprise to her as anyone
else. She still thought the title of “The Light of the Sunflower”
rather ridiculous, but it paid well and who was she to quibble?

“I have no idea. Pasha Azhikelyamova
negotiated the deal herself. I guess they changed their mind
again.” She made a dismissive gesture even though she was still
troubled by the mystery, but obviously the current puzzle was more
pressing. “Why on earth would you expect me to kill him? He’s a
businessman, no way he needs killing,” Vries said. “No way in hell
will I do it,” she said with a firm shake of her head.

“No. No. I’m sorry I wasn’t clear Vries. We
don’t want him eliminated. You will be guarding him from those who
do,” Lelia said.

That was even more shocking. “Guarding him?
Why on earth would he need guarding, especially by us?”

“It’s rather complicated. Usually you don’t
want to know the details, but I think in this particular case you
won’t be able to do your job without them. Do I have your
permission to tell you the whole story?”

Vries nodded, still looking at the photo.

“Azhikelyamov has managed to run afoul of the
president of his country.”

The icy hand squeezed harder. “Putilin?”

“Yes.”

“What on earth did he do to cross that
homicidal--” she bit off the word “sonofabitch” as Lelia didn’t
approve of profanity, “Man?”

“Azhikelyamov hasn’t done anything, at least
not yet. He is set to testify at a trial exposing corruption and
complicity within the Russian government and some of the craziness
that went on with the oligarchs back in the nineties.”

“Why in the hell would he want to do such a
thing?” Vries asked, forgetting Lelia’s proscription against
cussing. “If they’re allowing a trial, they’re probably only doing
it to bring out their enemies so they can be sent to prison.”

Lelia nodded, her eyes sad as she paused for
a long moment. Vries remembered too late that Lelia had personal
experience with just such a conspiracy. “Right. The U.S. State
Department apparently feels the same way. Except there’s some
indication that Putilin is actually against the trial, though he’s
not saying so publicly. According to them, he was maneuvered by the
parliament in some kind of way to let them go forward.”

“Somebody out-maneuvered Plutonium Putilin?”
Vries asked, using the nickname the president had earned after
several of his enemies wound up dead from the potent, and easily
traced, poison.

Lelia leaned forward with her elbows on the
desk. “Apparently they’ve concluded that he can’t poison them
all.”

“Wanna bet?” Vries said with a derisive
snort. “I don’t put anything past that man. He is positively
reptilian. He gives me the creeps.”

“You know him?” Lelia asked with an arch of a
well-manicured brow.

“I’ve run into him a time or two. He’s
married, but has a thing for young models. I’m too old for his
taste apparently, but he’s always at the Paris shows,” Vries said.
“Trust me he needs no excuse to kill. And doesn’t care who knows
it.” She looked back up at Lelia. “That still doesn’t explain why
Leo would take such a huge risk. He’s been around for a while,
surely he knows better.”

“I was going to ask you that. It’s one of the
reasons I chose you for the assignment.”

Vries frowned. “I told you, I’m not sleeping
with him. Sure, he’s tried, and I’m not unwilling, but we’ve never
managed to wind up on the same continent long enough for it to go
any further than that. He travels more than I do. According to
Pasha, he’s got business interests all over the world, even though
most of his money is in Russian oil and gas. Besides, I really
don’t know what his ex-wife would think of it. By all accounts
they’ve remained good friends. After all, he bought Girasol for
her, and couture houses don’t come cheap, even when they’re in
trouble the way Girasol was. Still it’s best not to sh... uh
defecate where you eat.” She quickly amended the phrase.