The Thieves of Faith (44 page)

But the door
pinged
again. They both popped up out of their seats, in perfect formation, only to be greeted by an empty elevator cab again. This time they exchanged glances before watching the doors close, the elevator’s hum dying off as it rose away.

They both took their seats again only to be warned yet anew by the elevator chime. This time they reluctantly stood as the empty elevator opened once again. They both smiled as the doors closed. But now, Dmitri did not sit. He left his comrade and walked to the malfunctioning elevator to await its inevitable arrival. And like clockwork the elevator chimed once more.

As the doors opened, Dmitri looked at the single wooden chair in the middle of the cab and it occurred to him that the chair before him looked far more comfortable than the metal one he had been occupying for the last eight hours. He slung his rifle over his shoulder, stepped in the cab, and grabbed the chair.

Dmitri never saw the prisoner, Michael St. Something, tucked in the corner, waiting to pounce. The wire noose slipped over his blond, buzz-cut head and was drawn tight around his neck, but instead of instinctively grabbing at his throat, Dmitri lashed out at his assailant. His punches sent Michael crumbling back against the elevator wall. Michael threw three punches in quick succession but they barely fazed the soldier. Dmitri didn’t bother with his gun as he looked at Michael; he knew it would be only moments before he beat him into submission. He smashed his fist into Michael’s head, sending him tumbling to the floor where he writhed, his legs flailing about.

Dmitri felt a slight tug at the noose around his neck as Michael kicked the wooden chair out of the elevator. He paid Michael’s action no mind as the elevator doors closed and the cab began to rise. He grabbed Michael by the neck, hoping his stale cabbage breath assaulted the American’s senses. He drew back his hand, ready to deliver his final blow. He shifted his weight back, preparing to concentrate his two hundred and forty pounds into the end of his fist, when he was violently jerked backward. The wire noose about his neck grew suddenly taut, cutting off his air.

And then it all came together. The wire was tied to the chair that the American had kicked from the cab and, as the elevator rose, it became a deadly anchor. The force of the rising elevator pinned him down and he knew it would be his last thought as the wire grew tighter, digging into his skin. Suddenly it yanked him to the floor of the cab. Dmitri began to struggle and scream, but the elevator paid him no mind as it rose higher. He was violently wrenched neck-first against the elevator doors as the elevator cab continued up, his face gone to crimson. And the wire dug in, deeper and deeper, cutting into his skin; he frantically clawed at the noose but it was useless. The elevator began to whine against the impediment; stuck, its motor began to smoke, but the machine prevailed. With a violent, loud snap the wire tore through Dmitri’s neck, through his spine, severing his head from his body in a grotesque pop.

Michael looked down at the mayhem: the body and the head lay in a giant puddle of gore. Blood continued to pump from the neck as the body reflexively twitched. He quickly picked up the guard’s rifle from the growing pool of blood, chambered a round, and pushed the button of the lowermost floor again. He held the gun high, his finger on the trigger. There was no question in his mind where the other guard would be standing, having witnessed the beginning of Michael’s fight with his partner, not to mention the curious chair that was attached to a wire.

As the elevator doors parted, Michael’s suspicions were correct. Pelio never knew the fate of his partner as the bullet exploded out of the back of his head.

Michael wedged the chair in the elevator track, freezing the door in place. He threw both bodies and the detached head into a vacant cell, forcing down the bile that ran up in his throat—he would never be comfortable with killing. He stripped them of their pistols and rifles, radios and keys, and closed the door. He returned to the elevator, pulled out the bloodied floor rug, and used the vodka and the guards’ shirts to wipe the human mess from the elevator cab walls.

Michael rode the elevator up two floors and headed back to the security monitor room. He checked the monitors but saw no sign of the Suburbans.

He inventoried his supplies. Two loaded pistols, two extra clips, two rifles. A ring of keys—besides the elevator key, who knew what worlds they unlocked. Two virtually useless radios as he had no idea of the language. Two knives, his weapons of choice as their use went far beyond a weapon. The electrical wire, six Kremlin tourist maps, and some paper. Michael stored the two rifles in a cabinet, righted the chair, and sat in it. He tucked one of the pistols in his waistband, covering it with his shirt. He took the other and sat on it. He cuffed the chair arms then took a roll of tape and wrapped it several times around the teeth of the cuffs. He tested them, ensuring they slid in and out of their counterparts without catching.

He would wait for Raechen’s return with Susan, but this time he would meet him on his own terms.

Chapter 47

S
usan got off the elevator at Le Royal Meridien
National and raced down the hall to her suite, her still-damp hair pulled back into a ponytail. She entered the living room and poured herself a drink from the bar. She was concerned for Michael. He had yet to call to let her know what was going on. All she knew was that Genevieve was gone, whisked away before Busch and Nikolai could get her out of the Kremlin. She prayed Michael was all right and thought—with his background—he somehow would be.

She removed the box from her bag and placed it on the coffee table. It had no equal. Its gold radiated throughout the room, reflecting and accentuating the morning sunlight that poured into the hotel suite. And as she admired it, she realized that this was the price to be paid for Stephen’s safe return. He had been there for her like a father, all the while dealing with his own loss stoically, on his own. He never let her down and she wasn’t about to allow him to die. She would protect this box and never let it go until Stephen was safely returned.

Susan walked back to the suite entrance, double-bolted the door, picked up the box, and headed into the bathroom. She turned on the shower, laid the box on the counter, and covered it with a towel. She stripped off her clothes and stood there naked, waiting for the shower to heat up. She looked at her body in the mirror, at the bruises and scrapes that now marred her once-perfect flesh. Not that she ever thought of herself as perfect, it’s just she had never been beaten so badly. Even when she was a tomboy, fighting on the Central Park playground, she was usually the one
causing
the bleeding, rarely the recipient of injury. She turned and looked at her back. It had taken the brunt of the force when she was sucked down the drain tube and slammed into the pile of bodies and bones that lay upon the grate. She tore off the bandage, and ran her fingers along the jagged stitches on her shoulder, wincing at the pain. Though she feigned strength when Michael stitched her up—he had an excellent bedside manner—the action was excruciating.

And she finally realized she hurt, from head to toe, and knew that it would be worse the next morning. She stepped into the shower and let the hot water run through her black hair and down her shoulders. It was a mixed blessing; it eased her sore muscles yet stung the open scrapes, wounds, and particularly the stitches.

She lathered up and pondered the last several days. She had never met a man like Michael. He was so contrary to everything she ever looked for in a man. And was such a contradiction to his half-brother. Though they had never met, she sensed Michael and Peter would have bonded. They were both good men, they just had a different approach to life.

And she thought again of Michael’s kiss. Of his lips upon hers. They were tender and caring. She had not felt a warmth like that through her body since before Peter died. Her preconceived notions of Michael were all wrong: he was not selfish; in fact, he was anything but.

She stepped out of the shower and wrapped herself in a large towel. She uncovered the gold box and looked at it again. It was one of the most beautiful pieces of art she had ever seen. The detail was almost lifelike: animals running about, birds floating through the air. The sun in the top left corner truly glowed. Yet, that this simple object would be exchanged for Stephen riled her. How could anything be worth more than a human life? She failed to understand how anyone could not hold life as the most precious of gifts.

There are pivotal moments in life that everyone experiences, a crossroads, an epiphany, a point where we evaluate and reassess our goals. As Susan looked at the box, she realized that the things that were important to her no longer held the same weight. She had been chasing a career without regard to where it was taking her. It wasn’t that she would leave her job, it simply meant it would no longer be the center of her existence. It had become the fortress around her heart, a place where she could bury her feelings without facing them. Where eighteen-hour days kept her in a false reality, one where she didn’t have to deal with the rest of her life. A place to hide away from the risk of opening her heart to someone else. She had worn her anger at losing her husband on her sleeve, lashing out at anyone who challenged her, her tomboy ways rising up from her youth. It saddened her that only an extreme circumstance could bring her back, make her see clearly.

She had spent the last year thinking of herself and her loss. Peter was gone. She had to move on with her life. Life was about living and now she found in Michael someone else she could care about. It did not mean that she was leaving Peter or loved him less. It was just time to end her mourning.

She dried herself off and dressed in a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt. She loved knockabout clothes, an indulgence she rarely allowed herself. It was always suits and dresses, skirts and blouses constricting her movement, her life, and her comfort.

She sat on the bed and held the box in her hand.

Michael’s warning was clear; it still rang in her ears: “Do not open the box.” She looked at it and pondered its contents. She knew that though the golden treasure was worth a fortune—if not priceless—its contents must really be the object of Julian Zivera’s desire. A desire worth a man’s life. And the more she thought on it, she imagined Zivera would kill however many were needed to fulfill his desires.

And all the while the temptation hung in the air. It was like Michael had baited her with his simple demand. What of such value could be contained in a cigar-box-sized container? What secrets did it hold that Michael didn’t want her to see? What didn’t he want her to know but was willing to consider giving to someone as dangerous as Zivera? What secret was worth a man’s life?

She looked at the lock. It was simply a slotted hole. She reached into her travel bag and withdrew a nail file. She inserted it in the keyhole. It fit perfectly. She could feel it pressing against the simple cylinder. And she thought better of it.

She laid the file on the bed.

Michael had asked her—no—he told her not to open the box.

But the why and the what gnawed at her brain. Like an incessant ring, it called to her. What secret had set everything in motion, had set her and Michael on this quest? What secret had been hidden away for five hundred years? A secret that Ivan the Terrible, one of history’s most evil men, thought too dangerous for the world.

She looked at the lock and wondered if the excitement she was feeling was why Michael did what he did. Venturing where you shouldn’t, opening locks to hidden riches.

All logic seemed to slip from her mind. All of her education ignored. Warnings to be heeded were disregarded. It was the temptation, the allure of the unknown, it was the forbidden knowledge we are exempt from as children.

And then logic took over. She had the power to resist; she was a grown adult with the ability to tame her curiosity.

She continued to look at the box, crafted thousands of years ago. It had been held by kings and queens and tsars before it was lost to history for five hundred years. She picked it up, holding it, turning it about in her hands, admiring its perfection, its beauty. Amazed at the craftsmanship from an era before modern tools, before machinery.

And in that same way that we convince ourselves that it’s all right to drive above the speed limit when we are late, that it’s OK to eat that one piece of cheesecake, to call in sick on a perfect beach day, Susan made a decision. The consequences are always minimized until they are realized, but it is a lesson that is seldom learned. It is why people continue to get speeding tickets, gain weight while on a diet, or get caught with a tan after being out with the flu.

She inserted the file in the keyhole and turned. There was a subtle resistance but after an instant the simple lock gave way with a small click. She looked at the box. No one would ever know. Against all logic, in a momentary lapse of reason, she slowly opened the top. The reflected light on the lid slid down the wall as the cover lifted up.