Freak (10 page)

“Not possible,” he said, even as he saw the truth of the statement. His heart raced and he fought to control his emotions. Rosenberg and Frenz were watching, after all. He couldn't afford to lose it now.

“I know you always saw a resemblance. I know
that's why you were attracted to me. It's one of the reasons I was assigned to your case,” Natasha continued in the same unaffected monotone.

It's one of the reasons I was assigned to your case. . . .
This had to be wrong. This had to be a sick joke. How could anyone do this to another person—send his dead wife's cousin to seduce him—to exploit that weakness in his heart?

“Tatiana and I were sent to America to watch you. To keep an eye on you and see if you suspected what was going on within the Organization.”

“The Organization,” Tom repeated, adopting the same flat tone Natasha was using. If he didn't he was sure his myriad of emotions would show through, and he couldn't have that.

“You're not going to like this, Tom,” Natasha said.

Tom narrowed his eyes at her. She was on the verge of telling him something. Something big. And from the triumphant look on her face, she was going to enjoy it.

“Okay, I'll bite,” Tom said. “Who sent you? Who's running the Organization?”

Natasha lowered her chin and looked up at him through her lashes, her eyes gleaming. Time seemed to stop, but it hadn't. The only sound in the room was the ticking of Tom's watch.

“It is Yuri. My uncle. Katia's father. It was Yuri who sent us.”

At that moment, Tom was glad to be sitting. His
every nerve and cell felt sick. Yuri Petrova could not be alive. Katia's evil psycho of a father could not be alive.

“Try again, Natasha,” Tom told her, clear as a bell even as his hands shook under the table. “Yuri is six feet under and has been for years. We both know it.”

“There have been many changes,” Natasha continued as if Tom hadn't spoken at all. “Yuri is growing old and he needed a successor. Tatiana was being groomed to take over the Organization. But Yuri needed to be sure that you and Gaia would not get in the way. He needed to be sure that—”

Tom laughed. He couldn't help it. It was the only release he could allow himself. It burbled up through his chest and throat and pressed at his lips until he just couldn't hold it in any longer. Natasha stopped talking and stared at him.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” Tom said mirthfully. He pressed the top of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, then folded his hands on the table, his eyes still dancing. “It's just, I thought you were going to tell me the truth here tonight.”

This couldn't be the truth. He refused to accept that.

“And I am,” Natasha said blankly.

“You expect me to believe this?” Tom asked, standing abruptly, his chair scraping back across the concrete floor. He hovered over her, suddenly hyperaware of the eyes on him from the other side of the glass, hyperaware of the hammering of his own heart. “Natasha,” he
said, pressing his fingertips into the metal table and leaning over her. “Yuri has been dead for years.”

Natasha leaned forward, the single light hanging above them casting distorted shadows across her face. She gazed up at him through her lashes, a coy smile playing on her lips. Whatever she was about to say, whatever bomb she was about to drop, she was enjoying it to the fullest.

“Yuri Petrova is very much alive, Tom,” Natasha said firmly.

Tom swallowed. “I don't believe you.”

“Well, you had better start,” Natasha told him, cool and calm. “He is alive. And he is here.”

“Here?” he repeated, searching her eyes. His body started to believe her before his brain did. The hairs on his arms stood on end and a chill shot through to his core. Natasha had lied to him before and he'd believed her, but this time she was telling the truth—the impossible, horrifying truth.

“He is in the U.S., Tom,” Natasha told him, her smile widening at his obvious discomfort. “Yuri is here.”

Spooked

“OKAY, WHO IS THIS GUY AGAIN?”
Jake asked as he and Gaia climbed the stairs in Dmitri's building two at a time. They'd given up on the
elevator after only two and a half minutes of waiting. Gaia and patience had parted ways hours ago.

“He's the one who helped me put Natasha in jail,” Gaia told him, controlling her breathing as best she could. “And he wouldn't leave without telling me.” Why would he tell her he'd always be there for her and then bolt the next minute without even a phone call? It wasn't like him.

“But that Sam guy said—”

“I know what he said,” Gaia snapped, emerging onto Dmitri's floor. “And either he's wrong, or something's happened.”

“Like what?” Jake asked, holding his side as he gasped for air. He was in great shape, but Gaia would bet it had been a long time since he'd taken fifteen flights of stairs at a sprint.

“I don't know! Maybe he was kidnapped! Maybe by the same people who took my father!” Gaia whispered hoarsely, growing frustrated. “That's what we're here to find out.”

Gaia paused in front of Dmitri's door, took a deep breath, and knocked. There was no movement inside the apartment, no sound at all except the sound of Jake's rapid breathing behind her. She tried the knob—locked. Jake stepped aside as Gaia moved back, lifted her leg, and kicked in the door.

“Jesus!” Jake said as the locks ripped free from the wall. “Are you
trying
to get the neighbors to call the cops?”

Gaia couldn't even reply to his sarcasm. She was staring at what was left of Dmitri's apartment. This couldn't have been the same room she'd sat in just a few hours ago.

Drawers hung open, papers were strewn everywhere, a plant in the corner was overturned, a trail of clothing cut across the living room. The place was a total wreck.

“Something's not right,” Gaia said flatly.

“Yeah, no kidding,” Jake replied.

“Sam didn't say the place was trashed,” Gaia told him, taking a couple of steps into the apartment. “He said Dmitri left a note. Somebody must have done this after Sam left.”

“Like who?” Jake asked quietly.

“I don't know,” Gaia said. “Someone's after him.”

Then she heard a creak from a floorboard and before she could turn around, she and Jake were grabbed from behind.

You
know what I need? I need to get out of here. I don't mean out of this bar or my school or my apartment. I need to get the hell out of this city. I need a college in a different state. Maybe a different country. I need to get as far away from here as possible, because one thing has become crystal clear to me: I am never going to fall out of love with Gaia as long as I have to see her every damn day. And as long as I'm still in love with her, no other girl has a shot. And as long as no other girl has a shot, I've got no shot.

No shot at love.

No shot at a functional relationship of any kind.

No shot of getting any play of any kind on any level.

Don't get me wrong. Sex isn't the only thing I think about. But I am a guy. A teenage guy. So it does occupy approximately
eighty percent of my conscious thoughts. Maybe ninety. And when Gaia's in the room, it's more like ninety-nine.

When I'm with Kai, I can't kiss her without thinking about Gaia. And when Gaia's in my line of vision when I'm with Kai, I can't even focus on what the girl is saying. I hate to admit this, believe me. Kai deserves better. She's an awesome girl and I wish I could be the boyfriend she deserves—for me
and
for her. But when it comes to girls of the non-Gaia variety I am shit outta luck, as they say.

So maybe if I go away—maybe if I go to St. Louis or Seattle or San Francisco, Paris or Madrid or Minsk. Maybe if I don't have to see her every day I'll finally get her out of my system. I'll finally be able to focus my abundant sexual energy on someone new. “Out of sight, out of mind,” right?

Or . . . wait . . . is it
“absence makes the heart grow fonder”?

Damn.

Why couldn't the proverb people just come up with one opinion and run with it?

“Why is Yuri here?” Tom asked. “He wants Gaia,” Natasha replied.

Credible Threat

“SHE HAS TO BE LYING!” TOM
asserted, his teeth clenched. “Yuri is dead. We know this.”

Agents Rosenberg and Frenz watched Tom as he paced back and forth across the longer wall of the debriefing room. Director Vance stood in the corner, an intimidating presence, his arms crossed over his chest and his jowls working. No one present wanted Natasha's statement to be true. In his heyday, Yuri was considered to be a credible threat to the U.S. government. A serious danger to national security. He was on the international most wanted list. He was known for his ruthless tactics, his penchant for physical and emotional torture, his sadistic nature.

He was not a pleasant person to deal with.

“Agent Moore, I don't want to believe her any more than you do,” Agent Rosenberg said, gripping her notebook. “But you and I both know she's exhibiting none of the signs of distress associated with lying. She hasn't blinked, she hasn't touched her face, she hasn't cleared her throat. We've been monitoring her body temperature with censors and—”

“I know, I know, it hasn't changed,” Tom interrupted.

“And neither has her heart rate,” Rosenberg finished, glancing down at her notes.

“Of course, we can't say the same for you, can we?” Agent Frenz asked stoically.

“Why don't you just say what you mean?” Tom demanded, feeling the truth of Frenz's insinuation. He was heating up even as he stood there.

“You almost lost your cool in there,” Frenz pointed out. “Again.”

“The woman just told me that my wife's psychotic, criminal mastermind father was still alive and that he had ordered surveillance on myself and my daughter. I think you can cut me the slightest bit of slack,” Tom said, stepping up to Frenz. He was so close to the man he could see his already sizable nostrils flaring.

“Sir, I respectfully suggest that we remove Agent Moore from this case once and for all,” Frenz said, taking a step back and looking at Director Vance. “I think we've given him enough chances to prove himself.”

All eyes turned to Vance as he took a deep breath and rubbed his sizable hand over his face in frustration. Tom's throat was dry, but he forced himself to speak.

“I'm going back in there, sir,” he said. “I have to finish this.”

Vance inhaled again, drawing himself up to his full height. “Go,” he said. “But tread lightly, Moore. You've been warned.”

As Tom exited the room headed for the interrogation block, Frenz eyed him skeptically. Tom could have punched the little weasel.

Who the hell did he think he was, suggesting Tom step down? His rank was so far beneath Tom's, he couldn't even remember what it was like to be in Agent Frenz's position. When this debacle was over, the first thing Tom was going to do was file an inquiry into Frenz's assignment to this case. It was insulting.

Tom strode into the interrogation room and found Natasha exactly where he'd left her, sitting straight-backed at the table, waiting patiently. He sat down across from her and got down to business. He was sick of messing around.

“Why is Yuri here?” he asked.

There was a moment of silence as Natasha savored whatever morsel she was about to share. She tilted her head, sighed, looked at him like he was pitiful—like he was missing something so very obvious.

“Why, Natasha?”

“He wants Gaia,” Natasha replied.

Tom felt all the muscles in his body recoil. He turned his head and looked at the one-way mirror, somehow keeping his gaze steady. He knew that Vance had his hand on the doorknob right now to come relieve him before he could explode. He tried with all his might to convey his message to his superior:
Back off. I'm staying.

“Why?” Tom asked, his jaw clenched.

“He's decided that Gaia would be the better candidate to take over the Organization,” Natasha explained.
“Tatiana has been, for lack of a better word, passed over.”

I don't believe this,
Tom thought, his fists gripped together under the table.
He wants Gaia? He wants Gaia to take over his international terror organization?

“If he wants to groom her to take his place, why instruct you to kill her?” Tom managed to ask.

“He did not order the hit,” Natasha replied. “That was me.”

Tom once again saw himself lurching over the table. Saw himself squeezing every last trace of life out of Natasha. Instead, he waited. He breathed. He gradually started to see straight again.

“I didn't appreciate his decision to demote Tatiana. She trained all her life. She deserved to take the helm,” Natasha said. She flicked something off the knee of her orange jumpsuit and gazed at Tom.

“Why did he do it?” Tom asked her. “What suddenly made him decide to. . . choose Gaia?”

“Gaia was always the ideal candidate, but Yuri couldn't risk coming to the States,” Natasha explained. “Not as long as Loki was operating here. It was too risky.”

Tom gazed at the tabletop, his mind working. “So once Loki fell into a coma—”

“Yuri ordered you to be taken out of the picture,” Natasha finished. “I didn't know it at the time—I was as shocked as everyone else when you were taken to the hospital—but that is what he was doing. He wanted you gone so he would be free to—”

“To approach Gaia,” Tom said.

“Precisely.”

Tom's mind reeled. This was unbelievable. In his wildest dreams he never would have imagined that this was the story behind everything that had happened. That Yuri was alive. That the Organization still functioned under his watchful eye. That Loki . . .