The Boy Who Glowed in the Dark (32 page)

Bobby started to raise his right hand but dropped it just as quickly. There was no need for him to wave.

The girl turned toward him.

CHAPTER 46

N
ADIA TRIED CALLING
Bobby three more times to no avail.

“I’m getting voice mail immediately now,” she said. “After only one ring.”

Simmy nodded beside her in the back of the Land Cruiser. “He turned the phone off. That means he needs silence. That means
they
need silence, I should say. I keep forgetting he’s not alone.”

“Not just silence. Total silence. He could have shut off the ringer but kept the phone on vibrate. But he didn’t. He shut it down completely. That means they beat us. He’s there, at the castle, now.”

“
They’re
there.”

“Right. I keep forgetting, too. They’re there.” She shook her head. “I guess I should take some comfort in knowing he’s not alone. But for some reason, I don’t.”

“Of course you don’t,” Simmy said. “The fox was born distrustful. It’s genetic. There’s nothing she can do about it.”

The highway from Irkutsk to Listvyanka gave way to a slipshod path covered with pebbles. Privacy signs warned tourists to turn at the roundabout ahead and correct their error in navigation. Sure enough, the owner of the property had actually carved a turnaround for cars three hundred yards down the path. The pebble road must have been built to discourage adventurers, because it soon gave way to freshly paved blacktop complete with yellow dividing lines between lanes.

Streetlights appeared around a bend. A wall reminiscent of a medieval fortress appeared ahead. A small stone cottage stood beside a gate. An iron gate blocked the entry to the compound beneath a stone archway. A dog began barking as they approached the gate. Three men emerged from the cottage. Two carried rifles. One held a leash. The dog at the end of it sat obediently at his feet. It looked like a cross between a sheepdog and a wolf with twice the ferocity of the latter.

The driver pulled up to the gate and lowered the windows. A gust of cold air blew into the cabin and cooled the perspiration on Nadia’s forehead. The guards aimed their rifles at the driver and Simmy respectively.

“You’ve made a mistake,” the guard holding the leash said. “This is private property. Please back up, turn your car around, and leave.”

Simmy introduced himself. “I’m going to reach into my wallet,” he said. “So I can give you a business card. To present to Mr. Golov. Please apologize to him and tell him I’m sorry I didn’t call ahead, but I need to speak with him about an urgent matter.”

The guard appeared stunned when he heard Simmy’s name. He narrowed his eyes, looked closer, and glanced at his colleagues. They, too, appeared shocked.

The guard studied Simmy’s business card and frowned. “Like I said, sir. You’ve made a mistake. This is not the Golov residence.”

Not the Golov residence? Nadia glanced at the destination on the map on Simmy’s tablet computer. The image of a car had landed on top of the target. It pulsed in red. Nadia recalled Simmy telling her that this region of Lake Baikal was popular with billionaires. Had they missed a turn? Or had the man at the airport purposefully given them the wrong destination? That would mean Bobby was alone. She would never arrive in time to help him.

“Of course it’s not,” Simmy said. “I understood Mr. Golov to be a guest here this evening.”

Good one, Nadia thought. He was making up the story on the fly.

“Please present my card to your employer. Please extend my apologies for this impolite intrusion. And please tell him Simeon Simeonovich would be in his debt if he agreed to a brief visit.”

The guard disappeared into the cottage. Nadia could see him through the window placing a phone call. While he was on the phone, Nadia counted eight cameras on the cottage, the walls, the gate, and the overhang. A seeing eye in the form of a black bulb was mounted beside the cottage door. Every conceivable angle was covered. Whomever the guard was calling could see the passengers in Simmy’s vehicle.

The guard returned. “We’ll need to inspect your vehicle and search the parties in the car. All weapons will have to be left here, to be returned upon your departure.”

Nadia, Simmy, the driver, and Simmy’s other bodyguard stepped out of the car. Simmy’s men surrendered their handguns. One of the men insisted on searching Nadia. The process unnerved her but the man behaved professionally. One of the other guards produced a pole with an illuminated mirror attached to one end. He walked around the perimeter of the car with the mirror beneath the SUV’s carriage in search of explosives. The SUV’s storage area contained Simmy’s overnight bag. Otherwise, it was empty. The heavy bags were in the second SUV, whose headlights had vanished from the side-view mirror as soon as the pebble road turned paved. Nadia had no idea where it had gone, and she knew better than to ask Simmy. If he wanted her to know, he would have told her.

Once the guards were satisfied, they climbed back into the SUV. The lead guard motioned to a colleague to open the gate. The iron grates rose into the air as though a city lay beyond it. The guard gave Simmy a slight bow.

“Mr. Milanovich will see you now, sir.”

CHAPTER 47

J
OHNNY STUDIED THE
menu at the Tropicana Diner. A man knew he was in the right place when they offered a rib-eye steak for $11.95 as a side item for breakfast. The waffle finger was interesting, too. A crispy waffle and three chicken fingers with all the butter and syrup a man could justify. A southern touch to soothe a man’s soul in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Johnny had been planning to stick with his egg whites, but the prospect of representing a cop stressed him sufficiently to demand some quality carbohydrates on the side. When his client didn’t arrive by 9:00 a.m. sharp, Johnny placed his order for six egg whites and a short stack of golden brown pancakes. Hold the butter, he insisted. The folks who ordered the waffle finger would undoubtedly use it.

Johnny hoped the pancakes might temper his apprehension, too. Nadia still hadn’t called him with an update. She was probably in the thick of it now, whatever that meant. He wondered if she was all right. He wondered how Bobby was doing. He hoped the rich man was coming through for them. He wished he were there with them, wherever they were.

Richard Clark sauntered in fifteen minutes late wearing a black nylon warm-up suit, white cross trainers, and a shit-eating grin on his face. A cop on the verge of being arrested should have looked concerned. He should have been on time and reeked of humility. But he wasn’t and he didn’t. Instead he slid his bodybuilder-gone-to-pot physique into the booth, rubbed his unshaven face, and grinned like an entitled child armed with a badge and gun. Johnny regretted opting for the short stack instead of the full monty.

“You know,” Clark said, “you’re a lot older in person than you look on your company website.”

“Occupational hazard. Can I see some ID?”

The grin turned into a laugh, then morphed into a look of disdain. “Are you for real?”

“Are you in need of my services?”

Johnny checked Clark’s badge and driver’s license, not just to verify the man’s identity, but to establish the upper hand. And to punish him for being late and to piss him off a bit, too.

Johnny’s waitress delivered his pancakes and eggs. She greeted Clark with familiarity—she called him Richie—and a complete lack of enthusiasm. Evidently he tipped like the asshole he was. She poured him a cup of coffee. Clark didn’t bother looking at the menu. He ordered his usual, two eggs over easy and the rib-eye steak on the side.

Johnny didn’t wait for Clark’s food to arrive. He slid the egg whites onto his pancakes, poured syrup over them, and dug in.

“My boss said we know each other,” Johnny said. “I can’t seem to place you. Refresh my memory.”

“Your boss lied. Or you weren’t listening. I never said I knew you. I said I knew of you.”

Cops knew criminal defense attorneys by reputation. The more successful a lawyer was in defending alleged perpetrators, the more they hated him. Until the day they needed his help, that is.

“What do you know about me?” Johnny said.

“I know you were the lawyer for the James brothers, two of the biggest scumbags ever to walk the sidewalks of Elizabeth.”

“Reformed scumbags.” The James brothers had been notorious drug dealers but had cleaned up their act. They owned and operated a chain of car washes now. Johnny glanced at Clark. The shit-eating grin still hadn’t vanished from his face. “You know, for a guy who’s staring at an indictable that might cost him his career and land him in jail for who knows how many years, you don’t seem concerned. You want to tell me your story so I can see what I’m missing?”

Clark took a sip of coffee and leaned back, spreading his arms along the top of the booth as though he didn’t have a care in the world. “Sure. I’ll tell you my story. It’s simple. I’m not worried because you’re going to be my lawyer.”

The certainty in his voice struck Johnny as offensive. Johnny gave Clark his own shit-eating grin. “You sure about that, are you?”

“Absolutely. What you’re missing is that my case is just as important to you as it is to me.”

“Is that right?”

“Yeah. That’s right, counselor. You see, I know the magic word.”

Magic word. Clark’s arrogance soured the syrup on his breakfast cakes. Johnny sighed. “What’s the magic word, Richie?”

Clark broadened his grin. “The magic word is Nadia Tesla.”

CHAPTER 48

B
OBBY NEVER THOUGHT
about the purple streaks in Eva’s hair until the girl turned. He’d caught a glimpse of her hair countless times during the trip from Japan. He’d had ample opportunity to consider its color. It had never dawned on him that the absence of purple might be evidence the girl was not Eva. Only when he saw her face did this occur to him. The girl was not wearing purple lipstick either. And he’d never seen Eva without her lips painted her favorite color. Eva was all about purple, and to Bobby the color purple was all about Eva. In his mind, the two were inseparable.

This girl had no trace of purple about her.

And yet, his heart leapt in his chest nonetheless, for the girl he’d faithfully followed for the last three days was Eva.

Other than the absence of purple, she looked exactly the same as he remembered her, except she was totally different. Her high cheekbones seemed more drawn. Dark circles surrounded her eyes. But the creases that sprang to her forehead when she realized there was a man behind her caught Bobby’s eye. Only three years had passed since he’d seen her last, since her uncle—the Coach—had told him she’d died. And yet she looked ten years older. Not in a bad way. In a mature way. The latter observation struck fear in Bobby’s heart. Maybe she’d think he was too young for her again. She was nineteen. He was about to turn eighteen. Maybe in her eyes he’d gone back to being a kid.

The creases vanished. Her eyes came alive. They shone with intensity. Her lips curled upward. No, they weren’t just curling upward. They parted to form a rapturous smile, an uninhibited look of joy the likes of which he’d never seen from her before. She’d been the tough girl with the inscrutable expression. Now she stood before him looking like he were the person in the world she most wanted to see.