The Doves of Ohanavank (37 page)

“Is she? Let me ask you this, would Sergei have gathered us in a room and offered each of us one hundred thousand for the LeFreak job? Is it right that I get the same as you, when you’re doing the job? Is it fair that even Samson gets the same as you? Besides, would Sergei ever let us know what each of us was going to get?”

Ari lifts his head from the table and gives Yuri his first direct look. His eyebrows twitch and his eyes narrow, to focus better. “Go on,” he says.

“The point is, that right now Carla isn’t much better organized or qualified to run the sex business than LeFreak. The only difference is that she has experienced people around her, us, and LeFreak doesn’t. But if we follow her every order, what good is our experience?”

Yuri lets Ari mull that over. He refills their glasses, raises his to Ari and downs it. He starts to eat, while Ari, who has already finished his plate, waits for more food to come. His huge hands are on the table, his fingers almost twice as thick as Yuri’s.

“Which of her orders you’d rather not follow?”

“If you were running things, how would you plan and execute the LeFreak job?”

Ari shrugs.

“Okay, let me tell you how Sergei would have done it. Aside from what I already said about the money, Sergei would have taken care of Samson along with LeFreak.”

Ari’s eyebrows do a dance, rising half way up his forehead and falling back to the bridge of his nose.

“Don’t look surprised,” says Yuri. “Samson is a long-term liability to us. Once we pull this off, he’ll be looking around for a better deal. He changed sides once, right? Why not again? Besides, we know very little about him. Two years with LeFreak, but where was he before that? What was he doing in Moscow? He won’t talk about it. So Sergei would use his knowledge to plan the operation, but would make sure he goes away with LeFreak.”

“How?”

“If we go the sniper route, he’d tell you to take two shots. Shouldn’t be difficult, they are in the same room, they’ll probably be so taken by surprise by the first shot that you’ll have good fifteen-twenty seconds to pull the trigger on a second target. If LeFreak paces the room as Samson says, you choose your moment when he’s passing by Samson, and do one after the other within two or three seconds. Those would be Sergei’s instructions to you. And he’d pay you at least one-hundred-and-fifty thousand, if not more, and you definitely won’t have to wait a month for the second half of your payment.”

They bring the main course. Yuri has ordered the entrecote for both of them. It is a large steak, topped with grilled mushrooms and onions, and there’s a plate of fries for them to share. The timing is perfect,
because Ari does not want to respond to Yuri quite yet, and he turns his full attention to his plate. Yuri notices that his eyebrows move up when he opens his mouth to take a bite, and twitch a little while he chews. The man could look quite comical, but if you know what he does for a living, it won’t be easy to see him as a comedian, no matter what his eyebrows do.

“I need to study this,” says Ari after a while. “First I need to see the room from that roof.”

“Of course. When you go up there, you can ask Samson where everyone usually sits.”

“How will you get me one-fifty if this works?” asks Ari, ignoring Yuri’s last comment.

“I’ll give you half of my share,” says Yuri without hesitation.

“But she may not pay either of us, if she takes Samson’s death as something that went wrong.”

“She will, Ari. If LeFreak is dead, she will pay us. Besides, we’ll be saving her the extra hundred thousand that she was going to pay Samson. She’ll be happy, she’ll pay.”

Yuri’s next order of business is to have Hov come to Yerevan. He cannot take the time to drive up to Stepanavan again, which is a two hour drive each way, and does not have anyone he can trust to take Anna’s picture to him. Besides, he wants to be there to assess his reaction.

He plans to make Hov his first personal recruit. When he finally gets some money of his own, he’ll pay Hov’s salary himself, without telling Carla. Things are finally beginning to look up. LeFreak will be gone soon enough, hopefully with Samson, Ari and Hov will work for him, then he’ll claim Ano’s operation in Dubai, and the villa. After that, it will be time to figure out who Nicolai is and put him in his place.

It takes Hov a few days to secure a one-day leave to come to Yerevan, on the pretext of having to visit a sick relative. Yuri decides to meet him in the outskirts of town, in Proshyan. He will meet with him in his car and
send him back right away. If this Anna is his wife, Yuri does not want the risk of having him linger in Yerevan.

He directs Hov to drive to the cemetery, where they have the best chance of being alone. There is a direct road from Ashtarak Highway, which, although it passes through the small town, is relatively quiet. Hov gets there a few minutes before Yuri, and parks his white Lada by the cemetery entrance. Yuri parks his black Mercedes SUV behind him, and signals him to come over. Hov gets in the passenger seat and, unlike at their last meeting, shakes Yuri’s hand.

“Thanks for driving all the way,” says Yuri. “I won’t keep you long. Do you know this person?” and he hands him the close-up of Anna’s face.

Hov’s face lights up.

“You found her!” he exclaims.

“She looks nothing like the picture you gave me,” says Yuri.

“I knew she’d have different eyeglasses, but I never thought she’s cut her hair, especially this short. Where is she?”

“Not so fast, Hov, I’m afraid this is a bad time to go after her.”

“Why? What’s the problem?”

“She doesn’t know that she’s been discovered, and I know exactly where she is, and can follow her every move. So you don’t have to worry about a thing. But right now, there are much bigger problems to resolve.”

“When?” asks Hov, uninterested in Yuri’s explanation.

“Not long at all, I’d say around May 21. And I may have an added bonus for you at that time. Now go back and continue doing what you’ve been doing. By the way, she’s changed her last name.”

“Just don’t lose her.” Hov isn’t interested in her name change either.

Chapter Thirty-One

I
t is Friday. I have class this afternoon, from three to five-thirty. I’m in my usual late morning routine, having had coffee and a light breakfast in the kitchen and returned to my room, when Edik calls.

“Have you seen the news?” He sounds out of breath.

“No, what’s happened?”

“LeFreak is dead. Do you have a TV there?”

“Diqin Alice has one.”

“Watch the First Channel. It is interesting.”

I turn on the small TV in the corner of the kitchen to Channel One. It shows a crowd gathered in front of a building. The police have barricaded the entrance and are keeping reporters away.

“The police don’t have much to say at this point,” says the announcer, “but our sources say that this was a professional job, with a high velocity rifle. Mr. Aleksyan was shot once in the base of his head. One of our sources, who spoke by telephone with someone who was in the room at the time, says that the entry wound is barely visible, which makes some experts speculate that it may have been a six-millimeter slug. A police spokesman said
that the shot most likely was made from the building adjacent to where Mr. Aleksyan was holding a meeting.”

“They moved pretty fast,” I mumble to myself.

“There were four others in the room when Manvel Aleksyan was shot. No harm has come to any of them.” They show the faces of the others who were in the meeting. Lara does not recognize any of them. “They will take the body to the coroner’s office first and then to the home of the deceased. Mr. Aleksyan is survived by his widow, a fifteen year old daughter and a ten-year old son,” says the announcer.

There is a sudden commotion in front of the building. The camera shows a group of reporters running toward a woman. “Mr. Aleksyan’s widow has just arrived,” says the announcer. The camera tries to focus on the woman, who’s screaming hysterically and trying to enter the building. “It does not look like the police will allow her to go up to the crime scene. We’ll provide regular updates on this late-breaking news as soon as we have them.” And the announcer moves to other news.

I turn off the TV and call Edik.

“This was fast.”

“Gagik is working on the next phase. I hope it turns out to be as easy as this was. I’m coming down to Yerevan. I’ll call you later.” Edik hangs up.

For the first time it occurs to me that the walls of my room are gloomy. They are totally bare, and their old, grey color is depressing. The paint is chipped in several places, and there are a couple of places where even the plaster is coming apart.

I tell Diqin Alice that I will repaint my room a lighter color, a soft cream, with a white ceiling, and that I want to redo the bathroom, and also, at my own expense, upgrade the kitchen. She looks surprised, and a bit concerned.

“Lara jan,” she says in her shaky voice, “why go through all that trouble,
bala jan
?” Diqin Alice calls me
bala
, meaning child. My father sometimes called me
balés
. My child. I love to be called by these names: kurig, balés, bala… they all have a homey ring to them.

“I don’t know,” I say, which is the truth. “But do you mind? Everything I do will be an improvement and will add value to your house.”

“Ha jan,” she says, “go ahead if you really want to.”

I’m surprised at how excited I am about this. I want to make this room mine, even if it is temporary. I want a brighter room, pictures on the walls, nicer curtains and a few items of memorabilia on the small table in the corner. I have not felt this need before. I want a little bit of Saralandj here. And how I’d love to have a picture of Sevajayr. Edik has so many beautiful pictures that he’s taken. One or two could grace these walls.

Edik has decided on a different business formula to help Avo. He has proposed a partnership, rather than an outright loan, to kick start the honey business. I was impressed with the way he explained it to Avo.

“Let’s be very clear on the business arrangement,” he told him, looking dead serious. “I am not lending you this money. You do not have to return it. Here, I am taking the risk with you. Fifty percent for the capital, fifty percent for the labor. What that means is that I put in the money, you put in the labor, and we own the business fifty-fifty. If it goes bust like the pig farm, you owe me nothing. If it does great and makes millions, half will be mine. Do you understand the new arrangement?”

“Sure I do,” says Avo with a chuckle. “You want me to do all the work and give you half the profits.”

“Exactly,” laughs Edik, “do you understand why?”

“Because you have money and I don’t.” Avo is doing his best to give Edik a hard time about this.

“No, Mr. Entrepreneur, that’s not why. I deserve half the profits because I am taking a risk giving all the capital to you, and trusting that you will not blow it, and I expect to be rewarded for taking that risk. It is so easy to take risks with other peoples’ money, isn’t it? If we lose everything, you don’t lose a penny, you just lose the time and effort that you put into this. I, on the other hand, lose everything I put in it. Now, do you understand why
you’re
the lucky one in this deal?”

“Maybe, but you’ll have the best honey ever produced in the history of mankind,” laughs Avo. “As much as you can eat, for the rest of your life, for free. Tell me who’s the lucky one now.”

This is an unusual way to seal a deal, but it is sealed, and even a divine intervention could not make either side renege on anything that they agreed. If I have any role in this venture, it is to assure both of them that Ahmed’s promise to buy the honey is good enough to take to the bank, and, in my humble opinion, it is probably the most secure aspect of the venture.

I no longer wonder about Ahmed and me. That alone is a huge relief. Now I know that the sexual part is over. He will go his own way, and he’ll expect me to do the same, even though I still cannot tolerate even the idea of intimate contact with any man. I now admit to myself that perhaps, under very different and special circumstances, Ahmed could have been, may have been, and perhaps would have been, an exception, but that is entirely academic at this point, and I am relieved and happy that that prospect is no longer in the cards. I am amazed at how many lingering issues Ahmed’s visit resolved. I hope that it did the same for him.

I do not own a computer yet, but Edik has lent me one. He showed me how to connect to the Internet, using a special access code. I’m sure that the code costs money, which he is covering. The purpose is to research the various shelters that already exist in Armenia.

I am amazed at how many are here and in operation, including some recently opened. ‘
Mer Doon
,’ which means ‘Our Home,’ based in Etchmiadzin, opened this year. According to its site, it houses girls who are dismissed from the orphanages at the age of eighteen, and have no place to go. That is my age. Imagine me sheltering girls my own age. Then there is ‘
Houso Aygi
,’ meaning ‘Garden of Hope,’ in Yerevan, that shelters young girls from underprivileged families. There is Orran, which takes a different approach. It gathers the children begging in the streets of Yerevan and gives them schooling, three hot meals a day and a nurturing environment. The children who end up at Orran are ideal targets for traffickers. Then I see something more unusual. There is a shelter created and run by UMCOR, some church in America that I have never heard of, nor can I pronounce their name, but here they are, with a shelter for sexually abused and exploited women in Yerevan.