The Rybinsk Deception (11 page)

While she was in the bathroom he took the opportunity to use the phone again, this time to book himself a seat on the first available flight to New York tomorrow afternoon – a less than foolproof means of guarding against the chance of the US Immigration Service receiving early notification of his death, but a precaution that he thought would be good enough.

To address his other problems, he sat down with a notepad and a pencil, but had got no further than listing them when he was interrupted by Heather calling to him from the bedroom.

She was standing by the dressing-table, wrapped in a towel and struggling with the clasp of a chunky bracelet she’d taken from the carryall she’d brought with her from the village.

‘I wanted you to see this.’ She held out her wrist to show him.

The bracelet was gold, set with diamonds and inlaid with entwined strips of what Coburn thought were platinum or silver.

‘Where did you get it?’ He fastened the clasp for her.

‘It’s a present from Indiri. Isn’t it lovely?’

‘Did you ask her where it came from?’

‘Oh. Do you think I should’ve done?’

Coburn grinned. ‘Probably not. If her husband came across it in a safe on board one of the ships, he’d have put it in his pocket. Pirates are pirates. They don’t just go after zinc ingots and boxes of mobile phones. I wouldn’t worry about how she got hold of it.’

‘I’m not going to.’ She waited for him to take it off again.

He wished she hadn’t. She was standing close enough for him to feel her breath and smell the freshness of her, but as usual, she was making no attempt to move away.

To stop himself from wondering why she wasn’t and whether her
eyes could possibly have more flecks in them than they had done yesterday, he focused his attention entirely on the bracelet.

It didn’t work. No sooner had his fingers touched her skin than he wanted to grab her by the wrist and pull her into his arms.

‘Thank you.’ She placed the bracelet on the dressing-table. ‘Indiri said she gave it to me so I’d remember her. All I have to do now is work out how I’m supposed to remember you.’

‘Meaning what?’

‘Meaning that if I’m going to disappear and you’re going off to Maryland, we might never see each other again.’ She waited again as though she was expecting him to say something, but turned her head away in exasperation when he didn’t.

‘For God’s sake,’ she said. ‘What do I have to do? Don’t you want to make love to me?’

So unnecessary was her question that he couldn’t answer it.

She didn’t need him to. Taking a step forward she stood on tiptoe and fastened her mouth on his, pressing her breasts hard against his chest to show him how foolish he’d been and how long she’d been waiting for this moment.

His misreading of the signals had been a huge mistake. By failing to understand the reason for her moodiness, and by misinterpreting the change in her attitude towards him, he’d given her the wrong impression. Worse still, in doing so he’d wasted all the nights she’d spent together with him at the village.

To make up for them she was in a hurry, as eager as he was and unwilling to wait for what she wanted.

Still continuing to kiss him, she released her towel and let it drop, refusing to let go of him until he gathered her up in his arms and carried her over to lay her on the bed.

She watched him strip, wide-eyed in anticipation, trying to catch her breath, but quickly making room for him when he went to kneel beside her.

To begin with he did nothing except kiss her on the shoulder, allowing her to relax before he brushed his fingertips lightly across her nipples.

She stiffened, pushing out her breasts to encourage him when he
took his hands away and trying to kiss him on the mouth when he bent over to touch her again.

This time he was more enterprising, lingering until her nipples became more swollen and she was ready to reach out for him.

Trembling slightly she grasped him in both hands, no longer content to offer him her breasts, but inviting him to touch her between her legs by drawing up her knees.

Intoxicated by the warmth and silky smoothness of her skin he was slow to do what she was asking him to do.

To make him, she took one of his hands and forced it between her thighs. She held it there, opening her legs the minute he started to explore her, gradually surrendering herself to each of his caresses until she was unable to bear it and became overtaken by her own desire.

She pulled him towards her then twisted on to her back and guided him urgently inside her.

For a second or two she was too tense to accept him properly, waiting for him to take the initiative before she allowed herself to be penetrated to the point where, for Coburn, the experience began to assume the quality of a dream.

Lost in the world she was creating for him and unable to think of anything but the pleasure she was giving him and the need to possess her, by now he was no more capable of slowing things down than she was.

So eager was she that her contractions began almost before he knew it. Whispering to him, she started out on her climb, clinging to him and holding back her shudders until she suddenly arched her back to share in a climax of such intensity that, for an instant, Coburn could believe he’d been too late to prevent her from opening the fridge and that, as a consequence, none of this could possibly be real.

Not until the next morning did he come to realize she’d been trying to make a memory he’d be unable to forget. But by then the chance to tell her he understood had gone, and too much else was happening for him to explain how well she had succeeded.

H
ARI WAS HAVING
difficulty with the suitcase. While he’d been manhandling it over the doorsill one of its plastic wheels had collapsed, and now the other one had stopped rotating it was beginning to cut a groove in the lounge carpet.

‘Hey, let me give you a hand.’ Coburn went to help.

‘It is not necessary.’ The Frenchman dragged the suitcase the last few feet into the kitchen and stood it up in front of the fridge. His face was beaded in sweat and he looked as though he would expire at any minute. ‘I should have asked Lin for his assistance,’ he said. ‘If one day I am persuaded to do such a thing again, I shall find another way.’

‘Is Lin going to wait for us downstairs?’

‘He says the smell from the suitcase makes him feel unwell, so to flush out the air from inside his car he stays to run the air conditioning.’

Coburn could appreciate why. The stench was dreadful, already starting to fill the whole apartment, and so overpowering that Heather was hurrying around opening every window she could find.

‘I am sorry for the unpleasantness.’ Hari lit a cigarette. ‘At this time of year, bodies do not last so long out of doors, and for all of yesterday this one was left lying in the sun. If you think we should remove it from the case, we can try, but I must warn you that to make the body fit, certain adjustments to it have been made.’

‘Like what?’ Coburn wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

‘To hinder its identification by means of fingerprints or dental records, before I leave the village I arrange for the teeth to be smashed
and for the tips of each finger to be burned a little.’ He glanced at Heather. ‘For ease of transport I regret to say that it was also necessary to package the legs on top of the arms.’

‘It’s all right.’ She was unconcerned. ‘I’ve seen plenty of butchered bodies.’

Hari smiled at her. ‘But not inside a suitcase.’

‘No.’ She put a hand over her nose. ‘How long is this going to take?’

‘You don’t have to stay.’ Coburn went to fetch her carryall. ‘I can handle things by myself. Wait with Hari in the car.’

Hari passed him a small box. ‘You will need this timer you ask me to purchase for you,’ he said. ‘Since it was made in China and cost less than twenty dollars, it would be prudent for you to check its operation before you use it.’

‘I will. Anything else?’

‘Only that you could perhaps consider putting your watch on the wrist of the body. It is a small idea, but one that might be helpful.’

‘OK.’ Coburn was anxious to get on with it. He gave the carryall to Heather and squeezed her hand. ‘I’ll see you down at the car.’

‘You’ll be careful, won’t you?’ She took her hand away from her face and attempted a smile.

‘Sure. Go on, both of you. The quicker you’re out of here the sooner I can get to work.’ He watched her leave the room, knowing that with too much left unsaid between them he’d need her to himself for a while before he boarded his flight, but beginning to wonder if he’d have the opportunity to do so.

To test the timer, he set it for ten minutes then, after connecting a table-lamp to it and plugging it into the wall socket in the kitchen he switched on the power.

Instead of sitting around counting down the minutes, he went through the apartment again to make certain he had everything he needed before he returned to the kitchen and tried to decide what he should do about the body.

The timer turned out to be reasonably accurate, switching on the lamp after eleven and a quarter minutes – a long enough delay, he thought, which meant he didn’t need to readjust it.

He turned off the wall switch and wound back the dial to zero then
went to unpack the suitcase, but had got no further than unzipping part of the lid when he was forced to retreat, first by a trickle of foulsmelling liquid that ran out on to the floor, and then by such a revolting smell of putrefying flesh that he came close to gagging.

For his second attempt he was better prepared. Holding a wet towel over his face, he used the handle of a broom to finish opening the lid, and quickly tipped the case over on to its side.

A severed leg fell out, but the top half of the torso remained in place until he used the broom again and managed to dislodge it.

The body was in an advanced state of decomposition. Although the skin colour wasn’t a bad match, he couldn’t tell how old the victim had been, or even what had caused his death. Where the teeth had been smashed, the lips were peeled back in a grotesque grin and it looked as though whoever had attended to the fingertips had been over-enthusiastic with a blowlamp.

Coburn didn’t hang around. Holding his breath he replaced the lead to the table-lamp with the one for the fridge, flipped on the switch again and backed away, remembering to open the fridge door and throw his watch on top of the disgusting mess before he washed his hands in the bathroom and left the apartment for the last time.

Once outside in the street, he spent a moment or two gulping in fresh air, glad the job was done and ready now to embark on the more difficult part of what he’d kept telling Heather was his plan, but that if he was honest with himself, he knew was little more than a poorly thought-out step into the unknown.

For a weekday morning the street was quiet. A group of people was waiting at the pedestrian crossing at the corner, but not close enough to be in danger, he decided, and unless the explosion was to be a good deal more violent than he expected, even passing cars were unlikely to suffer anything worse than superficial damage from fragments of flying glass.

Lin had wisely parked his Mercedes some distance away. Standing beside it, Heather was talking to Hari through an open window and was slow to see Coburn coming.

Indicating that she should remain where she was, he hurried over and suggested it might be best if she watched from inside the car.

‘It’s facing the wrong way.’ She didn’t move. ‘I want to see what happens. How long do we have?’

‘Five or six minutes. You never know though. A lot of bombmakers blow themselves up with cheap timers.’

She glanced at her watch. ‘You are absolutely sure about the people in the other apartments, aren’t you?’

‘I’ve told you.’ He’d explained this to her before. ‘The building’s made out of reinforced concrete slabs. Anyway, you were the one who said you heard the couple next door leaving at half past eight this morning, and the young guy on the other side only ever uses his place in the evenings when he has a new girlfriend to sort out.’

‘Like you, you mean?’

‘Yep.’ Coburn grinned. ‘How much cash do you need for your airfare?’

‘You don’t have to pay for it.’ She looked awkward. ‘I don’t need a ticket. I’m not going back to England.’

‘Yes you are.’

She shook her head. ‘I’m going back with Hari to the village. I can stay with Indiri and her husband. Hari’s already phoned to see if it’s all right. He thinks I’ll be safer there than I would be in Europe.’

Coburn didn’t say anything.

‘Don’t look at me like that.’ She frowned at him. ‘Last night doesn’t mean you can tell me what I can do or where I can go. Hari’s lending me his sat phone so you can call me from the States whenever you want. I promise I’ll carry it with me all the time.’ She handed him a piece of paper. ‘There you are. I’ve written down the number for you.’

‘Is that really where you want to go?’ He was trying to think. ‘Do you really want to stay at the village?’

‘Mm. I’ve still got Hari’s little gun, and if you let me have yours as well, I’ll have two.’ She smiled. ‘You don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be fine.’

Hari had been pretending not to listen. He was also growing impatient. Climbing out of the car he shielded his eyes from the sun and peered back at the building as though he thought something might have gone wrong.

‘It’s OK,’ Coburn said. ‘Another couple of minutes.’

‘Miss Cameron has informed you of her decision?’

‘Whose idea was it – hers or yours?’

‘While we are waiting for you, she asks me if such an arrangement would be possible. I tell her that for as long as she wishes to be a guest at the village, she will be welcome and kept safe.’

‘You might have to bolt her down. If she ever wants to go out with you on a night raid, don’t let her.’

‘Of course not. I think that—’

Coburn never discovered what Hari thought.

In a deafening roar, the whole front wall of his apartment blew out in a sheet of flame, shattering into door-sized chunks before what was left of it crashed harmlessly on to the lawn below.

For several seconds all he could hear was the ringing in his ears, vaguely aware of airborne debris bouncing off the car and raining down around him, and not appreciating the true violence of the blast until the smoke began to clear and he had his first glimpse of the blackened hole where his kitchen once had been.

People were standing bewildered in the street not knowing where to run. At the corner, a nose to tail car accident was forcing traffic to back up, and already in the distance he could hear the wail of sirens – the aftermath of an explosion that no one in the apartment could have possibly survived, he thought, in which case, for a while at least, he had an opportunity to settle the account, and more importantly, a chance to see if he could guarantee some kind of future for himself and for the girl beside him.

Three days later, on a warm summer evening in Maryland he was ready to find out just how difficult that was going to be.