Page 107 of Cruel Demands

His eyebrows rise.

“It’s my boss.”

That doesn’t appear to help.

I give him the address of my apartment as though that somehow proves I am not insane and point through the windshield. “Please?”

He shrugs and pulls into traffic.

I sink lower in the seat until only the top of my head is above the window and watch Mikhail’s sedan several cars ahead of us. This is stupid. Invasive. Reckless. I’ve spent the last five days trying to convince myself that the things I know about him are explainable. That whatever exists between Mikhail and Orlov is political or financial or some particular variety of powerful-man ugliness that I don’t understand because I am twenty and American and have been in Russia for barely long enough to learn which grocery stores stay open late.

I also kissed him five days ago. Softly. And he kissed me back like he was afraid I might disappear if he moved too quickly.

That memory has been doing completely unreasonable things to me ever since.

Now I’m paying a taxi driver money I absolutely should not be spending to secretly follow him because Pavel turned right instead of left.

I am an idiot.

Mikhail’s car moves away from the government district and toward the river. Grand stone buildings give way to warehouses, service roads, and blocks of industrial property waiting to become luxury apartments. More traffic peels away until the sedan is easier to follow and harder to hide behind.

I tell myself there could be a reasonable explanation. Politicians visit development sites. Politicians meet donors late at night. Politicians travel with armed drivers and have private conversations about transport companies whose owners have relatives who disappear under suspicious circumstances.

My own thoughts sound sarcastic now.

Mikhail’s sedan turns off the main road onto a narrower industrial street.

“Stop here,” I tell the driver.

He looks at the road ahead. “Here?” There is nothing here except a shuttered auto shop and a chain-link fence.

“Yes.”

He tells me the fare, and I wince. Of course following a suspected criminal politician across Moscow is also financially irresponsible. Ironically, if said suspected criminal politician knew about it, he would yell at me and insist on paying the fare himself. I pay him and step out before I can reconsider. The taxi drives away, leaving me alone in the cold.

Mikhail’s sedan disappears around the next bend. I pull my coat tighter and follow.

The cold closes around me as I walk through the dark, afraid that I may have lost him in the last few minutes. I consider calling another taxi and going home, but I would have to stand here and wait for it, and the thought of returning to my apartment with no idea where Mikhail went suddenly feels worse than the thought of continuing.

Then I see his sedan parked farther down the road.

The building beside it appears abandoned. Three stories, narrow windows, faded lettering above a loading entrance. Light shows through one window near the back. There are two other cars parked outside. Neither looks like the vehicles donors arrive in. One is an old black SUV with mud crusted around the tires. The other has no rear license plate. I move closer. Every step feels louder than the last.

The loading entrance is closed, but yellow light spills through a narrow gap beneath it. Voices carry from inside, low and indistinct. I circle toward the side of the building, keeping close to the wall.

There’s a window at shoulder height, filmed with grime except for one clear section near the corner. I should leave. Instead, I look through it.

The room inside is larger than I expected. A former warehouse floor, mostly empty except for several wooden tables and a line of metal shelving against one wall.

Mikhail stands near the center. Arkady is beside him with six other men. My stomach tightens. Six. I don’t know why that number feels familiar at first. Then I remember the page. SIX — PENDING.

The men are not standing together like friends or associates. Two are sitting in metal chairs. One has his hands restrained behind him. Another is standing near the wall with two men positioned on either side of him. The others are separated across the room as though someone has deliberately decided they should not be able to speak to one another.

None of them are dressed like political donors. Heavy coats. Work boots. One has a tattoo climbing above his collar. Another has dried blood along one side of his mouth.

A man I do not recognize places a black plastic case on the table.

Mikhail opens it. Inside are phones. Several of them. Burner phones, I think, though I have only ever seen those in movies. Cheap black rectangles piled beside documents and folded papers.