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CHAPTER 23
WHEN BANDIT STARTED barking at the basement stairs, the street-smart Poplovs slipped back outside, closed the door, climbed the steps, and scattered like the wind throughout the backyard. Dogs were not to be trifled with. Dogs can smell, hear, and sense things that humans cannot. The Poplovs knew this, and they knew the police knew this, too.
Once the police car had cleared the gate, Dr. Parks backtracked into the house, went back to the basement, and tugged on the light. She looked around. They’d hidden well.
“They’re gone,” she announced to the luggage and skis, thinking the Poplovs still hid. She crossed to the outer door and found it unlocked. She locked it again and went back upstairs. Clearly, they’d sneaked back out, but when?
Jeanine was packing her bag in the kitchen.
“Where did you go? You disappeared,” Dr. Parks said.
“Oh, the bathroom,” Jeanine said. “Sorry.” And then she continued: “Coyotes aren’t vectors for rabies.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
“But they can carry parasites.”
“All right. Yuck.”
“Right. Amoxicillin for ten days, in case.” She placed a bottle of pills on the counter. “Wrap it in turkey.”
“What about his leg?”
“Neosporin. Change the bandage. Keep the cone on. You know the drill.”
Dr. Parks walked Jeanine out. Then she headed to the backyard again to find the Russians. She stood on the pool deck and looked around.
“Hello?” she called out, and then gazed at the dead coyote. Would it attract other animals? Raccoons? Crows? Should she cover it with something? Probably… Or maybe she should bury it. Would Animal Control retrieve the bullets for the police? What were the odds? The officers, she thought, suspected nothing, but she decided not to chance it. She’d bury the coyote herself, deep.
“Hello?” she called out again. “Everyone left. My neighbors, the police.” No one responded. “Anyone here?”
A moment later, Nikolai crawled out from behind a bush, brushing the dirt from the palms of his hands, and Masha appeared from the back of the pool house.
“That was close,” Masha said.
But none of them saw Nikolai’s mother.
A few minutes later, they found her sitting in the grass in the grove, her back against a tree, trying her best to sob as quietly as she could. Masha and Nikolai gently approached, but Dr. Parks hung back.
From the ground, Sophie looked up at the doctor. “Please don’t make us go,” she said. “Please let us stay.”
CHAPTER 24
“WE GO BACK in two hours,” Boris said. He and Shev trudged through the woods, back out onto Bellagio Road. They’ll all be asleep and the dog knows us now.”
“I’m hungry,” Shev said. “I need a burger. It all made me hungry. We didn’t have lunch.”
Boris said nothing. He was too angry. “You should’ve killed the lady.”
“She was too fast,” Shev said. “You should’ve killed the dog.”
“I wasn’t hired to kill the dog.”
“I wasn’t hired to kill the lady. And you should’ve used a cooked fish. Salmon or tuna. A dog would not leave a fish behind. I know this.”
Boris stayed silent the rest of the hike. Shev had a mouth that needed shutting and an attitude that needed a readjustment. He cleared the brush, stopped walking, and looked up the hill, and then back down. Where was the van? It was nowhere in sight.
“Fuck,” he muttered. “Where’s Vad?” He listened, heard nothing, then took off down the hill toward the city. Shev followed six feet back. They didn’t carry phones on these jobs. Too risky. Phones could be traced. They walked about a quarter mile, then Boris rounded a tight bend and stopped.
