The Troika Dolls - Miranda Darling [141]
‘It’s my star sign,’ Henning replied with a smile.
Stevie paused for a moment. It was now or never.
‘I saw two men, you know, with the most extraordinary tattoos,’ she went on, her voice bold in the way of someone who has never been concerned about drawing too much attention. ‘When I was out walking this morning. I think they were Russians. They sounded like Nicole Kid-man in Birthday Girl, only male. One guy had a skull in the middle of sniper sight, like on 24 with Keifer Sutherland. And some words on the bottom—I think they were Spanish: malo mori something.’
‘Malo mori quam foedari,’ said Henning quickly. ‘Death before dishonour.’
He hastily added, remembering his cover, ‘It’s Rambo’s motto.’
‘Whatever. The other guy had his sleeve pushed up and he had a wolf’s head with horns.’ Stevie shrugged and examined her nails. ‘If you ask me, it’s a bit de trop on the hands, don’t you think?’ Stevie sighed and pulled out her compact. ‘Just look at me in these hideous goggles, Henning.’
Dragoman was definitely listening; she could see him in the compact mirror, reflected over her shoulder.
‘No wonder those Russians didn’t recognise me!’
‘I told you not to talk to anyone,’ Henning said wearily.
Stevie pouted. ‘They talked to me. And anyway, they weren’t interested in me. They wanted to know if some friend of theirs was here—’
Stevie adjusted her bikini bottoms. ‘At least I think that’s what they wanted. I could hardly understand their English and I don’t understand a word of Russian except vodka.’ Stevie laughed inanely at her joke. ‘Anyway, I told them I didn’t mix with the other guests and I left.’
Behind her, Stevie heard Dragoman click his fingers and felt the shadow detach from the back wall and approach. Dragoman spoke in Russian. After every third or fourth word, he stopped and panted, as if fighting for air.
Something was jogging her memory but . . .
Stevie listened as he repeated her description of the men with tattoos in rapid Russian, confident the two idiots in front of him wouldn’t understand a word. The shadow then disappeared.
A loud clapping of the hands and a chuckle announced the arrival of Heini. He was dressed in his own bathrobe, a shiny black affair printed in the yellow-and-black horse insignia of Ferrari. The ginger barbarian bodyguard followed him in then went and stood by the door. The pugs had been made to wait outside.
‘It’s bad for their eyes.’ Heini smiled with his huge lips. He really was a singularly unattractive man, thought Stevie.
Dragoman did not reply and Heini settled himself on the lounge beside him. Stevie could hear them clearly.
‘Who’s the primrose? A lovely specimen. Ochin krasivo.’ Very pretty.
There was no reply from Dragoman.
‘Not enough meat on her for me though.’
Stevie could almost feel the leer creeping over her shoulder. She shuddered at the thought of Heini’s lips anywhere near her.
‘I hope,’ he went on, ‘that she will be present at my celebration— she is after all a guest here and we have no primroses in our lovely bouquet of flowers.’
‘You know I detest—breathe—your ridiculous metaphors, Heini. They—breathe—reveal a florid, philistine mind.’
All at once, Stevie remembered the phone call in the dacha— hadn’t Kozkov said the man on the other end was ‘out of breath’?
Heini’s chuckle turned into a deep cough.
‘Felix, you just need to get yourself a girl—heh heh—or boy.’ He coughed again then continued his train of thought, oblivious to the dangerous chill in Dragoman’s voice. ‘It’s not natural to go without sex. If I was in your line of work I would go crazy just trying to sample every piece of merchandise—crazy.’
‘I don’t know what you are referring to.’
That sleazy chuckle again. ‘Please tell me you get “high on your own supply”, as they say, every now and then!’
Heini slapped a meaty thigh. ‘Heh heh, you know, dip your wick?’
There was no reply from Dragoman.
‘Heh.’ The huffing Heini ran out of steam. For such a callous killer, he certainly could come across as a buffoon, thought Stevie. That, perhaps, was part of his