The Troika Dolls - Miranda Darling [63]
Had Kozkov’s enemies come after her?
Stevie and the babushka were maybe five metres from the men when the 4WD pulled up alongside. The front window lowered all the way down.
There was a man in the passenger seat, shaven head, fat gold chain, leather overcoat and a tattoo creeping up his thick neck. There were others in the car. Stevie couldn’t help but look at him, and he looked right back at her. She saw he had a mouth full of gold teeth. The tip of a handgun was resting on the door.
The thug raised the gun to the height of Stevie’s head and jerked it sideways twice, as if urging her back. The babushka saw the gun, cried out and skidded on the ice, slammed into Stevie, knocking her to the ground. Four shots rang out. Tyres screeched, filthy grey snow sprayed out over her. The 4WD reversed through the parking lot at speed, spun around and disappeared off down the main road. The two men ahead lay dead.
Stevie didn’t dare get up yet, but she turned her head slowly to get a clear view. The two militzia had seen the whole thing from the other side of the parking lot. They remained standing there. One was talking into a radio. Neither looked in a particular hurry to get involved.
Stevie stood cautiously and made herself walk up to the two bodies. The babushka who had knocked her over had disappeared.
One victim was in his forties, the other much younger. They seemed to be of average means—strong cheap shoes, clean hands, gold rings on the older man—unremarkable in any way. Stevie removed her right glove, then knelt over the older man and checked for a pulse below the ear. The skin was warm and soft to her touch but there was no pulse. A neat bullet hole above the ear was visible. Unsurvivable. The other man had fared no better: no pulse, a wound in the cheek, the forehead and the neck—a disorganised cluster of bullet holes, but effective nonetheless.
Blood was pooling in the snow, spreading through the ice crystals to form a huge stain like a big red balloon, floating over the heads of the victims. As much as Stevie wanted to flee, she had seen the assassin’s face and it was her duty to describe it to the militzia.
A pair of tiny babushki hurried past the bodies without even giving them a second glance. The men were obviously not sleeping there on the street, but the old women’s studied incuriosity came from a long history of lessons in self-preservation: see nothing.
The two militzia men sauntered over and stood over the bodies. They took no notice of Stevie.
‘I saw the man who did it, bald with tattoos on his neck. He had gold teeth,’ she told them.
The policemen stared at Stevie, then went back to looking at the bodies. One bent down and began to search the older man’s pockets. He pulled out a wallet with an identity card. The wallet was empty. The policeman tossed it to the ground.
‘They were driving a black 4WD—you must have seen it. It was waiting in the car park,’ she pressed on.
The men in uniform paid as much attention to Stevie as the dead men in the snow. They began thoroughly searching the younger man’s pockets.
‘If you need a statement, I’m staying at the Metropole.’
One militzia made a hissing noise, jerked his head twice at Stevie, just like the thug had with his gun. Get out of here, the gesture said, this is not your business.
Stevie was only too happy to oblige and she resumed her scurry down the boulevard, into the fading frozen light, her cut lip forgotten.
Back at her hotel, Stevie called down for a bucket of ice. As she went to replace the telephone receiver, her hands began to shake so violently that it took her several attempts to sit it back in its cradle.
In her mind, she saw the small flecks of brain sitting on snow crystals; the neat bullet hole encircled by singed skin; she remembered the smell of gunpowder and exhaust fumes; the taste of fear like metallic electricity in her mouth. Bile rose in her