“There’s nothing to explain,” she said, dipping low, then back up again, in perfect time with the other riders. “Patricia’s husband is handled, yes?”
“No,” I said between searing breaths. “I mean, yes. But…” I looked around anxiously, but the women around us were entirely focused on the instructor, pushing up and dropping low, pedaling like crazy people. The music was so loud, I could barely think.
“Increase tension!” the trainer called out.
Irina adjusted a knob between her knees and crouched over her handlebars, her butt perched high over her seat.
I pumped my legs, determined to keep up. My pedals were flying like living, hungry beasts. I moved faster, afraid if I stopped they’d chew the backs of my feet off.
“You are my only option,” she said, her forehead beginning to glisten. “My husband knows everyone else in your line of work. You,” she said, smirking as sweat drenched my collar. “You he does not know. It will be easy. He won’t be expecting it from someone with your…” My shoes slipped precariously on the pedals and I nearly came flying off the bike. Her grin widened. “Your modest skills.”
Great. Just great. In her mind, not only was I qualified, but I was perfect for the job.
“More tension!”
No, damnit. No more tension!
“Aren’t you afraid someone might find out?”
“Who? Feliks?” she asked, taking me off guard. She waved dismissively, never once breaking rhythm. “Feliks does not involve himself in domestic affairs. If Andrei is careless enough to allow himself to be subdued by a pretty face, I’m sure Feliks would agree that Andrei deserved whatever happened to him. Andrei has been reckless. He’s become a liability. Andrei is only lucky Feliks hasn’t done it himself.”
“Push it out, people!” the instructor bellowed. “Really push it!” Was the woman kidding? I hadn’t pushed this hard since I was in labor with Zach.
The group grunted with a collective burst of speed, like something out of a nightmare. I couldn’t feel my legs, and yet every inch of me was in pain. Irina leaned into her bike with a savage grin as the room took on the colors and tone of a disco. Lights flashed, sirens blared, the bass thumped. My heart was slamming out of my chest.
“I respect you for telling me no,” she said over the music. “I understand your position.”
“You do?”
“And I respect you for insisting on more.”
“I wasn’t … I didn’t…”
“That’s right! Give me a little more, ladies!” the instructor roared.
“No,” I wheezed, “I don’t want any more.”
Irina smiled, endorphins loosening the stern lines of her face. She actually looked like she was enjoying this. The woman was a masochist. “It is a hard thing to be a woman in a man’s world,” she said over the music. “We are conditioned to believe we are not worthy. But this is why I believe in you. You will do this job for me. And I will pay you what Feliks would pay any man to do the same work. Women must stick together. It is the same reason Patricia gave me your number. Because this is something she understood.”
“Aren’t you the least bit worried about her?” I panted.
“Why should I be worried?”
“The police are searching for her. What if they find her?”
“What makes you think there’s anything left of her to find?”
My legs stopped moving, my shoes carried by the momentum of the spinning pedals as her words spun around in my head. “What do you mean?”
Irina’s eyes were cold and cutting as she looked at me sideways, her chin held high, above any judgment or remorse. “Patricia Mickler no longer exists. I made certain of it.”
I couldn’t catch my breath to speak. I looked around me, wondering if anyone else had heard what Irina Borovkov had just confessed. But all the eyes in the room were straight ahead, on the instructor. All but Irina’s. Her faintly amused and crooked smile was angled sideways, toward me. A bead of sweat trailed down her temple. Somehow, she looked cool in spite of it, as if her heart rate was completely unaffected by any of this.
“It is better for everyone this way,” she said. “Better for you, too. Patricia has always been skittish, easily intimidated. If the police pushed too hard, she might have said something foolish. And that would have been very bad for both of us.”
My mouth hung open, my legs numb as I struggled to keep up. Patricia Mickler was dead. Irina had had her killed just to keep her from talking. To conceal a crime I hadn’t even committed yet. I thought they were friends. What happened to women sticking together?