He turned to the first officer on scene. “You indicated some urgency with my seeing the body?”
“Yes.” The officer stepped to the side of the body beneath the sheet. The medical examiner handed Arkhip latex gloves, which he snapped on before squatting. The medical examiner pulled back the sheet. He had already bagged the victim’s hands to preserve any blood or bits of flesh he might have under his fingernails from the altercation. Arkhip pulled the sheet lower to view the bullet wound. A hole was just to the right of the left shoulder blade. The bullet had struck the heart, no doubt. His death instantaneous. However, the puncture hole in the shirt was round, with minimal bleeding. This was most definitely an entry wound, not an exit wound. The bartender said he saw the decedent leaning against the unknown third man but he did not see a gun. With good reason. It seemed unlikely the man shot the decedent.
“Turn him over,” Arkhip said to the two men from the medical examiner’s office. They did so, confirming what Arkhip had surmised. The exit wound was larger, more jagged, with a lot more blood. “Hmm.” He stood.
“Senior Investigator Mishkin?” the officer said. “We have confirmed the decedent’s identity.”
“Did you?” When the officer did not continue, Arkhip said, “Let’s not hide it.”
“This is Eldar Velikaya.”
“Velikaya. How do I know that name?”
“He is the son of Yekaterina Velikaya. The grandson of Alexei Velikaya.”
“The gangster.”
“Mafiya,” the officer said.
“Why didn’t you tell me immediately?” Arkhip said. “This changes everything.”
8
Yakimanka District
Moscow, Russia
Jenkins stepped into an alley that smelled of rotting garbage and urine, though that was not his focus. His focus was his appearance, and what had just happened. The bartender had opened the door to the alley. He saw the punk, shot, leaning against Jenkins. He had concluded, wrongly, but certainly understandably, that Jenkins had gone into the alley and shot the punk. The bartender could not have seen the punk’s companion, Pavil, behind the open door.
He removed his leather jacket, ripped off his bloodstained shirt, and tossed it into a garbage bin, then put back on his jacket and zipped it closed. His mind spun. He should have walked away. Every instinct in his body told him he should have walked away from the situation, but every instinct wasn’t as strong as that one pang of his conscience that wouldn’t let him watch another human being be so brazenly degraded. He could not stand by as the woman was beaten and abused. It didn’t matter that she was a prostitute. If anything, it made it all the more imperative that she be treated with sympathy. She certainly did not deserve to be mistreated by a two-bit punk.
Still . . .
What had the woman meant? What have you done?
She said the words with such clarity and . . . fear, and despite all the drugs pulsing through her system. Her fear had sobered her like a bucket of ice-cold water tossed on a drunk. The words came out in a haunting whisper, as if she could not accept what her eyes clearly saw and her brain, at least momentarily, registered.
What have you done?
Jenkins had miscalculated the two men’s determination. In his experience and his Krav Maga training, most men, having been disarmed and so quickly incapacitated, would have run, and lived to fight another day. Most would have considered the woman not worth their pain and their suffering.
The big man got the point too late. The punk never did. And the punk was the person calling the shots. The fact that the punk did not stand down indicated he was not used to being confronted, not used to being denied what he wanted, and that he usually got away with such behavior. And that raised the more important question. Who was he?
At least Jenkins had worn the mask. He’d get back to the hotel and discard Charles Wilson forever—
He stopped midstride. He looked at his hands. Shit. He’d taken off the latex gloves. What had he touched? The bar door. The tabletop.
The beer bottle.
He looked back, contemplating if he had time to go back and . . . No. Definitely not. He needed to take his chances. Move forward. He had other masks and disguises.
Jenkins checked his watch; he’d activated the stopwatch as soon as he left the alley. He walked briskly, his hands in the pockets of his jacket. His head turned away from the streetlamps where he’d seen the cameras. He did not run. He did not want to appear guilty. He did not, however, have a lot of time. The police would check the facial recognition cameras and see the confrontation in the alley. They would identify Charles Wilson through his passport photo entered into the system at Sheremetyevo Airport. Once they did, they would follow him from the bar to his hotel—the CCTV cameras, he had been told, were that good.