Chasing Ivan (6 page)

THE VIP GATE attendant, a GQ/Soldier hybrid in a pressed white suit, gave me a look that indicated he didn’t think I was VI. “Sorry sir, but the show closed at six thirty. With the prince making the rounds, only owners and their guests are allowed in this evening. You can’t get in without an invitation. And you can’t leave your motorbike here.”

As I pulled out my wallet, he nodded toward an overhead camera. “Don’t bother, sir. Along with the Grand Prix, this is our signature event. The principality takes security very seriously.”

With every second of delay, Emily was disappearing deeper into the crowd. And since they’d swapped out her purse, I had no electronic means of tracking her. I ran back to the Ninja, and Jo. “Are there other entrances, or do I need to get more creative?”

Jo pointed. “Around the corner and down a hundred meters or so. Aren’t you glad I brought the bike?”

“Yes. You’re a genius.”

We covered the distance in about a second and a half, after which I backed the Ninja in between a shiny black Maserati and an equally polished white panel van. I slipped the Range-R into a breast pocket opposite my Glock, while Jo stuffed a few items into her purse before locking the pannier. “This event has vendors, right?” I asked. “Companies selling yachts and navigation systems and jewelry for the mistress?”

“Of course. Hundreds.”
 

“Do you know what admission costs?”

“At least a hundred euros, I’d guess. But they’re not selling tickets tonight.”

“They’re always selling tickets. It’s just a question of tactics and price.”

“Tactics and price?”

“A price that motivates flexibility, and tactics that supply an excuse to bend.”

I kept simple tools with me at all times, including paperclips, parachute cord, and bills of large denomination. I palmed five hundred euros, leading Jo toward the gate and scoping the scene as we walked. I angled our approach to put my back in the right place while we passed the guard, and strode toward him exuding authority like the chief of police. Jo followed suit.

This guard appeared to be the other guy’s twin — a model’s face with a soldier’s physique and grooming. The Prince of Monaco’s version of a corporate receptionist. He eyed us with interest, but not alarm. “We left our badges back at the Rolex booth. They just gave us this temporary pass.” I slipped the bill into his left palm without breaking stride, leaving him with two options.
 

He made the wrong choice.
 

He grabbed my right shoulder with his right hand.

Throughout history, the Latin proverb “
Fortune Favors the Bold”
has been adopted as the motto of many of the world’s elite military forces, urging soldiers to undertake the same valiant action that helped create the Roman Empire. It’s a tactic I often employ, both because it’s a personality fit, and because most people are content to leave well enough alone. Unfortunately, this guy wasn’t. By grabbing my shoulder, he’d invoked another classic axiom: Newton’s Third Law of Motion.

I shot my left hand up and clamped it down above his right, trapping it atop my shoulder while lifting my right elbow and spinning around in a rapid, fluid sequence. This combination placed the startled guard into an arm lock that forced his face down and set his head up like a football on a kicking tee. He’d miscalculated, inviting a world of hurt, and now all he could do was suck it up and take it.

The key to a knockout blow is overwhelming the central nervous system and effectively tripping a circuit breaker. Boxers do this by delivering a jaw strike powerful enough that the brain not only smacks into the back of the skull, but also recoils forward to concuss the front, creating a two-pronged neural attack. I was no heavyweight boxer, but I was using a knee rather than a fist, which was like upgrading from .22 to .45 caliber ammunition, and my cross-country skier thighs packed a magnum load.
 

The sound told me I’d gotten it just right, a clean crack reminiscent of a home run baseball swing. The effect was as stark and immediate as flipping a light switch. He went from rigid to limp in a millisecond. I caught him and dumped him back behind his little podium while Jo looked on with wide eyes.

“You were saying something about tactics and price?” she said.

I shrugged. “He didn’t like my tactics, and so he paid the price.”

“Will he be okay?”

“He’ll be fine. Five hundred euros buys a lot of aspirin. Unfortunately, we’re now marked if anyone was watching. Let’s move.”
 

We headed back toward the VIP gate, hoping to get lucky and spot Emily right away. Without prompting, Jo split off a couple feet to my left, helping us better blend into the crowd. Her instincts were good.
 

The blue-carpeted dock was lined with pristine white vendor tents on one side, and envy-provoking yachts on the other. I hand-signaled Jo that we should divide our attention, with her scanning the yachts while I checked the booths.

My eyes still roving, I got Oscar back on the mike.
 

“Where are you?” Oscar asked.

I ignored his question and asked one of my own. “Who owns the jet?”

“They’re peeling back the last layer of the onion now. Hold on. How are things on your end?”

“We’re at the Monaco Yacht Show. We lost them at the VIP entrance — no tickets — but are inside now attempting reacquisition.”

“You better do more than attempt, Achilles. Failure is not an option.”
 

Failure is not an option
. Anyone who said that had never been in a firefight. I’d learned pretty fast when bullets were flying that failure was always an option. A bit of bad luck with a ricochet, or a weapons malfunction, put failure front and center. But I wasn’t about to fail.

We were scanning the busy crowd with the intensity of desperation as we walked in the direction of the VIP gate. Michael had shed half his chauffeur’s uniform in the Mercedes, and emerged wearing just a white shirt and black slacks. Dressed that way, he matched half the male crowd, but with his broad shoulders and 6’ frame, I still hoped to spot him quickly. Emily, now about 5’8” with heels on and hair up, was wearing blue and gold silk. The dress would make her an easy mark in most crowds, but not this one. Blue and gold were nautical colors, and silk dresses more plentiful during cocktail hour in Monaco than either shorts or jeans.
 

“Got it,” Oscar said. “Arman Voskerchyan owns the jet. Know the name?”
 

“Russia’s wealthiest citizen, according to Forbes, although I’m sure his actual wealth pales in comparison to President Korovin’s. Is it his jet?”
Of course it was
, I thought. That made perfect sense.
 

“It is.”

“I’m sure he owns a yacht or six. Are any of them at the Monaco Yacht Show?”

“If he’s got his boats nested like his aircraft, it’s going to take a while to build a query. Voskerchyan controls over a hundred corporations, and they’re registered all over the world, from Shanghai to Lagos to St. Kitts.”

“NASA allegedly spent ten million dollars to develop a ballpoint pen that would write in space. Know what the Russian Space Program did?”

“Paid a NASA engineer a thousand bucks for the plans?”

“They used a pencil.”

“What’s your point?”

“Google it. The Monaco Yacht Show is a prestige event, and those run on publicity.”

Oscar didn’t respond right away, but he came back in under a minute. “The
Anzhelika
. It measures at 110 meters. When it launched it was the second most expensive yacht in the world.”

We were back in business. Relief flooded over me until I thought about our next move in context. A Russian oligarch could pack a small army of security guards onto a yacht of the
Anzhelika’s
size.

Chapter 11

EMILY’S FEET BARELY touched the gangplank as she boarded. First the limo, then the jet, and now this unbelievable yacht. Her life would never be the same now that she had enjoyed the equivalent of fifteen minutes of fame. And the night was still young.

The
Anzhelika’s
main lobby was dominated by a grand circular staircase, running both up and down. A master craftsman had carved dolphins and octopi and schools of tropical fish into the banisters and rails with such precision that she half expected them to swim. Michael passed the sculpture by without a glance, leading her through an open double doorway above which was written
main saloon
.
 

The decorator had paneled this grand room with cherry wood, and furnished it with armchairs and custom-shaped couches — the piles of pillows, all upholstered from rich Italian brocades the color of cotton, hummus, and gold. Tonight, the owner had filled it with pampered guests, all dressed to the nines and drinking fine wines, while conversing in a panoply of languages. Emily detected English, French, Chinese, Arabic, and Russian. A veritable United Nations, but far more upbeat and harmonious than the typical General Assembly, she suspected.
 

“We’re right on time,” Michael said. “Andreas told me he’d be out on the aft deck. Would you like me to show you, or can you find your way?”

“I’d appreciate an escort,” Emily said, not entirely sure she’d be able to pick Andreas out of the crowd. She’d only seen his blurry profile picture, and as Jen loved to point out, those tended to be lies of height and weight and follicular status. Given the omission of his economic status, or at least that of his friends, she was prepared for a large pendulum swing — in the less attractive direction. Andreas’s appearance really didn’t matter to her, so long as his age was in the same ballpark, and his sentiments had been genuine. And they had been. Jen had asserted her skeptical manner, and together they’d verified the history of her dialogue with Andreas. That check confirmed it. When it came to likes and dislikes and social opinions, Andreas had led. He’d spoken first. He hadn’t been telling her what he knew she wanted to hear, because he had no information from her to follow.

Maybe he was like Stephen Hawking or something — brilliant and sensitive but seriously handicapped? Maybe he was a dwarf? Maybe he was pushing eighty?

She studied the crowd as they crossed the saloon, her eyes naturally gravitating to the other women — to their figures, their jewelry, and their dresses. They were clustered in fours or fives, each homogenous in their composition and choice of beverage. White wine or mixed drinks for the older cliques. Champagne or sparkling water for the younger. All the women were beautiful. Going by faces and figures, there wasn’t a woman over thirty-nine in the room. Judging by necks and hands, about half were north of fifty. Those were the wives, Emily figured. The rest were mid to late twenties, like her. Except not. The girlfriends clearly skipped both lunch and dinner in favor of the gym, and then spent their evenings either strutting elite Italian runways, or working exclusive Paris clubs.

The men were of two sorts as well. There were the masters of the universe, with their Cognac and cigars, scattered about in groups of two to four, and there were security guards — solo figures blending into corners, with thick necks, watchful eyes, and ear mikes. Emily supposed that made sense. There was probably as much jewelry on the
Anzhelika
as in the Tower of London.
 

They crossed onto the aft deck and into the open air, where she found more of the same. Emily’s eyes darted between the male guests, attempting to locate Andreas. She found it an odd experience, looking for someone whose soul she knew but whose face she had yet to experience. When her first pass failed to produce a fitting candidate, she turned to Michael. He too looked perplexed. “He’s not here. Let’s try the next level up. Technically speaking, there are five aft decks.”

“How many decks does the
Anzhelika
have?”

“Six. The two below us are service levels, containing engineering, the galley, the tender boats, and the crew quarters. He wouldn’t be on either of those. The three above are all candidates.”

They took an external staircase to the fourth level. Michael paused at the top, hesitant to intrude. They surveyed the scene from the shadows. It was reminiscent of the one below, but smaller and less populated. “This is the owner’s deck,” Michael said. “I see the owner, but not Andreas.”

“Is he the tan gentleman in blue slacks and a white jacket?”

“You’d think, wouldn’t you? But no, that’s the Chairman of DeBeers.”

“The diamond company.”

“Yep. Mister Voskerchyan is the man he’s speaking with.”
 

Emily studied her host from behind. He was small but stocky, like a wrestler. Well into his fifties by her estimation, his hair was still thick and naturally black. He wore black slacks and loafers. A fitted black sweater with the sleeves pushed up onto forearms broader than her calves completed the look. She couldn’t see his face, but from behind, the adjective Voskerchyan’s appearance brought to mind was
tough
.
 

“Let’s try the next,” Michael said.

The aft deck on five had but one couple — a younger man and woman busy getting to know each other’s dental work. Michael didn’t even pause. He kept right on climbing.