Nina's Friends

1. THUMB DRIVE

Mickey was eating a spicy chicken sandwich and waffle fries in the Chick-fil-A at the mall in Willow Grove when the South Philly meathead walked in. Bomber jacket, thin gold chain, weightlifter build, plenty of product in the hair, a theatrical swagger, and not a lot sparking behind the eyes. This would be Rob, or at least he claimed that was his name on the phone. The guy looked the way Mickey expected, which was a disappointment, but it was all he could get at the price he was willing to spend. Mickey nodded at the meathead, who nodded back and sat down.

Mickey pushed a drink across the table. “I got you a Coke.”

“Why we meeting here, making me drive all the way out?”

“I’m the one hiring you, so why should I drive down to your shithole neighborhood? You can come up here to see me.”

Rob sneered. “This suburban dump? You live here?”

“Not here, but close.” Mickey had a disconcertingly high voice, with a hint of a lisp. He offered fries, which Rob refused. “When I was a little kid, before this mall was built, right where we are now used to be the biggest bowling alley in the world. Had this huge, pointed roof over the entrance, like a rocket ship taking off.”

“Rocket ship?”

“Yeah. And a little over from that, one of the top amusement parks in the country.”

“You kidding me? We’re sitting here talking about local history, just because you’re old?”

“God forbid you might learn something.” Mickey slid an envelope across the table. “Half now, half when it’s done. The address is in there. They need to be dead, and it needs to be done in their house. Not on the street, in the car, or the back yard, in their house. That’s the way the client wants it.”

“How am I supposed to get inside?”

“Part of your job is to figure that out. Watch the place for a while, you’ll see an opportunity.”

Rob took the money, put it in a pocket inside his jacket. “What’s their deal, besides being rich Russians?”

“A big gay guy and his hot wife, I hear. I never met them.”

“You mean big like fat?”

“I mean big like a bear.”

“Why would a big gay guy have a hot wife?”

“You ever been anywhere?” asked Mickey through a mouth full of spicy chicken. “Never saw a rich gay guy hide behind a pretty wife?”

“It’s fucking stupid.”

“You might want help, since there’s two of them, that’s out of your fee. Keep whatever you find in the place, and they’re likely to have all sorts of nice stuff. There might be cash around.”

“Nobody keeps cash these days.”

“These people might. I’m told they’re the type. If you find any you can keep it.”

“That sounds good.”

“Something else – you know what a thumb drive is? For a computer? Sticks in a USB port?”

“Yeah, what do you think, I’m an idiot?”

Yes, actually, Mickey did think he was an idiot. “You find any in the house, if it’s one or twenty, you bring them back to me. There’s a bonus in it for you.”

Rob nodded.

“One last thing.” Mickey tapped Rob’s jacket where the envelope sat. “In there is a postcard with the Ukraine flag on it.”

“Is that a country?”

“You don’t see the news? Nothing about the war?”

“You mean them fighting the Russians?”

“Yeah, that’s the one. You need to leave it with the bodies, where it will be found. This is important.”

“Jesus, why don’t you do it, everything has to be so perfect?”

“Do I look like the kind of guy goes to high tea at a mansion in Society Hill? Cops will pick me up just for walking around.”

Rob looked the man over. Mickey was at least in his late fifties, maybe on the other side of sixty, balding on top, the hair he had left kept long and pulled back into a frizzy ponytail. Thick drooping mustache, round wire rim glasses, and a battered leather jacket. It seemed like he could use a shower.

“You got a point,” said Rob. “You want them to suffer?”

“No. Just make them dead. Don’t forget the postcard.”

2. JUDAS

The shriek of the phone emerged out of the staccato pellets of rain on the big window. Black outside, no moon, nearly the devil’s hour. Dragan Markov, still a little drunk, only answered the phone once he saw it was Sergei’s private line. Sergei Golubev was a mid-level Russian oligarch, not the sort of man to make his own calls unless it was both important and personal. In that case he wouldn’t hesitate to bother someone well after midnight with a demand disguised as a favor.

“Someone has stolen pieces from my collection,” said Sergei. “I need you to get them back.”

“Are they stolen or just missing?” Dragan was annoyed; why couldn’t this wait until tomorrow?

“Stolen, I’m sure of it. They’re all very good items, small so they are easy to move. They knew what they were doing.”

“I’m in embassy operations, not security. What value would I add?”

“We think it was Ivan. You’ll put him at ease, while you look out for my interests.”

Oh, fuck me, thought Dragan. He said, “You’re joking, that can’t be right.”

“There’s a security team going to his house. I want you there on my behalf.”

“Dammit Sergei.”

“I want all my art returned.”

“I can’t promise that.”

“Yes, you can. As far as I’m concerned you already have.”

Dragan blinked from the glare of the lamp when he turned it on. He had to sober up, fast, and jump start his engines. He had some crystal meth stored in the back of his night table drawer, which would help. He put on coffee for the drive. He entered the shower, trying to make himself presentable so he could threaten and interrogate one of the few friends he had.

***

Dragan arrived at Ivan’s little post-war cape in a quiet residential neighborhood in Arlington, south of Washington D.C., as the day was getting started. Surfaces glistened from the overnight rain, everything looking damp and forlorn. Down the block someone drove off to work, and at the corner the lights of a school bus flashed.

He entered the house only to find that the drama was very nearly over. Three security officers stood in the living room. At the center of this circle a slight man in his sixties sat in a winged armchair, his head down and his hands clasped between his knees. Dragan nodded to the senior security officer, a humorless prima donna named Sacha who didn’t much care for Dragan, either.

He was expected. Sacha directed one of the officers, a young woman in tactical pants and a hooded sweatshirt, to provide an update. She walked over to Dragan, and together they stepped out onto the porch. The woman gave Dragan a handwritten list of the missing artworks.

“It didn’t take much effort to break him down,” she said in Russian. “He seemed relieved to tell us, actually. He admitted he had been taking artworks for years and selling them to a gallery owner in Georgetown.”

“Please speak English outside. We don’t want a neighbor to hear Russian and become agitated.”

“Yes sir, I understand.”

“Do you have the info?”

“Yes, sir, I wrote it on the back of the page, there.” She showed him. “The dealer’s name is Collins. That’s the address for the gallery, and that one is his home.”

Dragan made a call. He read off the addresses, and asked the person on the other end to go to the art dealer’s home and drag him out of bed. “The idiot’s been fencing paintings stolen from Sergei Golubev,” he explained. “Take him down to his gallery and get what you can out of him, I’ll join you later.”

He took a deep breath. Across the street was a stone wall, and beyond it were the sprawling sports fields of a private academy. Mist clung to the grass, not yet burned off by the sun. He imagined Ivan waving at neighbors in the evening as he watched the sweaty children of privilege play their matches.

“Are you okay sir?” the woman agent asked. Dragan nodded.

The front door burst open and the other junior officer, a thick, red-faced man, pulled Ivan along by the arm. Struggling to keep up, Ivan fleetingly looked at Dragan before descending the steps into the rear seat of a black sedan squatting at the curb. The thick man leaned against the sedan, lit a cigarette, and waited. The woman joined him.

Sacha stepped out, his suit pressed, his grey hair immaculate, wearing sunglasses even though there was no need for them.

“I asked Leonid to pick up this man Collins,” Dragan told him. “I’ll talk to him first.”

“Trying to track down the artworks?”

“Yes, of course. You can have him when I’m finished.”

Sacha tapped the paper in Dragan’s hand. “That’s what Ivan remembers taking from the collection.”

“Do you think this is everything?”

“I think he thinks so. He’s nervous. People get nervous, they forget things.”

“Work with him through the weekend. Learn what you can then send him back to Moscow, let them figure out what to do with him.”

Sacha took a mint out of a tin and placed it gently on his tongue. “The invasion of Ukraine has gone from a quick victory to a giant mess. They turned our troops away from Kyiv and our casualties are humiliating. You think Moscow cares about a few stolen artworks?”

“Probably not. Sergei does and that’s who I answer to right now.”

They both looked at Ivan. Sacha asked, “Do you want to say anything to him before we go?”

“I probably should.”

Dragan walked over to the sedan and asked the two officers for privacy. He opened the rear door and crouched so he was eye-level with Ivan, who looked small and defeated.

“Of course they would send you,” said Ivan. “Sergei’s favorite errand boy.”

“I’m here because I’m familiar with the art.”

“Don’t you have anything better to do than be his majordomo? You need to get a life.”

“Stop it.”

“Judas.”

“He thought I might put you at ease.”

“You mean distract me, let my guard down as you slip the knife in my back?”

“I’m here because we’re friends.”

“We’re not friends, not now.” Ivan glanced at the security guards standing off to the side. “Unless you can get these gendarmes to set me free.”

3. PRIVATE COLLECTORS

“I can’t do that.”

“Last time you were here we drank bourbon on the porch and talked about Franz Hals, of all people.”

“I remember.” Dragan gestured with his chin. “You’re bleeding.”

Ivan touched under his nose and looked at the wet red smear on his fingers. “It happens sometimes, when I become stressed.”

Dragan handed him a handkerchief.

“Thank you,” said Ivan, handkerchief against his face. “You’ve always been kind to me.”

“You did the right thing, talking with us.”

“It’s ‘us’ now? Throwing in with those three?”

“Ivan, please.”

Ivan waved him off. “I knew it was coming. Did they tell you how they found out? A request came in from a curator at a small art museum. Kansas, middle of nowhere. Wanted to borrow two pieces from Sergei’s collection for an exhibition. Good ones, I have to admit. A small Malevich and a Rodchenko photomontage. Of course, I was supposed to prep them, but I knew they were gone.”

“Because you already stole them.”

“Years ago. I tried to get them back from Collins; he said they were sold. So, I had to report them missing. They did an audit and found out about the others.”

“They blamed you right away?”

“I can’t fault them. I managed the collection. All that work couldn’t walk away without me knowing it.”

Dragan nodded. “Why did you do this?”

Ivan deflated a little and sighed. “I don’t know.”

“Was it money?”

“No.” A shrug. “A little. If it was money I’d be the fool, wouldn’t I? I sold them to Collins for nickels and dimes, really.”

He giggled, which Dragan found slightly disturbing.

“It was mostly resentment I think.” Ivan lowered his voice so only Dragan could hear. “Sergei has so much. Of everything. So much art he doesn’t appreciate what he owns. I wanted him to have a little less.” He looked down at the bloody handkerchief, as if he was surprised to be holding it. “Are you going to talk to Collins?”

“I had him hauled down to his gallery.”

Ivan giggled again. “Oh, I’ll bet he liked that!”

“I’ll find out soon enough. I need to locate those pieces and put a lid on this.”

“I’m sure you’ll track them down. And when you do, destroy them. Burn them. Tell Sergei they were lost. Don’t give them back.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“It could. Don’t let him have everything he wants.”

Dragan sighed in exasperation. “Stop making this harder than it needs to be.” He patted Ivan’s arm. “Continue to cooperate, it’s best for you. Please don’t repeat what you said about Sergei, there’s nothing good can come from it.”