Killing Eve Die for Me (Killing Eve #3) - Luke Jennings Page 0,67

posture in front of his Russian counterpart. Loy’s neck is also broken and his head has been positioned, face down, in Stechkin’s crotch. For several long seconds the four of us stare, incredulous, at the last and greatest work of the artist formerly known as Villanelle.

“Find her,” Tikhomirov whispers to the two men. “Find the fucking interpreter.”

He closes the door on the dead presidents, pulls out his phone and starts giving orders. Other FSB men arrive at a run and are dispatched around the building. After a few minutes Tikhomirov lowers his phone and stares at me. “Eve, you need to go. Find Dima. He’s in the car outside. He’ll take you somewhere safe. Go now.”

It’s like walking in a dream, or a nightmare. The corridor seems to last forever, my steps noiseless on the scarlet carpet. As I step out onto the mezzanine floor the orchestra is playing “The Waltz of the Flowers.” My parents had a scratchy old record of The Nutcracker.

Then there’s shouting, as six FSB men burst into the foyer from the direction of the orchestra stalls. At their center, writhing and kicking, is a female figure in a dark suit. It’s Oxana and she’s fighting for her life. A rifle butt smashes into her head but she fights on, her face bloody, teeth bared like an animal, and with a furious twist of her body manages to wriggle out of the suit jacket that two of the men are holding and sprints for the main door. She makes it, and hurtles down the steps toward the square. Very calmly one of the FSB men steps into the open doorway, raises his rifle and fires an aimed burst. The rounds hit Oxana between the shoulders—spots of red on the white shirt—lifting her momentarily before pitching her onto her face in the wet snow. I try to run to her, screaming now, but my feet won’t carry me, hands hold me back, and all that I see is the dark, unfurling flower of her blood.

Of what follows, my memory’s fractured. I remember being bundled into a vehicle by men carrying guns, and driven fast through the city. I remember it being very cold when we reached our destination, and being hurried across a courtyard and up a flight of stairs into a small room with an iron bed. I remember letting go. Submitting, finally, to the knowledge that I’m breaking apart.

It’s not only Oxana, although it will always be only Oxana. It’s the things I’ve seen and done. I followed her into the mir teney, the shadow world, not realizing that I couldn’t survive there, that unlike her I couldn’t breathe its poisoned air. I remember, so clearly, the sensation of riding away with her on the volcano-gray Ducati. Of fitting myself to her back, of holding her tight as we flew into the night. I’d never encountered anyone so dangerous, or so lethally reckless, but she was the only person in the world with whom I felt safe. And now that she’s gone, there’s nothing left of me.

Oh my love. My Villanelle.

When I finally start to weep, I can’t stop.

13

An hour after sunrise I’m brought food and coffee on a tray by Dima, Tikhomirov’s assistant. He doesn’t speak, instead he moves quietly and swiftly. Looking out of the window I recognize the courtyard below and realize that I am inside the Lubyanka complex, the headquarters of the FSB. The door to my room is unlocked; there’s a corridor outside with a bathroom, and stairs leading downwards, but I don’t go further than the bathroom. I spend the day curled up on the bed, staring at the rooftops and the falling snow. Later, a man in civilian clothes comes in and gives me an injection, following which I sleep deeply. On the second day a female doctor comes in, asks me to undress, and subjects me to a medical examination. I spend a second day lying on the bed, too tired and numbed to think. In the evening there’s another injection, and the soft rush into forgetting.

The next morning Dima arrives with my breakfast and stands by the door, his arms folded, as I eat and drink.

“You’re going on a driving trip,” he tells me. “To Perm, fifteen hundred kilometers away. You will be on the road for two days.”

“Why?” I ask. “And why Perm?”

“You need to leave Moscow. It’s too dangerous here, and you will be in safe hands. Also…” He looks at me sympathetically. “We