twice a week between Moscow and London. Only six seats, and today the only passenger is me. He doesn’t run it to make money. It takes a loss, he told me once. He runs it because people on flights often do business, make calls, use their laptops, and he films it all and listens to it all. All those Russian and British businessmen with connections between Mother Russia and Britain, unwittingly letting him see all their deepest, darkest secrets.
He also employs the best-looking flight attendants you’ve ever seen, and they’re paid to get the businessmen drunk, and flirt with them; although they never sleep with them. Drunk and flirty is enough to make them sloppy with the info they give out. These women aren’t air hostesses; they’re damn spies. Highly paid ones too, and I ought to know because I signed off their paychecks last month.
“Champagne, sir?” I glance up at this particular hostess, intrigued by her charming accent, and note her name. Ines. French? Fits with the sexy accent.
“It’s Bohdan, Ines, and no thank you. I’ll have vodka, chilled, straight up, if you have any.”
“Of course, Bohdan.” She saunters down the aisle, her swinging hips and ripe ass have my dick awake in no time.
K must have recruited her from Paris. One thing I know for a fact, though. If she’s working for him, he hasn’t fucked her. That shit got him into hot water a while ago, and he doesn’t do it anymore.
So having her won’t mean having any of his sloppy seconds.
I push out of my seat, and wander up to where she’s fixing my drink in the tiny galley. My mood hasn’t been the best these past few days. Someone is after our operation, attacking K, and now I must go to London, for who knows how long. I’ve sorted everything out as much as I can in Moscow, and things should run smoothly for a week or two, but you never know in our business.
Plus, I don’t like London. It’s one of my least favorite cities. It always feels like interconnected sets of villages to me, rather than a proper city. I can’t stand the Brits in general. I much prefer the French or the Italians. The Brits are dour, like us Russians, and they only come out of their shells when they’ve drunk too much … like us Russians. I like the exuberance of the Italians or the Greeks. In fact, some days, I think about leaving all of it behind and moving somewhere like the Amalfi Coast. What a glorious place. I’d buy a few acres of land, raise chickens, and grow food in the fertile soil. It would be heaven. I’m a street rat, a city boy, but I long for nothing more than the wide-open vistas of the countryside, or the beauty of the coast.
I’ve got the body of a boxer, and women tell me the face of an angel, but my soul is a dark place. With my past it couldn’t be anything but. I want to leave all this behind one day and simply be. Nothing more than existing while I soak up the sun and let it bleach all those dark, hidden places deep within me.
That’s not my life, though. This is. Being a fixer for K, and I’m damn good at it.
“Thanks,” I say to Ines with a smile. I bet my smile has around eighty percent of women wet within seconds.
Will Ines be one of them?
She smiles back, lowers her lashes, bites her lip and looks at me. Yep, she’s one of them.
“Won’t you join me?” I ask.
“Oh no, we’re not allowed to drink at work.”
“Well, I’m a colleague of Mr. Silvanov’s, not your usual cargo, and I won’t tell if you don’t.”
She shakes her head, but I can see she’s not a million miles away from giving in and having some vodka with me. I drink it and sigh. “That’s damn good vodka. Come, have one glass.”
She smiles again, and she’s got a lovely smile. “Okay, just the one. If you swear I won’t lose my job over this.”
“No, I won’t tell a soul.”
I pour two more glasses and hand one to her. These aren’t plastic glasses; they’re heavy tumblers, and when food is served, it’s served on china not plastic. There is a security risk in it, but seeing as the two pilots on this route are ex Spetsnaz airborne division, and both are carrying, along with the navigator, K must feel the risks