Die for Me (Killing Eve #3) - Luke Jennings Page 0,65

with his asymmetrical gunslinger gait, and the implausible blond swirl of Loy’s hair. As they approach the delegation at the door both men halt. Stechkin’s profile is in clear sight.

“Send it,” I murmur, my voice weirdly calm, but Stechkin slips from view. From below us, partially muted by the headset, comes a sound like fireworks, and then there’s a thump of feet on the stairs. I freeze, Charlie turns, and a burst of automatic fire smashes into their chest. Behind us, weapons leveled, are three men in FSB combat dress. From behind them steps a fourth and obviously female figure, in a black ski jacket and ski mask. Approaching Charlie, who is writhing and gasping in a spreading pool of blood, she pulls off her ski mask and draws her Makarov handgun. “This is for Kristina, bitch,” she says, and fires a single round between Charlie’s eyes. She watches them die, then looks at me bleakly. “Eve.”

“Dasha.”

The three FSB men help me to my feet. I’m shaking so much I can hardly stand, and when we’re joined in the overcrowded octagonal room by Vadim Tikhomirov, I just stare at him.

“Dead?” Tikhomirov asks Dasha, indicating Charlie, and she nods.

“Then we’re square,” he tells her.

“We’re square,” says Dasha, unzipping her jacket, holstering her gun, and giving me a tight, pale smile. “Thank you all, and goodbye.”

Tikhomirov inclines his head. “Goodbye, Miss Kvariani.”

As she’s leaving, Tikhomirov’s phone sounds. He listens for a minute, mutters something inaudible, and shakes his head.

“Where’s Vorontsova?” he asks me.

“I don’t know.”

“We thought we’d worked out where the second firing point was. I’ve got a team there right now, but there’s no one there.”

She’s alive, I tell myself. She’s alive.

“The good news is that Loy and Stechkin are safely inside the theater,” he goes on.

“How did you know they were the Twelve’s targets?” I ask him.

“They had to be. I knew as soon as I got your report. For which thanks, by the way. You were brave and brilliant, and I could not have asked more of you.” He reaches out his hand, and mindful of the sad, bloodied figure of Charlie on the floor in front of us I shake it.

“And now, while my men clear this place up, I should get you to a place of safety.”

I follow him down the stairs, past the lifeless body of Tolya. When we reach the ground floor he opens a door for me, and then, frowning, closes it again.

“Let’s suppose, just for the sake of argument, that there is no second firing point. That the whole idea of two sniper teams is, and always has been, a ruse. A diversion, sold to you in the knowledge that you might be an FSB plant. What then?”

I attempt to pull my shocked and scattered thoughts together. “Two things, I guess. First, that your intervention here has proved them right, that I was an informer, and second…”

“Go on, Eve.”

“Second, that…”

His voice hardens. “Say it.”

I whisper it. “That the real attack is happening somewhere else.”

“Exactly. And there’s only one place that’s likely to be. Where the intended victims are. The Bolshoi Theatre.”

Taking my wrist, he leads me more or less forcibly into a dark, arched passageway, and from there through a massive, studded door into Red Square. It’s jammed, and the dazzle of the lights, the blare of pop music and the acrid smell of fireworks envelop me in an instant. Tikhomirov pulls me through the crowd past a set of road barriers, to where a black SUV with FSB insignia is waiting. His assistant, Dima, is at the wheel.

“Teatralnaya,” Tikhomirov orders. “Go fast.”

12

Even with the sirens howling, and some very aggressive driving on Dima’s part, it takes us almost ten minutes to reach the front of the theater. The entrance doors are closed, and the sumptuous foyer is silent except for the sotto voce chatter of the front-of-house staff, who surround us officiously as we enter and then stand back respectfully when Tikhomirov identifies himself. He makes a call, and thirty seconds later two FSB officers in dress uniforms hurry down the central staircase, salute, and assure him that all is well, and that all the appropriate security measures are in place. Tikhomirov looks unconvinced and summons one of the theater managers to take us into the auditorium.

We’re led up a short flight of steps to a horseshoe-shaped corridor with numbered doors. “These are the lower boxes,” the manager explains, opening the furthermost door. “And this box is always kept in reserve. You’re