A Man Overboard Page 8

  He went to the computer and brought up Amazon.com, fully aware that his internet activity was most likely being monitored by the FBI now. He’d only gotten a hundred pages into the Koontz novel, and it was so far a pretty decent thriller—though a supernatural or psychological one, he wasn’t sure yet. He typed in the title and scrolled until finding a Publisher’s Weekly review that revealed nothing more than what he’d already discovered in the first hundred pages. At least not until its last couple of sentences.

  …Koontz’s resolution, involving a complex Soviet plot, transforms the story from cozy chiller to political thriller and may not please readers tired of cold war paranoia and propaganda…

  Soviet plot? Cold war paranoia and propaganda? He’d suspected a ghost story.

  He scrolled back to the search bar and this time typed October’s Ghost into the search bar. The screen switched to the details of the Pearson novel. The product description suggested a premise built on Castro still having possession of an October nuke that leads to the US and Russia bracing for another nuclear standoff.

  According to the novel’s product details, the books had been published in 1988 and 1994. Though that didn’t necessarily mean anything. At least nothing that could explain the kerosene man having a book from the same series as Stacey’s current read and it containing a similar Russian message as that of her House of Thunder. Coincidence? The Jerry in him didn’t believe in coincidences.

  Then realization struck home and stiffened his back. He should’ve checked the whole house last night to see if anything else was out of place, to see what else the man had come to do. Because he knew now that he hadn’t just come to burn it down.

  He began walking through his home, the bag and its contents ultimately bringing him into Stacey’s closet and confirming his unconfessed suspicion that the books and letters had not been brought into the house. His eyes danced over her hanging clothes, and suddenly she was there with him, wearing every one of them. Ignoring the stinging emotion surfacing around his eyes, he moved his gaze back and forth, looking for anything out of place.

  The fluorescent bulb above him flickered. He raised his eyes…and saw that the air vent in the ceiling was unscrewed and slightly ajar.

  Stepping up onto a wall shelf full of shoes, he reached up and pressed against the rectangular grid, popping it up and into the ceiling without complaint. Pushing it aside, he moved it so that it was lying to the left of the hole, resting on top of the ceiling. There was nothing attached to it, no duct work slithering through the open space and distributing either heat or cold throughout the house. Slipping his hand into the hole, he felt around. Just an empty space above the ceiling. Strange. He reached in further, standing on his toes and straining, trying to convince himself that it was just a simple mistake made in the original blueprint, a plan discarded maybe.

  His middle finger brushed something.

  Gaining a few more centimeters, he was able to pull whatever it was toward the opening. When he could finally grab it, he hopped down off the shelf with it in his hand.

  Another book. Seventeen Moments of Spring by Yulian Semyonov.

  He never heard of it, but something fluttered to the carpeted floor at his feet when he opened its cover. Bending over, he picked up a black-and-white photograph of a man. There was Russian written across the back of it. And as he opened to the back of the book, he had more than an inclination of what he would find. And indeed, there was more Russian writing staring up at him.

  He slammed the book shut. “What the hell is going on?” It didn’t take a genius to figure out where the backpack’s contents had come from.

  Leaving the bedroom, he put everything back in the pack and slung it over his shoulder. Before leaving, however, he first stopped in front of a modest bookshelf much smaller than the one containing his books on government conspiracy, the global elite, politics, and secret societies. These were all novels, mostly Stacey’s. He pulled one out after another, thumbing through the pages before tossing them over his shoulder and into a pile on the floor. None had messages in them.

  When he stepped outside, finally ready to revisit the address that belonged to his mother-in-law just a week ago, he heard an engine screaming and turned his head just in time to see a black sedan come speeding down the street. He saw the rear window slide down a few inches and a cylindrical object poke through the widening gap.

  It was a scene he’d seen in many movies, and given the downward turn his life had suddenly taken, there was no hesitating to get down. He dove to the ground as the silent bullets smacked into the door above him. Then, rolling behind a bush that stood to the side of the walkway, he withdrew the 9mm from his pants.

  It was too late. The sedan was gone.

  But then came a new sound echoing down the street and through the rain. The van was pulling away from the curb and coming toward him. Jumping to his feet, he jogged across the front yard, reckless fury raising the pistol and firing four times as the vehicle passed. It disappeared around the bend at the end of the street, four holes now lining its side.

  Jack sprinted to the car, tossed the gun on the passenger seat, and threw the Hyundai in reverse with smoking tires. Jamming the car into drive, after whipping it into the street, he noticed his neighbor, Steve, standing wide-eyed and slack-jawed, staring at him from his mailbox, newspaper in hand.

  Jack slammed on the gas and shot to the main road, but the van was nowhere to be seen.

  He swore and slammed the steering wheel over and over again.

  “What the hell is going on?” he screamed again.

  16

  Jack pulled into Viktoriya’s driveway, and his eyes darted suspiciously about a property that had once been so familiar to him. It seemed as if some malevolent force had for some reason taken an interest in his family, and now he was expecting it to materialize out from some other realm at any moment. When his phone sounded in his pants, it nearly propelled him over the steering wheel and through the windshield.

  “Hello?” he answered after wrestling the smart phone from his pocket.

  It was Agent Johnson.

  Jack took a deep breath. “I think you need to get over to my place. The front door’s unlocked. Just…check the garage.” He paused before adding, “It was self-defense.”

  A string of questions began dripping from the phone’s tiny speaker, but Jack didn’t have time for an interrogation right now. “Look, I have to meet someone, but I’ll call you as soon as I’m done. I think I do need your help.” He hung up.

  Taking the gun off the passenger seat, he opened the door and stepped into the rain. The signs were still there leaning against the house. He hadn’t dreamed that either—unless, of course, his waking up was part of the dream. He shrugged off the Sandman nonsense once more, finding it strange that the old folk tale’s suggestion was so persistent, and punched the sign’s phone number into his phone.

  Suddenly wary of how he might appear to a passerby, standing there on the side of an empty house in the rain, phone in one hand, gun in the other, he trotted back to the car. His clothes were soaked and clinging to him and chills were rattling through his body. Returning the pistol to the seat beside him and turning on the heat, he hit the send button on the cell.

  “Hello?” a man’s voice answered.

  “Hi, I’m looking for Viktoriya Arsov.”

  A pause before, “And how did you come by this number?”

  Jack didn’t see what would be lost by stating the truth, so he just said it. “Actually, this is her son-in-law. Her house is empty, and she isn’t answering her cell. I got this number from the sale signs. Can you tell me what’s going on?”

  “You’re her son-in-law, you say?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, Mr. Son-In-Law, how is it that you didn’t know she was moving, huh? Your wife is her daughter, no? You expect me to believe that she doesn’t know when her mother is moving? And if she does know this, then I have to wonder why she hasn’t told you, no?
How do I know you aren’t some crazy stalker person looking to cut Viki’s throat? How do I know she didn’t move to get away from you? You could be a serial killer, no?”

  “What? No. What the—”

  The accented man continued. “Well, I own the house. Your so-called ‘mother-in-law’ was only renting it from me.”

  The statement slapped him with surprise, its handprint lingering. “How long?” he stammered.

  “How long?”

  “Did she rent from you?”

  “Goodbye, Mr. Son-In-Law. I suggest you speak with—”

  “She’s dead,” he blurted.

  The man on the other line didn’t hang up, but silence occupied the line for a few seconds. “And when did this happen?” he finally asked.

  “A few days ago. We were on a cruise. She went overboard. Viktoriya was watching my son, Joseph, at our house. When I got home, they weren’t there. So I came here. Wherever she went, she took my son.”

  “Even if I did believe you were not a serial killer, I couldn’t help you anyway. I do not know where she went. I was going to sell the place, but now someone else is stepping up to rent.”

  “Did she give you notice?”

  “Yes. About one month.”

  “Thanks.” Then, in an attempt to validate his claim, he added, “The FBI may be in touch.” He tossed the phone on the seat, and it settled next to the gun. He stared past the windshield. Everything was incomprehensible, the rain, like the gathering clues, splashing off the glass and distorting his view.

  The cell rang again, cutting through the storm’s rhythmic beat tapping against the roof of the car.

  “Yeah?”

  It was Ivan. He was waiting for him.

  “I’ll be right there.”

  * * * *

  The 9mm left behind in the glove compartment, Jack splashed through the puddles that spotted the parking lot, not caring to spend the extra time avoiding them. When he opened the heavy glass door, the smoky smell of Starbucks’ strong coffee greeted him, as did a warm and cozy environment that was sure to be lost on someone just in a shootout. He spotted Ivan at a table in the back corner. No line of coffee vampires stood shouting out their blood orders in paragraphs, and he was able to order without delay. A bold venti seemed to be what he needed, and as he handed over a five-dollar bill, he couldn’t keep his hand from shaking.

  “Thanks,” he said to the friendly face handing him his drink. He took it to Ivan.

  “So what’s all this about?” Ivan asked before Jack could even sit down.

  Letting the backpack slip off his shoulder as he sat, Jack looked around the small shop. Only three other people were present, all positioned at tables and engrossed in their own private worlds. One was on a laptop, one was reading a paperback—which, Jack was relieved to see, was the newest King novel and not another episode from that Ryne Douglas Pearson series—and the last was hiding behind an opened newspaper. “Have they been here long?” he whispered.

  Ivan looked confused. “Before I got here.” He laughed nervously. “Jack, if this is about that GMO rice with the human DNA I told you about…”

  “It’s not.” He brought the backpack up and retrieved its contents, placing them on the table between them.

  “What’s this?” Ivan asked.

  “It’s all in Russian. Can you read them?”

  He picked up October’s Ghost and began flipping through it. “This is English, buddy.”

  Jack didn’t smile. Instead, he snatched the book and promptly opened to the scribbled message in back.

  Ivan read it. “‘What a wild idea this one is, my precious Anna! I truly do love these stories. We should take pen to paper ourselves one day!’” Ivan looked up. “Who’s Anna?”

  But Jack just pushed the Koontz book toward him. “Same spot.”

  After a furtive glance at his friend, Ivan read the note in The House of Thunder. “‘This one truly was thrilling. Oh, that it might be so! I should send the…’” his eyes bolted up.

  “What?” Jack asked, leaning against the table.

  “‘I should send the Kremlin this one, my love!’” he finished. “Jack, what the hell is this?”

  “There’s one more book.” He handed over Seventeen Moments of Spring.

  “A classic,” Ivan stated, taking the work in his hands.

  Jack took a gulp from his coffee. “What is it?” His hands were still shaking.

  “It’s a story set in 1945 about a Soviet spy operating in Nazi Germany. It’s considered by a lot of people to be the greatest Soviet spy novel ever written.”

  “Open it.”

  Ivan did as instructed, and had no trouble locating the glossy black and white picture. “You know him?”

  “No.”

  “Where did you get it?”

  “Found it in my house.” Jack impatiently signaled for his friend to get on with the interpreting.

  “Okay,” he remarked unsurely, squinting down at the note. “‘My dear Anna, I love you more than anything else. I hope you know that. Remember me always and know that you will always be in my heart. I wish our lot in life had been a better one, but at least I was able to share a time with you.’”

  Taking another sip, Jack turned his eyes to the parking lot. The rain was lashing the windows, drowning the light music coming down from the speakers above them.

  “The note in the back of this one,” Ivan said, pointing to the novel, “just says ‘hope you like this as much as I did.’”

  “And these.” Jack rested the stack of letters on the table.

  “Oh, come on, Jack. You want me to read all these to you?”

  “Just tell me what they are.”

  Ivan lifted his own coffee concoction to his lips before working pages from a random envelope. A few minutes passed in silence before he selected two more to read from.

  All of a sudden, Ivan looked uncomfortable, squirming awkwardly in his chair.

  “What?” Jack demanded.

  “They’re letters from a guy named Vadim to this Anna girl.”

  “What do they say? Why would Stacey keep them hidden in her closet?”

  “She had them hidden in her closet?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I have no idea. Maybe she’s holding them for a friend of hers.”

  “I don’t know any Anna. Are there any dates?”

  “2005 through 2006.”

  “The year before I met Stacey.”

  He looked down at the letter still in his hands and was about to say something, but apparently changed his mind. “Jack,” he said instead, “why don’t you just tell me what the hell is going on?”

  So he did. Everything from the cruise to Viktoriya’s landlord.

  Ivan looked incredulous. “You were just shot at outside your own house?” He was scanning the parking lot now, too.

  “It’s funny, you know what my first thought was with these books?” Jack asked.

  “What?”

  He began laughing. “That it was some Catcher in the Rye thing.”

  “You mean from Conspiracy Theory? The CIA programming Jerry to always need a copy?”

  Jack nodded. “Look what you’ve done to me. You got me thinking my wife is a Russian spy programmed to buy Soviet-themed novels.”

  But Ivan wasn’t laughing. After a deep breath and a moment to reevaluate the content of the letters in light of his friend’s story, he said, “The letters allude to something that the Vadim guy is involved in. Something he promises to find a way out of so that they can be together again.”

  Jack’s smile faded. “Vadim and Anna.”

  “They seem to be married. Now he never comes right out and says what it is he’s involved with, but it’s clear that it’s the reason they’re not together.”

  “Something like…”

  “Like SVR crap.”

  “SVR? As in Russian foreign intelligence?”

  Ivan ran a hand through his black hair, nodding. “As in the FSB’s Foreign Intellige
nce Service, yes.”

  “The FSB being—”

  “The new KGB.”

  Jack looked confused. “I thought…”

  “The KGB was disbanded in 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1995, it was restructured into Ministry of Security, Federal Service of Counter-Intelligence, and the Federal Security Service—or FSB. But in 1998, Yeltsin appointed Putin, who of course was KGB, to head up the FSB. When Putin became president in 2000, he began siphoning power back into the Intelligence Services, the FSB drawing all kinds of other departments beneath the umbrella of its own directive, many of them just old KGB departments renamed. They said the KGB was a state within a state, but the FSB, in many ways, has become the state. Ruthless and more powerful than the KGB ever was.”

  Slowly removing the lid from his cup, Jack began swirling its contents, staring into the blackness as if the key to understanding everything was resting on the bottom of the paper cup and he needed only to catch a glimpse of it in order to set everything in its proper place. When no shining sword rose from the coffee depths to choruses of revelation, however, he looked up to his Russian friend. “Is it possible that you could be overreacting?”

  Ivan’s slightly rounded face brightened into a smile, but the conviction in his brown eyes did not change. “It’s possible that your story tainted my objectivity. But masked men, missing family, guns and intrigue…” He shrugged. “It’s hard not to make the leap. A guy tried to burn down your house, Jack, and he had these books with him. I think it’s safe to say you’re in the middle of something.”

  “You think the guy in the photo is Vadim?”

  “I don’t know. I guess.”

  They sat in silence for a few minutes, Ivan letting Jack wrestle with the information.

  “So,” Jack finally began, “the man in my house was taking those…” he indicated the pile of letters and books on the table.

  “Or he was planting them.”

  “No. There wasn’t any evidence to suggest that the hole in the ceiling was recent. No drywall dust—”