“Pierre, you are here early today.”
That’s two more unusual things. One of the armed guards usually opens the door, and Marchuk Sr. doesn’t call me Pierre. On my first delivery day, he asked my name, converted it to Ukrainian, and announced that that was what I’d be called as long as I was in his home. He looks tired. Another sinking feeling in my stomach. Was he up all night because he got word about us? The weight of the phone still in my pocket assures me a little. My lifeline.
“Sorry, sir. I found extra work planting spring barley. I start today. I hope delivering breakfast early is not too much inconvenience.”
“Food deliverer, and now farmhand. A recent arrival to our village, and already you have two jobs, yes?”
“Yes, sir. We must take jobs when they are presented, since they are difficult to come by in my country.”
“In Tunisia, yes? And yet your Ukrainian is near perfect.”
I can’t help but wonder if that’s an observation or an indictment.
“Of course,” Marchuk Sr. continues, “you speak your native Arabic and French, but you also speak excellent Russian.”
“Russian and Ukrainian are so similar. And I have an affinity for languages, sir.”
I bet he’s thinking I don’t resemble most of the Tunisians who have made Ukraine, with its Swiss-cheese borders, part of their migration route into the European Union. He’d be right, since I’m a black guy from Georgia—the one in the United States, not the one just 1,500 kilometers from my current location—but until now, I never worried that Marchuk Sr. knew the difference. He puts his hand on my back as I step into the house, and I stiffen before realizing it isn’t an act of aggression, but the total opposite—very unlike the man. I’m still glad for the four inches of height and thirty pounds of muscle I have on him.
“I admire you, Pierre.”
The morning is full of surprises for both of us, though Marchuk Sr. doesn’t yet know about his. At least I hope he doesn’t.
“You are an industrious young man. My layabout son takes nothing seriously, is only concerned about spending my money on women and drink. He could learn something from you.”
All the curtains are drawn. As my eyes adjust to the darkness of the house, I look around the room for the lazy son, glad to find he isn’t here. Pavlo Marchuk Jr. doesn’t like me—or anyone else, as far as I can tell. He was only here for three days before he left, but that was all I needed to figure out he lived in a constant state of being pissed-off because his father made another man, not his only son and namesake, his second-in-command. Then, just this week, Marchuk Sr. changed his mind and gave Pavlo the job. That hasn’t changed Junior’s disposition one iota. Hearing his father praise even a lowly food deliverer as his better is just the kind of thing to set Pavlo off. I don’t need that today. I must stay focused on finding the hacker and getting the hell out while I still can. The clock is ticking.
I want to ask him what changed his mind about making his son second-in-command, considering his low view of Pavlo, but I’m not even supposed to know, or care, about his business. Instead I say, “Thank you, sir. I will just take this to the kitchen.”
I hold out the box of food, as though my reason might be different than it has been the last two weeks, but I shouldn’t have. The movement draws up my sleeves, exposing my wrists, along with the watch I don’t usually wear. A small thing to most, but probably not Marchuk. Before he went to the dark side, he spent twenty years in my line of work. That’s about twenty years longer than I have. Experience trumps youth and size nearly every time.
“No, not in the kitchen today,” he says, keeping his attention on the activity in front of the house. “They are busy in there … packing our things.”
More like whipping up a few Molotov cocktails for the road, but I play dumb.
“You’re leaving?”
“I have business abroad and must leave immediately.”
“Immediately, sir?”
Marchuk looks at me for a second, and I wonder if I seem a little too eager about his departure. He reaches into his pocket, and again I prepare for the worst. And again he surprises me, pulling out a wad of money—American dollars—and handing it to me.
“Yes, you will have to find a new second job, but don’t worry. It won’t be difficult for a hard worker like you, Petro,” he says, this time calling me by my Ukrainian name. “As soon as everything is ready, we must leave.”
I bet they must, now that Junior is back and the black ops teams of several pissed-off clients are right behind him.
“I will stay out of the way in the kitchen,” I say, hoping I don’t sound pushy.
“No. Leave it. The men can take breakfast there, in the dining room, if they want. They are too busy, anyway.”
I put the box of food where he directs me to, but this isn’t good. I need access to the kitchen. Marchuk’s office is on the other side of it, and I’m certain that’s where the hacker is. Marchuk is standing in the door, just as he was when I arrived, as though he’s still expecting someone who clearly isn’t the food runner. He’s distracted, but not so much that I can sneak into the kitchen without him noticing. I begin taking the food out of the box and placing it on the coffee table, but accidentally-on-purpose drop a large container of dumpling soup.
“Oh no, the rug! I will get a towel,” I say, running for the kitchen before Marchuk Sr. can stop me.
I make it to the swinging kitchen door, surprised he hasn’t followed. I’m even more surprised to find no one there. No bomb-making materials on the table, either. Just free-and-clear access to the office. But when I reach it, I’m disappointed to find the office doesn’t yield any clues, either. In fact, the room is completely empty. It has been stripped bare of computers, file cabinets, desks, everything. Not a single sticky note on the wall over the place where the computer monitor used to be. No impression left behind on a notepad that I could run a pencil over to reveal a clue. The hacker is gone.
Coming to the compound might have risked our operation—I’m definitely risking my life—and all for nothing.
But I don’t have time to feel fear or regret. Only thing left for me to do is get the hell out of here before it’s too late. As I pass through the kitchen, I grab a towel so I can at least make a show of cleaning up the soup.
I push open the swinging door at the very moment Marchuk Sr. yells out, “They are here!”
It takes my brain a second to wonder if “they” are friend or foe, and then another second to realize it doesn’t really matter. Marchuk has drawn his sidearm and pointed it into the yard, but my entry must throw him, because he turns to look at me.
“Petro, get down!”
Another second passes and the house is under attack, the staccato of AR-15 gunfire outside drowning out every sound except for the pinging of ammo ricocheting off every surface inside. Marchuk Sr. is now on the floor three feet inside the house, knocked that far back by the shot that has to have killed him instantly. I dive behind the concrete wall that separates the living and dining areas and speed-dial my boss. I can hear a volley of gunfire outside, most likely between the men loading the truck and whoever “they” are, but I suspect one of the Marchuk family’s clients has arrived before my team began our own incursion.
“The Marchuk compound is under fire,” I say the moment I hear her voice on the other end. “I don’t know who it is but—”
“Peter, where the hell are you?”
I’m afraid to tell her, but I’m also afraid of dying today, and the bullets have not stopped flying. “At the compound, in the dining room. I know I shouldn’t be, but I couldn’t leave without—hold on. They stopped firing for some reason.”