The Doves of Ohanavank (38 page)

Every one of these organizations is in a constant struggle to raise funds to keep their operations running. Together, they have saved hundreds, if not thousands of lives. I, on the other hand, have been promised a budget which is probably larger than what these organizations work with, yet I have hesitated, and even now I waver about whether I can meet the challenge.

I make it my first order of business to visit these organizations. I start calling them and making appointments. It is not easy to explain who I am and why I’d like to visit them. Some are rightly particular whom they allow into their premises. They offer to meet me elsewhere first, to get acquainted, before inviting me to tour their home.

I’d love to take Anna with me on as many visits as her time allows. She may consider living in one of these places until we figure out her situation. Lucy’s reaction upon seeing her with her glasses on has not stopped worrying her.

I turn on the TV one more time before leaving. The First Channel no longer covers LeFreak. I flip though the other channels. Shant has a music show on, Kentron has an interview with a writer, but Armnews is doing a special feature on LeFreak. I watch with some interest as they talk about his business achievements, while the screen shows his mansion, and the camera moves around the fence that Avo had to paint. The announcer lists some of his charitable contributions, this time showing the church that he built. That’s another farce that any oligarch worth his salt cannot do without—building a church. Armenia must already have more churches and monasteries per person than any other country on earth, and they keep building new ones. Edik says if they want to spend on churches, their money would be better spent on renovating some of the old masterpieces.

I wait a few minutes for updates on the police investigation, but the program continues recounting LeFreak’s life story. I turn the TV off and leave.

I take the bus to Vartanants Street to look for paints and plaster for my room, and to talk to someone about installing a water heater and a new sink in the kitchen. After about an hour, I take the bus to the University.

Ahmed calls. I give him a brief report, both about Avo’s progress and about the shelter. The conversation is businesslike, like it was when he left. He does not call me
habibty
once. I am relieved, and yet feel an unusual sense of loss. It is unusual because the sense of loss is sweet. A past that no longer haunts can be warm and comforting.

“What do you think of ‘
Apastan
’?” I ask him. “It means ‘Sanctuary’ in Armenian.”

“Go for it. I’ll have Manoj come over to register it as a foreign-owned charity. But you have to prepare everything in advance. He won’t be able
to stay more than a day. Hire a lawyer. He’ll get paid as soon as we transfer the funds. And don’t delay finding a house.”

“I’ll do my best, Mr. Chairman.”

But Ahmed, typically, has already hung up.

Chapter Thirty-Two

A
ri knocks on Carla’s door and enters. She’s on the maroon sofa, her bare feet resting on the coffee table. She looks good: trim, self confident, not pretty but handsome in a strange way that Ari finds appealing. He has known her for a long time, since she was in her late teens. She had once asked Ari to talk to her father about letting her into the business. Ari had smiled, and then ignored her.

Now she sits there in a white blouse and black leather skirt, with a stone-cold expression. Her new role suits her. Ari wonders if he did the right thing by not talking to Sergei on her behalf, but he never liked interfering in other people’s family affairs. Besides, given the nature of their business, he knew that Sergei would throw him out. And yet, he watches as Carla walks into the role as if she had been in it all along. She is devious, intelligent, and she has a subconscious that works overtime on figuring out people long after her conscious mind rests.

After their first time together, Carla tells him about one of their henchmen whom she had asked to come over to see her.

“Something just didn’t seem right about him,” she tells Ari, who’s lying in bed wondering how on earth he could have done what he just did with the dead boss’s daughter. “It’s not that he was nervous,” she says casually, as if talking to an old classmate, “they all are nervous when I call them in the first time. There was something else in the way he talked and the way he looked at me, it was almost as if he was avoiding something. Anyway, I did not think of it again. When I woke up the next morning, I knew instantly that the man had turned. I could see him, as if I was actually in the room myself, taking money from LeFreak. I told Yuri to watch him, and sure enough, two days later he told me the man had turned.”

“What did you do?” asks Ari.

“I had him beaten till his mother could not recognize him, then let him go. Wasn’t worth the risk killing him.”

Ari might have assumed that she’d tell a story like that as a warning to him, but he didn’t. He believed that she was telling the truth.

She has slept with him twice. Ari was uncomfortable the first time, enjoyed the second time very much, and has been looking for a third time since, but she never called. Today he is happy that he had a reason to call and ask for a meeting.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she says, taking her feet off the coffee table and sitting up straight. “I was going to call you myself today. Sit down.”

Ari takes the seat next to the sofa.

“That was very well done, Ari. I’m sure you know that already.”

“Thank you.”

“I hope you have not told the others about our arrangement.”

“Of course not,” says Ari dryly. She shouldn’t need to ask him that.

Carla takes a thick envelope from the coffee table and hands it to him.

“That’s your first hundred thousand,” she says. “You’ll get another envelope like that in two weeks. Once again, the others cannot know that I made a separate deal with you.”

“You don’t need to either remind me or ask me again if I’ve told anyone.” His eyebrows twitch.

“Now, you said you had something to tell me?”

“Don’t trust Yuri.” Ari does not like to use a lot of words. The very process of talking is cumbersome to him.

“You have to tell me a little more than that,” says Carla. “Speak up, Ari, I know not to trust him already, but I want to know what you know.”

“He thinks you have no experience and we should not follow your every order. He says you’ll run the business into the ground.”

“That’s all?”

“He wanted me to shoot Samson too. He offered me half his fee to do it. He is angry that I didn’t.”

“That son of a bitch!” Carla, visibly angry, stands up and starts pacing the room. Ari watches her tight leather skirt, buttocks moving invitingly, but half his brain remembers Sergei. He used to get mad like that, except he’d scream till his face turned red. She stands in front of him, legs apart, hands on her waist, breasts heaving, and is about to throw a tantrum, when she controls herself and sits down.

“So,” she says with a calmer voice, “he wants to run his own operation behind my back. Now Ari, I want you to answer two questions for me. First, why did you refuse to do what he asked? Second, why did you decide to warn me about Yuri?”

Ari shrugs. “He’s not one of us,” he says, as calm and casual as one can be. “I don’t like him.”

“Is that the answer to both my questions?” she asks.

Ari shrugs and nods.

“And Samson?

“He is okay. Should be watched, but is okay.”

“And me?” she asks, “am I one of us?”

“You’re Sergei’s daughter,” says Ari, averting his eyes, “and I like you.” His eyebrows twitch.

“You like me, eh?” she says, enjoying making a man more than fifteen years her senior nervous. “We both need to calm our nerves a bit, and we have something to celebrate. How about a cognac?”

Ari nods.

She fills two snifters and returns to the sofa, crossing her legs. She puts them on the coffee table, and taps the space next to her. He gets up and sits next to her on the sofa.

“Here’s to a well executed mission,” she says.

“Thank you,” says Ari and takes a big gulp.

“And this,” she says raising her glass again, “is to a new friendship. You will not regret what you did today, Ari. Here’s to you.”

“Thank you,” he says again.

“Now, how about you show me exactly how much you like me?” she asks, standing up and taking his hand. Ari follows her to the bedroom, unable to keep his heart from racing.

Ari is past forty-seven and generally old fashioned and conservative. He has a wife, who knows very little about what he does, and two teenage boys. His tastes are simple, and he does not like to indulge in sexual activities that diverge from the essentials. He makes up for some of his prudishness by his strength and stamina, but still, neither his looks nor his performance do much for Carla. That is why she has not asked him back for so long. But today is a special day. She wants to seal his loyalty and their new alliance.

“You said Yuri was angry,” she says when he’s done. “What did he do?”

“He asked why I didn’t shoot Samson.” Carla is amazed at how non-descriptive the man can be.

“That’s it?”

“Yeah, but he was mad.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I could not get a good shot. He was way in the back of the room.”

“Was he way in the back of the room?”

“No.” And Ari and his eyebrows smile one of their rare smiles.

“How do you think I should deal with Yuri?” asks Carla, even though she has already made up her mind.

“He’ll be trouble. Get rid of him.” Ari wants to get up and get dressed, but finds the moment awkward.

“Get rid of him? How?”

“There is only one way to get rid of someone.” He gets out of bed. He finds it surprising that he feels shy walking naked in front of Carla. He starts to get dressed.

“There is no way to put him to good use?”

“Maybe there is, but he will always be trouble. Get rid of him.”

“I want to do this myself, but you will set things up for me.” She does not sound like she is making a request; this is a new order.

Ari nods. “Thanks for this,” he says patting the envelope. “I have to leave now. Let me know when you want me to set things up.”

Just when things were beginning to look up, Yuri finds himself with a deflated morale. Ari’s non-compliance is one thing. Maybe Samson was beyond his sights, as he says. But for two days now he and Hov have been waiting for an opportunity to snatch Anna, with no success. The ideal location and time is when she comes off the bus at night on her way home. Her building is in the outskirts of Yerevan and relatively isolated. She does not have to walk far from the bus stop to her building, just three blocks, but the street is badly lit and usually deserted. They can grab her in that stretch, throw her in the car and drive away. Before she can scream more than once, they can gag her. All other options that he has studied are much more problematic.

The problem is, the past two nights have been unusual. The first night the Swiss journalist drives her and the Galian girl and drops them at the entrance of their respective buildings. The second night, two other people get out of the bus with Anna, and walk in the same direction. This has never happened before as long as Yuri has had her under surveillance. Hov has to hang around in Yerevan for a third day to try again, but his absence is already causing him a lot of trouble back in Stepanavan, especially given the assassination of LeFreak.

He is tempted to have Hov quit his job and move to Yerevan to work for him, but Carla has not paid him his fifty thousand yet. That is another major source of frustration. She has been too busy to see him. Yuri is livid. How can the horny bitch be too busy? Doing what? LeFreak is dead, and she is too busy?

It is the third night that he and Hov stake out Anna. He has parked his Mercedes SUV around the corner from the bus stop, in a spot where there is no streetlight. Hov is with him. The bus comes around every half hour until nine o’clock. They cannot be sure when Anna will arrive, but they know she leaves work at seven, so it is unlikely that she’ll get there before
eight. Eight, eight-thirty and nine are the only real possibilities. They have arrived ten minutes before eight, just to be on the safe side. Waiting in the car with Hov is demeaning to Yuri. He considers himself so much higher in the chain of command that it is painful to sit there with him and make small talk. But he cannot leave this one to him alone. Not yet.