Carpathian (38 page)

The next thing the woman knew was the sensation of falling, which came on her so fast that she thought she had blanked out momentarily. She hit the floor and then saw the second man’s large frame, the thug who had wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted her off the floor, come crashing down beside her.

Ryan moved far faster than he had ever moved before. Seeing Doc being assaulted and the woman grabbed was far more than Ryan’s mind could grasp at one time. The end result was that Jason Ryan reacted as he was taught by the colonel. The next move was to bring his hand up and into the thick wrist bone of the man holding Pete by the throat. The bent knuckles came up and smashed into the wrist of the mobster, separating the two halves of the bone. The man screamed in pain and shock and Golding slid to the floor gasping for air.

Gina tried to stand as she saw the two remaining men from the table charge toward the man she thought was called Mendenhall. She grimaced as she saw the small dark-haired man take a stance and as he did the brute whose wrist he had just shattered went to his knees holding his arm. Ryan kicked out with his new Gucci shoes and caught the mobster on the chin, sending him backward into one of the men coming to his rescue, knocking him over the blackjack table. Ryan readied himself for the fourth mobster to make his opening bid so Jason made ready to defend himself. His eyes widened though when the man pulled out a gun and brought it up toward the small naval aviator.

“Oh, shit,” Ryan said. “There always has to be one pussy in the crowd that brings a gun.” He waited for the bullet that would end his small adventure in the Carpathian Mountains.

Before the shot was fired, several men dressed in black suits swarmed the man with the gun and his three companions. One of the guards lifted the injured thug with the broken wrist to his feet and unceremoniously pushed him back.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen, this is only our first night together and we have this breaking out in the first few hours?” Dmitri Zallas said as he approached the gaming area with many of his security men in tow. Janos Vajic was with him and he hurriedly went to Gina and helped her to her feet. Zallas looked at Ryan for the longest time, even tilting his big head so he could get a better look at the man he didn’t recognize. Then the Russian host looked over at the injured man, who was holding his shattered wrist and glaring at Ryan. “Leno Kurkovich, I should have known,” Zallas said as he reached out and helped the man lean against the blackjack table. “This may be appropriate behavior in Krakow my friend, but we expect a little more restraint here at the Edge of the World.” He leaned in close so the Polish mobster could see his face. “Misbehave again, my friend, and you and your companions will be living at this magnificent resort permanently—am I understood?”

The large Polish mobster only glared at the much smaller Ryan as the Navy man finally relaxed. Jason Ryan, USN, reverted to his aviator spirit and his natural way of looking at things—he winked at the killer, whose eyes suddenly widened. The man started forward but was stopped by Zallas.

“Enough!” Zallas said as he gestured for his security men to remove the four troublemakers. “See to it our friend here makes it to the infirmary.” Zallas patted the injured man on the back. “We have an exceptional medical staff and we’ll get you fixed up in time for the gala grand opening of Castle Dracula.” His head tilted to the left and his men removed the four from the casino.

Ryan stooped down and helped a stunned Pete Golding to his feet while at the same time retrieving Gina’s ever-present clipboard.

“Damn, Doc, you’ve been hanging out with crazy Charlie Ellenshaw too much for your own good—his and your confrontational attitudes are out of control.” He slapped Pete on the back. “Just like your overwhelming sense of justice.”

“Thanks, Mr. Ryan,” Pete said as he pulled the wrinkled and damaged cravat from around his neck. “I thought that monster was going to rip my head from my shoulders.”

“I think that was the object lesson he was trying to impart to you, Doc.”

“Gentlemen, I don’t know what to say,” Gina said as she retrieved her clipboard from Ryan’s hand. “But thank you.”

“Yes, I must say I have never seen our friend Mr. Kurkovich subdued with such reckless abandon,” Zallas said as he stepped up to Ryan and Golding. “And with such skill.” The Russian looked from Ryan to the still shaken Golding. “Both of you, exceptional indeed.”

Ryan didn’t say anything as he turned to face the host of this freak show. Their eyes met and Ryan knew this man was used to getting what he wanted.

“If we had our own security teams in place—” Janos began.

“If we had your security in place our two heroes here would now be dead and bleeding all over my new carpet.” He turned and faced Janos Vajic after cutting him off. “And we can’t have that can we, Janos?”

Vajic gave Zallas a weary look and then placed his arm around the young waitress and his general manager and started to steer them toward the breezeway that led into the hotel. “No, we cannot.”

Ryan watched the exchange and determined that the balding partner and his manager, Gina, were not too fond of the Russian.

The woman turned around as she was led away and caught the attention of Ryan, who was watching her leave. She mouthed the words “
Thank you
.” Then Ryan mouthed the words,
“I’m not gay.”

Gina smiled as she was led away.

Zallas watched Ryan for the longest moment and then he too smiled: this small man wasn’t an associate of his or anyone else’s that was invited.

“Now, what can I do for two such exceptional gentlemen? I am deep in your debt. Especially since I don’t know either of you, and since this is my party I feel slighted somehow.”

Ryan looked over at Pete, who snagged another glass of champagne from a passing waitress to soothe his aching throat muscles, what was left of them anyway.

“Name is Jason Crubble.” He winced as he said his cover name. “My friend is Pete Postlewaite, and we’re here because we received an invitation.” He made a show of reaching into his coat pocket for the gilded and very much Europa-forged invite, but Zallas stayed his hand.

“That is not necessary, Mr. Crubble, not at all. If you’re here that means you were meant to share in this monumental achievement.” Zallas smiled as two gorgeous women came up and placed their arms around his waist, one on each side, and then they both eyed Jason appreciatively. “I am deeply in your debt, sirs, if you need anything.” He looked slightly to his left and then right at the two beautiful women at his side. “And I mean anything at all, you gentlemen have but to ask. I treat heroes with much respect.” He smiled as his eyes took in Pete Golding as he finished off another glass of champagne. “And from what I have seen, no ordinary heroes.”

As Zallas walked away he kept his eyes on the small Navy man and Jason knew they had blown their covers because of his stupidity and womanizing. Ryan saw one of the two women lag behind with a nodding glance from Dmitri Zallas as he did so. She stepped up to Ryan and took his arm and pursed her bright red lips. Ryan shook his head and removed her hand. He gestured toward Pete by tilting his head in the direction of the hotel, indicating it was time to leave. And then Ryan faced the woman Zallas had left for his enjoyment, but compared to the Romanian GM who had just been led away from the casino, this blonde would never be comparable to the dark-haired beauty.

“No thanks, beautiful, I’m gay.”

*   *   *

Dmitri Zallas saw that the small man had spurned his chance for an easy partnership in his room with the young female offered to him. He watched the two Americans leave and then he gestured for one of his bodyguards to join him.

“Yes, Mr. Zallas?”

“I want the interior minister to check out these two Americans and any other Western men and women I don’t recognize. I want complete workups on those two and any others I don’t recall having met before.”

“You suspect they are not here as your friends?” asked the big man.

Zallas laughed. “I have very few friends here.” He gestured at the roaming guests of the casino. “These are all business opportunities. But these two Americans, no, not friends, I suspect they are something much more.”

“Police?” the man asked. “Interpol?”

“Perhaps,” Zallas said, watching the two American men vanish into the breezeway. “Whoever they are, those two and anyone they converse with bear watching.”

*   *   *

Anya couldn’t move another step. She was carrying her nephew in both arms and had stumbled with the sleeping boy ten times in the past hour. She finally had to stop and rest.

It was a full five minutes later that Mikla came limping into their resting place. The giant wolf flopped to the ground, its massive chest heaving in and out in exhaustion. Anya reached out and felt the very tip of Mikla’s nose. It was warm and dry and that worried her. The Golia was feverish and there was nothing she could do until they reached home. She leaned back and was startled when she heard noise coming from in front of her. She raised her head up and scanned the darkness. She saw blazing lights in the distance and wondered just how far off course she was. She knew of no lights that bright within 150 miles of Patinas. She shook her head angrily as she realized they must be lost.

She lay down and placed a hand on Mikla. The wolf must have been desperately ill to get so lost on his way home. That was something Mikla was good at, finding his way anywhere he was sent and returning without fail—with the exception of their predicament at the moment.

Anya was so exhausted she couldn’t help it and closed her eyes thinking she would get just a couple of minutes of downtime. She went to sleep and for the next eight hours never realized that her home was only one mile distant and the lights she was seeing was the resort at the Edge of the World.

She had made it back home after nine long years, but for now she was too tired to care.

*   *   *

The six men sat at a large table in the very elegantly designed Roman Spring restaurant. The waitstaff was wondering just how many bottles of the $900 1995 Lafite Rothschild the strangely dressed men could drink. As it stood, the food and beverage manager had ordered a case out of San Francisco and another from a warehouse in France, so altogether the restaurant had eight bottles of the elite wine and six of them sat empty in front of the men. They had also dined on oysters, steaks, and a dozen other expensive entrées, most of which were picked up by the wait staff without so much as having been nibbled upon. They seemed to be content with Dmitri Zallas’s expensive and personal Lafite Rothschild. The large man with the silver-embroidered head scarf raised a hand for the waitress and indicated that they wanted another bottle of the expensive wine.

Marko watched as the staff started buzzing around knowing that Zallas had to be informed of the wine usage of his personal stock. The dark-haired man smirked because he knew the wine was a favorite of the man he had set up in business.

The wine steward arrived and opened the wine for the men but one of them removed the bottle from the steward’s hands after it was uncorked. Without waiting for it to breathe the large Gypsy started to sloppily pour the wine into their glasses.

Marko’s eyes were drawn to a couple who was being seated in the nearly empty Roman Spring restaurant. The man looked to be a little over six feet in height, which made the beautiful woman in the blue evening dress stand out that much more because of her small stature. His dark eyes watched as the man held out a chair for his more petite companion. His eyes studied the couple as they accepted their menus and listened to what the restaurant had to offer.

One of Marko’s companions held another glass of wine out for the prince of princes but immediately saw that Marko wasn’t there, at least in the mental sense. The men around the table knew the look. He was probing someone close by. Each man in turn quieted and placed his glass on the table. Each turned and looked in the direction of the two who had just been seated.

“Are you feeling something?” one of the men asked as he looked at the small woman across the way and was impressed by what he saw.

After a minute Marko blinked and then tried to focus once more on the man and at that exact moment the object of his concentrated thoughts looked up and the two men’s eyes met for the first time, and then the feeling slammed into the front of Marko’s brain like a sledgehammer. His eyes widened as the man’s secret opened up for Marko and for the first time in his life he was stunned at the feelings that came from someone he connected with. The man’s penetrating blue eyes met Marko’s brown ones and it was as if both men had an insight into the other. The stranger with the blue eyes raised a brow and then looked away. Marko did not, as his eyes were still wide. He was slowly feeling a knot grow in the pit of his stomach.

“Marko, you look as if you have seen Moses himself, what is it?” asked the man next to him, who removed the glass of wine from in front of Marko’s shaking hands.

“Let us leave this place,” was all Marko said as his eyes went from the man to the smiling woman. He watched her lightly touch the man’s hand from across the table and then saw her pull her hand away after initial contact as if it were forbidden somehow for the two to come into physical contact. “Go and I will meet you outside.” He looked at his men. “Go, brothers, I will join you soon.”

The men did as they were told and stood to leave without looking back at the man and woman who had frightened Marko—a man they had never seen shy away from trouble of any kind, and since they were witnessing this behavior for the first time they were unnerved by it. They started to move off toward the exit much to the relief of the waitstaff and the wine stewards, who couldn’t fathom how to begin explaining the missing wine to Zallas.

Marko sat alone at the table as his men filed out of the restaurant. The man and woman watched the Gypsy men exit.

As his men left as ordered, Marko continued to study the couple. The couple’s eyes never left each other, but he knew they were aware of everything happening around them. These two were not the same kind of people he had felt around him for most of the evening. The man and woman weren’t like Zallas and the other guests.