Chapter Twenty-Four

Four men stood outside Dmytro Zelenko’s house in the dark next to the massive door of his triple garage—Yalta Yuri, his two henchmen, and Dmytro himself. The view from the street was obscured by dense shrubbery. In the driveway were two parked cars—Tyler’s, and the dark van with tinted windows that had followed it back from Alba.

Dmytro was listening to Yuri, and looking worried. “Okay,” said Yuri, “now it’s your job to step up and explain to him how he can’t be ripping us off. You gotta show me you can run this business properly.”

“What about Vic?” said Dmytro.

Yuri shrugged. “He wasn’t there. But it’s okay. Just scare this guy and he’ll scare Vic.” He chuckled. “I make it easier for you.”

“So what do you want me to say?” said Dmytro.

“At first, you say nothing. Just maybe that you’re disappointed. Then you’re going to have to get physical. Silent and physical. After that, he’ll tell you what he’s been up to and apologize. I guarantee it.”

“I’ll start with the dogs,” said Dmytro.

“Oh, we had to take the Italian girl, too,” said Yuri.

“What!”

Yuri shrugged. “She was there while we were pushing him into his car. But no worries. We already control her. She won’t make any trouble. She makes trouble, her brother’s business is gone and she knows it. Maybe it’s good to let her know who she’s dealing with.”

———

Tyler and Flavia were on the other side of the garage door and could hear the men talking, but couldn’t make out what they were saying. They had been hustled inside this garage from the car after Tyler had endured a long, bumpy ride with his wrists duct-taped together, making it impossible for him to work the safety latch on the inside of the trunk or reach his phone. Flavia had been yanked out of the backseat.

In the few seconds when they had stood in the driveway, restrained by the two thugs, Tyler had ascertained they were in some dark suburb, and not far from the street. Another man, an older guy, had taken his phone, and asked Flavia for hers. She had handed it over from the purse hanging on her shoulder. Right after that, they’d been pushed deep into the garage, and the garage door had slid down.

“Where are we?” she said in a tiny voice.

“Did you see anything from the window?” he said.

“They made me lie down in the backseat.”

Tyler looked around. “We’re in somebody’s garage.” The lights were off but he could still see. There was a workbench with some tools on it, garden furniture, and a lawn mower. “Can you get this tape off my wrists?”

Flavia started silently picking at the tape. Tyler continued looking around. At the back of the garage, opposite the main door, was a regular door that looked like it led to a garden. And that’s where the dim light was coming from. There must be some kind of exterior porch light there. The door had a large pane of glass in it and some crisscrossed molding. Tyler looked over at the tools on the workbench. He saw an electric drill there and some hand tools, including a couple of hammers and a light-weight sledgehammer.

“They didn’t prepare this place to be some kind of a prison,” he whispered.

“They even gave me back my purse!” she said, hopefully, arranging it so the strap crossed her chest, the way Italian women often carry purses.

Tyler pointed to the workbench. “We can use those tools to get out of here through that door, even if it’s locked.” He wondered if the drill was charged up. It could be a pretty effective weapon. If they could get out that door to the garden, maybe he’d take it with him.

“This place isn’t far from the road,” said Flavia.

“So if we get out of here we’ll probably be near other houses,” said Tyler. “I can bust out that door and get help.”

“No! I’m coming, too,” said Flavia. “Don’t leave me alone here!”

She yanked off the last of the tape. “Are they just trying to scare us? Who are they?”

“Did they talk in the car?”

“Yes, but in Russian. And they made one phone call but that wasn’t in English either.”

“There were three of them?”

“That’s right. One sat in the back with me.”

Suddenly, the garage door began opening. Flavia and Tyler stared at it. After it had risen about two feet, they saw two Rottweilers and a pair of human legs. A second later, the opening was about three feet taller. Now they were looking at a portly guy who was holding on to two leashes. Tyler grabbed Flavia and pulled her into a dark corner of the garage.

“I guess you wonder why I brought you here,” said Dmytro.

“Mr. Zelenko?” said Flavia.

“I got no beef with you,” he said strolling purposefully toward them. “I got a beef with him.” He leaned over to the dogs and started whispering to them. Then he went over and grabbed Tyler and pulled him into the light. Suddenly, he looked astonished. “Shit!” he said, dropping the leashes and running back out. In another second, the door was being pulled back down.

The dogs began to growl. Tyler picked up Flavia and carried her to the workbench, where he sat her down. “Stay up there!” he said, grabbing the drill, while she scrambled into an upright position.

He pointed the drill at the more aggressive of the two dogs, and depressed the button. One of the dogs bared his teeth.

Meanwhile, Flavia was rummaging in her purse, and soon was frantically opening a Styrofoam clamshell box. It contained the snack she’d made for Tyler with tonight’s antipasti. Tyler could smell salami. She handed him a long, crusty roll. He dropped the drill and divided the roll in two. Each side was full of salami and cheese.

The dogs stopped growling and trotted over, still dangling their leashes. Soon, they were bolting their treats, wagging their tails and licking Tyler’s hand.

From outside the garage door, they heard Dmytro Zelenko’s voice. “You assholes!” he was shouting. “I swear to you that’s not Chip!”

“They think I’m Chip?” said Tyler.

Flavia was scrambling off the workbench. She pointed at his jacket. Tyler looked down. Even upside down, the laminated ­nametag pinned to the Elite Valet jacket he’d snagged from the booth right before he was jumped clearly read CHIP.

“Listen, Flavia,” said Tyler. “They’re confused. They’re arguing. This might be a good time to go out the back door!” He ran over to the door with its cottagey window. The dogs had finished bolting their sandwiches and came over and groveled at his feet. He ignored them and rattled the round doorknob. It seemed to be locked.

He went back to the workbench and grabbed the sledgehammer he had spotted earlier. And then, from outside, after hearing a bunch of Russian men screaming at each other, he heard a new voice. A woman’s voice.

The garage door was being raised again, with a groaning sound. Tyler and Flavia froze and stared at the door.

An old lady with a witchlike mane of gray hair stood there. She wore an old-fashioned pale blue flannel nightgown, and she was screaming in a Slavic language and gesturing wildly. From ­behind her they heard the voice of Dmytro Zelenko yell in English, “Fuck you. Now my mom is upset! Are you guys crazy!”

“Listen,” said Tyler, “I’m not Chip.”

The old lady stopped yelling.

“You have an issue with Chip, I don’t care,” Tyler went on. “We can just forget about this. I guess you guys just made an honest mistake.”

The old lady started yelling again and pointed at the dogs, then at the sledgehammer in Tyler’s hand. Then she flapped her hands at Tyler and Flavia. Tyler set the sledgehammer back down on the workbench. Now the old lady turned to her son and began berating him, ending with a sharp smack across his face. Yalta Yuri and his henchman flinched sympathetically.

“Okay,” said Tyler. “I guess we’ll just walk over to the car now and be on our way. Come on, Flavia.”

Dmytro Zelenko was now stroking his mother’s arm and speaking to her in soothing tones.

Flavia surprised Tyler by beginning to walk calmly out of the garage. Tyler walked out with her.

Dmytro turned to look at them. “Hurry up, just go!” he said.

“Are the keys in it?” asked Tyler, pointing to his car. The guy in the Oakland A’s shirt nodded.

Dmytro turned to Yalta Yuri. “Okay, it’s the wrong guy so let’s just forget about it. My mom is really upset.”

The old lady had now begun to sob.

“Yeah, whatever,” said Yuri.

“Can we please have our phones back?” said Flavia.

A few minutes later, after they had driven away and managed to find the entrance to the freeway, Flavia said, “I knew he’d let us go as soon as I saw that he was afraid of his mother.”

“Okay, now I’m calling Veronica,” said Tyler. “She can call the cops and tell them exactly where they can find these guys.”

“But it’s two in the morning!” said Flavia.

“Well, I can at least leave a message on her phone if she doesn’t pick up.”

Surprisingly, Veronica answered. Tyler gabbled on for a while about being abducted, and asked her if they should call the police.

“Listen,” said Veronica. “I can’t deal with this. I’m very upset right now. Muffin is really sick.”

“I have an address for the guys that abducted us,” said Tyler.

“The address will still be there tomorrow,” said Veronica. “We’ll regroup in the morning when the detectives will be available. I don’t want to explain all this to a 9-1-1 operator. And I don’t want to get up and go with you to make sure you don’t screw up when you talk to the cops. Muffin can’t be left alone.”

“Okay,” said Tyler.

“But don’t go home. Either of you. This whole thing sounds very weird. I don’t want those guys to track you down again. Why don’t you guys spend the night at your grandfather’s house in Ballard?”

When Tyler explained all this to Flavia, she said, “Can we go by that address for Captain Zhukov on the way there? It’s close to your grandfather’s house, right?”

———

Detective Dave Chin elbowed his dozing partner. The two men were parked in the shadows in a nondescript van in an alley behind the Zelenkos’ body shop.

“Hey,” said Chin. “I told you it was a good idea to keep an eye on this place. I had a clear sense these guys all had some unfinished business. Even though they were speaking Russian, when that guy from Santa Monica barked at the Zelenkos, both of them looked at their watches. I figured they had some kind of appointment, and knowing the kind of guys these are, I figured it might be under cover of darkness.”

His partner rubbed his eyes. “What’s happening? Is Volodya Zelenko still in there?”

“Uh-huh. And those three clowns from Cali who were there earlier today just dropped by. And they got the other Zelenko with them. Dmytro. Volodya must have been waiting for them. I seriously doubt he just happens to be in there beating out a door panel at this hour.”

The detectives fell silent and now observed five men—the two Zelenkos and the three visitors who’d been there earlier in the day—heading out to a large black Cadillac Escalade SUV behind the shop. There was the sound of crunching gravel in the alley and car doors slamming.

Detective Chin started the engine. “Get on the radio, will you? I don’t know what these guys are up to, but if there’s any reason to stop any of them, I’d like to have some uniformed backup.”

———

Captain Zhukov’s address was at the end of a short gravel street that dead-ended at the water’s edge in Ballard, tucked behind an upscale gym, all chrome and glass, that catered to the affluent young singles who had been moving into the neighborhood. The newcomers lived in the massive condominiums that had replaced a lot of the old blue-collar businesses and little wood-frame houses where Ballard fishermen and carpenters had lived a hundred years ago.

Tyler hadn’t known what to expect, but there had to be some mistake. There wasn’t anything here. He pulled over and killed the engine and the lights. In front of them was a dusty collection of the kinds of plants that spring up in neglected corners of Seattle—horsetails, Scotch broom, and Himalayan blackberry—and then a chain-link fence with some morning glory working its way upward. And there was a big gate in the fence with a thick chain wrapped around it a few times.

At the entrance to the fenced-in area was a small building made of concrete blocks. Faded painted letters in pale green read SWANSON DRY DOCK COMPANY.

Behind the fence, across an expanse of asphalt, loomed a giant ship, painted white with touches of rust here and there. It was many stories high, with metal steps like old-fashioned fire escapes zigzagging up the multiple decks.

“That’s a factory ship,” said Flavia. “They go fishing up in Alaska and gut and process and freeze the fish on board.”

“Maybe someone named Zhukov is the captain of this trawler,” said Tyler. “But it seems kind of weird for a sea captain to be moonlighting as a mafia chieftain. Maybe Grandpa got the address wrong. Or I maybe I entered it wrong in my map search.” He took out his phone and started searching again.

“Wait,” said Flavia. “Can you read those Russian letters? Look!” She pointed to the side of the vessel, where the vessel’s name was painted in Cyrillic letters.

Tyler changed his search to one for an application that converted phrases in the Roman alphabet to Cyrillic. He found one and entered “Captain Zhukov,” then held up the phone to compare the results to the side of the ship. It was a near match. Tyler figured the Russian word for captain was slightly different. But the Zhukov part was identical.

“Wow! Captain Zhukov is a ship, not a person,” he said. Come to think of it, Grandpa had said “go check her out” when he’d called.

Just then they heard another car pulling up alongside them.

“Duck,” said Tyler, sliding down in his seat and putting his hand on Flavia’s shoulder and pushing her down. Cautiously, he peeked out the window into the dark. The car had stopped right next to his. It was a Toyota.

Someone got out of the car. A man with a lit cigarette. Tyler lowered his head quickly as he walked right next to Flavia’s window and flicked the cigarette at it. Tyler could see her scrunched down, her arms wrapped around her knees. She was staring up at him with wide eyes.

The man unwrapped the chain on the gate. Strangely, there wasn’t a padlock on it. And whoever this was now opening the gate appeared to be wearing an Elite Valet windbreaker.