Even by Victor Kemp’s reduced standards, this was the most miserable holiday season imaginable. Over the past month, he and his associates had invested—no, wasted—time and effort cutting their ties with human traffickers. That meant canceling lucrative shipping contracts with very dangerous customers during a busy time of year. He brought his personal lawyer in to handle the tricky negotiations with clients and offer bribes or concessions where necessary. Kemp had little doubt other methods might also be needed.
He blamed Daniel for pushing him into transporting human cargo. He might have blamed himself for agreeing to such a scheme. He might have faulted himself for allowing his eldest son Paul to accompany him on his personal vendetta eighteen months earlier. He might have, except Victor Kemp wasn’t given to self-recrimination. Each of his sons made his choice.
The only rebuke he deserved was in not dealing more harshly with Daniel after the incident with the dead girl. Bad enough he had to deal with an infuriated gangster whose cargo had been lost. Worse, the debacle brought the company to the attention of several international agencies. He couldn’t be sure, but he couldn’t take chances. Everything Kemp had rebuilt as Francesco Guzman had been imperiled by Daniel’s carelessness.
What had Kemp done about it? A slap on the wrist in deference to the boy’s mother. Then Daniel had caused irreparable harm with his foolish plan to shoot the former assassin. At a party hosted by a member of Parliament and swarming with security! On the heels of the disaster at sea! How could any son of his be so stupid?
Now Daniel’s latest rash act promised potentially greater scrutiny. It put Suzanne Foster on notice. The law enforcement and intelligence agencies might not connect a headstrong, party-loving Brazilian to an Eastern European criminal entrepreneur presumed dead. Eventually, though, she would.
Victor Kemp knew when to cut his losses. Daniel had to go.
Dyukov called in a team of specialists who could quickly establish a series of false leads. They left evidence at Daniel’s flat of a hasty departure. They wiped his phone records and added charges to credit cards. Someone matching Daniel’s general description traveled to Dubai. Another lookalike boarded a plane for Auckland. A third left for Moscow under the name Daniel Grubman.
The efforts paid off. The hunt slowed while the hunters spun off in different directions.
Kemp wished he could find a way to get rid of Daniel’s date, the woman the young man escorted to the party. The trashy-looking girl from the posh family was all over the news, going on about her close relationship with the would-be killer. Dyukov advised against it. As he predicted, the media realized she knew almost nothing, not even that her escort had been carrying a gun. They moved on; her brief fling with fame evaporated.
Unfortunately, she’d put the name Guzman out to the public. Authorities were quoted as making headway in tracking down the gunman’s father.
That could never happen.
In the midst of a frenetic forty-eight hours, Kemp heard from Luisa. He’d been dreading her call, but there was no avoiding it. In Rio for last-minute business, she had made arrangements to spend the holidays with her lover and her son. As if they were a normal family. He thought it nonsense. Yet he couldn’t help but be touched by her desire to behave as other people did.
Though they often video-conferenced, she called this time from a prepaid cell phone. Her sultry voice was pinched with worry. They spoke in Portuguese.
“It’s all over the news, Victor. Is it true? Did Daniel shoot those people at the party?”
“It seems he did.”
“Why would he do such a thing?”
“If I had to guess, I’d say he believed he was doing me a favor, trying to kill the woman he holds responsible for both my injuries and his brother’s death. He obviously didn’t think it through. He missed and shot the woman’s son.” Kemp didn’t mention that Daniel had also shot his daughter, although the news wire had reported on the minor injury sustained by Lady Annabel Westcott. He hoped Luisa wouldn’t bring it up.
“He was trying to kill the woman you chased up to Wales? The former assassin, Susan Smith?”
“I think so.”
“How does he know about her?”
“Perhaps his brother told him.”
“And how did he get a gun?”
“Not from me. He undoubtedly made contacts from his time working on the docks.”
“That’s insane.”
“It was. It is. Trust me, Luisa, I would never in a thousand years condone, let alone recommend such an act.”
He could hear her breathing into the phone.
“I know that. But where is he now? Has he contacted you?”
How he hated to hold back from her. Luisa had been his mistress for nearly forty years. She bore him two sons, dealt with his long absences, and even, on occasion, used her considerable professional clout on his behalf. She put her career on hold and came to stay with him while he lay in agony recovering from the mishap that killed their oldest son. She found a reliable surrogate to cover Kemp’s interests on the board. All this she did without complaint.
Kemp supposed Luisa understood her remaining son’s foibles, perhaps better than Daniel himself. If anything, she was inclined to forgive, an inclination the father didn’t share. She understood that as well. At some point, she would draw her own conclusions about the fate of her youngest. Nothing would be gained by telling her everything in that moment.
“He’s probably in hiding.”
She didn’t respond.
“Luisa, I realize you planned to return to London. In light of these events, I think it’s better for you not to come here. There’s nothing you can do. I’m not even certain you ought to remain in Rio, although I leave that up to you. I doubt the authorities will connect you with Daniel Guzman. Your children were—are—named Paulo and João.” He silently berated himself for that slip.
A few seconds went by. Then Luisa spoke, her tone restrained.
“I will take care of things from my end.”
“I can help—”
“I don’t want your help.”
Once upon a time, he wouldn’t have permitted anyone to talk to him like that. No one refused Victor Kemp. He alone decided when someone said yes or no to him, with one exception. He had allowed the former assassin to leave, only to discover the magnitude of her deceit. Never again, he vowed.
Except this was Luisa. He had repaid her loyalty by causing her further distress. A smart woman, she must have sensed he was withholding information. A proud woman, she would take matters into her own hands. She was through with him. He knew it.
Yet he continued. “I will be moving out of this building and probably out of London altogether,” he told her. “I will task a realtor with the sale of the property. Not you; you don’t need the attention. Naturally, you’ll receive a portion of the commission. I’ll also be consolidating my business ventures. I may even sell a portion of them. Whatever interests you have will be honored.”
“Fine.” She sounded utterly neutral. They may as well have been concluding a business agreement.
He felt an unfamiliar pang. If she left, the humanizing qualities she brought to his life would disappear. Against his better judgment, he asked the question he had no right to ask. “Do you know where you will go?”
Silence.
He cleared his throat. “I trust you will contact me when you’ve settled. I’ll do the same.”
“Goodbye, Victor,” she said and disconnected the call.
~
Arkady Dyukov was not given to sentimentality. True, he practiced an old-world version of fidelity, but its roots were pragmatic rather than emotional. He couldn’t imagine betraying his boss. Nor did he ever question Kemp’s advancement of first one and then the other of his sons. They were polished, educated, and connected in ways a Russian roughneck, even one good at math, would never be. They were also blood, and that counted for much.
Paul had been an intelligent young man, dedicated and knowledgeable. He treated his employees with respect and his father with appropriate deference. Dyukov appreciated that. His loss had been a blow to Kemp and to the company.
Daniel turned out to be something else. Vain, spoiled, and shallow, he learned nothing from his six months working on London’s docks. Six months against a lifetime of privilege hadn’t been enough to toughen the boy up, let alone develop a sense of responsibility. Dyukov had tried to warn his boss. But Kemp had a soft spot for his wayward son. Even after Daniel endangered his father’s entire business, Kemp let him off with a demotion. Dyukov would have removed at least a finger or two or perhaps something lower down.
The shooting proved to be the last straw. Dyukov never doubted his boss would take the necessary steps. The trusted enforcer would have killed the son even without permission from the father.
As for getting rid of the corpse, Dyukov treated it as a pesky garbage disposal. He spoke with a few professionals he knew who were experts in such things. He persuaded mostly with American dollars, sometimes mixed in with a few threats and made arrangements through a sister shipping company. Lye worked as well as anything to dissolve tissue. A body in a Teflon-lined barrel could quickly be reduced to nothing more than a few bones. The container could be dumped in the middle of the ocean. Illegal but necessary, as were so many things Dyukov did for his employer.
He couldn’t say how he felt about the mistress’s apparent departure. Dyukov used women exclusively for sex. He never treated them roughly; he always paid them fairly. He had no need to do otherwise. He’d never been in any kind of relationship. He preferred to avoid emotional entanglements. His enjoyments ran to vodka, pirozhki, and the occasional wager on a race or sports event.
All in all, he was a simple man, familiar with the rules governing both fealty and authority. His only concern related to how Luisa’s exit might affect his boss.
Victor Kemp had married into London society. Dyukov saw that as a strategic move. Luisa Guzman exerted a different sort of pull. Perhaps she fed into Kemp’s vision of himself as a successful and wealthy businessman who could have whatever he wanted: fine clothes, fine homes, a beautiful mistress, and a socially prominent family. At some point, Kemp grew genuinely fond of the Latin woman. The arrival of two possible male heirs appealed to his ego in ways his massive empire could not. Or so Arkady Dyukov surmised.
Now that portion of Kemp’s life was gone. Dyukov could only hope the fallout wouldn’t affect business.
Even before Daniel’s latest and most disastrous blunder, Kemp ordered key alterations to the way he did business. He could not and would not touch human cargo ever again. Nonetheless, he chose to stay in shipping. He didn’t wish to waste the time and money he’d invested. Francesco Guzman had to retire, though. A thoroughly original identity had to then be established.
A new entity incorporated in Madagascar and headquartered in Melbourne purchased the four shipping companies previously owned by Senhor Guzman, along with their vessels, clients, and routes. The legal documents listed a South African named Johan Krüger as the owner. Krüger was known to be interested in resurrecting struggling maritime companies. The ships now flew new flags, carried new registrations, and used alternate shipping routes.
Kemp/Krüger named his newest company Monachus, the biological category belonging to the Mediterranean monk seal. An ancient and critically endangered species, the mammal survived hidden in caves underwater or tucked into rocky cliff sides. Kemp found the symbolism appropriate. He ordered his ships adorned with a silhouette of the rare animal.
Frederick Weber, Kemp’s personal attorney, led the legal team that handled the paperwork for the new company. Over the last decade, Weber had acted as Kemp’s personal consigliere. He’d been with the firm much longer. The German-born lawyer didn’t hesitate in reaching out when news of the shooting first made the news. He even volunteered to fly to London.
Dyukov didn’t care for the man. He resented Weber’s education, his opportunities and advantages, and especially his friendship with Kemp’s son, Paul. He found the man slippery, his easy grace masking a sense of entitlement. Though Arkady Dyukov wouldn’t admit it, he also viewed Kemp’s reliance on the lawyer as an impediment. Dyukov had come to believe that with Daniel’s demise and Luisa’s departure, he would hold the coveted position of favored son, blood or no. He intended to make that happen. No fancy German-born solicitor from New York would get in his way.
Dyukov had once caught Weber gazing at Paul Guzman with something akin to desire. The enforcer had no interest in whether the lawyer was gay. Unlike his boss, he cared nothing about anyone’s private life unless it interfered with work. This was something different because it involved Kemp’s beloved son.
He didn’t know how far it went or whether the apparent attraction had been mutual. With Paul dead, would it even matter? It most definitely would to Kemp. While Dyukov had no concrete evidence, he didn’t imagine he’d need much to provoke a reaction in his employer. He kept his impressions to himself. He might decide to act on them one day, but not yet.
Weber ended up remaining in New York. He and Kemp spoke twice a day by secure video feed or telephone line. Dyukov was included in these conversations, which reassured him as to his position within the hierarchy. Together, he and Weber promised Kemp’s most important clients the same level of service from the new company. Dyukov demonstrated his worth in other ways. Kemp’s new operations needed an intricate underground network of criminals, bribable officials, and dupes. Dyukov made sure the infrastructure continued to function effectively.
His sources let him know the Foster boy had survived. He reported to Kemp.
“And my daughter?”
“Superficial wound, exactly as reported. The bullet hit her elbow. She’ll be fine.”
“You took care of the other matter? I don’t need details.”
“Everything is taken care of.”
“Good.”
Relocation now became a priority. Kemp had already moved into a discreet boutique hotel across the Thames, preferring to be away from the East London building. Papers were burned, information downloaded to flash drives, laptops trashed, security systems disabled, and any recordings destroyed. Now the older man discussed more permanent solutions with both Dyukov and his lawyer.
The enforcer contained his irritation at Weber’s continued involvement. He couldn’t begrudge the other his dedication or his accomplishments. Through back channels, the attorney found a buyer for the Wapping building. He flew to London to conclude the transaction and remained a few days longer. The three men weighed various relocation considerations, including access to excellent medical help. Then Weber went back to New York.
Dyukov listened, observed, and weighed in from time to time. He appreciated that Kemp valued his opinion. The man’s recent losses—his son dead, his mistress gone—appeared to have stripped him clean, purged him of any concerns save building his empire. Kemp would never again entertain notions of legacy or family. His life now revolved strictly around his work. Dyukov presumed revenge would figure into future plans, but he couldn’t be sure. Kemp had fared worse than Suzanne Foster. Perhaps the obsession with the former assassin had played itself out. The man was first and foremost a businessman. Sometimes one had to cut one’s losses, regardless of the pain, and move on.
One thing he understood: wherever Victor Kemp went, Arkady Dyukov would also go. He’d always been Kemp’s most reliable man. Now he was more, raised up by virtue of circumstance, combined with his own patience and unswerving fidelity. Notwithstanding Weber’s talent as an attorney, he would never earn the degree of trust enjoyed by the ambitious Dyukov. The lieutenant intended to show Kemp how invaluable he could be. The thought pleased him.