Red Equinox

Chapter Twenty-Two

"Bald-headed cretin!"

"True, dear Comrade Sister Anya. I can't deny it."

"Pock-faced imbecile!"

"No doubt at all, Comrade Sister Anya. Your vision is as sharp as ever."

"And stop agreeing with me!" Her voice was so shrill that Gregori Zimyanin feared that the window panes in their apartment would shatter.

"Whatever you say, Comrade Sister..."

The cheap mug his wife held, crudely painted with the words A Happy Memory of Leningrad, shattered against the wall a few inches from his head, splinters showering him. He winced away from his wife's raging fury.

"That was a gift from old Uncle Fyodor," he protested. "He would be so upset to think that we didn't treasure his kind present to us."

"Fuck Uncle Fyodor!" she screamed.

"If you wish me to, Comrade Sister Anya, though I think the old man might vigorously resist my advances."

For a wonderful moment he thought that his wife was going to fall stricken to the threadbare carpet. A vein throbbed at her temple, and she actually slapped herself on the forehead in her anger.

With a valiant effort of will Anya controlled herself. She stood staring him down, hands on her heavy, peasant's hips, eyes narrowed deep in the sweating slabs of her face.

"Gregori Zimyanin."

"Good." He gently clapped the tips of his fingers together. "After barely six weeks you have mastered my name."

"Six of the worst weeks of any woman's life. They have worn me to a shadow."

Despite the cold anger that surged through his body, Zimyanin couldn't help smiling at his wife's words.

"A shadow. A shadow that weighs the same as a loaded sec wag, wouldn't you say, Comrade Sister Anya? Huh?"

"My mother warned me."

"Ah, yes, your mother. The prize sow of Terechevo! You should have heeded her warnings, my dear wife, should you not?"

Anya Zimyanin owned a polished .32-caliber blaster, thrown together in one of the small industrial units around the back of the Museum of the Peoples' Struggle. And he'd even taught her how to use it. His own 9 mm Makarov was in its holster, which hung on the back of the door. But he had a slim-bladed skinning knife sheathed at the small of his back.

The woman made an obscene gesture to her husband, using the little finger of her left hand, curving it as an indication of what she thought of his sexual prowess.

He replied in kind, carefully placing the tips of his middle fingers together as well as the tips of his thumbs, creating a large circle.

"Like a tunnel, dear Comrade Sister," he mocked.

"Better than a peeled shrimp, Comrade Brother Gregori."

It was stalemate, a Kiev Standoff as they called it in Russia.

He shook his head and turned away, intending to take a shower — if there was any warm water in their heater — when his wife delivered her parting salvo.

"You're a failure, husband, a failure and a shit-stinking coward." He turned to face her, eyes blank and emotionless. Anya took a clumsy, stumbling step away from him, holding up a hand to ward off a blow that hadn't even been threatened.

"Slut," he whispered, his voice so quiet it barely disturbed the dusty air of the apartment. "Slattern. Whore. Bitch. There are many things that your tongue can slide to that I can ignore. But not coward. No, not that, dear Anya."

"I did not... Please, husband..." Her mouth was working in terror, her face becoming distorted with her own fear. Anya had been pleased enough when the sec officer had appeared in her social circle, less than two months earlier, with a reputation for bravery against undesirable social elements in the far, far east. Despite his slightly odd appearance, he had a definite charisma, an aura of something different in the safe world of Moscow petty officialdom. She had set out to bed him and then wed him.

It had seemed a good idea at the time.

Not now.

A thin-bladed knife glittered in Zimyanin's long, strong fingers, held point upward.

"Not coward, wife."

"I beseech you, husband."

He nodded. "I have had many men — and women — beg to me." His eyes were gazing into some far-off time and place. Anya Zimyanin was more terrified than she had ever believed possible, knowing with an utter certainty that he was going to kill her.

"Anything?" she whispered, throat dry.

He paused. "What?"

"Anything."

"I don't hear you, Comrade Sister Anya. Say it again."

"Anything, Comrade Brother Gregori. I'll do anything if you don't cut me."

"I've been offered a lot of things, wife. But I've never been offered anything. Let's stand a while and think about that."

The dusk gathered strength outside their windows. Inside the apartment the husband and wife stood, six feet apart, time crawling past them. Zimyanin was calmer now, completely in control of himself and his surging tide of anger. He was certain now that he wouldn't butcher the large, ungainly woman in front of him.

Anya felt the tension slipping away and her breathing began to return to normal. But her husband checked it once more when he took a half step toward her and spoke.

"Anything?" She nodded cautiously, fearful that her neck might snap if she moved too vigorously.

"Good. My men will call here if there's any news of our three visitors, so we have plenty of time. You and I have all the time in the world, my dear Anya. We can make a start now."

"A start, husband?"

Gregori Zimyanin smiled at her, very patiently. "Go into the kitchen, Anya. Put a large pan of water on to boil. Bring me the potato peeler, the roll of strong cord, your best darning needles, the short scissors with the serrated edge. I have my own knife."

"Then?" Tears bunched at the corners of her eyes.

"Then you may come in here. Remove all of your clothes." He paused. "And kneel down just in front of me. And then we shall begin."

For Anya Zimyanin, the night was both long and memorable.