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FOURTEEN
14
Blanche is driving her Mercedes.
The suspension is soft; it's like a waterbed on wheels.
"What do we know about Kayla Zelenyy?" Blanche asks.
"Kayla Zelenyy is a Georgian businesswoman and philanthropist and now the widow of Alexi Zelenyy. Last year the Sunday Times estimated her wealth at £650m, making her the 196th wealthiest person in the UK. She is the founder and President of the Zelenyy Foundation that supports education initiatives in Georgia. She has two daughters, Marina and Sasha. The death of her husband will spark one of the biggest estate battles ever. Kayla has extensive business and property interests in Georgia and across the rest of the world."
She raises her forefinger from the steering wheel. "This is the place."
We pull up outside a twelve-foot-high gate attached to a couple of pillars. A perimeter wall stretched around the estate on either side, topped with broken bottles that sprout from the concrete.
Th
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NO ONE ASKED FIFTEEN
15We emerge out of the drive and swing right, taking the back road. The Mercedes floats over the dips."Did you see Daler Kuzyaev's face? I thought he was going to have a heart attack.""He's frightened.""No shit, Sherlock? World War III?"Blanche begins listing the security measures, the cameras, motion sensors and alarms. Barklay could have come straight out of the SAS."Blanche, let me explain," I said after she had been talking non-stop for about ten minutes."I wish you would," she said sharply."Daler Kuzyaev is a financier who made his fortune in Moscow. He has been receiving death threats since lifting the lid on a $230 million tax fraud by corrupt Russian government officials last year."Heading back towards North London, I can't get a single question in my head:Who is next?"I need to go back and see Amber Chase," I say, "and I need to have another look around Robbie Chase's apartment again. I'
NO ONE ASKED SIXTEEN
16Blanche drives me home and offers to cook me something."That's probably not a great idea," I reply, but she's already opened the fridge. I'm embarrassed by the contents. Six bottles of Peroni, grated mature cheddar, parmesan, orange juice, sundried tomatoes and half a dozen eggs."She opens another cupboard and finds a lone onion and some sad-looking potatoes that are starting to sprout."This is going to be a challenge," she laughs."I could get a takeaway," I suggest.Blanche gathers up the meagre supplies and pauses to pull back her hair and loop a band around a ponytail.I open two beers and watch her cooking, and we make small talk about our likes and dislikes, involving politics, food, theatre, cinema, sport, and past relationships. The conversation becomes a little strained."I'm not very good at this," I say. "I've been on my own for a long while.""Me too," she replies, raising her bottle of beer and clinkin
NO ONE ASKED SEVENTEEN
17Katrin Cajthamlova's Paris studio is on swish Avenue Victor Hugo, a short walk from the Arc de Triomphe, in a building that houses the Icelandic embassy; a thickly-built man in a tightly-fitted suit opened the door with a false smile. He assumed Blanche and I looked at the haute-couture clothing and the impossibly high-heeled stilettos Cajthamlova designs and sold under her KC brand."They are press," Cajthamlova said when she spotted Blanche's notebook. She looked at the thickly-built man pleadingly and spoke with a note of panic in her voice. "They are here to talk about Daler Kuzyaev."The man walked briskly to the door and opened it. "She will say no more to you," he said curtly in French. "She's had problems with the press. It's bad for her business."I held up a hand in protest. "We are not the press, and we are investigating the death of Daler Kuzyaev, Robbie Chase, Igor Akinfeev and Alexis Zelenyy."Cajthamlova is well over 6 feet tall,
NO ONE ASKED EIGHTEEN
18If, for a contented mind, time is peace, then for a fevered one, it is the opposite. The nearly three hours or so it took us to return to London were close to torture. The more I thought about Paris, the more I wondered what was wrong.We cross-referenced everything Katrin Cajthamlova had told us and what she said to the press and social media. She never told the same story twice. The inconsistencies were acute, but they were there.But why?Was she scared?Or was she playing us?Once we had arrived at St. Pancras, Blanche, we intended to catch the Northern Line train from Kings Cross to Woodside Park and continue with our work over a Chinese Takeaway, but only as we walked from one mainline station to the other did I realise that we had a tail.I thought I had sensed it on the Eurostar, but it took me some time to be sure.We stopped at a paper shop, bought a paper without actually looking at it, tucked it under my arm, and
NO ONE ASKED NINETEEN
19Using her mobile phone at an internet café we found near Kings Cross, Blanche studiously researched Mariella Novotny, the reporter of the article in the newspaper. Fortunately, Novotny people are rare, with only a total of six of them having Facebook pages. Only one of those was a Mariella Novotny, who appeared to live in London, which was promising. Blanche went through Mariella's page, looking at all her posted photographs and noting down the names of those who had made any comments about them. Then, she read through her profile and made a list of those people she was following. But was this the right Mariella Novotny? According to Blanche, the clincher was tucked away in her likes. Way down at the bottom was the declaration of
NO ONE ASKED TWENTY
20Two detectives have turned up. One of them is Detective Chief Inspector Sandra Burton, and Inspector Brooks accompanies her; neither of them appears happy.A paramedic flushes out my eyes with distilled water while I sit on the back ramp of the ambulance, head tilted, while she tapes cotton wool over my left eye."You should see an eye specialist," she says. "It takes a week before the full damage is clear.""Permanent damage?""See the specialist."Behind her, fire hoses snake across the gleaming road and firefighters in reflective vests are mopping up.My left thigh corked; my knuckles scraped and raw. There are questions. Answers.The name Mariella Novotny is fresh in their minds after the article."Explain to me how come you ended up breaking into the house.""I came out of the pub and thought I saw a burglary in process.""Why didn't you call the police?" Burton asks."I don't have a mobile p
NO ONE ASKED TWENTY - ONE
21The most extraordinary faculty our minds possess is the ability to break apart and compartmentalise. It's how we juggle multiple demands and how we cope with pain and trauma. After my wife died, I saw a string of therapists and grief counsellors and psychologists. One of them suggested I take my memories, lock them in a chest using heavy chains and padlocks, and drop the trunk into the deepest part of the ocean, beneath millions of tons of water.I tried it for a while, but it didn't work. The memories are still with me. They are like wolves hunting me through the forest. I have hacked a clearing from the undergrowth and built a fire to keep them at bay, but I have to keep collecting wood, or the fire will burn down, and the wolves will creep closer.The newspaper arrived, and the headlines were full of the explosion—the cause given as a gas leak leading to journalist Mariella Novotny's untimely death. Other victims include a retired gay couple, a thirt
NO ONE ASKED TWENTY - TWO
22The tower block has internal stairs and an out of order lift that serves all levels.The entrance smells of disembowelled bin bags, cat piss and wet newspapers. Victoria Usheava lives on the third floor.I watch as twelve officers in body armour climb the stairs. Four more use the lift. Their choreographed movements seem overblown and unnecessary, considering the suspect has no history of violence.Police no longer knock on doors. Nowadays, they dress up in body armour and break the doors down with battering rams. But, again, privacy and personal freedom are not as important as the safety of the public. I understand the reasons, but I miss the good old days.The lead officer reached the flat and pressed his ear against the door. He turns and nods, and Detective Chief Inspector Sandra Burton acknowledges. A battering ram swings in an arc. The door disappears. The arresting group halts. A snarling Alsatian lurches at the closest policeman, who ste
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