A Bride of Allah

Chapter 8

August 31, 8:33 PM

Vacant Lot near a Railroad Line

Andrei turned away from the girl’s prostrate form on the car seat; his trembling fingers were having a hard time pulling a cigarette out of a crumpled pack. The lighter wouldn’t work, either. The car’s lighter would be handy right now, he thought, too bad I threw it away. Finally, the end of the cigarette caught a tiny lick of flame. Andrei pulled on the cigarette with delight.

The suicide bomber wailed covering her face with the palms of her hands. This typically female reaction to life’s troubles calmed Vlasov down. Or was it the strong tobacco in the cigarette? Lately, he smoked much more than he used to, and stronger stuff, too.

Between sobs, the girl moaned, “I don’t want to live, I don’t…”

Without turning, Andrei said through his teeth, “Shut it, will ya? I’m not going to give you to the cops. Just take off your belt and get lost.”

“I don’t want to live,” the girl kept saying, rubbing on her wet eyes.

“Okay, the railroad is over there. Go throw yourself under a train.”

“Suicide’s a sin,” the terrorist said earnestly and even stopped bawling. Her rounded eyes looked at Vlasov in amazement. How can anyone not understand this?

“Righteous, are you? So what was it you wanted to do by the metro station? What do you call that?”

The girl sat up, put the palms of her hands together, and started droning in a monotone, “I must die for my faith. I shall take the enemies of Allah with me; then I shall go to paradise. Paradise is a good place. There is no pain and no humiliation. There are flowers, divine fragrances, and everlasting happiness.”

“Exactly what enemies were you planning to destroy? Did you actually see those people by the metro station? Women with children, shopping for the start of the school year!”

“All infidels are enemies of Allah. Your women raise soldiers who kill our children.”

Andrei cringed; he’d heard those “songs” before.

“Soldiers are killing children. Yeah, sure, they’ve got no one else to fight, just children. What are you, a black widow?”

The girl suddenly stopped crying and said dejectedly, “No, I didn’t get a chance to be a wife.”

“Got it. Your guy fought against the federal forces, so he got wasted?”

“No, he wasn’t fighting.”

“Had to be a good man,” Vlasov winced sarcastically. “What happened to him?”

“He was killed in a raid.”

“Happens,” Andrei yawned ambivalently.

“What? Happens?” The girl, indignant, jumped out of the car. “They hit him with the butt of a rifle on the head and shot him like a dog. Prostrate, on the ground! He wasn’t even armed!”

Andrei flicked away the cigarette butt.

“Don’t you make a soldier angry when he’s got his finger on a trigger! He may be in a uniform, but he’s just a kid, and he pees himself when he walks into your courtyard, with hostile mugs all around! So you and your guy had to stick your highlander pride up your ass when you got raided. Got it?”

Andrei’s stare met the girl’s; flames of rage ran toward each other and snuffed out like a brush fire when one wave of fire meets another. Andrei looked down and said calmly, “Take off that belt.”

“I can’t,” the girl said desperately.

“What do you mean, can’t? Don’t make me angry!”

“It was put on so that I can’t take it off myself.”

Vlasov leaned forward. “Show me.”

The girl, ashamed, covered herself; her swarthy face reddened.

“Stop playing hard to get!” Andrei spread the girl’s clasped hands and opened her cardigan. His fingers carefully lifted up the loose blouse. On the girl’s slim waist, there was a weighty foil-wrapped bundle shaped into a wide belt. “Um, nice package.”

The girl pulled the blouse down, “Don’t look!”

“Hands off, okay? Don’t make me angry! I am not trying to play your lover.”

The girl closed her eyes in embarrassment and bit her lower lip; her face bore an expression of suffering.

“Take off your cardigan,” Andrei ordered.

The girl, ashamed, clasped her hands and shook her head no.

“Come on, take it off. No need to cover. I don’t care about your curves.”

“They tied it up from behind.”

“Okay, so turn around.”

The girl obediently took off her cardigan and leaned forward, her face to the car seat.

Andrei lifted up her blouse; on her back were large bruises.

“Ouch! That’s quite a beating you got by that metro station.” He looked closer; along with fresh bruises, there were older, yellow marks. “Where did you get those? Did our military do that? Did you try to fight for your fiancé? Special forces have hard boots.”

The girl sobbed silently; her body started shaking as she wept. Andrei bared her entire back. Under her fine skin, he could see the protrusions of her vertebrae; on both sides of her spine, there were traced of multiple beatings. She wasn’t wearing a bra. Andrei looked askance; he could see a part of her breast and on it, a dark bite mark.

The girl moved her elbow covering her breast; her shoulder blade lifted up on her back.

“What are you looking at? Untie it!” she hurried him rudely.

Andrei bent over the knots; his fingers couldn’t grab on the nylon cord.

“It’s tied fast. Can’t untie.” He pulled with his teeth, but soon gave up. “Looks like this belt wasn’t supposed to come off. Too bad I don’t have a knife. I’ll try a screwdriver. Hold on.”

He opened the trunk; for a while, tools clanged as he rummaged through them. Andrei came back with a small screwdriver. The girl faced him sitting up. Hardened expression on her face, she watched the lights of a commuter train speeding by. When the train’s rattle died down, she said tiredly, “It wasn’t yours.”

“What? I don’t get it.” Andrei inquired.

“It wasn’t the military who beat me up.”

“Who then?” Andrei looked at the girl, surprised.

There was no answer. The suicide bomber turned her back to him and shouted rudely, “Untie it!”

“What do you think I am doing? You better, um, wipe your face. You’ve got dry blood on your lips. I’ve got tissues between the front seats.”

Andrei made an effort and broke the cord in two places with his screwdriver. The belt came off. He weighed in his hand, ran his fingers over it.

“Solid preparation. About three kilos. They’ve cut up enough wire to cause mayhem! Explosives alone are about two kilos. You know what would be left of you? Maybe your head.” Andrei thought of the woman’s head he saw on a pavilion’s roof near Rizhskaya. “Girl, you would fly all the way up to heaven. With no help from God. Only you fiancé wouldn’t recognize you, I’m afraid.”

He looked for a place to toss the explosives, but put it in the trunk.

“I’ll dump it into the river. Otherwise, kids may find it. Or you, silly, change your mind and get that battery.”

He closed the trunk and looked at the girl standing next to the car.

“All right, goodbye, suicide bomber. Now you’re harmless. Maybe you’ll live a while longer, and I have to go.”

Chapter 9

August 31, 8:45 PM

Grigoriev

Oleg Alexandrovich Grigoriev sat behind the driver and thoughtfully looked trough the papers in his leather portfolio. He was no longer concerned about the slow driving. The colonel was more concerned about the troubling events of the last few days; steady movement was helping him concentrate.

Terrorists surfaced in Moscow again. True to their new custom, they were using the most monstrous and most effective weapon, female suicide bombers; someone even came up with a catchy moniker for them, brides of Allah. Had to be decent image makers at work.

How were they able to keep producing those “living bombs”? How much of a fanatic fighter for the illusory idea of independence did one have to be to sacrifice themselves in this barbarous way? Unless it’s something else altogether; fear, hatred, revenge? Perhaps every case had its own motive, but one way or another, the intelligence reports were being confirmed. Another batch of “brides of Allah” had been dropped into Moscow.

How many were there? Most likely, four. That’s what the source in Chechnya said. Unfortunately, he could provide no details, so there was no way to intercept. And now, the results.

First, there was an explosion on a bus stop on Kashirskoe Shosse, which at first received no attention because there were no casualties. That must have been a test of the explosive device. Then, there were horrible crashes of two passenger airplanes that departed from the Domodedovo airport with a brief interval between them.

By now, it was clear that both crashes were caused by onboard explosions. The nature of damage to the planes suggested the use of an explosive device without an outer shell filled with wire fragments, similar to those commonly used in suicide bombings.

And today, two suicide bombings near metro stations, one of which, unfortunately, had been successful.

Analyzing information at his disposal, Grigoriev was beginning to conclude that the same group of terrorists was behind all cases. The entirety of facts suggested that someone brought to Moscow four female suicide bombers. Two of them blew up the airplanes, the other two were supposed to blow up subway stations. One blew herself up on her way up to the Rizhskaya station, too scared of the police patrol to go inside; the other for whatever reason failed. Most likely, a faulty detonator or a dead battery. This kind of thing happened, and it was easy to fix.

But the terrorist escaped.

The colonel winced, thinking about a living bomb hiding in the city, ready to explode at any time in a public place. He wanted to call home and tell his family to stay inside. His wife, to be honest, would be home anyway, but his daughter was getting ready for her wedding, so she spent a lot of time in public places.

Grigoriev dialed the number of his daughter, Lena. “The subscriber you’re trying to reach is not answering or is unavailable,” a soulless voice informed him. This could mean anything, even that the person was already—

No, the colonel cut off the stream of troubling reasoning. Because of this job, the darkest thoughts get into his head. His daughter could simply be on the subway, where mobile communications don’t reach, Oleg Alexandrovich reassured himself. But immediately, there was an old man’s pain in his chest; his daughter was on the subway! Where the suicide bombers were headed.

He wanted to drop everything and go look for his daughter. But what kind of example would he set for his subordinates? He could not incite panic! For that, stupid journalists were more than enough. He must find and neutralize the suicide bomber.

Find and neutralize! Sounds good, but how?

His cell phone started vibrating in the sweaty palm of his head; Russian national anthem started playing. It was Lena’s joke; she downloaded the ringtone into his phone and set it up to ring when any of the co-workers were calling. So that had to be an office call.

“Oleg Alexandrovich, I have a description of the suicide bomber,” Yura Burkov was chattering excitedly.

“How did you manage that?”

“Interviewed strictly by the book! First the policeman who was on duty near the station, then other witnesses.”

“Are you sure they aren’t confused?”

“The policeman remembered a lot; the others concurred.”

“This is good. Get it to the office and give it to the press.”

“To the reporters?” Burkov asked shyly.

“Yes. And quickly.”

“What about secrecy?”

“Wrong case for that, Yura. Let’s make the opponent nervous; they’ll make a mistake or get scared and drop their plans.”

“She may go in hiding.”

“So be it. People’s lives are more important. And our job is to figure out where she is and find her there, wherever that might be.”

“Got it, Oleg Alexandrovich.”

“Now describe her.”

The colonel listened to the terrorist’s description and hung up.

This was a small success. This was how cases got cracked, step by step. Now his colleagues in the Northern Caucasus would have new information. When added to the previously available data, it might lead to finding out the Shahid’s name and known associations. The identities of the two airplane suicide bombers should already be established. They were caught on security cameras at the airport. Also known were the names under which they registered for the flight. The investigating team at Rizhskaya would likely dig up something, too. Forensics from the plain crashes had already come in, DNA analysis was being conducted.

All that would definitely provide some food for thought and help trace the remaining terrorist.

The colonel smiled for the first time today. This was an analytical problem of the kind he liked. He’d have something to do in his office at Lubyanka. Grigoriev snapped his portfolio shut and impatiently tapped the driver on the shoulder, “Sasha, step on it.”

Chapter 10

August 31, 8:59 PM

Lyublinskaya Street

Andrei Vlasov walked around the gloomy-looking girl and got behind the wheel. The sound of closing car door put some distance between him and an unneeded dangerous problem. The car made a three-point U-turn on the narrow lane and slowly drove over the bumps toward the asphalt. In the rearview mirror, Andrei could see the girl’s figure shrink.

She put her cardigan back on, adjusted her hair, and tied the headscarf. Then the twilight hid her from sight.

Good thing it was over, he sighed with relief. What had got into him? He just helped a terrorist escape retribution! The crowd would have torn her apart, and rightly so. He, the fool he was, had to intervene. He had to forget this stupid story as quickly as possible.

Andrei turned on the radio and immediately got a newscast.

“A detailed description of the suicide bomber who escaped from the Dmitrovskaya metro station has been released,” the newscaster was saying. “She appears to be twenty to twenty-five years old, approximately 170 centimeters tall, slender, of dark complexion, oval face of European type, arched eyebrows, brown eyes, the bridge of the nose narrow and straight, wide mouth, triangular chin, long black hair. She was wearing a brown skirt below the knee, a gray cardigan with blue geometric patterns, a light blouse; on her head, a green checkered headscarf. She is assisted by an accomplice, a young man. His description is still being finalized. Law enforcement authorities are asking anyone who has information about the terrorist to call 02.”

Not bad this time around, Andrei thought, surprised. He wouldn’t be able to give a better description of the girl himself. Except maybe add something about bruises on her back and that damned birthmark on her heck.

He didn’t like the sound of the word “accomplice’. What a role he’d been given! Wait a bit, and he’d be promoted to mastermind.

He was getting worried.

As soon as the damn Chechen shows her face in public, she’d be grabbed. The police are out in numbers, the description fits perfectly. If she is arrested, she would tell on me, Andrei kept reasoning. She definitely would. If she doesn’t want to, the pressure will do the trick. The security services can do that, they have a lot of experience. She’d cover the real masterminds to avoid her family getting hurt, but she’d tell on me for sure. What’s her reason to keep quiet about me? None. And if she remembered the car, I’ve got about five minutes left as a free man.

What a bind! How would I explain the idiotic act I pulled near that metro station? That was aiding and abetting terrorists, pure and simple.

Vlasov sighed heavily and cursed through his teeth.

I can’t leave her alone now! She’d sink herself and drag me down with her.

The Lada quietly driving along Lyublinskaya Street suddenly made a U-turn over the double solid, tires squealing, and sped back. Turning into the now-familiar alley, Andrei turned on the headlights. The high beams highlighted the figure of a girl wearing a long skirt standing on the side of the road. Without the thick belt under her clothes, she looked taller and more slender. But her headscarf made her look like nun in the dark.

Andrei drove up to her and braked. She apathetically continued to walk.

“Wait! Where are you going?” Vlasov shouted.

The girl, it seemed, didn’t notice him. Vlasov lowered a window and baked up the car.

“Where are you going to go now?” he asked in a calmer tone.

The girl looked at him ambivalently, but kept on walking without a word.

“To your people? Here in Moscow?”

The girl shook her head no.

“Good idea. Forget this foolishness and go home.”

The girl still walked barely shuffling her feet, while Andrei drove along.

“Do you have money for the trip?” He looked at her skeptically. “Nah, where would you get it? You were going on the longest trip, the no-ticket-required kind.”

The girl was still silent. Andrei lost his patience, stopped the car and jumped out.

“Wait, you!” He stood in her way, irritated. “At least take off your headscarf, stupid! Otherwise, the first cop you come across will grab you! Your description is already on the radio.”

She stared into his face in confusion. Andrei took her by the elbow and steered her toward the car. The limp female body offered no resistance.

“Okay, here’s the deal. We’re going to my place. You spend the night there. Tomorrow, I’ll get you new clothes and send you home.”

Andrei pushed in the door lock safety and closed the door on the girl’s side. When he got behind the wheel, he turned to her.

“Take of that damn headscarf, will ya?”

The narrow palm of her hand pulled the headscarf down to her knees. The girl shook her head; long black hair fell onto her shoulders.

Andrei said approvingly, “Now that’s better.”

The girl closed her eyes in exhaustion; he head fell back on the seat. Her pale lips opened slightly, and her chin made several jerking motions.

Chapter 11

August 31, 9:20 PM

Safe House

Aslan Kitkiev looked at the apartment number again. Everything was right; building 18, apartment 64. He remembered the address ever since he left for Moscow, but hasn’t been here yet. The apartment was a backup location to be used in the event of a partial failure of the operation. It had to have a supply of medication and food for two weeks, enough to sit around without going outside.

Aslan had a key, but he preferred to push the doorbell button and take two steps back. While the lock was clicking, the young man held his hand inside his coat. The palm of his hand was wrapped around the ribbed grip of his handgun.

The door was opened by a woman of about forty. A shock of unnaturally white hair framed her round face with prominent slightly crooked nose, straight black eyebrows, and thin brightly painted lips. At the roots, her hair was black for about a centimeter. Massive earrings pulled down her earlobes. She wore a variety of necklaces, rings, and bracelets. Her pink blouse accentuated not only her large breasts, but also the folds on her stomach.

The woman quickly glanced around and retreated into the apartment. Aslan quietly came in, looked into the only room and into the kitchen. Only after that his right hand left the inside of his coat.

“Where did you leave the car?” the woman asked.

“Don’t ask meaningless questions, Fatima! There are more important things now,” Aslan snapped and went into the bathroom.

“Nevertheless,” Fatima repeated her question when Aslan came out of the bathroom.

“Are you still harping on about the car? What a bore! The next street over, near the store.”

“You’ve finally learned the basics. Now tell me about the girl.”

Aslan hated to report to women. Although Fatima had been posted to Moscow years ago and conducted several operations here, it was he who was appointed the head of the group. She would have to report first. But the failure of his mission made Aslan more agreeable on the small stuff. In addition, no one else was there to see it.

He sloppily dropped into the only armchair (let the woman stand!) and briefly told her about what happened to Aiza near the metro station.

“Too bad they didn’t kick her to death!” Fatima barked.

“Since that didn’t happen, we have to leave!”

“Why?”

“Woman,” Aslan hissed, lowering his eyes to fat knees peeking out from under her skirt, “Aiza may already be captured and spilling her guts on us as we speak!”

“She doesn’t know about this place.”

“No, but she knows us!”

“What about the money?”

“We’ve done a lot already.”

“Especially you. We won’t get anything for blowing up that glass booth on Kashirskoe Shosse.”

“I know. But three brides out of four succeeded. The airplanes were my work! Or have you forgotten? Hundred fifty thousand bucks would be enough for now.”

“We can’t leave her alive! That’s bad example. Did she come by the old place?”

“No. Vakha is posted there. If she shows up, he’ll let me know.”

“Just don’t bring him here. Remember the rule? Only you can see me.”

“And the girls.”

“They don’t count. They are here today, gone tomorrow. Were it not for today’s mishap… Where could Aiza be?”

“I think she’s still with that guy.”

“Did you find out where he lives?”

“Yes.”

“Is he a cop?”

“No. A common idiot.”

“How do you know?”

“It’s reliable. Our source from the police headquarters came through.”

“That one?”

“Yeah,” Aslan smiled. “It was my idea to recruit him.”

“Show me his address on the map.”

Aslan opened a Moscow road atlas.

“He lives here, on Volgogradsky Prospekt. I wanted to go there, but you said to do nothing until I saw you.”

Fatima faltered, but finally said in a decisive tone, “No. We won’t stick our necks out at night. Too risky. We’ll go there in the morning, when everyone’s off to work.” She opened a curtain slightly and looked out the dark window. “I still hope the girl would push the button. Aiza wanted to die so badly.”

Aslan’s face spread in a greasy smile, “I tried my best.”

Fatima threw him a contemptuous look, but didn’t say anything. She found a remote control and turned on the small TV.

“Let’s hear the news. You’ll see my work, and maybe Aiza would show up, too.”

“What is she doesn’t?”

“The Russians have a saying, there’s no bad thing without a good thing. Tomorrow is September 1, the beginning of the school year. We’ll find her in the morning and send her to a school. I’ll up the dosage, and she’ll do what she must.”

“Are you still drawn to schools, teacher?”

“Why not?” Fatima lowered her voice. “I’ve discussed a school with you-know-who a while ago. And if tomorrow we – ”

“School; girls with bows,” Aslan smiled. “That would be way better than a metro station.”