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2024-10-29 19:42:56Chapter 3
Although the difference between them was only ten years, Pustovalov called the colonel "you" and this had an extremely practical meaning. Pustovalov generally avoided other meanings when it came to work. In negotiations with Yasin, he did not want to attract too much attention, and the role of Basurov's assistant suited him perfectly.
The colonel smiled sourly.
- Do you want a take? I almost fell into a hole there.
- What hatch?
- In the woods. Maybe an abandoned bomb shelter? - Basurov jerked the zipper on his jacket and twisted his face, as if his stomach hurt badly. - And yet, on the other side of the car is a cop.
Pustovalov said nothing, but Basurov obviously expected a different reaction.
- What do you say?
Pustovalov shook his head.
“I didn’t look too hard, though. Maybe DPS?
- Not.
Basurov looked at Pustovalov and screwed up his eyes.
- Oh, Sanya. Get on the right path, you would have made a good military man. Did you even serve?
Instead of answering, Pustovalov, like a pilot, began to turn on the toggle switches above his head before takeoff.
- Well, yes, - Basurov grinned, - a trifle, go, poked, then something bigger. Were your parents drunks?
“I’m from an orphanage,” Pustovalov answered, starting the engine.
- What is it about. The Colonel sighed. “These are the only ones that get through. And on both sides, which is interesting.
- Which side are you on?
- You're joking, Sasha, but I can close you and your corrupt cops for a long time.
The colonel scratched his forehead and glanced at the flat chrome-plated block bolted to the side post, on which Pustovalov was flicking toggle switches.
- And what's that?
- Design improvements.
Do you think I'm completely stupid? I'm talking about the hand. Show me.
Pustovalov unfolded his hand. Two sharp parallel scars crossed the brush along the fingers and the bottom of the palm.
- From what?
- Saw blade.
– Manual? For metal?
Pustovalov nodded and narrowed his eyes, which made his huge eyes turn completely black.
The Colonel shook his head.
“You rotten people, whatever you say. I served nine years in the technical control department. There is no handmade canvas of this width. When, why is this. Did you climb into someone else's lair?
Pustovalov lifted the corner of his mouth - he already understood that Colonel Basurov would no longer be able to sit silently.
- Listen, about Yasin ...
- I will not address him by your criminal nicknames! Basurov got angry, exposing his excitement.
- It's a name, but he doesn't mind being called Jacob.
"It's not too late," a thought flashed through Pustovalov's head.
This time he looked seriously at Basurov. At the fifth second, the colonel gave up.
- Well. - He said in an undertone. - What are we to fear?
Pustovalov really wanted to lie, but, alas, this would only make things worse.
Elastic tanned skin stretched, revealing a row of even teeth and dimples on Pustovalov's cheeks.
Basurov gave a forced laugh.
“But it's just business. The commodity is money. Money is a commodity. Win-win, as they say.
Pustovalov shook his head.
- “Just business” is selling pasties or changing mixers for grandmothers. Look at it differently. Like a profession with its side effects.
“Listen, I wasn’t born yesterday,” the colonel fidgeted in his chair, “I didn’t want to hear from you.
“You know why you are here. Just do what you have to and you will be in chocolate. You wanted it.
The Colonel was silent. Its elongated profile set off the dim light of a lantern outside the window. Finally, he sighed, turned around and, looking into the glove compartment, said:
- Yes, they all went.
- That's better. Wipe their nose.
Somewhere in the distance, a siren howled piercingly. The black BMW X5 moved off powerfully, crossed the path of cat tracks, turned and after thirty meters ran into a tall automatic gate with a small brick checkpoint.
Pustovalov turned his head. In the light of the lantern, his bronzed face, framed by dark, wavy hair, looked particularly masculine. Basurov looked at him wearily, without lifting the back of his head from the headrest.
“Listen, about this…problem.
- I dont know. - Pustovalov said quickly and signaled.
Trust me, it will be easier for me.
“In fact, I don’t know,” Pustovalov repeated ingenuously, looking around the upper edge of the gate, crowned with a row of spikes made of thin reinforcement.
Pustovalov looked to the left. The concrete fence behind the checkpoint went into the darkness of the coppice, thick barbed wire coiled tightly over it. Above the gate, he noticed two cameras: one was aimed at the entrance, the second at the entrance to the checkpoint.
Pustovalov again regretted that he had not found the time to study the map of the area. He's been in too much of a hurry lately.
- I will give a signal when I understand it myself.
- Symbol?
- Well, yes, I will say, for example ... For example, "the first snow."
- First snow?
- The first snow is a code phrase. Is it coming?
“A child,” Basurov said unexpectedly, looking out the window.
- What?
- Your palm. Basurov turned his head and looked at Pustovalov. - You were a child.
Pustovalov looked down at his double-scarred right palm and clenched it into a fist.
***
Hinges creaked. A massive metal panel slid open to reveal a car-cluttered courtyard in front of the end of a four-story building.
Out of habit, Pustovalov was in no hurry to move in, as if he was waiting for an invitation.
A strong guard came out from behind the gate, from the side of the checkpoint. A couple of seconds later, his twin brother appeared on the left, half a head shorter, and waved his hand - they say drive in. In the bright xenon light, a molten ear flickered under the short haircut.
Pustovalov nodded and slowly set off. Upon entering, he immediately stopped the car, ignoring the bearded man, who vigorously shook his bearish hand in the direction of the dumpster.
Pustovalov looked around. The gates closed quickly. The brain is working as usual.
- Why are you? - Colonel Basurov gave his voice. His eyes sparkled in the darkness of the cabin.
They want us to park there.
- AND?
Instead of answering, Pustovalov jerked off abruptly. A powerful car rolled out into the middle of the yard, and, braking a millimeter from the chrome-plated Hummer, squeezed its back between two cars right in the middle of the site, leaving the front end in the roadway. He did all this in a matter of seconds. From the darkness under the visor of the vestibule, a figure in a coat separated.
- Sanya...
- Get out faster! - Pustovalov told him.
He was already getting out of the car. His movements took on an unexpected briskness.
The bearded guards approached.
The figure in the overcoat turned out to be an imposing man of medium height with sad, avoidant eyes and a curly, lamb-like head. Pustovalov expected to see such a manager in the office of a large company, and not at the Yasinsk slaughterhouse.
“Good evening,” the man addressed them in a trained voice, “move the car there, please.”
He pointed towards the container. There really was a lot of free space.
Instead of answering, Pustovalov put the key in his pocket. One of the bearded men stood in the way.
- Sanya, what's the matter? Basurov tensed up.
“Sorry, brother,” said Pustovalov, rounding the hood of the BMW, watching the bearded men out of the corner of his eye, “Yasin is waiting for us at twelve-thirty.
The man in the overcoat shook his head wearily.
- I understand, but…
No, friend, you don't understand. Pustovalov put his hands in his pockets and stood opposite the man. “Twelve-thirty is not just time. This is the beginning. The beginning of the auction, in which your boss will debut as a VIP participant. But if by the beginning of this important procedure we do not have time to present him, then ... well, boys, you know better what will happen to Yasin when, through your fault, he finds himself in a stupid position.
Basurov followed Pustovalov with interest. He had never seen his new partner so confident before. Pustovalova's facial expressions artistically echoed the tact and intonations of her voice. His big eyes shone, he bowed his head first to the left side, then to the right - he seemed to be playing a role, but this game seemed so natural that Basurov literally physically felt a wave of disarming charm.
The man looked at the bearded men and nodded slightly. They parted.
Pustovalov tapped his finger on the dial of his watch and headed towards the building. Basurov followed.
But before entering the building, Pustovalov stopped and looked to the right towards the dumpster.
The street LED hung on the wall behind the container, and the smooth line of the shadow outline almost connected with the blind area of the building. At the far end of this line, Pustovalov caught movement and, looking closely, noticed a small uneven shadow. Someone was crouching behind the container.
Pustovalov looked back at the yard.
A man with a sad face, along with bearded men, stood near his car.
“You will be met,” he shouted, thinking that Pustovalov did not know where to go.
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Only one person directly looked at her - a stern, gloomy old man from the gallery on the second floor. She had seen him before, I think in the ninth block - an ordinary mute worker with the right of free movement. He seemed to her out of his mind, but in his current “hawkish” look there was some kind of repulsive meaningfulness, without a hint not only of compassion, but even of curbed hatred. He looked at her just like a log, dissatisfied with the fact that the log was too thin and would not give the required warmth. There was no life in that look, only cold. This is how a dead man who managed to challenge life itself would look.However, all this, even the dumb old man, she saw fragmentarily, as in a painful dream, and then completely disappeared, only the darkness above her head remained - real or in her imagination. She stopped hearing conversations, footsteps, and the creak of the wheels of the gurney; only dull pops were heard in her head, reminiscent of explosions of a gas-air
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- Stole?Boris nodded, pointing to the picture.- On the day of the visit to Novikov, Colonel Basurov, a well-connected former member of the procurement commission of the Ministry of Defense, was with Pustovalov. Most likely, he played the role of an intermediary. He went missing that day. Since Pustovalov himself is a ghost and it is impossible to track his movements, we tracked Basurov's movements before he disappeared in the warehouse. And through him they came across a certain Dementiev. We interrogated him. Dementiev is a professional safecracker, it was he who helped Pustovalov steal the installation. He also said that there were two installations. That is, one working sample, and a spare case without filling - in fact, a dummy. But it looks like the real one. He confirmed that Pustovalov was going to sell the unit to Yasin after learning that he was behind her order on the black market. In addition to Basurov, another person went missing that day, previously in contact with Pus
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The car ran into a minibus lying on its side, Boris opened the door, leaned half out of the passenger compartment, exposing his haggard face to the frosty wind. There was a false peace here. Distant screams and shots were drowned out by unobtrusive music, but this tiny lane adjoining Frunzenskaya Embankment bore little resemblance to the island of former life. Rather, the coldness of the future blew from him - the very one that none of them would ever find. Desolation oozed from the planed poplars gathering darkness, from the mangled cars sprinkled with snow, forever left after yesterday's accident, from under the architraves of the shifted "stalinok", from the black windows of the buildings deprived of power supply.Boris looked at the piece of paper with the address and saw how it was distorted by a five-centimeter wall, carved from a dark space ice floe. With a crackling, cascading arc, the wall passed through Windman and, outlining the front facade of a two-story Chinese restauran
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He appeared on the bridge in a couple of minutes. Maurice, who was sitting under the window of a high tower, calmly rose and aimed his rifle at him:- One, two, three, and well, freeze! - He said cheerfully.Pustovalov obeyed and, without raising his head, said:“Using your man as bait?” Clever.“You used yours to get out too, didn’t you?”Pustovalov raised his head. Maurice saw through the eyepieces of the night vision device that Pustovalov was without night vision devices and knew that he only saw the outline of a dark silhouette in the window.- Komsomolskaya, - Maurice nodded with a smile, - now I understand why Daniker began to be so lucky before his death.- You're confusing me with someone else. I happened to be there.“Just a subway passenger?”- Exactly.Maurice burst out laughing and at that moment Pustovalov disappeared. He quickly figured out that he just jumped through a hole in the bridge.Still laughing, Maurice jumped lightly onto the bridge and called out:"You're br
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Coming up to him, Maurice found a crumpled fireman's heat-reflecting suit and smiled. We must pay tribute, although Maurice was not upset at all. He could have guessed right away that the trick with heat guns only made sense if you were already inside. It didn't matter now. Maurice knew that infrared sensors would not be a problem for him, like everything else that they had already prepared. He knew that the one they were waiting for would go very far, perhaps even manage to reach the very end. Of course, to the end, to which he is allowed to reach. That's why Maurice was here. And Maurice was rather upset if the one they were waiting for deceived his expectations.After walking a few more meters, Maurice saw a shining helmet with a visor-mirror in the bushes, and his smile grew wider. No, as long as he did not deceive his expectations.***Having reached the northern section of the bypass route, Kruchina quieted down and took a step. Moving along the trodden path, he soon came to two
