Page 116 of Capuleto
We were alone, and I didn’t waste any time. I knew what I was doing, and since I was the cause of the outage, fixing it wasn’t a challenge. However, I had to pretend it took me a bit to find the problem that would take me to the upper part of the house.
After fifteen minutes, Kulkov grew impatient.
“What’s the problem? Don’t you know how to fix it?”
“It’s not that simple. In a house like this, it could be several things. I need to rule out a few to pinpoint the source.” He must have picked up on my accent because the next thing he asked was about my origins.
“Where are you from?” He stretched his neck to observe my profile.
“Ukraine,” I replied, fiddling with one of the circuit breakers.
There were many Ukrainians settled in Spain, children taken in, especially for their summers, after the Chernobyl nuclear explosion.
“I thought you looked Russian.” I gave him a tight smile. Ukraine hadn’t been part of Russia since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. “Do you speak Russian?”
“I can get by. Excuse me, but I need to keep working if you don’t want all the food in your fridge to spoil.”
He gestured for me to continue. I could feel his eyes on the back of my neck.
“Which part of Ukraine?” I wasn’t sure if his questions were to catch me out, so I answered without hesitation.
“Pripyat. Do you know it?”
“I’ve never been, but I know it’s near where the accident happened.”
“That’s right, almost three kilometers away. My mother was pregnant with me at the time.”
“Well, I don’t see that you were born with two heads or any deformities. They said children were born with malformations.”
“That’s because you haven’t seen my foot; I’m missing all my toes, that’s why I limp. Excuse me, but I need to concentrate,” I cut him off. He went silent again. After five minutes and with a circuit breaker changed, I toggled it without success.
“Do you see where the problem is?”
“I’m trying, but I think it might be a bad connection. It rained a bit last night; maybe something near the roof got wet. I’d need to see the second floor.” He seemed uneasy. “Hey, if you don’t want me to go up, no problem, call someone else.”
“Net, the boss will be very angry if you don’t work a miracle soon. Let’s go up, I’ll accompany you.”
I crossed my fingers not to run into Yuri.
We were climbing the stairs when I saw a pair of shoes too expensive to belong to one of Korolev’s thugs. They shone on the top step, making me keep my head down.
“Who is this?” the voice questioned in a guttural tone.
“He’s a compatriot, from Ukraine, sent by the power company to fix the problem,” Kulkov added.
“I don’t care if he’s Polish. Get the power back on immediately, or I’ll kick your ass back to your country.” I didn’t move; men like Yuri wanted to intimidate, so the smartest move was to stay humble.
“Yes, sir, I’m on it,” I murmured meekly.
“You,” he growled, addressing his man. “Tell Ivan to prepare the car, I’m going out. Any news on R’s dog?” I tensed up hearing the nickname.
“He’s still in the ICU.” The ICU? Who was in the ICU? The possibility that it was Aleksa made my pulse race.
“Will he get out of there?” Yuri was trying not to give too much away, probably because he was talking in front of a stranger.
“Everything points to yes.” Okay, whoever was in serious condition was recovering.
“Then make sure someone brings him flowers when he’s moved to the ward. You know what to do.” They wanted to kill him; it was their subtle way of saying it. I had to warn Nikita as soon as I could.