Marin Groza took off his robe and turned around. Bisera was shocked by the sight of his scarred body. It was covered with cruel welts. There was something in his expression that puzzled her, and when she realized what it was, she was even more perplexed. It was anguish. The man was in an enormous amount of pain. Why did he want to be whipped? She watched him as he walked over to a stool and sat on it.
“Hard,” he commanded. “Whip me very hard.”
“All right.” Bisera picked up the long leather whip. Sadomasochism was not new to her, but there was something different here that she did not understand. Well, it’s none of my business, Bisera thought. Take the money and run.
She raised the whip and cracked it down against his naked back.
“Harder,” he urged. “Harder.”
He flinched with pain as the tough leather beat against his skin. Once…and twice…and again…and again, harder and harder. The vision he had been waiting for came to him then. Scenes of his wife and his daughter being raped seared through his brain. It was a gang rape, and the laughing soldiers went from the woman to the child, their pants pulled down, waiting in line for their turn. Marin Groza strained against the stool as though bound to it. As the whip fell again and again he could hear the screams of his wife and daughter begging for mercy, choking on the men’s penises in their mouths, being raped and sodomized at the same time, until the blood started pouring out and their cries finally trailed off.
And Marin Groza groaned, “Harder!” And with each crack of the whip he felt the sharp blade of the knife tearing into his genitals, castrating him. He was having difficulty breathing. “Get—get—” His voice was a croak. His lungs felt paralyzed.
The girl stopped, holding the whip in midair. “Hey! Are you all right? I—?”
She watched as he toppled to the floor, his eyes open, staring at nothing.
Bisera screamed, “Help! Help!”
Lev Pasternak came running in, gun in hand. He saw the figure on the floor. “What happened?”
Bisera was hysterical. “He’s dead. He’s dead! I didn’t do anything. I just whipped him like he told me to. I swear!”
The doctor, who lived in the villa, came into the room within seconds. He looked at Marin Groza’s body, and bent down to examine him. The skin had turned blue and the muscles were rigid.
He picked up the whip and smelled it.
“What?”
“Damn! Curare. It’s an extract from a South American plant. The Incas used it on darts to kill their enemies. Within three minutes the entire nervous system is paralyzed.”
The two men stood there, staring helplessly at their dead leader.
The news of Marin Groza’s assassination was carried all over the world by satellite. Lev Pasternak was able to keep the sordid details away from the press. In Washington, D.C., the President had a meeting with Stanton Rogers.
“Who do you think’s behind it, Stan?”
“Either the Russians or Ionescu. In the end it comes to the same thing, doesn’t it? They didn’t want the status quo disturbed.”
“So we’ll be dealing with Ionescu. Very well. Let’s push the Mary Ashley appointment through as quickly as possible.”
“She’s on her way here, Paul. No problem.”
“Good.”
On hearing the news, Angel smiled. It happened sooner than I thought.
At ten P.M. the private phone rang and the Controller picked it up. “Hello.”
He heard the sound of Neusa Muñez’s guttural voice. “Angel saw this mornin’s paper. He say to deposit the money in his bank account.”
“Inform him that it will be taken care of immediately. And Miss Muñez, tell Angel how pleased I am. Also tell him that I may need him again very soon. Do you have a telephone number where I can reach you?”
There was a long pause, then: “I guess so.” She gave it to him.
“Fine. If Angel—”
The line went dead.
Damn the stupid hitch.
The money was deposited in the account in Zurich that morning, and one hour after it was received it was transferred to a Saudi Arabian bank in Geneva. A person can’t he too careful these days, Angel thought. The goddamned bankers will cheat you every chance they get.