April 31, 1996
Wednesday
12:00 p.m.

I pried my eyes open at noon, crawled out onto the deck. Zhorik rushed past in a white suit and a captain’s cap. Then back the other way.

Zhora was not just bustling, he was swearing too. In short – swearing at Jeff, who had sent my business clothes to Moscow. I had arrived on the yacht as if to Pioneer camp: in little t-shirts and underpants. What were they to dress me in so I didn’t look like an Octobrist? Today we were expecting elk of regional level, not yesterday’s deer from the Pokrovsky market.

I put on Burberry shorts and a Lacoste polo and went up to the top deck. Zhora confirmed: collective-farm luxury, pure and simple. It’ll do!

A launch moored at the yacht’s stern and unloaded a group of men in stern-looking jackets from Mosshveya.

Nicole came over to me. Over the course of the nightly acrobatics I had sorted the girls out. Nicole smelled of soap with a strawberry flavor. Chantal and Toma differed in the tactility of their tits. Chantal had a confident size four, pleasant to take in the hand and squeeze. Practically: get ink and weep! Toma had a four as well, but plastic, pleasing to the eye, not the palm.

We went down to the lower deck and became the center of attention. I waved: hey, everyone! Nicole steered me toward a chair off to the side with a shove to the ass.

Sitting down, I watched the men’s astonished faces:

• envious of my beach look in shorts;
• jaws dislocated, drooling, as they watched Nicole peck the top of my head and walk off.

Zhorik savored the sight. Announced:

– So, gentlemen. Roman Viktorovich might take an interest in your project, if you give us specifics.

The men exchanged glances. One pulled out some papers, a second half-rose and snatched them away, the third and fourth exchanged glances. The fifth was staring at me. His face looked familiar. From where?

Zhorik prompted:

– Roman Viktorovich, this is Dmitry Sevastyanovich, son of Sevastyan Dmitrievich.

It never rains but it pours. Who are these people? Though wait! It seems I partied with Dimas at «Uriah Heep» six months ago. We brought the band to Verkhnetarakanskaya Province to please the governor. Or rather to please the governor’s son. Now the son is here. And what is that to me?

I nodded to Dima:

– Bro! Hey! How’s it going?

Dimas saluted back:

– Solid! Bro! 

The men exchanged glances. Zhorik laid it out:

– Your stake in the project is thirteen million. By the way, wouldn’t you like to buy out the whole project? I could arrange a discount. A hundred and twenty million. No? Pity. A real pity. It all started out so well, so cheerfully. Yes, those were golden times, but right now Roman Viktorovich needs working capital for expansion back in Russia. That’s the times we live in. Some people move capital out of Russia, others move it in. If your direction is toward Europe, we’re happy to swap places.

The most distinguished of the men, the spitting image of Boris Fyodorov, cleared his throat:

– Let’s get into the details. What we’re interested in is our zone of responsibility. What do we back it with? 

Zhora shifted his gaze to the ceiling, to the distinguished-looking man, to me:

 – Looks like Roman Viktorovich is wasting his time. We’ll sort out the details without him.

No need to tell me twice. I got up and laid it out:

– Fellas, dig around on your own. I’ve got other plans.

I stepped out onto the top deck, grabbed Nicole, and hauled her off to the cabin past the salon’s portholes. An hour later the bed got crowded. Chantal and Toma turned up wherever Nicole didn’t reach.

The next day the same thing happened with another group of stern men. Then a third, a fourth, a fifth… They stormed our yacht like zombies.

I’d come out in polo and shorts, nod, take my seat in the salon, listen to the pitches, then retreat for a nap, leaving the women from the deck to tan themselves black. No strength left for daytime sex, it all went into the nightly marathons. I wanted to sleep around the clock.

Zhorik finally explained the point of my being on the yacht on May twelfth, as he put me on a flight to Moscow:

– Your money’s coming back.

– What money?

– Ah, you poor sap. How much money did you hand over to those idiots?

– Didn’t hand these guys anything. Dimas’s dad is out of his mind. I settled things through the prosecutor.

– Fine, how much did you hand him?

– A lot.

– Don’t want it back?

– Wouldn’t mind.

– Then relax. Some other devils are working the refund out of your idiots. And we’re working these ones.

– So what do you need me for?

– Every crook in Russia thinks he’s a genius of the scheme. They’ll draw it up so slick that an investor pours in millions and doesn’t even notice how he ends up with his ass bare. 

– And?…

 – We’re the investors, they’re the geniuses who need convincing there’s no con on our end: clean papers, millions in the accounts, bulldozers standing by. They showed up and are waiting for the scheme to kick in with free millions out of thin air. But this isn’t Russia. The scheme’s never going to start.

 – Why not?

 – Hell if I know. Just gotta get them sucked into the project, and it’ll sort itself out. French bureaucracy has never once let us down.