"No Survivors aka The Survivor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cain Tom)

5

“Good afternoon, Monsieur Marchand,” Alix said, making a conscious effort to stand up straight and smile as cheerfully as her stress and fatigue would allow.

She spoke French. That at least had been one positive achievement over the past few months. She had a third language to add to her native Russian and the English she’d been taught by the KGB a decade ago. The same agency had trained her to charm any man she wanted, but Marchand seemed resolutely immune to what was left of her old powers. He was the clinic’s finance director. His sole concern was the bottom line.

“Could you spare me a moment, Mademoiselle Petrova?” he said, managing to combine an obsequious, oily politeness with an unmistakable hint of menace. He waited until she had followed him out into the corridor, out of Carver’s hearing, then spoke again.

“It’s about Monsieur Carver’s account. The payment for last month will soon be overdue. I trust there is not a problem. You should be aware that if patients are unable to settle their accounts, it is the clinic’s policy to terminate their treatment.”

“I quite understand,” said Alix. “There is no problem. The account will be settled.”

Marchand gave a curt nod of acknowledgment and farewell. Alix watched him walk away down the corridor. Only when he had turned the corner and was out of sight did she go back into Carver’s room and slump down in the visitor’s chair, holding her head in her hands.

Somewhere Carver had a fortune, the profits of his deadly trade, banked in an anonymous offshore account, or stashed in safe-deposit boxes and private hiding places. The money would keep Marchand satisfied for years, but only Carver had ever known where it was. And now he had no clue that it even existed.

He had at least been blessed by one benefactor. Thor Larsson, the tall, skinny, dreadlocked Norwegian who was Carver’s technician, computer expert, and closest friend, had given Alix access to Carver’s flat. Using money paid to him by Carver, he had done his best to meet the sanatorium bills. But now that money was running out and Larsson had nothing more to give.

Alix would happily have paid her share, but she had no formal identification papers and no work or residency permits, and thus no way of getting a respectable job. In any case, she spent every day at Carver’s side. All she’d been able to find was a late-night waitress gig in a sleazy bierkeller, whose owner was only too happy to turn a blind eye to Swiss employment law if he could hire pliable, immigrant women on the cheap. As he liked to remind his girls, Switzerland had no minimum wage. Alix just about made ends meet from her tips, but she couldn’t hope to pay Carver’s bills as well. Not if she stuck to waitressing.