Prevailing Years
Russia 2007
The sun was slowly
disappearing into Moscow’s cloudy early evening skies with a threatening hint
of rainfall, it was a chilly cold April evening Ilona thought as she pulled
away from the large window overlooking the banking district of the city as the
wine bars and beautiful restaurants started to come alive with a rich blend of
successful lawyers, bankers, government officials, lobbyists and investors
alike. She caught a glimpse of her best assets in the long oval mirror with her
nipples almost an inch long ever seeking out attention in spite of any type of
bra she might be wearing and observed that her ass was beginning to contend
with her breasts for attention, great she thought welcoming the competition as
she let slip from her delicately broad shoulders the silk negligee and
stretched her long legs into the waiting bath tub enjoying the warmth the bath
offered while wondering how she would accomplish what Ivan had insisted she do.
Shame she thought probing her mole’s mind how she would approach solving the
problem and still remain in contention for one of Russia’s most successful bachelors
ensuring a lifetime of luxury, not that she would lose any sleep as she was the
toast of Moscow’s elite with a master’s degree in maritime finance and six
years experience as head of corporate banking in one of Russia’s most powerful
banks with a network list of connections as long as her Russian legs. At
precisely six feet tall she barely got away with wearing high heel shoes
without intimidating most of the egoistic assholes in various circles of
Russia’s topmost rich and powerful class. The phone startled her out of her
thoughts as she climbed hurriedly out of the bath dripping water as she reached
for the phone, “Evening Ms Reznik”, your car is here. A female voice was saying
as she got the phone to her ears, “thanks Vera, kindly tell the chauffeur l
will be down in half an hour” Ilona said, and dialed laundry.
After passing through several security check posts the
chauffeur pulled up by the huge entrance to the 17th century
building used by the ministry of international trade where the minister was
hosting his counterparts from thirteen African states and five European states,
a state security personnel opened the door and she stepped out of the limousine
he held out his hand which she took gratefully thanking him with a smile. Two
others pulled the big brass double door open with a long corridor leading to
the east wing where the state dinner was taking place; a bit further into her
strides she started seeing huddled together in small groups some of the power
brokers from the politburo, Oil, Gas, maritime and banking sectors she noticed
Dmitri Yakov talking to a group of men. He murmured something and broke away
from them grabbing her hand in only three strides smiling broadly as he kissed
her cheeks while saying in Russian “My sweetest love when will you surrender?”
though he spoke perfect Queen’s English having attended Oxford. “I adore you
too and am sure you can wait” she said as they walked coming to a bullet proof
glass double door pulled open by two security personnel.
An FSB officer appeared from nowhere and
whispered into her ears ushering her towards a large table full of high level
bureaucrats as she glanced back at Dmitri explaining with her eyes that they
would hook up later. A silk suited squirt looking man jumped to his feet
throwing open his arms in embrace “Ms Reznik, a lovely evening to you, he said
loudly then he put pressure on her shoulders bringing her to his level
whispering “the dignitary Mr Brodsky would like you to engage is sat on table
one where a seat has being reserved for you, perhaps you should powder you nose
and study this brief prepared for you by comrade Ludvig” he said thrusting into
her hand a tiny make up kit pack, and just as quickly as he appeared he was
gone.
She made her way to the rest room thinking as she looked
across the room towards table one she saw the big frame of comrade Ludvig the
trade secretary sat amongst of a blend of European and African dignitaries, she
noticed quite a number of heads turn as she carefully strode across the
polished 17th century marbled floor between tables of dignitaries,
carrying her beautiful frame elegantly her flaming blond hair reflecting the
bright lightening in the huge banquet hall … It has begun she thought, in front
of the wall to wall endless mirror in the ladies, she flipped open the small
make up kit inside which was the paper brief neatly folded, and read through
quickly noting only the necessary details and finally coming to the last page
of three which had a picture. She was amazed and had never thought of Africans
in this manner but he was so very handsome and fair skinned, perhaps he had
Caucasian genes in his DNA. Ilona
flipped back to the second page that held the personal info, he had a first
class bachelors degree in (PPE) politics, psychology and economics with a
masters in corporate financing “wow” she gasped as her jaw dropped, he was only
35 years old 6’4 single and worth a whopping 164billion US Dollars,” where did
all that fortune come from she wandered? Scanning through the brief with her
trained eyes, it stated that he had his hand deep in various sectors around and
including; Banking, crude exploration and refined Petroleum, arm supply deals
for Mining rights, and Solid Minerals spreading through Africa from the Congo
to West Africa. Shrugging her shoulder she lit a cigarette and with the same
flame set the brief on fire dropping it in the ashtray and watched it burnout
completely just as some ladies came in giggling and chatting amongst
themselves.
This would certainly be fun, she thought heading straight for table
one. Ignoring all their gazes, there was an empty seat next to Ludvig’ she made
for it putting out her arm, but that wouldn’t be necessary as all the men stood
up and one held the chair for her while complementing her. “You look stunning”,
he said in Russian, smiling Ilona Reznik looked round the table as she took her
sit staring them all in the eyes, there were only sharks on this table she
noted as her eyes finally rested on him, “hmm” she thought. He looked amazingly
smashing, even better looking in real life and more adorable in his Saville Row
tailor made suit, she was certain he must have some white blood in his genes
even though the file claimed he was black African, his skin suggested otherwise.
He smiled at her as he sat down and continued his conversation with Ludvig who
was saying something to him in Russian about the new maritime regulations due
to the Somali-Ethiopian pirate operations affecting all concerned in the
shipping industry and how it has drastically increased the risk of freight
across the industry.
It wasn’t until late into the Russian evening and after Secretary Ludvig
expertly removed himself from between them using the excuse of state matters
that required his immediate attention to create an opening for her and after a
few casual conversations with different dignitaries and a number of glasses of
the most expensive champagne that she made her move turning towards him, she
asked despite knowing otherwise; “is this your first time in Moscow”? "No! He
replied, "but it’s my first time in this historic building", he said in perfect
Russian. I did my first degree at Saint Petersburg state university where l
read politics, psychology and economics; he could see she was taken aback. Why
Russia? She asked, “it was the only university that would have me’ he joked,
“no he said more seriously l made scholarship’ or else l would still be
peddling something on the streets of Lagos”. “Hmm”, “peddling something” Ilona
thought wondering what he had been peddling! What about you? He asked, refocusing
her thoughts she reached for her Versace wallet and handed him her card, he
glanced at his watch instead and without looking at the card he thrust it in
his suit pocket! “I have two meetings scheduled before 11am tomorrow and need
to get some sleep but if it’s OK with you we could do lunch at 1pm”. She got up
while he was still talking and he noticed how tall she was’ he got up and two
of his security details appeared from nowhere on either side of him, pulling
their chairs far back. Waving them away he continued, “Should l send a car for
you at 12.45pm? Ilona walked slowly allowing herself to take in as much as her
champagne filled head would allow; she had already worked out how she was going
to go about getting what Brodsky wanted so badly, leaning slightly towards him
as they walked’ she asked, “is that a pick up line, and “where would you find
me"? “The Ritz Carlton Hotel” where you have resided since your flat’s renovation
started 5 weeks ago to be precise, he replied answering her question as they
walked along the ancient corridors they arrived at the large historic doors.
One of his aids opened the door to her chauffeur driven car. She paused, he was
certainly linked to the FSB and probably every other security agency in the
world of espionage, she smiled and gazed into the Moscow night”, “well l will
be waiting if l can get away from my desk early” Ilona said shivering from the
cold Russian windy night, turning sideways to conveniently slide into the back
seat of her Mercedes, he leaned forward and kissed her cold cheeks just as his
convoy of armoured Benz wagons pulled up alongside hers, his lips were soft
and sensual yet he barely touched her cheeks. Impressive she thought realising this
would be more difficult than she first thought because of his highly placed
links. He knew so much about her and that was an indication of his
international prowess. This was going to be a very dangerous assignment she
thought! No wonder Brodsky wanted her on this one perhaps the African was
threatening Brodsky’s control of the crude oil sector which number one had
personally left Brodsky in charge of. An underworld supply of crude oil worth
billions of dollars in revenue every year, yes this was certainly very serious
and she needs to be on her highest level of operative alertness known in their
circles as code red. Ilona shuddered at his smoothness that only the years of
her own involvement as a double agent made her aware of, with that kind of
money at his disposal he can buy anyone and so he probably already knows she is
a senior SVR agent. She would give this one her utmost caution, who knows he
may even be her way out of this arduous way of life, being an SVR operative was
hard enough added to the dangers of a coerced recruitment by the CIA three
years ago due to a grave covert error which now made life unbearable, she needed
a way out or else she could be six feet under soon because double agents were
considered rats and it is SVR standard practice to terminate such agents; but Ilona intends to live and stay very alive.
As her car pulled away she waved and
he blew her a kiss knowing that they won’t be having lunch tomorrow or anytime
soon, but what a lady he thought as the door shut and Oleg slid into the seat
next to Abel handing over a certified official copy of an old KGB classified
file titled Ivan Brodsky the file was heavier than usual. "Does Yuri have a
copy, and do we have anything on Ilona Reznik"? Abel asked. "Yes Yuri has a copy
of Brodsky’s file but l excluded Ms Reznik’s file". He opened the file going straight to the back
and removed the large envelope with Ilona’s name, he opened it and brought out
a smaller file’ he flicked it open and a few pictures of Ilona stared back at
him. At the same time Oleg ordered the chauffeur to head for the Moscow Savoy hotel which
was close to Red Square and the Kremlin, a part of the city his boss and best
friend adored. Abel caught sight of Bolshoy and Maly theatres as the
bulletproof G55-wagon sped across the magnificent city of Moscow he felt a
sense of security he never enjoyed anywhere else, trusting his life into Oleg
and Yuri’s hands like no other and even his London office with its entirely
impeccable security prowess isn’t as capable as one of these two men. Oleg, his
left hand and Yuri the right and together they were unbeatable, a formidable
triangular force tried and tested with almost two decade of endless triumph.
Yes he could never have done it this long and this well without his hands; they
were the closest humans alive to him and were the envy of their peers, they
were the reason he wasn’t married as one prospect after another were exposed,
his hands left no stone unturned. Even the much acclaimed daughter of the
respectable Emir of the oil rich gulf state with all his affluence was found
wanting when his left hand uncovered her shameful depraved sexual exploits in
Geneva and later Oxford were exposed, even the Emir asked for his forgiveness at his
most precious daughter’s shame. It had hurt him at first but who can argue with
hard evidence. The lift stopped on the 4th floor and they got out
turned left as one of Oleg’s men opened the door to the royal suite which had
four exquisite double bedrooms an office and private conference room, Yuri was
sat in his suit even so late in the evening going through some files, on the
far corner a giant LCD flat screen was showing BBC 10 o’clock news which was
wrapping up with something about Gordon Brown trailing in the opinion polls and
his inability to win the next elections out rightly. Yuri turned waving away
the female help in the suite’s lounge and the security details that followed
them in then spoke to Oleg in Russian, “Has the meetings in the morning been
reconfirmed? No it’s been cancelled he replied, “Our friends need more time to
evaluate the company’s stocks behaviour on the Asian markets, and then report
back to us.” However, we will be heading to London in the morning for the
signing of the joint Shell exploration contract agreement. They sat discussing
very late into the early morning hours all the evening’s events at the function
and particularly Brodsky and his weakening influence on number one, as well as
changing the crude oil shipments routes out of Africa, and finally they
strategized on ways to defuse the ongoing refined product’s internal local
price hostilities Apex Oil started back in December which was destabilizing the
local Nigerian market”. Now though Abel knew where Apex Oil got his refined
products from (Brodsky), so all they had to do now was threaten his benefactor
in his own comfort zone in Russia and enrage number one even further.
Ruthlessly making him realize that what he stands to gain by using Apex Oil to
dump his refined products in Nigeria was nothing in comparison to what he stood
to lose in his own backyard in Russia, six weeks earlier prior to their coming
to attend the Russian-African trade conference in Moscow Abel with Oleg had met
with the heads of eight out of twenty three biggest players in the world of
Crude Oil refineries, while they already enjoyed existing partnerships with
most of the refineries outside this group, since he seized total control of
Crude supplies between 1994 and 1995 with the help of Yuri and Oleg who crushed anyone in his path;
and in six year from 1994 to 2000 they carved out a huge chunk of the supply
chains of refined petroleum products and aviation fuel in exchange for billions
of dollars in Crude Oil with ruthless precision. Abel controlled the refined
products through most of the African Petroleum cartels in most of western and
central African countries a huge population of perhaps a little over five
hundred and thirty million people with the aid of his Russian Oil barons from
whom he enjoyed complete loyalty and support which made it possible for Abel to
monopolize the existing West African market supply outlets by lowering price to
the point where it became impossible for existing players to operate without
Abel’s reasonably cheap supplies, and the dollar bills poured in endlessly in
tens of millions at first then the Asians came on board and soon they had their
hands full when hundreds of millions of dollars began pouring in fortnightly;
they had no choice but to float their own Bank so Abel got Yuri to buy
controlling shares in the weakest Anglo Russian bank which wasn’t doing too
well with only four branches across Europe. A branch each in Moscow, London, Paris and
Istanbul. A year after stabilizing and re-furbishing of the bank’s existing
service structures, offered in the European arm of the bank and with further
intensive refinancing with endless cash flows from Abel’s arms, petroleum,
steel and solid minerals trading empire they opened subsidiary commercial and
corporate banking branches in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Tripoli, Gabon, Accra,
Lagos. The headquarters was relocated to Jersey and an administrative nerve
centre was situated in Abuja’s central business district with a large banking
hall offering high interest foreign currency depository personal banking
services with branches in Sao Tome & Principe, Gabon and Guinea within
three years of acquiring it. Though the bank had independent administrative
executives directors Yuri kept an eye on all the banks activities while Oleg
was the bank’s board chairman.
The 2005 Gulf-stream G200 Honeywell model finished
climbing and steadied at a high altitude, the fasten your seatbelt signs
turned off. Yuri raised an arm and two female air hostess swung into action,
Abel Kanuri opened his eyes and looked through the round shaped aircraft
windows at the clouds formations, he has often wondered how the clouds seemed
perfect in their variations as if an artist had drawn images with clouds in
the sky. The sunlight reflected on the beautiful black and gold with white
accents exterior of the air plane, he recalled the day Yuri took delivery
of the third and latest addition to his air fleet, the excitement in Yuri’s
voice when he showed it explaining every little detail about the jet, Abel
loosened his tie then sank himself deeper into the comfort of the soft cream
leather seat and stretched his legs on the matching leather foot stool; he
dragged his weary eyes away from the captivating beauty of the skies and took
in the valour of the air plane’s interior. Yuri was saying something about the
newly elected Nigerian President expecting Abel at the state convention of NDP
to contribute to the expensive governorship campaigns in two Northern states,
Abel considered the issue for a second then instructed Yuri to authorize a
donation of two hundred and fifty million naira in support of the incumbents
campaign and the same amount to the candidate of CPP who was enjoying a clear
lead in the Kano state opinion polls, insisting that both donations are not
to be made public and Yuri is to ensure Lanre Fowler personally make
both donations directly to each of the candidates on behalf of Kanuri Group
otherwise half the money will be lost to greedy politicians in transit. Oleg
began explaining to him the recent success of their London trading office in the NSE
stock market and the advisory program they wrote for their Lagos office to install
and use which was now reaping great results reflected in soaring profits both
in Johannesburg and Lagos.
But Abel was so exhausted from lack of sleep and
endless meetings he couldn’t make sense of what both Yuri or Oleg were saying, his thoughts continued to return to the distant past. They had enjoyed three
and a half years of peace after a blood bath lasting twenty three months of all
out Mafia style war in the Congo for the control of the huge steel and mineral
deposits in which one former president’s son had fought on Abel’s side against
the notorious former Congolese parliamentary chief whip Fabrice Dieu. Prior to
the peace times the past year or two had proved to be hectic while he contained
various insurgencies on different fronts particularly in controlling crude oil
thefts in the Niger delta region coupled with infiltrations into his crude oil
supply chains throughout the Gulf of Guinea by local rebel militant lords that
had threatened to degenerate into a mini warfare. Oleg insisted they had
no choice but to ruthlessly snuff out the betrayals and mutinies from greedy
rogue Government officials and rebellious trade alliances collaborating with
disgruntled or unfriendly militant groups. Which Abel did reluctantly but
ruthlessly to the incredulity of some West African Presidents two of whom met
with him secretly during the West African economic summit along with the host.
President of Guinea on Abel’s private yacht in international waters off the
coast of Guinea at the height of the mayhem, they spent a few hours ironing out
financial matters with both Presidents and their personal teams of experts
regarding their remunerations into their Panama and Jersey trusts operations;
then they returned in Guinea’s Presidents private Yacht which dropped anchor
besides Abel’s. Towards the end of the meeting the Guinea President put a call
through to his old friend Gaddafi on Abel’s satellite phone who
reassured him of Abel’s ingenuous track records backed by probably the best
team ever assembled by any independent Oil baron anywhere in the world. The
President respectfully thanked his old ally Gaddafi then said goodbye. After
their conversations which lasted almost three hours the President of Guinea
wanted further assurances that with the death of his first cousin and with
majority of his gang out of the way there will be no more killings in his
country because the opposition and its sympathetic media were accusing and attacking
his government of corruption at every given opportunity and the return of peace
is not only desirable for all concerned but paramount.
Different thoughts clouded
Abel’s feverishly congested mind each thought jostling over the other, each
stream of thoughts perhaps more chaotic or more pertinent to his tortured past
and his now super privileged existence; he drifted in and out of various vivid
lines of thoughts. Abel felt he heard Yuri and Oleg talking in the distance
when they were opposite each other and only a few feet away from him, the
gentle humming of the air-plane’s engines drowned out his calls for their help
reaching them as he began drowning in the sea of his tormenting memories. The two continued their conversation on which strategy they would adopt to
quell the on going Brodsky Apex Oil recent price wars oblivious to Abel’s drowning
dilemma into his shadowy past. Alone again Abel fought and succeeded in keeping
his head above the violent waves of conniving memories but lost out in keeping
his drowsy eye lids open despite his best efforts. Waves of ancient painful
memories swarmed his line of thoughts
battering the defensive walls protecting his mind and they eventually
broke through and took over his mind with the past threatening to engulf him in
its entirety; he despised his vulnerability to the memories from his murky
past, remembering how dire it had been. Although in the beginning of Abel’s
rise to prodigy his memories had served as a very useful but upsetting source
of resolute energy, now though it’s threatening to bring back the fulsome
memories of those who perished in terrifying circumstances and sadly still do.
Involuntarily Abel’s eyelids shut firmly closed as the jet raced across the
skies over Belarus, Poland, Germany, the Netherlands and eventually United
Kingdom heading for London City Airport docklands in east central part of the
ancient city of London, probably the most famous city in the world; trembling
from the cold sipping through the blanket covering him. Abel helplessly drifted
into a deep sleep and his dark, very dark eerie past.
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