The Doves of Ohanavank (14 page)

This is going to be a day of many surprises and many revelations. It will also be the day when the healing starts. If Avo can still look at me with love and acceptance, maybe I no longer have reason to fear my demons so much. I do my best to control the tears that are welling up in my eyes, but fail. His eyes are wet too.

“That is the truth, Avo jan. Do you understand?” I repeat.

“I understand,
kurig
.” I burst into sobs at the sound of that word.

Edik gives me a few minutes to gather myself, and then jumps in.

“That explains the way Manoj was talking to you,” he says. “The courtesy that he extended to you is actually coming from his boss.” I know what he is trying to do. He wants to reinforce, for everyone’s benefit, that I was treated well and with dignity. Avo needs to focus on that aspect now, before his mind starts wandering into darker scenarios.

“Now we all know he was polite,” says Gagik finally breaking his silence. “But did he want anything?”

“Al Barmaka wants to talk to me,” I say, skipping the ‘wants to see me’ part. “He asked if I would give him my permission to call me, and for my number. I said yes, he can call me, and gave him my number. If he wants to call, let him call.”

“He requested your permission to call him,” repeats Gagik looking impressed. “His Excellency requested your permission…”

“That is exactly what he requested,” says Edik, “But there is a lot more on the agenda today.” He checks his watch. “It is almost two p.m. We need to go somewhere and talk, so the rest can use this room. Let’s go to Ashtarak and have lunch there. My treat.”

I know Avo is dying to learn more about Al Barmaka, and, probably much more important for him, how I intend to handle his continuing interest in me. I know this from the way he is looking at me, I hear him with that third ear. I cannot let him wonder like that. I have released a few secrets, and I like the feeling. I find clarity liberating.

As I am thinking about the effects of freeing secrets, I remember another conversation with Al Barmaka. He used to tell me that in the Middle Eastern culture, it is ambiguity that provides safety. No one should be made to be very clear and final about anything, he would say. It is the same in Asia, he’d say. “The Chinese and Japanese don’t like the ‘yes’ and ‘no’ words. Clarity is too deterministic, and so, once spoken, those words immediately restrict one’s options. Only ambiguity offers options,” he would say. “But it takes great skill and sophistication to manage ambiguity, my lovely Leila… Simple people cannot handle it. Simple people need a yes or no answer.”

None of that made any sense to me then, because I could not relate to what he was talking about.

But in the last two days, I have discovered the liberating properties of clarity. In my case, ambiguity did not provide safety. It provided constant uncertainty and unnecessary fear. Maybe I am not sophisticated enough. Ambiguity may hold options, but it also houses the loose ends, which are not always liberating. It is clarity that Avo needs right now.

“Avo, I know this man’s visit has troubled you,” I say, intending to clarify as much as I can without creating new anxieties. “I am as confused by it as you are, but I will tell you the truth, as I know it. I suspected that Ahmed was falling in love with me in Dubai, but I never thought that he’d track me all the way to Saralandj. I’ll be honest with you about something else, Avo jan. I feel bad for betraying his trust when I ran away. He was in China. He did not deserve to be treated like that. I should have at least explained to him that I wanted to go back home. He would have understood. But at the time I was afraid that he’d hand me back over to Ayvazian. So I betrayed him. Now I don’t think that he would have handed me over to Ayvazian, and I don’t know what will happen next. If he calls, I’ll talk to him, and I’ll let you know what he says. Okay, Avo?”

I know I have done the right thing. Avo believes me, I can tell. He looks relieved, and grateful for the explanation. A little clarity has gone
a long way. I now believe more strongly that this is the beginning of the healing process.

We spend a few hours at the restaurant in Ashtarak, briefing Gagik and Avo about Anastasia’s visit and discussing strategies of how to best use the opportunity. Then Gagik and Avo head back to Saralandj, with a promise from Gagik to visit the new family in their pen, and Edik and I leave for Yerevan. We agree to have dinner together that night, and meet with Anna the next day before he returns to Vardahovit.

Chapter Twelve

C
arla is in the bedroom of her father’s private suite. This is where Sergei Ayvazian raped Lara on the same night that his men took her from Saralandj. This is the room where Anoush, the housekeeper that they kept at the time, and who they’ve since let go, tried to clean up the mess, making a shell-shocked Lara take a bath and go to bed, telling her that this is how things are, and that they will be this way from now on, that she’d better get used to it. Lara, clutching Araxi Dadik’s ring in her hand, shut off the world around her, and, for the first time in her life, experienced the feeling of being alone.

Carla has introduced important changes to the room; she has added a large high definition TV, where she watches her large collection of porno films. More than half of her collection is supplied by Yuri. She has made him make at least one special trip to Moscow just to procure a few bondage films. She avoids using the Internet for fear of being detected. She does not trust the authorities.

Carla’s latest obsession is bisexual threesomes, after finding out that having another woman in bed along with Yuri is more satisfying than having Yuri alone. And Yuri does not mind.

But on this chilly afternoon she has only Yuri as company. He has been attentive as usual and succeeded in satisfying her seemingly insatiable desires. They lie in bed, silent for a while. Yuri stirs first, and goes to the bathroom to wash his face. When he returns, she’s sitting up in bed, with the sheet pulled up to her shoulders. The expression on her face is pure business, as if the past half-hour did not happen.

“You need to fly to Dubai,” she says. “And the sooner the better. There are three direct flights a week. Catch the next one, I think the day after tomorrow.”

Yuri hates surprises, especially when they involve last minute, rushed tasks. He looks at her for a minute, his irritation showing, and starts getting dressed.

“It’s important,” says Carla. “Viktor had made some large investments in Dubai. All his files must be there, probably with Ano, who, by the way, is still running more than twenty girls for us. We have far too much at stake that is still up for grabs.”

That gets Yuri’s attention.

“He’s made investments? Aside from the girls and Ano?”

“I believe so. My mother, who normally knows nothing about the business, remembers my father saying that he bought a large piece of real estate in Dubai. She does not know what. He never said anything more about it to her, other than that Viktor handled everything for him.”

“The documents were not in your father’s papers?” asks Yuri, wondering how he is going to uncover Viktor’s acquisitions without a paper trail.

“Nothing here. Nothing at Viktor’s place either,” Carla says, then, seeing his inquisitive look, adds, “I had his place searched. Everything is here now. Nothing about any property in Dubai. So I have to assume he kept the paperwork there. It makes sense, he’d need those documents there, not here.”

Yuri knows better than to ask whom she hired to do the searching and the confiscation of Viktor’s papers. He had asked a similar question once, and Carla had walked out of the room without saying a word, with such a chillingly disapproving look that he learned never to ask again. She has already volunteered a lot by telling him about her search.

The next day Yuri applies for a visa at the travel office suggested by Carla, and gathers as much information as he can about Dubai, including Ano’s coordinates and piecemeal records of past income flows, some of which seem inconsistent and in conflict with each other. He also checks Viktor’s passport—issued under the false name of Viktor Arakelian, which Viktor needed to get back into Dubai after being deported once—to check for the latest entry and exit stamps into Dubai. Viktor had been in and out of Dubai, and then to Istanbul, only a few days before the accidents in Sevajayr. Yuri finds that interesting. Could part of the mystery surrounding the deaths of Hamo, Viktor and Sergei be concealed in Dubai somewhere?

Dubai swelters in forty degree Celsius heat. As Yuri leaves the air-conditioned airport, his breath catches. It is not just the heat, but the humidity that he is not used to. In the few minutes that it takes for him to get into a taxi, his clothes feel wet. He checks in to the Emirates Towers, one of the more expensive business hotels on Shaikh Zayed Road. He showers, and calls the laundry service.

Ano is not amused when Yuri calls. She’s had major problems with the girls in recent weeks. They have gotten wind that Viktor is no longer there, and started to question Ano’s authority. Some have outright defied her and are no longer making payments. Others have added new conditions, including more independence, cell phones that they can use to call overseas, and of course much lower percentage payments from their earnings. She’s had to accept most of these demands.

She has called ‘Ali the Enforcer’ for help, but without success. Ali is the most feared disciplinarian. He serves many pimps, bringing insubordinate prostitutes into line with just a single one-on-one session. The girls are terrified of him. Ali has been cooperative with Ano in the past. It was he who drove Lara to Al Barmaka’s house after the deal was sealed. But now he ignores her, often by not returning her calls, and on the rare occasion that he does answer a call, by saying he is far too busy. Ano suspects that some of the girls have gone to work for him, accepting his protection.

When Yuri calls, Ano is aware that the operation is slowly but surely slipping from her grasp. He is rude on the phone, talking as if he owns her and everyone who works for her. He says he represents the Ayvazian family interests and summons her to his hotel for an urgent meeting. Given everything else that is going on, Ano decides to go, as one never knows, this may present a solution to some of her problems, even if it creates new ones in the process.

“How do I know you are who you say you are?” asks Ano once they sit at a remote corner of the hotel lobby.

“Viktor flew to Dubai on September 12 last year, stayed one night, then flew to Istanbul from here. The Moscow office has been wiring money to the family of one of your girls, who, as we understand it, somehow escaped on your watch. Now, how would I know all that if I am not who I say I am?”

“You don’t have all your facts straight,” says Ano, but realizes that the man does know too much to be a stranger to Ayvazian’s business.

“Ano, neither you nor I have a lot of time to waste. So let’s do this right,” says Yuri, looking dead serious. “Before Viktor was killed, the Ayvazians’ income from Dubai, after all expenses and fees, exceeded one hundred thousand dollars per month. Some months, it was much higher, closer to one hundred-and-fifty thousand.” Yuri knows that he’s taking a chance with these figures, which are based on piecemeal accounts, but even if he is wrong, the orders of magnitude make enough sense to him to be worth the risk, if it means Ano will fall into line faster. “Now, as you know, for six months the Ayvazians have not received a penny. You must be a very rich woman by now, Ano, at someone else’s expense.”

“First, let me say that you are way out of line, and if you really want to do this right, as you say, you better get back on track real fast, or I will leave right this moment,” says Ano, looking equally serious, and waiting for Yuri to respond.

“Go on,” says Yuri. “I get the point.”

“Good. Now listen carefully,” continues Ano with renewed confidence, “because I do not feel under any obligation to explain this to you even once, let alone repeat it for you later. I have not seen Viktor for over six months. I have not heard from anyone claiming to represent the Ayvazians until you show up. I have not heard about you and have no idea who you are or how you got your hands on the information that you have, which, as I said,
has some of the facts wrong. Finally, the business that you are referring to is nowhere as profitable as you suggest. I have lost more than half of our girls in the past few months, and I have lost most of the local influence and protection that we used to have when Viktor was around. I struggle every day to keep the operation going against all odds, all alone, and here you are accusing me of getting rich at someone else’s expense. You have some nerve, Mr. Yuri.”