Code of Silence

Code of Silence - Chapter 12

The following morning Anatoly Dragovich arrived at the Ekranotech offices by taxi at 7.00 am, stepping out into the cold bright morning, sunshine ricocheting off the ice and snow in the car park onto the glass façade of the building. He approached the main door in the usual fashion, as any senior employee would, announcing his name and ID number to the voice-activated security system. Standing back, he waited for the doors to slide open. Nothing. A second attempt was interrupted as the doors opened, controlled from inside. He was met by two of Radoslav's protection officers. Two burly, suited men, stern-faced and of similar size and stature to himself.

They ushered him through the doors, then off to the left of the reception area into a windowless office. It was basic, just a large round table with half a dozen chairs and a plasma TV screen hung on one wall. Some plain brown cardboard boxes containing stationery were propped up against another wall beside a photocopier. The main reception and office were quiet, it would be another hour or so before the first trickle of staff arrived to begin their long day. Dragovich was unlikely to witness this. The two imposing minders urged him to be seated with his back to the door. Immediately after he sat down, Radoslav and another two men entered the room and took their places round other side of the table. The two suited minders stood either side of Dragovich, one observing the gathering and the other monitoring the door. Dragovich knew this wasn't going to be good news, but suppressed his natural instinct to fight like a cornered animal. There would be time for that on another occasion.

On his way to the office, he'd reflected on the history he had with Ekranotech, and his first meeting with Radoslav. They had got on initially, not because they were like-minded businessmen or through any common ground, but more because each of them needed the other, or at least that's what Dragovich sensed Radoslav thought. Dragovich remembered thinking that Radoslav was incredibly bright, bursting with charisma and clearly successful, but that he'd struck it lucky with his first venture. Right time and right place, and if he was honest, he envied the fact that Radoslav hadn't had to get his hands too dirty to achieve what he wanted. Dragovich was the complete opposite: a hired hand, trustworthy but at times brutal, nothing got in his way but he didn't have the intellect to harness it to his own benefit, but was smart enough at least to recognise that. Consequently, he had nurtured and earned the reputation of a ruthless hardman.

Being well connected throughout Moscow's business community meant that he'd been employed by many individuals and corporations seeking to get a tough job done. Whether the results were achieved though bribery, blackmail or simple brute force, Dragovich always delivered. Not long after some early work he did for Radoslav, he was hired by Ekranotech as a permanent staff member. Radoslav had explained that he could see the need for his unique skills, and didn't want to share them or have to wait for his talent to become available. Dragovich himself saw this as a potentially lucrative payday, given what he'd learned about Radoslav's past ventures; joining Ekranotech as an employee meant he was part of the next one, with a shareholding to keep him there. In his own mind it was also a chance to go straight. To remove himself from the shadier side of Russian business and politics and, ultimately, to distance himself from the infamous Vory, the Russian mafia.

Dragovich's darker connections went way back to his teenage childhood and the rough district of Moscow he was brought up in. His father and mother just managed to get by in the old Soviet Russia, but his father was drawn into petty crime as a way to top up the pitiful income he received from working in a hotel kitchen. Most local communities had several members of the Vory in their midst; it was how they managed to survive, as the state help they received did little or nothing to meet their needs. From moneylending to providing narcotics at ground level, the Vory ruled and were not to be crossed under any circumstances. On a global scale their influence reached across all continents, where serious organised crime made them billions of dollars annually, creating its own powerful and incredibly wealthy hierarchy.