Strange Bedfellows Ch. 03

Jennifer had a text drafted ready to send on her phone and she tapped 'send'.

In the forest to the north of the warehouse two of Jennifer's mercenaries who had been keeping Dan Murphy and Tim Morrow under constant surveillance since before they arrived at the warehouse silently moved in and injected a paralysing agent into their necks and they both fell to the forest floor dropping their weapons.

The five men that Reznik had concealed with high powered weapons were shot in the head by silenced sniper rifles.

Dmitriy Yakovich burst out of one of the rusty lockers and pointed a pistol at Alexi Reznik and Jennifer Jones ripped her Walther PPS M2 9mm out of her shoulder rig with lightning speed and thrust it in Penelope Bishop's face.

Alexi Reznik had time to scream a Russian obscenity before Dmitriy Yakovich shot him four times in the face and he fell to the ground dead.

"Your weapon please Penelope," Jennifer waggled the muzzle of her gun in Penelope's face.

"You double crossing vicious cunt!" Penelope spat and reached for the weapon at her waist.

"Don't do anything stupid please. Dan and Tim are alive and well. It would be a shame if you sacrificed your life for nothing," Jennifer said sweetly.

Dmitriy was standing over Alexi Reznik's dead body glaring at him. He had finally killed his most hated adversary.

Penelope handed her weapon to Jennifer butt first and Jennifer took it in her left hand, spinning it in her hand so that she held it by the grip, her finger resting along the trigger guard.

"You have done well my darling. We will take my daughter with us and the Americans can fight over Reznik's carcass," Dmitriy kicked Reznik's lifeless body.

"Whatever you wish my love," Jennifer smiled at Dmitriy and with rapid and skilled precision raised her left hand and shot Dmitriy four times in the chest.

"There you have it. All done nicely," Jennifer said matter-of-factly as she ejected the magazine from Penelope's pistol and handed it back to Penelope.

"Here is your story. Unbeknownst to us all Dmitriy had secreted himself in the locker at the place where we had arranged to arrest Alexi Reznik. Dmitriy leapt from the locker and shot his arch rival dead before you had a chance to take him down," Jennifer applied the safety to her weapon but didn't holster it.

"How did he know? How did he know where the exchange was taking place and that Katerina was his daughter?" Penelope was shocked and incredulous.

A wry smile crossed Jennifer's face.

"You set this up!" Penelope's face was contorted with rage.

"Of course I did. But everyone gets what they want. You and your cronies not only got Alexi Reznik, you personally took out the evil crime lord Dmitriy Yakovich. You will all be heroes," Jennifer smiled.

"You killed Dmitriy," Penelope whispered.

"At this very moment, those lieutenants in Dmitriy's Bratva who are not loyal to me are quietly disappearing. The corpses of Alexi's men are being removed from the forest and Tim and Dan should be regaining consciousness in about an hour," Jennifer went over to Dmitriy's corpse and took the things she needed from him.

"What about Katerina? What about Katya?" Penelope was incredulous.

"Katerina is coming with me and will join her mother back at their house in New York," Jennifer smiled.

"We have all been used by men. Sometimes they treat us well and sometimes they don't. I think it's time to see what happens when a woman runs things for a while," Jennifer patted Penelope's shoulder.

"You had me send Tim Morrow down to Brownsville and had Katya distract Dan Murphy while you set this up! You knew that they would never condone using Katerina as a lure to trap Reznik. You used me! You used Alice!" Penelope's eyes filled with tears.

"I really do like you Penelope. You are so very much like me. But if you put a magazine in that weapon before Katerina and I leave the warehouse I will shoot you dead," Jennifer said coldly as she helped Katerina up off the bed.

"Maybe we will meet again but it's probably best that we don't," Jennifer said as she guided Katerina, who was still a little unsteady, out of the office.

Penelope didn't move until she saw Jennifer drive away.

*****

The next day Katerina was reunited with her mother at her house in New York State. Katya had flown out on a commercial flight the morning of the exchange and Jennifer and Katerina flew out of Balwyn in a private jet. Jennifer had driven from the warehouse directly to Balwyn airport.

"Mother, you need to tell me about those missing years; the years when I lived far away from you. The years you keep shrouded in secrecy. There is no need to keep them secret anymore now that my father is dead. Tell me everything about the scorpion tattoo," Katerina beseeched her mother.

"My Katerina... they were shameful times. I did things that you will despise me for. I loved a man who was unlovable who cast me aside when I no longer pleased him and another man who brought me pain and despair because of his self-centred actions," Katya held her daughter close.

"Tell me mother. If you don't; there will be a hole in my life that will never be filled," Katerina pressed her hands against her mother's chest and looked up into her mother's deep blue eyes.

Her own blue eyes were rimmed with tears.

Katya took a deep breath and began.

"I was born in Rohoziv Ukraine and lived there with my mother. My mother was beautiful. Beauty runs in our family but it is a curse as well as a blessing. My father left us destitute and my mother's boyfriend beat her regularly and had recently taken an unhealthy interest in me, stealing my underwear and sneaking around my bedroom door."

"On my eighteenth birthday I ran away from home with dreams of becoming an actress in America. I had established an online relationship with a man claiming to be a scout for a theatrical agent in Hollywood and he sent me airline tickets to America..."

Katya told her daughter everything and when she had finished mother and daughter clung to each other and cried until they could cry no longer. Katya felt unburdened and Katerina felt empowered with knowledge.

*****

Jennifer Jones sat in the heavy teak and leather chair behind the antique pedestal desk made from quarter cut solid oak timbers with ornate brass fittings. The same desk that many times she had been bent over and fucked by Dmitriy, as had all the Girl Fridays before her. It was one of the many ways Dmitriy liked to extol his power.

Jennifer had already made arrangements to have the desk replaced. The chair too. The seat had been shaped by years of Dmitriy's muscular buttocks sitting on it and Jennifer's small but perfectly rounded ass was not comfortable on it.

But the desk and chair could wait; at least for now. Jennifer had more pressing matters to deal with. She needed to solidly cement her position as the new Pakhan of what had once been Dmitriy's Bratva. Her bold play in eliminating Dmitriy and his hated rival Alexi Reznik, then seizing control of Dmitriy's Bratva, was seen as an act of decisiveness, ruthlessness and bravado by the other Pakhans who headed up the Odessa and Russian mafia in the US. But there was a power vacuum left by Alexi Reznik's demise and the other Pakhans were fighting over the carcass of Alexi's Bratva.

This distraction had allowed Jennifer to ingratiate herself with the hierarchy in Russia and Ukraine, whose tentacles reached into every corner of the world.

There was only one other female Pakhan. She was a Serb who headed a Bratva based in Italy which had close ties to the Italian mafia. Jennifer was not a Balkan and she was a transgender woman and she was still young but her abilities spoke for themselves. She had a loyal following and those in her Bratva who were not loyal to her were no longer around.

Jennifer knew many things but what she knew most was that money talks and so long as her businesses prospered and she kicked money up to the hierarchy in the old Slavic states they would leave her alone. She would deal with the other US-based Pakhans when they had finished fighting over the remains of Reznik's Bratva.

Jennifer was busy and more than a little annoyed when the guardhouse called to say that she had a visitor who insisted on seeing her.

Anyone approaching Jennifer's property on the outskirts of LA would be impressed. Jennifer had overseen improvements to the property herself during her reign as Dmitriy's PA but in those days she had never dreamt that the house would one day be hers.

The long driveway was protected by a manned guardhouse built into a substantial brick wall which ran along the borders of the property. Inside the walls were manicured lawns, landscaped gardens scattered with marble and sandstone sculptures and several fountains. The house itself was imposing but modern and stylish. It was obvious that whoever lived here had money and was important. There were men in suits patrolling the grounds and Jennifer had doubled the guard until things cooled down. There were also gardeners and household employees going about their business. The place was busy.

Jennifer had delegated the power to deal with routine business matters to her lieutenants but she was still a busy woman. Her vision was to empower her employees and reward them when appropriate to build trust and garner respect. Dmitriy's outdated idiom of centralising all power in the Pakhan and ruling with an iron fist was obsolete but Jennifer was not averse to using brutality when it was called for. She knew that already she was being called the skorpion suka or 'scorpion bitch' behind her back. She liked the name and did nothing to deter its use.

Jennifer had a valet, Peter, who doubled as her personal bodyguard but she realised that she needed a PA; a Girl Friday to whom she could delegate those tasks that required diplomacy and tact and who understood her vagaries, principals and standards so that things got done the way she wanted them done. She also needed someone who would deal with her personal day-to-day minutia like telling this thick-headed minion guarding her front gate that she was not to be disturbed.

"Olav, I left strict instructions that I am not to be disturbed," Jennifer snapped at the intercom.

"The girl says that her name is Katerina Kuznetsova and that she is a personal friend of yours," Olav said, his accent still thick, having recently arrived from Kiev.

Jennifer had been on a recruiting drive to replace the men whom she had needed to eliminate because their loyalty to her was questionable after the change of regime.

Katerina was no longer using the nom de plume Katerina Walker and had taken her mother's last name.

"Have her escorted to the house and Peter will meet her at the door," Jennifer said and closed the connection.

Jennifer had not seen Katerina since she had used her to lure 'The Jackal' and Dmitriy to their deaths. She knew that Katerina knew that Dmitriy was her real father and that she was doing well with her studies at Rutgers and visited her mother Katya at every opportunity. Like her predecessor, Jennifer had spies everywhere and kept a close eye on anyone who with whom she had had dealings... good or bad.

Peter brought Katerina into the room and discretely left. Jennifer was shocked at how much Katerina had grown to resemble her mother. She was even dressed the same.

Katerina towered over Jennifer standing a little over six feet tall in heels. A stunning slim young woman with jet black hair cut into a severe bob which accentuated her deep blue expressive eyes. She had pert breasts and long legs clad in gossamer-sheer nylons and was wearing fashionable business suit. Her face was narrow, with accentuated cheekbones, a pointed chin and small nose. Her skin was pale and she wore heavy eye makeup and blood-red lipstick.

Jennifer came around from behind the desk, stood on tippytoes and kissed Katerina on the cheek. She could smell Katerina's perfume: Dior Poison, the only scent that Jennifer and Katerina wore. The same scent that all of Dmitriy's Girl Fridays were mandated to wear.

Rather than sit behind her desk, Jennifer led Katerina to two comfortable lounge chairs and they sat opposite each other.

"You are the spitting image of your mother," Jennifer smiled at Katerina who blushed.

"Thank you Jennifer. I know that you are busy so I'll get to the point. I wanted to thank you for being a benefactor to my mother and I," Katerina said.

With Dmitriy gone Jennifer had freed Katya from servitude and granted her a substantial stipend for life. To Jennifer's surprise, rather than retire, Katya had asked to take over Vlad Volkov's business dealings and Jennifer had agreed and made her a Bratok.

"It was the least I could do given all your mother has done for me and for what I put you through in Balwyn," Jennifer did not feel guilty but she gave credit where it due.

Katerina looked at the piles of correspondence on Jennifer's desk and the flashing lights on her desk phone. Jennifer's cell phone was buzzing incessantly with incoming calls and text messages.

"You appear to be snowed under. You haven't appointed a PA yet? Mother said the term often used was Girl Friday," Katerina smiled and nodded at the jumble of paperwork on Jennifer's desk.

"Katya told you about being Dmitriy's Girl Friday?" Jennifer was a little surprised and she reached out and patted Katerina's knee.

"Yes and all that that entailed," Katerina said soberly.

"Dmitriy had his demands, but most Girl Fridays fared well after they were replaced," Jennifer said a little tentatively.

"And some not so well," Katerina said gruffly.

"I'm sorry for what happened to your mother Katerina. I'm sorry that your formative years were spent mostly without her but I have recompensed her as best I can," Jennifer said curtly.

"Oh you misunderstand me Ms Jones. I'm not here complaining. I'm here because I want a job," Katerina smiled.

"Don't be silly. You have your studies to complete," Jennifer laughed but it was cut short when she realised that Katerina was serious.

"I'm not much older than my mother was when she was brought to Dmitriy and became his PA and I'm still a virgin," Katerina said defiantly.

"I'm intelligent and articulate and I can be ruthless; you know that. My mother has told me about the business and what she hasn't told me I'll be quick to learn," Katerina continued.

"Yes all that is true but being a virgin is no longer a prerequisite," Jennifer smiled wanly at Katerina.

"Maybe not, but surely you would like to deflower me yourself before you put me to work," Katerina licked her lips seductively and stared into Jennifer's glacial green eyes fascinated by the light bluish heterochromia in her right eye.

"Do you know what you are asking?" Jennifer was astonished.

"I told you. My mother told me everything," Katerina stood and straightened her skirt and kept her head bowed.

Jennifer stood and stepped into Katerina and lifted her chin and looked up into her pretty face.

"Oh Katerina... if only I could," Jennifer pressed her lips to Katerina's and kissed her softly.

"I'm sorry that I'm not worthy," Katerina broke the kiss and turned away.

"Peter will escort you back to the gate," Jennifer sighed.

She buzzed Peter into the room and he led Katerina away and Jennifer sat down behind her desk and tried to continue her work where she had left off.

"Fuck it!" she hissed.

She buzzed the main gate on the intercom.

"Tell Peter to bring Katerina back to the house. Tell him to bring her to my private quarters," Jennifer said curtly.

A smile crossed Jennifer's face.

She looked down and saw that she had tented her skirt.

The End