Dead Run Read Free

never had a chance. My bike clatters to the floor as I drop it and walk after him.
    â€œWait, you were better than good. You placed in the Olympics, right? Gold?” Viktor stops at the top of the stairs, listening. “You were the best in the world. That’s why I’m here. I could be like that. Like you. But I need a little help.” Viktor turns around slowly. I’m surprised to see that he’s smiling.
    â€œYou think you need a little help?” he says. “I can tell. You need lots of help.” Some of the couriers in the garage laugh at that. I’d forgotten about them. I feel my face start to burn when I see the red-haired girl shaking her head.
    â€œAll right,” Viktor says finally. “Come upstairs. We’ll have tea. Maybe we’ll talk about racing.”

Chapter Four
    Viktor leads me up, then through a cluttered room filled with desks, filing cabinets and a couple of computers. We pass a guy wearing a green baseball cap and headset, working his phone and computer. He nods as we walk by but doesn’t stop talking into the phone. The whole building looks like it was built a hundred years ago and nobody has cleaned up since. There are layers of posters on the walls, piles of papers everywhere. We go down a long hallway, where Viktor unlocks a wooden door with a sign that says Viktor Lubyenko, Owner .
    Inside, his office isn’t any neater. A big desk—more papers, no computer—and a couple of armchairs. There’s clutter everywhere, but it’s the stuff on the wall that catches my attention. A bunch of framed pictures and newspaper clippings, including a sports page with a picture of a young guy on a podium. Must be Viktor. I check the caption. 1976 Montreal Olympics. Individual Road Race. Gold medal.
    â€œYou like milk in your tea?” asks Viktor. I turn around and see Viktor pouring boiling water into a teapot. Then he squeezes a slice of lemon into his teacup. “I drink mine like the Russians, with lemon. You want that instead?”
    â€œYou got any coffee?” I say. Viktor snorts and shakes his head.
    â€œToday, you drink tea. But I’ll put milk and sugar in, make it easy on you.”
    â€œIs that what you are?” I ask. “Russian?”
    â€œNo, no. I’m Serbian.” Viktor sees my blank look. “Schools here, they don’t teach anything,” he mutters. “Serbia. It’s a little country, used to be called Yugoslavia when the Russians took it over. So I’m Serb, but I grew up Russian. Lived with Russians, trained with Russians, came over here with their Olympic team.”
    â€œThat’s when you won your gold medal.”
    â€œYeah. Nearly lost to a guy from Sweden.” Viktor hands me a cup of tea, warm and mud-colored. We both sit in the beaten-up chairs in front of his desk.
    â€œSo what happened after that? What else did you win?”
    â€œWinning at the Olympics isn’t enough for you?” Viktor pauses, slurping some tea. “I had to go back home. In those days, it wasn’t easy to leave Serbia. The government kept athletes like me under lock and key. They owned me. But it was a good life. I trained, I coached. Nice wife, handsome son. He was taller than you.”
    â€œSo why did you come here?”
    Viktor slumps a little into his chair and looks at me over his teacup.
    â€œWar. We had a big war, everybody fighting everybody—you know any of this?”
    I shake my head.
    â€œNo, you were born too late. That’s the problem with young people—you make me feel old, part of ancient history. Anyways, when the wars came, my son ran away to fight. He was your age, foolish, full of ideas about Serbs and Croats, right and wrong. Came back one month later. Only now a grenade had taken away his hand.” Viktor stares at his own left hand, slowly flexing it. “His hand wasn’t the only thing. He had changed so much. So full of hate. My wife