by Tom Wood
‘Would you mind not blaspheming?’
‘Did I blaspheme again?’
Victor nodded.
‘Then please accept my most sincere apologies,’ Linette said with a glimmer in her eyes. ‘Unless you don’t like sarcasm either.’
Victor raised an eyebrow.
‘How do you even do that? I look like I’m having a seizure if I so much as try.’
‘I’ve had a lot of practice.’
She said nothing for a moment, her attention going to the wall-mounted television that Big Pete was watching with keen interest. Journalists were discussing the shooting in Chicago and the rumours it was related to organised crime.
‘Makes me glad to be Canadian,’ she said, and swallowed more ginger ale. ‘That kind of thing just doesn’t happen here.’
‘You might want to touch wood for that,’ Victor said.
She stood. ‘Look, I gotta go, but I’m off duty real soon. If you want to continue this, meet me at the diner near the station in half an hour or so. Best waffles north of the border.’
‘Sure.’
Linette turned around, waved goodbye to Big Pete, and headed out of the bar. Victor watched the news while he finished his beer, thinking of Michelle’s move out of the big city, having no credit card, a job that paid cash, a pre-pay mobile phone. Linette had joked that perhaps Michelle had wanted a quieter life, yet Victor knew different.
He knew what running looked like.
At the bar, he asked for another beer and bought one for the French barman, who had just taken over for the late shift. After toasting and sipping, the barman, eager to learn more about a breaking development in Chicago, searched in vain for the TV remote. He found it too late.
‘Do you know what happened?’ he asked.
Victor, tired of lying, said, ‘Yes, there was a murder.’
The French barman’s eyebrows rose and he grimaced at Victor’s short explanation. ‘A murder?’
‘The head of an organised crime conglomerate, the top guy,’ Victor continued. ‘The next-in-line was getting sick of waiting for the throne to pass to him so he expedited the succession.’
The barman sipped beer. ‘They know all that already?’
Victor shrugged. ‘Call it an educated guess.’
The barman shuffled off to serve another customer.
Big Pete was now sat in front of the bar. ‘If I’m not working here, I’m drinking here,’ he told Victor again. Then he said, ‘It saves on gas,’ and chuckled.
Victor nodded in return. Regardless of his reasons for still being in town he needed to stick to his cover as much as possible, which was a man on a fishing trip. So, while he waited for Fendy to deliver on her assistance the bar was as good a place as any to think, to plan.
He felt restless because he was stationary. It was rare for him to be in any one place so long, unique for that one place to be a staging ground. He should always be moving, always working, always running.
The Frenchman said, ‘You like it here?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘You’re still here,’ he said. ‘I thought you were staying for only a few days.’
Victor nodded. He had shared his plans with the Frenchman because that’s what a lone man on a fishing trip would do.
‘There’s something I need to take care of first,’ Victor explained.
The Frenchman gave him a look and opened his mouth to speak, but Big Pete, close enough to hear, spoke first: ‘He’s getting friendly with Linette. Wants to get her into a pair of handcuffs.’
He laughed and slapped the bar surface with a meaty palm. The Frenchman smiled apologetically at Victor, who raised his bottle of beer to Big Pete to acknowledge the joke, to show he had not taken offence.
There were a handful of other patrons in the bar who all looked to the entrance. Not all at once, but within a few seconds as the noise grew. Big Pete looked too. So did the French barman.
Only Victor didn’t.
Hard to know how many through sound alone, but it was more than one. Half a dozen at least. A cacophony of exhausts rumbling. No mufflers. No revving engines, just the steady loud splutter of powerful machinery outside in the parking lot.
Ignitions turned off and spark plugs no longer sparked. Fuel no longer ignited and engines no longer turned. Exhausts ceased spewing out waste products.
Silence.
The Frenchman glanced at Big Pete, who grunted in response.
‘They won’t come inside,’ Big Pete said to Victor. ‘The whole gang is barred. They might be lowlifes but they know better than to try it on with me. They understand Big Pete won’t tolerate any kind of thuggery.’ He used his chin to gesture at a hockey stick displayed over the bar to emphasise his point. ‘Still got my swing.’
‘I don’t think they’re here to drink.’
Big Pete shrugged. ‘As long as they stay out there then I don’t care what they’re doing. They’ll be gone before too long. Night’s going to be a cold one.’
Victor finished his beer. ‘They’re not going anywhere.’
The barman said, ‘Another?’
Victor rocked his head from side to side to crack his neck. ‘I’m done, thanks.’
He stood up from the stool.
Big Pete held up his beer. ‘You be good.’
Victor said ‘I think it’s a little too late for me’ as he walked outside to greet the silence.
FORTY-THREE
The meeting took place out of the city and far away from their estate. A long drive, yet a necessary one. They took the limousine because neither liked to drive any more. They used an agency to supply the driver so there was always one available, whatever day, whatever time of day. Once they had a live-in driver, but even servants had to sleep, had to eat, had to have time off from work. Some even had the audacity to complain when politely informed Christmas Day was not a holiday. How else were they supposed to get to mass and back?
This driver was one of their favourites because he never spoke unless spoken to first. He might as well have been invisible, which was perfect. They needed staff to help them through their busy lives but didn’t enjoy unnecessary interaction. Staff were only staff, after all.
All of the preparatory work had been done. Each of their personal assistants had been tasked to research, to compile, to narrow down the options. Two separate lists with two distinct yet overlapping goals. Two isolated tasks, each shielded from the other so neither assistant could ascertain the ultimate objective.
But there was only so much that could be achieved with the labours of ignorant parties. Ultimately, they needed to get their hands dirty.
They had come to enjoy getting their hands dirty.
The driver had been given a GPS coordinate and nothing more, and drove them to their destination with no questions, no words. Their favourite.
When the limousine stopped, the patter of rain on the bodywork became louder, almost violent. Raindrops clung to the window glass or snaked down in crooked rivulets. They waited until the driver opened the door for them and they climbed out, one at a time. A slow, awkward process. It had been a tortuously long journey.
The night was chilly, the rain falling in a relentless downpour. They needed to hurry.
The driver shielded them with an umbrella and handed it over before closing the limousine’s rear door and returning to the driver’s seat to wait until they were finished. They had told him in advance his presence was not required.
Waiting for them in the wash of the limousine’s headlights was a lone figure.
‘I’ll do the talking,’ she said.
He nodded. He knew his place. He held the umbrella aloft and they approached the figure.
The man had a tall, boxy frame. He had been waiting for them and was soaked to the skin. This appeared not to bother him in the slightest. They knew he had been a military man. They knew all about him.
His name was Garrett. An African-American gentleman, which neither was pleased to discover, but they co
uld bite their lips for the greater good.
‘Thank you for meeting us,’ she said.
‘No problem.’
‘We always prefer to meet our employees, regardless of their reputation.’
‘I understand.’
She added, ‘Especially when the matter is of a sensitive nature.’
‘You’re not only paying for my services,’ Garrett said, ‘but my discretion.’
‘You understand what we want done?’
‘Yes.’
‘I don’t like how easily you say that. It worries me. It makes me wonder if you fail to appreciate how important this is to us.’
‘If I gave you that impression, I apologise.’
She continued, ‘Do you understand loss? Truly understand, I mean?’ She didn’t wait for an answer. ‘Because we do. We know all too well what it’s like to have that which you love most wrenched away from you. There is no suffering that comes close. It leaves behind a hole that runs straight through your soul and that emptiness is for ever. It can never be filled. That is loss. Nothing can relieve that pain.’ She paused to steady herself, lest emotion get the better of her. ‘But I want you to try on our behalf.’
Garrett nodded, and she saw that she had made herself clear.
‘This cannot be a common request, even for a bounty hunter,’ she said. ‘There can’t be many others in our particular situation.’
‘This is the first job of its kind I’ve been tasked with,’ Garrett admitted. ‘But far from the first unique challenge.’
‘And how successful have you been with these unique challenges?’
Garrett smirked. ‘You already know the answer or we wouldn’t be here now.’
‘We don’t want to be connected. We have arrangements in place to protect our interests but we need to know that your end is similarly protected, whatever the outcome.’
‘My end is always covered,’ Garrett assured her. ‘Even in the worst-case scenario, there will be nothing that connects you to me. All of our previous communications were encrypted and have now been destroyed. Once we walk away from here, the last remaining link is broken. You won’t know when I make a move. You won’t receive progress reports. This is the first and last time you’ll ever see me.’
Unable to hold his tongue any longer, a voice came from beneath the umbrella. ‘Then how will we know it’s over?’
She cast him a sharp, scolding look and he couldn’t meet her gaze. She turned her attention back to Garrett.
‘Please answer his question. If we have no further communications, how will we know when the task is done?’
‘Because it will be done,’ Garrett said. ‘My guys are waiting outside the town at this very moment. Once we’re through here, I’ll be joining them. This thing could all be over inside a matter of days.’
‘We expect resistance.’
‘Resistance is inevitable. And it won’t be a problem.’
‘Are you sure?’ she asked, searching his eyes. ‘Are you really sure?’
‘I only work with the best. I have a whole team of ex-SF. I never do things by halves. I never take chances. It’s smart business. The fastest route to acquiescence is via overwhelming force. The fiercest of dogs out there cowers before a pack of wolves. But your call. I can take extra bodies if that makes you sleep easier. Just know it will increase the fee and it’ll put the brakes on the op.’
‘Money is no object,’ she was quick to point out. ‘And we don’t want even the slightest delay. However, that’s not what I meant. Are you sure you can really do what needs to be done? Should there be … resistance.’
Garrett nodded. ‘Take comfort in the knowledge there’s no line I haven’t already crossed.’
‘That’s exactly what we wanted to hear.’
FORTY-FOUR
The moon was bright and the air as chill as the silence. Many breaths rose into the night.
‘I’ve been waiting for this all day,’ Castel said.
Victor approached. ‘You have it the wrong way round. It’s me who’s been waiting for you.’
The concave arrangement of jagged black shadows tightened, sharp knives staying pointed at Victor as he closed the distance. He stopped just out of range.
Castel was surprised to see Victor walk forward across the lot towards the Nameless, surprised he didn’t turn and run straight back into the bar. Surprised, but pleased, because he smiled as Victor neared. So pleased he danced a few steps on the spot, hips and shoulders rocking to a soundless melody.
When he stopped, Castel said, ‘You need to understand something from the very start, Mr Fisherman. There’s nothing you can say that’s gonna change anything. Nothing will prevent our righteous retribution. We’re way beyond the point of apologies, way past forgiveness. But there is something I can do for you if you do something for me in return. If you tell me who you are and why you’re here, then some day you’ll walk again. Some day you’ll be able to swallow actual whole food again. That’ll be nice, won’t it? No one likes soup for breakfast, lunch and supper every single day for the rest of their life.’
‘Tell me where I can find Joshua and Michelle and you’ll still have a crew come morning.’
Castel pivoted his head back so his chin pointed at the night sky and let out a moan of frustration, as if at the universe itself. ‘Ugh, what is it with you and those two no ones?’
‘No one is no one.’
‘Is he your bastard offspring or something? She your long-lost baby mama?’
Victor remained silent.
‘You might have convinced Bobby McGullible with this whole routine, but I sleep with my boots on, you feel me?’
‘Not in the slightest.’
‘Why were you at my cookhouse yesterday?’
‘Abe dated Michelle.’
‘The whole town probably dated Michelle. You gonna turn up at everyone’s door?’
‘If I have to,’ Victor said. ‘Why did you kill him?’
‘I didn’t kill Abe. He was always an accident waiting to happen. I’m just glad I got so many batches of crystal out of him before he went and set himself on fire.’
‘That’s quite a misfortune for such a prolific cook.’
‘Or maybe I killed him because I felt like it,’ Castel said as he tapped the heels of his snakeskin boots on the asphalt in a fast, rhythmic dance. ‘But if I did, I didn’t, did I? Because you killed him, not me. You killed him the second you stepped your toes in that trailer. You threatened my meth, my business, my very freedom. That ain’t polite. We have manners up here, Yankee.’
‘I was no threat to you.’
Castel clicked his tongue, rocked his shoulders from side to side. ‘You said “was”.’
‘That’s correct.’
‘When we spoke on the phone you did your talking in the present tense. You slipped up, amigo. I see through you like I always saw through you. It’s Fendy, ain’t it? You’re not from a rival crew, you’re working for her. She’s done sitting on the sidelines. She wants to take my pie all for herself.’
‘Fendy only wants to maintain a peaceful county.’
Castel grinned. ‘I think that peace has come to an end.’
Victor said, ‘When we spoke on the phone, I told you I was no threat to you because it was the truth. I wasn’t interested in your crew, your meth, your anything. You could have told me what I wanted to know and it never had to come to this. But here we are. You’ve brought your whole crew and you tell me there’s nothing I can say to prevent your “righteous retribution”.’
‘Oh yeah, you better believe it.’
Victor nodded to say he did. ‘That’s why I switched to the past tense. Before now, before this moment, I was no threat to you.’
Castel’s small eyes grew smaller, narrowing as he stared at Victor, as he analysed the words and the man before him. Castel disliked what he saw, but what he failed to see displeased him even more. But it was too late to doubt himself and too late to reconsider. He had his entire crew wi
th him for a reason.
‘I want him to be able to talk,’ Castel said, looking at Victor but addressing his eight Nameless. ‘Just make sure he can still talk by the time you’re done.’
FORTY-FIVE
The eight Nameless didn’t all come forward at once. They couldn’t. They weren’t communicating and they weren’t coordinating. Their semi-circle tightened around him as one stepped forward, then another and another, until they were all approaching. But no formation. No plan.
Victor had a plan.
Four seconds. Four down.
As soon as the closest was within three metres Victor dashed forward one step, then a second, and with his back foot – his left – firm on the ground he shot up his right knee to power out a savage stomp kick with his heel straight into the abdomen of the closest biker.
That man was tall and Victor’s heel struck him low at the midpoint between the hip bones, the tremendous amount of energy meeting with little resistance – exploding capillaries in the skin, rupturing the walls of the lower intestines, sending shockwaves of trauma throughout his entire torso. The biker folded and crumpled and staggered backwards all at the same time, his eyes squeezed shut in shock and pain. He dropped to the ground without a scream or grunt, just a powerful rush of air leaving his lungs.
Victor was already moving before the guy had finished the fall, pivoting off his lead foot that recoiled from the kick and springing to close the distance to the next Nameless to the left because that was the shortest turn to make and the fastest.
The elbow hit the biker high on the skull, to the temple.
His head whipped in a sharp rotation until it could go no further and then his shoulders and hips twisted to follow the head and he collapsed mid-pirouette, pupils at maximum dilation, black and empty.
The next closest biker was beginning to react by then, although an instinctual reaction, basic. Primal. That instinct made him back off a few steps, away from the danger.
But his trepidation did not counter Victor’s aggression, who covered that extra distance with another dashing step that only increased the force he generated for the roundhouse kick he delivered to the side of the biker’s knee.
