Every Wicked Man

by Steven James

  I gave her the info she would need.

  “Let me plug that in. Stay on the line.”

  56

  “Where’s Mannie?” Sasha asked Blake.

  “Temporarily indisposed.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m afraid he’s otherwise engaged right now.”

  She saw movement out of the corner of her eye and realized that it was the man from the backseat of the executive car, the one who’d given her the water. He’d surreptitiously entered the greenhouse and was now coming her way.

  “Sasha,” Blake said, “do you have any idea how long I’ve known?”

  “Known what?”

  “That you’re not who you say you are.”

  “No one is who they say they are.”

  “That may be true. But not many people are DEA agents.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Why do you think Agent Greer hasn’t shown up yet?”

  “What?”

  “Agent Greer. Your backup. The tracking device in your shoe.”

  How does he know? How could he possibly know about that? Unless—

  Earlier, Greer had told her that he would contact her supervisor at the DEA once they had a location.

  Blake got to one of them. He has to have. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

  Blake’s goon came closer to her, and as she swung the gun in his direction, Blake went for the weapon. She was good at her job, but he was lightning quick. He struck the back of her hand with one of his, while also hitting the inside of her wrist with his other hand. This dialed the gun away from him, and then, with a quick twist of his wrist, he was able to disarm her and obtain her weapon.

  He leveled it at her chest but did not fire.

  “Sasha, the lies can stop now. There’s no need for them anymore. It’s time for your investigation, your deceit, to come to an end. You’re the one who gave up the location of the condominium that was raided earlier today, aren’t you?”

  She said nothing but quietly assessed her situation, looking for a way to turn the tables on him.

  “I’m going to give you a choice,” he said.

  “What choice is that?”

  Blake commanded the man to lead her back to the office building, but when he approached her, she grabbed his arm, swept her leg forward, and took him down with a sideways reap. As big as he was, he hit the concrete hard, colliding with a satisfying thud.

  She spun toward Blake, but he fired at the ground beside her foot.

  She froze.

  “That’s enough of that. The next bullet will shatter your kneecap. Now, go on. Back to the office. There’s something you need to see. It has to do with a friend of yours and a very important decision you’re about to make.”

  57

  It didn’t take long for Angela to verify that I was on the right track.

  “Yes,” she said. “That location—it looks like three of your victims visited it within a week or so of their subsequent deaths. Kewley as well. What’s located there?”

  “I’m about to find out.”

  I exited the car and scanned the neighborhood but saw no sign of Calvin.

  It was a crime-riddled area, and tension between the lower-income residents here and law enforcement had heightened over the last few years and resulted in fewer cops patrolling the streets since they didn’t want to be the next star of an arrest video on YouTube. The ones who did come around typically just drove through and didn’t get out of their cruisers unless absolutely necessary—and that only exacerbated the problem, resulting in even more crime.

  And now, I had the wrong skin color to be in this gang-controlled neighborhood at this time of night.

  But so did Calvin.

  On the phone earlier, he’d said, “We must be ready for anything,” and I couldn’t imagine that he would have said that unless he was planning on being here somewhere.

  I tried his number again to no avail and decided it was possible he’d beaten me here.

  I started across the street toward the address the suicide victims had visited before they died—the same address Calvin had uncovered as the place to search for the Matchmaker.

  * * *

  +++

  Inside the building, Blake directed Sasha to have a seat.

  By then, his man had joined them and did not look happy to have been brought down by a woman her size.

  Well, too bad.

  Blake nodded to the guy, who walked to one of the file cabinets, opened the drawer, and produced a roll of duct tape, a plastic bag, and three zip-ties.

  Sasha felt her heart begin jackhammering in her chest.

  You need to get out of here. Now.

  “We have an enthusiastic viewing audience tonight,” Blake told her. “They’re either going to be treated to a homicide or a suicide. I’ll leave that up to you.”

  “I’m not going to kill anyone, if that’s what you’re thinking. Unless it’s you. Then I might have to make an exception.”

  “I’m afraid it’s not me that you need to be concerned about right now. It’s Agent Greer.” He showed her his phone’s screen. “You’re going to decide whether he lives or dies.”

  Agent Greer was tied to a chair, and Mannie was standing beside him holding a plastic bag and a duct tape roll of his own.

  Blake said homicide or suicide.

  Suicide?

  No.

  “I’m not going to kill myself.”

  “Let’s do a practice run and see how all this works,” Blake said. Then he spoke to Mannie through his cell. “Do it.”

  Mannie tugged the plastic bag over Greer’s head as the restrained FBI agent tried futilely to lean out of the way. Then Mannie began to loop the duct tape around Greer’s neck to secure the bag in place.

  “No!” Sasha cried. “Stop it!”

  Greer yanked at his bonds but couldn’t get free. As he tried to breathe, the bag suctioned in against his mouth and nose, sealing off any air that might’ve been in the bag.

  Buy time, Sasha. Anything to buy time!

  “Take it off! Whatever you want, I’ll do it! Don’t kill him!”

  “I don’t believe you,” Blake said.

  You’re watching him die. He’s going to die!

  “Believe me!”

  Blake said into the phone, “Let him breathe.”

  Mannie tore the bag open, and Greer gasped, desperately drawing in as much air as he could.

  “What do you want from me?” Sasha asked.

  “It isn’t just what I want. It’s what they want.” He wavered his phone at her, then glanced at the bottom of the screen. “There are nearly two thousand already.”

  He gestured toward the items that the man beside him was holding. “Put the bag over your head and then tape it in place around your neck, or you’ll watch it happen to Agent Greer, and this time, we won’t stop it. You do it; he lives. You refuse; he dies.”

  “How do I know you won’t hurt him if I do what you’re saying?”

  “Trust, Sasha. I haven’t lied to you yet. It’s a big decision. I’ll give you a few minutes to decide.”

  * * *

  +++

  I saw a drug deal going down on the corner across the street, and when the two men noticed me, one of them hurriedly stuffed something into his pocket and hustled off into the shadows.

  Not my concern at the moment.

  The other man glared at me, but I shifted my attention to the house.

  In this neighborhood, I hadn’t expected to see any single-family dwellings but found that the address in question was, in fact, a dilapidated two-story home.

  As I crossed the street, four men who were sitting outside a nearby brownstone looked my way. One of them stood and called to me, but I ignored him and proceed
ed toward the house. Another tugged out his phone, tapped in a number, and started talking with someone while he continued to stare at me.

  No lights were on in the house.

  When I turned and glanced over my shoulder, I saw that the man who’d shouted to me from the stoop was briskly approaching me and was now only about ten meters away.

  He called out angrily, “Whatcha doin’ here?”

  “I’m looking for a tall guy,” I said to him. “Slim. White. Probably wearing a trench coat. Late sixties, early seventies. English accent.”

  He was quiet but stopped short about five meters from me.

  “Have you seen anyone like that?”

  “I think it’s time for you to leave.”

  “I want to talk to the Matchmaker.”

  “Ain’t no matchmaker ’round here.”

  “Is that so.” I ventured out on a limb, but I remembered Vidocq’s advice about obtaining the trust of those you’re investigating by gaining their confidence and using subterfuge, and said, “I have an idea for a video he might be interested in.”

  “I don’t know nothin’ ’bout no videos.” He started toward me again. “You need to get back in your car.”

  “Don’t provoke me,” I said. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt. Keep your distance or you’ll regret it.”

  He paused and stared at me, clearly trying to figure out what was going on here—was I stupid? Was I bluffing? Was I a cop?

  He brushed his hand across the front of his jacket to show me his gun. When I didn’t back away, he pulled it out, and I recognized it as a Taurus PT92. Higher-end than I would’ve guessed for a street thug to carry, but maybe he wasn’t just a street thug.

  Could this guy be the Matchmaker?

  “This is cocked and locked,” he told me. “You know what that means?”

  From my experience, that was more a phrase a soldier rather than a gangster might use, and I wasn’t certain he knew what it meant.

  “It means it would be prudent for you to put it back beneath your belt.”

  “You threatening me? I’m the one with the gun!”

  “I’m searching for my friend. If you can help me, help me. Otherwise, you’re wasting my time.”

  “And the Matchmaker. You’re lookin’ for him too.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Who told you ’bout the Matchmaker?”

  Vidocq.

  Think like Vidocq.

  “Someone at work. Someone who’s looking for something unique and memorable.”

  “How memorable?”

  “Memorable.”

  I was making this up as I went along, but it seemed to be working.

  The guy glanced over his shoulder toward the porch where he and his buddies had been. It was empty now.

  He came toward me, and I braced myself for a fight, but instead, he went to the door of the house, clicked it open, and gestured for me to go inside in front of him.

  When I did, he followed close on my heels. “To the left and then down the stairs,” he said tersely. “Go on.”

  The only available light in the darkened house was the thin, muted smear of it that seeped through the windows, but it was enough for me to find the stairwell.

  Still no sign of Calvin.

  Halfway down the stairs, I realized that the man with the Taurus wasn’t following me anymore.

  At the base of the staircase, I came to a steel-reinforced door.

  I knocked and waited.

  When the door finally opened, I was greeted by a man with no nose. The scarring told me it wasn’t a birth defect. Somehow his nose had been removed—and based on the irregularities and jagged scars, it didn’t look it’d been done by a surgeon.

  The room had no overhead lights, but half a dozen computer screens emitted a bluish tinge that dimly illuminated the room. The sweet-stark smell of marijuana hung the air. The noseless man cocked his head and eyed me. Flame tattoos curled around his face, and he’d done body modification to create two nubby horns on his forehead. His four lip rings glinted in the blue light of the basement.

  “I’m here to see the Matchmaker,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “I represent someone who has an idea for something very special.”

  “Special, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You a cop?”

  “I’m a federal agent.”

  He scoffed in a good-natured way. I couldn’t tell if he believed me or not. In either case, he looked me up and down, assessing me, and, without another word, stepped aside.

  I walked into the basement, and he closed the door behind me.

  * * *

  +++

  “Well?” Blake said to Sasha. “What’s it going to be—you or Agent Greer?”

  Sasha considered all of her options. Blake was out of reach, so if she went for the gun, he and his men would undoubtedly kill both her and Greer. She had no idea where they were keeping Greer, so there was no way of getting to him even if she was able to overpower Blake—which she doubted she would be able to do.

  You cannot let him die.

  From what she’d seen earlier of Mannie and from all she knew about him, he at least seemed to have a conscience.

  Then why is he helping Blake with this? Is he just going along to make it look like they’re serious? Would he really go through with it and kill Greer?

  She doubted it.

  “You’re bluffing,” she said to Blake.

  “I don’t bluff.”

  In the end, even if Mannie wouldn’t do it, that didn’t mean that Blake’s other men wouldn’t kill Greer.

  And her.

  Her only hope was to trust that Greer had gotten word out about her location and that backup was coming.

  “Time’s up,” Blake said.

  The only chance she had at resolving this favorably was drawing things out as long as possible.

  And that meant she would have to put the bag over her head.

  “Alright.” She held out her hand. “Give it to me.”

  58

  In addition to the guy with no nose, there were three other men and one woman in the room.

  All of them, apart from a man standing in the middle, who appeared to be calling the shots, were seated at computer keyboards. The guy who was on his feet was probably about my age but looked like he spent a lot more time at the snack machine than on the treadmill.

  He turned and eyed me.

  “Are you the Matchmaker?” I asked him.

  “Who’s asking?”

  “My name is Patrick Bowers. I’m with the FBI.”

  He smirked slightly, and the man who’d greeted me at the door snickered.

  “FBI, huh?”

  “That’s right.”

  He didn’t bother to ask me for my ID but simply said, “We’re not doing anything illegal here.”

  “Then you wouldn’t mind if I invited some of my coworkers over to have a look around. We can all have a little—”

  “It’s a spectator sport. That’s all.”

  “A spectator sport.” I felt my temperature rising. “Watching people die?”

  “Public executions have been popular all throughout human history, Agent Bowers. They’re still held in eight countries today. There’s nothing abnormal about wanting to watch others expire. It reminds us of our own mortality. Helps us treasure each precious moment that we have.”

  As long as he’s talking, get as much out of him as you can.

  “Have you had a tall Englishman down here? Dr. Werjonic?”

  “You’re our first visitor tonight, I’m afraid.”

  Maybe I shouldn’t have believed him, but I did.

  “What do you know about the Selzucaine?”

  “Sometimes people want some
thing to take the edge off when faced with a stressful and irreversible decision. That’s all.”

  By his tone, I could tell this guy treated death as trite, and that didn’t sit well with me. “I want to know about the man who was there when Jon Murray died.”

  “Everything we do is confidential.”

  “How much do I have to pay to be present when someone else dies?”

  He was quiet.

  I cursed. Couldn’t help it.

  “The man on the roof,” I said. “The grandfather and the bleach. The mom who overdosed. Who was present when those people took their own lives?”

  He shook his head. “This is a can of worms you do not want to open. You have no—”

  Losing my temper, I grabbed him by the collar. “Who was there when they died?”

  “Joe,” the woman who was seated in front of one of the computers blurted, “it’s happening. She’s going to do it.”

  I looked at the screens throughout the room.

  Every one of them contained the same image—Sasha MacIntyre, seated on a chair in a nondescript office. She had a plastic bag and a roll of duct tape in her hands.

  I couldn’t imagine this ending well. “Shut it down.”

  “We can’t.”

  She’d tightened a zip-tie around her belt and then attached two more ties to it and threaded the free ends through the hole just far enough to get the loops started.

  For her wrists. For when it happens. So she can’t stop it once it’s started.

  “I said shut it down!”

  “We have no way of contacting them.” Joe didn’t sound concerned for Sasha at all. “Look at the counter!” he exclaimed excitedly. “We’re up to almost four thousand viewers!”

  * * *