Waiting for Mister Cool

by Gerard Houarner

  The death of her childhood world had left her empty. Her savior Rithisak filled it. Her need for that fulfillment was as strong and real as it was the day she became small and let the village’s blood spill over her. If the roots of Rithisak’s worldly power remained in her, the roots of her emotional stability were still sunk deep in him.

  If she could have escaped or killed him, she would have done it long ago. She had found another way to free herself.

  “She can leave him because his roots are still in her,” Max said. “She has a part of him with her.” The blinding glimpse of the life in her came back to him. He blinked, eyes stinging. From the glare of oncoming headlights, he was certain.

  “Yes,” Mani said. Her voice was a breeze lost in bare branches. In the shadows of the backseat, she was so small she was almost invisible. No wonder the Khmer Rouge, or the beisac, had missed her.

  But the Beast had her fixed. Max knew exactly where she was, what she was.

  “I remember,” Max said. “All the things I felt and saw in you, I remember. You gave him what he wanted. You were afraid he was going to kill you after he got it, weren’t you? That’s why you held out, spent so much time away from him doing his work, finding other ways to be useful to him. But in the end, when you realized you could use his need to your advantage, you gave in. That’s when you went ahead with your escape plan. And that’s why he wants you so badly. Why you could bargain for your freedom. You’re carrying his baby.”

  Lee smirked. “Bingo, we have a winner,” he said. “Fuck pride and all that shit.”

  “I taught him about life, to want a child,” Mani said vehemently. Her legs and arms whipped around as she sat up and filled the backseat with her anger. “Before me, he knew nothing of the living world. It was always the dead he wanted, the dead he could control. He tracked me after the massacre because he thought he’d find something in a survivor to dominate the beisac. I showed him what I knew, but it was not enough. My father’s way was life; that’s the way I was born into. That’s what I had to offer. But he corrupted me, turned me into what I am.”

  “The beisac changed you before he found you,” Max said, dismissing her justifications with a wave of his hand. “Now you’re getting what you need from your bond with his child.”

  “It’s not the same,” Mani said, collapsing into a corner like a broken spider drawn in on itself. “I still feel so alone....”

  “The child is enough to fill your emptiness and let you run. You can live without Rithisak, as long as you keep his child with you.” Max glanced at Mani in the rearview mirror. In her excitement, she had lost her self-control and her scent filled the car. He smelled a boy. “But Rithisak’s son is his future, his legacy, and he can’t let that go. That’s the real reason he’s coming after you.”

  “A son,” Mani said, looking down at her belly and rubbing it. “Less than a month old, and already you know. I wish you could’ve been the father.”

  “I don’t want a child any more than you do. But you needed one, for your freedom. Are you going to make him your tool, as Rithisak made you his?”

  Mani frowned. Her eyes blazed, and rage colored her face. The hunger of the dead reached out for him, tried to snatch him as it had in the street and pull him into her. But this time he was not distracted by her allure. He felt the cold of the grave creep through his flesh, the tug of bony fingers on his heart. His own rage answered, and the Beast’s. Their joint roar filled Max’s mind and broke her grasp on him. Her eyes widened, her lips parted. As the cry carried on, she shuddered, looked away, and put a hand up between them.

  “I wanted the baby, too,” she said, a tremor in her voice. “But not for Rithisak to use like me. I wanted one on my terms, to serve the living, as my father did, and as he wanted me to do. I need him, yes. I may not be able to let him go if he chooses to leave me when his time comes. But by then there may be someone else to fill me.” She turned back to Max, gave him the slightest of smiles. “Or if not, the boy may care more for his mother than for the world’s mysteries and dangers.” She widened her smile, allowing a thin line of teeth to show.

  “Damn, I must be getting old,” Lee said, pushing Mani with his free hand back into the seat. “I almost missed her having an angle. I really do need a fucking vacation.”

  The Beast volunteered to toss her out of the moving car. Max held its reins tight, using its energy to fuel his racing thoughts. Lee’s comment about the show of respect and honor in having someone important escort her came back to him. She was a trophy, being passed through various circles of power in a kind of ceremony. Max’s superiors respected her power and what she was turning over to them. They were appeasing her with a ritual show of their strength. And at the same time, they were displaying their contempt for Rithisak. Without his favored weapon, wandering out of his Asian jungle element and into a Western urban sprawl, no one believed he had a chance to take her back. They were taunting him. And more.

  They were luring Rithisak into a trap, using Mani and the child, and Max, to kill him. And once Rithisak was dead, the people Max worked for could use Mani as another weapon in their wars, controlling her through the child who had allowed her to escape Rithisak in the first place. But as Mani had shown, she had talents against which his superiors had no defense. A dangerous game was unfolding, with players holding different views of reality, conflicting sets of rules and objectives. And at the heart of it all, an unborn child grew in a mother’s belly, its potential for power and control already claimed by three parties.

  For once, he had a window on the machinations behind his assignment. He found no comfort in the view. Mani and his superiors were getting both more and less than what they had bargained for, which suited Max as long as he was not in immediate danger. He did not care if Mani had placed herself and her baby into circumstances worse than Rithisak’s service. He had killed enough of her type for his pleasure; guilt had never been his burden to bear. If he had met her under different circumstances, she and her child would have known a great deal more pain before dying. But if his superiors had underestimated Mani, then they might have done the same with Rithisak.

  It was no wonder neither he nor Lee had been fully briefed. The more he knew about the situation, the less certain and stable it became.

  Max gripped the wheel of the Lincoln tight as he took the Willis Avenue exit off the Deegan. People not getting what they bargained for were not his problem. Surviving the night was.

  Lee directed them away from the Mitchell Houses, across Bruckner Boulevard and under the ramp to the Triboro Bridge. They skirted freight rails and empty lots until they found a short, lonely, warehouse-lined block that ended on the water. Riker’s Island prison lights, small and hard, shined in the distance. There was no one on the surrounding streets, and the windows were dark. Metal trash bins were clustered under a recessed loading dock, its rolling security door shut and locked. Across the street, the rickety frame of a fire escape stair clung to a six-story factory building like the skeleton of an extinct dinosaur to a mountainside. The breeze off the water gently herded paper and cardboard from one side of the street to the other.

  Max glanced at Lee, who confirmed the place was clear with a nod of the head. Max opened the window, shot the two streetlights out with the Ruger as they cruised to the dead end. He popped the trunk open and released the front hood, then stepped out. Lee directed Mani out with the shotgun in one hand, the .45 in the other.

  Max walked around and put a hand over the .45 in Lee’s hand. “I don’t think she’s a threat.”

  Lee lowered his weapons. “Sorry. For a minute there I forgot who the hell we’re supposed to be protecting.” He went to the trunk and began unpacking weapons. “Damn, you’ve even got mines in here,” he said, with a slight hush of awe.

  “You have to arm them,” Max said.

  “No shit.”

  Max sidled up against Mani, who leaned back against the car. The dim light from the car’s ceiling lamp spilled out the side window t
o carve her hips and narrow waist out of the night. She raised a hand to her head, accidentally bumping Max’s arm. Heat prickled his skin beneath where she had touched his duster. He grunted, acknowledging her attempt to entice him.

  “How can he hurt us?” he asked, poking her shoulder roughly with his index finger, trying to intimidate her. Muscle yielded only slightly.

  “The same way I can. Magic.”

  “We’re not going to start the mumbo jumbo again, are we?” Lee called out from the rear. “How about the real stuff. You wouldn’t be holding out on us again, would you?” He stepped out, brought a flashlight beam to bear on her face. “Does this old boyfriend have any surprise backers? Professional reserves? Maybe someone inside our operations looking to make his bones on us?”

  “No. He doesn’t do things the way you people do. He only works with people he knows, or controls.” Mani lowered her head, shivered. “He’s catching up to us. Two, three, maybe four cars. There don’t seem to be many people.”

  Her frown sent a warning ripple through Max. Things were happening even she could not predict, and she had been Rithisak’s agent for years. “Lee,” Max said, holding out a hand to cut the beam off. “Set the mines up, then pick your high ground. Make sure you have an escape route. Take a headset, channel three. I’ll do the remote crossfire and take the grenades.”

  Lee turned the off flashlight, glanced over his shoulder as a truck rumbled by on the avenue, walked up to Max. “I feel like I’m putting up a coffee shop for Mormons in Utah. Now our tail is up to four cars and just a few guys. It doesn’t add up. You really believe he’s tracking her through this spirit mumbo jumbo?”

  “If you don’t trust my instincts, trust the things you’ve seen with me that you can’t explain.”

  “Yeah, sure, we’ve been through weird shit.” Lee pointed the flashlight at Mani’s face. “But she’s been yanking our chain all night. You don’t think she’s still setting us up? You trust her?”

  “No, to both.”

  “Then are we doing the right thing, trying to ambush her old man? Maybe she’ll tip him off.”

  Max leaned into Lee. “Would it matter if she did?”

  Lee hesitated, then laughed. “Damn, you really don’t give a shit.”

  “At worst, how much of a problem can the opposition be?” Max took the flashlight and swept it like a pointer at the open end of the street.

  Lee backed away. “Right. A bunch of half-assed guerillas lost in the big city. Cheap mercs and street guns, at best. No special equipment. Like knocking off neighborhood wanna-be hoods.”

  Mani’s manipulations and Lee’s doubts had awakened the Beast’s appetite. Keeping the Beast under control was wearing out his resolve. The unexpected mission changes only heightened his frustration. He did not want to admit to Lee how badly he needed the release of a fight, the familiar routine of killing. The Beast had to be fed again, tonight. And Max required death’s reassurance to calm him in the face of so many lies, so much uncertainty, and the maddening potential of even more changes. If he did not get his ration of blood, he could not guarantee Mani surviving the shelter of his protection. He could not even promise to keep his patience with Lee.

  Max turned away from Lee, who went back to the trunk. Mani brightened with Max’s attention.

  “Where do you want me?” Mani asked, looking at the garbage bins.

  “In front of the trunk.”

  She snapped her head around to stare at him. “I thought you were supposed to protect me.”

  “Is Rithisak out to kill you?”

  “No.”

  “Then you’ll be perfectly safe out in the open. Is he the only one protected against your little mind trick?” She nodded.

  “Then he’ll come after you himself and use his people to protect him. This is a small space, so you should have line of sight on them. You distract as many as you can while Lee and I close the killing box. If you’re lying, you’ll have no one to blame but yourself.”

  She held her stare on him a moment longer, gave him a thin smile, shook her head, and looked at the ground. “This isn’t what was promised to me. What would happen if I made a call to your superiors and told them what you were doing?”

  “I’d cut your hand off.” He waited for her reaction. She gave him none. “If you got through, I’d explain the complexity of our situation. I’d mention the fact that you and Rithisak possessed either the technology or ability to penetrate Nowhere House security. Since our safe house might be compromised, I’d point out that I had no choice but to make a preemptive strike against possible pursuers, using those measures you possessed to our advantage. You’d then have to explain and demonstrate your abilities to my employers. There would be tests. Examinations. A delay, I’m sure, in delivering your money and final living arrangements. If they found something that interested them, the delay might be lengthy. In the end, if none of these explanations proved satisfactory, I’d point out that I’m an assassin. I kill people, for pleasure and for money. Whether or not you survive, my employers received the services specified in my original contract with them. I killed for them.

  “That is, if I gave a big enough of a fuck to explain myself to anyone.”

  Mani’s gaze took in the street, the walls around them, the tractor-trailer rumbling past on the avenue. “I see. And what happens when you start shooting and blowing things up? My abilities don’t work against bullets, or shrapnel.”

  “Jump into the trunk, close it.” He led her by the arm to the back of the Lincoln. Lee backed away, dropped a bag with rope, a machete handle, and a gun muzzle sticking out, and trotted out into the street and both curbs, laying out a pattern of a dozen mines, letting their weight pin the loose cardboard and paper trash he used to cover them. Max took a bag of smoke and flash grenades, the .45 and shotgun Lee had left behind, an Uzi, two short tripod- and swivel-mounted guns with radio antennae, a bag of extra clips, and the bag of surveillance equipment. As an after-thought, he took out the tire iron and jammed it into the ammo bag. He locked down the weapon lockers so the trunk appeared normal once more, and showed Mani the trunk light switch, radio beacon, and cell phone compartment, and the inside hood lock.

  “What if I want to shoot back?” she asked.

  “You wouldn’t want to do that,” Max said. “I don’t think you’re used to combat shooting, and the plating this car does have won’t stop armor-piercing rounds.”

  Lee returned, slipped on a climbing harness over his jeans and jacket, and put on a communication headset. As Max took out a set from the surveillance bag, Lee adjusted dials until they were able to hear each other over the earpiece. Lee picked up the bag and headed for the fire escape. “Don’t do anything I’d do,” he said with a mocking wave as he left them.

  Max pushed down the headset mike away from his mouth, took the two swivel-mounted guns, and motioned for Mani to follow him. “How did you do that trick?”

  Mani pointed to her head, then to his, and back to hers. She laughed at his nod. “Why do you want to know? Do you think you can learn it?”

  “If you can get inside me, maybe someone else can.” Max set up one of the guns between garbage bins, bracing it against metal walls.

  “Rithisak taught me how, but you don’t need to worry about his skill, unless you’re easily seduced by men.”

  Her leg was warm against his back as he secured the clip and cleared the antenna on the gun. He stood, rubbing against her thigh, hip, breast. She grinned and leaned into him. The Beast wanted to use the muzzle of the other gun as a cock, and for a moment Max’s hand shook with the desire to add his own cock to the Beast’s cruel punishment. He pushed her away, crossed the street, quickly dropped the gun by a drainpipe, wedging one of the tripod legs between the pipe and the wall.

  A car passed. Max started. He was sweating from the exertion of controlling himself. A cold, hard ball of nausea was working its way from stomach to throat. He headed back to the car, where the rest of his gear and Mani waited. He st
opped by his equipment, wondered why he didn’t go ahead, end it, fuck her, kill her, fuck her again, throw her in the trunk and drive back to Tuckahoe, with Lee in the trunk if he tried to stop her, and the men on the other end of the encrypted phone line, if they objected.

  She waited, leaning back on the lip of the trunk, arms stretched above her head, fingers spread, tips pressed against the inside trunk hood. The arc of her body across the opening was a bowstring waiting for its arrow, a line daring to be crossed, a question without answer, a bottomless void demanding to be filled. The scent of her sweat caught at him, sharp as a hook. The embodiment of appetite, he realized. Like him and the Beast within him, destructive, dancing on the boundary between fulfillment and self-destruction. She was giving in to her need even if it meant a return to Rithisak’s service.

  Despite having fought her off, he still felt vulnerable to her, almost like prey. He was sure if Lee could know all that had gone on, he would have considered the feeling kinky, and encouraged him to surrender to his hunter. Shreds of their intimacy clung to his thoughts. Her voice, her need, echoed in his head, reinforcing the Beast’s raving cry for her. And a part of him reared with jealous rage at the idea of Rithisak’s importance for her. He wanted to be the sole object of her appetite, the center of her life.

  The most frightening aspect she had awakened, or planted, in him wanted to protect her and the baby she carried. As strong as his drives to protect the twins and kill everybody else, this mewling newborn desire spun images of a human baby that inspired him to care and provide for it, teach it all he knew, and replace Rithisak as its father.

  The Beast tore the ghost desires apart and fed on the carcass of kindness and caring.

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