In the past, I always did everything that I could to push any ideas like that away. Maybe I wasn’t ready. More likely, all of those times it wasn’t with her. Only with her. If it was her, I could make little Katyas and Vassilys. If it was her.
And then she was gone.
~~
They swarm out of the minibuses so fast, by the time I see them coming, they are on me. They hold me down just long enough for them to snatch Katya.
I wrestled my arms free and I crack their heads together. It doesn’t much good. They have protective helmets under the hoods. My movement is restricted, and it stops me getting any momentum. I stunned them long enough to swing a knee up. I drive it hard into a groin. I hear a satisfying crunch. The man’s face contorts.
Fast and hard, I jab my knuckles. I slam them into the throat of the other man.
The bus at the front of the convoy has pulled away. Katya is inside. The second two busses are starting up. My two guys roll away, then they run. They turn back to shoot at me. It slows them down. I speed up. They both fire. They both miss.
They head for the bus at the back. I run hard. I’m closing on them.
The bus revs. Its door is open. The first man jumps in. He clambers into the back bench seat. The second is close behind. But I’m nearly on him. He has his foot on the step. The bus begins to move. I jump on his back. He hangs on to the bus. It pulls away. My arm is around his neck.
I grab a handle inside the door. And I bring my knees up behind his. He collapses forward. His arms wrench and crack as he falls forward. I’m on top of him. We’re in the footwell at the front of the bus.
I yank his head, hard. Back and around. I hear his companion chamber a round in his pistol. He leans over the back of the front seat. The driver is looking down at us. Panicking.
The bus bounces.
The gunman hesitates. He’s calculating the odds. Can he get an effective shot into me? Sure. Against it is the risk of shooting his colleague. I’m straining on his pal’s neck, trying to snap it. If I manage it, the guy has no reason not to shoot me.
I slam the man’s head into the floor. I grab the driver’s ankle. Shove his foot down on the gas pedal. Reaching I yank on the steering wheel. The bus lurches. The door is still open and I’m struggling to stay inside. I half jump, half roll up onto the seat. My fist slams a punch square in the gunman’s face.
I grab hold of his gun hand and bend his wrist over the seat back. It takes me both hands to keep the gun pointed away. He squeezes off a shot. A raw burn rips across my ribs.
I thump his hand hard with the side of mine. His wrist makes a wet crunch. He shouts, and I get the gun from him. I don’t wait. I shoot him and turn to the driver. He kicks sideways. His foot connects with my rib and I slide out of the bus.
~~
Bunched up and braced, I hit the pavement hard. Rolling, I watch the bus pulling away. I hurt all over. There’s no time to think about that. I’m just glad I’ve still got the gun. I drag myself up to my feet. In the middle of the road I turn to face the traffic. The gun is at arm’s length. I have it pointed at the driver of the next car coming. He screeches as he swerves his big, red, all-American muscle car. I run to the driver’s door. Waving the gun, I motion for him to get out. He shakes his head.
I have no time to dick around. She’s in a bus, vanishing over the horizon. I point the gun at his temple. He still doesn’t get out.
I yell. “Fucking move over then.” Shocked, he slides over.
I climb into the driver’s seat. I slam the car into gear and floor the gas pedal. The proud owner is scrambling for the seat belt. He starts to speak. I know from the look on his face that he’s going to whine about his precious car.
My eyes are fixed on the buses. the gun is in my left. I raise it to remind my companion.
“You wanted to come for the ride. You got your wish. Now shut up.”
The convoy turns off the highway and into a town. The car is fast but I’m fighting to catch up.
he van rocks. I’m at the back. The two men covered in black are either side of me. One of them has a phone. He puts it on speaker.
My whole body tightens and contracts when I hear the voice. My flesh ripple and shrinks away. I doubt I ever heard him say more than a dozen words and that was so very long ago, but I recognize the sound of him immediately.
The confined space in the back of the blacked-out bus is stifling and hot. Still, the voice chills my bones and gives me shivers.
“My little honey pot.” It takes me back to the Great Hall in my father’s house. A huge man leaning down low to talk to me. “I’m so very glad to see you.” He said the same thing then and it terrified me. I didn’t know why. He still has the power to make me fold up in fear.
I can’t see him. The screen is blank, but from the way that the hooded man holds the phone toward me, I’m sure Maleovich can see me.
“It’s been so long.” then, “Hold the phone higher, Doran, Sweep from her head to her toes. Slowly.” the man does what he was told. “Now back up again.” Inside I’m shivering almost uncontrollably. I know that I’m not letting it show now, but the effort of will is hard to keep up.
“You’ll be here soon, little flower.”
The other two men snap tight plastic cable ties around my wrists. Then they tie a blindfold on, tight around my head.
“Not too tight,” Maleovich says, “I don’t want you to damage my little matryoshka.”
The men laugh. Hearing them laugh when I can’t see them brings up familiar terrors. I wish that I had a key or a paperclip. Most of all I wish that I had a real weapon.
Maleovich said, “I can’t wait to get a proper look at you.”
am going to get her back no matter what it takes. I don’t care what the costs or the risks are. I’m not going to let her go. Not like this.
“You’re going too fast. Watch out! You’re too near that truck. You’re going to have a wreck.” The owner of the car whines. I wish I’d kicked him out.
“It’s a fucking muscle car, man. Don’t you ever want to flex the muscle?”
“Wife doesn’t like me to drive it hard. She didn’t want me to buy it.”
I can’t stop Jimmy talking without shooting him. Letting him fret and whine may actually help me to stay relaxed.
Driving pursuit is always hard on the nerves. Doesn’t matter how well you drive, some asshole drifting out of his lane can always fuck you up. So, I let Jimmy go on about his car and his wife. I find myself starting to like the poor sap.
He practically killed himself to pay for this brute of a car and he loves it like a treasure. But his wife has him too scared to even drive it properly. “I was only driving back home from doing some work on her in my friend’s shop. He’s got a pit and a ramp and hoists and all of that kind of stuff.”
From the way he tells it, it’s like the wife is on him the whole time about the upholstery and the finish, because of the investment value. But as I hear him, I think he’s missing how much she’s just afraid he’s going to hurt himself. I get the picture of a woman who fell for a real man’s man, but then gets frantic whenever she thinks he might do any of the man’s man stuff.
So. Marriage guidance while driving pursuit. Of course, I don’t share any of this wisdom with him. But it’s good to have a puzzle to solve while you’re doing something difficult and dangerous.
I tell him, “Write down your number for me.”
“You won’t call.”
“I won’t if you don’t give me your number.”
He wrote on the back of a calling card and handed it to me. “I know you won’t call.”
“Maybe I’ll invite you to my wedding.”
“I thought you just said…”
“It’s complicated.”
We’re cruising through a commercial district. Built-up and with traffic. That should help me.
On the highway, there was no way for me to get ahead of the convoy without being seen. In a grid of city blocks, I’m m
ore at home. I’ve gotten close behind the buses and there’s no clue that they spotted me. I make a hard left, then gun the engine while Jimmy bleats and frets. I charge down a block, make a right and then floor it for four blocks. A fast right again, speed along another block and scream to a stop at the intersection. I’ve gotten in front of them but not by much.
The first bus is already passed when I get to the crossroads and the second is passing. I let the third one go.
Jimmy yells and wails as I slew his precious collectible vehicle in front of the last, oncoming bus. The bus jack-knifes but it can’t get past. Jimmy shrieks at the whump as the van smacks into the rear wing.
I’m out the door with the gun up. I run straight at the driver. He opens his door and leans out. He’s reaching for a weapon. I shoot him before he can get it. He topples out from the cab. I run to shove him back in. As I clamber in and shove him off the driver’s chair, I pull off his hat and his shades.
I want his jacket with the hood, too. Patting him, I feel there’s a Kevlar vest underneath. I want that, too but it will have to wait. What I need now is to catch up with the convoy. A phone rings on the dashboard. I pick up. A male voice in Russian says, “You okay back there? Still with us?”
“Fine.” I say, “Slight delay. No problem.”
“We won’t wait, so fucking catch up,” and he hangs up.
I drive around Jimmy. He’s practically in tears about the little dent on his car.
I have to drive hard to catch the convoy. They’re three blocks ahead of me and speeding up.
By the time I finally have them in view, they’re pulling out onto the interstate. A few seconds slower and I might never have found them. We drive at speed in a tight line.
I call Mikhail.
“Boss, we got news from Carmine. Two of his businesses got hit today. A gang of guys dressed in black. They sound like the men who hit the club. He said he thinks something big is starting. It’s like an invasion. That’s what he said.”
Quickly I bring Mikhail up to date. “I’m not going to let those fuckers take her, Mikhail. It isn’t going to happen.”
I try to describe to him where I am and where I’m headed.
“Don’t worry about it, Boss, I see where you are.”
“How?”
“I’m tracking your phone.”
~~
I follow the convoy to a long chain-link fence. After a moment, the bus at the front stops at a gate. Half a dozen heavily armed men in fatigues and helmets, all wearing narrow black shades cluster around the bus. they talk with the driver and peer inside the bus. Then they wave the bus in. I’m fingering an Uzi and pointing it at the door as we inch forward. The other three black vehicles, mine included are waved through. The paramilitaries or whatever they are seem more anxious to shut the gate than to engage with any of us. Then, as I draw level with the gate and I’m almost in, one of the soldiers puts up a gloved hand to stop me.
I’m holding the gun and wondering just how accurately it will fire through the door. I wind the window down. He peers in at me. “Are you the last?”
“Yup.”
He waves me through and I follow the other buses out onto a wide cement apron. We are headed for the open rear gate of a massive transporter plane. After the other three buses have been swallowed up in the darkness of the open rear of the plane, I bump onto the ramp and drive up. As soon as I’m inside the belly of aircraft, the ramp behind me slowly closes and the cargo hold is almost completely dark.
The whine and grind of airplane engines rises in pitch and shakes up through the wheels of the bus.
The front van peels off and turns to drive into a hangar. that’s the bus with Katya inside.
he sound inside the bus changes. We’ve driven into the inside of an echoing building. Hands grab me by the tops of my arms. I’m pulled up roughly. Another hand holds down the top of my head down. “We’re here!” The blindfold is pulled off. In front of me in narrow shades but with his hood down is the bullet-headed man from the photograph. He has one of the nastiest grins I ever saw. And a voice like nails dragging on a chalkboard. “This is your final destination. We hope you had a good kidnapping.” I’m pulled roughly out of the bus and down to a cement floor. I’m in front of the man.
He’s short and very stocky. “Maleovich was so excited when I told him I saw you. This last week or two he talked about you. Very often. He is so thrilled to have you here.”
I don’t say anything. All the time he was talking I fought the urge to kick at him. Now I do it. I know it’s idiotic, but the rage boils up in me and I can’t help myself.
I lash out with my foot as hard as I can. The first kick gets him right in his balls. My foot slams against a hard, protective jockstrap. Princess’ pretty running shoes are soft and no use for fighting. His face reddens but his expression doesn’t change. The hooded men either side of me drag me back. But he holds up a hand. He takes hold of my jaw and puts his face close to mine. “You’re a lucky girl. Maleovich wants you.” His mouth comes nearer, “Otherwise I would take a price for that.” His eyes drill into mine. “He will decide how we break open the dolls within the doll.”
Then he orders the hooded men to take me. “To the stage.”
All the way at the back of the hangar is a raised platform. A lectern with microphones stands in front of a huge screen. Next to the screen, against the bare brick wall, chains dangle with open manacle cuffs on the ends.
More men, hooded in black, maybe twenty or thirty of them, are gathered around the platform. They all look like beetles. On the screen is a logo. It’s like the old communist hammer and sickle but this has a sickle and a gun. I’m pushed along the side wall. In the hangar, there are trucks and two small jet aircraft.
The men shove me along to the side of the platform. The screen has changed to a video of New York. Commentary is from the voice I know. Maleovich is talking about the businesses in Manhattan. It starts with interiors in a club. It takes a moment before I realize that it’s Vovo’s, where Bruno’s two punks took me as a hostage. I didn’t recognize the place at first with lights on and people inside.
Maleovich is talking about opportunities for ‘Development and exploitation.’ He makes New York sound like a mine that he’s going to extract precious metals from.
Above the screen is a lit window in the wall. It looks like there’s a control room there.
I’m manhandled up a set of steps and onto the stage. As I climb the steps, the commentary stops and the video pauses. His voice changes in tone. With obvious relish, he says, “Ah, our guest has arrived.”
The image on the screen fades and dissolves into a huge close up of a pair of eyes. No more of the face is visible, it’s in shadow. The slit of light like a letter flap is all that is visible. Two hooded, dark, almost black eyes. They look down at where I am. They follow me as I’m shoved across the stage. They crinkle in a smile as I’m dragged to where the chains and the manacles are.
Maleovich says, “This is the famous Katya, gentlemen. The matryoska.” The hooded men cut the cable ties that bind my wrists. I feel like I’m going to miss them. But the manacles are hard and corroded. They will give me all the friction I want and more.
“So, our lovely Katya has a very special surprise. You do still have your special and unique gift, don’t you, Katya?”
Vassily: Perfect Pain - a Bad Boy Mafia Dark Romance Page 16
