Shotgun Opera

by Victor Gischler

  “Will you let me finish a sentence?” Nikki snapped. “I’m trying to get us both off the hook.”

  “Fine. Talk.”

  “Tell the man with the voice it’s over. You can walk away if you deliver that message. I’m not working for him anymore. If he sends anyone else, I’ll kill them, and then I’ll come after him.” It was a good, tough speech even if it was mostly hot air.

  The old man only blinked, and said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Of course. The old man was probably a subcontractor, didn’t even know who had hired him. He probably worked for somebody local, who in turn worked for the Voice. “Tell whoever sent you. The message will get through.”

  “Nobody sent me.”

  Nikki digested that, didn’t know what to do with it. “Then who the hell are you, and what are you doing here?”

  The old man hesitated, seemed to consider. “I’m Mike Foley. Andrew Foley is my nephew.”

  What? Who the hell was Andrew Foley? The name did strike her as vaguely familiar, but—Oh my God.

  Impossible. That’s all she could think. Andrew Foley was the final target, the one she was hoping Middle Sister would kill for her, so Nikki wouldn’t have to put herself in harm’s way. And this guy was his uncle? How did he where did he ? Nikki’s world had turned upside down.

  She realized her mouth was hanging open. She closed it.

  “That’s over,” Nikki said. “Nobody’s after your nephew anymore.”

  “I’m just supposed to believe you?”

  “How about we both lower our weapons,” Nikki said, “and I’ll tell you a little story.”

  * * *

  Sprat checked his watch. Two minutes. He stood, readied himself to go in through the French doors. He thought about climbing up to one of the second-floor windows, but even with his skills, he didn’t want to risk slipping in the rain.

  As the seconds ticked away, Sprat suddenly felt nervous. He didn’t know what was on the other side of the French doors. It was a big house. The chances the woman would be standing right there ready for him were remote. And Ortega had said the woman could be dangerous. He didn’t like thinking Mavis would find her first and get into some kind of trouble and Jack wouldn’t be there to help.

  The thought of Mavis not being there anymore struck him in the gut. He loved her so damn much. If something happened to her

  No. Can’t get distracted like that. Get in quick and do the job.

  It would be okay.

  * * *

  Although they’d lowered their weapons, Nikki’s .380 still pointed more or less in Mike’s direction. Mike held his shotgun at waist level, finger still on the trigger as he listened to her story.

  Nikki Enders wanted out. Mike knew what that was like. She said nobody would be coming to kill his nephew, her least of all. She had bigger worries. Her boss wanted her head. Not exactly her boss, Mike thought, but somebody who pushed her buttons. Somebody who wanted her dead if she didn’t follow orders.

  And Mike realized that killing her would be meaningless. It would be like shooting a carpenter’s hammer because he built your house crooked. Nikki was a tool. That was all.

  But a dangerous tool. Mike still wasn’t completely ready to trust her. “How do I know this isn’t a trick?”

  She sighed, thought a moment, then stepped over to the desk, set the automatic down, and pushed it away. Mike kept the shotgun on her the whole time. He could do it now, blast her with buckshot. His finger tightened on the trigger. His killer’s instincts rose up hard. If she were pulling some kind of trick, then it was the worst trick Mike had ever seen. He started to lift the shotgun. She was so very close to death.

  But he couldn’t do it. No, it wasn’t that he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. It would be pointless. In the old days, it wouldn’t have mattered that it was pointless. You didn’t leave a foe alive. It could come back to bite you. Better safe than sorry, right? Mike wouldn’t let himself think that way anymore. He forced the killer inside him to stand down.

  Still, there was something he needed to get out in the open. “Your sister is dead.” Mike didn’t say how or that he’d done it. Nikki would know. He didn’t want her to find out later and seek revenge. This had to be dealt with now. No loose ends.

  Nikki’s eyes widened. “Which one?”

  “Which one what?”

  “I have two sisters.”

  “Meredith,” Mike said.

  Nikki’s lower lip trembled slightly just for a moment. She mastered herself, nodded. “I figured. Hazards of the business.”

  Good, Mike thought. She’s taking it like a professional. No grudges. All business. Mike couldn’t decide if he blamed her for Keone. But who was he to cast stones? He’d made his own mistakes and had to live with them. It was enough that she wouldn’t come after Andrew. He’d made sure his nephew was safe, paid any debt he thought he owed his brother. Time for all of this to be over. Let it be finished.

  Mike wanted to go home.

  “Okay,” Mike said. “You have a deal. I’m going to back out of here nice and slow. You stay right where I can see you. I’ll leave, and we’ll never see each other again, right?”

  She nodded. “Agreed, Mr. Foley. You don’t have a thing to worry about.”

  And then the lights went out.

  40

  The instant everything went dark, Nikki snatched up her pistol again and dove behind the desk. She paused, listened.

  “Foley?”

  “It’s the storm,” the old man said. “The lights have been going on and off all night.”

  She glanced at the alarm display on the wall. There should have been a blinking green light, but there wasn’t. “It’s not the storm. The alarm’s been cut too, and it’s a separate system.” She took a deep breath, exhaled. “They’re here.”

  “They who?”

  “I told you,” Nikki said. “They want me dead.” The man with the voice had sent his killers. She would never be safe. They would hound her to the ends of the earth.

  “It has nothing to do with me,” Foley said.

  The old man’s voice had moved. He was shifting in the darkness, trying to find a spot for himself. He was an old veteran. She could tell. But he was long in the tooth. Most didn’t last so long in this business. Time to see what Mike Foley was made of.

  “We can help each other, Foley.”

  “I told you. Not my concern.”

  “They won’t see it that way,” Nikki said. “They’re going to come in here any second and sanitize the place, including you, whether you feel involved or not.”

  A pause. “What do you want from me?” Foley asked.

  “Kill anyone downstairs that’s not me. My mother is upstairs. I have to go.”

  “How will I know if it’s you or not in the dark?”

  “I’ll say, Don’t shoot me, Mike Foley you son of a bitch. How’s that?”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Okay,” Nikki said. “I’m going. Good luck.”

  She ran quickly out of the library, through the dark house, down the hall to the stairs. The furniture had not been moved in years. She had that much over her assailants at least. She could navigate the house with a bag over her head. No problem.

  Nikki had a split second of warning before she saw the tiny penlight hovering in the dark, then the fist smacked into her face, bells shrieking in her ears, fireworks behind her eyes. The world spun. Nikki flew in the air. Her feet couldn’t find the floor.

  * * *

  After the lights went out, Sprat waited thirty seconds, steeling his nerve.

  He pulled a knife, held it loosely, poised to toss should he see a target. He took a step back and a deep breath and kicked open the French doors just as a blinding flash of lightning lit up the Garden District.

  * * *

  Mike flinched when the French doors flung open with a loud crack, the rain and wind roaring into the library.

  The lightning filled the doorway with blue-white light. Standing in contrast was the shape of a man. He could have been a cardboard cutout from a police shooting range. The outline of this guy holdin
g something up near his head. It was right there for a fraction of a second, the duration of a lightning flash, and then this outline vanished back into the darkness in the same heartbeat that Mike swung the shotgun and blasted buckshot.

  Mike heard the intruder yell. Immediately, Mike knew it wasn’t a pain yell. It was a surprise yell. Another lightning flash, and Mike wasn’t sure what he was seeing. The man seemed to spring onto a set of bookshelves like a spider monkey, something flying toward Mike, spinning and glittering metallic in the lightning flash.

  It struck Mike in pitch-darkness, stabbed medium deep into his leg. The monkey guy had tossed a knife at him. It stuck in his leg, and Mike was afraid it would bleed too much if he pulled it out.

  He gritted his teeth, pumped the shotgun, and caught a glimpse of the guy leaping to the floor in the next lightning flash. He fired, buckshot spraying, but the monkey man had slunk under a desk. The guy was cat-fast, a twitchy lizard. The way he moved, Mike couldn’t get a bead on him. He pumped, fired the shotgun, pumped and fired again, trying to follow the little man’s jerky movements in the white-bright lightning strikes.

  Mike circled, pumped, blasted. The tinkle of broken glass. The French doors flapped in the wind. Thunder cracked. The shotgun hammered away at the interior of the library, but it was like trying to shoot a ghost.

  Mike pumped and pulled the trigger again. Click.

  Shit!

  Mike reached into his jacket pocket, grabbed a handful of shells, fumbled them to the floor. He knelt, felt along the floor, but found only a single shell. Son of a bitch. He loaded the shell, pumped it into the chamber.

  When he tried to stand up again, his back went out.

  * * *

  Only because she’d seen the flashlight did Nikki have time to turn away as the cement-hard fist hit her face. If she’d taken the punch full-on, it would have finished her. Still, the glancing blow spun her around, teeth flying out in a spray of blood. She had slipped halfway into unconsciousness, landed hard. She shook the bells out of her ears, stood and wobbled away on shaky legs, only her strict training keeping her upright.

  The flashlight hovered in her peripheral vision. Instinct took over. Nikki spun, kicked the hand holding the flashlight. She heard a grunt and something heavy falling. The flashlight clattered across the wood floor, light splashing like an out-of-control disco ball.

  Then she ran.

  Something massive slammed into her from behind, powerful arms going around her, lifting her off the ground. She felt the attacker’s chest press into her back, a slight hint of flowery perfume. A woman? Yes, a giant woman with arms like iron.

  The arms squeezed, began the slow, hard crush, and the air left Nikki’s lungs.

  * * *

  Where the hell did he go?

  The man had surprised Sprat. There wasn’t supposed to be anyone else in the house. Now Sprat couldn’t catch a glimpse of movement in the lightning flashes, and he couldn’t hear anything over the wind and rain. Was it possible Sprat had nailed him with the knife? No. The blade had been wet and slick, and Sprat knew his aim was off. The knife had gone low. It had possibly caught the bloke’s leg, but it might have missed altogether.

  He took the little flashlight from his jacket pocket, thought about using it to check for a body. But he also knew the light would make him a target. Maybe that’s what the sneaky fellow was counting on. Maybe he was playing possum.

  Sprat spider-crawled on top of a table, crouched low, stepping carefully to avoid knocking over decanters of expensive liquor on the tabletop. He pulled the other knife, prepared to spring. He could pounce on somebody like a jaguar, entangle them in his arms and legs, and slit a throat before the victim said boo.

  He scanned the room, straining to see any hint of movement in the shadows.

  Where are you, you crafty bastard?

  Nikki went limp and threw her arms over her head. If the big woman anticipated the move, then Nikki was through, but she caught her attacker by surprise. Her sudden deadweight slipped through the big woman’s hug.

  She lay on the floor, waited a moment, knowing the woman would bend over to grab her again. Nikki kicked up hard, caught the behemoth on the chin. Her attacker stumbled back and fell, the sound of an avalanche.

  Nikki scurried to her feet and flew up the stairs. Who else is in this house? How many? She ran to her mother’s room and threw open the door. Her mother looked up from her rocking chair. She knitted the scarf by candlelight. The old woman raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

  “There are intruders in the house.”

  She snorted. “Come for your father, I suppose. Tell them he’s not here.”

  As she closed the bedroom door, Nikki said, “Lock yourself in, Mother. Don’t open the door until I check—”

  A heavy hand on Nikki’s shoulder spun her around. Nikki ducked the punch just in time. The giantess had followed her up the stairs so quickly. Nikki had thought the kick to her chin would have put her down a little longer. She dropped and attempted to sweep the woman’s legs. It was like kicking stone, the woman’s ankles like granite monuments.

  The woman lifted an enormous foot and brought it down hard, trying to stomp Nikki’s chest. Nikki rolled to the side, and the foot impacted the hardwood floor, which cracked under the force.

  A sudden memory. Her old martial arts teacher, wrapping a blindfold around a seventeen-year-old Nikki. Fighting without sight, sensing the mass of your opponent in front of you. Listening for breathing and the rustle of clothing. Nikki closed her eyes, kicked, her heel impacting the big woman’s knee.

  A pained yelp, strangely high-pitched and feminine.

  Nikki scrambled to her feet, leapt high and kicked, felt the ball of her foot flatten the woman’s nose. She spun, kicked again, landed another blow on her jaw. A fist flew out of the darkness and landed above Nikki’s ear. She staggered back, spots in front of her eyes. She shook her head, tried to regain focus, when another unseen fist hit her square in the mouth. She tasted blood and fell backward, landed on her back.

  She lay a split second on the floor, trying to block out the pain. She felt groping hands on her head. The woman grabbed a fist full of her hair. Nikki kicked up and over her head, caught her in the face again, and heard her teeth rattle. But this time the big woman hung on tight, hoisted Nikki to her feet.

  Nikki felt a thick forearm tighten on her throat. It wasn’t the haphazard grip the woman had used on her before, some kind of wrestling hold. Going limp wouldn’t work this time.

  Nikki bent her knees and heaved with all her strength to slam the big woman against the wall. It was like trying to move a bulldozer. Nikki managed to knock the woman against the wall, but it was barely a nudge. Nikki hadn’t even bruised the giantess. The grip tightened on Nikki’s throat, her face red and the air pressed almost completely out of her.

  This time Nikki brought her feet up against the wall and pushed away hard. The big woman hadn’t been ready for that. She stumbled back, still clutching Nikki.

  Their mass hit the stair railing, smashing it apart like so many matchsticks. The big woman panicked, let go of Nikki, arms windmilling, screaming bloody murder. Nikki was almost unconscious, but training and instinct kicked in, an arm snaking out to grab something solid.