by Lake, Keri
“He’s still there?” I asked between heaving breaths.
“Still there.”
“We killed about an hour, at least. One down three to go.”
He snorted and leaned in to kiss me. “Maybe once the windows defog, we can burn off another hour.”
* * *
I laid my cards down onto the console between us, and smiled when Dax sank down into his seat. “Straight flush.”
“You have a photographic memory. Pretty sure you cheated somewhere.”
“Don’t be mad, baby. Pay up,” I held out my palm, flicking my fingers until he set a cigarette there.
“Where’d you learn to play like that?”
“One of Dmitry’s guards, Aleksey.” I shoved the cigarette behind my ear, next to the one I’d won in the last round, my thoughts turning somber. Scratching the back of my head, I searched for distraction in a bid to keep my memories from pulling me into the black abyss of imagining how brutal his death must’ve been. “Guy hated losing, so I learned to beat him. Quickly.”
Dax kicked his arm up onto the back of the seat and tipped his head, lip curved into a half smile. “You don’t back down easily, do you?”
“No,” I said, gathering up the cards into a stack. “I refuse to let someone win simply because they’re more intimidating.”
“How did you end up on the drugs? Seems like that would’ve compromised your objective with Tesarik.”
Gaze locked on shuffling the cards, I schooled my attention, to keep from looking troubled by his question. It was innocent enough, but the answer felt far more complicated. Or maybe I just had a hell of a time trying to explain it. “It’s a long story.”
“We got time.”
“Dax … you don’t want to know. Trust me.”
“It’s easier, right? You see something you can’t unsee.”
His stare burned in my periphery, yet I still kept my attention on the cards, as his words brought to mind the faces of the women during my captivity, and Eden.
“Something that just keeps spinning and spinning inside your head, and when you try to make sense of it, you feel your instincts kick in. To reject it, but you can’t. So you pop a pill, and then you don’t have to think anymore. The pill thinks for you. Tells you everything is going to be okay. All you gotta do, is make sure there’s another pill waiting for you.”
Only another addict would understand. Only someone who’d been through some insurmountable shit would know that fragile line between morals and goals, and just trying to cope and survive. Every moment with Dax felt like another thread unspooling inside of me and latching onto him. It felt good to be tethered to something, yet I knew, at some point, those strings would snap and I’d find myself drifting again.
“Is that how it was for you?” I asked, in a desperate attempt to reel in the loose threads.
“You’re lying if you say it wasn’t that way for you. I didn’t tell you a personal experience. It’s every addict’s story. Only difference between all of us is the single thing that pushes us over the edge. So, what was yours?” He brushed his finger across my neck, where the scar of Villam’s knife answered for me. “What made a determined woman fall into that empty space?”
A shadow moved in my periphery and I lifted my gaze past Dax, to where a fat, bald man stumbled toward the Astro van. “Leaving.”
“What?”
“Kenny. He’s leaving the bar.”
Dax snapped his head back, and when the van pulled forward onto the main road, he fired up the ‘Cuda. “Must’ve cut the game early.”
“Did you tell him anything?”
“Who? Frank? Hell, no. Kenny would’ve been dead and buried the moment he set foot inside that bar, if I had.”
Which would’ve been the sweetest justice, if not for the fact that I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of watching his face strain against agonizing pain.
As Dax trailed after the gray van, my heart hammered inside my chest.
My next act of vengeance would be my worst yet.
29
Dax
Keeping two car lengths behind, I stalked the Astro van through the city and down a dark side street, where the houses bore the telling decay of slowly declining economics. Most neighborhoods in Detroit looked that way—as if they’d stood through war and its depressing aftermath.
I slowed the ‘Cuda to a crawl and rolled to a stop half a block from where the van idled along, veering toward the curb on occasion.
Kenny turned the vehicle into the driveway of a weathered white house, the width of which was smaller than its length. He’d clearly gotten drunk, evident in his stumbling and swaying as he struggled to make it up the porch steps. The screen door sat cockeyed on its hinges, which he threw back carelessly, tripping forward with the effort, before disappearing inside the dark house.
Lights in the lower level flicked on.
From the corner of my eye, I caught Nicoleta reaching for the passenger door, and I set my hand on her arm.
“Give it a minute. He might pass out.”
“I don’t want him to pass out. I want him to see what’s coming for him.”
I squeezed harder, and she lowered her hand with a disappointed huff.
Through the naked picture window at the front of the house, Kenny fell into a recliner, the shiny crown of his head peeking over the top of the chair, as he flicked on the TV.
“Must’ve gotten too drunk and blew through his cash early.”
Arms crossed, Nicoleta glanced over at me and shrugged a shoulder. “Must be shitty at poker.”
“He’s not bad. Seen him win a few rounds, but the asshole’s pretty cocky. Likes to talk a lot of shit. Frank hates when he shows up.”
“I need to get out of this car. My adrenaline is so pumped, I feel like I’m going to throw up.”
Gaze on Kenny again, I waited to see if he’d move, get up for a drink, or stumble along to bed. He hadn’t so much as lifted his head since falling into that chair, which told me he might’ve already passed out. “All right. We’ll see if there’s a back entrance. That window is wide open for any bastard to peek in.”
I nabbed the gun from the glovebox and checked the mag. Not that I’d need it, necessarily. The asshole was drunk enough, I could knock him out with one sloppy smack across the face, which made the whole thing somewhat unappealing. He wouldn’t even know why the hell he’d taken a hit, let alone comprehend what’d come next.
Exiting the car, Nicoleta followed after me, as I shadowed the side of the house toward the back. Through the window of the backdoor, some kind of wall obstructed the entrance, like a shelving unit. For kicks, I turned the knob, which clicked open and hit the enormous object, rattling something on the other side of the door. I didn’t bother to push, for fear of knocking it over with the kind of clatter that could wake the asshole from his drunken stupor. Instead, I backed myself away from the house and searched for another way in.
Having explored abandoned buildings most of my life, I’d come to know there was always more than one point of entry. Even the most secure structures typically had a weakness—one spot that made it penetrable.
Something hit my foot as I blindly backed myself into the yard, and I glanced down to see a small naked baby doll lying half buried in the mud. The right side of its face was bent in, with white hair matted in dirt and tangled in knots. The yard held no other toys, so perhaps it’d been discarded, or tossed.
Ignoring it, I gave a quick scan of the house’s exterior.
The second floor bedroom window sat cracked, a sheer white curtain fluttering against the opening. Below it, the roof of the back porch, encased in brick walls, slanted downward, meaning I’d need to climb onto the porch roof to gain access to the window.
Taking a few steps back, I bent my knees, then pushed up onto the balls of my feet and darted forward. In three long strides up the side of the brick wall, I braced my palms against the top of the roof, hoisting myself onto its surface.
Hel
l, three years of parkour and a decade of dumb stunts hadn’t been for nothing, after all.
I reached over the edge for Nicoleta, and without any instruction, she gripped my arm, scuttled up the wall, and onto the roof beside me. The two of us ducked down and peered into the dark room through the window. A bed sat off against the wall, empty and unkempt, while the door at the opposite side of the room had been closed.
After widening the crack, I slid through the window first, setting my foot against torn-up carpeting, and pushed through, careful not to set too much weight onto the floor in case it creaked. With light steps, I entered the room and made my way toward the closed door.
Ear set to its panel, I stopped to listen for any footsteps, or a sign that someone else might’ve been inside the house.
Nicoleta came up from behind, setting her hand to the doorknob. “Let’s go,” she whispered, “I need to get this over with.”
I couldn’t blame her. Had I not spent half my life hunting pedophiles and thieves, I might’ve been just as antsy. But I couldn’t get that doll out of the back of my head, either. Might’ve been discarded trash. Or maybe it belonged to someone inside the house.
“Easy,” I warned. “Don’t be too hasty.”
“If you saw that video, you’d be hasty, too.”
I took a moment to let that sink in, to remember why we were there in the first place, and with a nod, I let her turn the knob.
We slipped through a narrow gap in the door and padded down the hallway, toward where the sounds of snoring echoed up through the house.
At a creeping sensation crawling up my spine, like shadows trailing our steps, I turned around.
A little boy, maybe three years old, stood in the middle of the hallway behind us. In nothing but Superman underwear, he reminded me of an orphan kid, with dirt shadowing his neck and knees, random cuts and scrapes typical of a young boy, and sandy brown hair overgrown in disarray.
“Aw you hewe to huwt my daddy?” He rubbed his eyes, as though he’d just gotten out of bed, but either half asleep, or at ease with two strangers in his house.
“Where’s your mommy?”
“I dunno. Her doesn’t live wif us anymore.” His eyes shifted to the bannister and back, as though wary of us.
I knelt down to one knee, keeping my distance so as not to scare him. “It’s just you and your daddy?”
“And Lala. My sistew.” He scratched at his nose, one hand clutching the band of his underwear. “You not gonna punch my daddy, wight?”
“Has someone hurt him in front of you before?”
“Him got beat up by some guys. Dey stealed ow money.”
A quick glance back at Nicoleta showed her staring over the balcony, completely disinterested in our conversation. “What’s your name, little man?”
“Daniel.”
“I want you to do me a favor, Daniel. Okay?”
He gave a nod, and the hand picking at his nose joined the first as he held them together in front of his body.
“I want you to go back to your room and close the door. Can you do that for me?”
At the second nod, he did as I asked, toddling along back to the only other room down the hall, which I guessed he must’ve shared with his sister.
When I spun around to face Nicoleta, the expression on her face was unreadable. Perhaps disappointment. Anger. And something else.
Crossing her arms over her chest, she shook her head. “It’s too late, Dax. I’m not turning back now.”
“Can’t do it. Not like this, Nic.” I shook my head, too, and hiked a thumb over my shoulder, toward the bedroom behind me. “Those kids don’t deserve that shit.”
“Those kids aren’t safe with him.”
“Maybe not. But I’m not killing a man in front of his boy. I won’t do it.”
“We might not get the opportunity again. We walk away tonight? That kid might tell his dad we were here. They might flee first chance they get.” She pushed past me, toward the staircase. “I’m doing this. With or without you.”
A tight clutch of her arm swung her around, and I dodged a punch to my face, wrestled her other arm against me. “I’m not letting you do this! Whatever this motherfucker did … his kids don’t need to see that. They’re innocent. Watching that will fuck them up for life.”
“What makes you think they haven’t already been exposed, huh? What makes you think they’re not suffering his abuse everyday?” Jaw tight and eyes raging with frustration, she fought my grasp, twisting and yanking her hands. “I guess you need a dick pic sent to you before anything warrants punishment, is that it? You have to be groomed and seduced before they’re considered guilty?”
No lie, her words struck like a blow to my chest, but I stood by my argument. Had any of the bastards I met up with, and beat the shit out of, had a child with them, I’d have spared them my fists until the next time.
“I’m not saying I don’t believe you. I do. But this isn’t happening like this. Not tonight. Now, if I gotta drag you out of this house kicking and screaming, I will. Then we’ll watch how fast they bounce out of here.”
“Fuck you, Dax. Fuck you.” With tears in her eyes, she wrenched her arms from mine, but instead of heading toward the staircase, she stormed back to the bedroom we’d come in through and climbed out the window.
Everything about the night, from the moment the asshole had stumbled home, until I saw that doll in the backyard, had given me a bad vibe.
Maybe she was right. Perhaps I hadn’t seen enough to flip my kill switch.
The boy didn’t have the bruises I’d come to know of an abusive parent. Yeah, the piece of shit had left two young kids home alone, and was probably a deadbeat dad who didn’t take care of them like he should’ve. But my own mom had done the same thing when I was that age. It was shitty, but I’d have never wished her dead for it.
I leaped off the rooftop and made my way back to the ‘Cuda, where Nicoleta already sat staring through the windshield. The wet streaks on her face told me she’d been crying, and the second I fell into the driver’s seat, she wiped her skin clean.
“Nicoleta—”
“Piss off. I’m done with you. You promised me.” Turning to face the passenger window, she sniffled “You told me you’d help me!”
“I did. And I would’ve. But the game changed, Nic. Sometimes, you gotta fold.”
“No. You don’t fold. The weak fold. The beaten fold. I. don’t. fold.”
“That may be true. But the experienced players know when to step back and assess the situation.”
“Is this a crack at my age? Because you’re a decade older, you know so much more?”
“Yeah, it is. Christ, have you forgotten what it’s like to be a kid? To have a shitty parent, but love them, anyway?” Tilting my head failed to get her attention. “I get it. He hurt someone you care about. I know that feeling. I know it eats at you. I’ve acted on it myself, impulsively. But there isn’t a damn good reason in the world that would justify mutilating that asshole in front of those kids.” Didn’t seem like anything I’d said was getting through to her, the way she kept her eyes glued to the passenger window. “You think your friend would want that? You think she’d want two more kids to be fucked up because of this cocksucker?”
More tears wet her cheeks, and shoulders slouching in defeat, she finally dropped her gaze to her lap. “No. You’re right. She wouldn’t.”
“He’s going to pay for what he did. I promise you.” I gripped her chin, guiding her eyes back to mine. “I promise you. We’ll go back and rethink the plan.”
“And if the kid says something?”
“His dad will probably think he had a nightmare.” Sitting back into the seat, I started up the ‘Cuda and revved the engine. “People don’t usually break into houses in Detroit without taking some shit with them.”
30
Dax
The clock read just after one in the morning, when the rattling buzz of my phone left me scrambling for it before Nicol
eta could wake up to the sound.
She’d calmed down a bit once we’d arrived back at the apartment, and both of us had come to the decision that we’d need to remove those kids from the picture before going after Kenny. Even if it meant placing him at the mercy of protective services instead of her long-awaited revenge.
Having grown up with social workers and foster care my whole life, I admittedly hadn’t developed a shit ton of faith in the system, but it was worth a shot. I’d planned to make a few calls to some contacts first thing in the morning.
I rubbed my eyes and stared down at a notification popped up on my screen. The accompanying message from China bore a warning:
I don’t know who these bastards are, but I hope you make them pay for this. Watch at your own risk.
With a quick glance back at Nicoleta, I slid from the bed, grabbing my pack of smokes from the nightstand, and threw on the pants I’d draped over the chair. Damn the pounding of my heart, as I snuck out the front door and down the staircase. I didn’t want there to be any chance Nicoleta might see, or hear, the video, which, from the sounds of it, would undoubtedly throw her straight into another night terror.
Christ, I knew firsthand how that felt, seeing someone you loved murdered. I’d watched my sister’s snuff video and ended up beating one of my friends to death as a result.
Stomach churning, I rounded the side of the building, well out of sight, and clicked play. The video started out with a man sitting in a chair, his face hidden beneath a pig mask—one of the creepy Halloween variety. The darkness behind him made it difficult to see anything else in the room. Piggy by Nine Inch Nails played in the background, low enough that I could hear sniffles and crying from somewhere in the room beyond.
Pigmask unzipped his pants, turning just slightly, and crooked his finger. From the right side of the screen, a young girl, whose age was difficult to pinpoint from her profile, crawled toward him on her hands and knees. Her body too skinny and bruised. Long blonde hair hid most of her face as, sobbing, she knelt down in front of him. The second he whipped his dick out of his boxers, I had to fast forward ahead. Couldn’t watch that shit. It was one thing to watch staged porn, but to know the girl had actually been kidnapped and murdered by the end of it only made the scenes in between more sickening.
