That being said, I’m not an idiot and I know I can’t maintain this pace for much longer. I have to catch Jones, and fast.
I can see him in front of me. He looks over his shoulder at me and nearly falls over a trashcan. He recovers quickly and ducks into an alley on the left, between two buildings.
“Marcus!” I shout. “Quit making me run, you asshole!”
I enter the alleyway after him, but he’s nowhere to be seen. It’s a dead-end, what the...
Dammit, fire escape—just behind one of the large dumpsters against the right hand wall. I look up and see him climbing the metal stairs up to the roof.
Shit.
I take a deep breath and move back a couple of steps. I sprint toward the ladder that Jones has ever-so-kindly pulled up and jump, stretching as best I can under the circumstances and managing to just grab the bottom rung. The pain ripping through my torso right now is excruciating and difficult to ignore. I breathe rapidly to compose myself and after a few seconds start to pull myself up.
Once on the fire escape, I set off running, taking the stairs two and three at a time. I step down onto the roof of the building just in time to see Jones reach the other side and jump. Without breaking stride, I rush over and see he’s made it over the next alleyway and onto the roof of the adjacent building.
“You gotta be kidding me?” I say to myself, gasping for air.
Without thinking—because, let’s face it, if I stop and think about it, my brain would definitely tell me this is one of the dumbest things I’ve done in a long time—I run and jump…
Thankfully, the gap is deceptively small and I cover the distance easily enough, landing heavily on the neighboring roof. I stand up, wincing in pain, and see Jones ahead of me. He’s at the edge of the roof again, but he’s just standing there with his back to me. It takes me a moment, but I realize we’re on the edge of the block. There’s nowhere left to go.
He turns to face me, glancing over his shoulder quickly at the ledge, and subsequent drop, now behind him. We’re easily five or six stories up, so the drop would be fatal. Let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that… at least not before I get some answers.
I slow down as I approach him, catching my breath. I draw my gun and take aim one-handed.
“Finally,” I say. “Have you finished being an asshole? Me and you need to have a chat.”
“I ain’t got nothin’ to say to you,” he says, defensively.
“You don’t know that… You don’t even know who I am, or what I want. Don’t write off your ability to be helpful before we even start talking.”
Jones shrugs. “Okay, so who the hell are you, man?”
“I’m a concerned citizen who wants to know what Dark Rain is planning.”
I see the flash of concern on his face, but he seems set on pleading ignorance.
“I ain’t ever heard of no Dark Rain, man.”
“Bullshit. I saw your reaction when you laid eyes on Clara. Why did you run?”
He glances over his shoulder again. “I ain’t talking and you can’t make me,” he shouts. “They’re gonna hunt you down and slay you in the street for this!”
I fire once, above his head. “Enough,” I say. “If you’re gonna talk, stick to what I want to know, not what I could give two shits about.”
I step closer to him. Again, he looks over his shoulder at the street below, except this time he inches himself backward a tiny bit so he’s standing right on the edge.
He wouldn’t jump, surely?
“Don’t even think about it, Marcus,” I say.
I’m maybe ten feet away from him. I can see the defiant look in his eyes. His jaw is set and his breathing is rapid.
Shit… he’s going to jump, isn’t he?
Screw it.
I take a chance and shoot him in his left kneecap. He falls forward, screaming in pain and clutching his leg, which is pumping out blood on the ground around him.
The kneecap is one of the most painful places to get shot. I didn’t do it to make him suffer, though. I needed him to fall forward—if I’d shot him in the arm or shoulder, the impact would’ve sent him backward and over the edge. At least putting one in his knee meant he’d him keel over and drop straight to the floor.
I walk over and crouch beside him, putting my gun to his head. Before I can speak, I hear a loud bang behind me. I spin around, aiming my gun, preparing for anything. I see Clara walking toward us. The door that leads to the roof must’ve hit the wall as she opened it.
“Hey,” I say, lowering my gun. “How’d you find us?”
‘I was following you in the car,’ she replies. ‘I could see you on the roof. When you reached the end of the block, I figured the chase was over so I came up through the building.’
She walks over to Jones, looking down at him quickly before turning to look at me.
“Can you interrogate anyone without shooting them?” she asks.
“Not usually,” I reply with a shrug.
“Maybe I should handle this?”
“Be my guest.”
I take a step back as Clara crouches down next to him.
“Marcus,” she says. “I need your help.”
He looks up at her; his teeth are clenched in agony. “Screw you, bitch!” he says. “You’re a traitor, and you’re gonna die!”
Seemingly unfazed, she places her hand on his throat. “Marcus, did you know about the Uranium?”
“Do you have any idea what they’re gonna do to you if they find you? Or to me, if I talk to you? Kiss my ass, traitor!”
Clara squeezes his throat. His eyes widen as he gasps for air, but he can’t breathe. After a few moments, she loosens her grip again. “Do you have any idea what I’m gonna do to you if you don’t talk?” she says to him. “I can make the agony you’re in right now last for days. Weeks, if necessary.”
He starts to cry… the poor bastard.
“Please—they’ll kill me!” he begs.
“Marcus, you’re dead anyway. You’re going to bleed out on this rooftop in a lot of pain. But if you help me, tell me something that we can use against them…” She pauses and I see a look on her face that reminds me of a nurse comforting a patient. “…you can rest knowing you’ve done the right thing. I can ease your suffering.”
I have to admit, she’s good. This is probably more effective, and quicker, than me shooting him and beating on him until he talks. I’m not going to admit that to her though.
“Please, Marcus,” she urges. “Did you know about the Uranium?”
“Yes,” he says, finally.
“What’s the big picture?”
“Once they’ve mined it, it was my job to transport it to their lab.”
“And then what?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Marcus, come on.” She squeezes slightly on his throat again.
“Please! I swear, I don’t know. I heard talk that they’re holding a scientist somewhere until the Uranium’s ready. They’re going to make them process it into weapons-grade material.”
Clara looks up at me and my jaw muscles tense. I’m guessing we share the same concerns right now.
“Marcus,” I say after a moment. “Where are they keeping this scientist?”
“I s-swear I don’t know. I just heard a couple of people talking.”
Clara stands and motions to me to follow her. We walk a few paces away from Jones, just out of earshot.
“I believe him,” she says to me.
“Okay.”
“Ketranovich doesn’t tell any one person everything. He tells people only what they need to know to carry out their assignments. That way, if he’s betrayed, he’ll know who did it based on what information has been leaked.”
“That’s very smart. So now what?”
She looks over at Jones, then back at me. She lowers her gaze, and her body goes tense all over. That tells me she believes we’ve got all the information we’re going to get from Jones. And we obviously can’t leave him here…
<
br /> I sigh and give her an empathetic smile. “Do you want to do it?” I ask.
She shakes her head.
I nod. “Okay,” I whisper to her. “Wait here.”
I walk over to Jones, take aim and without another word, I look him in the eye and put a bullet in his head. The shot rings out and neither of us moves until the silence falls once more.
I take a deep breath, choosing to ignore the stabbing pain in my chest as I do.
At least we’ve got a lot more to go on now, which is a good thing. We know Dark Rain is hiding a scientist somewhere until the Uranium is mined. It’s interesting to hear that Dark Rain intended processing the material themselves—wonder if GlobaTech knew… It’s kind of funny that both parties were intending to betray each other. In a way, it would’ve been interesting to see what would’ve happened if the material were mined, and they both tried to convert it at the same time…
I’m assuming, given what’s at stake, no one’s going to let the fact that I have the deeds stop them from starting the mining process. With Jackson dead, I reckon that will delay things from GlobaTech’s point of view for a while. The next step is to find this scientist… If we can get to them before the mining starts, Dark Rain will be forced to delay things too, based on their inability to do anything with the material once they have it. The last thing Ketranovich will want is to be sitting on tons of Uranium that’s useless on the black market.
We need to act fast, but for the first time this week, things are looking up.
“What now?” she asks.
“We need to get out of here before the cops arrive,” I say. “Fancy a drink?”
14.
17:14
WE’RE SITTING ACROSS from each other in a booth, sipping our drinks. The bar isn’t too busy or too loud. There’s some music playing low in the background. There’s a very contemporary feel to the place. The interior is a mixture of brown leather and dark wood, as is the furniture. The people here seem more refined than the patrons in the places I usually drink. Everyone is in business dress or smart casual attire, talking in small groups like civilized people.
I’m cradling two fingers of Johnnie Walker; Clara’s holding a bottle of bud between her hands on the table, staring silently into space.
“So, what’s the plan?” she asks.
I shrug casually. “The way I see it, we need to start by tracking down this scientist,” I say. “Any ideas where they could be holding them?”
“There are a few places they might use. It’ll be within the city limits—they wouldn’t want to risk transporting the Uranium too far. Especially over state lines.”
“True. I’ll get my guy to look into it. You can give him the locations you know of and he’ll work his magic from there. He might be able to narrow down the search, track them by process of elimination.”
“Sounds good...”
She seems distracted. She probably has a lot on her mind, which I can understand.
“You alright?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” she replies, somewhat unconvincingly. “It’s just what Marcus said to me on the roof, about being a traitor. It’s like I told you, Adrian—you can’t walk away from these people.”
“Hey, you’re gonna be fine. You have my word—we’re going to stop them, okay?”
She smiles, but says nothing. We fall silent again for a few minutes, but it doesn’t feel awkward.
“Can I ask you something?” she says after a few moments.
“Shoot,” I say.
“Before, in your motel room, I got out of the shower wearing a towel.”
“Yes… you did.”
“And we had a long conversation.”
“I know, I was there, remember?”
“You didn’t check me out once.”
I raise an eyebrow and burst out laughing, prompting a disapproving look.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “But you’re such a woman!”
“What gave it away? These?” she says sarcastically, pointing at her breasts.
I smile, making a conscious effort not to look. “Let me ask you this,” I say. “If I had checked you out, or made a move or whatever, would it have got me anywhere?”
She seems to genuinely consider it for a moment, before smiling almost apologetically. “Probably not.”
“There you go. So if we both knew I wouldn’t have stood a chance anyway, why does it bother you that didn’t try?”
She shrugs. “A girl likes to be noticed, y'know. It makes her feel... special.” She pulls a playful face and smiles, messing with me.
I massage my temples in frustration. “Shoot me now...”
She laughs and I laugh with her. She finishes her drink and points to my glass.
“Want another?” she asks.
I take a final gulp of my drink and nod. “Please. Same again.”
She walks off to the bar. I notice a group of men at a table across from us stop and check her out. I smile to myself and stare absently at the table.
Why didn’t I check her out? I mean, it’s not like she’s unattractive. Purely based on looks, she’s one of the most gorgeous women I’ve seen in a long, long time. I just… I don’t think about stuff like that. I focus on my job and that’s it. After losing…
I rest my head in my hands and sigh.
I’m angry at myself now because I’m worried I’ve offended her in some way. I wonder if I’ve actually hurt her feelings… Women are complicated creatures sometimes. She was being playful, but there’s likely an underlying reason that prompted her to ask.
Or am I over-thinking it?
I let out a heavy sigh again.
“What’s on your mind, champ?” asks Clara, placing my drink in front of me and sliding back into her seat.
“Just thinking about what you said before, about not checking you out. I –”
She waves her hand and smiles. “I was just kidding around, forget about it.”
“No, it’s fine. I need to give you a real reason for my own piece of mind, okay?”
She shrugs, still smiling at me. “Go ahead,” she says.
I take a deep breath and a gulp of Johnnie Walker.
“Six years ago, I was working a contract over in Pittsburgh. A guy hired me to take out a local drug dealer called Darnell Harper, who sold some cocaine to his son. The boy died of an overdose and the coroner’s report said the coke had been cut with some kind of cleaning fluid, which made it toxic. The guy was beside himself, but knew he couldn’t do anything on his own. He reported it to the police, but they did nothing, so he hired me to kill the guy that sold it.”
She listens intently, occasionally sipping her drink.
“I looked into the guy—he was just a small-time dealer. He had a modest operation in the local area, but he wasn’t in the big leagues. I tailed him for a couple of days, learned his routines and his hangouts. Then on the third day, I waited until he was alone and I put a bullet between his eyes with a sniper rifle from a rooftop two streets away…”
“Nice,” she shrugs with what felt like professional admiration.
“Thanks…Unfortunately, it turned out Harper was the son of Wilson Trent, the drug kingpin who runs most of Pennsylvania. I didn’t find that out initially, because no one on the street knew about it. Apparently, Harper used his mother’s maiden name so he wouldn’t be associated with his old man. He wanted to make his own way, not on Trent’s coat-tails.”
“So what happened?” asks Clara.
“Trent put the word out that his son had been hit. It didn’t take long from him to track down my client, and it took even less time to convince him to give me up. Within a few days, I had five guys kicking in my front door, intent on killing me. An example needed making to send a message, to remind everyone that you didn’t mess with Wilson Trent.”
I pause and finish off my drink as I’m inundated with memories and images—visions from that day that will haunt me forever… and the darkness I tried to crawl out of in the year
s that followed.
“You alright?” she asks, leaning forward on the table. “You don’t have to explain anything to me, y’know? I’m serious—I was just kidding around before.”
“I know,” I reply. “Thank you. But it’s okay. I want to tell you.”
She nods and leans back against the seat, taking another sip of her beer.
“I wasn’t home when they came round,” I continue. “But they kicked down the door and stormed in to find that my wife and daughter were. Maria was just seven years old...” I let the sentence trail off for a moment as I picture my baby girl, smiling at me. “When I got home later that night, I found them both hog-tied on the kitchen floor with bullets in their heads and chests. They'd turned the house upside down and trashed it almost beyond repair. At the time, I had no idea what had happened. I just panicked, packed a bag, grabbed my guns and left. I rang the police a couple of hours later and said I was a concerned neighbor who had heard gunshots. I’ve not been back home since.”
“Jesus, Adrian, I’m so sorry,” she says. Her eyes are filling up with tears.
“That’s why I wouldn’t have dreamed of making a move on you, or even looking at you in that way,” I say. “As far as I’m concerned, I’m still married.”
She nods and smiles, casually wiping away the single tear rolling down her right cheek. “That’s very admirable of you,” she says. “So, how come you’ve never gone after this Trent guy since?”
“I hadn’t been in the freelance business that long when it all happened, and back then I was out of my league going up against a man like Trent. I just ran, keeping clear of the East Coast to this day. Nowadays, I’m more than capable of going after him, but… I’m not ready to face my past yet, or my guilt for running away in the first place. I was in a bad place for a long time. If it wasn’t for my friend, Josh, getting me through those dark times, I probably would’ve eaten a bullet years ago.”
“Well, you shouldn’t feel guilty, Adrian. Anyone in your position would’ve done the same.”
I smile. “Thank you for saying so, but that doesn’t make living with it any easier.”
“No, I imagine it doesn’t... I’m sorry.” She pauses for a moment. “So, your life since then has basically involved travelling around the country and killing people for money?” she asks, trying to change the subject and lighten the mood.
True Conviction Page 11
