Dead Eye Hunt (Book 2): Into The Rad Lands

by Meredith, Peter

  “Number seventy-nine!” the guard barked, before lifting his face from the clipboard. “Seventy-nine!”

  There was an odd pause in the room as the prisoners who were not currently drowning in a quagmire of fear and self-pity, looked around in confusion. Number Eighty shook his beastly head. “No. It’s number seventy-eight. This is him right here.” Again, he pointed with both hands.

  “Shut the fuck up. Number seventy-nine! Where are you? Don’t make me…”

  A little voice squeaked, “That’s me.” Cole had been in something of a daze when he’d been brought in and hadn’t noticed the person brought in seconds after him. It was a tiny girl with blonde hair. His heart leapt into his throat when he saw Corrina’s face—but it was not Corrina. It was someone else. It was still just a girl. She couldn’t have been over fourteen.

  She was frightened beyond the ability to walk. She shook and trembled, and although she made an effort to walk, she fell, her limbs curling inward until she looked like the fetus she had recently been.

  “No,” Cole whispered, unable to imagine what a girl that young could have done to deserve the death penalty. “Hard labor!” he gasped. “She should get labor, not this.”

  The guard twitched just as he was about to grab her and haul her to her death. He had never heard anyone make a plea for someone besides themselves before. The twitch was all the response he could make. Over the years, he had built up a mental and emotional wall. These were not people. Their screams were not real, and their begging hands meant nothing. He bent and grabbed the chain between her cuffed wrists and as he did, numbers Seventy-eight and Eighty both cried out, “Hey!”

  “You forgot him,” Eighty insisted. “Come back here!” The guard ignored him just as he ignored the girl’s whimpers as he dragged her away. When he was gone, Eighty sat stewing angrily, muttering, “You better be next or so help me.”

  Cole did not dare to hope. There had been a glitch in the numbers. The guard had called the wrong person. He had taken a child when he should have taken Cole. It ate at him, and now instead of being afraid, he was wracked by guilt. He almost wished he was called next. It would have been just. Instead the guard called out: “Eighty.”

  “No!” Eighty screamed. “He’s next. You skipped him. Look at his number. It’s seventy-eight!” He said this as if he was springing a surprise witness before the court. The only surprise was the fact that the guard didn’t gasp in shock and recheck the clipboard he carried. The guard opened the cage and stepped back, but Eighty clung to the bars, screaming, “Seventy-eight is before eighty you asshole!”

  The guard sighed and called a second guard over. This one came with a shortened version of a jump-up. He zapped Eighty until he fell to the floor in the exact same position as Seventy-nine had assumed. He was then dragged away and killed. The room was quiet. Eighty-one was called; a blank-faced black man with yellow eyes and no teeth. Eighty-two left next. All Cole saw of him were hunched shoulders and a broad back.

  Before Eighty-three could be called, a slim, neat woman appeared in the doorway. She wore a charcoal grey suit, carried a heavy briefcase and had a perfectly aligned part in her straight black hair. She talked briefly with the guard, handed him an envelope, then marched over, her eyes fixed on Cole. “You’re to come with me, Mr. Younger,” she said. “My name is Michelle Bentfield and I have brought with me an order temporarily staying your execution.”

  “Is that right?” Cole asked, trying to play it cool, even though his insides seemed to be coming completely unwound and sweat was racing down his back.

  “Indeed. You have powerful friends. Consider yourself lucky that we were able to get you thirty-six hours.” She glanced once at the other condemned prisoners and then stepped back for the guard to release Cole, which he did, chains and all.

  Cole came out of the cage shaking and his legs threatened to fail. He honestly didn’t know if he could walk just then, and to hide the fact, he stretched, cracking his back and reaching high. In mid-stretch he felt the odd compulsion to punch the guard and couldn’t explain why since the man had not been unnecessarily cruel. To keep from lashing out, he held his fists close to his sides as he followed after Michelle. “Who are these friends?” Cole asked once they had left the vomit-smelling room behind. He assumed that it was Ashley Tinsley who had saved him. A picture of her had formed in his mind when Michelle held up a small, soft hand.

  “Not here.” Michelle didn’t speak, not even once they left the courthouse, where Cole expected to find one of Ashley’s great fancy cars waiting for him. Instead Michelle flagged a taxi, which took them fifteen blocks north to Grand Central Station. As they drove, Michelle pulled a light jacket and a hat from her briefcase. “Put these on and when we get to the train station, keep close. We’re being followed. The police have a rather intense desire to kill you.”

  They were dropped off in front of the station and in no time, they were in the swirling crowd, Cole walking hunched into himself to hide his size. Michelle found a side tunnel that ran to the east entrance. They walked out into the rain and directly to a black sedan, where they climbed in. As soon as the door closed, it slid away from the curb and then proceeded south. Ashley’s apartment was north.

  “Hold on, who freed me?”

  “That I do not know, and I don’t want to know. My law firm was contacted to oversee your release. And that I have done. Driver? As soon as you feel you are free and clear, I’d like to be let out.” Two turns later, the car stopped abruptly, and Michelle reached for the handle. “Good luck, Mr. Younger.”

  She was gone in a second, just another pedestrian hurrying home. Cole considered hopping out as well, but at that moment the locks engaged on the doors.

  “Fuuuck,” Cole cursed under his breath. “So, who is it?” he asked the driver, a man in a sharp black suit. “Is it that jackass, Fantucci?”

  The driver cast a glance into the rearview mirror. “I’d watch your language around Mr. Fantucci.” This he said in accented mob talk and only then did Cole notice the tribal accessories: the gold pinky ring, the gold bracelet, the gold cross that would’ve displayed gross hypocrisy if he even knew what it meant. “Mr. Fantucci can be very touchy. I suggest you mind your friggin’ manners and agree to his terms. He has invested quite a bit of capital in you, but he will not throw good money after bad, if you get my drift.”

  Cole had a hundred questions, but even if the driver could answer them, he didn’t want the answers to come from the servant. He wanted them from the master. He sat glaring out the window until they took a tunnel beneath the city. He expected Fantucci to live like a vamp, safe and isolated beneath the city; he was wrong. They parked in an underground garage but took an elevator up fifteen stories to the top of one of the tallest buildings in the city.

  Unlike Ashley’s mansion beneath the world, which was warm with fires, filled with plush furniture, had polished wooden floors and was decorated with paintings of flowers and pretty girls, Fantucci’s home, if it even was a home, was cold. The floor was white marble; where there were walls, they were black granite, but for the most part, the room Cole found himself in was bound by heavy glass set in steel frames.

  Julius Fantucci himself sat in a black, leather chair with a glass and steel desk set in front of him. As sharp-edged as his world was, Julius was actually quite soft. He sported two chins, one atop the other. From there he spread outward so that he overflowed the armrests of the chair. Unlike most New Yorkers, he was strangely tan. He was older, though how old was hard to guess. His hair was so thick and black that it looked fake. His cheeks were flabby, but his eyes were tight and hard as he took in Cole from head to toe.

  Flanked on either side of him were bodyguards in black suits. They stood leaning forward slightly as if expecting Cole to suddenly attack their boss. Two more guards came to stand behind him; Cole could feel their breath on his neck. Off to the side was Bruce Hamilton. Despite his armor, he managed to sit casually on a sofa of matching black leather. His smirk ma
de Cole want to smash his face in.

  “Hey there, Cole. Are you nervous?” Hamilton asked. “You look nervous; scared really.”

  “Shut up, taxman,” Julius said, laying both of his hands on the glass top of his desk. He wore six rings, three per hand, each set with a massive diamond. He patted the desk, enjoying the clink sound they made. It was calming. “We’ve taken a twisting path to get here, wouldn’t you say so, Mr. Younger?” Cole crossed his arms and said nothing. This made Julius glance over at Hamilton. “You were right about him.”

  Hamilton’s armor creaked when he shrugged. “He’s predictable. Always has been. You could’ve saved yourself one of your weasels if you had listened to me from the get go.”

  Julius folded his fat hands inward until the six diamonds pointed out at Cole. He wasn’t used to people pointing out his lapses in judgement. “Eddie was an idiot as I’m sure, Mr. Younger would agree.”

  Eddie was just as much an idiot as the rest of you, was what Cole wanted to say. In fact, he had a great gob of things he wanted to say and would have in a different setting. He held off because he was not keen on going back into his cage. The stay of execution had been temporary; it could be reversed with a phone call. Of course, Julius could also simply decide to toss him out his window. Mob bosses had been known to do that on occasion.

  “I suppose I would agree.”

  “There.” Julius’ face folded into a wide, tight-lipped smile, which puffed out his cheeks, making it look as though he had a mouthful of mice. “Common ground. Eddie was an idiot. He didn’t understand that some men can’t be pushed. Some men have to be threatened and some have to be stroked. I’m guessing that you are one of those that need their egos massaged a bit.”

  “I have to be reasoned with.” It would have to be a very good reason for him to agree to work with a gangster. It was no stretch to guess that Julius wanted someone dead and that Cole would have to do the killing.

  The rings tapped at the glass again. Both hands went up and down in a synchronized motion. “Then there should be no issue between us. You are, after all, a bounty hunter of sorts.” He tipped Cole a sly wink, telling Cole with the gesture that he knew precisely what Cole really did for a living. “And I happen to know where a person like you could collect a bounty or three, or even four.”

  “Where?” Cole asked, feeling cold seep into his bones. He had the feeling he knew where, and if he was right, he knew why he’d been picked. “Krupp?”

  “I’m afraid so. In the deepest part of the Infinity Pit.”

  Cole felt his stomach drop at the idea of the Infinity Pit. It was called that for a reason. No one outside of Krupp knew how deep it went or what was down there. His heart sank as well. Ashley Tinsley’s family owned a controlling interest in Krupp and Cole knew firsthand that they had used zombies in the past for their dirty work. Julius was pitting him against the woman he’d been in love with for months. He wanted to spit in Julius’ face but it was his job to stop the spread of these creatures, even if it meant Ashley losing control of Krupp. Dead-eyes were dangerous and not just to him. They were a danger to the entire city. Although the population was vaccinated at birth, the shot was not particularly effective, and a good bite or repeated exposure would turn someone in less than a day.

  Forty years before, the city of Vancouver had been zombie-free one day and overrun by a quarter of a million zombies a week later. It could happen in New York just as easily.

  “Then why didn’t you just tell me this without going through all the crap,” Cole snapped. “You could’ve left me a note or a message on my machine.”

  “Nothing is ever that easy. I need you to be with me. I need you on my side, completely. You know what the difference between me and one of your run of the mill vamps?”

  A dozen nasty retorts came to Cole; he bit them back. “I don’t know, ten million dollars?”

  “No. The only difference is legitimacy. At heart, the average vamp is a murderous, cold-hearted thug.” He pointed both his thumbs back at his own chest. “Just like me. But what sets them apart is the facade of respectability they possess. They own conglomerations and corporations. They rub elbows with politicians. They are glamorous. They’re trendsetters. On the other hand, everyone thinks that I’m just a brute with brass knuckles.”

  “So, stop being a brute.”

  Julius grunted out a short laugh. “I did not call you here for bad advice. What I want is a facade as well. I want Krupp and you’re going to get it for me. There was a reason why you were released the way you were, just like there was a reason I sent a mook like Eddie to bring you in. I knew he would fuck it up.”

  “Then why send him? That doesn’t make any sense.”

  The mob boss leaned back, folding both hands on his expansive gut. “Why did I set you both up? Why did I make you an enemy when I really want you working for me? You aren’t seeing it? The facade, remember? People’ll see what I want them to see. They see me out gunning for you. Thanks to our friend here,” he gestured one jeweled hand at Hamilton, “they see the cops are searching high and low for you.”

  “Why? I have a legal injunction…” Cole stopped in midsentence. Since when have the cops ever cared about what was legal and what wasn’t?

  “You’re seeing it now, aren’t you?” Julius said, grinning with that mouthful of mice look. “The cops are after you, the mob’s gonna kill you, you got no money, and you have only a day and a half to clear your name. So, what do you do? You go for the big score.”

  Cole’s throat had gone tight and when he spoke it was croaky. “Because I know there are Dead-eyes at Krupp? Why would anyone think I know that?”

  Julius chortled. “Because you were there the night Dennis Tinsley died. It turns out there’s video footage of you. Not a lot. Just enough to put you at the scene of the murder.”

  “Dennis wasn’t murdered!” Cole sucked in his breath to go on, but it was obvious Julius knew everything already. The truth had been twisted until it felt like a garrote around his neck. “So, you’ve orchestrated all of this?”

  He raised a jeweled hand and pantomimed waving a conductor’s baton. “Yes. Not bad for a brute, is it? I need a bounty hunter to get inside Krupp and take down those Dead-eyes. I need it public. And I need to make sure there is no way I can be linked to you. It’s why I couldn’t go straight to your boss, not even with a rumor.”

  And if I refuse?

  The thought had just passed through his head when Julius leaned back with a shrug. “Of course, you can say no, in which case I’ll give you to your police friend here. You’ll die in a pool of blood and piss, and so will that little honey you got trailing around after you. Oh yeah, I know about her, too. Either way, I’ll get someone else to go after those Dead-eyes. Maybe I’ll get them or maybe they’ll get out like the last bunch. It would be sad that an entire city could be destroyed because of your lack of foresight. They say you’re obsessed with doing the right thing. Well, here I am giving you the chance to do the right thing for you, your little honey and the city, just by doing your job. On top of all that, if you win out, I’ll see that all your troubles with the law disappear. Whatdya say?”

  Julius had Cole bent over a barrel, and one thing was clear, he would not survive this. If the Dead-eyes didn’t kill him, there’d be a line of people after him: the Tinsleys, the police and of course, Julius himself. He and Corrina would be loose ends and no one went to such lengths only to forget to snip the loose ends that might unravel everything.

  There was no other choice. “I’ll do it,” Cole answered, taking a big bite out of the shit sandwich that was being mashed down his throat.

  Chapter 12

  “I’m going to need the dogs called off for a few days,” Cole said, staring at the floor and hating himself. “And I’m going to need a couple of guns and…”

  “Were you listening?” Julius asked, cutting him off. “No. No one’s getting called off. The Tinsleys aren’t dumb. When all this goes down, they’re gonna come
sniffing around and my prints aren’t gonna be on any of this. And about that other stuff, we know whatchu need. Hardware and a change of clothes, we got it all ready for you.”

  He snapped his fingers and one of his guards came alive, producing a brown bag from behind the desk. The guard set it at Cole’s feet. Squatting, Cole inspected the weapons first: a model ’57 Forino sat on top. It had a little rust on the grip and was scratched all over as if it had been thrown in a garbage disposal. As bad as the outside was, the inner workings were oiled properly and looked as though it had been maintained with loving care.

  The second gun was a Riker Mega. A huge, ugly, highly illegal gun. It fired a seventy-caliber copper-jacketed, armor piercing round. There were few uses for such a gun and hunting Dead-eyes really wasn’t one of them. Cole glanced over at Hamilton, who wore a bland expression, and then at Julius, who tipped him another wink. The reason for the gun was obvious. Julius didn’t want anything to get between Cole and his mission, and that included the police.

  “What about cash? I’m going to need a few hundred dollars at a minimum. And ammo. Guns don’t work very well without ammo.” He had no idea where he would get ammo for the Mega. Even back-alley dealers didn’t like to carry ammo for the Mega.

  “You’ll get what you need on your way out,” Julius said. He sat back appraising Cole, considering whether another warning was needed. It was. Cole had agreed too easily. “If you fuck this up, I’ll burn down that orphanage you grew up in, kids an’ all. I ain’t fucking bluffing. You got that?”

  “Yes.”

  The mouthful of mice smile came back. “Good. Oh, one more thing. If you even think about double-crossing me…”

  “Those kids die?”

  “Exactly. And so will you and let me tell you, you don’t know pain, not yet, not until I dish it out. There ain’t nowhere in this city you can hide, so do yourself a fucking favor and don’t go opening your mouth to anyone. You’re gonna want to, but don’t. Not to Ashley Tinsley, not to that weasel of a boss of yours, and not to any fucking politician. I’ll know if you do.” He gestured a jeweled hand to the door. “You should get going. Time’s awasting.”