“Oh my God, Carmen. How are you? Do you want a sandwich too? Tea?”
She looks me over, as if looking for bruises. I wonder if everyone’s gonna keep looking at me like this. This time there’s not much for anyone to see, though, they’re mainly on the inside. My soul is frozen in fear. I’m beyond terrible. I can’t tell her that.
“Sure,” I say lightly, “I’m starving. And I’d love tea. It’s funny, I haven’t felt like drinking coffee in a while now. It tastes weird. Did we change brands or something?”
Gabriela quits what she’s doing and puts a hand on her hip, studying me. Then she takes a step forward and lays a hand on my stomach, making me jerk from the unexpected intimacy.
“What—”
“Girl, are you pregnant?”
I take a step back. “What? No! What makes you say that?”
My mouth turns dry in an instant as my mind connects all the signs I haven’t seen. My boobs growing, the nipples suddenly so sensitive, the ravenous appetite, the weight gain. Oh no. Oh fuck no! I know whose it is. I carry a devil’s spawn! My whole insides crawl with the sudden absolute knowledge. He’s in me. He’s with me everywhere. He’s the only one who’s come inside me, that second time, four months ago. Am I four fucking months pregnant? The room spins.
“But… the IUD?”
“They can be displaced. They’re not hundred percent.” Gabriela looks at me with pity in her eyes.
My heart slams in my chest and the room spins. I grab the back of a chair to keep me upright as I think of how brutal he’s been. If anyone, anything would have fucked something up in me, it’d be him. After that first time… that dull ache in my stomach. Was it then?
“Don’t tell anyone,” I whisper tersely. “Please!”
“Are you getting rid of it? I know a guy.”
My immediate instinct is no. A big no. I was brought up a Catholic. I’m not overly religious, but some things are so deeply rooted in me that I can’t wash them out.
“Of course,” I say. That should be my reaction, so I lie through my teeth to sweet Gabriela. “Give me his number.”
“I’ll get it for you later.”
I keep up the facade as long as it’s needed. We have our tea, eat our sandwiches. My appetite is completely gone, but I force it down, pretending to be cool. I wait outside Gabriela’s room, get the number to the ‘guy’ and then flee to my own sanctum.
Matron doesn’t ask me to work, of course. I’ll be off for a few days. Except for mealtimes, I stay in my room the whole day and make plans. I pack and hide the bag under my bed.
I hesitate. I can’t be one hundred percent sure it’s safe, but just in case… I knock on Gabriela’s door. I want to leave one tiny opening for Lucas to find me, even though I shouldn’t. Just… in case anything happens.
“Can you keep a secret?”
I know she can. I know I can trust her.
Late that night, so late it’s early, when everything has gone silent, I leave my room for the last time, sneak through the house with my heart in my throat, through the basement, and climb out through one of the windows in the dungeon. The room reeks of sex. We clean it in the daytime. I don’t dare to use the front door in case anyone would happen upon me.
The hinges squeak when I push the window open, and I hold my breath for a moment, listening to the night. Everything is as quiet as a grave, though, and I push it open the rest of the way, throw out my bag and climb through. Closing the window, I straighten and try to get my breathing back under control while I look around me. It’s pitch-black here at the back of the house, no streetlamps, but the stars shine bright on the velvety canopy over my head, guiding me. I see it as a sign.
It’s a long walk. I hope I can catch a cab somewhere, but the first hour is gonna be just me and the road. The house lies on the outskirts of town with lots of greenery, and not a lot of civilization.
I jump at every shadow, and dive into the bushes every time I hear a car. My feet pound the gravel by the side of the road, and with every step images, rather than words, flit through my mind. There are no words that can describe the mess I’m in, so all my brain is capable of are the images. Lucas’ tormented face, the despair in his eyes. Salvatore’s emotionless gaze, the abuse, the humiliation. His baby in me. In my mind it has horns, a tail, and pitch-black, hateful eyes. My stomach churns and I have to stop. I dry retch in the bushes, wipe off the saliva with my sleeve and trudge on.
It’s not comforting to reach more populated areas without seeing any cabs. I have no protection against the predators in the night, and I begin to wonder if I should risk waiting for the day to break anyway. In daylight, I risk being seen by the wrong people. Weighing my options, none of them good, I opt to take a break in a dark alley anyway. Sitting on the filthy ground, I rest my back against the rough brick wall. I have on the most sensible shoes I own, flat sandals, but my feet hurt anyway, and I peel them off. There are blisters, big fluid-filled blisters and some that have broken. My fingers come back wet, but at least not bloody.
I only have water. I didn’t dare to make sandwiches and maybe raise suspicions, and I’m so hungry I could eat a horse. My stomach growls and I lay a hand over it, painfully aware of what grows in there. I don’t know what to do. I don’t dare to see a doctor. I don’t want to keep it, raise it. Give it away for adoption is my only choice, but I can’t do it legally, and no matter whose child it is, I don’t wish for bad things to happen to it. I need to find a good home, a family who are willing to take on a child without the proper papers. That doesn’t go together, does it? Good people willing to do an illegal adoption. Well, I’ll sort it. I have a few months.
My mind spins as I pull a few sheets of old newspapers over me, hiding me from plain sight, hoping to doze off a little. I can’t keep walking. I may be a lady of the night, but it won’t help me here. Daylight is only a few hours away. It’s Monday morning, people will be on their way to work and I’ll be safe. Hopefully it will be too soon for the house to have discovered that I’m missing. Probably. They’re generally not early birds, my colleagues of the trade.
I fall asleep, my heart heavy, seeing Lucas before me, my one sliver of happiness that I’m now leaving behind.
When I wake, I’ll make my way back to my old apartment, to my old roommates. No one knows that place except Gabriela.
Lucas
As soon as I possibly can, without raising suspicions, I flee the mansion. I’m drunk as a bat as I drive home, and a danger to myself and everyone around me. I stop at an abandoned parking lot on the outskirts of town, stumble out of the car and puke my guts out.
All I keep seeing, on repeat in my mind, is how he drags her away, her big dark frightened eyes. All I feel is desperately impotent. All my training, all the speed and strength I’ve built the last few years - for nothing. I couldn’t have saved her. Maybe if it had been him and me, but in a room full of his men, no. I’d be dead and of no use to her anyway. I keep seeing how he defiled her, how his filthy hand pushed in and out of her pussy, for everyone to see. Her contorted features, frightened, embarrassed.
He stared me down, the fucker, challenged me to act. His cruel face filled with anticipation. I hope I disappointed him good. Nurturing red-hot thoughts of revenge, I climb to the back of the limo and fall into a restless sleep. Two in the morning on Sunday. Still dark. In a run-down part of town. Alone.
Carmen follows me in my dreams. I miss her curvy little body in my arms, so warm, so soft. I want to hold her and tell her everything’s gonna be all right. Even if I’m gonna have to knock her unconscious and tie her up, I’m taking her with me. We’re leaving this shit hole.
I wake from voices and the sound of feet outside the car. It’s still dark, but more of a gray darkness now, holding the promise of a new day dawning. I grab the gun from under the seat and listen. Some punks. They’re taking the car. I scoff as a spike of adrenaline shoots through me. The hell they are. I slam open the door and aim the gun at the largest guy.
“Dude!” Th
e big one, a bald black guy, half his face covered in tattoos, holds out his hands. No gun.
“Get lost!” I growl.
There’re four. Two of the guys, one black guy with way too many pounds and a need to pull up his pants, and one twitchy, tall, blond and skinny pull out guns, it happens in a fraction of a second. I don’t hesitate. No talking, no warning. I shoot the twitchy one first, then the big guy before Skinny has even hit the ground. The other two yell out whatever shock and surprise they’re feeling before I plant two rounds in their chests too. I regard the first two. They’re dead, but I fire off a bullet in each of their heads to be sure. They don’t move.
As blood pools on the asphalt, I glance around me, satisfied to see we’re still alone. I kick the twitchy one, then I hop in the car and speed off. It shouldn’t feel good killing someone, but fuck me, the rush of adrenaline, taking out my fucking agony on some at least semi-deserving punks felt awesome.
I’m in a better mood when I get home. My mind swirls with constructive thoughts of our escape out of this hellhole. We’ll make our way to the East Coast, I haven’t figured out where yet. I have every initial step still planned from before. Phones. Money. Switching cars. I gotta get something to tie Carmen up with, something that won’t harm her. Not that I want to tie her up, but she’ll definitely try to get away, the little hellion. Maybe I can just cuff her to something in the car? I’ll look into that.
Jerking off in a hot shower, shamefully aroused by the visions from tonight, something I’ll never admit to Carmen, I then fall into bed. I’m drained. Gotta get some energy up for what I’m about to do. Gotta have a clear mind.
Early afternoon, I pack. I already have what I bought her the last time, still in the bag, never used. I got my gun, new phones, everything I can think of.
I sleep much better Sunday night. Tomorrow we’re starting a new life.
Monday morning, my heart pounds out of control when I lock up my place for the last time. I won’t miss it. I won’t miss any of this. All I see before me is my girl.
When I get there, the house is a mess. Fingers of ice clutch my heart. Something is wrong. She’s dead! The fucker killed her!
I run through the common room and grab the first girl I can get my hands on. She gasps and pulls her arm out of my grip with a string of protests against the treatment.
“Where’s Carmen?”
Her eyes dart to something behind me and then she spins on her heels and disappears deeper into the house. I look over my shoulder and find the matron standing there, her arms crossed over her chest, as if she’s comforting herself, rather than challenging me.
“Is it Carmen? Please tell—”
“She’s gone missing.”
“He killed her! I’ll fucking—”
She puts a hand on my arm. “No, she came back. She took her things. It’s all gone. She’s left.”
Relief floods my chest. At least she’s alive, and she’s done the only clever thing she could do. Now I just need to find her.
“Where is she? Did she tell anyone?”
She shakes her head. “Love, I’ve been interrogating the girls all morning. No one knows anything. She was up and had tea early with Gabriela, but after that no one knows.”
“Did you call the cops?”
She looks at me, deadpanned. My cheeks heat up and I feel like the stupid amateur I still am. Of course not.
“Does S— Do they know?”
The matron shakes her head again. “I don’t think it’s something we need to run around telling people. What do you think?”
I sag and fall onto one of the couches, rubbing my hands over my face. I jerk when I feel a hand on my shoulder.
“Go home. There’s nothing for you here.”
“Will— Will you please let me know…?”
“Of course.
Chapter 20
Lucas
Days pass. Then weeks. In the beginning I visit the house every other day. After a few weeks of nothing I begin to call them instead. Their voices sound increasingly pitying.
“No, honey. We haven’t heard from her.” The matron is ever-so-patient with me, but I feel that I’m stretching it thin.
“Are you sure? Is anyone looking for her? Did you try to find her family?”
“No one knows where she came from, Lucas. We found her on the street. She never said much about her background. You probably know more than any of us. Are you looking?”
“All the fucking time,” I mutter and hang up. I wonder if someone’s taken her bright, lavender scented room for their own. Does someone else live there now? I wonder where the Tolkien books are, and if someone else is reading them now.
I wonder if she’s safe. If she’s happy.
I increase my workload, take on more brutal missions, beatings, executions, anything to rid myself for a few hours of the gnawing hole in my chest. Carmen’s disappearance is a knife that keeps stabbing my heart. Krav Maga helps me focus, or I’d turn to booze, or the drugs we deal.
“Mate! Easy. For fuck’s sake, I’m fond of my face!”
Rodriguez has jumped back. Doubled over, he’s supporting his hands on his thighs as he pants, glaring at me from under sweaty, black tresses of hair.
I pull up my shirt and wipe off my face with it, leaving it soaked with sweat as I drop it. “Sorry, Rod.”
“You’ve become fucking dangerous, you know that?”
“I’m working out almost every day, of course I’m getting stronger.” I jump up and down to keep warm, and throw some punches at the punching bag, then spin and round kick it.
“I’m not talking about that, Payne. Yeah, you’re getting huge, and fast, but man, you’re not focused.”
I stop and turn to him. My insides clenching with the sudden pain. He doesn’t know. The only people who know about Carmen and me are the prostitutes, and the matron. And Salvatore. I get the odd look from Ivan occasionally, so maybe he knows too.
“It’s nothing. Let’s go again. I’ll be more careful.”
“I’m done for the day, dude. You’re like the Duracell bunny these days, but I’m spent. Look, you should do some fucking soul searching. I don’t know what’s with you, but it doesn’t take a genius to see something’s eating you. Do yoga, meditate, I don’t know. Do something to find your balance again. You’re walking on a razor’s edge.”
I know he’s right. I’m building strength, speed, but my mind’s not where my punches hit. I just can’t see myself sit in a lotus position, humming some nonsense and introspect. I’d be bored in a minute.
“Sure. Thanks for the tip. I’ll look something up.”
As weeks turn into months, I begin to despair. I drive through town every day, aimlessly, hoping to catch sight of her. I ask for her in bars, in grocery stores, in pharmacies, everywhere. I don’t have a picture, but I know her face and her body by heart and describe her to one uninterested stranger after the other. Nighttime, when I’m not working, I focus on the hookers, thinking they have to know her. Someone out there knows where she is. I just have to find them.
My hate toward Salvatore and his whole organization grows exponentially. If it hadn’t been for him, she wouldn’t have had to flee. We could have been happy. I know it. I would have taken care of her, my exotic Colombian flower.
The morning of the big hit I wake with a jerk. Today it’s been exactly five months. I want to resent her for never telling me that she was leaving, but I don’t have it in me. She was just a scared little girl, so badly hurt by life and by the wrong kind of men.
I make a cup of strong black coffee and pour a good portion of sugar into it. It was how she liked it, and I’ve taken after her habit. It’s sweet and strong. Like her.
I put the thoughts of Carmen aside and focus on what’s on the agenda for tonight. It will be spectacular, like how it went down in the good old days, a mob war, like New York in the seventies. I need to focus, because tonight I’ll bring them down.
A group of loosely connected people of dif
ferent nationalities and backgrounds have threatened shop owners in a suburban area, forcing them to pay for ‘protection’. Since we control, supposedly, every part of town, this can’t fly. A few weeks of stakeouts have gathered enough information, and tonight we strike. They’re fifteen. We’ll be far more. Everyone will be there, including Salvatore’s closest men. All of them. Eric Reed, Nathan and Christian Russo, Ivan Sokolov, Ray, Big Sean, and on and on.
Tension has risen in me with every passing month, frustration brewing under the surface. I might not ever find a way to get Salvatore himself behind bars. God knows I’ve looked for an in, for information, proof of his illegal businesses, of all the people he’s having executed, of the gambling, the drugs, the prostitutes, but I’m drawing a blank. What I have witnessed, what I know, means nothing. His squadron of ruthless lawyers would slaughter me in court.
I can’t take him out, but I can hurt him for the foreseeable future. I can put away a good chunk of his closest men, his fucking nephews in particular, Nathan and Christian.
Tonight is fucking it. I have proven myself over and over again since half a year back. I know I’m in. I’m trusted. I’ve killed whoever they’ve pointed me at. I’ve taken on missions of my own. I have so much blood on my hands it’ll never go away. The disappearance of Carmen stole away my remaining humanity. I’ve locked it up and thrown away the key.
I feel doomsday looming. Tonight I’ll execute whatever revenge I can on fucking Luciano Salvatore, whom I hate with every fiber of my being. I’ve spent night after night at his house, drinking his booze, laughing at his jokes, watching him humiliate one girl after the other. Some I recognize, some I don’t. There’s a darkness in him, a lethal air around him, as if he’s a cobra who could strike any minute.
I’ve cheered for new deals, gambled with his men and plotted my revenge.
On the other side of town, I gather some liquid courage in the shape of a couple of vodka shots, then I go to the payphone in the back of the run-down bar, cup a hand over my mouth to distort my voice, and make the call.
Russo Saga Collection Page 58
