The boy looked at him, making no effort to move.
“So, I’m Smithy – we didn’t really meet properly. I assume you heard the chat I had with Father Gabriel about you.”
The kid nodded.
“I get that there’s a lot of… whatever between you and him. You’re supposed to kill him or – actually, y’know what? I don’t really get it, but I’m guessing we don’t have that kind of time. It sounds like more of a ‘three years of intensive therapy’ type deal. Still, here’s the situation. As you no doubt felt, we sorta crashed into a snowbank.”
The kid leaned out of the trunk and looked at the side of the car.
“Yeah,” said Smithy, “we’re screwed. Well, I’m screwed. What happens next comes down to what you want, I guess. You can help me push the car onto the interstate, I can get you to the guy in Jersey and you can take that shot at a new life or…” Smithy looked around again. “Or I guess we hang out here until someone starts asking awkward questions that neither of us will have good answers to. I mean, I’m technically part of a kidnapping plot, but you’ll have to explain who you are, which might also be tricky. So I guess that’s the situation.”
The kid just looked at Smithy some more. To be fair, gagged and bound, he had limited methods of self-expression open to him.
“So,” said Smithy. “Do you want to take option A and, y’know, go to Jersey et cetera, et cetera?”
The kid nodded emphatically.
“OK,” said Smithy, a little relieved. He hoped the kid meant it, but he wasn’t naïve enough to simply believe him.
“So, I’m gonna untie you then.” Smithy waggled the gun in the air to remind David he still had it, then he slipped his switchblade from his pocket, hacked through two cords of rope and stepped quickly back. David brought his hands around and rubbed them. Smithy could see the rope burns from where he’d been trying to get out, same as anyone would. Then he ripped the gag from his mouth and commenced a spluttering coughing fit.
Smithy held up the can of soda he kept in the glove compartment for emergencies not quite like this one. “Do you want this?”
“Yes,” he said in a hoarse voice.
Smithy tossed him the can. David opened it and then quickly put it to his lips to catch the spouting fluid, gulping it down. He finished the can.
“So,” said Smithy, “we good?”
David nodded. “I… I’d like to go to New Jersey, please.”
“OK,” said Smithy. He’d never heard those words in that order before. Nobody liked to go to New Jersey. This really was a strange day.
David moved to get out of the trunk – first looking at Smithy, who nodded his assent. David threw his leg over the side and lowered himself down. Then he stood there, stretching his back out.
“Sorry about all of… y’know, that,” said Smithy, feeling awkward. “I’m sure it was uncomfortable but, y’know, Padre meant the best for you.”
David shrugged, and it hit Smithy just how young the guy was. He may have been an assassin, but on some level he was still an awkward teenager, same as Smithy and, well, everyone had been.
“Right,” said Smithy, “I’ll throw it in drive and then you and me are going to try to push it out, OK?”
David nodded again.
Smithy got into the front seat and released the brake, turning the wheel as much as possible so that the thing had the best chance of moving. He got out, shoved the gun into the back of his jeans and joined David at the back of the car.
They both braced against it.
“OK. On three. One… two… th—”
Smithy came around a few seconds later. The kid hadn’t hit him that hard, but it had been perfectly timed. Smithy lay there, dazed, on the snowbank. He turned to look down the incline and saw the faint figure of David in the darkness, running back the way they had come. It was then he realised that the kid had taken the gun too. “Fuck it!”
He stood up and watched as the kid’s outline faded to nothing. He had zero hope of catching him. He raised his voice. “I was… we were just trying to help you.”
Smithy kicked the back tyre of the cab, which did little to aid his predicament, mood or the state of his toes. “Goddamn teenagers!”
Chapter Forty-Eight
Emilio looked at the neon winter wonderland spread out beneath them. The snow was still falling steadily, so it was hard to make out much detail. This day was only getting weirder. His heart had leaped when they’d heard first Gabriel and then Bunny, shouting from somewhere out in the darkness. He’d been trying to cling on to hope ever since the two men in SoHo had shown them through to a loading dock and then calmly pulled guns on them. Since then, his world had consisted of terror with occasional making out. From the moment Bianca had delivered a right hook to one of their captors, he’d been living in fear of his own death and, worse still, hers. She wasn’t one to go quietly, but whoever these people were, one lucky punch aside, they knew what they were doing. They’d told them nothing about what was going on, but with Gabriel and Bunny showing up, they seemed to have something to do with it. Weirder still, it was Gabriel they appeared to be interested in. Emilio liked Bunny, but it wasn’t hard to see how he could piss somebody off. Father Gabriel on the other hand? All the man did was grind away, trying to do right.
Behind them, the sniper – called Martin, apparently, at least if the voice over the PA system could be trusted – was watching what was going on through his scope. Emilio didn’t know much about guns, but he knew some had infrared sensors. This one must have, as Martin appeared to be reporting back to his boss.
“Target is proceeding up the south side, coming into Jonah’s area. The other guy is moving up the north side. Confirm – I should not take shot?”
Emilio couldn’t hear what Martin was being told through his earpiece, but he saw the man wince.
“Alright, alright – just confirming. Seems pointless having me up here, but fine. Target has reached Jonah’s area. Engaged.”
Emilio watched as Martin shifted his position slightly. “I… Jonah is down. Confirm Jonah is down. What? What does…? Alright. I have… Correction. Jonah is alive but appears incapacitated… I don’t know.”
“Oh dear,” said Bianca loudly, “is it not going well?”
Martin pulled his eye away from the scope and looked at Bianca. “Just for that, the worst things you can imagine will happen to you before you die.”
Bianca glared back defiantly. “That’s assuming your guys win.”
Martin smiled at her. “Win? Regardless of what happens down there, you’re up here with me. There is no way out of this for you.”
Martin turned back to the scope. “Confirmed. Secondary target is entering Pascal’s area. This should be quick.”
Normally Bunny was good at sneaking. It was one of his skills. Normally, though, he wasn’t limping due to a wounded arse, and he wasn’t trying to make his way through four inches of snow. Sneaking was tricky in the snow, it being impossible to tread lightly when your feet were sinking into the ground. So, instead, he was limping at a steady pace, using the baseball bat as an occasional walking stick and making no attempt at concealment. He headed in the direction of the rollercoaster. He had no dog in this fight other than wanting to get Bianca and Emilio out of there.
He passed a merry-go-round. All the horses had clown faces. Bunny watched as they circled round and round under the garish lights, bobbing up and down. What kind of messed-up mind even thought of something like that? Coming from all directions, he could hear automated demented laughter, along with hoots, hollers, bells and whistles. Maybe if the park had been full of people on a sunny day it might have added to the “atmosphere”, but mostly deserted in the middle of a snowstorm, it gave the place an even creepier feel. He swore to himself that if he ever got out of this, he would track down the person who designed this nightmarish place and give them a piece of his mind. It was like Stephen King’s It mixed with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He’d passed a line of fat
animatronic clowns cancan dancing a minute ago. That was the kind of thing that would haunt his dreams – assuming he ever got to have any more. Bunny was feeling too old, too wounded and too cold to put up with this crap. One part of that he could do something about. He pulled his thermos flask out of his coat pocket and took the cup off. It had been one of the two things he’d quickly grabbed before they’d left the church.
“Howerya,” he said, raising his voice. “I can see you there, standing in the shadows behind that booth. I’m more than happy to get to the kicking-the-shit-out-of-each-other bit in a minute, but any chance I could have a spot of soup first?”
The man stepped forward. He had dark, Mediterranean-looking skin and was dressed all in black. In his left hand, he was casually tossing a knife up in the air and catching it after two rotations.
“Jesus,” said Bunny. “No offence, but you lot really do take the whole assassin image thing seriously, don’t ye? Still, cuts down on washing, I suppose.”
The man gave him a smile. “I am disappointed.”
“How’s that?”
“I was hoping you’d be Daniel. I’ve heard so much about him.”
“What? The padre? Ah yeah, he’s great. Not much of a conversationalist though. I’m Bunny. And you are?”
“The last person you’ll see before you die.”
Bunny raised his cup in salute. “Good line. I bet you’re feeling proud of yourself. I’m going to call you Mack the Knife.”
“As you wish.”
Bunny slurped some soup. “Jesus! Hot! Hot!” He waved a hand in front of his lips before he bent down, picked up a handful of snow and shoved it in his mouth.
“Fecking hell. Sorry about that, Mack. Tell ye what though, these flasks are the dog’s bollocks. I made that this morning. Still boiling hot. Incredible.”
“Fascinating.”
“So,” said Bunny, placing the flask down on the ground in front of him and picking up the baseball bat, “have I understood this correctly? We’re not allowed to shoot each other, and if we do, your sniper fella shoots us?”
“Apparently so.”
“I tell ye, I’m really starting to miss when people used to try to kill me the old-fashioned way. You knew where you were with that. I don’t suppose I could interest you in a snowball fight? Best of three. Standard one-point deduction for a head shot and no sticking stones in – someone could lose an eye.”
“You talk a lot, fat man.”
“Oh,” said Bunny. “I see we’re at the name-calling stage now, are we? For the last time, it’s the portion sizes. I’m telling everybody.”
“I’m bored with this.”
“Fair enough,” said Bunny, raising up the baseball bat. “Come at me. I’m too tired to chase you.”
“No, thanks.”
The blur of hand movement and the flash of metal were so fast, Bunny could only really process what had occurred when the blade dug into the flesh of his left thigh. “Fuck!”
He dropped the bat and stumbled backwards, his hands around the wound, and another blade thunked into his right thigh, in an almost identical position. “Ohhh…”
Bunny collapsed backwards onto the snow-covered ground, blood seeping from both wounds and turning his jeans red. He had a hand on each leg, and hot, wet blood was slipping through his fingers. He yowled in agony.
After a couple of moments, the face of his attacker came into view above him. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”
Bunny spoke through gritted teeth. “Cheating bastard. Same. As. Shooting.”
“No. Nobody said anything about throwing knives.”
“Arsevent.”
“I don’t know if you’re in any position to throw insults around.”
“I’m dying…” Bunny panted. “I’ll say what I like.”
The man shrugged. “Hard to argue against that.” He reached down and pulled the knife out of Bunny’s left leg, giving it a twist as he did so. Bunny screamed and lashed out with his hand, but the man effortlessly batted him away.
He pulled the knife out of the right leg in a similar manner. Bunny clenched his eyes shut, tears rolling down his cheeks.
Bunny tried to pull the Sig out of his coat pocket, but a blade descended and jabbed into his upper left arm as he attempted to do so. “Ara fuck!” This stab wound was about an inch above where he had been stabbed the night before. His voice came out in a whine. “You are such a prick.”
“Now now,” said the man, as he reached into Bunny’s pocket and took the gun, throwing it onto the ground a few feet away. “Sticks and stones will break my bones…”
Bunny lay back on the snow, his breaths short and shallow now. He looked up and watched the snow falling. He could taste blood in his mouth. Somewhere along the line, he must have bitten something. He laughed, causing blood-red saliva to bubble messily out of his mouth.
“Is something funny?”
“Weirdest sense of déjà vu.”
“Enjoy it while you can.”
Bunny spread his arms wide and raised his voice to the sky. “Feck it. Just do it.”
“Aw, nothing to say? Are you out of witty repartee?”
Bunny closed his eyes.
“Have it your own way.”
“Wait,” gasped Bunny.
The man looked down.
“Have I told you that you’re a prick?”
“Yes.”
“Grand. Fire away.”
The man flipped the knife in his hand again. “I’ve always wanted to try this. I call it death from above. Don’t move or we’ll have to do it again.” He threw the blade high into the air, and he and Bunny watched it disappear into the darkness.
“What goes up, must come—”
Mack was interrupted by the pop-pop-pop-pop of the tendons at the back of his right knee being sliced through, causing him to scream and collapse forward onto Bunny. The knife in Bunny’s hand was a Strider CPM S30V steel combat knife – namely, the one used the night before by David. It was the other thing Bunny had taken with him from the church, because not liking knives and not thinking you might need one were two very different things.
Mack’s scream was animalistic – equal parts agony and rage. Bunny hugged him with all the strength his desperation could summon, like he was a friend returned after a half a lifetime away.
Mack scrabbled for the other knife that was holstered on his belt, but he didn’t make it. As he looked into Bunny’s eyes, his own blade descended from the sky and buried itself deep in his back. Bunny held him there for a moment and watched the light fade in his eyes, then he fell back to the ground, the dead weight on top of him.
Bunny sucked in a few deep breaths and felt his eyelids growing heavy. Starting to close. He just needed to rest for a second. Just a second and he’d be fine.
Just a second…
He jabbed his own finger into the knife wound on his left leg, which had the desired effect. He screamed, and with a rush of frantic energy, he heaved his assailant off him and struggled messily to his feet, grabbing up the baseball bat and the Sig as he did so. He staggered forward, trying to ignore the feeling of blood running down both of his legs, causing his jeans to cling to him. Pain seemed to issue from every part of his body now. He screamed into the night.
“Did you see that? You shower of donkey-knobbing nutjobs? He’s dead! Ha – dead! I’d say it was the irony that killed him… but it was definitely the knife.”
He moved forward, dragging his feet through the snow. He couldn’t stop. Whatever energy was holding him up, he sensed its edges. Falling down again would mean never getting back up. He had to keep moving. Focus.
“I’m coming. Emilio and… Bianca. I’m coming. Hang on…”
He rounded the corner of the booth and screamed. Waldor the Clown, dressed as a cowboy, stood before him. Bunny swung the bat at its face on instinct, smashing fibreglass in a way that would probably get him banned from future visits. He staggered on. He was on some kind of thoroughfare, lights blinking
from stalls on either side. Ducks in shooting galleries swam by and buckets were waiting for things to be thrown into them; basketball hoops too. And the noise. Pinging, bells ringing and the clown’s mocking laughter provided a cacophonous backdrop. The rollercoaster was maybe a hundred meters in front of him now, going in and out of focus. “Fecking clowns. Clowns and assassins. Feck the lot of you.”
He was light-headed. There was a dizzy, giddy edge to everything now. The colours seemed somehow brighter even as the shapes blurred.
“I’m… coming.”
Seventy meters.
Sixty.
Fifty.
Forty.
A figure stepped out from behind one of the stalls and stood in his path. He had long blond hair and a thick muscular build.
Bunny staggered towards him. He didn’t have the energy to go around.
He watched as the man smiled at him, and then something dropped from his hands. Although Bunny couldn’t put it into words at that moment, he knew he had seen these things before, on TV. On one of the cable shows that you only find when trawling through channels late at night. He’d watched it at two in the morning, scuttering drunk, with kebab down his shirt, too tired to make it upstairs to bed. They were known as Chinese whips – nine-link metal chains with a spike on the end. The lad on the telly had said they were the hardest weapon in all the martial arts to master. The man standing in front of him seemed to have managed it. The whips twirled around him in a dizzying whirl, sending snow flying up from the ground as they did so. He spun them around his neck and legs at intervals. While it looked insane, it was all intended to build up more and more momentum. The man on the TV had explained it all. The whole effect was mesmerising. It was like the man had his very own dry ice machine.
I Have Sinned Page 27
