Molls Like It Hot

by Darren Dash

  Toni took the gun out of Smurf’s mouth, put it under his blue nose, and shot it off. His screams hit an even higher notch, and didn’t stop until she jammed the barrel into the space where his nose had been and shot twice, turning his brains into pizza sauce.

  She stood, stooped to collect something, then started back towards me. Collapsed after a few tottering steps. I hurried forward, picked her up and ran with her to the car. She was still clutching the gun. I took it from her, fired the last few bullets at the gate – I could hear those inside the yard starting to edge towards it, getting their courage back – then shoved her inside the car, jumped in after her, turned the key and jammed my foot down.

  And we were gone.

  Alive.

  Triumphant.

  I looked at the stricken girl beside me.

  Hurt.

  TWELVE — RECUPERATION

  Toni sat, crouched into a ball, trying to hide her nakedness. Her eyes were steady and centred on something beyond the range of vision. She hadn’t said anything since she’d finished with Smurf and returned to the car. I was too busy driving to try to comfort her. We had to put some serious distance between ourselves and the scene of the carnage.

  “Smurf kept telling me what was going to happen,” she said softly, not looking at me. “All the crazies he’d invited, all the things they were going to do to me.”

  “I’m sorry it took me so long to find you,” I said.

  “He told me they were going to film it,” she said, giving no sign that she’d heard me. “Make me watch it over and over before they killed me, then upload it to the internet. My memorial for all time.”

  “You’re safe now,” I muttered.

  She didn’t reply. Then, a few minutes later, she giggled hoarsely.

  “I took a souvenir.”

  She held out her left hand, which was curled into a fist. Opened it. I glanced down and saw something blue. Took me a few seconds to clock what it was.

  “Christ!”

  She raised the remains of the nose and held it over her own. Then she began to sing. “Mironova, the blue-nosed reindeer, had a very…”

  She stopped, choked on a laugh, and started to cry. And once she’d started, I knew it was going to be a long time before she stopped.

  Saying nothing, keeping my gaze on the road, I did what I did best.

  I drove.

  Although I hated having to involve her, I took Toni to Lucy’s. I wanted to keep my friends as distanced from the fallout of what had happened at the casino as I could, and would have preferred not to drag Lucy into this, even in the most minor way, but I needed clothes for the naked young woman in the car.

  I parked as close to Lucy’s apartment as I dared and told Toni where I was going. She didn’t want to be left alone, but I couldn’t take her outside, not naked like she was. She agreed to remain behind, but reluctantly.

  “Eyrie?” she whispered as I was getting out.

  “Yeah?” I looked back.

  “Don’t be too long. Please.”

  Her fingers were clenched and she was trembling. So unlike the brash, overly confident stunner who had come to my apartment just two nights earlier. I didn’t think Smurf and his creeps had broken her, but they’d certainly pushed her close to the point of breaking. If I’d been just a few hours later… if those Russian friends of Smurf’s had got to her before me…

  “I’ll be fast as I can,” I promised, and ran for the door.

  I had to ring the bell several times before I got a response. Finally a heavy-lidded Lucy answered, blinking in the light. “Eyrie?”

  “Hi,” I panted. “Can I come in?”

  “What time is it?”

  I checked one of my watches and was surprised by the advanced hour.

  “Gone three,” I told her. “But it’s important.” Thinking of what Toni had said, I added, “I won’t keep you long.”

  Lucy hesitated, then unlatched the door and let me in.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I need clothes. A couple of dresses. A few tops. Underwear.” She was a little larger than Toni, but close enough.

  Lucy gawped at me like I was mad. Then understanding dawned. “The girl?” she asked softly.

  I nodded.

  “What –” Lucy started to ask.

  “Please,” I stopped her. “Don’t ask any questions. I don’t want to put you in a compromising position.” Knowing Lucy would make me bring Toni inside if I told her what had happened, that she’d insist on helping.

  Lucy stared at me uneasily, then decided to honour my wishes. “Wait a sec.” She headed for the bedroom, taking care that I couldn’t see inside. I didn’t have to. I’d spotted No Nose’s car outside. If the moment hadn’t been so critical, I’d have smiled.

  She returned with her arms full of clothes. Much more than I’d asked for or needed. She spread the load on the couch and I went through it, picking out bits and pieces, mostly dark wear.

  “How about bandages?” I asked.

  “Sure. Anything else?”

  “Antiseptic? Some swabs?”

  “Coming right up.”

  While she was fetching medical supplies, I folded the clothes neatly and made a tidy pile of them. I was an expert at folding after my years in the Army. A habit I’d never outgrown.

  Lucy returned and handed me a small bag.

  “I packed some extra stuff,” she said. “Painkillers. A needle and thread. Other bits and pieces that might come in handy.”

  “Thanks.” I kissed her cheek and turned to go.

  “Eyrie,” she stopped me. “Will you be back?”

  I’d been wondering that myself. Smurf’s people would surely assume that Toni’s rescuer was the man they’d kidnapped her from, but would they bother to come after me now that their leader was dead? Perhaps his replacement would want to put the past behind him, wouldn’t care about the Mironova executions as long as I wasn’t a threat to him, would just want to move on with like and enjoy the power. Only time would tell, but I thought there was a fair chance they wouldn’t pursue me if I steered clear of London. But if I came back, brazen and bold, honour would just as surely compel the new crime boss to act. It would be madness not to go into voluntary exile.

  “I doubt it,” I sighed.

  “Then this is goodbye?” She looked sad.

  I couldn’t help myself. “We’ll always have Paris.”

  She thumped my arm and smiled.

  I turned again to leave, and again she stopped me.

  “The girl,” Lucy said. “Is she OK?”

  I shook my head. “She’s not as badly hurt as she could have been, but she’s going to struggle to put tonight behind her. She’s harder than most of the boxers I ever faced, but they hurt her bad.”

  Lucy’s brow furrowed. “What did they do?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  She chewed her lower lip and kept quiet.

  “If you need anything else…” she mumbled.

  “Thanks, but I’ve plenty here. I’ll try to post the gear back to you when it’s over, or reimburse you if you let me know –”

  “Just come through this alive,” she said softly. “That’ll be enough.”

  I smiled and hugged her. “Tell No Nose I could smell his feet,” I whispered.

  She stiffened, then chuckled and punched me. “You won’t tell the others?”

  “My lips are sealed.”

  “God bless, Eyrie.”

  “Yeah, well, we’ll see,” I muttered, doubtful that God was on the scene tonight.

  I let myself out and hurried back to the car, thinking about Lucy and the others and how much of a wrench it would be to sever my ties with them.

  I’ve never considered myself an expert when it comes to the human condition, or a font of all wisdom. Far from it. But there’s one thing in this life that I can say with one hundred percent certainty — it’s good to have friends.

  Toni pulled on some of the clothes when I got ba
ck in the car, then I drove west and booked into a rundown hotel near Earl’s Court. I had no notion of staying – if Smurf Mironova’s people did come looking for revenge, I figured they’d check as many hotels in London as they could – but I needed a place where I could clean Toni up.

  I bundled her into the bathroom as soon as we were in the room – she’d stayed in the car while I was checking in – and got her under the shower, where I washed off the blood and muck. She stood trembling, reacting sluggishly to my commands to turn and raise her arms, and neither of us took any notice of her nudity. I rubbed the sponge over her beautiful body and never once thought of anything carnal, though I did draw the line at her lower regions and left those areas to her.

  She started crying again, halfway through, and made a deep, keening sound that I had to ask her to mask, in case anyone in the neighbouring rooms heard. She did a good job of suppressing the moans after that, though she could do nothing about the tears coursing down her cheeks.

  I dried her carefully, worried about the scratches and bite marks. I opened the bottle of antiseptic and treated the cuts as best I could. Her little fingers were the worst. They’d heated the blade before cutting the tips off – Toni told me this in a dead tone – so it wasn’t as bad as I’d first feared, but she was in a lot of pain, even after I’d cleaned and bandaged the fingers. She should have had a doctor look at them, but we couldn’t risk that. Brue could set her up with proper care when I handed her over. We only had to get through the next twelve hours. After that Brue could secure her the assistance she required and everything would be fine.

  Or so I hoped.

  “Feeling better?” I asked as I helped her dress again, but in clean clothes — the first, bloodstained set would have to be balled up and dumped before we left. She nodded. She was still crying. “Ready to leave?”

  “We’re not…” she hiccuped on a sob, “…staying?”

  “No. Too easy to trace if anyone comes looking.”

  “So… where?”

  “I know a place.”

  “We’ll be safe?”

  “I hope so.”

  “Then I’m ready.” She wriggled her toes. “Any shoes?”

  Fuck!

  “Sorry. Didn’t think.”

  “That’s OK,” she sniffed. “I can manage without.” Drew back the curtains and stared out at the darkness. Said softly, blankly, “I’ve endured worse than walking around in my bare feet.”

  I drove east, back through the city, heading for the docks. A lot of the old, once-deserted buildings and factories had been redeveloped over the last twenty years, but there were still empty shells where a man in the know could hide. I’d come exploring here a lot as a kid, usually with friends, nothing better to do on long summer nights, moving from one temporary fortress to another, creating a world of our own. The area had changed a lot since I last swung by this way, but a few places had escaped unscathed, abandoned husks where nobody hunting us would think to look.

  I drove around slowly, exploratively for a while before settling on an ancient, monstrous warehouse, once used to store exotic fruits and goods, now an exclusive home for rats, bats, cockroaches and their pals.

  I parked inside – the doors were padlocked, but the wood was rotten, so I simply peeled chunks away from around the lock, and the lock came with one of them – and we climbed four flights of stairs so we’d have a good view of anybody who happened to chance by. We found sacks, cardboard, newspapers and rags, not that old, which had been used for shelter and bedding by tramps in more recent times. I picked out the least filthy scraps and made a spot for Toni to lie down. It wasn’t a bed fit for a princess, but she didn’t complain. I was relieved to note that she’d finally stopped crying.

  “Are you hungry?” I asked.

  “Not really. Thirsty.”

  “I should have stopped at a shop on our way.” I cursed myself again. “First I forget the shoes, now this. Why didn’t I think to –”

  “Eyrie,” she said softly, touching my arm. “Calm it. You’ve done good tonight. Don’t beat yourself up because of a few minor details, OK?”

  I smiled gratefully and placed my hand over hers, squeezing it gently, being careful not to hurt the amputated finger. “OK.”

  I only meant to sit by her side, but she wanted me to lie down and hold her. So I did. Took her in my arms and felt her thin body shivering and convulsing, partly from the cold, mostly from her ordeal. She whimpered and wept, even when she dropped off to sleep. I held her close and tried soothing her with kind words and soft crooning.

  Sometimes she’d start thrashing, and wake screaming and cursing, beating my chest. I held her tighter on those occasions, rubbed her head and back, let her bite my shoulder if she needed. I could take the pain. Compared with what she’d been through, it was nothing.

  In moments of calm, she’d cry quietly and tell me what had happened to her, describing the people who’d assaulted her, the women who’d laughed while they cut her, the men who’d grimaced ghoulishly while they masturbated over her, a giggling Smurf Mironova coordinating it all like some warped conductor. She vowed to remember everyone who had tortured and humiliated her, so that she could track them down later and make them pay.

  “Every fucking one of them,” she reiterated harshly, looking her normal self as she growled it. “I won’t forget. I won’t forgive. I’ll get even with them all, I don’t care how long it takes.”

  I listened without replying. I knew a thing or two about waiting to get even, but wasn’t sure whether or not to bring up my past. I felt it might help us bond, and provide her with some measure of comfort by proving to her that it was possible to get through something as dreadful as this. But at the same time this was all about her, and I was reluctant to talk about my own pain, for fear she might think I was trying to top her suffering, that I was turning this into one of those, “You think that’s bad? Wait until you hear what happened to me!” conversations.

  I didn’t want to listen to the finer details of how they’d hurt her, but she had to get it out, had to speak while the wounds were fresh. This was her way of dealing with the pain and overcoming it, confronting the cruel reality of her situation head-on, so that it could have no hold over her later.

  So I let her talk, and at times I wept with her, and I thought about Zahra and Dancing James, and wondered how we’d come to live in such a debased world, and I was sorry I’d never believed in God because at least then I’d have had something bigger to blame, some high overseer to hold accountable.

  “They cut off my fingers!” she screamed at one point, and began thrusting her hands at me. Tried ripping off the bandages to show me. I told her I’d seen them, but she wouldn’t stop, couldn’t stop. Hysteria was setting in and I wasn’t sure how to help dispel it. So, even though I’d been hesitant to talk about myself and how the world had turned against me in the desert, I started to tell her, hoping it would distract and console her, and prevent her from doing any more damage to herself.

  “I knew another woman who was tortured like you,” I said softly. “They cut off her fingers too, five of them, all the digits on her left hand.”

  Toni stopped tugging at the bandages and stared at me.

  “Her name was Zahra,” I continued, holding Toni, remembering the times I’d held Zahra when she was alive, and the last time, when she was limp, ruined, still. “I was in the Army, serving in the desert.”

  “What desert?” Toni asked.

  I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter. They’re all the same. Listen. Zahra was a local woman. We were encouraged by our superiors to mingle with the locals, get them on our side, convince them we were there fighting for them, for their future. But we were never supposed to fall in love with them…”

  I hadn’t meant for it to happen. Hadn’t thought it could. There was such a divide between us and them, our culture and theirs. The men kept the women away from us to the best of their abilities, wary of us, hostile.

  Zahra was in a dif
ferent situation to many of her countrywomen. As a nurse, she had more freedom of movement than most, but aside from that her father was a moderate and had always granted her plenty of leeway. He had lived for a time in England as a young man. He’d have happily stayed and raised his family there, but he loved his home country, hated to see it suffering, and believed it was his duty to return and do what he could to help defy the small-minded, power-hoarding tyrants, and restore law and order.

  At first it was innocent. I met Zahra a few times by chance and we chatted. She was always looking to practise her English. I’d tell her about London, what it was like, my experiences growing up there. She’d tell me about the desert, the troubles she’d faced all her life, the things a woman needed to do in order to survive in a society like hers.

  Things progressed by themselves before we could anticipate and sidestep them, as they sometimes do, and without our quite knowing how, the friendship became something much, much more.

  “Was she beautiful?” Toni asked, lying almost motionless in my arms, the calmest she’d been since I rescued her.

  “No,” I said. “A good-looking woman, but not the sort who’d turn heads. It wasn’t about physical attraction. I mean, there was plenty of that too, but I wasn’t looking for an exotic fling. I knew the danger she could find herself in if she got involved with an outsider like me. I wouldn’t have put her in that position if I’d had a choice. If it had just been about sex, I’d have gone to one of the brothels over there.”

  “They have brothels in places like that?” Toni was surprised.

  I smiled bitterly. “They have brothels everywhere.”

  We didn’t make love many times. There were few opportunities and it wasn’t that big a deal for either of us, as we thought we would have plenty of time for lovemaking in the years to come. I’d made up my mind, when it became clear to me that we’d both fallen in love, to convert. I’d never been religious and could happily pay lip service to any god. I’d serve out my contract, return when I was a free man, accept her beliefs, marry her, spend the rest of my life with her. I didn’t care that she lived in a hellhole. I’d have settled anywhere just to be with her.