Proust straightens up. He touches a hand to the top of his head.
‘You didn’t have to do that. I told you. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you before you’ll believe me. I didn’t hurt either of those girls. It wasn’t me.’
‘Say it as many times as you like. Don’t make it true. You want me to start believing you, then start telling me what really happened with those girls. I want answers. The girls’ families want answers. You wanna talk to them? You wanna tell them how you don’t know anything? Maybe I should arrange that. You wouldn’t believe how badly Megan’s father would like to have a private little chat with you about his daughter.’
‘You can’t do that. You can’t endanger me like that.’
‘Answers, Stan. Until I get them, I stay in your life. See you later. I ain’t sure what time yet. Don’t wait up. It could be late the next time I show up here.’
When Doyle leaves, he slams the door shut behind him. The rain has started up again, and it’s getting heavier.
‘Shit!’ he says, and steps onto the street.
Despite what he said to Proust, he’s not sure how long he can keep this up. The anger and the frustration are eating him up inside. It’s a question of who will break first, and he’s not sure it will be Proust.
He thinks about this as he hurries along the block to where his car is parked.
It keeps him distracted from the man who comes up behind him and presses the muzzle of a gun into his spine.
‘Don’t make a scene. I haven’t shot a cop in a while. I could do with the practice.’
The voice is deep and gruff and menacing. Doyle knows that any sudden move could carry the danger that his spine gets blasted in two, leaving him permanently paralyzed from the waist down. It would be a stupid, insane thing to do.
So he does it, knowing that it will be the last thing the man behind him will expect.
He whirls around, simultaneously chopping his arm into the gun hand of the man. The huge semi-automatic flies out of the man’s grasp, while Doyle completes his maneuver with one of the most powerful punches it has ever been his satisfaction to deliver. The man pulls his head back just in time to avoid having it removed from his neck, but the blow still lands on his chin, sending him reeling backward across the sidewalk.
In that instant, Doyle is back in the boxing ring of his youth. Not long after he was dragged all the way from Ireland to the Bronx and started getting into scrapes with those who saw this pasty-faced kid with an impenetrable accent as an obvious target, his mother decided that the best substitute for his absent father to advise him how to deal with such matters was a boxing coach. Turned out Doyle was a natural. He got stronger, he got faster, and he learned technique. But most of all he learned not to fear his adversary, no matter how big or ferocious he might be.
He puts all that training to good use now. He doesn’t know who this prick is. He just knows he wants to pound the crap out of him.
And so he goes after him. Doesn’t pause to give the man a chance to recover. Doesn’t even waste time trying to pull his own gun. That can wait until this piece of shit hits the ground.
He lands another punch. A good solid strike that bursts open the man’s lip. He pulls back his left for an uppercut that should finish this . . .
Which is when something hard and heavy smacks into the side of Doyle’s head.
He turns, sees another burly figure in front of him. It comes as something of a surprise. You don’t normally have more than one opponent in the ring. Queensberry Rules and all that.
Doyle raises his defenses. Ignores the pain in his skull. Ignores the fact that he’s now outnumbered by two to one.
Another blow, this time to the back of his head.
Make that three to one.
Doyle topples forward. He puts his arms out before he hits the ground, then remains there on his knees, trying to shake the dark swirling shapes out of his brain as the rain rolls over his back and down his arms.
He feels strong hands grip him and yank him to his feet. The two new attackers drag him back across the sidewalk and slam him against the side of his own car. They stay on either side of him, pinning him in position with his arms wide like a scarecrow. Doyle blinks. He sees the first guy come staggering toward him with murderous intent in his eyes. There’s not much Doyle can do to prevent the beating he’s about to receive.
Other than to kick the man in the nuts, that is.
He drives his foot with unerring accuracy into the man’s groin. The force of the impact is magnified by the man’s own forward momentum. He comes to an abrupt halt as though he has just run into a brick wall – which would probably be less painful – then clutches at his privates as he drops heavily to the ground. Doyle sees tears well in the man’s eyes before he bows to touch his forehead to the wet sidewalk like a praying monk.
One down, two to go, thinks Doyle. Although he starts to acknowledge that’s a little ambitious when the other two gorillas start smashing their fists into his midriff. He hears his own breath being forced out of him as the men pummel his ribcage and pulverize his abdominal wall. And when they’ve run out of steam and they allow their captive to sink to his knees, Doyle notices that the first attacker is back on his feet. He approaches warily and shakily, and Doyle prepares himself for the coup de grâce.
Raising his face, Doyle looks at the man, who is still clutching at his groin and baring his bloodstained teeth in agony.
‘That’s a terrible Michael Jackson impression,’ says Doyle.
Instead of a laugh, he gets a kick to the face. Doyle’s head flies back and bangs into his car door. The dark shapes flood into his consciousness again. They try to merge together to form total blackness, and Doyle has to fight to keep them separated.
He feels himself being dragged again, his feet scraping the ground. He hears a car door being opened. The hands frisk him and take away his gun. Then he feels himself being lifted from the ground and tossed into a vehicle. More doors open. The three goons climb in. Doors slam shut.
Doyle does his best to raise himself into an upright position in his seat. As the car takes off, he looks through the rain-washed window. The streets are mostly empty. Everyone has fled from the rain. The ones who are still out there stare back at him from beneath their umbrellas. One person points. Doyle knows that it’s unlikely they will report the incident.
Fighting the nausea that is starting to creep into his system, he starts to turn toward the man in the seat next to him. Stops turning when his temple touches the gun barrel leveled at him.
‘Gimme an excuse, dickwad,’ says the man.
‘Where are we going?’ Doyle asks. ‘Did Proust hire you?’
‘Who’s Proust?’ the man answers, and Doyle can tell he really doesn’t know. It was a long shot anyhow. Why would Proust risk organizing something like this, right outside his own premises?
No, somebody far more dangerous than Proust is behind this.
TEN
The conversation isn’t exactly sparkling during the journey. Doyle puts several questions, gets several stony glares in return. Oh, except that one time when one of the men tells him to shut the fuck up.
The guy sitting next to Doyle – the one who started all this with his offer of a free lumbar puncture – has white hair that contrasts starkly with the blood still dribbling from his lip. Not old-person white. Just white. And he’s not an albino either. Doyle wonders whether to ask him if he’s had an accident with bleach recently, but thinks better of it.
The other two bozos sitting up front are big and ugly and stupid. All muscle and no brain. It’s a wonder either of them has enough intelligence and coordination to drive.
But somehow they manage to transport Doyle across town without incident. He keeps an eye on the changing streets as he tries to work out where they’re taking him. The buildings around him become large brick-built warehouses, now mostly converted for use as bars and restaurants. Directly ahead, he sees the horizontal slash of the High Line – the e
levated park that was once a section of the rail system. His stomach begins to churn.
His fears are confirmed when the SUV makes a sudden turn into a narrow alleyway. That’s when the sun comes out, if only figuratively. In reality, the rain clouds continue to piss on everyone. But at least Doyle now knows exactly where he is. Knows exactly whom he has been brought to see. Knows exactly why he’s here. Shoulda guessed, he thinks.
This is the meatpacking district – a tiny quadrilateral that once somehow managed to contain over two hundred slaughterhouses and packing plants. The smell of death is rarer here now.
But not always entirely absent.
Doyle has been here before. Last Christmas, to be precise. It wasn’t fun then, and it won’t be any more hilarious now.
When the men drag him out of the car and he stands on the slick cobblestones, looking up at the dark-brick building, it all comes flooding back. He remembers every detail of that night. He has never told anyone else about it. Not the police, not his wife.
He has never told them about how he shot and killed a man in this alley.
The man with the whiter-than-white hair steps up to a side door in the building, pulls out a bunch of keys, and opens up. His two associates take Doyle by the arms and lead him inside.
They move through a dim utility room, then through another door that opens into a vast empty chamber. Doyle has never seen it like this before. The last time he was here, the place was heaving with gyrating, sweaty bodies. The air was filled with a rhythmic pounding that shook his bones. Everyone stoned and happy and oblivious.
Now, though, the nightclub is as forlorn as an abandoned ship. The dance floor is deserted and marked with scuffs and numerous unidentifiable stains. The bar is unmanned, and black steel shutters have been lowered to keep out intruders. The walls are of bare brick – harsh and unwelcoming.
The footfalls of the men echo around the converted warehouse as Doyle is led over to an iron staircase. They start to climb, and the metallic clatter reverberates. They arrive at a walkway that runs the length of one wall. Doyle can still picture the half-naked female dancers that were positioned here on his last visit.
They don’t stop here, but continue up another staircase to the next level. Doyle is guided along the walkway to a door at its center. Whitey knocks three times and waits.
‘Maybe he’s in the shower,’ says Doyle. ‘Or busy jerking off.’
The man to Doyle’s left gives him a smack on the side of the head.
When the door is finally opened, another man-mountain comes into view. He’s even bigger and uglier than the three who were sent to collect Doyle. The kind of guy who should be holding a peeled banana in one hand while picking his nose with the other.
‘Would you like to buy some of our cookies?’ Doyle asks him. ‘Or chocolate brownies? You look like a chocolate brownie kind of guy.’
The man furrows his eyebrows slightly, like he’s smelled something unpleasant in his cave. Then he looks at Whitey, and a spark of recognition fires in the recesses of his brain. He pulls the door wide open and steps aside.
The men hustle Doyle into the room, and he feels his breathing become faster. It’s a large office. Wood floor and oak paneling on the walls. A massive oak desk in the center of the room. The air is cool – the building designed to prevent its carcasses from rotting when it was used to house animal corpses. That time was way before Doyle’s last visit here, but even in his own memory this is a place of violence and bloodshed. He will never forget what happened here in front of his eyes.
There are two things vying for Doyle’s attention here. One is an object covered by a gray tarpaulin. It stands over to Doyle’s left, like a life-size sculpture waiting to be unveiled. Doyle isn’t sure what’s under that tarpaulin, but he can make some guesses.
Then there’s the man seated at the desk. He wears a dark suit, no tie, shirt open at the collar. He is broad of shoulder, broad of head, and carries a broad smile. His name is Lucas Bartok. Despite his smile, he is not a pleasant man. In fact, as Doyle knows only too well, Lucas Bartok is the stuff of nightmares.
‘Doyle! Glad you decided to accept my invitation.’
Doyle shrugs, then jerks a thumb toward Whitey. ‘How could I refuse, with your boy here asking so nice? For a while I thought he was gonna get down on one knee and propose.’
‘Yeah, Sven’s a charmer, all right.’
Doyle turns to the man with the snowy hair. ‘Sven, huh? And what part of Ireland are you from? Maybe I know your folks.’
Sven just glares back at him, possibly because he’s not sure if Doyle’s question is serious or not. Possibly because he doesn’t give a shit and just wants to tear Doyle’s limbs off.
Bartok says, ‘Looks like you didn’t fall for him right away, though, Doyle. That’s some whack you took to the cheek there.’
‘I’ll take your word for it. I can’t look at it without a mirror. Makes my eyes go funny.’
Doyle waits for everyone to tense, and he gets it. He gets it because he just broke the cardinal rule. The one which says: Don’t make fun of Lucas Bartok’s eyes.
Lucas Bartok is cross-eyed. And we’re not just talking a mild squint here. Not a slight drifting of a pupil. No, Bartok’s eyes are so misaligned he can have staring competitions with himself.
Everyone in this room is aware of Bartok’s condition, but none of the other men here will have dared mention it. Not ever. Otherwise they wouldn’t be in this room. They’d be somewhere nobody would ever find them. Decomposing.
Doyle says it because he needs to show these people that he’s not afraid. The jokes too. Humor to hide the fact that he’s actually scared shitless. To hide the fact that, although he may seem unruffled on the surface, inside he’s trembling. Because if there’s one thing he knows not to do right now, it’s to show weakness. Weakness could get him killed. But then again, so could pushing Bartok too far, because Bartok is certifiable. Doyle found that out last Christmas. He witnessed first-hand what this man is capable of when roused.
‘Get him a chair,’ Bartok orders, the amusement gone from his face now.
‘I don’t mind standing,’ says Doyle. ‘I don’t plan to stay all that long.’
One of the men brings a heavy oak chair over, places it behind Doyle, then pushes down on his shoulders to make him sit.
‘Long time no see,’ says Bartok.
It seems to Doyle that it’s a statement just crying out for a personal insult, but he decides it’s prudent to hold back this time.
‘Yeah, we should get together more often. Say, what are you doing next Thursday? I got tickets for Springsteen.’
‘Yeah? I’m tempted. Let’s wait and see if you’re still alive then, huh, Doyle?’
‘Why? What’s my doctor been saying to you?’
‘You got a clean bill of health. For now. Which is good news for me, because I got a job for you.’
‘No thanks. I already got a job. I got a long list of scumbags to lock up.’ Doyle selects one of Bartok’s eyes at random and focuses on it. Letting him know that he’s high on that list.
‘Yeah, well you’ll just have to fit this into your busy schedule. You don’t get to say no to this one.’
‘And if I say no anyway?’
Bartok glowers at him. At least, Doyle thinks it’s aimed at him. Then Bartok slides open a drawer in his desk and takes something out of it. He holds it up and studies it, allowing Doyle to do the same.
It’s an icepick.
It could be worse. It could be a meat hook, that being Lucas Bartok’s implement of choice when he really wants to go to work on someone. But an icepick can be lethal enough. Go ask Trotsky.
‘What does this say to you, Doyle?’
‘You’re expecting another ice age?’
Bartok’s sigh is more of a snort. He gets up from his chair, still brandishing the pick. Doyle’s eyes dart around the room as he tries to decide his best move. He’s got a psychopathic killer in front of him, and a wall o
f muscle behind him. And they’re armed too. The odds don’t seem in his favor.
He relaxes only slightly when Bartok walks across the room, away from Doyle and over to the tarpaulin-covered object.
‘You know what’s under here?’ says Bartok.
Doyle doesn’t answer. He doesn’t want to see what he’s about to be shown, because he knows what it is.
When Bartok whips away the tarpaulin, Doyle’s fears are confirmed. It’s a man, sitting on a chair. To be precise, it’s a man who is very naked and very dead. And, also to be precise, he’s not exactly sitting; he’s more kind of perched there. He’s scrunched up into a ball, his knees pushed up to his abdomen and his arms folded across his chest. His fingers are stiffened into claws and his eyes are open. He stares accusingly at Doyle. As well he might.
The sight of this figure is disturbing enough, but there’s something else that makes it all the more horrific.
The man is frozen solid.
Doyle can see the vapor tumbling down the frost-whitened flesh. He tells himself it doesn’t matter to the victim. He’s beyond feeling the cold. But still it doesn’t sit right with Doyle. You freeze turkeys. You freeze fish – even those with bones in. You don’t freeze humans. Even in the mortuary, bodies are usually stored a couple of degrees above freezing.
‘What are you thinking, Doyle?’
Doyle can’t tear his eyes away from that grotesque solidified corpse. Can’t shake the feeling that it in turn is looking right into Doyle’s soul. The icy glare chills him, and he wants to shiver.
‘Pretty good, Lucas. Can you carve swans too? I prefer swans.’
Another quip. Bravado. Trying to prove how unmoved he is. But it lacks conviction. It sounds hollow, even to himself.
Bartok leans closer to the frozen head of the man. He seems morbidly fascinated, like a kid observing a bug after he’s pulled the legs off it. Slowly he raises the icepick, then with the tip of it he gently taps one eyeball. The harsh clicking sound sets Doyle’s teeth on edge.
‘Now that’s what I call a stiff. You remember this guy?’
Doyle swallows hard. Do I remember? Of course I remember. Sonny Rocca. He worked for the Bartok brothers, back when there were two of them. I killed him. I had no choice.
Marked (Callum Doyle 3) Page 9