by Domino Finn
The bouncer's eyes bulged. He lowered the revolver quickly, like if he did it fast enough I'd forget the whole thing. But then he hesitated. I could see it on his face. Maybe I worked for Vukasin, maybe I didn't. But probably, I didn't.
The door to the back office twisted open. Milena stormed out. "Hands off means your face too, perv!" she shouted back inside.
The bouncer turned slightly but raised his gun to me at the same time, watching me from the corner of his eye. "Get back in there!" he yelled.
"I'm a businesswoman," she snapped. "I don't work for pigs!"
I slid a hand under the lift-up tabletop and jerked it open. The bar top forced the bouncer's arm up and struck him in the head. A sharp report loosed from the revolver. The overhead light exploded into sparks behind me. Crazy motherfucker actually had a loaded gun.
The Ukrainian wobbled on his feet, slightly dazed. I slammed the swinging table into his head two more times until his legs gave way.
"Where's your creatine now?" I taunted.
I stomped down the hallway. Milena watched from the exit, eyes wide with alarm. The shriveled up old guy from the photos on the wall emerged from the office. Nikolai. He looked smaller and skinnier in person. He held up his finger in protest but thought better about saying anything. I put my shoulder into him as I passed.
"Don't follow us," I warned.
Milena was still jumpy from the gunshot. "Was that what I thought it was?"
I grabbed her arm and pushed her into the sunlight.
Chapter 12
I forced the pickup over the curb on the drive out and kept an eye on the rearview mirror. No takers, apparently.
"Live and learn," I said in a deflated breath. "Turns out it's not a good idea to walk into mob central and ask what they're up to. You okay?"
"I'm better than okay," Milena cackled. "How often do you get to go on a job interview and slap the boss in the face?"
I conceded the idea had appeal. I just didn't like whatever spurred the slap. "I'm sorry you had to be exposed to that."
She snorted. "I get a lot worse all the time. I know how to deal with jerks like that. I can handle myself. Besides," she said, reaching into her back pocket, "I needed to get close enough to swipe this." She presented a scratched up cell phone.
"That his?" I exclaimed. "Nicely done."
She half shrugged. "I've picked a pocket or two in my day."
I didn't know what to say. I was impressed. It only took a few seconds for her to grunt in frustration.
"It's password protected."
"Try 1234," I suggested.
"Already did."
I drove in silence for a bit, puzzling it out. "The address to the club is 2230. Try that."
She laughed. "I have a better idea." She typed in a code and clicked her tongue in satisfaction. "Unlocked!" She sat quietly with a devilish grin, torturing me.
"You're gonna make me ask?" I asked.
She arched an eyebrow. "He's a pig who owns a strip club. I'm just surprised 6969 wasn't the first thing I tried."
I chuckled. She examined the phone while I pulled onto the highway.
"I got a name," I told her. "Vukasin Petrovic."
"Vuka who?"
"It's Serbian, apparently. He's the guy who knocked Hernan around. The bouncer inside recognized the description. He was scared of the card. Sounds like the guy we're looking for is not actually part of the Russian mob, but tied to them somehow."
She listened as she scrolled through the contacts. "No Petrovic. A couple Petras and a Peter though." She frowned. "No Vukasin either. Closest we get is a Vucari."
I grunted. None of those sounded promising.
"Location data's off," she reported. "I don't see any location history, either."
"So we didn't get much of anything," I whined.
"I'll find something," she said. "You just need some patience."
"What, me? Patient? No problem."
As if to compound the statement, my windshield wipers flicked on. The blades rubbed over the windshield with the high-pitched squeals of a dry squeegee. It set my teeth on edge. After the third time, Milena turned to me.
"You gonna stop being a prick?"
"It's not me," I said. "It's the poltergeist. I swear. Look, the switch is in the off position."
Milena froze up. "There's a ghost in here?"
I twisted my wrist back and forth, my hand a balancing scale. "Eh, at this point the truck's barely haunted."
"That's not funny, all right? What if it wants to kill you?"
"Been there, done that."
"What if it's a spirit that needs help?"
"What, like 'I can see dead people?' It doesn't really work like that."
"You know that for sure?"
I chewed my lip. "I'm the expert, right?"
She didn't look convinced. "What if this is like a four-out-of-five dentists thing? There has to be disagreement among the experts, right?"
I gave her the side eye. "Am I the fifth dentist or one of the four?"
"Ugh. You're hopeless."
She shook her head and went back to studying the phone. When the wipers rubbed the glass again, I slammed my fist into the dashboard. Message received, the wipers stopped. It wasn't exactly an exorcism but it would do for the drive.
The ghost in the truck may have gone incognito but my sour mood stuck around. I wasn't sure why. The more I figured it, something about locating Petrovic was getting under my skin way more than cracked wiper blades ever could.
This was a game to him.
I mean, I couldn't find the guy and I had his calling card. How sad was that? But that was how he'd designed the game. For all I knew, he'd expected me to ask around for him. Maybe the MMA-wannabe in the strip club was supposed to tell me his name.
Or maybe I was getting paranoid. One thing was sure, Petrovic wanted to meet me, but on his own terms. If I could find him on mine, surprise him, then the whole power balance of our relationship would flip dramatically.
But the bout couldn't start until we crossed paths. I was restless. I was a boxer without a punching bag.
That wasn't all of it, either. No, sir. I was tense. Granted, Russian Roulette's pretty much the opposite of a relaxing massage, but I was antsy in general. After months of avoiding me, Connor Hatch was coming to town. One misstep—if I overplayed my hand—he'd fold and walk away. I'd keep the table scraps, but I wouldn't get him.
While I drove, Milena went through the pictures on the stolen phone. Friends at the club. None matching our punk-rock suspect. Close-ups of women. Lots of those. Some other shots of empty bars, local restaurants, foreclosed properties by the River—stuff like that. I could only guess they had to do with Russian business interests.
When she showed me pictures of the casinos, I perked up. Most people don't think of Miami as a casino town, but times have changed. Sure, we always had the casino in the Miccosukee Indian Reservation, and the large casino cruise ships would sail to international waters and open their tables, but recent legislation allowed larger establishments to set up shop.
As far as I knew, the Russian crews conducted business at the Hard Rock and Magic City casinos. That in itself wasn't surprising for a bunch of gangsters, but I recalled the casino angle Manolo had mentioned in the morning. It was a two-bit theory from an underpaid mercenary, but it was a start. Unfortunately, the phone pictures didn't have anything of note besides some party shots on the outskirts of the casinos. After she had been through every picture twice, Milena hadn't seen a single tattooed face.
So my tension increased. The nagging doubts. I tried to step away from the micro-problem and envision the big picture. Trace over my footsteps and make sure I didn't miss anything. Passing Downtown, I thought of the Historical Museum and the phone call with Dr. Trinidad. There was something that went unsaid in that conversation. Some kind of link to what was going on.
"Slight detour," I announced. I exited the highway into the lunchtime traffic of Downtown Miami. We c
ruised between the high-rises in the heart of the city. "I've been meaning to run something down. It might be a waste of time, but it should make the Spaniard happy, at least."
I pulled along a large plaza and found an open parking spot on the street. Milena took her eyes off her task for a moment. "What's Downtown?"
"Dr. Trinidad at the Historical Museum."
"You mean HistoryMiami?"
"Yeah, they changed the name while I was dead. Apparently everything has to be a brand these days."
She shrugged halfheartedly. "Zoo Miami did the same thing."
"Zoo Mi— Wait, it's not called MetroZoo anymore?"
"Nope. They changed names around the same time."
I hissed. "I was only gone ten years and I feel like an old man pining for the good old days."
"Anyone ever tell you you're dramatic?" Milena crossed her arms. "You expect this doctor to tell you something about the Horn that will help?"
The straightforward answer was no. "That's just it. This isn't about the Horn. There's something else. The Horn's a hot commodity. At this point I wouldn't dare walk it in there. It's almost as if Dr. Trinidad somehow realized how important the artifact is."
Milena grunted. "Ancient antiquities are so boring. I'll wait in the car and keep trying to find a lead on the asshole who hit my abuelo. Leave the keys so I don't melt."
Worked for me.
Chapter 13
I made my way from the blaring sun into the temperature-controlled museum interior. The Historical Museum is one of the oldest in the city, the largest in the state, boasting an impressive catalog of native artifacts. Of course, their usage of the word "artifact" is purely academic. They don't know anything about animists or Intrinsics or conquistador wraiths. We'll keep that our little secret.
All recovered artifacts from the tri-county area are sent here for initial impressions. The Horn hadn't been recovered in South Florida, of course, and I'd never submit something so dangerous to unwitting hands, but the experts could provide me with invaluable assistance. That went without saying.
Now was a good time to drop by, too. It was close enough to our originally scheduled appointment. I'd canceled, but Dr. Trinidad should still have the opening. With any luck, I would catch her with a few moments to chat.
I made my way down a bustling hallway, holding my head down in a meager attempt to keep a low profile. The place looked like an old school, replete with appropriate stragglers and staff, all wandering with their own agendas. Some sort of training seminar huddled in the distance. I'd been here before and everything was business as usual. When I was almost at the door to Dr. Trinidad's office, it opened. I spun and faced the wall. Put my cell phone to my ear and acted like I was mid conversation.
A tiny woman with jet-black hair stepped out. She had to be a foot shorter than me, with shoulder-length hair as sharp as icicles. She wore a black leather jacket and tight pants. Stylish and pretty. Her stoic face stood in stark contrast to her softer qualities, as if every part of her being was trying (and failing) to fight off the overwhelming impression of cuteness. My type in some ways. Not as elegant as Emily or a bombshell like Milena, but striking. That was the best look I was willing to get without announcing my presence.
The woman stormed out of Dr. Trinidad's office with hard eyes, clearly upset at some development. My back to her as she passed, she muttered angry words under her breath. I couldn't catch them. On the plus side, she seemed too upset to notice anything, including me. To play it safe, I faked my phone call until she swayed her little hips right out of sight.
Yup. To play it safe. It had absolutely nothing to do with how attractive she was.
After it was clear she wasn't gonna come back and ask for my number, I headed in to Dr. Trinidad's office. It was a large area lined with tables for cataloguing things. The doctor rested against a countertop with her eyes closed, looking worn down. She stiffened suddenly when I closed the door.
"Problem, Doctor?"
The question came out a bit more accusatory than I'd intended, but I left it in the air. Instead of relaxing her posture when she saw me, she remained frozen, like I was a T. rex waiting for her to move so I could snap her into my jaws. Her eyes flicked to the door.
"It's business..." she answered, and shook it off.
I strolled forward slowly. Naturally. Nonchalant-like.
"Who was that?"
See? Just making small talk.
"A colleague," she said. "From the Chicago office. It doesn't relate to our business, if that's your concern."
"You sure about that?"
The doctor returned a deadpan stare, offended. "I have been truthful with you, which is more than I can say about you, Mr. Rose."
She was gonna keep stabbing that wound till I bled out. She wasn't wrong in her reproach, either. I was asking a lot of her, off the books and with a fake name. Now I felt like a dick.
"You indicated you weren't coming in today," she said.
"I wasn't going to bother you while you were sick," I lied.
She cleared her throat. "I'm under the weather, but I can still work. I can examine the Horn now, if you've changed your mind."
"I didn't bring it. You sounded strange over the phone, though. Have you learned anything since last week? Anything you're not telling me?"
She sighed, pulled herself off the counter, and opened a drawer on the opposite wall. She withdrew the three color photographs I'd supplied her.
"Based on the meager evidence in my possession, I was able to make a few preliminary conclusions."
She waved me to a desk against the far wall and sat. As I came up beside her, she arrayed the photos before us. The Horn of Subjugation must've been an impressive piece from her perspective. A large horn of a bull, slightly yellowed, brown at the tip. The white background had been used as a canvas for colonial etchings. A ship, a conquistador mounted on a horse, and other Spanish-inspired artwork. Both ends of the Horn were capped with dull metal, but the real treasure was the gold wrapping. Taíno symbols adorned those. The natives had no written language but they did love them some pictographs. The symbols scrawled into the gold lining were rudimentary and open to interpretation.
"My first observation," started the doctor, "is that this gold is probably not pure. It's most likely tumbaga, an alloy of gold and copper. The outside sheen is washed down to gold, but these scratches show traces of copper beneath the surface."
I watched Dr. Trinidad blankly. "There goes my resale value."
She smiled primly. "It is a small matter but it does strengthen the wrapping considerably while keeping it malleable for etching." The woman admired the photographs for a moment. "It's interesting to see the clash of Taíno and Spanish designs. And the obvious metaphorical victory."
"Victory?" I prodded.
She eyed me like I was an idiot.
"I... Uh... I'm not good at metaphors," I explained weakly. "Like a donkey."
She waited.
"That's it," I said. "Like a donkey. See what I mean?"
The corner of her mouth curled. "Ah, a language joke. How do you keep the ladies at bay?"
"It's really hard sometimes," I said under my breath. I didn't want to tell her it was actually pretty easy when my mere presence was enough to give people panic attacks. I scratched my head and did what I probably should've done beforehand: kept my mouth shut.
Dr. Trinidad appreciated the gesture. "The metaphor is the victory of the natives over the conquering powers. Here you have a symbol of Spanish oppression, a powder horn, representing superior technology. Destruction. The bane of life. Then you have the Taíno influence on the piece. The tumbaga wrapping, overtaking it, sealing it shut."
I nodded. I was an idiot but I wasn't a moron. I could keep up with that much.
"The pictographs are a trouble point, as we knew they would be. Besides the limitation of these poorly lit photographs"—she shot me a glare—"it is almost impossible to assume we know what most of these symbols represent." Before
I cursed aloud she caught me with a "But."
She pulled the farthest photograph over. A close-up of the etchings. "These three symbols strike me as peculiar. The first, a circle, could represent the sun. Or life. The middle is quite obviously a man. This third symbol I believe is a bat. We've seen it before on funerary dressings. Now," she said, taking a moment to turn to me and figuring out how to explain herself to a layman, "this is a leap of logic, but in Taíno culture, bats represent—"
"Death," I cut in.
Her eyes widened in surprise. No, I wasn't big on history, but Taíno bats were old news to me. The deep death spell I'd cast on myself a decade ago was called the Wings of Night. It was a reference to the bats of the Caribbean islands. The natives believed them to be spirits from their underworld, Coaybay, visiting them during the day. The only way to and from their promised island was on leathery wings. Aside from death, of course.
"That's right." The doctor nodded approvingly and returned her attention to the picture. "Now, the interpretation of these symbols is open for debate, but to me it looks like the three are grouped, offset from the others. It shows some kind of relationship. My guess is that this references a deity of some sort. A man between life and death."
I chewed my lip. "Always with one foot in the Murk."
"What's that?" she asked casually.
"Nothing, Doctor."
She turned to me again. "Is the piece empty?"
I shrugged. "I haven't opened it, if that's what you mean."
"But have you considered what's inside?"
I nodded. "Sure. Spanish gunpowder for a matchlock. That's what the horns were for. It's like you said, a metaphorical victory. I can't tell for sure, but it feels close enough to that from its heft."
She watched me carefully and cocked her head inquisitively. "What if it contains another kind of powder?"
Her gaze made me feel like a student who'd been caught sleeping in class. I had to admit she stumped me on that. "What kind of—"
"Ashes, I would guess. Inside the Spanish powder horn are the burnt ashes of an important man or woman. The funerary markings support that theory."