Bad Karma

by Dave Zeltserman

  “Is that right,” the other man asked Shannon. “You nervous?”

  “Nervous as all hell,” Shannon said.

  Both men had Russian accents. The one in the sports jacket seemed to be in charge. His accent was thicker, coarser, and his voice came out as a deep rumble. He continued to smirk at Shannon, his eyes lifeless.

  “Maybe you should not come here to stick your nose where it don’t belong,” he said.

  “Maybe, but I think my mistake was walking into a room without checking it out first.”

  “Pretty stupid,” the man agreed.

  The younger Russian laughed his ugly laugh again. It was muted, but still sounded like something you’d hear in an insane asylum.

  “Why don’t you stand up,” the older Russian said.

  “I like it down here.”

  “Stand up anyway.” He took the automatic from his waistband. As Shannon had guessed it was a .45 caliber Smith & Wesson.

  “Nice gun,” Shannon remarked.

  The Russian waved the automatic casually at Shannon’s head. “I ask you politely stand up.”

  “This is nice carpeting,” Shannon said. “Probably expensive. It would be a shame to ruin it.”

  “Carpet can be replaced.”

  Shannon started to stand up. Before he got to his feet, the older Russian stepped forward and threw a hard jab. Shannon saw the punch coming but wasn’t able to react fast enough to roll with it and it caught him flush in the eye. He felt like he’d been hit with a chunk of concrete and the punch knocked him against the wall.

  “That wasn’t very nice of you,” Shannon said, his hand up against his eye.

  “We not nice men,” the younger Russian said, smiling broadly and showing off yellowed, crooked teeth.

  “My friend is right,” the other one said. “We are not nice men. But neither are you. It was not nice to come here and make trouble. Beating up devout followers of Vishna. These are holy men here.”

  Shannon didn’t bother to respond. The area under his eye had already started to swell. He stood in a half crouch as he held a hand over his eye and tried to decide whether he had a chance of wrestling the gun out of the Russian’s hand.

  The older Russian held his free hand out and snapped his fingers sharply. “Your wallet,” he ordered.

  Shannon shook his head.

  He trained his gun on Shannon’s chest and slid the safety off with his thumb. “You do not give me your wallet then this is the way it will happen,” he said, his voice calm, methodical. “You come uninvited here, and when asked to leave you beat up people. Then you charge inside and jump on poor innocent girl.” He turned to his partner. “You know her name?”

  The younger Russian made a show of thinking about this while he tapped his skull. “Blonde girl, right? Meliza Coozan, I think.”

  “That’s right.” The older Russian clapped his partner on the back. Smiling grimly at Shannon, he said, “Meliza Coozan. Unfortunately you beat poor girl to death. I shoot you, but too late.”

  “That’s insane,” Shannon said. “No one would believe that.”

  “Why not? Thirty witnesses, more even, will claim that is what happened.”

  Something flickered in the Russian’s eyes. While Shannon wasn’t sure whether he would shoot him, he had no doubt that this man was a stone-cold killer. He handed him his wallet.

  “William Shannon,” the man read slowly from his license. “It is nice to know where you live, William Shannon.”

  “If you ever come anywhere near my home –”

  “What?” He laughed as his partner grinned wickedly. He slipped Shannon’s wallet into his pocket. “What would you do?”

  Shannon’s cell phone rang. “This is a friend of mine,” he said, holding up the phone. “He knows I’m here, and if I don’t answer he’ll be calling the police.”

  The grin disappeared from the Russian’s face. He trained his gun again on Shannon. “Answer it. And don’t be stupid.”

  Shannon told Eli to call him back in five minutes and hung up before his friend could ask any questions.

  The Russian waved his gun at Shannon. “Get moving,” he ordered.

  The two men escorted Shannon out of the room and back into the hallway lined with Hindu gods. The place was quiet—no sitar music or chanting coming from within the compound. As they walked to the marble foyer, there were no signs of any of the cult members. From behind, the Russian poked Shannon in the back a couple of times with his gun, his associate chuckling softly with each poke.

  “See what happens when you stick your nose into other people’s business,” he said. “No good comes of it. Vishna is a great, great man. People here because they want to be here. So why you have to come and bother them?”

  “Not a bad question,” Shannon said. “A better question is why are a couple of Russian mobsters involved with some half-assed cult?”

  The gun was poked hard into the base of his spine, making him stumble.

  “That is not smart thing to ask,” the older Russian said. His associate laughed his soft wheezing ugly laugh.

  When they got to the foyer, the Russians followed Shannon outside. The older one slipped his gun back into his waistband and buttoned up his sports jacket. The younger Russian unlocked the gate and turned to Shannon with his hand held out.

  “No hard feelings,” he said, a big smart-alecky grin etched on his face. Shannon could see in his eyes what he was intending. He took the hand that was being offered, and when the Russian jerked him forward and sent his knee heading towards Shannon’s groin, he stepped aside and swung his right leg around and behind the Russian, sweeping his one supporting leg out from under him and sending him hard on his tailbone. The Russian let out a loud “oomph” as he hit the pavement. Shannon, still locked in a handshake, was dragged down with him, landing with his knee on the man’s chest. Any sign of the Russian’s smart-alecky grin was gone. Using his free hand, Shannon threw quick rabbit punches to the Russian’s nose until the man let go of the handshake.

  Shannon heard scuttling noises from behind and was halfway to his feet when he took a hard shot to the side of his face. The punch knocked him to the pavement, and he took skin off his damaged hand using it to break his fall. He scrambled backwards, turned and saw the Russian approaching, his shoulders squared away and fists and feet positioned in a manner that showed he had boxed at a professional level. He shuffled forward quickly, throwing a combination, the first punch exploding as it hit Shannon in the chest, the second glancing off his skull.

  Shannon was knocked to his knees. The Russian stepped forward again, a thin smile playing on his lips, his eyes completely dead. He threw a straight right hand at Shannon’s jaw, but this time Shannon blocked it with his left and at the same instance drove his right fist into the man’s groin. He could hear the explosion of breath coming out of the Russian as he doubled over in pain. Without giving him a chance to recover, Shannon grabbed him by his ears and slammed his face into the pavement. As the man lay still on the ground, he retrieved his wallet, then kept searching until he found the Russian’s. The driver’s license identified the man as Dan Smith and listed a Los Angeles address. Shannon handled the license by its edges and tossed the wallet on the ground. He stood up slowly, his body stiff, his head and chest aching. He felt like he’d been worked over with a baseball bat.

  He turned towards the gate, a sharp pain sucking his breath away. The younger Russian had pushed himself up into a sitting position. Blood streamed from his nose and, like his associate, it was now pushed more to one side. He looked woozy but as he stared at Shannon, his eyes shrunk to small black dots. Slipping a switchblade from his pocket, he opened it and started to get to his feet, swaying as if he were on a ship in bad weather.

  A string of Russian words were barked out from behind. Shannon turned. The other Russian had gotten onto his elbow while still clutching his groin. His face was a bloody mess, his nose looking like hamburger meat. With his voice breaking into a hoarse whisper,
he barked out more commands to the younger Russian, who Shannon guessed was named Dimi since that word was used more than any other and with urgency. The younger man stared sullenly into space as he closed his switchblade with his thumb and slipped the knife back into his pocket.

  “You were lucky today,” the older Russian yelled at Shannon in the same hoarse whisper. “You come here again, you won’t be so lucky. Trust me. Maybe you lose more fingers. Maybe you lose more than that.”

  Shannon ignored him and continued through the gate to his car. When he got there, he went through his trunk and found a plastic bag to put the license in, then got himself seated behind the wheel. He watched while the younger Russian helped his partner to his feet and the two men hobbled back into the compound.

  His phone rang. It was Eli asking what the hell was going on.

  “All over now but the crying.” Shannon winced as he touched his eye and as his fingers traveled down to the area above his jaw where he’d been hit. He resisted the temptation to look at himself in the rearview mirror. “I’m in my car now. And mostly in one piece.”

  “What do you mean mostly in one piece?”

  “They sent a couple of goons to put the fear of God in me.” Shannon opened his mouth wide and moved his jaw from side to side, making sure it was still hinged properly and nothing broken. “As we were saying our goodbyes, they tried giving me a beating as a warning. It didn’t quite work as they’d planned.”

  “Jesus, Bill, are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Mostly. A little bruised and banged up, maybe some cracked ribs but nothing broken that I know of. Are you at the Center?”

  “Damn it, Bill–”

  “Sorry, Eli, but I’m rushed for time right now. I’ll tell you more about what happened when I see you. No more than an hour.”

  After hanging up, Shannon called the Boulderado Hotel. There was a cancellation and the reservation clerk could let him have one of their suites until next Thursday, but that was all she had. When she told Shannon the price, he winced a bit harder than when he’d touched his bruised eye and jaw, but told her he’d take it. Then he put the car in drive and headed back towards downtown Boulder. On the way he called Susan.

  “What’s wrong, Hon?” she asked, her voice uneasy, sensing something was not quite right with him.

  “Probably nothing,” he said. “I booked us a suite at the Boulderado for a few days. I’ll explain more when I see you, but for now pack what you need and go to Emily’s. I’ll pick you up in fifteen minutes and tell you more then.”

  “Hon, you have to tell me what’s going on.”

  “I will when I see you.”

  “I’ll wait here for you,” she said, an iciness edging into her voice. “We’ll discuss then whether we’re going anywhere.”

  “Susie, you have to pack and leave now. Please, do as I say and let me explain when I pick you up.”

  “You’re making me nervous,” she said.

  “There’s no reason for you to be nervous. Everything will be fine, but we need to leave the apartment for a few days. Trust me on this, please, Darling?”

  There was a long silence where Shannon imagined Susan holding her breath, her face white with worry, her brow one big wrinkle, her beautiful brown eyes welling up with tears. He felt lower than he had felt in years, hating himself for exposing her to more danger, something he swore he would never do after they’d survived Charlie Winters. He wanted to drive back to that cult and find a way to put the fear of God in those two Russians, make sure they knew what would happen if they ever came to his apartment and bothered Susan or him. But those two were beyond fear. They’d just take it as a challenge, if they weren’t already planning on it.

  Finally Susan told him she would wait for him at Emily’s. Her voice sounded so fragile it brought a lump to his throat. For the next few minutes he drove with his lips pressed hard enough together to make his jaw ache even more than it should given the punch he had taken. When he trusted himself to talk in a calm and rational tone, he called Daniels and asked if he could check on Melissa Cousins at the True Light compound.

  “Now why would I want to do that?” Daniels asked somewhat drily.

  “The place is bad news.”

  “Nothing I can do about that.”

  “Maybe not, but I have a gut feeling something happened to her. That that’s why I’m getting so much resistance.”

  “You’re getting resistance, huh?”

  Shannon hesitated and Daniels let out a loud, annoyed sigh. “Can you give me anything concrete?” he asked. “I need some reason for showing up there.”

  Shannon told him how he had gotten locked up inside True Light’s compound when he tried to see her. “Some professional muscle came an hour later and threatened to kill Melissa and frame me for her murder if I didn’t leave,” he added.

  “You’re shitting me.”

  “Nope.”

  “How about coming in and giving a statement?”

  “Wouldn’t do any good. They’ll manufacture dozens of witnesses with an alternative story.”

  “Which would be?”

  After clearing his throat, Shannon said, “That I assaulted a couple of them.”

  “Any truth to that?”

  “Anything I did was in self-defense.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened.”

  Shannon told him about the two robed stooges.

  “Fuck. So you went there and beat up two of their members. Goddamit, Shannon, you were supposed to be a smart guy.”

  “They swung at me first. I just reacted.”

  “By bouncing their heads off an iron gate?” Daniels asked, exasperated. “I’ll check things out alright. See if I need to bring you in on assault and battery charges.”

  Shannon ignored the latter part of his statement. “Just check that she’s okay. I’ve got a picture of Melissa I can give you if you need one,” he said.

  “Don’t need it, her mother faxed one over months ago and it’s still in her file.”

  “Can you call me after you check on her?”

  “You bet I’ll call you,” Daniels said somewhat disgustedly. “Especially since I’ll be bringing you in in handcuffs afterwards if they file charges against you.”

  “I’ll give you odds they don’t.”

  Daniels only grunted and hung up without giving any indication whether he cared to take that bet.

  When Shannon arrived at his apartment, he found that Susan had already left for Emily’s which he was grateful for—especially after he saw his reflection in the bathroom mirror. The area under his eye was puffed out and already a dark bluish-purple, and his cheek and upper jaw were badly swollen and discolored. He looked almost like he was wearing a mask on half his face. The older Russian must’ve wore a ring because he had left him cut up pretty good where he’d been hit. There were other cuts along his face which he couldn’t account for. He cleaned up as well as he could, gritting his teeth when he applied antiseptic, and using bandages where he could. Still, it didn’t help much. He looked even worse than he felt, and he felt like crap.

  After finishing with his face he worked on his hand, cleaning out the long stretch of raw flesh where his skin had been scraped off, then wrapping a bandage around it. He noted with grim humor how the bandage obscured the fact that he was missing two fingers. When he was done, he slowly removed his shirt, which was torn and had been left with an interesting pattern of blood splattered across it—something that would’ve made many a modern artist proud. Squinting, he could make out a grinning demonic face in the pattern, complete with two reddish streaks that served as horns. Most of the blood had come from the younger Russian, but he was sure some of it was his own. A bruise the size of a large grapefruit showed on his chest. He methodically tested the area, pushing his fingers against each rib. It was painful, but not enough to make him think any of them were cracked or broken. Most likely just bruised. After slowly chewing several aspirin, he held onto the rest of the bottle. />
  When he was done he put on a clean shirt; also changed his pants which had gotten a fair amount of blood smeared on them. Then, taking a deep breath and trying to ignore the butterflies fluttering around his stomach, he set off down the hallway to Emily Janney’s apartment, Susan’s best friend in Boulder. When Susan saw him and her face started to crumble, Shannon felt his heart turn to sludge.

  “It’s not as bad as it looks,” he told her, his voice sounding to him as if it were echoing from within a chamber. “I’m really okay.”

  She shook her head hastily, fighting to hold back the tears. “I thought when we left Massachusetts we were all done with this. I didn’t think I’d ever have to see you like this again.”

  Off in the background Emily scowled angrily at him. He turned his focus back to Susan.

  “Darling, I promise you this is nothing. In a few days it will all be forgotten.”

  “I don’t think I’ll be forgetting you looking like this anytime soon,” she said. “And we have to leave our apartment!”

  “Just for a few days.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “Later, when we get in the car.”

  “No. You tell me here and now!”

  One look at her and he knew there was no sense arguing. Emily stood behind her with her square jaw jutted out as she shot daggers his way. As much as Shannon loved Susan, he knew Emily was a close second. Fiercely protective, he had no doubt she’d throw her body into a line of bullets to protect Susan, and he knew right now she wanted to kick his butt for upsetting his ex-wife.

  He told them everything: about Pauline Cousins, her daughter, the Vishna Yoga Studio, the True Light cult, the Russians.

  “Oh my God,” Susan said, her eyes beseeching Shannon’s. “They know where we live? How could you do this to us?”

  “They probably don’t even remember the address,” Shannon mumbled, barely able to meet her eyes. “Anyway, this will all blow over in a few days.”

  “What if it doesn’t?”

  “It will. Please, Darling, trust me. All they wanted to do was scare the hell out of me. Make me decide it isn’t worth my time looking for Melissa.”