by Allen Eskens
Ianna deleted the message. Then she picked up a bottle of water and poured it into the exposed back of the phone, tilting and shaking the device until the lights on its face went dead. She sloshed the water around for a bit longer to make sure that she had thoroughly short-circuited Alexander's phone. Once she was satisfied that the phone would never work again, she pulled the battery back out, dried both the phone and battery with the bottom of her dress, and placed them carefully back in the console.
Drago watched the clock as he drove north, and when an hour had passed, he found a gravel road that led to a wooded area with no houses in sight. He put the battery back into his phone and turned it on to check for messages. He had none. He got out of the Explorer and opened the back. Desiree was drenched with sweat from being under that blanket for the past hour. Drago untied the gag and pulled the negligee from her mouth, letting her gulp in the fresh air. Trails of mascara streaked her cheeks, and her hair clung to the perspiration on her face and neck.
Drago held his track phone in front of her face. “You see that?” He showed her that Alexander hadn't called. “Your husband did not call me back. That is not good. You see, he has something of mine, and I want it.” He turned to her so that she would look at the seriousness in his eyes. “You heard me give your husband the simple task of calling me. You heard me say that, didn't you?”
Desiree nodded her head, barely enough to be perceived.
“And yet, he hasn't called me. I tried to be fair about this. You think I'm being fair, don't you?”
She looked at him with wide, unsure eyes.
“You know that I can't wait forever. He's driving north. He's running away from you with another woman, and he's running away from me with my property. At some point I have to honor my word. You understand?”
“Wait…what if I could tell you where he's going? Will you let me live?”
People about to die will bargain away the world for one more breath of life. They will lie and cheat and betray their own mothers in order to live. Drago doubted that Desiree had anything to trade, but he decided to hear her out. “You know where he's going?”
“You said he's going north, right?”
“That is correct.”
“What highway is he on?”
Drago contemplated whether to answer, but in the end, it wouldn't matter if she knew his path, so he told her. “When last I checked, he was on Highway 169 near Grand Rapids.”
Desiree nodded with determination. “I know where he's going. If I tell you, will you let me live? Please. You could just leave me in the woods—tied up if you want. I don't care. I don't want to die. Please!”
Drago gently skimmed the back of his hand along her temple, brushing away a tuft of hair that blocked his view of her face. “Desiree, you and I know that this…situation is not of your making. You had no hand in your husband's treachery. I am not a man without compassion. If you tell me where your husband is going, I will let you live.”
For the first time since Drago first put his gun in her face, Desiree could speak without a shiver in her voice. “He's going to our cabin. It's in the middle of nowhere up in northern Minnesota.”
“How do you know this?”
“He's in Grand Rapids. That's on the way.”
“And you could direct me to this cabin?”
“I have GPS in the car. It has the location of the cabin preprogrammed. If you let me loose, I'll show you.”
Drago looked upon Desiree with a strange feeling of pity. He lifted the gag back over her mouth. Desiree fought against this assault, a sense of betrayal coursing from her eyes.
“I will go and see if you are telling the truth,” Drago said. “This gag is only temporary, to ensure that you remain quiet.”
Drago walked to the cab and turned on the GPS. In a matter of a few minutes, he found the list of preprogrammed locations. One carried the designation “cabin.” He opened that location, and a blue line jumped on the screen, connecting his location on that gravel road to a red star on the edge of a lake. The path of the blue line followed the path that the Cadillac had taken. Drago smiled. His prey was leading him to a secluded location where he could finish his business with ease.
He walked back to the tailgate of the Explorer to find Desiree looking up at him with pleading eyes. He removed her gag. “You did well, Desiree,” he said.
“You'll let me live?”
“Yes, but you will be tied up, as you yourself suggested. I cannot let you interfere with my work.”
He lifted her from the vehicle and untied her legs and ankles but kept her hands tied together. A path led back onto a strand of woods several acres deep. He nodded for her to walk in front of him, and they walked down the path. Above them, a sober fog clung to trees stripped bare by the chill of autumn. Beneath Desiree's bare feet, a blanket of leaves, red and yellow and brown, cushioned her steps, making their march into the woods all the more silent. Drago held onto her bicep as they walked, and through her robe he could feel her body tremble—from the cold, from fear—it didn't matter.
When they'd walked deep enough into the woods for Drago's liking, he led her to a basswood tree, thick and crooked and hidden. He untied her hands and instructed her to kneel and wrap her arms around the tree. She hesitated.
“You won't kill me?”
“I will leave you to your own wits. Whether you live or die will be out of my control.”
She eased her arms around the tree, flinching when her soft, warm cheek touched the cold, wet hardness of the tree trunk. Drago retied her wrists, put the gag back into her mouth, and stepped back. She watched his movements intently. He inspected his work, smiled, and pulled his gun from its holster.
“I am impressed that you would trade your husband's life for your own.”
When Desiree saw the gun, she closed her eyes and screamed into the gag, her body convulsing with the knowledge of her coming death. Her scream changed to a deep-throated, guttural howl born of rage.
“Believe me,” Drago said. “I take no pleasure in what I do, but I have no choice. You have seen my face. You know where I am going and what I will do when I get there.” He put the muzzle against the back of her neck. She shut her eyes, squeezing them tight as though her clench might be strong enough to deflect a bullet.
“I promise you, you will not feel pain,” he whispered. Then he pulled the trigger and relieved Desiree Rupert of her fear.
Max found Alexander's squad car parked in a tow-away zone in front of the apartment where Jericho Pope lived. The night before, when he and Alexander and Billie shared notes on the investigation, Alexander talked about the beautiful penthouse apartment and the millionaire lifestyle Jericho had acquired on the back of his blackmail scheme. Max knocked on the vestibule door and waved his badge to the young man at the security desk, who immediately buzzed him in. Max explained that he was there to follow up on the penthouse break-in. The security guard was more than helpful in getting Max into the penthouse.
On the way up, the security guard said that he saw Ms. Markova and another man exit the elevator on the garage level and leave in her car. Max asked if the man looked anything like him, and the guard said yes, that Max and the man could have been brothers. After the security guard opened the penthouse door, Max nodded thanks to the man as an indication for him to leave, which he did.
Max stepped carefully though the destruction of broken furniture and upended shelves, going room by room, looking for any sign of where his brother may have gone or why. He kept his hand on his gun, but the gun remained holstered.
In the front room, he found a hole in the wall above the fireplace. He knelt down and picked up the makeshift box that once held Jericho Pope's secrets. He held the box over the hole to see the mechanics of the hiding spot. Then he saw his brother's knife, a knife identical to his, a knife with a spring blade that is illegal in the hands of anyone who isn't a member of law enforcement. He picked up the knife and read his brother's initials etched into the bolster.
Just then, his phone buzzed to let him know that he'd received an e-mail. He opened the e-mail and saw that Verizon had sent him the location of a ping on Alexander's phone. He looked at the address and knew immediately where Alexander was and where he was headed. The ping came from the vicinity of the Roadside Market in Hill City. Alexander always stopped there on their trips up to the cabin.
Max made a quick call to Niki Vang.
“Max,” Niki whispered. “Tiller and the chief are on the warpath. They're pissed as hell at Alexander and they're starting to get pissed at you. They keep asking me where you're at.”
“Niki, I'm sorry to get you screwed up in all this.”
“Shut up. I'm your partner. What do you need?”
“I need time. Tell them I was up all night. Tell them that I said I was going home and I don't want to be disturbed.”
“But you're not going home, are you?”
“No, I'm not. I have an errand to run—gotta go pick something up. I will likely be incommunicado for the rest of the day.”
“Good hunting, Max.”
Alexander thought that going to the cabin would be a good idea. He and Ianna would have time to organize things, plan a short- and long-term existence, now that they had the flash drive. It would give them a chance to be alone—really alone—away from the threat of Drago Basta and the pressures of Alexander's collapsing life. It would give them a space to breathe and time to think. But maybe time to think was the last thing that Alexander needed.
When they stepped out of the car, Ianna immediately ran to the lake, stopping at the end of the dock to look around.
“You really have no neighbors?”
“Not a one,” Alexander said.
Alexander started for the cabin but paused as the smells and sounds of his childhood overwhelmed him, the scent of pine and moss buoyed in the thick, moist air left by an evening sprinkle. A carpet of wet needles squished under his feet as he walked. His senses filled him with memories of better times. He shook away the images and went to open the cabin. It would turn cold soon. They would need a fire.
The cabin was laid out like a cross, with the kitchen at the head of the cross, the living room at the foot, and the dining room in the middle. The cabin had two bedrooms, making up each of the arms of the cross, one on either side of the dining room.
He brought their belongings in and laid the bags on the bed in one of the bedrooms. They managed to scrounge together enough clothing to last a couple days. And with $100,000 in cash, they could fill in the blanks of their wardrobe as they traveled.
As Alexander unpacked the duffle bag, Ianna wandered around the living room, looking at pictures of Alexander and Max over the years.
“You two look alike,” she said.
“What?”
“I said that you and your brother look alike.”
“Yeah, lucky him.”
“Definitely,” she said.
Alexander placed his laptop computer on the dresser and ran his fingers across the flash drive in his pocket. “Shall we watch this now?” he said.
Ianna walked into the bedroom with a twinkle in her eye. “I'm up for a movie.”
It took Alexander a while to get the laptop to read the flash drive, and for a moment he doubted the ability of the new computer to read the old drive, but then the screen opened to a menu with two files: one read “girls,” and the second read “death.” Alexander clicked on the “death” file.
The screen filled with the interior of a yacht's salon. On the left side of the screen, a man with a dusting of silver in his hair sat on a curved leather couch, his face unshaven, and his head slumped halfway to his knees. On the right of the screen, another man with thinner hair and a slightly more sober air stood next to the dark-haired man that Alexander recognized as Drago Basta. The man standing next to Basta spoke first.
“Richard, I don't want to do this, but you've left me no choice. Think about it. How will Sarah feel if she finds out you were with a whore? What will your kids think? Or your friends on the Appropriations Committee? All you have to do is agree to turn a blind eye. You don't have to set anything up. You just look the other way when the money turns around. That's all you have to do.”
“We've known each other for a long time, Wayne,” the man on the couch said. “I've known you to do some despicable things, but this…to me? If you get caught, they aren't going to indict you alone. They won't say ‘Well, Richard Ashton wasn't involved because he looked the other way.’ And then what will my wife think? What will my children think?”
“We won't get caught,” Wayne said.
“Nobody thinks they'll get caught, Wayne. Everybody thinks they'll get away with it.”
“Richard, we'll be fucking rich.”
“That's the difference between us, Wayne. I'm rich enough. I don't need a fucking yacht. I'm able to make deals because the men with the money trust me. My integrity has a value to me. I'm not throwing that away.”
“Yeah? Where was that integrity when you were banging that redhead?”
“I was drunk. You set me up.”
“How far will your friends trust you when they get a load of you huffing and puffing and sweating all over that prostitute's ass?”
“We're done, Wayne. This partnership…this…this company, it's over. You want to blackmail me? Well, fuck you.” Ashton stood up and walked to Garland, stopping an arm's length away to yell his defiance into Garland's face. “Without me, you have no company,” Ashton roared. “You have no money source. I'll take my chances with Sarah. And when my friends in Congress hear what you're doing, they'll be shaking my hand for dumping your ass. I'll start my own firm. My answer is, Fuck You!”
“I'm sorry we have to end it this way,” Wayne said.
Alexander knew what was coming, so he paid particular attention to Wayne Garland and saw the subtle nod he made to Drago Basta, who had slipped in behind Ashton. On Garland's cue, Basta drew a thin cord out of his pocket and pounced on Richard Ashton, wrapping the cord around the older man's throat.
Ashton's head snapped back, and his hands shot up to the cord around his neck. His face, already red from sun and alcohol and rage, began to move through ever-darkening shades.
“Start your own firm?” Garland taunted. “Fuck you, Richard. You could have been a very rich man. All you had to do was play ball.”
Ashton fell to his knees, reaching back far enough to grab Basta's hands, but the assassin ignored the slight annoyance. Then Garland kicked Ashton in the ribs, an attack that seemed to carry several years of pent-up frustration. Alexander couldn't tell if the kick knocked Ashton into unconsciousness or if he passed out from the garrote. Either way, Ashton went limp, and his body slumped to the floor. Drago maintained his pull on the cord, kneeling on Ashton's back while Garland went to the salon door to peek out.
Ianna had been kneading the muscles in Alexander's shoulders as she watched the video, and as the violence grew, the grip and pull of her hands on Alexander's trapezius increased. Alexander glanced up, at that part of the footage when Drago Basta climbed onto Ashton's back, and he saw Ianna smiling—excited by what she was watching. A strange chill ran through Alexander's body.
After Basta finished strangling Richard Ashton, he went to his quarters and returned with two barbell weights—large, round, steel plates—and a chain. He carried the weights and chain across the room and out the door to the deck. He then came back, grabbed Ashton by the ankles, turned him around, and dragged him from the room. After that, the footage ended.
“Oh my God,” Ianna said, her words breaking on the edge of laughter. “We're going to be so fucking rich.” She turned Alexander around and kissed him. “Did you see that? They're going to pay through the nose.”
“We have ’em all right,” Alexander said, forcing a smil
e to his lips. He reached for the laptop on the dresser and shut it down.
“I'm hungry,” Ianna said. “What'd you get us for supper?”
Alexander had been hungry before watching the video, but not now. He'd seen death before, in person and on video, and it never sat well with him. He and Ianna had just watched a man get murdered, a man who died for no reason other than he refused to sacrifice his honor. This man's death would be the source of their wealth. And Ianna was hungry?
“Steaks.”
“I love steak.” She whispered as she started unbuttoning Alexander's shirt. “Thick and juicy.” She pushed him down onto the bed. “But first things first.”
Their sex did not catch fire as it had the night before. Alexander couldn't stifle the images in his head. He kept seeing Garland kicking Richard Ashton, and Drago Basta kneeling on the dying man's back. He saw the smile on Ianna's face as she watched the murder unfold. Watching Richard Ashton get murdered seemed to turn Ianna on. He tried to put her reaction aside as he made love to her. You're with a beautiful woman, he told himself. Focus on her. Focus on the task at hand.
And like a journeyman carrying out his trade, Alexander performed his duty well but found little passion in it.
Later, after a big meal of steak and potatoes and wine, followed by more wine, the two of them made their way to bed. It didn't take long for Ianna to succumb to the exhaustion that hid behind her eyelids. Outside, a smudge of a moon pushed through the wispy remains of the fog, giving a soft edge to the woods. Alexander stared at the ceiling, glancing occasionally out the window to watch the faint shadows of the jack pine rustle in the light breeze. As tired as he was, he couldn't sleep. Every sound—every chirp of a bird or bug—seemed half a note off-key. The world around him played out in minor chords.
When Ianna fell into a deep-enough sleep, Alexander slipped out of bed and into a pair of blue jeans and a sweatshirt. Enough moonlight cut through the night to guide him to the dock where he used to sit and think when he was a boy, a place where the brushstrokes of his life seemed to blend together and make sense to him. He walked down to the lake because he needed, more than anything else at that moment, to make sense of what his life had become.