by Sam Jones
“It’s supposed to arrive by this afternoon.”
“And the truck?” Roenick asked quietly, as if it were a secret.
“It’s on standby.”
“Good. When we have time to spare I want to retrace the route.”
“I’ll need to refuel the Mustang. She’s running low on gas.”
Roenick waved her off. “We’ll do it upon our return. Let’s not break our back over the minutia.”
Prophet felt uncomfortable at his passiveness. Somehow she knew it would come back to bite them all in the ass.
“May I renew my suggestion from earlier?” she asked.
“Which?”
“Administering a sedative for Amanda. It won’t hurt her. She’ll be more docile.”
“Absolutely not.”
Roenick squinted as he buried the unidentified feeling of incremental stabbing pain that lived inside him. “I’m not taking any chances,” he said, almost grunting the words.
They approached a ladder, a portable one that looked like it was purchased fairly recently. It led upwards and pierced through a circle of light. A gateway between the underworld they were in and the unknown realm above them.
Prophet stood to the side and let Roenick go up first. The two of them ascended and disappeared into the light, passing from the murky, underground portal into the bright unknown.
Roenick’s head poked through the top of the opening to find a pair of combat boots staring him in the face. He continued his rise up the ladder, slowly. A beefy hand reached down and offered him a boost up that he declined.
Roenick emerged from the hole and found himself standing in an abandoned chapel of no certain religious denomination. A crumpled pamphlet on the ground in gold and pink read “Best Little Love Chapel in Vegas!” Photos on the front showed it was about a mile off of the strip. A picture on the inside flap showcased the once gleaming interior when it was proud of its own cheesiness. It was a place that held faded memories of sporadic couples and inebriated strangers that came here to tie the knot on a whim.
The place was boarded up to the point that the sounds of the outside world were completely shut out. Eggshell white paint was peeling of the walls, the color now turning shades just shy of yellow. Wilted flowers were scattered around in several cracked pots, their stems petrified and pedals turned to ash-like flakes. The wood floor smelled of mold and was caving in at certain parts from lack of upkeep. Stained-glass windows were boarded off with two-by-fours nailed up in a shoddy but effective fashion. A generator in the corner was up charging a pair of lamps, the type you saw on freeway construction sites at night. They added a decent amount of light to an otherwise pitch-black setting. Rows of pews, some cracked in half, others missing a leg or two, had been shoved to the side to make room for a large table where four men and two women had gathered. All of them were of different nationalities, shapes, and sizes. Each one, no matter the body type, had a lethal edge to them, a glint in their eye like a jagged dagger. Each one was jocked-up in customized and personalized military gear and a weapon close by or on them. They all turned to face Roenick as he and Prophet approached the table. All attention on him. Ready to receive orders.
At first, Roenick didn’t speak. He stood there and held his head low. His jaw was tight. The room’s composure went rigid in anticipation of something negative.
“Cassie, my dear?” Roenick asked as he slowly turned his head up.
From the back of the group, Cassie Palizzi stepped forward. The shift in her look was drastic; her rocker chick gear had been tossed out the window. She was now dressed in tan cargo pants and a windbreaker, her hair no longer a red base with silver streaks but a striking, platinum blonde. Tattoos were nowhere to be seen, but a fresh bandage was now taped over her busted nose.
“Yes,” she responded, solemn, well aware of the missteps she had taken.
Roenick braced a hand on the table. “If I were to ask you if Martin Black was alive, how would you answer?” Roenick asked.
A pause. Somehow Cassie knew whatever answer she gave would not be good enough. “I’m quite—”
Roenick balled his hand into a fist and slammed it on the table in front of him. Nobody flinched, on the outside. He held his frosty, rigid stare on Cassie.
“I handpicked every person in this room because of their impeccable track record. I contracted professionals of the highest possible caliber, and I have paid a small fortune for the privilege of their services. All I have asked and expected in return were results.”
“Martin Black may be alive.”
“May be alive. May be…”
Roenick rounded the table and walked over to Cassie, the mercenaries split in half to make a path for him. “I sent you to Los Angeles to take him alive,” Roenick said. “You failed.”
“He was still on his legs, the last I saw him”.
“You shot him. As I said: I asked for him alive.”
Cassie went somber like a child that had been scolded.
“He put up a fight. He was trying to take my life,” she said.
Roenick shook his head.
“You just couldn’t help yourself, could you?” said Roenick. He began making a repeated tsk noise with his tongue. “I should have sent someone else…”
The statement stung Cassie worse than her broken nose.
More pain gathered inside Roenick.
He didn’t show it.
He just breathed in, and then out.
“The next twenty-four hours are crucial,” he said to Cassie. “Don’t you understand that?”
Cassie could feel rage exuding through his eyes. She got a split-second gut feeling that came right before she knew someone was about to throw a punch.
“I understand. But Black dead makes thing slightly less complicated,” she said with all the sincerity she could muster.
To Roenick, it came off as an insult. He slowly stepped one foot back and then pointed to the space in front of him, much like a master would towards a pet that had just misbehaved. “Get on your knees,” he said.
After taking a second to process his request, Cassie became offended. She took a step forward and filled the gap between her and Roenick, her hands forming into fists.
“I understand that you’re upset,” she said with a sneer. “If Black pops his head around again, I’ll bring him in.”
Roenick nodded and held his hands up in a submissive fashion. “I apologize. I don’t think make myself clear enough.”
He balled a fist a buried it into Cassie’s gut. She doubled over and shot her hand out towards his throat. Roenick gripped her arm, wrapped his right leg around her own, and used her momentum to throw her onto the ground.
Two seconds. Flat.
He placed his left foot onto her throat, the edge of the heel on his shoe felt like a razor blade on her neck.
“Let me up,” she said, nerves tracing her words.
Roenick held a hand out. Prophet placed a gun in his palm. He cocked back the hammer and suspended the barrel just above Cassie’s forehead.
Not a single person in the room reacted or attempted to take sides. A few of them even seemed disinterested in the events that were unfolding.
“I need one, good reason as to why I should let you live…” Roenick said.
“You’ll have one less person on your team,” Cassie reasoned.
“That’s a terrible answer. How about a riddle?”
“What?”
“A riddle. Answer it right, you live. Answer it wrong, you die.”
“Roenick, this is—”
He dug his heel in. Cassie grimaced, her teeth gritting and on the edge of chipping.
“What?” Roenick began. “What were you going to say? ‘Roenick, this is silly?’ ‘Roenick this is absurd?’”
He dug his heel in, harder. Cassie’s face was starting to turn purple. The next words that came out of Roenick’s mouth were filled with stern intention and hard-hitting syllables.
“Now you know how I feel, M
s. Palizzi, after someone I hired came back and told me they didn’t finish the job that I hired them to do. It is indeed silly and without a doubt absurd. So, shall you take your chances with the riddle? Or shall we proceed with making these next few seconds your final moments in life?”
He waited for an answer, as did everyone else.
Cassie nodded.
Roenick smiled. “With pointed fangs I sit and wait; with piercing force I crunch out fate; grabbing victims, proclaiming might; physically joining with a single bite… What am I?”
Cassie had her hand on Roenick’s heel. She pushed it up (as much as he would allow her) and gave herself just enough room to clear her throat and draw in a breath to answer his teaser—
“A stapler…” she said.
Roenick shook his head.
He engaged the safety on his weapon and handed it back to Prophet.
He removed his heel and stood back from Cassie. She took a moment to prop herself up. She was still focused on Roenick, more so the pistol he was handing back to Prophet, hung up on the idea that he would snatch it back and finish the job at any second. Instead, he motioned for Cassie to stand in a ‘what are you waiting for?’ fashion.
She stood, dusted herself off, and waited at attention.
“If you fail me again,” said Roenick. “There will be no conversation, no jokes, no riddles. Your lights will simply just turn out. I don’t care what loyalties I have to you.”
Cassie wanted to shake her head. Even the personal connection she had to Roenick held no real value in his eyes.
“Do I make myself clear?” he asked.
Cassie gave the faintest of nods as she sequestered the rage building up inside of her. She slowed her breathing as she felt her hate turning into something shy of apoplexy.
“We’re clear,” she said.
Roenick turned back to table. “Where are we with plan B?” he asked.
A mercenary stepped forward. Six foot. Hair slicked back by natural oils that had accumulated from a week’s worth of no showers. A neck tattoo of a sparrow with a swastika behind it was inked into his chaffed, overly tan, and war-torn skin. All over him were bullet wounds/knife scars. The man looked like he was built from parts of fallen soldiers. His name was King.
“Gibson is on schedule to arrive in Las Vegas at 6:00 a.m.,” King said in a voice rich with a New Orleans’ droll. A Baptist preacher’s cadence.
“Miss Prophet?”
Prophet stepped towards the table. “Kaplan,” she said.
A mercenary in the back acknowledged her with a nod or something close to it.
“You and I will be executing the operation. According to Gibson’s schedule, he should be arriving in Las Vegas tomorrow morning at 6:00 a.m. without bodyguards, due to the nature of his initial visit to the state. Since he has been foolish enough to not embrace Roenick’s offer, we will be taking him by force. This is a broad daylight job. Massive exposure. High-risk. There cannot be any room for error…”
As Prophet finished, her eyes fell onto Cassie.
I’m talking about you.
Cassie smiled.
I know you are, bitch.
“At 5:15 a.m., we will execute the operation.”
One of the mercenaries, an African American woman named Dez, who moved like water flowing through a river, stepped forward—
“And what about Martin Black? What if he isn’t dead?”
Roenick looked at Cassie, a stroke of brilliance overcoming him. “You, my dear, will be the solution for that. I want you and King on the streets. You catch one word of Martin Black, or anyone that even looks like him, you terminate them.”
King produced a toothpick made of silver and began picking at his now smiling teeth. “With extreme prejudice?” he asked with slight glee.
Roenick nodded. “The next twenty-four hours are of the utmost importance,” he said, addressing them all. “All of the pieces for this are now in position. We take Gibson, we bring him to Amanda, and we finish the job. It’s that simple. Complications and mistakes that arise, from this point forward, will be a result of mistakes that you make. Should you have any, you will answer for them.”
Silent nods. Quiet confirmations.
He felt it again—
More pain.
Yet another reminder.
Roenick swallowed it. “Well… don’t let me keep you any longer,” he said. “I want us moved out of this location in the next five minutes. Pack up all of the gear and move it to the safe house.”
The group dispersed, weapons at the ready. As Cassie brushed past Roenick, he grabbed her by the elbow and whispered into her ear—
“Come with me. I want to show you something.”
For a hostage, Amanda had quite the living quarters. Roenick set her up about five miles away from the strip, up on a cliff lookout, off a back road, in a garish rental home that had been used by movie stars and drug dealers who wanted the ambience of Vegas but enough distance from the actual strip so that they could do whatever it was they did behind closed doors.
It was a two-story. A black iron gate traced around the entire spread of the lot. Behind that was a ten-foot tall concrete wall, a double-layered security deterrent. The house itself was constructed with the same style and poise of Caesars Palace: shined marble floors buffed to the point that they reflected anyone who stepped onto them. The cosmetic palate seemed to be only gold and white tones. Paintings of angels fighting with demons, good against evil, and even evil against evil, were hung up in every other room. Corinthian columns supported a twisting staircase that weaved in-and-out of the house at various, uncoordinated points. The furniture was expensive and extremely gaudy, each piece looked like something Mozart would have lounged around on while giddily clicking his buckled shoes. All of it was mostly for show and extremely uncomfortable.
The place, including security measures and physical layout, reminded Amanda of the photos she saw of the Benghazi consulate back in 2012.
That notion scared the shit out of her.
She was held up in the backyard, in a lounge chair, underneath a table umbrella with a bottle of water resting to the side. In front of her was a multi-tiered concoction, designed to look like a waterfall had trickled down and formed a pool area. Faux rocks made out of hardened plastic and live shrubbery gave off a fabricated jungle look. From a distance, it looked genuine but up close was nothing more than a turd wrapped in shiny tin foil.
Amanda saw it as a metaphor for the entire town.
The heat was getting to her. The ruthless consistency of it was like nature laughing at whatever souls were unworthy of bearing its harsh conditions. She was sweating, profusely, even though she was now wearing a black two-piece covered up with a gold towel. She was refusing, per Roenick’s orders, to ‘take a dip and lower her body temperature.’
When the woman, Prophet, presented Amanda with the swimwear after showing her the house, Amanda arched an eyebrow. “We having a barbecue?” she asked.
“You need to cool down and rest,” Prophet told her. “Dehydration can sneak up on you fairly quickly out here.”
“And if I refuse?” Amanda asked, her patience far past its point of wearing thin.
Prophet threw the two-piece at Amanda’s feet. “Take a swim.”
Two hours passed, and she was still here, sweating it out, her last form of protest, now that her dog distance had been limited to this shitty house and oppressive heat.
Across the way, at her twelve o’ clock, in a lawn chair, wearing khaki shorts, a blue polo, and Kevlar, was a man named O’Reilly. He was five-foot-six Irishman with a Dublin accent, a thick head of fire-colored hair, and a hand grazing the holstered pistol on his hip. His toughened, bulging-veined exterior was soaked in a layer of red, courtesy of his family’s history of hereditary alcoholism and two tours in foreign countries made of sand.
He was focusing every bit of attention he had on Amanda and never once broke his gaze. Nothing about it was sexual.
“Where�
��s my key chain?” Amanda asked him.
“Pardon?” he asked as he cupped a hand behind his ear, a tattoo of a shamrock on his wrist now visible.
“My key chain,” Amanda said. “I want it back.”
O’Reilly shook his head. “The fuck ya want that for?”
Amanda let it go and turned her focus on to one of the fake rocks. Another stretch of time passed and she could sense that his focus was still very much on her.
“Can you stop staring at me?” she asked him, flat. “It’s making me uncomfortable.”
O’Reilly poked his thumb over his shoulder, towards the pool. “Ya need to get in the water,” he replied. “Cool yerself down.”
“Get bent, you fucking leprechaun.”
O’Reilly cackled as he clapped his hands, stood up, and walked towards Amanda. “Yer a feisty lady. I bet that runs in yer family.”
“Wouldn’t know, I never meant my parents.”
She hadn’t.
“Ohhhh. Ya poor, little lass. Yer an orphan. What a sad, sad, story,” he said with false, theatre-like sympathy.
“I stopped crying about it a while ago.”
O’Reilly was a foot away, his hand near her bare shoulder. He leaned in and forward. Amanda flinched away. He then reached down, grabbed her water bottle, and offered it to her.
“Ya need to keep drinkin’ water. Ya can’t be getting too dry.”
She treated him like a ghost. His words went in one ear and out the other.
O’Reilly got down on one knee. “Do ya know why Roenick’s holding onto ya like this? I promise ya, it’s not good. So, I’d suggest taking the small moments of reprieve where ya can get them.”
Amanda removed the cheap pair of Ray Bans that Prophet had given to her from her face, little drawings of cacti on one side and the Las Vegas welcome sign on the other. It was something that was no doubt purchased at a local gas station or gift shop. The bargain quality of the manufacturing mirrored her situation: temporary, throwaway, and meant to be used for no longer than a few days at the most. When he handed her the glasses she felt like a representation of her fading timeline had been placed in the palm of her hands.
The countdown is on.
“I’m well past my breaking point,” Amanda said to O’Reilly. “What you see as being submissive is actually me just biting my time and waiting for your back to turn. When I have the opportunity, rest assured, I’m going to stab you in the goddam throat and watch you bleed out on that shag carpet I saw in the living room.”