“What?” I said. “No pithy quotes?”
“I have one,” she said. “Beware of the anger of the body.”
I felt a heat rise up in me, and some of that anger was at her. “Someone will have cause to beware of that anger.”
“There’s no need,” she said. “The police were there. I was protected. They will find the men.”
“I heard they killed Kai.”
“No,” she said. “He was still alive when the ambulance took him away. I want to see him at the hospital, but he’s in intensive care and they won’t let anyone in.”
“I’d rather come get you.”
“I don’t live in fear, Jimmy. I’ll be at your place shortly.”
She ended the call. I looked at the phone. Thieu laughed.
“I tell you,” she said. “Lizzy is her own woman. You no own her, you no tell her what to do. You lucky man, Jimmy. Nobody can buy her. Nobody can take her. She give herself to you sometime.”
“You know too much about me, Thieu.”
“I know everything about you. We all do.”
“No,” I said. “You don’t.”
She shrugged. “Not everything about words, Jimmy. We your friends.”
Friends.
***
Lizzy set down her phone, looked at her guest sitting on the couch.
“Who was that?” Nina Capushek said.
“My friend.”
“Boy friend?”
Lizzy laughed. “Not in that way. He’d be upset if I spoke of him that way.”
“You’re not one of those dancers who have self esteem problems with men, are you?”
“No,” Lizzy said. “I don’t have self-esteem problems.”
“You’re going to have a problem with Vladimir Darko, Liz. That psycho has you in his sights.”
Lizzy stared up at her wall. There was a Tibetan thanka framed there. In the middle of the eightfold maze was a serene white goddess, surrounded by demons.
Untouchable.
“I won’t live in fear,” she said.
“I hear that,” Nina said. “You got a gun?”
“No. I won’t use weapons.”
“That psycho comes to your door, you’ll want one.”
“I’m not afraid.”
Nina sighed. “It’s not about fear, Liz. I can look around in here and see where you are with your spiritual belief. Okay, cool. Me, I’m of the eye for an eye school. Only time I turn the other cheek is to get a better sight picture. You choose how you live, okay, I respect that. But you’re going to have to get used to have me or mine around for awhile, because I want Darko, and I got no compunctions about killing his ass I get him in my sight picture again. You got your work to do, I got mine, right?”
Lizzy smiled, a dazzling thing. “The Buddha said exactly that.”
“No shit?”
Chapter Twenty One
Sergey Komarov was on his knees, a rubber ball gag in his mouth, his hands manacled behind him. He wore only patterned silk boxers and stockings. Sweat dripped down his face. His eyes tracked Irina as she slinked back and forth in front of him, tapping a leather cat of nine tails in her red leather gloved hands. She wore a red leather dress, cut to mid-thigh, a slit displaying her legs sheathed in black mesh, and high heels.
The cell phone on the table rang.
Irina looked at it, then slashed Sergey across the face with her whip. His head jerked to one side.
“I didn’t give you permission to look. Don’t look. Do you hear me?”
He nodded, twice.
She picked up the phone. “Yes.”
Listened.
“Come now,” she said. “I will give you the key.”
She disconnected, then appraised Sergey.
“Be a good boy. Stay right here. Don’t move. I’ll be back. Shortly.”
She left the room.
Sergey watched her go. The door closed. He hung his head. Let tears fall from his eyes.
And his hatred rise.
***
Vladimir was strung tight. Dangerously so, Irina thought. She would have to handle him carefully.
He stalked back and forth in the room. His injuries didn't seem to hamper him.
Neutral would be best. “Do you feel better?” she said.
He glared at her. Muscles trembled in his legs. “Where is Sergey?”
She brushed past him, swish of leather, let him smell her sweat.
“He is unavailable right now, Vladi. Did you get your woman?”
“That’s not what…I have other business. I will be back for her.”
“Yes. Other business. Like the South African. Are you two ready to go and see him?”
She sat down in the executive chair behind the desk, thought about kicking her feet up, but thought it indelicate.
“Vladi…” she said, a hint of conciliation in her tone. “Is there anything else you need to take care of this for us? We are counting on you…”
She watched how his lip curled at her attempt to manage him, and filed that away in her TO BE RETURNED TO file, deep in her head.
“Don’t patronize me,” he said. “I have what I need, I’ll see to it. Then I’ll take my time away. I don’t think this is going to work out for me.”
“What won’t work out for you?”
“I will not work for those who will not trust me.”
She took her time answering. “I trust you, Vladi. To do what needs to be done. I am sorry…sorry that you feel we don’t trust you. This has been complicated. After you take care of the South African, perhaps a bonus…some time away. Eastern Europe, Europe is not a good place for you to indulge your tastes…here in America, perhaps Las Vegas or Los Angeles…there is a thriving business there, I have friends…”
That sudden stillness she had noted before fell over him, an icy cloak.
“Tell Sergey I won’t be back till I have the South African’s head.”
“Are we sure it’s the South African?”
“It was you who was so sure.”
“Make sure that you get whoever was with him, then,” she said. “He was not alone…if it was him. I am not so sure now. Did you even look at the others?”
“Yes. The army sergeant, no. The blacks are not good enough.”
“But could they have hired the South African? Did you consider that possibility?”
He thought about it now, she saw. And cursed herself for being swayed for taking in this man, a violent heap driven by his penis and his hatred. He had been nothing but trouble for them since he’d arrived, and this thing at the club would come back to her and Sergey sooner than later.
“Where is Ho?” she said.
“Waiting for me. In the car.”
She nodded. “Before you take the South African, visit the blacks. Look in their eyes. That will tell you. Ask the right questions, that will lead you where you need to go. But then, I don’t need to tell you this, right, Vladi?”
“No. You don’t.”
“Well, then…”
She watched him tremble with the desire to hurt her, and was surprised by the gush of heat in her crotch. He turned abruptly and stomped away, and she watched the tension rise in his shoulders and neck as he stalked out of the room. She dropped one hand onto her lap, cupped herself. Amused herself with the thought of how she would kill him.
Then she picked up the phone and dialed from memory Steep Ride LaRue’s cell phone.
“Hello, my friend,” she said, pushing her accent. “I have something I must tell you about…”
After a short conversation, she set down the phone, stood, and checked herself in the reflection from the glass covered surface of her desk. Touched her lips.
And then went back to her husband.
***
“Somebody’s coming who’s got to be got,” Steep Ride said to his silent partner in the hooded sweatshirt and sunglasses. “Get me four more niggers and the AKs we got.”
The hooded sweatshirt man, Leroi Tomlinson
, nodded. “Who’s coming?”
“Crazy ass Russian with a hard-on.”
“Why he got something with us?”
“Fool ain’t had none for too long. He’s backed up to the brain, nigger.”
Leroi laughed. “Word. I been like that.”
“You ain’t never been stupid enough to come for six niggers with AKs with just a Vietnamese for back up.”
“Who give him up?”
“My little Russian bitch.”
“You hitting that?”
Steep Ride grinned. “Not yet, nigger. But soon. She promise me.”
Leroi punched the other man’s fist.
“Now get me some niggers,” Steep Ride said.
Leroi shambled out of the room. Steep ride adjusted himself, first his crotch and then the Glock 21 tucked into his baggy pants beneath his Lakers jersey.
Oh yeah.
Be getting some of that Russian bitch.
Real soon.
***
“We need more men,” Vladimir said to Ho. They sat together in a black Escalade SUV that belonged to the Komarov’s holding company. The Hmong man stared out the window, thinking.
“I have men,” Ho said.
“Guns we have,” Vladimir said. “How many men?”
“Many,” Ho said.
“Do they have experience?”
“Yes.”
“We need at least four more, maybe six, and two more vehicles. Call it six and two cars. We can take one from the warehouse, you can get another?”
“Yes. I can get six.”
“Do it.”
Ho plucked out his cellphone and went to work.
Vladimir Darko stared through his reflection on the side window of the van, looked into the dark. Thought about what he was going to do to Irina Komorav. Very soon.
And then what he would do to the red headed dancer, after.
Those thoughts made him happy.
Or what passed for happy with Vladimir Darko.
Chapter Twenty Two
I left Deon with his two shooting buddies, and went home. I pulled the Wrangler into a spot right in front of my building. I scanned the street -- all clear. Or so it seemed. High level professional surveillance is very hard to spot if they have the time to set up properly. But if you’ve been hunted enough times -- and hunted -- you develop a sixth sense or. rather, you bring out that sixth sense all humans have. When you can feel the intention of those who mean to do you harm focusing in on you. It’s something atavistic, raises the hair on the back of your neck, tightens the pit of your stomach. It’s a knowing without words attached to it, at least at first.
You just know.
Nothing here.
At least, not yet.
I didn’t see Lizzy’s car, though.
I bounded up the stairwell to my floor, paused, listened, went to my door. My nostrils flared at her familiar scent as I stood outside the door, sensed what was inside there, felt my way inside…
Unlocked the door.
“Hello?” I called. “Lizzy?”
“She’s in here,” Nina Capushek said, sticking her head into my short hallway from the front room.
I stood stock still. “What are you doing here?”
Nina stepped all the way into the hall, squared on me. She looked tired, her face drawn, no buzz. She scratched the broken expanse of her nose, then propped both hands on her hips. I noticed there was a streak of something dark, could be blood, on the right sleeve of her heavy black leather jacket.
“I’d ask you the same, but then I wouldn’t be much of a detective, would I?” Nina said lightly. “Thought it was you in the pictures in here.”
I didn’t know how to feel, seeing her here. I walked up to her, brushed by her, saw Lizzy curled in my recliner, a cup of tea steaming in her hands. I looked at her, drank her in, looked back at Nina who studied me with a carefully impassive face.
“So you two…?” I said.
“We’re dating,” Nina said, brushing past me and then sprawling on my couch, where another cup of tea steamed on my battered coffee table. “Didn’t she tell you?”
Lizzy smiled enigmatically at me, sipped her tea.
“I think I may need a drink while I wrap my brain around that,” I said.
“Help yourself,” Nina said. “I didn’t drink much. Don’t care for that Negra Modelo. Need to keep some Coronas around here. Or there’s still hot water for tea.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Glad you could make yourself at home.”
I went into the kitchen, looked back at the two women smiling at each other.
When the devil can’t get to a man in any other way, he sends a woman.
Or two.
Not that the devil hadn’t gotten to me before.
And he might again.
Hell, he might be getting to me right now.
I took a Dark Lady from the fridge, cracked it open, went back and leaned in the doorway and looked at the two women: one radiant and light with hidden darkness, one dark and tough with hidden light.
There was a poem in that someplace. If I were a poet.
“Lizzy practices good OPSEC, you know?” Nina said. “She wouldn’t tell me squat about you. I had to pry my way in here with her.”
“Why are you here?” I said.
“She’s looking after me,” Lizzy said. “She was there, last night. She stopped those men, the Russian and the other…”
“Russian?” I said. I looked to Nina for an answer.
She nodded. “Darko. He’s taken a liking to Miss Lizzy here.”
***
Nina didn’t know how she felt, seeing Jimmy Wylde standing there. She’d taken a liking to him herself, enjoyed him, and the easy comfortable maleness he radiated in the bar. Seeing his belongings, the place he lived…that was a revelation. But then how people lived told you volumes about them. This place wasn’t what she’d expected, but then, she hadn’t really expected anything. Nina took everything, and especially men, as it came to her.
It was easier that way.
Less disappointing in both the short and long run.
The place was neat, tidier than most bachelors kept it. Even the bathroom and kitchen were clean, something unusual as she found that most men who lived alone became pigs and the first places to degenerate were the bathroom and the kitchen. It was plain, spare, austere. The furniture was okay, probably second hand, recliner in front of a 32 inch Sony with DVD and VHS player, all the cable networks, a rack of movies not as heavy on action as she’d thought, probably more independent and dramatic movies than action and thrillers; the long couch she sprawled on and a battered coffee table with an incongruous lace doily in the center that held a straw basket with his remotes and an I-Pod (and the playlists were interesting -- classic, delta blues, 60s and 70s electric rock, and a long selection of female folk singers).
The pictures on the wall were very interesting.
Military photos, from the Mideast she’d guess, probably First Gulf War, the Shield and the Storm. Jimmy Wylde in desert camouflage, younger, happier, cockier in a huddle of other men, some of them in mixed uniforms, a couple in what looked like Bedouin outfits.
Some kind of Special Forces.
A triangular wooden case holding a carefully folded American flag, and beside it a battle flag of what looked to be some kind of Arabic outfit.
More pictures, including a close up of Jimmy, with paint on his face, a black motorcycle or skater’s helmet on with night vision goggles pulled up, a M4 carbine held at a jaunty angle, with five other men similarly garbed, in the mountains someplace…Afghanistan?
Jimmy with a dog, but there was no dog or indications of a pet in this apartment.
Books: several cases full of them. Novels, lots of military non-fiction, books on guns and shooting and tactics (she filed those away in her mind, many of them books she enjoyed but a few that she’d never heard of), even several volumes of poetry.
That surprised her.
He di
dn’t strike her as the poetic type.
He struck her as the private type, and she relished his discomfort at her ease here in his sanctum sanctorum.
“You don’t mind me barging in here, do you?” Nina said. “I wanted to look after our friend for a bit. Somebody like Darko sniffing around…”
“Are you on him? Who do you have on him?” Jimmy said.
There was an interesting insight into him, she thought. A bit of the military, now that she knew what to look for, crept into his voice, a hint of command voice. Something she had and used when she needed to.
“Just about every cop in Lake City is looking for him, Jimmy,” Nina said mildly. “But I just have a hunch, just a hunch, mind you, that he might be out looking for Lizzy.”
That got to him. She could tell. That told her something else about Jimmy Wylde…he wasn’t used to being able to be got to. He certainly didn’t advertise his relationship with Lizzy…Nina had thought he was a single guy. And the vibe between him and Lizzy…strange. Different. Not what she’d expect. But there was something there, something under the surface for the both of them. If she had it in her to be jealous, she could be jealous of what she felt between those two. There was a connection with space in it. Something that tied the two together, but left plenty of room for them. Nina cocked her head, looked at Lizzy, then at Jimmy. Lizzy smiled as though she knew what Nina was thinking.
“You wouldn’t want anything to happen to her, would you, Jimmy?” Nina said lightly. “Me neither.”
“How’d that happen?” Jimmy said.
Nina shrugged. “I told you. He goes for top shelf. Lizzy’s top shelf in Lake City.”
Lizzy laughed, a delighted sound. “I’m flattered you think so.”
Nina grinned at her, and for a moment shut out everything but the exotic dancer curled up in the chair. Something about her…special.
She looked back at Jimmy and saw that made him uncomfortable too.
She had to laugh.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to steal your girlfriend,” Nina said. “I’m not trying to pry into your life, either.”
“Was there surveillance?” Jimmy said. “Was he waiting for her, what?”
“He’d been in the club before,” Lizzy said. “I pointed him out to Kai. He came in last night, but I don’t think he was looking for me…”
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