Blood Contest

by P. K. Abbot

  “But why would you leave now, Pete? The new Governor has dismissed all of Jamie’s appointees. They are all gone now.”

  “If it happened once, it can happen again.”

  “You are setting a trap for yourself by leaving. If decent people like you do not step up, it opens the way for people like Elliot, and Jamie, and Black to take power again. There is no better place for you than here, Pete.”

  Mike extended his hand to Mueller.

  “Come on, Pete,” he said. “You need to stay. You belong here.”

  Mueller felt like sulking. He knew that the State Police would not be perfect, but he also knew that Mike was probably right.

  Grudgingly he shook Mike’s hand.

  “I’ll think about it,” he said.

  “Good,” Mike replied and then smiled at him.

  Just then Mueller turned toward the gust of cold air coming through the door.

  Ryan had walked into the bar. He immediately looked for Lupita behind the bar. Lupita saw him through the corner of her eye, but she did not acknowledge him. Ryan walked over to Mike’s table and sat in the chair facing the bar, facing Lupita.

  “I ordered a beer for you,” Mike said.

  “Thanks. Did she know it was for me?”

  “What difference does that make?”

  “We’re still a little rocky right now. I am afraid that she may do something to get back at me. I was hoping to avoid her until she has had time to cool down.”

  “I am not concerned, Billy. She and I have a very nice relationship.”

  “Why is that?”

  “We respect each other. She respects me because I am honest with her.”

  “How do you know that?” Ryan asked.

  “I have told her how you can be a horse’s ass at times, and she sees you the same way.”

  Mike grinned at Ryan and raised his half empty glass toward the bar to signal Lupita for a refill.

  “Well, Billy, perhaps you will have the chance to apologize to her today and to smooth things over.”

  Lupita was smiling as she arrived at the table with Mike’s beer. She looked stunning in her short, clingy red dress with its plunging neckline. Ryan could not keep his eyes off her, but she ignored him.

  “Would you like anything else, Mike?” she asked as she leaned close to the table and set Mike’s beer in front of him.

  “No. This will be fine, Lupita.”

  “Be sure to let me know if there is anything that I can do for you.” She smiled warmly at Mike and tossed her lustrous black hair as she turned and started back to the bar.

  Her clingy dress showed Ryan every curve as she walked away from their table. Ryan could not take his eyes off her.

  “Lupita,” Ryan called out.

  She turned back abruptly.

  “Yes?” she said.

  “I want to apologize to you. I did not treat you well on our last date.”

  She walked back to the table and smiled at him.

  “Oh, our last date ended beautifully,” she said. “In fact, do you remember that you asked to take me out again for New Year’s Eve?”

  “Oh, I forgot... I’m sorry.”

  “I thought that you may not have remembered that, because you stood me up on New Year’s Eve, and you haven’t called me since then, have you?”

  “No. I’m sorry about that too. I would like another chance to make it up to you.”

  “Why should I give you another chance?” she fumed. “I don’t want to go out with you again until you can prove to me that you are reliable and trustworthy.”

  “Look, Lupita, you are absolutely right. I don’t deserve another chance, but still I would like to make it up to you. Let me buy you dinner tonight. I am very good friends with the owner of one of the best steakhouses in Trenton. He would give us a very good table in his restaurant — even on Valentine’s Day.”

  “I am busy. I have a date with Manuel.”

  “Manuelito? — Your little boy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then do you think we can double date tonight? It’s a great steakhouse.”

  “You want to double date, Billy?”

  “Of course,” he answered.

  Lupita smiled wryly at him.

  “Okay,” she said. “We will double date tonight.”

  “Great. Thank you. We’ll have a great time.”

  “I am sure that I will enjoy myself very much tonight,” she said. She touched his shoulder and smiled, encouraging Ryan further.

  “Maybe later, after Manuel goes to bed,” Ryan said, “you and I could go dancing and afterwards we could do whatever.”

  “Dancing?” she laughed. “Why would I do that? Billy, you did ask to double date, didn’t you?”

  “Yes…but…”

  “Well, I had already explained to you that Manuel is my date tonight.”

  “So?”

  “So your date is Abuelita — Manuel’s grandmother.”

  “What?”

  “I could ask her if she would like to go dancing with you — or we could just cancel the date if you would like.”

  “No… no,” Ryan replied. “We’ll keep the date. We’ll just forget about the dancing.”

  “And afterwards do you still want to do ‘whatever’ with her?”

  “God, no! — I’ll call Lorenzo’s and reserve a table for four.”

  Lupita looked over at Mike and smiled. She saw that Mike was beaming. He was absolutely beaming. He just couldn’t help himself.

  Epilogue

  Sunday, February 14, Belém, Brazil

  In this city of two million on the coast of northern Brazil, it was hot and very humid in the middle of the rainy season. A torrent had rolled over the city an hour earlier, and it had left the docks with the stench of wet garbage and human sweat.

  A young Afro-Brazilian woman in a tank top and short shorts was darting in and out of the crowd along the waterfront. She had been caught in the downpour, and her wet tank top clung tightly to her. She moved fluidly through the crowd with the graceful, swift power of a dancer. With her fingertips, she held a Cuban cigar which she smoked as she twirled past the people on the docks. With her left hand, she swung a briefcase rhythmically while she danced along the waterfront.

  She moved swiftly along the docks and examined the names of the ships until she came to the right one, the Boa Sorte. She took one long draw on her cigar, flicked it end-over-end against the ship’s hull, and watched it fall into the water. She sprinted up the gangplank with her briefcase. At the top of the gangplank, she asked the mate where she could find the captain. He pointed to the stern cabin.

  When she entered the cabin, she found two men sitting on opposite sides of the captain’s desk. The captain looked up from the far side of the desk and stared at her with cold, gray eyes. The woman’s boss was sitting with his back to her and with his arm in a sling. Her boss turned in his chair and asked her, “Do you have it, Gabriela?”

  “Certainly,” she replied. She laid the briefcase on the desk and opened it in front of the two men.

  The captain rubbed the scar on his grizzled cheek, smiled, and said, “So, this is what one million Euros looks like… I am impressed.”

  Gabriela’s boss interrupted him. “Now that I have delivered what I had promised, Captain, you have something of mine which I want.”

  “Of course. I have it right here.” The captain opened the top drawer of his desk, withdrew the man’s chronometer from the drawer, and handed it to him.

  Gabriela’s boss took the chronometer from the captain and stood up. He walked over to the porthole which was a few feet behind the captain, and he strapped the chronometer to his wrist. As he looked through the porthole at the city, he removed his injured arm from its sling and massaged the muscles in the arm. He stretched and flexed the arm until he could plainly see its sinews.

  Now he held his injured arm close to his chest and pressed two buttons on his chronometer. The golden girdle around the crystal stood up on one
side, and he slid his thumb through the metal ring.

  The captain had started to count the Euros in the briefcase. His cold, gray eyes now glowed at the sight of the money. It was love – no, lust – for the money that at last warmed his cold appearance.

  Gabriela perched herself on the corner of the captain’s desk near him and brushed against his arm. “You are not sending all of this money back home, are you, Captain?” she asked.

  She was smiling at the captain, and bending close to him. “You should spend a little on yourself, for whatever would make you happy, for whatever you desire, Captain.”

  He stared at her but did not answer.

  With her finger she traced the outline of the white scar on his grizzled cheek, and she smiled at him again. “You deserve it. Don’t you agree, Captain?” she said.

  The captain was thinking about Gabriela’s suggestion and had not noticed when her boss walked up silently behind him, drew the wire out from his chronometer, and quickly looped the garrote around his throat.

  It would take only a few seconds for the captain to lose consciousness after Gabriela’s boss tightened the wire around his neck, but in those few seconds the captain would struggle with all of his strength – with every fiber of his being – to stay alive.

  It would be a violent contest of wills. It was always that way – violent. The intensity of the violence surprised most people. It is what could make a strangler lose control if he were not prepared for it. But it did not surprise Gabriela’s boss. He would not lose control. He had done this before – many times before.

  As soon as he had looped the wire around the captain’s neck, Gabriela’s boss pulled the wire violently toward him. He dragged the struggling captain backwards out of his chair. He dragged the captain onto the floor, away from his desk, and away from any weapon or leverage that the captain could use against him.

  He then jammed his knee into the middle of the captain’s back and pulled upward on the tightening wire so that the captain could not touch the floor with his arms, so that the captain could not use his arms as leverage to twist himself out of the garrote.

  The captain’s arms flailed about and struck wildly at the wire, but without success. Only a whistle of air could now escape through the captain’s crushed larynx.

  After a few more seconds, the captain ceased to struggle, but it was not yet finished. Gabriela’s boss had to hold the wire tight for a number of minutes yet. The captain had to reach the point where he could no longer come back. After a few more minutes, Gabriela’s boss loosened the wire and allowed the captain to slump to the floor.

  He had cut into the captain’s neck, and the wire was quite bloody. He reached down and used a corner of the captain’s shirt to clean the blood from the wire.

  He then fed the wire back into the chronometer and placed his arm into the sling again while Gabriela repacked the briefcase.

  “Are you ready?” he asked her after a few moments.

  “Okay,” she replied.

  She and her boss walked out of the captain’s cabin with the briefcase and locked the door behind them.

  When they met the mate on the deck, Gabriela’s boss told him that the captain did not want to be disturbed for at least an hour. They nodded to each other. Gabriela and her boss walked down the gangplank and started to move away from the ship when the mate called out from the deck.

  “You are a very fortunate man, Doctor Black.”

  They paid no mind to him. They continued walking at a moderate pace until they blended into the crowd and disappeared from view.

  Thank You

  Thank you for choosing to read my book. If you enjoyed it, please tell a friend and take a moment to leave a four or five star review on Amazon.

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  Your review does not need to be more than a few words, but it would have a positive effect on the book’s popularity, and I would certainly appreciate it.

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  While you are at my website, feel free to write me with any questions or observations which you may have about my books — or if there is a character or two whom you would like to see again in a future book. Your thoughts and feedback are valuable to me, and I would enjoy hearing from you.

  Thank you again.

  — P. K. Abbot

  About the Author

  Before writing full time, I had a profoundly interesting career. For twenty-five years I worked as a buyer in two different industries. In my profession I met hundreds of remarkable people and travelled to Europe and throughout the United States.

  Perhaps the greatest insight that I took away from my career was the realization that business negotiations are often driven more by the personalities and egos of the individuals involved than by any objective business standards. Looking back now, I can see how understanding the drivers of human personality help me today in writing about my characters.

  On February 21, 2011, I experienced a life-changing event. On that day I went into V-fib — ventricular fibrillation. I would have died that afternoon, but I had been treated for cardiac arrhythmia, and I was prepared. My implanted defibrillator discharged seven times within two minutes that afternoon. After the fourth intensive shock to my heart, I questioned if I would have the stamina to survive the ordeal, but survive I did. I spent the next thirteen days in cardiac intensive care in the hospital and the following four months in recovery at home.

  After that experience, I decided that it was important for me to write, and I have been writing full time since then.

  I grew up around Trenton, New Jersey, and I attended high school and college in Philadelphia, where I studied writing, languages, and history. I also served for six years as a military policeman in the Army National Guard.

  Today I am the proud father of two talented young women, and I live in a small town in southern New Jersey with my beautiful wife and dozens of imaginary characters.

  — P. K. Abbot