Ballistic (A Vigilantes Novel)

by Keri Lake

  “Yeth. Dathper wath part of a club. They like to wath that thtuff. He put together the video.”

  I didn’t get the connection between Tesarik and Nicoleta. How she’d even end up on his radar. “Why?”

  “I thwear I don’t know. I thwear!”

  Nicoleta must not have known about Tesarik’s involvement. If she had, she’d have undoubtedly attempted to kill him herself when she’d had the chance.

  Still unable to look at the fucker’s eyes, I let my gaze roam the scars that crinkled his cheek. Deep grooves and patches of poorly healed skin across the right side of his face that extended chin to hairline. “What happened to your face?”

  “Had a run-in … yearth ago. Burned it on a sthove.”

  “Bad shit just keeps happening to you, doesn’t it, Kenny?”

  His brows pinched, nostrils flickering with rapid breaths, but he remained silent.

  The sound of rustling leaves arrived from somewhere behind me, and I twisted around to see two figures off in the distance. Nabbing my phone from my back pocket, I flicked the flashlight toward them and smiled. Three feral pigs rooted along the ground about fifty yards off from where we sat. Two more trotted up to the first three.

  “And this little piggy cried wee, wee, wee. All the way home.” Instead of slicing the last toe, I gathered up my cutters and removed the gloves. “I’m afraid this is where I fold. Seems your luck’s finally run out, Kenny. Those pigs found us faster than I thought they would. Must be starving.”

  I’d read a while back that the state had banned what they’d considered exotic animals, like the feral pigs, but somehow the preserve managed to get around it, and was known for it’s large Russian boars.

  “Pleath don’t leave me out here. Pleath!” He’d grown more ashen with every passing second, practically clinging to life. Blood had dried to the corners of his mouth, and his foot oozed blood from his wounds.

  “Give Jasper my regards.” I pushed up from the forest bed, leaving the flashlight propped on the rock, and made my way to the car, parked at the edge of the woods. From there, I could see Kenny struggle in his binds, until the first hog trotted over. Window cracked, I listened to his gurgling screams, as more boars joined the first. The light sliced across the trees, where one must’ve knocked it over, landing on Kenny’s toeless foot sticking out from between their swarming bodies. His legs shook and seized, and within minutes, they stilled.

  The screams went silent.

  32

  Nicoleta

  In a chair beside the window, I sat smoking a cigarette, with my legs tucked to my chest, while peering through the curtain to watch Dax ascend the staircase. I didn’t have to look at the clock to know it was after eight in the morning, as the rising sun left hazy yellow and red streaks across the sky. I’d gotten out of bed an hour before, and had noticed his car wasn’t parked in the lot.

  Red spatters across his neck and face had me putting out the cigarette, and I pushed to my feet, as he entered the motel room, looking defeated and tired, his eyes swollen to slits.

  “Where’ve you been?”

  He removed his coat, revealing more red stains up to his forearms, across his chest, and he made his way to the bathroom without saying a word.

  “Dax?” I followed after him, certain the red was blood, but whose, I didn’t know for sure. “What happened?”

  Flipping on the faucet, he kept his gaze from mine, as he cupped his hands and splashed water onto his face. He gripped the edge of the sink, hanging his head. “I killed him.”

  A tightness stretched across my chest, and my skin prickled. “Kenny?”

  Nabbing the soap off the counter, he scrubbed the blood from his arms, frantically rubbing it into his skin. “Yeah. Kenny.”

  I bristled, crossing and uncrossing my arms, before setting my hands on my hips. “Without me? How?”

  Instead of answering, he rinsed his arms, sending rivers of red swirling into the drain, and lathered the soap onto his face. Once he’d washed away the blood, he rinsed and dried his face, leaving a faint pink stain on the white towels.

  My heart hammered out a confusing beat of shock and frustration. “How did you kill him?”

  “Pigs ate him.”

  Numbness bathed my muscles, and I stood frozen for a moment. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah. Took him to a hunting preserve. Only took about sixteen minutes to consume every bit of him.”

  Gone. The man who’d haunted my nightmares, wiped out as if he’d never existed. In a matter of sixteen minutes, no less.

  From the pocket of his jeans, he pulled a morbidly bloody bag and tossed it onto the counter. “Saved his teeth. In case the pigs didn’t finish off his bones. Didn’t want dental records lying around. Turns out, they polished every bit of him.”

  Nervous laughter, so out of place, ripped through my chest. Hand slapped to my mouth, I gripped the doorframe and wheezed, my eyes filling with tears. I had no idea if I was crying from disappointment, or laughing with exhilaration. I bent forward and laughed harder, the tears unstoppable as they leaked from my eyes.

  Still drying his fingers, Dax tipped his head and frowned. Not even the austere angle of his brow could stop the laughter.

  As the clash of emotions overwhelmed me, I tipped my head back, desperate for some distraction.

  “The girl in the video. She was your friend, you said?”

  Funny that the question didn’t seem to strike me the same. Felt easy to answer, for the first time in years. Perhaps the lies would begin to fade, as well. I nodded and opened my eyes, to see his had filled with tears. Something inside of me sounded off a warning, and as I continued to watch his face, a terrifying realization dawned on me.

  He knew the truth. “I watched the video, Nic. To the end.”

  A tight fist of panic gripped my lungs, and I took a step back, as he took a step toward me. “You couldn’t have. It was taken down a while back.”

  The ridges in his forehead deepened, his eyes twice as troubled as before. “I know someone who tracked it down for me. It was you I saw at the end.”

  The alarms blared. My body turned cold. Paralyzed. “No. Nope. No, you didn’t.” Fuck. Fuck! Everything inside of me told me to run. To grab his keys and get the fuck out. Abort whatever plan had me considering staying with him. “That wasn’t me.”

  “It was. It was you, Nic. And I understand why you lied about it.”

  “I didn’t lie!” I hissed, my body poised to flee, or attack. Like an animal backed into a corner, I curled my fists, anticipating the fight, as he inched closer to me. “I didn’t lie to you.”

  “Had I known it was you all along, I’d have killed them both with my own bare hands.”

  Bastard. More tears slipped down my cheek, which I quickly wiped away. “So, you needed proof. Did you get off on it, Dax? Did it satisfy your curiosity?”

  “It gave me reason to go after Kenny myself.” Snarling, he bunched his shoulders. “To kill him with such brutality, my soul is probably more damned than his.”

  “My fucking hero.” My voice was devoid of emotion. Devoid of life. I was dying inside, couldn’t he see that? Couldn’t he see the shame and humiliation bleeding out of me?

  “It doesn’t change how I feel about you, Nicoleta. It doesn’t change anything. I still want you. You’re still my girl.”

  “It changes everything! You should’ve left it alone, Dax.” I shook my head, frantically pacing in the corner. Feeling stuck. Trapped. Like the lid of a small box had closed me inside, shutting the world to darkness. Emptiness. “You should’ve left me to die in that fucking storage room! I’d take that any day, over what you’re doing now.”

  “Don’t say that again. Don’t you ever say that shit again.” He gripped my arm, but I yanked away from his grasp.

  I pushed at his chest, kicking him back a step. “Don’t fucking touch me! Don’t ever fucking touch me again!” Hands balled to fists, I slammed my temples, pacing faster, back and forth, pausing on
ly for a second, to see he’d advanced toward me again. “Why, Dax? Why would you watch something like that? Why would you watch her die?”

  With his hand stretched toward me, he looked like a man trying not to set off a dangerous animal. “I wanted to know your pain. I wanted to understand it. I do now. I understand everything.”

  “You don’t understand a damn thing about me. I’m not that girl. I’m not her!”

  “You’re not. That girl is dead. She’s dead, and you rose up from her ashes. You survived. I don’t know how, but you did.”

  “You want to know how I survived?” I let out a mirthless laugh and blinked away the fresh tears. “I made a vow to myself that, someday, I’d be strong again. After what they did to me, I’d learn to forget. That I would avenge the girl they killed.” I stared off beyond him, while the memories of that night filtered into my mind, clouding my present. “A large chunk of the liquor bottle they broke had gotten stuck in my foot when I fell backward into the water. So I used it to cut myself loose from the rope that tethered me. I crawled back onto that dock, and I left that girl tied to the anchor at the bottom. And what kept me alive after that? The promise that I would stare into their eyes as they died at my hands. My hands. Not yours!”

  Eyes still watering with tears, he diverted his gaze from mine, his scowl still etched across his face. “I won’t apologize for what I did to him. But I’m sorry I robbed you of that. I lost my mind after I saw what they did to you. I couldn’t think. I just moved.”

  “You had no right. No right!”

  “I didn’t. I’m sorry.” He stepped toward me again, and as I backed myself to the wall, he nabbed my arm, yanking me into him.

  I slammed my fist into his chest. Twice. Three times.

  He didn’t fight me. His grip tightened around my body, but he didn’t fight me. “Don’t hate me. You can hit me all you want. Take that shit out on me, but don’t hate me, baby.”

  I pummeled his chest until my arms turned weak and my muscles sagged.

  He pulled me tighter, and I let him.

  I let him lift me into his arms and carry me to the bed, where he sat on the edge, holding me like a small child.

  “Don’t hate me. I need you, Nic. You don’t know how bad I need you.” Arms banded around me, he buried his face in my hair, his warm breath heating my head. “You know why I keep that fentanyl in the cupboard? In case I lost you. It was you who kept me off that shit. Who kept me from doing something stupid.”

  What a fucked up, twisted cycle we’d fallen into, of needing and surviving. A turbulent black sea with no land in sight, and no idea where it bottomed out. And yet, somehow we drifted together. We remained lost in the unknown side by side, as if fate had swept both of us out, just to see if we’d make it back alive.

  “I love you, Nicoleta.”

  I stared up at him, at those brown eyes filled with so much despair and pain. Kindred pain. Empathy for what I’d suffered, and yet, I didn’t know how to respond. Did I love him? How could I feel what I didn’t understand? What I’d never felt before in my life? Perhaps it was instinct. A default setting in all human beings. We were born to love, until someone gave us reason to fear and hate.

  I turned into him, pushed him back onto the bed, and crawled over top of him, threading both of my hands through his hair. Reaching between us, I unzipped his jeans, lifting up just enough for him to shove them down his thighs, springing his cock free. Hooking a finger into the crotch of my panties, I slid the fabric to the side and impaled myself on his erection. A slow roll of my hips seated him deep inside of me—deeper than he’d ever been before, it seemed. Through a blur of tears, I stared down at him, circling and grinding my hips, with my baggy shirt falling off my shoulder and his half yanked jeans scratching against my legs. Disheveled, messy, and far too hasty to care.

  We were as tragically beautiful and fragile as a dead rose. Two souls, broken beyond redemption.

  With the stains of Kenny’s blood still streaked across his chest and throat, Dax fucked me like a man out to exorcise my ghosts before they could take over my head. With such determination and fervency, it only took minutes to reach the pinnacle of pleasure. And when the two of us climaxed together, I sobbed in his arms, while he held me. We showered and lay together on the bed, staring off into the darkness of the room.

  For the first time in my life, I found a brief interlude of solace.

  “Have you ever heard the story of Lethe and Mnemosyne?” I asked, listening to the steady beat of Dax’s heart beneath my ear.

  “No.” His voice vibrated through his chest.

  “In high school, I read a book on Greek mythology. Lethe was the spring of forgetfulness. And Mnemosyne was the spring of memory. The ancients believed that when you died and crossed into the underworld, you were given a choice. Drink from the river Lethe and forget all the pains and sorrows of your life. Or drink from Mnemosyne and remember everything.” I traced my fingers over the small curls of hair on his chest. “Those who chose to forget would be reborn and return to earth to start anew, and perhaps repeat all their mistakes and sorrows from the previous life. And those who chose to remember went on to the Elysian Fields to live eternity in peace and comfort.” Deep ridges and valleys passed beneath my fingertips, as I dragged a hand up his stomach and chest to rest beneath my cheek. “I used to think drinking from the river Lethe was the better option, because even if I could potentially live through those sorrows again, I’d forget everything. Become someone else. I was scared to live for eternity with those memories.” A mist of tears coated my eyes, and I blinked them away. “I didn’t realize Elysian Fields was where I’d find you, though.”

  “You don’t have to be scared. Not with me.” His finger hooked beneath my chin, and he kissed me. “I won’t let those memories crush you.”

  “I love you, Dax.” I let the truth flow through me, change my heart. I savored the way the word paired so easily with his name, and how the two rolled like magic off my tongue. And when he wrapped his big arms around me, I committed the feel of them to memory, mentally tracing them into my skin.

  Because by morning, he’d no longer be mine. There were secrets I hadn’t yet told him. Ones that would ultimately destroy both of us.

  33

  Dax

  Darkness obscured the room when I opened my eyes. I’d slept an entire day, thanks to pulling an all-nighter with Kenny. As the cloudiness smothering my brain lifted, I set my hand down on the spot beside mine. Empty. Raising my head up off the bed, I found the white glow of a note in the place where Nicoleta had been when I’d fallen asleep.

  I flipped on the nightstand lamp, and rubbed the sleep from my eyes to read the somewhat short message.

  Dax,

  I’ve sat here three hours trying to think of what to say while I watch you sleep. If the world were a different place, I’d spend every night staring at your face this way, but this is where I finally fold.

  You were and always will be my favorite mistake.

  You’ll find Tesarik at the Belle Isle Boat House this Friday night. 10pm.

  Don’t come looking for me. You won’t find me.

  Always yours,

  Nicoleta

  Crushing the letter in my palm, I shot off the bed to the window. The ‘Cuda still sat parked in the lot. I scanned the area as far as I could see, but could see no sign of her.

  Racing back across the room, I swiped up my jeans, and yanked them up over my legs, threw on my boots without tying them, and tugged on a shirt. My wallet sat on the table, and as I thumbed through the cash, I noted about two of the five hundred I’d had missing. Not that I cared she took it, but it meant she might’ve grabbed a cab, or bus. Keys in hand, I shoved the wallet into my jeans and jogged down the staircase to my car.

  I didn’t even know where I was headed, as I pulled out onto the main road and drove, eyes searching the open fields and buildings that passed on either side of me. Rubbing the top of my skull, I fought the urge to let panic swall
ow me, and kept driving. She could’ve been anywhere in the city by then, but I didn’t think about that.

  For two hours, I drove down roads and side streets. The only bodies bustling about in the darkness were the homeless, who clustered against the sides of the buildings and under makeshift tents. None of them Nicoleta.

  “No, no, no. C’mon, Nic.”

  I drove for another hour, visiting the few bus stops and train stations scattered throughout the city.

  As I turned back into the parking lot, sometime after ten, I looked up to the room that stood dark and quiet. I sat there for a moment, could almost see her phantom form up on the balcony, smoking one of my cigarettes. Gripping the wheel, I slammed my head against it and let out a roar of frustration.

  Part of me wanted to keep driving.

  Another part of me knew I wouldn’t find her.

  I dragged myself out of the car and back up to the room. Had no idea where she could’ve run off to, and I didn’t want to think that Tesarik, or Dmitry, might’ve found her before I did. That I could very well hear about her dead body, discovered dumped in some abandoned shithole, just like Livvie’s.

  The the absence of her closed in on me with a suffocating reality as I entered the empty room. I couldn’t even look at the bed, or the chair where she’d sat by the window.

  I picked up the extra burner phone, to see if perhaps she’d made a call, but the log showed not a single one—not even a cab ride.

  She’d literally walked out of my life.

  A cold certainty settled over me, at the same time a vile black poison crawled beneath my skin, infecting my veins with something dark and painful. Something that promised the kind of anguish I’d not felt in years.

  I rubbed the back of my head, willing it away, but like an old friend, it’d become familiar with all my tricks and evasions.

  With a swipe of my hand, I knocked the fifths from the table, sending them shattering in a firework of broken glass onto the floor. The intoxicating scent of whiskey filled the room as the liquor seeped into the carpeting. I shoved the whole table over and threw the chair across the room, her chair, and it slammed against the wall, leaving a hole in the drywall.