Heller

by JD Nixon

  The two man-mountains stood by impassively through the whole ordeal, arms crossed, their features settled in approving expressions. They didn’t budge a muscle to help Heller, apparently well aware that their boss could take care of himself. Man-Mountain One slapped him admiringly on the back as he walked over to us while Man-Mountain Two said, “Good work, Boss.” Heller told him to bring Dixie and Lily to his vehicle and leaned in the door where I had collapsed on the back seat, somewhere between sitting and lying. I blinked my stinging eyes, hardly daring to breathe in his presence.

  “Matilda,” he reproached, his voice serious. “You disobeyed me. I told you specifically not to go inside.”

  “Lily was trying to escape out the door. She was crying and looked so scared. I was afraid of what they’d do to her. I didn’t know how long you’d be,” I told him in a subdued voice, not able to meet his eyes, almost hyperventilating in terror. Heller’s ruthless, efficient violence had frightened me deeply. I hadn’t been exposed to much aggression in my life and today had been a real eye-opener. I began trembling again.

  “We have to get out of here now,” he said unemotionally, although I knew he could sense my fear. “Let me check if you’re okay.” He leaned in further and quickly but gently examined my neck and jaw and prodded my abdomen. “Nothing feels broken, but you’re going to hurt for a while and have a lot of bruising,” he pronounced, handing me a handkerchief to press down on my bleeding arm.

  He took a moment to softly cup my chin with his hand and lift my head so that I was forced to look at him. “I wish you hadn’t seen that, Matilda, but this business is rough sometimes. You need to know that because it’s important. I’m not sorry about what I did. They would have done worse to me, and to you, if they’d had the chance.”

  Chapter 17

  Heller let me go and climbed into the driver’s seat. He ordered the two man-mountains to follow him in the second vehicle for a while in case there was any further trouble. Dixie was told to sit in the back with me to make sure I was okay; Lily forced to sit in front. She had been initially terrified by her experience, during which she’d been roughed up but ultimately unharmed. However I suspected that she had already begun to reminisce about it as if it had been nothing but a good laugh.

  She confirmed that suspicion immediately. “You people spoiled my adventure,” she pouted petulantly as we drove.

  “Mrs Hayek, have you ever been gang-raped?” Heller asked bluntly. It was said in that dangerously quiet voice that I was beginning to recognise as signalling his immense fury, his accent more pronounced again.

  “No unfortunately, but it sounds like a lot of fun,” replied Lily defiantly, throwing back her hair. She was wearing a spare Heller’s work shirt that fell to her knees, her own clothes almost shredded by those animals in the bar.

  Heller thumped the dashboard ferociously, making us all jump in fear. Dixie clutched my hand tightly. “Well, I do know someone who’s been gang-raped, and they didn’t find it the least bit fun!” he shouted. Lily shrank back in her seat, cringing at his anger. “It is a degrading and terrifying experience, from which some victims never recover. It robs them of their feelings of safety and trust in the world. Does that sound like fun to you?”

  Lily shook her head, and mumbled sulkily, “I s’pose not.”

  “You risked your own life and, more importantly for me, you risked Matilda’s life with your incredibly stupid and reckless behaviour.”

  “So what? That’s what she’s being paid for,” she retorted with sullen insolence.

  Abruptly, Heller twisted the steering wheel and screeched the Mercedes to a sudden stop by the side of the road, waving on the other vehicle when it slowed down. It drove off obediently. He opened his door angrily and slammed it shut, stalking around to the passenger side. Flinging Lily’s door open, he roughly pulled her out of the car, dragging her by her arm to an alcove on the deserted footpath created by a couple of large industrial skips.

  Dixie and I watched anxiously from the vehicle, clasping hands. “That man scares the shit out of me,” she whispered fearfully. I nodded fervently in agreement.

  We couldn’t hear what Heller was saying, but he seemed to be aggressively pointing out a few home truths, towering over tiny Lily in an extremely threatening manner. She looked rebellious though, and flung some retort back at him, one hip thrust forward, hands on her waist, that self-satisfied smile on her face. He sneered at her and suddenly raised his hand, slapping her hard across the face, unbalancing her and causing her to stumble. Dixie and I flinched in unison.

  She righted herself and launching forward, tried to spit in his face. He slapped her again, harder. She looked up at him, her hand cupping her stinging skin, tears flooding her eyes. He stepped closer to her and leaned down to yell right in her face, poking her in the chest repeatedly with his index finger. She was genuinely sobbing by then, big heaves lifting her shoulders, until she sank to the ground holding her arms above her head protectively. He pulled her up roughly by the arm and dragged her back to the Mercedes where he threw her onto the front seat. He slammed his door hard when he returned to his own seat.

  Heller didn’t drive away. We all sat in silence, except for Lily’s heavy sobs that slowly subsided to watery sniffs. Dixie and I hardly dared to breathe and had almost permanently melded our hands together, we were clutching each other so tightly. Lily wiped her nose on her shirt-sleeve and sat quietly, her breathing ragged. Heller clenched the steering wheel with his hands. His voice was quiet, but firm.

  “Mrs Hayek has indicated to me that she would now like to return to her hotel. I have suggested that she needs to provide her husband with a version of today’s events that explains her appearance, and she has agreed to do this. Matilda, I need you to be there for that explanation. Do you think you are capable?”

  I swallowed nervously and replied, “Yes Heller,” even though I wasn’t sure I was capable. It just didn’t seem like a good time to say no to him.

  “Dixie, I am taking you home immediately.”

  “Yes Heller,” Dixie whispered, uncharacteristically cowed.

  He drove off with a squeal of tyres and we travelled in complete silence, punctuated only by an occasional sniff from Lily. Heller pulled up outside of Dixie’s unit block and she leaned over to kiss me on the cheek, squeezing my hand, then scrabbled out of the vehicle as fast as humanly possible. I half-reclined on the back seat as we drove off, clutching my injured arm, trying to stem the blood flow.

  We pulled up outside Lily’s luxury hotel. I sat up and tried to look as though I wasn’t in extreme pain. Heller gestured impatiently for the valet to come forward. He spoke in a muted voice, slipping the man some money. The valet looked over at Lily, then at me, eyes wide. But it was a six-star hotel and he’d been hired in part for his ability to be discreet. He murmured some instructions and Heller drove off slowly around to the back of the hotel where there was a staff entrance. The valet met us at the door and bundled us to the staff elevator where we were able to arrive at Lily’s suite without attracting unwanted attention.

  Unfortunately for Lily though, her husband had returned to the suite from his meetings prior to our arrival. He regarded us with horror, his eyes flicking from his distressed wife, dressed only in a long unfamiliar t-shirt, a grim-faced Heller and me, trying gamely to hide my injuries. Lily burst into tears and threw herself on him, clinging to him pitifully. He patted her back consolingly, but his eyes moved to Heller for an explanation.

  “I’m afraid that your wife has been exceedingly foolish today, Mr Hayek,” he said, glancing at the weeping woman coldly. “She has deceived both you and Ms Chalmers about her activities. She rang Ms Chalmers this morning to advise that she would be spending all day with you and that Ms Chalmers would not be needed today. I presume that you thought she was with Ms Chalmers?”

  Hayek nodded, pushing Lily away so that he could see her face. She hung her head. “I was in meetings all day. What have you been doing, Lily?”


  Heller refused to cover for her. “We don’t know. I’m sure she can explain that to you herself later. Fortunately for her though, Ms Chalmers happened to spot her walking around the city by herself. She rang me for advice and we agreed that I would join her and we would bring Mrs Hayek back to her hotel room. Ms Chalmers continued to follow your wife discreetly.”

  Mr Hayek now pushed Lily right away and went to sit down on the sofa. I joined him by sitting on a nearby armchair without being invited, unsure that I could keep standing on my wobbly legs. I leaned against the back of the chair, faint with pain.

  “Unfortunately, Mrs Hayek wandered into a very disreputable part of town and was attacked by a group of men. They roughed her up, tearing her clothes and robbing her of her valuables. Ms Chalmers ran to her rescue and was quite injured during the ensuing scuffle. I’m not sure what would have happened then, but happily my men and I turned up and were able to scare away the attackers.”

  Mr Hayek’s eyes flew to me and he took in my paler-than-normal, pinched appearance, emerging bruising, red-rimmed eyes and the blood on my arm. He then silently absorbed Heller’s cuts and bruises as well. I noticed that he avoided looking at Lily.

  “Your wife is very lucky that she was only mugged and that nothing worse happened to her today. The outcome could have been much more serious, I’m sure you’d agree,” Heller finished reprovingly. My Hayek stood up and shook Heller’s hand, thanking him gratefully, and then did the same to me, apologising for his wife’s deceit. He wasn’t the type of man who appreciated being told how to manage his own wife, but accepted Heller’s brutal honesty and directness without complaint.

  “Now that your wife has been delivered back safely to you, I must see that Ms Chalmers gets some medical attention. So if you will excuse us?” We took our leave, Mr Hayek’s voice raised in anger before we even closed the door. I tried to find some scrap of pity for Lily inside myself, but there was nothing.

  Back in his vehicle, I slumped against the door in the front seat as we drove back to the Warehouse. Heller rang Daniel to have Dr Kincaid on hand for our arrival. He glanced over at me a few times during the ride, but I didn’t engage with him. I wasn’t ready to talk about what had happened today. There was a lot to think about, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about anything at that moment. And in any case, the pain was overwhelming all my thought processes.

  In my flat I had to have my wound restitched, the doctor tutting at me for my carelessness in letting the stitches split, warning me about scarring. I bore his rebuke silently. Daniel sat with me, averting his eyes again. Heller stood at a distance, arms folded across his chest, watching, his face expressionless. The doctor made me undress down to my underwear so he could examine my other wounds and I didn’t even care that the other two men were in the room.

  He told me that I had strong bruising developing already on my back and legs where that thug had kicked me and on my jaw where Bourbon-Breath had punched me. After much poking and prodding he finally pronounced that I would live, but with my current level of pain that seemed a highly unfavourable prognosis to me. He ensured I had enough painkillers to get through the next few days and left.

  I chased everyone else from my flat, made some toast and warmed up some frozen leftover soup. I took a long, hot shower, struggling with only one operational arm again, but managed to cope and felt much better afterwards. I ruefully viewed another ruined outfit lying crushed on the bathroom floor. I’ll deal with that tomorrow, I thought wearily, kicking it into the corner. I brushed my teeth, popped another two painkillers, grabbed my phone and hopped into bed. I rang Dixie and we talked for an hour. She had almost recovered her equanimity with the assistance of a couple of glasses of cheap red wine.

  “I nearly peed myself when Heller broke that dude’s arm!” she confided. “You’ve got to get out of there, Tilly. It’s not safe to be around him. He’s terrifying!”

  “I’m not scared of him,” I said, and then backtracked. “No, I mean that I am scared of him in general, but I’m not afraid he’s going to hurt me. I don’t personally feel threatened by him. In some ways it’s kind of nice to know that there’s someone who is willing to come along and kick butt for me.”

  “Tilly!” she protested. “He didn’t kick someone’s butt! He smashed that guy’s head into a wall until his nose broke and then broke his arm. It’s not the same thing. And God only knows what he did to that man in the bar.”

  “Hey, are you feeling sorry for those thugs? They were going to rape Lily! That jerk punched me and kicked me four times! That other guy punched me in the jaw twice and he groped me everywhere. I’m in agony here because of him. Heller saved my life. God only knows what that man was going to do to me.”

  “But your life was only in danger because you work for him. He owes it to you to save your life,” Dixie argued.

  “Dixie, what do you think either of those men would have done to him? They would have killed him. What was he supposed to do?”

  “I guess,” she admitted, reluctantly. “But you’re starting to go hard, Tilly. You better be careful. Men don’t like hard babes.”

  I sighed. “I’m not going hard. I’m just really glad that Heller was there today, that’s all.”

  “Yeah, me too, I guess. After you sprayed us all we weren’t much use to anybody.”

  “I said I’m sorry.”

  “We made a pretty good team though, didn’t we?”

  I smiled, in painkiller nirvana. “We sure did.”

  “Do you think Heller has another vacancy coming up? I think I might be good at that kind of work.”

  I laughed. “I thought you just told me I should get away from him?”

  “Well, you don’t want to look like a pussy either.”

  I laughed again wearily. “Okay Dixie. These painkillers are starting to knock me out. You enjoy dreaming about Heller tonight.”

  She laughed. “You too.”

  I hung up the phone and fell asleep immediately.

  Chapter 18

  It was night, or more accurately, early morning when I woke up. My bedside clock’s red digits read 2:23 AM. I rolled over, my body screaming in pain. Unbearably stiff, I knew I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep for a while. Hot tub, I thought. That might relax my stiff muscles and make me sleepy. I fumbled around for some swimwear, discarding my bikini as impossible to put on with one arm and settled instead for a pair of boardies and a t-shirt. I contorted myself into them, grabbed a towel and, after some rough calculations regarding my painkillers, also grabbed half a bottle of pinot grigio from the fridge.

  I climbed the stairs to the roof-top slowly and carefully, not wanting to wake anyone, but also because it was incredibly painful to move. There was bright moonlight that night and I padded over to the kitchenette to find a wine glass, bringing the bottle with me to perch on the edge. Once I was in, I didn’t want to get out to pour myself another glass. But as I approached the hot tub, I noticed a shadow already sitting in it. I recognised the silhouette. Oh shit! It was the very last person on earth I wanted to talk to right then. I froze, wanting to turn around and go back to bed, unsure if I’d been seen. I hadn’t exactly been silent. I half-turned.

  “Don’t go, Matilda,” Heller said quietly. “We need to talk.”

  “Are you decent?” I demanded, hoping that he would say no so I would have an excuse to leave.

  He laughed softly. “Is that a philosophical question? If so, the answer is definitely no. If however, you’re asking me if I am clothed, then the answer is yes. I’m practicing for you being around now.”

  I debated in my mind the advisability of getting into the hot tub with him, but in the end my screaming muscles won out. I carefully placed the wine bottle and my glass on its wide edge, and gingerly lifted my legs over the rim. I eased down into the warm, steaming water, being careful to keep my injured arm out, and gave an enormous groan of mixed pain and pleasure. I poured a large glass of wine and drank half of it in one gulp.

  �
�You shouldn’t be drinking while you’re taking those painkillers,” he scolded gently.

  “I know, but it’s been long enough since I took them to be okay.” I think.

  “Would you like the jets on?”

  “Yes, please.” He pushed the button and my body was assailed by powerful bursts of water. It was agonisingly blissful. I rested my head back on the edge and closed my eyes. The wine was already starting to take effect and I could feel my muscles relaxing.

  “You have to go back to Mrs Hayek tomorrow,” he ordered casually, completely ruining my mellow.

  “No way!”

  “Mr Hayek rang me late this afternoon and said he was still occupied with business, and that his wife refused to have any other chaperone except you.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “It will be pure babysitting. I will ask Daniel to book you both into a show and restaurant and you will take her to the gallery and maybe some more shopping. Mr Hayek advised that he would like his servant to accompany you both at all times.”

  I opened one eye and smiled. “Really? How interesting. Lily won’t like that.”

  “There won’t be any more problems with Mrs Hayek. He told me how much they were both looking forward to returning to Jordan to start their family.”

  “Poor Lily.”

  “There are worse fates for a woman than being a wife and mother.”

  “That’s your opinion. As a man.”

  “She lives a privileged life.”

  “She’s under his control.”

  I relaxed my head back again and enjoyed the pummelling from the jets.