by Matt Whyman
‘Is this wise?’ he asked at one point, and then promptly swatted at a mosquito.
With every turn of the reel, Titus considered the situation he had just uncovered. No doubt Nikolai was an underworld player. That was apparent in the packets of money they’d been forced to put through the cash register. Certainly the crude tattoos marked him out as a man who had served time in the Russian penal system. What didn’t stand up any longer, however, were the stories that preceded his arrival. On several occasions the man himself had called upon such infamous episodes from his past in order to deliver his threats. Still wrestling with his quarry, Titus glanced across at him. This figure, who claimed to have gorged on severed body parts, just flinched from a teensy fish. Could he really have a taste for human meat? From his experience, crossing that line left nothing to fear in the world but the safety of your own flesh and blood. Ultimately, Titus concluded, Nikolai Zolotov was no cannibal. Just a con artist.
‘Here it comes,’ said Lev, leaning over the side.
‘It’s a big one,’ Kiril added, who was ready with the landing net.
‘What is that?’ asked Zolotov, peering warily from behind them as something very large took shape from the depths.
‘Catfish,’ said Titus, who saw his chance to land it.
‘King of the bottom feeders,’ said Lev, nodding sagely. ‘There are monsters around here.’
With one final heave, Titus drew his quarry to the surface. He then grabbed the net from Kiril, who was just looking on in horror like the other two. It was way too small to cope with the great fish. All Titus could do was use it to support the body of his catch as he swung it on board. The beast had to be at least forty pounds, with a huge mouth, alien-like whiskers and sharp quills fanning from behind its fins. Unlike the little nipper, which had flipped about helplessly, this one thrashed from one side of the hull to the other, causing all three passengers to scramble back smartly. It was Kiril who was first to hop off the boat and onto the island, followed quickly by Lev, whose desertion caused the boat to push away.
‘Hey, wait a minute!’ This was Zolotov, who had been preparing to follow them. The boat drifted to a halt when the anchor pulled tight, but by then the gap was too far for him to jump.
‘Will you give me a hand here?’ yelled Titus, who was struggling to remove the hook from the mouth of his giant catch. The catfish – a flathead – continued to thrash wildly. Zolotov simply looked on, frozen to the spot, it seemed. With the hook free at last, Titus grabbed the beast in a bear hug and wrestled it back overboard. The fish hit the water with a heavy splash, but Titus only heard it. By then, he was hurriedly hauling anchor, a plan of action rising with it, before throwing himself into the pilot’s seat.
‘Don’t go anywhere!’ he called across to Lev and Kiril, and promptly fired up the engine. ‘Zolotov and I have a matter to discuss in private.’
38
Ivan found that the football moms had already set to work in the changing room. The long table, covered with Stars and Stripes crêpe paper, was in the process of being laid out with plates of home-prepared treats for the team.
‘How kind of you to help out,’ said Felicia, whom Ivan regarded as the mom-in-charge. Felicia was dressed casually but carefully in yoga pants and a pink zip-up sweat top. Despite the welcome, her tight smile told Ivan that she didn’t relish his presence. The other moms just ignored him completely. Ivan was well aware that they regarded him as a threat to their system. He wanted to tell them that they had nothing to fear. This was just a one-off, after all. Instead, he offered what he hoped looked like a smile and fished out the wrapped sandwiches.
‘I’ve had to guard these carefully,’ he told her. ‘I’ve already lost one.’
‘Well, they’re in safe hands now.’
Felicia reached for the package, only for Ivan to withdraw it from her reach.
‘It’s no problem,’ he said, and headed for the table. ‘I’ll take care of this.’
Collecting a plastic plate from the stack on the table, Ivan made a space at the far end. With his bag placed against the wall, he began to lay out his sandwiches. Bryce, Ryan and Chad always strong-armed their way to the table, so there was a good chance that nobody else would fall upon the plate first. Even so, there was no guarantee. It would be a shame, Ivan thought, if another couple of players got in before. Then again, as his father always said, collateral damage was sometimes unavoidable.
‘There,’ he said to himself, and stood back to consider the surrounding plates.
At a glance, there was no sign that his offering contained killer meat. Only Ivan could be aware that these sandwiches contained a fatal filling. If everything went to plan, those boys would leave the changing room like ticking time bombs. Ivan knew that he could see it through. He had already taken care of the guy who dared to threaten his family. It was annoying that he hadn’t got out of bed in time to catch his dad that morning and put him in the picture. Still, at least it didn’t matter now if it turned out that his old man really was past his prime. Nikolai Zolotov was a dead man walking. As far as Ivan was concerned, it meant he was ready to take over as the family’s hunter-in-chief.
Just then, the sound of whooping and high-fives from the corridor drew Ivan from his thoughts. The team were on their way back to the changing room.
The boy glanced back at his bag. Tinky Dinks was watching him from the gloom behind the half-open zipper. In Ivan’s mind, it was clear he was waiting for his master to strike.
***
Titus Savage had set out with a master plan for dealing with Nikolai Zolotov. The moment Lev and Kiril showed up, however, that plan had been laid to waste. All he had wanted to do was talk to the man at length and reason with him. Titus figured that their shared Russian heritage would help them bond. He had hoped that by the end of a peaceful trip upriver, Zolotov would’ve agreed to his proposal for the café. If Angelica and the rest of his family assumed he had brought him out here simply to kill him off then they were mistaken. They’d already ruled that the guy was inedible, and you didn’t just murder someone because they stood in your way.
It was only if Zolotov failed to be reasonable that Titus had intended to resort to measures such as that.
Now, with Lev and Kiril yelling at him from the little island in the waterway where he had just abandoned them, Titus Savage seized the chance to get his day back on track.
‘What are you doing?’ growled Zolotov, and promptly staggered backwards as Titus hit the boat’s accelerator. ‘Turn around, man!’
It wasn’t easy, negotiating the river here. Titus slammed the wheel one way and then the other in a bid to avoid mops of weed and overhanging branches. He glanced over his shoulder, saw Zolotov struggling to stand and a boiling wash of water in the boat’s wake.
‘Just hold on!’ he called back. ‘All I want is some space to talk.’
‘It’s too late for that!’ Zolotov spat at him. ‘Now stop this tub or I plant a bullet in the back of your skull.’
This time, when Titus looked around, he found that Zolotov had grasped a canopy strut for balance. He’d also produced a pistol. Holding the grip horizontally, he levelled the weapon at Titus and repeated his demand. By now, the island they had left behind was obscured by a bend in the river and banks thick with mangroves. Titus shut down the engine, letting the boat drift to a halt. Turning to Zolotov directly, he then raised his hands in surrender.
‘I’m surprised to find you’re armed,’ he said. ‘A man with your reputation.’
Nikolai Zolotov broke from his gaze at this, looking a little gassy. The colour had drained from his face, while the neck of his shirt was beginning to take on sweat.
‘Give me a moment,’ he said, and rested his brow against the support. ‘I feel like I might heave.’
‘Just take it easy.’ Slowly, Titus extended one hand towards him. ‘Put down the gun and have a seat. We can talk business back on dry land.’
‘How many times?’ Zolotov forced himself
to stand upright, reasserting his grip on the gun. ‘It’s too late to talk. If you’re not prepared to expand the business, Titus, then only one of us will be going home.’
With a frown, Titus considered the gun. He’d never faced a weapon before and it rattled him. In a situation such as this, he usually enjoyed the element of surprise. Bugs flitted all around them in the sunlight, which was dappled by the canopy of leaves and branches. Something stirred in the water towards the opposite bank, but nothing that could help him here. It left him with no choice, Titus decided. Unarmed, his only weapon was the truth.
‘You know, I’m not so sure that being on water is your problem right now. All that perspiration tells me you have a fever, not motion sickness, Nikolai. And cramps, judging by the way you’re wincing. Could it be something you’ve eaten?’
Zolotov didn’t answer for a moment, gripped as he was by another abdominal cramp.
‘I ate with your family last night,’ he said eventually, and looked up into his eyes once more. ‘I don’t see you suffering.’
‘How about lunch?’
‘I skipped it. Got by on a sandwich your boy gave me.’
Titus looked away for a moment, focusing on a point midway between the boat and the opposite bank. His boy would never be so generous. There had to be a reason why he would freely hand over something like that. Without doubt, he realised, Zolotov had been poisoned.
‘Well, maybe it is just the rocking of the boat,’ he said, to cover his thinking.
‘Food has never turned against me,’ agreed Zolotov, clearly in some discomfort. ‘Some of the things I’ve digested would turn most people’s stomachs.’
‘So I’ve heard.’ Despite the gun, Titus sensed his control over the moment begin to return. ‘Can I ask you something?’ he continued. ‘I’m curious about your experience of eating human flesh.’
‘What about it?’ asked Zolotov, who briefly dropped his gun hand to clutch his abdomen.
‘What does it taste like? In your experience.’
Zolotov met his eyes again, this time looking for some kind of reasoning behind the question.
‘Hard to say,’ he offered uncertainly. ‘Like beef?’
‘Oh, really?’
Titus raised one eyebrow.
‘OK, more like pork.’ Zolotov mopped his brow. ‘I meant pork.’
‘Are you sure?’ he asked, pretending to sound even more surprised.
‘Chicken?’
This time, a note of desperation came into Zolotov’s voice. Titus offered him a knowing smile.
‘Nikolai, those are the kind of answers people give when they’ve never tasted such a thing. If you’d said venison, which is a common guess, then I would’ve come to the same conclusion. You see, if human meat is in good shape, it should transport you. Quite simply, there is no comparison. It goes beyond the taste. Isn’t that the draw? The thing that keeps you coming back for more?’
With his mouth dropping a little as his listened, Zolotov appeared to remind himself to nod.
‘Sure it is,’ he said after a moment, and laughed nervously. ‘Who doesn’t get totally out of it gnawing on a severed limb?’
‘That’s not what I mean.’ Titus grimaced. ‘When my family and I sit down for a feast, we make sure the person we’re eating has been considerately sourced and cooked to perfection. If we went about gnawing on just anyone raw, we’d be no better than jackals, right? What you and I are talking about is evolved eating. In my opinion, fine dining on our own kind places us right at the top of the food chain.’
Now Zolotov simply stared, his eyes widening.
‘Are you serious?’ he asked quietly.
Titus lowered his hands, not taking his eyes off the man for a moment.
‘Nikolai,’ he said plainly, ‘you’re not a cannibal, are you? It takes one to know one, after all. But that doesn’t make me any more of a fiend than you. No doubt as a meat eater you’re happy to tuck into a steak, sausage or burger with little thought for the miserable existence some poor creature suffered in order to end up on your plate. Me? I make every effort to ensure that the people we eat deserve what’s coming to them. They might’ve lived a happy, free-range life, but ultimately their conduct means they won’t be missed. Now that, my friend, is ethical consumption. I’ve become a goddamn humanitarian!’
‘You’re sick,’ whispered Zolotov.
‘Take a look at yourself,’ Titus said with a chuckle. ‘When we heard all about the incident in the prison cell, everyone marked you down as some kind of twisted psychopath. I’m guessing you invented such a story to command fear and respect, and reinforced it with that demonic dentistry. It persuaded people to do things your way, right?’
‘This isn’t about me.’ Grimacing once again, with his insides clearly in uproar, Zolotov tightened his grip on the gun. ‘You got one last chance, Titus! Do I have your word that you’ll build that chain, in which case your secret is safe with me, or should I kill you for the confession you just made?’
‘Nikolai, you’re a man who has relied upon a terrible lie to build your business. It’s one thing to pull a weapon on me, but now I’m having difficulty believing that you’d actually shoot.’
With a glint of the metalwork wrapped around his molars, Nikolai Zolotov squeezed the trigger. Titus reacted with a jolt, unlike Nikolai, who took a moment to realise that the gun had jammed. With a roar of dismay, he threw his hands in the air, cursing Lev and Kiril.
‘I ask them to source me a firearm, here in America, and what do they bring me? Some crappy Russian ex-army model!’
As he moved to free the weapon’s hammer, Zolotov doubled up in pain. Titus considered kicking the gun from his grip, but the moment escaped him when the man’s cheeks bulged and he rushed for the back of the boat. At the sound of retching that followed, Titus pulled a face and raced to consider his next move. There was no way that he would agree to Zolotov’s demands, and the man was clearly willing to kill him if he could make the gun work. In no mood to reach for the garrotte he had packed in the pocket of his shorts, he took to the captain’s chair. Strangling a man while he was being sick would be messy, and there was a strong chance that Ivan had slipped something into his sandwich that was set to kill him anyway. Whether or not his son had intended to cause such a severe reaction, there was only one course of action available now. Under the circumstances, it came down to what was kindest. As the Russian criminal behind him continued to be violently unwell into the water, Titus twisted the ignition key. He then pushed the boat into a turning circle with such momentum that the nose of the vessel rose up like a stallion.
As a cry of surprise broke out in his wake, followed by a heavy splash, Titus turned his thoughts to Lev and Kiril. He’d only been gone a few minutes, but no doubt he’d find the pair thoroughly shaken from the experience. The alligators were rife around here, after all, he noted, on passing one such beast as it slipped into the river and headed at speed towards the boat’s point of departure. There was nothing more terrifying than thinking you might end up as supper, as Titus knew from experience.
Which is why he always aimed to make sure it was over quickly for his victims.
39
Ivan Savage was pleased to discover that the team had clawed to victory in the closing minutes. It meant the players were particularly boisterous and upbeat when they bundled into the changing room.
‘Well done, boys!’ declared Felicia, who had been standing in front of the table but then stepped smartly out of their way. ‘Just form a queue and we’ll make sure everyone is served.’
Totally ignoring her request, the team piled forward. Ivan had positioned himself behind his plate. Several moms stood alongside him, preparing to manage proceedings, but they could only look on helplessly as the first hands lunged out.
‘Easy now,’ said Ivan, as the assault on the refreshments got under way. As a precaution, he pulled his plate back when the first hand reached out to grab a sandwich, and only relaxed when he looked up and saw
Bryce.
‘Give me that, new boy!’
‘Be my guest.’ With his voice close to being drowned out by the chatter, Ivan then switched eye contact to Chad, who snatched the next sandwich from the plate. Once again, he pictured his victims living in blissful ignorance over the coming weeks. A little stomach sensitivity to begin, perhaps, but absolutely nothing that would arouse their suspicions and lead them back to him. Ivan glanced around, looking for the last of the trio. At the same time, he sensed the plate become lighter. With a start he looked back and saw the sandwich leave the plate, but not in Ryan’s grasp.
‘Thanks, Ivan.’
‘No!’ he yelled, on seeing who had taken it. Crystal had squeezed between the players at the front to grab it, and now stared at the boy defiantly. ‘Don’t do that. Put it down!’
‘Why?’ she asked, her voice raised over the chatter and howl of the team. ‘What’s in it?’
Chad had already ripped away a bite of his sandwich. Ivan saw Bryce lift his to his mouth, but then gasped when Crystal did the same thing.
‘Because … ’ Ivan sighed and bowed his head. ‘Because it’s poisoned.’
The boy made his confession in a voice so quiet that he was only heard by Crystal and the three bullish young men in front of him. Nevertheless, the way they froze was enough to kill the surrounding babble. It would’ve left the changing room in complete silence but for the sound of Chad spitting out his mouthful and Bryce dropping his sandwich to the floor. When he dared to look up, having hurriedly collected his bag from the floor, Ivan found the entire team staring at him. He glanced at Crystal, his plan in ruins.
‘Run,’ she said in a whisper.
Ivan needed no further encouragement. Snatching his plate with the last of the sandwiches, he scrambled over the top of the table, following Crystal as she wheeled around to make her escape. With crockery and curses flying after him, Ivan pushed his way through the scrum, thinking that if he had a ball in his hand right now then this would be a touchdown situation.