Hell To Pay

by Andrik Rovson

  His present troubles had come from wanting to admire Mary's naked body, writhing in fear, standing in all her glory, bound up, at his mercy for a few hours before he shot her in the head like her parents. He would have promised her a chance to live, in return for the reason why her family had been relocated to the desert, but that was a bargain he wouldn't have kept. He hated that nagging unanswered question more than the mess he'd made, more than all the little mistakes and extra deaths that had occurred. Not knowing might mean there was a path that led back to him, a trail he couldn't brush away, making his stomach turn and fill with acid. He'd have to poke around when he got back, to find out why he'd been detailed to this area and these people.

  It was a bad thing, to have wasted all that time, then added to the body count, making a bigger splash, but the explosions and extra bodies might be diverting, since the idiotic American press was always on the lookout for 'terrorists'. What fools, to think extremists, most Muslims from the Middle East, could thrive in their hedonist, freewheeling, sex crazed culture. The poor Arab boys would think they'd died and gone to Paradise with all the scanty clad females of all ages parading around them, making them forget to focus on their mission and its necessary secrecy. It was every man's weak spot, females and sex obsessions of some kind. It was an uneasy reminder that he too was human.

  Next time he'd fight the urge, if another young female showed up as baggage on a hit, like she had. That would fix it. He wasn't sure he could do it, but he assured himself he'd be able to repress his fatal fantasy. How often did it occur anyway? Twice now, the first time was on his second professional hit, twin girls of eleven he'd kidnapped. They'd who'd lived far out in the Russian countryside. A quick shot to eliminate their babushka to get access to them and they were his. They'd been peeking out their window and watched him go inside, a hanging thread, the kind he always cleaned up, very pretty girls who popped up, living next door to the man he'd been sent to kill. Bad luck for them, good luck for him.

  They'd both shuffled nervously, whining through their gags, amusing at first, then they'd tried to run away, idiotic in the small room he'd released then into, naked with hands tied in front. They bounced off each other and the walls until he'd grown tired of their horrified, averted eyes, unable to stand still and look at him, submissively, so he could recreate his primal sexual image. He'd shot them – totally unsatisfying. He'd tried to make them freeze in place, holding his pistol on them, yelling at them in Russian to stop moving, but they'd kept running around like scared rabbits, making disturbing, high keening wails through their noses since he'd taped their mouths shut.

  That was why he'd deviated tonight, to right that error, make this girl stand there like his long ago naked sister who'd learned that was all he wanted after he'd forced her to do it a few times, hiding out in his locked room. Then, after a few years, when she felt her own stirrings of puberty, she realized she'd started to like it, as much as he did. That was when he'd left home. He still remembered her first shy looks, different, her long ago fear and worry, then shame, boredom and impatience, gone – replaced by a budding sexual desire, for him. She'd found her own perverse enjoyment in what they were doing. That had spoiled it, her wicked, curious smile asking him if there was something more they could do – together – replacing her delicious fear and shame that had been so... arousing.

  That unblemished memory of his scared sister would remain his Holy Grail, a repressed sensual fantasy he could never let out on another job, ever again. So be it.

  His pilot circled, flashed his lights three times, to get three, then, after a pause, one more in replay as he sat in his pickup by the dirt strip, waiting for him to land then turn around. Vladimir left the pickup, his took kit and rifle packed away, a hunter going home from the hill. No words were exchanged, how he liked it, since he was paying. He jumped inside and they flew off immediately. It was right out of the eighties drug trade manual. You could never be too safe when the heat was on, as it would be now. Time to go and say goodbye to this unlucky desert and this shitty job, his worst ever, equaling the disaster of his first foray in the murder business. He knew, from experience, jobs like this never ended cleanly.

  He did his best to ignore the small plane as it bucked and rolled side to side as they flew away, never more than a few hundred feet off the flat land below, forcing the pilot to pull up radically then dive back down, flying over obstructions that appeared suddenly, blocking their path, terrifyingly invisible until the last instant when they appeared, ready to claw them out of the air. It made Vladimir sea sick, nausea he couldn't suppress, glad he never ate on a job. Vladimir assumed the pilot had to stay off domestic radar until he could pop up in a standard flight lane a hundred miles north, calling in to request his position, like he'd wandered off course at night, an unskilled novice pilot, pleading for help from the professional controllers.

  Looking out the dull Plexiglas windshield of the small plane he started working out whether he could let the pilot live after he'd delivered him to his rental car waiting at the airport near Dallas. Every life outside the contracted death was a decision that required careful thought. With nothing else to do and anxious to forget how he felt, Vladimir closed his eyes as he worked through his internal argument for the five uncomfortable hours it took to fly to the small unmanned airport. Reprieved by the popping in his ears, the engine power reduced, they were finally dropping lower, preparing to land. He'd resolved to let the pilot go, but only by a hair's breath, the pros of life out weighing the cons of death, for him.

  Chapter Two

  I now close my military career, an old soldier who tried to do his duty.

  General of the Army Douglas MacArthur

  Jabo was home, at least in the state of Texas – Fort Bliss, the base of the First Armored, 'Old Ironsides' division, but not where he'd plied his MOS. Soldiers like him, or more exactly, like he'd been, had no official MOS for what they did. They worked and lived or died in a non-existent black world, completely off the books, very very classified so they could do anything their leaders told them was necessary, for the good of the country – invisible soldiers, faceless bosses.

  Today Jabo was cycling out, done with his four year hitch that had paid for his tuition, along with an ROTC scholarship, the only way he'd been able to afford a degree from UT, Austin. His education had included various Army schools that took up his summers during his three year program. Not one to waste time, his pace had been highly accelerated. Jabo was not like 99% of the other students, drinking beer and chasing members of the opposite sex in their free time. He'd never had any slack from his freshman year until today.

  Women hadn't been completely off limits after he'd entered the Army. He wasn't neutered or lacking desire for sex and its other pleasures. For all his tom catting, he'd nurtured a deep friendship with the woman he loved, Cathy Sul Ross Bateman-Smith, a real mouthful of a name that had taken time to get right. They were friends first, then lovers, in name at least, since she was still virgin, something he hadn't chosen for himself, and nothing he'd hidden from her during their unique relationship, started when he'd graduated school then went into Army a few months later. She'd been dragged along to his ROTC ball after losing a bet, the year he graduated UT. She'd also been curious about the 'other' Texas University's military traditions, since her own beloved institution had originally been a male only, military school, going co-ed in the middle of the twentieth century.

  Cathy was the great, great, great, granddaughter of a Confederate general and the first president of Texas A& M, Sullivan 'Sul' Ross. A&M was once the hated rival to his beloved University of Texas. Lucky for him A&M had recently joined the SEC for some reason, which had smoothed things for him and his true love. He'd spotted her standing alone, too beautiful be be approached, dazzling him as well. They'd danced then talked to the wee hours before he drove back home to Dallas to deliver her at dawn to her surprised parents. They'd decided he was a real gentleman, the only UT graduate given a chance to court and wi
n her heart. Football determines many things in Texas, something natives of other states understand completely, or not at all.

  They grew serious after the first year they'd been together. Others saw them as old time Texas Royalty, joining two distinguished lines, the Bowies and the Sul Rosses, making a new family name, with even more hyphens, he was sure. It would be a burden his children would have to bear, as he'd been born and would always be a Bowie until he died. All their children would be named then given 'Sul Ross - Bowie' on the back end, no discussion on that one he was sure, since it hadn't come up yet. He'd learned to choose his battles and win them, and this one began with a complete surrender, to Cathy, once they left the church.

  Leaving the military was turning out to be tougher than getting in, which was a simple commitment letter when he signed up for school to get the monetary assistance the ROTC program offered, with summers dedicated to training, followed by the last four years he couldn't talk about to anyone, starting with Cathy which pissed her off half the time. Once a flaming liberal, she'd sat at his feet, demanding all the details he could give, about where he'd been, what he'd seen, the locals. His detailed impressions of people and places were what she most desired. She loved his mind as much as his lean, muscular body, the result of boredom and a nearby gym on deployment. The running joke was you'd better stop when your arms and shoulders were so muscle bound you couldn't comb your hair or reach back and wipe your ass.

  “You're kidding,” Cathy told him when he'd shared that military plum.

  “Honest Abe,” he raised his hand, giving her a straight face she always worried meant he was hiding something. “Gene was so muscular we had to open the door for him, part his hair and, well, you know...” his smirk grew making her whine with aggravation.

  “Jeb!” his faced stiffened slightly, hating that contraction of his name, Jacob Estes Bowie, preferring Jabo, pronounced Jay bo, not 'Bro', 'Jay' and never 'Jeb'.

  “I might be stretching the facts to enhance the flow of the story,” his grin finally broke through, “the truth is we tried to grow big muscles, like the gorillas in the Seals or the Neanderthal Greenie Beanies, but as you can see.” He'd flexed, filling out his shirt so it nearly tore apart, making her reach out to feel his 'guns', as they were called these days. “I got nothing like that.”

  His little aside when they'd talked at her hotel over the last week was a lame attempt to escape the dreary tedium of waiting for his decommissioning here in El Paso. They'd used the time to review the myriad marriage ceremony details Cathy had assembled for him, as the looming man of the family, to verify and affirm it was what he wanted, as much as her. He'd tried a blanket approval getting a hard look that said he couldn't avoid going over every little detail. Their marriage ceremony had a book bigger than any operation orders he'd had and their honeymoon – an island, a hotel, warm water, and a beach – were all he asked for, and got. But that wasn't detailed enough. Cathy wanted to nail down everything, starting with where they'd go – from Tahiti to the Aegean. It all had to be discussed, with him then her mother who was, via her father's incredible wealth, bankrolling the entire enterprise. He felt like a shave tail assigned to the Joint Chiefs.

  After they were married he'd find a way to cut her off from her family's money, or their new family would be torn between her strong willed mother's grand ideas about marital bliss and family life and his more modest, nearly quaint concept which operated on a far smaller budget and would require a house far from mama.

  “Can't you let them at least buy our starter home? There's nice one right down the street in Highland Park,” which was the reason he'd said no, that and the property taxes on the four bedroom two story house that didn't look like much on the outside would have cost his entire salary he'd made as a first lieutenant in the Army for the last year. The job offers he'd had wouldn't pay enough to cover the additional monthly bills, meaning he'd have to let her mother's nose under the tent, financially, which would be followed by daily visits, since she was right down the block, popping by to say hello, eventually running their household and his. No thanks.

  Her family's wealth, and someday hers, since she was an only child, made retirement planning simple, just stay married to the prettiest blond he'd ever met with a mind as sharp as his. That ended the problem before it started.

  His current difficulties, extracting himself from the only rewarding job he'd ever had, doing something that made a difference, as well as being incredibly difficult and dangerous, wasn't easy. It had turned into the debriefing from hell, as they tried to extract all the arcane knowledge he'd accumulated first hand, documenting his actions for the third time – the other two were after action reports and more thorough debriefings in dark rooms with men with hard stares and not a lick of humor. The Army was tedious at times, usually any time he was on base instead of out in the field doing something with his 'associates', other men who might or might not be in the military like him but who were all extremely goal oriented and hell bent for survival.

  “I can't tell you that,” he said for the tenth time this hour, making the Major scowl, then look to the DIA representative sitting next to him who waved his fingers, indicating he needed to move on to his next question, infuriating the Major even more.

  “What am I supposed to put in this blank?” Neither Jabo or the DIA man said a word, absent the roll of both their eyes when the man stared at his form, searching for something he could ask and get an answer to.

  “I think we're done here Major,” the DIA man said, pulling the rank his civilian clothes hid, but Jabo suspected it was at least O-6, a colonel or maybe even O-7, a Brigadier general, or the civil service equivalent, GS-15 or 16, one step under a Presidential appointee.

  You'd think someone had stolen the Major's new bicycle, the guy was lost and hurt simultaneously. He picked up his papers and stuffed them in his cheap leather briefcase and stalked out, leaving Jabo sipping his cold coffee and eyeing the pot which had gone stale hours ago.

  “What you going to do, other that get married to a woman I'd kill for if I was younger.” It was meant as a compliment, but fell flat, showing the man was trying to mesh with the Texas background he knew Jabo had and he didn't.

  “Dunno... sir,” not sure if the man was an officer serving or an annoying civilian who loved being mistaken for one.

  “Well, keep a lid on everything we went over and all the stuff you said you couldn't share with Mister Nosy.” His smile was fake yet genuine, the sign of someone who'd been a spook far too long, lies and truth had become the same thing.

  “So can I go now?” That was all Jabo was interested in, leaving the world of mess halls and machine guns behind, leaving his old camo uniforms in the closet unless he was hunting on their West Texas ranch, which was one of the few things he planned on doing in the next year, besides settling down next to Cathy every night, getting to know her as a wife and lover. They'd waited, at his insistence, not wanting to be distracted when he was operating in the field, or getting ready to go out, which was the sum total of his last four years, after he'd gone through the special schools to learn things he had just been told to forget by the DIA man who was cleaning his nails, ready to answer any last questions Jabo might have about his transition to civilian life.

  “Well, after I mention we'd pay you a cool hundred thousand to reenlist for another four years, if you're interested,” he didn't pause when Jabo's eyes said 'no' before his mouth did. “It would include a bump to Major, a car on base, Officer's quarters for you and your new wife, stateside for her the entire four years, here at Bliss or any Army base you choose, since you'd be overseas most of the time – even Hawaii.”

  Not likely. He'd had enough, doing his bit then getting out had always been the plan, not that his allegiance and patriotism had dimmed over time, but every man gets to make his contribution, and decide how long he'll stay. Four years was his max, plenty of time to payback his scholarship and make it clear he loved his country.

  “Alright, al
though I'm authorized to make you a light Colonel and pay you two hundred thousand, I'm sure the answer is the same, right?”

  “Yes sir, I'm done, ready for a new life here in the good old USA.”

  “Alright, you're out then,” he pushed the coveted final processing packet over to Jabo, then helped him sign in all the right places. There were more sheets that specified what he couldn't talk about and even more that explained what would happen to him if he did.

  “That it?” He asked, got a nod and left, emitting the longest sigh of his entire life as he walked down the hallway, checking out a well dressed female officer who checked him out as well, starting with his 'salad' that included a Bronze star with a cluster, a Silver Star, and a purple heart ribbon that didn't have space for all the times he'd caught something flying too fast and too low and too close to him, topped by the one that mattered most, the blue Kentucky rifle, his Combat Infantry Badge that certified he'd 'been there'. Her eyes rose, appreciative and something else that being engaged with a wedding date made him ignore. Turning down obvious offers like that was something he'd have to get used to from now on – another change on this day of days. After they'd passed he turned to give her backside a look and she caught him. Damn, she really was making it difficult to do the right thing.

  No saint, his other reason for delaying the marriage was the need to refresh himself in the field if the opportunity arose, a relief in many ways. Morality, for his generation, was a fluid thing, with sex reduced to the term hooking up, which portrayed the casual attitude toward mixing it up with a female for a night, or even a few hours. It was equivalent to going to a movie or having a beer, amusement for both parties, with no lasting effects or lingering feelings. Sometimes he'd needed that, to get his head on straight after a tough mission where people died, on both sides, but mostly the other guys, since he and his team members – who were never the same guys with the occasional female player – were devastatingly murderous so it was always them, never us.