The Doll

by Taylor Stevens

  The car jumped forward just enough to tap the vehicle in front.

  She leveraged her grip on Neeva into a pivot. Clamped her second hand on Neeva’s far shoulder, dragged a knee out from beneath the wheel, and punched Neeva’s pelvis with the cap, her own weight and size overpowering Neeva’s smaller frame, and still Neeva didn’t stop. In the space of seconds, the girl bucked, clawed, bit, and finally screamed, bloodcurdling and vicious.

  Few pedestrians were on the street, but it would only take one; houses with open windows, patios with open doors, just one curious bystander and this was over. In a move vile enough someone might die for it, Munroe leaned back and struck an open palm across Neeva’s face.

  In the shock of the blow, Neeva, eyes wide and blinking, gaped and went mute. “Shut up,” Munroe hissed. “And stay put. I will find a way, okay?”

  They entered Monaco at the principality’s northernmost border without anything to mark the crossing but a change in signs and a sudden tightness in building density.

  The GPS led them south along the coast, down pristine streets bordered by trees and beautiful landscaping, streets slowly filling with morning traffic; past the beach area of Larvotto; past a mix of grand architecture and block-style residential buildings making up in height what they couldn’t grab in land; past innumerable CCTV cameras, toward the area of the Japanese Garden and specifically to an underground parking not far from their final destination.

  It couldn’t have been easy for Lumani to send them down—even if he had the connections necessary to tap into surveillance cameras—not with nooks and pillars and cars with which to play hide-and-seek with his nerves. But in a city-state where square footage consumed fortunes, street parking was nearly impossible to come by, and accessing the garages was the only way to get rid of the car and move the delivery forward.

  Munroe pulled into the entry lane, took a ticket, and the beam lifted. Continued downward into a subterranean world reclaimed from the sea, well lit, and not yet filled with the day’s haul of metal.

  On cue, the phone beeped another alert.

  She scanned the text, placed the phone in her lap, and took the vehicle past long rows of sporadically spaced cars, down another level, beyond many open spots, toward the areas farthest away from the choice parking that arriving drivers would fill first.

  Cameras monitored the interior in the same way their counterparts did the streets above, and so Munroe continued at a crawl, searching out blind spots, and finally, as certain as she could be under the circumstances, pulled into a space next to a Pajero where at least the vehicle’s height would shield something.

  Turned off the ignition. This was the end.

  The final instructions required going on foot, out in the open, in public. Munroe left the parking ticket in the glove box and car keys in the visor, as instructed, and while Neeva sat staring, clearly waiting for some piece of advice or news, grabbed the backpack from the backseat, pulled the GPS off the dash, and shoved the machine inside. Paused long enough to glance over Neeva.

  The ripped tights had been replaced on the road toward Genoa, and although Neeva’s eyes were puffy and she was developing dark circles beneath them, the makeup had been redone well enough that she looked presentable—stareworthy, but not in a beat-up domestic-abuse sort of way. Munroe reached for Neeva’s hair, and when the girl winced, she stopped.

  Said, “May I?”

  Neeva held still.

  Munroe fluffed up the curls, untwisting several that had wrapped around one another. Other than that, the hair, like nylon doll hair, was still perfect, and for all of the attention the getup would attract, it also provided a distraction; human nature would have observers try to make sense of the costume before noticing the person wearing it.

  “You look good,” Munroe said, and Neeva rolled her eyes.

  Munroe reached low and popped the hood, felt beneath the seat for the lug wrench stowed so many hours ago, and left it on the floor between her feet. Then, deliberately and very slowly, so that she drew Neeva’s attention to her movements, she placed Lumani’s phone on the console, opened the driver’s door, and said, “Let’s go.”

  She made it around to the other side before Neeva had stepped fully to the pavement, took Neeva’s hand, guided her away from the door, and shut it. With her arm around Neeva’s shoulders, Munroe walked her several steps from the car and said, “We don’t have time to talk and I really need you to listen, okay? I am not one of them. I’m going to find a way to get us out of this mess, but you have to do what I say. Don’t try to run, because if you do, they will find you and I will be powerless to save you, you understand?”

  “But what about your friend who will die?”

  “That’s my problem,” Munroe said, her voice a whisper and speech running at hyperspeed, trying to cram into fifty seconds what should take much longer to say. “Right now we need to focus on staying alive. I can get us out of here, but only if you do what I tell you.”

  Neeva’s head tipped down, just once.

  “The sniper is out there somewhere watching us and we’re also being followed by the guy who hit you last night. I need to know where he is before we do anything. I’m going to give you the phone, my shoes, and the backpack. I need you to start walking when I hand them to you.”

  Munroe turned Neeva, oriented her based on what she’d seen on the GPS prior to packing it up, faced her toward an exit. “In that direction is a stairwell. Take it up to ground level. The exit will open to a street that leads to a seawall. Follow the ocean—you’ll see a big hotel and a tunnel that runs under the hotel. Anytime the path splits, keep left and as close to the ocean as possible—always follow the ocean. Walk slow and keep going until I find you.”

  “What if you don’t come?”

  “Then I’m dead. Just walk. Don’t talk to anyone, don’t make eye contact, and if anyone recognizes you, pretend you’re a body double.”

  Another head tip.

  “And I am not kidding, Neeva, if you run, or try to get away from me, you’ll be doing me a favor by letting me wash my hands of you, but these men will capture you again. If you try to get help from someone else, people will die. You are not smarter than them. Not faster. Not stronger. I am your way to salvation. Understand?”

  “Yes,” Neeva said, and Munroe, in one long, drawn-out movement, loosened her grip on the girl’s shoulders and turned her so that they were eye-to-eye. Searched her face, her expression, her body language, wanting and trying to read what went on behind the mask, and then let go of Neeva completely. Slipped off her shoes, put them in the backpack, and handed it over. If after this the girl still chose to flee, she did so fully aware of the cost, and Munroe’s conscience was clear.

  “If I haven’t found you within fifteen minutes,” Munroe said, “then you’re on your own.”

  Neeva stared at Munroe’s socks and then up again at her face. “Thank you,” she said.

  Munroe turned to the car, lifted the hood long enough to grab the rag she’d once used to wipe off engine fluids, and gently, quietly pressed the engine cover shut. Opened the driver’s door and pulled out the phone that was already ringing.

  She pressed talk and, before Lumani had a chance to speak, said, “It was an accident, I won’t forget again.”

  “You need to get moving,” he said, and because of what was missing in those five words a wave of relief washed over her. He didn’t have visual contact, had no idea what she’d just done, and Arben or some other thug would be there soon.

  “We’re moving now,” Munroe said, then paused and with a lowered voice that bordered on conspiratorial said, “Valon, is there anything I need to know? I can connect the dots. Things aren’t what you’d planned. If there’s going to be a double cross, if you’re getting set up—if I’m getting set up—let me on your side, we can work this together.”

  As had been typical of the man-boy so far, he waited a long while, but this time he didn’t hang up. “I can’t,” he said finally, “it’s
not possible.”

  So she ended the call.

  Before Munroe shut the door for the final time, she reached to the floor and pulled out the wrench. Set it on the ground and turned to Neeva, who’d remained waiting and quiet. Munroe put the phone in Neeva’s hand and a finger to her own lips. Pointed to her eye and then the exit, and with a slight wave, motioned the girl off.

  Neeva took a few hesitant steps, past an empty space, continued beyond the nearest parked car, and then turned as if begging for reassurance.

  Munroe waved her on farther.

  Neeva nodded and gave a mock salute: camaraderie—or Stockholm syndrome. Whatever went on inside that girl’s head was now completely beyond control, and with instinct rebelling against letting her go, Munroe remained in place, watching the rear of the departing costume as Neeva sashayed in slow motion toward the other side of the garage and out of sight.

  Munroe turned to the adjacent Pajero, and with the cold wash of assignment taking over, slid beneath, elbows to the ground, head angled beside a rear tire. Body poised and ready, she waited.

  Arben arrived within the minute driving a black Passat, the first Munroe had seen of his ride, tires cruising slowly past, while his head, visible through the window, swept from side to side as if searching out the Opel. He braked. Reversed slightly and then pulled into the spot directly on the other side of his target.

  Arben opened his door, and from where Munroe lay, she had only a line to his feet. If he’d been smart and on his game, if he’d believed half the things Kate Breeden would have told the Doll Maker, he would have leaned down to check beneath the chassis. At least then he might have had a fighting chance.

  Instead, he stepped from his vehicle to the Opel, opened the driver’s door, and according to the sounds that followed, dropped the keys from the visor into his palm and presumably took the parking ticket as well. His pause was long enough to tuck them into a pocket or pouch, and then he shut the door and returned to his car.

  Munroe slid out and in a crouch between the rear axles of the two vehicles, her body shielded by tires and trunk space, she stretched just high enough to observe him through the windows. He was in the driver’s seat on the phone, apparently on the receiving end of a one-sided conversation.

  Palms to the concrete, runner on her mark, Munroe closed her eyes. Arben would follow on foot, but with Neeva moving slowly and the assumption that the two were together, he held back, allowing a small lead time. Cold fed into her hands, fueling the drive of the hunt. The voices that had for the last several hours played as backdrop to rage hushed in peaceful anticipation.

  Arben’s door opened.

  She picked up the lug wrench and rag.

  His feet hit the concrete.

  She moved to a crouch.

  He stepped out of the car and turned his back.

  She stood.

  She came up behind him fast, and as if in response to instinct, or perhaps the rustle of her clothes or her feet on the ground, he began to turn.

  But he was dead from the time he’d arrived in the garage.

  Dead from the moment he’d laid hands on Neeva.

  Dead from the moment he’d first touched Munroe.

  All the rage, all the anger, all the hatred at everything the Doll Maker stood for, the pain over Noah’s death and Logan’s loss, came through on that first and only swing.

  The lug socket of the wrench connected with Arben’s temple in the same moment his face turned toward her. The force of the swing and the smack of the metal snapped his head to an unnatural angle, and his body, which had begun to pivot in Munroe’s direction, did a time-lapse pause before he sprawled against his car’s side and slid down.

  Whether he was dead or not, she didn’t care and didn’t bother checking. He was out cold, blunt trauma, with not a lot of blood. All that mattered. Wrench to the ground, both hands on Arben’s collar, she pulled him closer to the car and stripped him of his jacket. Found his weapon, retrieved it. Checked the magazine, checked the sound suppressor, which was already attached. Stashed the piece. Found his phone, the Opel keys, and the parking ticket. Pocketed them. Thumbed through his wallet and pulled out seventy euros in cash. Not much, but better than nothing. Found his keys, unlocked the door, and opened.

  Released the lever of the driver’s seat so that the back reclined nearly horizontal. In a crouch, she dragged him by the underarms to the driver’s door and propped him up. Tossed the jacket, the rag, and the wrench into the car; climbed in after them; and then, half kneeling, half squatting on the seat, hands cupped beneath his arms again, inched him into the car; stressing over the dead weight of his body and the time it took to drag him inward; stressing over how far Neeva had already gone and how much was still left to do.

  Munroe pulled Arben’s torso into the driver’s seat of the Passat, shifted his legs under the steering wheel, closed his door, and positioned him so he reclined with the seat. Leaned his head so that he faced his own window. Weapon to his hand, to the side of the head she’d battered, rag between her fingers and all she touched, Munroe pulled the trigger.

  The pop-spit spattered bone and blood, and like the snap of a rubber band against skin, provided the shock of release.

  She didn’t pause to examine the aftermath. Left behind the weapon and the temporary illusion of suicide that might, if she was lucky, buy her a fragment of time. Was out the passenger door with Arben’s jacket and her two pieces of evidence before she’d fully contemplated the emotional cost of what she’d just done.

  Still low to the ground between the cars, Munroe opened the Opel’s unlocked door, wiped the wrench down for prints, shoved it under the seat, and closed the door. If Monaco’s video surveillance had been intended to prevent crime before it could be accomplished, the city had failed miserably, but still open to debate was whether or not the kill had been observed in real time. The answer would determine how far she could get before this underground world exploded in noise and commotion.

  Strategy against strategy in mental triage, Munroe pulled out Arben’s phone. Thumbed through his recently used apps. Mixed in among a handful of games she found what she wanted. Opened. And there was Neeva, a little red beacon crawling along a close-cropped map, depersonalized into the equivalent of an object in a shooter game that might as well have had a detached floating label marked with dollar signs moving along with her.

  Bearings set, adrenaline still coursing, Munroe moved in the direction of the exit, slipping between vehicles whenever possible, dodging camera angles to the best of her ability, until finally out on street level, she traced the path Neeva had walked, or at least something close based on the pulsating red light, moved quickly to catch up, but not so fast as to draw the additional attention a young man in slacks and jacket with bruises on his face running down the road without shoes would bring.

  Munroe reached the seawall and followed the curve of the ocean in the direction of the port, where, in so small a space, was the world’s most expensive collection of waterborne real estate. Only when she spotted the back of Neeva’s costume and no longer needed digital eyes did she slow.

  In this early-morning hour tourist traffic was still thin, and although the roads were full of cars, there were few pedestrians. Not only did Neeva in her costume stand out, so did the man who sat on the seawall fifty meters down: the segment in which Lumani, in his final text, had instructed Munroe to deliver the package.

  Neeva had done well in dragging out the distance, and even now strolled casually, taking time to pause and gaze at the ocean as if she was one of those who kept house in a nearby apartment or belonged to one of the yachts ahead. The man on the wall, who’d been slowly turning his head from one end of the walk to the next, caught sight of the costume and stared intently in Neeva’s direction, fixated upon her.

  Oblivious, Neeva walked on.

  The man was middle-aged. Soft. Insecure. Scared.

  Another pawn.

  Munroe quickened her pace. Searched out balconies an
d approaching cars, moving ever forward, randomly lengthening and shortening the distance between herself and Neeva. Wherever Lumani hid, he had to be west of the ocean, and the sun, still lifting in its arc across the sky, would work against him.

  Pulling in detail, counting seconds, Munroe risked falling into the capture zone and into the crosshairs of Lumani’s rifle.

  She needed to see the client. Observe him. Memorize him.

  He’d be here.

  Somewhere.

  The type of man who’d set these events in motion wouldn’t be content to have the pieces fall into place without him. He would want to be present, watching, reveling in his own brilliance, gloating over how sure, odds stacked against him, he was to capture his quarry—certain to escape unscathed because he’d positioned others to take the fall.

  Neeva kept walking. If Munroe didn’t stop her soon, she would reach the man on the wall and slip into whatever trap awaited. Munroe quickened her pace to close the gap and then, in a heartbeat of recognition, hesitated.

  He was here.

  The focus of desire, in deck shoes and a sweater, clean-cut and casual, approached the sidewalk from a diverted path, walking a little dog in Neeva’s direction so that he might, if he wanted, draw close enough to intersect her trajectory. The man on the wall half stood in the presence of the newcomer and then, in a jerky movement, almost as if realizing he’d committed a faux pas and might as well have pointed out his master, sat down fully and returned his focus to Neeva.

  There was nothing overly distinguishable about the man with the dog: early fifties, perhaps, average height, and fit body, as were many wealthy people; straight blond or silver hair, kept short; skin tanned and freckled. His presence wasn’t the tell pointing to who he was, nor was it that he was one of few along the oceanfront, nor even that he studied Neeva with a curious smirk, as any passerby might, nor his posture or his stride. The tell, subtle and shameless, was his expression, which screamed of recognition.

  His image burned inside Munroe’s head: body shape, gait, ratio of limbs to torso, all of it etched onto a mental canvas. She sought out his eyes and he noticed her now, studying him, and averted his gaze while the narration of his body language turned a page and his lips lifted in a half-snarled grin, as if to say I know who you are, and I win: game over.