Obtaining information could also be seen as an art form. Enrico had once known an Iraqi torturer who worked for the late Saddam himself. An incredible man; he could do things to flesh, using the most primitive of tools; unbelievable things, unthinkable things. His knowledge of human anatomy and physiology and psychology was nearly spiritual. He knew the exact placement and sensitivity of the body’s nerve bundles, the human animal’s innate fear of damage to the eyes, the bed of the nails, the private parts, and the pit of the underarms. He understood the psychological fragility of nakedness; the tenderness of the sole of the foot and the space between the nose and upper lip. He recognized the terror of fire and metal instruments heated to white-hot luminescence. The man’s mind toyed with the possibilities of hooked and pointed things, the way a painter plays with color and texture.
If information was there to be had, this man would have it.
Enrico made no claim to be in this man’s class when it came to gaining information from stubborn parties, but he had learned from watching and had found useful bits here and there that aided his own brand of art. Information into the human psyche — into what mattered most to people at their most basic level — into their soul — into their art.
It was there, at the level of their own personal art, that people were most vulnerable.
And so the small, battery powered, flat screened monitor on the desk in front of the bound woman in the chair. She was going to die — she knew that — she had seen it in his eyes when she first awoke. She knew no matter of talking or anything she could tell him would save her life; it would just make the end faster — maybe easier. Enrico had learned that it was at times like these when it was most difficult to get someone to tell you what you want to know. He could beat her, he knew many forms of physical abuse designed to loosen tongues, but that was not Enrico’s style — not his favored form of art. He preferred to paint from long distance.
The shack had one window and one door. The power had long ago been shut off. It had once been a foreman’s office, back before construction crews worked out of mobile trailers, on a proposed highway in the Nevada desert that had never been laid. Two hundred yards away were five stakes with five women tied to them. The women meant nothing to Enrico, but they meant everything to the woman tied to the chair.
They were her art.
The TV monitor was attached to a wireless device that displayed the images of the women as seen through the high-powered scope atop the sniper rifle.
Enrico flipped a switch and the scope went from wide range to close, the crosshairs centering on the one-armed redhead’s upper lip.
Mary Cochran squirmed in her chair and tried to scream behind the silvery rectangle of duct tape covering her mouth.
Enrico left the rifle at the window and moved in between her and the monitor. He squatted down before her and she stilled, staring at him with hard wide eyes full of hatred and fury.
Yes; a tough one.
“I’m not going to lie to you,” he said in the most casual of voices. His accent told the story of his Italian heritage, but he had studied long and hard and so it sounded much softer than it might have. “There is nothing you can do to save yourself. But I will give you the chance to save that which you care more about than even your own life.”
He saw her glance over his shoulder at the monitor and a look of contempt crossed her features.
Enrico laughed lightly and shook his head. “No, not her, or even the others, not singularly anyway. It is not them — not their lives that I am offering you. It is instead what they mean to you — as a group — as what you made them. They are your creation. The Special Five. Alone they are just whores, but you made them something more, didn’t you? They are your art. And it is that which I offer you. If you tell me what I want to know I will allow your art to live — to go on even after you are gone.”
Turning, he pointed at the little dimple of skin beneath the redhead’s nose where the cross hairs touched. “Most people think the kill shot is between the eyes, but that is not correct. The real shot is here, just above the upper lip. This allows the bullet to pass through the brain and explode the medulla oblongata killing the subject and stopping all motor functions instantly.” He leaned in, lowered his voice to a near whisper. “One touch of a finger. That is all it will take for me to erase your art for all time.” He held up his index finger and looked at it. “One touch.”
He saw the hate leave her eyes, replaced with a complete lack of emotion; defeat.
He reached out and pulled the tape from her mouth.
She said, “What do you want to know?”
He held up a book he had taken from her bedroom. Her ledger; written in a strange code that only she would know the key to. She told him the secret to the book and then as much as she could remember about her former employee; the midget. When she finished, he took out his pistol and shot her once in the back of the skull.
After that, he called a number and gave the man on the other end of the line the coordinates of the women’s location. They would be freed and each paid five hundred dollars for their time and discomfort. Enrico, a man of his word, believed in professional courtesy.
Mary Cochran’s art would go on.
19
Dominic Elkins
* * *
The Wrestler
* * *
The fist, nearly as big as Dominic’s head, hit him like a 105 mm howitzer shell square in the chest. If it hadn’t been for his vest and trauma plate, it probably would have pulverized his ribs and sternum. The impact took him off his feet and into a table that collapsed sending glasses, bottles and chairs flying. His breath exploded from his lungs and didn’t come back. Bright gold sparks danced behind his eyes like muzzle flashes. He started to black out, but then remembered that Sarah was still in the fight which pushed him to get back to his feet. He saw Ted Pearson smacking his baton against the giant’s thigh. The giant reached out with one massive hand, cupping Ted’s head and lifting him from the floor. It looked like an orc picking up a hobbit. He threw him hard into Phil Leno and they both rolled into a crowd of panicking bar patrons.
It was a little after ten on a steaming hot Saturday night and Shooters was packed. Dominic tried to clear his head as the drunken black giant, known to the world as the famous wrestler Kid Kong, destroyed anything and everything in his path.
Dominic saw Sarah pull out her Taser and shoot two darts tipped with fifty thousand volts of electricity into the giant’s body. She stood behind him, maybe twelve feet back; a good distance for the Taser because it gave the little harpoons enough space to separate sufficiently before striking their target. The first dart hit Kid Kong about an inch to the right of his spinal column, just below the neck. The second punctured his flesh on the same side, two inches above his hip. The effect was both immediate and impressive. Kid Kong’s face scrunched up like a bare knuckle fist, his teeth grinding so hard Dominic could hear them squeak. His body convulsed backward and he hit the ground with roughly the same seismic force as his namesake when he fell off the Empire State Building. But as he hit, his arm flashed out in an electric jig swinging through the path of the thin copper wires and pulling the Taser out of Sarah’s grip before she could react. The Taser skittered away as the five-second burst of energy dissipated.
Kid Kong opened his eyes and grinned.
“Oh,” he said. “You used ‘lectricity on me. That wasn’t nice — not nice at all.”
He performed some hopping maneuver where he swung his legs toward his chest then up and out, jerking his entire body off the floor where he landed, light as a cat, on his feet — facing Sarah. She slipped her diamond wood baton out of its ring and took a two handed grip.
He really is a giant, thought Dominic. Bigger even than the K9 officers he’d worked with on his first night out.
Kind Kong towered over the small woman, advancing; his huge hands flexing and un-flexing.
Dominic pulled out his collapsible baton, not nearly as dense o
r heavy as Sarah’s, but a good chunk of metal and resin nonetheless. He left it un-extended, a little over a foot in length and threw it full force. It hit Kid Kong in the back of his skull with an audible crack. The giant turned, but Dominic didn’t wait; already running straight at him. Five feet out, he jumped and delivered a two-footed kick to the man’s stomach. It felt like kicking a brick wall; simply no give at all, and he barely managed to land on his feet. He thought he might have broken both ankles, but he didn’t have time to check because Kid Kong swung one of those monster fists at him again. He ducked, feeling the air whoosh above his head, and swung up with an uppercut, landing the blow on the point of the bigger man’s chin. A textbook knockout punch — it had no observable effect at all. Kid Kong brought up a knee that blasted Dominic’s ribs and then clubbed him with a double hammer fist that put him back on the ground, the world spinning above him as music roared and lights strobed across the ceiling. He tried to get up, but the lights went dark and so did he.
The helicopter hovered, a giant flashlight this time with a pig face where the cockpit should be. The wind, hot in his face, just like on the real day — the day it happened. They were on the rooftop, his men all around him sporting horrible, fatal wounds. Lance Corporal Walker spoke to him, each word spitting blood as his heart pumped his precious life force out through the massive tear in his throat. Walker talked in the voice of a frog, strange croaks that no human vocal cords could ever produce.
“Am I my brother’s keeper?” he croaked. The sound reminded Dominic of those old Budweiser commercials, the ones where the frogs sounded out—“Bud-Weis-errr”. Funny commercial, Dominic used to like it a lot. Only poor dead Sam Walker didn’t look funny at all.
“Yes,” Dominic heard himself say. “Yes, we all are.”
“From the ground cries your brother’s blood to me,” screamed the pig faced flashlight helicopter as it flew away.
“Save me, brother—save me from the butter.”
“I can’t,” said Dominic, feeling tears spill down his cheeks at the terrible sense of guilt and loss that overwhelmed him. “I can’t — I can’t.” But of course that was a lie.
They were all there, surrounding him, crowding in on him, crushing him with their weight and their smell and their death.
And they chanted — “Are you our keeper? Our blood cries out. Save us from the butter.”
The boot loui put his hand on Dominic’s shoulder from behind, like a father, or a big brother — like the serpent. “Send them in — it’s time.”
“I… I can’t — I can’t,” Only that too was a lie.
He saw the men — his men, sprinting for the vent. He knew what would happen, exactly what would happen, he had to stop them.
“It’s a dirty job,” said Lt. Nassif, “but… it has to be done.”
“I know,” said Dominic, praying for another way, a way that would give his troops at least a chance of survival.
And his men were dropping into the vent, one by one, like jumping into a wood chipper and the blood — the blood — the blood — a world of blood and flesh and bone and brains — clumps of hair, fingers, a piece of cheek with a hint of nostril and lip.
He turned, gripping his M4, but his training and his parents and the Bible all told him NO! that it was wrong, that there must be another way. But again he knew that to be a lie — a coward’s lie — the king of lies — the coward’s way. He pointed the muzzle, squeezed the trigger — but too late — God took over and he saw the exploding gases and felt the first hot burning piece of metal burn through his chest — stopping him from what he knew he had to do.
Dominic’s eyes opened. The music and the lights were the same. He didn’t know how long he had been out but it couldn’t have been long. He rolled over and saw Sarah riding the giant’s back, holding on with one hand twisted in his long dreads, the other punching him in the side of the face. Pearson was back in the fight, not much help since he was held in a headlock, but at least he was trying. Three bouncers lay unconscious on the floor around the laughing giant that was Kid Kong.
Dominic saw Sarah’s baton a few feet away. He pushed off the floor, his head fuzzy and the dream still bouncing inside his skull. He grabbed up the sturdy weapon. More than once during his tours overseas he’d had to go up close and personal with the enemy. In two separate battles he’d killed men with his M4A4 well after he ran out of ammunition, using the rifle as a lethal version of a pugil stick; really nothing more than a slightly longer, thicker night stick — like the weapon in his hands now.
Kid Kong, shirtless, wild tattoos painting his dark swollen chest and biceps, looked invincible; enormous, unstoppable. He reminded Dominic of the alien from the Predator movies. Blood ran from the giant’s nose and bottom lip. Good. If the giant could bleed, he could be stopped. Dominic swung the baton like a baseball bat — not a Gunwood PD approved striking method — but effective none the less — the hard wood smacking against the inside of Kid Kong’s right knee. Sounding like an exploding melon the leg crumpled instantly. The giant hit the hard tiled floor chest first. The impact jarred FTO Sarah Hampton from her perch. Kid Kong grunted and looked up. Dominic’s head buzzed like a giant dragonfly was flapping through his brain at incredible speed — a dragonfly — or maybe a pig face flashlight helicopter. Voices and words materialized out of the heavy buzz, pushing their way into his conscious mind. He felt nauseous, but he’d felt the thick, syrupy effects of concussion before and knew he could work through it. He waited until he could see the man’s eyes and then whapped him hard at the junction between neck and shoulder. The impact sent vibrations rippling up Dominic’s wrists and forearms. The giant grunted again but still staggered to his feet.
“Save us,” whispered the words from out of the buzz. “Saveussaveussaveus…”
He knew he couldn’t, it was against the rules — he knew he shouldn’t, it was wrong — he knew he wouldn’t, it would be the end of his career, his freedom, his dreams…
But he did it anyway, he had too, what other choice did he have?
Dominic swung with all his might, the incredibly dense wood striking Kid Kong’s temple with that same melon exploding sound. Only this time it wasn’t a knee — it really was a melon.
The giant dropped. The dream voices cheered; they were saved.
But when he looked around all he saw were the faces of his fellow officers and about a hundred boozers, staring — stunned — silent — accusing.
Just like before.
20
Cinnamon Twist
* * *
Fear
* * *
Cinnamon Twist looked up from her iPad to stare into nothingness. She had the same look that many of her stripper friends had while stoned on “H” or meth or crack or a half dozen other mind-numbing intoxicants, but Cinnamon wasn’t high or stoned or even drunk. She was scared.
On the screen were seven different obituaries opened from seven different news feeds. Seven people, all dead, all murdered. All people that played a part in her past, people that had hurt her. The way she received the information made it even more interesting. An anonymous e-mail that had somehow made it past her junk and spam filters. An e-mail titled “All for you, Sandra Lloyd”. There were only a handful of people in the world who knew her real name, and some of those were listed in the obituaries she’d just received.
What did it all mean? A stalker; someone hunting her? How had this person gotten her e-mail address; and if able to get her e-mail address, wasn’t it plausible he might also know where she lived?
Who could it be? A name slithered into her mind. Chills rippled at the thought. Barney Marko.
She’d lived with Barney for five months; as his…toy. Of course he wouldn’t say that. He said that he loved her, that he needed her, that he couldn’t live without her. Some of that might even be true, she thought. He had loved her, in a way, in his way, but Barney didn’t really love anything. To Barney love equated to absolute dominance. If Barney loved something
he had to own it, completely. As one of the country’s, perhaps even the world’s, most powerful mob bosses, he pretty much got what he wanted.
Cinnamon tried to leave on civil terms and thought she’d succeeded, but she’d learned over the years that when sex and love are involved men tend to lose all rationality. Sometimes even their sanity. Of course the fact that she’d managed to steal three and a half million dollars from him didn’t help the matter.
But he couldn’t know… could he?
She lit up a cigarette and looked out the large window of her tenth floor penthouse suite over the cities of Gunwood and Denver. A sea of twinkling lights that almost blanked out the stars overhead. A little after three in the morning, but there were still cars snaking along the streets, their headlights pouring out ahead of them.
She’d been careful, very careful, because she knew the stakes. She’d seen what he did to people, and what he’d had done to people. Another chill raced up her back and her whole body shook. If he did know — if he’d somehow found out, she was dead — simple as that. Only it wasn’t that simple, because he wouldn’t let her die easy. No, that wasn’t his way. He would want to set an example and the kind of examples Barney Marko specialized in were the things of nightmares.
Strange, because the man could be such a gentle lover and he treated his wife and ex-wives and children incredibly well. But she’d seen that for as kind and loving and generous as he could be, he could be equally evil, ruthless, merciless, and unforgiving.
Cinnamon breathed out a sigh and let her eyes come back into focus. She looked at the computer screen, saw the title. “All for you, Sandra Lloyd”. Would Barney have sent her such a message? She didn’t think so, at least not if he knew about the money. Even if he didn’t know about the money it would be strange for him. Of course, she thought, the rule of men acting totally out of character when it comes to women and love again comes into play. So what did it mean, these murders of people from her past? She’d always attracted weirdoes, but if this wasn’t Barney then it had to be someone with skills; someone with money, who could investigate and kill and keep from getting caught while doing it.
Gil Mason/Gunwood USA Box Set Page 77