The
man across the table grinned at Howard Feder and shook his head.
“Look
Mr. Leder…”
“Feder.”
“Right.
Anyway, you got the wrong man, but I can get you the right man. No
charge, okay? Just a little good will.”
Mr.
Feder thought over his options, found he had none, and agreed.
“Well,
you sit right here a couple of hours, and he’ll be by. If I can’t
get him, I’ll let you know. How does that sound?”
“Fine,”
Mr. Feder said. He was tired and disappointed. “But how will I know
him when he walks in?”
“Oh
you’ll know. You can’t miss Viktor Petrenko, believe me.”
“And
how will he know who I am?’ Mr. Feder asked.
The
man across the table thought for a second then pulled a silver-plated
lighter, heavy and worn, from his shirt pocket.
“I’ll
tell him you’ll be holding onto this.” He passed the lighter across
the table. Howard Feder shrugged his understanding of the plan. When the
man left the booth, Feder switched to a seat facing the entrance.
Two
hours later, at a little past midnight, Viktor Petrenko walked into the
cantina and Howard Feder understood instantly what the man meant by
saying Viktor was unmistakable. He wore a crew cut, and his face was
scarred through an eyebrow and under his chin. “Viktor Petrenko is
hardcore,” the man had told Feder. Petrenko looked the part. There
were scars on his arms to go with a few small tattoos.
Feder
waved his silver lighter. Petrenko saw the move but stopped at the bar
for a drink first and carried it to the booth. As he sat, Feder noticed
a dark ring around Viktor’s neck.
“Where’d
that come from?” Feder pointed at the strangulation mark.
“Last
week,” Viktor said. His accent was heavy, and he was careful that his
W not sound like a V.
“Son
of a bitch,” Feder said. There was worry in his eyes. “You mean
someone tried to kill you?”
“He
tried,” Viktor said and shrugged. He took a sip.
“And
you killed him?”
“I
put bullets in him. I did not check whether he live or die.”
Mr.
Feder drank from his own cup and rethought hiring Viktor.
“Are
you armed right now?” he asked.
“Why?
Are you going to kill me?”
Feder
put a hand up as though surrendering. He studied Viktor over another sip
from his drink. There were more scars on his face and forearms than he
had thought.
“What?”
Viktor asked.
“It
looks like you’ve run into some trouble in your time.”
Viktor
shrugged.
“What’s
going to happen when the Grim Reaper comes after you?” Feder asked. He
smiled, but Viktor didn’t understand the reference.
“Who
is Reaper?”
Feder
described him.
“Skeleton
in a robe with a sickle.” He put his hands out as though holding a
scythe.
“Ah,”
Viktor said. “Angel of Death.”
“Exactly.
So what’s going to happen when he comes after you?” Feder’s smile
returned.
“Bad
day for Reaper.” Viktor took another sip. He had no smile. Feder lost
his.
“Well,
I’m looking for someone who can help me with a problem.” Feder
paused to give Viktor time to show interest. He didn’t.
“It
might include some violence.” Viktor took another sip. “Lenny, the
guy who contacted you, he said you…”
“I
can help with violence. Yes. Go on.”
“It
might be risky.”
“Risk.
Yes. Go on.”
Mr.
Feder paused a moment, took a drink. His eyes welled with tears.
“It’s
my daughter,” he said. “They have her.” He reached for an inner
jacket pocket. Viktor eyed the hand as it moved.
Feder
brought out a picture. A little girl, maybe nine, looking up into the
camera, strands of hair running across her smile.
“Her
name?” Viktor asked.
“Her
name?” Feder repeated. Viktor nodded. He was used to people having
trouble with his English though he tried hard to speak clearly.
“Susan,”
Feder said. “She’s my only child. Please.” Feder’s tears had
started to flow, but he kept up with the job of wiping them away one by
one.
“And
who has her?”
“El
Ejercito de Liberación,” Feder said. The Army of Liberation.
“Ah,”
Viktor said finishing his drink. The Army was well known though new to
the nation. They claimed to work for the liberation of the People;
mostly, they guarded a section of mountain land where cocoa was
harvested. More recently, they had been moving into the cities.
Abducting children for ransoms that foreign firms and their insurance
companies generally paid was a new venture for them.
“Do
you want another?” Feder looked around at the bartender.
“It’s
only water,” Viktor said. “No more.”
Feder
turned back to Viktor, wiped away a last tear and straightened his tie a
bit.
“Can
you help me Mr. Petrenko?”
“They
want money?”
“They
want a half million dollars, American. I don’t have anything like
that. I’d have to sell my house. That would get me up to half what
they want. And it would take weeks. It’s been three days Mr. Petrenko.
Their note said she would die at the end of the week. I’ve been going
out of my mind.”
“Did
you contact American government?”
“The
note said not to. I can’t take that risk, I just can’t.”
Feder
was having trouble containing his emotion to a level that would go
unnoticed by others in the cantina. Viktor had no good news for him.
“I
do not know how to negotiate,” he said. This stopped Mr. Feder.
“Negotiate?”
Feder asked. “I don’t want you to negotiate. I want you to get my
girl. I want you to kill all of them if you have to, crush them, Viktor
Petrenko, bring them to their knees, but find her.” Feder’s eyes
were wide with anger; his teeth were clenched.
“Okay,”
Viktor said. “I will kill many of them. Maybe all of them, but they
will kill her.”
Mr.
Feder seemed deflated. His hand trembled as he reached for his glass. He
drained it.
“She
might be dead already,” Feder said. “I don’t have the money. I
can’t get the money. If I wait longer, they might kill her. I don’t
have any other ideas.”
Viktor
considered and looked at the picture again.
“So
what is your plan?” he asked.
Feder’s
face showed signs of hope. His plan was simple. If Viktor killed enough
of the men holding his daughter, and he did this fast enough, there
would be no one to kill Susan. Essentially, the plan was to hit them
like a bolt of lightning from a blue sky, grab the girl and drive away
at a hundred miles an hour.
“And
where is she?” Viktor asked, getting used to the plan.
“I
don’t know for sure,” Feder said.
“And
how many men do they have?”
Feder
lifted his shoulders and let them fall.
“And
how many will be working for you?” Viktor asked.
“Just
me and you,” Feder said. He smiled again, but Viktor could see pain on
the man’s face.
Feder
had a getaway van and very little cash – enough for weapons if Viktor
needed them, a few thousand for bribes, and a few thousand more for
Viktor. He passed an envelope of money to Viktor. On top of it he put
Susan’s photo.
“Meet
me at five a.m., across the street,” Viktor said. “Bring the
lighter.”
Feder
wanted to ask for a more precise location than “across the street,”
but Viktor was out of his seat already and walking away.
The
street, at five a.m., was mostly deserted. Feder stood opposite the
cantina which had closed only an hour before, his hands tucked deep into
his pockets. Even the tropics are cold just before sunrise.
Viktor
Petrenko came up from behind Feder, slapping him on the shoulder,
scaring him.
“Let’s
go,” he said. “Do you have the lighter?”
Feder
brought it from out of a pocket and handed it over.
“You
smoke?” Feder asked.
“Do
you have the van?”
“Sure.”
Feder pointed.
“Good.
Bring it around the corner in thirty seconds. Make sure the doors are
unlocked.”
“Why?”
Feder asked, but Viktor kept walking.
Thirty
seconds later, Viktor was shoving a blind newspaper vendor through the
sliding side door of the van, the man’s right arm wrenched as far
behind him as it could go without breaking.
“A
blind man?” Feder asked.
“Hardly,”
Viktor said, “Drive.” He gave an address across the city. In the
back of the van, he used duct tape to subdue the man, taping his hands
behind him and his feet together. A final piece covered the man’s
mouth.
“Manuel,”
Viktor started; his Spanish was accented, but Manuel was paying close
attention. “I have some questions for you, and I need answers. You may
wonder ‘How can I answer with tape on my mouth.’ The whole thing is
simple. I am not professional interrogator so I do things backwards.
First, I will hurt you, then I will ask questions. If your answers are
good, I will stop hurting you. Understand?”
Manuel
thought a moment before nodding. He tried to say something through the
tape. He wanted to say he’d cooperate and there was no need to hurt
him, but Viktor waved him off.
“My
friend, don’t try to answer anything. I’ve have not yet started to
hurt you.”
He
took out the silver plated cigarette lighter and flipped it open.
“I
have this lighter with plenty of fuel, a pair of pliers, and a wire.
Before I start, I will tell you that the wire will do permanent damage
if you make me use it.”
Manuel’s
eyes widened. He started to struggle. Feder looked back briefly to see
Viktor pin the newspaper salesman’s head to the side wall of the van.
He flicked a flame on and applied it to an earlobe, holding it about
three seconds. Before the van had made it all the way across to the
destination Viktor had indicated, Manuel had told everything he knew
about anything of relevance, and Viktor believed him. He cut Manuel’s
legs loose.
The
destination was an abandoned warehouse with no roof and a hundred
missing windows. There were trees growing through the concrete as the
tropics reclaimed its land.
“What
are we doing here?” Feder asked.
“We’re
dumping the body,” Viktor answered.
“But
he’s not dead.”
Viktor
shrugged and pulled a revolver from his waistband.
“Soon,”
he said.
Mr.
Feder looked out his driver’s side window and chewed on a thumbnail,
but said nothing. Viktor walked Manuel into the warehouse; there was a
shot, and Viktor came back to the van alone.
Late
that afternoon, the van stopped on the grassy shoulder of the road ten
miles from town. On foot, Viktor found a mud path Manuel had told him
of. When he was in sight of the house, he took up a safe spot. He
checked his watch and waited for the Sun to extinguish itself beyond the
mountains.
Through
the darkness of night, the soft rain, and the scope of his rifle, the
man’s face looked small and bored. There was time in the second before
squeezing the trigger for Viktor to reflect that the man was a real
human with feelings, however crude, with loved ones, however distant.
The bullet that caught him through the brain would end a life that,
however bad could have been better and put to sleep a soul that could
have repented.
Viktor
blinked, pointed his weapon away from the target then aimed again and
fired. The sound from his rifle was much louder than the rumble of
thunder that broke that moment on a distant hill, but Viktor knew from
experience that no one would think that a shot had been fired until two
or three more men had died. He walked through the wet towards the
compound the dead man had been guarding.
Another
shack off to the side of the mud road, another guard, this one reading a
newspaper, guarding nothing, another flash in the West, another
thunderclap and a shot that overpowered it. Some meters further and
another shack. Two guards. Difficult. It was the last guardhouse and he
needed to neutralize it – he could sneak in past them, but he would
not be able to sneak out – not after what he planned to do. Viktor
crouched behind an elephant ear plant and watched them. Through the
scope the men looked like friends. They were laughing about something.
He thought of his options. If he waited, one of them might go away. Or
they might get a call saying the two dead guards hadn’t checked in. If
he used his rifle on one, the other would sound the alarm. Even if he
could kill both before any alarm was sounded, the second shot would not
be muffled by thunder; it would just be a shot. A hand grenade might
work to kill them, but also alert others. Another flash of light in the
West, this time further, the rumble softer. There were other options.
Viktor
stood dripping a fraction of a second before the men noticed he was
there. The room was tiny, maybe six by six. Viktor saw what they had
been laughing at – a magazine lay open to the picture of a woman with
breasts so large they seemed unhealthy both for her and for any man
caught under them. The guards sat, their rifles leaning against a wall,
and that’s how they died. Viktor lunged into the room catching one man
in the back with his knife, stabbing somewhere above the heart taking
the blade out again then pushing forward toward the man across the
table. That man tried to stand – Viktor jabbed the knife into his
diaphragm, into a lung, into his heart and that struggle was over. The
first man moved a hand, possibly a nervous reaction to the ebbing of
life, and Viktor swung around and stabbed him twice more. Then he
crouched. The windows were rolled open and the light was on. If no one
had seen him yet, there was no reason for him to be discovered until he
had gotten inside the compound and could do what he came for.
Back
in the rain, Viktor checked his watch. He had twenty-two minutes before
Mr. Feder was due to arrive. He was running early, but that wasn’t a
bad thing.
Guards
were supposed to be at the gate, a metal arm, low and weighted on one
end with a sandbag, or on the front porch of the house, but they
weren’t. Maybe they didn’t like watching in the rain when los
federales were unlikely to launch a raid; maybe they already knew
Viktor was coming and awaited him inside.
Music
and laughter led Viktor to the dining room, where four men played loudly
at dominoes and four others watched on. A single woman, in shorts and a
tank top that strained to contain her, was clearing away some plates.
She looked at one man’s dominoes and joked. She left the room. Several
of the men had rifles of various makes. None of them noticed Viktor
until he started shooting. In seconds he had emptied clips to two 9
millimeter handguns, six of the men were dead, two were struggling to
make sense of the world seen from a position prone on the floor, not a
single shot had been fired back at him. He reloaded, put bullets in the
two who still moved and heard footsteps and screams. The woman was
heading further into the house. To get help? To get a gun? Maybe to get
little Susan. He followed her, both guns in hand.
“Que
carajo,” a man started to ask. He was coming out of a bedroom on
the second floor. Viktor shot him in the face.
Another
man jumped out into the hallway two doors down. He fired a shotgun blast
at Viktor. One of the pellets grazed his left thigh. Viktor hit center
mass three times, and the man hopped back into his room. There was a
closed door between the face-shot and the gut-shot. Viktor kicked it
open.
There
was a man with a gun. The gun was pointed at a small girl chained to a
bolt stemming from a five-gallon pail that had been filled with cement.
“La
matare!” the man yelled. “I’ll kill her.”
The
man moved toward the girl probably wanting to use her as a shield.
Viktor hit him a half dozen times from the room entrance. The girl,
crying and screaming, wasn’t Susan. No doubt another kidnap victim.
There was a cereal bowl on the floor with some bedding material and a
small brown teddy bear. He wanted to comfort her, but that was the wrong
thing to do at the moment. He would come back for her after he found
Susan. The girl was safest where she was, and Viktor handed her the bear
and closed the door on her again.
Gut-shot
man was dead, but his shotgun was in the hand of a woman in green
fatigues. She held it at her waist and rocketed a shell way over
Viktor’s head and was pumping another shell into place when Viktor put
four shots into her torso. She fell sitting.
Viktor
approached the last door on that floor. If Susan wasn’t there, he’d
have to check to see if there were outbuildings. An automatic weapon
strafed through the door. Viktor threw himself on the floor. When he
heard multiple clicks signaling the end of the clip, he got up and
rushed the door, ramming it with his shoulder. The move put him five
feet into the room before he could stop his momentum. He dropped to one
knee and found the shooter – tank-top – and shot her twice from
about four feet away emptying one handgun. She staggered back, but
didn’t drop the gun, and Viktor put two more bullets in her. He
reloaded his empty, paced the room for a moment, checked his watch, and
headed back down the hallway. He didn’t want to leave the little girl
behind, but had to until he cleared the building or had Susan. He’d
carry them both if he had to make a run for it.
Back
downstairs, the eight dead men were still dead. There was no basement or
pantry. The closet near the entrance held a rifle and two raincoats, no
little girls.
He
looked out back and could just make out a small outbuilding maybe twenty
yards of mud away. Possibly a tool shed, possibly a jail for children.
Viktor was about to head out when he heard running footsteps upstairs.
Viktor went back up as quickly and quietly as he could, handguns leading
the way. The door to the little girl’s room was ajar. He could hear
someone struggling with the chains. Then there was a shot and Viktor
raced up to the second floor landing.
The
little girl was still crying, but she was in the arms of a young man,
maybe sixteen. He had a revolver held to her head. His eyes were wide.
There were a dozen hairs growing on his chin. Viktor trained a handgun
at the boy’s forehead a dozen feet away.
“Busco
Susan Feder,” he said. “I seek Susan Feder.”
“Quien?”
the boy asked. “Who?”
“Susan
Feder,” Viktor said. He was going to start describing the girl. He was
going to say she was about nine, maybe four and a half feet tall, thin,
blond and that her smile was such and that there was money to be made by
whoever handed her over. He had a lot of things that he would have said,
but the boy pulled the trigger, probably without even wanting to. The
little girl went limp, and the boy lost his grip on her. She slid down
his body to the ground.
For
a moment, Viktor’s hands shook. His intestines felt as though they had
wrenched themselves upwards. He and the boy looked at each other. Viktor
regained his composure.
“Susan
Feder,” he tried again. The boy answered by bringing his gunhand up,
aiming for Viktor. Viktor was faster.
The
tool shed was empty. Another race through the house proved the house had
only spirits in it now. He checked his watch. If he stayed he would be
late. He went through the house again, calling for Susan. He listened
for even the smallest disturbance. Nothing. The time came for him to
leave, then that time passed. Manuel’s information was wrong or Manuel
confused one girl with another. He went back to the second floor, looked
at the little girl, lifeless, and left.
Viktor
arrived at the meeting spot five minutes late, but Feder’s van was
where it was supposed to be. Viktor had no idea what he should say;
wherever Susan was, he had no ideas about how to find her in time. He
opened the passenger side door and got in.
“Did
you kill them?” Feder asked. He was driving down the road quickly.
“What?”
“Did
you kill them?”
“Yes,”
Viktor answered.
“Even
a big breasted woman?” Feder asked.
“Yes,
but…” Viktor was about to explain that he had not been able to
locate Susan though that should have been obvious. Mr. Feder smiled at
him and pulled the trigger to a handgun Viktor had not even seen. He
pulled the trigger again, stopped the van, reached across Viktor, opened
the door and pushed his body out onto the wet road.
*
* *
Several
months later and in a different country Viktor found Howard Feder again.
He was in another bar, looking for another man who could get back his
daughter being held by another terrorist group. This time, the girl’s
name was Janie.
“Let’s
go, Mr. Feder,” Viktor said as he slid into the booth seat across from
him.
“My
name is Connors,” Feder said. He squinted at Viktor, trying to place
the face. “Oh my,” he said when he figured out who he was looking
at.
The
two men walked to Feder’s rented house, quite grand for the poverty
that surrounded it. Inside was cool. There were a hundred places where
bodyguards might hide, but Viktor was unconcerned. Feder was too cheap
for bodyguards – if he had one, he would have shown himself at the bar
or on the walk over. Viktor shoved him onto a plush sofa.
“What
do you want?” Feder asked. He was smiling.
“You
lied to me Mr. Feder.”
“You
want more money?”
“A
little girl, Natalia Abreau, she died because I thought I was looking
for Susan. Susan who doesn’t exist.”
“And
you blame me?” Feder asked. His smile had lost a little of its luster.
Viktor
gave him a thumbs up sign.
“And
Manuel,” Viktor added.
“Oh,
yes, the supposedly blind newspaper guy. You didn’t kill him. I went
back to get rid of his body but there it was still squirming in all that
duct tape. You left that job to me.”
“He
didn’t have to die,” Viktor said.
“What’s
the difference? Besides, I had more work to do in that city. Having him
live to point me out wasn’t going to work for me. We’re fighting a
war on drugs. There are casualties. Look…” Feder moved to stand;
Viktor kicked a booted foot into his face and got him back onto the
sofa, his lip bleeding. Feder’s smile was completely erased. With one
hand he gestured, with another he touched his lip.
“Look,
I get paid to do a job. I subcontract. The government wanted that group
destroyed. I got the results.”
“If
you tell me to kill them – without the story – I would do it,”
Viktor said. “You should have given me chance to save her; chance to
do one good thing, a little thing. You should not have lied.”
“It’s
what I do,” Feder said.
“Not
anymore,” Viktor said. He raised his gunhand, aiming at Feder’s
head.
“Wait,
wait, wait!” Feder had both hands up in front of his face as though he
would swat the bullet. “Can you hear that?” he asked. Viktor could
in fact hear it. Sirens. Several cars stopping out front.
“Silent
alarm?” Viktor asked. Feder nodded.
“What
are you going to do, Viktor Petrenko? Kill all of us?”
Viktor
shook his head. He wanted his revenge from Feder, but he had no
intention of shooting his way out of the house, killing officers who had
had no part in killing Natalia Abreau, innocent men with families of
their own.
“I
will find you later,” he said. “I will kill you then.”
“I
don’t think so, Viktor. You should have killed me back in that bar a
little while ago. I thought you were dead. You think you can’t die? I
put two bullets in you before, and I can do it again. Start running,
Viktor. Now that I know you’re out to get me, believe me, I’m out to
get you. I have friends, Viktor, powerful friends. I’ll have you
arrested. I’ll have you murdered.”
Feder
yelled more, but Viktor was already making his way out the back of the
house. He didn’t stop walking for an hour, then he went into a diner,
sat, and ordered. While he waited, he took out a photo, the smiling face
of a little girl he knew as Susan. He touched her chin with his finger.
The meal was put before him, and he ate in silence.
Copyright 2006 by
Steven Torres
