Blackjack Dead or Alive (The Blackjack Series Book 3) (14 page)

“Exactly.”

“Only thing to do is love her, bro.”

“I don’t have any other choice,” I said, that warmth back behind my eyes. “A friend of mine died today.” It felt weird to say, but despite what had happened, Sandy’s loss struck something I hadn’t known was there.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“I don’t have many.”

Bubu extended his beer once again and said, “A toast. To lost friends.”

We toasted again, and I finished my beer in one long pull. Setting the bottle down, I got up and headed for the door. “I can’t explain it, but time is running out on me, Bubu. I need that stuff.”

“You got it, bro. Tomorrow is a big day for us.”

*              *              *              *

My room was littered with drawings for the first printer. It would be like the Original Seven, generating other, smaller printers in its wake. In my head, I dubbed the printer Seven, a dream sketched out on dozens of schematics strewn about the room or stacked lazily according to part or mechanism. Most of those drawings were obsolete as alterations and improvements sprung to mind. If I took the time to jot them all down, the machine would never be built, but I kept the old drawings around as a reminder of the work to be done.

Seven was a traditional bed printer, only much larger, with a maximum build volume of 36 inches cubed but a layer resolution of 15 microns. With such a large volume and ten times the detail of any 3D-printer currently available, Seven would make ten smaller 3D printers, responsible for making the actual builder drones, and one specialized printer to make the fifty or so mothership drones – designed like rolling tanks. These motherships would serve as repository of raw materials for the smaller builder drones, with each returning when their onboard reservoir was depleted.

The builder drones would turn the concept of 3D-printing on its head, making the printer something mobile and independent, rather than a bed-based system, located atop a computer desk. These little works of wonder would have GPS control, guiding them within 0.001 inches of the design, each with a tiny fused deposition modeling head and a layer resolution as small as 50 microns. The plan was to design them as four-armed rovers with rotors to keep them aloft. As I made them smaller and smaller, I reduced the rotors to two, then finally to one, allowing the tiny drones to hover over the job. I had a vision of them dropping out of the sky en-masse to put down layer upon layer of material. These would work as a swarm to finish the design, creating detailed paintings, exquisite tapestries and carpeting, and manufacturing the elaborate moldings and woodcarvings of a castle worthy of Blackjack.

My mind was burning, ready for the challenge. I had all the schematics memorized, even the rejected ones. Haha was targeting people close to me. How long before he went after Madelyne or worse, my brother? I grabbed my coat and went back down to Bubu’s room, expecting him to be asleep. I pushed through his door and found him hunched over his laptop, scrolling down the list.

“Bro, we’ve got to talk about you knocking,” he said.

“I can’t sleep either,” I said. “Let’s get moving. If we leave for Bucharest now, we can get a jump on the work.”

Bubu shrugged and said, “I want to get started too, but it’s bad out there, and my car is crap.”

“So call a taxi,” I said.

“You’re kidding me,” he said. “Bro, calling a taxi this time of night is asking to wake up naked in the gutter. We should wait until morning.”

That would be one surprised taxi driving thief, but I still needed my cover. “And waste the morning driving? No. Get what you need, and I’ll find us a way to Bucharest.”

He turned to face me, still seated and lit a cigarette, taking a deep drag before saying, “Listen bro, we go out in that, maybe we get to Bucharest. Or maybe the car breaks down. Then you know what happens? We freeze to death. It’s not smart.”

“It’s not smart to forget who’s paying,” I said, my voice a growl. “I can’t use you if you won’t listen to me, Bogdan.”

“Bro, why did you hire me? Because I can get you stuff? My uncle could get you stuff. No, you hired me because I’m smart. What use is that if you won’t listen to me?”

“There’s more to it than that. Things you don’t understand.”

“You’re in a hurry – I understand. You think you know Romania better than me? You think I made a bad call since you hired me? Then fire me, but you know its bullshit.”

I looked out the room’s lone window and saw frost riming the edges of the glass, the swirling blizzard obscuring everything else, the lone streetlight’s illumination dimmed in the chaff. The townhouse was freezing, even with my coat and pants. I might survive the exposure, though I had never tested myself in extreme cold before, but Bubu wouldn’t. He was too useful to lose.

“You win,” I said, quelling the urge to pick him up and leave. “We wait for morning, but first thing, we get better transportation.”

“You got it,” Bubu said, acting as if he were not just fired and rehired within the space of a minute. “I get you a good deal on a car.”

I held up two fingers, “Get a pair, one for each of us. And no more bullshit. I say something needs to get done, it needs to get done.”

“As long as you’re not trying to get us killed,” he said, a small smile touching his lips.

I left his room without a word, thinking about the castle, beyond the thrill of creating something the world had never seen before, to the reason I was building it, and promised myself that Bubu would be home with his wife and kid long before Haha sniffed anywhere near Romania.

Morning came and the last vestiges of the snow flurries were still blowing past, but Bubu and I decided it was safe enough to drive the highway back to Bucharest. We had a breakfast of hard-boiled eggs, bread and goat’s milk, and then went to dig out his taxi.

Bubu’s car was under a heavy pile of snow, but the worrying part was the sharp angle he had parked it, facing down towards a crevasse. When we arrived the spot seemed fine, as the decline toward the edge of the cliff was over fifty feet. With the snow covering the mountainside, moving the car would be tricky. The only thing keeping it from sliding down and over the edge was the mound of snow covering it.

“Take the snow off the front and top,” Bubu said, after thinking about it for a while. “Leave the snow on back to stop it as brake.”

I was afraid when he turned the car on, the packed snow and ice would simply shift and spill, Bubu’s brake sloughing away into uselessness. Instead, I went around the back of the car, once we had cleared it of the snow and offered to push it out.

“Bro, the car will come back and run you over,” he said as I dug a pit between the rear lights.

“I’ll be good,” I said, tossing him the satchel with all the money we needed for today’s purchases. “Go on, get in.”

He shook his head and sat behind the wheel, turning the engine and dropping it in gear. I meant to let him pull out on his own, then throw myself face forward in to the snow like a goof. The fewer clues he had about me the better.

But the taxi didn’t budge when he began to slip the clutch, and the right tire spun as its grip on the ice slipped.

So I gave the car a little shove.

The taxi tore out of the rear enclosure of snow and raced up the hill like a rock hurled out of a slingshot. Bubu slammed the breaks, the early morning quiet broken by the squealing tires as he side-slipped the car to a jerky stop. He stared at me with shocked eyes through the rear view mirror as I hopped out of the snow and strolled over to the passenger door. I could feel him staring at me as I opened the door and took a seat, tossing on the seat belt.

“What was that,” he asked, both his feet still stomping the brake pedal.

“I don’t know, Bubu,” I said, angling the seat back, preparing to nap the whole way back to the city. “Think you have to be more careful with the clutch.”

He let the matter go, though it took him almost thirty seconds to compose himself and get us on the road. I slept most of the trip to Bucharest and he woke me as we were reaching a warehouse area near the outskirts that looked part warzone, part ghetto.

“See this place,” he said, once he noticed I was stirring. “This is the place you wanted. I gave you a castle.”

I looked around, bleary eyed. Most of the warehouses in the area were abandoned or demolished and for a moment, I was reminded of my old base in downtown L.A. I always figured they had torn it down as part of my arrest after Hashima, but in retrospect, they had never charged me with possession for the illegal chemicals stored there, and the more I thought about it, the more it was likely the place was still there, untouched. If I ever made it back to the U.S., I had to make a trip to Los Angeles and see my old base. The design for that portable hydrogen generator alone would make me a fortune, and the hard drives on that system had dozens of nascent projects that could make me a bundle.

Moe’s talk about money had me thinking that I needed to be independent, to have my own loot, if I wanted to be with Apogee. I didn’t want to be, as Moe called it, a “held man.”

“What’s so funny?” Bubu asked as he pulled up to a warehouse that had three cars parked out front. They were slick, black Mercedes 550s that looked totally out of place in the dilapidated neighborhood.

“Nothing. We should just buy those,” I said.

“Those belong to Mihai, bro,” he said popping out of the car. “Not for sale.”

“Is that our contact?” I said opening the door to follow.

“Yes, but you stay in the car. Okay?”

I looked around the street and saw it was empty.

“You afraid I’ll see how you’re gouging the prices?”

“Gouging?” he said. “What is this?”

I hopped out, talking to him over the roof. “It means that you’re charging me more for things. You’re getting them as cheap as you can and charging me full price.”

He looked at me as if I were speaking in riddles.

“Me,” he pointed at his chest. “You think I’m stealing from you?”

I walked around the car.

“It’s okay, man,” I said. “I don’t mind if you make your cut. I just want to see who we’re dealing with.”

“I don’t steal, bro,” he said, genuinely hurt. “You think I’m stealing, go find someone else.”

“I want you,” I said. “And I don’t think you’re stealing. It’s just…nevermind, okay? Sorry I said anything.”

He took a step back and gave me a strange look, as if regarding me for the first time.

“Bro, I don’t even know your name.”

It was true. I hadn’t shared it with him yet, though I wasn’t sure exactly why.

“Right,” I said. “Well, I’m Mister Black.”

“Mister Black?”

I nodded. “Call me Bee,” I said, recalling Cool Hand’s old nickname for me. “But if you have to introduce me, I’m Mister Black. Now you know my name. And you’re Bogdan, okay?”

“Arcos,” he said. “Bogdan Arcos. I’m telling you my full name because I’m not afraid.”

“I have reason to be afraid, Bubu.”

He cast a glance at the taxi, recalling my feat of strength in the snow. “Any problems,” I said.

Bubu shook his head.

“Good,” I said. “Let’s not keep your friends waiting.”

He let me take a few steps before following. Already a few large men were congregating at the warehouse entrance.

“Bro, let me talk, okay?”

“Don’t worry, Bubu. I don’t know Romanian.”

He stopped me, reaching for the money satchel.

“Let me hold satchel,” he said, and I let him take it.

He looked at the guys at the warehouse gate.

“Pretend you’re my cousin. You don’t talk, okay?”

I nodded.

“This guy Mihai is in the army,” he said, sliding the zipper open and rummaging through the piles of cash. “He won’t be curious if you’re quiet and look like you’re working for me. These stacks are twenty thousand?”

“Yeah,” I said.

He took eight stacks and stuffed them into his inside coat pockets, then threw the satchel back at me and started toward the warehouse.

“Don’t say anything,” he said again, not bothering to look back at me.

The guys at the door knew him and did the whole “shake one hand and hug with the other” thing. Both were massive mountains of men, muscled and dressed in black. Each guy had an MP-5 slung around his shoulder and dangling in the back.

Bubu introduced me and I did the shake/hug thing too, noting the heavy smell of alcohol and cigarettes lingering on them like perfume. They were so familiar with Bubu that they let us pass without a search.

Inside were rows of parked cars, packed so tight that moving a single car would be like a sliding tile puzzle. There were all kinds of cars here, from fancy sportsters like Lambos and Ferraris to big, comfy sedans like the 550s parked outside, to the big SUV’s we were looking for. I did a quick count of the cars in my head, estimating that there were about eighty or so vehicles, worth in excess of $10 million, though I doubt they had paid retail for them. Most were probably stolen from other European countries.

A few lights hung from the ceiling and we could hear a conversation going on from the middle of the warehouse, a space carved out in a sea of cars, set apart from the rest by a series of carpets thrown haphazardly. Atop the expensive-looking Persian rugs sat a wooden desk, a series of cabinets and several chairs. A gnarled man sat behind the desk, his small body lost in a massive leather chair. He was talking to someone on the phone and suddenly exploded in laughter. Two other men rose from seats in front of the desk as we approached. They were big goons like the two outside, but one of them was a monster, so big that I thought he might be a super. He looked like he wanted to charge me, scowling like an angry pit bull that sniffs another big dog in his territory. I wasn’t going to play that game, not with a normal that I could kill with a nudge. Instead, I played the part Bubu had given me – silent cousin – flashing a disarming smile.

The man at the desk waved Bubu over, while still on the phone the other two positioning to intercept. Muscles’ attention was on me, but the other guy walked over to my partner and gave him a shake/hug, clasping his shoulders, and did the same to me when Bubu introduced me. I noticed that he just waved at Muscles, whose wince must’ve been what passed for an acknowledging smile.

The other guy started talking to me, prompting me with questions, and Bubu jumped in for the rescue, explaining to him in Romanian that I couldn’t talk and they all had a laugh at my expense. Muscles grimaced and said something dismissive to me. I smiled and nodded.

From their conversation, I could discern that the other guy’s name was Dorin and that the big boy was Petru. Dorin invited us to sit and moved to a counter top along the side of a Mercedes SUV where they had a coffeemaker. He chatted with Bubu while pouring us a couple of cups as we waited.

Mihai was older than everyone in the warehouse by thirty years, with a lined face, blue eyes peeking out as slits and a shock of white hair as thick as sable fur. He wore a khaki military shirt with rank shoulder boards I couldn’t recognize, his jacket thrown over the back of the chair. He hung up the phone and looked at me.

“American?”

I smiled looking over at Bubu, who fired off his prepared story. Mihai kept his gaze on me, though, shaking his head.

“What is your name, friend?”

“Mister Black,” I said.

He stared at my partner, unhappy at the attempted deception. Bubu cast his eyes down, trying to keep his features neutral. I knew him well enough to understand he was pissed, probably wishing I had stayed in the car.

“You want cars from me, huh,” Mihai gestured at his lot.

I looked over at his shoulder boards which were gold with an edge of blue and a cluster of leaves running the length with a single star entrenched in the middle, “General?”

“Fortele Ariene,” he said, which sounded like he was in the Romanian Air Force.

“So you want cars and…” he rummaged through his desk for an old-style fax paper that was rolled up. “All this other shit. Cables and power supply. This is military grade stuff, Mister…”

“Black.”

Mihai’s smile widened, creasing the lines in his face. He stood up and lit a cigarette, offering me one and lighting his when I declined. Coming around his own table, he sat at the edge, facing me.

“You are in charge, no,” he said. “Or is there other man I talk to?”

I pointed a thumb back at my chest.

“Okay, this is good. We talk, you and me.”

“We can talk.”

“So, Black. This is the name we’re going with. Black, right,” he said and continued after I nodded. “What is the business for all of these items?”

“Am I talking to a general of the Romanian Air Force,” I said. “Or am I talking to Mihai…whatever your last name is…private businessman.”

He looked at me a moment, then at Bubu, who did a better job translating what I meant. Mihai then exploded into laughter. “Businessman,” he said. “You want food, coffee,” he said, then gave Petru a series of instructions and the big man ran out of the warehouse.

“We get breakfast, coffee, and we talk business,” Mihai said, still chuckling. “We get you eggs and bread. Americans always eat eggs and bread for breakfast. I visited the U.S. after the towers fall. Nine-eleven, right?”

I nodded.

“Well, we go to military base in Arizona for training exercises and every morning at the…” he paused, struggling for the right word. “Chow line? Is this it?”

“Right.”

“Every morning, big huge trays of eggs, scrambled. More trays of eggs, hard-boiled. And your American officers stuffed their plates with eggs, and bread…and bacon.”

He laughed.

“You like bacon, too?”

“Love it,” I said.

The general chuckled, lighting another cigarette and offering once again, offering me one. I declined, noticing he didn’t offer one to Bubu. “Eggs every morning. Kilos and kilos of eggs. I go to train with your Army for six weeks and that is all I remember. And at the end of my trip, I go and eat eggs every morning too. Now I think of it and get sick to my stomach. But for you we get eggs.”

“All I care about is the list,” I said, trying to keep it business. “The food isn’t necessary.”

He stared at me for a second, flashing a glance at Bubu and talking to him in Romanian. Bubu responded, and then translated for me. “He wonders if you’re a criminal. I told him the money you’re going to spend here is real and he should worry about that.”

“Bubu, as always, is right. Anyway, I look at list,” the general said picking up his notes, and walking back around to his seat. As he did, I noticed Bubu’s leg nervously twitching “I look at you. I think; you’re a serious man. With serious business.”