Enforcer (40 page)

At that moment, he realized he was having the dream again. He began to panic when he also realized that he could do nothing about it other than let the dream play out. He felt like he was watching a film of himself, shouting instructions and warnings at the screen, the movie Connor completely unaware. Dana squeezed his hand, putting her other hand over the top of his.

“You know she’s going to die, don’t you?” Dana asked, the innocence in her voice at odds with the terrible revelation.

“She’s not going to die,” Connor said.

“Connor, don’t be stupid. Of course she’s going to die. You killed Niklas without even trying. You killed Travis without even touching him. You killed me by making love to me. What you give up each time you murder someone is more than the last. Imagine what you’ll have to give up when she dies because of you. You know you are going to fuck her eventually. Then you are going to fuck her in another way that will end up with her dead.”

“No!” Connor screamed, trying to let go of her hands. “I didn’t kill you!” He stood up, nearly falling over from thinking he was wearing shoes instead of skates. “I loved you. I killed you only in my heart. I had to.”

“Dead is dead,” Dracul said.

Connor hadn’t noticed the Romanian skate up to the bench and stop, only the bench wall separating the killer from him and Dana.

“He’ll murder her,” Dana said, nodding toward Dracul with a smile, and received a rare smile in return.

“This is true. She will die. Then I will kill you.” Dracul spit on the ice, but made no threatening gestures.

“What’s going on?” Jera asked, wobbling her way toward the bench. Niklas and Travis followed behind her, pushing and shoving each other, trying to make the other one fall.

Jera nearly fell as she came to a stop. Dracul caught her in his arms and gave her a kiss on the forehead before giving Connor a knowing smile. Jera smiled up at the man and stretched her face toward him, Dracul meeting her halfway. Their long kiss made Connor uncomfortable. Dana, Niklas, and Travis cheered and laughed, making studio audience noises at the two would-be lovers.

Dana clapped her hands and giggled, looking at Connor, her beautiful red hair framing her perfect face. She reached over and grabbed his hand again, pulling him down to sit next to her on the bench. He sat, his eyes never leaving her face. He wanted to keep the dream going forever, if possible.

“It is time,” Dracul said. Connor glanced up from Dana’s face just as the Romanian drew a straight razor across Jera’s throat. Dracul smiled at him before dumping her body to the ice.

“I told you, Connor,” Dana said, her eyes ablaze, her voice no longer innocent and sweet.

He threw off her hand and stood up, leaning over the boards to watch Jera’s blood pool onto the ice. Connor screamed the instant Dracul pulled the razor across his neck.

CHAPTER 33

Connor looked at his phone one last time. He had to get moving or he would run out of time. He pulled the black knit cap down over his ears and put on the over-sized sunglasses that looked like they’d been stolen from a 1970’s police detective. He locked the car with a push of the button on the key and began to walk. The Lincoln would blend in with the rest of the cars at the Central Auto Repair lot on Boise Avenue, and he would blend in, he hoped, with the neighborhood as just another person. The type of neighborhood he was in didn’t have the kind of residents who called the police to check out suspicious characters. Every character in this neighborhood was suspicious.

Connor cut across an empty lot two blocks down Galveston Street, keeping to the ditch along the Frontage Road that followed the interstate. As he approached the house he was looking for, he glanced around before walking through a large break in the rotted wooden fence. He ducked down when he reached the house, listening for noises, hearing only the drone of vehicles traveling I-84.

Larry’s yard, the entire lot really, was just as cluttered and dirty as the inside of his house. He found the back door, almost hidden by a couple of rotting mattresses piled up against the house. Connor tried the knob, sighing when it was locked. He looked through the small window next to the door, but all he could see besides grime on the glass was what looked like a pile of cardboard boxes inside. He gritted his teeth and walked to the side of the house, poking his head around to see if anyone was passing by on Galveston.

After a full minute, he edged around the side of the house, trying hard to not look suspicious, knowing he looked like a caricature of a cat burglar in a silent movie. He stepped up on the front porch from the side and walked to the front door, listening for a moment before he slowly turning the doorknob, nearly fumbling in surprise when it rotated and the latch disengaged. He pushed on the door, hating his inability to remember if the door squealed like a banshee or not. The hinges were silent, and he cracked the door just enough to listen for a few seconds again before opening it enough to slip inside.

Connor closed the door as gently as he could. He remembered his disguise and pulled the cap down over his face, revealing the ski mask for what it was, then replaced his sunglasses so none of his skin was visible. As he listened, he reached into the pocket of the black coat he’d purchased at the thrift store, wrapping his hand around the 9mm automatic Petre had acquired for him. Connor paused for a moment, remembering Petre’s dark expression when he’d handed over the weapon. Petre knew about his aversion to firearms, but had remained silent, saving Connor the trouble of lying to him.

His ears picked up the sounds of voices. He crept along the living room to the hallway, Larry’s angry voice, and a woman’s, drifted back to him. The woman was begging for forgiveness, or maybe it was mercy. She sounded bored enough to fall asleep, which was probably the reason why Larry’s voice began to get louder, more vulgar.

“What, you fucking bitch?” Larry half-panted, half-yelled, Connor only able to see through a small space that separated where the door leaned against the frame. It didn’t surprise him that Larry had never bothered to fix the door after it had been kicked it completely off its hinges. “You better fucking do as I tell you, whore, or I’ll choke the fucking life out of you! Do you want to die, bitch?”

“Please, don’t hurt me,” the woman said, her voice full of enough excited to put Connor to sleep out in the hallway.

Her boredom was so evident that he almost laughed. He moved slowly down the hallway, stopping every foot or so to make sure neither of them sensed his presence. The woman, for all he knew, could be reading a magazine and filing her nails while Larry cursed and yelled and slapped her skin, grunting like a pig caught in a trap. Connor looked through the crack one more time before taking a step back and planting his feet.

He kicked forward at the door as hard as he could, knowing surprise would be his greatest ally. He watched in amazement as it flew across the small bedroom, catching Larry in the hip, shoulder, and elbow. The naked junkie crashed into a wall after the door blew into him, screaming in pain, still holding his mostly-limp cock.

The door crashed onto the bed after hitting Larry, striking the woman in the back of the head. Connor rushed into the room, directly toward Larry. The junkie’s eyes were wide with terror at the huge apparition charging at him, a monster from a nightmare in all black with glassy, black bug eyes. He wondered if he was so high he was hallucinating, right before the monster chopped him across the forehead with the butt of a pistol.

Larry faltered, dazed and in pain. Connor turned to the whimpering woman caught underneath the door. He figured she was more scared at the sudden chaos and the door landing on her head than she was in pain. The door had been a typical hollow interior type, made of cheap, thin wood that could easily have a hole punched through it by a determined fist.

Connor grabbed the back of Larry’s neck with his gloved hand, lifting him from the floor before putting the barrel of the pistol to his temple. He reached out his leg and kicked the door off the woman, who started to scream. Connor tightened his grip on Larry’s neck and tapped the woman on the head with the barrel of the gun. She stopped screaming, her eyes going wide, tears spilling from the corners of her eyes.

“Get out and never come back here,” Connor whispered as loud as he could, hoping Larry would be too scared, in too much pain,
too high
to recognize his voice. “Go on, get your clothes and leave. Keep your mouth shut or I’ll find you and kill you.”

He tapped her on the forehead with the barrel again to let her know to get her ass moving. She grabbed her panties, skirt, and a shirt from the floor, trying to put them on faster than her limbs could respond. Connor put the gun back to Larry’s skull, gesturing to the little man to put his hands on the back of his head as if he were being arrested. He didn’t trust Larry for one second, even with the fear of having a gun in his face.

The woman finally got her skirt on and pulled her shirt over her head. She looked back at Connor and Larry, her eyes still full of terror, but also anger. Connor hoped she wouldn’t suddenly get brave or mouthy. Instead, she stepped toward them, nodding her head at Larry, as if asking Connor for permission. She’d lost her fear that the intruder was interested in harming her, knowing this bit of drama was all for Larry.

“You fucking little weirdo,” she said, her voice no longer bored. “You couldn’t even get it up. Normally I’d be insulted, but with you…” the woman trailed off.

“Oh fuck you, Carmen, you stu—”

Carmen kicked him between the legs, making Larry shriek and try to double over. Connor held him with an iron grip. Larry began to gag and cough, his testicles producing pain on a scale he’d rarely experienced before.

“You cheap little fuck,” Carmen taunted Larry as he dry-heaved. “If you’re after his dope, I’ll tell you where it is if you’ll hook me up.”

Connor nodded, and dragged Larry along by the neck as he followed Carmen down the hall to another room off to the right. He peeked around the corner to make sure it wasn’t an ambush, but Carmen was halfway in a closet, pulling out a large plastic box.

“You fucking thieving bitch!” Larry screamed, finally able to feel his balls again.

“Uh uh,” Connor whispered, tapping the barrel of the automatic on Larry’s skull. “Be nice now, or I’ll let her kick you again.”

Connor realized the box was a cooler, the plastic kind people took on picnics and to tailgate parties before the big game. He gestured to her to remove the lid. She gasped when she saw what was in it. She’d known where Larry kept his stash, but she’d never actually seen what it looked like. Connor edged closer, looking over her shoulder while still keeping his grip tight on Larry’s neck.

Inside the blue cooler were two large freezer bags stuffed with marijuana, a small bag of something dark, probably hash, though Connor wasn’t an expert in recreational drugs, and two medium storage bags of crystal chunks. Connor gestured to the woman to grab whatever she could. Her eyes nearly exploded at the thought of getting all of the drugs in the cooler.

“Are you sure?” she asked him. He nodded, giving an impatient wave of his gun. He didn’t want to cut the time too close.

Carmen grabbed the big bags of weed, the two bags of meth, and even grabbed the little bag of the dark substance. Connor could smell the pot, and the other smell, he decided, had to be hashish. Carmen’s eyes went wide once again, as did Connor’s when he saw the stacks of bills sitting under the drugs. He waved her away with the pistol and she backed off, unable to take her eyes off the cooler even though she was holding at least fifty thousand dollars’ worth of various drugs in her hands.

“You fucking cunt, I’ll fucking hunt you down and kill you. I’ll rape your fucking asshole. I’ll rape your mouth. I’ll fucking rape you with a goddamn knife you goddamn fucking cu—” Larry’s scream of fury was interrupted by her planting another foot in his crotch.

Connor reached into the cooler, unable to believe how much money was in it. He grabbed one stack of hundreds and tossed it to Carmen while Larry rolled around on the floor, holding his crotch and screaming like a child throwing a tantrum. The woman almost dropped everything, but she caught the money.

“Now get the fuck out of here,” he said, risking his voice since Larry was an unending wail of pain.

Carmen winked at him and ran out of the room. He heard her shuffling around for a moment, probably grabbing her coat, or stealing one of Larry’s, before finally leaving. Once the front door closed, Connor got to work.

“Is this all of the money?” he whispered in Larry’s ear. When the junkie didn’t answer him, he tapped the man’s skull with the butt of the pistol just hard enough to get him to forget his balls and worry about his brain. “Is this all of the money?”

“Ye—yes!” Larry yelled.

Connor turned the barrel to Larry’s face, forcing the dealer to look down the dark tunnel that would explode and send bits of his skull and brains all over the walls.

“I fucking swear, man!” Larry screamed.

Connor punched him in the jaw. The light went out of the junkie’s eyes as he lost consciousness. Connor wondered about his luck, if it would run out soon. He’d been lucky that it had been a cold, gray day, with no traffic on the streets he needed to walk. Lucky that the front door had been unlocked and that Larry had been engaged in whatever sex he’d been attempting to engage in. Lucky that he didn’t have to hurt the woman, or tear the house up looking for the money. As icing on the cake, lucky that the single punch to Larry’s jaw had knocked him out long enough for Connor to flip him on his stomach and bind his arms and legs.