Blues Highway Blues (A Crossroads Thriller Book 1) Page 32

  The shot hit Potbelly in the crown of the skull. He dropped straight to his knees, let out a little squeal like a spiked boar, and fell dead on his side.

  “This is my fault,” Preezrakevich said with a heavy sigh, the still-smoking pistol dangling casually from his hand. “Do you see? To replace you, Moog, I go hire army.” He looked around to take stock of his corpse-strewn balcony. “Always go with quality.” He nodded, like he was making that point to himself. “Always the quality. Of course, there is still Rollo here,” he gestured at the Viking who was now standing behind him like an oak tree with its branches folded across an impossibly broad trunk. Filat barely came up to his prized bull’s belt buckle and together they looked like they were participating in some twisted Take Your Evil Son to Evil Work Day event. “I think you two will work good together.”

  “We’re not done, you and me,” Moog yelled. “Not by a long shot.”

  Preezrakevich turned back to him. “Da, we are. You fuck up. I forgive. That’s all done now.” He looked over at Daniel, who was still on the ground. “Now take care of him. And make it huuuuurt.” He purred the word like the thought of it excited him.

  “You forgive me?” Moog growled. “I give you eight motherfucking years. And then you send these backwoods, redneck motherfuckers after me, and you forgive me?”

  “Moog. You talk crazy now. It’s not personal. Just bees-ness.”

  “Not personal? Taking my goddamn life is not personal? How much more personal can it get than taking a man’s—” His own words stuck in his throat, choked him, and brought him to a stop. How could it get more personal? He thought back to the lives he’d taken in the Russian’s employ. His voice was soft and tired. “I’m done. I done everything you paid me to do, but I ain’t workin’ on your farm no more.”

  “Done?” The thought of it made the little Russian chuckle like a murderous elf. “You think you just retire from me? From Filat Preezrakevich?” The thought enraged him. “You not done, until I tell you. Do you understand me,” his eyes flared, “boy!”

  “Now that’s the second time you called me that. I let the first one slide because, goddamn it, I deserved it—bein’ your bitch and all. That second one there is a professional courtesy. But you call me ‘boy’ again and it’s gonna be your motherfucking ass that’s going airborne over that railing.”

  “Are you threat-een-ing me, Moog?” the Russian asked. “Do you think you frighten me?”

  There was one thing Moog was absolutely sure of. “I terrify you.”

  “No, Moog.” The little man slid on his best poker face. “You make me wonder how I ever put faith in you.” He stared into the big man’s eyes. “Boy!”

  The Russian turned to look way up at the giant with the Nordic tattoo across the bridge of his nose. “Show me what you can do.”

  Moog and the Viking rushed at one another and the two men collided like a thunder clap, but it was Rollo who drove Moog backward.

  Moog couldn’t remember the last time he wasn’t the biggest man in the fight and so it took him by surprise to find himself falling backward through the air. His size and strength had allowed him to move through life fearlessly, certain that his force was more than enough to enforce his will, and so he was caught momentarily off guard to be the one on his back with someone else straddling his chest.

  Rollo’s fist landed on the left side of Moog’s face like a wrecking ball. It was not the only punch Moog had ever taken, but he’d never taken one like it before. The whole world seemed to skip a frame, as if life were a badly scratched DVD.

  The second punch was even harder and opened Moog’s nose like a Mount St. Helens of blood. It was just a busted nose, but for the very first time in his life, the blood filling his mouth and running into his eyes left him to ponder something he’d never even considered before: he might lose this fight.

  It was more than that. He might die. Actually die.

  It made him angry. And maybe even scared.

  Before a third punch could fall, Daniel rushed across the balcony and threw himself on Rollo’s back, knowing all he could hope to offer Moog was a momentary distraction.

  The Viking flung Daniel across the balcony deck like a petulant child throwing a stuffed bear. But in the split second that the giant’s attention was diverted, Moog reached up and grabbed Rollo’s head, a hand on either side. And instant later, Rollo howled in agony as two black thumbs burrowed into his eye sockets.

  Tears of dark red blood streamed down the Viking’s face as he cleared Moog’s hands away from his face and focused his fury into a third punch. Moog survived it but knew he wouldn’t remain conscious if there was a fourth. And if he got knocked out, Moog was certain he would die.

  The Viking raised his hand, but there was no fourth punch coming. This time his right hand was filled with the handle of an Arkansas pig-sticker, a jagged-blade knife about a foot and a half long he’d had sheathed beneath his leather jacket.

  Moog wondered if this was what all those others had felt when he’d been the one delivering the beating, when he’d been the one taking their lives. Had the pain been as intense for them? Had they’d been as frightened of losing themselves in the spiraling abyss of shock? Had they’d been as terrified of the inevitable end, the dark finality that was waiting to close them out?

  And if they had, Moog wondered, why the hell hadn’t they fought harder?

  As the blade descended, Moog reached up with his left hand and seized Rollo’s wrist, struggling to keep the blade from plunging into his racing heart. With the knife’s steel tip just inches from his chest, Moog reached up with his right hand and cupped it around the back of the Viking’s head.

  In what seemed like a scene from Backwoods Man Love, Moog pulled the Viking’s face down to his open mouth, but it was no kiss of passion. Rollo roared in pain for what seemed like a full minute. When he finally managed to free himself from Moog’s toothy grip, the Nordic tattoo across the bridge of his nose was completely gone. Moog rolled to his side, gagged, and spit it out.

  Instinctively, Rollo’s left hand searched his face in vain for the nose that had been there only a second ago. In its place was a deep hole and a geyser of blood.

  By the time the Viking could refocus his thoughts and seek a target for his rage, Moog had already gotten back to his feet with a catlike nimbleness anyone would have thought beyond a man of his size. Rollo’s bloodied eyes burned with a lust for revenge, but it was already too late for him.

  Moog seized the Viking’s knife hand and twisted it back until it snapped; the size of the limb only amplified the disturbing crack of a human bone breaking, as the Rollo-size knife dropped to the ground. Moog pushed forward on the broken arm he still held and drove his victim to the ground. Then with his left hand, he picked up the fallen blade.

  Moog let go of the Viking’s useless arm, grabbed a handful of the man’s long, blond hair, and pulled back until the soft, tattoo-covered flesh of his throat was exposed. He pressed the sharpened steel of the blade against his throat. It was now just a matter of simple anatomy. Or basic butchery.

  But because their struggle had become intimate and personal, because Moog had surrendered his prized professionalism, he didn’t slit the man’s throat as he normally would have. Instead, he leaned forward and spoke into the giant’s ear. “I was the baddest motherfucker before you came on the scene, and I’m still going to be the baddest motherfucker long after you’re dead.”

  The brief monologue took about four seconds to deliver. Not long, but it was all the time the Viking needed to reach for the small .22 he kept in his back pocket for just such unforeseen emergencies. Moog—concentrating more on settling the score than taking care of business—never noticed.

  BANG! The concussion of the shot echoed in the valley of the Strip so that it sounded like there were dozens of shots, one right after the other.

  The Viking dropped his .22. It made a small, tinny sound as it hit the deck. Then he lurched forward and fell from Moog’s grasp to
the balcony. There was a bright red bullet hole in the left side of his head and an exit wound, bigger and redder, in the right.

  Moog looked across the deck and was startled to see Daniel standing there, Ponytail’s pistol still smoking in his hand. “He was going for a gun,” Daniel said, pointing out the fallen weapon.

  “Didn’t I just tell you I didn’t want you doing nothing for me?” Moog exploded. “Didn’t we just have that exact conversation?”

  “He was going to shoot you.”

  “I had that shit handled,” the big man insisted.

  Daniel didn’t want to fight about it, but still. “He was going to shoot you.”

  “This ain’t through,” Moog said, pointing a warning figure toward Daniel. But he had other business that needed settling first.

  His face was already swelling and the beating he’d gotten had left his senses whirling around his head like a child’s gyroscope. Splattered with blood—some of it his own—Moog lumbered toward the Russian.

  “You always best,” Filat said, his voice tinged with nostalgia. “But even you not better than bullet.” He raised the pistol he’d used to stop Potbelly’s desertion and aimed it at Moog’s chest.

  “Neither are you.” Daniel stood off to the side with Ponytail’s pistol still in his hand and the Russian’s head in his sights.

  “So,” Filat said with a toothy grin, trying not to let on that he hadn’t anticipated these turns of events. “We have the Mexican stand-you-off?”

  “We don’t have any fucking stand-off, ’cause I’m not with him,” Moog said angrily, pointing back at Daniel.

  “But I’m still going to shoot you if you shoot Moog,” Daniel warned the Russian.

  “And I will shoot Moog if you don’t put gun down.” Filat raised his pistol higher, trying to illustrate just how serious he was.

  “I’m not going to put my gun down.” The suggestions didn’t even make sense to Daniel. “I mean, he’s still the guy you sent to kill me.”

  “Thank you,” Moog acknowledged as if he’d just made some long-denied point.

  Daniel continued, “The guy who’s been hunting me for two weeks.”

  “Eleven days,” Moog cut in again.

  “But I am going to shoot you afterward. So, I think that calls your bluff.” Daniel flashed a satisfied smile. “Doesn’t seem like you’ve got much of a hand there.”

  The Russian, however, had a grin of his own. “You forget one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I always have card up sleeve,” he said slyly.

  “I don’t see any card.” Daniel took a deep breath and tried to ready himself to take his shot.

  “No, of course not,” the Russian laughed. “He’s over there.”

  “Hola, pendejos!” The voice was little more than a crackling whisper but instantly recognizable just the same. Everyone left alive on the balcony turned as Rabidoso stepped out of the shadows. He had a cervical collar around his broken neck and a pistol in his hand. “Did you really think Santa Muerte would let me die?” If his throat hadn’t been crushed the words would’ve come out as a triumphant, thunderous shout. Instead, they were merely a barely intelligible croaking. “Did you think she would let someone like you claim my soul?”

  “Didn’t figure you had a soul to claim,” Moog said, wiping blood from his face.

  “Of course, the blessed lady requires a soul for a soul,” Rabidoso hissed. “I thought I’d give her this one.” Without diverting his attention he reached back into the dark shadows and pulled out a living but beaten body.

  “Zack!” Daniel’s heart fell.

  And Moog saw Daniel’s pistol dip too. “Keep your goddamn shot!” he yelled loudly enough to recapture his attention. “It’s the only chance any of us got!”

  “You have no chance,” Filat chimed in. “What’s this sound I hear now?” He cupped his free hand to his ear for effect. “I think I hear fat lady. Singing!”

  Daniel was too overwhelmed to respond.

  “I knew it would come to this,” Rabidoso rasped. “I never enjoyed killing anything as much as I’m going to enjoy killing you two.” He put the muzzle of his pistol to Zack’s temple. “Put down the gun.”

  On his knees, with a gun to his head, Zack’s eyes filled with tears as he looked for his salvation. “Dad!”

  “Don’t do it,” Moog yelled at Daniel. “Focus on your target.”

  “Dad?”

  “Drop the gun!” Rabidoso’s hoarse whisper was louder and angrier. He pressed the gun harder until its target winced.

  “Dad, please!”

  Daniel looked at his boy on his knees and then back to the pistol in his hand.

  “Drop the fucking gun!”

  “Dad! Please!”

  Rabidoso thumbed back the hammer. “Your last chance, papi.”

  “Dad!”

  “Focus on the fucking target!”

  “Drop it!”

  “Dad!”

  The screaming became an assault on his senses, a cacophonous chorus of voices, all demanding his attention and compliance. And yet the only thing Daniel heard clearly was Mr. Atibon’s voice in his head. “No man got possession over Judgment Day. You can try hidin’ from Death, but the only thing you’ll miss out on is Life.”

  Daniel let Filat out of his pistol’s sight and aimed at Rabidoso’s chest.

  “That’s how it is, puta?” Rabidoso reacted to the challenge. “You think you got the cojones?” In his bravado, he took the gun from Zack’s head and threw his arms in the air, daring Daniel to take the shot. When he saw that Daniel was ready to do just that, he ducked back behind his hostage.

  “Zack,” Daniel called out to his son. “I need you to do something for me now. I need you to trust me.”

  There wasn’t a lot of confidence in the young man’s desperate eyes. “Please, Dad. Just do what he says. He’s going to kill me.”

  “That’s right. I’m going to kill him,” Rabidoso confirmed.

  Daniel ignored them both. “Zack. Listen to me. I need you to get to your feet.”

  “Dad,” the boy pleaded. “I can’t.”

  “That’s right,” Rabidoso told him. “Don’t you move.”

  “I know you feel that way,” Daniel continued patiently. “But you can’t do anything when you’re down on your knees.”

  “He can’t do anything anyways,” Rabidoso called back.

  Daniel wasn’t listening. “This trip you sent me on, Zack, it taught me that no matter what, you’ve got to get up on your feet.”

  “What are you doing, man?” Rabidoso asked. “I already killed your son once, you think I won’t—”

  “Don’t listen to him, Zack. Get up off your knees.” Daniel’s voice was stronger than his son had ever heard it before. “Get to your feet.”

  And to his own surprise, Zack found himself rising to his full height. He towered over Rabidoso, who wasn’t sure what was happening. “You think I won’t—”

  “Now just put him out of your way.” Daniel explained, as if dealing with an armed killer was just that easy.

  “Are you crazy, man?” Rabidoso put his gun back to Zack’s head. “I will kill him right here, right now!”

  “Put this fear out of your life,” Daniel instructed. “Push it out of your way and there won’t be anything you can’t do. You’ll own your life.”

  “Don’t do it, man,” Rabidoso warned.

  “Dad!”

  “Zack!”

  In an instant, Zack turned and pushed Rabidoso back. If the assassin hadn’t been broken and bruised and bandaged, he certainly would have killed Daniel’s son; maybe he would have killed Daniel too.

  But “ifs” and “maybes” don’t matter to desperate dads. Or the laws of physics.

  Rabidoso staggered back a step or two and then looked down at the wound in the center of his chest. “San Amado. Como podría usted me va a entregar?” His voice was small, like the child he’d never been. No one was quite sure what he’d
asked, but a second shot answered the question just the same. And then just like an old man had once promised him, Rabidoso’s head went BOOM!

  A second later Daniel’s pistol was trained on the Russian again, and this time the threat was much more menacing.

  A gloating grin spread across Moog’s face as he slowly approached Filat. “Looks like my ace in the hole just trumped the fuck out of the card up your sleeve.”

  His pistol hit the ground and his hands floated harmlessly above his head. “W-w-w-wait minute, Moog,” Filat stammered.

  The big man was not in a waiting mood. “You want to see someone go over this railing so badly, check it out your own damn self.” He swept the tiny Russian up into his arms and carried him over toward the railing.

  “Moog,” he squealed as he squirmed. “I have money. Here. In suite. All yours.”

  The big man hoisted his former employer up over his head like he was doing a squat and clear. “I’m not interested in your money anymore.”

  “Moog,” he begged. “Be reasonable. Be businessman.”

  “I’m done doing your business,” he declared. “I ain’t nobody’s boy no more.”

  Three and a half seconds later a dull thud echoed above the traffic noises of the Vegas Strip. Down below they could hear screeching tires and a woman screaming, but neither Daniel nor Moog bothered to look over the railing.

  Instead, Daniel went to his son, hugging him and then checking him up and down. He was bruised, but nothing that wouldn’t heal with time. “Are you all right?”

  “I think so.” Zack felt exhausted and elated at the same time. “What the hell happened here?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Daniel tried to reassure him. “It’s over now.”

  “Is that what you think?” Both Daniel and Zack turned to the booming voice behind them. A pistol dangled from Moog’s hand. “There’s close to a million dollars in that amp. Another five in the suite. And you two are my one-way ticket to a lifetime stay at High Desert State Penitentiary. You think you’re just going to walk out of here?”

  “Moog?” Daniel considered the pistol in his own hand and the man he was hoping he wouldn’t have to shoot. “What are you doing?”