Enforcer (11 page)

“Listen, Larry, I know we aren’t friends,” Connor said, his own head pounding enough to make him wonder if this was what having a stroke felt like. “We are business associates, and I’m going to give you some business advice. When I come back next week, she better not have that collar on her neck, or I’m going to put it on yours, hook a chain to it, and then tie the chain to the back of the car. Petre here would love to drive you around the block a few times.”

Petre chuckled at this, and got a glare from Larry.

“And I better see those bruises going away. I’m not going to tell you not to pimp her ass out to all your buddies and customers. I’m just telling you, no more collar, no more hitting her. You had better tell your pals that she’s off-limits when it comes to bruises as well, or they’ll be wearing the collar while trying to keep up with Petre’s crazy driving.”

“Fuck you,” Larry said through bloody lips. “You can’t tell me shit.”

“Wrong answer, buddy,” Connor said and smashed Larry’s nose with his elbow.

“All right! All right. Fuck.”

“Repeat after me,” Connor said. “No more collar, no more beatings.”

“No more collar. No more beatings,” Larry said, bleeding from three different areas of his face. “Why the fuck do you care? She’s just a stupid whore. Nothing but a dopehead whore.”

“Because she’s a human fucking being,” Connor said, and punched Larry in the stomach, causing the junkie to throw up near Petre’s shoes. Petre took a step back. “I don’t give a shit that she’s a whore. But human beings don’t wear collars. And they don’t. Deserve. To. Be. Beat.” Each word was punctuated by a fist to Larry’s face.

Connor let go of the junkie’s hair and stood up. He walked to the dirty kitchen and looked for a towel or napkin to clean the blood from his hands and elbow. He couldn’t find anything except garbage and dirty dishes strewn everywhere. He turned on the faucet and washed the blood off, walked back to Larry when he was done, and wiped his hands on the back of the meth head’s shirt.

He looked over at Jera. She finished separating and stacking the money. Connor walked to the counter, thumbed through the stacks, then pocketed the money.

“If he hits you again, I want you to run to the Gas-Mart down the road. Do you know where it is?” he asked her.

Jera nodded her head but refused to look at Connor. He reached out and grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at him.

“What did I just say?” he asked.

“To run to the gas station if he hits me,” she said, trying to force her head down.

“I’m going to tell every clerk on every shift that if you come in, they are to call me or my friend here, and to keep you safe until one of us arrives. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” Jera mumbled.

“I mean it. You run to the gas station, I don’t care if you are naked and bleeding. They’ll keep you safe until we get there. You don’t deserve this. You don’t deserve
him
,” Connor said, looking at Larry, who returned his stare with one that contained fantasies of slow torture and death.

He let go of her chin and stepped back toward Petre. Jera immediately ran to Larry, fell to her knees and put her arms around him. Connor thought Larry would shove her off, but Larry decided he’d had enough punishment for one day. His eyes never left Connor’s face.

Petre thumbed the hammer of the pistol forward and put the gun into its holster. He gave Larry a look that said
I’m sad I didn’t get to put a few rounds into your face
. Larry didn’t notice. He was still staring at Connor with hatred. Connor clapped his partner on the shoulder and said, “Let’s go.”

*****

“I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t do that,” the assistant manager said to Connor.

“Listen, Jake,” Connor said, reading the man’s name tag, “There’s a girl who is in a lot of trouble. If she comes in here, whether in five minutes, or at three in the morning a month from now, whoever is on duty is to keep her safe and call me or my friend.” Connor handed the man a piece of paper with two phone numbers on it.

“But—”

“No buts,” Petre said, towering over the man. He leaned forward until his face was inches from Jake’s. “Do as my friend asks. We will make it worth your while, I promise.”

Jake’s eyes bulged as Petre leaned back and his coat opened just enough for the gun and holster to be visible.

“Listen, friend,” Connor said again, getting the man’s attention, “He doesn’t mean we’ll bring
you
trouble. He means we’ll make it worth your while. This girl, she’s important to us. You wouldn’t want to see anything bad happen to your mother, or sisters, or wife would you?”

Jake took it as a threat and began to shake.

“That’s not what I meant,” Connor said, trying again. “I meant, you wouldn’t want to see someone doing bad things to your sisters or wife or mother and no one would help her if she was in trouble, would you? If this girl comes in, she’ll be in trouble. Not police trouble. Trouble that comes from a man’s fists. I’m sure you can agree that no woman should be subject to such things, right?” he asked as he dropped a hundred dollar bill into the front pocket on of Jake’s bright blue Gas-Mart vest.

“Nuh…nuh…no,” the assistant manager said, looking at Connor’s face, then Petre’s, then back again as Connor slid another hundred into the vest pocket.

“Good. Make sure,” Connor continued, another hundred making its way into the vest pocket, “that every employee in this nice little store you got here understands. Make sure they all have the numbers I gave you. Make sure they know that if we find out she came to you for help, and we didn’t get the call… well, it won’t be hundreds we are putting in their pocket.”

Petre clapped the man on the shoulder hard, making Jake squeak and jump at the same time. Jake flinched as Petre brought his hand up, but relaxed when Petre put yet another hundred in the man’s vest pocket.

“Every week we will come by and make sure you remember your promise,” Connor told him. “As long as you are willing to help us and possibly this girl out, we’ll keep helping you and your employees out. You aren’t having any trouble with the local gangbangers or dope heads are you?”

“Nuh…no. Not really,” Jake replied.

“Is that a no? Or is that a yes, but you don’t want to say anything because you are afraid it will mean more trouble?” Connor asked.

“I don’t want any trouble. I have two kids. Mikey over there has three,” Jake said, nodding toward the clerk at the counter. “Please. We don’t want any problems. We’ll call if the girl shows up.”

“Good. I’m glad, Jake, that we could come to an agreement,” Connor said, slipping one last hundred into the man’s pocket.

Petre raised his eyebrows at Connor, who nodded.

“This girl must be really important,” Jake said, finally realizing that he’d been given five hundred dollars for promising to call the two men in front of him if a dark-skinned, short-haired girl showed up in need of help.

“Very,” Petre said with a smile.

*****

“Four hundred dollars,” Petre whistled as they drove back to Boise. “This girl, she is in your head.”

“Maybe,” Connor said, staring out the window. He looked over at Petre. “I’m pretty sure I saw you drop a hundred in there. Maybe she’s in your head as well.”

Petre laughed. “I was just helping you. You have no food, no furniture, no car. I think maybe you needed help.”

“You
thought
I needed help,” Connor corrected. “And thank you, but I had it covered.”

“Ah, great hockey player has money stashed under his mattress, saving to buy his own team?”

“Nah,” Connor answered. “Saving it for a rainy day.”

“It might rain soon,” Petre said, both of them thinking about Jera.

CHAPTER 10

Connor streaked down the left wing, easily leaving two of the Swedes behind, leaving the lone defenseman to try to keep him to the outside. Connor’s speed was too great, forcing the defenseman to continue skating backwards as he drove around him toward the net. He watched the goalie’s stick begin a poke check, and easily flipped the puck over it. The instant the puck touched the ice again, Connor shot it into the back of the net. He felt the goalie’s stick catch him in the ankle, saw the red goal light come on, and heard the crowd erupt into pandemonium as the puck hit the nylon netting.

He tried to brace himself for impact, but his inertia was too great, his mind still marveling at the dekes he’d put on the defenseman, marveling even more that he’d lifted the puck perfectly and was able to finish, tying the game. He felt his back hit the boards at full speed, and had a fraction of a second to wonder how he’d been able to avoid dislocating or breaking something when the defenseman he’d burned slid into him.

White-hot, searing pain erupted in his right leg. He looked down, confused as to what he was seeing at first. The defenseman’s skate was lodged inside Connor’s protective pants, the icy metal blade resting against the muscle of his thigh. He didn’t even notice the blood at first, until he realized that the skate stuck in his pant leg had butterflied his thigh, the skin peeled back and the dark red meat exposed to the air. He watched in horror as a lake of blood formed around him and the defenseman.

He started to black out, feeling detached from his own body. Suddenly he was above his body, looking down at the ruin of his leg and the pool of blood expanding around him. He was scared that he was dying, that he
had
died. Why else would he be above his body just like in all of the near-death experiences he’d heard about. At the same time, he felt at peace. He’d tied the game. His team still had a chance to make the gold medal game.

He drifted away from the ice, through the Zamboni door, down a long corridor, until he came to the locker room. He didn’t remember pushing open the doors, but somehow he was inside, sitting on the bench in front of his locker. He waited for his team to enter the locker room, full of joy at winning the game. Niklas Laarkonen sat on the bench to his left. Niklas hadn’t been there when Connor had appeared in the locker room.

He was about to say something to Niklas when Travis Benkula said from his right, “Good one, Connor. You tied the game. That was a killer move you pulled off.”

Connor stared at Travis, fear growing inside of him.

“The price was high,” Niklas said. “But winning always costs something.”

“Nothing is free,” Travis agreed.

“Was it worth it?” Niklas asked while taking off his bloody skate. “Souvenir?” he asked, holding the skate out to Connor.

“Better hang that on your wall,” Travis said. “It’s going to be worth money some day.”

“You can sell it, maybe make enough to buy your life back,” Niklas agreed.

Travis’s face was black, eyes bloodshot, the white nylon rope now red, blood seeping out from under it where it had cut into his neck. Connor looked back to Niklas. Niklas was still holding the skate out to him, but his eyes were gone, his face rotted away. Worms weaved their way through the defenseman’s cheeks and nasal cavity.

“You’re dead,” Connor whispered, trying to back into his locker.

“No,” Travis said, “You’re dead.”

“Look at your leg,” Niklas taunted.

Connor looked down. His leg had been sliced open from knee to his groin. The exposed muscles made him nauseated. The blood pumping out of his femoral artery and onto the locker room floor made him scream.

“It’s not so bad,” Travis said as if he were talking about a movie he’d just seen. “Not as bad as what you did to me, anyway.”

“You got off easy,” Niklas agreed.

“It looks pretty serious,” Travis said, reaching over, pinching the end of the artery to stem the flow of blood. “You should probably get that looked at.”

“I didn’t kill you,” Connor said, black spots forming in front of his eyes.

“Yes you did. But hey, at least I was murdered by The Cannon. I have to hand it to you. I didn’t even see it coming. Your buddy Dracul, he’s a pro.”

“Bullshit!” Connor screamed.

“You at least got it quick and easy,” Niklas said to Travis. “Connor tricked me. He let me believe I could live, that I could be happy again.”

“Noooo!” Connor screamed. “I didn’t kill you!”

“Yes you did, friend,” Niklas said, shaking his head, dropping the bloody skate at Connor’s feet. “You made me believe I could be a star. All I got was a steering wheel through my chest.”

Niklas’ chest was a gaping ruin, the white of shattered ribs poking through muscle and skin, organs spilling out onto the floor. The worms had migrated from the Swede’s face down into his chest cavity. Connor noticed that one of the defenseman’s legs below the knee was missing, the other a mangled wreck, barely recognizable as the remnants of a foot and shin.

“I didn’t kill you!” Connor screamed over and over.

Travis laid a hand on Connor’s shoulder, his blackened face stretched in a terrifying smile, smoke rising from skin that began to melt off.

“You killed us. Now it’s your turn,” Travis told him.

*****

Connor woke up screaming. He had no idea how long it went on, only aware of what he was doing after his throat began to burn. He clamped his jaw shut, his entire body shuddering, sheets soaked and pasted to his skin. Connor reached down to his right thigh, expecting it to be sliced open and bleeding, the wet sheets soaked in blood instead of sweat. His fingers traced lightly over the long scar that ran from his knee to just below his groin.