Fatal (2 page)

He waddled to his kitchenette, grabbed a two-liter bottle of water from the fridge, and walked down a passage to his gym. He glanced at his profile in the mirror. He had full-length mirrors installed around the room, one of the few luxuries he afforded himself. He stood up straight, studying his reflection, and winced. He was strongly built, muscular for a fifty-five-year-old. All except for the wrist on his hand which ended in a pink stump.
Grotesque
.

The room was large and fully kitted out. It had bar- and dumbbells, incline benches, and a spinning bike. A boxing bag hung in the corner. He fixed a Velcro strap to his elbow and tied the end around the stump, then picked up a forty-pound barbell and fitted it to the strap with a buckle.
 
He picked up a fifty-pound barbell with his right hand and started his two-hour-long training session. After half an hour, he wiped the sweat from his brow and flexed his biceps; he was pumped. He took a sip of water and moved closer to the mirror.
 

Perreira scanned the newspaper clipping he had stuck to the mirror. It was written in Portuguese; he had torn it from the
Mozambique Tribune
the day before. It told the story of how Kruger National Park rangers managed to arrest three poachers and kill another at the Lower Sabie rest camp. They had found more than fifty rhino horns. He stared at the photo of four men standing behind the rhino horns, all neatly packed on a plastic tarpaulin. Three were wearing ranger uniforms. The guy on the far right was wearing army fatigues.
 

“Bryden,” he hissed through clenched teeth. Bryden standing there, smirking like an idiot.

He shattered the mirror with his palm.

He pulled his cell phone from his tracksuit pocket and dialed a number. His accountant picked up. They spoke Spanish. “You need to dispose of what’s left of the package. And I need another mirror in my gym.”

The man kept quiet for a while. “Was the package to your liking, boss?”
 

"Yes, I enjoyed it thoroughly. You chose well.” He smiled. “You always bring me such nice gifts.”

The accountant chuckled.
 

Perreira pressed the disconnect button and started training again.

Perreira met his accountant at the Mardi Gras Street Cafe, a modest place with plastic chairs and tables with Formica tabletops. Black and white linoleum tiles covered the floor. In the back stood four booths, two on either side of the room. Perreira ambled towards the booth at the back, trying his hardest to walk without a gait. His left hand was stuck in his pocket. He hated weakness.

He took a seat in the far right facing the entrance. The place filled with tourists in floral shirts and unpressed trousers and businessmen, smoking and reading their morning papers. A waitress dragged two metal poles with a chain in front of the booths. On the chain a sign read “PRIVATE.” These seats were reserved for the owner and his guests. Perreira motioned her over. He asked her to crank up the air conditioner and bring him his usual.
 

Danny Costas, his accountant, was wearing a crumpled navy blue suit jacket with a stained yellow vest underneath. He had dark stubble on his face and a thick black mustache. He sweated profusely, mopping off his brow with a dirty handkerchief. He uncomfortably hauled his bulk into the booth in front of Perreira.

Perreira liked the guy. Reliable, well-connected. They spoke in Spanish, discussing the weather, Pacquiao’s loss to Bradley. Then the accountant cleared his throat and commenced with his weekly report.

Business was good. The container had come through, and the shipment was delivered without a hitch. Their rhino horn supply was good, and demand was higher than ever. “Bryden got our guys in Komatipoort,” the accountant said with a wheezy drawl.

Perreira winced.

“Sorry, boss,” the accountant said and licked his lower lip. “Our operation in Mozambique will be quiet for a month or two, but Tanzania should start delivering soon.”
 

Perreira nodded.
 

The waitress brought two mugs and a large French press with an Ethiopian blend, Perreira's favorite.
 

Costas handed Perreira the silver USB drive. “Callahan sent the numbers in electronic format.” It sounded like he gurgled the words through the back of his throat. “What should we do with the surplus funds? We have twenty million dollars in cash from the arms deal.”

“Where?” Perreira asked.

“Stashed at Lobera’s place.”

Perreira nodded then lit a Marlboro. “Keep half in the country, the other half wired to the Caymans.” He tapped the tabletop with his finger. “Don't tell Callahan. I need some operational funds. Bloody Bryden. I want the bastard and his whole goddamn family wiped from the face of the earth.” Perreira sucked his teeth. “How much of the shipment was lost?”
 

The accountant breathed a husky sigh and pushed the plunger down. “More than half. It's bedded down in Xai-Xai in a fishing boat on the dry dock. Local police have been paid off, but we'll need to get it into China.” He glanced up at Perreira. “Lobera and his crew are becoming greedy. Every shipment cleared is costing us more. They want twenty-five percent of the profit.”

Perreira slapped the tabletop with his palm. “Are you kidding me? Twenty-five percent for stamping a goddamn piece of paper?” he said, turning red. “Do they want us to feed the entire African continent?”

The big man shrugged. “You said it, boss.” The accountant poured the concentrated brew into the mugs, tore open five packets of sugar, and poured them into his mug. He stirred it with his finger. He pushed Perreira's mug towards him — no milk, no sugar.

“OK, tell him I’ll go as high as ten percent. If he has a problem, tell him to come say it to my face.”
 

The accountant nodded, removed a toothpick from his mouth, and proceeded to clean his nails with it.

“Wire Callahan five million. I'll be in the Philippines on Friday. Need to sort out some business.”

“You got it, boss.” The accountant drained the last of his coffee, lifted his bulk from the cubicle, and turned around towards the door.

Perreira yelled at the waitress to bring him his breakfast and to turn the air conditioner down.

Dublin, Ireland

Callahan swirled the cognac in the glass then sniffed the caramelized nose. “One thing the French were good for,” he mumbled.
 

He lifted the glass to his lips and took a tiny sip of the amber liquid. He swallowed painfully. It warmed his throat and trickled down, smooth and viscid like honey. He took another sip.

Callahan sat in his study, or his public library, as he liked to refer to it. Tens of thousands of books were all filed neatly, stacked fifteen shelves high, all the way up to the patterned ceiling. A ladder rolled around on a track, offering a foothold to get to any part of the shelves around three walls of the expansive hall. In the center of the study stood a colossal desk made from Zimbabwean teak. The table was an antique, heavy and polished to a bright sheen. Papers and mementos were scattered over the desk. A chromed Beretta acted as a paperweight to keep the largest stack down, and a wire garrote hung as a painful reminder over the shade of an ornate Victorian lamp.
 

In a corner of the room, Callahan sat in a leather recliner, admiring the fine legs of his drink, holding it to the light of the fire. The room smelled of cigar smoke and leather and opulence. Callahan loved his luxuries.

Callahan picked up a remote and switched on an LCD TV. He flicked through the channels unenthusiastically. He stopped when an image caught his eye and he flipped back a couple of channels. Sky News. Bruce Bryden was on the television, all smug, conducting a television interview somewhere in the African bush. Perreira had briefed him on the shipment that had been lost, and here Bryden was sitting in the open, still alive, all smiles.
 

Callahan picked up his tablet from a side table, opened a browser, and logged into his personal bank account. Five million dollars had been transferred. He would need it all to get the resources Perreira had requested. He trusted Perreira; the man had never let him down before. But the resources he required were difficult to come by. Maybe Metcalfe would be able to help him out; he should get Roebuck involved.

A soft rap on the door, and Callahan peered over his shoulder. A blonde nurse was standing in the doorway. “Are you ready for your treatment, sir?” she asked, eyelashes fluttering.

Callahan switched off the TV and waved her in with a smile. “Nurse Angelique, you're late.” He pretended to scowl. “I was wondering where you were. I need my treatment to be on time.”

The nurse entered the room, pulling a trolley with an oxygen bottle and mask behind her. The top two buttons of her dress were unbuttoned, revealing a lacy black bra.
 

“Sorry I'm late, Mr. Callahan. I had to run some errands for the hospital. You know how demanding they can be.”

Callahan smiled.
Ha! The hospital
. “Sure, no problem, my girl. At least you came. I've been waiting in anticipation.”

She made a fuss of arranging the trolley in front of him, bending forward to open the valve, and fastening the tube to the oxygen mask. He admired her bottom and legs.
 

“Do you have the cash, sir?” she asked, turning around to face him.

Callahan removed a one hundred euro note from his breast pocket. “Have I ever not, nurse Angelique?” he asked with a wink.

She plucked the bill from his fingers and put it in her bra. “Never, sir,” she smiled and unzipped his pants.
 

She fondled him, but he gently took her hand away. “I’ve brought you a present,” he said and bent over, picking up a crop from the floor. He glanced up and grinned, motioning with the crop. “Get undressed.”

Angelique’s eyes widened momentarily, then she slowly undid the buttons to her dress and dropped it to the floor. She undid the clip to her bra, slipped it off, and tossed it onto his lap.

“Kneel here,” he said and tossed a cushion to the ground.

She kneeled in front of him then looked up hesitantly. He stroked the top of her breasts with the tongue of the crop then moved down to her nipples. He slapped her nipples, first softly, then hard.
 

Angelique flinched. “Ouch.”

“Shut up. Get down on all fours.”

She did as she was told. He smacked the crop down hard on her bottom. After the forth smack, she cried out in pain. She sobbed and looked up at Callahan. “You’re hurting me!”

He grinned. “Hurting you?” He pursed his lips and slapped his palm with the shaft of the crop. “You do not know what real pain is.”

Angelique glanced at Callahan and swallowed. Callahan particularly enjoyed the way her lower lip trembled. This was going to be a fun evening.

Barbie Spencer slipped into the alley and entered through the back door of the Temptations escort agency. Gardo, her pimp, did not like the special girls mingling with the walk-in clientele. And she was a special girl.

This agency was different from the others she had worked for. They specialized in what Gardo called “special needs cases.” They had a diverse client base. Each one of them had an ailment of some kind. Palsy, paraplegics, quadriplegics. One client had Down syndrome. All of them were rich, and all of them had their own
special needs
.

The Temptations agency satisfied those needs. You had to know what you were doing with a quadriplegic. The ladies received professional training in the different afflictions and how to treat their clientele properly. Gardo chose his girls well. He wanted tender, gentle girls who genuinely cared for his clients.

Carrie Enhardt looked up as Barbie barged through the door. She sat at a metal desk in the corner. The table was piled with papers, magazines, and makeup. An old-fashioned black phone stood on the desk. “Hi, hon, how was your gig?”

Carrie was Temptations’ receptionist. She also did the bookkeeping. And when the girls needed one, she was a shoulder to cry on.

Barbie tossed her handbag on a battered sofa. She stripped naked and threw her nurse’s uniform and underwear in a large front loader industrial washing machine. She turned the dial and the machine filled with water. “Same old. I honestly thought the guy was going to keel over today. I had to get another oxygen cylinder from the car.”

“Hoo boy, sounds like you made his day. Would you like some coffee?” Carrie asked.

Barbie put her hand to her throat and covered her breasts with her arm. “He hit me.”

“He what? Where?”

She turned around and showed Carrie her buttocks. Large blue welts were turning green and yellow. “He used a horse whip, the type jockeys use.”

“A crop?”

Barbie nodded.

“Why?” Carried asked.

“He was into that kind of stuff,” she said and sniffed, wiping her eyes with the palms of her hands.
 

Carrie shuffled towards Barbie with outstretched arms. She wore a pair of slippers and what looked like an oversized, shapeless white frock. “You’re not going back to that guy.”

Barbie hugged Carrie, resting her cheek on her shoulder. “I’m never going back. He’s taking it too far.”