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I’d probably been a little too rough with him. His nose was broken, bloodied, and he was missing some teeth. His eye was already beginning to swell. He was a mess.
Then again, he had tried to goddamned kill me.
And I was sick of it.
I wrapped my bloody knuckles with a bandage from the first aid kit I’d found in the backroom and decided that there was no chance I was sharing; the hit man could bleed out for all I cared. I treated the injury on my wrist and dosed myself up with the strongest analgesics I could find in the box.
Damn it.
I double-checked that the ropes I’d tied around the man’s ankles and wrists were secure. He’d, thankfully, stayed unconscious on the way here. And it’d been early enough that I managed to drag him through the streets of Sector Six with only one or two witnessing, but avoiding seeing, the clearly bloodied man being carried over my shoulder. Not that anyone would report me; no-one was a grass in Sector Six. And they certainly didn’t want to get involved.
I’d taken the hitman the one place I knew we’d be left alone.
Hell.
The abandoned bar previously run by my deceased lover hadn’t changed in its discarded year, a year since Sam had sacrificed himself. It’d been boarded up and left to rot. It’d been left with the gaudy year-round Halloween decorations I’d hated still on the walls, left with the cheap furniture, the dodgy lighting and even some dated booze behind the counter. I popped open a dusty bottle of whiskey and took a swig.
I’d thought about taking the comatose man to my apartment but had decided against it; not only was I too lazy to drag him up the staircase but I didn’t want to make my place even messier than it already was. I was going to do what the police wouldn’t. Suede and Johnson had wasted their chance with the last person that’d tried to kill me, the crossbow assassin, and they’d found out nothing. I was going to interrogate this damned bastard. Properly.
I was talking the law into my own hands, for now, and I’d turn him into the cops once I had some answers. I’d damned well better get some answers.
I stood back from the man, and moved back to the counter, leaving him alone in the centre of the floor. I’d need to wait for him to wake. I took another swig of whiskey and lit a cigarette and I hoped I hadn’t hit him too hard or too much. I’d punched him over and over when he’d jumped me. I took a long drag and blew the smoky cloud in his direction. I wasn’t concerned about his damned health, just his ability to reply to my questions.
This cheap whiskey was goddamned vile. I chugged a little more and swallowed. It would have to do; I needed to take the edge off.
And I waited.
And waited.
No more. I’d finished off the bottle of booze and smoked a selection of cigarettes, and I didn’t want to wait any longer. I needed to speed things along. Smelling salts. That’s what I needed. Or bleach. I just needed to find something with a strong enough smell to bring the sleeping man back to the waking world. I rummaged through the cupboards and shelves behind the bar, and aside from a bigger selection of dusty bottles, I found nothing. Most of the assets had been cleared out before the place had been boarded up. I was surprised the remaining surplus hadn’t been robbed. But maybe there was a cleaning closet with what I needed.
I circled the counter and headed to the toilets; if there was a closet it would be near the bathrooms at the back.
A groan made me a pause.
He was coming round.
I stepped toward the man and knelt in front of him. “Come on,” I said. I gently tapped his cheeks to try and bring him to. “Wakey, wakey.”
Another groan escaped and his head tilted upward a little before his chin dropped back down to his chest.
“Oh no you don’t.” I rapped his face, a little harder this time. “Wake up you damned bastard!” I slapped him but to no avail. “Goddammit,” I sighed to myself.
He fell back into unconsciousness.
I’d had enough.
I had a better idea. I returned to the bar and rather than looking for some bleach in the cleaning closet, I rummaged through the first aid kit I’d used to dress my knuckles and wrist. I found what I was looking for almost immediately. A small cannister of stimulant and the contents were still in date, not that it mattered.
I rushed back to my prisoner and stabbed him in the thigh with the injector. The cylinder hissed. I stabbed him again and the hitman screamed. Twice the recommended dose. It was a sure way of getting what I needed from him. Regan was goddamned dead, and I needed answers. Any answers.
I watched as the man I’d tied to the chair came to fully realise his situation; his scream died down, his eyes darted around the room, he looked me up and down, tried to move and free himself but his attempts were ineffective. His gaze, bloodied from my punches, settled on me.
“Good morning sleepyhead,” I said with a faded grin.
“Fuck...” His voice was quiet and desiccated. “It’s you.” He swallowed, hard, as if trying to suck out the meagre moisture from his mouth and into his gullet. “Gemini...”
I withdrew a cigarette from my jacket pocket, raised it to my mouth and, holding it between my lips, lit up. I took a slow and deep drag and blew smoke toward the man. “I want answers,” I said.
“Water...” he croaked.
I took another drag of my cigarette. I looked the man up and down. He wore all black, jumper and trousers, plus soft shoes. I’d emptied his pockets, the contents sat on a nearby table, and all he’d had on him was a strip of paper with my name, a SmartBoy and, aside from the machete he’d attacked me with, a small dagger. He didn’t look like a hitman, but then again, they never did; his battered face wasn’t exactly handsome, but rather plain underneath all the cuts and bruises. ‘Hitman’ tended to conjure up images of rough men with stubble and a face like a slapped arse. This man was not that. He looked boring, an accountant that I could easily imagine doing my taxes. Not that I hired anyone to do my taxes.
“Water...” he repeated and coughed.
I studied his face; aside from being caked in blood, his lips were dry and cracked. I’d really gone to town on the guy. His eyes pleaded for sympathy, and I gave in.
Damn it.
I found a bottle of water, probably stale but I didn’t care, from behind the counter and took it to my attacker. I held his head back and poured it over his lips. Dried blood softened and he drank as much of his own blood as he did the water. He lapped it up greedily.
I took it from him knowing he needed and wanted more.
“Who hired you?” I took a puff of my cigarette, almost a stub left, and flicked the remains to the floor. “Tell me.”
He shook his head.
I swung my fist back and punched. He grunted, spluttered, as I slammed into his gut. “Tell me,” I said.
“I... I can’t...”
I punched him again in his soft middle. “Goddamned tell me.” Regan’s death... I couldn’t let it be meaningless.
“I... I...”
“Is it the Victor?” I held my knuckles close to his face. “Did they pay you to kill me?”
“I don’t know,” he said, pain evident in each word. “I don’t know who hired me.” He spat blood, his gums were bleeding from the beating I’d already given him; reddish spittle landed in a glob to his left. “That’s not how it works.”
“Oh? How does it work then?”
“Look, I wasn’t hired to kill you.”
I hit him in the stomach again and he threw up; it was just water, some blood, and it cascaded down his jumper.
He coughed, gasping and ridding himself of the remnants of whatever he’d heaved. “It’s true,” he croaked. “I was told to scare you away from the Delartes case.”
“Attacking me with a machete wasn’t supposed to kill me?”
“Just injure you.”
I snorted a laugh. “Injure me? Ha!” I leant close to his face and spoke quieter to force him to really listen to my words. “You won’t stop me from solving this case. And you’re not the first to try; two of you have already failed. One is dead.”
“Are you threatening me?” His voice was coarse and damaged. “I’m not scared.”
“I don’t need to threaten you.” I stepped away and lit another cigarette. “You’re the one tied up.”
I could see cogs turning in his brain as he thought. He opened his mouth to speak but stopped. His brow furrowed. He was considering something, and I decided to help him with his decision.
I slammed my fist into his already broken nose.
“Are you ready to give me some answers? Who do you work for?”
“No-one!” he gasped. “I’m... I don’t...” He spat more blood. “I use a go-between! It’s safer for the client that way; it means the hit can’t be easily traced back to them.”
“Helpful.”
“And don’t think you’ll be able to find them either,” he said. He nodded to his SmartBoy on the table. “The go-between is an encrypted messaging application. I never know who I’m talking to.”
“Goddammit,” I said. “Well, what the hell do you know?”
He shrugged and I punched him in the gut. The man reeled in pain and scrunched into a ball, at least as much of a ball as he could while tied to a chair; I’d winded him. Good. Regan wasn’t going to die for nothing, and I was too tired and exhausted to put up with any bullshit. I needed sleep. I needed answers.
“All I know,” whispered the man. He was clearly hurting from my attack, “is that whoever hired me has something to do with art.”
“Of course it does,” I said. “It’s all about a missing Delartes.”
“What?”
“The Delartes is artwork.”
“Oh,” he said. He straightened up. “I don’t know much about that. The request for the hit came from a forum about art, that’s all I know. Then they, whoever hired me, started messaging me on the go-between.”
“I need more information,” I said. I took his communication device from the table and held it in front of his face. “What did the request say?”
“I can’t remember.”
“And your messages?” I raised my free hand as if to strike. “What do they say?”
“Look mister, I just want to get paid alright? It’s nothing personal.”
“Any mention of a con artist called The Victor?” I asked. “I’ve heard they’ve been showing a lot of interest in the Delartes.”
“The Victor?”
“Yes, The Victor. Are you goddamned stupid?” I realised I was still holding his SmartBoy in front of his face. I dropped my arm to my side. “Were they mentioned in your messages? Or on the forum where you were hired?”
“No.”
“Can you show me?”
“It’s encrypted,” he said. “You’ll need...”
Someone knocked the door. They hammered against the fake wood, a thunderous rapping, banging and thumping; someone really wanted to make their presence known. I tried to ignore them, but it carried on and on.
A well-known voice called out.
“Hey! Jack!” It was Detective Suede. “Open up! I know you’re in there.” His hand thrummed against the door once again. “Jack, we’ve been looking for you! Someone called this into the station. Let us in!”
Goddamned grass.
I pocketed the hitman’s SmartBoy, and it clinked against Regan’s; if I was going to let the cops inside then my interrogation would be over and I’d need to look for another way of finding out what was on the hitman’s device, what messages were on his go-between application. Damn it. But there was some hope of getting some answers; Gary Emmerson might be able to help. He might be able to get through the encryption. If I could trust him, that was, given his connection to the Church. I still needed to find out why he was there that night. I wondered if he know who Greene really was, if that was why he’d talked about forgiving August Smith. Damn it.
The policeman continued to bang the door.
“I think someone really wants to talk to you,” said my prisoner with a smirk.
“Shut up.”
I moved to the door, undid the bolts and opened up. The round face of Detective Suede greeted me; his partner, Johnson peeked over his shoulder with a moronic grin.
“Good morning, Mr Gemini,” said Suede. “You look a mess. Again.” He looked behind me at the hitman I had tied to a chair. He raised an eyebrow. “We have some news but... I think there might be something you need to tell us first?”
“Oh, that guy?” I pointed back with my thumb.
Suede nodded with a frown.
“Hitman,” I said. “Another one.” I stepped back from the doorway and let the two police officers enter. “He attacked me near the Sector Seven fire door.” Johnson quickly moved to my prisoner and started to untie him. “I’m sure if you check the security cameras, you’ll see what happened.”
“I’m sure we will,” said Detective Suede. “In the meantime, I think we need to take you both in for questioning.”
“Wow, Jack,” said Johnson. She’d removed the man from the chair and cuffed him. “You’ve really done a number on him, haven’t you?” My attacker opened his mouth to speak but she silenced him. “Shh, you don’t want to incriminate yourself.”
“Just asked him a few questions,” I said, “that’s all.”
“Must’ve been some tough questions,” she said with a smirk.
“Johnson...,” said Suede. He sighed. “What’ve I told you?”
“Sorry, sir.” She brought the hitman to the door. “I’ll lock him in the autocar.”
Suede and I moved out of her way as she escorted my attacker out and up the steps to the street above. Those damned steps held a lot of memories.
“It’s not his blood on my shirt,” I said as the policeman looked me up and down. “It’s not mine either.”
“Jack, you’re using up a lot of goodwill,” said the large cop. “You should’ve called this in straight away instead of going vigilante.”
“I know, I know, and no offence,” I lit up a cigarette, “but I thought I’d get more answers than you would.”
“No offence? You make us sound incompetent!”
“Not incompetent,” I lied. “You’ve got to stick to rules. I don’t.” I took a deep drag and blew a cloud of smoke into the air.
The other man rolled his eyes. “Are you drunk?”
“Tired,” I said. “I haven’t slept, and a lot has happened in the last twenty-four hours.”
“I can see. And smell it; you stink of booze.”
“I may’ve had a small drink or two to calm my nerves.”
“Two? Two glasses or two bottles?” he said. “You’re a pain in the neck, Jack.”
“Please don’t...” I heard my own voice break and crack as feelings bubbled up. An image of blood spraying from Regan’s neck flashed in front of my eyes. “I... I...”
“Jack.” He placed a hand on my shoulder for comfort and I appreciated the touch. It was unusual behaviour for Suede, but even I could hear the upset in my voice. “What’s happened?”
“I... not now... we’ll talk... later.” I couldn’t. I just couldn’t deal with processing Regan’s death. Or the Smith/Greene situation. I was too tired. Too exhausted. I pushed my heartache down into the depths of my stomach. I cleared my throat. “First tell me why you’ve been looking for me.”
“Okay.” He patted my back. “Bit of a breakthrough on your case,” said the cop. “Well, I say breakthrough, but I don’t think it’s gonna be that helpful.”
“Tell me.”
“The Victor. You mentioned they might be behind the Delartes case? Get this, they did come to the station about nine months ago,” he said. “For a face change. Something they regularly undertake to keep ahead of the authorities. But the interstation police were tracking them. Watched them for almost a whole year. The Victor underwent the procedure and left immediately to head for Space Station Alpha, via Earth.”
“And?”
“They’ve been under surveillance the whole time,” he said. “All their movements followed, all their online activity logged. I’ve been told they were planning to steal the Delartes, even started asking about buyers on the online black web-market, but they didn’t get anywhere with it. They’re still on Alpha, still being watched; they can’t take a shit without someone noticing.”
“Damn it.”
“Yep,” said Suede. “There is no way The Victor has anything to do with your fake artwork case; there’s another culprit at large.”