Pascal sat on a bench on the Brighton Cove boardwalk, watching the rain come down. He had found a sheltered spot by a pavilion. The observation deck, supported by brick pillars, provided a roof over his head. From this vantage point he could watch the boardwalk in both directions as he waited for the arrival of the man named Kurt.
It had not been easy to persuade Kurt to join him. The fellow was as skittish as a kitten. Plainly he was terrified of Bonnie Parker, sure that having escaped death at her hands once, he could not risk a second encounter.
His fear competed with his hatred. He wanted her to die, and he wanted to see it happen, but he was afraid to be anywhere near her. Pascal had required all his diplomatic skills to seal the deal.
“Are you shitting me?” the man had asked more than once.
Pascal had kept his voice low and soothing. “We have a common interest, a common objective. And she will not be expecting a second man.”
“I don’t know ...”
“There will be no danger. I will do the actual killing. You will serve merely as a diversion.”
“As bait?” The man’s voice jumped with panic. “That what you mean?”
“Not as bait. There will be no risk to you. I have it all worked out.”
This was true. He had worked it out in that moment, his mind accessing some stratagem perhaps tested in another incarnation.
“You’re sure it’s safe?” the wheedling voice pressed.
“Absolutely. You will come to no harm. And you will see Bonnie Parker die. That is worth something, is it not?”
“Yeah.” Pascal could actually hear the man lick his lips like a starved animal. “Yeah, it’s worth a lot.”
They had said a few more rewords, making their introductions. The man was Kurt, just Kurt. Pascal considered using an alias but decided it was unnecessary. He had already taken a dislike to Kurt, and he expected to eliminate the man after his usefulness was exhausted. This was a point he prudently did not mention.
Kurt agreed to meet him by the pavilion, which lay across the street from the parking lot where Pascal had stashed his car.
Even so, he still could not be certain Kurt would come. The man was a coward, obviously, and he could easily back out.
He was also a fool. He had not learned the most elementary rule of the hunt, to keep one’s emotions in check. It was perfectly all right to hate one’s adversary, Pascal knew, but the hate must be cold, ice cold—as cold as his own hands.
To the north, lightning flared, seconded by a whipcrack of thunder. Spiderweb traceries of fire lit up the bellies of churning storm clouds, casting the earth in sharp relief. In the sudden unnatural glare, a figure stood revealed, far down the boardwalk, coming this way.
Pascal peered past the plunging curtains of rain. Dimly he made out a man in a tan raincoat and baseball cap. He walked slowly, stiffly, each stride an effort. His left leg was unnaturally stiff. But he was coming. Kurt had not failed him.
It took a long time for the man to cover the remaining distance. Pascal waited, patient as a trapdoor spider. Even when Kurt had crossed under the observation deck and stopped, staring at him, Pascal made no move to rise. To greet him, to show the slightest deference, would be a sign of weakness. With a man like this, it was necessary to establish dominance early. Once instituted, it would never be challenged.
“Is that you?” Kurt said finally. It was the same hoarse rasp Pascal had heard on the phone.
Pascal nodded. He waited for Kurt to approach him. The man seated himself tentatively on the bench, choosing the spot farthest from Pascal, not making eye contact. Good. Very good.
“I am pleased you came, my friend,” Pascal said.
“Still not sure this is such a great idea. I had my own plan for getting her.”
“And yet you have not executed it.”
“I was getting ready. It was all set up. But ... your way might be better. I can’t be connected with it, if we do it your way.”
“Indeed not. No one will ever know. Did you bring a gun?”
“Haven’t got one.”
“And you intended to kill Miss Parker on your own, without a firearm?”
He bristled. “Look, if you can’t you use me, I’ll just get going.”
“I can use you.”
Pascal studied the man. His pale face wore a thick fringe of uncombed beard. The beard looked new. Pascal suspected Kurt had grown it to disguise his appearance. He had been awake all night and must have been drinking earlier, but the rain seemed to have sobered him up, leaving him more alert, and also more nervous—a scared, trembling thing, huddled against the chill, wincing at distant thunder.
He was no knight errant. Of that, Pascal was certain. He was a weakling with no stomach for killing. A useless creature who had not earned the right to survive.
Yet somehow he had. The riddle of it intrigued Pascal. “You said Bonnie Parker tried to kill you. Why then are you still alive?”
Kurt flicked an angry glance at him. “You think she’s so damn good she always gets her man?”
“I think she is more than good enough to get you, my friend.”
For a moment Kurt seemed to think about challenging him. Then his head nodded in defeat, his eyes drifting away. “She had me, all right. I was just lying there. Couldn’t move. Two slugs in me.” Unconsciously he touched his leg, and Pascal understood his slow stiff-legged gait. “All she had to do was ...”
“Deliver the coup de grace,” Pascal said.
“It sounds nice and civilized when you say it like that. When you’re choking on your own blood, staring down the barrel of a gun, it doesn’t feel civilized. It feels like you’re a goddamn animal in a trap.”
An animal, yes. But not one of the more heroic animals, those that qualified for inclusion on coats of arms. Not the lion, the wolf. Not even the wily fox. Rather, there was a rodent-like quality about this man, a quality stemming from his matted facial hair, his small pink hands, and his habit of chewing at his lower lip, like a rat obsessively gnawing, gnawing ...
“But she did not shoot,” Pascal prompted.
“She nearly did. I saw her draw down. But she didn’t go through with it. She just walked away.” Kurt worked his lower lip. “She was scared, I think.”
“Scared of you?” The words came out with just the lightest lilt of contempt.
“Not me. Scared of going through with it, face to face. Up close and personal, looking right into my eyes.”
This was possible. And if so, it meant Bonnie Parker had a weakness. That was good to know.
“So she let you live,” Pascal said thoughtfully.
“Fuck, no. I mean, she didn’t intend to. She wasn’t showing me any mercy. She thought I would bleed out in the snow.”
“But she was wrong.”
“She was wrong. I was stronger than she knew. Stronger than I knew. It was hate that did it. Hating her—that’s what made me strong. You know how that is?”
“I do.”
“Somehow I limped out of the woods, all the way to a gas station. Made up a story about how I’d been shot in an alley by a couple of kids. I tossed my ID, used a fake name, said I was homeless.”
“Why the deception?”
“I couldn’t have the police investigating what really happened. She was after me for a reason. I’d broken some laws.”
Pascal thought the man had an additional motive. He had not wanted Parker to know her quarry was still alive. She would surely have targeted him again.
“They patched me up at the hospital,” Kurt said. “Three surgeries. Then rehab. The whole nine yards. When I finally got out, I tracked her down and started making plans.” He chewed his lip, drawing blood. “She cost me everything. I’m in pain every damn day. Can’t show my face for fear of being recognized. I was on the way to having money, serious money, and now I’m living in a one-room apartment above a store. I cook canned beans on a fucking hot plate. That’s my life. And the only reason I get up in the morning is to have the satisfaction of seeing that bitch dead.”
Pascal smiled. “If circumstances proceed as I expect, my friend, you soon will have your chance. We need only wait for her call.”
“What the hell makes you think she’ll call you?”
“She is young and brash, and her blood is up.” He gazed past the pillars of the pavilion, into the lightning-streaked sky. His gloved hands were steepled, his voice knowing and calm. “She will call.”