Beloved Killer, page 3
And what now? Business as usual, except that in addition to paying off liquor distributors, she had a new weekly expense to budget for, a criminal partner who threatened her livelihood in a whole new way.
Chapter Four
J drove east toward the industrial section of the city. He took a left on Camelback, a right on Gallup, and headed up the hill toward the rendering plant. He could drive this city blindfolded. Its blueprint was etched on his brain. Sometimes, like now when he was a little foggy from hours without sleep, he imagined he was the city, one of its streets or buildings, a cog in a wheel that spun round and round at its creator’s whim—the creator being Kuypers, the man who basically owned the city, though the average citizen would never know it.
Good thing he could drive with only a fraction of his mind on the task, because right now he was mostly thinking about Nicolette Larson. Being in her presence was like touching a Van de Graaff generator and getting a charge that stood every hair on end. Sure the device appeared harmless, a simple shining orb, but it packed an electrostatic punch that made a person tingle all over.
Her fearlessness had taken him by surprise. Not to say she wasn’t scared when he tied her up last night or when she’d faced him in the Laundromat this morning, but she’d swallowed her fear and confronted J more boldly than many a cowering man had done. She hadn’t tried to beg or bargain. Instead, she’d kicked him in the balls and later hurled insults at him that had almost startled a laugh from him. That had never happened before.
She was the definition of a live wire and the exact opposite of him, so of course she attracted him like a moth to flame. Her pretty face and compelling green eyes didn’t hurt either.
J woke from his trance to find he was nearing the rendering plant. Time to concentrate on the task at hand and delete strawberry blondes with sharp tongues from his mind.
He parked in the employee lot. There was no fence or gate. A rendering plant was hardly a high-security business, though he supposed they might have to deal with animal-rights activists causing trouble, even though the factory was merely processing corpses into useful products.
He got out of the car, and a nose-curling whiff of offal made his empty stomach churn. Whatever filtration system they used couldn’t completely dispel the odor of decay.
J headed into the building, gave a false name to the receptionist, and waited to see the owner, Bob Sarno. After a couple of minutes, when the receptionist didn’t send him back to the office, he decided to intercept Sarno before he could run. J rose from his seat and walked down the hallway.
As expected, Sarno had vacated his office at the receptionist’s description of his waiting client. No doubt he’d expected a visit like this.
J pushed through the door and entered the plant. The din and activity of forklifts, processing units, and fans filled the busy factory floor. Workers tended the processors or loaded vats with organic matter. The stench of blood pervaded the room. J spotted Sarno weaving between mammoth stainless-steel vats. Workers wearing coveralls, gloves, and face masks looked up as their boss hurried past.
J would rather have taken care of the situation someplace a lot more private than a busy factory, but Kuypers had told him to resolve the Sarno situation immediately. It was apparently more important than keeping an eye on Nicolette Larson. So J strode quickly after the overweight, slow-moving factory owner hurrying toward an exit.
When Sarno noticed J nearly on his heels, he began to run. Catching up with him was as easy as beating a toddler in a footrace. J grabbed hold of the man’s shirt collar and dragged him to a stop.
“Mr. Sarno, I’d prefer to talk in your office,” he said quietly.
Sarno wrenched out of his grip and scurried up iron stairs that led to a catwalk overlooking the plant. J sighed and followed after him. Why did people always want to take the hard way?
He caught up with Sarno again on the grillwork and pinned the man’s body against a railing—the only thing stopping Sarno from falling a half story into a bin of dead animal parts. J flipped the man so he faced the drop, and wrenched an arm behind him. Below, the hopper of carcasses fed directly into a grinder. J winced at the sight of corpses being churned into red slush. He was pretty sure the view would have the desired effect on Sarno.
To be heard over the machinery, J leaned close and spoke into Sarno’s ear, catching a whiff of garlic and the stench of offal. “Mr. Kuypers has been patient, but your grace period is over.”
“I—don’t—have the money,” Sarno wheezed. “I mean, I have some, but it’ll take time to—”
“You’ve been given plenty of time. This is your final notice.” J pulled Sarno’s arm higher up his back and gripped his neck, forcing him to face the grinder below. “I could make an example of you to inspire some of Mr. Kuypers’s other delinquent accounts.”
“You wouldn’t. There are witnesses.”
True. Many pairs of eyes were on them as the workers took a break to gape at the action.
“Most of them are illegals. I doubt they’ll be calling 911,” J replied.
It was important to make the client truly believe his life was about to be cut short. Saved having to actually do the job and usually brought in the revenue, which was the whole point.
“All right. All right!” Sarno howled. “I’ll transfer the money right now.”
Jay escorted him back to his office and waited patiently while Sarno arranged a wire transfer. Sarno’s cramped office stank of the half-eaten pastrami sandwich on his overflowing desk. Files and catalogues, old food cartons, and empty cups of coffee littered every surface. J cringed away from the disorganized clutter that made him almost as queasy as that bin full of dead things had. He hated filth and mess.
The fat man’s fingers moved over the keyboard, and J watched over his shoulder to make sure the transfer actually took place.
“There,” Sarno said with a final tap. “That’s all the liquid assets I have right now, I swear. Absolutely everything I can get my hands on. But tell Mr. K I’ll get him the rest soon.”
J considered the discrepancy between what he’d been sent to collect and what Bob Sarno had paid and decided it was a reasonable balance. “By next week. The rest of it with no more excuses. If you try to leave town…”
“I know.” Sarno held his hands palms open in surrender. “I won’t. I can’t. I don’t have a cent left to buy a ticket. Not that I would,” he hastily added.
J didn’t add any other threats or leave Sarno with a broken finger or two as a reminder. An injury would only slow down his ability to scrape the money together. J walked out of the office, past the staring receptionist.
In the parking lot, he stopped between two trucks and leaned over to vomit up the cup of coffee and Danish he’d eaten on the drive over. He spat and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. Inside his car, he took a long swig from the bottle of tepid water perched in the cup holder, turned on the air-conditioning full blast, tuned in radio station Zen Chillax, and drove away from the rendering plant.
Only when his breathing had returned to normal and his stomach stopped churning did he check in with his boss.
“It’s done,” he reported. “Most of it anyway. He’ll have the rest next week.”
“Not a good precedent,” Kuypers said.
There was silence, and J braced himself to be sent back to finish the job—the making-an-example part. Sarno slurry was not an image he wanted in his head for the rest of his life.
“All right.” Kuypers changed the subject. “What about that girl? You sure she’s not going to be a problem?”
“She isn’t.” J didn’t elaborate. He’d reported earlier that Nicolette hadn’t tried to contact the police. She seemed to understand the arrangement her father had made and how these things were done. No need to reiterate.
“I guess you’re done, then. You’ve earned a rest. Go home.”
J didn’t say good-bye before hanging up. He leaned back in the seat, listened to the pan flutes and temple bells, and half closed his eyes as he followed the familiar route to his apartment. He hadn’t changed his clothes, showered, or slept in almost forty-eight hours. He was a gritty, jittery mess.
Entering the sanctuary of his place was like walking into white noise. Creamy walls, carpeting, and furniture absent of any jarring color gave the illusion of a peaceful haven. Soothing. Mindless.
He put away his tools, placing the case with the Ruger behind a panel in the wall, before stripping off his clothes and standing in the shower for almost twenty minutes. He pictured the water cleansing the stench of roadkill from every pore. With the heat nearly flaying his skin, he felt like he might be washed as bare as the walls of his apartment, or maybe something even purer than white, something transparent like crystal.
J started awake with his forehead pressed against the tile. Jesus, it was a wonder he hadn’t slipped to the floor and cracked his head open. He turned off the water and reached for a towel.
After drying and dressing, he went into the kitchen and searched for something to eat. There were no edible leftovers and not so much as an egg to fry. He got a box of crackers from the cupboard, a bottle of wine from the rack, sat on the couch, and stared at something on the History channel.
Two glasses of merlot and a package of crackers later, he was ready to crash. But though the soft white sheets of his bed were welcoming, when he closed his eyes, he could only see red. Spatters of crimson across a Klimt painting, a hopper full of scarlet sludge, a bin of bloody corpses and staring eyes.
His own eyes opened to stare at the ceiling overhead, and J concentrated on breathing.
In. He pictured a different red—lips that taunted him with dry, cutting comments.
Out. The smell of some light feminine scent instead of decay.
In. A pair of transparent green eyes staring into his soul.
Out. The softness of a female form pressed against him.
In. The heat of her breath brushing lightly over his skin.
Out. His cock was stirring, his body restless, and he was never going to get any sleep today.
Chapter Five
People said you could never go home again. Nikki was learning it was uncomfortably true. Ever since she’d moved back into her childhood home above the bar named after her dad and picked up the tangled reins of his business, she’d become painfully aware how far removed she was from the old neighborhood. She’d tried to reconnect with a few high school friends and found that, other than a little local gossip, they had nothing in common.
Her best friend, Carmen, had moved away. Paisley was on her second marriage and third pregnancy so all her talk revolved around husbands and babies. Shayla was too drugged out to have an intelligent conversation with. The various guys Nikki had dated or been friends with back in the day were either busy with their work and home lives or in jail. People she knew often came in the bar and chatted while they drank, but she didn’t have one good friend she could really talk to, certainly no one she could pour out her troubles to.
Anyway, she had no time to hang with friends even if she had any. Every second of her life was spent at the bar as she worked to make her payment the following Sunday. She let the extra bartender go and poured drinks herself from two in the afternoon to two in the morning. During the afternoons, she served customers without any help. In the evening, Tina was there and complaining about being the only waitress. Nikki convinced her to be patient just a little bit longer about the long hours and lack of help.
Through the rest of that week, the dark sedan and its owner stayed away. By Saturday, Nikki had stopped nervously startling every time someone entered the bar. So late Saturday night when she looked up from pouring a round of drinks and met a pair of black eyes gazing across the bar at her, she nearly let out a yelp.
“It’s not Sunday. I have one more day.”
“Yes.” Jay’s gaze swept across the bottles behind her. “Maker’s Mark.”
She frowned. “You’re just here for a drink?”
He nodded.
If she’d had more time, she might’ve flipped out or told him off, but she was far too busy. Tina was waiting on an order for one of the tables, and customers were two deep at the bar. Nikki poured a glass and set it in front of the henchman.
He took it and moved away from the bar.
“Scary fucker,” she muttered as she turned to her next task.
She tried to focus on each task as she performed it, but Jay hovered at the edge of her consciousness, making her jumpy as a grasshopper on a hot griddle. Nikki couldn’t stop glancing at him, sitting at a corner table. What the hell was he here for? Was he meant to harass and intimidate her with his presence until she agreed to serve up her bar to Kuypers’s illegal schemes?
He sat and nursed his bourbon. Nikki never caught him watching her but felt his gaze all the same. He was like a huge black rock in the middle of the stream of customers. The longer he sat there, the angrier she became, furious that he was intruding on her place, her life.
After about forty minutes, when the place quieted down, Nikki marched over to the table and planted her hands on her hips. “So, are you going to order another drink or not?”
He looked at his empty glass, paused a moment, then nodded.
She returned to her post behind the bar, feeling stupid. She’d really told him off. She poured another glass of bourbon and gave it to Tina to take over.
Tina leaned across the bar and lowered her voice so the guys sitting on their usual stools wouldn’t hear. “Who’s the guy? I’ve asked if he wanted a refill twice. Now when you ask, he wants one? He’s freaky. Definitely serial-killer material.”
“I’d say.” Nikki cast a glance at the demon lurking in the corner.
“Well, if he stays till closing, I’m sticking with you no matter how dead the place gets,” Tina promised before she strutted off to deliver the drink.
Nikki felt better, even if petite Tina would offer little actual protection. Just having someone else share her fear made her feel better.
There were more drinks to pour and a difficult drunk to steer outside. Another half hour passed in the blink of an eye. Nikki was restocking the liquor when a voice came from behind her.
“Nikki Larson! How the hell have you been?”
She turned and almost recognized the guy’s face, but couldn’t quite place him. Clearly it was someone from her past she ought to recognize, but she’d been gone awhile, and everyone’s faces seemed a little distorted from her memory of them.
“It’s Allen,” the man said. When she didn’t immediately respond, he added, “Allen Martindale. From high school.”
The pieces clicked into place, and she remembered the boy who’d been in a few of her classes. Not somebody she’d spent time with.
“Oh! Allen. Right. I remember. Sorry. I just moved back, and everything’s the same but different, you know?”
“I get it.” His smile was wide and pleasant. “I did a tour in the army, and when I got home, the neighborhood seemed really different to me.”
“Overseas?” she asked.
“Afghanistan. Talk about culture shock.” He shook his head. “What about you? You’re working at your dad’s bar.”
“Mine now. He passed away last month.”
“I’m sorry.”
She nodded, accepting his condolence. “Thanks. I was only going to come back long enough to settle his affairs, but then… Plans change. I decided to see if I could keep the place going.” And it wasn’t as if she’d had buyers clamoring at her doorstep.
“Where were you living? Didn’t you have your own life to get back to?”
“Sadly, not really.” She was sharing more details about her life than she cared to. “Anyway, I’m here now. What can I get you?”
Allen ordered a beer and tried to make more small talk, but Nikki was an expert at keeping overly chatty types at arm’s length. Pretty bartender. Drunk male customers. It was a recipe for annoyance if not disaster.
More time passed as Nikki moved around doing her closing tasks and people drifted away leaving the bar near empty except for Lurch in the corner. It occurred to Nikki she might make use of good old Allen. The presence of an ex-soldier might be just the bodyguard she needed right now.
Nikki stopped in front of Allen. “One more for the road?”
He looked at his nearly empty mug. “I guess not. Thanks.”
She wiped the counter and considered how to ask him to stick around until the last customer was out the door.
“Nikki, I have to tell you something.” Allen suddenly blurted. “This is kind of embarrassing, but if I learned one thing in Afghanistan, it’s that life’s short and opportunities shouldn’t be wasted. It has to mean something that both you and I came back home after being away and bumped into each other like this. Fate or something.”
Nikki recognized the earnest tone. Seemed Allen had been drinking before he got here and now he was in that stage of drunkenness when secrets came out and coincidences became “fate.” She braced herself.
“Back in high school, I had such a huge crush on you, but I could never work up the courage to ask you out. I’m too old to let fear of rejection stop me now.” He stared at her with sincere blue eyes. “Would you want to go for coffee or dinner with me some time?”
“Oh, wow. That’s so flattering. I had no idea you used to like me,” she lied. “I’d like to, but honestly, I’m working nonstop right now. I’m sort of married to this place.”
Luckily, Tina bopped over just then to save her. “He’s still here, and it’s time to close. I think you have to ask him to leave.”
“Who?” Allen said.
Tina jerked her head. “Stalker in the corner. Been there all night, and we want him out before we’re stuck all alone with him.”
Allen looked at Jay, a long, level stare he didn’t try to conceal. “Asshole’s been hanging around bothering you?” His voice was hard as he rose from the stool.
