got my recorder and my tape, but the wire was still running, Mo. Still pumping it out to another machine. All that stuff you said after you brought me into the house. It’s all been recorded. You’re finished, Mo.’
Franklin stands up on the rock. His gun is still aimed at Doyle, but his eyes scan the woods nervously.
‘Don’t try to mind-fuck me, Cal. As an attempt to save your ass, it’s pretty pathetic. You’re the loneliest man on the planet. You dropped off the face of the earth, and even if you hadn’t, there isn’t another cop who’ll knowingly come within a mile of you.’
‘Who said anything about cops?’ Doyle asks.
The crack of the gunshot sounds like a huge branch snapping off one of the trees. Doyle’s whole body jumps.
But he’s not the one who’s been shot.
Franklin’s gun hand jerks to his left, the Glock flying from it and clattering onto the rocks. The woods are suddenly alive with the sounds of animals and birds scampering and flapping in panic. Franklin clutches his arm, looks down at it in disbelief and agony.
Then, from behind Franklin, another figure appears and steps up onto the rock. He walks casually, a sniper rifle with telescopic night sights in his hands. Franklin whirls on the intruder.
‘Who the fuck are you?’ he asks.
The man’s response is to slam the butt of his rifle into Franklin’s face. Franklin spins away and drops heavily from the rock. Without hurry, and seemingly without emotion, the man follows Franklin down and aims his rifle at him.
Another man comes into view from around the rock. He’s not holding a gun, but Doyle knows that he is definitely the most dangerous man here.
He steps over to where Franklin is lying on the ground.
‘Stand up.’
Franklin staggers to his feet.
The man says, ‘You know who I am?’
Franklin rubs his injured face. ‘You’re Lucas Bartok.’
Bartok nods. ‘And you’re the man who had my brother killed.’
Franklin hesitates. He knows it’s the end, Doyle thinks. He hopes his boss will choose to go out like a man.
‘Your brother was a stinking piece of shit,’ Franklin says. ‘And you’re a stinking piece of shit who can’t even see straight ’cause he jerks off too much. Get it over with, Squinty.’
Like a man, then, Doyle thinks.
Bartok doesn’t argue and doesn’t wait for a second invitation. His arm shoots out into Franklin’s face, and for a brief moment Doyle wonders why he leaves it there.
And then he remembers something about Bartok.
He remembers that he likes to use a meat hook.
And right now that hook is embedded in Franklin’s left cheek like he’s a fish.
With a roar of anger, Bartok yanks Franklin toward him, spins him right around, and then flings him toward the rock. As Franklin goes one way, Bartok wrenches the hook in the other direction. Franklin’s cheek explodes as he hurtles back against the rock.
Doyle takes a step forward, but Bartok’s henchman raises his rifle, smiles, and shakes his head.
Bartok advances on Franklin, and again his arm whips out. This time the tip of the hook sinks into Franklin’s eye.
Franklin’s high-pitched scream scythes through the night air. He claws frantically at the metal thing protruding from his skull as Bartok drags him away. They disappear behind the rock, and even though they are now out of his sight, Doyle finds that he has to fix his eyes on the ground. He has to stare into the hole he has been digging and concentrate on that blackness to shut out the images. He tells himself that the noises he hears are wild animals fighting and calling to one another. It’s nature, that’s all. Just the animals. They sound like that sometimes. Almost human.
When it ends, Doyle feels faint with relief. The clearing is so chillingly silent he wonders if his fervent desire to cut out the screams has made him go deaf.
Bartok reappears looking like something from a zombie movie. In the moonlight, the blood that covers him from head to toe looks black. He walks toward Doyle, panting with the effort of his labors.
‘Talk about cutting it fine,’ Doyle says.
Bartok’s arm lashes out again. Doyle starts to dodge, but isn’t quick enough to avoid the cold steel connecting with his face. He drops to the ground, rolls to get away from Bartok’s onslaught. But when he looks up at Bartok, he sees that the man is no longer carrying his meat hook. What he struck with was Doyle’s own Glock.
Doyle touches his cheek. He feels warm blood there, but nothing as bad as he expected.
‘That’s for when you arrested me and my brother,’ Bartok says.
Doyle can sense he’s not done, though. When Bartok’s foot comes up, Doyle is ready to block it, grab it and push upward and back, knocking Bartok off balance.
But he doesn’t.
He doesn’t because that would mean his death. It would mean a salvo of bullets piercing his body within a split-second of any reaction against Bartok.
And so he takes the lesson, lets Bartok get it out of his system. Allows Bartok’s shoe to collide with his face, splitting open his lip.
‘And that’s for being a wise-ass.’
Doyle gets to his knees, tastes the blood gushing into his mouth. He spits it out onto the ground.
‘You done?’ he asks. ‘We finally quits now?’
‘Put your hands behind your back.’
‘What?’
‘You heard me, you dumb Irish fuck. Put your hands behind your back.’
Doyle looks at Bartok. Wonders why it is that the end of one predicament always seems to lead straight into another.
When Doyle has clasped his hands behind him, Bartok signals his goon to approach. The man slings his rifle over his shoulder, then pulls a length of cord from his pocket and begins to tie Doyle’s wrists together.
‘What the fuck’s going on?’ Doyle asks.
‘Shut up,’ says Bartok. He snaps his fingers at the other man, who tosses him something soft and dark. Bartok moves behind Doyle, slips the cloth bag over his head.
Oh, Jesus, Doyle thinks. Not like this. Not after all I’ve been through.
He feels something hard press into the back of his skull.
‘You know what this is?’ Bartok says, his voice muffled through the cloth.
‘A gun.’
‘Yeah, a gun.
My gun. Aimed at me again. This is starting to get repetitive.
‘We made a deal, Bartok.’
Ah, yes. The deal. Me getting my life back in return for handing Bartok the killer of his brother. Lucas sure got a shock tonight when I turned up at his door offering that one. Now where did I get the idea he could ever be a man of his word?
‘You think I’m stupid, don’t you, Doyle? Think I don’t know shit. To you, Kurt was the brains and I was just the dumb sidekick. Ain’t that right, Doyle?’
‘No, actually your dastardly ruse never fooled me for a minute. I always suspected you were the criminal mastermind and Kurt was just your puppet.’
For his impudence, Doyle receives another smack in the mouth, rattling his teeth.
‘Oh, you are so pushing it, Doyle. You are so asking to die here.’
‘What’s the difference?’ Doyle asks, finding it harder to speak now. ‘You’re gonna kill me anyhow.’
The laugh from Bartok seems to fill the clearing. Doyle can picture the forest denizens deciding they want nothing to do with whatever insane creature is issuing that fearful noise.
