It opened a crack, closed again, then swung wide.
Jack hesitated before crossing the threshold. ‘You’re Finn?’
A young man in his twenties faced him, a high hairline crowning a beak-like face. He nodded once. ‘From The Chronicle.’
He didn’t look like a reporter. Jack had seen it all, and could always pick up on that indescribable hard edge. Education wasn’t top priority in the start-up world — big ideas and grit usually trumped an MBA — so he’d worked closely with men and women from all walks of life. Finn gave off an aura that he was no stranger to conflict, but that wasn’t cause for concern. An investigative journalist who took stories that required meeting secretly in the dark heart of the Tenderloin wasn’t going to be made of marshmallows.
Jack stepped inside, walked past the guy, found himself in a small studio apartment with windows facing Hyde Street. Or, at least, they would be, if the shades weren’t drawn. It was so dark in the main space it was hard to even make out the furniture. The only light came from an adjacent bedroom.
Jack spoke to the empty apartment as he walked in. ‘How long have you been with The—?’
His voice died as he heard the soft crinkle underfoot, realising he was standing on a plastic tarp.
He whirled around, a twinge in his outer knee masked by panic.
Finn had shut the door. A gun had appeared, only its silhouette visible in the dark. He said, ‘I’m not with The Chronicle.’
‘What…?’
‘Are you armed?’
Jack tried to hide his terror. ‘I-I—’
‘Show me you don’t have a gun.’ He said it like he might let Jack go.
Jack’s hands shook as he stripped off his jacket, turned out its pockets, pulled his tucked shirt out from under the belt, twirled on the spot. He was manic with desperation. ‘This isn’t right…’
Finn said, ‘Isn’t it?’
‘You expect me to talk to you now?’ Jack didn’t understand that his brain was glossing over the earlier revelation, trying to keep the blissful ignorance. Maybe Finn was a reporter who didn’t play by the book. Please, God…
Finn said, ‘I don’t expect you to do anything.’
He put his gun down on a side table when he realised Jack’s possessions consisted of his phone, wallet, and keys.
Then he lifted fingerless combat sports gloves off the same table and slipped them on.
Jack’s chest rose and fell. ‘What are you—?’
‘Don’t want to break my hands.’
‘I’ll go,’ Jack said, his voice a whisper. ‘I’ll just go.’
Finn shook his head.
Jack was only a teddy bear to a point. Past that, he was the man who’d survived decades in Silicon Valley, like some dormant beast resided within. But he was old. It came with limitations.
He charged at the door, hoping to shove past Finn, hoping…
Finn caught him around the mid-section, lifted him above his own hips, then pivoted into a suplex-style slam. The impact — head-first on the cheap carpet under the plastic — broke Jack’s neck. He didn’t even know he was paralysed when he collapsed on his back, the shock was so sudden and all-encompassing. He couldn’t see. Too dark. Finn rained down punches with joints that snapped like pistons when he threw. He punched with the calibre of a professional boxer. It only took ten or twelve consecutive blows, all aided by gravity, to kill the old man.
Finn kept punching.
He’d kept it dark so he didn’t have to see the aftermath. When he finally rose, chest heaving as he sucked in air, he sensed wetness across the front of his shirt and pants. Serious blood splatter. One of his final blows had caved Jack’s face in. He’d felt bone give under the leather padding. There’s a misconception about gloves in combat sports — they’re not used to take force out of the punches, because they don’t. They’re to protect the fighter’s hands. He’d used MMA gloves, only eight ounces each, so the damage was egregious.
He didn’t touch the light switch. He pulled his phone out and took flash photos in the dark from different angles, his handiwork exposed to brilliant light for only a few short bursts. It was enough to make him sick. He messaged the photos off where they needed to go, tucked the phone away, took the gloves off, and made for the shower. There’d be a clean-up crew in later to take care of the mess.
Between gasps of air to replenish muscles now drained of lactic acid, he managed a quick sob.
Best to let it out here.
He only let himself cry when he was alone.
2
In Palo Alto, where status reigns supreme, the high-rise was a symbol of success.
Mary Böhm could remember the first time she laid eyes on Vitality+’s new offices on the eighteenth floor, the wonder she’d felt. She’d been with the start-up for four years now and wasn’t long detached from the days of grinding away in a rented studio space far from the glitz and glam of Palo Alto, its gloomy interior barely large enough for their six employees. Now she was one of fifty or sixty, but you get used to anything. This morning, as she hustled along the sidewalk toward the building, she didn’t even glance up at it.
Too preoccupied with wrapping up a call.
Her mother’s voice came from the phone pressed to her ear. ‘That sounds real nice, love.’
Catherine Böhm had a mid-Western accent with no trace of Mary’s slight German inflection. Catherine had never left the country, favouring the simple life (Mary wasn’t sure whether it was preference or habit), but she’d still managed to meet Walter Böhm, a German engineer who’d immigrated to Louisiana, and they somehow made it work. At least long enough to raise Mary, get her into a STEM degree at LSU, then they quietly went their separate ways. A textbook clean divorce. No mess,
