Page 103 of Ballistic

“Please! Dmitry, don’t do this!” Panic thumped inside my chest at the thought of my small, white room, with the barred windows and tiny cot. The mind-suppressing drugs and nightly visits from Doctor Emberle.

Dmitry stood over me and stroked a hand down my face. “You know how I feel about betrayal, Nicoleta. Besides, chtoby ctati privedeniem, nyjno izbavitsa ot teh kto verit v tvoe cyshestvovanie.” He leaned forward to plant a kiss to my cheek, and whispered, “To remain a ghost, you must eliminate those who believe you exist.”

I shook my head frantically, kicking and wriggling on the bed.

Dmitry stepped back, waving his hand toward Doctor Emberle, who approached carrying a syringe.

“Once she’s out, I’ll have the orderly help carry her down to the vehicle.”

“No! No!” The bed shook and rattled with my tantrum. I yanked on the binds, damned near tearing through my numb wrists to get away. “No!”

Shoving the cigar into his mouth, Dmitry held tight to my arm, as Doctor Emberle lined the needle against it.

I kicked out at him, slamming my foot square into the doctor’s nuts.

“Fuck!” He took a moment to cup himself, and even less time to jab the need haphazardly into my arm.

“No!” My muscles sagged with defeat, tears streaming down my face.

Dmitry let go of my arm.

Doctor Emberle took a step back from the bed.

I lay staring at the ceiling, waiting for last shreds of my freedom to fizzle into blackness.

39

Dax

I turned the ‘Cuda into the empty strip mall parking lot, then killed the lights and engine. As usual, I set the ‘For Sale’ sign in the windshield and kicked the seat back. Clock said ten-to ten, meaning I’d arrived ten minutes earlier. The silver Audi was nowhere in sight, yet, which gave me a minute to have a smoke and chill out.

Cracking the window brought the stench of the nearby garbage dump wafting through the air. Much as it made me sick, I found it fitting for the evening’s plans. A gun lay beside me on the passenger seat, taunting me.

I’d reached breaking point. The thin, fragile line between sanity and madness. Beyond the sadness. Beyond anger. The space where I no longer gave a fuck about anything, anymore.

The headlights of a passing car drew my attention toward the silver Audi, pulling into a dark lot just down from a Seven Eleven, where I was supposed to have a meeting with him. Well, where Jackson, the thirteen year-old he thought he’d been chatting with, was supposed to meet up, anyway. I’d told him I’d have a friend drop me off there, and figured the dark lot beside the dump next door would be the perfect place for a shady bastard to sneak up like a snake through the brush.

Turned out, I was right.

I gave him a minute, or two, to park and check the place out. A minute turned to two. Then three. Five minutes passed. Didn’t usually take so long for them to get out of the car and investigate, but maybe he was the cautious type. The second he exited his vehicle, I nabbed the gun from beside me and stepped out after him.

Crazy how nine times out of ten, the assholes who showed up were small, weasel-looking things, who seemed to have too much time and money. Could just tell the guy walking toward the Seven Eleven had probably never worked a day of hard labor in his life.

“Excuse me!” I called after him, and he immediately spun around and took a step back. “I’m, uh …. I’m having a little car trouble. Think you could help me?” Thumb hiked over my shoulder, I watched his eyes skate toward my ‘Cuda and back.

“I’m … I’m sorry.” He shook his head, shuffling back toward his vehicle, and I jogged toward him, drawing my piece.

“Freeze!” With my gun aimed square at his skull, I imagined bone and brain blown to chunks all over the pavement.

Asshole raised his hand in the air and turned back to face me, the familiar look of fear clouding his eyes. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”

“Oh, I think you can.”

“You want money?”

“No.” I advanced closer, keeping the barrel pointed at him. “I want to know why the fuck you came here to meet a thirteen year old for sex.”

His eyes shifted away and back. Liars always did that shit, for some reason, like another answer was sitting next to them, or something. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I came here to grab a pack of smokes from the store.”