Page 109 of A Breath of Life
A cigar. The sweet smell of a particular brand. That’s what I smelled. It had been decades.
We descended a set of stairs. Although I couldn’t see, the walls felt close. The air grew damp and cool. A basement.
Another short walk ensued. A turn. Another turn. A door slammed behind me, making me jump. The hand on my upper arm jerked me around. Someone shoved my chest, and I stumbled off balance. Instead of landing on my ass, I landed on a hard chair that didn’t budge, jarring my spine.
People moved around me. I couldn’t get a read on how many. One of them wrapped a rope around my legs directly over top of the knife hidden under my pants. No one else touched me. No one spoke. The door opened and closed again. Was I alone? I strained to hear. No. Someone was still in the room.
To that point, I hadn’t been harmed, so when the hood was abruptly torn off, I didn’t expect the pistol-whipping.
Blinding pain sliced through me with the impact. My head flew to one side, teeth rattling. It wasn’t enough to knock me out, but it was enough to daze me. My chin connected with my chest, and I groaned as a fresh trickle of blood ran down my cheek from my temple. A violent urge to fight back surfaced, but I repressed it, submitting to the agony.
I skated the edge of control and would have liked nothing more than to give the jackass gunman a taste of his own medicine. My concern for Tallus and Nana kept me from fighting.
The gunman left me alone after that. As the pain in my temple subsided and my senses returned, I slowly lifted my head to find myselfin the same room as before. I was alone. No company. No one watched over me. I scanned with fresh eyes, wishing I could find clues to indicate where I was being held.
Nothing stood out.
Part of me yearned to go for the knife, cut myself free, and fight my way out, but that was a risk I wasn’t ready to take. I needed to be smart. Think. Assess.
Time passed. My fingers grew numb from their tight bind, and I wiggled them to try to increase circulation. A thin line of blood circled my wrists where the wire cut into my flesh. It grew worse the more I moved, so I tried to keep my hands still. My head throbbed, and I was getting really sick and tired of being used as a punching bag.
Several times, at regular intervals, a rumbling sounded in the distance. Faint vibrations hummed under my feet. More coherent than the previous time I was locked in this room, I decided it was definitely a nearby subway line.
The waiting seemed endless, and I couldn’t determine if I’d been alone for twenty minutes or an hour when the Consigliere entered, his ostentatious stride and stance stinking up the room. Similar suit. Identical arrogance. The Bishop trailed behind, dressed in black and with his god-loving white noose around his neck. What a fucking fraud. Whatever his claim, the man was no Bishop.
He carried a sturdy briefcase, and I strongly suspected it didn’t contain church documents or holy water. The Bishop might look innocent, but this was the man who’d subdued me in a parking garage and broke my face multiple times with his fists before turning around and doctoring the wounds like the fucking sadist he was.
The Bishop moved to the sideboard and set the case down, snapping the locks and opening it to reveal an array of tools. My headbuzzed with too much energy, nerves twitching and readying themselves for a level of torture I was all too familiar with.
As a child, when my father took the notion to beat me, I would do my best to sever the connection between my mind and body to escape the pain. I’d lost the skill as an adult. Part of me craved pain to a degree. It served as a stark reminder that I was alive.
The Bishop left the instruments untouched but in view. A visual threat. A warning. I’d been privy to those plenty as well. He lingered in the background, clearly not wanting to impose on what was meant to be the Consigliere’s show.
I glared at the fake religious motherfucker, remembering Tallus’s story of running into him on the street. If I ever got my hands on him, on any of them…
The Consigliere cleared his throat, drawing my attention away from the Bishop and his tools. Hetsked disapprovingly as he stared down his long, beaky nose like he couldn’t quite decide what to do with me.
I held his gaze, challenging him the only way I could when restrained. He would not see my fear.
After a substantial amount of posturing, the Consigliere withdrew an item from the inner pocket of his suit jacket and tossed it on the floor. The decorative ace of spades clattered noisily, landing face up, the engraved skull in the center catching the light in a premonitory fashion.
I stared at it, my vision shrinking, my nerve endings shorting out.
“No.” I didn’t recognize my voice.
I’d left the card with Tallus. Oh god. If they had the card…
Too many words got caught in my throat at the same time, choking me. I couldn’t form a single sentence. I wanted to ask questions but was too afraid of the answers.
“We have a problem,” the Consigliere said, opening the conversation. “Do you know what that card represents to us, Mr. Krause?”
I didn’t respond and only stared from the card to the man, knowing he would go on without prompting, knowing I wouldn’t like what he had to say.
“In our industry, the ace of spades is a mark of death. In fact, its symbolism is widely recognized. You’re a smart man. I’m sure you discovered that in your research.”
“Where’s Tallus?”
“When someone in Ace’s employ fails to obey the rules, or if a bargain is struck but a person does not fulfill their end of the agreement, measuresmustbe taken. An examplemustbe set. Otherwise, where would we be? No one enters into a contract with Ace without first understanding the consequences. He is a reasonable and generous man. He did not get this far by happenstance, Mr. Krause.”
