Page 59 of Vice

24

Viper

When you get into the organized crime business, it’s an accepted fact that mistakes get you killed. At any time, your life is forfeit. Your personal death is an occupational hazard to the lifestyle, and those who thrive in it treat facing death like a rainy day. Something to prepare for. An inconvenience. An inevitability. You don’t fear it.

That’s something I learned long before the Soles put a gun in my hand, and Wyan taught me how to shoot. I should have died with my mother but managed not to. Every day since then has been hard fought for and every day afterward will be the same. Clawing every moment of time that I wasn’t supposed to have and running from death until it catches up to me.

So it’s not a surprise that Madelyn doesn’t blink an eye when Wyan points his gun at her to force her cooperation when we force her into a chair with her hands cuffed behind her back. She’s not going to let herself be killed if she can avoid it, of course. But she’s not particularly concerned about it either.

Which is why torture is such an effective method of getting something out of types like these. But there’s no telling how long someone can hold out on torture, so I don’t start there.

“We know who you work for. We know what they’re doing. We just need you to take us there to see for ourselves or tell us how to get in to see it,” I say vaguely, just in case she isn’t sure who she works for and what they’re doing.

“Fuck you,” Madelyn spats.

“Thought you’d say that. Look, I’d eventually get it out of you with torture. But that method would take too long. So let’s not stand on ceremony here. What do you care about? Who do you care about?”

Madelyn gives nothing. But she will if I press the right buttons.

“A husband? A wife? A partner? A parent? A child?” Before I can continue, something in her eyes change. Hardens even more than it was before. Seems like I’ve hit something. “A child then?”

I don’t need her to confirm. I already know.

“So here’s what it’s going to be. You could just tell me what I want to know. Or you can refuse. And I'll torture you. And then I'd still get it out of you. But also, you’ll have wasted my time and made me an angry man with a vendetta, and I might have to look you up… find this child. End your line with them and you.” I say. “So are you going to cooperate? Or do you need time to think it over.”

Madelyn is angry and fearful all at once. She hates me. She wishes she could get up and kill me where I stand. But she knows to try that and fail would be to condemn her child. Or whoever the fuck it is she cares about. So she doesn’t try.

Instead, she says through gritted teeth, “Fine.”

“Great,” I say. I look at Wyan and say, “Watch her while we get dressed.”

I head back into one of the bedrooms. Dele follows behind me. While I immediately begin to get my clothes and gear on, Dele stands near the door watching me. If we weren’t in a rush, I wouldn’t mind. I like getting up to get dressed after I’ve fucked her and for her to languish about and watch me. But right now is not the time.

“What?” I snap.

“Her child,” Dele begins.

“What about her?”

“You wouldn’t… you really wouldn’t have gone after them? Would you have?”

“Probably not,” I say dismissively “Would have been more trouble than was worth the effort for someone as unimportant as her. A waste of time and resources and dreadfully inefficient.”

“But what if it wasn’t?”

Something about Dele’s tone, the uncertainty in it, makes me turn to look at her.

“Why does it matter?

She only asks firmer, “What if it wasn’t?”

“I suppose I’d go through the trouble, then. I wouldn’t have taught you better than to make idle threats if I were going to do the same thing.”

Dele makes a noncommittal sound and expression before proceeding to get dressed. But I feel like I’ve missed something. Like I failed a test. It’s my turn to watch her get dressed while I question her.

“Why does it matter?”

I think she’s going to ignore me, and I’m going to have a force an answer out of her when we have time later. But eventually she says, “You’d kill anyone who even thought about making that kind of threat if it were you. Doesn’t matter who they were. They’d be an instant enemy to you.”

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