Page 60 of Exposed
“What kind of torture?” I cannot help asking.
“Why would you want to know this shit, Madame X?”
“I’m not Madame X anymore, Len. My name is Isabel. And I’m learning that no one is ever as they seem.”
Len nods. “Fair enough. We ripped his fingernails out with pliers. Cut strips of his skin off with a box cutter. Burned toes off with a blowtorch. Waterboarded him. Beat him half to death. Stuck pins in him until he looked like a pincushion, and then heated ’em up with a lighter.”
“My god,” I breathe. I am horrified. “Did he survive it?”
“Oh yeah. Point of torture is to cause pain so bad they’ll tell you anything to make it stop. So yeah, he survived long enough to sing about the generals, but when we had what we needed, we put a couple rounds in the back of his head.”
“Double-tap,” I say, thinking of Logan.
Len nods. “Yeah, we double-tapped him, and left him for the vultures and the ants.”
“Tell me one more thing,” I ask.
“Sure, why not.”
“What’s the best thing you’ve ever done?”
“That’s a helluva lot harder.” Len is silent for a long time. “There was this girl. In Fallujah. Local girl. We were headed out on foot after a raid, and I heard screaming. Followed the sound, against orders. Discovered some local fellas running a train onthe girl. Killed ’em all. I had some local currency in one of my pockets, and I gave it all to her, then pounded leather back to my unit. Whenever I could, I stopped by and helped her out. Brought her money, food, clothes. Whatever I could scrounge up. I still dunno why. I don’t stand by rape, I guess. I’m an evil motherfucker, don’t get me wrong. I’ll beat up, torture, and murder men without thinking twice about it, but I won’t touch a woman in violence, and won’t stand to see it happen. I may be a bastard, but I’ve got my own code of honor. Such as it is, at any rate.”
“What happened to her?” I ask. “The girl?”
A shrug. “Lost contact with her. Battle of Fallujah happened, and it got to where I couldn’t really go looking anymore without getting my ass shot off.”
“Have you ever killed anyone for Caleb?”
A stony stare. “We’re not talking about Mr. Indigo.”
“You have.” I meet Len’s glare. “Would you kill Logan if he told you to?”
Len’s answer is immediate: “In a heartbeat.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s dangerous.”
“So are you. So is Caleb. I’m surrounded by dangerous men, it would seem.”
Another shrug. “You’re not wrong there.” The car stopped a long time ago, but Len has been holding the doors closed. Now he allows them to open. “He’s not back yet, but he will be shortly.” The conversation is over, apparently.
“Thank you, Len.”
Len seems puzzled by my thanks. “Yeah.” And then he’s gone, doors closing between us.
I don’t know what I’m going to say. What I’m going to do. You will be here soon and I’ve got a million, billion questions, and answers that I don’t know the questions to, and demands Idon’t know how to formulate. Needs I don’t know how to meet. And all of this requires that I face up to you and not flinch, speak to you and not succumb to your sorcery.
I do not have the best track record when it comes to that. I am weak.
I stand for long moments a mere three steps into the colossal space you call home, the echoing, open-plan apartment occupying the entire footprint of the tower. There, the couch. Where you fucked me. Here, where I stand, the carpet under my feet where you shoved your cock into my throat and came on my face. The haptic memory is overwhelmingly strong, a twinge in my jaw reminding me how wide I had to stretch my mouth, a ghost of heat and wetness on my face where you finished on me. There, the kitchen, the breakfast nook. You pulled me down onto your lap in that chair, the westward-facing one, with all of Fifth Avenue spread out for you. You pulled me down onto your lap, wrapped your fist into my hair, tugged my head backward so I was forced to stare up at the ceiling while you thrusted up into me and bit my neck in sharp nips. You never spoke a word, didn’t touch me other than to fuck me and bite me. It was almost like a punishment. But for what?
Strange that I remember that encounter. You’d woken me up out of a dead sleep at three in the morning, hauled me into the kitchen, yanked off my underwear and tossed them onto the table, and then proceeded to fuck me until you came, and then you were done. You shoved me off you, snatched my underwear and shoved them into your pocket. Tossed back the last of your doppio macchiato, strode out without a backward glance. I went back to sleep, and the next morning it had seemed like a dream, easily forgotten.
There is a crystal bottle of something amber on a side table near a window. It is an artfully crafted little vignette: a small round table of dark wood, a cut-crystal decanter and twomatching tumblers on a silver tray, the table and tray nestled against the wall between two floor-to-ceiling windows. There are two overstuffed armchairs facing the table at oblique angles, and each armchair has a tiny table near to hand, on which rests a cut-crystal ashtray, a silver cigar cutter, and a torch-style lighter. A few feet away, between the next pair of windows, is another small table, this one with two rectangular boxes, glass-topped. Cigars. I open one of the boxes, select a cigar. I bring my cigar with me and pour a measure of scotch whisky into a tumbler. I’ve seen you do this a thousand times. I cut the end off the cigar with the platinum cutter sitting on the table near to hand, put the freshly cut end to my lips and light it, rotating the cigar and puffing as I’ve seen you do. When it’s smoking merrily, I suck in a mouthful and taste it. Thick, acrid, almost sweet. Blow it out. Roll the smoke around in my mouth, let it trickle away. Play with it. I try a sip of the scotch. This, I’ve had before. I think of Logan as I roll the powerful liquid around my mouth and then swallow it.
I wait for you this way, the way you have often waited for me, a cigar coiling serpents of smoke toward the vent cleverly hidden in the ceiling, a glass of scotch in hand. Eyes dark and brooding, watching traffic and the sunset or the sunrise. Time seems to have no bearing on you. You are the same at dawn as you are midnight, always put together and perfect and silent and powerful and tensed.