Page 249 of Fractured Loyalties

He wants me to look rattled. He wants me to ask how. I do neither. I look at his hands. No tremor. I look at his pupils. Pinning a touch. Stimulants or the pleasure of a script he’s rehearsed.

“You think I’m lying,” he says, pleased.

“I think you’re talking,” I answer, closing the gap between me and the screen.

He laughs. Real laugh. He enjoys the hour. “I am. I won’t be when you bleed out on my floor.”

The man with the sub-gun starts to raise it. I raise my hand and show them my palm like I’m surrendering. Their eyes go to the hand. People always go to the hand. My other hand pulls the cord from the back of the screen and kills the light.

Dark wraps the room. Someone curses. The shotgun man steps where he shouldn’t. The table corner bites his thigh. I slide left and fire twice, center mass, then pivot and fire once more where the inhale told me the second man stood. The sub-gun clatters. The shotgun falls and discharges into the ceiling. Plaster dust rains down like chalk.

The light from the hall stripe punches a thin silver band across the floor. Volker freezes for half a beat, then reaches for the map on the wall like it can protect him. I cross the room and slam him into it so hard the frame cracks. The safe behind the map thumps against the drywall like a heart.

“You talk too much,” I say.

He claws at my forearm and grins anyway. “And you came alone.”

“Absolutely.”

He drives his knee up toward my thigh. I ride it and put him on the table. The marker rolls to the floor and leaves a black smear. He reaches for it out of habit. Useless.

The door to the hall opens a fraction. A curious head. I toss the shotgun into the strip of light. It hits the floor with a boom. The head vanishes, and a voice yells for help. That is the noise I planned to use. Panic starves coordination.

I put my forearm on Volker’s throat and ease the pressure until he wheezes and stops pretending he can chew glass.

“You put a camera on my street,” I say.

“I put five,” he chokes, eyes shining with the kind of joy that only men who think they cannot die own. “And a microphone under your girl’s kitchen window. She makes small noises when she sleeps. Does she know that?”

My hands want to close. I don’t let them. I want names, not silence. I shift weight and let him drink air he does not deserve.

“Which van?” I ask. “Plate.”

“You really think I’ll tell you?” he says, beaming. “You’re better at asking when you can show them a blade.”

I show him my empty hand. He shakes his head like I’m boring him. Then I crack two knuckles into the safe door behind the map. The hollow metal rings. He flinches. He is not afraid for his life yet. He is afraid of what is inside.

“Code,” I say.

He laughs again. Still enjoying himself, even with blood on his teeth. “You won’t shoot it open. You might hit something that stains your conscience.”

“I don’t carry one,” I say. “Code.”

He spits at my cheek and misses. “Take your time. The van does not need me.”

I hear boots in the hall. Two sets. Running in a pattern that says they don’t know if they are brave. I pick the subgun off the floor without looking and point it into Volker’s chest. His hands grab it just to keep it from breaking his ribs. I take the marker off the floor and jam it between his fingers and the trigger guard.

“Pull,” I say.

“What?”

“Pull,” I repeat, and lean just enough that the muzzle points at the window. Men in the hall see the barrel. They drop.I release the weapon. It clatters away. Volker flails for it, off balance now, breath hitching like he climbed five flights.

“You make a mess,” he pants. “And for what? One girl. One small woman who will leave you when she understands what you are.”

“She understands already,” I say.

He bares his teeth. “She thinks she does. Wait until you come home with a piece of me under your nails. Wait until she smells me on your skin.”