Outsourced

AK-47.

The car had knocked a large hole through the wall. Yuri charged through it, firing his rifle. Joel hit him once in the shoulder and again in the chest, but before Yuri went down he got off a round hitting Joel in the hand. The bullet blew off two of his fingers and sent his AK-47 clattering across the floor.

“Motherfucking cunt,” Joel swore as he stared at the bloody stumps where his fingers had been. When he looked up he saw Petrenko through the hole. The Russian fired once at Joel, hitting him in the thigh and sending him falling on to his back.

“You fucking zhid,” Petrenko swore. “You’re going to steal from me?”

He squeezed his body through the opening in the wall. As Petrenko made his way forward his injured knee seized up. When he recovered he found that Joel, still lying on his back, had a forty-five caliber pistol aimed at him.

“I was carrying two guns, asshole.”

There were three gunshots, all rapid-fire. Petrenko looked with mild surprise at the three red dots spaced out along his chest. Then he fell over dead.

Joel looked down and saw he was bleeding badly from his thigh. Commie son of a bitch hit an artery. He took off his shirt, and using his teeth, ripped off a strip of fabric. Wrapping it above his wound and pulling as tight as he could, he tied his makeshift tourniquet. He sat for a moment, trying to build up the strength to stand. He got halfway to his feet and then blacked out.

The two detectives found nothing in Dan’s storage locker. Resnick told his partner to meet him at the car, waited until he left and then pulled Dan aside.

“I can’t let you get away with this,” Resnick said.

Dan didn’t bother responding. As Resnick looked at him, the muscles along his jaw hardened until his face looked carved out of stone.

“I’m going to keep searching until I find something. Even if I don’t find any concrete evidence I have to make you pay for this. I can’t let you skate with one woman dead and another critically wounded.” Resnick paused, sucked in his breath. “Do you have any idea what type of animal Petrenko is?”

“I never heard of this Petrenko-”

“Let me educate you then,” Resnick said, giving Dan a cold stare. “He used to torture people for the KGB. Over the years we’ve found bodies dumped in the ocean that have been skinned head to toe. There’s no doubt in my mind Petrenko did them personally, but he’s smart and I’ve never been able to tie him to any of them. If I arrest you and get your name in the papers, he’ll go after your family. Even if we assign a police detail to protect them, he’ll get them. The guy is as relentless as he is sadistic.”

Dan’s color drained a few shades. “I don’t appreciate this type of threat, Detective.”

“It’s not a threat. I’m telling you what will happen for a fact.” Resnick looked away as he rubbed his jaw. “I know he had other items besides money in those boxes. I know him well enough to know that. My guess is those items would send him away to prison for the rest of his miserable life.”

Raising his gaze to meet Dan’s eyes, he added, “If I were you and I cared at all about my family, I’d make sure those items ended up in my hands.”

Resnick gave Dan a short nod and left.

When Dan got back to his car he sat paralyzed for a long moment. Then he took out his cell phone and called Joel. The phone rang until the answering machine picked up. He hung up and tried again. This time after the fifth ring someone picked up.

“Joel, are you there?”

“Yeah, you woke me. Who’s talking?”

“Dan. We got to meet.”

“Yeah, okay.” There was a long pause. “You come here now, I’ll split everything with you.”

The phone went dead on him. Dan had no clue what was behind Joel’s change of heart and wondered whether this was some sort of setup. In the end he decided he had no choice. He put away his cell phone and headed for New Hampshire.