The Darkness

47

Rex Malloy opened up the backseat door and slid in, keeping his gun trained on the back of Curt’s head. Detective Makhoulian was walking in front of us, leading us toward the path that the Sam’s fish truck had pulled into. I now knew that Makhoulian had tipped them off about our meeting with Hollinsworth. Curt had trusted him. And so had I.

“Weapon, please,” Malloy said to Curt.

“I’m not packing.”

“And I’m Tiger Woods. Weapon. Please.”

I closed my eyes as I felt the muzzle of the gun pressed against my head. Curt reached down and unstrapped a gun from his ankle, then handed it over.

“Thank you,” Malloy said. “Was that so hard?”

I could see Malloy through the rearview mirror. His gun was held level, steady, and there was even the slightest hint of a grin on his face.

Curt looked straight ahead. He was quiet, but I could sense that he was seething inside. As a cop, I could imagine it was a massive blow to your ego to be ambushed like this. But it wasn’t Curt’s fault. At least now we knew who the mole was inside the NYPD. And it was the very man who’d helped “investigate” my brother’s murder.

“How long has Makhoulian been working for you?” I asked. Up ahead we approached a gate, which opened for us.

Malloy tilted his head just slightly. “Now come on,

Henry. There’ll be plenty of time to ask questions. And please call him ‘Detective.’”

“He’s no more a detective than you are a soldier,” I spat.

Malloy squinted his eyes just slightly, and the hint of a grin became a full-blown smile.

“You know, I wasn’t sure how much Bill Hollinsworth was able to get out before we quieted that rat,”

Malloy said.

“He told us everything,” I said. “I know about Panama, about the Hard Chargers. I know that your brother was killed and you’ve decided to emulate him in some sick game, you whack job.”

“Emulate?” Malloy said. “My friend, I am a living tribute to my brother.”

“Shame you didn’t both get plugged over there,” Curt said. “Save us all a lot of time.”

“Even if I did,” Malloy said, “it wouldn’t have changed anything except my post-military career. You two just happened to be caught up in the current, and lucky enough for you, you’ll actually get to know the truth before you die. Well, at least all the truth that’s fit to print.”

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?” I said.

“Just sit tight,” Malloy said. “We’re almost there.”

I followed Makhoulian down a long dirt road, both sides bracketed by fencing topped with razor wire. The forest was thick behind the fence, blocking our path from view. The road snaked and twisted for over a mile, before it opened into a large open field, surrounded by more fencing and still closed off from the rest of the world.

There was a large brown warehouse in the middle, some sort of facility. As we approached the facility, two men carrying machine guns came out to meet us. They stopped on either side of the car and waited.

“Get out,” Malloy said.

“Or what?” Curt replied.

“Or I’ll kill your friend Parker. And if Parker doesn’t get out, I’ll kill you. And if you both refuse to get out, I’ll kill every member of your family.”

Hatred burning through me, I opened the door and stepped out. Curt did the same.

As we stepped out, I was shoved up against the car and searched by the man with the machine gun. The man on the other side did the same to Curt.

From me they confiscated a Bic pen, and from Curt a

Swiss army knife that was attached to his key chain. Then they took the whole key chain as well.

I was sweating terribly, my mind and heart racing. As I stood back up, I was finally able to get a full glimpse of our surroundings. Parked around the side of the warehouse was the fish truck, the rear backed in to what looked like a loading dock. And if there was a loading dock here, I had no doubt that this was where they shipped the Darkness.

“Come on,” Malloy said, “she’s waiting for you.”

“Who the hell is waiting for us?” Curt said. Then he turned to Detective Makhoulian. “And you, you fucking rat. If I don’t leave here alive, I swear to God you’re coming with me.”

Makhoulian just stood there and said, “I’m sorry,

Curtis. You’re a good man, but you’re out of your league.”

“What the hell does that mean? And who is this ‘she’ you’re talking about?”

“Eve Ramos,” I said. “She was one of the survivors of the attack in Panama. She’s the Fury.” Curt looked at me, confused, then his eyes widened as the totality of our situation sank in. “She’s the one who wanted my brother killed.”

“Henry,” he said.

“I know.”

Malloy said, “Follow me.”

As if we’d had second thoughts, the two gunmen proceeded to follow us as Malloy led us up to the warehouse. He entered a code on a side door, opened it and ushered us in.

We were in a long, narrow stairwell, painted a dull gray.

Cameras were positioned at several spots at every landing.

Malloy walked in front of us, taking us up two flights of stairs before we stopped in front of a door with another keypad. I counted three cameras, red lights glowing steadily.

“You come with me,” Malloy said, looking at Curt.

“You’re staying here.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Curt said.

Malloy ripped the gun from his waistband and jammed it under Curt’s jaw, hard enough to make the man wince.

“You’re going to come with me, right now. ”

Malloy signaled to the two gunmen, and they kept their muzzles trained on me as Malloy led Curt somewhere upstairs. When he was out of sight, one of the men turned to me and said, “You’re going to wait in here.”

He jabbed a code in with a calloused finger, and when the LED light turned green he pushed it open.

To my surprise, the door opened into a medium-sized conference room, complete with varnished wood table and comfortable leather chairs. There was even a speakerphone hooked up and sitting on the middle of the table, like a cadre of suits was about to walk through the door and talk shop while scarfing down bagels and coffee.

“What the hell…” I was able to say before I was pushed inside, the door slamming shut behind me.

The first thing I did when the door clicked shut was run to the table and turn on the speakerphone. I wasn’t shocked to find that there was no dial tone.

“Shit!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. It wasn’t quite a substitute for “Help” but nobody could hear me anyway.

I walked around the room, looking for anything I could use. There was nothing. I debated unscrewing one of the wheels from the chairs to brandish as a weapon, but in a warehouse filled with people armed to the gills it was more apt to get me killed quicker.

They wanted me here for a reason, or they would have killed me already. Besides, this room was too pretty to commit murder in.

At least, that’s what I thought until I saw the light red stain on the carpet by the door I’d come in through. It had clearly been scrubbed numerous times, but damned if blood wasn’t just too difficult a liquid to get out.

“His name was Jeremy Robertson,” a voice said. “And he didn’t listen.”

I whirled around to find a woman standing at the other end of the room. From the lines and age in her face I made her out to be in her early to mid-forties, but the tone and muscle definition was striking beneath her black tank top. She had long black hair that I could see spread out behind her waist and her green eyes looked at me with a strange kind of calmness that would have given me chills if I wasn’t scared to death.

“Jeremy killed himself,” she said. “We only bring in men who have something to lose. Unfortunately, as we learned later, Jeremy had nothing.”

“Eve Ramos,” I said. “You’re the Fury.”

Ramos laughed, her voice high-pitched, full of delight.

“The Fury,” she said. “I always found such enjoyment in that name. And to think how many people trembled at the very sound of a person who might not even exist. I suppose it works the same way with Satan and even Jesus.

Beholden to deities we will never know exist until the day we die.” Eve Ramos looked up at the ceiling. “I bet

Jeremy Robertson knows whether there is a devil.”

“You manufacture this poison,” I said. “I’m pretty sure that if there is a devil, that puts you on an even keel with him.”

“Oh, Mr. Parker,” Eve said as she crossed the room to where I was standing. Then, moving faster than I knew possible, she had gripped my throat in her hand and said,

“Who’s to say the devil is a man?”

She then pushed me backward. I coughed once, but stared her down.

“You killed my brother,” I said. “Just like you’re responsible for about a dozen more deaths from this drug.”

“A dozen?” Ramos said. “Henry, you don’t know the half of it.”

“So what do you want?” I said. “And where’s my friend?”

“Officer Sheffield is fine,” she said. “Unfortunately, as a police officer, we cannot simply dispose of your friend until we can be certain it is done in a way that is, shall we say, less than incriminating.”

“And me? Why am I here?”

“Henry, you came to us, remember?”

“Why am I alive?”

“You’re alive because you have use to me. Before you die, you have a chance to do one last noble deed. And then when the time comes to meet your maker, you can be sure it will be the right one.”

“I don’t understand,” I said.

“Please,” Ramos said. “Sit.”

I didn’t move.

“Fine. You’ll be sitting enough anyway.” She went to the head of the table, pulled out a leather chair and lay back, propping her feet up on the table. She was wearing dark boots, dirty and worn. This was not a woman who preferred high heels. “You are a newspaperman. I take it you know much about our product from the reporting of

Ms. Paulina Cole.”

“I read her article,” I said. “And I know how you got her to write it.”

“See,” she said, smiling. “I knew you were a bright young man. There’s no way Ms. Cole could have had access to that information without anybody else knowing about it. Yes, we fed it to Ms. Cole. And now you are going to write another article for your newspaper. And once that is done, you can leave this world in peace, knowing you’ve kept your loved ones from harm’s way.”

“My loved ones?”

Eve took her feet down, leaned forward. “You came to my attention right after your brother, Mr. Gaines, was killed. How fortunate for us that another man was accused of his murder, that was an unexpected bonus. But when you figured out who pulled the trigger, we needed a way to keep you in check. It is part of my job to learn about people. Their families, backgrounds, careers, loved ones.

I know you have barely seen your parents in ten years. I know you have little family or friends. But you do have a woman who holds your heart. So piercing her would pierce you.” She smiled. “So to speak.”

“My brother,” I said. “You were behind it. You killed him.”

“Guilty,” she said. “When you run an organization, the buck stops with you. When your brother learned about our plans to diversify our product, he objected. In my line of business you cannot have employees questioning decisions, or threatening to divulge company secrets. He came to you, and that’s when I decided he had to be dealt with.”

“Dealt with,” I said. “That’s a pleasant term for coldblooded murder.”

“Nothing around here happens without my say-so,”

Ramos said. “And if you do not write this for me, I will take your woman, Amanda, and I will make her scream so loud that even if you do make it to heaven, Henry, her cries will pierce the ears of God himself. I will grind her bones to paste, and coat the walls of this room with her blood. And I will make sure you are alive when all of it takes place. And only when you have no screams left to offer will you join her.”

I sat there, my whole body cold. Amanda.

“You see, when I kill a person, their death must not be in vain. It must represent something. Your brother’s death was a sign that even our highest-earning lieutenants were not invulnerable. Kenneth Tsang’s death was a warning to new employees as to what could happen if you weren’t trustworthy. Brett Kaiser’s death showed that we can reach anybody, anywhere. To me, blood and bone are like paint and a brush. With the right artistry, one can create a work of art that speaks to people. Your family, Henry, would be a message that our reach does not stop within our organization, but that we can touch even the smallest, most insignificant lives.”

“You wouldn’t…”

“I wouldn’t?” Ramos said. “Your mother and father live in Bend, Oregon, on a sunny little street called Eastview Drive. I can have a man there tonight. Your parents could be dead before the evening news. Your parents are insignificant, which is why their deaths would be all the more glorious.”

“You’re a monster.”

“I’m only a monster because this involves you, Henry.

How many monsters do you see, day in and day out, in your line of work? Proximity heightens emotions.

Things could be different. You could have been down on your luck, penniless, and come to work for me. And then, like so many of these young men, you would have understood.”

“I don’t know anything besides what Paulina wrote,”

I said. “There’s nothing more to the story.”

“That’s not true,” she said. “You’ve been quite an explorer. Tell me what you know.”

I looked up at her, and if looks could kill Eve Ramos would have been dead several times over. “I know that you and Rex Malloy were in Panama together, and that your troop was attacked and Chester Malloy was killed. I also know that it was in Panama that you learned how to synthesize Darkness, and you managed to smuggle it back to

America. I know that all your drug mules are young men, and you’re using their debts to get them to work for you.”

“Great thing about those young men,” Eve said, “is that they have something to lose. You see, when a man has pride, he will do things he knows are wrong to prove his worth. These men were born with nothing, but worked their way into high-paying jobs. When those lives were taken away, that ambition, that pride, left a gaping hole.

I simply offer to fill that hole. I will not use men from the slums, poor urban souls who have nothing to lose.

Dealers are nothing more than hungry animals. You feed them, throw them an extra bone here or there, they’ll do anything for you.”

“Even die for you.”

“Not by choice, but yes.”

“Why 718 Enterprises?” I asked.

“Ha! That’s simple, Henry. I was born in Queens.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

There was a knock at the door behind Ramos. She went and opened it. A man stood there. He was wearing a suit, brown hair neatly combed. And he was holding a legal pad and pen.

“Leonard, come in,” she said. “Meet Henry Parker.”

“Mr. Parker, it’s a pleasure.” He didn’t offer a hand.

Just as well.

“Leonard Reeves,” I said. He looked at Ramos with evident discomfort.

“How much does he know?”

Eve chuckled softly. “Apparently more than I thought.”

“Leonard Reeves,” I said again. “Graduated from

Princeton in 1993. Former executive at Morgan Stanley, and liaison to the Department of Finance.”

I watched as Reeves’s eyes widened, rage drumming up inside of him.

“How do you-”

“Which leads me to this question,” I said. “How much is Eve Ramos paying you to sell out our government?”

Now it was Ramos who couldn’t contain herself, laughing hysterically. Reeves looked at her. His rage seemed to subside as he saw how unperturbed she was by my knowledge.

“Henry, you have this all wrong,” she said. “We’re not selling out the government. Hell, we’re working for them.”