David Lindsey - The Rules of Silence

“Get out, ”said the guy sitting next to him. They both got out, and the guy came around holding something in his arms. “Take off your clothes, ”he said.

Titus undressed, and when he was down to his shoes and underwear the guy said, “All of it. ”Titus kicked off his shoes, peeled off his socks, and shed his underwear. Part of his instructions from Luquin had been to leave all identification behind. Apparently they were going to drive off and leave his clothes and shoes right where they were.

“You work out? ”the guy asked, handing Titus the clothes he had been holding. The driver in the Navigator snorted.

“Yeah, ”Titus said.

“Weights?”

“Yeah, ”Titus said. He put on the pants and buttoned them and then the shirt. From what he could see in the light from the opened door, it was some kind of service repairman's uniform, putty gray. After he buttoned up the shirt, the guy dropped a pair of shoes on the ground.

“Elevens?”

“Right. ”Titus bent down to put on the first shoe and lost his balance. Staggering, he reached out reflexively to the guy, who reacted the same, catching him with a beefy shoulder to keep him from falling. Quickly Titus righted himself and then finished putting on his shoes. He had managed to leave a mole from his right hand on the back side of the man's upper right arm.

When they got back into the SUV, the guy handed Titus a black hood.

“Put it on, ”the man said.

Titus slipped it over his head and immediately had to fight claustrophobia. It wasn't just the feel of the close-fitting cloth. It was all of it, the whole menacing unfamiliarity of it.

He tried to keep track of the turns, but it was impossible; besides, he suspected the driver was doubling back and retracing his course much of the time. After Titus had shed his clothes, the two men began talking in Spanish. They must've known that Titus couldn't understand them because they didn't seem to be cautious or stinting in their conversation. Then the car hit what must have been a stretch of highway, because the Navigator sped up to a sustained speed. The conversation stopped.

Titus lost track of time on the highway, and the monotony of the constant speed and the lack of conversation conspired to create a strange timelessness. Then suddenly the car began to decelerate quickly, and without pulling off to the side of the highway, it stopped.

The doors flew open and Titus was hustled out and shoved into another vehicle-another SUV, from the feel of it. Again he found himself in the backseat. Quickly, because he didn't know how long he would be in the car, he left another mole on the seat between his legs. The car turned off the highway and accelerated quickly, roaring over a paved but undulating road, maybe a county road.

Another turn. A gravel road that climbed. Switchbacks. Slowing. A stop.

The SUV's doors opened: the driver and only one other. Different men, he guessed. Somebody took him out and, holding his arm above the elbow, guided him over gravel, then grass or weeds, and finally a couple of steps to a porch. Wooden porch. Into a front door.

By pretending to be more uncertain of his movement than he really was, he was able to reach out often with searching, fumbling hands and to touch his escort more often than he would have done otherwise. Between the car and the porch, he managed to leave a mole on this man also.

Inside, he was told to stand still and wait for instructions, then he heard the man leave and the door close behind him. He could tell someone was in the room with him, and he could smell a cold fireplace. The wooden floor underneath his feet creaked. Old. Deteriorating.

“Take off the hood, Mr. Cain.”

Titus recognized Luquin's voice.

He took off the hood and found himself in a one-room shack. It was lighted by a kerosene lantern that sat on an overturned bucket in front of a caved-in fireplace. The light was harsh around the lantern, giving way quickly to shadows that waited anxiously around the edges of the room. The odor of kerosene mixed with the stench of rat urine and rotting wood.

“Sit down, ”Luquin said. He was sitting to one side of the lantern in a canvas deck chair. His shadow, thrown against a near wall, was broken by the angles of a corner. The seat he offered Titus was another overturned bucket. He was dressed in very nice street clothes (Titus could see the silk in the trousers), which made him look entirely out of place in his surroundings, as if he'd stepped off the back lot into a movie set. They were alone in the room.

“You wanted to talk, ”Luquin said. He was relaxed, his arms resting on the arms of the chair, his hands dangling loosely over the ends.

Titus stepped over and sat on the bucket, five feet from Luquin. He looked hyperreal. Knowing what he had done to Charlie had altered Titus's perception of him.

“You had Charlie Thrush killed.”

“Yes.”

The monosyllable, so readily given, so free of guilt, was disarming.

“Do you know how he was killed?”

“No. ”Said with the same weightlessness of conscience.

“You don't know.”

“No. ”Luquin twisted his head in irritation. “What do you want, Mr. Cain?”

“You shouldn't have killed him, ”Titus said.

Luquin raised a finger and wagged it slowly at Titus. “Be careful. You are up to your ass in shit here, and sinking.”

“Why?”

“I told you, ”Luquin said, “that I would decide who died and when. And so I did. That surprises you? What in the world did you think I meant when I said that?”

A beetle flew in, heavily, like a miniature aircraft, and smacked into the globe of the lantern. It fell at Luquin's feet, spinning around in circles on the dusty floor with a broken wing. Luquin didn't even notice.

“What did that accomplish, killing him?”

“Did it change the way you thought of your situation?”

A rhetorical question. Titus didn't answer.

Luquin's expression soured, and he nodded. “That's what I accomplished.”

Luquin's manner dripped arrogance, and Titus hated it that Luquin thought that this was the way to play him.

“Have one of your people come in with a telephone, ”Titus said, “and I'll put through the first ten million right now. And I'll make the next payment of twenty-one million within twenty-four hours, rather than the forty-eight you've instructed.”

Luquin's eyes brightened, but even as he nodded affably in gratified surprise, his brow puckered in skepticism. Titus could see him formulating a question and then instantly correcting himself and moving his chess piece to another square.

Without taking his eyes off Titus, he lifted his foot and crushed the beetle with a sharp pop of its crusty shell.

“Roque, ”he said in a voice no louder than the one he was using to speak to Titus. There were stirrings outside in the darkness, the door to the shack opened, and a man came in and stood behind Titus.

“Tu celular, ” Luquin said, lifting his chin at Titus. The man unsnapped a cell phone from a holder at his waist and handed it to Titus.

Titus dialed Lack Paley's number and listened to it ring. Luquin was watching him like a lizard, motionless, processing. Paley answered.

Titus told him to move the money to Cavatino first thing in the morning, the moment the bank opened. He told him to get the second investment ready. Lack knew the drill, and though he didn't know what was behind it all, he knew something extraordinary was going on. That was that.

After Paley had hung up, Titus pretended to be listening. Before Roque had handed him the phone, Titus had managed to work off one of the lighter moles and was holding it between the forefinger and thumb syof his right hand. He held the phone in his left. As soon as he had the mole the way he wanted it, he concluded his feigned exchange with Paley, punched the disconnect button, and with his right hand handed the phone to the waiting man. The mole stuck like a leech. The man returned it to the clip at his waist.