James Patterson - Don’t Blink

“Even better to be both,” said Torenzi, meaning every word of it. “You got the rest of my money?”

“Of course I do. In the trunk,” he answered with a throw of his head. “Gave you a little extra for all your troubles. You did a fine job.”

Torenzi didn’t say thank you. Instead, he was wondering why LaGrange still had the car in park.

“What are we waiting for?” he asked.

“There’s one other piece of business we need to take care of.”

“What’s that?”

“Me,” said the man outside the open car window.

How do you say revenge in Russian?

BRUNO TORENZI DIDN’T recognize the voice, but there was little doubt about the barrel of a gun jammed against the side of his head.

“Put your hands on the dashboard,” ordered Ivan Belova. “Slowly. Very, very slowly.”

Torenzi complied with disgust as LaGrange removed the keys from the ignition and opened the driver’s side door. “I’m sorry, Bruno,” he said before stepping out. “Remember the San Sebastian Hotel? You fucked up, you horny bastard.”

Belova, a better-dressed and slimmed-down version of Boris Yeltsin, kept his eyes squarely focused on Torenzi. He had no intention of giving the professional killer any opening. It was a lesson his two sons had learned the hard way at that hotel in Manhattan where they’d tried to run their scam on the Italian.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked in his heavy Russian accent. He was the head of the Belova crime family, that’s who. They were the U.S. arm of Solntsevskaya Bratva, one of the most powerful crime families in Moscow.

“No,” answered Torenzi, who knew enough to keep looking straight ahead out the windshield.

“Those were my boys you killed in that hotel room, my flesh and blood,” he said with equal parts anger and despair. He was his own Molotov cocktail ready to explode.

Belova waited for some type of reaction from Torenzi. A look of surprise, maybe even regret. “Sorry” was a long shot, as was anything else approaching an apology – Belova had no delusions about that. Not that it would’ve made a difference. There was no changing his plans. No chance of mercy for the Italian killer.

Still, Belova never would’ve imagined the response he did get from the man.

“They were punks,” said Torenzi. “They had it coming.”

“Motherfucker!” yelled Belova, pulling back the hammer on his Makarov PM.

“Wait!” yelled LaGrange even louder. He was standing behind Belova.

“What?” asked Belova impatiently over his shoulder. He still wasn’t about to take his eyes off Torenzi. He knew how lethal this man could be.

“For Christ’s sake, not in the car,” said LaGrange. “Not unless you want to clean up afterward.”

Belova reluctantly nodded, reaching out with his free hand. He opened Torenzi’s door and backed up a few steps, just to be safe.

“Get out,” he said.

For the first time, Torenzi turned to Belova. But all he gave him was a quick glance as he stepped out of the car. LaGrange, on the other hand, received a glare that would have made even the devil stutter.

“How much?” asked Torenzi. For how much did you sell me out?

LaGrange didn’t answer. He could only look down at the dirt beneath his feet.

Torenzi stared back at Belova now, unblinking. There was no plea for mercy, no begging for forgiveness.

“Turn around,” ordered Belova. “Let me see the horse’s ass.”

Torenzi shook his head adamantly. “No. You look at me when you do it,” he said.

With that, he linked his hands behind his back and dropped to his knees. As if that weren’t enough, he opened his mouth wide.

Sick and twisted to the bitter end.

Belova stepped forward, shoving the barrel of his Makarov PM straight back to Torenzi’s molars. He was the boss of his family; it had been more than a decade since he’d killed anyone himself. He was far more accustomed to giving the order, not seeing it through.

The result was a split second’s pause. A blink of the eye. The chance Torenzi was banking on, or at least hoping for.

Now!

Torenzi whipped his head to the side, forcing the gun against the inside of his cheek as a startled Belova pulled the trigger. The bullet blew a quarter-size hole in the hit man’s face, but only his flesh went flying, not his brains.

Falling backwards, Torenzi reached under his pant leg for the stiletto strapped to his shin. With the grip clenched in his fingers he lunged for the Russian asshole, stabbing him so deep in his thigh that the tip of the blade struck bone.

Belova screamed in agony as he collapsed to the ground. The gun dropped from his hand. Torenzi scooped it up and fired straight into Belova’s throat before whipping his arm around at LaGrange for his second shot.

But LaGrange had other ideas.

He had already fired his Ruger SR9, the oversize trigger an easy squeeze in his large hands. The round caught Torenzi in the stomach, sending blood spurting out of his mouth as he keeled over on one side.

Stepping forward, LaGrange quickly pumped two more shots into Torenzi’s chest before waiting to see if yet another would be required.

It wasn’t.

Torenzi had slid onto his back, arms spread, the gun resting in the palm of his hand, never to be fired again. His eyes flickered as he drew a last breath, his chest heaving upward before slowly deflating.

Then he was gone, straight to hell. Do not pass Go.

“HELLO, MR. DANIELS, I’m Marie McCormick,” said my new nurse for the night. She came into my room at Lenox Hill Hospital with a welcome smile and an even more welcome cup filled with two Vicodin. This was my second hospital of the day. After finally being stitched up, I was being “kept for observation,” which I didn’t mind so much since my apartment was still a police crime scene.

“Boy, am I glad to see you, Marie,” I said.

Not just because of the good meds, either. The day nurse assigned to my room had all the charm and charisma of the leaders of the Spanish Inquisition. She was also a stickler for the rules. Visiting hours ended at 8:30 and at 8:31 she had shooed Courtney out as if she were a fox in a henhouse. How could anybody with a heart do that? Couldn’t she see how good Courtney and I were together? Heck, we were holding hands, and had been for half an hour.

Before I could tell Nurse Ratched where to shove her rules, Courtney announced she had to be somewhere anyway. “I’ve got to go put the finishing touches on something,” she said. “Sorry, Nick. I’ll be back in the morning.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“Something kind of interesting. But I can’t tell you yet. I don’t want to jinx it.”

“So I’m a jinx, huh?”

It’s hardly what she meant, but it’s not like I could blame her or anyone else for thinking that, especially anyone who happened to tune in to the news.

Clearly, Nurse Marie had watched a little of the coverage before coming on duty.

“You’re what my aunt Peggy up in Boston calls a trouble magnet,” she joked, wrapping a blood pressure sleeve around my arm. “Of course, she should talk, the big dope. She’s been married and divorced three times to the biggest losers on the planet.”

My cracked ribs made it hurt to laugh but I couldn’t help it. Marie was my kind of woman. Down-to-earth and funny.

“Say, where’s that brave little niece of yours?” she asked. “I saw her being interviewed.”

“She’s back home safe with her mother,” I said. “Right where she should be.”

Agent Keller had personally driven her back to Weston. He certainly knew the way. For good measure he was spending the night – even though the Bureau had already assigned four agents to guard the house. “Just in case,” he said. “I owe Elizabeth.”