Rob Thurman - Basilisk

“She doesn’t seem as if she’d do that. She’s been helpful.” In ways she hadn’t planned on being. “And who’s to say I wouldn’t like being led around by my no— dick .”

“Fine. You’re a cursing machine now.” He put the gun back on the table. “Then be extra careful. The nice ones don’t play rough, but they don’t give your heart back either. And growing a new one takes a long time. Trust me.” He stripped, pulled on sweatpants, and slid under the covers of his bed for the night. “But don’t trust me much.” He stared at the ceiling. “Between being based at a strip club and Nat . . . to hell with it, I don’t know shit about women. Or maybe I don’t know shit about myself. Either way, just be careful.” He turned over, then yawned with an exhaustion that covered body and soul. He’d found out Anatoly had died, we’d lost our home, and now he was thinking about the past. And the past was Natalie. All of that would exhaust anyone.

Natalie was the woman Stefan had loved. Or, as he’d said, as much as he was capable of loving. Searching for me, blaming himself, putting away his morals to make as much money as he could in the Mafiya —it had all meant there wasn’t much left over for Natalie. She’d known it too. She’d left him and, as far as I knew, he hadn’t tried again. If he had an itch to scratch, as he’d phrased it, several of the strippers liked making a little money on the side.

“The side of what?” I’d asked, but that was when I was new to the real world, barely rescued. The Institute didn’t spend much time on procreation beyond the very basics. They didn’t describe the way it made your brain explode in the best possible way, the almost painful but beyond-pleasurable feeling of ejaculation. It felt as if your life were draining away in a rush of warmth and ecstasy, and you were happy to go with it. If that was what happened with only your body, I couldn’t imagine if there was emotion involved. What poured out of your body was warm; what poured out of your heart if someone ripped it in half when they left you would be an ice-cold river of sharp razors and broken glass.

Why would anyone want to repeat that experience? Or risk it to begin with? I looked at the laptop for several seconds before pushing it away across the bed. Then I went to the bathroom, emptied the ice into the sink, and filled the bucket with water. Carrying it to the door, I used my penknife to slice the carpet. Just as I thought. Cheap hotel equaled cheap or no insulating rubber or wood threshold. There was at least an inch between the bottom of the door and the floor. I went outside and quietly poured the water all the way up that nonexistent threshold. Back inside, I closed the door, I went to my backpack for my small case of tools, and knelt before the TV. “Sorry.” I sighed with real regret. “I know it’s your life or ours, but we need the light.” And as with all no-tell motels, that was all we had—a single lamp and the bathroom light.

After unplugging the television, snipping the cord, stripping the insulation to find the hot wire, usually the black one, I folded the grounding wire back out of the way. Counting my blessings there was an outlet by the small table by the smaller window (in case you brought your own extra lamp—God, I hadn’t missed these crappy rooms), I plugged the TV cord in and rested the tip of the black wire in the water that had run a few inches under the door onto the concrete floor that had been under the carpet. There. It wasn’t a pipe bomb, but it would do . . . and it wouldn’t kill.

“What are you doing? You destroyed a TV. That’s like the Holy Grail to you. And you gut it to electrocute the maid?” Stefan demanded, the flat motel pillow folded under his head.

“It won’t kill. But it will make you extremely sorry you came knocking at our door.” I stood from my squatting position and said, “You might want to call Saul. If he steps in the water in the morning, his beard will bristle like a porcupine getting a prostate exam. Oh, and he’ll be thrown a few feet away, wet himself, and will probably scream himself hoarse when he can move again.” I grinned. “On the other hand, he’s probably already asleep. Let him rest.”

He snorted and reached for his cell phone resting beside his gun. “Running for the second time is a damn sight different from the first. Now you’re teaching me instead of the other way around.” He pressed the numbers. “And you have become somewhat of a shit, too, just like I said. And not so little either.”

I thought about that and the pipe bombs, the plane, hiring drug dealers, possibly electrocuting the maid, and more Stefan didn’t know. No, I didn’t mean he didn’t know—I meant, he didn’t know because he hadn’t asked me about them. Semantics can save your soul.

I’d become a shit, my brother thought. I grinned again—nothing theoretical about that.

I really rather had.

Iforgot the satisfaction of knowing my new self and becoming who I was meant to be—a manipulative, slightly amoral shit/genius—when at four a.m. a scream and sizzle/zap woke me up. Preparing for the worst was an excellent hobby. Getting the worst was not as enjoyable. Stefan was already at the door with his Steyr 9mm in hand. He didn’t have to tell me to pack. We’d learned last time. You pack before you go to bed for cases like this. “Watch out for the water,” I cautioned. “I can’t drag a crispy, fried brother to the car and our bags too.”

Avoiding the inch or two of water that had seeped under the door, but not unplugging the cord in case whoever was out there had a friend, he opened the door. Half in and half out of the puddle of water, a man twitched convulsively, eyes rolling back in his head. “Well, he’s not dead, but I’m not sure he’s quite alive either,” Stefan remarked.

I raced across the room and yanked the TV cord from the outlet. “Incompetent,” I muttered at myself. “Older buildings had a less safe wiring configuration and their electrical insulation isn’t always up to code if the owners don’t make the investment, which apparently they didn’t.”

“I’m not crying any tears over it.” Stefan lightly kicked the man’s shoe with his own bare foot. “See the gun? That is not a particularly friendly gun. It’s a Russian GSh-18 pistol, made to carry armor-penetrating rounds. It’s what we used to call a nye ostavtye ni odin jiveaum , a ‘take no prisoners’ gun or a Siberian Special.” Lingering long ago from the Stalin years (the History Channel cleansed my palate between movies), some older Russians considered Siberia equal to death . . . or Hell. Many had passed on that sentiment. Stefan’s grandfather had survived Siberia, but to hear Stefan retell the stories, none of his grandfather’s friends had.

“Call Saul. Get your shoes and rat while I check to see if there’s anyone else out there.” He was out the door, bare-chested and barefoot. He didn’t look any less dangerous for it. Five minutes later, the three of us were in the parking lot. The still-twitching guy wasn’t Mafiya despite the Russian gun, which was at least one less problem. He was one of Raynor’s men, loyal beyond his boss’s death—I’d checked his wallet. He had the same crappy fake government ID. He was alive but wasn’t exactly functional. The three of us went back to our rooms, dressed, hefted our bags, and ran back out to the parking lot.

Saul was equally unhappy. His ginger hair was standing on end, there was a sleep crease on his upper cheek, and he was in pajamas—in a way. He saw me wincing and huffed. “This is what you get. If I don’t have a half hour to do it right, I’m not doing it at all. He headed for his SUV, parked several cars from the one we had stolen. Our vehicle had its license plate switched twice over from the fast food place where we’d acquired the Mustang. It paid to take precautions. I started after Stefan when Godzilla jumped off my shoulder after spotting half a discarded Twinkie on the asphalt. I turned, dropped one bag, and caught him in midair to scold him. It was only half a minute, but that was enough time for Stefan to reach for the car door handle.