2. Nicolae Dragos
nicolae dragos
Tatiana
I watch Lash close the door behind himself, the sting of rejection burning like acid in my gut.
I strip out of my skirt and underwear, leaving them on the floor for once in my life. I dress quickly in my most comfortable jeans, with a soft and supportive sports bra, a fitted white T-shirt, and my vintage leather biker jacket. Heavy black shit-kicker boots complete the look; as well as being cool, the boots are incredibly comfortable, and feature steel toes as an added bonus. I make quick work of braiding my hair and then coiling the long braid into a bun.
Knowing time is short, I grab a small leather backpack-style purse from my closet and stuff a change of clothes into it, along with some feminine products just in case, deodorant, a new toothbrush and travel tube of toothpaste, and…for reasons I don't care to examine too closely at this moment, a string of condoms.
A knock at the door announces the end of Lash's patience. "Are you ready?"
"Nearly," I answer, opening the door and pushing past him.
I go into the second bedroom, which I use as an office; crouching beside my desk, I enter the combination to my safe. Within is the emergency kit Tata has insisted I keep on hand: a fire- and waterproof bag containing cash—ten thousand euros, ten thousand US Dollars, and five thousand in an assortment of currencies; a compact handgun and two spare, loaded magazines; my passport; and a cheap, disposable, pre-paid burner phone with a full battery and a charger with a converter for wall and car use.
I stuff everything but the handgun into my bag; the handgun goes into the pocket of my jacket.
Lash grins at me. "You are your father's daughter, I see."
"For better or worse, yes. When I first moved out to live on my own, Tata gave me this safe with all of this in it. He insisted I keep this emergency kit with me wherever I live, and that I keep the passport current. I've never needed anything but the passport until now."
"Such is the nature of emergencies," Lash says. "Your father has many faults, but he is no one's fool." He glances at my jacket pocket and the weapon therein. "Do you have training with that gun?"
I nod. "Tata makes me go to the range with him every Sunday morning." I shake my head. "I had a gun in my hand when Filip shot Ana and Katya. I…I froze. It was so sudden. So unexpected, and I…I did nothing." My eyes burn.
Lash takes me by the arms, and his deep, wild, dark, and unknowable eyes pierce mine. "You are not a killer, Tatiana. That is a good thing. To carry death on your conscience is a hard thing. Be glad you do not."
"They were sweet, innocent girls," I say, feeling rage boil in my blood. "They had nothing to do with anything. There was no reason to kill them. Why, then? Why not kidnap me from my bed, or while shopping? Why kill Georg? He was innocent as well.”
Lash shakes his head. "Who can know the reasoning of bloody-minded insects like Filip?" He frowns. "Tatiana, about what I said…"
I move past him. "Later, Lash. As you keep saying, we have to go."
He nods, and we leave my flat together, Lash preceding me, gun held in both hands close against his chest with the barrel angled down—a grip unique to those trained in close-quarters combat and room-clearing tactics. My father employs men from all walks of life across his various business interests, both legitimate and otherwise; his bodyguards and enforcers are all exclusively former military and police, and I have enough experience with those types of men to know when a man is an operator, as they call themselves, and when he is merely a thug with a gun.
Lash is an operator, through and through: it is written in the scars on his body, in the brusque efficiency in everything he does, in the lethal, predatory way he moves, in the cold hardness of his eyes.
His hallway takedown of the two men impressed me; it was utterly silent, brutally quick, and accomplished without firing a shot.
I wonder what it says about me that it turned me on. Am I a sadist, to be aroused by the murder of two men?
It wasn't the death that affected me that way, though, I recognize. It was the skill he demonstrated. The feeling of safety and security engendered by his protection.
We're out on the street and Lash has stowed his gun at the small of his back, hidden by his shirt. We walk in silence for a long time, covering block after block, turning at random, circling, doubling back, and crisscrossing our own path until I am disoriented myself.
"Where are we going, Lash?" I ask, after almost an hour of walking.
"Nowhere," he says, eyes roving restlessly. "I am assessing the skill of our pursuers."
"Pursuers?" I check behind us and see nothing, no one.
He indicates a camera atop a pole supporting a traffic light. "They watch us."
"So we wander Zagreb aimlessly hoping to confuse them?"
A shrug. "That is part of it. What I am really assessing—well, testing, perhaps, is the more accurate word—is their response time. They know we escaped their men at your flat. That was an hour ago. If they are watching us as I assume, I need to know how fast they can send more men our way.
"Are we talking about Tata's men or Mercado’s?”
Another shrug. "Either—both. They may be the same, also. Remember, Filip was your father's man until Mercado turned him. When loyalty is purchased rather than earned, it becomes a commodity possessed by the highest bidder, and your father is not in the same universe as Mercado on that front."
"He is so powerful, then? This Mercado.”
Lash nods. "Oh yes. More so than you can imagine." A newer Lada Niva creeps up behind us. "Your father controls one small city in one small country in Europe. Mercado controls much of Latin America, from the Rio Grande to Tierra del Fuego."
"Oh," I say, processing this. "But we are not in South America. We are in the city controlled by my father."
"For a man worth billions, a man who owns politicians, who controls police forces and can command the generals of armies, it is a simple enough matter to exert in his influence wherever he wishes." Lash nudges me so I am forced to walk with my shoulder brushing the wall, putting his body between me and the Lada still trailing us by a few meters. "If Mercado wanted to, he could have your father assassinated and put whoever he wishes in his place, and then Mercado would own Zagreb."
"What is stopping him?" I ask.
"Value. What does Mercado want with Zagreb, Croatia? It does not factor very heavily in the world of illegal trade. Drugs do not flow through here and neither do guns or women."
"Tata deals heavily in drugs," I say. "Guns and women not so much."
A shrug. "Think of it this way, Tatiana: your father is a distributor. He purchases his drugs from elsewhere—in bulk, yes, by the kilo and hundreds of kilos, but he still purchases and then distributes. Mercado is the source . He controls the flow. He produces the drugs, and he decides where they go. That is genuine power. I do not mean to denigrate him, Tatiana, but your father is the ant scurrying this way and that with crumbs. Mercado is the hand wielding the entire cookie."
I frown all the harder. "If Mercado is so powerful, then what chance do we have?"
Lash grins. "My employer is the difference."
"Who is your employer?" I ask.
"An excellent question," Lash says. "A powerful individual. A very mysterious one who deals in information, among other things."
“What is his name?"
Lash shakes his head. "That's the mysterious part. I don't know."
I laugh. "You work for someone, and you don't know his name?"
"I have never met him, only his second in command, Inez. But I see the effects of his power." Lash shrugs. "Where Mercado is the stormtroopers of the cartels spreading murder and destruction in broad daylight, my employer is the whisper in the shadows, a knife in the dark."
“The knife in the dark being you,” I say. “The obsidian blade."
He nods. “Yes." He glances back at the Lada. "Are those your father's men? I think they must be, or they would have attacked us by now."
I look and then nod. “Yes. That is Jakov and Tomas."
"Tell me about them."
I shrug. "The bluntest of instruments. They guard shipments, usually. If Tata needs someone intimidated or leveraged, he sends them."
Lash nods. "Wonderful."
All I catch is a blur of movement, and Lash has his gun out— BANGBANG ! The hood of the Lada sprouts a pair of holes and smoke plumes from the engine bay. It's so sudden that I jump in shock, shrieking. Before I can so much as stammer a question, Lash is at the driver's window, smashing it with the butt of his gun, reaching in and yanking open the door, and dragging the driver out.
"Call Stjepan," Lash growls in Croatian. "Now."
Tomas, the driver, blinks blood out of his eye where a shard of glass cut his face above his eyebrow. He digs his phone out of his pocket and hits a favorite contact. The handset rings, and Lash takes it, puts it on speaker.
"Tomas," Tata's voice barks. "You have her?"
"No, Stjepan, I do." Lash's voice is a low growl. "I did not kidnap her. The video you saw was a deepfake. Your man Filip was a traitor."
"Nicolae Dragos," Tata says. “It has been a very long time. Tell me, old friend, why should I believe you?"
"Believe me , Tata," I say, taking the phone from Lash. "It was Filip and Ivan. Filip killed Ana and Katya right in front of me. He molested me and he would have raped me. He was working for Mercado. Lash saved me."
A long, tense silence. "Tati, is it you? You say so?"
"I say so, Tata."
"Then you can come home. Lash can deliver you."
Lash takes the phone back. "I am not certain that is a good plan, Stjepan. If Mercado turned Filip, who else in your circle has he turned? Who can you trust?"
Another silence. "Filip was my trusted right hand."
"And Mercado bought him. You cannot trust anyone."
"But I can trust you, eh, Nicolae?"
"I never betrayed you, Stjepan. You know what I went through. You know what happened. Would you have stayed?" He shakes his head. "Nicolae Dragos is dead. He has been dead for many years. Now there is only Lash."
"You always had a flair for drama, Nicolae." Tata sighs. "What do you suggest, then?"
"For one, I am not Nicolae, I am Lash. For another, you release my friends. For a third, you do some quiet investigation into the finances of those you think you can trust. Until you know for sure who Mercado owns and who he does not, Tatiana is safer with me."
"If I release your friends, what leverage do I have over you?"
Lash sighs in annoyance. "You are thinking about this all wrong, Stjepan. You do not need leverage over me. And holding a man like Solomon Cabot is not the leverage you think it is. I do not know the other two, but if they are with Solomon, then you have not one tiger by the tail, but three. Release them, and soon, before you discover what I mean the hard way."
"You have my daughter, Lash."
A sigh. "I do not have her, Stjepan. I am with her. She is not my prisoner or my hostage."
"Tata—Father," I say, switching to Croatian. "Listen to him. Please. I do not know what is in the past between you two, and I do not care. It has nothing to do with me."
Tata sighs, thinking. "I cannot trust you, Lash . When my daughter is returned to me, I will release your friends. I will do as you say, however—I will look into those I feel I can trust."
Lash shakes his head. "You always were stubborn, Stjepan. At the very least, keep your men close. Sending them after us only muddies the water, and I have enough to worry about with Mercado's men after your daughter."
"They are after my daughter? I assumed he was using her to get to me."
Lash snorts. "I do not know what he wants, but I do not think it is you. His men, before I killed them, said he wants her alive. Why, I do not know. Perhaps it is to control you."
"If what you say is true, then would she not be safer at home in my compound, protected by my men?"
"Not if your men are not yours."
"Who can I trust, then, if not the men I have paid handsomely for so many years?"
Lash shakes his head, snarling in frustration. "You are a fool, and I just told Tatiana that you are not a fool. You make a liar out of me, Stjepan."
"Insulting me is not the path to earning my favor."
"I do not care about your favor!" Lash snaps. "I care about your daughter's safety."
I touch Lash's thick bicep. "If you know my father," I murmur so only he can hear me, "then you know he must make up his own mind. You will never change his mind.”
A disgusted sigh. “Yes, yes. You are right, of course. I forgot what a stubborn old donkey your father could be." He ends the call, cutting short my father's spluttering bluster. He gives the phone back to Tomas. "Go back to him and tell him what happened here. I have not hurt you when I could have."
Tomas, short and wide, tough and dimwitted, nods eagerly. "Yes, yes, I will tell him."
"Come." Lash strides away, and I follow after him.
We round the corner just in time for a city bus to squeal to a halt at a bus stop. Lash and I board, pay the fare, and sit at the back.
A block later, I glance at Lash. "Now what?"
"For your father's sake, I must free my friends. Solomon is not a patient man and will only tolerate captivity for so long. And believe me, when Solomon Cabot runs out of patience, bad things happen." He sighs, rubbing his face with both hands. "The truth is, I have a feeling Solomon is only here because of me. This worries me. I have a feeling we are only seeing one small aspect of this whole situation."
"Who is this friend of yours, this Solomon?" I ask.
Lash's grin isn't a nice thing. "A ghost. We are all ghosts, Tatiana, me and the men I now consider my brothers."
I consider this for a while, tucking it away with the growing pile of things about Lash that I am trying to process. “And who is Nicolae Dragos?"
He sighs. "That was my name, for a time."
I furrow my brow at him. "For a time?"
A nod and a shrug. "Yes. For a time."
"What does that mean?" I ask.
He doesn't answer right away. "I have had many names in my life. I put them on and take them off like hats. Nicolae Drago is…" he closes his eyes and rests his head backward. "It is the name I wore the longest. I had happiness as Nicolae. The greatest happiness. I also knew the greatest sorrow as Nicolae, as well."
“Will you tell me?" I ask.
He shakes his head, but it does not feel like a refusal. "I would not burden you with such sorrow, Lovely One."
"Yet you carry it alone.” For a moment, I see the exhaustion on his face, the old agony.
It is gone as swiftly as it appeared, and his face is an expressionless mask of stone once more. "It is mine to carry."
"Which stop is ours?" I ask, after a long silence.
Lash, eyes closed, just grunts. "We are resting, not traveling. We cannot be snuck upon while seated in the back of a moving bus."
"Oh," I say. "Smart."
A quick quirk of his lips is his only expression. "This is not my first time being on the run." He opens one eye and regards me. "Close your eyes and rest. When the bus stops, we look to see who boards."
And so we passed the hours, dozing between stops. After we ride the bus long enough that Lash feels somewhat rested, we disembark—despite having ridden for a long time, we hadn't actually gone anywhere, since the buses run in a loop. Instead of asking the question I feel percolating in my brain—now what?—I follow Lash away from the bus stop. We cross the street, cut down an alley, cross another street…this is not aimless wandering. Lash going somewhere specific—following smaller one-way side streets and back alleys, places where it is likely we will be spotted by cameras. We walk for ages, it feels like, block after block until my feet ache and my legs protest. Gradually, I recognize where we are: near Tata's compound.
"Lash, we can't get into my father's compound," I say. "It is too well-guarded and too secure."
Lash just shrugs. “Getting in is easy. Getting out with Solomon and his friends without killing your father's men… that's the hard part."
I know the security measures Tata has in place: biometric locks, cameras, laser tripwires, regular patrols. Getting in is not easy: that is the entire point of the security, is it not?
But then, Lash does not seem like your average person, nor even your average operator. For one thing, what did it mean that he has had many names, that he takes them off and puts them on like hats? What is the sorrow he carries? What happened between him and my father?
Why did he reject me?
We are short on time, that much is obvious, and reason enough. But it wasn't that. He didn't act tempted and then stop because we didn't have enough time.
He rejected me. Turned me down cold. Literally pushed me off of him and walked away.
I cannot be what you want. What does that mean?
I've never been turned down before. It's not a good feeling and I don't know what to do with it.
I don't know what to do with him.
Am I attracted to him? Or is it merely the feeling that I am safe with him?
I steal looks at him as we walk. He is not a tall man, perhaps five-eight or five-nine at the most, but he is impossibly muscular—massively broad, hard, round shoulders, immense arms, and a thick chest. His long, glossy black hair falls down his back, tangled and in need of brushing. His beard is long and neatly trimmed and clean. His skin is dark olive, naturally dark from his ethnicity and tanned darker yet from a lifetime in the sun.
He notices me looking and arches an eyebrow. "Why do you look at me this way?"
I shrug. "Trying to figure you out."
He snorts. "Good luck with that."
"Why do you say that?"
A shrug. "I am not an easy man to know."
“So I am discovering. You won't tell me anything about yourself."
"No." It is his only response.
I wait until it's obvious nothing more is forthcoming. "Well? Why not?"
"I do not wish to be known."
"Why not?"
A sigh. “There is nothing but pain in my past, Lovely One. I have experienced enough pain to last many lifetimes."
I consider this answer for a long time. "To be alive is to experience pain, Lash. You cannot escape it through isolation. Is that not its own kind of pain?"
He nods. "It is. But I prefer that pain to…." a harsh breath, a shake of his head. "To the pain of loss."
"Who did you lose?"
He doesn't answer, but I see his jaw flexing. He halts, ducking into a doorway. "Wait here."
"Lash—" I start.
He chops his hand downward, silencing me. "This I must do alone. Wait here. Keep a sharp lookout for men you do not recognize. If men you do not recognize approach you, shoot them." He cups his large, rough, powerful hands around mine. "Shoot to kill. If you feel you must shoot, do not hesitate. Hesitation is death.”
"O-okay," I say. "Please be careful, Lash."
His smile is gentle. "I will be fine." He gestures at my father's compound. "This is child's play. Your father thinks his fancy electronics keep him safe."
I wonder at that pair of statements, but before I can put together a response Lash is striding away from me, continuing down the sidewalk parallel to the compound. He crosses the street toward the compound and is gone from my sight.
My heart pounds as I shrink back into the doorway, trying to will myself invisible.
It is funny how naked and vulnerable I feel without Lash.