79. Kai
Kai
Iopen my eyes and immediately wonder whether I’m dead.
But if I were dead, I don’t think I’d feel any pain and I’m in so much of it.
My head is throbbing and fuzzy, like cotton has been stuffed between my ears.
It hurts to breathe, to blink, to exist. My chin rests heavy against my chest while I get my bearings.
It stings and aches. I’m sure it’s covered in bruises and cuts. My shirt is torn and soaked in blood.
I try to move my hands but they’re being restrained by something.
Zip ties maybe? I can’t move my legs either.
They are shackled to what I think is a wooden chair.
And wherever I am is dark and dingy. The entire place feels musty and closed off, everything covered in a thick layer of grime.
Maybe I’m underground? The floor feels wet and so do my sneakers.
Glancing down and squinting, I realize the concrete is saturated, from a mix of my piss and blood.
Jesus fucking Christ. I’m going to die here.
In this dirty, disgusting shithole.
And just as I begin to slip into a panic attack, a rough hand grabs my jaw, yanking it upward.
“Nice of you to join us, pretty boy,” the man sneers, giving me a menacing smile. It’s the same disturbing voice of the person who attacked me in the parking lot. He slaps my face hard, making sure I’m paying attention.
“Where am I?” I mutter, turning my head out of his grip. I lick my bottom lip where blood trickles out, the metallic taste flooding my mouth.
“We can’t tell you that. That would take all the fun out of it, wouldn’t it, lad?
” he speaks with a heavy Irish accent, confirming what I already know.
I was right to be paranoid. There is no doubt in my mind that the man or men who kidnapped me are connected to the O’Rourke mob.
I saw this coming. I just didn’t want to accept it.
“What do you want?” I snarl, staring up at him.
He’s tall, maybe an inch or two shorter than me, with muddy brown hair and empty emerald eyes.
He has a gun in a holster on his hip along with black steel-toed boots.
Tattooed biceps bulge underneath his t-shirt.
I could probably take him, or outrun him, but not in the condition I’m in.
That’s assuming I could even break free somehow.
“Listen mate, you thought you could fuck around with the O’Rourke’s and we wouldn’t come to collect?”
“I paid 30,000 dollars more than the debt. I would hardly call that fucking around,” I respond. He moves quickly, even with his slight limp, taking a knife stowed in his pocket and bringing the sharp edge to the side of my face. He kneels in front of me, pressing it into my cheek.
“It wasn’t your debt to pay, lad. And it wasn’t your business to fuck with.”
“But it’s paid,” I told him, trying to understand what this was all about.
“It’s not about the money anymore, lad. We’ve been waiting for Aiden to pay his dues for years now.
Do you know how much of our time he’s wasted?
And the boss doesn’t like his time being wasted.
” I swallow, unable to form words. “The debt's been paid. But disrespect?” He clicks his tongue, dragging the knife down my cheek, a stain of blood following it.
“That's a different kind of bill entirely.”
“Please, I will give you whatever you want. Please,” I beg. “Don’t kill me.”
“Don’t worry, pretty boy, we aren’t going to kill you. You’re of no use to us dead,” he says standing.
“So then what do you—what do they—want?” I sputter.
“You know, just a cool million.”
The number lands like a punch to the sternum. A million dollars. I run the math before I can stop myself, liquidating my accounts, breaking my CDs early, bleeding out my retirement fund. The house in Thailand. Maybe then. Maybe.
“I don't have that kind of money liquidated right now,” I say carefully. “That's not something I can pull up on my phone in the next five minutes.”
He tilts his head, unbothered. “No one said anything about five minutes.”
“I'm serious. That's… I'd need time. Days, maybe. To move things around without triggering flags.”
“Flags,” he repeats, like the word amuses him.
“You're worried about flags?” He crouches down to my eye level and I can smell tobacco and something metallic on his breath.
“Let me tell you something about your friend.
Aiden's been borrowing from the boss for the better part of two years.
Small amounts at first. Harmless, really.
" His mouth twists. “Then not so small. And every single time the deadline came, there was an excuse. Always a reason. Always next week, next month, just a little more time. Do you understand what that does to a man like the boss? What it costs him?”
I say nothing.
“Aiden wasted months of his time. And the boss?” He stands. “He doesn't forgive wasted time. That's the one thing you can’t buy back.”
"The million," I press, trying to keep my voice level. "If I get it to you, does that settle it? Is that the end?"
He laughs at that. like I've said something genuinely funny. "The money's just the opening act."
My stomach drops. "What does that mean?"
"It means the boss wants what's owed. And what's owed isn't just currency anymore." He walks a slow circle around me. "But we're reasonable men. Wire the money first and we'll have a conversation about the rest."
"And if I can't move it fast enough?"
He stops behind me. I can't see him and that's somehow worse.
"Then we start making calls," he says quietly. "There's a woman. Pretty. Dark curls. And a little boy—your son, yeah? Cute kid.”
Every single nerve ending in my body goes cold.
"Don't," I say. My voice comes out lower and steadier than I feel, which surprises me. "Don't you fucking go near them."
"Then get us the money." He reappears in my periphery, moving toward the long wooden table where a leather toolkit is unrolled beneath a poorly lit swinging lamp.
I can't make out exactly what's laid out on it but dread fills in every detail my eyes can't. He reaches for something small and electronic.
***
They drop me off blindfolded, barely conscious, hands tied behind my back, in an alley or abandoned street somewhere.
My only indication of where I am the zip of cars and honk of horns in the distance.
I hear quick footsteps approaching and flinch, nervous O’Rourke’s men had come back.
I can tell someone is kneeling down in front of me, and they gently remove the blindfold from my eyes.
It's the first time I’ve seen the sun in days and it makes me want to weep.
“Hey it’s okay, we’re going to help you,” a kind voice whispers. That’s my last real memory before I wake up in the hospital.
***
Idon’t breathe a word of what happened to me to anyone. Not my parents, not the police or doctors. The only person that I think actually knows the truth, or some version of it, is Kendall. And she’s been asleep at my bedside for the second day in a row.
I recount the fabricated story so many times that I want to scream. I tell them that I had been attacked, kidnapped, and beaten violently and returned somewhere near my apartment.
I didn’t get a good look at them; they were wearing masks and they drugged me.
That’s all I’m allowed to say. Those are my rehearsed lines and I stick to them like my life depends on it, because it does.
Keeping my mouth shut ensures I keep my tongue and the rest of my body parts.
Although I can tell from the heavy sedatives and the blinding agony in my knee that I’m in trouble.
I would never play hockey again. I know that much.
I wake up every couple hours in so much pain that my only option is to fall back into an endless drug induced sleep.
But my dreams have transformed into nightmares and so has my reality.
Every time I close my eyes, I hear the crack of bone, feel the splintering of tendons and shredding of ligaments all over again.
And Jesus, the blood. I’ll never be able to unsee it.
I relive the horror that gripped my soul every time he lifted the golf club and the roaring, explosive pain that followed.
It was unescapable. It had reconfigured my DNA and seeped into the marrow.
These wounds, this torture, will stay with me for the rest of my life.
It makes me wish I was dead.