Kotik

Chapter 13 The Magic Words #2

Big guy blowing out people’s brains in the street…

“Anyway. Enough people know you now that it’s problematic.

Sergei has to meet you. He’ll saddle you with some not-so-fun information, then tell you that he’ll kill you if you ever tell anyone.

You and everyone you love. That’s loyalty, you see?

Everyone goes down together, so it’s in everyone’s best interests not to go down. ”

I realized I’d been twisting my mitten into a now-fraying knot in my lap. I was too tired to be shocked by anything he said. This was all just a quiet descent into hell. A cold, cigarette-smoke-filled hell.

“Don’t worry,” Misha reassured me, “it’s not as scary as it sounds. Just remember that everyone’s a businessman. There’s only a handful of problematic…” He scrunched his nose. “Well, no, you know the problematic one, don’t you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you’re seeing him.” He grinned, and we pulled onto the curb of a pharmacy. A faded poster of a woman holding up a tube of Colgate smiled at me from behind the metal bars on the windows.

“Why do you keep saying that?” I hurried as he swung his door open.

“Sit and wait here, I’ll be right back. You sure I can’t get you an antiseptic or something? Aspirin?”

“No, thank you.”

I sat with my eyes forward and my hands neatly folded in my lap until he returned with a large leather duffel bag and threw it in the back seat.

“Anyway,” Misha said, and the cold air smacked across my bare skin as he got back in behind the steering wheel.

“Don’t sass Sergei, and when he asks a question, answer it honestly.

You’re shit at lying, and you’re just going to get yourself and Vitali in trouble.

And only one of you can handle trouble.”

“Why are you telling me all this? Isn’t it all supposed to be… I don’t know, not out loud?”

“What’s not out loud?” He snorted. “You don’t see the assholes with the red jackets and golden chains? Don’t see the Mercedes? It’s practically being screamed at you, and somehow it’s surprising.”

“Misha,” I said, and took a deep breath because this wasn’t something I actually wanted to know, but God, he kept dancing around it so much that my stomach was just one big twisted mess of knots, and I either threw up the question or my breakfast. “Why do you keep saying that stuff about Vitali? I know what happened last night was… it was awful, but you make it sound like he’s somehow worse.

What does it mean that he’s a ‘hungry dog?’”

“You think he has Roman follow you just to protect you? Watch, pay attention, Katienka. Pay attention to how many things about Vitali make no sense. I’ve known him a long time.

Knew him before he was shipped off to New Zealand.

He was a bright boy—brighter than me, that’s for sure.

But he came from a bad family. Parents were drunks and used to beat on him and his sister. ”

I heard my voice come from a numb place, a place that didn’t really feel, just wanted to gather information for when things made sense again, and I could process something. Anything. “I thought they died when she was a baby?”

“Not that one. His older sister. I heard rumors, but can’t exactly ask Konstantinov about it; he doesn’t like his family mentioned, probably because he shot his parents.”

“What…”

“Yeah, shot them dead in the kitchen. I think he finally snapped after his papa broke his arm with those army-issued boots. Those things are heavy-duty, you know? Hurts like hren to fire a pistol with a broken arm, but he did it. Can you be a friend and reach back there, check the inner pocket?”

I twisted toward the duffel bag and had to climb halfway over my seat to reach it. There was no doubt my butt was right in Misha’s face. Vitali shot his parents. The bag was full of money and hard, pillow-shaped bundles wrapped in shopping bags. “What am I looking for?”

“There’s a baggie of bright yellow tetracycline tablets. A bottle of vodka is in there somewhere—get that too.”

I did. My first thought was that the vodka bottle was sealed.

I handed him the pills and thought he’d wash them down, but he just swallowed them dry—like some kind of maniac.

He lit another cigarette and held it clenched between his teeth as he let go of the steering wheel to pull off his coat.

I had to squeeze against the door to avoid getting punched as the big guy fought to free himself of a sleeve.

The roads were icy. I could still die that day.

“Do you mind?” he said through his teeth as he took hold of the steering wheel with one hand and pulled up the side of his shirt with the other.

I stared at the thick, crude, bloodied bandage over his ribs.

“Just pour however much on there. I need the clots to loosen before we get there so I can have someone redo the whole thing. Boris is shit with medicine, and the girl who usually does it went to visit her parents in St. Petersburg for the holidays. Her papa is an orchestra director. Interesting guy.”

I stared at the vodka in my hands, then twisted off the cap, took a swig, and stuck the bottle’s lip against the bloodiest part of the bandage.

“BLYAD! Warn me first! Jesus Christ, where did he even find you!”

“Sorry,” I muttered. “You were there.”

“HA!” he roared, then slapped away the bottle.

“You know what happened that day? Funny story about your ‘Why’s he such a scary guy’ friend.

Great story. He told us, ‘Get in the car, we’re going,’ and I didn’t even have a chance to put my good hat on.

He never said where, just piled us in. You might wonder, who is ‘us?’ Well, I’ll tell you.

It was Vitali, me, and a man named Pasha. ”

I immediately knew I didn’t want to hear this story. His tone said I didn’t want to hear this story.

“Pasha was unfortunately already piss drunk, but Vitali didn’t care because Pasha was the one who knew the bastard whose party it was.

Dima or something. Well, you see, Pasha couldn’t handle just listening to the radio.

He’s messing with it in the front seat while I’ve got my ass pressed to the back of my throat in the rear.

I tell him to shut the fuck up because he is getting rowdy.

Disrespectful. But it’s to me, so I know I can cave his face in later, but I’m thinking he’s about to cross a line with Vitali.

Which—Konstantinov doesn’t have a thin patience.

He’s diplomatic that way. But I can tell Pasha is getting on his last nerve, and that’s not good.

I start thinking maybe once we get to this party, I’ll feed Pasha a glass or two so he is out cold. ”

I tapped my fingers on the bottle’s glass. Tap-tap-tap.

“Well, we didn’t get far enough for that to happen.

Because Pasha is fiddling with the CD player, trying to stick his fat fingers into the slot because the CD is jammed.

Vitali tells him to get his filthy hands away from it, and if he busts it, Vitali will break his jaw. Here is where Pasha really fucked up.”

I pressed the bottle to my lips and tipped it back, trying desperately to outrun his story.

“He starts getting in Vitali’s face, but careful-like because somewhere in that idiotic head of his, he still knows what’s good for him. But he’s getting no reaction. So, he says, ‘You know, good boys listen.’”

I gagged, but I was a soldier, and took another swallow while Misha flicked the cigarette butt out the window and lit another.

“There was no going back. Vitali looks at me through the rear-view mirror, and I’m scrambling, searching through my pockets, because I can’t shoot inside the car and break the glass. I can’t get his leather dirty.”

I absently surveyed my seat. This seat. Pasha’s seat.

“So I reach over and open the passenger door. Pasha doesn’t realize what’s happening yet, and Vitali’s eyes are back on the road.

I opened my window and reached through. Got hold of Pasha’s collar.

The car is still going. He starts swearing, grabs onto whatever he can.

Grabs onto the gear shift. But I’m bigger, you know?

I’ve got him up to one asscheek out the door.

So he bites me. Right on the forearm. Bites hard.

Draws blood. And at this point, I’m done, and Vitali is done, so he slams the butt of his gun on Pasha’s fingers.

Let me tell you, the bastard released the shift right quick because his thumb was the only thing left intact.

I throw him out, thinking he’ll break a thing or two on the way, maybe enough to be handicapped for the rest of his life.

Learn to keep his mouth shut, and someone will pick him up off the side of the road and take him to the hospital—it’s still daylight out, you know? ”

Oh good. So it was Misha’s blood I stuck my fingers in.

“But Vitali doesn’t keep driving. He stops, and then, calm as if coming out of a parking spot, he shifts gears and reverses.

And at this point, I know what’s happening, and Pasha isn’t going to be handicapped anymore.

Vitali backs the car over Pasha. I don’t like the screams, so I try not to listen, but I still feel the crunch because Vitali is a good driver.

He lined the tire up with Pasha’s head. And all I can think about is this was the least cleaning up I’d have to do other than choking him.

Should have choked him. And now we wouldn’t get to stop at the store for cigarettes because we’d be late, and whatever Vitali wanted with that goddamn party, I wasn’t about to be the reason we were late after all that. ”

The vodka came back up my throat, but I gulped it down. This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t a real story, I was just in shock.

Misha raised an eyebrow. “Take it easy, you don’t want to be plastered for this.”

“That’s exactly what I want to be…” I choked out, three-fourths of the bottle sloshing around in my grip.

“Turned out you were the why. Could even say Pasha was your fault.” He laughed, but seeing my expression, tactlessly waved it off. “Relax, I’m kidding. That mraz said the magic words, and if you say the magic words, the bad thing happens. Had nothing to do with you.”

“What magic words?” I trapped the bottle between my feet to keep it from rolling and rubbed my temples. The liquor drummed through my veins.

“Good boy.”

The words gave me a discomfort I could only describe as oppressive. “Who is good boy?”

“Oh.” Misha tightened his lips and scratched his itchy heart. “Well, blyad, if you don’t know, then I definitely shouldn’t be the one to tell you. Sergei is the only one who isn’t scared to say it. Go ask him.”

Knowing this became imperative to my life. Maybe I was a little drunk. “I don’t want to ask Sergei anything. Come on, tell me? I haven’t told anyone ANYTHING you’ve told me.”

“Just nice to talk to someone who listens, you know?” Misha muttered, then scrunched his nose. “If I tell you and you open your fucking mouth, you’re digging my grave, and you better believe I’ll get to that shovel first and yours will be deeper.”

I pinched my fingers and dragged the imaginary zipper across my lips.

“I’m sure you’ve had the pleasure more than once to see the… the tattoos, right?”

Nod.

“You know what they’re covering?”

Nod.

“Bet you don’t, if you’re asking,” he said, and his tone changed, the terrifying light-heartedness gone and what replaced it was somehow scarier. “The New Zealand Bratva did a number. He was a young kid, just a boy—fifteen?—and no one would come looking for him. He had no one.”

“They tattooed a noose on him, I know. What does that mean?”

“A noose?” The look of genuine surprise on Misha’s face sent chills down my spine. “What noose? He came back with ‘Good Boy’ all capitals inked into his neck.”

The world stopped, and for a heartbeat, it stood still.

“Oh Vitali…” I whispered, the tears knocking.

* * *

About Russia:

kozel – equivalent of ‘asshole,’ but literally ‘goat’

vinegret – traditional beet salad