The Unlucky (22 page)

Anger rose in her as she moved closer to him, her focus on the back of the councilor’s head.

The rear door of the restaurant banged open as a cop jumped out. Machiavelli turned at the noise, but Sarah sprung into action.

She wrapped her free arm around the councilor’s neck, yanked him back into her and brought Diner’s gun up to his cheek.

“Drop it!” the cop at the restaurant shouted. He moved closer, lowering a few steps as more officers exited the restaurant behind him. “I’ll take the shot. Drop the fucking gun.”

Machiavelli’s hands moved skyward, the cell phone still locked in his grip, as Sarah spun him around to protect herself from itchy triggers.

“Tell them to back off,” she ordered Machiavelli. “If I take a bullet, you do too.” She jammed the tip of the gun into his cheek hard enough to bruise his gums. He grunted and tilted his head to the side to ease the pressure.

“Okay, okay.”

Seven uniformed officers had now emerged from the restaurant’s back door, guns up and ready. At any moment, one of them would try to play hero. This wasn’t working. The door opened again as more tried to come out.

“Tell them to remain calm,” Sarah whispered. “I don’t have to remind you what I did to Vanessa and Joel and Belinda and Fletcher’s dad.”

“Okay, everyone take it easy,” Machiavelli shouted.

“We’re going for a ride in your car,” Sarah said. “Mine needs some work now.”

“We’re leaving,” the councilor shouted for the cops to hear.

“Can’t let you do that, sir,” the officer who had come out first said. “Have to apprehend her.”

“You’re not listening, Officer. She will kill me like she has killed so many in the past two days.” Sarah started backing him up toward the Continental. “I’ll be fine,” Machiavelli went on. “Just don’t play hero and get me shot.”

“They can lower their weapons, too,” Sarah chimed in.

“Lower them,” Machiavelli ordered.

Sarah and Machiavelli stood against the side of his car. None of the officer’s guns lowered.

Sarah’s temper flared. She drew back on her arm, choking Machiavelli, and forced him to arch backwards and raise up onto the tips of his shoes, the whole time keeping Diner’s gun jammed into the side of his face.

“Lower them means,” she whispered, then shouted, “lower the fucking guns.”

Machiavelli was making choking sounds, his hands scrabbling at Sarah’s arm. Remarkably, his cell phone never left his grip. Sarah eased the pressure off, lowering him to the soles of his feet. He choked, gasped, and then coughed to clear a path in his throat to breathe.

“Open the door,” Sarah said.

Machiavelli reached around and pulled the back door to his Lincoln open.

“I’m going in backwards. You follow. Stupid shit gets you dead. Understood?”

He nodded, not ready to speak yet.

Sarah made him bend his knees as she got in the car. Vivian whispered to her that the car had a driver and that the driver was unarmed and willing to drive.

Then the upholstery of the Continental’s backseat met her butt. She eased back carefully, and pulled Machiavelli down with her.

He got inside the vehicle without a problem. Sarah moved the gun until it was placed at the opening of his ear, then reached over him to slam the door shut.

“Go!” she yelled at the driver.

The car got underway immediately. She chanced a look out the back window and saw about a dozen cops running after the car, half of them talking into little radios attached to their epaulets. Then she sunk lower in the seat to reduce her head being a target.

“No need to worry,” Machiavelli said. “This car is bulletproof.”

Sarah sat back up feeling a little foolish. They wouldn’t open fire on her in the councilor’s car as long as he was with her. Nerves after what happened to the Pontiac Catalina had made her duck.

She slid along the seat to the other side of the car and rested the gun on her lap, keeping it aimed in his direction.

“Thank you,” he said.

“For what?”

“Moving away.”

She frowned.

“You stink. What’s that smell?”

“Oh that. It’s a new collection of perfumes from Toronto’s finest importers and exporters of human beings. It’s called Garbage Scent. It also comes in Human Waste scent and for those special assholes, Scum of the Earth scent. I got too close to you, hence the smell.” She offered him a wry, half smile, then pursed her lips. “Tell me how you thought you could get away unscathed?”

The driver turned up another road, then ran a yellow and headed south on Spadina.

“How about you?” he asked, turning to face her. “With all the murders you’ve committed, do you really think there’s anywhere in this world you can go to escape prosecution?”

“Maybe I’ll kill every criminal in Toronto. That’ll help me escape justice.”

Machiavelli tried to stifle a laugh, but his mouth closed too late.

“That makes no sense whatsoever,” he said.

“I once heard someone say, kill a few people and you’re called a murderer. Kill a few million and you’re a conquerer.”

“Is that what you’re trying to do here? Conquer Toronto?”

Sarah shook her head. “No, not really. I’m only here to stop you.”

She looked out the window. The car was heading under the raised Gardener Expressway at the base of Spadina. In a block or so, the driver would have to turn left or right or they’d end up in Lake Ontario.

When she turned back to Machiavelli, he had a wide grin on his face.

“What could you possibly find so amusing?” Sarah asked.

“Your face.”

“Bold statement for a man in your position seeing as I’m the one with the weapon.”

The car stopped in the middle of an intersection. He had to be waiting to turn left. She needed more time to decide where to send him. The warehouse or the funeral home? But where were those buildings?

Where should I go, Vivian?

“You may have the weapon,” Machiavelli said. “But not for very long.”

“How’s that? You’re going to disarm me?” She braced herself for him if in fact that was what he wanted to do.

“No. They are.” He pointed behind her.

“So old, so old. That trick.” She wagged a finger at him.

The car still hadn’t moved. Through the windshield, no vehicles approached them. The driver wasn’t waiting to turn left after all.

Sarah dove across the seat and landed on Machiavelli just as something made of at least a dozen tonnes of steel smacked into the Lincoln. The car was shoved sideways until the wheels met the curb. It lifted up at a forty-five degree angle, hovered a moment, Sarah twisted uncomfortably, her face plastered against the passenger side window, then descended back to the road, smacking hard, the chassis protesting the hit.

Before she could regain her balance and locate Diner’s gun that had been knocked from her grip, something else smacked the car from behind. It was shoved forward and Sarah was pushed into the back of the seat, her shoulder twisting at an odd angle, pain shooting through her upper neck.

Another hit, but this time she saw what was attacking them. Three large pickup trucks with huge thick bars covering their grills were taking turns playing smashup derby with the Continental, which was losing poorly.

Another hit knocked her to the floor of the back seat. As she struggled to get up, one of the trucks hit them again, this time crunching in the side door enough that Sarah got wedged in, stuck.

“Shit!” she yelled as a deeper pain coursed through her shoulder. “Nothing had better be broken.”

Machiavelli’s door ripped open. Two men hauled him out and helped him away. Then a man carrying a long-barreled weapon came into sight.

“Get out,” he said.

“Nope. Can’t move. Stuck.”

Someone yanked on the door that held her in place. After two loud metallic bangs, the bent door gave way and popped open, exposing Sarah.

Rough hands wrapped around her shoulders and yanked upwards as she screamed at the pain.

This isn’t working out too well, Sis.

The hands pulled her free, then dropped her. After one bounce on the cement with her head, stars formed in her vision.

She looked under the Lincoln, spun her head frantically to look the other way, wincing at the pain in her shoulder. The sunlight was cut off by someone standing over her.

Machiavelli moved in close. He held a baseball bat, the trunk of the Continental open behind him.

“You’ll burn for this, bitch.”

The tip of the bat came in hard and too fast to avoid. It connected with her head and turned the lights out.

Chapter 26

Someone screamed. A man in pain. A lot of pain. All of it from under water. Distant somehow.

Consciousness swam up violently. Faint light filled her vision. A spotlight, but not on her, shone on the center of the tiled floor. Like a hospital floor. Her cheek ached. Her shoulder throbbed. Random thoughts flitted through her head.

Chinese restaurant. Vegetable oil. Grease. Smell. The car. The accident.

The baseball bat.

She opened her eyes and gasped. She was on the floor in a room similar to the morgue in the basement of the hospital.

A man stood beside her. She turned her head slowly. Another man stood on the other side of her.

She adjusted her weight, moved slightly to the right and sat up, testing her shoulder as she rose until her back leaned on a bank of cupboards. A cool dribble of saliva had pooled at the corner of her mouth. It leaked down her chin. When she wiped it, she felt the swelling the baseball bat had caused. A close inspection with her tongue revealed all her teeth were in the right places.

She smiled, frowned and opened her mouth wide, then closed it. No broken cheek bones. Only an ache in the face that felt like a sadomasochistic brick had kissed her too hard.

The scream again. Coming from the other room.

She looked up at the men beside her. Both wore suits. Were they the Mafia, the FBI, or well-dressed businessmen? Weapons were strapped over their shoulders. Large guns that could easily release multiple bullets in rapid succession.

A shadow filled the door. A man entered and turned on the main light.

“Ahh, she’s awake.” Councilor Marshall Machiavelli moved inside the room and stopped at a metal table. “How was your sleep?”

“Could have used a cocktail first. Maybe a whiskey.” The slight discomfort in her cheek made her wince and ease the words out with limited use of her mouth, but her shoulder was already feeling better. Probably just a sore muscle, nothing pulled.

“I unfortunately didn’t have any alcohol readily available when our little accident happened. But none of that will matter soon enough.”

“How and when does whiskey never matter?” she asked.

“Touché. You’re so right. I think when this is all over, I’ll go and enjoy a double. One for you and one for me.”

He maneuvered the metal table—an oversized gurney—until it was aimed at her.

“Let me ask you something,” Machiavelli said.

Sarah looked at the door Machiavelli had just come through. Someone else was in the room beyond that door. How many men were present? If she could disarm one of the guards standing on either side of her, maybe the weapon they carried could help her leave this place.

“You’re so masculine and strong,” Machiavelli said. “You have to tell me.”

She turned to glare at him.

“You must have a set of balls dangling from each side of your labia. That testosterone bath babies get must have come with a little something extra for you, right? Or do you still have testosterone baths regularly? Am I correct here? Because no woman could ever destroy so much in such a short time unless you were from some Mexican Cartel or elite Mafia hit squad.” He glanced at the men on either side of her. “Maybe she’s with the Mossad or MI6. Could be we have a hero among us.” Machiavelli met her gaze, a wide smile creasing his features. “A
super
hero. Wow.” He placed his hands on his hips in mock surprise. “Isn’t that something? A real, true-life super hero in our presence. Well,” he walked around the table and grabbed thick gloves off the counter, “we can’t have super heroes going around killing the citizens of Toronto, now can we?”

“I agree,” Sarah said. “So how about I just kill you? Then I’ll have that double whiskey and I’ll leave Toronto. When I get home, I’ll shave my ball sac and think about getting them removed as you’ll be dead and I won’t need them anymore. Sound good?”

“Being pretty gets you a few points.” He stopped in front of her and bent over, placing his gloved hands on his knees. “Being smoking hot gets you extra points. Man, the things I could do to you. I’d tear your pussy in half and come inside you so much you’d taste it a month later while you’re throwing up.”