Medianoche shook his head. They had been so close to fortune.
He walked through the sweet smells of perfume and took the escalator to the downstairs food court. The area was crowded. Lots of mothers and children. Medianoche bought a cup of coffee and sat in the section near the Coffee Store, closer to the end by Sony Style.
An older Latin man came downstairs. He had four small children with him.
Those were the old man’s grandchildren. All between the ages of eight and twelve.
The old man sat down and sent his grandchildren to get in line at Burger King.
Medianoche seasoned the coffee, just as he had done earlier.
As soon as the children left, Medianoche sat down in front of the smiling old man.
The old man took one look at Medianoche and said, “You are a soldier.”
“I was.”
“Soldiers recognize soldiers.”
Medianoche nodded. “That we do.”
“Bad men recognize bad men.”
“We have an aura.”
The old man crossed his legs. “You have killed many.”
“More than I can count. For country and for profit.”
“You are no different from me.”
“I’d like to think I am.”
The old man nodded. “And I take it that you are here for me.”
“You always come back to see your grandchildren. You always bring them here.”
“Our habits are what make us human. The same habits take us to the grave.”
Medianoche showed the old man a folder. Pictures of the old man in military uniform. Pictures of the vanished. Medianoche had photos of the old man’s family. Addresses.
The old man was an old warrior whose better days had gone by.
He said, “I only followed orders. I did nothing wrong. I had orders.”
“Like a good soldier.”
“Arrest me. Let me stand trial with the others.”
“Afraid not.”
“And if I refuse to go quietly?”
Medianoche motioned at the old man’s grandchildren.
That was a real threat. The old man knew that.
This could be done the hard way. Or this could be done the easy way.
Then Medianoche handed the old man the cup of coffee.
Medianoche told the old man, “Drink. It tastes better if you drink it hot.”
The old man said, “After all I did for Argentina, you give me poison.”
“Caprica Ortiz. She wanted you to hear her name before you die.”
“I do not know her.”
“She wanted you to die in increments. But I don’t have time. So yours will be a quick death. Quicker than the death you and your soldiers rendered to those you tortured.”
“My grandchildren. What about my innocent grandchildren?”
“Think of the ones who never got to have grandchildren. Think of the grandchildren who didn’t get this much time with their grandpar ents. She told me to tell you that you’ve been lucky.”
“Please. Allow me to make one phone call. I need someone to come get them.”
“Sorry. No phone calls. Tell me the number and I will call when this is done.”
“This is irony.”
“It is. This is irony. You will see your end here, in a building where the military junta used to torture Argentina’s missing citizens. I bet the ghosts of those you killed are applauding.”
The old man looked back at his grandchildren, saw them standing in line, patient and well-behaved. Kids who wanted to spend the day with their grandfather and eat fast food.
Medianoche watched the old man’s hands shake as he drank the coffee.
He drank it all, took the top off the cup and showed Medianoche that it was empty.
The old man smiled.
Medianoche said, “You have enough time to go hug your grandkids.”
“No. I will sit here. It is better this way. If they don’t see me go.”
“Your call.”
“See you in Hell.”
“Save me a seat by the furnace.”
“I shall.”
Medianoche walked away.
They were naked
inside the bathroom of a suite in the Four Seasons.
Her gray hair was down, framing her beautiful face. Medianoche thought she looked better than Sophia Loren did back in the ’40s, and vintage Sophia Loren was hard to top.
Caprica Ortiz held the marble counter and stared at Medianoche’s reflection in the mirror. He slipped his erection inside her, took her from behind, held her waist and moved in slow motion, watched the sinful expression swell in her face. He crawled inside her a little at a time.
She whispered, “Go slow this time. Please, Medianoche, go slower.”
“I will.”
He went deeper and she closed her eyes, her mouth open in an orgasmic expression.
It was like making love to a virgin on her wedding night.
Caprica Ortiz was married, loved her husband, but said she hadn’t had sex in almost five years. She moaned a lot but didn’t move much, just held the counter and made wonderful sounds.
Medianoche backed up and sat on the toilet, kept that same position. He held her hips, made her move up and down. She relaxed into him, accepted as much of him as she could, then leaned back into him and gave him her tongue. Her kisses were good. Were magical. Felt like they had healing power. He turned her around, opened her legs, and made her straddle him.
“You are a well-endowed man. Much larger than my husband.”
“You are a beautiful woman.”
“Not as beautiful as I once was.”
“And I don’t get as hard as I used to.”
Her gray hair. The lines around her eyes. Her beautiful, pouty breasts.
She looked fifty. A beautiful and confident fifty.
She sat on him with her mouth open, her gray hair framing her face as her lips parted in ecstasy, her sensual gaze deep and piercing, a stare that was as frightening as it was seductive.
Medianoche held her close, kissed her, focused on his breathing, focused on the sensations. Making love to a mature woman was much better than fucking a young woman.
Experience was where it mattered.
Caprica Ortiz reached over to the marble counter, picked up her
mate
, sipped through the metal straw, then put the metal straw to Medianoche’s lips, let him sip, then she put the
mate
back on the counter. Medianoche sucked her breasts for a while. The soft and sweet breasts of a mother. He gave her shallow penetration, slow movements, felt her holding on, heard her breathing get ragged as he worked his way deeper. She held the marble counter with one hand while her other hand pressed down on Medianoche’s leg.
She began taking all of him. She moaned and took all he had to offer.
Medianoche had killed his commander. He needed to numb his pain.
She put her mouth on his, made her tongue dance inside his mouth as she moved up and down. Each up and down strengthened Medianoche, made physical wounds heal.
He needed to destress.
Then Medianoche took her back to the bed, but she wouldn’t let him put her on the bed.
Caprica Ortiz snatched the comforter off the bed and threw it over the carpet.
She said, “Sit.”
Medianoche sat on the floor and she eased down on him, looked in his eyes, gave him a basilisk stare and squatted over him, surrounded him with heat and dampness. She got comfortable and wrapped her legs around him, rocked awhile, then straddled him again, moving up and down. She never took her eyes away from Medianoche.
Caprica Ortiz jerked, moaned, lost her rhythm, her orgasm taking control of her.
Medianoche lifted her up, put her on the bed facedown, had her body flat on the mattress. He moved in and out of her. She reached back and grabbed her ankles, pulled her feet up to the middle of her back. Caprica Ortiz trembled and came again.
And when her orgasm had settled, he turned her over.
He said, “You’re very flexible.”
“Yoga. Pilates. I do both. It helps with stress.”
He held her in missionary position, her legs wrapped around his, fucked her until he came.
He fell away from her, his heart beating as fast as it had beat in the
villas
.
She looked at his face. Looked at the cuts and swellings. She tended to his wounds like a battlefield nurse. He took pain pills and drank scotch, but nothing helped like sex.
He rested on one side of the bed, on his back, hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling. He had killed his best friend. He had killed a liar. He wasn’t sure if he had done what was right, but he had done what he felt like he had to do. He was nobody’s lapdog.
Caprica Ortiz was on her side, facing him, her wedding ring sparkling in the light.
She asked, “Was I okay? Was the sex with me okay?”
“You were great.”
“I’m a little nervous. You’re my first.”
“Your first?”
“My first affair. Does this make me a bad person?”
“All great women have affairs.”
“True. They said Evita had many extramarital affairs. They said she was with Aristotle Onassis, Tyrone Power, Errol Flynn, Warren Beatty, Otto Skorzeny, many others. Powerful and beautiful men wanted her. And some say she had whatever man she saw fit to have. She used them all as stepping-stones to ensure she achieved what she needed to achieve.”
Medianoche wasn’t listening. Her voice had been a drone. Background noise.
He frowned and felt a pain in his heart.
He had killed his friend. It could not be undone.
Caprica Ortiz traced her fingers over his chest. “The four men on my list, they’re dead.”
Medianoche ran his fingers through her hair. “The men on your list are dead.”
“I will find more. I will find as many as I can.”
Medianoche looked at the clock. He had fucked her for more than an hour.
She had been softened up. Now he could get to what the mission was all about.
He said, “I gave you what you needed. Now I need to use your resources.”
“What help do you need, Medianoche?”
“You have been able to track and find people that the government have been unable to find. Point-blank, I need to find someone. Someone I need to kill. An assassin named Gideon.”
“Is it personal?”
“Very.”
“I will help you find Gideon.” She nodded. “I have to go back home to my husband soon.”
“Too bad you’re married.”
“And if I wasn’t?”
“You’d become my fourth wife.”
Medianoche touched his swollen face. Ran his tongue over his tender lips.
She said, “Right now I will do anything for you.”
“Anything?”
“Except damage my family. I find it incredibly difficult to resist you. I am very attracted to you. You looked at me, and my clothes melted away. The night we met, you could’ve had me.”
“You could’ve had me too.”
She moved her gray hair from her face and smiled. “Tell me what you need.”
He said, “Use your resources to find Gideon.”
“Anything else?”
“Open that pretty mouth of yours and give me a blow job before you go.”
“What?”
“I want you to take me inside your pretty mouth.”
She paused, then laughed a little. “I haven’t done that in a long time.”
“You can go slow.”
“I want to make you feel as good as you’ve made me feel.”
“I want what you want.”
He wanted to fill her mouth. He wanted her to stop talking.
He didn’t want to be alone, but he didn’t want to engage in any conversation.
He needed to think.
He stared at the ceiling while she took him inside her mouth.
She was good.
Damn good.
Medianoche pulled Caprica Ortiz up to his face, kissed her, then turned her over.
He put her on her back.
She opened her legs like he was her brand-new husband.
Beautiful gray hair.
As stunning as Sophia Loren when she was the sex kitten of the world.
A body that time hadn’t damaged.
He mounted Caprica Ortiz, kissed her like she was his wife.
Medianoche eased inside her again.
He moved slowly.
Took his time.
He was thinking about killing a whore from Yerres.
He would kill her and both of her sons.
Chapter 50
build my gallows high
By the time
we made it halfway to Montevideo, Shotgun and Konstantin were both sleeping. I stayed awake. Medianoche was on my mind and wouldn’t leave me alone.
My cellular vibrated and surpised me. It was a text message: FUNDS TRANSFERRED.
My business with Scamz was done.
We were moving through an area where I could get a signal.
I kept my iPhone in my hand and went online.
I looked in on Powder Springs. Catherine had given up looking for the cameras.
She and the boys were fine.
It hit me then. I had a brother. Steven was my brother.
My phone rang. Hawks was calling. I answered.
She said, “I have your little problem sitting right in front of me.”
The information that I had gotten from Arizona had been sent to Hawks the moment it was in my hands. Arizona had been efficient. And Hawks was reliable. She’d left London on British Airways and flown back to Atlanta, then hopped on a Delta flight and gone to Memphis, Tennessee. With the information I had gotten from Arizona, Hawks had found my blackmailers.
There were two. They were holed up not too far from the Mississippi River at a boutique luxury hotel, the Madison. Hawks had knocked on the door and said she was from the front desk.
And the fools had opened the door and come face-to-face with a loaded nine.
Hawks said they knew. The moment they saw the gun, they knew what it was about.
Hawks had put them in chairs, used duct tape to tie them down.