Nikka screamed, yelling a warning in Russian. His head snapped up and he turned on his heels to run. Bowen caught him with a well-placed snap kick to the groin.
The Wolf’s eyes rolled back in his head. The duffle slid from his hand. His knees buckled and he toppled over sideways, green around the gills.
Bowen couldn’t help but chuckle when Nikka threw back her head in exasperation at the stupidity of her boyfriend and banged her head against the stripper pole.
“Too smart to come here?” Bowen mused.
“You son of a bitch,” Petyr groaned.
“Hey!” Bowen cut him off. “There are women present.”
“Strippers!” he said, breathless. “I think they’ve… heard it… before. They are whores…”
Bowen gave him a smack in the back of the head. “Language,” he said.
“Okay,” Petyr said, curling up from the pain.
“Just don’t kick me in the ba… in the privates again…”
“Privates,” Bowen laughed. “That’s fitting. I call mine ‘the generals.’”
Volodin’s head sagged, resting against the filthy carpet. He moved his jaw back and forth like he was about to vomit.
“Well, ain’t this a surprise,” Thibodaux said, looming over Petyr and pulling him into a seated position to pat him down for weapons.
“It’s no surprise,” the younger man groaned. “You obviously expected me to be here.”
Thibodaux gave a genuine belly laugh. “No, sir,” he said. “We expected to have a little chat with your spittin’ stripper girlfriend. We honestly had no idea you were such a dumb shit.”
“Go ahead and do it then,” Volodin said. His entire body slumped as if he’d given up.
Bowen shot a glance at Garcia, then Thibodaux. “Go ahead and do what?”
“Kill me.” Volodin shrugged. “Isn’t that what Mr. Anikin sent you to do?”
“We don’t aim to kill you,” Thibodaux scoffed. “Unless you start in with that whistlin’ again. That was some awful shit.”
“Why does this Anikin guy want to kill you?” Ronnie asked.
Volodin looked at Garcia, then looked away as if afraid Bowen might kick him again. “Vory would never allow a woman to ask your questions.”
“Vory?” Bowen looked at Garcia. “Whatever that is, we’re not it.”
“Vory v Zakone, Russian prison gang,” Ronnie said. “What have you done to piss off the Vory?”
Volodin pulled back one shoulder of his tracksuit jacket to reveal the eight pointed stars tattooed on his shoulders above the neck of the wife-beater shirt.
“Listen up,” Thibodaux said, “We could give a shit about your fictional ink. We need to talk to you about your daddy.”
Volodin’s head snapped up. “My father? Is he all right?”
“You’re close to him then?” Bowen asked.
“Not close.” Volodin shook his head. “I guess he wants to make amends for abandoning me and my mother years ago. He’s some kind of scientist so he helps me out with Russian body-building supplements.” His eyes turned pleading. “He swears it’s all legal shit.”
“When’s the last time you talked to him?”
“I don’t know… an email about two weeks a—”
A heavy rapping at the front door cut him off.
Thibodaux moved to Gug’s computer and checked the surveillance cameras outside the building. “Four dudes with guns,” he said, looking at Petyr. “I’m bettin’ these are the Russian mob boys you’re worrying about, coming for your fake ink.”
“You led them here!” Volodin fumed. “That’s the only way they could find me so fast.”
Nikka rolled her eyes at his stupidity, clunking her head a third time on the stripper pole. “You are idiot,” she said. “I am your girlfriend. This is first place anyone would look for you.”
“I should go,” Volodin said, grabbing the yellow duffle and pushing himself to his feet.
“Sit your ass down,” Thibodaux snapped.
The banging grew louder, followed by a loud crash as the door gave way.
The Asian waitress and the bony stripper both ducked out of sight under their booth. Gug and Saba knew enough to roll to the floor, but Nikka was a sitting duck ziptied to the stripper pole. The pop of small arms fire rattled down the front hallway and bullets began to thwack against leather upholstery and wooden rails. Two of the stage lights exploded in a shower of sparks. Petyr fell, face forward, doing a pushup over his yellow duffle.
“Get her down from there!” Bowen yelled at Ronnie as he moved in a crouch around the end of the stage toward the door. He returned fire blindly down the entry hall, hoping to hold the attackers at bay long enough for Garcia to cut Nikka free and move her out of the line of fire. Minchkhi was a hateful woman, but few people deserved to be gunned down while chained to a Cheekie’s stripper pole.
“One of the four just turned tail and ran,” Thibodaux said. The big Cajun had drawn his weapon but he’d turned the computer around so he could scan the camera feeds while keeping an eye on the back entrance to the club. “Conserve your ammo, Gus Gus,” he said.
“Thanks, Gunny,” Bowen shouted over his shoulder, sending three more rounds down the hallway. “But this isn’t my first prom.”
“Never mind,” the Marine yelled back. “I keep forgettin’ you were Army. You’re not apt to hit nothin’ anyhow.”
Ronnie came up beside Bowen and tapped the elbow of his support arm. “I cuffed Minchkhi under a booth. We’re good,” she said. Her tight clothing had made carrying impractical during her dance, so they’d agreed beforehand that he would loan her his ankle gun if things turned rodeo. Now that Minchkhi was out of the way, he passed Garcia the baby Glock 27.
Between the two of them, they were able to lay down a steady rate of fire that didn’t burn up their meager ammunition supply.
“Looks like they’re haulin’ ass,” Thibodaux said, watching the computer.
Bowen took a deep breath, heady from the gun battle, not to mention the proximity of Garcia. Her chest heaved beside him as she worked to slow her breath now that the shooting had stopped.
“How about the back door?” Bowen yelled over his shoulder, thinking the shooters might have circled around.
“Nope, Gus Gus,” Thibodaux said. “They’ve definitely hauled… What the hell?” The Cajun jumped to his feet and pounded the table with his fist.
Bowen turned to find nothing but scabby carpet in the spot with Petyr Volodin used to be.
“Damn this eye patch,” Thibodaux said. “That meatheaded son of a bitch took advantage of my blind side and beat feet while I was lookin’ at the screen.” He hit the table again, his face as red as Nikka’s at having let the prisoner escape. “I am gonna beat his ass for sure.”
“That’s enough playin’ around,” Thibodaux said to Nikka ten minutes later. “You need to do yourself a favor and tell us where your boyfriend went.”
“I want lawyer,” the woman said, before breaking into a litany of slobbering Russian.
“What’s she sayin’?” The Cajun asked, looked at Garcia.
“You know how your wife only gives you five non-Bible curse words a month?”
Thibodaux nodded.
“Well,” Garcia said, raising her eyebrows, “the words she’s using would probably cause a Bible to catch fire.”
Thibodaux’s huge jaw clenched tight. His face was red, still steamed from letting Petyr Volodin slip away.
Bowen sat at the center booth, going through a pile of papers he’d grabbed from Minchkhi’s room. The pile was mostly made up of lottery tickets and receipts from her doctor for STD treatments, but he’d learned over years of fugitive work that tiny slips of paper often caught very bad men.