I tried to look away, but I could still see him in my peripheral vision. If I closed my eyes, the dizziness and nausea would wash over me and I would be sick. It was important I not appear weak. I knew that.
The stench of hot feces filled the air, and I tried not to gag.
Kulak waited for the screams to die, for his victim to lie still in his own waste.
But panic was a luxury I couldn’t afford. Alexi Kulak could smell panic. He fed on it. He savored it like a fine wine.
“I loved her,” he said. “I would have done anything for her. I will do anything for her. Why would she want you, Mr. Walker? You are weak. You are no man for a woman like Irina. She would have run you around like a trick pony. Is that why you killed her?”
Bennett shook his head. “No.”
“Because she was too strong for you?”
“No.”
“Why, then?” he asked, as if he was asking a sweet small child. “Why did you kill her?”
“I-I must have been angry.”
“Yes.”
“She made me angry.”
“Yes. And so you killed her?”
“I swear to God,” Bennett whimpered, “I don’t remember killing her. I don’t remember anything. I must have blacked out.”
Kulak pointed at the stump of Bennett’s index finger. “This hurts quite badly, doesn’t it?”
Bennett nodded. He was flat on his belly on the floor, his face pressed to the concrete.
“Let me take your mind off that pain,” Kulak said.
He stood up, took the bolt cutter, and snapped off half of the middle finger beside it.
I wanted to put my fingers in my ears to block out the screams, But I couldn’t fold my injured arm that tightly. I wanted to throw up. I wanted to cry. Panic swelled in my throat like a balloon.
Kulak stood there watching Bennett Walker sob, watching the blood run from his mutilated hand and drip down into the drain n the floor.
“I’m sorry!” Bennett cried. “I’m so sorry! I don’t know what happened!”
I listened to him. I watched him lying there. Many times in my life I had told myself there was no punishment on this earth too severe for him. But all I could think in that moment was that he didn’t fit.
Bennett Walker was a bully, but he was also what Alexi Kulak had called him: weak. There was no way he could take what Kulak as doing to him and not spill his guts. He didn’t have it in him.
“You don’t know what happened,” Kulak said. He turned then and looked at me.
“If you don’t know,” he said, “then perhaps your lover can tell us.”
Chapter 62
Landry parked on the road fifty yards from the driveway of Sean Avadon’s farm.
The main house was dark.
There was one light visible in Elena’s cottage. Her car was parked out front. The front door was ajar.
Drawing his weapon, he went around the side of the house.
The French doors stood open.
Landry slipped inside. The only light was in the living room. Nothing was on-no television, no ever-playing jazz on the sound system.
He worked his way through the cottage, his anxiety growing. The guest suite was empty. Elena’s suite was empty.
His cell phone rang.
“Landry.”
“Detective?”
The accent was Russian. The voice was heavy and male.
“I call from Magda’s.”
“Yeah?”
The bartender, Landry thought. The big bald guy with the blue skull tats.
“You want Kulak?”
He almost said no. He almost said he didn’t care anymore about Kulak, but then he didn’t.
“That guy on the news,” the bartender said. “The one they say maybe killed Irina.”
“Bennett Walker?”
“Kulak has him. At the salvage yard.”
“Why tell me?” Landry asked.
“I tell you for Svetlana,” he said. “Kulak has that man, and a woman.”
“A woman?” Landry said, a chill washing over him. Alexi Kulak had Elena.
“You come and get Kulak,” the bartender said. “You tell him Svetlana sent you.”
Chapter 63
“He’s not my lover,” I said with as much bravado as I could scrape together. If I could manage to stand up to him, I might at least buy a little time and in that time find a way to take him or get away from him.
Big talk from a woman in a cage.
“What would I want with him?” I said, as Kulak came closer. “He’s nothing to me. He’s a piece of shit on the sidewalk.”
“I saw you on television,” he said. “You were lovers. Your father is his attorney.”
“I don’t have a father,” I said.
Something ugly flashed in his eyes. “Have you not learned, Ms. Estes, that I do not like to be lied to?”
“Well, I’m not exactly thrilled to be called a liar, Mr. Kulak. So I guess we’re even.”
He didn’t know what to make of me.
“Edward Estes,” I said, “stopped being my father the day he wanted me to lie under oath and give Bennett Walker an alibi, knowing he was a rapist.”
Kulak stood just outside the locker, very close, studying me like I was a specimen in a museum.
“You are very bold for a woman in your position.”
“I might as well be,” I said. “You’ll do whatever you want to do. I’ll at least keep my pride.”
He turned and looked at Bennett lying on the floor, crying. “You would not tell me,” he said. “You knew it was him, but you would not tell me. You think I am a fool. I came to you for the truth and you told me you knew nothing.”
“Because I didn’t. You wanted the truth. I hadn’t found it yet. Believe me, he’s the last person on earth I want to protect. He’s a rapist at best and a murderer at worst. Why would I risk my life for him?
Bennett could hear me. He looked up at me, pleading. “For God’s sake, Elena!”
“Shut up!” I shouted at him. “You’re exactly that and you know it.” Kulak’s interest went from me to Bennett and back again. “All right, Ms. Estes,” he said, unlocking the door to my cage. You believe he is a rapist and a murderer. Show me.“
He opened the door and pulled me out of the locker by my injured arm. Black spiderwebs shot across my vision, and my legs swayed beneath me.
Kulak pulled me over to where Bennett lay bleeding. His skin was pasty white and gleaming with sweat. He was going into shock. Once again Kulak kicked him in the ribs. “Turn over! On your back!”
“Oh, my God. Oh, my God,” Bennett whimpered. Tears ran from the corners of his eyes as he turned to lie on his back. Kulak put the bolt cutters in my hands, then pulled a.38 from belt holster and put it against my head. “You want justice, Ms. Estes?” he said. “You want revenge? I want revenge. For Irina. Give him the justice a rapist deserves, castrate him.”
Chapter 64
The bolt cutter was heavy. The sharp steel pinchers hovered over Bennett Walker’s genitals. The cold steel of the gun barrel rested against my temple.
“Is there a problem, Ms. Estes?” Kulak whispered.
“No,” I said. “I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment.”
Bennett cried, mumbling my name, saying “please” over and over.
“I’m just… a little dizzy,” I said, swaying against Kulak.
“Do it,” he said.
I pretended to try to open the bolt cutter without success.
“I feel really weak,” I said.
“Do it!” he shouted. “Do it!!”
Abruptly, I dropped to my knees and elbowed Kulak in the groin.
As he doubled over, I drove the handles of the bolt cutter upward with as much strength as the adrenaline rush gave me. One handle hit him in the face, shattering a cheekbone. The other caught him under the jaw. His head jerked back, and his gun hand swung upward.
The gun went off, the bullet hitting something metal across the room with a loud Ping!
He swung the weapon downward toward me.