“What the hell?”
It had been a long footrace, and the Russians were spread out along the path according to endurance. Pavel was the fastest, the only one who had made it around the last bunch of palms at the base of the bridge in time to see Serge dive over the railing.
The scuba diver stared dumbfounded at the rippling water where Serge had gone in. Serge stayed submerged for the longest time, and the diver started thinking he might have drowned. Just then, Serge broke the surface of the water with an irrepressible smile, holding the briefcase over his head like the Stanley Cup. “I got it! I finally got it!”
From the top of his vision, Serge saw the fastest Russian dive off the bridge. “Uh-oh.”
Boom.
The Russian belly-flopped on the end of the upright bang stick, and a shower of red hamburger rained on Serge and the scuba diver.
From down the path: “They went that way!”
Serge grabbed the scuba diver by the arm and pulled him under the Japanese footbridge. He put a finger over his lips for the diver to be quiet as feet clomped across the wooden boards above. The footsteps faded. Serge looked up at the slits of sunlight coming through the bridge. “I think the coast is clear.”
He looked back down, but the scuba diver was already scrambling up the far bank of the lagoon.
Fog rolled in from the ocean. A deep steam horn sounded from across the dark, night water. A cruise ship headed for the Bahamas.
Paul was not on it. He was strapped to a lawn chair at the deserted end of the Port Canaveral jetty.
“Where’s the briefcase?” said Ivan.
“I told you, I threw it in the lagoon!”
Ivan backhanded him across the face. “We already checked. I’ll ask you again. Where’s the briefcase?”
“That’s where I threw it!” said Paul. “Someone must have grabbed it!”
Slap.
“All we found was Pavel floating facedown, his lunch in the trees. Where’s the briefcase?”
“I don’t know!”
Slap.
A new Mercedes drove up, with dealer stickers still in the windows, headlights slicing through the fog, shining in Paul’s eyes. Igor got out and unlocked the trunk. He took the blindfold off Lenny and dragged him to the front of the car.
“Where’d you find him?” asked Ivan.
“Hiding in the windmill.”
“Any sign of the fat one with the beard?”
Igor shook his head. He tied Lenny to a second lawn chair next to Paul.
“Where’s the briefcase?”
“I never saw the briefcase,” said Lenny. “Can I go?”
“Sure thing,” said Ivan. “And would you like some cab money?”
Lenny smiled. “Yeah.”
Slap.
“We can do this all night,” said Ivan. “I don’t have to be anywhere.”
“I do,” said Lenny.
Slap.
“Let me pull his pants down!” said Igor, holding up a cage of scorpions.
Ivan smacked the cage out of Igor’s hand. “What is wrong with you? I mean it! You’re not normal!”
Igor pointed at the ground. “They’re getting away! Give me a piece of paper or something to scoop them up.”
Slap. “Forget about the scorpions!”
Igor rubbed his sore cheek. A foghorn blared. “Is that a cruise ship?”
“Probably,” said Ivan. “They go out of here all the time.”
“Ever been on one?”
“What?”
“Ever taken a cruise?”
“A couple times.”
“I heard you can eat all you want all the time, that they keep refilling the buffet twenty-four hours.”
Ivan stared at him.
“Do they really do that? If they do, that’s a pretty good deal.”
Ivan put a hand to his own temple and closed his eyes. “Don’t talk anymore. I have a headache. Just turn the car around and we’ll stick them in the trunk and handle this later at the motel.”
“You got it.” Igor hopped back in the Mercedes and started the car.
Ivan cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled over the engine: “Remember, you have trouble with English…R is for—”
Igor ran over Paul.
“…reverse.”
Igor put the car in reverse and backed over Paul. He got out and walked around the front of the car. “Is he okay?”
“Absolutely. Ready to dance all night.”
“But he looks dead.”
Slap.
“He is dead! You ran over him! Twice!”
Igor picked up a crumpled lawn chair and tried to unbend it, then turned quickly. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
“That noise. I heard something.”
“We’re outside in a park. There’s a million squirrels and birds.”
Igor stepped forward and peered into a palmetto thicket. “I could have sworn I heard someone.”
Two Russians still alive. Ivan and Igor. They drove back to the motel in silence.
“What do you want to eat?” asked Ivan.
“I don’t know. Something different.” Igor turned on the radio.
“It’s after midnight. We only have so many options.”
Igor thumbed through his CD wallet. “But we always go to the same place.”
“It’s a good place.”
Mosquitoes buzzed around fluorescent lights. Outdoor speakers played faint Muzak. A deep, rhythmic pounding came up the street, quiet at first, but getting louder. A white Mercedes Z310 came around the bend on A1A. The tinted windows were down, Igor’s head bobbing.
“…Everybody Wang Chung tonight…”
Lenny tried to adjust his eyes in the jet-black trunk. He screamed and he banged. The car came to a stop and Lenny listened carefully. The engine turned off. Lenny started screaming and banging again.
The trunk lid suddenly opened, bright light. Lenny shielded his eyes.
“Seven-Eleven,” said Igor. “What do you want?”
Lenny crunched his eyebrows in thought. “Jumbo dog…no, chicken salad. And a cookie. But if they don’t have chicken, don’t get the tuna—”
The trunk lid closed.
Ivan and Igor hit the chips rack, then the beer case. Hiding Paul’s body in the underbrush hadn’t been easy, and they still had quite a bit of blood on their shirts, but no more so than the other customers.
“Coors good?” asked Ivan.
“It’s all right.”
“You want me to get it or what?”
Igor scanned the rest of the display. “Have you had the new Killians with the pressurized ball in the can for real draft taste?”
“Come on! We’re fogging up the door!”
Coors it was. They moved on to the deli. Ivan grabbed the first sub he saw. Igor picked up three in succession, put each back. He waved at the cashier. “Are these salads fresh?”
“Made this morning.”
“What time?”
Ivan grabbed a salad and jabbed it in Igor’s stomach. “Take it and let’s go!”
They dumped their purchase on the counter. The cashier began ringing.
“The slot for the little bags of croutons was empty,” said Igor. “I don’t think I should be charged full price for the salad.”
“I have to charge what the label says.”
“But I didn’t get my croutons.”
“We’re out.”
“I know.”
“All I can do is void it.”
Ivan smacked the back of Igor’s head again. “Pay the man and get in the car!”
Further into the night. A1A became deserted, the last decent people straggling home. Traffic lights cycled through their colors with no cars. Next shift. A hooker rode to work on a bike with a banana seat. A police cruiser slowly rolled by, shining a search beam down each alley. A pack of wild dogs came out from behind a muffler shop, fighting over a large piece of unidentified meat, scattering when headlights hit them and a Mercedes turned into the parking lot of the Orbit Motel.
Ivan and Igor carried plastic convenience store bags to their room. The dogs took off down the street after a banana bike.
“I don’t know why you’re in such a grouchy mood,” said Igor.
Ivan stopped walking. “Did your mother, like, fall down several flights of stairs when she was pregnant?”