AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Damn it. I've been paying the wrong man for years. This probably isn't the best time to realise Nico is a genius psychopath.
"You have the wonderful advantage of catching me without my main interrogator. He is a little busy recovering from a chest wound." I'll make this sound like Gavriil did the work, as the reputation suggests. I'll leave my evil genius to recover without the spotlight on him.
"Surprised he ain't dead yet," the bolder man huffs.
I give him a smile; he has no idea what I have in store for him. I don’t quite know myself, but I've found some things in Gavriil's tool kit; Caeo and I made a show of guessing painful uses for the tools.
Nico never needed them, it was all mind games with him, but Gavriil liked to fuck people up. Petty crook and gambler to chief torture for the family. All thanks to Nico.
"We're built tough in this family." I crouch before him, squatting on my feet so I maintain a position of authority. "Gavriil is a competent interrogator. He would have you singing like a canary in under a day. He can tear your fingernails out like a professional. But you are going to get me, I'll poke around as best I can, don't blame me if I tear your fingers off." I hope I sound genuine, because I no longer believe a word of it.
"We didn't do nothing."
"You took a child by force."
"He ain't a child. He's eighteen."
"Such a grown up age," I huff. "Don't worry, I won't kill you so quickly."
"He died?"
"Three days without food and water; immobile and cold. Too much for a child of eighteen."
"Poor little bugger. Look, if I talk, can we reach some arrangement?"
The man beside him doesn't look so well. The rubber bullet in his gut has left him with some nasty bruising, and he's sitting more hunched over. Neither of these men pulled the trigger on Gavriil, they're just the bastards who dragged Nico out of the house.
I've made them think Gavriil is on the road to recovery and Nico's life is in the balance, while the truth is very much the reverse.
"What is your information worth?" I ask.
"I'm not sure, but you seem pretty keen to get it, and ain't no point me keeping secrets now."
"No, there ain't." I can do sarcasm, but compared to the show Nico puts on, it falls short.
I only have one question. Who. Someone put these men up to this, so the why will be answered by the who.
"I want to know who."
"Who what?" he replies.
"Who wanted you to take Nico and kill him slowly."
"I don't know who. It was just some lady on the phone, said to just tie him up in the hotel room. Then we were to just leave him there for you to find."
"But you didn't leave him. You stayed."
"She said we would be contacted when the ransom had been paid."
"Who did you send the ransom demand to?"
"We didn't. I assumed the bloke she represented would do all that."
"Who was the man?"
"We never asked. That's the whole point of using this woman as a middleman. Woman. You know what I mean?"
"Well, let's come to an arrangement then." Questioning them without Nico's cheek and Gavriil's glare is no fun at all. I miss my vibrant translator and his broken English. Those beautiful few words that follow Gavriil's detailed explanation of each torture device. Oh, how that boy did his job well.
