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“Well, then, you know what’s coming next,” said Luka. “Name the friends. Now.”
“I don’t know! I swear to you, I just heard from my buddy Gavin that there was some money bein’ offered for a onetime gig out here in the middle of nowhere and I took it. Like I said, I just need money for my brother’s bail. He never even really touched that woman who put him behind bars. Just like I never touched that girl of yours!”
“Now, you’re calling some woman a liar,” Luka said, kneeling down with the knife held out, glistening with fresh blood in the now-fading light. “Whileyoulie tome.”
“How many times do I have to say it, man? I’m telling the truth! Gavin hooked me up with one of his coworkers who said he had a gig.”
“Where does Gavin work?”
“I don’t know, some restaurant! I never asked. We just smoke together.”
“What’s the name of your friend’s coworker?” Luka pressed.
Fuck, it was like pulling teeth with this loser. He began to edge the tip of the blade along the man’s ribs, back and forth, individually, dragging tiny hairline cuts over his bruises.
“I don’t remember—it was something foreign. Started with an ‘R’ I think,” the man answered, flinching away from Luka.
“How and when did you meet Dasha?”
“I met him here the same day I met you,” he said bitterly. “I thought it was gonna be easy money. All I had to do was show up to these coordinates, bring some supplies like rope and… and some drugs.”
“Drugs? What kind of drugs?” Luka repeated.
The man bit his tongue, shaking his head. Luka gave him a swift punch in the stomach.
“Goddamnit! I don’t know, man—some kind of drug that makes you sleepy, okay? I can’t pronounce the name,” the man blubbered.
God, he was dense. Luka’s patience was wearing thin.
“Where did you get the pills?” Luka demanded.
“My granny’s medicine cabinet,” he said.
The enforcer drew in a slow, deep breath. “You little thief.” He began pricking the guy in the ribs with the knife, causing the victim to squirm.
“I didn’t wanna do it! Shit, theywantedme to rob a pharmacy!”
“So let me get this straight: you stole from your grandmother so that you could drug a woman you don’t even know out here in the desert?”
“I thought we were gonna sell those drugs!”
“So which is it? Either you were holding Inessa for ransom or you were selling drugs,” Luka snarled. “What did they tell you?”
“To come to this location with enough drugs and other supplies to keep someone here for a while! That’s all! And I… well, I didn’t even bring the right prescription anyway,” he admitted. “I got nervous and I read the labels wrong.”
Luka lifted an eyebrow. “I bet Dasha wasn’t happy about that.”
“He said he was gonna deal with me later,” the man croaked.
“You’re lucky he never got the chance,” the enforcer replied. “What he would’ve done with you is even worse than what we’re going to do.”
The man gulped. “What… what are you going to do?”
Luka stood up slowly. Without another word, he turned and walked out. He heard the man behind him sigh with relief at first, then immediately start to panic again. Just as expected. The fear of the unknown was greater than the relief of being left alone.
Especially since that was to be his punishment for the next several hours. This one was clearly too stupid to be of much use to them. He was a low-level criminal. Luka and Vadim left as darkness swept over the ghost town. The man screamed for help, realizing that he was about to be abandoned alone, bruised, bleeding, bound, and exposed to whoever—or whatever—happened upon him.
At midnight, Luka would return to collect him, incapacitate him, and drop him off on the sidewalk in front of his apartment like a bag of garbage. Alive, but never the same. For now, though, Luka had several hours to kill. And he knew exactly where he wanted to spend them.
