Kill the King (18 page)

The old woman
embraced him tenderly and walked away without saying another word.
She never looked back. Tyler walked back to the ersatz memorial for
one last visit, hoping to find the strength to carry on.

His hand
trembled as he took the small rock out of his pocket. His fingers
refused to yield. He was not ready to say goodbye just yet. A
choice had to be made.

Peace or
vengeance. Peace or vengeance. Peace or vengeance. . .

****

Peace or
vengeance. Peace or vengeance. Peace or vengeance. . .

Tyler paced
around in his apartment, reciting his mantra over and over again.
The old woman was right—he had to make a choice.

Peace or
vengeance. Peace or vengeance. Peace or vengeance. . .

Whiskey.
Cigarettes. An eight-ball. More whiskey. More cigarettes. A few
more lines of coke. The mantra continued.

Peace or
vengeance. Peace or vengeance. Peace or vengeance. . .

A punch to the
wall. The emptied bottle thrown out the window. The ashtray smashed
on the floor. More lines of coke. Vodka. More cigarettes. More
pacing back and forth. The words in his head were alive with
fire.

Peace!
Vengeance! Peace!
Vengeance! Peace! Vengeance!

At last, the
moment of resolve had arrived. It all became clear to him. The old
woman’s dilemma didn’t apply to people like him. It was all an
illusion. The choice had already been made for him long ago.

There are no
forks down this road. . .there’s only one path that I can take.
It’s the only path I’ve ever known.

****

The giant
sentry guarding the front entrance never saw it coming. Tyler had
casually walked up to him and unloaded his MAC-10 on the big man’s
face before he could even utter a word of protest. The front door
was painted with his brains. The rest of his colossal frame
collapsed like a felled tree.

Vengeance.

The next ones
to go were the two men lounging around by the pool tables to his
right. A hail of unexpected bullets thrown in their direction was
enough to do them in. They never stood a chance.

Vengeance.

The bartender
was too slow in reaching for the Tec-9 that he kept hidden
underneath the cash register. A quick burst tore through his throat
and shattered the bottles and glasses that stood on display behind
him, sending shards of broken glass and crystal flying through the
air.

Vengeance.

Tyler knocked
over a pool table and used it to block the front door. He then
ejected his emptied clip and replaced it with a new one—the last
one he had on him. He had yet to even say a single word until this
very moment.

“Marko!
Marko!
I’m coming for you! You hear me, Marko? I’m coming
for you!”

Tyler kicked
open the doors to the kitchen. Artan was inside, clutching a huge
knife. He could barely hold it in his trembling hands as he called
out for help.

“Someone help!
Tyler’s got a gun! He’s in the kitchen! He’s in the fucking
kitchen! He’s in the—”

The kitchen
doors hit Tyler from behind as two men barged in, knocking both him
and Artan to the ground. Tyler had dropped his gun in the fall and
made a lunge for it before the others could, turning around just in
time to empty his clip on his two new assailants. Artan dropped his
knife and made a desperate attempt to wrestle the gun away from
Tyler, mistakenly thinking it wasn’t yet out of ammo. Tyler obliged
and let go of the gun, sending Artan stumbling backwards and
slipping on the bloodied floor. Tyler grabbed him by the ponytail,
the kitchen knife now in his hand and pointed at Artan’s
throat.

“Take me to
Marko.
Now.”

****

There he was,
alone in the vast wine cellar—Marko Boreta.
The Dragon. The Man
who Refuses to Die. The King.

Marko stood
calm and composed as Tyler slowly walked down the rickety wooden
stairs with Artan in tow. He was being yanked from behind by his
hair, the large kitchen knife still pointed at his throat. His eyes
pleaded with Marko for help. Marko was not interested in
intervening on his behalf. To him, only he and Tyler existed in
that room. Artan was only taking up space.

“Do you have
more guns on you, my son?”

“No. You?”

Marko shook his
head. That was all Tyler needed to know. He jammed the knife under
Artan’s chin and shoved him into a nearby wine rack, knocking over
a dozen bottles in the process. Artan was a native of Marko’s
homeland, and though he did not refuse to die he was still very
stubborn about it. He thrashed about on the floor with blood
spouting out of his mouth like an overflowing toilet. It seemed to
take forever for him to stop moving and give up. Tyler tore out a
chunk of Artan’s tongue when he plucked the knife out from under
his chin.

Marko was
greatly upset but was not horrified by the carnage. The stories he
told about the war were not fabrications. They were all true, right
down to the most horrendous detail. He had already seen and done so
much worse than anything Tyler could possibly do. This side of the
word was so much softer by comparison.

“So. . .it’s
come to this. All these years, and it’s come to this. The boy I
took in and raised as my own. The boy I loved and protected. The
boy I molded in
my
own image. My greatest achievement. All
of this. . .and yet you still betray me. I should have known that
one day God would send my own son to punish me. Rozafa was right. .
.she was
always
right.”

Tyler picked
the chunk of Artan’s tongue off the knife and wiped the blade on
his jacket sleeve and slowly inched towards Marko.

“You knew this
day would come someday, Marko. I wasn’t lying when I told you why
they let me out. . .
your
life, for
my
freedom. I was
telling you the truth and you knew it right from the start. You’re
many things, but never a fool. Not you, Marko.”

Marko grabbed a
bottle of wine from one of his many racks and uncorked it.

“I don’t have
any glasses down here. Are you sure you’d rather not talk about
this with me upstairs? We can sit in the dining hall and have some
nice wine. . .maybe smoke some cigars too if you’d like. Let us go
upstairs and settle everything over some good wine. What do you
say?”

Tyler locked
the cellar door.

“You stay right
where you are. Before I kill you, I have questions I need to have
answered. I’m sure you have some as well, so why don’t we go over a
few rounds of quid pro quo? No more bullshit. No more lies. No more
secrets. . .only the truth. We settle everything right here.”

Marko sat down
on a plain metal folding chair and began to drink the wine straight
from the bottle.

“My son, I
don’t think this will be pleasant for either of us. Please grab a
chair and sit with me, and we’ll talk. Take a bottle of wine if you
want.”

Tyler’s glance
veered towards the huge rack. Hundreds of expensive vintages were
ripe for the taking. The bloodshed and cocaine had left him too
agitated to calm down.

“I’m not
interested in having a glass of fucking
wine,
Marko. . .it’s
answers that I want, and it’s answers that I’ll get. Now then, it’s
to my understanding that you’ve been providing medication to Frank
Metzger for quite some time now. He was gay and dying of AIDS, and
Ron MacKay knew all about his dirty little secret. He only kept his
mouth shut on the condition that Frank let him take over the
Fourteens. How do I know this, you might wonder? I know because
Frank confessed all of this to me before he died. I want to know
why
you’ve been providing him with these drugs.”

Marko drank
before answering. He threw the empty bottle behind him, sending it
crashing onto the concrete floor.

“A wise man
knows when to hit an angry dog with a stick, and when to keep him
chained up and starving. I fed him just enough to keep him alive
and obedient. He wouldn’t dare bite the hand that fed him!
Everything was running smoothly until
someone
decided to
hang him high enough to dance in the air. Now they’ll be crying out
for our blood. Are you satisfied? Now answer me—you stole money
from me and let the runners get blamed for it, did you not?”

Tyler grit his
teeth, his heart beating like thunder in this chest. Even in the
face of death, Marko could still wield the power of fear in his
friends and foes alike.

Never
betray.

“Yes. I found a
lot of money stashed away in Finch’s apartment when Khaled and I
went looking for the merch he swiped. I stole most of it and gave
the rest of the loot to the runners to throw off the scent. Khaled
never noticed a thing. I was going to leave town. I wanted to
disappear.”

Marko
unsuccessfully attempted to stifle his anger with the help of
another bottle.

“I knew it. I
fucking knew it! I just didn’t want to believe you’d stoop so low.
Only six days a free man, and you’ve brought nothing but trouble!
How could you do this to me? How could you betray your father like
this?”

Tyler kicked
Artan’s bloodied corpse in a fit of rage. “I’m not done with you,
goddamn it!”

Marko sat back
down and drank some more.

“
Go on, my
son.
You’ve stolen from me and gotten other men killed because
of your treachery. You’ve tried to kill me already once before and
now you want to try it again. I even spared your life! Somehow,
this is
still
not enough for you. What more could you
possibly want from me?”

Marko’s face
looked sad and exhausted. Tyler remained resolute.

“I want more
answers. Finch had something else stashed away in his fridge. .
.something
strange
. I’m not a doctor, but I swear that they
were bags filled with blood. I want to know what this has to do
with you.”

That question
raised Marko’s eyebrows up high. He was so incredulous, he almost
laughed.

“Oh my! They
didn’t tell you, did they? Tyler, my son. . .they’ve played you for
a fool!”

No. . .

“Have you ever
noticed how odd it was to have a prison warden referred to as
Doctor?
Did you not wonder why everyone calls her
Dr.
Nieuwendyk?”

No. . .it can’t
be.

“Oh yes, I know
it was her that put you up to this. No one else could be so cunning
to send you after me.”

This is not
happening. . .

Tyler glowered.
He inched closer to Marko, within easy stabbing range.

“No. I don’t
believe you. You’re lying.”

Marko shook his
head.

“I wouldn’t lie
to you, my boy. I can’t betray the ones I love as easily as you
can.”

Tyler stared
into Marko’s eyes. He was telling the truth. The pieces of the
puzzle began to fit one after another, and the resulting picture
was a horror show.

“You’re selling
blood? Fucking
blood,
Marko?”

Tyler had a
hard time saying it out loud. The idea seemed so foul, even by
Marko’s unscrupulous standards.

“No. I don’t
believe it. There’s no way you’re working with her. . .that you’re
selling fucking
blood.
Have you lost your fucking mind?”

Marko crossed
his arms and spoke in a professional, matter-of-fact tone.

“Is it really
that hard for you to believe it? The world has changed while you
were away, my son. Blood is only one of the many new products we
now sell. We also traffic in
organs.
You see, Dr. Nieuwendyk
is by profession a thoracic surgeon. One of the best in the
country, in fact! She was already quite successful with her work,
but the money wasn’t enough to please her. Then one day she met
Daniel Rickards—I’m sure you know of him, yes?—and together they
ventured into the private prison industry. Do you see where this
story is going now?”

Tyler’s blood
ran cold. This was going to get even uglier than he had
imagined.

“I don’t
understand. This is some dark, twisted shit—even for you. Why are
you doing this, Marko? Why?”

Marko stood up
and stared at him, his face as hard and cold as stone. He objected
to the very premise of the question itself.

“For the same
reason we always do what we do. . .
necessity
. Our drug
supplies don’t bring in the money like they used to. We were
running out of money, and the Fourteens were only getting stronger
by the day. When Dr. Nieuwendyk and Rickards got in touch with me
and made their proposal for a new partnership, how could I refuse
such a gift? Since then we’ve been handling the distribution and
logistical side of business. It didn’t take long for me to learn
that the
red market
is a very lucrative one, my boy. We now
deal in
spare parts,
and business has been good. . .
very
good.
Blood is the new cocaine, and I’m
Pablo fucking
Escobar!”

Marko raised
his bottle in a triumphant pose before pouring the wine down his
mouth without a care in the world. His conscience on the matter was
a clear as glass. It all sounded so unreal to Tyler, as if this was
all just some lurid nightmare from which he could not escape
from.

“You’re. .
.
evil,
Marko. Pure fucking
evil.”

“Oh, my boy. .
.don’t be so dramatic! These are
prisoners
. No one gives a
fuck
about them! When their bodies don’t get claimed by
their families, why should their spare parts go to waste? They’re
worth a fortune and they’re ripe for the taking! Across the ocean
there are many places where donors are hard to come by, and those
who can afford it will pay top dollar for what we have to offer and
never ask questions. It’s
meat
worth its weight in
gold!”

Tyler was
speechless. It all seemed impossible. Marko took advantage of
Tyler’s silence to ask him questions of his own.