She listened to sounds from the house. The steam hissing and softly banging through the old pipes. Muffled male voices from the floors below her. An occasional sharp sound coming from the big kitchen on the second floor.
She felt trapped and surrounded. She didn’t want to be in this house with all these men. Beck made her uneasy. She hadn’t thought about him nearly enough before this had started. How could she? She knew so little about him. She had mostly thought about Manny.
Beck was the only man she had ever met that made her unsure of herself. On one level, he was doing exactly what she wanted him to do. But there was too much that he wouldn’t reveal to her.
She was as sure about Manny Guzman as she had ever been. He hadn’t taken all that much effort. Mostly just time and persistence. Something she was very good at. It had been easy. She had played the role of his one, loyal relative perfectly. It was kind of like training an attack dog. Feed it. Be the only one kind to it. Let the dog feel loved.
Manny loved her. He’d let her know it the only way he could. By telling her if she ever needed him, just reach out.
She had never asked him for anything. Ever. But she had kept careful track of him. The days and years left in his prison sentence. The dates of his parole hearings. The likely time of his release.
When she offered to help him get settled outside of prison, he’d gently refused her. That was when she’d found out about Beck and the place in Red Hook.
And now she was inside the Red Hook headquarters, most likely for the duration. Right where she wanted to be. So why didn’t it feel better?
She stared up at the plaster ceiling. What was it that made her feel uneasy? On one level it seemed obvious. She was surrounded by killers. Maybe not the computer guy, but all the others. She’d manipulated men all her life, but never men like these. Never men who could or would kill. And never a man like James Beck.
Manny would never let anything happen to her. Never. And Beck had made it clear that he needed her. He would protect her. So why was she worried? Because the violence had spun out to terrifying levels. Olivia winced when she thought about that fight in the elevator. She touched her cheek where the blood had spattered. She remembered the sound of Beck’s gun butt smashing into that man’s body.
Beck was unbelievable. To be so close to somebody doing what he did to those men. The power excited her. The strength. She’d been attracted to Beck almost from the moment she first saw him. It was easy to come on to him in the hotel room. But he was too smart, too disciplined. Now she wanted him even more, but she crushed the idea. Not now.
This was going as planned. She was exactly where she needed to be to push everything along in the right direction.
The predawn gray slowly crept into the small room.
The room reminded her of her small bedroom back in the projects. She had lived with her mother and her abuela. The household was all women. Her father disappeared when she was two. Her grandfather had died of alcoholism when she was eight. Her mother and grandmother raised her, scraping by on food stamps, dependent-child payments. And the numbers.
Her abuela was a tough old bird. She’d run the numbers in their Mott Haven neighborhood for years.
Olivia shook her head and blinked away thoughts of the past.
She felt tired. More weary than tired. But she couldn’t afford to be slow or lacking now. She had to keep up. Right now, most of what was going to happen depended on Crane. And on how well Beck could hold off whatever Markov would be sending at him.
They’d almost had her at the hotel. That fucking idiot manager Raymond. Well, she told herself, it’s my fault. I never stopped him from giving me discounts before. He was one of those stupid grinning men waiting to be smiled at and patted on the head for his favors.
Markov clearly had connections to powerful resources. How much time would it be before they found this place? How long before they stormed in here?
Surely Beck had a plan for that. Beck was the key. Thinking of Beck again sent another pulse of desire through Olivia. This time she didn’t push it away. She let the feeling blossom. Something she hadn’t felt about a man in a long, long time.
She felt the ripple of desire just in the pit of her stomach, pulsing down between her legs. She let her right hand slide under the flimsy black triangle of her thong. Her middle finger slipping into the warm space between her labia. She moved her finger further so that the heel of her hand pressed into her clitoris, sending a pulse of erotic sensation flooding through her.
She grabbed herself and squeezed, pulled her hand away, and moved it upward to cup her left breast and pinch her hardening nipple between her forefinger and middle finger.
She wondered what kind of lover Beck would be. On the couple of occasions when she’d touched him or bumped into him, she could tell he was solid. No fat on him. And God, he moved fast and with such sureness. Again she thought about the elevator. Those two he went after—it was like they’d found themselves in a cage with a wild animal. They never had a chance.
When the first one turned to look at her, she’d been sure he was going to kill her. Just pull out a gun and shoot her. But Beck got them both. He didn’t hesitate. If he ever made a move for her, she imagined it would be fast and hard and without any bother to seduce.
The thought excited her. He’d resisted her, but it only showed her how much she would have to do. Olivia Sanchez had never met a man she couldn’t seduce, and James Beck wasn’t going to be the first.
46
Leonid Markov sat with Ivan Kolenka in a dirty kitchen in the building on Coney Island Avenue where Kolenka had met Beck. Kolenka chain-smoked his unfiltered cigarettes, which made the small, overheated space almost unbearable for Markov. Even if Kolenka had noticed, he wouldn’t have cared. All he cared about was killing James Beck.
His calculations had been swift. His conclusion immutable.