Herb had been contemplating death for many months. Courting it like a lover flirts. Bullet wounds were agonizing. But being held captive was a suffering Herb could no longer endure.

  Death is inevitable.

  Misery doesn’t have to be.

  All I have to do is lunge. A bullet to the head will end it all.

  The idea was more than just seductive. Herb craved it. A pang for death, overriding all other emotions.

  Lunge. Die. Stop the pain.

  And Herb was ready to do it. The impulse took over, and his muscles tensed, coiled and ready to spring—

  —and then he heard Tequila say his name.

  “Herb.”

  He didn’t say it as a warning. He didn’t say it as a question. Tequila’s voice was calm, quiet, soothing.

  And Herb knew what Tequila was saying. Tequila knew Herb’s intentions.

  Tequila was telling him goodbye.

  Herb went limp. His infatuation with a sudden death was strong, but he couldn’t leave his friend alone, to face whatever new nightmare they’d entered.

  Herb got out of the van, slowly, kneeling in the dirt next to Tequila.

  “I’m the Cowboy,” said the black clad figure. “You work for me now. Whatever life you used to have, that’s over.”

  The accent was American. This was the first gringo they’d seen for as long as they’d been prisoners. Could they actually be in the United States? Herb hadn’t ever been to the Great Plains west of Illinois, but he’d seen pictures. Were they in one of the Dakotas? Missouri? Nebraska? Wyoming? Oklahoma?

  Am I actually back in my homeland?

  “I’m a cop,” Herb rasped, buoyed by the possibility. “My name is Sergeant Herb Benedict, I’m from Chicago. There are people looking for me.”

  The Cowboy’s eyes were as dead as any corpse Herb had ever seen. “You don’t have a name. You don’t have a past. No one is looking for you, because you no longer exist.”

  Herb should have ended it there, but that son of a bitch named hope kept his lips flapping.

  “Listen,” he implored, “I have money, and I’m sure we could make some sort of deal and—”

  The Cowboy drew the pistol, whacked Herb across the side of the head, and holstered it before Herb hit the dirt, face-first.

  The pain came fast and hard. Herb reached up, felt blood on his temple.

  “I already made a deal.” The Cowboy’s voice was flat, devoid of humanity, but oddly soothing in Herb’s ringing ears. “I bought you for three thousand dollars. You’re my property, to do with as I please. If I want to hurt you—”

  The Cowboy kicked Herb in the crotch.

  “—I’ll hurt you. And if I want to kill you…”

  The Cowboy drew, superfast, pointing the gun at Tequila’s head.

  “Don’t,” Herb groaned through clenched teeth. Both hands were cupped around his groin, and he’d curled up into the fetal position. His head and balls were having a contest for which throbbed more, and the balls were taking the lead.

  “Don’t?” the Cowboy asked. “Livestock doesn’t give orders. A cow doesn’t say don’t. It stays compliant, until it’s slaughtered.”

  Tequila stared, unflinching, at the Cowboy. “Go ahead and kill me. Throw your money away.”

  “True. I need you to work. But you can work with only one knee.”

  The gun went from Tequila’s head to his leg. His bad leg.

  “Please,” Herb groaned.

  “Begging is useless. I demand obedience.”

  Herb stole a glance at Tequila’s leg, remembering how horrible it had been to break it. “We’ll obey.”

  “Of course you’ll obey.”

  “I don’t have a name,” Herb quickly said. “I don’t have a past. I no longer exist. I’m your property.”

  “That’s not obedience. That’s just repeating what I said.”

  “Whatever you want us to do,” Herb continued, “we’ll do.”

  The skull face bandana made reading the Cowboy’s expression impossible. But it seemed like the Cowboy was going to shoot, just to prove a point.

  “Whatever I want,” the Cowboy said.

  Herb nodded. “Yes.”

  The Cowboy looked to Herb. “Break his nose.”

  “Break his nose?”

  “Punch him in the face and break his nose, or I’ll blow off his kneecap.”

  Herb looked at Tequila.

  “I’ve played this game,” Tequila told him. “I’ve followed orders, and I’ve hurt people. You can’t change the outcome of things. Whatever is going to happen, will happen. But you don’t want to be the one who makes it happen. You have a choice.”

  “What are you saying?” Herb said.

  “Don’t do it. I’ll take the bullet.”

  “You have five seconds,” the Cowboy said.

  “That’s insane,” Herb argued with his friend. “A broken nose isn’t as bad as a shattered knee.”

  “This asshole is going to hurt us. Making us hurt each other is worse.”

  “Two seconds.”

  Herb looked at the Cowboy—

  —then punched Tequila in the face, hard as he could.

  His nose burst like a ripe tomato being thrown to the ground.

  Tequila took the hit, and didn’t make a sound, even as the blood poured down over his chin.

  But he looked sadder than Herb had ever seen him.

  “Good,” the Cowboy said. “Here’s what is going to happen next. I’m going to put you on the land train, and you’re going to be put in a cultivation car. After some quick training, you’ll be required to harvest a daily quota of sap. If you fail to meet the quota, I’ll pull out one of your teeth. If you show any insubordination, I’ll pull out one of your teeth. You can’t escape. You’re going to die here. But how many days that takes depends on how hard you’re willing to work. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Herb said.

  Tequila said nothing.

  The Cowboy squatted down to Tequila’s level. “You’re a hard man. I can see it. I’ve dealt with hard men before. The last one, I heated up some metal-working pincers, heated them until they glowed orange, and stripped off all the skin on his chest. He lived for two more days, begging me to kill him the whole time.”

  “And begging is useless,” Tequila said.

  The Cowboy nodded. “The question isn’t if you obey or not. The question is how much suffering are you willing to endure before you obey.”

  “Stay alert,” Tequila said. “Because the moment you lose concentration, the moment you zone out for even one second, I’m going to take that Ruger Bisley Vaquero out of your cute little leather holster and show you what real sharpshooting is.”

  Herb braced himself for the violence.

  But instead of lashing out, the Cowboy asked, “You think you can shoot?”

  “I could shoot your balls off at two hundred meters,” Tequila said. “But someone seems to have beaten me to it.”

  The Cowboy stared. Just stared, without moving or talking. Herb knew Tequila was going to get himself shot and he couldn’t bear it because, dammit, he had his own chance to die a moment ago and threw it away and now he was going to be all alone in whatever fresh hellhole this was.

  “I’m a good shot,” Herb said, thinking quickly. “My former partner was a great shot. Won trophies.” He pointed at Tequila. “But in the truck, he told me he was the best of all time. Better than you? I dunno. You seem to have skills. I guess there’s no way to prove who’s superior…”

  The appeal to vanity was a long shot. But Herb didn’t think the Cowboy was here for the money. There was some other motivator at work. Sadism, obviously. But maybe ego was also a trigger.

  Herb had known his share of psychopaths. Some of them couldn’t handle being shamed. They’d take any dare, no matter the risk, to prove their superiority.

  Hopefully, the Cowboy fell into that group.

  “Have you fired a derringer?” the Cowboy asked Tequila.

  Tequila answered with his eyes.

  “My back-up pistol is a two shot Bond Arms Cowboy Defender. Know it?”

  “It has a rebounding hammer that allows it to half-cock, so it won’t fire if you drop it.”

  “Exactly.”

  The Cowboy kept the Vaquero on Tequila and lifted a leg, reaching into a boot. Out came a tiny, silver gun with no trigger guard. The Cowboy reared back and hefted it into the plains, at least fifteen meters away. It landed with a plume of dust.

  “Go fetch,” the Cowboy said to Tequila.

  “You have six shots,” Tequila said.

  “I never need more than six. But, for you, I promise to only use two.”

  Tequila seemed to consider it. Then he nodded.

  “The moment you pick up the gun, I’ll draw.”

  Tequila stood, then began to limp over to the thrown firearm.

  “Which knee should I shoot,” the Cowboy asked Herb. “Left or right? I’ll let you choose.”

  Herb stayed silent.

  “Pick one, or I’ll shoot them both.”

  Herb already felt sick for punching his friend in the face. He didn’t want to choose which knee. But if he didn’t, he knew the Cowboy would make good on the threat.

  “I just met the guy,” Herb said. “He means nothing to me.”

  Tequila was almost there. But as good a shot as the man was, Herb had no hope that he’d prevail. The derringer had a two-and-a-half-inch barrel, compared to the Vaquero’s five-and-a-half inches. Even if Tequila had been in perfect health on a windless firing range, and was able to take his time aiming and firing, hitting anything beyond seven meters with a gun that small was blind luck. At this distance? Quick draw? In his condition? Injured and dehydrated and exhausted? Tequila might as well have been unarmed.

  “Fine,” the Cowboy said. “I’ll shoot both knees.”

  Herb felt like throwing up.

  “The left one,” Herb said.

  He figured that leg was already injured. Why harm the healthy one?

  The Cowboy took ten paces away from Herb, then holstered the revolver.

  Tequila stopped and stood over the derringer. He glanced at it, then stared at the Cowboy.

  “Whenever you’re ready,” the Cowboy called. “Or maybe you’re too scared to—”

  In one fast motion, Tequila dropped to his good knee and snatched up the gun, falling to his left as he brought it to bear with his right hand.

  The Cowboy, caught off-guard, drew the Vaquero and fired at the same time as Tequila.

  It all happened so quickly that Herb couldn’t be sure how many shots rang out. If he had to guess, it was two from Tequila and four from the Cowboy.

  Tequila continued to pitch sideways, then sprawled out onto the ground. Herb couldn’t tell if he’d been hit.

  The Cowboy remained standing, no trace of injury.

  “No!” Herb yelled. He moved to get up, to rush to his friend, but the Cowboy pointed the revolver at him, dissuading Herb from the notion.

  “I still have two in the cylinder.”

  Herb stayed still.

  So did Tequila.

  “Get up, or I’ll shoot your friend,” the Cowboy called.

  Please don’t let him be dead.

  Please don’t let him be dead.

  Please oh please oh please oh—

  “You winged my hip,” Tequila shouted.

  “I told you to get up.”

  Tequila awkwardly got to his feet, his hands over his head. Herb saw his pants leg was soaked with blood.

  “I want my derringer back,” the Cowboy said. “Toss it over here.”

  Tequila chucked a furious line drive directly at the Cowboy, who had to duck to avoid getting beaned in the head.

  “You still haven’t learned who’s in charge.” The Cowboy stood up straight. “This will teach you.”

  The Cowboy aimed at Tequila.

  Herb closed his eyes so he didn’t have to watch.

  The gunshot was the loudest thing he’d ever heard.

  PRESENT

  YURI

  For the Belarusian, the nightmare was always the same.

  He was in the palace dungeon. Naked. Manacled. Immobile. Helpless.

  His own men, men he fought with and spilled blood with, stood around him. Hard men, with hard eyes, but Yuri saw the fear in them.

  Fear that they, too, might end up like Yuri.

  “You are lying,” the President said.

  “No, my president. I would not dare.”

  “You are from Polotsk. The heart of White Russia. From a noble family. A warrior family. And yet, you betray me.”

  “I would never. My loyalty is with you.”

  “We shall see. You are a big man, Yuri. But big men can be broken.”

  Then the torture began.

  They said the brain had no memory for pain. It was the reason women had more than one child, because if they could truly recall the agony of their first, they would never repeat it.

  But in the nightmare, Yuri relived every kiss of the whip. Every caress of the cattle prod.

  It went on and on, until he broke, willing to confess to anything.

  But still it continued. Continued until Yuri couldn’t remember his own lies, which made the torture even worse.

  Eventually, mercifully, Yuri woke up. He didn’t wake up screaming, because his whole body, including his jaw, was cramped, teeth clenched to the cracking point.

  His bed was always soaked. Sweat. Urine, still stained with blood this many years later, from the internal injuries he continued to suffer.

  For a moment, Yuri just laid there, willing his muscles to relax, letting the memory of the pain subside. Then he changed the sheets on the air mattress—an indignity not befitting a warrior such as himself—while thinking of all the things he’d do if he had the President at his mercy.

  Thoughts of vengeance were the only thoughts that keep him sane.

  The blood and piss soaked sheets were thrown out the window, lest his men discover them. The whole train reeked of bodily fluids, but Yuri used Lysol to mask his own.

  A huge man, he felt an equally huge amount of shame.

  Then he looked out the window. Looked up to the pinpricks of light in the black sky.

  Most were stars. But there were manmade objects there, too. More than two thousand satellites circle the earth.

  “Soon,” he whispered to the night.

  He had whispered that to the night many hundreds of times. But his nightly promise was close to coming true.

  So very, very close.

  Yuri then reached for his glass pipe, lit it, and the sickly-sweet opium filled his lungs.

  It helped.

  But the memory of the pain won’t fully go away.

  JACK

  Traveling in the Crimebago Deux was sort of like being in a five-star restaurant that served food you hated. The seats were plush and comfortable. The toilet had a heated seat and one of those Japanese built-in bidets. The motorhome had Direct TV, and a computer with Wi-Fi, and was well-stocked with a high-end variety of booze and snacks.

  At the same time, I’d rather be anywhere else.

  I was having a hard time focusing. Not because of the ample distractions; I ignored those. I needed to be thinking about Herb, about finding him, but instead I was beating myself up over my fight with Phin, and wrestling with my cop-sense that told me something was very wrong with Heckle and Jeckle and I needed to follow-up on that hunch.

  The vehicle came to a stop—probably for gas, because this beast got half a mile to the gallon—and I heard a knocking sound, coming from my right. I ignored it, thinking it was just some random RV noise, but then I heard it again, and noted it was coming from the refrigerator.

  Heckle and Jeckle, sitting on the sofa across from me, looked at each other and snickered.

  Rosalina whined, and nudged the refrigerator door with her nose.

  “What’s in the fridge?” I asked.

  “See for yourself,” the twins said in unison.

  I took a few steps over to the fridge, grabbed the handle—

  —and hesitated.

  “McGlade,” I called. “There’s something in your refrigerator.”

  “That’s Waddlebutt,” he said from the driver’s seat. “Probably hears you talking, wants to say hello.”

  That made about as much sense as anything else since I’d climbed aboard, so I opened the fridge, and found myself staring at a bird.

  A black and white bird, about twenty inches tall and maybe seven pounds in weight, with black flippers for wings, a black beak, and little yellow eyes.

  It chirped at me, an abrasive sound not unlike rubbing a wet finger across a water balloon.

  Harry walked up and squatted next to the animal.

  “J-Dawg, meet Waddlebutt. He’s dressed like a butler, but don’t let that fool you. He’s a penguin.”

  Waddlebutt was standing on the bottom shelf of the fridge, in the center of a pile of small, round stones. The upper shelves had been removed.

  “Harry,” I said, using my patient Mom voice, like the time Sam flushed a Costco five-pound bag of Goldfish crackers down the toilet to set them free. “You can’t keep a penguin in the fridge.”

  “He likes it in there. It reminds him of winter in the Arctic, where there’s no sun. And no air.”

  “You’re being an idiot again.”

  “How? There’s no air in the Arctic. It’s a proven fact.”

  “Penguins live in the Antarctic, not the Arctic. And they have air there.”

  “Have you been to the Antarctic, Miss Know Everything World Traveler? No, you haven’t. Everyone knows you can’t go there without oxygen.”

  “You’re thinking of Mount Everest,” I said. “Or scuba diving.”

  “You have no idea what I’m thinking. My mind is an enigma. What am I thinking about right now?”

  “Porn,” I said.

  “Okay, you got one right.” Harry made a face. “So, should I punch some air holes in the fridge?”

  Waddlebutt chirped, or quacked, or whatever you called it. While it wasn’t exactly cute, I couldn’t stop staring. It was like one of Sam’s stuffed animals, come to life.

  “Why is he sitting on a pile of rocks?” I asked.