Authors note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Tracking Evil - Bucharest Part 3
Note: While some characters in this tale appear in the series Tracking Evil: a Podcast. It isn't necessary to have read that series to enjoy this story. This story is set a few months after the events in the final chapter of Tracking Evil: a Podcast.
Chapter One: "Revenge, the sweetest morsel to the mouth that ever was cooked in hell " - Walter Scott
Ioana steered her small shopping trolley past the cashiers in the grocery store. It was one of those rectangular fabric carts, four small wheels and an extendible handle like a suitcase. Ideal for flat surfaces but a pain when it came to manoeuvring it down the three steep steps outside of the store.
The young man who approached her was tall, although everyone seemed tall to her now. She felt she'd shrunk another few inches since Maria had died, and the guilt of sending little Denisa out to hunt them down.... She was a stupid old woman to have lain that burden on the young woman's shoulders.
The man couldn't have been any older than Maria, an open smiling face, dark of hair and eye. He smiled in a way a person does when they expect to be recognised and she did feel he was familiar. He must have sensed her confusion, speaking first to save her the embarrassment of not knowing who he was.
"Vlad... I knew your granddaughter, and I know Denisa."
"Vlad, of course. I'm sorry, but it's your own fault. You've grown up so much, fine man now. Oh, thank you dear." The last was said when Vlad smoothly took charge of her groceries, lifting the heavy cart effortlessly, placing it onto the pavement outside.
"That's so good of you, a real gentleman. Not many left nowadays."
"Can I walk with you for a minute. To talk..." he seemed awkward now, finding it hard to say the words. More commiserations about Maria no doubt. She welcomed them even though they kept the pain of her loss fresh. Talking about her meant she wasn't forgotten.
"Of course, nice to have a young man walking me home. Hasn't happened in about fifty years," she cracked the small joke, feeling better for it.
They started up the street, he kept his pace slow, his long legs half stepping so that Ioana could comfortably keep up. She didn't press him to start talking, knowing it would come to him in time.
"Please... don't react to what I'm going to say to you. Okay?"
"Of course," she was a little bewildered by this opening, her mind was still sharp but even so it was the oddest start to a conversation she'd had in a while.
"Denisa sent me..." he paused at her startled gasp, waiting while she took a hold of herself.
"She sent me to talk to you. She said... she said to tell you that she knows who did it. And she said that she is already making them pay. Do you understand?"
"Yes." She wanted to leap about, to shout out loud. Not in joy, not in pleasure, but with satisfaction that justice would be served. An eye for an eye.
"She wanted to tell you herself but... the people behind this are powerful and she doesn't want this coming back on you. Also, if they realise it's connected to Maria then you might be watched, so she can't risk herself being stopped before she's finished the job." Vlad got it all out in a rush and then he stopped walking, Ioana following suit. He made a pantomime of examining the store front they had stopped beside, as if he was admiring something in the shop window. He pointed inside the store, a woman's fashion boutique and puzzled, Ioana followed his lead.
In the store, Denisa stood looking outside. As their eyes met, she blew a kiss towards Ioana, Denisa smiling then in gratitude to Vlad. To her credit, the old lady didn't react overtly. Instead, she raised a hand as if she was now drawing Vlad's attention to an item, but as her hand lowered, her fingers waggled in an approximation of a wave to Denisa.
"Come on, I'll walk you home, maybe you'll make me a coffee?" Vlad linked an arm in Ioana's, offering her the support she so suddenly needed.
"That would be lovely Vlad. Thank you," Ioana answered, the two of them turning from the window, continuing down the street.
Denisa waited until she was sure they were well out of sight, leaving the boutique with a few new items she'd bought herself. Not just to avoid suspicion but because she'd already managed to get blood evidence on some of her clothes between the killings at the club and the execution of the city councillor. She'd torched and dumped the incriminating clothing already.
The news on the TV had been full of reports concerning the body found the day before in the garage, a city councillors murder a big headline. But oddly, or maybe not, there had been no reports about the three men she had killed in the club. All for the better, she didn't need a full-on police manhunt right now. Though that did mean the organisation would be handling the matter themselves. She trusted in the fact that the first suspicions would fall on criminal rivals and not a twenty-year-old woman with no connection to them or their illicit businesses.
She checked surreptitiously that nobody was following her, doubling back twice to be sure. It was overkill but the stakes couldn't be higher for her. Denisa was on her own in this, no back up, one mistake and she was dead.
Back at her hotel room it was still evening and she was waiting for night to fall to go to work. To kill some time she took a shower, letting the hot water ease muscles and aches that were still lingering from the events in the club. Her feet still smarted a little from the beating, there was some tightness in her shoulders from struggling against the restraints on the sex machine. Overall, though, she was in better shape than she had any right to be. She'd been lucky. If there had been anymore members of the organisation there that night, even one, she wouldn't have been able to act as she had. Her father was a firm believer in the adage of 'making your own luck' and if she was going to get through this, then she'd be as prepared as possible... no more taking stupid chances.
The city councillor's phone had provided addresses for both Lukeba, the 'brains of the organisation' and Malo, the head of the enforcement side of the gang. Six months before all of this, the old Denisa would have risen to the challenge, going head on at Malo first, relishing the idea of pitting her skills against him. Not now, she was smarter now. Her friends had helped instil that. The biggest danger was the cleverer of the two bosses, Lukeba. So that meant that he became target number one. Tonight, she'd go to his place and kill him. Brutally simple as plans went, but with no resources, simple was all that she had. Of course, the added benefit being that 'simple' is harder to fuck up.
