Page 24 of Erase Me
“Okay, I broke the contract.So what?”he barked.“I’ve been in your position.I did the job you’re doing.Led that same miserable life.But I knew I deserved better.So when my chance came, I took it.I made my choice and stayed.”
“Thinking you’d get away with it.”
“I did...until now, didn’t I?”A confident smirk pulled at his lips.“But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, there’s power in money and everyone has their price.So, what’s yours?Name it.”
I shook my head.
“Whatever you want, I can make it happen for you,” he continued.“I have the money.What do you want?A house on the beach?Women?Name it.”
Quite the salesman.
“There must be something.”
His eyes darted toward the stateroom door behind me just as I heard the footsteps.
The steward I’d seen earlier came at me swinging a collapsible metal baton that would have left quite a mark if he’d been able to land it.Fortunately, his ample muscles were trained for power rather than for speed.
I caught him by the wrist and, using his momentum, slung him headfirst into the wall.The crack of his forehead against the hard paneling was definitive.Tomorrow, when he woke up, I was sure he’d be sorry he didn’t take a restaurant job in some safe, quiet town far from any boats.
Before he even hit the floor, though, I expected Volpe to attack.
As I spun around to face him, I saw the wine bottle arcing toward my head.He was holding it by the neck, using it as a club.The blow glanced off the left side of my face, staggering me.
Volpe was not one to let an advantage go by.He kept coming for me, and there was murder in his eyes.
The next swing was again aimed at my head, but I stepped forward, ducking inside the trajectory of the weapon.Driving forward with my shoulder, I lifted him and felt the bottle smash against my lower back.
Together, we hit the wall beside the opening to the balcony, and the air audibly rushed from his lungs.He wasn’t done, though.Jamming my face backward with his free hand, he tried to knee me in the gonads, but hit me in the thigh instead.
This guy was really beginning to wear on my goodwill.
In the periphery of my vision, I caught sight of the bottle again in the air, and he was poised to crown me with it.Not caring to wait for the possible outcome of that, I headbutted him hard, stunning him momentarily.I followed with a fierce punch to his solar plexus that robbed him of the ability to breathe.
He dropped the bottle.“Okay,” he gasped.“Okay.”
Showing me he was finished, he held out a hand in surrender while the other gripped his midsection.
I stood back and watched him try to draw air.
He turned toward the open balcony and took a couple of wobbling steps.He leaned on the table, and I saw the blade of the cheese knife gleaming in the light just as he snatched it up.
When he spun around to stab me, I jumped and kicked him solidly in the chest.Volpe went crashing through the table and over the side.I went in the water after him.
I thought he had to be done, but I was wrong.
When I surfaced, the sonovabitch was lunging toward me, the knife still clutched in his hand.It was clear that he was not going to quit.Not until one of us was dead.
Grabbing his wrist as he slashed at me, I managed to turn him and plunge his arm into the water.He went under.
I twisted my body, got one leg over his shoulder, and hooked my legs around him.Still holding his wrist, I put all my weight on him, driving him deeper into the black waters.
It only took a couple of minutes before the thrashing stopped.He still had the knife in his hand when I pulled his lifeless body to the surface.
This wasn’t the way I liked to end things.But he’d given me no choice.
I swam around the stern end of the yacht and climbed up onto the dock.
There was no one by the restaurants when I went back up the stairs to the parking lot.That was probably a good thing, since that wine bottle to my face had opened up a cut that was still bleeding.
