23. Baits

Soles clacked, and the polished terrazzo floor reflected his every step as Warshon strode through the corridor to his office on the top floor of Telesphore Pharmaceutical. 

He slid into the leather chair, a forefinger propping against his temple as he leaned to the side and made an order to the nearest Golden Gate Burger on the Wellington. He texted the order to Nikita Ozal with an untraceable burner. 

Since the beginning of the election, a wild theory had formed in his head that his lord father intended to make Keiren Zaman the Premier only to see the man destroyed. To run a test on his theory, he needed a reaction. And if Nikita Ozal was indeed a mole, he should work well as a catalyst. 

Tilting his head back, he stared at the pendant light centering the dropped ceiling lit on four sides. Her voice returned to his head, soft and sweet, a pur that made him ache when faded, devoured by the screams from those earlier years. 

When he finished high school at fifteen, instead of going to college, he was sent to the regiment garrisoned on their borders with Tamen three years after the North Bay War that killed thousands of civilians and left Tamen divided, with the Central North remaining tyrannical, and the Federal South as the Republican proxy. The enlistment, as far as Lord Qusbecq was concerned, should "cleanse the Tamen out of him." And it broke me. The looting, the boozing, the whoring, the drugs and abuses. Days in and out for three years. The Tamen women of the Federal South flung themselves at the Republican soldiers. Combating for a place in their bed, they prided themselves on bearing the seeds of savages who fucked them like broken toys, as if the half-breed they carried would reassign their own birthrights. While the women did all these, their men cheered. Destitute and desperate for the Republican aid, they pimped their sisters and wives, and those who did nothing, subdued by their conscience or cowardice alike, quailed on the periphery like wraiths that walked the edges of graves. 

So much shame roared at their being shameless, and so much ire and loathing in their sweat of love – it tore Warshon into shreds. 

To drown his guilt, his shame, and his disgust that kept him wide awake in the dead of night, and to prove himself a Republican, he implicated himself in every heinous act of his comrades, punishing the Tamens who made him feel ashamed because of who he was, which only got him even more sick to the stomach. Three years, it was like staring at his own ceiling, reading the same damn textbook he couldn't even turn the page, let alone finish – until he contracted syphilis at seventeen. At the infirmary where he met nurse Nonna Aleksandrova, she slapped him back to sanity. 

What he didn't tell her, or anyone, however, was the voice he still heard, drawing its cold, venomous breath, that he was damaged beyond repair. So he laid waste to the world in the hope that he would self destruct in the process. His hate had become his purpose, his master, his cure and poison, beyond which, he had nothing else. 

A wry smile tugged at the corners of his lips. He rested his eyes. The girl's voice resurfaced, caressing the decay of his soul like a kiss he didn't deserve. 

His watch vibrated. A message from the burger delivery service asking for the one-time passcode to enter the building and his floor. 

He typed in the number. Erasing his sadness, his yearning, his ache – anything that might give him away – he turned his face to the door he had left open, his hands steepling upon the midriff. 

In a few minutes, the shadow of a brawny man slanted on the wall. Nikita Ozal entered without so much as a knock and put the brown delivery bag on Warshon's desk. 

"Personal delivery from the manager himself, I appreciate it, " Warshon deadpanned. "Quarter pounder no sauce with cheese?" He flipped open the bag.

"Can't stay long or it'll be suspicious, you know the drill." Ozal flopped into the couch centering the office. 

"I do," He took out the fries. "That's why you'll go home right after this. The security camera will see you coming in, but a system error happened in –" he paused to check his watch. "Now, there won't be more footage for this building until midnight." Nibbling the fries, he winced. "Soggy." He chucked the other half away. 

Ozal cocked his head, his face still, those glaucous eyes betraying no irk, no qualm, nothing, an aptitude that was as dangerous as it was useful. One look, and Warshon knew that the man wanted to ask why he was called here, and why they couldn't communicate over the secured channel. But as patient as a leopard stalking his prey, Ozal waited. 

Warshon chuckled, peeling off the burger wrapper. "I suppose you know who snitched on us?"

The man stayed quiet. 

Warshon took a bite. "And you wouldn't tell me?" 

"I'm a businessman, like you," Nikita replied. His thick beard bobbed, suggesting a smirk. "And I don't do drama." 

"So long as there are people, there are dramas," he slurred with his mouth full, his wrist twirling. "And since business is about people, it's a damn stage." 

"Maybe." The brawny shrugged. "But there are acts that don't need my performance."

Still, he wouldn't give away what he knew, what they both knew, that Serhat Qusbecq went behind him. Ozal was wise enough not to gossip about the stupidity of a man who had blundered badly, committing a betrayal when he was the only suspect. But could a man really be that stupid? Should they continue the discussion, the ugly truth would peer into sight that Serhat Qusbecq didn't blunder but lost a wager, one he placed on Warshon's life. Had it not been for the luck that fell on his side, the DEA would have shot him dead, and his face under the Phantom mask could have caused Lord Qusbecq some real headache. Nikita had no intention of getting involved in the family drama of House Qusbecq, and rightfully so. It didn't need his performance. 

Warshon could respect that. He could even respect that Ozal didn't even bother pretending to warm up to him, so he'd trust him more, divulge more, maybe even confess, so there would be more to report back to Lord Qusbecq. To either the father or the son, Ozal did only what was stipulated in his contract. Any extra mile could kiss his old, flat ass. 

"How's your son?" Warshon asked instead. The boy, who should be nineteen by now, suffered from liver damage due to a genetic condition of Alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency. Understandably, Ozal didn't wish to give Warshon any chance of holding his son hostage, or the advantage of keeping him in debt. He didn't come for help until it felt almost too late. "He was making so much progress I was surprised when you pulled him out of the treatment," Warshon added. 

"He's fine." The man stiffened. "He's alright." 

Warshon angled his head. The boy had three transplants that all ended in failure. Due to the low likelihood of success, the association suspended his treatment indefinitely. But unless he got the right match for a new transplant somewhere, he should have been dead by now. 

"Good." Washon took another bite. "Where is he now?"

"College."

"God bless!" Slapping what was left of the burger in the brown parchment bag, Warshon leaned back, a half smile twitching his lips. "I'm happy for him, and you."

"Thank you." A flicker of what might have been a smile came to Nikita's glaucous eyes. "And thank you, Dr. Qusbecq, for not giving up on my son," he added. 

Holding the other's gaze, Warshon sensed hesitance. "I'm sorry I wasn't more helpful." 

Nikita shrugged, his hands crossing upon his knees, his lips compressing into a slit. 

"Anyway," Warshon continued, propping his cheek on his knuckles as he leaned to the side. "I called you here because we need to approach a new client."

The gunman's face shuffled back to the blank page he wore like his skin. "Haven't we expanded the list already?" 

Warshon favored him with a nod. "There is one more."

"Name?" 

"Keiren Zaman."

Ozal kept quiet for a long time without so much as a stir in his face. "Why?"

Slumping in his leather chair, Warshon swiveled. "Because I'm bored." stretching out his words, he loosed a chuckle. "Everything's been so orderly, so peaceful, so dull it's insufferable. I need to set a few baits to see the fish broach and the pound ripple." Cracking his knuckles, he licked the bottom of his front teeth. 

Every word should go to his lord father, who ought to hear the menace dripping in each unsettling vowel. A weapon sneering at his wielder – Arslan Qusbecq would have hated that more than anything else. A lonely man desperate to keep hold of his weapon while fearing it no less, and to screw him tight in his own dilemma was among Warshon's favorite pastimes. But beyond the delight he took in being an irk set a much bigger board where he needed to lure pieces into moving. For the pound to ripple. If his surmise didn't hold, that his lord father indeed wanted Zaman to be the next Premier and stay in his position, he would order Ozal to sabotage Warshon's plan of turning his running mate a client. But if it did, Arslan Qusbecq would stay put now that weapon had leveled itself at the target he had in mind before he even made the aim. 

Having set the bait, he waited. 

"But Zaman," Ozal continued at length, leaning forward on his forearms braced on his lap. "He's pretty straight-laced I've heard. Never indulges in anything. How're we going to, you know…" He moved his jaw sideways. 

"Straight-laced he may be, he needs medication."

Ozal cocked a brow. "He seems a healthy bloke."

"Can we change that?" 

A moment of silence. Ozal squinted, his larynx bobbing. "Are you suggesting that we approach his family doctor to prescribe him something he shouldn't?"

"Too much trouble and unnecessary." Uncoiling from his chair, Warshon rose and unbuttoned himself as he sauntered over to the cabinet where bottles of booze and the emergency kit were kept. He shucked off his shirt, revealing the suggestive bandage slung over his back. "A cut, a fall, an accident," he went forth. "Anything could happen to put him in an emergency for medical attention that goes past his family doctor whose loyalty is beyond us." He turned his face away to shield the wince as he peeled off the old dressing. Ozal's gawking eyes on him, he could feel it. "Sure, we could try to influence the doctor, convince him, confuse him, corrupt him, and you could take care of him should he ever try to go behind us. But like I've said, too much trouble and unnecessary." 

An even longer pause later, Ozal harrumphed; his frown deepened. "Did you know you'd get shot?" 

"No," Throwing the antiseptic on his back, he groaned. "But I wasn't surprised." 

"Did your father know?"

He shrugged, swathing new bandages under his arm. 

"And did nothing?"

Holding one end of the strip between his teeth, he trussed up the sterilized gauze. "Why overreact. It's a low-velocity bullet that scraped the underarm. I'm alive and well, aren't I?" he spat. 

An indignant snicker from the other slowly rose into a shaky laugh, reminding Warshon of the first time they met, when he was still a greenhorn cadet on the north border, when Nikita was demoted for reporting to the press the atrocity of their own men. Fifteen years, Nikita Ozal had served, and the army hawked him up like phlegm. Since then, he had been a gangster and a thief. He had done a lot of things he shouldn't have, which turned him more vulpine and vicious as time progressed, a claw in the dark when Warshon met him again after he got out of prison the last time nigh on a decade ago. Yet regardless of who or what he had become, Warshon recognized the indignation. It was the snicker of a man who once wanted to do good in a wolf den, and the laugh, his resignation, the toppling of his pride. 

Perhaps it wasn't Ozal after all. Perhaps there were other ways Lord Qusbecq got his tidings. From one or perhaps more of those underlings whose families Warshon paid for, or kept hostage, so to speak. For a heartbeat, Warshon clung on to the tenuous hope that the gunman, who was also a veteran and a father, didn't betray him. A father. He savored the word. Unlike good old Arslan, Nikita would put his own life on the line for his son. And just like how he had pocketed the expenses for the underlings' families, keeping them safe and well only to keep tabs on the men, should anyone take care of Nikita's son, they had the father on their leash. 

Either way, Warshon had to test it. He needed Ozal to hold no qualms when he told Lord Qusbecq every word he heard here tonight. He needed him to keep being the eye. "Have Zaman injured," he said, his voice final and flat. "Not too bad that he wouldn't be able to carry on with his campaign, but enough to require immediate medical attention and to pop a few painkillers every now and then to keep him going." Then, he flipped his shirt, arms slipping in as it settled in place while he whirled to meet the other in the eye. "Kieren is flying out after the final debate with Mustafa. I believe I can count on you for a little accident on his way to the airport. That said, should other opportunity present itself, text me, and we'll see if and how we should modify the plan." 

Ozal rose with a slight bob of his head, his glaucous eyes stoic and quiet. As he turned on his heel, Warshon added, "I'm happy for your son. I really am. He's lucky to have you as a father who'd put him first no matter what."

The man halted by the door for a second as he looked over his shoulder. His legs resumed shifting. 

When the echo of his footsteps faded into the distance, Warshon put in the earpieces. 

"Call Erdem Aktas." 

The young man bleated out a cuss amidst the overlapping conversations and the hum of jazz playing in the background. 

Warshon chuckled. "You have company?"

"Do I look like some loser who goes to a bar alone?"

"Get rid of them. Play drunk. Once you shake the dust off your heel, meet me at the clinic."

"You nuts?"

"I know I gave you the day off. And I'm sorry. But I wouldn't ask if it wasn't urgent."

A moment of pause with nothing but the background noise overlaying the jazz. "Give me two hours." Without so much as a snort, he cut the line. 

In the ensuing silence, Warshon flipped off the light and poured himself a scotch. Standing before the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the plant and the gleam of Huron Sea afar, he brooded over Nikita's son. The scorch singed, rolling down his gullet. He winced at the thought that he and Arslan Qusbecq were really two sides of the same coin, his gorge rising. 

A crack of lightning cleft the night sky afar, chasing the yarns of clouds like silvery veins that rambled across a pumping heart. Thunder roared in its wake, heralding a storm.