The secret destination that Mercedes had just arrived at was a house on the outskirts of the city of Los Angeles, and what she had stashed away in this house was her little sister, Daniella, whose birthday was today.
Daniella and Mercedes had been born to the same parents, with Mercedes being the older one, due to being born 14 years earlier. They had both had to witness the abject poverty in their family which had led to their father taking a loan from Aleksandr Matiç, the same loan which their father had been unable to repay, and which had subsequently forced them into to a life of servitude, dependence and oppression by the ruthless Serbian.
Mercedes, however, had hidden Daniella from Aleksandr's knowledge and radar, going to extreme lengths such as, locking her away from the world in a room which she was prohibited from leaving, not letting her even go to school, to prevent her being kidnapped, paying the room's rent through snaky means because Aleksandr kept eyes on her finances and coming to see her only twice every month because she was very terrified of what the brute would do to her if he found her; perhaps turn her into a stripper as well, traffick her for money or use her in some way that would ruin the little girl's innocence and set her on a dark path from which she would never be able to return; and Mercedes had told herself a long time ago that, come what may, fire or sword, she was not going to lose her sister to Aleksandr, after losing everything that mattered to him: her parents, her independence, her joy and her…
No, the other thing she'd lost to Aleksandr was something she didn't even want to think about now, because it would only open a well of pain that she'd kept locked for years.
"Hey, Dannie, happy birthday," She said as she rushed to the bed, sat on it and hugged her little sister tightly. There was a chill in the air, but the hug was so warm that neither of them noticed it, at least for the moment. It was a massive shame that Daniella's birthdays always had to be celebrated in secret, with hushed tones, silence and the constant action of looking over their shoulders, but, this was the price that they both had to pay to keep Daniella away from the ever perambulating monitors of Aleksandr Matiç, who had men scattered all across the city.
".. I thought you wouldn't come," Daniella said, with tears welling up in her eyes as she held her sister tightly.
"Hey, hey.. Don't say that.. It's your birthday! I wasn't going to miss it for the world! I'm always going to come for you.. Always, Dannie.."
Mercedes eventually released her from the hug and pulled out a small box she'd hidden in her cloak all along. "Here.. I got you something.."
Excitement replaced the pain in Daniella's eyes, for the moment, as she was thrilled by the prospect of receiving a gift from her sister. "What is it?"
"Well, it's your present.. Why don't you find out?" Mercedes said with as much cheer and joy in her voice as she could muster. She would have loved nothing more than to take Daniella wherever she wanted; DisneyLand, the theater, a basketball game, hell, she wouldn't even mind if Dannie had wanted to go to Haiti, but the situation at hand had not only tied her hands, but had given her no other choice but such a boring, dull concession of an occasion.
Daniella opened the box and saw, lying elegantly in it, a beautifully crafted necklace with a pendant in the shape of a 'D', to represent the first letter of her name, 'Daniella'.
Daniella smiled for a moment and even began to chuckle lightly, but then, her underlying emotions which she had tried hard to suppress soon overrode her slight happiness and she suddenly burst into tears. Mercedes was taken aback, because she didn't know what to make of it.
"What.. What's wrong, Dannie? You don't like it? I swear, I'll take it back to the jeweler and get another one, Dannie.."
Daniella cried all the more before blurting out, ".. It's not about the necklace! I just want a normal life, Mercedes!! I'm sick of lame birthdays! I'm sick of not going to school! I'm sick of hiding away like unwanted property! I'm sick of seeing you only twice every month! I'm sick of not being able to leave this house!! I want a life!!"
Every one of Daniella's words stabbed Mercedes like a blade. Daniella had begun to feel the frustration, and her innocence was being ripped apart slowly. She wished she could give the girl freedom, joy and an actual childhood and everything she'd demanded, which were her rights, but how was she to explain to her that she couldn't? As she began to speak, she could feel a quake in her soul.
"Dannie.. Trust me.. I know.. And, I wish, to God, that I could let you have all these things.. You think I want you to celebrate your birthday in a house with the blinds dropped, with no birthday cake or flowers or food? You think I like the hide and seek I play with people trailing me every time that I have to come here? No, Dannie.."
She felt a lump rising in her throat, but she kept on speaking, though she had to dig deep to find the will to say the words she'd need to. Daniella kept looking at her with pleading eyes.
"I would love nothing more than to give you the free, normal life I know you deserve.. But, Dannie.. You know I can't.. If that man were to find you.." Her voice trailed off, and she could feel hot, prickly tears tugging at her eyes.
".. But, can't we go plead with him? Ask nicely?"
Daniella knew the answers to these questions, because she'd asked them countless times before, and she knew what Mercedes always had as a response, but she was just willing it to be different this time.
"Dannie.. It's not that simple.."
Upon hearing this, Daniella broke down into tears once more, and Mercedes grabbed her, holding her tightly, as she burst into tears herself.
She sincerely wished she could snap her fingers and right all that was wrong in her and Daniella's lives, but, when you owed a debt of millions of dollars to an unforgiving, unforgetting Mafia boss like Aleksandr Matiç, things were never that simple.
As she comforted Daniella, Mercedes was startled by the sound of rapid knocks on the door. She stopped and listened, thinking that, perhaps, it could just be her mind playing games with her.
But, as she listened, she heard the knocks again.
Instantly, all the hairs on her neck stood upright, her brain's processing speed tripled and her heartbeat increased significantly.
Could it be that someone had discovered this safehouse?
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The knocking on the door continued, and sure enough, the tension rose accordingly and sporadically."Stay.. Here.."It was a simple, two word instruction from Mercedes to Daniella that didn't need any reiteration or explanation. She had wrapped her right palm over the mouth of the whimpering 14 year old, in an attempt to stifle the sound of her cries and prevent them from reaching the ears of whoever was at the door.Daniella nodded, to indicate that she fully understood the words that were being said to her, and when Mercedes was certain that her message had been efficiently passed across, she freed Daniella's mouth, left the room - locking it firmly behind her - grabbing a nearby baseball bat that had been kept for situations like this one, and then, she stealthily moved towards the door.Whoever was on the other side of the door was probably an intruder who had trailed her all the way here. Could it be the men from the Accord? She'd believed she had lost them, but what if they had
40… 60... 80... 100. No, these were not the first, few attempts of a child or reminiscent adult at recapping all the multiples of 20; they were the sporadically rising miles per hour readings of the grey 1967 Maserati Ghibli, being driven by Giovanni Colpani, which was speeding down the road on a highway at a far end of the city, the part of town that 'belonged to' and was run by the Italian crime organization known as the Uomini Marrone. Gio, as he was fondly called, the only child of Don Fabrizio Colpani, underboss of the Uomini Marrone and undisputable heir to the mob crew, who was reputed to be the best marksman in the family, wasn't currently speeding because he was accelerator happy or simply a reckless driver, but because, lately, he had begun to get increasingly frustrated with his father, Don Fabrizio Colpani, and his various administrative choices, which seemed to be tilted only towards the goal of satisfying the Don's personal gratifications, neglecting the bigger picture
Being trained by experts in jujitsu since childhood and mastering many other forma of combat were irrelevant in a fight with no rules, against aggrieved and muscular men, and Giovanni Colpani was finding this out first hand, as, he was being tossed around by the four brutal men who'd waylaid him at the pub.Presently, their boss, the man who'd thrown the first punch at him, had hoisted him up into the air and slammed him down onto one of the tables, instantly splitting it in two, and leaving Gio writhing in pain.As he was down, one of the men who had a dagger tried to pin him down with it, but, he lifted his two legs, gripped the man's arm and then used his hands to forcefully wrestle the blade from him. At this point, one of the other men, seeing that Gio had overpowered his colleague, rushed forward, but to his own peril, because Gio performed a swift kick up, hit the first man in the jaw with the blade handle and then drove the blade into the abdomen of the onrushing man. Groaning
A box of cereal. And another one. And, oh yes, yet another box of cereal. The cart was slowly getting filled with one brand of needless junk after another.Shopping was one of the avenues through which Mercedes spent all the money she got from Tequila which she didn't know what to do with, released pent up stress, and most importantly, allowed herself room to breathe and think.Yes, she was definitely being followed, but today, she really didn't care, not wanting to add to her already overflowing list of anxieties.It had been a busy week, with her top-tier performance at the Pay Per View event, to Daniella's birthday, hushed as it was, and it still promised to be even busier, with another Pay Per View coming up in two days, which was supposed to be her second scheduled performance of the week, when she would once again be expected and aiming to captivate and intrigue grown men, who would be willing to spend their entire month's pay to see her shake her butt and touch herself. A pity,
Unable to run quicker than a well built man in his early thirties who still went jogging every morning and who had chased criminals down dark, narrow alleys more times than he could count, Mercedes had been easily caught up with by FBI Agent Snyder, who had been stalking her for a while, in the name of investigative duties.At this time, she had been left with no other choice than getting into his car and agreeing to a questioning, after he had flashed his badge and threatened to arrest her.Presently, he had locked all the doors and gotten his tape recorder out, placing it on the dashboard."Name, please.." He said.Rolling her tongue around inside her mouth, feeling her teeth and coming to the annoying realization that she would have to answer whatever questions this federal agent had to throw at her, Mercedes took a deep breath before saying, "Mercedes Gomez."Agent Snyder smiled slyly before adding, "Not Coochie, no?""'Coochie' is not my name, young man. I've told you my name, so
It was yet another night of work for Mercedes, or, as she was known and called in this life of hers, Coochie. There was another Pay Per View event at Tequila and she, as expected, was supposed to be the center of attraction, and the main event. And so, she had left her two bedroom apartment early, in a bid to get to the club on time and then have enough prep time backstage as she could get before the show would begin in earnest.However, from the moment she'd walked into the building that cool evening in her winter coat, leather pants and boots, she could feel that something, somewhere wasn't right. From the fact that she'd been asked to go in through the back door, to the way the bouncer at the aforementioned back door sharply turned away when he spotted her, and then, crowning it all was the way Andrej had waved almost eerily while smiling weirdly at her from his office's balcony which overlooked the entrance to the strippers' backstage area. He'd never waved at her before then. Wha
Fluffy pillows, clean smelling sheets, a spacious bed that was definitely king sized, the feel of a thick, comfy blanket, and then, the slow regaining of full consciousness and memory… Where was she?Mercedes woke with a start, her eyes popping open sharply and her mind quickly recalling that she wasn't supposed to be here, that this bedroom she was in, nice, sizeable and beautiful as it was, wasn't hers, that she had last been in the changing rooms of Tequila, that she had been accosted by some men and that after seeing these men, she had blacked out.. All these things she remembered immediately caused her heart to begin racing, instilled fear in her and moved her to begin visibly shaking. She looked around and was stunned to see that there had been two men who'd been standing and watching her silently all along. They wore brown coats, with brown flat caps on their heads and gloves for the cold. They looked stoicly at her in a way that made her shudder even more than she already wa
There was no small amount of drama at Tequila from that night until the following morning after Mercedes had officially been declared missing. It was Mindi who'd discovered this, coming back to the changing rooms after her own performance to see Mercedes's phone on the floor, face down, with her bag and locker ajar. She'd not taken it seriously until she saw the open second door in the room which led through the back door and out into the yard behind the club. Making a few inquiries and finding that no one had seen Mercedes, she'd then raised an alarm, and just like that, from that moment up until 9:44 am the following morning, she hadn't been found.Mindi was sitting in the changing room, in the exact same spot that Mercedes had been sitting the previous night, terribly shaken and reminiscing so much that although she had FBI Agent Ruby standing before her, shooting questions at her, she couldn't hear a thing."Miss Mindi!! Are you okay?" Ruby's impatience had run out and she was now