Bullet to the Brain: Chapter Five: Tangled up with Addie

(You can find the links to previous chapters below)

After thoroughly enjoying a shit, shower and shave, I was guided (by a goon) through a maze of elephant tusk archways into Kurtz’s office. Kurtz leaned back in a fur lined chair, which was upholstered with the hide of a poor beast he’d poached on safari. His Gucci shod feet rested on the ponderous desk; a nineteenth century antique; rosewood, inlaid with mother of pearl.

“Nightcap?” He asked.

I nodded. 

Kurtz opened an ornate cabinet, which was the same vintage as the desk, and pulled out a decanter. He poured two fingers of bourbon for me (and three for himself) into Waterford crystal tumblers. I held mine up, “To my surviving the night.”

“Ah, my dear Felix. Where does one draw the line between optimism and self-delusion?” he asked.

My smile faltered.

To my relief, he lifted his glass and laughed. The light filtered through the amber whiskey and was refracted into dancing rainbows by the heavy, heavy, hand cut crystal. 

Addie walked in (flushed with excitement) wearing a white lab coat. She’d changed her stilettos for sensible shoes. She’d forgotten to remove her safety goggles; a layer of fog made her two eyes appear the same, nondescript, color. 

“Ah, my sweet chemist,” Kurtz said with a condescending smile. He tapped his temple. 

Her excited flush deepened to an embarrassed blush. For a moment I saw the teenage girl she’d been: awkward and nerdy and perpetually mocked by the cool kids. She removed the goggles and tossed them aside; the poise returned to her posture; the panache rushed back to her face; her eyes regained their vibrant David-Bowie-colors. 

My heart leapt. 

“Have you met with success?” Kurtz asked. 

“I stand before you triumphant.” Addie proffered a Ziplock bag full of cartridges, which were akin to JUUL pods. “I was on the verge of solving your life force entanglement quandary before I indulged in my little sabbatical.”

“Excellent,” Kurtz smiled. 

“As a show of goodwill,” Addie continued. “I also cooked up a big batch of Vardaman.”

“Vardaman?” I asked.

“A cross between Molly and Special K,” Kurtz explained. “The club kids have been going gaga over it.” 

“I sent a few of your boys down the river with a boatload,” Addie said.

“A boatload?” Kurtz’s smile grew toothy. “That should net a cool hundred grand. This calls for some Louis XIII.”

As he rooted around the cabinet for a cognac snifter, Addie held up four fingers. 

I nodded.

Kurtz proffered the Louis XIII to Addie. She turned up her nose. “I’ve held up my end of the bargain. I’ll not share a drink, or anything else, with you until--”

The sturdy oak door creaked open. Joad shoved D.D. and Cady into Kurtz’s office and followed closely at their heels.

“You were saying?” Kurtz smirked.

“Mom!” D.D. said and rushed into Addie’s loving embrace.

“I should have known you were somehow mixed up in all this,” Cady hissed at me. Her narrowed eyes shot daggers and her gnashing teeth were ready to devour me (not in a good way).

“I hope you ladies will join us in a toast,” Kurtz said. “Cognac? Bourbon? Or perhaps I should call for a bottle of Champagne?”

“Cady will have some whiskey,” I said.

Cady opened her mouth to protest. But the words died in her throat. She seemed to be deciding which she loathed more, me or bourbon. The wheels spun for a moment. She finally said, “I take it neat.”

“Let’s get the formalities over with,” Addie said. She handed a JUUL vaporizer to Joad.

“Not so fast,” Kurtz said. He settled in behind his desk. “Joad, you and your charges will stand over there,” he pointed, “by the bookcase.”

Joad dragged D.D. and Cady to the far side of the room.

“My father, after he was shipped off to the federal penitentiary, had a little saying: Trust, but verify.” Kurtz said. “A pity he’d not learned that lesson earlier in life.” He shook his globular head contemplatively. “D.D., you’ll be taking the first puff of your mother’s latest concoction.”

“You bastard,” Addie said.

“Don’t make me ask twice,” Kurtz’s voice was like ice.

Addie nodded to her daughter.

D.D. inhaled a mouthful.

“Do it like you mean it,” Kurtz said.

D.D. inhaled a lungful, blew out a cloud of mist and repeated the cycle several times.

Kurtz poured himself another three fingers of Pappy. He put his feet up on the desk and sipped until his tumbler was empty. “How do you feel, my dear?” he asked D.D.

“A little tingly around the lips.”

“Your turn, Joad,” Kurtz said. 

The scumbag killer inhaled long and deep.

“Pterion,” I said to Cady.

She cocked her head and looked at me quizzically.

“Pterion,” I repeated.

The lightbulb flashed in Cady’s mind. She remembered the self defense lesson, which (months earlier) I’d imparted to her. She swung the heavy, heavy crystal tumbler at Joad’s head. The pterion is the weakest spot on the skull. The middle meningeal artery courses, like a subterranean river, right below. She struck him squarely on the spot. 

Clunk.

Joad shook it off. His sneer said, ‘I’m no stranger to street fights, you bitch.’ He pulled his fist back to wallop Cady.

She cringed, closed her eyes and steeled herself for the blow.

Kurtz drank in the scene, a lurid smile painted on his square face.

Joad fell backwards. 

Thud. 

Kurtz fell sideways. 

Thud.

“He wasn’t shitting me,” I said. “They were entangled, big time.” 

Addie’s drug had not been designed to disentangle Joad’s and Kurtz’s life forces. It was designed to make the arteries in the inhaler’s body as flimsy as wet toilet paper. Cady’s blow had ruptured the middle meningeal artery in Joad’s brain, which had caused a lethal epidural hemorrhage. 

 The drug was also designed to only affect cells housing ‘Y’ chromosomes. D.D.’s cells, of course, were full of ‘X’s’. Not a ‘Y’ in sight. Addie’s nobody’s fool.

“Ten Mississippi… Nine Mississippi…” Addie began the countdown. She locked the door.

The four fingers (which Addie had held aloft when she stepped into Kurtz’s office) indicated the number of armed men who remained on Kurtz’s estate. Addie had held eight fingers aloft during the barbecue, but she’d sent four armed men down the river with the cache of Vardamon. Eight minus four equals four.

“Eight Mississippi… Seven Mississippi…” 

I heaved and strained and flipped Kurtz’s desk onto its side. I hoped the thick rosewood would protect us. Addie herded the girls over. We all huddled behind the fine antique.

“Six Mississippi… Five Mississippi…” 

Of the four remaining armed men, two, Joad and Kurtz, were dead. Four minus two equals two live goons at the Kurtz estate.

Addie’s countdown indicated the amount of time we had until those last two were upon us.  “Four Mississippi… Three Mississippi…” 

Just as she’d reckoned, the remaining two goons began shouting and pounding on the stout office door.

I ran my hands underneath Kurtz’s bespoke blue blazer. Nothing but broad pecs and chiseled abs. “I thought you said he always carries a gun.”

“Two Mississippi… Ankle holster… One Mississippi…” 

I found the pistol strapped to his muscular calf. 

Gunshots rang out. One of the goons shot out the lock. They kicked in the door and burst through. 

As a neurosurgeon, I pride myself on my steady hands. But as I leveled the Sig at the goons, my hands shook and my heart fluttered like a candle in the wind. I held my breath and pulled the trigger. 

Click. 

“What the fuck?” I said.

“I thought you said you were an expert with firearms,” Addie said.

“I never used the word ‘expert’,” I said.

The pair of goons wasted an extra few Mississippis. They gazed (open mouthed) at Joad, whose lifeless body was sprawled across the floor. One of them poked him with a toe.

I pulled the trigger again.

It didn’t even ‘click.’

The goons locked on our position and raised their pistols. 

“The slide!” I chided myself. I yanked the slide back and released, chambering the first round. 

The two goons and I all emptied our magazines. 

Their bullets turned the fine antique desk into splinters. 

My rounds turned the goons into Swiss cheese. Well, not exactly. Most of my twelve bullets turned Kurtz’s books into confetti, the walls into sieves, the water pipes into fountains… you get the idea. But a couple of 9mms found their target and the goons lay dead. 

###

When the dust settled, D.D. embraced her mother and said, “I knew you’d save me, Mom.”

Cady slapped me real hard and said, “You’ve been nothing but a pox upon my family. If I never see you again, it will be too soon.” She turned, stepped over the dead bodies and walked out of Kurtz’s office. I hated to see her go, but I loved watching her lower unit recede down the hallway.

“Good luck getting an Uber out here, Cady,” I said. I rubbed my stinging cheek and her palm print faded away.

Addie told D.D., “Use the G-Wagon, it should be parked behind the Lamborghini, and take that poor girl back home. By the time you return I’ll have figured out the combination to Kurtz’s safe and we’ll skedaddle with a tidy sum.” 

Addie turned the piercing spotlight of her gaze towards me. “Felix, I trust you will give us a few hours head start before you alert the authorities.”

“Take your time getting back here, D.D.,” I said. “Addie, do me one favor before you skedaddle.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Strap those stilettos back on and teach me some of your fancy dance moves.” 

She extended her hand and I took it.

I hoped our little tango would be starting vertically and ending horizontally.

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If you’d like to read chapter four (at the end you can also find links to chapters one, two and three…

Bullet to the Brain: Chapter Four: Fetching the Chemist