Consent (The Loan Shark Duet 2)

He stops struggling, knowing he’s as good as dead. “What the fuck, man?”

“Where’s Magda?”

He grunts as I push up his arm. “Back office.”

“Who’s with her?”

“She’s alone.”

She usually is. The office is soundproof. She won’t hear me rough up Scott unless she walks through the door.

“Why did she go to my house, yesterday?”

“I don’t know.” He curses and whimpers in pain. “You’re breaking my arm.”

“That’s the idea,” I snarl. “Where did Magda get the tape?”

“What tape?” He turns his head to the side and gulps air through his mouth. “Ah, fuck, that hurts.”

“The one she left at my place. Yesterday.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I push harder, inviting more swearing, this time mixed with snot and tears.

“An old tape. Home movie.”

“Fuuuuck. Stop.”

He squirms like a worm. I let go an inch, giving him room to breathe and speak.

He pants and hisses. “I dug up a video tape in the graveyard.”

“Which one?”

“Rosettenville.”

“Which grave?”

“Haynes, Charles.”

I shove again, inviting a howl. “He’s not dead. If you lie to me, you son of a bitch––”

“It’s his plot,” he screams, “for when he dies.”

“When?” I accentuate my urgency with putting strain on his elbow. “When did you dig it up?”

“Ah, fuck! For the love of God.” Air wheezes through his teeth when I let go. “Yesterday.”

“How did you know it was there?”

“Charlie.”

“He told you?”

“He told the shrink.”

“Who, Christopher?”

“Yessss.”

That bastard. That’s why Magda insisted on the hypnotherapy. She needed to find a tape she was looking for. Some pieces fall into place, but there’s still a big, dark hole in the middle of the picture.

“Why did she give the tape to my wife?”

“I don’t know! I don’t even know what’s on the tape.”

I reached my limit with Scott. He doesn’t know more. Gripping the gun by the barrel, I bring the shaft down hard on his head, knocking him out cold. Just in case, I retrieve the cable ties Magda keeps with various other torturing tools in the bottom drawer and tie his hands and feet. I put out a closed sign and lock the front door before heading to the back office to get my answers.

Magda hops from her chair and rounds her desk, calling for Scott before the door shuts behind me.

I advance on her. “He can’t help you.”

Her eyes slip to the gun in my hand. “Be reasonable, Gabriel.”

“Like you were when you gave Valentina the tape?”

She pales to the color of whitewashed wood, the surface of her skin uneven and rough. “She showed it to you?”

The diabolic side of me wants to play with her. A rabbit and a fox. “Were you hoping she wouldn’t?”

She holds up her palms. “All I wanted was for her to leave. I only wanted my son back.”

My voice grows louder with each syllable. “You thought she’d run knowing my goddamn father raped her.”

“Yes, I thought it would drive her away. You haven’t been yourself since she came into your life. She’s destroying you, just like she destroyed your father.”

“She destroyed him?” Every one of my limbs is shaking. “He’s the one who took her innocence, her youth––God, Magda, they beat her to an inch of her life––and she destroyed him?”

Her eyes are magnified behind her glasses. “She seduced him!”

“She was thirteen fucking years old,” I grit out.

“I saw the way he looked at her, even when she was that young. Do you know how that feels? It’s the way she walks, with her ass swaying and her tits pushed out. It’s what she wears, those short skirts and tight tops.” She points a finger at my chest. “She did it to him, and she’s doing it to you.”

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “How long have you known?”

She looks away.

“You will tell me,” I say. “Today’s the day we come clean.”

“You weren’t supposed to find out, not like this.”

No. Neither was Valentina. God, not like this. “I did, so start talking.”

She faces me slowly. “What are you going to do with the tape?”

She needs to understand how serious I am. I’ll frighten her into talking, and if that doesn’t work, I swear to God I’ll torture my own mother. “It will go to the authorities, the ones you don’t own.”

She trembles from the hem of her dress to her neatly trimmed hairline. “It’ll destroy us.”

“We’re already destroyed. It’s over, Magda. We’re over. The business is over.”

Her Adam’s apple bobs as she swallows. “Don’t do this, Gabriel.”

“Why not? My father is a rapist. My mother is a criminal, and I’m a killer.”

“We do what we must to survive.”

“Don’t fucking justify our sins.”

“You say that because you’re under her spell, just like your father.”

“No, Magda. I’m in love with her. I love her like I’ve never loved a woman. I’ll go to hell for her, and I won’t blink an eye to send you to jail for what you knew and covered up, so start talking.”