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The River's Truth

(An E&R misadventure)

By M Kier MurdockPublished 7 years ago 13 min read
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Edin stopped at the bar, patting the solid oak top in a slow beat to draw the attention of her new friend. And from the back he appeared, a slow smile lining his tan face.

"You seem to be frequenting this place quite often, senorita."

She shrugged, threw on a crooked grin, "What can I say? This place serves a mean vodka screwdriver."

He turned and grabbed not one, but two glasses by their bottom in one hand, and a bottle of Grey Goose and a carton of orange juice in the other.

"Should you be drinking on the job?" She cocked an eyebrow as she watched him make their drinks expertly.

"Senora Petrucci is...taking a day off, shall we say." He said as she swilled the drinks, allowing the orange flavored goodness mix with the smooth vodka.

Edin snorted in response, rummaging in her shirt pocket for her packet of coffin nails, finding it and shuffling one out between her fore and middle finger.

"Which is a nice way of saying she's shacked up with some poor stupid bastard she just met last night." A little sleight of hand and a lighter seemed to appear in her right hand; she flicked it twice and lit her cancer stick, taking in a drag of the smog of eventual suicide and relishing it.

Rio pointed to it as he slid the finished cocktail across the bar top,

"You never told me you smoke." He took a drink of his vodka screwdriver.

"There's a lot I've never told you." She said turning her head l and exhaling the noxious cloud away from him to be courteous.

His finger traced the grain of the wooden surface, his eyes on his concoction.

"I know what I need to know."

"Oh?" Her motley colored eyes flashed a look of genuine surprise. "Do you now?"

"Senorita you are easy on the eyes, but you are-how do you say- a beautiful disaster."

"Pfft, you trying to say I'm a klutz, Mister River?" She had the decency to appear amused.

Rio looked up, his dark brown eyes were pits of endless enigma. It was haunted look, one filled with more grim knowledge than one person should ever endure.

Before she knew it, he threw his glass at her, but instincts kicked in before conscious thought could. She reached up and caught the glass with the same hand that held the cigarette, while her left hand fluidly drew an AMT Accelerator, and flicked the safety off.

"Don't do that." She warned, leaning in to take a drag of her cigarette before putting his thrown concoction down onto the bar.

"¿Por que? Because you will pull the trigger, because your training has been so ingrained in you, that without hesitation you will end my life and any life that threatens yours or those you command?"

Edin said nothing; she just kept her pistol trained on the bartender not wanting to betray her own ruminations of how he knew who she really is.

"Well, am I right... Madam Widow?" Rio rhetorically inquired with a smug satisfaction that was oddly familiar.

"I have no idea who that is." She replied breathing out a haze of nicotine and carbon monoxide in his face, all politeness gone.

He waved away the grey, sickening menthol cloud casually, reaching beneath the bar. He was however, halted by the sound of the AMT's hammer being thumbed back.

"You might not want to do that either." She warned, her voice was even, her countenance betrayed no emotions.

His hand came up with a rag which he let drop flat on the bar.

"I made a mess, senorita, one I cannot leave unattended."

The bartender's movements were meticulous, each motion was slow so not to cause Edin's restless trigger finger to be indulged; he wiped the bar in methodical circles, never taking his eyes off her.

"Is the gun still necessary?" He asked sopping up the last of the spilled vodka screwdriver, and tossing it over his shoulder, landing it on the edge of the sink.

"You threw a glass of alcohol at my head," she took another drag of her cigarette, exhaled it through her nostrils, "you broke the trust Mr. River."

He chortled,

"A truce, then? I give you my word that I will not assault you with glassware or any such objects and you promise to put the gun away and keep it tucked away." He said so calmly, as if this was a rational discussion and he was NOT a finger twitch away from being red paint on the bar.

Her eyes narrowed, but she flipped the safety back on, fluidly sliding her pistol back into her hip holster, albeit reluctantly.

"So long as we're done with the glass chucking...yeah, truce." She offered him the hand that once held the gun.

Rio flashed a charming smile and nodded, wiping off his wet hand on his pants before taking her hand, pumping it twice.

"A truce, it is, senorita."

They let go and Rio turned on his heel and began gathering some glasses, and the necessary ingredients for Jack Daniels' & cola.

"I have to know," he was already adding ice to the drinks; he looked up curiously as she asked, "How...how did you know what and namely, who I am?"

He shrugged,

"At first, when you walked through that door I didn't know you were the Widow, but I was positive you were a Fixer."

He offered her the drink, which she took a quick sip, then placed it on the counter.

"That's good stuff." She said tapping the lip of the glass before getting back on task, "Not many can point out my...profession just by looking at me. You're either in the 'wet-works' business yourself or you're a cop."

He choked on his drink just as he put it to his lips, quickly setting it down and wiped his mouth.

"A cop? As a bartender?" He rationalized, "Brazil's finest may not be well paid, but I doubt one would tack on barkeep onto their-how do you say-repertoire."

"You don't move like an assassin, your movements are telegraphed, I knew what you were going to do before you did." Another sip of the J.D. & Coke, the ice clanked against the glass.

"Strange that I can determine who you are but you cannot do so to me." Rio teased coyly.

"You never did say how. I'm starting to think it was an extremely lucky guess...or clever eavesdropping on Senora Petrucci's part."

"Actually Senora Petrucci's lips have been sealed about you. All I knew was that you were a distant relative in need of *Senora's* services. That is all."

"You're beating around the bush, River. Out with it, already." Edin said becoming a little impatient.

"¿Que?" he scrunched up his face, clearly not understanding her meaning.

"...Idioms, right. In other words, you're evading the question, tell me."

"Ahh, thank you for clarifying." He sipped his drink, then cleared his throat. "The way I knew you are an assassin was when you came to sit at the bar. Initially, I thought to myself what a pretty young woman coming into an empty bar, but as you looked up and I saw that cold look in your eyes...I have seen that look before in another's eyes."

"You get my type of clientele often in here?" Edin asked, cocking an eyebrow.

"Let's just say I wasn't always standing behind a bar, senorita. I have met the roughest of the rough here in South America."

"You're becoming quite the mystery man, Mr. River. I have to know your story." She said, settling in on the barstool.

"Are you sure? My line of work isn't exactly-how do you say, uh-distinguished." He fixed his clothes compulsively, clearly anxious about telling his story.

"Says the man to the master assassin." She joked, "If you don't feel comfortable-"

"No, no it's fine." Rio assured her, waving her off. "I'm sure my name has appeared on your radar at some point. You know me as Mr. River, but here I am known as the Black Whisper."

She said nothing, she merely stared at her mysterious friend, judging silently.

"The terrorist..." she finally said.

"I prefer the term 'freedom fighter', my career as a mercenary has come with unfortunate misnomers."

"Or...it could be that you hung a man by his ankles, gouged out his eyes, cut out his tongue before slitting his throat." She recalled, in a matter-of-fact tone.

"A message needed to be sent, I was merely the messenger." Rio rationalized calmly.

"I know this'll be odd coming from me, but don't you think the law should've handled it?"

"The law? Ha!" The unveiled mercenary scoffed, throwing his head back, "Men like Ongo Segasu, Frederic Ridley don't have enough humanity in their bodies to stop themselves from committing atrocities so why should they be tried like men and not put down like rabid dogs? And even if they did, the justice system is flawed! Rapists are released from jail after a few years, mass murderers are allowed to have appeals in some instances, your Wall Street houses crooks that embezzle millions of other peoples' hard-earned dollars and never see the inside of a prison. The only way to punish cuckolds like them is to strip them of their self-entitled dignities and crush them beneath your boot heel."

Edin just watched the man before her, having now seen the true face of the man with whom she had become friends. Tapping the collection of ashes accumulating at the end of her cigarette into an ashtray she hadn't noticed before, she stabbed out the butt, inhaling through her nose, exhaling out of her mouth. She wanted to yell at him, wanted to tell him his point of view was absurdly psychotic, that he needed to turn himself in or she would do it, dead or alive.

But she didn't, because on some level he made sense.

"Your methods are brutal, borderline serial killer...but your reasons, I can agree with." She dropped her gaze, shook her head, sweeping her bangs from her eyes and tucking them behind her ear.

"I need to know...how do you keep the collateral damage under control." She asked.

"Simple...I hunt smart." Rio replied shortly.

"That isn't simple, you've used high-yield explosives in your little 'demonstrations', yet unwanted casualties have been kept in check. So either you're very, VERY good or you're insanely lucky."

She folded her arms under the swell of her bosom.

"I like to think I'm a bit of both, senorita."

She wrinkled her nose at him, rolling her eyes, and decided not to press the issue.

Mechanically she reached in her hip pocket, drawing her phone to check the time.

It read: 15:49.

"As enlightening as this's been, Mr. River, I've got a flight to catch."

Rio turned his back on her, compulsively rearranging the bottles on the shelf.

"No you don't senorita, you've only just arrived." He said shaking his head, a smile could be heard in his voice.

"Doesn't change the fact that I need to head back to the States." She rose from the stool and stretched, relishing the feeling of tension escaping her taut muscles.

"Suit yourself...I suppose I'll see you when I see you." He said airily, turning to her.

"Suppose you will...Black Whisper." Edin responded with a small smile.

She strolled out of the bar, summoning the elevator and just like that she was gone.

A moment later, Rio felt another enter the room. Her perfume was a lingering ghost on her skin, her hair was thrown into a messy ponytail and her clothes were wrinkled, baggy. The former heir to the Vedovas birthright was still gorgeous, though; groggily she padded barefoot from behind the hidden corridor behind the liquor shelf, shielding her eyes from the harsh phosphorescent track lighting.

"Dim that won't you?" She croaked out, her usually lush voice was hoarse and gravelly.

Rio reached under the bar to retrieve a small bone white remote with a dimmer on it. He cranked the slide down, easing the eye searing white light to a soft orange ambience.

"You are a darling and when I am up to it, I'll wander my way to your bed, minus these clothes." Jésebelle, the proprietor/ex-assassin information broker promised coyly, her hand fell from her face to her exposed collarbone where she scratched the bronze skin absentmindedly.

"I'll just put it on your tab." Rio replied, taking to compulsively wiping the bar down, despite cleaning it a few minutes prior.

"I have never known any man to resist my charms as long as you have, Mr. River." The femme fatale mused, milling about the bar straightening chairs that didn't need to be straightened, running her fingers along the handsome red oak table tops that she picked out.

"And I've never known a woman that wanted me as you do, *senora*." Rio continued to clean the bar.

"Which surprises me. A man of your 'talents' and no woman to keep your bed warm." She shrugged the frumpy robe off her dainty shoulders carelessly. "Makes me wonder if you've lost your appetite."

She padded around the bar now in a grey camisole and loose navy blue sweatpants. Rio watched her curiously, he couldn't help it. Every time she entered the room, something about her drew his gaze; she was so alluring.

Her aimless walking led her to the jukebox which she plugged in and pressed the code to unlock free songs. Cycling through, she let out an "Ahh" and selected a song. Within a few seconds music filtered out of the jukebox,

Pick apart/

The pieces of your heart/

Let me peer inside/

Let me in/

Gotye's "Heart's a Mess" oozed out its mellow tones, the lyrics hurtling a javelin of pain through his chest, but he didn't even flinch. Jésebelle sashayed towards him; her movement looked as if she was dancing, each step enticing him. The chorus came, striking true to him, making him uncomfortable how apropos it was,

Your heart's a mess!

You won't admit to it/

"Say the word Mr. River and I will end your little drought." Jésebelle enticed, she was within arm's length if him now, those beautiful blue eyes were a raging pair of sapphire infernos, locked onto him.

"Why do you do this?" River's voice was quiet, an edge of a quiver in it.

She shrugged, her hands tugging playfully at his black V-neck shirt now, her lips pouting,

"Maybe I enjoy making you uncomfortable, maybe..." Jésebelle was close enough to kiss, her lips were mere inches from Rio's lips now, "it's just me wanting something I cannot have. Something I see every day and yet cannot touch."

"And how would that look? The bartender is canoodling with the boss..."

"It would certainly explain how you got a job at a premiere bar so quickly." She countered, scooping her bottom lip under his top one, coaxing him to kiss her.

"As opposed to my skill serving drinks, and friendly demeanor..." he added, staying stock-still.

She said nothing to this, instead grabbing a fistful of his shirt, pressed her exquisite form against him, every luscious curve and contour of her body separated from him by a thin layer of comfy clothing.

"All this is yours...just say the word." The temptress breathed, biting her bottom lip sensually.

He let his head fall, the band holding his hair slipped off and his taut ponytail came undone, obscuring his face.

"Tempting as it is, my answer's still the same."

She opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something but closed it, too flabbergasted to speak. Jésebelle let go of his shirt, fell away. She cleared her throat awkwardly, clearly, her ego had taken a blow.

"She really means that much to you?"

Her words were lilted with broken glass shards smaller than grains of sand yet they cut deep, the unexpected laceration cutting through his hard fought wall of indifference.

Silence, then another throat clearing, more back pedaling until she found the discarded robe, which she insecurely wrapped around her dainty shoulders.

I know I should say something, but...

He didn't, Rio smoothed a hand over his untamed hair, gathering it back into a ponytail while reaching into his linen pants pocket and retrieving a new rubber band. He tied it back up, exhaled sharply through his nose, and went around the bar.

Jésebelle watched him just stroll out, towards the door and all he said was,

"I'm going out to get some fresh air...I'll be back before the night shift starts."

DING! The elevator opened, he stepped in and it closed.

She exhaled a labored, quivering sigh, plopping down into a nearby chair, lolling her head into her hands.

END.

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About the Creator

M Kier Murdock

Level 29, writer/photographer trying to carve out my place in this crazy little literary word.

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