The Black Jester (Episode One, Kings of New Orleans Series)

CHAPTER SEVEN: THE ABDUCTION

  After hastily departing the Red Jester’s company following the conference room massacre, the Black Jester trailed Antonio Strong to a posh office building not far away. He didn’t engage them, but instead scoped things out and observed the entrances and exits they used. He then left only to return at night once more.

  The Black Jester plants himself at the exit the men used in the narrow alley behind the building. He leans against the windowless black van and watches them as they exit the building and proceed across the alley into the small parking lot.

  “What the hell?” one of the men stammers as he sees the Black Jester leaning against the van they’re heading towards. He glances at his partner then draws his handgun, pointing it at the costumed terror.

  “Don’t you move, you son of a bitch!” the other curses at him. He, too, draws and points his handgun. “We ought to kill you right here. We heard about what you did last night!”

  “Don’t shoot,” the Black Jester says casually as he raises his hands. He straightens and faces the two men.

  “I think I will shoot you, you crazy bastard! What are you, some kind of clown?” The other henchman says.

  The Black Jester tilts his head. “Not a clown. A Jester,” he corrects.

  “Whatever! Let’s kill this clown!”

  “Hold on,” the Black Jester says calmly. “I’ll make you a deal. If you don’t shoot me, I’ll surrender. You can even tie me up. Throw me in your van. Take me with you to wherever you’re going. And then, turn me into your boss so we can have a nice talk.”

  “Why should we?”

  “I think he may have something to say to me, don’t you?” He holds his hands out in an offering of surrender. “Bet your boss will reward you nicely for capturing me.”

  The two exchange a look. “Let’s just do it, Carlisle. We’re on a schedule,” the first says. “Turn around, you asshole. And if you try anything, I’ll put a bullet in your head!”

  “Larry, cuff him, we ain’t takin’ any chances,” Carlisle orders.

  “Put your hands behind you,” Larry says. “If you so much as flinch I’ll blow your head off.”

  The Black Jester complies, turning around and placing his hands behind his back. Larry handcuffs him and shoves him into the back of the van. He laughs. “You know, you’re either really stupid, or really crazy,” the mafia henchman chides.

  The Black Jester rights himself and sits up against the van’s wall. The henchmen close the van’s back doors and get into the vehicle. He hears them briefly discuss the direction they’ll take to find the girl before they drive out of the parking lot.

  Across town, Rose White leaves her apartment after scanning the area, looking forward to a cool evening run. She’s nervous as usual, but she desperately wants to start running again because it has always helped her feel better. Dressed in a long sleeve, white Lycra running shirt and black jogging pants, she turns on her iPod and slips it inside the pouch on her armband, then pops in the ear buds. She glances around once more, her eyes searching for anyone that might be watching her. Seeing nothing suspicious, she takes off down the sidewalk. The sun has just set and the sky is still softly lit. The air cools quickly. This is always her favorite time of the day to be outside.

  After just minutes on her route, Rose spots a rowdy looking group of juveniles ahead of her at an otherwise vacant intersection. Her instincts prompt her to cross the street and cut under the I-10 overpass to get to a more populated neighborhood. The new route leads her directly through a large, abandoned car lot. Feeling uneasy, she stops running and glances around nervously. Daylight is nearly gone and blackness begins to engulf the night. Something doesn’t feel right. She begins to think she shouldn’t have come this way. Unfamiliar with the area, she debates which direction will take her to a better lit route.

  She starts jogging towards the far corner of the car lot towards a neighborhood street. Before reaching the end of the lot, she hears a faint noise over the music playing in her ears. The feeling of imminent danger creeps over her, and she becomes aware that something is behind her. A rush of wind hits her back. Her heart skips a beat. She whirls around just in time to see a hefty man in a dark suit jump out of the passenger door of a black van that slows to a stop. Before she can react, he swings his meaty fist right at her face.

  The blow knocks her to the ground, and she hits hard, groaning. Her ear buds are ripped from her ears, and they, along with the iPod, go flying across the roughly paved lot. Before she can move, the man grabs her by the hair and yanks her to her feet. She screams. The driver of the black van, another rough looking man in a suit, runs to the back of the van and prepares to open the doors.

  “Someone’s been looking for you!” the man holding Rose growls. She recognizes his Brooklyn accent.

  In a panic, Rose quickly tries to remembering a few of the basic self-defense moves Michael taught her. She jams her elbow into her attacker’s stomach and pivots to deliver a swift kick between his legs. Her attacker grunts and curses. She kicks him again, but he isn’t letting go of her. Despite appearing to be an overweight meathead, he’s solid as a rock under the suit and her strikes have little effect on him.

  “Goddam it!” he snarls. He yanks her head back by her hair. With his free hand, he punches her hard in the face, then delivers a series of crushing blows to her stomach and ribs. She screams until the attack knocks the wind from her lungs. She struggles with all her strength against his hold to no avail. When he sees that she’s incapacitated, he wrangles her by her hair and slams her head into the back of the van for insurance. Then he rips her arms down behind her and slaps handcuffs on her.

  “Christ, Larry! Don’t kill her!” Carlisle chides his violent partner. “He wants us to bring her to him. He didn’t say nothin’ about killing her.”

  “He didn’t say nothin’ about not roughing her up either,” Larry retorts. “Open the damn doors!” His partner complies. “Let’s see how you like riding with this guy,” he coos cruelly in her ear before shoving her into the van in one fluid motion. Her chin hits a wheel well inside and the force dazes her for a few moments. “Hey asshole, we’ve got you a friend,” he teases the Black Jester, witnessing the violent scene. “Play nice.”

  They slam the van doors closed and bicker loudly with each other as they get back in the front and peel out of the parking lot.

  Riding on the metal floor of the van is bumpy and rough. Rose’s head is pounding and she feels the fresh warm blood oozing down her face. Intense pain radiates from her stomach and ribs. She struggles to regain her breath and coughs. Spikes of pain shoot through her body. Her emotions betray her, and she cries. She tries to stop, and to hold her breath to avoid the pain, but her efforts fail.

  Panicking and disoriented, she struggles to sit up and when she does, she nearly screams at the sight of the masked face staring back at her.

  He says nothing but stares at her, studying her condition. Rose goes rigid. She straightens and scoots away from him, pressing her back into the wall of the van in hopes of escaping the costumed man. But her fear of her captive partner is interrupted by the pain overtaking her body.

  “Oh, my God,” she cries. She grimaces and forces herself to swallow the blood in her mouth, her nose and her busted lip bleeding freely. She closes her eyes, hoping to wake up from the nightmare. But she knows she won’t. Her husband has found her and her worst fears are coming true.

  She opens her eyes and reluctantly looks at the masked face again. The man is dressed like a Jester, his clothing, eye mask, and hat all black. She peers into his eyes. Where there should be color in his eyes, they’re white instead, giving him a demonic appearance. Despite danger literally staring her in the face, all she can think about is that her monster of a husband has found her.

  Noticing the costumed man’s hands seem to be secured behind his back, she assumes he is a prisoner just as she is.

  “Where are they taking me?” she whispers.

  T
he masked face tilts curiously to one side.

  “Do you know?”

  Remaining silent, the Black Jester still watches her. After a moment of awkward silence, Rose cries out in frustration, then cringes at the pain in her ribs. “I cannot believe this is happening.” She shakes her head in disbelief and begins to panic once more. “I can’t believe he found me.”

  “Who?” the Black Jester asks quietly.

  Rose looks at him strangely. “Antonio Strong. These are his henchmen. I knew he’d be looking for me.”

  “Why?”

  “It doesn’t matter… I’m screwed. He’s got me now.”

  “Does he?” The Black Jester brings his hands from behind his back to reveal that he has picked the lock on his own handcuffs. He drops them on the van’s floor.

  Rose stares at the cuffs in disbelief. Her sobs subside and a wave of hope sweeps over her. “Can you take mine off, too? Please?”

  The Black Jester considers her question but doesn’t answer. Instead he scoots over to her until he’s too close for her comfort and peers into her eyes. She presses back against the wall of the van and lets out a small groan when the bruised spot on her head hits it. “Ouch,” she says with a grimace.

  The Black Jester reaches up and carefully takes her head in his hands. She sits paralyzed, unsure of his motives. He moves her head side to side as he inspects the fresh damage. With his large, wide palm hand, he wipes at the streams of blood running from the gouge in her eyebrow and from her nose and lip.

  “Oh God… is it bad?” she says.

  He doesn’t answer but continues to evaluate her wounds. His ghostly eyes peer into hers, sending shivers down her spine.

  “Who are you? Why are you in here?” she asks him.

  The Black Jester releases her. He looks at her blood on his hands, then folds them and rests them in his lap. The slightest of smiles flashes across his black painted mouth and leaves just as quickly. His lips part as if he wants to say something, but he does not.

  His silence makes her all the more uneasy. “Okay, you don’t have to tell me,” she concedes. “You know what’s crazy? I’d rather be in here with you then with that monster.”

  “Monster?”

  “Antonio Strong.” She lowers her head as her thoughts drift off to the hell she’s been trying to escape. A sudden shooting pain in her abdomen jolts her out of her flashback and she groans.

  “Are you sure?” he asks quietly, his tone low.

  “About … what?”

  “That you’d rather be in here with me?” His face is stone still with no trace of the ever so slight smile.

  Fear rolls around in her stomach, but the situation at hand is by far worse than the white eyed character in front of her. “Can you help me escape?”

  The Black Jester brings his hands to her shoulders and rests them there for a moment. Whether he’s making an odd attempt to comfort her or trying to creep her out, she can’t tell. With his hands, he traces her arms down to the handcuffs, staring at her silently as he manipulates the cuffs behind her. Their faces are only a few inches apart. The slow, warm puffs of his calm, controlled breathing brush past her cheek. She shifts her gaze to the floor of the van as she becomes uncomfortable being the focus of his demonic gaze. The fidgeting behind her back ends, and he pulls out her handcuffs, tossing them next to his on the van’s floor.

  Rose brings her hands to her ribs and holds them in hopes the touch will help lessen the pain. Unmoving, the Black Jester watches her. He watches her hands run gingerly over her ribs and her stomach, and sees her face cringe with pain. Interested in her wounds, he slides his right hand under hers. She jumps at his touch, still uncertain if the costumed terror is going to hurt her. He runs his hand over her side and gently feels her ribs, surveying the damage underneath the bloodied white running shirt. His eyes examine her ribs as they rise up and down with every strained breath she takes.

  “Are my ribs broken?” Rose’s question breaks the silence.

  He presses more firmly on her ribs. She grimaces and chokes back a groan. “Yes.”

  “Great,” she laments. He continues to stare at her, but before she can say anything else, the van lurches to a stop and they can hear the men talking as the driver and passenger doors open and close. “Oh, no,” Rose breathes. She begins to panic and breathe heavily, intermittently wincing in pain.

  The Black Jester starts to slide away from her but she grabs his arm in desperation. “Can you get us out of here? “

  He presses his index finger against his black painted lips. “Shhhh,” he hushes her. He points to the van doors. “Don’t move.”

  Rose nods her head. She holds her breath as they wait, shaking in pain and fear.

  The van doors crack open. The Black Jester springs into action, moving with a speed and ferocity that Rose has never before witnessed. He violently kicks one of the doors into Larry, knocking him to the ground. Before Larry can get up, the Black Jester is out of the van attacking Carlisle. He screams and curses as the Black Jester slides behind him, hooking an arm around his neck. With a quick movement, the Black Jester snaps Carlisle’s neck, and the lifeless body slumps to the ground.

  Larry barely gets back on his feet when the Black Jester pulls a knife from his long coat and plunges the blade into the henchman’s throat. Larry’s attempted screams come out gurgled as his throat fills with blood. The Black Jester withdraws the knife and repeatedly stabs Larry’s throat and chest until the bloody gurgling stops and Larry falls dead onto the hard cement floor.

  Rose witnesses the scene through the still-swinging van doors, too terrified by the brutal violence to move. Filled with panic yet remaining quiet and still, she watches the bodies of her abductors fall.

  The Black Jester pulls both van doors wide open and holds them until they stop swinging. He peers into the van and stares at Rose’s ghastly expression. His breaths are heavy but controlled from the burst of action. He’s speckled with blood, his black trench coat shining in spots from the dark red splatters. After what seems to be some consideration on his part, he offers his hand to her. She recoils, but his gesture remains, his outstretched hand unwavering. Reluctantly, she decides to accept his help, keeping her eye on his other hand that still grips the large bloody knife.

  Her movements are slow and labored, her body half broken from the brutal assault. Holding onto the masked killer’s hand, she carefully climbs out of the van. Once on the ground, she is overwhelmed by the bloody scene at her feet. “Oh, my God,” she breathes. She looks up and tries to determine where she is. The henchmen had driven them to a large parking garage, possibly that of a large office building or a hotel.

  Bloody knife still in hand, the Black Jester points it towards an exit sign and looks at Rose. “That way. Run!” He orders.

  Rose understands that he’s helping her get away and she feels relief that she is going to escape this ordeal. The Black Jester still has a hold of her hand. His hand is gentle but strong, and surprisingly warm as it completely engulfs her own. She notices but it doesn’t register that it is also covered in both hers and Larry’s blood. His gentleness is just as surprising to her as the brutal attack. How could he be the same person that just slaughtered two men?

  The Black Jester’s gaze follows Rose’s eyes down to their enjoined hands. He releases his hold on her. “Go!” he orders again, and tears swiftly away from her in the opposite direction he told her to run.

  Terrified and in agony, Rose holds her ribs and laboriously runs in the direction of the exit, stopping only once to look back at the van and its bloody scene. She scans the darkest areas of the parking garage for the Black Jester but doesn’t see him.