'In blood and battles was my youth,
And full of blood and battles is my age,
And I shall never end this life of blood'

-Sohrab and Rustum

Kirk strode down the sidewalk, a predator amongst the people who streamed by him lost in their own existences. To most he was a man unseen, perhaps noticed for a moment, appraised favorably for his broad shoulders and long legs, and then forgotten just as promptly. His footsteps fell with a thousand other footsteps on the busy city streets as he strode towards his destination. A slight breeze caught the tip of his silk tie, but left the close-cropped, thick, black hair on his head untouched. His face was pleasant, but not model handsome. It was the sort of face that always seemed familiar. If shown a picture of him, most people would say that they'd seen him recently, perhaps in a hardware store shopping for nails, perhaps assisting customers at the self-checkout in a supermarket. If one questioned the general public, he was everywhere. He was a taxi driver, a bank manager, that guy who'd taken their parking space the other day. He was their kid's swim coach, their ex-wife's new boyfriend. In truth, he was none of these things. He was no-one to anyone and that was just the way he liked it.

As he walked amongst the bustling crowds, the black rimmed pupils of his granite gray eyes, the parts of his body that most often drew undivided attention and remained truly memorable to even casual observers, were hidden behind dark, wire framed sunglasses. In his thirty-five years on the planet, Kirk had seen more than most men would see in their entire lifetimes. He'd certainly seen more than any sane man would wish to see. When he looked at someone, truly looked at them with the weight of his past behind him, he was not so easily forgotten. People reacted to him the way a mouse reacts to a hawk. They cowered, sometimes they shook visibly. If they were men, they would occasionally grow violent simply because of the hard threat that lived in his gaze. He'd learned to keep his eyes hidden; with sunglasses on he was almost invisible.

His destination was an office building like any other. Concrete slab pillars guarded the lobby, the silent guardians of a new age. Bored workers buzzed around the entrance like bees at a hive. They had no idea that the handsome man in the expensive, well-tailored business suit was anyone other than another client. With assured authority, Kirk ignored the receptionist's saccharine greeting and stepped into the shiny, steel elevator that smelled of cleaning chemicals and sweat. He pressed the door close button without waiting to see if anyone else wanted the elevator, and pressed the button for the basement. The interface buzzed harshly, requesting the code needed to access that level. He punched it in with a callused thumb then stood to the side as the elevator began to descend.

The basement level was filled with rows of shelves stacked with moldering boxes. He frowned, immediately disliking the layout. It was impossible to see what, or who, was lurking in the narrow rows and he was forced to proceed cautiously towards the back of the basement, where a small flickering of fluorescent light between blinds called to him. Behind every row of shelves there could be a surprise waiting for him, and in Kirk's line of business, surprises were never a good thing. Never.

The basement turned out to be empty, as he'd been promised it would be, and he made it to the far door without incident. Turning the metal handle, he stepped into the shabby subterranean office. It was a mess. Old, damp carpet curled up at the edges and the musty stench that pervaded the entire basement was much stronger here.

Four figures occupied the room. At the back were two skin-headed men in oversized jackets, with vicious expressions on their faces. They nodded to him wordlessly. No exchange of meaningless pleasantries was necessary. This was business and everyone knew why they were there. The goons were responsible for the state of the room's other occupants, a paunchy middle aged man and a young woman. Both were taped to chairs, their mouths slathered with the same industrial tape that held their bodies prisoner. Trussed up completely, the only way they had of communicating was with their eyes, and both sets of eyes were wide with terror. The strained, puffed breaths they took through their noses sent trails of moisture down the metallic surface of the tape. Kirk stood in front of them and pushed his glasses down momentarily, taking them in over the frames. Years ago he might have felt some pang of empathy, but he'd seen too many scenes like this to be concerned by soft impulses like that anymore.

This was often the face of business in the underworld, a world he'd grown comfortable in. Where once he would have balked at the idea of detaining a man and threatening him over money, he'd quickly learned that there are layers of law in the world. There is the written law, which the majority of society obeys. There is the law as it applies to the very rich and powerful, a fact that is resented by the common people who are free to observe the imbalance. Then there is the law as understood by the ruthless outcasts who carve out empires on the fringes of the mainstream: those who run guns, drugs and flesh, those whose dealings never see the light of day. This was the world Kirk inhabited. It was a filthy, cruel world, but no less ordered than common society in its own perverse way.

He stepped forward and ripped the tape from the older man's mouth. After a gurgle of pain, the blabbering began almost immediately, the pleas for clemency, for life. If he'd known what Kirk knew, he'd have saved his breath. There was no point pleading. Anybody willing to kill a man trussed up in a chair was likely to enjoy the sight of their victim groveling before them. Defiance would have been a better option, but fear and a primal desire to appease the aggressor made the old man blubber like a baby. His name was Phil, Phil Day and he was a limp wristed importer / exporter who'd gotten in way over his head with the Russians who lurked in the background, waiting to finish the job they'd started. Kirk didn't know who the woman was; he didn't pay her much mind. She was as good as dead now that she was in this room, privy to a dirty business that should never be made known to feminine ears and eyes.

“Silence,” Kirk ordered, cutting the man off with an abrupt, unsentimental bark. “You know why I'm here. Twenty million. I'm taking it before I leave here today, one way or another.”

Phil's plasticine jowls wobbled in distress as his eyes became watery and started leaking tears. “Please. You have to believe me. I'm doing what I can. It's hard to ship material at the moment. They're watching the ports like hawks. I got two shipments busted this month. You have to tell Vlad I need more time.”

“You don't have any more time,” Kirk said with deceptive calm. He used both hands to take his sunglasses off, folded them carefully and slipped them into the breast pocket of his suit jacket. “Twenty million. Transferred to the unmarked account. Now.”

“I don't have it,” Phil protested. “I can get it, but I don't have it.”

“Then we have a problem,” Kirk purred. “I have no choice but to let your gentleman callers continue their business before I begin mine.” The threat, though unspoken, was clear. He would allow the Russians to have their brutal fun before he carried out the sentence for nonpayment – death.

The two men who had been lurking silently in the back of the room stood up and began cracking their necks and knuckles. Vicious gleams of anticipation lit their eyes. They were like dogs given permission to tear at a wounded animal before the hunter finished it off. “No!” Phil almost shrieked the plea. He jerked his head towards the woman. “Take her.”

Without sparing the woman a glance, Kirk rejected the deal with a swift shake of his head. “She's not worth twenty million.”

“You asshole,” Phil swore in a sudden, unexpected display of temper. “That's Evelyn, my youngest daughter. Take her as security. I'll get you your money.”

An expression of pure disgust passed over Kirk's features before he could hide it. Phil was scum, but it took a special kind of scum to offer up their own family as security. Phil saw the look and shrewdly interpreted it for what it was, the sign of a chivalrous trait entirely out of place in Kirk's line of work. “You think I'm shit for making that deal, huh? If you don't take her as security, you don't buy me some time, the Russians will kill me and take her. Vlad wants her, special order.”

The filthy chuckles from the men in the back of the room confirmed Phil's statement, and explained the woman's presence. At first Kirk had assumed she was just a secretary who'd been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now he was inclined to believe Phil's story. He allowed his gaze to settle on the woman properly for the first time. He'd ignored her as an irrelevance at first, but now that she was in play, she was worth noticing.

It was hard to tell what she looked like with half her face covered in duct tape, but judging by the tight body straining against its bonds it was certain she must have taken after her mother, not the flabby lump of flesh that was her father. She was wearing a fairly conservative dress that covered her from shoulder to knee, but there were visible curves under the stiff burgundy fabric, hips that strongly suggested a classical hourglass figure. Her hair was a glossy deep brown cut in a long bob and a few silky strands had been caught in the tape when she'd been bound roughly. Above the tape her wide, caramel brown eyes held more than a note of intelligence. She was scared alright, the fast rise and fall of her full bosom was testament to that, but she didn't lower her eyes subserviently, she held his gaze in a way that almost made him think that she was appraising him the same way he was appraising her. That clear, innocent look hit him like a punch in the gut. She didn't belong here, she was not of this world.

He swore softly under his breath. There was little to no choice. If he walked, Vlad didn't get his money, Phil got whacked and god only knows what happened to the girl. If he took the deal, maybe Vlad got his money, maybe Phil stayed alive, and the girl kept her virtue a while longer. Kirk nodded, his gaze hard. “I'll take her. You've got one week to get me that money, Phil. One week. You don't get me that money, you don't see your daughter again.”  He made his voice menacing, it wasn't hard to do. He was angry at having been pressed into a devil's deal that could potentially see him on the hook for twenty million dollars, or have the blood of an innocent woman on his hands.

He turned to the woman and reached into his pocket. A moment later there was a flash of silver as the long, sharp blade of his flick knife sprang out from its casing.  He crouched down in front of her, making eye contact and holding it as he laid down his expectations. “I'm going to cut you free,” he said in a devastatingly soft voice. “Then we're going to walk out of here like a normal couple. You put one foot wrong, you try to call out for help, you do a single thing that draws attention to us and daddy dearest will be at the bottom of the river by midnight, understand?”

She nodded slowly. “Clever girl,” Kirk purred, working at her bonds immediately. He kept an eye on her, waiting for her to make some frantic attempt at escape, but she sat quite still with a quiet watchfulness, that was somehow feline, as he first freed her legs, then her upper body. Finally he reached for the tape. “This is going to hurt,” he warned. He placed his thumb against her pale cheek and ripped the tape off quickly. Immediately a red rash-like mark sprang across the tender skin of her cheeks, chin and lips, but unlike her cowardly father she didn't make a sound.

Looking down at her with his hands on his hips, Kirk grunted with dissatisfaction. He couldn't walk out with her looking like that; she looked like she'd been slapped across the face. That would draw attention of the worst kind. “You have makeup?” She nodded once more, still silent, her lips pressed together firmly. “Good. Cover up that mark.”

He waited in silence as she reached into the purse that had been placed under her chair and fished around in it for some foundation. Her composure was admirable as she dabbed small dots of liquid foundation onto her face and massaged it across the skin with a light touch. He knew she was afraid, he saw her fear in the fluttering of her pulse in her neck, the way she breathed quick and fast through her mouth, not her nose. She was trying to hide her anxiety, and she was doing a fairly good job. To an untrained observer, she looked perfectly calm as she reapplied the lipstick that had been smeared off on the inside of the tape. She didn't look at her father once, and no words of sorrow or comfort passed between father and daughter. Phil looked smug and satisfied as he sat there like a pale toad.

“Be in touch, Phil.” Kirk put his sunglasses back on, placed his hand under Evelyn's elbow in a gentlemanly fashion and escorted her out of the room, through the dank basement and into the elevator without her saying a word. She seemed to understand well enough that her opinion of events mattered little, and if she was bitter about being traded like a pawn by her father, she certainly didn't express it. She didn't express anything at all, and Kirk found himself shooting curious glances at her more often than he would like.

In the elevator he observed her out of the corner of his eye, quickly coming to the conclusion that she was quite a beauty in her own right. Underneath the tape she'd been hiding a heart shaped face and a pretty bow mouth. Her nose wasn't perfectly tiny and pert, but rather long and aquiline; it gave her a refined appearance that worked rather well with her arched brows and pretty eyes. There wasn't much of Phil in her appearance, though she did have his height. She stood at a mere 5'5, even in her heels her head only just came up to Kirk's shoulder. A pocket Venus, that's what she was, Kirk mused to himself during the short elevator ride.

“Right this way, m'lady,” he said charmingly as they stepped out of the elevator. There was no reason to be cruel to her; she certainly hadn't done anything to get herself into the situation. She did as she was told, walking with him out of the building and onto the street without any of the hysterics he feared.

His car was parked a block away. He saw a slight hesitation when he unlocked the silver beast and motioned for her to get in. This was the point of no return. This was her last chance to try to run, to cry out for help. People were passing them by on all sides, consumed with the problems of their own lives, far too preoccupied to notice or really care about the woman and the man lingering a little too long by the car.

“Evelyn,” Kirk's voice was gravelly and low. He did not threaten her, but the native menace in his tone was designed to remind her of why she was with him and what would happen if she decided to start trouble for him now.

At his word, she crumpled lady-like into the car, swiveling her hips as her knees folded so that her derriere touched the seat and her legs simultaneously swung around, knees so tightly clamped she could have been holding a dime between them as she swept her skirt out of the way of the door and sat entirely composed, her hands in her lap.

She was a real lady, Kirk thought to himself, one of the old school ladies you didn't meet anymore. Nowadays women were hard and brash and mouthy. Not Evelyn, she'd obviously been taught when to keep her mouth shut. He made sure her door was shut securely and walked around the car, keeping one wary eye on her but also keeping an eye out for other dangers. In his world there were always dangers, even on crowded streets in broad daylight.

He entered the vehicle without incident, locked the doors and put his key in the ignition. “Seat belt please,” he said, glancing over at Evelyn, who'd not moved at all since she got in. She was acting like a china doll, but the moment he instructed her to do so, she reached for the seat belt and pulled it across her body, clipping it in place. She accomplished the task without looking at the belt itself, or at anything but some vague point in the distance through the windscreen. It was almost eerie, the level of detachment she was showing, and Kirk wondered if she'd been traumatized in some way, or if she was perhaps simple.

“Listen,” he said, fastening his own seat belt before he started the car. “My name is Kirk and I've no intention of hurting you, so you can relax.” He was not usually one to give unnecessary reassurances, but then again he was not usually one to trade nubile female flesh for Russian drug debts either. He was way off profile on this one, but he'd adjust. That was what life was about, making adjustments. You got too rigid, you failed to adapt to a situation, and that's when you started losing, making silly mistakes. Evelyn didn't so much as acknowledge that he'd spoken. Her hands were folded in her lap, her porcelain expression composed once more. “How old are you?” He asked as he pulled out into the steady stream of traffic.

“Nineteen.” The reply came quickly, but still in that calm, detached tone.

He was surprised. He'd thought she was older. The cosmetics she liberally applied to her face certainly made her look older, and the composure with which she conducted herself seemed alien for one so young. How much had she seen in her short life that she behaved this way at nineteen? “Do you go to school?”

Her glossy hair caught the sunlight as she shook her head. “No.”

“Why not?”

“My father says it is a waste of time. He says my talents lie in other areas.”

Kirk nodded grimly, his jaw set hard. So Phil thought her talents lay in other areas, did he? Other areas like being traded like a side of meat, apparently. He continued the drive in silence, taking a long and complicated route designed to shake any tails he might have failed to spot, and also to disorient Evelyn. For best results he should have blindfolded her, but it would have been difficult to do that on a busy city street without drawing attention and his enemy was attention. Being noticed was the worst thing that could happen.

He drove out to the outskirts of the city, where it was calm and peaceful, where children played on the streets and he was more concerned with dodging carelessly thrown footballs than stray bullets. Their destination was on the corner of two streets on a section ever so slightly elevated above its neighbors. It was a plain two story dwelling, the wood walls painted pristine white; the window sashes a deep blue that matched the front door. The sloping lawn was mowed and bordered by flower beds that held a riot of colorful wild geraniums protected by a waist high fence made of white pickets. “Here we are,” he announced, pressing the garage door opener.

Evelyn looked vaguely befuddled. No doubt she'd expected to be dragged off to some horrific subterranean lair, but that wasn't Kirk's style. There was no better protection than the protection afforded by ordinary people. Sure he could have had an inner city apartment watched by armed henchmen, but he preferred it out here, where the air was clear and where his elderly neighbors often offered him excess lettuce from their gardens, and gave him unsolicited advice about his apparently lacking love life.

Once inside the garage, he killed the engine and waited for the garage door to close before he spoke again. “Here's the story in case anyone asks,” he said. “I'm Kirk Brentwood and I work as an accountant in the city. You're a co-worker staying with me for a week whilst your apartment in the city is fumigated for bed bugs. Got it?”

She nodded quickly, glancing at him with a touch more nervousness than before. She was firmly in his world now, entirely at his mercy. “Good. Remember, do as you're told and no harm will come to you,” he reminded her. “This is a good neighborhood, so refrain from hysterics if at all possible.”

A door lead from the garage into the house and he ushered his captive through it. They walked through the washing room, where a pile of laundry was waiting to be done atop the washing machine, and into the kitchen, which was light and airy and friendly. There was a certain golden tone to the light out in the suburbs that cast a wholesome glow over everything it touched. That was one of the reasons he liked living out here, out here he could sometimes pretend that he lived an ordinary life, that he had ordinary concerns.

He almost didn't feel the whisper soft touch at his hip, but he certainly heard the sound of a gun being cocked. His gun. Evelyn backed across the kitchen, the gun trained on him, her innocent brown eyes suddenly hard.

He smirked at her. “Impressive,” he drawled, taking a step towards the fridge.

“Don't move!” she barked the order at him, her lips thinning with determination. He ignored her forceful request and opened the fridge. It was well stocked with cold meats and cheeses and he paused a moment before settling on a pastrami and Swiss combination.

“I have your gun,” she reminded him, her voice rasping in the background, made husky and raw by the adrenaline surging through her tender young body.

“You do,” he agreed, elbowing the fridge door closed and placing his choices on the counter top. The bread bin was a few inches away and he slid it open. A ciabatta loaf he'd picked up that morning before heading into the city awaited him.

“Aren't you afraid I'll shoot you?” Evelyn lost the battle with her curiosity as he pulled a bread knife out of the knife block. The flash of light on the silver blade made her hold the gun a little stiffer, but he didn't let that worry him. This was far from the first time a gun had been trained on him. The fact that her finger was drifting around the trigger concerned him slightly, but it was obvious from the way she held the weapon that she wasn't accustomed to such things. That meant the wavering finger was more likely a result of poor trigger discipline, not any real desire to shoot him.

“Let's think about what happens if you shoot me, shall we?” He removed the thin end of the loaf and carved two thick slices of bread as he spoke with her in entirely conversational tones. “Mrs Kransowsky next door hears it. She calls the police almost immediately. You're seen running and picked up, taken to jail and charged with either murder if you manage to hit me anywhere that matters, or assault with a deadly weapon if you miss, which is more likely.” He quirked a brow at her as he laid a slice of pastrami on one piece of bread. “You go to jail, and your daddy dies.” A slice of cheese followed the pastrami, then another layer of meat, and another of cheese all placed by capable, calm fingers.

“Fine,” Evelyn said, the gun wavering in her hands as her muscles began to grow tired of holding the weight of the pistol out in front of her like some sort of talisman. “Then I'm leaving now. Don't try to follow me.”

“You want to escape?” He smirked cruelly. “Be my guest. The Russians will look for you and sooner or later they'll find you.” He placed a piece of bread on top of the sandwich and glanced over at her casually. “My guess is sooner rather than later,” he drawled before bending his head to the task of cutting the crusts off the sandwich. “And when they find you Princess?” He slashed the sandwich into quick halves, using the knife with the assured motions of a man who considered it an extension of his body. “You know what they'll do to you? They'll use you until they're done with you and then they'll set you to work somewhere.” It was a crude, harsh insinuation, but Kirk knew all too well that he spoke the truth, and a muted version of the truth at that.

“I wouldn't do that,” she bit back, her voice thick with disgust at him and his kind. She was doing a damn fine job of maintaining her composure, but there was a tremor to her lower lip that belied her bravado.

“You would. They'd give you drugs, drugs so addictive that after one dose you'd do anything, anything at all to get another hit.” He turned to her with a half-smile. “Sandwich?”

“I'm not hungry,” she said bitterly, turning her head away from him as she put the gun down on the counter, giving up on her grand idea of escape. He resisted the urge to rush for it. Instead he bit into his sandwich, savoring the taste. He was glad she'd pulled his gun on him actually, glad because it finally gave him some insight as to her character, insight he'd been lacking when she sat next to him like a doll, not moving or speaking. She was tougher than she looked.

“Go have a seat in the lounge,” he said, overtly taking charge of the situation once more. He'd never lost control of course, but she didn't know that. She thought that she was playing him. The quiet demure act was just that, an act. He couldn't wait to see what emerged now that she knew her ploy had failed.

It didn't take long for Evelyn to start displaying her true colors. Instead of the ladylike motion she'd used to enter the car, she almost stomped into the lounge and basically flopped into a wide, comfortable arm chair, her legs splayed, but still pressed together at the knees. She might have been angry and petulant, but she was still a lady.  Kirk smiled to himself at the change. She was off balance, good. Her plan had failed and now she would have to come up with a new one. He was determined to make sure she didn't have a chance to formulate one that would work. She folded her arms over her chest and stared at him with hostile eyes as he wolfed his sandwich down.

“You're a bad man.”

He chuckled at the child like cadence of the observation. “Am I now?”

“Yes, and bad men always get their comeuppance. Always.” She spoke with a sheltered, self-satisfied smugness that seemed genuine. He cocked his head to the side, wondering if she really believed that. If she did, she was simple minded. He made no effort to educate her at that moment. A simple woman would be easier to control than a recently disillusioned simple woman.

“As I'm a bad man, you'd better be careful to keep on the right side of me,” he said conversationally. “Here are the rules. You don't leave the house. You don't go near the windows. You can eat and drink anything you want in the house, but if you need anything you can't find here, you tell me and I'll get it for you. This is one week you'll survive easily if you follow those rules. If you decide to test them, you'll regret it in more ways than one.”

He let the threat hang between them, unspecified. She'd seen enough to know that he could make her life unbearable if he chose to do so, but he had no intention of harming her seriously if she decided to test his resolve. Kirk had better ways of handling a misbehaving woman, ways that would leave Evelyn's cute rounded behind stinging for days.