Heart of the Assassin - Rilegato

Ferrigno, Robert

Rilegato

ISBN 10: 1416537678 ISBN 13: 9781416537670

Casa editrice: Scribner, 2009

Riassunto

A third volume in the trilogy that began with Prayers for the Assassin finds the Islamic-occupied nations that once comprised the United States struggling with the drawbacks of religious fundamentalist beliefs, a situation for which retired shadow warrior Rakkim Epps endeavors to unite the Islamic Republic with the Bible Belt.

Su questo libro

L'autore

Robert Ferrigno was born in South Florida, a tropical backwater rife with mosquitoes and flying cockroaches.

After earning college degrees in Philosophy, Film-Making, and Creative Writing, he returned to his first love, poker. He spent the next five years gambling full-time and living in a high-crime area populated by starving artists, alcoholics, thieves and drug dealers, becoming friends with many people who would later populate his novels.

He used some of his winnings to start a punk rock magazine called The Rocket, where he interviewed the Clash, Elvis Costello, Iggy Pop, etc. The success of The Rocket got him a job as a feature writer for a daily newspaper in Southern California, where he took the adventure-and-new-money beat.

Over the next seven years he flew jets with the Blue Angels, drove Ferraris, and went for desert survival training with gun nuts. He ultimately gave up his day job to become a novelist, and his first book, The Horse Latitudes, was called "the fiction debut of the season" by Time magazine.

His most recent novel, The Wake-Up, was described by Kirkus Reviews as "Sharp, fast, and slick. Ferrigno can read like Raymond Chandler on speed, with pages turning and adrenaline pretty high throughout."

Prayers for the Assassin is his ninth novel.

He lives in Washington State with his family.

Estratto. © Riproduzione autorizzata. Diritti riservati.

CHAPTER 1

Lester Gravenholtz stood beside an old-fashioned red phone booth, stood there in the Florida sun waiting to kill the Aztlán oil minister and get back into some air-conditioning. Sweat rolled down his bare scalp as a tour bus filled with tourists drove past, their voices going silent as they caught sight of him. He scratched his nose, fingers bumping up against the mottled blue prosthetic that covered half his face. He couldn't remember what kind of genetic disorder he was supposed to have, but the plasti-flesh molding was so realistic that when he checked himself out in the mirror he wanted to puke. Sweat burned his eyes. The Old One had insisted on his head being shaved, leaving only a few tufts of reddish hair sticking out at odd angles to complete the picture. He looked like a hyena with mange.

Over six feet tall, fish-belly white, with a heavily muscled torso and huge hands, Gravenholtz wore a filthy, oversize coat that concealed his powerful frame but left him steaming hot, itchy and miserable. Thirty-nine years old and this is what it had come down to. Two days he'd been standing out here -- if he hadn't wanted to kill somebody before, he sure wanted to do it now. Actually...he was always ready to do some damage. That's what the Old One liked about him. A natural aptitude, that's what he called it. Gravenholtz had killed a dozen men in the last year, here, there and everywhere the Old One had sent him. He shifted in the sun, wished this Mexican oil minister would show up so his aptitude could kick in, and he could get back to his air-conditioned suite and those frosty rum drinks that Baby had introduced him to. He rubbed the fake pustules dappled across his forehead, wanting to tear his face off.

Don't fret, Lester, Baby had said after the makeup techs had finished with him. You're going to be as handsome as ever when this is over.

Maybe handsome enough to throw a fuck to, that's what Gravenholtz had thought. Ever since they had shown up at the Old One's Miami hideaway, Baby had stayed in her own bed. Turns out the old man was her daddy, which was some big dark secret, and since the Old One was Muslim, and Baby was still technically a married woman, that was that. Last night, while the two of them watched the beach from her veranda, she had given him a perfunctory jerkoff, not even taking his dick out of his pants, laughing as he popped his cork within moments. Ha-ha.

The Old One. What a crock. Baby tried to tell him that her father was at least 130 years old, but the geezer wasn't a day over seventy, tops. Gravenholtz played along -- guy was a billionaire with his own private army, he could call himself fucking Methuselah for all Gravenholtz cared. He remembered hearing some big news about how it wasn't the Jews dirtybombed New York and D.C. and Mecca thirty years ago -- it was the Old One and his crazy-ass master plan. The Muslim messiah come to bring on the Caliphate, which was evidently dancing girls and flying carpets from sea to shining sea. Truth be told, Gravenholtz didn't give a shit if the Jews toasted New York, or if it was the Old One or the Sugarplum Fairy. That was ancient history and somebody else's bad luck, not his.

One thing for certain, the old man had enough enemies for more than one lifetime. Not that it seemed to concern him much. Baby said the only one he was really worried about was Rakkim Epps. That was all it took to convince him to sign on with the Old One. Gravenholtz would have paid money for the chance to kill Rakkim.

Gravenholtz squinted in the sun, amazed at all the sky tattoos. He had seen them in the Bible Belt a few times, a baby Jesus in the manger sketched over Atlanta at Christmas, and the stars and bars on Independence Day, but here...there were all kinds of ads plastered across the sky here, offering everything from time-share underwater condos to sex drink specials at the beachfront nightclubs. One of the largest tattoos looked just like the ocean, a full-on underwater scene up there in the clouds, manta rays and dolphins swimming in perfect unison.

He changed position, his pants sticking to him in the heat so he had to adjust his pecker, and he thought about the hump-girl in the pigtails last night. The old man might be territorial about his daughter, but he didn't mind importing pussy for Gravenholtz. Every night a new one appeared at his door. All colors and ages, from young to younger. Slim ones and big ripe ones with hungry eyes and soft mouths. Some of them spoke English and some didn't speak at all, which was just as well. Gravenholtz let them in, gave them the best workout they had probably ever had and sent them on their way. It didn't help. They weren't Baby. He requested ones that looked like her -- long-legged Southern girls with honey hair, all pouty and pink as far as the eye could see.... He would close his eyes and pretend they were her, but he didn't really have that kind of imagination. He got mad sometimes, busted a few of the girls up pretty bad. That helped, but it didn't last.

A party bus drove by, music blaring out this chunky Latin beat that he could feel running up his thighbones. People danced on the top deck of the bus, hoisted pastel umbrella drinks, women shaking their bare brown titties for all the world to see. Nueva Florida, where the world comes to cut loose. Bonerama, nonstop.

Say what you want, the Cubans who ran Nueva Florida knew how to have fun. The couple hundred miles of white-sand beach fronting the Atlantic were covered with luxury resorts: Alligator Ballet, the Fountain of Youth, Everglades Under Glass...but it was Viva Libertad! that drew the most tourists, Viva Libertad!, a thousand acre thumb in the eye to that bearded commie prick who ruled Cuba once upon a time. No fun in that Cuba, just work work work and rationed toilet paper. Viva Libertad! was all glitz and glamour, a theme park development of manicured beaches and luxury hotels. At the center of the resort was Castroland, a run-down slum modeled after old Havana, a crumbling facade of cheap buildings, falling-apart cars and beggars hustling handouts.

He watched the legless teenager across the street, saw him hop over and take a beer from a cooler hidden in an abandoned sofa. Stumpy popped the beer -- his fourth of the afternoon -- and finished it in two long swallows. He smiled at Gravenholtz as his belch echoed, tossed the empty bottle against a brick wall, sprayed broken glass. Happiest dead man Gravenholtz had ever seen, probably already thinking about the virgins waiting for him in Paradise, ready to do a dance on his dick. The Old One had the assassination of the oil minister all worked out, but he forgot to ask Gravenholtz how he felt about being Stumpy's decoy. Where's the fun in that? No, if there was anyone going to get his hands dirty, it was going to be Gravenholtz. If the Old One didn't like it...well, they could discuss that when he got back to the hotel.

Gravenholtz sweated as the buses and limos rolled past, thinking how much he missed the Belt. He had been happy working for the Colonel back in Tennessee. The Colonel was the most powerful warlord in the Belt, Gravenholtz his special enforcer, keeping the shitbirds in line and loving every minute of it. Yeah, it was one sweet situation, until Baby gave him the look that one afternoon, the Colonel's young wife back from horseback riding, sitting up on that white stallion like the queen of Sheba. How you doing, Lester? she said, staring down at him with those green eyes, the top button of her blouse undone so he could see the beauty mark between her breasts. The Colonel had been gone that day, and when Baby shook out her hair it was like a golden net he couldn't escape. I'm bored, Lester Gravenholtz.

If he had said no to Baby that day Gravenholtz would still be the Colonel's chief ass kicker. Instead...he waved at the gnats that buzzed his mouth...instead, he was standing under a phony banyan tree while tourists hurried past, crossed themselves and thanked God that they didn't have whatever the fuck he was supposed to have. Welcome to Castroland. Stumpy across the street did a flip, walked around on his hands to applause from the small crowd gathered around him. Gravenholtz squeezed out a dry fart.

A South American tour group walked past Gravenholtz, Brazilians with their emerald jewelry flashing, hurrying now as they got a good look at him. A little girl with short black hair started crying, buried her face into her mother's hips, was quickly lifted into the señora's arms. The elephant man prosthetic scared off normal folk, but according to the Old One it was just the thing to reel in the oil minister, make him go all gooey inside.

Gravenholtz watched the helicopters fluttering overhead, hotel guests heading out to what was left of the Bahamas. A year ago, he and Baby had stolen the Colonel's prize Chinese helicopter and flown to Florida, along with three of Gravenholtz's men. Supposed to sell the bird for enough that they could all live high and easy for a while. Good plan, but Baby changed it.

She had them set down the chopper in the Everglades. They barely got out before Baby shot his boys in the head, one-two-three, just like that. You'd think she'd been waiting forever to do it from the look on her face. Come on, Lester honey, she had said, tugging on his earlobe, I want you to meet my daddy. Good thing Baby hadn't tried shooting him -- bullets just stung, but the betrayal might have pissed him off so bad he forgot himself.

He watched a barefoot mamacita waddle out of a shanty and start hanging clothes on a line. Bright colored tops with frayed sleeves, shorts with holes in them. He could hear her huffing and puffing from where he stood, raising herself up to pin the clothes.

The Islamic Republic had the Fedayeen, best fighters in the world maybe, so to counter that, twenty years ago some generals in the Bible Belt set up a secret project. They brought over this Jap scientist to build their own supersoldiers, augment the raw huma...

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Scribner
• Data di pubblicazione: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1416537678
• ISBN 13: 9781416537670
• Rilegatura: Copertina rigida
• Numero di pagine: 358