Their casual inattention was going to be the death of them-real soon.
After several minutes of walking, the men reached the edge of the park that Finn had mentioned. An iron gate curved over the entrance, and a maple tree rune set in the middle of the design denoted it as a park, along with the name Green Acres. Just the place that I wanted to be. Old-fashioned iron streetlights lined a cobblestone walk-way that led farther into the park.
I cocked my head to one side and reached for my Stone magic, listening to every part of the element around me, from the pavement and sidewalks that I'd just left behind to the cobblestones stretching out in front of me.
The pavement and sidewalks behind me only whispered of the steady grind of traffic, while the cobblestones ahead gave off low, quiet murmurs of the wind rustling in the trees, the pit-pat of small, eager feet, and the easy lope of animals across the grass. This was the sort of place that families came to enjoy a picnic lunch or an afternoon in the summer sun. Nothing else.
So I waited until the men were about two hundred feet in front of me, deep into the park, before following them.
I stayed off the well-lit path, instead moving from tree to tree, and keeping the men within sight. As I skulked, I also kept an eye out for LaFleur. Just because the assassin had gotten into a limo with Mab didn't mean that she wasn't meeting up with her men later. Hell, she could be on her way here right now. LaFleur might want the pleasure of killing Vinnie herself. Some assassins were twisted like that, and she'd certainly seemed to enjoy frying the dwarf with her electrical magic last night.
Finally, the men reached their destination-the playground that Finn had told me about. Since this was Northtown, the playground was a monstrous, elaborate affair, with at least ten swings, several seesaws, a large merry-go-round, and a sandbox that was almost big enough to be its own private beach. The metal gleamed a dull silver underneath the white glow of the streetlights, while the sand glinted like gold. I slithered behind the thick trunk of a maple tree so that the swing set stood between me and the men.
The giants slung Vinnie down in the middle of the sandbox. The Ice elemental bartender did a header into the ground, his face plunging into the loose sand like he was an ostrich. After a moment, he flailed up onto his knees, coughing, choking, and trying to spit out the sand all at once.
And that's when the fun started.
The giants yanked Vinnie up and started hitting him, while the third man stood back and watched. Thwack-thwack-thwack. The giants held Vinnie up between them, so he couldn't even curl up tight and try to protect himself. Their massive, meaty fists slammed into his chest, his face, even his balls once or twice. Vinnie groaned with every blow.
After thirty seconds, Vinnie was in bad shape. At the minute mark, he looked like he'd been hit by a bus. By the time two minutes had passed, the bus had been joined by a couple of tractor trailers.
I thought about intervening, about jumping into the mix and stopping the torture. After all, I had questions for Vinnie-questions that he couldn't answer if he was dead. But the giants weren't going for broke just yet. They could easily have killed Vinnie with one blow to the head. Quick, efficient, mostly bloodless. But instead, they concentrated their fists on his chest, hitting him hard, but not with enough force to kill. Which meant that they only wanted him bleeding and broken, not dead. Not yet, anyway.
Finally, the giants finished beating Vinnie and dropped him into the sandbox. Vinnie let out another low groan and coughed up several mouthfuls of blood. The thick gobs gleamed like wet rubies against the gold, glittering sand. The giants moved back a few steps and stared down at him with their oversize, buglike eyes. Their ham-size fists hung loose and ready by their sides, just in case Vinnie had any misguided bit of fight left in him.
The third man, the one who'd been leading the way to the playground, stepped in front of Vinnie. I mentally dubbed him Mr. Brown because everything about him was a dark sable color, from his hair, skin, and eyes to the suit, tie, and shoes that he wore. He was much shorter than the other two goons, only about six feet tall, which meant that he wasn't a giant. He smiled, and I saw the fangs in his mouth. A vampire, then. One who wasn't big on personal hygiene, judging from the yellowish tint to his teeth.
"Vinnie, Vinnie, Vinnie," Brown drawled, pacing a loose circle around the bartender, his wingtips sinking into the blood-spattered sand. "What are we going to do with you? You know, you really disappointed LaFleur tonight."
"But I did exactly what she said," Vinnie sputtered. A thick Russian accent colored his voice.
Somehow, Vinnie pushed himself up onto his knees, swaying from side to side as he tried to maintain his balance and not pass out from the excruciating pain that he had to be feeling. Blood trickled down the left side of his face, where the giants had opened a cut high on his cheek, while his right eye had already started to blacken and swell from their hard blows. Sand crusted in his dark goatee and hair, and he had his arms wrapped around his middle, as if that would ease the pain in his sure-to-be-broken ribs.
"I told everyone at the bar about the shipment of drugs coming in. And I gave you the names of all the people who seemed interested, just like you asked. Every single one of them, I swear."
"Well, Vinnie, you must not have been convincing enough because the Spider didn't show last night like LaFleur thought she would," Brown said. "Which means that LaFleur couldn't kill the bitch like she's being paid to do. Like she promised Mab Monroe that she would."
Despite the blood, bruises, and sand covering his features, Vinnie's face paled a little more at the mention of the two women. He swallowed, his Adam's apple bouncing up and down like a yo-yo in his throat.
"Let me try again," he pleaded. "I will tell more people. Many more people. I swear it."
The vampire crossed his arms over his chest and sighed. "I don't know that I believe you, Vinnie. I mean, look what happened tonight. LaFleur comes by to have a little chat with you, to tell you that no one showed up, and what do you do? Wait five minutes, and then bolt for the nearest door. Your actions don't inspire a lot of confidence."
Vinnie didn't say anything, but his face took on a greenish tint underneath the bruises. So he'd tried to run after LaFleur had come by. And, in doing so, he'd brought about this little smackdown and hastened his own death. At least, that's what he would think.
But I knew that LaFleur had just been playing with the Ice elemental. She'd come by the club with the sole intention of spooking him into doing something stupid like running just so her men could beat him. I hadn't had a chance to read Fletcher's file on her yet, but I recognized the type of person, the kind of assassin, that LaFleur was-a sick, sadistic bitch who enjoyed playing with her food before she killed it.