“You can’t afford me,” Jake said.
“If I don’t get this guy, we’re up shit creek without a paddle. What the hell happened?”
Jake inched down in the cracked leather seat. “I was at the door, about to bust in when a couple gunshots rang out. Pulled back and heard the window break. Kicked in the door and found a dead guy on the floor.”
Logan jerked his head toward Jake. “Dead guy? Who was he?”
“Don’t know. Didn’t have any ID. Mid-thirties, blond crew cut in a mid-range blue suit. Shot twice—one to the chest, one to the head. Very efficient. Looked out the window and didn’t see Voleski, but the fire escape ladder was lowered. He must have beat it down the alley.”
Logan slumped. “Shit.”
“Exactly. Then, the dead guy’s cell phone rings, and I fish it out of his pocket.”
Logan’s bushy eyebrows shot up. “You answered it? What for?”
“Thought I could figure out who he was. Some girl starts screaming, crap starts breaking and the line goes dead.”
“Who was the girl? What did she sound like?”
Jake pushed a long breath out, tired of the questions. “I don’t know, man. Like a screaming random girl who was scared to death. You want me to imitate it for you?”
“Hell, no.” Logan took off his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes. He reached to the console and shook a couple of Advil from a bottle.
“Headache?”
“Hungover,” Logan said, dry swallowing the pills. “Head feels like I got whacked with a bag of brass doorknobs.”
“Let’s tour the streets and see if we can spot him.”
Logan wheeled the car through the one-way streets of Kansas City’s downtown. They cruised around the light traffic, peering in alleys. They stopped at several locales in town and talked to informants, dropping Voleski’s name and description. Several knew who Voleski was, but none had seen him. Logan left their phone numbers and greased palms with a ten-spot and promises of more if they saw the man. Jake and Logan ended their search at the condo building where they lost Voleski. The cops were still parked outside.
Jake shifted his six-foot three-inch frame in the seat, bone tired from the day’s manhunt. “I need coffee.”
“You and me both,” Logan said, turning left on Broadway. They cruised in silence toward the Plaza and found a Starbucks. Logan was addicted to frappuccinos even though he couldn’t afford them. They sat in the parking lot sipping their overpriced drinks. “You still have the cell?”
“No, wiped it and left it in case someone wanted to track it. Got the number the girl called from, though. Kansas number. Maybe use it to figure out who that guy was.”
“No telling. Lot of people looking for Voleski besides us.”
“Still wonder what’s in the briefcase that’s so fucking important.”
Logan started the Explorer and shifted into drive. “We’re getting paid to get the case, not worry about what’s inside.”
Logan headed north toward the heart of downtown. Jake drummed his fingers on the armrest.
“What are you thinking?” Logan asked.
“That being a private investigator doesn’t seem much different than when I worked for the mob. It’s still finding dead guys and chasing after dirtballs.”
“And it pays a hell of a lot less. So, you got that goin’ for you. You’ve only been at it for a few months. Give it a decade and you’ll really hate it.”
“If you hate it so much, do something else,” Jake said. “What happened to your Senior PGA tour dream?”
“Can’t afford to play golf. My ex-wife took my clubs in the divorce settlement. Bitch doesn’t even play.”
“You could be a security consultant or something with your experience.”
“Yeah, right,” Logan said. “Look at me. I drink too much; I hate to shave and I can’t iron to save my soul. Would you hire me? Besides, I’m too fuckin’ old to start a new business.”
“People love ex-cops in the security business.”
Logan huffed. “Hell, all they have to do is fire up the Internet and read the bullshit. After that, they wouldn’t hire me to cut their grass.”
“Give me a break. Like anyone would believe you were a dirty, drug-running cop.”
Logan lit a cigarette and blew a plume of white out the cracked window. “Some people did.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed. “What people?”
Logan was silent for a beat, white knuckling the steering wheel. “The ones who matter. You want to come over tonight and grill some steaks?”
“Are they going to be as bad as the ones you cooked a couple weeks ago?”
Logan slapped Jake on the arm. “Cut me some slack. My grill was new.”
“Well, the meat certainly wasn’t.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Logan said.
“I’ll think about it.”
They stopped at a few more locales Logan had contacts with, but nobody had seen anyone matching Voleski’s description. Jake already knew the guys at two of the stops, but not the third one. A tiny-framed Hispanic with bulging eyes too big for his head.
“He was a new one,” Jake said as they got back in Logan’s truck.
“Cisco. He always smells like a week-old burrito, but his info is usually pretty good. You remembered the other two?”
Jake nodded. “Frankie and Quince. I actually knew Quince from before. Picked up a grand that he owed Keats a couple of years ago.”
“You’re getting the hang of it. This job is all about patience and information. Voleski will pop back up on the radar eventually. It’s gonna work out.”
“It better. I made promises.”
Logan chuckled. “Promises get broken. For example, you promised to pay me a couple of years ago if I found Julio Ramirez for you.”
Jake craned his head. “He was whupping you six ways from Sunday in a dark alley. Technically, I both found him and saved your ass.”
“I was just getting my second wind.”
“That would have been interesting since he knocked the first one outta you. I gotta come through on this one. There’s too much for me to lose.”
Jake fell silent as the traffic flashed by, every bit as fast as the last six months of his life, the last four cementing his ties to Logan. He didn’t talk to Logan much about his days working as an enforcer for the Kansas City mob, and Logan knew Jake well enough not to ask for the gory details. The head of the mob, Jason Keats, agreed to let Jake out for taking down a rival drug lord six months earlier, but also let it be known the price included keeping his mouth shut. Keats gave Jake a decent windfall for the task, but the fund was dwindling.
“So what promises did you make?” Logan asked.
Since getting away from breaking bones for the mob, Jake slept better. But, in the wee small hours of the morning, the nightmares still paid the occasional visit. Despite burying his abusive father, Stony, six months earlier, the old man still lurked in his dreams, still swinging the pipe that shattered Jake’s knee. Sometimes Stony was accompanied by Jake’s older brother Nicky who overdosed on heroin years ago, sometimes by the countless faces of those Jake hurt over the years. The nightmares were becoming fewer and fewer, but they still came.
“To do something that will let me sleep at night.”
Logan nodded; weariness etched in the lines on his face. Not tired like he needed a nap. Tired like he was worn to the bone by life. His heavier than normal drinking of late wasn’t helping things either. “I’d like to make enough so I don’t have to steal my dog’s food so I can eat.”
“Canned or dry food?”
Logan grinned. “Canned. Damned kibbles hurt my teeth.”
“Well, we gotta find the briefcase now. You’re too young to have dentures.”
“Couldn’t afford them anyway,” Logan said.
“You know what’s in the briefcase?”
“Not a clue. I was hired to track down Voleski and get the briefcase. End of story.”
&
nbsp; “Hired by who?”
Logan regarded him, his bloodshot eyes little more than slits. “You really want to get into the PI business? Then learn rule number one, kid. Don’t ask too many fucking questions. The less you know on this one, the better.”
Chapter Two
Alim Zaman stroked the dark beard framing his hooded, midnight eyes while watching one of his operatives, Bessel Al-Nazirra, strain against the cables binding him to the chair across the room, the cords in his neck bulging like blue ropes from the effort. Beads of sweat streaked down the top of Bessel’s barren head before disappearing in the gray-streaked black tufts lingering at the sides. Bessel’s fifteen-year-old daughter trembled in the chair next to him, her long, black hair pasted against her forehead. Bessel’s struggle was pointless, though understandable given Alim’s moniker in Middle Eastern circles of “The Butcher” and having seen his barbaric handiwork first-hand.
The pungent smell of death wafted from the wood slats covering the walls, the ghosts of those who were tortured and died there dancing in the shadows cast by the single bulb swaying from the ceiling. The door to the room creaked open, and a thick, bearded man named Jalal entered and handed the Butcher a three-inch vial. Alim held the vial to the ceiling bulb. The viscous, faded emerald-green liquid warmed beneath his calloused fingertips.
“Is this all you found?” Alim asked, casting a sidelong glance. “Disappointing.”
Jalal shrugged. “He said that’s all he had.”
Alim took two long strides and stood in front of Bessel. Jalal leaned against the door underneath a ceiling-mounted camera.
“You know the crimes you have committed against your people and why you are here,” Alim said. “I hold the evidence in my hand of your treachery. Now, I’m going to pull the gag from your mouth. You will not speak. You will not beg. If you do not comply, I will cut out your tongue, and my friend here is going to rape your daughter in front of you. Do we understand each other?”
Bessel’s owlish eyes darted to Jalal who would devour his daughter like a famished wolf would a plump sheep. With thick, raven hair framing flawless caramel skin, she was quite striking, and the hungry look in Jalal’s eyes must have terrified him. He nodded.
Alim slid the gag from Bessel’s mouth, holding the vial in front of his face. “You know what this is?”
Bessel eyed the vial, tears collecting above his lower lids. He nodded, jerky movements that sent the waterworks cascading down his lined face.
“Of course you do.” Alim squatted until his face was even with Bessel’s. “You were going to use this on me, were you not? A little revenge? For your family?”
Bessel’s eyes flipped from fearful to enraged. Alim grinned like a wolf. “You have something to say? Speak.”
“You’re a monster,” Bessel said, voice quavering. “A godless monster who slaughters women and children like they were sheep. My wife…my mother…my children.”
Alim pursed his lips and nodded to the girl. “Well, not all your children. And none of this would have been necessary had you simply done what you were told.”
Bessel jerked his head in violent dissention. “No, I will not be a part of your insanity any longer. Do with me what you will. My conscience shall be clear.”
“Very well. Since you planned on using this on me, we’re going to conduct an experiment and test it on you,” Alim continued, his voice low and calm. “If it does what they say it will, you will most certainly die a horrific and painful death, but we will set your last remaining child on this earth free. If you do not comply, Jalal will have his way with her, and we will pour the vial down her throat. You can watch her die and then we will cut off your body parts one at a time until you bleed to death. That is your choice and there is no other. You simply nod you will comply or shake your head you won’t. You have sixty seconds to consider it.”
Alim raised his six-foot frame, cast a contemptuous glare down his hooked nose and edged to Jalal. He ticked his head; Jalal nodded and left the room. Bessel gazed at his daughter, his furtive eyes softening. She cried against the gag in her mouth, and Bessel shushed her, saying her name soft and low to calm her. It was touching. Alim may have well-earned the name of The Butcher, but he had daughters of his own.
Jalal returned with a third man who crowded into the room. The three stared at Bessel, who nodded. Alim handed the vial to the third man along with a black, plastic aerosol gun, and left with Jalal trailing behind. They clipped down a dusty and narrow twenty-foot hallway to a cramped chamber with several computer monitors resting atop a gnarled wood table as old as time.
“Why are we watching from here?” Jalal asked. “It’s not contagious.”
“So they say,” Alim answered. “You want to take that chance?”
“No. But what about Hassan?”
Alim waved the air with his hand, as if shooing a fly. “He is of no consequence. That’s why he’s in there instead of you.”
On the monitor, Hassan inserted the vial into the aerosol gun which would turn the emerald liquid to a mist. He donned a full-face respirator and goggles from a nearby table and marched to Bessel. Hassan pointed the aerosol gun to Bessel’s face and depressed the trigger. A green mist shot from the nozzle. Bessel winced and blinked rapidly. Hassan jumped out of sight of the camera eye.
Nothing happened for a minute and the pangs of disappointment raked their way across Alim’s stomach. Thirty seconds later, he was rewarded. Bessel’s eyes bulged and he bucked against the ropes. Jalal zoomed the camera to a tight shot. Bessel’s mouth opened wide and bellowed a throat-rupturing scream, loud enough to carry to the control room down the hall. His eyes bugged to a cartoonish degree before filling with blood, the skin around them melting to a mottled gray. The screams became gurgles as pink foam bubbled from the man’s mouth. After he choked on his own blood, Bessel’s head slumped forward.
Jalal manipulated the joystick controls of the camera to widen the frame. The daughter howled against her gag, terrified and fixated on the blood-soaked shirt of her father. Thick, dripping ropes of red dangled from his mouth. Bessel was dead, but the girl appeared unharmed. Perfect.
Alim nodded. His teeth ground together as he pictured using the green liquid to choke the bastard Americans who killed his wife and sons with a drone strike two years ago. Bessel’s face was replaced with the infidel officer who tortured him for weeks in that Afghanistan underground chamber. Oh, they would pay. Every last one of them.
Alim slapped Jalal on the back. “Make the call. I want all of it.”
Chapter Three
Logan dumped Jake at his apartment after another fruitless hour swooping through the downtown Kansas City streets. They hoped to catch Voleski out in the open but had no luck. The caffeine from the frappuccino wore off, and Logan claimed he had to finish up on another case. Jake suspected he just wanted to go home and sleep off whatever bender he’d gone on the night before. He looked like hell.
Jake sat on the edge of the couch, muscles tense from the manhunt. He needed to chill. He dialed the first name on the contact list of his cell. Nothing relaxed him more than the sultry voice of his girlfriend Maggie back in Warsaw, Missouri, a 2,000-person Lake of the Ozarks town a couple hours southeast of Kansas City. His hometown, though the fond memories were few and far between. It was Maggie’s day off from Hospice House where she worked as a nurse.
“Hey, beautiful,” Jake said.
“Hey, handsome. What’s shaking in KC?”
“Not this case. I need a mental break. Give me something.”
She breathed heavy in the phone. “We talking something like what am I doing, or something like what am I wearing?”
Jake grinned and melted into the cushions of the couch, the muscles in his neck releasing. “Which one is better?”
She laughed. “Neither. I’m in that torn-up sweatshirt you hate and I’m cleaning Halle’s room. No wonder we never have any towels. They’re all on her floor.”
“If a dirty room is the worst thi
ng we have to deal with concerning our daughter, I count us lucky.”
“She misses you,” Maggie said. Last fall, Jake reunited with Maggie after a sixteen-year absence to discover he had a daughter. The last six months had been a wonderful, whirlwind reunion. He was still getting used to the idea of being a parental figure to a human being.
“I miss you both,” he replied. “I’ll be down this weekend. Maybe we can steal Bear’s boat and go fishing.”
“Steal the county sheriff’s boat? Thought you were trying to go legit, Caldwell.”
“You make me want to be a better man.”
Maggie laughed. “Stealing movie lines won’t work on me. How’s your case going?”
He didn’t want to worry her. He’d promised the dangerous days were in the past. No more leg-breaking, no more mob errands, no more danger. She thought he was trying to track a regular guy, not some fugitive with a mysterious briefcase everyone in the city wanted. Then again, he thought the same thing when he took the job from Logan two days ago. So much for his promise.
He drew a deep breath and lied. “Uneventful.”
“Good. We need some uneventful. I gotta go pick her up from Kendra’s. Be careful, babe.”
“Always. Love you.”
Jake twirled his cell phone in his hand while staring at the spinning blades of the ceiling fan. He missed Maggie—her eyes, her mane of blonde hair, her strong arms, her love for him. He missed his newfound daughter as well. A seventeen-year-old spitfire, just like her mother. She called him Dad for the first time last weekend. Jake smiled.
Thinking of Halle dragged his thoughts to the screaming girl on the phone, and the smile disappeared. He should let this thread go. It was probably unrelated to the task at hand of finding Voleski, and he had enough on his plate as it was. But, instead of some random girl, he pictured Halle in the same situation and knew he didn’t have a choice but to dig into it. He dialed the 913 number he memorized from the dead guy’s cell phone. It rang twice before a smoky-voiced woman answered.
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