Speeding with a cop driving is fun.
Frank drove us to the airport using one of the luxury SUVs from the recycling lot that was supposed to be shipped back with Vladimir. It was a new Land Rover Range Rover. It was supercharged and handled beautifully. It had been stolen. Frank sure drove it that way.
I sat shotgun with the women in the back and in the rear were black duffle bags. They were on our minds, definitely. The ride was otherwise quiet.
We made it to the airport and drove straight to the cargo plane. The white Phantom was parked beside it. The Bear. We saw no one outside the plane and there were lights on from within. Frank was doing his best to calm Sally. I said nothing. She had good reason to be worried about her brother. Belsay was in over his Q-tipped head.
We exited the Land Rover. Sally Rhode and Frank had taken their police issued Glocks and moved into position behind the SUV, taking aim at the door of the plane. Anna and Palo remained in the Land Rover. They wouldn’t be seen through the tinted windows. If things got ugly, they were to drive out of there. I took the money bags and walked towards the plane’s ladder. I set the bags on the asphalt.
“I want to make an exchange!” I yelled up to the open door and waited. I was nervous. I had hoped that Belsay was still alive but there was no real hope that he would be.
“Bring out the cop!” I yelled.
A second later The Bear moved into the doorway. His frame filled the entrance. He looked down on me. Frank and Sally wouldn’t shoot. Not yet anyway.
“You dare to come here!” The Bear screamed. “I will cut you into a thousand pieces!”
“Shut up and listen!” His face twisted. He wasn’t used to taking orders. “I have all the money from Vladimir in these bags. You can have it. But I want the cop sent out first.”
The Bear laughed hard. He was a twitchy man. He was nervous and fidgety. I doubt he fell asleep easily. He looked back into the plane and said something.
When he looked back to me he started laughing. “That’s not going to happen, comrade! I like him where he is!”
I could hear Sally speaking to Frank. She was going to shoot him, I knew it. But The Bear stepped back into the plane, just out of their view. He was talking again, maybe to Belsay, maybe to the pilot. I grew nervous.
“The entire place will be crawling with police in a few moments. This is your last chance!”
More laughing. “I am the police! You have no idea who you’re dealing with!”
The plane started. We were going to lose. He had no reason to hand over Belsay. I looked back to give the signal for the real cops to shoot him down.
“Father! I am here!” Palo screamed beside me.
I wasn’t ready for it. It wasn’t part of the plan. I gave her an incredible look, but she didn’t look at me.
The Bear stopped laughing. I could see the anger in his eyes. He would kill her as soon as he could.
“Let him go.” Palo said. “I will bring you the money. You have my word.”
Hesitation on his part.
“Palo, I can’t let you do this.” I whispered.
She didn’t look at me. “It ends tonight, Hitman.”
“He’ll kill you.”
She turned to me then. Her beautiful eyes were filled with so many emotions. “You are an angel. But now it is my turn. I will let no one die because of me.”
The Bear began yelling into the plane.
I stared into Palo’s eyes. Hers began to water. Mine already were. “I love you, Palo.”
Palo kissed me.
I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed. It hurt. We broke apart and wiped our tears. I turned back and yelled towards the Land Rover, “Shoot him!”
Palo called them off. She took my hand. “Do not worry for me. Have faith.”
“Bring the money up!” The Bear called down to us. “Then I let the cop go!”
“He won’t,” I said to Palo. “He’ll kill you all.”
She gave me a faint smile then picked up the duffle bags carefully and began walking up the steps, taking my heart with her.
I watched her go into the plane. The entire plan had gone awry. I began to panic. Anna, Frank, and Sally raced to me. Frank was already barking orders to race up into the plane. But then a figure stood in the door, hands held before him, tied together, with a white wrap around his head. He was shirtless and bleeding from cuts on his back and chest. Wounds that would scar ugly.
Belsay moved down the steps to us. He was crying.
Before he reached the asphalt, The Bear jumped into view holding a pistol, shooting rapidly down at Belsay. Frank and Sally returned fire as I dove forward and tackled Belsay to the pavement, covering him with my body. Shots were being fired all around us. Belsay was screaming that his leg had been hit. I stayed on him for a moment more, then the shots quit and the plane began to drive away.
“Michael!” Sally yelled.
I scrambled to my feet in time to see the ladder folding back into place and the plane’s door had been shut. It was driving away, picking up speed in a hurry.
“No!” I screamed. “Palo!”
We all screamed helplessly. Frank began ordering us to do something, some idea hatched out of thin air that wouldn’t bring Palo back. But I had stopped listening the moment he began. I stood frozen. Capable of doing only nothing. I was in a trance of disbelief. Heartache crippled me. I stood and watched the plane leave the airport and ascend up into the dark sky above.
I couldn’t feel my fingers or toes.
“Michael!” Sally screamed. She had been yanking on my arm trying to snap me out of it. The others were waiting in the Land Rover.
“We’re going-”
“I’m not going anywhere!” I snapped at her. My eyes stayed on the plane’s lights as it made a sweeping arch, heading east. “There’s nothing we can do, Sally! It’s over!”
“Michael…”
Then she hugged me. I shook in her arms, trembling uncontrollably. I broke down. Palo was going to die. I fought so hard to save her, just to have it all end up like this. It was unbearable. I shoved my face against Sally’s shoulder and cried hard.
Frank began speaking again, but I didn’t listen this time either. I didn’t want to hear anyone. I didn’t want to see anyone. I didn’t want to do anything anymore.
Then Sally was turning my body away from her. One hand was pointing skyward. I looked. I saw the plane. Then in the darkness I saw something else. Something dark falling. Then a parachute opened from it.
“Palo!” Anna was yelling.
I rubbed the tears from my eyes and focused hard. I could see her blond hair. My heart pounded faster. I panicked. “Go! We have to get to her!”
We raced back to the Land Rover. I drove this time. The others piled in wherever. It didn’t matter. My foot hit the pedal and we were gone. I kept my eyes on the body drifting towards the ground. She was about two hundred yards away. Still within the airport grounds. I drove off the runway strip, speeding across the flat ground.
We were about fifty yards away when she hit the grass. I didn’t know if she was alive. It occurred to me that The Bear had killed her and tossed her body down to us. I was nervous enough to vomit.
As the headlights came across the parachute, I locked on the brakes and skidded to a halt. We all broke loose outside, racing towards the body somewhere underneath the nylon and silk canopy. We all began looking.
I found her. Face up. Her blond hair across her flawless face.
She was breathing.
“Palo!”
Her eyes opened and found mine. She smiled right away. “I told you, Hitman. Did you not have faith?”
“The Bear?” Anna asked.
Palo sat upright and looked through the sky. We all did. Then she pointed to it. “Timer is set.”
Anna hugged Palo.
“He needed to go to prison for life,” Sally said.
“He’ll get what he deserves,” Frank replied. “They all will.”
We watched the lights of the cargo plane for a moment more. Palo stood and took my hand into her own, pressing her lithe form against mine. Then the sky was lit brightly with a giant fireball. The sound came a second later in a thunderous, magnificent boom.
“Now it ends.” Palo said.
We watched in silence for a few minutes. Bits of fire fell to the ground. We had put the C-4 and the timer in one of the bags of money. It was a beautiful sight. I could imagine a hundred people sorting through the wreckage and finding burnt money, wondering what the hell had taken place while they were fast asleep in their plush, comfy beds.
We waited a moment more, then left. Belsay had to get to a hospital. The bullet wound on his leg wasn’t life threatening, but the doctors had enough work to do on him to last a week or so.
“You should check yourself in as well,” Sally told me on the way to the hospital. “You look like you got the brains beat out of you.”
Frank groaned something underneath his breath. I let it slide. I sat in the backseat and rested my head against Palo’s shoulder. I closed my eyes.
Dreams found me right away.
I woke in the afternoon.
We had checked into a fancy hotel near the hospital. Belsay didn’t want to be far from us. He didn’t want to be alone. None of us did. None of us were. Anna was getting treatment for her eye, sharing a room with Belsay, who made jokes and kept Anna smiling.
Frank and Sally checked into a room across the hall from mine and Palo’s. The hotel was nice, full service. There was a swimming pool and a hot tub outside. I loved the idea of a hot tub underneath a canopy of stars. And Palo. But we slept instead. Deservingly so.
There was a breakfast cart bedside when I woke. It was a quarter to three in the afternoon. I needed a dinner cart. Palo was up and showered already. She was sitting by the window staring out at the bright sky. The sun was shining and the sky was blue and cloudless. A beautiful day. A new start.
“Palo,” I said. She turned to me. “Pinch me.”
Palo walked over to me with a smile and sat next to me on the bed. “Pinch you?”
“I just wanted to make sure this isn’t a dream.”
Her smile was heartwarming. It slowly faded. “Frank and your friend were here. There’s police statements to give. Your friend said that when you awoke you should call her. I think she is worried about you.”
“She’s a good friend.” I smiled. “So are you.”
Palo’s eyes twinkled. She had tried to keep her promise by giving me the money due for what she had hired the hitman for, but I couldn’t take it. It wasn’t about the money. She understood. Anna would use it to help set up an organization to provide for battered women. A just cause. She had lost all sight in her left eye, but none of the fire.
“I have to leave now.” Palo stood. I sat upright. “So much work to be done now.”
“What will you do now?”
“All my father’s businesses will be sold. We want nothing to do with them. But now Anna and I will go back to Moscow and work with the police there to rescue the other women kidnapped.”
“Does that mean you’re leaving for good?”
Her smile said it all. “You saved me from so much. I have so much to return. But I cannot stay here. This is not my home. I never had intended…”
“It’s okay, Palo. I understand. I will miss you.”
Palo leaned down and gave me a kiss on the cheek. “What will you do now? Date again? Maybe retire?”
I thought about it for a moment while I stared at her beauty. I was really going to miss her. “No. I think the world needs a hero.”
“Yes. It does.” She walked to the door, opened it, and then looked back with a dazzling smile. “Go be our hero.”
Palo stepped through the doorway and out into the hall. The door closed and I was left alone. I sat for a few minutes doing nothing but remembering her face, savoring her scent, and missing her already.
I threw the soft sheets off of me and hit the shower. I had a busy day of talking to police. I needed to get back to the train station and collect the El Camino and take her for a long drive. But first I had something important to do. I would have to stay in the city for another day or so. But old friends are worth the wait.
Three days later and hope still clung to me.
I stood slumped against the El Camino SS, relaxing comfortably in the shade of an elm, staring at the brick courthouse building as he came out. He moved so fast that I thought for a second he was going to walk right past me.
“Angelo!”
Angelo Garboni stopped and turned. He looked shabby, unkempt, and even slightly oblivious to what his fate nearly was. He walked from the sidewalk over to the street where I was parallel parked between two police cruisers. He looked confused.
“Angelo, I came to pick you up. Do you want to take a ride? I have something special to give you.”
His head nodded eagerly. “Yeah. I go. I go with you. They had bologna again. It’s not good. Not every day. And no pop cans. Milk only. No chocolate.”
I laughed. “Get in. I think you’ll be happy.”
I drove Angelo across town. He talked more in between blocks than I had in two years. He was on machine gun mode. I didn’t mind. What free man didn’t enjoy a good story or two from someone in the pen?
We pulled into the lot and I parked beside the giant bulldozer. Police were everywhere still. The dead bodies had been cleared out but the business wasn’t about to be open for some time. Definitely under new ownership.
We exited the El Camino and I walked Angelo Garboni around the big heavy equipment, to inside the giant warehouse structure, to the massive piles of uncrushed pop bottles waiting to be recycled. These were heaped in piles towering over us. An old pop smell filled my nostrils. But to my friend, it was Heaven.
“All yours,” I told him. “Every bottle.”
Angelo’s mouth opened. Not a word came out. Not a sound. Nothing. He was mesmerized. Frank and Sally pulled some strings for me and we had several business in the city donate their empty bottles for a simple man who had been wrongly imprisoned.
“Well, should we count them?”
Angelo smiled brightly. Then he ran and jumped into the pile and began to play like a kid in leaves. I let him. We all need moments like that.
Hours later I pulled into Sally’s driveway for the last time.
She was outside walking to her Hummer. I parked beside her and got out. The sun was dropping below the tree tops and the heat was going with it. It would be a cool night, cloudless and moonlit.
“Where to?”
“Hospital. I was going to take Belsay a book to read. With his swelling receding, it is easier for him to focus.”
“Good. Tell him I said hello.”
“Will do. He’s been asking about you. He says you would make a great cop.” We both smiled. “Doctor says he can come home in a few days. He’s pretty excited about that.” Sally paused, then asked me the question she already knew the answer to. “Will you be around then?”
I didn’t answer with any word. I walked up to her and extended my hand. She looked down to it, accepted it, held back her emotions, and nodded.
“Tell Frank not to hate me so much.”
Sally smiled. “He wouldn’t listen.”
“Take care, Sally. Thanks for everything.”
“Don’t be a stranger.”
I walked back to the black El Camino SS, started it up, backed down the driveway, hit the road, hit the gas, and never looked back.
Chapter 28
Four days later I was in church.
Sort of. I was there for confession only. I found Saturday mass in southern Florida to be too hot to sit through. When I attended mass, it was Sunday morning. If I got there early enough, I would spend a minute or two outside talking to the priest while he smoked a cigarette.
It was good to be back home.
But I felt that times were changing for me. It felt almost hypocritical to sit in a churc
h, after the week’s events. I didn’t feel like I had the tunnel vision as the other grey birds filling the pews. I had been exposed to such gruesome activities that I could never train my mind to forgive and forget. Not with knowing what I knew. Not knowing that out there, all over the world, there were helpless individuals who were kidnapped, stolen, beaten, enslaved, hidden from the world, screaming for someone to come and defy the odds and rescue them. The thought of it bothered me more than anything else ever could. The world did need a hero. I had no issue with attempting to be one.
I sat in the pew with a heavy mind. I was about to do something that I never in my wildest dreams thought I would ever have to do. I was troubled, really. Bothered by the fact that the words I was going to say were real and mine. I could barely think them. I had no idea how I was going to say them aloud.
The confessional door opened and a frail old woman came out. I went in and knelt down right away. I didn’t want too much time to think about it. Better to do it fast and get it over with.
The small purple curtain on the wall before me slid to the side and I heard him speak from behind the fake wood paneling. He was young, maybe my age, maybe younger. He was full of energy too. A quick talker.
“God is listening,” he said.
“I killed a man, father.”
I said it fast, one breath. I sighed deeply. But not in a bad way. It was off my chest and I was relieved.
“I’m sorry. Can you repeat that?”
“I killed a man. Several, actually. That is all, father.”
There was a pause. I imagined his face was twisted in confusion and shocked with my abruptness.
“Are you a cop?”
I sighed again. This time out of annoyance.
Acknowledgements:
First and foremost I have to give credit and thanks to God for helping me pull this together. Winging it isn’t always easy. I need to also thank my wife and my kids for continued support, as well as those fans I do have.
Dirty Rotters was a phrase heavily used by my late grandmother, Beatrice, of whom I am grateful to have had spent time with, though it doesn’t seem quite like enough.
This was by far the most fun I have had writing anything, save for the notes I have left to my wife on the bathroom mirror with her lipstick. Guess I should be thanking Windex and Brawny as well. I look forward to jumping back into the saddle and continuing on with The Hitman series.
About the author
Sean McKenzie began writing shortly after high school, publishing his first novel, the epic fantasy The Elf King, following it with a short novel based on a screenplay he and his wife had written called Project Human.
Sean also continues his love for writing screenplays. Dating Casey, Again is a romantic comedy he co-wrote, which should be available in spring of 2015.
Sean currently lives in northern Michigan with his lovely wife and two children.
You can connect with the author at:
https://www.facebook.com/AuthorSeanMcKenzie?ref=hl
The Hitman: Dirty Rotters Page 27