The Saint Of Baghdad

by Michael Woodman

CJ’s phone was vibrating on the table.

  “Sit down, both of you,” he said, shuffling backwards and snatching up the phone and reading the message.

  Never keep a lady waiting. Luckily, we were on hand to take care of her. We’re all having a blast. But she can’t take much more of this. I’d give her two hours before she gets stuffed in a barrel. See U. Sean.

  It hit him with a jolt, anger ripping through him and flattening everything he needed to get her out of there. Stuff like rational thinking and a clear head. He could see it all getting blown off the edge of his horizon. Freckles, the temperature-controlled wine cabinet girl with the Manhattan-skyline-cosmetics dresser was a guest at the CJ-was-here toxic factory.

  “Give me your car keys.” CJ reached out his hand, but Colby didn’t react. Not at first. She was probably about to. Maybe she was thinking about it. His first bullet hit a cushion between them on the couch. That got their attention. And the second bullet closed the deal, burying itself in the seat between Colby’s thighs.

  She tossed him a key fob and he put it in his pocket.

  “I don’t want any more trouble with you guys,” he said. “So I’m going to leave your gun and keys outside. Do not follow me. Just make sure I can see both of you standing at that window from downstairs. That way you’ll see where I hide your stuff, and also I can make sure you’re not following me.”

  CJ walked backwards out of the room. That was important. He had to keep his eyes on Ashford and Colby and not let them wander to the side, where they might notice other things. Like the keys to Tratfors’ Cadillac on the coffee table. They were hidden from where CJ had been sitting, but they were right in front of Ashford and Colby on the couch. They had to have seen them. Now CJ was forgetting them. It had to look convincing.

  He dashed downstairs and ran across the street to the Cadillac, one hand in his pocket, searching for keys. He stopped and looked up at them at the window. He idled a moment, feigning confusion before pulling out Colby’s remote and clicking it. A Chevy SUV parked two doors down called out a hello. CJ took out Colby’s gun, held it up for them to see, then slid it under the Tratfors’ Caddy.

  They disappeared from the window. But CJ was long gone by the time they hit the street, and so was Colby’s Chevy.

  Eighteen

  CJ drove south on the 405, juggling certainties and unknowns. The Chevy SUV he was driving was a certainty. It was a rental, so it was bound to have a tracking device. But Ashford and Colby were spooks. They didn’t have the law enforcement creds to strong-arm a rental company into coughing up that info. Ironically, that was a pity. CJ wanted the car to be tracked. His plan didn’t depend on it, but having Ashford and Colby hot on his trail gave it a real boost. Could they still track him? That was the first unknown. His guess was yes. He’d been standing right in front of them when he’d received a message from Kowalski, an isolated data connection at an exact time and location. The spooks might not have local law enforcement clout, but they had the signals networks in their pockets. They could ID his phone, track it, then follow him.

  Did they know about West Coast Drum?

  Were they still in league with Tratfors?

  The answers were on the way.

  Ashford had protested mightily when CJ had accused them of being in cahoots with his erstwhile employers, and there had certainly been issues. After the Iraq War, Tratfors had won contracts worth billions from allied intelligence and defense agencies. But during CJ’s hibernation, a rogue Tratfors crew had been caught on camera murdering Iraqi civilians. That video had taken political and military scalps and put an end to the fat cat days of contracts with strings of zeros. But alliances written in blood often survived bumps in the road and they didn’t always need to get signed off with government ink.

  CJ drove past West Coast Drum, scouting the street and noting the junkyard next door, with its chain-link fence and locked gates. He skirted the block, finding an auto paint shop that backed onto both West Coast Drum and its neighboring junkyard. The paint shop gates were open and a couple of guys were working at the side of the yard in the shade of a metal roof. CJ parked and slipped in through the gates, concealing himself behind a shed. The painters across the way were standing with their backs to him, looking down at a handsome hog in the midst of a makeover. CJ’s side of the yard was littered with bikes and work sheds. It was limited cover, but enough. He made his way to the back of the yard and picked a spot on the fence behind a parked van where he could work unseen. He was directly behind West Coast Drum, although that didn’t help much since his view was limited by a stack of barrels inside the fence. He listened. Strange acoustics. Walls of barrels bouncing sound, filtering and distorting it. Sean Kowalski. He could hear his voice. And four or five men. And Enya, the voice apart, a voice in pain.

  He used his multitool to cut a hole in the fence big enough to crawl through. It took more time than he wanted to spend, but hoping that Enya was in good enough shape to scale the fence was a risk too far. Sneaking back out onto the road, he ordered a taxi to pick them up at the paint shop in sixty minutes. That was a contingency plan. His first choice was to bushwhack the painters and steal their handsome hog.

  With all that in place, he dialed 911 and faked his best American accent.

  Some guy just smashed his car through a wall. He’s gotta be DUI. There’s blood everywhere.

  He told them the street name and rang off.

  How long would the cops take? That was the hit-and-miss part, but having reported the accident, he now had to stage it. He drove back to the factory, and as he turned the corner at the end of the block, he saw Ashford and Colby cruising towards him. The big Caddy was two blocks off. Only it wasn’t cruising anymore. The moment he saw them, they saw him and their SUV lurched forward like a sprinter coming out of the blocks.

  CJ toed down and made it to West Coast Drum before they had turned into the street. He spun the wheel and crashed into the factory gates. There was a chain looped around hooks on the other side of the gates. The chain held, but the gates didn’t, buckling half-open with the hooks twisted and broken. CJ jumped out and ran up the street, scooting over the neighboring junkyard’s chain-link fence and dodging through piles of wrecked cars. He was looking for somewhere to perch unseen, where he could stage-manage the drama about to unfold, invisible to any cop car cameras. He ended up in a junked Toyota, balanced on a stack of wrecks, concealing himself as Colby skidded the Tratfors tank to a halt by the wrecked Chevy. She jumped out of the car as a posse of Tratfors goons came running out from the yard, brandishing weapons. CJ wondered if Leila’s private eye was watching from across the street. If so, he was in for hell of a show.

  CJ heard the black-and-white when it was several blocks off. No siren, but the hurried pace of its V-8 was a standout from the background buzz of city sounds. It turned into the street and slowed down as the patrol officers scoped out the scene. Assessments, decisions. It was all done in a blink, with all their attention on the armed citizens milling around the two vehicles blocking the road. Then the black-and-white burst into sound and light and screeched forward as CJ let off two quick shots. The first took out a headlight. The second ripped a hole in the hood. The patrol car zigzagged to a halt, with both officers taking cover behind open doors, guns drawn and aimed at Ashford and Colby and the Tratfors crew.

  CJ was already out of the Toyota and scrambling over the chain-link fence into the factory by the time cop voices boomed out ultimatums. He dropped into a narrow corridor between the fence and a wall of stacked barrels. He’d heard four or five voices, but there had to be more. Kowalski was trained for this stuff. He was out of shape, but he wasn’t out of his mind. And he wasn’t stupid enough to believe that an unknown SUV crashing through the gates, the simultaneous return of their stolen Caddy delivered by spooks, and the arrival of a police car were a coincidence. He’d see it for what it was. A diversion. But that wouldn’t stop it working. There was no way to ignore that Chevy parked on the wreckage of their entra
nce, or the spooks driving their stolen vehicle. As for the pissed-off cops pointing shotguns, explanations were due.

  CJ was expecting to find one man guarding Enya, so he was flattered to find two. Closest was the blue baseball cap. The man with the shotgun from the parking lot. The second guy was new. He was wearing a shiny bomber jacket and standing on the other side of the yard. They both had Enya in eyeshot, and they both had their weapons out. But they were distracted, one on each side of the office peeking around the corner to check out the commotion in the street. The factory floor was just as he’d left it, his Halloween-themed conceptual artwork untouched. The broken chair-dash-bludgeon was still on the floor by the table. Grambo was still deep-diving his barrel, and the suit’s head was still poking up, his eyes bright with surprise like a jack-in-the-box. But now there was a new addition. Enya was slumped on a barrel set between them, head lolling, face bloodied, blouse patched in red. Her hands were tied behind her back and her legs were strapped around the barrel. Between her legs was a heart daubed in her blood with CJ scrawled inside it.

  He pulled himself back behind the barrels, rage swooning, fingers clawing the chain-link fence. He wanted to shoot both of the goons. But that would bring the cavalry, and he’d have no time to cut her free. He stuck his pistol in his belt and worked through the barrels until he was as close as he could get to Baseball Cap. The din from the street was settling. Cooperation, explanations, hands up and plenty of yes-sir, no-sir. It was all working.

  He left the cover of the barrels and took two long steps before catching Baseball Cap as he spun around and leveled his gun. CJ got one hand on the gun, jamming the slide, and slammed his other hand into the man’s face, driving him backwards and smashing his head against the wall. He slid to the floor, his head trailing a smear of blood, his baseball cap rolling to one side. CJ plucked the gun from his fingers, then picked up the baseball cap and slipped it on. An engine fired up. The Chevy. Something was happening out on the street, and Shiny Jacket across the way wanted to find out what. He edged around the corner of the office, where he could check out the front gate and keep his eye on Enya at the same time.

  He was snapping his head back and forth between them, too fast and too focused to catch sight of CJ peeking out from the other corner. But Enya saw him. She looked from CJ to Shiny. CJ wanted her to do nothing and leave it to him. But he knew that was never going to happen. Now that she’d seen him, she’d be right on it. Some plan. What? He didn’t know. He just had to hope it worked. She started to sway her upper body from side to side. CJ eased back behind the bricks.

  Distraction.

  That was the plan. She was going to create a commotion and get the full attention of Shiny. The ever-resourceful Ms. O’Brien was about to gift him the edge he needed. The empty barrel beneath her wobbled on each swing of her body. Shiny looked back.

  “Bitch.”

  He ran at her, wielding his gun like a club, but her barrel toppled over before he got to her. It crashed into Grambo’s and knocked it over, and she ended up sprawling between Grambo’s legs. Shiny kicked her, then holstered his gun. He was bending to grab her hair, when CJ tackled him, bowling him over Grambo’s barrel. He went for his gun as he fell, but CJ was on him already, lacing his arms around his neck. A dull crack bounced off the barrels and faded into Enya’s muffled gasp as Shiny and his floppy head fell to the ground, and CJ reared up over him, covering both sides of the office with his gun.

  No one. Not yet.

  He pulled Enya up off the floor, flicked open his knife and cut the tape binding her to the barrel. He grabbed her bound wrists, and they took cover behind the steam cleaning unit. They were just feet away from the stack of barrels and its labyrinth of pathways to freedom. CJ checked. Still no one. He cut the tape around her wrists and she peeled it off.

  “This way.” He turned and ran towards the wall of red and yellow, but Enya went the other way. CJ whirled around. She was crouched over Shiny, rifling through his pockets.

  Hurried footsteps.

  CJ aimed his gun towards them as Enya sprinted back towards him and they dashed for the barrels.

  Hollering. Shots.

  They made it to the fence with the sound of running feet too close. They were never going to make it. They had to stop them. CJ ducked down between the fence and the barrel wall. Enya didn’t need a manual to figure out his plan. She dropped to the floor beside him, and they both put their backs to the barrels and pushed off the fence with their legs. It was chancy. The barrels at the top might come crashing down on them. But with Tratfors guns just feet away and no guaranteed pickup on the other side of the fence, they had to take the risk.

  They pushed. Combined weight, about three-twenty pounds. Theoretically not enough to shift those heavy barrels. But the goons with guns were a big help. The wall teetered, threatening to crush them both, before it tumbled over. One stack into the next. Barrel on barrel. Rolling and crashing. A psychedelic symphony syncopated with screams.

  CJ hopped through the hole in the fence and covered Enya as she scrambled through. They were in the clear behind the parked van in the paint shop yard. The barrel-rolling stunt was a masterstroke, but it came with a downside. That amount of noise was sure to alert the guys painting the hog. But CJ was beyond caring. He’d saved Enya. Priority one was accomplished. And he certainly wasn’t going to let a couple of guys with fancy paint guns stop him. On the other hand, a couple of guys with pump shotguns was another story. And that was what the painters were holding.

  “Drop it, fella.” The one with the headband spoke first. There was one standing at each end of the van. CJ looked from one to the other. No way out. He dropped the gun. “Now step away.” He took a pace away from the gun, and Headband scooped it up. The other one had a leather waistcoat in place of a shirt and arms festooned with ink. He nodded at them to start walking, blue eyes sparking over ruddy cheeks, reminding CJ of a kid in school they all used to call Porky.

  As they stepped out from behind the van and headed towards the workshop, Porky glanced at Headband and said, “Mr. Kowalski is going to owe us big-time.”

  Nineteen

  “They ain’t going anywheres.”

  Headband was on the phone.

  “Yes, sir. Quaid’s got the Mossberg aimed right at his belly.”

  And so he did. He was standing about six feet away, inked arms—elbows out, shotgun shouldered, porky eyes trained along its sights at CJ and Enya, who were sitting in wood-and-canvas folding chairs like Hollywood bigshots presiding over a movie scene gone badly wrong.

  Ten minutes. That was CJ’s guess. That’s how long they had. Even if the cops kept the Tratfors crew bogged down longer, Kowalski would make a phone call and someone else would storm through the paint shop gates and it would all be over. And this time there would be no fooling around. It would be a bullet in the head and a body in the barrel. At least for CJ. As for Enya—with no training—she’d soon break. And tell them what? Everything she hadn’t told them already. Everything she hadn’t told him. Like why she’d risked everything to get something from a dead man’s jacket.

  “I got it, sir.” Headband rang off. “Keep a close eye on this one.” He pointed at CJ. “He’s super special.”

  Porky flicked his eyes in acknowledgment as Headband disappeared into a caged-off area and emerged carrying a nest of cables. “We don’t got no rope strong enough, but this’ll work.” He stepped behind CJ, a length of cable stretched between his hands as a car roared into the yard kicking up a cloud of dust.

  Tratfors? Already?

  In a black Jag?

  Headband stopped, his eyes on the car emerging from the cloud of dust. No alarm bells. No concern. So Porky checked it out too. A glance. Just a second. But a long one. CJ leapt out of the chair, his hands on the shotgun. Porky jerked it around and it went off, punching up dirt. CJ stomped Porky’s knee catching the joint at the side. Enya threw herself on the ground and hid under her hands. Headband was racing for the cage, reaching for
something. Porky was screaming, rolling around and holding his knee. Headband reared up with the other shotgun as CJ fired, knocking him backwards, his body crashing into a table of paints. In a screech of tires and a slipstream of dust, CJ’s late-but-welcome luxury ride skidded out of the yard and roared off on another adventure. CJ looked down at the screeching Porky and leveled his gun. The screeching stopped and the porkiness drained from his face. He lifted his hand like a shield and pleaded for his life in a monosyllabic nasal whine. CJ whipped the gun around and clubbed him into silence with its butt.

  Enya was pulling herself up, her eyes stuck on Headband. He was slewed against a wall in a shambles of busted paint cans, blues, greens and whites dribbling into the blood-red mash of his chest and face.

  “Come on.” CJ leapt on the Harley and fired it up. Enya vaulted astride it as an SUV skidded into the yard. They flashed past it as they swerved out the gate in clouds of gravel and dust. There was a flourish of spinning heads in the SUV and a brandishing of guns, but that was already way too late.

  Outside in the street, CJ swung the bike in a circle. He cocked and aimed his pistol, and when the SUV roared out through the gates, he fired six shots in groups of two. The SUV buried itself in a tangle of chain-link fence and metal poles opposite the paint shop. CJ gunned the motor and they sped off. Three blocks away, he hauled the Harley back to a modest urban speed. Even so, they had to dump it fast. They needed a discreet getaway vehicle, and a partly painted hog, its hollow pipes booming, was a howl for attention. Besides, they had no helmets. A peccadillo—given the destruction left in their wake—but many a big crime has tripped on a minor infraction, and CJ had no plans to feather the hat of some eagle-eyed officer on traffic patrol.

  With Wilmington’s grime fading in the rearview mirror, they were soon navigating the smart streets around the country club, where they swapped the Harley for the VW and faded into the flow of traffic. CJ drove inland over surface streets, following a route map in his head, destination unknown. It wasn’t important. Not yet. Putting miles between them and the bodies in Wilmington was the priority. There were errands to take care of too. Enya confirmed that she did not need hospitalization, but CJ wasn’t convinced, and he kept up a barrage of side-glance inspections. Her brave face cracked at times with bouts of sobs and sniffles as she mopped her cuts and bruises with bloodied tissues.