by Mike Slavin
That was the cost of war.
Ten minutes to one o’clock, Joe lay in a prone position on the makeshift plywood table. He was behind his sniper rifle and relaxed, with a tight stomach.
Earlier in the week, Joe had worn his hat pulled down low as he walked down the alley Tony should be coming out of. He had tied three light scarves between himself and where Tony would be, including one scarf close to where Tony would exit his casino. At one o’clock, all the scarves were slightly moving from Joe’s left to right. Not enough wind to bother adjusting for.
At five past one, he felt the wind on his left cheek and noticed the scarves moving slightly. Still no Tony. Five minutes later, the scarves were steady, showing a five- to ten-mile- per-hour wind. And still no Tony.
“Damn,” Joe mumbled. “Come on, Tony, before this wind kicks up.”
In the next five minutes, the wind picked up, with two gusts up to twenty miles per hour.
Shit, this could get a little tricky.
At 1:20, the wind was ten to fifteen miles per hour, but choppy. In the last five minutes, there was one strong gust up to twenty-five miles per hour. At 1:22 the back door finally moved. The door opened toward Joe, so it briefly shielded anyone coming out. One of Tony’s bodyguards stood with his back to Joe, holding the door open with his left foot, presumably waiting for Tony to come out. Last Thursday, the car had been waiting for Tony, but today the car wasn’t there yet.
It was sweltering out. Tony might be waiting for the car to pull up. The next person out of the door would probably be Tony, with his other bodyguard behind him, but Joe couldn’t be positive. Tony’s limo couldn’t pull up to the door, so Tony could be open for a shot during his ten-second walk to the limo. If he happened to be shielded, Joe’s last chance would be if he stopped by the limo. If Tony waited for the bodyguard to open the door, like he’d done the previous week, it would be Joe’s last chance to take the shot. The first bodyguard he saw was a big guy, not one of the guards from the previous week.
The wind blew strongly against Joe’s face and the scarves extended along with it. Joe made a slight adjustment. The shot would still be easy so long as the wind stayed steady. Tony stepped into the light and his second bodyguard came out behind him.
It happened in microseconds.
Joe took a deep, steady breath and held it. He squeezed the trigger. The wind gusted, but he’d already taken the shot. As the bullet was on its way, Joe realized the gust was big—twenty to twenty-five miles per hour. He felt sick to his stomach, but he hit his mark.
Tony’s forehead jerked and his body fell back. The bodyguards grabbed him and dragged him back into the casino.
“Nailed the son of a bitch,” Joe murmured and pumped his fist. “Time to haul ass.”
Adrenaline surged through him as he took off the silencer, then broke apart the rest of the rifle and put it in the carrying case.
He leaped down the steps in the empty under-construction building, got to his car, and left with adrenaline still pumping through his veins.
I did it. I killed a bad guy and helped Jeff. He’s really gonna be pissed.
A few miles outside Vegas, Joe called Case on his burner phone. He hoped Case would take it well.
“Hi. You back in Reno yet?” Case asked.
“Not exactly,” Joe said.
“Where are you?”
“On the way back to Reno, but … I decided to go ahead and take care of business.”
“What does that mean?”
“It’s done. Tony’s dead.”
“Dammit, Joe! What did you do?” Case growled.
“It was a clean shot and a clean getaway.”
“You sure?”
“Guaranteed!”
“I’m not happy! Wait for me to call you. It might be a few days.”
“No problem, boss,” Joe said. He was feeling good and bulletproof. He was already wondering who his next target would be. When he got home, he’d check the Internet for criminals to see what he might find.
“Good job, if you got it done cleanly. But you should have waited.”
“Sorry.”
Joe wasn’t sorry at all. Case would get over it. He felt alive and juiced.
During the last two hours of his drive, Joe thought about how good a cold Coors would taste. Every time he thought about it, his mouth watered. As soon as Joe got back, he grabbed the rifle case from the trunk and walked straight to his work shed. He hit the light. It was a rustic structure with a dirt floor. He set down the gun case, opened the little refrigerator, and pulled out a Coors. Joe cracked the can, which made the familiar sound that screamed—Take a drink! So he did. He took a long, slow sip that filled his mouth with a familiar taste. He took a deep breath and said, “That was good.”
Joe turned on the TV in his shed, took another sip, and fired up his metal forge. It took twenty minutes to get the forge to about twenty-three hundred degrees. Then he settled down in his old beat-up shed recliner and watched to see if he’d made the news.
He planned to strip the firing pin and barrel out of the rifle and melt them down as best he could. There would be nothing left for ballistics to match.
Joe waited about thirty minutes. Nothing on the news. He checked the temperature on the forge. It was twenty-five hundred degrees. That should be enough to make any metal malleable enough to pound a hammer on it. Even carbon steel with fifty percent carbon would get malleable at 2246 degrees.
Joe got up and destroyed the evidence.
Then he turned off the forge, turned off the TV, turned off the lights.
He walked outside and locked his shed. He was on his way to bed. As far as he was concerned, he’d done a good thing today, but now it was time to wait for a call from Case. Joe was willing to wait. He also was wondering what bad guy he might shoot next.
When Case got off the phone with Joe, he stood up and, with both hands in fists, pounded on his desk. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest. The sensation was mirrored in his temples. He wanted to scream, but that wouldn’t be a good idea while he was still at the office.
Shit! Shit! Shit!
He ignored my orders. I’d court-martial his ass if we were still in the Army.
Case had the urge to clear his desk with a swipe of his arm, to knock everything to the floor, but he’d just have to pick everything back up. Instead, still feeling like his head would explode, he stood up straight, shut his eyes, and inhaled five times, as deeply as he could. Then some calm thoughts floated through his head.
It’s done, can’t do anything about it now.
Gotta be careful. What an asshole. Joe could put me in jail.
If he disobeyed me once, he’ll do it again.
Case felt his pulse slow down as the anger and rage left his body. He opened his eyes, sat at his desk, and leaned back in his chair. He kept his feet planted and started to swivel his executive chair right and left, keeping his eyes on the picture of his wife holding his son. He leaned to the left, his elbow on the arm of the chair, his hand supporting his head.
Un-fucking-believable. How can they be dead? It just isn’t right.
I killed a man and ordered another one killed.
Now it’s just Ronnie to go.
47
Houston
July 27, 2018, Friday
It was just another day at Houston Police Department homicide when Sergeant Gary Blowers’ iPhone rang. He looked down and saw it was Jeff Case.
“What can I do for you, Jeff?”
“Are you busy?” Case asked.
“There are enough unsolved cases to keep me busy forever, but I’m as busy as I want to be.”
“Can we meet for supper?” Case asked. “With Larry gone, you’re my only cop friend.”
“Sure. I never turn down a free meal,” Blowers said.
“How about seven tonight at Morton’s by the Galleria?”
“Morton’s? Sure that sounds really good. I haven’t eaten there yet.”
Case
arrived a few minutes early and ordered a glass of Cabernet as he waited in the Galleria’s bar. A few minutes later, Blowers showed up. Case leaned over to the pretty waitress who was ready to assign their table. As he subtly passed her two twenty-dollar bills, he said, “We need as quiet and secluded a table as you can find us. We’re going to be talking business.”
“Yes, sir. I have a small room available,” she said.
“Perfect,” Case said. “Thank you.”
Once they were seated, Case ordered a bottle of wine for the two of them to share.
“What do you need to know?” Blowers asked in a friendly and relaxed tone.
“I’m sorry to put such a strain on our new friendship. To be honest, during our lunch the other day, I was a little worried you might arrest me.”
“It crossed my mind,” Blowers said. “I have nineteen years in. I can retire in eleven months if I want. What I did for you and what I didn’t do based on everything you told me—well, not only could I lose my pension, but I could go to jail.”
“I know. I really appreciate it.”
“You can thank our late friend Larry,” Blowers said as he lifted his glass. Case lifted his glass and they met with a clink. “Here’s to Larry.”
“To Larry,” Case said. They took a drink and Case continued. “I’d like to discuss some more hypotheticals with you.”
“Did you get what you needed the other day?”
“I did, and thanks again.” Case looked around. They were in a separate room and the door was closed each time a waiter went in and out, so it was very private.
“What did you do with the heroin?” Blowers asked.
“You wearing a wire?”
Blowers laughed. “Check if you like.” Blowers stood and held out his arms. Jeff was patting Gary down as the waiter walked in with the salads. It seemed awkward, but they pretended nothing strange was happening and sat down.
“So, what did you do with it?”
“I killed someone,” Case said.
“Holy shit. You’re fearless!” exclaimed Blowers. He couldn’t hold back a large smile. “So, are you sure? I mean, absolutely positively sure this was the guy that killed your wife?”
“No doubt. Someone saw him at the store on the day of the robbery and identified him. I also got a box from his garage with the gun, two ski masks, and a little over forty thousand dollars.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m dead serious.”
Case went into the details of how he’d killed Krusty. Blowers sat riveted and in disbelief as he listened. Neither of them ate, but they continued sipping wine. When the waiter came in to check on them, they stopped talking and Case ordered another bottle of wine. The waiter left and shut the door.
Blowers knew his staying out of trouble relied in large part on how meticulous Case had been in his endeavors. When Case finished giving all the details of Krusty’s murder, Blowers said, “You’ll be fine. The police will assume it was an overdose and probably won’t do an investigation, or not much of one, anyway. Nothing ties Krusty back to you?”
“Nothing I can think of. The police don’t know he killed my wife or robbed the store, so there’s no reason to look at me,” Case said.
“Shit,” Blowers said. “I'm glad you're on our side. I have to tell you, it feels right. He killed your family, and you killed him. It’s vigilantism but, in my opinion, the real problem with vigilantism isn’t that a civilian takes justice into their own hands, but that they usually act on pure emotion and punish innocent people. It sounds like you took the time to find the right person and make them pay. I shouldn’t say this as a cop, but I’ll say it anyway—I admire what you’ve done.”
“What about this guy’s accomplice? He was visiting Krusty, who talked him into helping with the robbery as a lookout. All indications are that he's a good kid, but he did wind up shooting and killing the store clerk who had the drop on Krusty. I’d made up my mind that he should suffer the same fate as Krusty, but I’m not sure. If I figure out a way to turn the evidence in, what kind of penalty would he get? Forget about how much of a choir boy he is. What kind of a sentence you think would be likely?”
“State?”
“He lives in Missouri.”
“If the evidence is there, then the death penalty.”
“I guess I thought the kid might be redeemable.”
“No way! I appreciate you trying to be fair, but this kid murdered the clerk and was involved in killing your wife and son.”
“I was thinking about giving him some money for college,” said Case in a low voice. He could hardly believe he was saying this.
“Ninety-nine percent of the time, someone who commits a crime will do it again. Ronnie killed a man in cold blood!”
“Maybe I’d just turn the evidence over and let the legal system take care of it, instead of taking him out myself.”
“Bad idea. You’re in way too deep.” Blowers shook his head. “While you may have committed the perfect murder, if you try to turn the evidence over, which is a problem in its own right, you now tie Krusty to the murder of your wife and child, and you become a suspect. The kid will probably squeal like a pig, and then the cops will start putting two and two together. The cops now assume Krusty is an overdose and are looking at it only casually, but that would change. You’ll have detectives digging all over this case. You don’t want to turn the evidence over. If you want justice for Ronnie, you need to do it yourself.”
“Yeah, I know you’re right.”
“And about the evidence? There’s no chain of custody. You obtained it illegally. I’m not sure how you’d get it admitted,” Blowers said. “Plus, your PIs would probably have criminal charges brought up against them. Not to mention this shit suddenly gets way too close to me.”
Case sighed. He lifted his arms over his head and stretched. Then he stood and walked around, shaking his head.
“I just don’t like to kill people, regardless of what you think. I feel like everyone I’ve killed so far has been firmly justified. I’m just feeling unsure about Ronnie. Yes, he killed a man, but Krusty pushed him into it. He’s nineteen. He seems to be a good kid.”
“Good kid? Bullshit! He made the decision to be involved. And he made the decision to kill the store clerk. If he hadn’t killed the store clerk, there’s a good chance Krusty would never have killed your wife and son. If I had to bet my life on it, he’d commit a crime again, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it were murder.”
“I never considered that...”
“If I were you and I thought I could get away with it, I’d waste the fucker,” Blowers said.
Case nodded slightly, but didn’t agree. He was unsure of what to do.
He finally sat down and they ate their cold meals. They’d just shared buried secrets, which tended to make people very close. Sometime during the evening, they ordered a third bottle of wine. They didn’t finish it. They shared stories about Larry, about college, their wives, their children, their careers, and their lives. The evening felt exceptional. There was a special bond between them now.
One of the waiters came in and said, “Sir, we’re closing soon.”
“Thanks,” Case said.
“You’ve read Kill Crime?” Blowers asked.
“Most of it. Why?”
“You know how it recommends you kill people where there’s no doubt they’re horrible criminals, but you must have no personal ties to it?”
“Yes.”
“Well, when you’re done with what you have to do, I know lots of those guys,” said Blowers with a sheepish grin on his face.
48
Kansas City
July 30, 2018, Monday
Krusty’s overdose had been ruled an accident.
Tony’s death never made it into the news.
So far, so good.
Blowers had convinced him. Now it was time to kill Ronnie. As time went on and Case got more reports from Bobby and Trish about what a good kid Ronnie seemed
to be, he knew he’d probably forgive him. It’d just be human nature. So Case made a point to not focus on Ronnie’s good qualities. He continually reminded himself that Ronnie had helped murder Becky and Little Jeff. There should be no reprieve for Ronnie, no matter what.
Case decided to drive to Kansas City from Houston so there would be no record of a plane flight. He drove up over the weekend and planned to see Ronnie on Monday. Thanks to Bobby and Trish, Case had Ronnie’s resume. Ronnie had it on Craigslist and LinkedIn because he was looking for a job. Case also knew Ronnie’s routine and schedule.
He packed the sux drug. Initially, when it was administered, the person would have trouble moving their eyes and fingers. Next, they’d be unable to move their arms and legs as every muscle in their body became paralyzed. They’d still be fully conscious and probably start to panic. Next, it would become hard for them to breathe and swallow. Soon they’d stop breathing, fully conscious as they suffocated. Unless an anesthesiologist could revive them, they’d die.
It was a horrible way to die.
Ronnie’s resume was pretty thin. He’d worked at a fast food restaurant in high school. His last job had been as a part-time stocker at a grocery store. Ronnie did volunteer work at the food bank, at his church, and with seniors. He’d played high school football. He did well in high school, with a high B average, and in one year of community college, with a low A average.
The Monday morning after he’d set up in Kansas City, Case called Ronnie’s cell from his burner.
“Hi, this is Ronnie.”
“Ronnie, this is Doug Bellows. I found your resume online. Are you still looking for a job?” Case asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Would you be interested in a shift manager position at McDonald’s?”
“Yes, sir, but I’m going back to school in the fall.”
“That’s not a problem. If you do a good job, we can work around your schedule.”