by D D Loomis
Ten minutes went by before Tony let loose with a holler. “Looks good to me, Francis.”
“Me too,” bellowed Marty.
I stood and waved at Alice who had an annoyed look on her face. “Sorry, Alice. Once we get walls up for private offices instead of these cubicles, we won’t have to listen to these kids screaming.”
She gave a shrug. “That’s all right, Francis. They’re just trying to get a rise outta me, ever since I hollered at Tony the other day that he had a phone call.”
I strolled to her desk. “On another note, any other phone calls of interest from the Warehouse gang?”
“Nope. Probably started using emails if they’re still conversing with that Lance character.”
“All the more reason to get back in there and bug their entire system,” I said, continuing on to Wilbur’s desk. “Hey, do you still have that flash drive with the program…”
“Yeah, you mean the one that puts an eavesdropper program in their computer. How many computers you need to bug?”
I thought a moment. “Three, probably.”
“Okay; I’ll give you four. Each will have the same program on it, which will automatically move from the flash drive into the computer. Make sure and bring them back, will you? Don’t want to leave any evidence around.”
“Nice thinking.” I raised an eyebrow. “Keep it up, and next thing you know you’ll be breaking in to these places instead of me.”
“Sure hope not,” he said, face serious. “I don’t see how you can take risks like that, myself. But each to his own, I guess.”
I headed for my desk. “You’re right about that.” Damn, he was correct. It was a risk, each time I broke into a place or picked a pocket. A little shiver ran up my spine. But it was so much fun.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Alice appeared at my cubicle entrance. “Looks like tonight’s gonna be clear,” she said. “The warehouse is closing early. Got a meeting with a supplier, so decided to leave one guard and head out.”
I checked my watch. Closing in on five o’clock. “Thanks, Alice. Gives us time to get a bite to eat before the action starts.”
Nate poked his head around the corner. “Yeah, dinner sounds good. Do I get to pick the place tonight?”
“Long as it’s not too far from where we’re going,” I said. “Why don’t we plan on leaving in an hour? That should give us a cushion of time before dark sets in.” I opened the floor plan of tonight’s target, losing myself in its diagrams one more time.
We stopped in front of Bell’s Deli, Nate’s latest idea of a gourmet restaurant. I stepped out of the vehicle slowly, eyeballing the sky. God, it was gorgeous. Moments ago the sun had sunk below the horizon, and large cumulus clouds were basking in their orange and gold glory. “Nice choice, Nate. Looks like we’ve got a beaut of a sunset to watch while we eat.”
He gave a glance at the sky. “Yeh, and best of all the roast beef and ham sandwiches are huge, man.”
By nine p.m. I was on my third cup of coffee. Nate had been fidgeting the last half-hour, reminding me of a little kid. I took a last swallow. “I think we’ve stalled long enough. It’s dark as it’s going to get.”
Nate was up and walking before I finished my sentence. “Great. Why don’t you pay for the meal. I gotta hit the head.”
I dropped some bills on the counter and waved at the waitress on my way out the door. Jeez, he’d gotten good at dodging the bill. Been watching Marty too much. I pushed through the exit, bumping into a slim, dark-haired man coming in. “Oh! Sorry, wasn’t watching.”
The man nodded. “Quite all right, sir.” He continued inside, another guy following. Both were in jeans and dark shirt, almost twins. I watched them for a second, trying to remember where…
Nate came hurrying out, and shooed me towards our car. “C’mon, man. Let’s get moving.”
I shrugged, brain moving to the present while I slipped into the passenger’s seat of his Chevy sedan. “Yeah, right. Hope you left enough room in that gut to ingest a hamburger.”
“O’course I did. Now let’s vamoose, man!”
It was only a couple minutes before Nate steered us into the strip mall’s lot. We made a loop around the front of all the stores. A Wendy’s fast food joint at the entrance and a small tavern at the other end were the only things showing life. We drove slowly by Wholesale Furniture, my target for tonight. Only thing lighting the place up was the street lights from this side. Hopefully the same in the rear.
Once we’d made the loop, Nate parked at the rear of Wendy’s. “Okay, I’ll give you fifteen minutes to get to the back of the warehouse. Then I’ll pull outta here and squirrel around the parking lot a couple times, drawin’ attention towards me. Once you’re done I’ll be inside the tavern, like we discussed.”
“Right. Careful about overdoing the fancy stuff in the parking lot, don’t want the police to show up and arrest my ride home.”
He chuckled, opening his door. “Not me.” Once we were out, he gave me a half salute. “Stay safe, man.”
The furniture store was two buildings away and only took a couple minutes to reach it, even at my strolling pace. A driveway crossed in back of all the stores, wide enough to allow delivery vehicles and trucks through to do their business. There was a thin scattering of streetlights that semi-illuminated the backs of the businesses, but with the ski mask, dark sweater and pants I had on it was a minimal risk.
Once at the back door I rummaged in my fanny pack until I found the right sensor, and plugged it in the keyhole. No red lights and sirens, so the alarm system really was off. “System off,” I whispered. Have to keep Nate in the loop, so he didn’t get antsy. “Entering now.”
Since there were two locks to pick, it took a little over three minutes before I opened the door. A thirty second pause-no noise-and I slithered through the now-opened door. A hissing sound accompanied by moisture around my mouth and eyes had me gasping for breath, and–blankness flooded through my mind.
* * *
“He’s coming out of it now,” a disembodied voice said.
I struggled to raise eyelids that weighed a ton each. A moist cloth to my face helped the process of finally opening them. A bright light startled me the rest of the way awake, making me blink rapidly. “What…”
The light winked out and was replaced by a face just inches from mine, making me flinch away. “Yes, I think he’ll be all right. His pupils seem to be responding normally now.” He stood up. “Almost lost you, man.” A jovial voice. Too jovial, like he was forcing it. “You shouldn’t have inhaled that sleepy-time spray so deeply.”
A deeper voice filled the room. “He gonna be alert enough for what’s coming?”
“Yeah, I think so. The stuff we squirted him with doesn’t dull the senses any.”
“You can beat it now, Doc. Just make sure you got more of that wake-up juice ready, okay?” A large figure stepped into my line of sight. I tried to stand, and suddenly realized I was bound to a chair. Felt like tape. My legs were solidly attached to the legs of the chair, and arms fastened behind me. I gave an experimental jerk. Pretty solid chair, too. The fact I was naked belatedly dawned on me. Served me right for not paying closer attention when I broke in.
A hand lifted my chin. “You hear me, Baker?”
I shook his hand away, and managed a mumbled “Yeah. What’s…”
The big guy looked to the side. “Okay, boss. He’s ready for you.”
A slim man in his late forties moved into my line of vision, a scowl on his face. His slicked down brown hair glistened in the overhead light. That face–seen it somewhere before. “Nice to finally meet you, Mister Baker.” He glanced at the other one. “Okay, Lance, you can beat it.”
My head drooped. Damn. It’d been a trap from the beginning. And I’d fallen for it, like a rookie. I coughed, clearing my throat. “You must be Willie.”
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He gave a hint of a smile and rolled up his sleeves. “Right the first time. Sorry to hear about Marianne’s untimely death.” He strapped on an apron. “She and I were the best in the business, back when I first started working for her. Learned quite a lot about how to torture people from the bitch.” He laid several tools on a small table in front of me. “If she hadn’t been in such a lather to kill me for screwing up like I did, I’d still be one of her crew. Wanted to thank you for helping catch her. Probably saved my life.”
He picked up each implement, giving a close examination to each. A one pound sledge, a couple knives with three-inch blades, and a pair of long handled pliers. “Now, though, I need some information. You give it to me, and I promise to end it quickly.”
I stared in his eyes and shook my head, feeling the hate build.
He nodded. “Good. I was hoping you’d provide me some entertainment.” Picking up the pliers, he tapped my chest. “Y’know what’s the most sensitive place on a man’s torso?” The pliers gripped my left nipple and squeezed, causing me to hunch forward, gasping with pain.
Willie lifted my chin with the pliers. “Oh, my. That smarted, didn’t it?” A bigger smile spread across his face. “I’ve got to admit, I do enjoy making people hurt.” His scowl returned. “Especially you. One last time before I really start. Where’s the money?”
I looked up, feigning surprise. “Money? Is that what this is about?”
His scowl returned. “That just earned you a toe.” He picked up the small sledge hammer, holding it in front of my face. “Notice how one side has been rounded into a cone shape, with about a square inch surface on the striking face? Really nice for doing things like this.” He brought the hammer down on the top of my foot. I grunted in anguish, feet twitching as they tried to pull free.
A second rise and fall of the hammer—I screamed in agony when it impacted the smallest toe on my right foot. I slumped forward, world spinning around me.
He chuckled. “That hurt, huh? How about a repeat?”
The sudden shot of agony from my already damaged toe sent me shrieking into unconsciousness.
A waterfall of freezing cold water brought me coughing and sputtering back to the world. Needed to come up with some kind of plan…A slap across the face scattered my thoughts.
Willie’s scowling face hovered over me. “You about ready to talk, or you want some more?”
When he straightened, an afterimage of his face remained—wait, that wasn’t his face. I blinked, and the image of an expressionless face surrounded with dark hair disappeared. I looked at Willie, questions forming on my tongue.
Another slap brought me the rest of the way awake. “How about a thumb this time? Maybe that’ll loosen your tongue.” He disappeared, and the thumb on my right hand caught fire when he squeezed down with crushing force.
A whimpering scream burst out of me. “Wait-wait! I’ll tell you. Just quit doing that, okay?”
He reappeared in front of me again, still scowling. “So talk.”
“When we found out about the money, three of us went down to Belize and my computer guy put programs on your files. Sucked out all the money, just as the forty million was transferred to you, then to our accounts.” I paused to cough. “You got some water?”
A face full of ice water sloshed over me again, making me whimper. “Okay, man. No more messing around, really.”
Shit, hope he believed what I was going to tell him. Maybe he’d just end it. I gave my head a shake, forcing the cobwebs away. “Unfortunately, the FBI already had a copy of the information about your accounts. When the money disappeared, they followed its trail to us. Took all the money.”
He laid the pliers down and picked up a knife, eyeing me intently. “All of it?”
“Almost all.” I coughed, clearing my throat. “We managed to convince them to leave ten thousand as a finder’s fee, and not to prosecute us for what we’d done.” Jeez, hope his people hadn’t been able to find out what’d really happened to the money.
After staring at me for several seconds, he nodded. “Sounds plausible. But just to make sure…” A searing pain in my right shoulder had me whimpering while I tried to flinch away, making the pain worse.
“Let’s see if your story is the same after another round, okay?”
Ages later I felt the sting of a needle in my left arm. I roused enough to crack an eye open. “No more. Please.” I mumbled. My right shoulder felt as if it was in shreds, and my right foot was in screaming pain.
A quiet chuckling brought my eyes back to Willie, still in front of me. A crooked smile was on his face while he looked me over. “Damn, you don’t look too good.”
I tried to smile, failed. “Don’ feel so good,” I mumbled.
For the first time he threw back his head in a laugh. “Y’know, under different circumstances I think we might’ve been friends.” His face turned serious and he eyed me intently. “Now how about the money? Where is it?”
My head drooped. “Like I told you. The feds got it now.”
He grabbed my hair, lifting my head up. “Okay, I believe you. Unfortunately, though, I’m not going to kill you nice and clean like I promised.” His lip curled as the frown returned. “Forty-nine million is worth a lot of pain, in my book. So I do promise you this—you’ll suffer until I can’t wake you up anymore.”
My head began drooping, but a vestige of hate and anger sparked through me, bringing it back up. “Fuck you, maggot.” A blow to the side of my head knocked the chair and me to the floor.
“Oh, by the way. Just to cheer you up, thought you might want to know. We set fire to your office, with all your friends inside last night. Smoke must’ve got ‘em, since no one tried to get out. Either that, or they were too cowardly to face us.”
Gone? All of my friends? I shook my head, groaning in anguish. A deep feeling of defeat filled me, bringing tears to my eyes.
For what seemed like hours the pain came in waves. I lost track of the times I shrieked myself into blessed unconsciousness, only to be forced back into the pits of hell for another round. Eventually, all agony ceased and I drifted away entirely.
* * *
Aching pain crept back into my mind. I stirred, causing a fresh wave of throbbing in my right foot and hand to bring me fully awake. I creaked my head around, surveying the room. An eerie silence greeted me, nothing else. The lights were on, but no one was around. A red trail led from a large pool of blood into a room to the right.
I shook my head while coming fully awake, surveying my surroundings closely. There was a rectangular hole in the ceiling. It took a moment to sink in that a large ceiling tile was missing. I bent down, looking at the floor around me. A knife rested between my feet.
I straightened and noticed another anomaly. My hands and feet were now free. The left hand was still functional, but the right was slow to respond. A closer examination explained it- four fingers and thumb either broken or dislocated. A burning pain started in the hand, as if awaiting my notice before deciding to hurt. Careful inspection showed the right foot had four toes crushed. There were also several shallow stab wounds in my shoulder, but it could still move. Very sore and leaking blood, but otherwise okay.
After several minutes of extremely painful trial and error, I managed to crawl from the room, following the drag marks on the floor. Bare skin rasped across it, reminding me of my nakedness. Never realized how vulnerable I felt without clothes on. I made it into the next room, almost passing out when I bumped my injured foot on the door sill.
Once the pain subsided I looked around, gaping. Four bodies lay on the floor, each surrounded by a pool of blood. Three had died from a slit throat. The fourth one, the one that had been dragged from the room I’d been in, had me gagging. Willie hadn’t gone quickly. His stomach had been slit open and intestines pulled out to lie on the floor next to him. A rictus of horror was frozen on h
is face.
I crawled to the nearest corpse, going through his clothes until–Ah! A cell phone. Placing it on the floor, I turned it on and slowly punched in 9-1-1. “Please-Please help. They’re all dead.”
A woman’s voice echoed down the line. “What is your location, Sir?”
I glanced around again. Nothing to show where I was. “Don’t know. I’ve been injured, and someone’s killed everyone else.”
A pause while she talked briefly to someone else, then she came back. “What is your name, Sir?”
I sank down, resting my head on the floor. “Francis Baker. Call T&M security, tell ‘em I’m still alive.”
She was still talking but I couldn’t hear what she was saying as everything faded out…
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
This time the pain was only a ghost when I opened my eyes. The hospital bed felt a lot better than the floor I’d been on when I passed out. On my left Tony was curled up in a chair, quietly snoring. For a time I just lay there, soaking in the fact I was alive. And not in screaming pain. A stray thought surfaced, causing me to groan as I twitched. Tony was alive!
“You all right?” Tony’s face appeared next to me, concern showing on his face.
“Yeah, I am now. Willie told me all of you’d been killed in a fire.”
He sat back down. “No, that was the old place. The bad guys must’ve thought we were still there.”
I looked around the room. “What time is it?”
“After midnight. Everyone else was here when they operated on you.”
I hesitated, taking mental stock of how I felt. “What’d they operate on? I remember the fingers and toes on my foot were probably damaged pretty good. Oh, and some cuts on my shoulder.”
“You had ligament damage and lost a lot of blood from the shoulder, so they worked on that the most. Asshole cut a little too deeply. Nicked an artery, apparently. Oh, and the doctor said when you woke up to tell you not to move around too much. They got your foot strapped down, but he said even with all the painkillers they pumped in you, it might get pretty uncomfortable. Seemed more concerned about pain from the foot than the hand or shoulder.”