Wounded Animals

by Jim Heskett

  Alan’s house was a split-level with an entryway, then immediate stairs up to the kitchen and dining room, or stairs down to the living room. I knelt to look in the living room. The lights were off.

  I looked up the stairs but couldn’t see anything.

  “Hey there, Candle,” I heard Wyatt’s voice from upstairs. “I’m up here.”

  I climbed the stairs, gun out. At the dinner table sat Wyatt, a shotgun across his lap. He was wearing a fedora, with a trench coat wrapped around his ample frame. He looked like a chubby private eye.

  “Don’t be too hard on your poor neighbor there. We got his parents gagged and hog-tied in a warehouse in Cleveland. His dad was a hell of a fighter, nearly broke the jaw of one of our guys and dislocated the shoulder of another one. What I’m getting at is, this ain’t his fault. You have no idea how hard it was to orchestrate all of this.”

  My teeth gritted so hard I could barely open my mouth. “Where is Grace?”

  Wyatt sighed, then coughed. “I had hoped for this to all go down one way, not the way it did, know what I mean? Kareem was supposed to die, you were supposed to go to jail for killing him, and everyone would live happily ever after.”

  “Where…is…my…wife?”

  “But then you had to get all Indiana Jones on me, interfering with the plan every chance you got. I’ve learned a thing or two about managing people from this experience, I’ll tell you what. For example—”

  “Darren is dead.”

  Wyatt stroked the barrel of the shotgun. “I figured as much. It’s a shame because the kid had so much potential. Real eager to please, know what I mean? I had a feeling you were going to find a way to mess up things with my boy. Thought I’d best stay out of it and wait over here.”

  He coughed for a few seconds until he took out a handkerchief and unleashed a torrent of mucus into it.

  “Feeling okay?” I said with a sneer.

  “Damn altitude gets me every time. I hate Colorado.”

  He raised the shotgun, and I pointed the pistol at him.

  “Now, Candle, m’boy, this here is a twelve-gauge. I’ll put thirty holes in you compared to one little pinprick you might put in me. Why don’t you have yourself a good think about that.”

  “The one hole I put in Shelton’s forehead seemed to be good enough.”

  He frowned. “I wish you hadn’t done that. Shelton was a good man.”

  I said nothing

  “Well,” he said, “if I can’t have it the way I want it, then I guess I’ll have to settle for the way I can get it. With Kareem Haddadi gone, I can still find a way to make it look like murder, but it just won’t have the same poetic justice I was going for.”

  “Tell me where she is, or you die.”

  “You don’t understand the score, now do you? If you’re alive, missing, in jail, it doesn’t matter. When Haddadi took it upon himself to reach out to you, we had to escalate things, but it would have turned out the same way. When your dad passed, we changed the plan.”

  “What plan was that?”

  “Blackmail, you idiot. We were going to have you kill Kareem and then blackmail your poor old dad to keep him quiet. But with him gone, we had to improvise a bit.”

  “Keep him quiet about what?”

  Wyatt sniffed but said nothing.

  “Where are your two other guys? Thomason and Glenning?”

  “Oh, they went back to Dallas. Everybody works for somebody, son. I’m just playing my part too. But none of that matters, now, does it? Because this only ends one way for you.”

  I stared him down. “I don’t believe you.”

  He laughed. “And that’s what I love about you. You think, with all this going on, that there’s still a chance you matter. Like your opinion counts for something. Even after everything we did to you, like kidnapping your wife, taking you up on that mountain top to scare you, even killing people you know, you still got the balls to stand there and think you’re gonna win. Shit, me and Shelton had a little bet to see what you’d do with that dead nigger’s body. I thought you’d drop her in a dumpster.”

  “Her name was Keisha.”

  “Ain’t that sweet.”

  We stared at each other for a few seconds. He was right about the shotgun versus the pistol, and I didn’t know what to do. What was he waiting for?

  He let loose another barrage of coughs, and I saw my chance. I dropped to the floor, aimed, and shot a hole in his ankle. I was aiming for his knee, but that would do.

  Wyatt screamed and dropped the shotgun as his hands flew to his ankle. Bone fragments poked out underneath the hem of the trench coat.

  I raised the pistol again and squeezed the trigger. The bullet tore a hole in Wyatt’s throat, and he slumped in the chair, a river of blood rushing down his shirt, just as it had when Martin had died in my living room.

  I dropped the gun. I think it was out of bullets, anyway. I hadn’t been counting.

  Wyatt’s eyes were wide, staring at me. He was trying to talk, but he could only gurgle and leak blood from the corner of his mouth.

  I heard a noise behind me and whirled to see Alan pointing down the stairs. “Basement. I’m so sorry, Candle. I’m so sorry.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  I STAGGERED TOWARD Alan then turned to the door his finger was indicating. I opened it to a dark room, and a set of stairs leading down. I hadn’t spent much time at Alan’s house before; never seen his basement.

  Down the unfinished wooden stairs, one at a time, and then I saw her. Lying on a twin bed, her pregnant belly bulging. It had only been a week, but she seemed to have grown.

  I rushed to her and knelt beside the bed. Her eyes were closed. I brushed her hair back from her face, and caressed the curve of her stomach which housed my unborn son. Our son.

  She stirred.

  “Hey baby,” she said, her voice light and slow. “I was dreaming about you. Are you back from your trip already?”

  She was drugged, barely conscious. “Yes,” I said, and I couldn’t stop touching her face. Her sweet face, so pure and soft. “I’ve been back for a few days. We’re going to get you out of here.”

  “Why?” she said, her eyes dimming.

  “We need to go, baby. We need to get you to a hospital.”

  I wrapped my arms around her and tugged to get her out of bed. Every part of my body resisted trying to carry extra weight. With all the injuries I’d been subjected to over the last week, I could hardly believe I had anything left to give.

  “Candle, let me help,” said a voice from the stairs. Alan trundled down the steps, then stopped at the bottom. “I am so, so, sorry,” he said. “I never wanted to lie to you, but they have my family. They said they’d kill them if I didn’t cooperate. You understand, right?”

  I didn’t want to respond. I wanted to zap him again with the stun gun, and press it into his heart until he stopped breathing. How could he have done this to me?

  I ignored him. “Grace, how did you call me? Did you get away?”

  “That was me,” Alan said. “I was trying to text, but I accidentally hit the call button. Candle, I’m so, so sorry. Please, let me help you.”

  I stared at him, a strange mix of vile hatred and pity running through my head. “Get her legs,” was all I could say.

  Together, we carried her up the stairs and into the living room. Alan flipped on the lights.

  Her eyes were open, and she smiled. “I missed you,” she said. “I’ve been so tired lately.”

  I couldn’t stop touching her stomach, running my hand back and forth over the curve our child made. “I missed you too, baby. Everything is going to be okay now. I’m never going to leave you again. I’m going to be right here beside you from now on, alright?”

  “Sounds good,” she murmured in her gravelly drug-state.

  “I’ll call the cops,” Alan said. “I’m going to tell them everything.”

  “There’s no need to call anyone,” I said as the first chirp of the siren echo
ed from down the street.

  I left Grace on the couch and walked to the window as the cul de sac started to fill up with ambulances and cop cars. Blue and yellow lights flickering, bouncing off the snow coming down in sheets. Rodrick was out there, waving his arms and pointing toward Alan’s house.

  Through the mist, I spotted something small and brown, four-legged and wobbly. A dog. The same dog I’d met out in the open space, the one who’d defended me against the coyote. He was wandering down the street, head down. Sniffing.

  The dog stopped to look at Rodrick and padded over to him, then sat down in my front yard, watching the people in uniform spill out of their official vehicles as Rodrick was frantically waving them toward Alan’s house.

  Grace was safe. I was home. It was over.

  Ready for more? Get the sequel on the next page!

  Afterword

  Want to read more?

  There are two ways. You can go on to the sequel, The Legend of Kareem, at jimheskett.com/kareem. Or, for the exact same price of the next two books, you can get the whole Trilogy at the link below. Plus, the box set includes a bonus Tucker Candle short story, not found anywhere else.

  jimheskett.com/wbox

  Or,

  Skip ahead a few pages to read a sample chapter from THE LEGEND OF KAREEM.

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  Bonus Chapter

  Legend of Kareem preview

  And now, please enjoy this preview of the second book of The Whistleblower Series, THE LEGEND OF KAREEM. Then get it at jimheskett.com/kareem

  As I stepped off the elevator at the third floor of the hospital, a wave of lavender-scented cleaning products assaulted my nostrils. Maybe that was better than the gut-wrenching starkness of bleach and ammonia, but my hand still involuntarily went to my face to block the infiltration.

  Always hated hospitals. Any time I step into one, I can’t help but think that someday, I’m going to be old and frail and live out my days in one of these places, hooked to beeping machines, sleeping in uncomfortable beds and eating food on trays with single-serve milk and juice cartons.

  I approached the locked double door and lifted the corded phone from the receiver. After a few seconds of silence, the phone chirped in my ear.

  “Can I help you?”

  “I’m here to see Grace Candle in 306, please.”

  The door in front of me buzzed as the phone connection severed. Not the most polite nurses in the world, but I suppose if I rutted through a trough of body fluids every day, I’d feel a similar compulsion to cut the chit chat to a minimum.

  On the other side of the door, I sauntered down the hall toward the wall with the green stripe, which is how I remembered to turn left to find Grace’s room. A collection of men and women in scrubs that were all colors of the rainbow went about their jobs of helping the living, the dying, and the ones they didn’t yet know how to classify. A few of them smiled at me, most paid no attention.

  I stopped outside room 306 and did a quick arrangement of the flowers in the vase in my hand. Gerbera daisies with no baby’s breath, because, for some reason, my wife detested the stuff like mosquito bites or fluorescent lights. Don’t ask me why, I just do as I’m told.

  When I entered the room, she rotated in her bed and smiled at me. The IV bag next to the bed shone in the light from the window. “You just missed him. By, like, two minutes.”

  “Aw, come on, he wasn’t supposed to be here until two,” I said as I checked the time on my phone. “That’s not fair.”

  “He was early. Is the dog okay?”

  I set the flowers down on the nightstand next to her bed and wheeled a chair close to her. Her hair was mussed and her skin seemed pale, but she still had that same bright look in her eyes she always wore.

  “The dog is fine.”

  “You think of a name yet?”

  “So far, he’s responding pretty well to Dog. He likes the new food I got him better than the last stuff; no puke on the rug today. But forget about him, what about you? What did the doctor say?”

  Her eyes welled with tears, and I felt my heart rip for a split second until she let out a breath and nodded. “The baby is okay. We’re okay.”

  My hand instinctively reached out to the curve of her belly. After everything Grace had been through in the last couple weeks, I marveled at how easily she seemed to take the events in stride. How she could smile and laugh and tell me she was grateful to be safe and with me again.

  And now, even after they’d drugged her for days on end, the baby was safe. That was even more of a miracle. I was so relieved, I let out a sigh that made me lightheaded.

  We kissed and held hands over her belly. “Where are your parents?” I said.

  “They went to the airport to pick up my sister.”

  “Huh. I was wondering if she was going to show up. I’m going to lose twenty bucks on that one.”

  “Oh, stop,” she said. “She had to cut her business trip short.”

  Grace raised an eyebrow.

  “What’s that look for?” I said.

  “I’ve been thinking about something. Something you told me about that Kareem guy. That was his name, right?”

  I closed my eyes and thought for a few seconds. Couldn’t remember what I’d told Grace about the whirlwind events I’d suffered through. Had I told my wife that I’d killed Wyatt Green, Darren Werner, and Stan Shelton? Everything happened so fast that day, and she was oblivious to what was going on, even though she was three hundred feet away in the neighbor’s house the whole time it was happening. I didn’t want to lie to my wife, but I didn’t know if I wanted her to know the extent of the violence that occurred in our home. What good could that do?

  “Yes, Kareem was his name.”

  “When you met him at the bar in Boulder, you said he told you not to go down to Dallas.”

  “Right.”

  “I’m having trouble understanding why he would do that. It doesn’t make sense, if you think about everything that happened after. If it was a blackmail killing about money like you said, why would he make it a point to tell you not to go to Texas? Couldn’t he have handled it himself? Or at least, he could have been specific with you.”

  “I don’t know, Grace. Kareem said and did a lot of things that didn’t make any sense.”

  “And he also said there was someone down there who was dangerous and meeting him would cause lots of problems.”

  “Right.”

  “And you told me you assumed it was this Darren guy, the one who trashed Kareem’s house and chased you on the highway out of Boulder.”

  I’d been filling in Grace on some of the details during my visits at the hospital, but her memory was impressive. Clearly, she had nothing but time at the hospital to sit and think. “Yes, it was Darren. He was Wyatt’s puppet, the one who killed my trainees.”

  “But that’s my point,” she said. “You assumed it was Darren, but Kareem never actually said that’s who it was, right?”

  I replayed that night in my head. Kareem in his Led Zeppelin t-shirt, the trickery with turning water into wine. The stun gun and the fake reanimation of the rat in the alley. “I suppose that’s true. But what are you getting at?”

  She searched my eyes. “Is it over?”

  I rubbed my hand over the curve of her be
lly and gave her the warmest smile I could muster. “Yes, it’s over. We’re safe now.”

  I did my best to keep my face light and free while portraying confidence, even though I certainly didn’t feel it.

  After Grace and I had dinner in the hospital room and watched a couple hours of some dumb home renovation show on the wall-mounted TV, she told me to go back and check on the dog. As had become my habit over the last few days whenever I had to leave her side, I asked her a million times if it was okay for me to go, and made her say it more than once before I’d actually leave.

  Would have been nice to let someone else watch the dog, but since my next door neighbor Alan was now awaiting a court date for kidnapping my wife and the rest of the neighborhood seemed to cross the street to the opposite sidewalk whenever I went out to walk Dog, looked like I was on my own there.

  I didn’t even really want the dog. Kitty didn’t want the dog either, and they weren’t the best of friends. The dog and I had bonded over a surreal fight with a coyote in the open space, then he’d wandered onto our front porch and wouldn’t leave. Just sat there with those giant ears folded in half, flapping in the breeze as the paramedics removed my drugged wife from Alan’s house.

  What was I supposed to do? Leave him and his floppy ears out there in the snow?

  As I pulled into my neighborhood in the rental car and neared the cul de sac, I couldn’t help but feel downcast at the newspapers piling up in Alan’s driveway. Yes, he’d helped Wyatt and those IntelliCraft bastards kidnap Grace. But he’d done it under duress, and I planned to go speak at his trial as a character witness if they’d let me. I had no idea how that worked, though.