Lawless Measures_Vigilante_The Fight Continues

by Lyle O'Connor

  “Where do you think they’ll try to enter,” Bludd asked.

  “I don’t think it makes any difference. Let’s set up at a narrow point and have a fallback position. Once we’ve drawn contact, we’ll improvise.”

  “Is that part of your random and roving plan too, mate?” Bludd quipped.

  I answered him with confidence, “Absolutely!”

  The ranch style house had three bedrooms and a single bathroom located off the main hallway. Bludd took up the forward position in the hall, and I at the opposite end. Too much light illuminated Bludd’s position at the front of the hall, but to make a shot they’d have to be in the house. That shot for them wouldn’t come without paying a price.

  Pembroke broke for the backdoor, running on all fours like a wild animal. We didn’t want to shoot and give our positions away; we did, however, want to shoot Pembroke. The door, centered between the kitchen and breakfast nook, now stood wide open from Pembroke’s exit. If nothing else, it made a convenient entry point for our intruders.

  “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot,” I heard Pembroke yelling outside. He’d caught a lucky break and escaped, for now. You win a few, and you lose a few, but he’d be the big loser at the end of the day. Maybe not today, but his last day was coming soon.

  A man like Pembroke played a dangerous game of two sides against the middle. Maybe it was a lawyer trick he’d learned in the school of higher lying. Where I went to the school of hard knocks, double-crossing tricks didn’t play forever. Sooner or later you got caught in the squeeze, with pants down around you ankles, and Bludd and I would be there, waiting to serve up a plate of fresh justice. He was deep in the Mob’s grasp, either willingly or unwillingly. I didn’t know and I didn’t care. He had set us up to be taken out. Pembroke was a louse and deserved to be hunted down and squashed like a bug. First, Bludd and I had to get out of our predicament. The party was thrown in our honor and was about to kick off.

  Again, there was yelling outside. It was clear they weren’t concerned that we knew they were all around us, and they must have banked on us not being cop callers. And they were right. Why screw up a good thing with cops. It wasn’t every day we were given such opportunity. By the sounds of the voices outside, they were all around us; there was no way they could escape us now.

  The shouting of what sounded like orders tapered off. What had Pembroke told the late arrivers? We could assume it was everything he knew from weapons we carried to the killing of Mostarda and the others. Then it was quiet, deathly quiet. It was the type of stillness you get when you walk across a cemetery; cold, and eerie. Death permeated the air.

  Bludd maintained vigilance while I opened the bedrooms and bathroom doors to see if entry could be gained through the windows. All rooms had a single sliding window that opened about ten inches. It was too small to crawl through. Access would be by one of the two doors. In the middle of a fire-fight, I imagined a thug or two might try the front door, but only after a diversion, unless they were really novices. The back door would be the most likely point of contact. Bludd fell back to the first bedroom and used the door frame for cover. I followed the same line of reasoning with the last bedroom.

  The stillness was broken by a single gunshot through the front room window and struck in the hallway lath and plaster. I suspected it was a diversion tactic, but neither Bludd nor I moved. Then, the party crashers unleashed a barrage of bullets into the house; I listened for automatic weapons fire, but I didn’t hear the cadence. The popping noise of the weapons fired sounded like small caliber handguns, but there were five or six shooters unloading on us at once, and that might have been all there were.

  It was adding up amateurs wasting ammo on nothing besides breaking glass and punching holes in the plaster walls. They might have been good at putting the muscle on someone, but they were out of their league in an assault on a fortified position. Bludd and I would hand them an education they’d never forget.

  It was quiet again. I suspected they were maneuvering into position to try something more stupid than shooting up the house. If they thought we were cowering in a corner or shaking in our boots, they’d been watching too many old Hollywood black-n-white gangster flicks. There was only killing or dying going to happen next. I wasn’t afraid to die, and I didn’t think Bludd had thought about it, one way or the other. I crouched and duck-walked forward on the smooth Oakwood tongue and groove flooring to where Bludd was positioned.

  “They’re getting their courage up to come at us,” I said.

  Bludd responded with a sharp sanguine nod.

  “Okay, let’s set the wheel in motion. It may catch them off guard before they can spring their plan on us. Let a few rounds fly toward the kitchen, and I’ll do the same toward the front room. Then we’ll drop back to the end of the hall. Let’s draw them into this long hallway.”

  Bludd nodded again, but before we could kick it off, gunfire erupted through the living room window. Bullets zinged into the walls and penetrated the bedroom where Bludd took cover. I returned fire, sending a couple rounds down range in the direction of the front room window as I slipped down the hall to the back bedroom. Bludd dropped a couple rounds into the kitchen then pulled back to my position at the back bedroom. While we were setting the trap, a voice called out from the breakfast-bar area which was veiled by walls from our view.

  “Come out here, we won’t shoot. We want to talk to you. That’s all, just talk.”

  We played it smart. We didn’t engage in small talk. I figured they’d weaseled their way into the kitchen and were prepared to launch an assault. Pembroke had questions he needed answers to, and I knew his crew would be relentless to get what he wanted, there was never another consideration.

  They probably counted manpower by counting heads, and they had the numbers on their side; but the way we’d counted, the odds were still in our favor. We would play a costly game of hide and seek, winner take all. Anyone militarily trained knew that it took an overwhelming force to rout an enemy that was dug in. They didn’t have it, and what they did have were unskilled street punks. What it boiled down to was strategy. Ours were simple; our aggressors had to expose themselves to the greatest risk to advance on us, and we knew they didn’t have a choice in the matter. They couldn’t leave it like it was.

  Body count would tell the story. If we got the upper hand on the first assault and took out a few shooters, they’d likely tuck-tail and run. They weren’t fighting for God, country, and mom’s apple pie; they were fighting for money, but it was only peanuts. The inherent problem with paying peanuts was all you got were monkeys. We were fighting for our camaraderie and survival. It was a better motivator than peanuts.

  We sat patiently and waited the way boxers lay in wait to throw a counter-punch. Let the other guy take the chance and open up first. When he committed to the punch and had closed the distance, he was most vulnerable to the counter strike.

  We heard voices and shuffling around by the kitchen. They were amassing their force to bum rush us.

  “One of their mates was hit,” Bludd said.

  I asked, “How do you know?”

  “I heard one of them say it”

  I could hear the panicky sound in the voices. If we’d hit one of them with a lucky shot, it didn’t change a thing. I remained suspicious it was part of a ploy to draw us out. If they were being tricky, they were really good actors. The panic in their voices sounded genuine.

  Again, a man called from the kitchen area, “Give up your guns. If you don’t, we’re going to shoot you up.”

  The stage was set; they’d drawn a line in the sand. We continued to play it safe and not say a word. I could hear voices in the kitchen area. They were in disarray. Confusion had set in, and arguments were discernible. Suddenly silence. I could see a trickle of light that streamed to the end of the hallway. The passageway by which they would come was now illuminated. They were afraid of the dark; I embraced it as a friend. Maybe they needed light to aim their guns because they lacked the
skill to shoot directionally in the dark. Regardless, we were in the dark recess, and they would be silhouetted. They were foolish.

  “Slide your guns down the hall to us, buddy.”

  They had to act soon; I was bored with the stand-off. I wanted to have action, so I threw a monkey-wrench in their works.

  “Why don’t we liven up the party?” Then I let fly a volley of lead, down the hall, in their direction. I’d no sooner stopped firing when the mobsters made their presence known at the end of the hall entrance by a slew of bullets spewed toward us. At this rate, the winner would be determined by who had ammo left when the other side ran out.

  “I’m hit, I’m hit,” Bludd screamed.

  He wasn’t a bad actor either. The fix was in. If they believed Bludd took a bullet, they might become overconfident, and walk straight into the ambush. I told Bludd, “Nice touch,” and we dropped back from the doorway of the last bedroom, to a fortified position we’d haphazardly thrown together. Something was better than nothing. Bludd used a metal desk he’d tipped on its side; I took a chest of drawers, pulled them away from the wall, and squatted down. Bludd was in the left corner of the bedroom and I in the right. The grease-balls had to make their way the length of the hallway, exposed, with no place to hide. They would be a nervous wreck by the time they made it to us. We counted on it.

  Slight sounds of movement in the hall broke the silence, and shadows moved against the wall.

  I whispered to Bludd, “Rock-n-roll.”

  “Aye, aye, mate.”

  Chaos and confusion soon followed. One of their crew busted out the sliding glass bedroom window from the outside the house. Glass shattered and flew throughout the room. I believe it was intended as a signal to overrun our positions, but it was launched prematurely. The men inside were not ready. It was a mistake they couldn’t correct.

  Keyed up and ready for anything, I was set to kill. Through the broken window, a flash-bang grenade was tossed. It struck the floor and rolled toward the front wall before it exploded. Bludd and I ducked low behind our barriers. The Mob shooters made their advance.

  Men with guns blazing entered the room through the plume of smoke given off by the grenade. They didn’t blaze long. My hearing was toast in the matter of a millisecond, but my vision was intact, unaffected by the flash. The men, who’d rushed into the room, were stopped by the flash-bang smoke, but silhouetted in the doorway by the light they’d used to traverse the passageway. The flash-bang had not worked in their favor. We opened fire with deadly accuracy.

  The smoke drifted into the hall and away from the bedroom, aided by the slight breeze through the broken window. Bludd advanced on the downed men to determine the status of their wounds while I secured the hallway from the bedroom doorway. Bludd searched the men for weapons and threw their guns into a pile. He took their wallets, looked in them, pulled out their identification, and dropped their wallets to the floor.

  “All Canadians,” Bludd said.

  I was just about to laugh, when one of the downed men beat me to it. I motioned to Bludd to cover the hall while I pulled the grease ball to a sitting position against the wall.

  “Who put you up to this?”

  “I don’t have anything to say.”

  They all say that, at first, but I’ve found ways to persuade people to talk. “Kid, that stuff works with the cops and maybe in court, but not out here.” I followed up with a couple swift raps on the beak then stepped on his leg wound and squished it around. He screamed in pain. If there were others still outside, they would get an earful of what I had for them as well.

  “What’s your name, pal? Your license is right here on the floor with the others, but I’m giving you a chance to be up front with me.”

  “Dino, Dino Bianchi.”

  “How many people are with you here?”

  “I don’t know, the three of us came in one car, the others came in another. I don’t know them.”

  “You’re just a snot-nosed kid; you’re sure as hell not the brains of this outfit. What are you twenty years old?” He didn’t look that old, but I was giving him the benefit of the doubt.

  “Twenty-two.”

  “Twenty-two, and almost dead; it’s not a good start. Did Pembroke put you up to this? Did he fork out the dough?”

  Dino scoffed at my statement. Maybe he didn’t know the role the attorney played. The muscle end of the business wasn’t able to be trusted with too much info. They don’t earn enough money to keep their mouths shut when the chips are down. In Dino’s case, I wanted to make sure we had an understanding. I pointed my Glock at one of his comrades that lie bleeding from a sucking chest wound, and blasted him. This time the shot was to the head.

  “Who do you work for?”

  He struggled with his words, “The guy you just shot.”

  “Who was he to you, your boss?”

  “He’s my uncle, Valente; I help him out sometimes, that’s all.”

  “Well, he’s been a real bad role model, kid.” I pointed my pistol at the other survivor of their trio. He too appeared mortally wounded from multiple bullet holes in his torso. “Who’s this guy?”

  “Just a guy, he worked as a bouncer at a strip joint. Uncle Valente gave him some side work, that’s all.”

  “Sounds like your uncle was the boss?”

  “I guess he’s a boss, I don’t know about that.”

  “I’m sorry for you kid; sorry he got you into this mess. Do you know who De Luca is?”

  “Everybody in Toronto knows who he is.”

  “You give him a message for me. He doesn’t run Toronto anymore. I do.”

  Bludd looked uneasy. “He’s seen us mate. We can’t let him go.”

  “Don’t worry about it; he’ll make a good errand boy. He doesn’t know anything, “Do you kid?”

  Dino shook his head. I snatched him up by the collar, “Don’t ever come looking for us, boy. If you do, you’ll die a slow and miserable death. That’s a promise. We’re not mobsters, and we’re not in it for the money, we’re assassins. That’s all we do, kill.”

  Bludd said, “I duuno mate, that’s awfully chancy.”

  I looked at Dino, and said, “I don’t think so. He doesn’t want to die that badly. Do you, kid?”

  Amidst Dino’s muffled sobbing he said, “No.”

  It was our turn now. Bludd and I started to inch down the hallway when an explosion ripped through the silence of the night. We crouched low to the floor and waited to see what followed.

  Bludd said, “I think they blew up your car, mate.”

  If Bludd’s speculation were true, I’d not be able to contain my anger. It also meant there were still other targets nearby. Now in the absence of noise, our adrenaline ridden breathing became audible. At the entrance to the hall, Bludd turned his attention toward the kitchen and back door while I ducked down and quickly made a beeline for the front room. With a flick of the switch inside the kitchen, Bludd extinguished the light. The shadows once again hid us.

  We remained quiet and motionless until our night vision improved. The outside porch area was still lit, and a skunk light on a telephone pole had kicked on, probably automatically at dusk. I could see something burning, maybe a car, but considerably farther away from the house than where my car was parked.

  It had taken a couple hours to learn the truth. Pembroke, Maximillian’s secret weapon in our crusade against crime, was himself involved with the seedier criminal elements of the underworld. We’d successfully held off the first wave, but there were more mobsters lying in wait somewhere outside the doors of the old farm house.

  We were all in the same boat when it came to time. None of us could hang around here long. After the explosion, and with the fire burning, cops or emergency vehicles were likely to show up. With one or more dead bodies in the house, a witness, and plenty of Mob affiliation to go around, Bludd and I decided it would be riskier to stay than leave.

  We gathered up the files Pembroke had brought, but left behind when
he scampered out the back door. Bludd covered me as I went to my left out the back door toward the corner of the house with the broken window. I expected whoever was outside might be still be in the area. I’d planned to secure that corner first. I stayed close to the building, my Glock poised at the ready.

  Bludd headed to the opposite rear corner and secured it. Once at my corner, I squatted down and pivoted around the edge. I’d raised my gun to fire, but the body didn’t move. In the foreground lay a man, face down. I kept my eyes riveted on him as I drew close. I checked for signs of life, but he had none left in him. Blood had pooled under his body. There was enough blood loss I knew he hadn’t died from natural causes; unless you considered being shot a natural cause for a mobster. My best guess was he’d caught a stray bullet by accident. Bludd said he’d overheard one of the mobsters claim to have been shot earlier. Maybe this was as far as he’d made it. Let sleeping dogs lie, as the old saying goes, it applied to dead dogs, too.

  The body count had climbed. I was happy about finding dead mobsters instead of live ones. I came to the front corner, but my attention was drawn down the road, to where a small fire burned. What was it? It wasn’t my car. It was visible and parked where I’d left it. Maybe the explosion and fire down the road was Pembroke’s ride, it was nowhere in sight.

  I assumed Bludd had made it to the other corner by this time, but the porch light made it impossible to see him. I moved out into the yard. The skunk light illuminated the snow, which made it easier to see movement. I squatted down and stayed put until I spotted Bludd moving up on the Avenger. He checked it inside and out, and then signaled for me to join him.

  “There’s a body in the backyard,” I said. “It looked as if he caught a bullet.”