Killer of Killers
by Mark DeRobertis
Published by
Melange Books, LLC
White Bear Lake, MN 55110
www.melange-books.com
Killer of Killers, Copyright 2012 by Mark M. DeRobertis
Second Edition Copyright 2013
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should go to melange-books.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.
ISBN: 978-1-61235-453-8
Names, characters, and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Published in the United States of America.
Cover Design by Caroline Andrus
KILLER OF KILLERS
by Mark M. DeRobertis
He was the world’s greatest martial artist – a master of the world's deadliest art. Once revered, he became feared, and for that he blamed his homeland. America was no longer the land of the free and the home of the brave. It had become the land of murder and the home of corruption. But for a man like Trent Smith – it was the perfect hunting ground.
Biochemists have invented a drug that cures all disease and stops aging, but a New York industrialist has kept it secret for a specific purpose. He wants to form an exclusive fraternity of immortal supermen, all of whom are beholden to him. Only one thing puts a kink in his plan – the drug's side effects, which include wild surges of increased sexuality and unpredictable flares of homicidal rage.
Trent Smith has trained in Japan for over twenty years and he has his own agenda. He vows to avenge the innocents slain by the ever-growing number of American celebrities who murder with impunity. But when a dying scientist gives him the only copy of the secret formula, he must decide if the miraculous benefit is worth the toll it takes on the prodigious people who use it and their credulous victims who don't.
Killer of Killers is an action-packed martial arts thriller that pits one man's quest for justice against the wonders of medical science. But wonders for some are horrors for others in a secret society ruled by greed, malice, and a singular objective to attain eternal youth.
All things seemed in their kinds to be my enemies...
It seemed then to my apprehension to proceed from indignation,
wrath, and as it were a gnashing of teeth against me.
Richard Norwood,
English Puritan,
1638
A true fanatic, his promptings were reasons enough for his actions.
Robert E. Howard,
Red Shadows,
1928
The question is not whether we will be extremists,
but what kind of extremists we will be.
Martin Luther King, Jr.,
American Civil Rights Leader,
1963
Table of Contents
"Killer of Killers"
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Epilogue
About the Author
Previews
Prologue
JFK Airport
It was a long time coming, but he made the decision, and Dr. Samuel Bernstein rushed through the terminal a different man. He wanted no more the role of absentee father and no more the bane of negligent husband. No more research facility half a continent away. Never again would he sweat ice in humid vaults of bubbling vats and sterile test tubes. And no more nightmares—the waking screams in halls of horror, the dire consequence of scientific arrogance, soul-chilling visions of a holocaust revisited.
Never again. For Samuel, the sprawling biological laboratory in the Minnesota wilderness would forever be a memory. A bad one. He carried a black leather bag in one hand and pressed a cell phone against his ear with the other. Finally, an answer. “Samuel?” It was Martha, his wife.
“Yes, yes, where are you?”
“I’m in the car, waiting. Hurry, before they chase me away.”
* * * *
Traffic was light, and Samuel gunned his BMW, passing cars as if they crawled. Though red lights in the mirror likely meant the end, it was a risk he had to take. “Where are the twins? Are they packed?”
“At home, and they’re very upset. They still don’t know why you’re doing this. You haven’t told us anything.”
“I can’t explain. Right now, we must disappear. All of us, disappear.”
“Samuel, you’re scaring me. What happened? Why can’t you tell me?”
After pulling off the freeway and speeding through his neighborhood, Samuel screeched his car to a stop in the driveway of his tract home. “Inside, hurry,” he urged, but upon the porch, his keys slipped from his grasp and rattled to the doorstep. “Merciful God,” he groaned, “not now.”
Just as he spoke, the door unlatched from within. Samuel hoped to see his daughters, but when the door opened, his hope turned to dread. “You!”
The man’s name was Stiles, and he was huge—a veritable giant dressed in a dark suit and tie. A wide-brimmed fedora topped his black face, which split into a broad smile of shiny white teeth. “Dr. Bernstein,” he boomed, “how nice of you to not keep me waiting.”
“Where are my daughters?” Samuel snapped.
“Never mind them. Hand over the disc. I’m not playin’ around.”
Samuel hesitated, but his wife didn’t. She dodged the suited titan and bolted through the doorway. Samuel shouted, “Martha, wait!”
“Wait, my ass,” Stiles growled. He seized the lapels of Samuel’s coat. “I want the disc first and then the bag. And if you don’t get smart and hand them over right this minute—”
Chilling screams turned Stiles’ head, and Samuel squirmed free of him. He dashed to a head-on collision with his wife at the staircase. “They’re dead!” she wailed. Tears streaked her twisted face. She clung to Samuel, gulping air between agonized howls.
“No!” Samuel cried while craning his neck to the upper floor. Then he glared at the hulk behind him. “You murderer. You’ll never get the disc. Never in a million years!”
Stiles said, “I told you I wasn’t playin’ around.” A vicious backhand knocked Samuel’s glasses off his face, and a punch to his jaw sent him over the coffee table and sprawled on the living room carpet.
Martha screamed, “Stop it! Stop it!” but to no avail. Samuel was dazed, and he realized that Stiles was rummaging through all of his pockets. He saw Martha with a broomstick. She whipped the man’s back again and again. At first, Stiles seemed oblivious to the effort, but she continued the flogging until he turned a frightful head.
* * * *
&n
bsp; Josh Jones preferred a low profile, and he regretted his continuing inability to have one. He blamed his blond hair, extreme height, and movie star looks more than anything else. It’s why he dropped Benjamin off at the wayward doctor’s home. Let him get the credit for recovering the disc.
In his white Mercedes, Josh cruised the quiet street, and as he circled back to the Bernstein residence, he spied the parked BMW. He pulled over, stepped out of his Mercedes, and squeezed an electronic key in his light gray sports coat. The Beemer’s trunk popped, and he peeked inside. There sat a black leather bag. “Hello,” he said. With a small bolt cutter, he broke the bag’s padlock, examined its contents, and transferred it to the trunk of his Mercedes. “That was easy enough.”
Standing tall, Josh panned the well-kept houses lining the street. The tranquil scene triggered memories of a carefree youth. Just as chirping birds and a cool breeze embellished the reverie, crashing wood and shattering glass assailed his ears. He spotted neighbors peeping through windows. “Benjamin,” he said under his breath. “What the hell?”
Josh burst into the home, agape and unbelieving. Benjamin was brutally pummeling the unmoving Bernstein, spattering blood with every blow. It was only when Josh snared a wrist on its back swing did the bedlam end.
“What the hell are you doing?” Josh yelled. He peered at the beaten doctor beneath his partner and witnessed a bloodied body that didn’t breathe. “You killed him. What the fuck. You killed him.”
A quarter pivot revealed the doctor’s wife slumped on the kitchen tile. “What? Her, too?” Josh hustled to the woman and touched her neck. “What the fuck. She’s dead, too.”
Benjamin stood up and yanked on his breast-pocket handkerchief. He removed his hat and wiped crimson spots from his skin. With a shrug, he muttered, “I... I didn’t mean it.”
Josh walked over to his colleague. Being the taller man, he looked down at him and sneered, “You didn’t mean it? Are you kidding?”
“You gotta believe me. All I remember is the screaming. I couldn’t even find the disc. The damn fool wouldn’t tell me where it was.”
“For christsake, man, it’s in the bag with the rest of the stuff. Just now I took it from their trunk.”
“You mean we got it?”
“Yeah, we got it, but gawd-damn, we didn’t have to kill anyone.”
“Aw, shit.”
“Whataya mean, ‘Aw, shit’?”
Benjamin looked up, as if to peer through the ceiling. For Josh, the ensuing moments were as painfully tense as they were horrendously silent—until Benjamin finally said, “I think I killed all of ’em.”
Chapter One
The Medallion
It could be said he was an extremist. Those who came to know him might even agree. To be sure, he was a man who lived for justice. At least for now. He called himself Trent Smith, and he strode the L.A. Airport with a singular purpose. A former football star was arriving tonight, and Trent planned on meeting the infamous athlete face to face.
He scanned the crowded concourse and slouched into a seat. The wait was brief, but for Trent it seemed like hours before the disembarking passengers came pouring through the gate. Antsy boarders crowded lanes in their efforts to be first. Babies cried, children fussed, complainers made their case, and through the constant chaos, Trent’s focus never swayed. The gate exuded voyagers, and it was there he trained his eyes.
Within minutes, an unusually large black man, wearing a pinstriped suit and wide-brimmed fedora, bullied forward. With a black leather bag in hand, he paid no more attention to the folks he swept aside than he might have given to pesky gnats. Once the floor cleared, Trent rose from his seat and trailed the flock of tired travelers. Unexpectedly, the big man veered into an open-faced restaurant. Departing customers allowed him a wide berth, and he promptly found the restroom in the restaurant’s rear.
Trent recognized his opportunity. He entered the restroom and spotted Benjamin ‘Steely’ Stiles at the furthest urinal. Locking the door behind him, he waited with a quickened pulse, surging adrenaline, and a sobered resolve.
The ex-football star turned around and locked his eyes into Trent’s. Having never met, Trent knew he wouldn’t be recognized, nor was he. Stiles picked up his leather bag and started toward the door. When Trent made no effort to step aside, Stiles stopped and faced him squarely. He stood much taller and outweighed Trent by more than a hundred pounds, but his expression was not of a man assured. He reached for his coat, and Trent reacted instantly. A clamping grip of Stiles’ shoulder, followed by a sudden twist, left his pinstriped arm disjointed before it touched his lapel. Seeing how Stiles goggled his now useless arm, Trent was convinced no one on the gridiron ever moved like that. This was going to be easy.
Stiles dropped his bag and threw a desperate punch. Trent parried the blow and countered with finger strikes to the neck. The rapid jabs split the triple scalene muscles, first left, then right, as he swerved around the mammoth torso.
At that moment, it was over. Though Stiles remained upright, he was dead on his feet. From behind, Trent eyed the striped suit impressed it still stood. ‘Steely’ Stiles was ‘steely’ indeed, but in the next moment, he crumpled to a lumpy heap beside his black bag in the pathway to the exit.
Trent’s heart pounded with exhilaration. Vacating with expediency was in order, yet he lingered to view the multi-jeweled corpse. There were fancy rings, bracelets, and several necklaces, one of which featured a gold medallion.
His first kill—and it was flawless.
At once, Trent’s speeding heart slowed, and the excitement passed with his prey. He released the bolt, but the well-dressed carcass blocked the door. Glancing down, Trent eyed the medallion. It displayed a prominent relief of the figure eight. Overcoming an urge to snatch it, he focused on the exit, forced a breach, and wriggled through.
* * * *
Inside a quick-stop tavern amid the airport gift shops, a mustachioed man with a scar on his face propped himself up on a swivel stool. His name was Amman Bey, and he lined his four empty shot glasses over the countertop. While chugging a fifth, he heard the multiple clicks of a woman’s high heels. He spun around, surprised. It wasn’t who he expected, but she carried the black leather bag.
Before Amman could react, the woman dropped the bag and handed him an envelope. Without a word, she turned and walked away. Following a quick surveillance of his surroundings, Amman drew a stiletto from his coat and sprang its shiny blade. He slit the envelope and removed its contents—a long chain with a gold medallion. Standing a full head taller than the other customers, he picked up the bag and departed from the tavern. There were too many people he needed to see. And he was already behind schedule.
Chapter Two
The Blond Detective
Relaxed in his airline seat next to the aisle, Trent was content for a mission fulfilled. A multiple murderer who had escaped justice did not escape him. He supposed the body had been discovered by now, but no one could know the cause of death until an autopsy hit the books. Even then he wasn’t sure the coroner’s report would be accurate. Only a diligent examination might disclose the crushed internal arteries that blocked oxygen from the brain.
Trent gave it no more thought because something else absorbed his mind. The passenger sitting next to him was a strikingly beautiful young lady apparently traveling alone. He had no inclination to flirt, yet he sensed an irresistible attraction the moment he sat down. Living his entire adult life as a bachelor in Japan afforded no shortage of pretty Asian paramours, but something seemed different about this woman, and it wasn’t at all unpleasant. In fact, it was quite the opposite.
For starters, she wasn’t Asian. She was fair complexioned and had long blond hair, straight and full. Blue diamond eyes of a goddess glistened with vibrancy, even as the sparing use of make-up bared innate humility. Trent made a point not to look, because her face and figure made it difficult to stop looking. Regardless, he wasn’t in the mood for idle banter. He wanted to be
left alone and hoped she felt the same, but with an ethereal gaze, she turned toward Trent and said, “Hi, how are you tonight?” The melodic and soothing voice, combined with the alluring charm of her eyes, seemed almost magical.
“Hi,” Trent responded with a polite smile.
“Are you a football player?” she inquired with a smile of her own.
“No. Why do you ask?”
“Because you look like one. You have the shoulders of a hard hitter.”
“Is that so?” It was interesting, Trent thought, her choice of words, but still he looked away, hoping to convey disinterest.
“My brother used to play football,” she continued, clearly undaunted. “He was really good, too.”
Trent couldn’t just ignore her. Twenty years of Japanese etiquette saw to that. “Did he play pro ball?” he forced himself to ask.
“Yes, for Baltimore. Josh Jones.”
“Left defensive end when they won the championship. He retired a couple years ago, right?”
“Right. Are you a fan?”
“Not really.” Trent didn’t want to talk about himself. He had to think of a question to make the conversation about her. “So tell me, um... Are you a professional cheerleader?”
Only scrunched eyes of disbelief accompanied the young lady’s silence. Trent found himself on damage control. “I mean you could pass for one.” That didn’t seem to help.
“I’m a cop,” she said.
Trent responded with a double take. “A cop?”
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