“He’s got a man in Killburry, this Tom Myers, but I don’t know why. Myers already had a run-in with Dexter and broke his wrist.”
“He did what to my nephew?” Mike asked.
Hodges leaned back a little. Mike’s voice had suddenly become icy and sounded young, yeah, there was still some of the real Uncle Mike inside the old man.
“Dexter did something stupid, Myers caught him, and then he broke his wrist when Dexter pulled a knife on him. But never mind that; I’ll handle that. What I want to know is that you’ll get payback for me if The Brotherhood whacks me.”
“Burt, don’t get involved with these guys. You’re already somebody. You’re my nephew, and I miss seeing you. Why not leave Killburry and move to Hartford? You’ve got family here and I’d love to see Dexter again. That kid always reminded me of your father.”
Hodges stood.
“It’s too late, Uncle Mike, but listen, if anything happens to me, I want you to look out for Dexter.” Hodges reached into his front pocket and took out a thick sealed envelope that contained cash. He handed it to his uncle. “That’s fifty grand. If my bet on The Brotherhood goes sideways, Dexter will know to come see you, and that you’ll take care of him.”
Mike looked down at the envelope.
“I don’t want this, Burt.”
“You’re the only family I got Uncle Mike.”
“There’s your Cousin Sheila and those kids over there.”
“Sheila wouldn’t understand this.”
“No, she wouldn’t, but that’s not what I was talking about,” Mike said.
Mike stood and stuffed the envelope into an inside pocket of his jacket. Hodges made a face at the jacket. It was a warm spring day, and yet, his Uncle Mike felt the need to put on a jacket. It was one more thing that signaled the man had grown old.
Hodges hugged his uncle again, waved goodbye to his young cousins, and headed back to his car. In a few days he would either come back to see his uncle with a smile on his face, or he’d be taking a dirt nap somewhere. There was no middle ground.
***
There were other residents of Killburry in Hartford. They were Killburry’s Chief of Police John Ellison, along with the security chief from Silicon City, Jim Brett, and Brett’s wife, Sue. Sue and Jim went by other names as well.
On the cul-de-sac they lived on, they were known as Bart and June McGurn.
Chief Ellison rubbed a hand over his chin.
“Tom Myers is on to you two?”
“I don’t know for sure,” Brett said. “But he made a crack about me setting bait.”
“Bait? That sounds like he’s got your number.”
“Jim slipped, too,” Sue Brett said. “He called Myers by name, and we were never introduced.”
The Chief chuckled.
“I did peg Myers as a bright one. Now, the question is, does he have a big mouth?”
“You think he knows who the vigilantes are?”
“It’s the watch group,” Ellison said.
Brett laughed.
“No way, those guys are just using that as an excuse to hang out together. They’re not the ones committing the assaults and making the threats. I’d bet on that.”
“You may be right, Jim, but there’s a reason I suspect them. One of the people assaulted by the vigilantes was a man who had DUI convictions, Driving Under the Influence. When he moved to Gentry Court, that neighborhood watch group harassed him over his drunk driving record, or so he claimed. He also said that he hadn’t had a drink in years.”
“If he was no longer drinking then how did they know that he was a former drunk driver?” Brett asked.
The chief made a face.
“He drank, I verified that with a bartender in town. I think he drove into that cul-de-sac drunk as a skunk one night and that neighborhood watch group spotted him. He was later beaten, threatened, and told to leave Gentry Court, or else. He moved his family out the next day and sold his house at a loss. He was also warned to keep quiet, but after a while, he contacted me and told me his story. Since then, I’ve uncovered several others who were similarly threatened.”
“Okay, maybe it is those four guys in the watch group and they’ve been playing dumb, but what’s our next move?” Brett said.
“Here’s what you do; turn it up a notch. When you go back to Gentry Court, wait until it’s good and late and then wake up the neighborhood. Make it sound like you’re practically killing Sue here, then Sue, I’ll send an ambulance by for you. Unless things are crazy tonight, I should be able to keep one on standby.”
“An ambulance?” Sue said. “Why, did ‘Big Bad Bart’ finally go too far?”
“That’s right, so go heavy on the makeup, and pretend to have a broken arm. If that doesn’t make the vigilantes take action, then I don’t know what will.”
“Great, once the ambulance takes Sue away I’ll be a sitting duck,” Brett said.
“You won’t be alone; my daughter and I will be on duty and in the woods across from the houses. Plus, you are armed, aren’t you?”
“Hell yeah, a Colt Python. I’ll be ready for anything.”
“All right then, that’s the plan,” Ellison said.
“Chief,” Sue said. “Why did you ask Silicon City to help you with this instead of using your own people?”
“It wasn’t my idea. Your CEO suggested it, and I agreed. It seems one of the sex offenders that the vigilantes roughed up and scared away was his younger brother.”
Sue looked shocked.
“Martin Anders brother is a sex offender?”
“He’s in the registry, but he’s no sex offender. I looked into it. Years ago, the CEO’s brother was hiking in the woods and had to urinate, and of course, he went. Before he could zip up, a family of four appeared through the trees and saw him. They had a little girl with them and so they overreacted, and yes, technically, the young man had exposed himself in public. Your CEO, Anders, he said he was there and whizzing on another tree. If the family had come from that direction, it might be his name on the sex offenders’ registry.”
“All right, so it was an accident. Why is Anders brother listed as a sex offender?” Sue said.
“According to the officer that investigated the incident, Anders brother angered the judge repeatedly. The kid was outraged at being harassed just because he took a whiz in the woods. I don’t blame him, but he did himself no good when he made the judge angry. The officer told me that the judge was a bastard. He had him arrest the kid and now the young man is in the registry.”
“Do you believe that’s what happened?” Brett said.
“It sounds plausible to me, and the cop I talked to had no reason to lie,” the chief said. “Anyway, Silicon City offered me help and I took it, now it’s up to you two to deliver.”
Sue slapped her husband on the face playfully.
“This big bully here will put on a good show, don’t worry, and I’ll make them think he’s a wife beating beast.”
Chief Ellison smiled.
“That should bring out the vigilantes, and when it does, I’ll move in for the kill.”
CHAPTER 3 – The monster in the closet
The scream woke Tanner and he sat up in bed.
Alexa stirred beside him, as the sound of something heavy falling echoed in the night.
Then came a voice, the voice of Bart McGurn. It was faint given the distance between their homes, but distinct, and he was yelling something about baseball.
Tanner got dressed, as he did so, Alexa put a light on, rose from the bed, and donned a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.
“Oh my God, Tanner. It sounds like he’s killing her. Are you certain that Bart McGurn isn’t what he seems to be?”
Tanner kissed her.
“I’m going to find out. Please stay here and I’ll be back within an hour.”
“An hour? Why so long?”
“I don’t know how long this might take, but if you come looking for me, then the neighbors will know tha
t I left the house.”
Another scream came from the McGurns, but this one was more a cry of pain. Alexa watched as Tanner armed himself.
“You would kill him if he’s hurting her?”
“I’ll likely just give him a taste of what he’s dishing out.”
“Be careful, please?”
“I will.”
Tanner left his house by the side door after disabling the home’s alarm. He was dressed totally in black and wore a night-vision monocular. After activating the monocular, he headed towards the McGurns’ house.
He didn’t get very far before realizing that he was not the only one prowling the night.
There was a figure ahead of him in the Anderson’s yard. It was a lithe figure that moved with the grace of a dancer. When a sound came from behind, Tanner took concealment at the side of a storage shed, and watched, as a second figure moved past him to join the first.
Tanner stayed with them and saw two more figures. The sounds coming from the McGurns had grown quiet, but now there was a new sound. An ambulance was approaching.
The four figures moved towards the front of the home they were at and lowered themselves to the ground behind a short row of bushes. Masked, and dressed in black, they were for all intents, invisible.
Tanner had taken position behind a tree and had a good view of the street. With the ambulance lighting up the night, Tanner had been about to power down the monocular. But then he detected two figures out in the woods.
He couldn’t make out much detail, but they were both wearing uniforms and one of them had a pair of binoculars. The one with the binoculars was clearly female, and a shapely one at that.
Tanner smiled. The four figures in front of him were about to walk into a trap. June McGurn came out of her house whimpering. Her face looked not only bruised, but also bloody. She moved stiffly, and was cradling one arm with the other.
The ambulance attendants ran to meet June, as behind her, Bart McGurn kept saying that his wife fell down the stairs, and that she was always hurting herself.
June was helped into the ambulance for treatment, as Tanner crouched low and moved back towards the rear of the McGurn property. He used the monocular to look for more cops but saw nothing other than two deer and a raccoon moving about in the dark. It looked as if the sting operation was being run with few people.
Tanner removed the monocular and knocked on the home’s rear door. The house was set-up much like his own, with a rear deck and sliding glass doors. His knock was loud enough to be heard inside, but not thunderous enough to carry out to the street where Bart McGurn, or whoever he was, pretended to be a wife beater.
Tanner entered the house after gaining access through the sliding glass doors by picking the lock. He then moved silently through the rooms, while stopping to gather items he figured would come in useful.
There was a Colt Python sitting on the coffee table, as outside, Bart was telling the ambulance driver that he would come to the hospital later. He said he needed his sleep and wasn’t going to stay up all night just because his wife was clumsy.
As McGurn spoke, Tanner removed the bullets from the Colt and took concealment.
The ambulance left a short time later and Bart McGurn came back into the house. After turning off the lights and grabbing his gun, McGurn made a call.
“I guess you watched the show, Chief. Did you see any signs of uninvited guests?”
In his hiding place, Tanner realized that he’d been right about McGurn, and apparently, McGurn was working with Chief Ellison to draw the vigilantes into a trap. McGurn told the chief that he would go up into his bedroom and hide in the closet.
Before doing so, he would arrange the bed to make it look like he was asleep in it. If anyone made a move, McGurn would send a text. Once the message was sent that the vigilantes were in the house, McGurn, along with the chief and the female deputy, would take down the vigilantes.
Tanner was able to move up the stairs without being seen by McGurn. After entering the bedroom, he concealed himself again and waited.
McGurn arrived in the bedroom only a few moments later. As he said he would, he arranged the bedding and pillows so that it appeared that someone was sleeping beneath the covers. He then did something that Tanner thought was a nice touch.
McGurn placed a tape recorder in the bed. It was playing a recording of someone snoring, and it sounded realistic.
With his trap set, McGurn opened the closet door and stepped inside to wait for a visitor. He didn’t realize that he wasn’t alone in the closet until Tanner placed a choke hold on him from behind.
McGurn attempted to struggle free, and then became desperate. He bent his arm and pressed his gun against Tanner’s head. Through the green glow of the monocular, Tanner verified by sight that the gun’s chambers were still empty.
McGurn pulled the trigger and the weapon CLICK, CLICK, CLICK, CLICK, CLICKED uselessly, before dropping from McGurn’s limp hand.
A few moments later, Tanner had McGurn on the bed. The man was gagged, immobile, and deafened by wads of cotton taped in place in his ears. Tanner had taken the cotton balls from McGurn’s medicine cabinet, while the tape came from a kitchen drawer.
The other guests to the party didn’t arrive until after another twenty minutes had passed. After creeping up the stairs and entering the bedroom, they moved towards the figure in the bed. All four of them were holding weighted batons, and there were military grade stun guns in holsters as well.
Before they could strike out at McGurn, Tanner revealed himself by stepping out of the closet and pointing McGurn’s Colt Python at them. This time, the gun was loaded.
“Hello there.”
***
Alexa stayed inside the house but certainly wasn’t going back to sleep. Feeling a bit hungry, she decided to make tea and indulge in a piece of lemon meringue pie.
When Tanner unlocked, and then entered through the sliding deck doors, Alexa gasped when she saw that he wasn’t alone.
“What’s going on?”
Tanner went to her, kissed her, and then gestured at their guests.
“Say hello to the real neighborhood watch group,” Tanner said.
They were the wives of the men on the neighborhood watch, Anna, Louise, Tina, and Josie. Like Tanner, they were dressed in black.
Josie, always the flirt, used a finger to swipe a dap of the pie’s fluffy topping, then licked it off seductively as she stared at Tanner.
“Alexa, I hope you’re willing to share?”
“You’d better be talking about the pie,” Alexa said.
Josie giggled.
“What else?”
CHAPTER 4 – Nice try!
Anna Vitale smiled at the image on her phone.
The picture was coming from a camera in her home and showed her six-month-old daughter sleeping peacefully. There was also sound, and the baby mewled softly once before rubbing her little face in her sleep.
Anna then switched to a different feed, and the image of her snoring husband appeared. Her husband, Bill, was a hairy man. He was sleeping with his mouth hanging open, and a line of drool ran down his chin and onto the pillow.
As Anna checked her house, the other women were doing the same, ensuring that all was well during their absence.
“Don’t your husbands realize that they’re being drugged?” Alexa asked.
Anna looked abashed as she answered.
“We only do it once in a while, when there’s a problem we have to take care of, like tonight.”
“The cops nearly took care of you tonight,” Tanner reminded her.
His neighbors all knew him as Tom Myers. He had told them that his occupation was freelance researcher, but Anna and the other women were giving him curious looks.
“How did you know that the cops were out there in the woods,” Louise Garston asked. She was a blonde with short hair. The hair had been sticking up ever since she removed her ski mask.
Tanner revealed the night-vision monocu
lar and explained what it was.
“All right,” Anna said. “That’s how you saw the police, but how did you know that Bart McGurn was a phony?”
“I didn’t until tonight, but he seemed to be laying it on a little thick, didn’t he? I would think someone new to the neighborhood would dial their true self down, not broadcast what they are.”
Josie smiled.
“I think you’re speaking from experience, Tom.”
Tanner responded to her allegation by asking a question.
“Why have none of your victims identified you all as females?”
The women laughed, then, one by one, they all spoke in what were convincing male voices. Anna also pointed out that they wore dark and baggy clothing to hide their curves.
“All right, but how long have you ladies been acting as masked avengers?”
Tina laughed, she had dark hair and wore it short, as Louise did. Both women had children, but Tanner thought that you couldn’t tell it by their figures, as they were slim, but shapely.
“We’re not masked avengers, Tom, Alexa, we’re just a group of women who are tired of having to worry about our children. There were six known child molesters living in town when we came here, six. We just made sure that they went somewhere else.”
Tanner looked at Josie.
“You don’t have any children; why do you do it?”
“I do it because it’s fun. I’m a big fan of fun, Tom. Don’t you like to have fun?”
“Who doesn’t?” Tanner said.
“Then maybe the two of us can have fun together sometime.”
“Dial it down, Josie,” Anna said. “Look at Alexa, she’s ready to strangle you.”
Josie smirked at Alexa.
“You might be bigger than me, Alexa, but I have more skill. I’m an expert in karate and judo.”
Josie was standing in front of the counter, upon which stood a block of knives. Alexa walked over, grabbed the large carving knife from the block, and told Josie to step back.
Alexa then proceeded to put on a display of immense skill as she moved the knife around in a blur of speed. The blade went behind her back in one hand only to reappear in the other, then under a leg, past her buttocks, and back around to the front.
The TANNER Series - Books 13-15 (Tanner Box Set) Page 29