He had no idea how long he had been staring at the phone, lost in his nightmare of memories, before it suddenly occurred to him that the phone he was holding was a danger to him, a glaring beacon that could easily guide the law, or anyone else looking for clues into Savage’s death, right to him. He was about to toss the phone into the quench bucket when it then occurred to him that not only could the phone be a means to lead people to him, it could also be a means for something else. He hurriedly removed its SIM card and then stuffed it and the phone into his back pants pocket as he walked quickly around to the other side of his father’s car to where the plastic bag full of his bloody clothes, the laptop, the backpack, and the iron-black, blood-covered machete were all laid out on the ground like evidence at a crime scene.
If Killian had had the time, or if he hadn’t been provoked into killing Savage so quickly, he would have gotten the passcode for the phone from the pimp before killing him and he would have now been able to unlock the device and exploit all the valuable near-real-time data it was sure to contain. However, since he failed in obtaining the code, he would have to rely on the notes he took weeks ago during the reconnaissance phase of the mission to help flesh out the plan of action that was beginning to take life in his mind.
He knelt, zipped open the backpack, and, as he began digging through its contents – the tripod, the roll of duct tape, the knives, the sheathed machete, all of which were stained a rusty brown from the pimp’s dried blood – he had to force himself to stay focused on his present objective and not become trapped once again within the prison of last night’s scattered nightmare memories. After finding the blue mission folder, now battered and bloodstained like everything else in the backpack, he flapped it open on the ground, and, while still battling to keep his mind clear of the haunting images, began reading through his hand-written notes.
Whenever Killian began reconnaissance on a newly selected target, he always applied a layered approach to his information gathering, with each layer getting him closer and closer physically to the target. The first layer of reconnaissance always occurred virtually via the internet, which is where, through mostly legal means, the bulk of his information about the target could be gleaned. Through basic search requests and surveilling the major social networking platforms, he could map out a comprehensive diagram of his target’s social profile of friends, family, business associates, learn about his interests, likes and dislikes, and obtain home addresses, business addresses, building blueprints and schematics, tax records, police records, military records, and more. But the most important online information he sought, that information which could throw light upon those nefarious activities for which he wished to hold his target accountable – computer files, phone records, illicit dark web transactions – would almost always have to be acquired by less than legal means.
Even though Killian had a computer science degree from Carnegie Mellon University, he had learned the foundation of his hacking skills mostly on his own through online forums and trial and error; the rest he learned from the advanced training that the navy and the National Security Agency had provided for him. But these days, the aspiring hacker, ethical or otherwise, didn’t necessarily need to have such a deep and sophisticated knowledge of computers, networks, and programming as Killian had. All the tools and knowhow needed to remotely exploit a computer, a program, a network, or even a mobile phone, were being continually developed and made available online by a legion of experienced, ethically-challenged global hackers. All the aspiring hacker needed to take advantage of these tools were the means, and the fortitude, to venture down deep within the grimy bowels of the dark web to find them and put them to use. Of course, one would do well to always remember that the illicit tools the aspiring hacker sought to acquire to exploit others, could just as well be technological lures set to exploit the aspiring hacker.
Fortunately for Killian, he didn’t have to worry about the risks associated with relying on other hackers to build the tools for him, he could build his own. His biggest concern was in maintaining a constant anonymous presence while operating online; to not be tracked while he was out tracking others. To accomplish this most critical aspect of his online reconnaissance operations, Killian accessed the internet using the Tor network, as did a large share of the world’s hackers, child pornographers, sex traffickers, law enforcement agents on the hunt for hackers, child pornographers, and sex traffickers, activists, whistleblowers, dissidents, oppressive governments on the hunt for activists, whistleblowers, and dissidents, as well as many ordinary internet users who simply wanted to maintain their privacy while surfing the web.
Tor, a free software which also included a highly secure web browser, first encrypted and then randomly bounced internet traffic through an open, distributed network of over seven thousand relays run by privacy-advocate volunteers located all over the world, making it very difficult to track internet activity back to the user. Killian took great advantage of the network and, using his extensive hacking skills, built a comprehensive profile of Savage, which included his multiple business operations – the strip club, the drug-running, the prostitution ring, and the trafficking of women and girls – his few primary friends and associates, his many enemies, and his home life.
From going through his notes, Killian eventually focused on two of Savage’s closest associates – Terrence Reeks and Lars Blackman. Reeks, born February 8, 1990, was a Philadelphia native who went by the handle T-Rex, and was Savage’s step-nephew. In addition to being club bouncer and Savage’s personal bodyguard, Reeks was in the process of taking over the day-to-day management of Savage’s stable of prostitutes. Blackman, born June 12, 1979, was a Baltimore native and former Baltimore City police officer who had to leave the force after falling under suspicion of being on the payroll of several of the city’s drug gangs.
Identified publicly as the Fantasy Plus security manager, Killian knew from his hacks into the club’s computer network that Blackman was involved in more than just security. It appeared by his internet activities, or at least by the strict protocols he maintained to keep his internet activities hidden, that Blackman was providing much more than security services for Savage. Killian had his suspicions at the time that Blackman was more than likely Savage’s point man in setting up and securing the movement of Savage’s drugs and women. But even if Killian had found that his suspicions about Blackman were true, the security manager was doing his dirty work on behalf of Savage, the primary target, so Killian hadn’t concerned himself any further with Blackman at the time. Killian closed the folder and returned it to the backpack. He then stood up and stretched, thinking that it was now time he concerned himself with the former disgraced cop.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Lars Blackman stood at the large window in his dead boss’s office looking out upon a dark, empty, and very quiet club. He liked the club better when it was like this, calm, peaceful, devoid of the animal-like atmosphere and the incessant tribal-like music. But a quiet club meant a quiet cash flow, so Blackman was strategizing hard how to, with Savage now dead, resume club operations as quickly as possible so he could get that cash flow making some noise again and continue quietly skimming his take from the top of it. Unfortunately, he had serious impediments to overcome first.
“Look, you cracker mother fucker. I ain’t gonna ask you again. You Hollywood’s security. How the fuck you gonna let someone get into his own mother fuckin’ house and do him like that?” T-Rex demanded.
Blackman turned around to face Savage’s only surviving next of kin, who was now sitting at Savage’s desk.
“Look, Terrence, I understand you’re grieving and want answers about your uncle’s murder. So do I. But there’s a lot you don’t know about the relationship between your uncle and me or how he operated the club.”
“What’s this we bullshit? There ain’t no mother fucking we operating this club,” T-Rex said, standing up so he could look directly into Blackman’s eyes. “I always told Hollywood you
was no good to have around.”
Blackman saw in T-Rex’s glaring eyes the hate the young man had for him. “Look, Terrence. It’s no secret you’ve always despised me and my relationship with your uncle, but—”
“Stop calling him my uncle like you trying to remind me of my place, mother fucker,” T-Rex said.
Blackman nodded his head to acknowledge T-Rex’s point. “All I’m trying to say, Terrence… T-Rex, is that despite your feelings for me, Mr. Savage and I worked very well together. We always have, even when I was still on the force. There never was any question who the boss was. The man was both respected and feared all throughout the city, and by me as well. But he also understood that I had certain connections and talents that could help him establish himself even further. We worked well together and we prospered together because of it.”
“Ain’t this a bitch, you all up in here acting like you’re some kind of white mother fuckin’ savior. Shit, Thug Killa was killing it without your white ass and you actin’ like he was nothing but a piece of shit before you came along.”
Blackman shook his head from the hopelessness of the situation and walked toward the door.
“Where the fuck you going?” T-Rex demanded.
Blackman stopped at the door and turned back around, not bothering to hide his impatience with the heir apparent. “To my office,” he said. “I have work to do. Perhaps after you calm down we can discuss what we need to do to get this club running again.”
T-Rex took an intimidating step toward Blackman. “Again with the mother fucking we,” he said through clenched, golden-capped teeth. “From now on, there is no we around here. There’s only me. You feel me, mother fucker?”
“I have no illusions that I could run this club on my own, T-Rex.” Blackman said calmly. “Just as I’m sure, once you understand all that’s involved in its operation, you will have no illusions that you could run it on your own either. Of that I’m sure. Hopefully, you’ll come to that understanding in time for us to figure out how we can best work together so we can get this club back open as soon as possible.” He left Savage’s office and walked up the hall toward his own.
T-Rex rushed to the door and hollered at Blackman walking away from him, “Oh, this club will be opening back up tomorrow, mother fucker. But it’s gonna be opening back up without your ugly white ass, that’s for damn sure.” He took several steps out into the hallway after Blackman entered his office. “And I tell you what, you punk ass bitch, without Hollywood here to protect you, after tonight you even think about stepping foot into this club again, you better come strapped because that’s the only way you’ll have any chance of getting out of here alive.”
Blackman closed and locked the door to his office and walked over to the filing cabinet that stood in the corner of the room behind his desk. He pulled up a ring of keys that were attached to a belt loop by a retractable reel and flipped through them until he found the key to unlock the cabinet. He pulled his chair over from the desk and sat down and opened the cabinet’s bottom drawer. Inside was a top opening drawer safe that was custom-made to fit within the entirety of the drawer. He placed his right index finger on the lock’s biometric reader and the top unlocked without a sound and opened automatically on silent, hydraulic hinges. He did a quick sight inventory of its contents. There were three vacuum-sealed ten-thousand-dollar stacks of hundred-dollar bills, the leather case that concealed his drug kit, the same kit he used for Toni Steele’s first high, and a small brown package of heroin, his passport, his .40-caliber Glock 22 pistol, a sidearm he had been relying on exclusively since his days as a Baltimore beat cop, three boxes with twenty rounds per box of Cor-Bon DPX .40 S&W solid copper hollow point bullets, three, fifteen-round magazines, and a brown leather executive portfolio. He took the portfolio from the safe and wheeled himself over to his desk.
He zipped the portfolio open and began searching through the many documents that it held until he found the one he was looking for. It was the form that legally declared him as the sole proprietor of Fantasy Plus. As a convicted felon, Savage didn’t exactly have the stellar financial foundation that banks looked for when determining whom to loan to. Blackman assuming all legal responsibilities for the establishment was a favor to Savage, one that only he, Savage, and the bank were aware of. Had it gotten out that Blackman was the owner, it would have been suicide, both in a business sense as well as a physical sense, for both he and Savage. He scanned the other like forms that declared him proprietor of Savage’s coin-operated laundromats located throughout the city. The laundromats, in addition to the strip club, while providing modest revenues, were primarily used as legal fronts to launder all the hard cash dirty money, the real source of their income, that came in through narcotics and sex trafficking.
Blackman felt no pleasure from the ownership the documents afforded him. In fact, without Savage to lord over the businesses, it could be very dangerous for him now if it were to become known that he, a white man and former police officer, was the owner. The only way he could continue the operation of the club and all the other enterprises as it had been was if he were to find someone to step in and take the place of Savage. Someone equally feared and respected, as well as equally understanding of the game. Terrence, Savage’s nephew, was the logical choice. He understood the game and was just as complicit as Savage and Blackman were. But he was young and an inexperienced leader. In fact, he was even an inexperienced soldier, having had arrived at his high rank through nepotism, not through any significant thug deeds out on the street. Blackman wasn’t convinced that the nephew was the right man to take over Savage’s dynasty; but unfortunately, as things stood, he was the only choice.
He returned the papers to the portfolio and leaned back in his chair. His head ached, and he was hungry. He pulled out his phone and opened up the geo-location app. Not only did he have Savage’s mess to clean up, he also had to worry about New Orleans and whether the team that was sent to receive Toni had been able to track her down after he had given them her locator ID. A map of the United States popped up on the phone’s screen. He entered the locator ID into the input form and the map view instantly began zooming down as the satellite located and began tracking the beacon that had been implanted beneath Toni’s right breast. When it had locked onto her location, a blip started blinking somewhere over Georgia. Blackman could only hope that Toni had been captured and was now being transported down to New Orleans. He tapped on the application’s menu and a list of previously entered locator IDs slid out. He selected the ID for Ruby Black. The map once again went through its maneuvers until it locked onto a location somewhere in the waters off the coast of Louisiana. He stared at the blinking red blip, wondering what Ruby was doing out there on the water. Probably providing her expert services while cruising on some luxurious yacht, he surmised. But then he wondered, what if she was dead and her body had been dumped out in the Gulf? Would the satellite still have been able to track the beacon under water?
He was sitting there mulling over the fate of his daughters when he heard a commotion coming from Savage’s office. It wasn’t much of a commotion, but enough of one to make him consider his weapon. He wheeled back to the safe and quietly loaded one of the magazines into the pistol and then wheeled back to his desk with it. There were more troubling noises from the office, and then he thought he had heard a brief, muffled conversation. It went silent for a moment until he heard lumbering footsteps coming up the hall toward his office.
Blackman chambered a round. “T-Rex?” he hollered out. There was no response. Just as he was about to stand up, the door to his office was busted open and T-Rex came stumbling in.
“Jesus Christ, Terrence. What the fuck—”
From behind T-Rex’s massive body, Killian stepped out and, using the gun he had wrestled away from T-Rex, fired a round into Blackman’s right thigh. He then ducked back behind T-Rex for cover. Blackman fired off a round just as he was struck in the leg. His bullet tore through T-Rex’s neck. Killian strug
gled to keep the large man on his feet and use him as his cover, but he couldn’t hold him up and T-Rex crumbled to the floor. Killian dove to his right, barely escaping the flurry of Blackman’s bullets. When he hit the floor, he rolled and, from his back, fired off a round right into Blackman’s shooting hand.
Blackman fell back into his chair in agony. When he saw his gun on the floor under the desk, he started to make a move for it, but Killian, now standing, struck out with a powerful front kick directly to Blackman’s right temple that sent the dirty cop sprawling to the floor away from the gun. With a gloved hand, Killian quickly grabbed the gun from under the desk and tucked it into the back of his pants.
Blackman was dazed, but he managed to get himself up on a knee. “What the fuck is this bullshit, you crazy mother fucker,” he said.
Killian didn’t answer; he just kept his gun targeted on Blackman’s head as he carefully walked backwards to where T-Rex was laying bloody on the floor. It was obvious by the large exit wound out the back of his neck that he was no longer among the living. Killian seemed to relax some as he directed his attention back to Blackman.
“I don’t want to kill you, but if you don’t cooperate with me or if I think you’re lying, I won’t hesitate to put a bullet right between your eyes,” Killian said quietly.
Blackman took in a deep breath and then nodded.
“I’m here for the woman, Toni Steele. Where is she?” Killian said.
It was as Blackman suspected. New Orleans. Despite the GPS location system, they weren’t able to recover her. “I... apologize,” Blackman said through the pain. “I was the one who was supposed to bring her to the meet. But...”
“But what?” Killian demanded. “Where is she?” He kicked Blackman’s chair over to him.
The Good Kill Page 26