by Mike Gomes
Turning the knob to the back door, it clicked and opened. Suddenly, the sound of aggressive barking from the side of the house started to build, and Falau turned to see the Rottweilers staring at him from the far corner. They broke into a charge in unison, and looked far larger from this close up, maybe a hundred-and-ten-pounds each. Their teeth were exposed and their jowls flapping as they ran, it was pure muscle in motion, like a great sprinter or speed skater.
Falau slid in the door and shut it as fast and quietly as he could. The dogs banged against the door and jumped up at the window, barking and scrapping with one another. Falau dropped low and pulled himself next to a table in case someone came to investigate the noise.
After a few minutes of silence, he heard the dogs break off into another run, their attention diverted elsewhere by some blowing leaves or a skunk.
Standing, he moved gently to the side of the room, assessing everything he saw in front of him. The room was the size of a restaurant kitchen and set up much the same. A line for cooking sat along the wall, with stoves, microwaves, skillets, deep fryers and a grilling station. Further away a pastry section was set up around refrigerators and a walk-in freezer. Directly in front of him was a meat preparation section, most likely where the man from Permoski’s Fine Meats did his job. A man of Mr. Wise’s wealth could afford to have the butcher come to his home each day and cut select meats for his meals, all at a premium of course.
On the wall was an old fashion dumbwaiter with an electronic keyboard. Falau moved in closer to inspect it. He could see there were four floors to the house, including the one he was on. An intercom was embedded into the wall next to the dumbwaiter, assuring that the meal would never sit too long and falling below proper temperature.
The table of the meat carving section held various tools in an oversized butcher’s block. Falau ran his hand over it, taking out the cleaver. Spinning it in his hand he could feel the balance was off, its weight drifting to the head too much. He placed it back in the block and pulled out a six-inch flaying knife, quickly placing that back into the block too. Letting his hands wrap wound the series of knives he eventually pulled out a long thick butcher’s knife. He swung it in his hand and flipped the blade into the air, grabbing the handle before it hit the metal table. It was perfect. If he did end up in a fight the knife would not give away his position the way a gun would.
The steps from the upper levels dropped down directly behind him without walls to conceal them, so Falau was sure nobody was there. He ascended them as slow and silently as possible, holding the knife to his side. The door at the top was ajar and no lights were on in what Falau assumed was the home’s show kitchen. He made out the tile floor; nothing that would be homey enough for a dining room.
He crouched down, opening the door just enough to slip through into the kitchen. He waited, expecting a guard to come charging at him. He’d been exposed far too long on the outside of the house and he was sure there were also cameras inside the house too. But still nothing came.
Falau stood up and saw a hallway just to his side. Pressing his cheek against the corner of the doorway, he looked down exposing as little of himself as possible. He only saw the front door, large and ornate, a double-door that stood ten-feet tall and led into a great foyer with a double staircase like in an old-fashioned movie.
Keeping to the wall the big man slid along toward the front door, all the while keeping his eyes back where he had come from. The foyer was adorned with a large chandelier that hung above the point where the two staircases met. Falau half expected a princess to come walking down at any moment.
The faint sound of music drifted down the steps. It was definite, but too far away to make out the words or the song. Someone was definitely home.
Brandishing the knife in front of him, Falau reached the top of the steps and heard the music getting louder. Death metal, the coarse and ripping guitars and pounding tempo now evident. The singer sang indistinguishable words with his mouth far too close to the microphone to let anyone know what he wanted to say.
Following the music the big man moved to the right, the volume increasing with every step. Reaching the corner he took a peek around and saw a slightly open door with a sliver of light pouring through the gap. Falau thought the music spilling from the opening seemed out of place in a traditional home like this one.
Inching his way closer Falau felt sweat start to build on his neck and hands. The knife was slipping in his hands, and he used the back of his coat to wipe the sweat from dripping down into his eyes. His chest rose and fell in rapid succession as his heart rate rose as his hand reached out to slide open the door.
The music hit him hard as the door fully opened, preventing him from hearing anything other than the grunts and wails of the singer and the shredding guitar riffs.
Falau’s eyes squinted against the harsh light. Disoriented, he narrowed his eyes for a better field of vision.
When he finally focused, the hand holding the knife fell to his side. There was a man lying on the bed with blood coming from his mouth, his body not moving.
Falau immediately recognizes the man as Mr. Wise.
Chapter 35
The screeching sound of metal wheels moving fast along a track overcame the sound of the music, but the horrific sound came to a halt with a crashing din of metal vibrating after a sudden stop. The sound came from behind Falau, who took a moment to register it amid the roar of the death metal.
Turning his head behind him and looking out into the hall he saw a young man vaulting himself out of the dumbwaiter on the opposite side. His feet hit the ground, and he was leaping at his target before he could fully turn around.
Caught off guard, Falau felt the full brunt of Calvin driving into him. The young man rammed his shoulder into Falau’s upper rib cage, driving him to the ground. The knife slipped from his hands as his head bounced off the floor.
“Ahhhh!” Calvin screamed, reaching for the knife and picking it up in a flash. Turning back to Falau he swung the knife down and sunk it deep into his right shoulder.
“Noooooo!” screamed Falau, feeling the knife cut far into his bone and muscle. Immediately his shirt stained red, spreading from the wound and rapidly expanding.
“Who are you?” shouted Calvin, projecting his voice over the loud music. His hand tightened around the knife and he turned it back and forth, twisting it and chewing up the muscle and tissue inside.
Falau’s eyes rolled into his head from the excruciating pain that shot down his arm and across his chest with every small twist of the blade.
Looking up into the killer’s face for the first time Falau saw nothing. No gritted teeth, no savagery. He was stone cold, and more than anything appeared apathetic. Falau felt a shiver at the contradiction between what Calvin’s body was doing and what his face was showing. It was as if there were two people inside him.
“Answer me,” squawked Calvin, yanking the knife from deep inside Falau’s shoulder. Raising his hand again the glint of the knife shone beneath the light projecting in the room. He was about to drive it down again, giving Falau just enough time to roll away from the killer. With a sharply placed kick his boot hit the hand wielding the knife, sending it flying across the room.
With pain searing through him from the wound, Falau pulled himself away from the killer, putting distance between them.
Calvin jumped to his feet and charged the big man, only to be met with the heel of a boot driven with force into his knee and causing it to hyper-extend backward. Trying to put weight on the knee made it collapse, giving Falau the chance to regain his feet.
Falau scanned the room for the knife, not knowing the direction it had flown. Taking a step deeper into the room he got a clear look at the young man’s father lying dead on the bed. His face had started turning blue and his lips had taken on a purplish hue.
A fist slammed into Falau’s back in the location of his kidney, and he gasped for air, dropping to his knees. A hand reached over his shoulder, grippin
g him by the knife wound and pulling him back. Falau thrashed to get away but the pain was too intense. His head bounced off the hardwood floor, fuzzing his vision for just a moment.
He shook the cobwebs from his mind and turned himself over onto his knees and then back to the center of the room.
Calvin was advancing with the knife in his hand. It had fallen under the desk with the pictures of all the women whose lives he’d stolen.
He was upon Falau in an instant, lunging at him with his knife only to be met with a clean block by Falau, who used both hands to guide the knife aside. Falau gripped tight to the young man’s fingers and bent them back, feeling them breaking one by one as the knife dropped to the floor. Falau kicked it, sending it sliding across the floor.
Calvin’s face turned red with anger and frustration. He pulled back and butted his forehead as hard as he could into Falau’s nose, breaking it instantly and causing the big man to let go.
Falau’s eyes filled with water and a wave of nausea overcame him. Buckling over in pain, another kick landed squarely in his midsection to drive the breath from his lungs.
Senses on high-alert, Falau heard Calvin’s feet rushing across the floor towards the knife. Then they stopped and he could hear a chair being slid across the floor. Wiping the tears from his eyes he focused to see the killer picking up the knife and turning to face him.
Falau reached back, pulling the 9mm from its spot on his lower back and aimed it directly at Calvin Wise, who froze.
The two stared at one another as the thumping music blared on, deeply out of place in the room of the so-called all-American boy.
Falau cautiously pulled himself to his feet, not taking his eyes off the target. Center mass was where he was aiming.
A laugh bubbled out of Calvin as he stared down the barrel of the 9mm. He looked to the desk and then back at Falau. Raising the hand with the knife he reached with the other for a remote control that sat on the corner. Hitting the button the music stopped, leaving an eerie silence to fill the air.
“You don’t have the balls to shoot me,” said Calvin taking a small step forward. “If you did I would be dead by now. Killers don’t hesitate. They just do what they need to do. Who are you?”
Falau stood in silence holding the Ruger tight in his hands. Blood still flowed from his knife wound and needed to be packed before he lost much more of the life-giving fluid.
“Look what I did to my dad. It was fun. I saved him. I have saved a lot of evil people from evil things. I delivered them to God.”
He took another step closer, smiling, a dead look in his eyes, and motioning to the sides in response to things that were not there.
“You’re going to be saved tonight. I will save you. It will feel good. Trust me.”
Looking to the knife in his hands, a giggle erupted from the man with the lifeless eyes. His hand dismissively flipped the knife aside, it coming to rest on the bed next to his father’s corpse.
“I don’t need that. You’re going to come along willingly. I bet you’re going to feel good. That moment when your life stops. It will be everything you have ever thought it could be,” said Calvin, now sounding more like a preacher than a killer. “I wonder what your last expression will be? Maybe fear, maybe terror? Acceptance? No matter what, I will be there looking into your eyes and sharing the moment with you.”
The killer moved forward again cutting the space to five feet. The barrel of the 9mm started to tremble in unison with the big man’s fear. If he were to shoot Calvin he would need to do it while looking into his eyes. It would have to be cold-hearted and calculated. A simple decision to end the man’s life. Falau didn’t know if he could do it.
“You’re afraid. I can see it on your face and your shaking hand. You’re no killer.”
Falau felt a sense of happiness being told he was no killer. If felt good to have those words enter his head after all the times the flashbacks had told him differently.
Stopping a foot away from Falau, the killer held his hands out to the side, tilting his head back and taking a deep breath. “You won’t kill me. You can’t kill me. It’s not in your nature.”
The madman lowered his head and let his hands drop down by his sides. He looked down at the gun in Falau’s hands and smiled. “Do you think you could kill me with that little gun? You’d be lucky to pierce my skin with that. What is it, a 9mm? My grandmother used to carry one of those.”
A look of defeat washed over Falau’s face, much to Calvin’s delight. He pointed the barrel of the gun up to the ceiling and brought it close to his face. His eyes inspected it and its small size. Maybe Calvin was right, and this gun would not do the job, despite Tyler’s special bullets and the history of the gun itself.
Without hesitation Falau’s right hand holding the Ruger SR9C struck out, cracking Calvin across the bridge of the nose with the handle of the gun. Calvin dropped to his knees and reached up to hold his nose, that now dripped blood over his shirt and the floor.
Grabbing the killer by the hair, Falau felt the pain shoot through his wound, but he refused to let go. His right-hand pistol-whipped the man several times, spraying more blood over himself and the room.
Letting go of the hair a few chunks remained in his hand, ripped from the scalp during the beating. Calvin fell to the floor in a hefty lump, unconscious.
Looking down at the bloody mess, Falau held the gun in front of him as it dripped with the blood of Calvin Wise.
“Nine millimeters is more than enough!”
Chapter 36
Reaching down to his plain white tube sock Falau stretched the elastic and dug his hand deep inside, emerging with six thick zip-ties made of hard plastic. Their tensile strength far exceeded anything a man could break through with sheer force, and Calvin Wise was certainly not the kind of man who had any of the skills required to slip them once they were on.
Falau’s hands worked quickly over the young man’s body, placing a zip-tie around each leg and pulling tight. He added a third in the middle, leaving no room for movement. The same procedure was followed with his hands, which were positioned behind his back.
Yanking hard on the middle zip-tie, a moan rumbled up from the bloody face of the killer.
“What are you going to do to me?” he spat, drops of blood flowing from the corner of his mouth. His face lay flush against the hardwood floor and he struggled to lift it. “Who are you?”
Falau ignored the man and kept moving, still unaware if there were any guards left in the house. The clock was ticking and it was time to move before they went on their rounds of the house.
Gathering the pictures and trinket prizes on the desk, Falau folded them with little care and stuffed them into his pocket. Pulling the desk draws open, he rummaged through them but found nothing more of interest.
The laptop sat on the desk. The evidence inside would be more than enough to help the judges make their decision, but it would be cumbersome while trying to move Calvin out of the house. Leaving it behind seemed more prudent.
“Why are you going through my things? Who the hell are you?” Calvin demanded, pulling himself upright and raising his voice. “Don’t you know who I am? I am Calvin Wise. Answer me!”
The killer’s shouting was now a risk.
Falau ran to the adjoining bathroom and pulled open the closet and the medicine cabinet, sifting through the contents. Returning to the killer Falau held his fist tight, looking down at the young man.
“I’m going to blame you for the killing,” Calvin said. “I came in and found you’d killed my dad and then we fought. Who are they going to believe, me or you? Go ahead, bring me to the cops. I’m fine with that.”
Smirking and shaking his head at the killer, Falau took a deep breath. With the speed of a cobra his right leg kicked out in a karate style kick, landing directly on Calvin’s nose and causing him to scream out in agony.
Falau raised his fist and, putting his whole body weight into the punch, landed squarely on Calvin’s chin and re
ndering him immediately unconscious. Pain shot through Falau’s shoulder, but he was now running on adrenalin and ignored his own injury.
“Thought he would never shut up,” mumbled the big man to himself as he opened his left hand to reveal a needle and thread. “Everyone should keep duct tape around. You didn’t.”
Falau fed the thread through the eye of the needled and tied it off. Rolling Calvin onto his back Falau pushed his lips together with one hand as he poked the needle through the skin behind his lips where it was more durable. Working in a methodical fashion Falau’s skill at sewing left much to be desired. The thread veered left and right, horribly uneven, but finally he pulled the thread tight, and smirked as Calvin’s lips pursed closed as if he was waiting for a kiss.
Dragging the killer into the hallway Falau stuffed his limp body into the dumbwaiter and programed it for the first floor where the cooking area was.
He ran down the steps, foregoing any thought of keeping himself covered. It was now time to go all out and make a break for the fence with his target secured.
Reaching the bottom floor Falau saw no response of any kind. He went to the dumbwaiter and opened the door, standing to the side. There sat Calvin, still unconscious in a crumpled heap.
Falau dragged his body and threw it into the back of the meat delivery truck. He smiled at the irony.
Stepping back into the kitchen he saw several towels lined up for the next day’s work. He grabbed them and pushed one beneath his shirt to help stem the blood flowing from the knife wound in his shoulder.
Entering the van Falau kicked hard, breaking off the steering column and exposing the wires, allowing him to hotwire the car quickly and efficiently.
The car sprang to life and he put it into reverse, edging back, and then putting it into drive.
The small road was only a few hundred yards from the gate on the rear side of the property. Another road led to the main street up from the lake. The big man pushed hard down on the gas, bracing himself for the massive impact that the gate would have on the vehicle.