by James Hunt
Cooper paused before entering the store. She gritted her teeth and pulled the Taser from her belt, drew in a breath, and felt the steady rush of adrenaline flood her veins. The first step inside didn’t trigger either the clerk or the guard. But on the second step, she watched the clerk’s eyes fall to the Taser, and his right arm jerked for the shotgun.
Years of firearms training and practice kicked in, and the adrenaline rush only sharpened Cooper’s senses as she squeezed the Taser’s trigger and the metal prongs latched into the clerk’s skin, sending tens of thousands of volts through his body as he hit the floor.
With the clerk neutralized, Cooper ejected the cartridge and aimed toward the guard, his hand around the grip of his 9mm pistol. A half second too slow, Cooper was forced to jump left into one of the aisles for cover. Gunshots erupted and chip bags and candy wrappers exploded, raining snacks and chocolate over Cooper’s head as she crawled to the back of the aisle.
“You dumb bitch!” The guard stopped shooting, and Cooper heard him on the other end of the aisle. “Don’t you know whose place this is?”
Cooper peered around the aisle’s corner and caught a glimpse of the guard’s right leg, but the distance between her and the target was too long for an accurate shot. She picked up a can of beans and threw it over the aisle that separated her from the guard. The goon turned at the sound of the can landing, and in the same instant Cooper sprinted down the opposite side.
When she turned the corner, Cooper discharged the second Taser cartridge. She quickly darted behind the counter to check on the clerk, who was unconscious. Cooper bound his wrists, ankles, and mouth with duct tape and did the same to the guard, pulling both their bodies behind the counter. She picked up the shotgun and crunched over the exploded chip bags and candy wrappers. She aimed the twelve gauge at the door and fired, blasting the lock to pieces along with a chunk of the door frame.
The moment she squeezed the trigger, the workers inside opened fire, turning the door and wall into Swiss cheese and forcing her back into the cover of the aisles. When they were done, Cooper slowly crept back to the door, shotgun still in hand.
“You should leave, now!” The voice was faint, though Cooper wasn’t sure if that was because of the loss of hearing from the gunfire or if the back room was larger than she’d anticipated. “This is Quentin Farnes’s money.”
Cooper slowly reached for the door handle, keeping the shotgun aimed inside. She paused and listened for a second longer, then kicked the door in, the remaining pieces of the frame splintering apart. She processed the scene inside in less than a second. In one sweeping motion, she located all three shooters before they managed to squeeze off a single round.
Bullets ricocheted off the floor and walls, and Cooper dove behind a filing cabinet in the corner. She waited until she heard the click of firing pins to jump from the safety of cover, aiming for the worker on the far left, and fired close enough to scare him without killing him. After that, the other two quickly laid down their weapons, shoving their hands into the air as they kicked their pistols toward her across the concrete. “Look, we don’t want any trouble, all right?”
Cooper kept the shotgun aimed between the three of them, each man more accountant than body guard. Cash covered the tables, and what had fallen to the floor was more than she could ever hope to accumulate from her annual salary as a detective in her lifetime. Giant bins were overflowing with stacks of more money than she’d ever seen. “Bag it up. All of it.”
The second man, balding with thick coke-bottle glasses, lowered his hands. “You won’t be able to escape with all of this.”
Cooper squeezed the trigger and fired the shotgun into one of the bins, which sent the bills flying into the air, cash raining on all of them. “That should make it easier.”
The goons exchanged a look and reluctantly complied with her request, dumping all of the cash into sacks that they piled into an old laundry cart. Once they were done, Cooper tied the three of them up and checked the time, knowing the cops wouldn’t be far behind.
“Wait,” one of the goons said. “I know you. You’re that cop that shot Johnny Farnes! What the fuck are you doing here?” Cooper ignored him, and he just shook his head. “Damn, you are some special kind of stupid, aren’t you, bitch?”
Cooper punched him in the nose and felt the crunch of cartilage and splash of blood as the goon’s head was flung backward. He landed on his side, wailing in pain. “I could say the same for you.” She grabbed another one by the collar and pulled him close. “When your boss comes, tell him that if he doesn’t want more of his money gone, then he should change his business model.” She removed McKaffee’s cell phone from her pocket and tossed it into his lap. “Tell him I’ll be in touch.”
Cooper shoved the cartful of money past the guard and clerk still bound behind the counter and grabbed two bottles of lighter fluid off the shelf on her way outside. She shoved the money bin into the alleyway and emptied one of the bottles over it. She struck a match and tossed it onto the pile. Flames took light instantly and danced high into the sky. Her eyes glowed and reflected the fire as she felt the intensity of the heat.
Sirens wailed in the distance, and Cooper returned to McKaffee’s sedan. She started the engine for him but kept his hands taped to the steering wheel. When she ripped the tape off his mouth, he screamed and floored the accelerator. He stared at the flames climbing higher into the sky when they passed the alley. “Are you fucking insane?! I thought you were going to use the cash as a bargaining chip! Do you know what you’ve done?”
Cooper glanced back at the glow of the fire that lit up the night. “Yeah. I’m getting his attention.”
***
Cooper remained hidden in the shadows outside the bar. McKaffee was parked two blocks down, tucked away out of sight. The neon signs of refulgent pinks and blues glowed in the windows, and what patrons had lingered after last call were thrust from the establishment earlier than they would have liked and stumbled drunkenly into the streets.
The early closing hour was no doubt due to Cooper’s escapades at the convenience store, and if the news had reached here, then the remaining locations would have been notified as well. With the shotgun still in hand, Cooper shouldered the twelve gauge and pulled one of the flash grenades from her belt. She cautiously approached the rear of the building, keeping quiet and listening to the arguments inside.
Windows lined the top of the wall just below the roof, and when she reached the paint of glass that rested right above the back door, she aimed the shotgun and squeezed the trigger. Shouts echoed from inside, and Cooper pulled the pin on the grenade and chucked it through the broken window. The loud pop rumbled through the walls, and Cooper blasted another slug into the door’s lock as she burst inside.
Four men rolled on the floor, squinting and cradling their heads, all of them defenseless, their weapons cast aside on the dirtied bar floor. Cooper kicked the rifles away into the corner and picked up the smaller handguns, tucking them into her belt. She flipped her shotgun around and used the butt to crack the foreheads of the first two men, still dazed on the ground, which knocked them unconscious.
The third man stumbled to his feet before Cooper could strike and unsheathed a knife. He slashed wildly, cutting the air between the two of them as Cooper jerked backward. The Taser didn’t have any charges left in it, but she gripped the shotgun like a baseball bat and cracked it against the goon’s hand. He screamed. The knife clanked to the floor. He charged Cooper, barreling head first, but Cooper swung the shotgun like a golf club and knocked the guard square on the chin.
The crack from the contact between metal and bone thundered and left the guard motionless on the floor. The fourth man flung one of the tables over and crawled behind it. He removed a pistol from his ankle holster and fired wildly in nearly every direction, still blind from the flash grenade.
Bullets splintered the wood floors and barstools, shattered beer and whiskey glasses. Cooper reciprocated the gunman’s m
ove and flipped one of the tables over for cover, reloading the shotgun. A lull in the gunfire offered Cooper retaliation and one squeeze of the trigger sent metal balls through the flimsy wooden table with ease. The gunman scrambled from cover, leaving the pistol, and stumbled blindly into another table, where he collapsed on his stomach. Cooper sprinted from behind him and smacked the butt of her rifle against the back of his skull, his face bouncing off the table as his body went limp.
Smoke wafted from the tip of the shotgun’s barrel, and Cooper wiped away the drop of sweat clinging to the tip of her nose. She reached for the duct tape on her belt and saw that it was nearly gone. With all four assailants on the floor knocked out cold, she limped toward the back room, the burn in her calf suddenly returning.
When Cooper examined her pant leg, she saw blood had soaked through both the bandage and the cloth of her pants. She grimaced and pushed her way into the back of the bar, where the rest of Quentin Farnes’s money was, and piled everything into the biggest bins she could find.
After scraping the last few bills into the pile, Cooper carried them out into the alleyway, past the still-unconscious bodies on the floor. With the rest of the lighter fluid she’d stolen from the store, she soaked the cash and tossed another match that set the entire bin aflame. Stacks of twenties, fifties, and hundreds popped and crinkled in the fire. The colors of the flames shifted, turning the green bills a charcoal black. Cooper tossed the empty lighter fluid bottle in with the rest of the burning cash and started her way back to the car.
A gunshot thundered in the alleyway and Cooper watched the ricochet of the bullet spark against the brick of the building to her right. The rest was instinct. She reached for her revolver, positioning her grip on the handle as she turned, her motions fluid and natural despite the fatigue and injuries. Training took over, and Cooper squeezed the trigger. The bullet entered the man’s chest, and he collapsed to the pavement.
Through the crackling of the fire, Cooper heard the man’s last dying moans. She lowered her gun and found herself drawn to his pain. He wallowed in a puddle of runoff water, blood mixing with the fluid on his back and some dripping from the corner of his mouth. “You’re dead, Cooper. You know that? Fucking dead.”
At first she didn’t recognize him. The chaos of her entrance had not allowed her mind the time to process anyone’s face. But in the light of the fire from the burning cash, she saw him perfectly clearly. “You picked the wrong side, Hall.” Unsure of why, she felt her arm aim the pistol at his head, her finger pressing against the curve of the trigger. “Does Diaz know about this?”
Detective Hall coughed up blood, choking and laughing to himself. “Yeah. He knows. He keeps telling me it’ll get me killed. I guess the fucking asshole was right.” He narrowed his eyes, squinting up at her, the last bits of life drifting away. “Unlike you, he didn’t give me up to anyone. He was my partner and he stayed my partner. No matter what. They have a special place in hell for people like you.” He spat a wad of blood at her feet, and the last bit of strength in his neck disappeared as his head smacked against the pavement.
The whisper in the back of Cooper’s mind had grown to a roar. She was an outlaw. Wanted for murder. Her family was gone, her partner had betrayed her, and she was alone. She didn’t have to abide by the laws anymore. She was free. She could offer her own brand of justice.
“You don’t even have the balls to do it, do you?” Hall spit up more blood. “I’m already dead, Cooper. Go on. Finish the j—”
Smoke drifted from the tip of the revolver, and the bang of the gunshot lingered in Cooper’s ears. The bullet sliced right through his head, freezing the features of his face to the last breath of life he drew. Cooper tucked the revolver into her waistband and left Hall’s corpse to rot until morning or until the cops arrived.
Ash from the burning bills drifted from the sky and fell softly on Cooper’s shoulders, slowly covering her in a haze of grey. There were no longer any blurred lines. She saw everything clearly and understood what it would take, what she would have to become. The scales of justice had been torn down, and in their place she would erect the guillotine.
Chapter 8
The motel room was old. The carpet reeked of a musty smell that permeated the walls, the towels in the bathroom, and the sheets on the bed. Stains from god knows what covered the floor like the misshapen spots of a cow, and the wallpaper bubbled over the walls. It was a dump. But a dump that didn’t ask any questions and didn’t mind accepting cash without verification of identity.
Beneath a cluster of empty water bottles and discarded chip bags that Cooper had purchased with what was left of McKaffee’s cash was a map of the city with five locations circled in black marker. Four of them had been crossed out. Six bullets were stacked on the table, and the chamber of the empty revolver spun, the mechanical click of the device revving in speed with every flick of her thumb, then slowly losing momentum before another flick sent it spinning. But the rhythmic cadence of the revolver chamber waned in and out between the sounds of the television in the hotel room as the news stations reported Cooper’s antics from the night before.
“Bound, gagged, and beaten, employees at a local convenience store in south Baltimore say a woman, who was later identified as former Baltimore Police Detective Adila Cooper, went on a rampage through the store but didn’t take any money.” The news anchor turned to another camera, a second picture plastered on the screen of the bar she’d attacked. “And it seems that one rampage wasn’t enough. It wasn’t but minutes later that Mrs. Cooper traveled a few more blocks in the area and set her sights on a small bar, where one man was found dead in the alleyway with several more injured. This raises Mrs. Cooper’s criminal status to a double homicide after the shooting of Baltimore Police Captain Jonathan Farnes, a thirty-year veteran with the force and brother of the former governor of Maryland. If you have any—”
Cooper clicked off the television and set the revolver down on the small round table next to the red-and-beige striped chair. They didn’t mention the money. She wasn’t an accountant, but the amount of cash she had torched last night had to have been upwards of a few million. Quentin Farnes must have had a crew come in and clean it up before the actual police arrived. But considering how far Quentin’s reach stretched, it could have been cleaned up when Baltimore PD arrived. “What do you think?”
McKaffee was handcuffed to one of the iron pipes in the bathroom, of which she kept the door open to keep an eye on him at all times. His mouth was still duct taped, and he mumbled wordless nonsense, his face reddening from the effort.
Cooper snapped the revolver shut a final time and set it down next to the ammunition. She closed her eyes, feeling the weight of the sleeplessness in her eyelids, hearing the sound of the revolver’s gunshot. Bang. Bang. Bang. Over and over again in her mind. She’d taken a man’s life outside of the law. But there’s still one more to take.
By now Quentin Farnes was scouring the city, calling in every dirty cop and former official to track her down. Cooper sat on the edge of the bed, close to the nightstand, where a yellowed phone from the eighties rested next to a lamp from the same era. She lifted the receiver and dialed McKaffee’s phone, which she’d given to one of the workers at the convenience store.
The phone rang three times before a brusque voice answered. “Hello?”
“Put your boss on the phone.” The noise of the cell phone being passed between hands traveled in Cooper’s ear, followed by a steady, heavy breathing.
“You have my attention.” The voice was aged, but the sharp tongue of the seasoned politician had yet to lose its gravitas. “You’ll soon learn that it’s not something you want.”
“I’m impressed you managed to clean up the money sites so quickly,” Cooper said, leaning forward and resting her forearms on her legs. “Or did you have your hands in the pockets of the local media outlets too?”
“What do you want, Detective?”
Cooper pushed herself off the bed, travelin
g as far as the coiled cord would allow her then retracing her steps back to the nightstand. “To meet. Face to face.”
“Why?” Genuine curiosity filled his tone, and he drawled the words out. “I didn’t have anything to do with the death of that sister of yours.”
“My sister’s death showed me how little the law cares for justice. You slipped through my fingers three years ago after Danny’s trial, but I’m not going to let that happen again.” She recited the prepared response just like she’d rehearsed. Though after the amount of his cash she’d torched, she was guessing she could have given any reason and he’d still believe her.
“You know there isn’t anything you can gain from all of this. The moment I see you, I’ll kill you. And it’s not like you can call the police.” He chuckled to himself. “You’ve backed yourself into a corner, Detective. How do you expect to escape all of this alive? Or do you not care about that worthless life of yours anymore?”
“This evening. 7 p.m. 26 Mulberry Road. If you really want me dead as much as I think you do, then you’ll show. But I don’t come out until I see your face.”
“And if I don’t show?”
Cooper inched the end of the receiver closer to her mouth. “Then there’s still more money for me to burn.” She slammed the phone down then walked back over to the table and the map. She brushed the littered garbage off and examined the only circled location that she hadn’t crossed out. It was the best she could do with what she remembered from the meeting she’d walked in on with Hemsworth and his agents. It was one of the locations he had his team monitoring to look for the killer, and it was the perfect spot for Cooper and Quentin Farnes to meet. The moment the FBI saw him meeting with her, they’d know something was wrong. The only problem was making sure she could escape the FBI’s wrath before she was arrested as well.