by Sean Lynch
“Don’t move.”
The cops stopped in mid-turn. Farrell spoke from a covered position behind an Alameda police car. He tried to mute the tremor in his voice.
“Don’t get stupid. I have you in the open, and I’ve got cover. If you want to be heroes, go ahead. It’s your funeral.”
Farrell could feel the tension in the two cops as they debated whether to chance taking him on. He didn’t want a shoot-out with cops.
“If I wanted to kill you, I’d have done it already. I’m not going to shoot unless you make me. All I want to do is leave. Drop your weapons. Do it now.”
Neither cop made a move to comply, still standing with their backs halfway towards Farrell. Farrell fired a round from the shotgun into the rear window of the wrecked Camaro a few feet from the two policemen. He chambered another round.
“I know you’re thinking: ‘He can’t get us both.’ So which one of you wants to tell his partner’s widow what you did to save your own skin? I ain’t going to say it again: lose the hardware.”
Both cops reluctantly complied. A shotgun and revolver clattered to the street. Farrell could hear more sirens in the distance.
“You with the shotgun: you’ve still got a sidearm. Drop it.”
The officer did.
“Alright. Turn around, put your hands on top of your heads, and step back. If a hand comes down, I shoot.”
The cops turned around and backed up, their hands on their heads. Farrell stepped from around the patrol car. Farrell couldn’t see the cops’ ashen faces.
“Relax. I said I wasn’t going to shoot unless you made me. Neither of you have seen my face. If it stays that way until I leave, you both get home to your families. Don’t turn around.”
Both cops exchanged looks of disbelief, and Farrell scooped up the two revolvers and the discarded shotgun. Clumsily cradling the weapons, he backed away towards the Oldsmobile, still covering the lawmen with his shotgun one-handed. He tossed the guns into the Olds and climbed in the driver’s seat. Wordlessly he put the sedan into gear and drove off, covering the lower portion of his face with his coat as he passed the two Alameda cops. He took Doolittle Drive towards East Oakland. The last thing he saw in his rearview mirror was the two cops speaking animatedly into their portable transceivers.
Farrell motored down Doolittle Drive and merged into moderate traffic. Slocum was long gone, but Farrell scanned to his left and right hoping to spot him. Slocum could have easily commandeered a car at gunpoint, or fled to the bustle of the nearby airport. In either event, Farrell couldn’t linger in the area searching. While the police had no description of Slocum, they certainly had a general one of him, as well as his vehicle.
He turned onto Hegenberger Road and the cover of Oakland metropolitan traffic. The Oldsmobile had no windshield, and his eyes stung in the cold air. Normally a car in such battered condition would have attracted attention, but not in East Oakland. His mind reeled, and he struggled to accept the night’s happenings. Too many images and emotions crowded his brain at once.
Every cop in the Bay Area would be searching for him.
It didn’t matter that he saved a child. He’d lost Slocum.
More importantly, he’d lost Kevin Kearns.
CHAPTER 42
Vernon Slocum drove slowly through Oakland into San Leandro. A corpse was his passenger.
The pain in his left leg was excruciating, and wave after wave of dizziness rolled over him, threatening to make him black out. But he held on, like a Marine should. Even with the pain at its worst he knew he was going to make it. He had no choice.
But now there was other pain to contend with. Unbeknownst to Farrell, one of the bullets he fired in Cole’s house struck meat. The hastily fired round punched through the flesh of his latissimus dorsi, the large triangular muscle beneath his left armpit. The bullet exited cleanly, but the wound it left bled profusely. Slocum knew within hours the arm would be useless.
Also, when Farrell rammed his car, Slocum’s face slammed into the dashboard. Most of his teeth, both upper and lower, were spit out with saliva and blood. It all happened so fast. His ambush failed, and he was only able to get the younger of his enemies. Once again, it was the older one who’d proved the most formidable. But Slocum hoped with his partner gone, the old hunter might lose focus and give up.
Not likely.
Slocum drove a brand-new BMW sports coupe. It featured a rich-sounding stereo cassette system its owner would never hear again. At the moment, the stereo was playing “It’s The End of the World As We Know It” by REM.
Slocum had hobbled to the highway, spears of agony splintering his damaged leg with each step. He jumped in front of the first motorist who approached, forcing the car to stop. When the indignant driver stuck his head out the window to rant in protest, Slocum shot him in the face. He then climbed into the driver’s seat, pushing the lump of flesh that was once a slip-and-fall attorney to the passenger side of the car.
Slocum drove aimlessly down Doolittle Drive towards San Leandro. His left arm was soaked in blood and going numb. Surprisingly, his shattered teeth produced more pain than his perforated left side, a condition which would undoubtedly change.
He pulled the car off the road and into the parking lot of the Shoreline Café on Doolittle Drive. The café was closed and the parking lot empty. He switched off the car’s engine and withdrew the ignition key. He knew within minutes his wounded arm would fade, and he needed to use it while he could.
He lumbered out of the car with great effort and opened the trunk. Inside, he found two large suitcases. He took them out and set them aside, dizzy with exertion. Slocum then opened the BMW’s passenger door and pulled out the body of the car’s one-time owner.
Normally, for a man of Slocum’s size and physique, stuffing the body into the trunk would have been quick and easy work. But not tonight. Slocum had to drag the limp body from the car where he would have once simply lifted it. He stopped several times to let the waves of pain subside. At one point he leaned against the car to prevent himself from passing out.
Eventually he got the deceased lawyer into the trunk. He took a moment to pull a fat wallet from the pocket of the dead man’s expensive suit. Inside, explaining the suitcases, were ticket stubs from a Los Angeles flight. Apparently the BMW’s driver was returning from a business trip to LA when he met his untimely demise. The wallet also contained credit cards and some cash.
Slocum threw one suitcase into the back seat of the car. He opened the other, and sure enough, found several towels with a hotel logo embroidered on them. He tucked one towel under his left armpit to quell the flow of blood, and used the other to pat his battered and toothless mouth. He closed the suitcase and tossed it into the car with its mate, then stumbled back into the automobile.
He was nearing exhaustion. His left leg was agonizingly painful, and had stopped bleeding entirely. Instead it was leaking more of the pus he noticed a couple of days ago. He risked a glance at the leg by rolling up the trouser bottom.
Even in the dim light of the streetlamps, Slocum could see the flesh was a putrid gray, and knew without looking his toes were black. The wound was fully gangrenous. The nutrient-robbing methamphetamine accelerated this process, but without it he would have collapsed long ago.
Slocum patted his pockets until he found his bindle of meth. He opened it with shaking hands and lifted the paper to his nose, inhaling deeply. He licked a filthy finger and used it to smear some of the dirty brown paste over his bloody gums and into the sockets that were once his teeth.
The rush came and again the pain drifted. He carefully refolded the bindle of crank and pocketed it. He then reloaded his .45. This took a long time because his fingers had trouble inserting the rounds into the magazine. He lit a Pall Mall and sat back in the seat.
First Elizabeth and then Cole. They’d left; run off. They’d run out on Daddy and the family. They’d left him to rot in the VA hospital. They thought they could run away and hide. But Vernon
knew where they were. He knew where to find them.
Vernon exhaled smoke, his cigarette pink with blood. He knew he was badly wounded. He would have to alter his original plan and scrub the mission. All because of Cole and Elizabeth. They were traitors.
Traitors to their family.
Had they no pride? Were they content to be weak and afraid? Hadn’t Daddy taught them anything? Was all he did for them meaningless? Did they remember nothing of home? Of their father?
They remembered nothing. They’d shit on their heritage. Elizabeth and Cole were sniveling, whining cowards, with no gratitude, and no pride. They’d left like thieves in the night, just like the Bible said. Wade was weak too, but at least he’d gone out with some honor. He’d been a Marine, and died in combat. Even though Wade was the oldest, Vernon knew inside he was the strongest. The truest. The family’s honor was his burden to bear. It was his duty to reclaim it.
His mission.
But now the mission was over. He was a casualty; no longer mission-capable. He’d anticipated opposition, but not the relentless, unwavering determination of the two men who’d stalked him.
They followed him at every turn. They must have known all about Cole, and Elizabeth, and Wade, and Daddy. About the family. Elizabeth must have told them, or the head-shrinkers at the VA hospital. The doctors and counselors must have divulged his secrets. They’d invaded the deepest recesses of his mind at the hospital, and the two men who’d been sent to track him must have been armed with the things they found there.
They must have known his mission.
Yet Vernon knew the hunters weren’t invulnerable. They’d certainly not engineered their traps well. Had they executed a better ambush at Elizabeth’s, he would be dead. Vernon had stupidly allowed himself to be drawn into the cul-de-sac, and Buddy was KIA as a result.
Yes, the two men must have known his mission. But their ill-preparation for their own mission cost the young stalker his life. Oddly, Vernon didn’t hold his enemy in contempt. His enemies had accomplished their mission. They’d prevented him from taking Cole and Elizabeth home. They’d critically injured him, and forced him to abort his own mission and retreat. Though the junior one lost his life, he’d done so honorably, and in combat.
Vernon knew he hadn’t much time. Even a Marine has limits. He would have to alter his original plan and make his primary mission one of survival. It would require all his fortitude to get home, and home was a long way off.
Vernon’s new mission was pathetically simple. He would drive straight home, stopping only for fuel. The credit cards and cash would allow him to use the full service facilities at gas stations without leaving the car and arousing suspicion because of his wounds. He would have some time before anyone reported the attorney and his car missing, and by then he would be well clear of California and could obtain another car. He only hoped he could hold out for the thirty or forty hours it would take to get home. His salvation was the methamphetamine, and fortunately it was still plentiful.
With luck, the meth combined with the pain would keep him alert. He finished his bloody cigarette and threw the butt out the window. He put the coupe into gear and started down Highway 61 towards the Interstate.
Vernon Slocum was going home.
CHAPTER 43
Farrell sat in the damp sand, staring off into the water of the San Francisco Bay. San Francisco Bay was cold at night, just like Farrell had told Kearns it would be. Yet the chill in the old cop’s bones didn’t originate entirely from the night air.
He’d ended up back in Alameda, but not by design. He drove into Oakland and cruised aimlessly until the trembling in his hands impeded his steering. The last thing he needed was to get pulled over by a cop for an inadvertent traffic infraction.
Farrell was reasonably sure his identity was still unknown to the cops, but he dare not risk going home to San Francisco over the Bay Bridge in so thrashed a car. The CHP would pull him over in an instant.
He’d wandered through Oakland. His meandering route eventually took him over the Miller-Sweeney Bridge and back again into residential Alameda. He followed Broadway Street to Bayview Drive, where it ended at the beach. Soon he was on Shoreline Drive, watching the San Francisco skyline reflect off the choppy waters of the Bay.
He pulled over near Grand Street. His hands were shaking so badly the car was weaving in the lane. His eyes were tearing, partly from the chilly air blasting through the shattered windshield, and partly from the trauma of the past hour.
Farrell left the Alameda police shotgun in the car, along with his own, and put on his overcoat. He pocketed the two service revolvers he’d taken from the Alameda cops, and also the bottle of bourbon from the back seat. He peered into the cooler at the sandwiches, but the thought of ingesting them made him gag. Farrell wasn’t concerned about leaving the car. It was a rental, purchased under an assumed identity. His shotgun couldn’t be traced to him either; it too was purchased back in Iowa with a false ID. Farrell opened the trunk and took out a red gasoline can. He unscrewed the cap, and poured the gallon of gas liberally over both the interior and exterior of the Oldsmobile. He’d already grabbed the yellowed medical file on Slocum they’d stolen from the veterans’ hospital in Des Moines.
Though only a few weeks ago, Des Moines seemed a lifetime away.
Farrell tossed a road flare into the car’s interior and walked away as it lit up the night.
He walked across Shoreline Drive to the beach. He strode directly to the waterline, through sand moist and deep. There on the hard-packed sand Farrell walked westward, lumbering under the burden of his many guns and papers. San Francisco’s lights loomed large across the Bay. He heard sirens. He walked until he could walk no more. He plopped down at the water’s edge cross-legged and put his face in his hands. They were still shaking. He could see the lights of the police and fire vehicles in the distance, attending to the pyre that was once his car.
Things had gone terribly wrong. Kearns was dead. His body lay on the floor of a home belonging to people he’d died protecting; strangers he’d never even met. Farrell fumbled in his pockets for the bottle of bourbon.
He knew it was over. Kearns was dead and Slocum had escaped. He’d never be able to track the deranged killer again, even if he knew where to look. His chances of finding the murderer again were zero. He’d failed. Game over.
What consolation he took in rescuing the Ballantine girl faded quickly. Slocum would find another Kirsten Ballantine, or Tiffany Meade, or whoever. It was inevitable. It’s what Slocum did.
Farrell uncapped the Jim Beam and took a long pull from the bottle. The scorching rush of the bourbon took the shakes from his hands. He took another swig and stared out at the water. The bourbon lent some warmth to his body, and after another swig he felt his hands begin to steady even more.
Farrell lit a cigarette, sucking in the smoke. He thought about turning himself in. Give Scanlon and the FBI what information he possessed about Slocum and hope they could track him down, even if only for prosecution and not death. Farrell had his chance, and he’d fucked it up. Not only did he fail to bag Slocum, he cost a young deputy, a kid really, his life. A kid who Farrell tricked into becoming part of his scheme to hunt down Vernon Slocum.
Farrell drank some more bourbon. Normally, his tolerance to alcohol was quite high. But the day’s stark events had whittled him to near exhaustion, and the booze was sinking in.
It wasn’t supposed to go this way.
Despite the setback in Omaha, Farrell never felt he was not in control. He’d always believed he could handle the situation, whatever came up. But when he first saw Deputy Kevin Kearns, tortured by his guilt in the death of Tiffany Meade and under the grill by Scanlon and the FBI, he should have heeded the warning. He should have recognized the shadow of himself in Kearns’ face. And he should have realized he was projecting his own shroud of guilt on the young deputy.
Farrell told himself he was doing the right thing, going after Slocum alone, and in convincing
Kearns to accompany him, affirmed that belief. He’d told Kearns it was a simple thing, really; a matter of good versus evil. And he implied that they were on an epic quest. Doing what nobody else could do.
Saint George versus the dragon.
But the dragon won.
Farrell pulled Kearns’ wallet out of his pocket. Other than a bit of cash and his Iowa driver’s license, it contained nothing but a folded scrap of paper. He stared at Kearns’ photo, and at the face of the young cop. A kid he had used, betrayed, and left dead on the floor of a stranger’s house far from his home, for reasons which now seemed inconsequential.
With half the bottle gone, the biting cold of the San Francisco Bay seemed to diminish a bit. Farrell helped himself to another large swig, and lit another cigarette. He unfolded the piece of paper. He instantly recognized the feminine script. It was his daughter’s phone number, written in her own hand. She’d obviously given it to Kevin herself.
Farrell felt hollow and drained. He spat out his cigarette and ran his fingers through what was left of his hair. He’d have to tell Jennifer, and soon. He couldn’t let her find out any other way. It wouldn’t take the Alameda cops long to identify the John Doe in Ballantine’s house as Story County Sheriff’s Deputy Kevin Andrew Kearns.
Why had Kearns gone into the house alone? Why hadn’t he come back to the park? Did he hear something inside? Did Cole or Slocum draw him in?
It didn’t matter. It wasn’t Kearns’ fault. It was Farrell’s fault. It was Farrell who indirectly let Kevin die on Cole Ballantine’s floor. Because it was Farrell who brought him into the mix in the first place. It was Farrell who exploited the young deputy’s pain, and guilt, and coaxed him into partaking in the lethal hunt for a murderous madman, knowing full well the deputy wasn’t up to the task. And it was Farrell who introduced Kearns to Jennifer. Using his own daughter like he used everybody else. He drained the bottle in a series of continuous gulps.