Star-Spangled Rejects (The Heavenly Grille Café Book 3)

by J. T. Livingston

  “You didn’t tell me you went back to that bar?” Dottie stretched out in the recliner and reached for the crocheted afghan that draped over the back of the chair. “I could smell the smoke on you when you came in this evening.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Thomas replied absently, as he re-read his notes from an interview with one of the bar’s regulars. He tapped the paper. “This man—a regular at the bar—told me that he passed Stella on his way to the bar—said she was walking toward town—on Friday afternoon. He said she was a regular at the bar, too, so he knew who she was—didn’t know her name—but identified her from the picture I showed him. He said he went inside the bar but had to return after a few minutes to get his wallet from his truck. He said that’s when he saw a black SUV pull up beside Stella as she was walking down the road. He saw someone get out of the passenger side, approach Stella, punch her, and then dragged her into the car.”

  Dottie sat upright. “He saw all this and didn’t report it? I don’t believe it!”

  Thomas shook his head. “You have to consider the source, love. That side of town—and the people you find there—trust me, nobody wants to get involved with anyone else’s business.”

  “But he watched an old woman get punched and dragged into a car, and he didn’t think it was worth reporting.”

  “He said he figured it was someone who Stella stole from or owed money to, and he wasn’t about to get involved.”

  “Well, could he at least give you a description of the car?” Dottie was still angry at the lack of humanity and compassion that some people exhibited.

  “The car was too far away, but he said it looked new and expensive. He did say that the person who grabbed Stella looked young.”

  “Young?”

  Thomas nodded again. “Young—as in—not quite a man yet, teenagers maybe.”

  “What kind of teenagers can afford new and expensive SUVs?” Dottie grimaced.

  Thomas looked back at her and smiled from ear-to-ear. Her last question had released something from his recent memories—a black SUV, full of teenagers, who had tried to pick a fight with a homeless man in a park. “Well, I’ll be damned…” His cell phone rang. “O’Brady here.” He was quiet while he listened to dispatch tell him about the call that had just come in about Gordon Whiting. “Thank you,” he whispered into the phone and hung up.

  Dottie was out of the chair the moment she noticed the paling of her husband’s skin. “What’s wrong, Thomas?”

  Tears flowed from Thomas’ eyes and he shook his head. It felt like he was losing a father all over again; he never knew the first one, and Skipper was the closest he had ever come to knowing anyone who might have been like his own father. “He’s dead…Skipper is dead.”

  Kirk jumped from the Land Cruiser and reached for the Smith & Wesson, M&P Shield 9mm he carried inside a waistband-concealed carry holster. He had taken the gun from his father’s locked gun cabinet when he got home from school, earlier that day. His father had a collection of seventeen handguns and twelve rifles and shotguns, so he doubted that this one gun would be missed anytime soon.

  Kirk had spent the entire day at school, thinking about the situation he was in with his two hostages. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that killing them both was the only solution to his predicament. The old woman would be easy—nobody would miss her anyway; but, the Crennan boy was a different matter. He had seen the police at school today, interviewing the students in Jimmy’s classes. He figured it would only be a matter of time before they got around to talking to other classes, as well.

  The three friends had worked out a schedule to get them through one week. David would keep watch over their hostages on Monday; Mike would change shifts with him after school on Monday; and, Kirk would replace Mike on Tuesday morning, early enough for Mike to make an appearance at school. They intended to keep this schedule for a week, but Kirk had not anticipated the immediate response from the police department. Their search for Crennan had mandated that Kirk speed up things—to re-think his initial plans.

  “Stop right there, Crennan! Don’t you dare take another step—you either, old lady. Turn around, both of you. Start walking back to the house, and don’t try anything stupid. I know how to use this gun.”

  Jimmy took a step forward and tried to reason with Kirk. “You don’t have to do this…”

  Kirk pulled the trigger and the bullet ripped through Jimmy’s left shoulder, missing his heart by only two inches. The bullet entered and exited Jimmy’s skin cleanly. There was a lot of blood, but Kirk wasn’t lying when he said he knew how to use the gun—he could just as easily have centered his target on the heart.

  Jimmy grabbed his shoulder and dropped to his knees. Stella screamed loudly into the empty darkness. There were no other houses around—no chance for anyone to hear her screams, but she kept screaming, nonetheless.

  Kirk slowly aimed the gun at Stella. “Shut up, old woman—or you’re next!”

  Stella either didn’t hear Kirk, or she was too scared to care—she continued screaming.

  Kirk raised his gun again. His aim was sure and as accurate as he intended it to be. Stella Sieber stared blank-eyed at him and fell like a ragdoll, to the ground. The bullet had found its mark—square and center of her forehead.

  Jimmy was losing a lot of blood and was in shock—not so much from his own loss of blood, but from seeing the old woman drop beside him and stare up at him with open, accusatory eyes. He had failed to save them both.

  The screaming and gun shots had jolted Mike from his drunken sleep. He came running—huffing and puffing—from the direction of the lake house. He saw Jimmy on his knees, and the old woman lying in a heap at his feet. He saw blood soaking through the back of Jimmy’s jacket. He stared wide-eyed with panic at his best friend, who stood in front of them both, holding a pistol. “Damn, Kirk—what did you do, man?”

  Kirk took three deep breaths and finally returned the pistol to its hidden carrying case in his waistband. He stared hard at Jimmy, barely glanced at Stella, and then looked back at the person who was supposed to be watching his prisoners. “This is all on you, Mikie—all on you. Put them both in the back of your truck and get back to the house,” his voice echoed into the empty night.

  Mike ran his fingers through his hair and tried hard to focus on what was happening—what had happened. “But…we had a plan, Kirk. We had a plan.”

  Kirk jumped back inside his car and rolled down the window. He gunned the engine loudly and yelled back. “The plan just changed!”

  It was after midnight when Officer O’Brady followed Doug back to the Heavenly Grille Café. He went inside and Doug poured them both a cup of coffee.

  “I can’t believe he’s really gone,” Thomas sat on the stool and lifted the hot coffee to his frozen lips. “I mean, here the man was—accused of a crime he didn’t commit, stabbed by some crazy inmate, and, finally cleared of the crime. Justice had been served. He was free to go.” He stared at Doug with a dazed look. “He gave me a hard time about giving him a ride from the hospital, but I wouldn’t take no for an answer. I dropped him off at the campsite just after dark tonight. He said he was going to work on his poetry. I was worried about him being out in the cold; I even offered him our couch for the night.”

  “Skipper wasn’t one to accept generosity from anyone. Don’t blame yourself, Officer. That’s why I went over to him tonight—to try to talk him into coming back and staying in the upstairs apartment.” Doug walked behind the counter and grabbed Skipper’s backpack. He handed it to the officer. “I brought this back with me. I probably should have left it at the campsite and let the police deal with it, but, I don’t know…it just didn’t seem right to have strangers going through his stuff. You probably talked with him more than anybody else ever has, so I thought you might know what to do with all this—who to give it to.”

  Thomas opened the backpack and saw the notebook lying on top. He took it out and held it to his chest.

/>   “That fell from his lap,” Doug offered. “I didn’t see a pen, so I’m guessing, maybe, he was just reading some of his poems.”

  “I think they were the only thing that ever gave him peace of mind,” Thomas smiled. “His poems were a way for him to remember and acknowledge the soldiers he served with—especially the ones who didn’t make it back home.” He flipped through the pages again. He stopped at the last written page. “This must be a new one—I don’t remember seeing it before. I guess he could have written it while he was in jail, or in the hospital, maybe.”

  “Which one?” Doug asked as he peered over the officer’s shoulder.

  Thomas pointed to the last, filled page of the notebook. “This one—he titled it, That One Final Day.” Thomas read the poem to himself and smiled. “Listen to it…”

  Dreams seldom last beyond first light

  Leaving the horrors of realism to pass in the night;

  We focus on life as we know it today

  Knowing we are all destined to that one final day.

  Depth of one’s vision rules all the late years

  Defining all truths along with the fears;

  We must brace to the wind while facing the rain

  Then harness our thoughts into full refrain.

  Time fades the sight as the mind grows less keen

  Remembering less each day of the life we have seen;

  There seems to be less faith when we kneel down to pray

  As we drift to the downside of that one final day.

  The progression of time is more difficult to endure

  A once positive mind becomes less and less sure;

  Days flash by without the freshness of youth

  Only to collide with the harshness of truth.

  We can never recapture the youth that we’ve spent

  As our body gains age, a message is sent;

  Both the rich and the poor shall wither away

  Then we all become equals on that one final day.

  Thomas closed his eyes and barely managed to hold back the tears. He had grown attached to this lone, brave Veteran over the past few weeks, and he would miss him. He closed the notebook and held it to his chest again. He looked over at Doug and said, “Thank you for this. I have the contact information for Skipper’s brother. I’ll notify him in the morning.”

  Doug nodded. “Yeah, he did have an older brother, didn’t he?”

  “Yes, he did. I don’t think they had seen each other in a long, long time. It’s too bad that their reunion also has to be their final good-bye.”

  Doug placed a comforting hand upon the officer’s shoulders. “Our Father always told me that good-byes are not forever—good-byes are not the end—they simply mean I’ll miss you…until we meet again.”

  “OUR Father?” Thomas asked.

  Doug squeezed the officer’s shoulder again. “Yes, OUR Father…”

  CHAPTER 33

  Too Late for Regrets

  Neither Michael nor Kirk had gotten any sleep.

  Michael paced back and forth in front of the glass sliding doors, glancing occasionally at what he knew still laid in the bed of his pick-up. He had bitten his nails down to the nubs during the long night. His mind was relatively clear of drugs and alcohol, but he wished that it wasn’t. He knew that he could handle everything that had happened much better if he could just dull the finality of it all.

  “Will you please sit down!” Kirk yelled. “Go check on Crennan before you leave—make sure the packing is holding in his wound. I wouldn’t want him bleeding to death before I can kill him, too.”

  “You really did it, Kirk,” Mike continued his pacing. “I can’t believe you really did it. I mean, I guess I thought this was all just fun and games—that you were just trying to scare the two of them—but, man oh man, I never thought you would ever really do it.”

  “I need you to hold it together, Mikie. I never thought you would be the one to freak out on me.” Kirk went into the kitchen and put on a pot of coffee.

  “No, man!” Kirk shrieked. “It’s not like that, I swear. If anything, man—I’m like in freaking awe of you. That was awesome! You really killed that old hag! BANG! Right square between the eyes, too!”

  “Calm down,” Kirk sighed deeply. “This isn’t one of your stupid video games. It really happened. The old woman is dead.”

  “Yeah, man, like I know that—she’s in the back of my freaking pick-up truck!” Mike shook his head and paced some more. “Hey, she can’t stay there, right? I mean, like, I’ve got to get to school. We have to keep doing this, right—keeping to the schedule?”

  Kirk nodded. “Yeah, for now anyway, but things are moving quicker than we first planned.” He started to pour himself a cup of coffee, but instead, walked over to the hearth and put on his jacket. “Get the old woman’s chain and come with me.”

  Mike’s jacket was still on Stella, so he grabbed Jimmy’s lighter-weight one—the one with a blood-stained bullet hole. He gathered up Stella’s chain that had been left where it had fallen the night before. “What about Crennan?”

  “We’ll check on him when we finish what we have to do.”

  “What do we have to do?” Mike asked as he bumped into Kirk’s back on the way out the door. “The sun’s barely up, and I need to sneak home and change clothes before I go to school.”

  “Just bring the chain, Mike—and hurry up,” Kirk opened the tailgate to his friend’s truck. He dragged Stella’s cold, stiff body to the edge of the truck, bent down and threw her over his shoulders.

  Mike was still tagging along at Kirk’s heels and had to jump back when half of the old woman’s body flew over his friend’s shoulders. He drew back again when her head bounced off Kirk’s back and one of her hands flew out toward him. “Damn!” he hissed. “She is dead, isn’t she?”

  Kirk sighed but didn’t look back at his friend. “Just bring the chain and follow me.”

  “Where are we going, Kirk? What are you going to do with her? We don’t need the chain to bury her, do we?”

  Kirk bit his tongue and didn’t respond to Mike’s idiotic questioning. Instead, he walked quickly and steadily toward the end of the dock. When he reached the end, he leaned forward and allowed Stella’s body to drop hard against the wood decking. He nodded toward some concrete blocks that were stacked near one of the postings. “Grab one of those blocks and bring it over here. Give me the chain.”

  Reality seeped in quickly—even for Mike. He giggled and hurried to retrieve the concrete block. “Oh, man! This is just like in the movies—I love it! Nobody will ever find her in the bottom of this lake. It’s one of the deepest lakes in the county.”

  Kirk wrapped one end of the chain around Stella’s bony ankle and secured it with the padlock. He looped the other end of the chain around the holes in the concrete block, and secured it with another padlock. He stood up and stared down at Stella—at the clean hole in her forehead. Her eyes were still open, staring at him, but he felt nothing—no emotion at all when he stared back at her. “I wonder if she spent all of the five hundred dollars I gave her?” He bent down and dragged her body to the very edge of the dock.

  “Maybe we should, like, row her out to the middle of the lake and dump her there,” Michael suggested.

  Kirk looked back at him like he had grown two heads. “I’m not rowing out to the middle of the lake—are you? Do you want to do it?”

  Mike backed up and lifted both hands. “No, man—it was just a suggestion.”

  Kirk used his foot to push Stella over the edge of the dock. It was only a two-foot drop to the water, so there wasn’t much of a splash. She didn’t weigh enough to drag the concrete block all the way along with her, so he pushed it to the edge to make it easier for momentum to take over. He removed the gun and holster from his waist, and threw them as hard as he could toward the middle of the lake.

  “That should keep her down there until the fish get their fill,” Mike giggled. “Oh, man—I can’t believe we did this. Aw
esome—totally, awesome! That was a nice gun, though, man—too bad you couldn’t have kept it.”

  The two friends turned and walked back to the lake house. “Go check on Crennan before you leave, Mike. He should be fine; the bleeding stopped last night.”

  “What are going to do with him, Kirk? You can’t shoot him, because you just threw the gun away. Hey—whatever—just make sure you don’t do it before I get back here, okay?”

  Kirk nodded. “Go on. I’ll be here all day and night. David will relieve me in the morning. I’ll make final plans by the time we all gather back here on Friday afternoon.”

  “Okay, okay,” Michael giggled again. “Hey, you know the police are looking for Jimmy-Boy, right?”

  Kirk shrugged. “So—let them look. They have no reason to connect any of us with him.”

  Officer O’Brady walked out of the police station and headed for his cruiser. He had Skipper’s notebook in his hand and dropped it into the passenger seat. He looked over at it as he buckled up and smiled. “One last ride with me, Skipper, before your brother comes to claim you and all your belongings.” He laughed out loud and shook his head. “Well, that sounded a little morbid, didn’t it?”

  It only took him about fifteen minutes to get to Rome High School. He wanted to follow up on his suspicions about the black SUV that supposedly picked Stella up on Friday afternoon. He remembered the name of the teenager who drove a black SUV—Kirk Blankenship, a rich kid with a bad attitude.

  Kirk was reported as absent this Tuesday morning, but Thomas was able to secure the names of some of his closest friends, from his homeroom teacher. He glanced down at his pad—David Mizen, Michael Bozeman, and Kristy Littleton. He stopped at the classroom where David Mizen was supposed to be and knocked softly on the door. The teacher opened it, and he explained that he needed to talk to David.