Norton hung up on the FDLE agent, looked up at his friend Henry Janzig and started to laugh.
Janzig said, “What’d he say?”
“He’d pass it along. Gave me some shit about talking to the snitch, but I just brushed it off.”
Janzig took another bite of his turkey sandwich as he sat back and enjoyed the cool air in Norton’s kitchen.
Norton said, “If that don’t scare those FDLE guys chasing him into shootin’ first and askin’ questions later, then nothin’ will.”
“Yeah, them boys’ll shoot, too. They got them MP-three machine guns.”
“MP-five.”
“Whatever. It’ll kill old Luther just as quick as a flash.”
“Then that’ll be one less problem we’ll have to worry about.”
“Told you we should’ve got a real attorney to draw up them papers.”
Norton scowled at the older man. “Number one, we didn’t have to pay him nothin’ but a cake job in the library. Two, we didn’t know what a lawyer on the outside would say. We could control Luther. At least when he was inside. And number three, it’s done. We can’t go back, so stop worrying about it, you old goat.”
The corrections sergeant laughed and took another bite of his sandwich.
Tasker eased his car into the rear lot of an industrial park that gave him a clear line of sight to the back road that led to the housing for the prison personnel. The hodgepodge of cheap, plain buildings and manufactured homes served over half the prison employee population. He took his big Tasco binoculars and realized he could see all the way down to the first row of trailers along the rear fence of Manatee. He had to be sure. He didn’t want to think that Billie would be involved with this group, but if she’d been in the trailer once, she’d be there again.
He sat and watched, knowing he’d get no backup or relief. This was something he’d do himself until he was satisfied. He made some notes on a legal pad so he could adequately brief his director when the time came. He had a little chart at the top where he wrote Norton’s name in a square, then added squares for Janzig and Renee on either side. This was the corporation he had hard info on. Then at an angle on the page, he wrote Billie Towers in the corner. He gazed at the paper and tried to think if anyone else could be involved.
An hour after he started his surveillance, the first vehicle came out of the housing area. He picked up his heavy-duty binoculars and zeroed in on the big sedan moving toward him on the dirt road. He could clearly see the driver was an older black man in a brown DOC uniform.
Over the next hour, he saw three more cars, all leaving and none of them occupied by anyone who looked even remotely like Billie Towers. Then, in the late afternoon, he saw a blue pickup truck cut off the highway and zip down the road. The truck moved so fast he didn’t get a good look, but he saw dark hair and a small frame. A few minutes later, the truck came back out the road, giving Tasker plenty of time to use the binoculars to clearly see what he didn’t want to see: Billie Towers driving the old Ford pickup they had used on the professor’s dig.
thirty-nine
Tasker sat at the sub shop off US Highway 27 near the prison, picking at a turkey on whole wheat. Intellectually he knew he had to eat, but emotionally he didn’t want to. Was everyone in this town in on Norton’s scam and using him? Renee was bad enough, he had feelings for her, but Billie Towers? He never would’ve guessed she was a crook. Now the motive for the professor’s murder was in question, as well as the suspect. Had he discovered the scheme? Tasker didn’t want to try to figure out that line of reasoning past what he already knew.
He grabbed his large Coke and tossed most of the sandwich as he nodded to the cute high-school girl behind the counter. His Monte Carlo was on the far side of the parking lot to take advantage of the shade from a black olive tree in the swale. It was getting late in the afternoon, but keeping cars cool is a way of life in Florida. It becomes a habit.
As he approached the car, he noticed a movement on the far side. Then he heard a small pop and hiss and the car’s angle changed. He quick stepped to the rear of the Monte Carlo, careful not to crunch in the gravel. He peeked around the edge of the trunk and saw a man crawling toward the front of the car. Tasker took a quick look around to make sure the guy was alone, then quietly crept up directly behind him. Tasker watched as the man placed the tip of the blade of an open buck knife against the front tire.
“Do it and you’ll be digging that knife out of your ass,” said Tasker, now slightly turned to kick the vandal hard in the head if he had to.
The man turned, sat up and looked at Tasker. He said, “I got the knife.”
Tasker jerked the drawstring of his belly bag, exposing his Sig P-230 automatic. “I gotta gun.” He swiveled his head again to make sure the vandal was alone. “Listen, dumb-ass, right now that’s enough reason to shoot you.”
The man opened his hand and let the knife drop onto the ground.
Tasker nodded. “Good move.” He realized he recognized the young, thin man. “Shit, you’re an officer at Manatee. What’s your name? All I can think is Loretta Lynn.”
The young man swallowed and looked at the ground and mumbled, “Lester Lynn.”
“That’s right. We have some issues, don’t we?”
The man remained silent.
Tasker said, “Look, I’m out of patience with you guys. I’m gonna ask some questions and you’re gonna fucking answer them or—”
The man made a quick grab for the knife on the ground before Tasker gave him the options. Tasker didn’t even draw his pistol. He just stomped down hard on the man’s hand, feeling the small bones of his fingers snap under his running shoe.
Tasker reached down, grabbed the man by his ear and hoisted him upright, the man squealing like a little kid the whole way. Tasker shoved him against the car and then patted him down roughly as the man nursed his crushed fingers.
“You were gonna try and stab me? What made you think you’d be able to do that?”
“Had to try and scare you. I ain’t gonna answer no questions.”
“You’re not?”
“No, sir.”
“We’ll see.”
“When?”
“After you change my tire.”
“You crazy? I can’t change nothin’, my fingers is broke.”
“Didn’t say it wouldn’t hurt.” Tasker shoved him toward the rear of the car and opened the trunk, keeping his eyes on the man.
“Okay, Lester,” Tasker started. “You got the tire in front of you. I know there are no guns in there, so it’s time.”
“Time for what?”
“To get to work.”
Sullenly, the man reached in the trunk. He fumbled, using his left hand to free the tire, then yanked out the jack and tire iron.
Tasker took a step back, half-cautious and mostly enjoying the man’s suffering. A little payback for the problems he had caused.
After half an hour of effort, Lester, face blackened with dirt, shirt smeared black, finished the job.
“We’re even, satisfied?”
“You have got to be shittin’ me.” Tasker shoved him around to the other side and then into the passenger seat of the car. He came back around to the driver’s side, zipped up his gun pouch and then hopped in the car. He pulled out onto US Highway 27 and headed west toward Lake Okeechobee without acknowledging his passenger.
After a few minutes of driving, the young man asked, “Where are we goin’?”
“To a place where I can question you properly.” He kept his eyes on the road, never turning to the flustered vandal.
“I got nothing to say. I wanna call me an attorney.”
Now Tasker let out a little smile. “You’re mistaken. I don’t arrest people for misdemeanors. You’re not under arrest.”
“I don’t wanna go nowhere with you, so you’re kidnapping me.”
Tasker said, “Now you’re finally catching on.”
Luther Williams had spent the night in a lower-end, oc
eanfront hotel in Daytona Beach. As rough as that town was, no one would notice a nicely dressed, middle-aged black man checking into a cheap hotel alone and paying cash. He had tipped the clerk an extra twenty to keep him quiet if anyone came looking for him.
The ride north on I-95 the next morning was uneventful as he stayed about six miles over the speed limit and usually kept with traffic. His Buick LeSabre wasn’t going to attract the attention of too many cops. He took Interstate 210 near Jacksonville past the Naval Air Station, then ended up heading due west on Interstate 10. Now it was just a straight shot across a few states to his new, temporary home.
The light traffic on I-10 encouraged him to pick up the pace a little, still staying with the few cars on the road but now riding near eighty miles an hour. The newer Buick had a fine, smooth ride and the stereo had a good bass as he listened to an oldies station out of South Georgia. He relaxed as he made good time. In the trunk, he had hidden two pistols he took from Scooter Brown’s house. The two automatics were both nine-millimeters, one a Browning Hi-power and the other one of those Czechoslovakian CZs. They were both loaded and ready to go. Up under the bench seat fold-down armrest, he had the Sig nine-millimeter he had bought from a guy he knew from his days as legal counsel to the Committee for Community Relief. The big model 226 packed a punch and was easy to handle.
Just west of the turnoff for I-75, near Lake City, he passed a Florida Highway Patrol trooper’s vehicle sitting in the median of the highway.
“Shit,” Luther said to himself, as he quickly checked the rearview mirror to see if the brown-and-yellow marked car came onto the highway. Just as he thought he had made it away cleanly, he noticed a vehicle in his rearview closing the gap quickly. It was the damn trooper.
Briefly he considered trying to outrun him, but knew that would never work. He lifted the armrest to see the black pistol underneath and then moved over into the right lane. The trooper followed right behind him, then turned on his overhead flashing blue lights.
Luther immediately pulled to the shoulder of the road, his eyes in his rearview watching the trooper pull in behind him. He had some decisions to make. The trooper would run his tag, which would come back to the owner of the Buick from whom he had stolen the tag. He had no idea who that was, so he couldn’t even lie about the name. The Florida driver’s license he had would hold up. Mr. Nyren’s contacts were the best. They used legitimate DL numbers that matched the name you were given. In Luther’s case, he was now Louis Drexler. He liked it because it was a little different but not outlandish. He saw the trooper slowly emerge from his Crown Victoria. A tall, blond cop, about thirty. Luther moved the pistol under the armrest slightly so he could grab it quickly when he had to.
Luther lowered the window as the trooper walked up. He knew he should grasp the pistol now and shoot before there was any chance the cop knew what was happening. As soon as he heard the cop say, “License and registration,” he’d pick up the pistol and put a nine-millimeter slug in his face. He didn’t want to, but he’d come too far to go back now.
The trooper stopped, then leaned down, looking into the car before he spoke.
Tasker turned down a dirt road he had chosen at random. He pulled in toward the dike that surrounded Lake Okeechobee. The grass-covered, earthen mound had been shoved into place at different intervals over the years by different groups of men who thought they could control the giant freshwater lake. They had been wrong a couple of times, and Mother Nature, in the form of a hurricane in 1928, had shown them that the lake wasn’t always going to stay right where they wanted it.
With each passing mile, Lester, nursing his three broken fingers, grew more nervous. “Look, let me off here and we’ll call it all even. Sort’ve my punishment for playing a prank.”
Tasker kept quiet. He knew setting had more to do with an interview than almost anything else. If taking the time to find the right setting also served to unnerve Correctional Officer Lester Lynn, then all the better.
“C’mon, Mr. Tasker. I didn’t mean nothin’ by it. Just having a little fun.”
Now Tasker stopped the car. A path in the brush led to the top of the dike. It was nearly dark and they were at least three miles off the highway. He shut off the car and then, without a word, climbed out and walked around to Lester’s door. He opened it and grabbed the startled correctional officer by his shirt, then pulled him out of the car.
“Wait a minute. Where you taking me?”
Tasker shoved him toward the path.
Lester had to take some wide steps to keep his balance. He let his right hand touch the ground to keep from falling, but his damaged fingers made him yelp. Once he had his balance, he picked up his pace. He darted up the path ahead of Tasker.
Tasker calmly said, “Nowhere to run, Lester. We’re not near anything at all.”
Lester realized the truth of the statement and stopped running. Once Tasker caught up to him, they walked together to the rim of the dike. The top was wide and flat like three lanes of a running track. The open black water spread out toward the north and west. There was nothing in the water nearby. No trees or small islands, just water. Like a calm ocean. With the sun now gone, the water had no color to it. Just blackness. The rising moon gave off enough light to make Tasker feel alone out there.
Tasker looked toward the water, ignoring Lester like he was no threat whatsoever. He stretched, reaching his arms high like he had learned in yoga. He cut his eyes to make sure Lester was as beaten as he seemed. He didn’t want to be surprised if the tall correctional officer took a swing at him. He was satisfied the young man was open to a real talk. He also had waited long enough that he no longer wanted to kill somebody.
He kept looking out over the water and said, “So, Lester, how do the fingers feel?”
Lester hesitated. “Sore. You broke ’em.”
“You realize that if you don’t play ball with me, that’ll be the most pleasant thing that happens to you tonight?”
“What kind of cop are you, anyway?”
Tasker turned toward him now. “A pissed-off one. I’ve been fucked with since the first day I came to this shithole. Now I want some answers. Understand?”
Lester took a step back, nodding his head.
“First things first. Did you let Linus Hardaway loose on me in lockdown?”
Lester was silent.
“Nothing is gonna happen to you. I just need to know.”
Lester started to speak, then stopped.
“Lester, the longer this takes, the more pissed-off I get.”
The young man mumbled, “Yeah, it was me.”
“Good. Now, wasn’t that easy?”
Lester nodded.
“Now the question is, who told you to do it?”
“No one.”
“You know how I can tell you’re lying?”
“How?”
“’Cause you’re screaming.” He grabbed two of Lester’s damaged fingers and squeezed. The young man screamed like a lightning siren on a golf course.
Tasker stayed calm. “Now, who told you to do it?”
Lester took a few seconds to settle down and catch his breath. Panting, he said, “Sergeant Janzig just told me to let something happen. I thought of Linus myself.” He sucked in some more air. “I woulda done anything to get a transfer to the control room.”
Tasker never took his eyes off the correctional officer. He sure looked like he was telling the truth. “So you let me fight off a crazed inmate to impress your bosses.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“What about the Aryan Knights? You have anything to do with that?”
“No, nothing, I swear to God.”
“Then who did?”
Lester kept his mouth shut.
“I know someone did. I didn’t just run into a group of thugs who only wanted to kick my ass and not anyone else’s.”
Lester remained silent.
Tasker grabbed him by the shoulders and nudged him toward the dark water.
&
nbsp; “Wait, wait, wait. I didn’t have nothin’ to do with them crazy Nazi guys. They’re Janzig’s boys.”
“He tell them to go after me?”
“Don’t know what he told them, but he told me to ignore it on the control room monitor.”
“I thought you worked in the psych ward?”
“They’re letting me work the control room when it suits them.”
Then Tasker looked at him differently. He remembered talking to him briefly about Dewalt, then dismissing him. “You love that control room job?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you would’ve done anything to get out of the psych ward?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Now Tasker got ready to throw out the big one. He had the pieces. The forensics, the marks on the psych ward door and now a motive. Tasker looked at the young man and said, “You’d even cover up Rick Dewalt’s suicide?”
The young man just stared at him silently. He didn’t have to say anything. He sank down, then plopped to his butt on the grass.
Tasker squatted next to him. “C’mon, compared to the other shit, it’s not that serious. You found him hanging from the door and moved him, right?”
Lester started to cry. “I’d just been there so long and I knew the sergeant would be pissed. Dewalt was dead. What did it matter if they thought someone killed him and dumped him outside?” He started to sob.
“He ever say why?”
Lester caught his breath and said, “He was always down about being locked up. He said his dad was some big shot who was embarrassed by him. I never thought he’d do anything like that. I mean, the look on his face with that belt he’d taken from the officers’ station around his neck.”
“Then what happened?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. I got him down. Took the belt and used some old rope to tie his hands so it looked like he was murdered. I just tossed his body out the door so no one would see me.”
Tasker stood up. “Shit, son, compared to some of the people at Manatee, you’re a fucking model state employee.”
Escape Clause Page 26