They made a turn, and he estimated his time of arrival at about ten minutes. "This will be fun."
Chapter Fifty-Five
Wore A Shit-eat Grin
I checked the perimeter and did not see anyone else.
More thugs might be on their way though. Time to bring attention to this house, to make things go boom. I grabbed both sides of the stove, a high-end Samsung gas oven, rotated it about ninety degrees away from the wall.
Like a yellow snake with a metallic head on each end, prey trapped in each mouth, yellow gas line connected from the stove to a spigot coming out of the floor. Detaching the yellow snake, the spigot began to hiss softly as if in defense to being threatened.
I retrieved a candlestick from the catch-all drawer, making sure the wick was good, before placing the stick of wax in my jacket pocket. I hastened to the back door and placed the candle next to the rose I had left there when I entered the house. I decided to leave the rose in place.
I ambled into Frogger's bedroom.
His eyes told me he was not excited to see me.
"I don't need you anymore." I turned and the dead body, formally known as Lola, lay still on the floor. Surely the fetus had survived although it wouldn't live for long. Doubted this piece of shit cared either way about the fetus living or not.
A neighbor or two probably called the cops after the gunfire.
Pulling out the machete like an ancient Japanese warrior, I held it firmly in my right hand.
His eyes widened. "What are you going to do with…"
I hacked Frogger's ankles as if I were chopping wood.
Blood squirted onto the bed and floor.
Allowing the rage to flood my brain, not feeling the pain in my back or breast, I raised the machete again.
"No! Stop!" he begged.
I hacked until he stopped moving. Cops will think a psychotic maniac killed him. The medical examiner will report that this hamburger meat had suffered before he died and the cops who get the case will make a joke about his painful experience, and might even thank God for it.
Amazingly I didn't get much blood on me, but the machete's blade dripped red. Wiping the blade clean on the bed sheet, I placed the machete back in the secret compartment in my jacket.
With my cell phone, I took a picture of Frogger's corpse.
I went to the other bedroom and took two pillowcases. I filled them with one shoe from each thug. These made for a good present later.
Entering the living room, the smell of gas was strong now. I picked up my HKs from the floor in the dining room and holstered them.
Ready to leave now. Twelve men dead here. Four at the other house. Three in the drive-by car. That totaled nineteen dead thugs.
"Get up if you want to live!" I ordered.
He stared at me as if I was crazy. "What?"
"I'm letting you go! Stand up and leave this house!"
No need to repeat myself. Fatstuff stood, and headed, for the front door. As he got to within a foot of the front door, I headed to the back door. No smell of gas back here yet and thought it safe enough. Lighting the wick, I placed the candle inside the doorway, in the dining area.
I exited the back door, and it felt like the temperature had dropped. I thought it was against Texas state law, to be this cold!
Heading for the back fence, the pillowcases went over first. Before I hopped over to the other side, a man yelled out in a deep voice. "Hey!"
Turned back, Fatstuff still on the ground and a man standing above him. That man had short black hair, and his chest and arms were swollen.
He wore a shit-eating grin. It was Happy.
I smiled; Happy smiled.
Then I flipped him off.
He waved me over, lifting up his shirt. At first I thought he was showing me his washboard abs, but he was showing me that he was unarmed.
He waved me over. "Come over here, I won't hurt you."
I smiled and as if on cue, the side of the house exploded.
Chapter Fifty-Six
A Hundred Driver's Licenses
"I don't care who he is! Drop the gun or I'll drop you!"
The gunman dropped the handgun and laid down on the floor.
"Go ahead, hook him up, I'll cover you." Henry did not find any wounds or blood on the man's body. "You hit?"
The man on the couch shook his head. "No."
Henry thought he recognized something in the man's face. Too calm. He was just shot at, and he did not appear to be scared or frightened. Not normal.
While cuffing the man on the floor, Mitch pointed at the man on the couch. "What's your name?"
"Rogelio Marquez."
Mitch scanned the room. "Anyone else in the house?"
The man shook his head. "No, but his girlfriend was just here, she went outside to wait in the car." He pointed to the back of the house.
Henry stepped forward. "They parked in the back?"
"Yes."
"Sit up," Mitch told the gunman, hooking his right arm under the man's left arm helping him up.
The gunman tried to stand, but Mitch stopped him. "No, sit there on the floor." The gunman sat on the floor.
"Rogelio, you armed?"
Turning his head, gazing up at Henry, he shook his head again. "No, but I do have a handgun in my office down the hall."
Mitch picked up the gunman's pistol, releasing and placing the magazine on the coffee table. Then he slid the slide back to see if there was a bullet in the chamber, and found one. He put the bullet next to the magazine. "What's your name?"
The gunman glanced up at him. "My name is Felix Fernandez. I'm on the job. Vice."
Henry stood there with his sidearm still out. He nor Mitch commented on that. Sometimes people who are guilty of something will say anything to get the cuffs off.
"Is he right? Nobody else here in the house?"
"There is no one else in the house, my girlfriend left and is waiting in my car in the back."
"Mr. Marquez, we entered the premises because we saw Mr. Fernandez here, with a handgun, pointing at you, and firing it," Mitch informed, grabbing his pen and notepad from his pocket.
Rogelio said, "I understand."
Holstering his sidearm, Henry eyeballed cards or something similar covering the couch and floor in front. Baseball cards? He got a better look and discovered they were driver's licenses. "What's the story with these?"
Rogelio made a face. "I don't know. They aren't mine."
Frowning, Felix said, "He's lying! I found those in his office, down the hall. Go back there and see for yourselves. He's got more, many more!"
As he picked some of the licenses up, Henry read the names. He read three names before coming to an interesting one. "Check it out partner, this was our dump victim right here."
Mitch grabbed the ID from Henry. "Yep, Candice Zelman."
Henry reached for his cuffs. "Get up, and turn around."
An eyebrow raised, the man stood. "Hey, those aren't mine!"
Henry looked down at the man. "Sir, do you want me to arrest you forcibly? It might hurt?"
Rogelio stood up and turned around. "I'm telling you, you are making a mistake!"
Henry cuffed him. "Sit down!"
"Why are you arresting me?"
Henry shrugged. "Not arresting you, the cuffs are for me and my partner's safety."
From the floor, Felix looked up. "I'll tell you everything."
"Felix the cop, talk to me." Mitch pulled out his cell phone and hit the voice recording button.
Felix talked and didn't stop talking for almost twenty minutes, coming clean about everything. He told them how Rogelio killed the woman and dumped her body. He told them about how he offered to help Rogelio. He and a man named Antonio 'Tony' Nunez helped with contracting Triple H for the hit on Sarah. And Felix told them that he believed that Tony was dead.
"Do you have anything to add Mr. Marquez?"
He shook his head. "No, I want a lawyer."
"Just so you know, s
ir, we know you were with the victim last night in your restaurant. There are witnesses. We know that you had drinks with the victim and you were the last person to be seen with her. Now, we see that you have her driver's license. Can you explain that?"
Rogelio shook his head. "You can talk to my lawyer."
"Alright, you will be allowed to call your lawyer at the precinct, okay?"
Mr. Marquez nodded.
Mitch called it in and a patrol car arrived six minutes later. Another one arrived two minutes after that. They still had to wait for the crime scene techs to process the scene.
They decided to make a cursory examination of the premises, if anything to make sure the house was secure.
Mitch walked up to Henry. "I told you, he did it!"
Henry nodded. "Yes, you did."
Half an hour later, the Crime Scene Unit was on scene.
Henry went to the car and retrieved a couple of pairs of latex gloves. They found the black boxes that Felix had mentioned.
"There's got to be over a hundred driver's licenses here," Henry commented, shaking his head. Some were from California, Tennessee, and New York. Florida and Alabama too.
He put the licenses down on the desk and recognized the pattern. "Young and blonde. Most of them have blue eyes."
"One of these expired fifteen years ago!" Mitch said.
Henry pulled four of his batch, placing them on the desk.
Mitch pulled eleven of them from his batch and added them to Henry's four. All fifteen licenses had Houston addresses except for two. One from San Antonio and the other from Florida. He and Mitch were familiar with each name.
Back in the living room, Henry sat in a chair next to the couch where Rogelio sat.
Felix was now sitting in a chair on the far side of the living room, opposite Rogelio.
Mitch stood, hands on his hips. "Mr. Marquez do you realize that you have the driver's licenses of fifteen murder victims." He held them in his hands.
Rogelio blinked as if he did not understand the implication.
"Can you tell us how you came to possess these, sir?"
Rogelio hiked up his shoulders.
Mitch went to the front door. Looked outside, then came back. "Mr. Marquez?"
Rogelio said, "Yes?"
"Where's your car?"
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Human Degradation
He opened his eyes and the sky, leaves, and branches hovered directly above him.
The blue of the sky calmed him. The clouds, the few that were there, reminded him of cotton. The wind nipped at his ears and kissed his cheeks. Juan just turned eight years old last month. A week into the summer vacation, he and his friends just played a game of baseball, relaxing under a big oak.
His team had won. Six runs to five. The game was tied until the ninth inning. The boy led off and got a double. He scored the winning run two batters later when Hector hit a single to left field.
Neighborhood boys, all lying there, talking about girls as if they understood them.
He got up and climbed the oak when some of the other boys climbed the big tree. Juan was smaller than most of the other boys, but he could do some things better than all of them. He never showed any weakness. Never.
The other boys went home.
He grabbed his glove and bat and went to the corner store and bought a Mountain Dew and a Three Musketeers from Mr. Jones. A friend of his mama's, who would come over late some nights. Mr. Jones was nice, not like some of mama's other friends.
It was getting late and would be dark soon. His mama always wanted him home before dark. He sat on the outside of the store drinking the Coke and nibbling on the candy bar. He loved Three Musketeers.
He was halfway done with the Mountain Dew and candy bar, when Tubby Teddy showed up with some of his friends. Teddy was older and much bigger. He was a bully and Juan hated him.
"Hey who are you?"
He stared up at the bully.
"My name is Juan."
"That is such a stupid name!" Teddy grabbed Juan's Mountain Dew and knocked the candy bar out of his hand. Trying to move out of his way, Juan tripped and fell.
His left wrist throbbed after he landed on his knees and hands. The boy realized the candy bar landed on the sidewalk on top of a piece of dirty gum two feet away.
He did not cry, just got mad.
"Oh look, Juan fell down!" Tubby Teddy said, laughing.
Rage filling him, Juan stood up, a whole head shorter than the bully.
"What? You ain't going to do nothing!"
His eyes watered.
Teddy said, "Next time I see you, you buy me Coke!"
Juan went home and the following week he waited in an alley, a route that Teddy took home.
When Teddy passed the tree he hid behind, Juan stepped out and hit him in the leg.
Falling down, the bully cried.
Juan hit him again.
Teddy begged him to stop. Juan stopped hitting him. "You ever touch me again the next time I won't stop hitting you with this bat!"
The bully held his leg. "Okay, I promise, I'll leave you alone!"
He had forgotten about that incident until now.
Happy, stared up at the sky, his head woozy. He smelled smoke. His ears were ringing and then Oso hovered over him.
"Yo, Happy, you okay?" Oso asked, a cut on his forehead bleeding down over his left eye.
The question was muffled. He took a deep breath, sitting up. "Am I bleeding?" What happened?
His underling gazed at his face. "You got a cut on your cheek but that's it."
That was not it. There was more. Happy touched his face, and a finger came back bloody. The ground was so cold, and the air grated his face, barely able to feel his nose.
"We were lucky, homie!" Oso uttered with disbelief, glancing over Happy's shoulder.
He remembered watching Bull coming out of the house, holding onto his belly. Bull fell in the front yard. Happy went to him. Bull told him about how the gringa killed his other men.
It was her. He remembered her flipping him off.
The front corner of the house was missing. Scanning the immediate area, the stove lay in the front yard, not far from his current position.
"Help me up."
Oso helped him up.
Happy stood up straight, blinking in the reality of the situation.
"What the hell happened?" Oso asked.
"An explosion."
Oso surveyed the immediate area. "Yeah, but how?"
He stared at the gaping hole in the house, ignoring the question because it did not matter. A few neighbors stood in their front yards. One old man had a cell phone up to his ear, probably talking to 911. Happy would have to leave soon before the cops arrived.
Bull was still down on the ground. "Oso, check on him."
Oso did. "He is alive but he will need to go to the hospital. He's unconscious."
Bull had better chances at surviving if he saw a real doctor. Besides cops couldn't prove shit. Happy would make sure Bull had a lawyer before he woke up.
"Okay, we leave him here. The ambulance will come. He needs to see a real doctor."
Oso stared at him like a lost dog.
"I'll find him a lawyer, he'll be okay."
"We need to get out of here, someone probably called this in already, an ambulance will probably be here soon."
We walked over burnt and burning wood, entering through the new hole in the house, into what used to be the kitchen.
"Where are the others?"
He said, "I don't know, maybe inside?"
He and Oso had to leave, but he needed to see. He entered through the missing corner of the house.
Inside the house, broken boards, dishes, and sheetrock. Little yellow and orange weeds of fire sprouted up inside in different areas of the house.
There were so many bodies. Everyone Happy sent to capture her had been killed. "But how?"
Happy had underestimated her.
Kneeling
, he noted half of Fonzo's jaw had been blown off. Happy had seen plenty of dead bodies, many his doing, but the way Fonzo's tongue dangled, from the hole in the bottom of his face, like a dead snake creeped him out.
He stood up and noticed something missing from each man. "Where are their shoes?" Each body was missing a shoe.
"I don't know, they aren't here."
He went into a bedroom, searching for Frogger, and found him, or what was left of him.
With the level of mutilation, Happy suspected that a machete was used. He hoped that the morgue would fix Frogger up good enough to have an open casket at his funeral.
Happy knelt down to see Lola better. Happy didn't realize Lola was this far in her pregnancy. Shot close range. This gringa was cold blooded.
Even Happy wouldn't shoot a pregnant woman.
As they drove back to his shop, he received a text message. He'd sent a couple of men to the safe-house to dismantle the Mercedes and load the pieces up in two trucks and take them to Austin and San Antonio.
The text message told him the soldiers protecting that safe-house were all dead there too.
"Damn it!"
"What?" Oso asked.
"She killed everybody at the safe house too!"
Oso's eyes turned back to the road.
Happy put the burner down on the seat, next to him. "Let's go there, right now."
"Let's go." Oso drove to the next intersection and took a right, heading to the safe house.
The day had turned out to be one of the worst days of Happy's life. He really needed to ask Bull about this gringa; she would pay for all of this.
They arrived at the safe house and went inside. As Happy walked into the house, the guys he sent to dismantle the Mercedes studied him, no doubt wondering what kind of hell he would release on the responsible.
Happy gazed at the bodies that used to be his men, his soldiers, his homies. He knelt down next to a headless body. After he examined the head, he recognized Santiago.
Santi, an excellent soldier, was as loyal as a Saint Bernard. He joined Triple H eight years ago and had always been a good earner and a fearless defender of Triple H.
Placing his hand on Santiago's head, Happy said a little prayer his mama used to say when he was little.
Not Forgiven: A Thriller and Suspense Novel: Ungoverned Series Page 20