Motive

by Dustin Stevens

  “Which side fired?” Danilo asked, moving fast, keeping his voice low and even.

  “Wait...what?” the man asked, his voice sounding shocked that such a thing was being inquired about.

  “I said, which side fired?” Danilo repeated, slowing his cadence, putting a razor’s edge on the words. “Did they come out shooting, or did you dumbasses open up?”

  The panting continued a long moment before the guy replied, “Hell, I don’t know. Stewart told me to call you, so I am. We’ve got company!”

  The last words came out just short of a scream, the man’s fear, his inexperience audible over the line. The moment they were out the call went dead, the guy no doubt moving away in abject terror, out to do his own part in the mess taking place across town.

  White hot rage roiled within Danilo as he jerked open the door to his truck and wrenched the passenger seat forward. The idea to hire untested guards for the lab was not his, and he had gone as far as he could in letting that be known.

  Zall, for all his business acumen, was not someone terribly accustomed to doing this kind of work. This entire project was something far outside of his comfort zone, something Danilo had known for quite some time. Men like Zall weren’t designed for engaging in such matters. They lived in places where a sharp tongue and deep pockets insulated them from any dangers the world may have, allowing them to sleep easy at night.

  Danilo wasn’t delusional enough to think such a place actually existed. If left to his own designs, he would have disposed of the bodies in a much more sensible manner, someplace where nobody would ever find them, instead of leaving them out in the open.

  Loyalty, not to Zall, but to a promise he made long before was the only thing keeping him around. The things he had done would earn him a lifetime in prison, but that would be a welcomed eventuality upon knowing his vow had been fulfilled.

  In the past months, Danilo had watched as Zall’s good sense slipped away, being replaced by desperation. That fact was even more apparent now, evidenced by things such as Zall insisting on hiring a team of thugs, men that looked the part but accomplished little else. Even his own presence in the guest house proved that the old man felt the world squeezing in around him.

  Reaching into the open space behind the seat, Danilo extracted an oversized plastic case measuring eight inches in height and twice that in length. Gripping it by the handle he pulled it free and slammed the door shut, leaving the seatback lurched forward at an awkward angle.

  Never before had Danilo been past the front foyer, a request from Zall that he had always abided by. In times past there was never any call for him to go charging ahead, earning the wrath of his employer. Nothing had ever occurred that couldn’t be handled in the front of the house, the few encounters they had had there simply to exchange information.

  Tonight was not such an encounter.

  The front door was unlocked as Danilo stepped inside, taking long, exaggerated steps, the case swinging by his side. The waning glow of dusk outside had been just dark enough for him to see the only light in the house was coming from the second floor, his body aimed in that direction as he passed through the hardwood foyer and headed straight up the stairwell before him. Climbing the steps two and three at a time, he called out, “Zall! Where are you?”

  He already knew the man was inside, as he was to be informed whenever he left for the foreseeable future. In his voice he left the sense of urgency that was surging through him, wanting it to be known.

  There was no response as he reached the second floor landing, light splashing out from a room to his right. “Zall,” he said again, not quite as loud, but his tone just as urgent. His feet smacked against the floor as he cut a path straight towards the light and swung through the open doorway. He had his mouth opened to call for Zall again, but stopped just inches inside the room, the words fading from his throat.

  Years before, when it first became apparent that Zall was going to beat the court case in front of him and flee to the islands, Marilyn Zall had come to see Danilo. How she found him he never found out, letting the matter go, as much out of respect for her having the courage to come to his home as for the years he had been in her service.

  That night she had lain out that she knew what Thomas was up to and his reasons for doing it. There was no way she could ever be in the same city with him again, not after knowing what had happened, what he had taken from her. Even worse, she couldn’t stand to sit and watch her son wither away, the result of a man incapable to accept the consequences of his actions.

  In her stead, she had implored Danilo to stay by his side, to watch over William, come what may. In return she vowed to do the same for his parents, both remaining behind in the New York City area, both too advanced in years to move six thousand miles and begin anew.

  At first, Danilo had thought to reject the offer. He wasn’t sure he even wanted to come to Hawaii, intent to stay in the city and look after his parents himself. Knowing their failing health would soon outstrip his own meager funds though, he had accepted the offer, thanking Marilyn profusely, making on oath to her that so long as William breathed he would do everything in his power to protect him.

  Despite more than three years having passed since that night, not once had Danilo ever actually seen the boy. Through a solid network of information of maids and gardeners that worked there he kept tabs on everything that happened, though always one step removed.

  When Saiki was brought on board, he suspected that it was in the name of helping William. When Zall called him to the front of the house and had a very serious talk with him about changing the scope of his services, he accepted without thinking twice. Marilyn had stood by her word, looking after his parents, and he would do the same.

  The gravity of that vow struck him full in the face as he stood on the edge of what appeared to be a scene from a hospital, the room bathed in bright light. In the center of it was an oversized medical bed, a tiny, frail body with a thick shock of dark hair propped up in the middle of it. The sight of it pulled the air from Danilo’s chest as he stared, recognizing the visage of young William’s face, the rest of his body shriveled to little more than a skeleton. His entire mass weighed less than one hundred pounds, his muscles atrophied to nothing, his motor skills completely eroded.

  Standing across from him on the far side of the bed was Saiki, an enormous needle in his hand, the tip of it ready to plunge directly into William’s spine. Perched on the near side, holding the shriveled form upright to receive the shot, was Zall. He turned over his shoulder as Danilo entered, his face pale and drawn.

  “What is it Danilo?” he asked, his voice strained, just south of angry. “You know I have asked that you never come in here.”

  For months Danilo had done as he was asked without question, knowing who the tasks were really in service of, even if he couldn’t say as much. He had performed some truly atrocious acts, had endured the perverse oddities of Saiki, had even bit his tongue about the handling of the house in Hawaii Kai. It had all been done in the name of a promise to Marilyn, on the basis of providing his parents the care he couldn’t.

  Still, despite knowing all that, it didn’t make seeing what was happening on the bed before him any easier.

  “William,” he whispered, taking a step forward, glancing between Zall and the shriveled figure on the bed. “I never imagined.”

  Targeting the pregnant women. Searching out children and confiscating their teeth. Bringing in the idiosyncratic doctor from Japan and setting up a lab in the basement of a home in Hawaii Kai. It all made sense. No longer were they content to simply keep William alive, they were trying to bring him back, to return him to the young man he had been.

  How the old man had managed to keep it all so well hidden, even keeping him at bay over the years was nothing short of impressive. Danilo stood and stared at the frame of the once virile young man that had been reduced to nothing, and he understood.

  An impatient sigh pushed out through Zall’s nose as he
glanced at Saiki and back to Danilo. “Is there some reason you’re here right now? As you can see, we’re in the middle of something.”

  Twice Danilo’s jaw worked up and down as he stared at the shell of his former friend, his charge, bestowed to him by an oath he would die protecting if it came to it. A ripple of emotion of a different form, something he had never felt, had no chance of defining, passed through him, as he stared at the young man.

  “We just got a call from the Hawaii Kai house,” Danilo said, his voice neutral, his attention aimed on the figure propped up on the bed.

  “And?” Zall asked.

  Setting the case down on the floor, Danilo popped open the silver hinges on either side of the handle. He pulled the top back and folded it towards the floor, a half dozen handguns gleaming under the bright lights. Stripping away a pair of Heckler and Koch P7’s he rose and placed them on the surgical scrub table behind him, both already loaded, the safeties off, before turning and heading towards the door.

  “They’re coming.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  When the group left the station, Tseng asked for a half hour. He wanted to have time to call on Sturgis and Li and get into position, allowing both sides to arrive at their respective destinations simultaneously. If he couldn’t get through to them, he would have to call on somebody else, risking widening the number of people involved, but willing to do so to ensure he didn’t show up alone.

  Kalani and Rip had both agreed to the stipulation, leaving Tseng on the curb and climbing into the Jeep. They watched as his taillights disappeared down Beretania Street in silence, not bothering to start the engine, sitting in the cooling evening air.

  “Hungry?” Rip asked without looking over at her.

  “No,” Kalani said softly, shaking her head from side to side. “You?”

  “No,” Rip echoed. He paused and glanced over at her, concern on his face. “Where you at right now?”

  “Right here,” Kalani said, her attention aimed out through the front windshield, her gaze unfocused.

  A low snort slid out of Rip as he glanced over at her. “You know, we’re going to be alright. We’re just going up to knock on a door and see if anybody’s home. It’ll be just like Mary-Ann Harris’s this morning.

  “We’ll knock, nobody will answer, we’ll be on our way.”

  Kalani heard the words without really listening to them, her thoughts in a dozen other places. Bit by bit she parsed through everything they knew, everything they had learned that afternoon, tying it all together in her mind. She wasn’t especially crazy about the idea of going up to that house, unannounced, after dark, but would do so. Before she did though, she had to make sure things were in order, that they were making the right call.

  “You should also know,” Rip said, rolling his head along the seatback to look over at her, “even if something does go down up there, you’re ready.”

  Somehow the words found their way into her consciousness, pulling her attention towards him. Gone were the thoughts from a moment before, falling by the wayside as she sat and stared at him, her expression blank. He hadn’t specified exactly what he meant, but he didn’t have to. Kalani had gotten where he was heading with the comment, even though not once before had they ever discussed what happened.

  “You don’t know that,” Kalani said, her voice no more than a whisper.

  “I don’t?” Rip said, turning to face forward a moment before looking back at her, a half smile on his face. “You think for a second I would have ever taken this on with you, that I would be willing to go up there tonight with you, if I didn’t know that?”

  Kalani felt her mouth open to respond, but no words came out.

  “I’ve read the file,” Rip said, staring back at her in earnest. “Back when it all went down. I called in a favor and I read every word of what happened. It wasn’t your fault.”

  Again Kalani tried to respond, her eyes growing glassy, but no words passed her lips. She turned to face forward, looking out through the window at the empty street ahead, forcing herself to remain composed.

  “Back when I was in the military, we had an expression,” Rip said. “Shit happens.”

  The tenor of his voice was almost a challenge as he leaned towards her another couple of inches. “Every last one of us that has ever worn a badge, in any department, for any agency, in the country knows what can happen on any given night when we clock in. Your partner knew it then, just like I know it now.

  “And he trusted you then, just like I trust you now.”

  There were an untold number of things Kalani could have said. She could have explained to him how she still saw the incident every night when she went to sleep. She could have told him that everything they had done so far was pretty straight forward, but this was the first time they faced real danger. She could have thanked him for the vote of confidence, for knowing she needed to hear it, even if she would never say as much.

  She said none of that. Instead she glanced down at the clock on the dash and said, “Half hour’s almost up. We should get going.”

  Rip stared at her a long moment, his face betraying nothing, before the right side of his mouth curled up a bit. He looked at her a long moment before simply saying, “Let’s go.”

  Chapter Forty-Four

  There was only two ways the collision could end. The first was for the front of the SUV to crumple in on itself like an accordion, sending the grill into the engine, and the engine through the front seat. If that happened, the V-8 would tear through Tseng and Sturgis as if they weren’t even there, the hot steel ending up somewhere close to the backseat. Li as well would be hard pressed to survive without being crushed, a quarter ton of jagged metal shrapnel hurtling towards him.

  Option two was for the clasp on the edge of the gate to give way, causing it to swing back over the driveway, ushering them in. If the gate was made of reinforced iron, or positioned on rollers that stretched across the length of the pavement, Tseng might have had misgivings about aiming the front of the car at it and slamming the gas. As it were, he could tell the flimsy structure was meant more for decorative deterrence than actually keeping anybody out, a symbol that was put in place for a home, not a makeshift lair.

  Fortunately for all three inside the Tahoe, his supposition was correct.

  The magnetic sleeve keeping the gate closed tight held for just a moment before giving way, the oversized object swinging back with vicious ferocity. The sound of the magnet wrenching lose let out a thunderous screech, followed by a rush of wind as it swung backwards.

  To their right a pair of muzzle flashes ignited, brief spots of yellow followed by the pinging sound of bullets smashing into the body of the truck. A moment later the sound of men crying out could be heard as the gate completed its arc, mowing down a pair of guards, their bodies flattened against the pavement.

  “Holy shit! Did you see that?” Sturgis yelled from the front seat, his body perched upright, staring out the window. In his right hand his Beretta was out and pointing towards the ceiling, waiting just inches from the side of his face.

  “That’s two,” Li called from the backseat, his body twisted around, watching the pair of inert objects land in misshapen heaps not to move again.

  Tseng remained silent as he ignored the path of the driveway, hunkered low behind the wheel, gripping it with both hands. Blood pulsed through his body, his arms clenched so tight he could barely move them, his rigid form oblivious to the jostling car as it bounded forward across the lawn.

  Outside a pair of guards descended the driveway towards them, guns drawn, extended out in front of their bodies. Tseng bore down on them hard for a moment, watching as the tips of their weapons ignited with tiny orange blossoms, hearing them as they ricocheted off the body of the truck. Two more found the front windshield as he drove, a matching pair of divots erupting in the front glass, the crystalline pattern spreading across, obscuring his vision.

  “You boys ready to go?” Tseng asked through gritted tee
th, every nerve in his body tingling with sensation.

  “Oh, hell yeah,” Sturgis said beside him, rocking back and forth in place, anticipation rolling off of him.

  “Do it,” Li said from the backseat, his voice still even, one hand on his weapon, the other on the door handle.

  Aiming his focus on the distorted images of the men before him, Tseng closed the gap between them before pounding the brakes, the heavy truck lurching to slow down. At the same time he jerked the wheel to his left, the massive form of the SUV skittering sideways, the sound of rubber sliding over asphalt meeting their ears. Chunks of sod and dirt sprayed upward from the front tires as they peeled off into the lawn, the heap coming to rest less than ten yards from the men standing across from them.

  The car had barely stopped moving before both passenger side doors burst open, Sturgis and Li exploding out. Both took their first steps with guns extended, one round after another pounding from their weapons.

  Tseng watched for just a moment as the two guards got off a pair of shots before their bodies began to writhe in place, bullets finding their flesh, twisting their bodies with impact.

  The smell of gunpowder, burnt rubber, fresh plowed soil, all met Tseng’s nostrils as he stepped from the SUV, using the driver’s door as a shield. Turning away from the men on the drive he aimed his attention at the front door, his outstretched arms resting between the v-shaped crook of the body and door of the car.

  A moment later the shooting died away, the only sound the hissing of the engine just inches from his face.

  “You guys okay?” Tseng yelled, his heart pounding in his chest, sweat bathing his body.

  “Good,” Li replied, his voice even, just a tiny hint of strain in it.

  Chancing a glance across, he saw Li standing with arms outstretched, tucked away behind the rear door, attention focused on the bodies lying prone on the pavement. In front of him Sturgis was leaning back into the car, resting his forearms on the seat, wiping a hand across his forehead. When it came back his palm was painted red, crimson streaks running through the creases in it, sliding down his wrist.