Retreat

by J. F. Gonzalez

  Paul Westcott spoke into the Blackberry he clutched in his right hand. “Pete, I need you here now!” His left hand drifted to the firearm holstered at his hip.

  Joe reacted. He raised his weapon, aimed.

  Paul Westcott raised his weapon.

  Gunfire followed.

  CHAPTER 41

  The moment shots were fired, the guests in the dining room got up from their places and began to file out of the dining room.

  Wayne Sanders and Emily Wharton reacted instantly. They were up and along the far wall of the dining room, making sure everybody exited in an orderly fashion and that coats and purses were in the possession of their rightful owners. Emily knew this wasn’t a drill—they weren’t scheduled to perform one until tomorrow night, per the unofficial by-laws established by the core members of the group. Thankfully, everybody was treating this seriously and were heading out quickly. Pete Atkins was shouting orders into his cell phone, probably alerting Glenn and Scott—he’d already retrieved his weapon, a Beretta 9mm. Theresa Johnson ran out of the kitchen, her pretty bimbo features a mask of horror and shock. “Oh my God, oh my God!” she screamed.

  “Shut the fuck up and get out!” Emily ordered.

  Theresa stopped at the pass and turned toward the kitchen. “Mitch!”

  There were sounds of a struggle coming from the kitchen and the pantry beyond. Emily couldn’t tell who it was, but she could hear Anna King screaming for help.

  Theresa looked torn between wanting to follow Emily’s orders and heading back into the kitchen for her husband. A male voice yelled—it sounded like Mitch—and that decided it for her. Theresa sprang back toward the kitchen, yelling his name again. “Mitch!”

  Orders given, Pete Atkins sprang forward, firearm in hand.

  “We need to leave, Ms. Wharton,” Wayne Sanders said. For the first time since Emily had known him, Wayne looked nervous, but he was doing his best to hide it.

  Emily knew they had to leave. They’d established an emergency plan years ago upon formation of the club. At the first sign of trouble, all members were to vacate the premises immediately and turn over all security decisions to Paul Westcott and his hand-picked team. Paul and his team were to dispose of any human remains left in the incinerator that was set just off the storage room and pantry. Paul and his team had exactly thirty minutes to dispose of any human remains and evidence in the event somebody called the police.

  There was another gunshot, followed by a scream. “Mitch! Oh my God, Mitch!” Theresa turned, and still screaming, ran back towards the dining room.

  Shortly after, another gunshot, and Theresa fell face first on the floor, sprawled near the pass.

  Pete Atkins crouched below the countertop that led to the pass. He was talking into his cell phone again and Emily could pick out the frantic tone of his voice.

  Wayne Sanders gripped Emily’s elbow. When she turned to him she read the stark fear in his watery blue eyes. “We really need to leave. Now!”

  Emily nodded and let Wayne lead her out of the dining room.

  Scott Baker arrived just as Emily and Wayne were halfway down the hallway heading toward the elevators. His weapon drawn, he rushed past as Emily and Wayne walked purposefully toward the elevators. “You and I can take my car,” he said. “Glenn should have activated the gates that lead out to Route 7.” Route 7 was a rural road that bordered the rear end of the property about two miles from Bent Creek proper. The access road that led to it was seldom used and wasn’t known to the general clientele of Bent Creek, nor most of the staff and security agents Paul employed; it was a private road, used only for the board and their guests during the private event. Upon notification of any sign of trouble, the security agent manning the system would have deactivated the gate, allowing for board members and their guests to exit the property swiftly.

  “Okay,” Emily said. Her heart was racing.

  “Everything will be fine,” Wayne said. They stood at the bank of elevators, waiting.

  Behind them, in the dining room, the battle raged on.

  * * *

  Joe Taylor had taken Paul Westcott down with two shots that hit the Chief of Security square in the chest. He went down with a bloody gurgle and Chef Munchel scattered back to the doorway, missing it by a foot, eyes wide, face flush with fear. Joe pointed his weapon at him. “You stay right there!”

  Chef Munchel raised his hands. Surrender.

  From the pantry, excited, panicked voices. The woman who’d shouted out the warning kept it up. “Get me out of here! Help!”

  Joe motioned toward the Beretta Paul Westcott had dropped. “Brian, pick that up, please.”

  Brian swooped down and picked up the weapon.

  “Chef Munchel, I want you to move over to the corner on your left,” Joe said. He had a bead on Chef Munchel and he felt a strange sense of calm now that his worst fears had been confirmed. Somehow, having his worst fears about Carla’s disappearance coming to light and bearing evidence was driving his actions, and he was calm and methodical about what he planned to do next.

  Chef Munchel did as Joe asked, shuffling over to the corner. In the pantry, a man and a woman were arguing, their voices rising and falling in their panic. “We paid for her, goddammit!” the man shouted.

  “Turn around, face the wall,” Joe said to Chef Munchel.

  “You don’t want to do this,” Chef Munchel said.

  “Turn the fuck around!” Brian Gaiman snapped. Whatever fear Brian had was now gone. He gripped the Beretta by the barrel.

  Chef Munchel turned around slowly, hands still raised in the air.

  Brian swooped forward and brought the butt of the Beretta down on the back of Chef Munchel’s head. There was a sound like a watermelon falling to the floor and Chef Munchel dropped like a sack of meat. His right leg twitched for a few seconds and then stopped.

  “Get him tied up if you can,” Joe told Brian. Without waiting for an answer, he stepped into the pantry, weapon raised.

  The first thing he saw when he stepped into the pantry was a man dressed in a black suit and a white shirt standing over a woman in a mussed-up waitress uniform who was lying on what appeared to be a rolling serving tray. The woman was tied up. The man was holding a large butcher knife, a look of indecision on his face. From beyond the pantry, in the kitchen, a woman was screaming at somebody named Mitch. The man looked up as Joe entered and he raised the butcher knife over the woman on the table. Joe shot him once in the face just as the screaming woman from the kitchen emerged in the doorway to the pantry.

  The man went down, dropping the knife. The woman screamed. “Mitch! Oh my God, Mitch!” She turned and ran out of the pantry, screaming.

  The woman on the table was struggling to free herself. She cast a pleading look to Joe. “Please get me out of here!”

  “In a minute,” Joe said, walking past her, gun still raised. He crept up to the doorway that led to the kitchen, then stepped through, raised his weapon and fired at the woman running away. He shot her in the back and she went down in a spray of blood.

  Return gunfire from somewhere out in the dining room beyond whizzed by him and Joe dropped, taking cover behind the large rectangular grill and stove that lay center in the kitchen. From the dining room Joe heard another male voice, probably speaking into a cell phone or Blackberry. “Get the fuck down here, goddammit, we’re in a load of shit!”

  You’re right about that, asshole, Joe thought. He had eight rounds left in this clip and another three clips in his right slack’s pocket. The man who had returned fire was probably one of the three security guards working for Paul Westcott. The other two would probably be on the scene any minute now. Which meant that...

  Joe felt the presence behind him before he heard the voice. “Freeze, motherfucker!”

  Oh shit! Joe froze, heart in his throat as somebody stepped close to him. “Make one move and I’ll blow your brains all over the floor. Now drop the gun!”

  Joe took a deep breath, trying to center hims
elf again. He slowly lowered his handgun to the floor.

  “Good. Now push it toward the front of the kitchen.”

  Joe shoved the gun away from him, feeling his defeat grow as the weapon slid down the smooth tiled floor of the kitchen.

  The voice behind him called out to the man who’d returned fire from the dining room. “I got him, Pete!”

  “Where’s Scott?”

  Another voice, fainter, from further back in the dining room. “Right here, boss. What do we got?”

  “We got somebody who thinks he’s the fucking Lone Ranger, that’s what we got,” Pete said. To the man who had put the drop on him, Pete said, “Glenn! There anybody else with this scumbag?”

  “Don’t know. I came through Chef’s office.”

  “Where is Chef?”

  “Don’t know that, either, Pete.”

  There was silence from all around. Even the woman on the table had stopped yelling for help. Joe only hoped that Brian Gaiman would be his element of surprise. Surely these guys knew that Brian had escaped, right? This was confirmed a moment later. “Who is it?” Pete asked. Judging by the sound of his voice, Pete was drawing closer, but cautiously. “It’s not Gaiman, is it?”

  “No, it’s not Gaiman,” Glenn said.

  “Where’s Paul?”

  “Don’t know.”

  Another pause. Then, “I’m coming in. Scott, stay here.”

  “You got it, bro.”

  And then, with a sickening mount of dread rising with each footstep Joe heard, Pete Atkins headed toward the kitchen.

  * * *

  Scott Baker stood at sentry duty at the entrance to the dining room, his heart racing.

  He’d been awakened from a sound sleep by the blaring of his Blackberry. When he picked it up, Pete Atkins’s frantic voice had wiped every trace of tiredness from his system. “Get down here now! We have a situation! We have a situation!”

  “Leaving now,” Scott had said, and he did. He’d pulled on slacks, shoes, grabbed his gunbelt and keys, and was out of his suite in thirty seconds.

  His route to the dining room was taken with speed and agility. Weapon drawn, he’d made his way quickly to the entry hall of the banquet area and quickly went on alert when he drew closer. Pete was shouting at somebody in the kitchen and he heard Glenn’s voice as well. He’d heard a single gunshot on his way downstairs and his pulse had quickened. Whatever had gone down had happened quickly. Even the guests had filed out and were gone—they hadn’t taken any chances. Scott hoped that they could wrap this mess up quickly and efficiently. He knew that in the event something unexpected like this was to happen, and should they successfully eliminate the threat, the board had promised bonuses for them. Scott accepted that as part of the conditions of taking on this job. Of course he didn’t want this kind of trouble—what kind of private security guard wants to put up with trouble that could result in being killed or being convicted of a major felony?—but now that it was here, he was going to do his best to eliminate it, work with his team to solve the problem. That’s what he did and who he was. He was a problem solver, a guarder of secrets, a man who protected those who employed him and provided for him.

  He watched as Pete made his way to the kitchen. Just beyond the pass, he saw a spill of blonde hair and the top half of a dead woman lying sprawled face down on the floor. From here, it looked like Theresa Johnson. Holy shit, she’s dead, he thought.

  Scott’s mind was racing. Glenn would have been manning the security booth when the shit hit the fan. He’d probably come down the back stairs and entered the kitchen through the entrance in Chef’s office, which was just catty-corner. Glenn probably dropped the guy there. Scott frowned. Glenn said the shooter wasn’t Brian Gaiman. So who was it? Somebody Gaiman had managed to call during the past twenty-four hours? Highly unlikely. Paul ran a tight ship here security-wise. The security control room had wireless monitoring equipment that could intercept cellular transmissions and eavesdrop on conversations. Had they been able to pick up on any kind of cellular call Brian had made, they would have caught it.

  From the kitchen, Pete and Glenn were talking. “Who the fuck is this?” Pete asked Glenn.

  “Fuck if I know,” Glenn said. “I came out of Chef’s office, saw Theresa run screaming, then this guy steps out of the pantry and shoots her in the fucking back.”

  “What’s your name?” Pete asked the still-unknown suspect.

  “Bob Garrison.”

  Scott’s frown deepened. Bob Garrison was the last minute addition to the event for this week. Chef Munchel had added him. He remembered Paul Westcott being pissed off because he’d been unable to completely vet him, but Chef had insisted this Garrison guy be his guest. Chef was probably hot for the guy. Probably wanted to blow him or fuck him while the two of them rolled around in grilled human loin meat dipped in hot buffalo wing sauce. Figures.

  “You’re the guy Chef Munchel invited,” Glenn said.

  Silence.

  From Glenn again. “I didn’t hear you.”

  “Yes,” Bob Garrison said.

  “Where’s Chef Munchel?”

  “Back there. Storage room.”

  “Did you kill Chef too?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “What the hell’s wrong with you, Mr. Garrison?” Pete asked. “Chef invites you out of the kindness of his heart to this shindig and you go all goddamn crazy. Like goddamn fucking Clint Eastwood.”

  There was a beat of silence, then Pete barked a command at Garrison. “Rise to your feet slowly. Hands up so we can see them.”

  Another beat of silence. Scott cast a glance in the hallway, noted it was getting dark outside, then turned his attention back to what was going on in the kitchen.

  “Were you in on this with Brian Gaiman?”

  “No,” Bob Garrison said. “I don’t know who Brian Gaiman is.”

  “So you acted alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  Silence.

  Pete to Glenn. “I’ve got him covered. Go check the storage room.”

  Another beat of silence, then Glenn called out: “Paul’s dead. Chef’s knocked out. Nobody else is here.”

  “Shit,” Pete muttered. At the mention that Paul was dead, Scott felt a sense of coldness settle into his belly. Paul was dead? What the hell were they going to do now? From the kitchen, Scott heard Pete Atkins tell Bob Garrison, “You killed Paul!”

  “He was going to shoot me.”

  “I oughta fuckin’ shoot you! Goddammit!”

  Glenn said something to somebody else in the kitchen. “You know this guy?”

  Scott strained to listen. It sounded like somebody was crying. A woman. Anna King? It had to be. They obviously hadn’t taken her out yet for tonight’s dinner. Jesus...

  “We’re not gonna get anything out of her,” Pete said to Glenn.

  “Yeah, you’re right.”

  Pete called out to Scott. “Everything okay out there, Scott?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “So what do we do with this guy?” Glenn asked Pete.

  “I say we pop him.”

  “But what if Wayne—”

  “Wayne isn’t here, and we’re in charge of maintaining the security and well-being of our clients now that Paul is dead!” Pete barked. “And I say this guy got killed when we came in to try to save Bent Creek’s guests.”

  Scott felt his heart stop. His attention was wholly riveted to what was going on in the kitchen. He never thought his security duties at Bent Creek would escalate to this—he’d taken the job knowing there was the possibility, however slight, especially since he was required to carry a firearm. But now that it was happening, Scott didn’t know if he was willing to sign on for another season despite the hefty salary. Carrying a gun while on the job was one thing; using it was a completely different ball game.

  “Turn around, motherfucker,” Pete said to Bob Garrison.

  Anna King started to scream out in a sobbing cry. “No! Pl
ease, don’t shoot him! Don’t!

  There was a muffled coughing sound that exploded from Scott’s left and something whizzed past his face. Pete’s head rocked to the side in an explosion of blood and he dropped like a sack of meat.

  What the hell? Scott thought.

  Glenn looked at where Pete had just been standing a moment ago, then turned toward the dining room. For a moment, his eyes locked with Scott’s. There was another muffled cough from behind and slightly to the left of Scott, and Glenn was hurled back, as if taking a sharp punch to the chest. He fell against the countertop, his chest suddenly bloody, and slid to the floor, bringing down pots and pans in a clatter.

  “Ohmygod!” Scott said. He turned around.

  A man Scott had never seen before stepped toward him. He turned the silencer-equipped pistol on him and pulled the trigger and Scott didn’t have to worry anymore about staying on for another season at Bent Creek.

  CHAPTER 42

  Calm down, calm down, calm down. Joe kept repeating this litany silently to himself, ignoring the woman tied up behind him who was mumbling incoherently. Joe opened his eyes, not even seeing the two corpses at his feet. All he could think of was how lucky he was that Dean Campbell and Clark Arroyo had arrived in time.

  “Joe?” It was Dean. He was flattened against the wall near the pass. Joe couldn’t see him, but he could make out his shadowed form.

  “I’m okay,” Joe managed. He took a deep breath. His heart was racing like mad in his chest. He felt like he was going to faint. His knees felt rubbery. He put out his left hand to steady himself, gripping the edge of a countertop. He looked at Pete’s body splayed out on the floor. The last thing he remembered was Pete telling him to turn around, the gun pointed directly at his face. Joe was on the verge of leaping forward and launching himself at the guy when the shot had taken Pete in the head, dropping him. Until that moment, Joe thought he was a dead man. His call to Dean Campbell had occurred thirty minutes ago. He knew it would take them at least that long to make their way up the winding driveway to the grounds of the country club, then they had to find their way inside. The code Joe had given Dean indicated that Dean and his partner, Clark, were to head straight to the kitchen. It’s a good thing those instructions were so concise. Otherwise, he’d be dead now.