After a deep breath, he shook his head and double-stepped it to the truck. He had to rummage through his belongings but finally located and retrieved his aluminum bat.
It had been a gift from his father when the man had tried to get him to enroll in the local little league team. The dream hadn't lasted long since it very soon became clear that he absolutely sucked at baseball.
The bat had proven useful in other situations, though. He had held onto the piece of aluminum like it was his friend and introduced the bullies in his high school to it—as well as a couple of car thieves before he joined the Marines.
Of course, he'd long since graduated to weapons that didn't need to be swung around, but the bat had always held a special place in his heart. He kept it with him almost everywhere and always close enough for him to use in an emergency.
And if this wasn't an emergency, he didn't know what was. He patted it into his palm a few times as he circled to the rear where the men attempted to break in through the back door.
He was undecided whether he wanted to wait for them to actually accomplish that or not since there had been no keys for that particular door. He would have to take it down at some point, but it would be easier if the door was open.
"Come on, Jay, we don't have time for this," one of the criminals said. "Beeker wants us back before nightfall."
"I've needed to practice my lock-picking skills," the man who knelt in front of the door protested.
"What skills?" one of the others asked. "I'm with Drew. We should break a window and get in that way."
And that was where he drew the line. He would let them get in through the door, but if their shenanigans would add to his work he needed to do to bring this place into working condition, he would stop them right there and then.
He grasped the bat a little tighter. "I thought you guys were supposed to pull this shit at night?"
The five men paused in their efforts and spun to look at him. They were obviously surprised to see him and more importantly, surprised by how calm he was as he stood there with his baseball bat which he used to point at them.
"Seriously, you'd think you people would do this when there's as little chance as possible for you to be caught by the people who run the place, have them call the police, and have you arrested," Taylor continued. "Think about it. If you are arrested, all this needs to be done all over again. You're simply not that intimidating when I stand here and watch you guys do it."
"I—wait," one of the goons said with a hasty glance at his cronies. He recalled that he’d been referred to as Drew. "There are five of us and you're not intimidated?"
"What do I have to be intimidated by?" Taylor asked. "You guys have been stumped for the past five minutes by a fucking door."
"I need to practice, man," Jay complained, looking between Taylor and the door. "Don't be shitty."
"Don't be shitty to the dumbasses trying to break into and trash my property?" He adopted an incredulous expression. "Yeah, that’s a huge stretch to ask me to do."
"Fuck you," the first man retorted and drew a pistol that had been tucked into his pants.
Taylor was already on the move before he even pulled the weapon clear. He stepped closer as he raised the bat, and swung it hard in an underhanded arc.
The man's knee cracked audibly. He tried to scream in pain, but it was cut off as the bat hooked around and hammered him on the side of the head.
Drew fell without so much as a sound and flurried a cloud of dust around him. Taylor had already moved toward the others. They were used to the kind of people who would avoid conflict at all costs, even if it was directed at them.
Their arrogance and bravado were based on bullying simple business folk who merely wanted to make a living.
It was painfully clear they really hadn’t anticipated that someone would retaliate. And given that none of the others made any effort to draw weapons when he attacked them, he could tell they hadn’t come very prepared for any resistance.
No one else had a pistol.
Well, that was their loss. He was used to staying on the move and always delivering pain whenever he could. His survival instincts had been honed for optimum damage in the shortest possible time. It was how he had lived as long as he had in the Zoo.
Well, that and his fair share of luck.
He was in the midst of them before they could fully comprehend what he intended. The man who tried to pick the lock took a blow to the head and sagged. His comrades immediately tried to go to his aid. The first caught the knob of the bat in his gut and again in his ribs. The crunch of bones breaking could be heard even above his shriek of pain.
By now, the two men left had realized that they were horribly, horribly outmatched. They spun away, dropped the knife and tire iron they carried, and rushed to the car they had parked down the street. He wasn't sure if they were not used to running or if the whole shitting their pants in terror reality made them a little uncoordinated. Neither one would have surprised him, in fact, but he was able to catch up before they had crossed half the distance.
One collapsed and clutched his knee after Taylor’s crushing blow. The second tripped over his own two feet and sprawled in his distraction.
"Hey, man, I'm cool here," the thug said and raised his hands. "I'm on the ground and I surrender. There’s no need to bash my face in. If you have to do some bashing, maybe stick around the torso area or maybe the legs. Not the face, please."
"Do you think I want to beat you clowns?" he demanded and waved his bat. The man flinched. "I'm defending my property. You know what's a good way to avoid having your face bashed in? Don't break into other people's place of business."
"Not the face, man, please."
He shook his head. "Get the fuck up. I won't hit you with the bat. But you will help me to handle your friends."
"Anything you say, man."
Taylor eyed him. “Hard of hearing? I said get the fuck up."
The goon clambered quickly to his feet and looked like he considered running again before Taylor tapped him on the shoulder with the bat.
"Don't even think about it," he warned when he anticipated where his mind was going, caught him by the shoulders, and shoved him over to where his comrades had begun to recover. The leader, Drew, was conscious again but after a few seconds, he pulled himself to his knees and threw up.
"Fucking— Damn it. Now I'll have to clean that shit up." He yanked his phone out of his pocket and dialed nine-one-one.
"Nine-one-one, what's your emergency?" said a calm, feminine voice.
"Yeah, I have five dumbasses who tried to break into my place of business," he told her belligerently. "You have my address already, right? I need someone with a badge to come and take them off my hands."
The woman hesitated for a moment while he began to collect the weapons the thugs had dropped.
"Of course, sir. We have cruisers in your area and the officers should arrive in a few minutes," she said. The pause had clearly been so she could check. "Please find someplace safe to stay and they should be right with you."
"Yeah." He growled his annoyance as he hung up. "I don't think that'll be a problem."
Chapter Ten
She’d said a few minutes but it ended up being closer to ten. That meant enough time for Taylor, with the help of his new friend, to drag the characters into the delivery entrance at the back and find wire to tie them all up with. It was a nasty business, but the upside was that it seemed they would prefer to deal with the cops than whatever he might have in mind for them.
If the truth be told, it was the smartest decision they had made all day. They would simply wait quietly until the cops arrived and they wouldn't have to face the angry man with the bat anymore.
Some of them nursed injuries that would require medical attention, but he really didn't care. He was pissed to the point where they needed to consider themselves lucky that he hadn’t locked them in the meat freezer in the back of what had once been a grocery store.
&nb
sp; The ten minutes passed before he finally saw the red, white, and blue lights flashing as the sun began to set. They were probably looking around for something that would give them a pass to head out and say the call was a hoax when he moved over to open the larger gate that would allow them to drive in.
Or maybe Taylor was merely feeling particularly cynical.
"They're in there ready for you," he told them as one lowered his window and directed them to drive inside where the five goons waited in silence to be taken away—or rescued if their expressions were any indication.
He didn't want to tell them how to do their jobs, but only two officers in a single cruiser were not enough to take five perps to jail. In fairness, if they had found it was only a prank call, they would only have to arrest the caller so maybe that was why they had come alone.
"You guys took your sweet damn time," he stated and shook his head. "Do you think it's my job to hold the guys who were breaking into my place of business for you?"
"I…I'll ask you to mind your tone, sir," one of the officers said and narrowed his eyes. "Now, would you like to explain the situation?"
"I did to the nine-one-one operator but sure, I have nothing else to do today so I'll explain it again. These five guys were breaking into my place of business—in which you stand—and I stopped them."
The cop raised an eyebrow and Taylor closed his eyes and forced himself to take a deep breath.
"I apologize for my tone, sergeant," he said when he felt a little calmer. "It's…been a long day, and these guys got on my last fucking nerve.”
“No problem, sir,” the man said. “I’m Sergeant Smith, and this is Officer Smith.” He indicated his partner, who tipped his cap. “No relation.”
“Fantastic. I’m Taylor McFadden.” He waved a finger around in a circle. “I own this whole lot and I was working on some repairs when a trio of toughs came up and asked me to pay them off for protection. I refused and not two hours later, this cavalcade of fuck-ups tried to break in through the back."
"Wait, you own this property?" the sergeant asked.
"You took all five of them down?" the officer said. Clearly, he was the one who asked the real questions.
"In order," Taylor said, “yes, I own this place. I bought it yesterday and started working on it today. And, yeah, I took all five of them down."
"On your own?" the man asked in disbelief. The sergeant rolled his eyes but kept his mouth shut like he wanted to hear the answer to that as well.
"Well, me and Betsy," he replied.
"Betsy?" the sergeant asked.
"Betsy the Baseball Bat." He tugged the bat in question up from where it rested next to him. "They were armed too if you were wondering. I collected all the weapons and put them in that trash bag in case you guys wanted them. I didn't actually touch them, so fingerprints shouldn't be an issue."
"Don't worry, we're fully aware that you were well within your rights of self-defense," the sergeant said. "Besides, being from the area, we know a thing or two about these five."
"Yeah?" Taylor looked over at the glum group. "They don't seem the type who would be too memorable as criminals. Goons, from the looks of them, and not up for much more than the dirty work."
"Hey, fuck you, man," Drew shouted.
"Sit tight, Drew, or I'll let you have another long talk with Betsy," Taylor called in response.
"I can't condone any further use of violence sir," Sergeant Smith said, shook his head, and chuckled. "Between you, me, and Officer Smith here, though, I don’t really shed any tears about you treating them roughly. These five have been in and out of jail their whole lives—racketeering, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, you name it. Some have even done time in the past, although it was always for lesser charges. All five are on the last of their three strikes."
"Fun times," Taylor quipped. "Wait, Nevada has a three-strikes law?"
"We do," Officer Smith confirmed and retrieved handcuffs from his belt. "It’s not quite like the Cali law, but these quote, habitual criminals, unquote, will face between five and twenty years in the slammer depending on how good their lawyers are and how busy the prosecutor is."
"Yeah, he's had a ton of work from the gang activity around here," Sergeant Smith said morosely. "The chances are they'll be given the opportunity to roll over on some of their compadres for reduced jail time since we know these ass-munchers won't last long in the maximum-security jails—right, Jay?"
No answer issued from the five. Taylor recalled Jay as being the inept lockpicker and could guess that hard time would be akin to hell for someone as young as he was.
"Anyway, we don't want to take up any more of your time, Mr. McFadden," the sergeant said and gestured for the officer to start rounding the group up. "Suffice it to say I don't think any of these hoods will bother you in the future. We appreciate your efforts."
His partner began to handcuff the group as a second police vehicle turned slowly into the lot and approached the group.
Maybe they weren’t that lackadaisical after all as it seemed they’d already had backup on the way. It most likely had something to do with the neighborhood, which meant his earlier assessment of their attitude had been a little skewed. The thugs were shoved none too gently toward the cruisers—a few complaining about their pain.
"I appreciate that," Taylor said and took the sergeant's proffered hand. "And again, sorry for my attitude before. It's been something of a day."
"Hey, I completely understand," the Smith said with a laugh. "I’m glad you held back on taking them down too hard. With self-defense laws being what they are, you wouldn't have any charges pressed against you, but they would have still made us bring you in to make a statement at the station."
"As is, though?" he asked.
"Oh, I'll use the statement you gave us here and put that into the report," the sergeant said. "A detective might come over to get extra details for the DA, but it shouldn't be more than that."
"Well, I appreciate that, sergeant, officer." He nodded briskly to the two of them. "If you don't mind, I think I'll get back to work. There are still a couple of hours of work I can fit in before it gets too dark."
"Everyone likes an industrious man," Officer Smith said as he moved to keep an eye on Drew who stood beside the cruiser and seemed to have regained a little of his belligerence now that he was safely tucked beside a police vehicle. "By the way, I noticed you had some cameras outside. Would you mind—"
Taylor already had a memory stick ready. He pulled it out of his pocket and handed it to the sergeant. "I thought you guys might like video evidence of what happened. There should be markers on the footage that says it's tamper-proof too."
"Much appreciated, Mr. McFadden."
"You'll regret this, man," Drew yelled although he made no effort to move closer. "Do you think this shit will simply go away? Nah. My peeps will tear into you and make sure you don't live long enough to see an officer of the law to talk to. You'll be silenced for fucking ever, asshole."
The officer looked like he was about to tell the man to shut the fuck up but Taylor felt something a little more emphatic was needed. He closed the distance in a few long strides, grasped the thug by the collar of his knockoff brand shirt, and dragged him in close so their eyes were barely five inches apart.
"Listen up, bubba, because I'll only say this once." He deliberately kept his voice calm and measured as he stared directly into Drew’s eyes. "Folk have tried to silence me for a long time. Well, not folk, strictly speaking, but they were a hell of a lot more intimidating than you five incompetent, dumb shits."
The man tried to turn away, but he caught his chin and twisted him to make sure he paid attention. "Eighty-three times they tried, and eighty-three times, I was the one who walked away alive. There's nothing you and your gang of Crips impersonators can do that will make me flinch. When the screams of your dying comrades are the noises that keep you up at night, hell isn't your biggest worry anymore. Staying alive is. Try me, punk, and
next time, it won't be Betsy that bashes your fucking skull in. I'll do it with my own two hands."
He released Drew's collar, shoved him back into Officer Smith, and turned away. While the thug tried to put on a brave face, his knees shook visibly and he had to almost be lifted into the car.
Neither police officer had much to say about what he had said, but the sergeant had apparently looked away as if he didn’t want to be a witness if any of this came to trial. His gaze landed on the trio of mech suits that were inside.
"What the fuck are those?" he asked, not too well-versed in the suits and what they were used for. "What, are you trying to be Iron Man or something?"
"Fuck no," Taylor retorted. “Iron Man never fought in the Zoo.”
Sergeant Smith nodded. “Thanks for your time, Mr. McFadden. You have a nice night.”
He and his partner gestured for the first cruiser to pull away and slid into their vehicle.
“Did he say the fucking Zoo?” Officer Smith asked once they were out on the road again and on the way to the station.
“Yep,” the sergeant said as he watched the footage Taylor had given him on the cruiser’s computer. “But looking at this shit… Well, let’s say I wouldn’t want to be the one to call him a liar.”
Neither the officer nor the sergeant looked forward to the sheer amount of paperwork it would take to book all five men. While it was mostly an open and shut case, four of them required at least some kind of medical attention and it would therefore take a while until they were all processed.
Three were still talking to paramedics while two were in the holding cells, waiting for the arrival of their lawyers. None of the five were the sharpest knives in any selection of drawers, but they had been around law enforcement for long enough to know how to shut the fuck up before their legal advisors arrived.
Normally, Sergeant Smith would have been annoyed by their knowledge since it would have been easier to get a confession from them if they didn’t have their lawyers around, but not tonight. Drew Haskins would be a tough nut to crack, but all the others would rather have a chat with the DA and take deals to avoid hard time.
Hired Killer (Cryptid Assassin Book 1) Page 9