“What?”
“Tanner, he was touched by this.”
“Really?”
“Um-hmm, and he came here just before he left us. I guess he wanted to say goodbye.”
Laurel reached out and touched the tombstone engraved with Cody Parker’s name.
“That doesn’t sound like Tanner, but tell me, are there any photos of the Parkers?”
“No, they were all destroyed with the house, oh, but wait; there is one picture of Cody Parker.”
“Can I see it?”
“It’s at the library, inside a new display they just put up. Someone came across it in their family photos and realized who was in the picture.”
Laurel cocked her head as she stared down at Cody Parker’s tombstone. Years ago, while they were still lovers, Tanner had told her he had grown-up on a ranch in Texas.
“I think I’ll stop by the library later.”
While at the hospital, Ivanov had passed along the location of more than a dozen Russian street soldiers. They all lived together in an apartment building that Krupin owned.
Tanner watched it from the roof of a nearby building and noticed that the men seemed complacent. They were not expecting to be attacked because they thought all the focus would be on their boss, Michael Krupin.
Still, they took precautions when they traveled by staying in packs. Tanner had seen that strategy before. By always leaving the building as part of a group, it made them harder to kill or capture. If one or two of them were going off to guard Krupin, the pack could cover them against being followed, by watching in every direction for a tail.
After observing the building for several hours, Tanner knew there were at least eighteen men living inside it; he also knew they would not be living much longer.
Laurel entered the Stark Texas Public Library with Romina, who led her over to a glass display case. There were words written above the case: THE HISTORY OF STARK — 1865 to Present.
Romina leaned over and looked at the old photos displayed behind the case, after a few seconds of searching, she pointed to a photo that was in the lower right-hand corner.
“There he is; that’s Cody Parker.”
Laurel bent down and squinted through the glass.
The faded Polaroid picture showed a little boy of eight standing beside a girl of the same age who was wearing a birthday hat. Someone had scribbled words on the photos white border.
Cody and Ginny on Ginny’s eighth birthday
The birthday girl, Ginny, was standing to Cody’s left on what looked like a front porch, and she was holding Cody’s hand. On Cody’s right, there was a blonde woman, and a dog was lying at the boy’s feet.
The boy resembled Tanner, but he was so young that his features had yet to form fully. The woman was another matter. The face was most feminine, but she looked like Tanner, so much so that Laurel said the words aloud.
“His mother…”
Romina nodded. “Um-hmm, that’s Cody’s mother. They say she died not long after that picture was taken. The woman that died during the massacre, Claire, she was Cody’s stepmother. But hey, Laurel, I see a friend over there by the computers, so just come find me when you’re ready to leave.”
“I will, and thank you.”
Laurel continued to stare at the picture as she struggled to understand the mystery behind Tanner. Was he really Cody Parker, and if so, how had he survived?
“Can I help you?”
The pleasant voice startled Laurel from her reverie and she turned to see an older woman smiling at her. The woman wore a pin that had the word STAFF printed on it.
“Hi, um yes. I was interested in that photo of Cody Parker and his mother. Are there any other photos of them?”
“I’m afraid not, but that photo has been digitized. Would you like a copy?”
“Yes, absolutely.”
When Laurel left the library, she was carrying a piece of Tanner’s past.
372
A New Record
Tanner met with Duke at the same bar they were at the day before. He noticed that the man seemed nervous.
“Why the jitters, Duke?”
“No offense, Tanner, but being near you is not exactly a safe place to be. Did you know that the Alvarado Cartel has slapped a half a million-dollar bounty on your head?”
Tanner smirked. “That’s a new record.”
“Yeah, well I hope you’ll understand if I stay away from you after this. I have my health to worry about.”
“I don’t blame you, but did you get what I need?”
“I did; they’re in the same car I put the rocket in. And did you ever put that to use. I saw the scenes of that jet crash on the news.”
“Yeah, and I’ll put the new items to good use as well.”
“Be careful with that stuff, and remember, the blue ones are harmless, but the red ones cause death.”
“Blue and red? That reminds me of a movie.”
“What movie?” Duke said.
“Never mind.”
Tanner made Duke start the engine and open the trunk again. When he was certain the car was all right, he handed Duke an envelope.
“What’s this?”
“A bonus, and it comes with advice. Leave the city until things cool down.”
Duke peeked inside the envelope. “Nice. And you watch your back, Tanner; I know guys that would kill for half a buck, never mind half a mil.”
“Yeah,” Tanner said. “But it feels good to be wanted by so many.”
Pullo was in the hotel bar and talking on the phone with Mike Conti. Conti had ostensibly called to discuss Sophia’s funeral, which would be held the next day on Staten Island. However, his real intention was to get a feel for how Pullo was thinking.
“I’ll be there, so will Sammy Giacconi.”
“I never met the kid. I still thought Sophia was with Tanner.”
“Yeah, so did the cartel.”
“Does Tanner blame himself for Sophia dying?”
“No, Mike, he blames the Alvarado Cartel. They’re going to wish they stayed in Mexico.”
“Joe, be realistic. You can’t win this war. The cartel has ten times the men you have and a hundred times the money.”
“They don’t have as many men as they had yesterday, and tomorrow they’ll have even less.”
“Listen to yourself, you sound crazy. There’s no way you can win a war against them, and your boy, Tanner, he’ll be dead soon.”
“Never count Tanner out.”
“Again, be realistic. The man is worth half a mil dead. Someone will collect that money; it’s just a matter of time.”
“What are you saying?”
“Make peace. Give them whatever they want and walk away while you still can.”
There was silence on the line. It lasted so long that Conti broke it.
“Joe? You still there?”
“Yeah, Mike, I’m here, and I’m staying.”
Conti sighed. “They’ll kill you, Joe. These bastards will kill you.”
“Thanks for the advice, Mike. I’ll see you at the funeral.”
Pullo ended the call and sat staring off into space.
Bosco, his wounded arm still in a sling, was sitting at the bar nursing a beer. He called over to his boss.
“Is something wrong?”
“Yeah, I think I smell a rat. Are you sure the limo will be ready by tomorrow?”
“It’s ready now. I sent Tony and Benny to get it.”
“They know what to do?”
“Yeah, don’t worry. They’re not stupid enough to park the thing out front.”
Pullo picked up the phone again. “I need to make a change with our travel arrangements.”
Bosco stood. “You need me to leave?”
Pullo pointed to the chair that sat across from him. “Have a seat.”
Bosco smiled as he sat down. “You can trust me, Joe, you know?”
“It’s why you’re still here.”
“So, what are these new plans?”
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“Mike Conti knows we’re coming to Sophia’s funeral.”
“Yeah, and the cartel can probably guess the same thing.”
“Right, so it wouldn’t be too smart to just drive up to the cemetery.”
Bosco pulled at his collar. “There’s a toll booth too, and I think of that scene in The Godfather every time I drive through one.”
Pullo laughed. “Yeah, well, I don’t plan to wind up the same way.” Pullo had dialed, and when his party answered, he spoke into the phone. “Yes, Anywhere Air, I need to rent a helicopter.”
When Pullo looked across the table, he saw Bosco give him the thumbs up sign.
373
Missing In Action
BROOKLYN, 1:41 a.m.
Tanner made just enough noise to make the Russian take notice and turn his attention to the left.
Tanner was on the roof of the apartment building where Krupin’s troops were housed. He needed to take out the man guarding the door to the stairway. Normally, he would do the deed himself, but he was not alone.
As the man peered into the gloom on the left side of the roof, Joe Pullo came up on his right. The Russian felt a stab of pain at the base of his skull, and then his world faded to black.
Tanner walked over, smiling. “I see you haven’t lost your touch with a blackjack.”
“Some things you never forget,” Pullo said.
Like Tanner, Pullo was dressed all in black. Also, like Tanner, there was a small pack strapped to his back. The packs contained two of the items they had procured through Duke.
After gagging the Russian, Tanner secured his wrists and ankles, then followed Pullo into the stairwell. They went slowly, making as little noise as possible as they headed for the basement. On the third floor, they heard a TV that was broadcasting a sport of some kind. Whoever was watching it seemed to be the only one still awake in the building.
Once in the basement, they brought out flashlights and looked around for what they were after. Pullo spotted it first and slid his pack off. When he reached into it, he removed a canister of compressed gas.
And while Pullo readied the canisters, Tanner went to work taking off the screws on the cover of the HVAC system, the heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning unit.
Ten minutes later, they had everything ready to go. After donning filtering masks, they flooded the building with gas.
SIX HOURS LATER
Rico entered the building with eight other men and was surprised to find no signs of bloodshed.
He had been awakened at 6:30, after the men who were supposed to report for a shift change in Manhattan never showed up, and no one answered the phones in Brooklyn.
Tanner?
That was the first thought that passed through Rico’s mind, accompanied by images of wholesale slaughter.
After arriving at the building, Rico watched it for a short time, but saw no movement in any of its windows. Then, it was time to go in and see what was what. But once he and the men with him had searched every room, the basement, and the roof, he still had no idea what had happened.
The men weren’t dead; they were simply gone, vanished.
“The man is truly a devil,” Rico said to himself.
Nineteen Russian street soldiers were gone without a trace, and there was no sign of violence or a struggle. Rico looked at the men around him and saw that they were as unnerved as he was by it all.
One of the men spread his arms out. “Where the hell are they?”
“In a mass grave somewhere,” said one of the other men, and although he didn’t voice his opinion, Rico agreed with the man.
In Mexico City, Alexa was torn by two competing desires. She wanted to find Tanner as soon as possible, but she had also spent many weeks devising a plan that would get her inside the Alvarado compound.
She couldn’t put the plan in motion until nightfall, which meant she would lose a day’s time in finding Tanner. She sipped on a cup of coffee as she dangled her legs from the rear of her van and watched the sunrise.
She had discovered that Alvarado brought a group of whores into the compound once a month for the men guarding him. The women were driven into the compound inside a van, then led back toward the barracks for a night of sex.
In order to do that, the guard dogs that normally roamed the compound at night were kept inside, and motion detectors were activated.
There had to be a window of time between the dogs being brought inside and the motion detectors being activated. Alexa planned to use that gap of time to make it over the wall and into the house.
It was a risky plan, and she didn’t even hope to get close enough to kill Alvarado. However, if she could learn the layout of the home and ferret out a weakness in their defenses, the information could be invaluable.
She might never get close enough to kill Alvarado by herself, but with a Tanner someday wreaking havoc in the compound, she would have a chance.
She had discovered there was a price on Tanner’s head and knew that the man would be hunted by many who wanted to claim it. But he was a Tanner. He would not die easily. He couldn’t die. She needed him alive, and together they would kill their mutual enemy.
Alexa had also seen a copy of the drawing that Rico had made of the man. When she first saw it, something inside her stirred even more than when she had seen the crumpled picture. Her grandmother would have said that her “little voice” was talking to her, but Alexa suspected it was her libido. The man was hot, this Tanner, and Alexa wanted to meet him for more than one reason.
Alexa closed her eyes and listened for the “little voice.” When she opened her eyes a minute later, she had made her decision. She would infiltrate the compound, gain as much info as possible, and then leave the following day to find Tanner.
It was a good plan, now all she had to do was survive.
374
Goodbye, Sophia
Inside a hangar at LaGuardia Airport, Rico greeted the new men that Alonso Alvarado had sent him.
While he knew several of the faces, most of the men were unknown to him. They had arrived on seven different jets, and it had taken a day for the cartel to issue them all phony credentials and identities.
The landing strip near Mt. Pleasant had been so much handier, but then, its very isolation made it a perfect killing ground for Tanner.
Rico had been unaware that Tanner had tortured one of the specialists, Manuel. Had he known that, he would have assumed that Manuel had told Tanner about the landing strip, and he would have diverted the jets and sent teams of men to the area to kill Tanner.
Juan Alvarado had known that Manuel was tortured. If the heir apparent had any street smarts he would have had the sense not to land the jets in a place that Tanner might know about. Rico blamed Tanner for Mateo’s death, but part of the blame landed at Juan Alvarado’s feet as well.
Outside the hanger, three buses waited to transport the men. They were all staying in Manhattan, inside the building where Krupin and Juan Alvarado were. They would add on to the already massive security guarding the men. Both Alvarado and Krupin were so fearful of Tanner that they never left the building.
However, these new men would be leaving soon, leaving to return home in a matter of days if Rico’s plans worked out, because Joe Pullo would be tracked down with help from Mike Conti. Once Pullo’s location was known, Rico would send his new army in to kill him and his men. With luck, Tanner would be among them.
The missing Russians bothered Rico. Why take the men instead of just killing them and leaving the bodies behind?
The only answer that Rico could see was that Tanner or Pullo was playing head games with him. Either that, or the men would start showing up in pieces.
Whichever way you looked at it, it was unnerving. When Rico shared the story with the new men, he saw the faces of many of them grow worried.
“Whatever Tanner’s game is he will soon stop playing it, because we are going to kill him.”
The men voiced their agreement, then
Rico told them to climb aboard the buses, while he wondered if Conti would be successful in planting a tracking device.
On Staten Island, Mike Conti looked up and watched as Pullo’s helicopter landed in the cemetery parking lot. Once on the ground, the occupants of the craft were met by a limo. The limo drove over to join the rest of Sophia’s mourners, which included Sammy, who had left the hospital against doctor’s orders. Pullo had hired a car and a nurse for Sammy. He was there in a wheelchair surrounded by several of Pullo’s men.
Bosco emerged from the limo first, followed by Pullo, and then Tanner, who Conti had only seen in his Romeo guise of spiked blond hair and fake tattoos. The hair was now dark, and Tanner wore a suit and tie, along with sunglasses. Conti saw none of Romeo’s demeanor in the man.
Tanner was no joke, and to even be out in the open when there was a price on his head told you something about the man.
As the group from Manhattan joined the rest of the mourners, greetings were exchanged, and then the priest began the solemn ceremony.
As the priest was talking, Tanner noticed that Sammy didn’t cry a single tear. Pullo was right; Sophia’s death had hardened the man. As Tanner raised his gaze from Sammy, he saw a familiar face.
It was Buck, the actor whose real name was Edwin Seevers. Buck was standing beside a blonde who Tanner knew by sight. He had seen her in person once before while dining with Sophia and knew that the woman had been Sophia’s friend. It was Amber Rose, a renowned actress on Broadway. When the services ended, Buck walked over with Amber Rose.
“I didn’t expect to see you, Tanner, but Amber says that you and Sophia Verona were friends.”
“Yes,” Tanner said, as he took in Amber Rose. He had never seen her on Broadway but had watched her on various TV commercials over the years.
The Tanner Series - Books 1-11: Tanner - The hit man with a heart Page 117