Balance of Power - An Action Thriller Novel (A Noah Wolf Novel, Thriller, Action, Mystery Book 7)

by David Archer

  “What’s up, Scotty?”

  “Wanted you to meet somebody,” Forney said. “This is Rex Madison. He’s Kate’s brother.”

  The deputy reached around Forney to shake hands with Noah. “You’re Kate Madison’s brother? Kate from the radio?”

  “Yep,” Noah said, “but don’t hold that against me. She and I don’t have a whole lot of use for each other. She’s letting me crash at her place right now, but only till the paperwork is done on my house.”

  “Your house? You renting a place around here?” Forney asked.

  “Hell, no,” Noah said. “Renting is just another way to throw money down the toilet. I made a deal this morning to buy this little farm. The old Howerton place, they call it.”

  The deputy’s eyebrows rose. “You bought Lonnie Howerton’s place? Man, that’s a sweet old place.”

  “Sweet?” Forney quipped. “I always heard it was haunted. You do know the old man killed himself out there, right? Stood right there in the kitchen and blew his own brains out with a .45.”

  Noah looked at him. “You know, the broker never mentioned that little detail. Not that it worries me, you know, just would’ve been nice to know.”

  The deputy was grinning. “Scott’s just playing with you,” he said. “Lonnie died in Mercy Hospital of complications from pneumonia.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Forney said. “That’s the official story, anyway. The Howerton family had enough money to cover up the truth, that’s what happened. The old man killed himself because it was about to come out that he was behind some of the murders that happened back forty years ago.”

  The deputy simply shook his head and chuckled. Noah looked from one to the other, but then he shrugged. “I ain’t afraid of no ghost,” he sang, and both men burst out laughing.

  “Anyway,” Forney went on, “I just thought you might want to meet Rex. He’s moving here to try to start over, on account of he just got out of the federal prison down in Texas.”

  The deputy kept smiling, but the humor went out of his eyes. “That so?”

  Noah looked him in the eye. “Yep. Did five years on a conspiracy rap. I’m sure my probation officer will be letting your office know about me.”

  “Rex Madison, right? Is there anything in particular I should know about you?”

  “I don’t know what it might be,” Noah said, “other than the fact that I did five years for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute narcotics.”

  The deputy nodded, and his eyes softened a bit. “But you’re here to try to go straight, right?”

  “Absolutely,” Noah replied. “Let me tell you, one stint in Bloody Beaumont is more than enough. I don’t ever want to go back.”

  “That’s good to hear. By the way, Scott told me your name but didn’t tell you mine. I’m Billy, Billy Martin. You run into any kind of problems around here, feel free to look me up and let me know. Oh, and tell your sister I said hello, would you? If you put in a good word for me, maybe she’ll let me take her out again one of these days.”

  Noah put a wide grin on his face. “Billy, I’ll be sure to do that.”

  The deputy swallowed the last little bit of his beer and said good night, then got up and walked out the door. Forney watched him go and then turned to Noah.

  “Well, we’ll know soon enough if your story is true,” he said. “I can flat guarantee he’s on his way back to the office to check you out.”

  Noah rolled his eyes. “Which is exactly what you had in mind when you called him over,” he said. “Don’t worry, I don’t mind. The way the world is nowadays, you’ve got to be really careful who you’re dealing with. Maybe after he reports back to you, you might tell me more about that possible job opportunity, yeah?”

  “Yep,” Forney replied with a smile. “And that, my new friend, is why I really called him over. You sound like you might be a useful guy to have around. Anybody who can live through five years at Beaumont is probably pretty tough, and the people I’m thinking of like having tough guys working for them.”

  “Hey, as long as the pay is there, I’ll be as tough as I need to be.”

  “That’s good to hear,” Forney said. “Why don’t you let me get your phone number? If things work out, I might be able to give you a call in the next day or two, get some money coming into your pocket.”

  Noah gave him his phone number, and Forney walked away. Noah went back to nursing his beer but took a look over his shoulder and saw Forney leaning down to whisper in Jimmy Morgan’s ear.

  Noah finished his bottle and ordered another, then sat and sipped at it just as he had the first one. People moved around him, and a few said hello. One girl who looked to be about sixteen sat down beside him and tried to strike up a conversation, but Noah waved his wedding ring at her. She huffed at him and moved down the bar to an older man who seemed more appreciative of her youth and company.

  He had just about finished the second bottle when the girl suddenly yelled an obscenity and jumped off the barstool. Every head in the place turned toward her and the man she’d been talking to, as she loudly called him every name she could think of.

  “You dirty mother—you piece of crap, I wouldn’t touch you if you were the last man on earth! You need to learn to keep your filthy hands off a woman, at least until she lets you know it’s okay.”

  The man appeared to be mildly intoxicated, as he sat there laughing at her. “Screw you, bitch,” he said. “Everybody in here knows you’re nothing but a whore—why you getting all high-and-mighty? Just like any other business, baby, you want to sell your wares, then you’ve got to allow the customer to examine the merchandise.”

  A number of men were getting to their feet and looking at the fellow, but Noah noticed that Morgan’s people were staying in their seats. The girl started to turn away, but one of the men who had risen grabbed her arm and spun her back toward the man she had insulted.

  “You need to apologize to that man,” he said, but the girl spat at him. Before she even realized what was happening, the man holding her arm had punched her in the face. Her head reeled back, and blood began running from her nose.

  The man on the barstool had stopped laughing, and he held out a hand and said, “Hey, stop. Leave her alone. She ain’t worth it.” He turned away and picked up his drink.

  “What the hell you mean, leave her alone?” asked the man holding her arm. “This bitch got you scared or something, Cory? You can’t take that kind of crap off these whores, man—get up and slap the snot out of her!”

  Cory knocked back what was left of his drink and turned to face the girl, now being held by two men while four others stood around them. Noah thought that the man didn’t seem all that drunk anymore, nor did he seem nervous or frightened. He kept watching, curious about what was going to happen next.

  “Look,” the drinker said. “Apparently, I thought things had progressed a little further than the lady did. Now, I don’t care if she called me a few names—that doesn’t hurt me any. Just let her go so she can go home and clean herself up or something. I think you’ve already handled the situation well enough, Philip.”

  The young man Cory had named as Philip cocked his head to the right and stared. “So that’s it? You’re just gonna let this go?”

  “Philip,” said a new voice suddenly, “Cory already said to let it go.”

  Philip turned his head to see Jimmy Morgan’s son, Ralph, on his feet and staring directly into his face. “Ralphie, come on,” Philip said. “We can’t take shit off whores in this town, right? They got to learn their place, right?”

  Ralph Morgan looked at the girl’s face. “Well, I think you sure taught her. You’ve done enough damage to her already—she’s going to be off her beat for a week or two. Now, you know what the problem is with that?”

  Philip looked at the girl and screwed up his face as if confused, then looked back at Ralph. “So she takes a couple weeks off, so what? Booty girl like her can probably afford it, right?”

  Ralph nodded slowly
. “Yeah, she won’t go hungry, nothing like that. Hell, come tomorrow she might even be ready to say thanks to you, giving her a little vacation like this. But, you see, that means two weeks she ain’t making us no money, which is why we don’t allow anybody to beat up on our girls. Now, here’s what’s about to happen. Cory, there, he’s going to turn around and pay attention to whatever he’s drinking. You and your boys are going to let go that girl, and she’s going to walk out of here and go on home. After that, your boys can decide just how stupid they want to be tonight.”

  Philip’s grip tightened on the girl’s arm. “Ain’t none of us stupid,” Philip said. “You know, maybe you and your daddy got the whole town scared, but you don’t scare us. Y’all hurt one of us, there’s twenty more gonna come back on your ass for it.”

  Ralph shook his head. “Philip, you don’t have enough friends to give us any problem. And your friends that are standing there with you right now? I’m looking at their faces, and what I see is some guys who really wish they were somewhere else.” He looked at each of those men in turn, and the man holding the girl’s other arm suddenly let it go.

  “Phil,” the young man said, “let’s just let this go, okay? Ralphie, I’m sorry, man, we didn’t know she was one of your girls. We thought she was somebody new, because your girls don’t never act like that.”

  Ralph looked at him for a moment. “Okay, Billy,” he said. “I’ll make this easy. The only one who actually did any damage here was Philip. The rest of you can leave, or you can stay and take the same punishment he gets. Better make up your mind right now, though, ’cause time has already run out.”

  Noah saw several of Morgan’s men slowly start to rise to their feet, but then he caught a furtive movement out of the corner of his right eye. The young men surrounding the girl were facing Ralph, so their backs were to Noah. The one farthest in the back was reaching up under the back of his shirt, and Noah saw him wrap his hand around the grip of a small pistol.

  No one else in the bar could have seen it, though Noah was sure there were security cameras that would catch it. Noah’s mind raced at incredible speed, predicting the outcome of several different choices he might make in the next three to five seconds.

  He could easily take the boy down and remove the pistol, but even though he would be attacking in defense of Ralph Morgan, it was highly probable that the others would immediately start swinging at anyone within reach. That would start the very sight Ralph Morgan seemed to be trying to avoid.

  He could wait until the gun was being brandished and then attack, take the boy down to the floor and disarm him. That would paint him as a bit of a hero, but it could also result in someone innocent being killed or wounded if the gun were to go off. That could seriously affect his ability to infiltrate the organization.

  He could simply sit still and wait until the boy actually fired a shot and then move in. There would be other guns in play, so it would be risky. If the boy managed to kill or wound Ralph Morgan, then taking down his shooter would probably help Noah when the decision was made on whether to use him.

  Throughout all of his thinking, Noah had kept his eyes focused mostly on Ralph. When they examined the security cameras later, it would appear that he couldn’t have seen the gun being drawn, and if it weren’t for his extraordinary peripheral vision, he might have missed it completely.

  The gun came out of the back waistband of the boy’s pants and was held low for a moment, behind one of his friends in front of him, but then the boy started shaking and simply pushed through between two of the others. His gun came up instantly and pointed directly at Ralph’s face for a split second, and Noah lunged. The gun went off just as Noah’s hands grabbed the boy by the neck and yanked him back.

  Noah spun and threw the boy to the ground, as gunshots rang out in the bar. Noah crouched low over the shooter, his knee in the boy’s back and his right hand holding his wrist. He squeezed as hard as he could and the boy screamed, and the gun fell out of his hand without firing again. Noah grabbed it and slid it along the floor until it was out of reach.

  Something hit Noah in the back, and he realized that it was one of the other young men, who’d been shot through the chest and had fallen backward. Noah looked around and saw that Philip and all of his friends were on the floor, but he focused on the scene just in front of them.

  The bullet had hit Ralph, but Noah couldn’t tell where. Five men were crouched over him, and one of them was Jimmy Morgan himself. The shock and tears on his face told Noah that the situation was serious, and the sobbing of the girl kneeling on the other side only served to confirm that opinion.

  Noah suddenly felt himself yanked away. He rolled onto his back on the floor and looked up at Scott Forney, who was holding a pistol pointed at his face.

  “You in on this?”

  Noah shook his head, keeping his hands in plain sight. “No,” he said. “When I saw that kid aim his gun, I thought I could take him down before he could fire. That other boy, is he…”

  “It ain’t good,” Forney said. He turned his attention to the boy Noah had taken down, who was trying to turn over and get to his feet. “That’s Benny Smoot. Benny, he’s a tweaker. A meth head, know what I mean?”

  Forney’s gun had shifted over to Benny, so Noah got up onto his haunches and yanked Benny back down to the floor. “I know what a tweaker is,” Noah said. “That’s the gun over there. What do you want me to do with him?”

  Forney walked carefully around Noah and Benny, then picked up the gun and looked at it. “A freaking little Ruger 22,” he said as he popped out the magazine. It was loaded with hollow-point rounds. “Makes a little bitty hole in your forehead, but then it can make one hell of a mess in your brain.”

  Noah grabbed Benny by the front of his shirt and shook him. “What was this all about? You got some grudge against that boy?”

  Then he looked scared, but he was trying desperately to hold on to his bravado. “Screw you,” he said.

  Noah looked at him for a second, then reached out and caught the skin on the back of his upper arm between three fingers. He pinched the skin tightly and twisted as hard as he could. Benny let out a scream, and when Noah dragged his face up close again and asked the same question once more, he started nodding frantically. “I got paid, I got paid, man,” he said. “Dude gave me two grand, said he’d give me five more if I get a bullet into Ralphie’s brain.”

  Forney stood looking on as Noah held on to Benny. “Who was it?” Noah asked. “Who paid you to try to kill him?”

  “I don’t know, man,” Bennie said. “Big dude, like a pro football player. He handed me the two grand and promised five grand more once it was done.”

  Noah shook his head. “Sounds like you got sent on a suicide mission,” he said. “Why would you be that stupid?”

  Benny looked at him for a moment with resignation in his eyes, then turned them down to the floor. “Didn’t think,” he said. “Just didn’t think it through, and I needed the money.”

  Noah looked around at where Ralph had fallen and saw Jimmy turn his head toward Forney. Forney pointed downward at Benny, as Jimmy got to his feet and started walking toward them.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  A siren could be heard in the distance, but it was rapidly getting closer. Jimmy stood and stared down at Benny for a long couple of minutes, then turned his attention to Noah.

  “What happened?” Jimmy asked bluntly.

  “Benny says somebody paid him to try to kill Ralphie,” Forney said. “He might have gotten it done, if it wasn’t for Rex, here. He saw the gun come out and tried to stop it.”

  Morgan turned to Noah. “Is that true?”

  “Yes, sir, and I’m so sorry,” Noah said. “I didn’t see the gun until it was pointed at that boy, and I thought I could get him before he could pull the trigger. If I’d seen it just a split second sooner…”

  “Can’t worry about the what-ifs in life,” Jimmy said. “Just tell me what you saw.”

  Noah
looked down at Benny for a second, then turned his eyes back to Jimmy as he got to his feet. “I was just watching what was going on,” he said, “and then all of a sudden I saw this guy raise a gun and point it at the one who was talking to them. I jumped then, to see if I could get him down before he hurt anybody. I wasn’t quite fast enough; I heard the gun go off. That boy—how bad is it? Is that your kid?”

  Jimmy stared at Noah’s face for a moment, then looked down at Benny again. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “He got it along the side of his head, like it took a crease out of the skin just over his left ear, but he’s not dead. He just don’t have any idea who he is, at the moment. Ain’t making any sense.”

  The sirens had gotten closer, and Noah heard cars screeching to a halt outside the bar. Several officers, including the deputy he had met earlier, came rushing through the door with guns drawn. At a wave from Jimmy Morgan, however, they stood down and put their weapons away as three teams of paramedics came racing through the door. One of them hurried over to where Ralph was lying, and a woman began barking out orders. The others began checking the rest of the bodies on the floor.

  A couple of the deputies gathered around Jimmy, but Billy Martin took one look at Noah’s face and beckoned him off to the side, while Forney stood over Benny.

  “Are you in the middle of this somehow?” Martin asked.

  “Kinda. I was sitting at the bar when this boy”—he pointed at Benny—“suddenly had a gun and pointed it at that boy who was shot. I jumped and tried to get him before he could pull the trigger, but I was a split second too late. Damn gun went off as I grabbed him, and I couldn’t reach it to try to make it deflect upwards.”

  Martin looked into his face for a moment, then slowly nodded. “Who shot you?”

  Noah looked confused for a moment, but then Martin pointed to his left shoulder. Noah looked and suddenly realized he had been nicked by one of the flying bullets. There was a hole through the fabric of his shirt, but a quick glance inside showed him that the blood leaking out of it was from a simple flesh wound.