by Jonas Saul
Once the chocolate bar was finished and he’d licked his soiled fingers, he rolled out of bed slowly, waddled to the bathroom, and did his business.
Hair mussed, teeth unbrushed for days, he trudged out of the bathroom and headed for his bank of computers. Where was everybody? What was The Clock doing? Had Anton found a random girl to kill yet?
Once he logged onto his system by typing the password fuck_cancer_twice, he quickly checked the day of the week. The date with Jessy was coming up. After years of being bullied, beaten up at school, being misunderstood as a feminine boy who liked other boys, Ben Wilson had grown a thick skin. Then, with his whole life ahead of him, his own pancreas betrayed him and he began a long, arduous journey of falling apart from the inside.
When people complained on Facebook that life wasn’t fair, he laughed. They had no idea what he’d been through. They had no idea how much he hurt on the inside. The daily pain. The threat of death this month or next.
All he had were the few games he played and his Mars bars. Without them, he would’ve killed himself directly after the diagnosis.
Euphoric with the knowledge his final act was coming, he tore off the end of another Mars bar and chomped half of it before he noticed Anton Olafson had sent him a video file.
He stopped chewing and frowned, then leaned closer and clicked to open the file.
When he saw what Anton had sent him, he swallowed what was in his mouth and almost choked. Ben Wilson—PAIN—watched as Anton placed a pillow over a girl who really did look like Clara Olafson and proceed to hold it down until she was dead.
Ben’s heart raced in his chest as he watched. He adjusted his bulk on the worn office chair and leaned closer, not wanting to miss a single second of the captivating video. The Mars bar forgotten temporarily, he studied the computer screen as Anton placed a mirror under the girl’s nose.
Her eyes. It was her eyes that did it for Ben. That dead stare. Like the ceiling in the room was a captivating hypnotist. The stupid girl had fallen victim to Anton and he had done it.
Now Clara was to be set free.
Ben paused the video. He would watch it back a dozen times, but for now he needed to reach out to Ansgar. Hopefully the fool was still able to take direction. After the recent debacle with Ansgar’s attitude, which made him less a professional than Ben had previously thought, maybe the mercenary would make things right by doing as he was told.
Ben typed his message. Before hitting send, he looked up and debated the context of the message. Maybe Ansgar needed a small push, a little more incentive.
Ben’s fingers danced over the computer keyboard. He brought up a couple of financier’s accounts, linked them to bank accounts and began a hack that took him a half hour. Once funds were placed into his holding company illegally with virtually no way for them to trace it back to him, he finished his text to Ansgar.
Remove the girl. Do it ASAP. No longer needed. Ever. Bonus has been transferred to your account. Regular fee plus generous bonus. Just do it now and confirm with photo.
He hit the send button.
After he finished eating the bar, he grabbed two more from the case in the corner, sat back at his desk, and watched Anton’s video over and over.
On camera, somewhere in Denmark, Anton said, “Sarah Roberts, I now declare you … dead.”
Ben said the girl’s name in his head.
Sarah Roberts.
Why did he know that name? Who was she?
He opened another screen and searched her name. Screen after screen filled with her picture and who she was. Realization settled in over him.
He set the Mars bar down beside the keyboard as he watched Anton’s video again. He had to make sure Sarah was dead. He had to be absolutely sure. If Sarah Roberts was involved, she could foil his plans. Probably the only reason she was involved was to come after him and he couldn’t have that.
The video was convincing enough. Sarah Roberts appeared to be dead. No doubt about it. Unless Anton was in on it. Some kind of conspiracy to get to him. Someone like Sarah could do it.
Chocolate bars forgotten, he researched Sarah deeper.
When he learned that Aaron Stevens was her boyfriend and that Aaron’s dojo was blown up earlier this week, the news speculated on how Sarah had missed warning him.
“Aaron Stevens is with Sarah?” he mumbled to himself. “Shit.” He pounded his fist into his other hand.
That’s shaking a stick at a hornet’s nest. The Internet was full of Sarah Roberts exploits. She even wrote a batch of books about her life’s adventures.
“And Ben just had to go after her boyfriend. That’s fuckin’ dangerous.”
Why was Sarah in Denmark? Being killed by Anton? And wearing clothes that made her look like Clara?
“What the fuck is going on?” Ben asked out loud. “Do I smell setup?”
He had to locate the hospital Sarah would’ve been taken to. He needed into their computers. He needed to see when she was admitted and when she was declared dead.
If Sarah Roberts wasn’t dead, he would need another layer of security. Hiding behind his computers wouldn’t be enough for that psychic bitch.
Ben suddenly recalled all the stories over the years of her helping the Toronto police. She was not someone to mess with.
A thought dashed into his mind. Was Aaron Stevens declared dead yet? Did they find his body in the aftermath of the dojo explosion? If not, where was he and what was he up to?
Ben launched a search for Aaron without success. They were still combing through the wreckage of his dojo. He set an alarm in his system after sending out electronic spiders to search for Aaron’s name. It was a small program he wrote himself, similar to a find-your-cell-phone application. Instead of homing in on the cell phone, his program homed in on what he typed to search for. The second someone entered Aaron’s name into a computer anywhere locally, and in some cases globally, Ben would know seconds later.
Once that was done, his fingers raced over the keys as fast as he could, searching for answers on Sarah that only he could get. But with everything this extensive, it took time. Hacking into secure websites and government computers wasn’t an easy task. Ben was up to the challenge, but it would take the better part of the night to discover what he needed to know.
The Mars bar in his stomach churned with the acid of nervousness and made him feel sick.
Sarah Roberts scared the shit out of him. He had to know if she was dead.
Then he would solve his other problems.
Like why Ansgar wasn’t responding to his text.
The sensation that his ideas and plans were slowly unraveling came over him. He wondered if he would even make it to the Tuesday meeting with Jessy. If Sarah Roberts was alive, he doubted he would.
What Ben saw Anton Olafson do on camera to Sarah would piss her off. Then she’d come looking for him and no amount of servers and routers would ever stop someone like Sarah.
Not when she had a voice from the Other Side advising her.
Nothing could stop her.
Ben ran a search to triangulate Ansgar’s cell phone. It was near a hospital in Etobicoke. He frowned. What’s Ansgar back there for? Hurt his nose again?
Next he spent ten minutes getting into the hospital’s computer system. He got in far enough to see the names of the people being admitted within the previous few hours. Daniel and Benjamin showed up. Clara Olafson, too.
“What the hell are they all doing there?” he whispered. “And why is Ansgar outside?”
He needed someone in his corner. But who?
He tapped his fingers on his chin until a name popped into his head.
Jessy’s brother, Shawn Bryant. The youngest homicide detective on the force. Maybe Ben could get him involved in some way and keep him involved until Tuesday.
He quickly triangulated Detective Bryant’s cell phone and saw he was at the hospital.
“What the fuck? Why’s he there? Was someone murdered?”
Open-mout
hed, he stared at his computer.
“How long did I sleep?”
He quickly texted Ansgar to take them all out. Finish this as soon as he could. Then Ben revealed where they were. The Clock would have money. Lots of it, he typed.
Ben continued his search for Sarah Roberts and Aaron Stevens. A soft beep announced that one of Ben’s spiders caught something. He opened the link and saw that Sarah was admitted at a hospital in Silkeborg, Denmark.
She had been brought in and declared dead on arrival.
He leaned back in his chair and clapped his hands so hard they stung.
“Shit wave on a Bingo. The wicked witch is dead.”
He grabbed a Mars bar and started eating. Things were already looking up.
Now he just needed to find Aaron, if he was still alive. Then have him killed so he could carry out his own personal vendetta against Homicide Detective Shawn Bryant.
Chapter 41
Aaron got Alex to park a block from the hospital behind a retail store that had gone out of business. Ansgar was still unconscious in the backseat of the cruiser. Getting any closer to the hospital could draw unneeded attention their way.
“What if they’re not here?” Alex asked as he got out of the cruiser.
“They’re here.”
Aaron exited the vehicle and walked around to stand beside Alex. He’d pulled out his personal cell phone, then held it up for Aaron to look at.
“No text from Daniel,” Alex said. “We have no idea where they are.”
“They’re here,” Aaron repeated. “We passed five cruisers near the entrance to the hospital, two unmarked. Cops are here taking statements and matching it to what their colleagues have found at the hotel by the airport. Probably not letting Daniel use his phone.”
Alex leaned down and glanced in the back window of the cruiser.
“What about him?” he asked.
Aaron stepped back to join Alex. “You stay here with him. I’ll go inside and see if I can find out what’s going on. Make sure everyone’s safe.”
“If he wakes up?”
“Hurt him. Put him back under.”
“Can I ask questions? Do you care?”
“Do whatever you want, just don’t kill him. We need to learn who hired him. That’s where this ends.”
Alex leaned against the car and crossed his arms.
“Go. We’ll be fine here.”
Aaron didn’t wait to be told twice. He started away, but Alex shouted at him.
“Wait,” Alex said, the cell phone in his hand.
Aaron turned back around. “What?”
“Ansgar’s phone. Just got a text.”
Without going back to Alex, Aaron asked, “What’d it say?”
“Told this shitbag to kill Clara, Daniel, and Benjamin and you if you’re still alive. Said they’re all in there.” Alex pointed at the hospital.
“See, told you they were here.”
“But how does this guy know?” Alex pointed at the phone.
Aaron shrugged. “Must be some kind of hacker. Otherwise he works at the hospital. Doesn’t matter. His killing dog is done.”
“He offered Ansgar a lot of money.” Alex glanced at the pavement. “Who would want us dead so bad?”
“Don’t know. You’re going to have ask him when he wakes.”
Alex looked in the back seat of the cruiser at Ansgar. “I might just do that.”
Aaron started backwards, then turned and ran the length of the city block, jumped over a small bush and entered the hospital parking lot. The emergency entrance was on his left. He headed that way, enjoying the cool night air on his burning forearms.
Once inside, he headed to the nurse’s station. Behind a Plexiglas partition, a woman in her sixties sat at a computer station, reading glasses resting on her nose. A pink string suspended from the glasses wrapped around her neck.
“How can we help you?” she asked without looking at him.
“Burned myself.”
She lowered her head to look over the upper rim of her glasses and winced when she saw Aaron’s reddened forearms.
“Painful?” she asked, meeting his eyes.
“Quite.”
“I’ll fetch someone to get you right in.”
Aaron stepped away from the counter as she spoke into a phone on her desk.
“Sir?” the nurse called.
Aaron moved back toward her.
“Your name?”
“Aaron Stevens.”
“Date of birth.”
He told her.
An access door opened and a young man in a white lab coat stepped up to Aaron. He gestured for Aaron to follow him.
The nurse looked at him over her glasses again. “When you’re done with the doctor, I’ll need the rest of your information.”
“No problem. I’ve got my health card right here.” He made an effort to point at his pocket as he headed toward the open door. The doctor led him to a cubicle where he pulled the curtain half closed.
“I’m Dr. Paul Shelp,” the doctor said. “How did you manage to do that?”
Aaron looked down at his forearms, suddenly very hungry. He thought about how long it had been since he’d had anything to eat and couldn’t remember.
“An iron. A prank that went wrong.”
“A prank?” Dr. Shelp said, one eyebrow raised. His eyes danced over Aaron’s face, studying something. Probably trying to ascertain whether he was telling the truth. “And did this prank cause the other bruises and rope burns there.” He pointed at Aaron’s wrists. “It seems you’re also missing a finger.” The doctor stared him in the eye. “Was that another prank as well?”
Aaron stepped closer and came to stand directly in front of the doctor. “I need to know where my friends are.”
To Dr. Shelps’ credit, he didn’t flinch when Aaron invaded his personal space. “Your friends?”
“Earlier tonight. Gunshot wound in the leg.”
“Oh, them.”
“Where are they?”
“Is that another prank?” Shelps asked as he grabbed something off the counter behind him. He tore a package open and squeezed a white salve out. With plastic gloves, he proceeded to rub it on the burns on Aaron’s left arm. The intense cool salve made Aaron shiver.
“No prank. We were shot at.”
The doctor didn’t look at him this time, but Aaron saw the doubt on his face.
“What have you heard?” Aaron asked. “They’re okay, aren’t they?”
Dr. Shelp applied the salve to Aaron’s other arm.
“Your friends came in with a fantastic story of kidnapping and murderous hitmen.” The doctor stopped what he was doing and placed the empty packaging in a small receptacle. “I have to admit, their story swept through the emergency department as rumor mixed with facts, turned fiction.”
“I assure you, it’s no fiction. Where are they?”
“In custody, last I heard.”
“Custody?” Aaron had to contain himself from shouting. “My friend was shot. How is that a crime?”
“According to a witness, that’s not what happened.” The doctor moved toward the curtain and pulled it out of the way. “And now you’ve reached the limit of my knowledge. To know more, you would need to go join them.”
Aaron left the cubicle and eased past the doctor. “Where are they?”
Dr. Shelp pointed to his right. “Around that corner.”
Aaron started away but didn’t get five feet before the hospital lights blinked off. Emergency lighting kicked in. Someone gasped. A buzzer flared somewhere.
Suddenly the hospital was a commotion of people calling out to get the power back on.
What else could go wrong?
Aaron ran past three empty cubicles, turned a corner and almost bumped into a tall cop. The emergency lighting was enough for Aaron to see Daniel standing by Benjamin’s bed. Both men were handcuffed to the pole beside the bed. Large white bandages surrounded Benjamin’s leg like a huge tourniquet.
Clara sat in the cubicle beside them, a female cop holding her hand. Two men in suits stood at the end of Benjamin’s bed.