A missing persons case was also opened for David Maus. Darius Adamczuk, Arshavin, Salenko and Zurawski were implicated as the main suspects, given their involvement in the slaying of his assistant. He was never found. Nobody suspected him to be wrapped in chicken wire lying at the bottom of the Detroit River.
Just as Joe Beck thought, the red Buick clocked up just over sixty parking tickets before being impounded and, eventually, searched. Police found the two dead bodies and the machete, the murder weapon in the case of the liquor store owner and the missing parking attendant, in the trunk. From finger and palm prints and blood DNA gleamed from the machete, police identified the dead guy in the trunk as the killer in both cases, of the guy from the liquor store and of the woman who was in the trunk of the Buick beside him. The reason he ended up dead, himself, and locked in the trunk beside one of the people he had killed was never uncovered. None of the stores on Woodward Avenue had CCTV footage of the incident. The only store that had a camera with a partial view was Rijkaard's. But the security system was archaic. A new recording overwrote the last one every twenty-four hours. And too much time had passed.
The fire at Naomi's salon was eventually determined to be a random arson attack. Fire marshals noted the point of ignition was the sofa, with the fire starting from a burning scrap of paper, set alight with either a lighter or a match, not left at the scene. They also noted the use of gasoline as the accelerant.
Police interviewed her and she gave a statement. She said she locked up for the night and left. Went home and came back the next again day and found it that way. They asked her if she had any enemies or knew of anyone who would have a vendetta against her. She said she didn't. They also asked if she had insurance. She said she hadn't. Finally, they asked if she knew anything about a murder that happened at the liquor store across the street and another one that happened right after it out on the road outside that night. Again, she said she didn't.
Trying to connect the two crimes and hopeful that they would identify a common person of interest or even a suspect, Detroit police asked the store owners nearby if they knew of, saw or heard about anything to do with the fire or the killings. But nobody said a word, all of them still afraid to even mention Polanski's name. The Chinese woman in the laundrette or the guy in the hardware store never as much as mentioned Joe Beck coming calling. The Chinese woman kept tight lipped through fear. The guy from the hardware store did so through gratitude and admiration. He was one of those strong-willed noblemen from yesteryear.
Without him at the helm, Vladimir Polanski's criminal empire crumbled. The men Joe Beck didn't kill found what happened. After discovering him lying dead in the skybox, word of his slaying traveled fast. A few committed ones felt a sense of rage, centered on protecting the cause. They worked the networks and the syndicates to see if anybody knew anything, but ultimately came up short.
Seeing the writing on the wall, with no future means of income guaranteed, the rest of the crew simply dissipated and looked out for themselves. One by one, they disappeared. Some hung around Detroit, looking to pick up where Polanski had left off and tried to go into business for themselves, like little mice trying to feast on the crumbs left behind by the bigger, badder predator. Others set off east to New York, while some travelled south toward Florida and a few went west toward Washington state.
The travellers tried to rock up in town and set up an operation and muscle their way in. But, ultimately, they were unsuccessful. All of those places already had crime syndicates of their own, and they never took kindly to the new upstarts on the block. They quashed them within days of learning about their new competition, killing everyone involved. In some cases, gruesomely.
Back in Detroit, Vladimir Polanski's new nightclubs were finished on time, mid-December, just like the contractors had committed to. But the payments Trudeaux promised them never materialized. Three of the clubs became great big shiny and pink 'white' elephants which the contractors wrote off against their bottom lines. Jim McGrath, however, got the money back. Not only had he taken insurance policies to cover his firm in event of non-payment, he also managed to sell the building on to a real estate developer from New York who saw the potential of turning it into a block of apartments.
Word also travelled about the drug dealing that had gone on inside Vladimir Polanski's Amaranth and Magenta nightclubs. A few local newspapers picked up on it and did a series of expose features, outing the clubs, the man and the empire. When the DEA got wind of it all, they reigned down like a snowstorm. The two nightclubs were permanently shuttered and those named in connection with them, who were still alive, were arrested and thrown in jail.
Polanski's salvage yard also went to wreck and ruin. With nobody and nothing left to guard it, the place became a hotspot for hobos and travellers. They pitched up in tents and trailers and practically turned the place in a refugee camp, some of them even using things like tires as pillows and car doors as mattresses, the king of the troop claiming the dead Russian's white wooden cabin as his own.
Free from Polanski's crushing grip, Detroit's small businesses along Woodward Avenue flourished. They money they drew in all went to their bottom lines, every dollar down to each last dime. More stores, restaurants and boutiques opened up and street went from strength to strength.
Inevitably, though, capitalism would strike back. It was only a matter of time. All Joe Beck had done was clean the current stink from the air. Eventually, somebody else would eventually rise up and take Vladimir Polanski's place. It was just one of those facts of life. It was the cycle. It had all happened before and it would all happen again. But, for now, Detroit's main street enjoyed the fresh new day that had dawned.
Terrified of the overhanging threat of prosecution, now that he thought he had been rumbled, Jerry McDan cut and run. He sold his apartments and took the money and settled down to a simpler life, only practicing accountancy at Hamlin & Hughes in Ann Arbor.
DaMarcus and Jamal, the two pimps who ran the Diamond Dolls escort service, were taken to Henry Ford Hospital, where they made a full recovery. After they got out, they tried to track down Joe Beck, looking for payback against him for beating their ass. They pressured Vanessa into telling them what she knew. But they weren't the big shots or even as remotely well connected as they needed to be. Their search came up short and, after a while, they just gave up and went back to focusing on pimping out the women.
Joe Beck kept true to his word. On his way back from the Rockwood salvage yard, he stopped by Naomi's motel room in Dearborn and knocked on the door.
She answered it with a smile and an air of anticipation.
He invited her out to the back of the Camaro and popped the trunk.
She saw the bags and looked him the question.
He told her to open one of them up and look inside.
She did. And she cried.
That was when he told her that one third of them were hers. Thirteen bags, packed with somewhere around six hundred and fifty thousand dollars. He lifted them out and put them in her white Peugeot, told her not to spend it all in one place and kissed her goodbye.
Naomi never hung around. After speaking to the cops, she took the money Beck gave her and paid off her loans to the bank, then, along with her son, Josh, moved out of state. They went south to Chicago, where she bought a contemporary apartment along West Sunnyside Avenue, buying it outright and paying in cash. She used what was left to open a salon around the corner and set Josh up with a college fund, enrolled him in school and settled down to a new life with her son in the windy city.
After giving Naomi her share of the spoils, the next place Joe Beck went was Woodward Avenue. He stopped by Rijkaard's and knocked on the door. There was no answer. But he hadn't expected there to be. Not on a night as cold as that, not at that early hour. So, instead, he simply went round back and busted his way in through the back door. All it took was a good smash with the right side of his monstrous frame.
Inside, he found a scrap of paper
and a pen and used them to write the old guy who owned the store a short note. It said, 'Look below the counter. Consider yourself retired, compliments of Mr. Polanski. P.S. Sorry about the door.' He left the note on the glass counter by the cash register and went back out to the car. Grabbed half of the remaining twenty-six bags, a third of the original amount, and brought them into the store. He tucked the bags in underneath the counter, packing them in neatly, so they wouldn't fall out. Then, he grabbed a couple of planks of wood, a hammer and some nails, and went out back.
He quickly slung the planks across the back door and hammered them in place with the hammer and the nails, effectively sealing the store up. He nodded and smiled at a job done, then dumped the hammer and a remaining handful of nails in a rusted steel trash can by the back of the building and went back to his car.
Once inside, he turned on the engine and sat silent for a moment, pondering his future to the low whirring sound of the heater blowing out hot air from the dashboard vents, thirteen bags full of cash in the back, and hundreds of thousands of dollars to the good. He sucked a deep breath and grinned. Feeling like a million bucks, he pulled away from the snowy curb, turned on the Camaro's CD player and picked the next track on his Bruce Springsteen album, then set off southeast, heading back home.
THE END
READ THE FIRST JOE BECK THRILLER
Army of One: Introducing Joe Beck
Ex-cop, turned unlicensed outlaw private eye, Joe Beck is in McAllen, Texas, for the funeral of an old friend who took his own life, but winds up being taken hostage at gun point, alongside a prostitute he only just met, by three men he's never seen before. Three men who know more about Joe Beck's dead friend than they ought to.
What do they want? What do they know? And how will Joe Beck react?
Get it today
It’s available on Amazon and in major book stores near you.
READ THE SECOND JOE BECK THRILLER
Payback: A Short Joe Beck Thriller
Joe Beck meets Brandi Burrows, a brunette bombshell, at a bar in Trinidad, Colorado. She's slim, tanned and attractive. She has it all. Except, her left eye is horribly blackened, caused by the hand of an abusive ex-boyfriend.
Beck offers to deal with the guy, no questions asked, but winds up getting sucked into handling a local outlaw biker gang.
Get it on Amazon today
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alastair Brown is a crime-thriller writer who authors books featuring lead protagonist Joe Beck. He was born and raised in Bellshill, Scotland, a small town on the outskirts of Glasgow, where he spent a bit of time as a marketer making adverts for a living.
However, it’s storytelling and writing that’s his real forte. He writes occasionally and for only one thing: entertainment. And when he’s not writing, he’s imagining - he’s thinking up his next plot, visualizing the characters and the scenarios and picturing exactly how Joe Beck would react when faced with the next few conventional and unconventional situations he’ll be thrown into.
A bit like Joe Beck, he practically runs on caffeine, drinking anything from five to ten cups of coffee a day. Sometimes, it’s more, but it’s never less. And he appreciates good old classic rock music and fast, powerful American muscle cars.
He’s currently working on the next Joe Beck thriller now.
Visit his official author website to learn more.
www.authoralastairbrown.com
Easy Money Page 36