Ice Cold

by Mark Graham

  Chapter Nine

  After viewing all the things he had from the satellite pictures he came up with the conclusion that it couldn’t be done in a reasonable manner. There was too many connected, many of which didn’t even live in that area but were frequently there. He felt he would have to have some help; maybe as few as four or five. They didn’t usually take those kind of missions. The higher ups figured that something too big could be taken care of by the CIA or military, but he knew this was one of those things that needed no newsprint about and involving the U.S. in any way. He thought about it every which way he could and ended up knowing he would have to call the Director and get his input into this. He was glad he was a seasoned agent or the Director would think he just wasn’t up to it.

  Steve decided he would go down to a bar that was owned by a Vietnam veteran and catered to those veterans, and veterans from his war too. It was also frequented by both active cops and those off duty. He found three guys he knew well in the corner playing cards and walked back to them. They needed a fourth player so Steve was happy to pass his time in an environment he could feel comfortable in. Steve hated drunks, especially those who got stupid or violent. The people there would take care of the problem on the spot, with them sometimes just bringing the guy home. If someone came in and weren’t really fitting in, they were on there own. There’d been a few times when somebody came in, or a small group came, and they started a fight. Some were just wanna-be cops or veterans. They would in return get there asses handed to them. If they were from a different town they would find them selves thrown out of a moving car in their own county, or their local hospital. More than a few times people were just warned, and may even have been threatened with death. Steve and a few others knew about the time two fags came in and started to mouth off about homophiles and such. They were warned, then thrown down the back metal steps which were three flights down ending up next to the river. One died immediately from the fall and the other one was taken by one of the guys to the Indiana border and dropped off.

  Steve drank Jack Daniels and water so he wouldn’t have a hang over the next day. At that he still didn’t drink too much and chased every glass of Jack with a glass of water. He figured he’d wait until 10AM New York time before calling the Director. He actually hated to, but he was in no hurry to die, or get a lot of their own killed.

  “What you got Ice?” the Director said immediately when picking up the phone. “I was just thinking about calling you when you called. What can I do for you?”

  “Well director, I hate to say it, but that mission down Arizona and Mexico way cannot be completed except by using a bunch of people, and lots of preparation.” Steve waited for a statement.

  “Well hell Ice,” the Director responded, “that’s exactly what I was going to call you about . . . or one of the things I was going to talk to you about. We came up with the same conclusion and reached out for some other kind of other conclusion. You know our country doesn’t want to take the burden of killing people in foreign countries. I met with the directors of several agencies. The results were that the CIA, DEA, and Customs would mount an intelligence gathering of information and then each of them will do what they can. Hell, it’s not the right conclusion, but the more I thought about it I agree with you. It would take too many of our agents, with too many possibilities ending with dead agents. Besides, you know we only to do jobs that usually take two or three at the most. More than that and news gets out. Of course we made an exception in the Michigan thing but they were so far out that the place disappeared and only now some are questioning what might have happened. I heard it scared the shit out of a few people up there though. As we like, everybody is keeping a very low profile.”

  “That is kind of a real relief for me,” Steve said, “especially after looking at all the terrain and the people who might be or probably weren’t even involved. Just on the tail of the Michigan thing I think I’d like to do some personal work missions with only having one target . . . well, maybe up to six. Cheaper by the half-dozen.”

  The Director laughed, liking Ice, “well, we probably have a few right down your alley.”

  “What you got?” Steve asked.

  “Well,” the director responded, “we have one person here who needs some very traumatic abusive behavior done to him, but not killed. Guess they want the guy spending the rest of his life crippled, deformed, and maimed. We also have a three some who have been transporting Mexican, Korean, and our own girls and boys, to places across the country. They are slave traders and most of their victims don’t have a very good life expectancy. With that one we might come up with those who actually kidnap them and we can follow up with it later. If it happens like I expect we might be able to keep you busy in this country and even others for quite a while.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Steve replied, realizing he was getting assignments he could get into. He considered them easy even when most didn’t. “You got the details Director?” Steve asked.

  “Not here on the phone. We have some worries on this end if you know what I mean. I will be sending you by code all the information you will need.”

  “Yes, Sir!” Steve responded.

  “Okay, we might have three or four other ones of a similar kind, and I’ll send them along too. It will probably keep you busy for a few months. Let us know what you may need, and where, and it will be taken care of.”

  “Cool,” Ice replied. “Anything on the folks that want to kill me, or who killed all the other agents?”

  “Nothing on your guy, but we might be getting some good intel on the murders. There’s a bunch of agencies working together and I think they will be able to squeeze something out within a week or two. I’ll let you know. In the mean time take a couple days off and I’ll get those mission reports off to you tomorrow, more than likely the next day. I have to put things in order for you so you can be very efficient, as always.” The Director hung up with a polite, “watch your self son,” and hung up. Steve always knew he was in the Director’s good graces when he called him “son.”

  Steve took it easy for the next two days. He got some quality time with his dogs, and fine tuned his security system with the cameras. He also put a back up system that would keep all the video security pictures located in another location, so that if something damaged his system he would still be able to look back to see what might have happened. In addition he put several other lights that would come on at different times throughout the night. Someone who might be checking on him would see that someone might be going from room to room, or assume he was awake reading or something.

  The time passed quickly and he got the e-mail the director had promised. There was quite a procedure but he printed it out and started deciphering it. After an hour he had the memo printed out. He would write himself some notes he could put on his person and would destroy the e-mails on both the computer and the printer sheets of paper.

  On Sunday he was expected to take out a man while he was in church in a way that looked like he had a heart attack or stroke. That was in Illinois. He was to leave there and head on down to Nashville and take out a small cell of reported Iranians who were said to be terrorist ready to launch a big explosion. Then he needed to head on down to New Orleans and take out a man and wife team, then on over to Houston to do some serious torturing, not to result in death. He felt that might end up being interesting and would definitely expel any violent thoughts for a while. After that he was going to Laredo to harass with gunfire a particular resident of some Mexican cartel boss. He really didn’t like that kind of job because it was way to easy to get a cops attention, and have to take care of a bunch of stuff if need be. They weren’t really asking for a death but if one or two died, well that’s the way the game was played. He also knew that some of these criminal groups were well prepared for such things, so he might end up in a fire fight which if he lived through, would definitely get the attention of the cops.

  After that job he was asked to head on up to Colo
rado Springs and take care of the problem with a rogue group of white supremacy people. The group was also known from some heinous crimes to some women and children. When he was done there he was supposed to stop by a building in Missouri and destroy it with everybody who might be in side. He realized this would be one of the longer lists he had ever gotten at one time. He thought that perhaps the Director wanted him off the grid for a month or two, to accomplish these missions and knew they’d be taken care of properly. Although Steve did most of missions all the way to completion, but he had made a mistake two or three times. The thing was that he had a better rate of success than anybody else in his department except for maybe Karen. She was real good at what she did too. If it wasn’t for the job he thought he might try to get to know her better, but knew it would never work out, so why mess with it. One guy had gotten involved with another employee of the department and she wasn’t even an agent. He was dismissed immediately but was later hired by the FBI and went to Alaska for his first duty assignment.

  Ice started out for Illinois on Saturday with his target being just west of Jolliet. He got there in really good time and was able to take the afternoon to check everything out. He learned where the guy lived, what he drove and went to the church he went to. He learned too that the church had two morning services, so knew he might end up sitting through two services. Well, if so, not a full service for one of them. Just in case, he rented a car to use while he was there. Just a safety precaution and if he didn’t have time to drop it off, the rental agency would be called and told where it was. His ID was so well protected that nobody could figure out who rented their car. All they had was a driver’s license that was fake and a check card that would be immediately canceled the day after the rental. After all, his department tried to save money where they could. Ice always thought that was funny. The federal government would pay five million dollars on a project where if they had a private concern take care of it, the amount would probably fall into the one or two million dollar bracket.

  The guy in Illinois was Chet Eavesma. He was said to be a big man, leaning toward the fat side. He was over six foot tall and he was bald from the front to the back. The hair he had was brown and grey and he was fifty three years old. Chet was well known in his community being members of several organizations, and a deacon at his church, which was one of the bigger ones in his community. Ice didn’t have to know why he was taking someone out, but many times the Director would share with him why. With Chet he had learned of his sins which were the kind of which with him dieing, it would be best for everybody and people wouldn’t find out what he was up too. One bad thing he did was to con a bunch of church go’ers out of their retirement. The worse was that he was not just a pedophile but also went overboard and killed some of the young boys he became enchanted with. He also was guilty of black mailing a congressman, two local politicians, a few other pedophiles, and a priest. Steve never could figure out why some of these things got to his level of correction; but knew too they were very good at hiding actions nobody would know about. Sometimes he rather not know the what, just asked to do it. If torture were involved he always knew what the perpetrator did so he could work his torture schedule to include anything the perpetrator had done. Ice figured he’d at least be fair. This one was supposed to be a clean kill, in public, quickly and efficiently. Ice had a small tube with a very short needle for these kinds of things. It contained a really deadly substance that couldn’t be discovered on a regular autopsy, and caused the heart to shut down without chance of revival. The thing was made up of a hollow glass tube, and rubber injection system like the old nose drops with the eighth of an inch needle. He only had to prick the skin and squeeze the rubber bulb. The dangerous thing was it would be easy if a person wasn’t careful, and pricked themselves. Shit happened but he didn’t intend for it to happen to him

  On Sunday morning Steve was wearing a dark business suit with a red, white and blue tie. He always thought he looked more like an FBI agent or Secret Service. He arrived twenty minutes before the service was supposed to start. He kept an eye on all the people who were standing around talking and checked the auditorium quickly to see if Chet was in there. A few people came up to Steve and welcomed him and hoped he would come back. He was actually quite personable when he wanted to be, and the people usually left happily, if a little more than a little naive. Steve figured he would stay in the vestibule in case Chet had been some place in a meeting or whatever. It paid off because while the organ was still playing prior to the service Chet walked out a door that looked like it was an office or something. Chet stopped and welcomed Steve with a smile, then walked down the aisle to near the front ,and sat with a woman his age and two teenage kids.

  He walked in and the usher took him down to the front and upon Steve’s request got him seated right behind Chet and his family.

  Steve knew the gig since being brought up in the church . . . a quaint little Church of Christ. The service started and they had to stand up and sing, they sat down, prayed, and the announcements were given. Shortly after that and before the sermon the song leader asked everybody to welcome everybody else. Some people stayed basically in their place. Chet shook the hands of the people in front of him, then to the people on the left side of them. Last he turned around to shake Steve’s hand. He immediately saw Steve as the guy he already met and gave Steve a big smile and put his hand out to shake. Steve shook his hand and with his other hand grasped Chets wrist giving him a good two handed shake of fellowship. In his second hand he had the needle ready and punctured Chet’s wrist. Chet was not aware of the poke and turned around and waited for the song to be finished before everybody would sit down. Just before the speaker stepped up the podium Chet fell forward, right over the seats in front of him. It seemed everybody became immediately concerned and everybody was either just standing where they were, or several actually ran up to see if they could be of help. With all the commotion Steve slowly threaded his way to the front wall next to the stage and walked out the door. He knew all he had to do was walk to the steps, go down a level and use an exit door nearest to where his car was parked. Not to gather any attention, he had parked the car about a block away along with other church folk .who parked there too.

  Steve drove directly to the rental agency and left the car in front of their building then went to his car, got in and drove off. He made a quick stop at the motel and picked up anything he had left there including several sets of ID. He was off to Nashville by the time the last church service would have been finished. He had the radio on and heard where a well known man had died of a heart attack while at church. The only thing bad Steve saw was that an asshole like Chet would be thought of as such a good Christian family man. By the time he got to St. Louis he was very hungry and stopped to get a good meal under his belt. Once he finished he knew he was only a couple hours away from where he was to go. He casually drove like he didn’t have to be any place. He knew he might take care of the terrorist thing tomorrow, but then it might be a few days depending on what had to be done. He was scheduled to do the Missouri thing last but he decided to get it done early on. If there was a leak on the inside the person would remain a step behind. In code he had let the Director know so that he wouldn’t be stepping on anybodies toes, and could finish the job the way it was supposed to be done. A lot of times a hit like this one had to be done on the day and the time arranged for because the target would only be there at that particular time.

  When he found the building he learned it was an old three story hotel with only a handful of rooms on the second and third floor. It looked forsaken but he had been told the group lived in the rooms, and the kitchen was operative, as well as any other rooms on the first floor. Steve did see a bulb lighting one of the rooms on the third floor. He felt this would probably be an easy one to do, but not being caught was a different story. He found a decent motel several miles away where they had their own restaurant on their ground floor. He checked in and came up with a plan.

>   On Monday he cased the place and found out there was an alley behind the hotel with several dumpster backed right up to the back of the hotel. There was also a space of about two feet that separated the hotel from the auto parts store next door.

  On Tuesday he got up early and put on his sweat pants and shirt so he would look like any other jogger out for a early morning run. He drove to a lot about two blocks from the hotel, grabbed a back-pack and in a round-about way got to where he wanted to be. He quickly and quietly dropped a plastic bag into the dumpster. The bag contained twelve sticks of dynamite that was attached to a cell phone. He then walked slowly along the side of the building between the hotel and auto parts place being very careful of where he stepped. There was a lot of really nasty looking stuff in that miniature alley, some of which were dead animals and some live rats. When he came to within thirty feet of the front he took out another bag like the first one with the same amount of dynamite in it. He thought this would be too much for a small job but needed to be insured the entire building would be blown all around the neighborhood. He dropped this one down into a window well that was half full of leaves and junk so the bag wasn’t really that noticeable. He started back to his car, stopping at the front door of the auto parts store and learned that they would be closed in the morning because of a funeral. “Perfect” he told himself because he could see with his own eyes what was left of the hotel.

  He ran back to his car, and into his room to take a shower and remove all his stuff and put it in the car. He immediately went to the little restaurant and got himself a good breakfast. When almost finished he dug his cell phone out and called the number. Within a few seconds he could hear and feel a large explosion explosion. He smiled and asked for a refill of coffee. To no one special he said loudly enough for others to hear, “Damn, what the hell was that?” Everybody shook they’re heads. He turned and looked in the general direction of where the hotel was and saw a huge plume of dark gray smoke.