by Matt Rogers
Targets are David Lee and Miles Price, from Rafael Constructions.
An address was listed under that. King guessed it led to the head office of Rafael Constructions, where the pair of construction workers had made a living. There was nothing else.
He swore and threw the briefcase across the room, at the same time making sure not to damage any of the walls. He’d caused Ronald enough distress already. It would do him no good to destroy his property. King scrunched the note up and shoved it in his pocket. He left the room as it was.
On the walk back to the sedan, the frustration of dead ends began to eat away at him. Coupled with a splitting headache and throbbing wounds, King felt anger rising inside his chest. No, not anger. Stifling rage. The leads had been worthless. He had the address of the construction company, which he probably could have located on a computer anyway. He doubted there were many competing near Jameson.
He passed reception only a few minutes after leaving it. On the way past, he stuck his head in the door and saw Ronald with a landline phone pressed to his ear, speaking animatedly. Probably still on the phone to the police. King waved, smiled, and tossed the key back over the desk. He registered the disbelief on Ronald’s face, then slipped back into his car and drove the smoking, bullet-ridden wreck out of Queensbridge for the last time.
CHAPTER 23
The second he stepped into the motel room he saw Kate’s face fall. He knew why. If she had even an inkling of concern for him she would be appalled by the injuries he’d sustained.
The drive back from Queensbridge had not been pleasant. As he came down from the high of combat, the pain had begun to seep into his face, his hand, his ribs. By the time he pulled up outside Yvonne’s motel and stumbled up to room four, he was ready to pass out.
‘Oh my god,’ she whispered.
They hugged for a moment, then King tossed the phone onto the bed. ‘That’s what I found.’
‘What was on it?’
‘An address. For a motel in Queensbridge. I went there. There was nothing.’
‘There had to be something. You’re beat half to death.’
King sat down in the rickety chair by the door and sighed. ‘Let’s not get into it. What’s done is done.’
She nodded. ‘Did you see anything?’
‘The package you delivered was there. But it was empty. It had a couple of guns in it and an address to Rafael Constructions.’
‘I know the place. It’s down the road.’
‘Well, that’s all I’ve got.’
‘You think they have something to do with what’s going on?’
‘I don’t know. It’s where David Lee and Miles Price worked. Doesn’t necessarily mean it’s connected. Unless…’
‘Unless what?’
King stared blankly out the window. Thinking hard. ‘Do you have a phone?’
‘Of course.’
He fished around in his back pocket, searching for something, unsure if it had remained in place throughout the commotion of the morning. His fingers closed around the business card Richard had given him the previous day. Bent out of shape, but still intact.
Kate fished a smartphone out of her bag and handed it across. He took it with a nod of thanks and punched in the number scrawled on the front of the card.
Richard answered on the second ring.
‘Hello?’
‘Richard. It’s Jason King.’
He heard elation creep into the man’s tone. ‘King! My God, I didn’t think I’d hear from you again. Do you have good news?’
He recalled Richard asking him to keep an eye out for potential employment opportunities.
‘Far from it, my friend,’ he said. ‘But I’m wrapped up in a bit of a situation here, and I need some answers.’
‘I see. Well, anything I can do to help.’
‘We talked about how you were laid off?’
‘We did.’
‘Can I ask where you used to work?’
‘Place called Rafael Constructions. Worked there about two years before it got bought out.’
‘When we talked you mentioned overseas buyers. Do you know who?’
‘None of us do. The whole thing was done so fast … next thing we knew we were told to leave.’
‘Did you see them?’
‘I saw one of them. I don’t know how many there were. It might have only just been him. He looked similar to you. White, tall, in shape. He wore a suit. Didn’t match his surroundings.’
‘You sure he was from overseas?’
‘Well, not certain. But it looked like he’d flown in. All I saw of him was when he walked into the factory floor and shook hands with the manager. They both headed into the office after that. But he looked important. Like he didn’t belong in a town as small as this.’
‘Did you see anything else?’
‘Nope. They must have finalised the deal, because the next day most of us got informed we would be let go. I haven’t been back there since.’
‘Most?’
‘They kept a couple of guys on. To help them with some temporary work, I think.’
‘David Lee and Miles Price?’
‘Uh, yeah … how the hell did you know that?’
‘Richard, I have to go. But thank you. You’ve been a huge help.’
King hung up and tossed the phone back to Kate. ‘Rafael Constructions is now priority number one.’
‘What was all that about?’ she said, tucking the device into her bag.
‘I met a guy yesterday who’d been laid off his job. Turns out someone bought Rafael Constructions and got rid of all the old workers. What could they possibly want with a construction company?’
‘What about those two workers who you saw get shot?’
‘They kept them on to help out with something. The pair of them must have seen too much.’
‘So they’re definitely eliminating witnesses?’
King nodded. ‘They’re covering something up.’
‘We should visit their head office,’ Kate said. ‘I know where it is.’
He nodded again. ‘I need to rest first. I’ll pass out if we go now.’
She rose up onto her tip-toes and planted a kiss on his bloody lips. ‘Let’s get you fixed up.’
Kate left to visit the chemist down the road. He was wary of letting her go alone, especially given the nature of recent revelations. But he knew he was in no state to accompany her.
Besides, she could handle herself.
He stumbled into the bathroom and let the shower run cold. He needed the soothing relief. The water trickled over his wounds, washing away the blood caked over his body, cleaning him, reinvigorating him.
He stood under the stream for what felt like an hour but in reality couldn’t have been more than ten minutes. He dried himself tentatively, taking care not to disturb the wounds already throbbing over his body. Now that he had time to stop and breathe, he could assess the damage.
Cole had landed several hard body shots, but no ribs were broken. Nevertheless, his sternum ached and three large welts had surfaced across his abdomen. His cheek continued to swell, beginning to obscure his vision in one eye. His nose was battered, but not broken. He knew the difference from past experience. Still, swathes of pain drilled into his skull underneath his eyes. His lips had been cut in multiple places, either from elbows or punches. The stab wound on his hand had finally stopped bleeding, but it was a nasty injury, throbbing incessantly. Overall, he had taken a serious beating.
He estimated his body would take over a week to completely heal.
He didn’t have a week.
Still naked, he heard the door unlock and stuck his head around the corner to see Kate, breathless, wielding a pair of shopping bags packed with medical supplies.
‘You okay?’ he asked.
‘Yeah.’ She smiled at him. ‘Just didn’t want to be seen by the police, or … whoever. I got you new clothes too.’
She patched him up as best she could, rubbing antisepti
c into the cuts, bandaging his hand, holding an ice pack to his face.
‘Who did this to you?’ she finally asked, digging blood out of his nose with a Q-tip. ‘You can’t keep me in the dark like this.’
‘Somebody I wasn’t expecting,’ he said, staring into space.
She paused. Took his head in her hands. Made eye contact. ‘Jason, what’s going on?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said, struggling to control his emotions. ‘I honestly have no fucking idea. A man I used to work with showed up here. I hadn’t seen him in five years, and he’s here. Ten thousand miles from where he’s supposed to be. He tried to kill me.’
She went pale. The news hit her, too. The understanding that all the killings, all the violence, all the death … revolved around him.
‘You told me you were just passing through,’ she said, stunned.
King looked at her, tears welling in his eyes. ‘I am. That’s why I’m so scared now. I quit my position a couple of months ago. Travelled here, to get away from it all. No phone, no computer. I fell off the grid. And all this chaos still followed me.’
‘But…’
‘You should leave, Kate.’
She sat on his bare thigh and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He held her tight. Thinking it might be the last time he ever would.
‘I’m not just abandoning you,’ she whispered.
‘This is on me. I’m being targeted. You need to get yourself as far away from me as possible. I knew I never should have let you get close.’
‘They tried to kill me, too. You’re not the only person being targeted.’
‘I remember thinking the shooter at the landfill site had to be an awfully well-trained marksman to be so accurate. Now I know that he was. Because I trained with him.’
‘Where is he now?’
‘Dead.’
No need to elaborate.
She bowed her head. ‘So you didn’t find out anything else? All we have is Rafael Constructions?’
He nodded. ‘That’s it.’
‘Then we go check it out,’ she said. ‘I’m not just running away from Jameson because it’s somehow connected to you. You’ve saved my life at least twice now.’
‘I’m not someone you want to be around, Kate.’
‘I think you are.’
There was a brief pause as neither of them spoke. They looked at each other for a long time. Wondering just how they’d got each other into this mess. Wondering if it would end. Kate kissed him. Her hair spilled over his shoulders and they stayed that way for what felt like forever, moving slowly against each other, feeding off each other’s energy. King stood up, carrying her, and they fell onto the bed. They moved gently. Carefully. Kate slid her pants off, revealing the same toned physique, and together they crept under the covers once again. King felt the elation and the joy and the release of the experience and in that time he believed that there was a way out of this horrendous situation. They would find answers, they would leave Jameson behind, they would move on. He would finally rid himself of the demons of his past, and they could just disappear together.
The morning melted into a blur of pulsating colours, of motion and energy and connection. When they finally finished King drifted into a half-sleep, staring up at the ceiling until it faded away, one hand around Kate’s slight shoulders, breathing in her smell. He put the tension and the stress and the pain on hold. Just for a few short hours.
When he came to around mid-morning, he heard the rare sound of a passing vehicle. Its engine grumbled by. Then, all of a sudden, the noise came to a halt. Right in front of the motel. There was a car stopped outside. He was sure of it. He stayed completely still in bed, but his senses perked up. He listened for any type of uncommon noise. In all likelihood it would be nothing more than a local, stopped for any of the million reasons why people stop their cars.
But maybe, just maybe…
Then the window shattered.
In the calm silence of the mid-afternoon the sound exploded through the motel room like a gun. King threw the covers away and leapt out of bed the moment he heard it. He shut off the nerve endings screaming at him to slow down. He wouldn’t listen to them, because he had just seen the object that had launched through the window. A small round ball, heavy. It thudded into the carpeted floor and rolled toward the bed.
He couldn’t believe his eyes.
A military-issue M67 hand grenade.
Pin missing.
Acting with the urgency of a man who knew exactly how much danger he was in, King scooped up the grenade with one hand and took an enormous bounding step toward the broken window. Before Kate had even propped herself up in bed he threw it like a baseball, knowing it would detonate at any moment. He’d thrown it blind, hurling it back from where it came from before he even had a chance to scout the area.
He made it to the window before the detonation. Got one look at the scene before him. A police car, from the Jameson Police Department, resting idly in the middle of the road. A single man standing by the driver’s side door, staring up at the motel. King saw the slick hair, the white skin, the large eyes.
It was Brandt’s imposter. He must have escaped from the station, stealing one of their vehicles in the process. Then he’d tracked King down and hurled a live grenade into his motel room.
And he certainly hadn’t anticipated the same weapon hurtling back at him barely a couple of seconds later.
He didn’t stand a chance.
The grenade bounced once on the asphalt, skidding along the road until it shot under the police car. The imposter could do nothing but stare. His reaction speed was not quick enough. From the time King threw the grenade, the man had perhaps a second to act. He didn’t take the opportunity.
A vicious explosion tore the police car in half. There was no fireball, no theatrics like in the movies. Just an immense blast that sent loose parts flying in all directions. The imposter became a bloody, shredded corpse. At the same time the blast shattered every window in Yvonne’s motel simultaneously. The noise almost destroyed King’s eardrums. He ducked below the windowsill to escape the shockwave. The room’s foundations shook around him. M67 detonations were close to the most terrifying experience on the battlefield, especially within such close proximity.
In a small country town, they caused pandemonium.
CHAPTER 24
The surrounding area erupted into bedlam. Screams of shock sounded from all levels of the motel complex as the entire building vibrated on its foundations.
Kate scrambled out of bed and threw her clothes on, her motions jerky and panicked. King followed suit, diving into the outfit she had bought him earlier that morning. A pair of jeans and a long-sleeved cotton shirt. Both tight fits. They gathered their things, speechless, reeling from how close they had come to getting blown to pieces. He sensed that she was unsure as to what exactly had happened.
‘What’s going on?’ she said finally, scooping up her bag, ready to leave.
‘Someone just threw a grenade through our window.’
Her eyes boggled. ‘Was that what it was?’
He nodded. ‘Let’s go. Right now.’
They threw the door open and headed out into the street. On the way to Billy’s sedan they passed Yvonne. The old woman had staggered out of reception, tears in her eyes, staring vacantly at the widespread destruction across her motel. Repairs would be expensive. King took one look at her, then reached into the windbreaker he carried in one arm and took out the remaining stack of bills from the biker’s clubhouse. At least ten grand, maybe more. He peeled off a couple to get them through the next few days, then handed the rest over to Yvonne.
She met his gaze. ‘What’s this for? Did you do this?’
‘No. But there’s people who want to hurt me, and I stayed here knowing they might target me. So it’s on me. You use this money to fix it all up. I’m sorry, Yvonne.’
‘It’s not your fault.’
‘Everyone’s telling me that, but I’m start
ing to think it is.’
They left her and took Billy’s sedan out onto the main road. Kate averted her eyes from the grisly remains of Brandt’s imposter, lying in pieces next to the smouldering police car wreckage. A surreal sight when contrasted with the peaceful country town around it. King stared at the scene as they passed, knowing every police officer for miles in any direction would be on their position in no time. They had to get out of Jameson, at least for the time being.
‘To Rafael Constructions?’ Kate said. Her voice shook, probably from the shock of seeing such a grisly death up close and personal.
King nodded. ‘There’d better be something significant there.’
They passed the chemist, and the post office, and the convenience store, and the cafe, and a swathe of other buildings. Already shopkeepers and customers alike were out on the street, their eyes searching for the source of the almighty racket they’d heard before. King kept his gaze fixed on the road ahead and in no time they were out of town, heading north.
Kate turned to him, as if to say something. She stopped. Decided against it.
‘What are you thinking?’ he said, aware there was something on her mind.
‘It’s about time you told me what you used to do. Specifically.’
‘Why now all of a sudden?’
‘Because that was insanity. I heard the window smash, and I paused for what couldn’t have been more than a second … I think just to register the noise. And in that time you jumped out of bed, picked it up and threw it back. Before I even realised what was happening. No-one is that fast. I’ve never seen anyone react the way you do. You’re an anomaly.’
King sighed. ‘I made it to the Delta Force at twenty-two. That’s where I met Cole. He was one of the only people I got along with. He and another man named Dirk. Everyone else hated me. I was at least five years younger than any of them. They accelerated me through the ranks quicker than most.’