The Keepers

by Jeffrey B. Burton

  The room came alive. Vira a fury of barks and snarls, pulling at the leash, fearless, in attack mode. Callum fussing with his dart gun, apparently reloading. And Man-mountain marched into the room—giant steps—heading in our direction.

  That’s all it took.

  “Vira!” I screamed again, and the two of us were at full sprint, bats out of hell, racing down Talcott’s corridor, past the coffee station and refrigerators, Vira a full leash ahead on the way toward the mayor’s back exit. I hit the doorway with a shoulder, twisted the knob, and suddenly we were in the hallway, running full-bore, retracing the steps where Weeks had led us to slaughter, where I knew in my heart he’d led Wabs.

  Vira cut left ahead of me. I spun the corner, top speed, and bounced off the wall like a bowling pin. I stayed on my feet as we kept moving. We flew about a final turn, fleeing to the elevator vestibule as the door to one car dinged open and out stepped Officer Kippy Gimm. Hearing the commotion, Kippy’s hand dropped to her holster as she turned to face us.

  “Hold the door,” I shouted. “Hold the door.”

  Confused, bewildered—both understatements—Kippy stepped toward us as the elevator door behind her slid shut. I dropped Vira’s leash as she sailed for Kippy, twisted myself past the two of them, and jabbed fingertips at the elevator buttons, both up and down arrows.

  “It’s a trap, Kip,” I said, sucking air. “It’s a trap.”

  Kippy backed away from Vira, her eyes wide. “Where’s Wabs?”

  “Callum and that big fucker were there, in Weeks’s office,” I choked out the words, lunging for Vira’s leash. “Where are the stairs?” I pressed at the elevator buttons again as if that would make them open faster and glanced about. “Where are the goddamned stairs?”

  “Where’s Wabs?” Kippy repeated, searching my eyes and not liking what she saw. “Oh, no. Oh my god.”

  Vira’s leash stretched tight, a low snarl emanated from her chest. I faced the corridor from which my golden retriever and I had just fled. Like Vira, I sensed his presence before he turned the final corner, a lone figure filling the hallway, a hundred feet away, now staring back at us.

  Man-mountain’s right arm swung out from a fold in his long jacket; that’s when I caught sight of the firearm in his hand—black and deadly—and pointed at the floor. Our eyes met and he stepped forward, another long step, turning to strides—heading our way down the corridor and breaking into a sprint.

  Vira was on fire, barking, howling, snapping, and demanding to be set free. The elevator chimed open beside me. I jammed a heel in the door, grabbed fistfuls of leash, and wrenched my golden retriever into the elevator car.

  “Kippy,” I shouted, grasping a clump of uniform and shoulder flesh, pulling her into the elevator with us, pressing floor buttons at random with my leash hand. Tears dripped down Kippy’s face, and I pulled her deeper into the car, knocking her off balance as she struggled for her sidearm.

  My last image of Man-mountain as I stumbled and yanked the crew backward into the elevator car was that he’d covered more than half the hallway, racing toward us, his pistol up, beginning to sweep in our direction. The doors began sliding shut as I continued stabbing the close button with a forefinger. I could hear his footsteps—felt them, too, as though he were a T. rex after prey—right on up until the doors squeezed shut and we began our descent.

  “Why’d you stop me?” Kippy said, facing straight ahead.

  “What?”

  “I was going to kill that son of a bitch.”

  “Kippy,” I said, trying to control the wave of panic that had flooded over me, knowing there could be no upside in a firefight outside the mayor’s office. “We need to get the hell out of here.”

  As the elevator door opened, we stumbled onto the third floor—Vira quiet now, body taut as a drawn bowstring. We brushed past a small horde of business suits, Vira running point with me towing Kippy by her forearm. I figured the floor layouts were similar on each level and we rushed down the hallway looking for what I’d spotted in our mad dash across the fifth floor. And suddenly there it was. I hit the brakes at the red alarm mounted on the wall.

  I smashed the glass with my elbow and pulled the alarm. A siren went off, piercing and intermixed with a prerecorded voice instructing people to stay calm as they exited the building. Seconds later we were in the south stairwell with an expanding hive of employees and visitors, politicians and aides, many expressing frustration, others wondering if this were yet another drill timed to screw up their lunch hour … or the real deal.

  By the time we hit the lobby and the crush of wall-to-wall foot traffic, the security guards were active. They were in fire evacuation mode, holding open doors and ushering hundreds of people out onto the plaza. Sirens were louder yet outside City Hall as the fire engines began to arrive.

  Five minutes later, we were in my F-150.

  CHAPTER 30

  “There is no goddamned fire,” Police Superintendent Callum barked at the security guard. They both stood inside the entryway to the mayor’s office.

  “Sir,” the guard replied, “with all due respect, everyone must evacuate the building until we’re allowed back in.”

  “It’s a false alarm—there’s no smoke, there’re no flames.”

  “The chief fire officer makes that call. My job is to clear this floor ASAP.”

  “Do you know who I am?”

  The guard nodded but repeated, “My job is to clear this floor ASAP.”

  The two had been going at it for over a minute, Callum and the broad-shouldered cop-wannabe who worked for building security. The glorified crossing guard clung to his crackling walkie-talkie as though it were the nuclear football.

  “Sir, I can get into big trouble if I don’t do my job.” The guard walked over and peeked in the bathroom, and then he took a glance in Weeks’s side room. “Are you the only one up here, Superintendent?”

  Callum’s eyes flicked toward the two IKEA boxes along the far wall. One contained the mortal remains of Officer Dave Wabiszewski. That box would not be an issue. At least not until two or three days passed and the odor became all-encompassing—something that could not be ignored, mayor’s office or not. But Callum had no fear of three days passing, much less another hour. It was the other IKEA box that was problematic. He and Cordov Woods had worked quickly to place the comatose Carter Weeks as gently as possible inside this second carton, and they were able to curve him into a fetal position at the container’s bottom.

  Callum realized it was past time to get this unyielding security guard the hell out of here. It would be most inopportune for the sedative to wear off only to have Weeks shrieking and popping up from the second IKEA container like some deranged jack-in-the-box. Callum assumed the mayor would be unconscious for hours—hell, considering the dose of the sedative, perhaps until the following morning—but, if an early awakening did occur, Woods would soon be packing the third IKEA box with the remains of an expired building security guard.

  “The mayor left with the others as soon as the alarm went off,” Callum said. “Sorry to be such a pain in the ass, son. Let me head out with you.”

  Callum also wanted to draw the cop-wannabe away from the mayor’s side room. If the guard got a wild hair up his ass about inspecting the room’s closet, he’d be most unhappy with what he’d find in there … most unhappy, indeed … and the third IKEA box would be filled.

  Cordov Woods was to stay behind with the mayor no matter what. Woods was also to make certain no one—no firemen, no security guards, no random dipshits—laid one finger on any of those two boxes. Callum would have a quick chat with the chief fire officer and, unless he’d lost his touch, he’d be back up in the mayor’s office inside of ten minutes. They’d then get Carter Weeks laid out on the side room’s bed and tend to his wrist, which was really just a series of puncture marks and broken skin from that mutt’s teeth.

  The mayor would be just fine.

  Police Superintendent Callum, however, was consumed
with silent fury. He’d cautioned Carter Weeks against appointing Peter Feist to head the Special Prosecutions Bureau. Feist was a boy scout and deeply committed in his quest and all that other happy horseshit the mayor had flung far and wide during his eulogy at Holy Name Cathedral. But that made Feist uncontrollable, and—subsequently—a force to be reckoned with. Carter, of course, hadn’t taken his warning seriously and, sure as shit … Feist began poking about in things best left alone.

  It was Chicago, after all.

  Eliminating Feist’s real estate investor source had been difficult enough, but eliminating Feist was not a decision Superintendent Gerald Callum made lightly. Quite the opposite. It tore at his guts. But Feist’s actions forced his hand … and a decision had to be made.

  Callum kept underestimating the dog handler, including earlier today when he’d assumed the girl was the only one with any real brains. He’d wondered if Reid’s sniffer dog had placed Cord Woods at the scene of Feist’s demise that first morning at Washington Park. He’d even asked Woods to check up on the dog trainer. Woods had come back with some stories—interesting stories—about a couple of the dog man’s more recent cases. But he’d waved away pursuing any action as their plate was full and, quite frankly, it made no sense to chase after a fart in the wind. Callum changed his mind when he spotted Reid in the cathedral’s restroom. Sure, Reid was likely intimidated by Police Superintendent Callum—he had that effect on people—but the dog man was squirming in his dress shoes.

  Squirming as though he held a secret.

  Callum had sent Woods to throw a scare into the dog handler, to introduce him to his proper role in the universe. And, perhaps down the road, something of a more permanent nature could be undertaken.

  But then—out of the clear blue fucking sky—this female cop shows up and forces a meeting with Carter Weeks. And at the top and center of her agenda is … the fucking dog man.

  Callum’s anger burned with the intensity of a collapsing star. The plan, a good plan—his plan, for Christ’s sake—had turned to shit, and there were now pieces scattered about the board that required his immediate attention. What should have been a quick fix would now go extra innings … and all because of that fucking dog trainer and his golden retriever.

  Even though it had only lasted a handful of seconds in Mayor Weeks’s office, he’d seen the look in Reid’s eyes. Sure, there was the initial shock, but then something more. Disdain. Reid had glared at him with great disdain, something the police superintendent was not used to in all his years on the force. No one stares at me like that, Callum seethed, and—as he headed down the stairwell with the overgrown security guard—he thought of what he’d told Cordov Woods before he’d shut the closet door.

  “It turns out that goddamned mutt is special. Kill it quickly. But when you catch the dog man,” Callum had instructed his driver, deadly serious, “and before he takes his final breath … cut out his eyes.”

  PART THREE

  ROCK LAKE

  Here, Gentlemen, a dog teaches us a lesson in humanity.

  —Napoleon Bonaparte

  CHAPTER 31

  I broke speed limits getting from City Hall to Wabiszewski’s townhome in Albany Park. I figured we had a minor head start before Police Superintendent Callum—and all the power at his disposal—came hunting. Kippy and I toyed briefly with making a run for it in her vehicle, but then we quickly realized her squad car could too easily be tracked. We were at Wabs’s home for two minutes; just long enough for me to stuff some clothes, dirty and clean, into my gym bag, hoist a bag of dog food onto my shoulder, and grab Maggie, Delta, Bill, and my napping German shepherd.

  Kippy spent her hundred twenty seconds liberating a few of Dave’s sweatshirts from a top drawer as well as a couple of sweatpants and a short stack of his Cubbies hats. She spent her final ten seconds in her partner’s office, tucking Wabiszewski’s homework packet under her arm—Wabs’s ever-expanding research, thoughts, and ideas about the mess we’d found ourselves in.

  The mess that had reached out and claimed his life.

  Soon, we were in front of an ATM machine at a nearby strip mall, both of us withdrawing as much as our accounts would allow in a single transaction. I withdrew four hundred dollars, which pretty much cleaned me out. Fortunately, Kippy was able to hit her daily limit at an even grand.

  A half-hour later we were standing in Paul Lewis’s office at Chicago Animal Care and Control.

  * * *

  “You can’t just show up here out of the blue, act as though you’ve been diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer, request a favor, and then not tell me what this is all about.”

  “The less you know, Paul, the safer,” I said. “Believe me.”

  Paul took a moment to sit down in his chair. “Whatever’s going on, I’d recommend calling the police.” He looked from his closed office door to me, then to Vira, before his eyes settled on Kippy. After a moment he added, “But then you are the police.”

  Kippy stared at Paul and said nothing. Except for a logistical yay or nay or short-phrase ambiguities on any requested information or queries on my part, Kippy had kept silent, withdrawn—she was with us in the flesh, but her thoughts had checked out. Vira had noticed this, too, had placed her head on Kippy’s lap on the ride over to CACC, and even now nuzzled at her fingertips.

  Paul looked my way. “Is this a Vira thing?”

  I nodded my head.

  “And you need to borrow one of my trucks—no questions asked?”

  I nodded again. Chicago Animal Care and Control was a fifty-four-thousand-square-foot facility on South Western Avenue. CACC acts as a shelter and can house over five hundred animals in separate kennels at any given time. It’s also the command center for Paul’s squadron of animal control officers, with a fleet of eighteen animal control trucks and an extended van equipped for off-site adoptions and vaccine clinics. With eighteen CACC trucks in play, I figured they could get by on seventeen for however many days we might need one.

  “Lenny will notice it missing and come tell me.”

  Lenny Blakeman, one of Paul’s animal control officers, had worked at CACC for decades.

  “Tell him it’s with a mechanic, getting some work done.”

  “Lenny’s the one in charge of getting the trucks repaired.”

  I shrugged. “Just stave him off, okay? Buy us a few days—that’s all I’m asking.”

  “A few days? And after that you’ll let me know what the hell’s going on?”

  “God, I hope so,” I said. “But listen, Paul, in four days—or three if Lenny keeps pushing at you—you need to call the police and report the truck missing. Okay?”

  “Call the police?” Paul stared at me as though I’d sprouted a second head. “Why can’t you just bring it back?”

  “I will if I can, but if I can’t, you need to call the police and report it missing.” I took a deep breath; now for the hard part. “One more thing, Paul. If my name comes up in any conversation with any cop or detective, in any way, tell them how I’ve volunteered here for years—which is true—and how I know where everything is kept, which is also true, and how I could easily have grabbed the truck.”

  He began shaking his head.

  “I know, Paul, but if any cop starts asking about me, sell my ass down the river. Tell them you can’t believe I’d ever do such a thing but if, for some reason, I wanted to get my hands on one of your trucks … it’d be real easy for me to pull off. And I’m just a volunteer here—you only know me on a superficial level, just enough to say ‘Hi’ and bitch about the weather. Keep your answers short, Paul. All you know is some prick stole one of your trucks and you want it back, pronto. That’s all you know.”

  “You’re starting to scare me, Mace.”

  I began to reply but realized I had no idea what to say.

  CHAPTER 32

  We transferred our gear from my pickup into one of Paul’s CACC trucks. Kippy hopped behind the driver’s seat and headed out. She was chauffeuring Vira,
Maggie May, and Delta Dawn to the O’Hare Inn and Suites, which was just a couple miles from O’Hare International Airport.

  After they left, I turned to Paul. “Can I beg a final favor?”

  “Name it.”

  “Take care of Sue and Bill for me, okay? Sue’s still recovering, he can’t move fast, and this excitement could be too much for him to handle.” I glanced at my bloodhound. “And Bill is Bill—he’s just a puppy.”

  “You got it,” the head of CACC replied. “Knowing Sue—he’ll want a penthouse suite with showgirls feeding him grapes.”

  “Something like that,” I mumbled, handing both leashes off to Paul and kneeling in front of my two boys. I scratched at the back of my German shepherd’s neck. “I sure wish you could come, Sue—you know I do—but you’re still healing. And you gotta keep healing, buddy.”

  Sue sensed something in my tone—in my mood—and licked at my cheek, attempting to cheer me up in his own manner. It was the first time my shepherd had done that in eons.

  I then gave one of Bill’s ears a gentle yank so he wouldn’t feel left out. “Be good, Bill. And try not to roll in anything.”

  Paul stood next to my F-150 as I got ready to leave. He said, “Jesus Christ, Mace, one hell of a first date you’ve got yourself on.”

  I looked at my friend a long moment, hoping my features didn’t betray how frightened I was. I patted him twice on the shoulder and jumped into the cab of my pickup.

  I drove to the airport, dumped my F-150 in long-term parking, put on one of Wabiszewski’s Cubs caps, and took the free shuttle to the Inn and Suites where Kippy and the girls were waiting.