Fatal Flaws

by Clyde Lawrence

  I certainly had no inhibitions about him piloting the aircraft which would play a critical role in the current endeavor, and I was more than content to ride shotgun on this particular nocturnal mission. As Hank completed his routine of inspecting the aircraft for any defects, I jumped into the right-side seat of the cockpit and donned my headset. As was typical of most of the opportunities I’d had to fly in Hank’s plane, I began to fantasize about when I would be able to afford my own aircraft and smiled when I pictured the moment when I would casually mention to Hank that my own vessel’s performance was slightly superior to that of his Mach 1 Mustang in the sky.

  With his pre-flight tasks completed outside of the Cessna, he climbed into the pilot’s seat, slipped on his own headset, and looked at me. “Well, Marky-Mark,” he said, “let’s fire this bitch up and get the hell out of here.” After waking the engines from their brief slumber, he idled for several minutes as he completed the engines hot, cockpit portion of the preflight routine. Satisfied that the engines, the hydraulics, and the avionics were all operating flawlessly, he instructed me to climb back through the open door on the airplane’s left flank and remove the chocks that were still in place around the rear wheels. He thoughtfully reminded me to avoid the superheated exhaust shooting out the back of the engines as I bent down behind the wings and reached forward to remove the safety devices from around the landing gear. I completed the task without melting my contacts, climbed back in through the side door, secured it for flight, and hopped back into the cockpit. It was a short taxi to the main runway, which had no other traffic because of the hour. Hank communicated the necessary information to the air traffic controllers, got his clearance for take-off, and punched it. Within a couple of minutes, we were looking down from an altitude thousands of feet above the earth’s surface at Lake Pontchartrain as we headed toward the location of our malicious, early-morning adventure.

  “So,” I said, “are you sure Roger left the car at the airport?”

  “Yeah, I told him I’d be in sometime in the early morning and he should just leave the car at the terminal. He’s not a night owl, so I knew he wouldn’t want to get up at zero dark thirty to pick my ass up and take me to the hotel,” Hank replied. “Our meeting with the real estate guy isn’t until eight, so we’ll have plenty of time to take care of business and get back to the hotel before it’s time for me to meet up with them in the lobby of the hotel—or motel—or whatever the fuck a Hilton Express is.

  “Cool,” I said, “so far, so good then. I just hope everything from there goes as planned.”

  “Stop worrying, dude,” Hank said, with his ever-present tone of self-confidence. “It’s up to us to make it go as planned. I’m here to tell you, brother, we’ve got this. That asshole is a goner and neither of us will ever cross the minds of the police after they find that sorry ass motherfucker dead in the parking garage. Just chill and enjoy the flight.”

  Chapter 38

  The plan to get back into Dallas, where we would whack my wife-beating prick of a son-in-law Brandon, was actually a bit complicated. The plain and simple truth of the matter which had occurred to us was in order for the alibi of me being in New Orleans, where I was supposedly sleeping off a hangover after a night on the town, to work, I could not show up somewhere else with Hank. It sounds a bit obtuse and obvious to say it, but it was just that simple. If any information came to light that suggested I was not tucked into my snuggly bed in my hotel room, or hugging the toilet and puking up my toenails in said room, it might occur to the police there could be a reason I was not there. That reason, of course, could be that I was, in actuality, snuffing the flame of life out of my daughter’s piece of shit husband in Dallas. It was unlikely anyone would really investigate my whereabouts at the time of Brandon’s unfortunate demise, but we had to make sure my location was completely verifiable. This would be vitally important if his murder was approached by the police as something other than a robbery turned murder, and they got it in their silly little heads that they needed to consider he had an enemy who felt the need to end his life.

  If, by some chance, my alibi was checked out, it would be a simple task to identify my companions in New Orleans as Mandy and Hank. It would be equally easy to determine from there that Hank had flown in via his personal airplane. Furthermore, it would not require a super-sleuth to determine that Hank left New Orleans overnight via his plane and returned to a location that was near Dallas, where Brandon would take his last breaths a short time period later. I did not feel comfortable with the idea that anyone would provide information to the police investigating his homicide which suggested even a possibility that I could have accompanied Hank as he left New Orleans.

  Beyond that, there had to be a logical and verifiable reason Hank would fly his plane out overnight—especially to such a location. What we put together took some research and some creativity, but as we tested it for plausibility and believability, it worked out quite nicely. The plan we came up with gave Hank and me great confidence. We believed we could bet our lives on the likelihood that we could complete our murderous mission without exposing ourselves as possible perpetrators of the horrific crime which resulted in the early demise of Brandon James, an unfortunate young professional who found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Over the course of the days leading up to the trip, we laid out the blueprint for the entire endeavor and repeatedly reviewed and critiqued it, making sure that we kept our eyes peeled for any factor which could become a possible impediment to us successfully achieving the two main goals—lights out for Brandon; and Mark and Hank in the clear, forever. As we flew over Louisiana and eastern Texas, I reviewed the entire mental schematic in my mind once again and made sure there was nothing that had been overlooked.

  Chapter 55

  The trip to Dallas and back had gone completely as planned. Brandon had been permanently ejected from the game of life and we were certain that we had accomplished our goal of misleading the police in a way that they’d never connect us with the case. Mandy and I were sitting in the hotel hot tub with Hank and Debbie from the bar. Somebody had suggested that the chicks should go topless and they readily agreed. Now we were doing Patron shots and I was trying not to stare too long at Debbie’s gravity-defying rack.

  “There she is, Hank said, as he pointed out the rotating signal light at Terrell Municipal Airport. Suddenly I found myself back in the copilot seat of Hank’s plane rather than celebrating our successful mission with a couple of hot topless chicks and a bottle of premium tequila.

  “Bummer,” I mumbled. “Oh well, back to reality.”

  “I like this airport!” he called out through my headset. “They do a classy job here.”

  I considered telling him about my daydream, but then I thought better of it. I figured that it was best for us both to keep our minds in the present and our eyes on the proverbial ball.

  “Here we go,” I thought to myself. “No more fantasizing that we could fast-forward past the coming events to the time when we’ll be congratulating ourselves on a job well done. Also, there’ll be no more theoretical planning in the land of let’s pretend. This is the real thing. Once we do this, things’ll never be the same.” I steeled myself for what I was about to do. What I had to do.

  “Sweet,” I blurted out nervously. “I’ll be ready to jump out at the end of the runway. Just make sure you have everything in your bag when you leave the plane.”

  “Settle down, dude! We haven’t taken anything out of our bags and we already ran down the list before we left the hotel room. You’re just getting nervous—it’s okay,” Hank responded reassuringly as he adjusted the engine output and the flaps in such a way that began our descent. “Now, put a sock in it as I call the tower.”

  Hank contacted the air traffic control tower and notified them of his intent to land. They relayed the pertinent information and welcomed him to Terrell Municipal Airport.

  Prior to touching down, I had moved to the back of the plane and strapped into
the seat closest to the door. The touchdown was perfect and, as we coasted down the landing strip, I pulled the hood of my dark sweat jacket over my head. I’d researched the airport the previous weekend. I had discovered the southern end of the landing strip was within fifty yards of Interstate 20. I also confirmed that there was no fence enclosing the airport, so this would be the perfect place for me to exit the plane and escape the airport without detection. As the aircraft rolled along the landing strip and bled off its kinetic energy, I left my seat and moved to the door. The cabin lights were off, so unless someone was straining to see it, the opening of the door and my rapid exit from the plane would be hidden from sight by the night.

  “See you down the road, dick licker,” I said, as I disembarked from the plane. Somehow, it helped me to ease the tension I was feeling by insulting my counterpart.

  Hank had crawled out of the cockpit and was standing next to the door in order to rapidly reclose it. He, apparently, didn’t feel the need to ease his tension. At that moment, I envied the fact that he had, while in the Marines, previously undertaken clandestine missions for the purpose of robbing others of their lives. On the other hand, I appreciated his composure and his ability to approach the coming hours with a businesslike equanimity.

  “See you in a few minutes, buddy,” Hank said, as he looked down at me from the plane. As our eyes met, I borrowed the strength and self-assurance he projected, and my confidence was bolstered that everything would work out as planned. I felt profound gratitude toward him, in that moment, as my own self-doubt was diminished, and I was finally able to focus my resolve.

  I immediately dove into the tall grass which grew along the runways and taxiways. As I peeked out from my cover, the plane engines revved, and the aircraft began rolling toward the terminal buildings. The entire process of stopping the airplane through the resumption of forward movement had taken about 30 seconds. If asked about it by anyone at the terminal, Hank was prepared to say that he had gotten a leg cramp in his calf and he had to stop to stretch it out. As it turned out, no one was around when he pulled into the small hangar that Hank had leased from the airport. He had been traveling back and forth to Terrell for the past couple months as he worked on a real estate deal involving a forty-unit apartment complex that he planned to purchase. He made a habit of housing his beloved aircraft in protected and secure locations whenever possible. Since he was repeatedly flying to and from Terrell, he had procured this spot in order to keep the plane out of the elements and to keep any airport maintenance personnel from fucking around with his little baby.

  Hank hopped into the car his lawyer, Roger, had dropped off for him the night before. Because he had several businesses that were continuously growing and because this expansion often stepped on the toes of people with competing business interests, Hank paid Roger a large retainer to be his deal closer and his personal attack dog. Roger loved this role and his legal practice had evolved such that he represented Hank almost exclusively. Hank had even partnered with Roger on several deals which had proven quite lucrative. For these reasons, Roger was extremely loyal and obedient to Hank and when his master requested that Roger leave his car parked next to the hangar so he wouldn’t have to wait for a cab or Uber in the early morning hours, Roger had eagerly complied.

  I had walked through the field which ran along Interstate 20 for about a half mile before coming to a QuikTrip gas station and convenience store. I was wearing my Kurt Cobain wig and had my hood pulled up, so I wasn’t worried about being identifiable on any surveillance cameras which I knew were positioned around the parking lot in order to keep an eye on anyone looking to mess with or steal from the business or any of its customers. I was ‘jonesing’ for some good coffee, so I went inside and poured two cups, to which I added all of the typical accoutrements. They had a good selection of fresh donuts, so I grabbed a couple of maple bars as well and headed for the checkout counter. As the clerk was handing me my change, I saw Hank pulling into the gas station. He pulled around the side of the building, so there would be no camera footage of him picking up a middle-aged grunge rocker carrying coffee and donuts. As I approached Roger’s silver Camry, which was parked at the far edge of the small parking lot, I looked over my shoulder and confirmed that there were no cameras pointed toward the vehicle.

  I set the goodies on the roof of the car and pulled open the passenger door. “So far, so good,” I said, as the car door settled into the fully open position. I handed Hank the coffees and placed the small bag containing the donuts on the seat. As I did so, I picked up the license plates that Hank had placed in my seat. I’d jacked the plates the previous week from an old Jeep that was parked in the lot of a used tire shop in Rockwall. It was not the type of place that had any cameras around, or any other type of security for that matter. Prior to placing them in Hank’s backpack, we had super glued several strong magnetic strips to the back of each of them and glued them into a couple of cheap, silver, plastic frames that said ‘Dallas Cowboys’ in blue lettering along the bottom of the frames. Hank had remembered that Roger, being the cheapskate that he was, did not have frames around his license plates. This made it easy for me to affix the stolen plates over the top of his legitimate license plates in just a few seconds. The beauty of the Cowboy’s frames was that the lip of the frames was deep enough to conceal the edges of both license plates, so no one next to or behind us in traffic would be able to tell that there were two plates present. We certainly didn’t need any observant patrol cops noticing that we had a set of stolen plates covering the originals. Being mindful of these types of details made us feel like we were covering all of our bases and that we would be able to avoid detection during and after our crime.

  With the tags in place, I hopped into the passenger seat and took a big bite out of my maple bar.

  “Good call, dude,” Hank said, with a mouth full of donut. “Maple bars rock. Thanks for the snack.”

  It was around 5am at this point, so we had plenty of time to get into the city and be ready for Brandon when he finished his boxing class. However, due to the fact that metropolitan traffic can be a total crapshoot, I felt like we were cutting it a bit close. We hopped on the interstate and headed for Dallas. Hank made sure not to speed, so there would be no chance of a cop pulling us over and ruining our alibi. On the way into Dallas, I asked Hank about his current business ventures and he asked me about how my practice was going. We talked about our kids and even a little about the weather. We specifically did not talk about what we were about to do. We’d already been over our plan time and time again as we prepared for this particular morning. Talking about Brandon at this point was just going to make us nervous and possibly even cause us to ponder, once again, the morality of what we were about to do.

  We ran into a couple small slowdowns on the interstates, so it took about 45 minutes to get to Lemmon Avenue. As planned, we parked in the back of a Take Five Oil Change parking lot. We knew they didn’t open for service until 9am and my previous recon had demonstrated the employee who arrived first in the morning, presumably the manager, did not pull in until well after 8am. We took turns climbing into the back of the Camry and changing into our disguises. Each of us kept on our hoodies, but we changed our pants out for some ill-fitting, partially tattered jeans that we’d found at Goodwill. We had each picked up a pair of generic high- top court shoes at Walmart. Each of us had chosen shoes that were 2 sizes large on us, just in case we ended up leaving any footprints at the scene. We had kept the jeans and shoes in the bags that we’d bought them in, so there would be much less chance of bringing any forensic evidence with us on the shoes that could be traced by the police. We each donned a pair of latex surgical gloves which were tinted brown before we pulled the shoes and clothes out of the bags and put them on. The gloves were darker than our skin color, which was not likely to be noticed in the mostly dark setting of our impending crime. However, we were striving for a look that would draw no attention to us, so we added fingerless leather gloves on to
our ‘street people’ disguises.

  I still felt like my shaggy, blonde grunge rocker wig was perfect for the gig. Hank chose a Bob Marley style dreadlock wig he’d worn to one of our Halloween parties. We both put on sunglasses which offered minimal ‘shading’ from the sun—mine with a yellow tint and his light rose. Also, within our backpacks were laundry style bags I had, along with our hoody jackets, thrown in a mud puddle behind the hospital before carrying them to a local laundromat and drying them without washing them first. This gave them the appearance of belonging to someone living on the street or, at least, someone who spent his money on important things like cigarettes, drugs, and booze, rather than soap and laundry detergent. Within our purse-stringed bags we carried the remaining supplies we would need to complete our tasks.

  We stepped out of the darkness surrounding Roger’s parked car and into the artificial brightness created by streetlights, headlights, signs, and all the various sources of illumination aimed to defeat the darkness and enable city dwellers to overcome the veil of the night. We strolled lazily along Lemmon Avenue, taking time to look into trash cans along the sidewalk to see if there was anything among the rubbish of value to the homeless wretches we were trying to impersonate. Hank stopped several times to bend down and snatch up a cigarette butt with unused potential, then carefully placed it in a raggedy coin purse he carried in the pocket on his hoodie. As I watched my friend out of the corner of my eye, even I was nearly convinced of the authenticity of his disguise. We had decided that we’d portray, with our bearing and mannerisms, the intimidating and potentially dangerous kind of bums, rather that the down on your luck and just trying to get by variety. We definitely didn’t want to come across any ‘good samaritins’ who might offer us money or help finding a shelter. We wanted anyone we passed to look away and give us a wide berth. I did my best to saunter along beside Hank with the deliberately irregular cadence and the excessive upper body swaying of somebody who is attempting to project the image of a prototypical ‘original gangsta’. My body language, which normally would say, ‘Excuse me, but I have places to be,’ as I walked hurriedly into my clinic or the hospital, was now trying to say ‘Watchu lookin’ at mothafucka?”