by TJ Martinell
“You plan to kill them,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Have a problem with that?” Griggs asked Jean.
“I did not say I had a problem,” she said. “I asked a question.”
“You don’t seem to like the answer.”
I placed a hand on Griggs. He got the hint. I’d handled it. We didn’t have time to discuss it right now.
***
The hideout was an old gun store by the water. Broken cars and dumpsters sat in the parking lot, a foul stench seeping out of it so strong we could smell it a block away. The front doors were clearly locked.
I peered out the window and studied the storefront, noting the dimmed lights coming from the back of the building. From there came hints of men talking and laughing together.
It was easy to visualize what they were doing. Their habits and preferences had been well described. Griggs had been more than willing to disclose their habits, their distinct preferences for imported tequila and whores.
It was also why he had to wait in the car.
Revenge was sweet.
But this wasn’t revenge.
For all the talk about avenging the Warsaw Martyrs, as they come to be known, it was not personal. It wasn’t even political. The front-page story had given us a major propaganda victory.
Nor was it about business. It was about survival.
The Examiner needed to understand it was self-destructive for them to cooperate with the ISA. They needed to realize whatever the threat the government posed, we were far more dangerous.
“They are all in there,” Griggs said. “Moe is the worst of the trio. He’s got a weird haircut. You can’t miss him. He’ll be sitting alone. He likes women, but he’s choosey, know what I mean?”
“Yes.”
“Take him out first. Trust me. The other bastards will have trouble getting the girls off their laps and out of the way to shoot you.”
“How are you going to avoid shooting the girls?” Jean asked, craning her neck as she turned and looked at me.
The car grew silent.
“These bitches ain’t nuns,” Griggs said.
“They have nothing to do with why we are here,” Jean said.
“Then don’t shoot them. Try avoiding them when you only get a second or two before they get their guns out.”
Jean hesitated, then asked in a low, distressed voice what he meant by that remark.
“You want to die so those two-bit sluts can live? Go ahead.”
Jean looked at me. “You want me to come with you?”
I nodded. “I didn’t bring you here to just so we could enjoy your company.”
I took another look at the storefront, then grabbed my automatic rifle and checked the magazine. Jean was reaching slowly for her gun.
“Have the car ready for us when we’re done,” I told Griggs.
“Sure. Just don’t die.”
I got out of the car. Jean sat motionless until Griggs whispered into her ear and grinned wryly. She gave him a dirty look before stepping out with her Tommy gun by her side. We did our best to stay in the shadows, but Jean moved out into the open. I grabbed her and pulled her beside me.
I already regretted bringing her, but there was nothing to do about it.
The thickening fog gave us perfect cover as we made our way across the road and to the parking lot. Peeking over the concrete wall surrounding the parking lot, I looked for booby traps and hidden homeless people. All appeared safe.
“Why didn’t you bring the rifle I bought you?” I asked.
“I did not know I would need it,” she said.
We went into the parking lot, remaining by the outer part of the wall until we reached the storefront. Stopping near the small alleyway next to it, I paused and had Jean stop behind me.
“I’ll go for this Moe guy. You take the other two.”
“What about the girls?”
“We won’t have time to figure that out.”
“Roy…”
“What?”
Her face was full of pleading as she formed the words I could hear in my head. I couldn’t tell, however, whose voice it was; hers or mine.
“Save it,” I said. “Griggs is right.”
Moving towards a side door to the building, I grabbed a hidden latch in the right-hand corner of the door and yanked it open. A small rock kept it open. I ran down the unlit hallway, catching the musky smell of cannabis.
Around the corner was a door with double dead bolts on it. I slapped a small explosive device on both bolts and ran back with my ears plugged. Seconds later the controlled explosions blasted off the two sections.
I didn’t wait for the smoke to settle. I kicked the door open and stormed into the room to the sound of high-pitched screams and men frantically cursing and bottles crashing onto the floor.
The three men all sat in chairs. I searched for Moe, spotted the half-shaved head. He looked at me strangely reached for his gun on the table, like he had almost expected it.
My rifle blew off a portion of his chest. I didn’t wait to see him fall back over his chair. The other two men were pushing nearly nude girls off their laps as they scrambled for their weapons up their guns.
For a split second, I panicked; I had just enough time to get one of them.
The other would have me.
I went for what I hoped was the faster one. A warm splash of blood on my face as the man’s head flew back.
The third man already had me in his sights.
I blinked as a gun fired.
A moment later, I was still standing. I opened my eyes.
The man was down on the ground. The shot had missed me by an inch or two and gone through the wall.
Jean stood over him with her Tommy gun, striking him in the head with it. Each blow brought another flow of blood splattering her clothes. The gun’s wooden stock dripped red and she screamed louder and louder.
The dead men’s girls huddled in the corner and cried, certain they were next. Fortunately for them, they were more useful alive. They’d spread the word for us.
I grabbed Jean. She paused only to wipe away the tears blinding her, and then she hit the man again until she I pulled her away. She pushed me off and fell backwards against the wall and slid down and let the gun fall into her lap. She tried to get the blood off her clothes.
Something inside her had snapped.
I seized her by the wrist, picked up her gun, and dragged her through the broken door and back out into the alleyway. Our visit was drawing attention from the nearby buildings. I wasn’t going to wait and find out if they were overjoyed or livid to see us.
Griggs had the car ready. I shoved Jean in the back and then jumped into the front passenger. We got back onto Route 99 and went south for several miles. Griggs then turned us off onto several side roads and then onto what remained of I-5. We slowed down when we reached North Seattle and no one seemed to be following us.
“You get them all?” Griggs asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “And you’re right. Moe had a shitty haircut.”
“Ha! I told him it would get him killed. Son of a bitch didn’t listen.”
Jean was huddled by herself in her seat, still crying. Even in the dark, Griggs noticed her blood-stained fingertips.
I tried to console her, but she jerked away from me.
Something was wrong.
She suddenly spoke after we had crossed the marker for our territory at the Seattle City Light building.
“My gun jammed.”
***
The boys walked into the room one by one with straight backs but low hanging chins. Jamie was the last to enter the room, seemingly relaxed. Griggs closed the door behind him and bolted it shut.
On the table was a pot of coffee and mugs. I brought out a bottle of whiskey and placed it on the table and offered it to them.
None of them moved.
It didn’t wo
rry me. Behind their wearied faces was a sense of pride and accomplishment.
“Everything go as planned?” I asked.
“Yeah, boss,” Jamie said, rubbing his hands. “We took care of ‘em all, caught ‘em unprepared.”
“No injuries or wounds?”
“None.”
Griggs appeared unenthusiastic about the news as he walked over to the table and poured himself a cup of coffee and then added a generous amount of whiskey to it. He sipped on it as he leaned against the counter and raised an eyebrow at Jamie. Not quite certain as to the reason for the lackluster mood in the room, I clapped my hands together and smiled at the boys.
“It was rough business, but it got done,” I said.
“What if they keep at it?”
I pointed at the boy and spoke with a firm voice. “Then we keep at it. Sooner or later they will quit.”
The boys tentatively moved across the room towards the table. They poured themselves coffee and drank it wordlessly. One of them broke out a cigarette pack and shared with the rest. As cigarette smoke filled the room I studied the boys and their faces, trying to get an understanding of their angst. Their sullen looks spoke of a struggle before they had accomplished their assignment. For Jamie, it had been a quick, clean kill. Others had had to look directly into their victim’s eyes and watch the life fade from it as they took it while pushing back all the natural impulses to stop. Killing was never pleasant, regardless of how evil the person was.
“Take it easy for now,” I said. “It’s time to wait.”
We cleared the boys from the garage. Jamie and Griggs inspected the street while I cleaned up and removed all traces of our presence. I left several items and noted their position in my notebook before I locked it up and met them outside.
“Where was your girlfriend?” Jamie asked. “I thought she was supposed to be there.”
I frowned, at a loss of how to explain what had unraveled once we had gotten back. After her curt explanation, Jean had asked me to stop the car in the middle of the road. Without another word, she had gotten out and ran off.
I had tried to call her back, but Griggs had convinced me to let her go. I wasn’t terribly worried. She had managed to survive in the city without me.
“Don’t worry about her,” I said. “We have bigger things to concern ourselves over.”
***
Our arrival at the library was announced with the pomp and circumstance of soldiers returning from a victorious and decisive battle.
The men cheered while Jamal kept pumping my hand, escorting me personally to the best table in the center of the room on an elevated platform offering a full view of the stage. A mug overflowing with ale was shoved into my hand as the men burst into spontaneous song. I refused to sit at the table, however, and moved amongst the crowd and accepted the tobacco held out from a dozen eager hands. Griggs, Jamie, and I sat at a table where everyone could see us. With raised mugs in the air, we sang until our voices grew hoarse and we drained our ale to relieve the burning sensation in our throats.
We all settled into seats as the stage lit up, revealing a banjo player sitting on a stool. All presumptions of a folksy upbeat tune were shattered as he strummed a heartfelt, embittered ballad of a lost brother.
During the song Adrianna came over and discreetly eased herself into my lap, her arms draped around my neck. Her eyes hinting of things to come later that evening, she then sat beside me and basked in the limelight coming from all corners.
As I ordered a refill and listened thoughtfully to singer’s lamenting words, I sat back and relished the sights and the sounds and the feel of the place, realizing how much I loved it all. Loved to be in the company of men who, for all their faults, there was a camaraderie I would not find elsewhere. I loved to be free. Free to drink and smoke and sing and swear and speak without fear, never wondering if we had anyone’s permission to behave as we did. I loved the respect as a man previously denied. I loved the certainty that beyond all the dangers our world brought we were freer than those who lived a meaningless existence in a society that had neither freedom nor security, merely the illusion of both.
I loved to finally know my place in the world.
Chapter Fifteen
The storefront was a disfigured face. Frontage ripped apart. Exposed framework like shattered bone. Window glass shards broken teeth.
I surveyed the damage from my car, remaining detached for the pedestrians arriving and whispering their suspicions. More than likely, their theories were correct, even if the details were not yet fully known.
The bombing of our Central District safe house left only a handful of suspects.
The initial reports indicated they had been caught unprepared. That narrowed the list of suspects even further.
The victims were lying on the sidewalk, reminding me of the faceless brass on a medieval casket. The blood and other unsightly remains gave it all a macabre quality. But to those who had lived in Seattle long enough it warranted nothing more than a passing glance. It was as unusual as trash in the gutters.
One of my stringers interviewed the lone survivor. Half his face was covered in a bandage.
I got out of the car. In the back seat, Jamie begged me to stay.
I ignored him. The people needed to see me here, to know I was not afraid. I also needed to see the destruction myself, with my own eyes. The rest of the city would read about it in the evening paper, see the pictures of the dead and the destroyed building. No word or image could compare to actually seeing the dead with my own eyes. It drove home a greater truth.
The war was far from over.
The stringer spotted me, halted his interview. I waved at him to continue as I surveyed the bodies. Their injuries made it evident they had all died instantly.
I got back into the car when I had had my fill. Jamie took the long route home, hit the brakes whenever his intuition told him something was amiss. Several of our abrupt stops seemed unnecessary, but I didn’t protest or question his judgment.
“Whadya gonna do, boss?” he asked as we arrived at the newspaper. “Ya want me to get the boys organized?”
I pressed my lips together thoughtfully. We couldn’t repeat the same tactics, the same strategy. In war, familiarity and consistency were fatal vices. An alternative strategy called for something they wouldn’t expect me to do.
“No,” I said. “I’ll handle this myself.”
Jamie looked over his shoulder, a worried expression underneath his large flat cap.
“Ya sure the big boss will like it?”
“That is for me to handle.”
Olan was in an agreeable mood when I met him back at the newspaper. Agreeable towards me, at least. Everyone else received his ire as he poured cigarette smoke into the room and reworked our delivery routes in response to the latest news. Every week it seemed as if our circulation was undergoing an upheaval.
“Whatever it takes,” Olan mumbled to me as he wrote on the circulation list. “Don’t care how ya get it done.”
The conflict known informally as the Pravda War had ignited a passion within him. Such determination was equally reflected in our readership. For others a subscription was too much of a liability to maintain. They were lost unless we could establish a foothold in their communities. The intent of the Central District bombing was clear: to inform the residents we no longer had control.
In my office, I tried to get a hold of Jean. Three calls for nothing. I coordinated with our sentinels on the outskirts of our territories and then ordered one of the stringers to ask around Central District. He came back with the descriptions of four men seen outside of the storefront twenty minutes before it had blown. I transferred his call to one of our research writers so he could copy the notes and compare them to our compiled records.
A fourth call to Jean got her immediately.
“Where the hell have you been?” I asked angrily.
Her tone was cold. “What do you
want?”
“They bombed one of our safe houses. Three dead, one wounded. We’re getting the names as we speak. We’re hitting them tonight. Meet me at the library this evening at seven forty five. I’ll explain the plan there.”
She did not give a verbal reply, and I didn’t wait for her to give one before I hung up and resumed other work.
Her behavior had been odd lately. I knew the Ronald’s Bog “delivery” had taken its toll on her. But I had given her ample time to recover without any pressure for her to resume her work. Her experience with the Fifth Avenue Boys proved she was capable of handling the difficult assignments. She just needed the right push.
***
The library broke into a wild applause as the band wrapped up their act. I glared at Griggs and Jamie as they went to clap and stopped. Griggs rested his hands on the table and raised an eyebrow as he reached for his ale and drank. He loosened his tie and looked at me.
“Why so sad?” he asked.
I glanced at my watch. It was well past seven. Jean was nowhere to be seen. She was never tardy.
Something had happened.
“You sure don’t look happy,” Griggs said. “Can’t imagine why, after what happened. If you ain’t happy, something ain’t right.”
I forced a smile as I lit a cigarette and called to the waiter above the noise. I ordered another round but as he was walking away I called him back and asked for a whiskey. Jamie’s eyes widened and he asked if I was switching over.
“No, just want to try something new,” I said.
“I take it you aren’t pissed off?” Griggs asked.
“Why would I be?”
The waiter returned with a shot of single malt whiskey from a SoDo distiller not far from our printing press. I held the glass up and offered a toast, and Griggs and Jamie rose and held their ales high and I held back my trepidation as we toasted and cheered and laughed as we drank and sat back down.
Jamie was already on his fourth ale but still had command of himself. When several of his friends called from a nearby table, he excused himself and his ale as sat amongst them. Within seconds they were singing a song but they were too inebriated to pronounce the lyrics to the point of comprehension. Griggs raised his ale and laughed at them and then looked at me, his face turning suddenly somber as he set his glass down.