Nightmare in Red

by Bernard Lee DeLeo

  Rachel yanked on Nick’s arm. “You’re kidding. Someone said that?”

  “Yep. A couple of times. It was hilarious, especially with Gus making gagging noises in the background. You should have heard him when the girl I saved from the rapist/killer in the park wanted me to do a ‘selfie’ with her. I thought Gus was going to stream out of my com unit to choke me when I agreed.”

  Rachel enjoyed that word picture. “Oh… I can picture that.”

  Deke growled. “Uh oh.” Nick hurried ahead to where Jean held Deke away from a gang of five mixed race thugs with his leash near the side of a very high end cabin cruiser. Sonny knelt near Deke holding on to his collar too. Nick did a sharp two toned whistle. Deke backed toward Jean and sat down. “Sorry about that, guys. We were doing the Harbor Walk for the first time with our dog Deke.”

  “They were-”

  “Jean! It is always the dog owner’s responsibility to watch out for people.” Jean had quieted as Nick gave her a quick head shake. Rachel caught up with her stun gun and pepper spray in her hands at her sides.

  “Move along then, Homer,” the lead guy with tattoos over his eyes and forehead gestured at Deke. “Keep the fuckin’ dog movin’ too.”

  “No problem, Sir,” Nick said. “C’mon kids, let’s keep going down the dock. Goodnight, guys. Sorry for the disturbance.”

  Jean and Sonny started along the walkway again with a very nervous Deke. Nick put an arm around Rachel’s shoulders and guided her along to follow the kids. They only took a few steps on their way when the five moved to follow.

  “So much for the quiet beautiful walk, huh Rach?”

  “Let me tune them up, Nick. You go watch the kids.”

  Nick laughed and hugged Rachel. “I love you, baby.”

  “I love you too. I hope they’re smart enough to walk away. I’ll keep the kids moving.”

  “That would be best.”

  “Hey Homer! We decided you have to pay reparations for your fuckin’ dog.”

  Nick turned to face the five. “I already called 911, boys. The police will be here any minute.”

  “Fuckin’ tourist,” one of the others said. He sported a black Bowler hat with matching scarf. “By the time five-o gets here in Boston, you’ll be dead and we’ll be takin’ the wife and kids on a special tour. Ever hear ‘bout the ‘Polar Bear’ game, Homer?”

  Nick kept backing a half step at a time to give Rachel a chance to get the kids around a couple of the weaving curves along the harbor walk. “Sure. I saw that commercial. The polar bear gives a seal a Coke and they’re besties from then on. You guys want me to buy you a Coke?”

  His adversaries enjoyed Nick’s remembrance of an old Coca-Cola commercial with the usual hand jivin’ gestures. Then Eye-Tats took a step to the side, turning at a slant to Nick almost as if he were thinking of walking away and actually looking back in the opposite direction. Instead he charged, fist readying to sucker punch Nick. Waiting until the last second, hands at his sides, Nick pretended being stunned at the assault. At the same time Eye-Tats swung a roundhouse at Nick’s head, Nick ducked down and shot a right uppercut to the man’s ball-sack, sliding sideways away from his victim’s plunge to the walkway. The sharp, ear piercing, staccato screams emanating from their writhing leader halted the rest of his cohorts.

  “You do know that in real life polar bears eat seals like tater-tots, right boys?” Nick grinned, feeling the heat rise while uncovering his Colt in its Blackhawk holster. “Anyone interested in living through the night?”

  The other talker of the night, Bowler hat, saw what Nick packed and stared into his eyes. In those eyes death stared back. As his friends made disparaging noises and hand actions as if reaching for their own weapons, Bowler hat spoke in harsh tones to the crew. “Don’t reach! We done here! Get Ray on his feet. Drag him if you have to. Go on, man! Get the fuck out of here!”

  “I’m not going anywhere, boys, not until I see you all safely on your way… or dead. Choose quickly. Time is short. If you go, don’t stop for anything.”

  Bowler hat didn’t wait any longer for his contemporaries. He dragged on the injured Ray in the opposite direction of where Nick stood. His companions, sensing something deeper at play they didn’t understand, finally started helping with Ray. Moments later, the five men stumbled back from where they came from with Ray openly sobbing as he was half dragged and half carried. Nick didn’t move until the men could be seen far down the walkway. Gee, I am so sweet to have let those banditos live. El Muerto… you pussy.

  “C’mon, Nick. They’re gone,” Rachel called out.

  Nick sighed as he turned toward his wife’s voice, where he saw Rachel, Jean, Sonny, and Deke all watching him from about twenty yards down the walkway. “You were supposed to continue with the kids and Deke, dear.”

  Nick jogged to them. “How long were you all standing there?”

  “From the time you told them about the polar bear and seal, Dad,” Jean answered, elbowing Sonny who was about to say something. “Not now, I told you.”

  Nick was not amused. “First off, the confrontation was not a joke, Momster. You bunch should have been a quarter of a mile away by now. You heard them. If things went badly, they would have been on your backs. What was that all about?”

  Rachel started laughing with Jean joining in and Sonny smiling. “Those posers had as much chance of being able to come after us through you as the proverbial snowball in hell. Every one of them flinched when you put the first guy down like a used condom. The guy with the hat saved their lives.”

  “All true, Rach,” Nick admitted, walking alongside of them again, “except for what I tried many times to caution you about: unintended consequences. You knew I had a few pops. If I slipped a notch, you’d be in a battle for your life now with the kids. Deke would do what he could, but they had guns.”

  “They didn’t try to use them on you though, Sir,” Sonny remarked with Jean tugging on his jacket. “There were four of them left to take you… but they didn’t. Would you have been able to take all of them?”

  Nick shrugged. “Yeah… unless I tripped and fell off the pier. The difference is they hesitated every moment. They hesitated after I put their man down. They hesitated when they knew I was armed, and they would have hesitated when they tried to draw their weapons. I would have shot them all in the head before they could have cleared whatever place of concealment they carried their weapons. If any of them had killed before, it was by accident or they shot their victim in the back or from behind a tree. I think the guy with the hat has been in the service overseas. He knew he was getting trapped into a gunfight with a bunch of guys more likely to shoot each other than me.”

  Sonny wasn’t through. “Don’t you get scared?”

  “Yes, but not of combat. I fear losing the people I care about through something I’ve done. It’s a bit easier to focus away from the fear with Rachel, Jean, and Deke. They would be dead if we weren’t together. I figure the four of us as always on borrowed time anyway. We had people wanting us dead only fate on our side prevented from succeeding.”

  “Fate, and the most deadly man alive,” Rachel said. “Are you sure we should be telling Sonny any of this?”

  “Sonny’s made his choice. I believe him to be a lot like Jean. He sees flaws in people, accepts them, and moves on. Sonny knows I’m more than a novelist. We’ve let him into the inner circle. He knows things happen around our family and friends that will be deadly. I’m not a scoutmaster. I gave him the opportunity to leave us in the rear view mirror. If he’s going to be with us, he’ll have to know the details of why the less he knows the better, and to never share what he does know with anyone else.”

  “I’m sorry, by the way, for not doing what I should have done,” Rachel admitted. “It was stupid. You’re right. Anything could have happened and I’d be facing them with only Deke between us and death.”

  “You’re forgetting you had Viper and Cracker here at your side,” Jean stated. “We have our knives.�
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  Rachel gasped. “You gave ten year olds knives they can throw? I thought the throwing knives in a nice case you claimed was a sport would be the only knives thrown and under adult supervision.”

  “I…I didn’t think it was any big deal. They’ve learned to use the throwing knives like a couple of professionals. Naturally, it takes a lot more practice to throw a balanced folding knife. They mastered the art in no time at all. They would have been better off with the knives than without them. Yes… I know… I’m going to hell.”

  “Right there with you,” Rachel said. “Regular people will be wondering how the hell we ever kept custody of ten year old Jean. Maybe we should head to the hotel. Taxi, right?”

  “Absolutely,” Nick answered. “No need to get cocky. My guess is the only reason they were hanging around that high class boat has to do with some illegal substance arriving or the goons paying off their supplier. I may go back later and take a look.”

  “Why the hell would you do that?”

  “We’re going to be in town another couple of days. I’m not someone comfortable with inexplicable loose ends. The goons were in a spot on the harbor no one lets goons hang out on a regular basis. That means something else was going on we interrupted. We don’t know if they decided to follow us after we ran into them or someone on the boat told them to scare the shit out of us. If so, that person may decide we saw something we shouldn’t have.”

  “Damnit, Nick! Your imagination never leaves anything alone. I figured this incident was a done deal… a one time occurrence. You have me thinking it’s a Columbian Cartel operation or a floating meth lab we wandered upon. Doesn’t anything ever just happen, you deal with it, and it’s over?”

  “Not to my recollection.” Nick listened to the kids laughing at Rachel’s tirade over his cautious nature when it came to unforeseen occurrences. “How many times have I been wrong when I follow through on checking my hunches?”

  “Never,” Rachel admitted. “I’m done. Take me back to the hotel so I can hold Quinn and pretend I’m a real mommy on vacation.”

  “As opposed to what truth, dear?”

  “A captive traveler locked inside an out of control starship with the ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’, plunging to the surface of an unknown planet.”

  “Well… okay… very creative.” Nick took her hand. “Enjoy your evening, babe. I’m accepting of your perception concerning my rather acute paranoia as long as you’re not thinking of me as Groot.”

  Rachel shook her head at the mention of the plant like ‘Guardian of the Galaxy’. “I’m thinking of you more as Drax.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Nick countered. “Drax is dumber than a bag of hammers. I would be the far ahead thinker, Star-Lord.”

  “One more word out of you and I cast you as Groot and tell everyone. You’ll be hearing ‘I am Groot’ until your eyeballs pop from their sockets.”

  “That’s just mean.”

  * * *

  The three men dressed in casual clothes sat around the galley kitchen playing cards with the man from earlier in the evening, still wearing his Bowler hat. They all had drinks. No one was touching the cards anymore. The tension in the air was palpable.

  “We sent you to find out what those tourists saw and five supposedly bad-ass street dudes come running back with their tails between their legs. The only real info you came back with was how to get your nuts busted and frightened out of your minds by some stranger with a couple kids and a dog. What’s wrong with that picture, Sammy?”

  Sammy considered his words carefully. “I’ve been to the sand, Murray. I know a killer when I see one. I don’t know what the woman, kids, and dog were to him, but that guy was no tourist stroller. Talkin’ killin’ and doin’ killin’ are two different things. The man was a shooter. I had Urkels watching my back and not a shooter amongst them. I learned a long time ago not to push people who don’t push. They didn’t see anything. Ray got his balls busted for nothing. They happened to be walking by the boat during supply day. So what? I know you guys don’t want… oh shit!”

  Murray and his two cohorts glanced behind them at the cabin entrance where Sammy was staring in a trancelike state. Three men whom they had no clue where they came from entered the cabin with silenced MP5’s. That they weren’t wearing masks or gloves sent a chill down Sammy’s spine.

  “Hi guys,” Nick said. “Go on with your discussion. Sammy… nice seeing you again, buddy. Who are these nicely dressed guys?”

  Sammy didn’t hesitate. He pointed. “Murray Durance, Pinter Caulfield, and Kel Florencia. They own the boat. Dude… how the hell you get in here?”

  “You’ve been around the block, Sammy. My associates and I aren’t stray cats looking for a way inside out of the rain. We make it rain. We heard supply day. I figured as much when I saw you and the goons hanging around a very expensive boat like this. Here’s the deal. I want to know what the hell you would think was so important the three of you head honchos would send Sammy and the goons after a family.”

  “Fuck you!” The man pointed out as Murray said, pounding the table a split second before Nick shot him between the eyes. The others tipped over chairs, shouting gasps of shock and bewilderment while Gus and John merely moved to cover them.

  “Sammy… throw a towel down around Murry’s head. Yeah, that’ll do. Thanks. That’s an incorrect answer. Pinter, you and Kel stand. Put your hands behind you. Sneeze and I put a round through your nuts. Not you, Sammy.”

  Pinter and Kel stood reluctantly to be restrained by Gus. They were then duct taped to the chairs. Sammy finished the blood mopping. Nick gestured for him to sit down.

  “What about you Pinter? Would you like to take a crack at an answer or do you want to see what’s behind door #2? It won’t be an easy death like Murry got. He was the example I like to use when strangers don’t understand I’ll do anything without a thought to make you talk.”

  “Cocaine,” Sammy said before Pinter could say anything. “We were making deals for it from the gangs distributing around Boston. Their hold is filled. They get their product from the Sinaloa Cartel.

  “You’re dead, Sammy!” Kel screamed out at the unimpressed Sammy, who sat slumped in his chair after putting towels down to absorb the blood that had now stopped flowing from the dead Murry.

  Sammy smiled at the red faced Kel and Pinter who stared at him with looks of unadulterated murderous intent. “You fools are too stupid to realize this man is going to kill us all. If you don’t tell him what he wants to know, you’ll just die screaming after telling him everything you know. I’m smart enough to know when to fold and quit bluffin’. It sucks I made it to the ‘Stans and back in one piece only to die like a damn two bit punk.”

  “Thanks Sammy,” Nick said. “That’s very perceptive of you. I know an operation like this with a hold full of blow doesn’t chug into Boston Harbor without connections. What politico is playing patty-cake with the Sinaloa’s? You first, Pinter. Keep in mind what Sammy explained to you, but let my friend show you what happens when you choose door #2.”

  John moved with his tablet to a position where he could show The Unholy Trio’s evisceration videos. To say Pinter and Kel were impressed would be an incredible understatement. The two men had seen and performed killings and torture. They had never seen anything like what they saw on the videos.

  “I think you two look suitably impressed,” Nick observed. He took out his scalpel. “Anyone need a demo of what it’s like to watch your intestines spill out of your cut open belly?”

  Energetic negative head shakes conveyed the answer Nick wanted. “Good. Let’s hear about your adventures in Sinaloa cocaine land. Who helps open the ports and places you two must be operating in to do this dirty business?”

  “We port in Camden. Sinaloa owns a container ship that delivers product to the East Coast that anchors in Camden. From there we distribute along with some others,” Pinter answered. “It’s well known Senator Cameron from Maine has a source inside Camden and
can get any ship given a pass using the national security panel she’s on. The port authority thinks covert operations by the United States government are going on under her panel’s authority. It’s so well established now, port authorities think of us as undercover operatives. We never thought the scam would last long, but with her influence we’ve been porting and shipping without any product problems.”

  “How interesting,” Nick said. He traded grim looks with his Unholy Trio partners. “Isn’t that just fabulous our Princess of Maine, Diane Cameron has expanded into private enterprise. Every time I step into a pile of shit, her name pops out.”

  “Yeah, it’s amazing,” Gus agreed. “You still have a trip in the works with Phil to see the great Senator. Maybe a video recording of these two reciting all the parts to this puzzle including distribution ships, container ship, and everything they know about Cameron’s role in this could make them invaluable as witnesses.”

  “I believe you may be right. Okay, boys, you guys may have bought yourselves a ticket to live for a while. We’ll record your assistance. After the evidence is presented against Senator Cameron, I’m sure they will need corroboration. That will be where your testimony will be invaluable. Let’s get started. My barf reflex kicked in when I heard Di’s name again. First order of business, my friend John will be transferring all your secret accounts into our custody. Please be cooperative or I'll have to show you my surgeon’s skill with the scalpel.”

  “You can’t use us if you torture us,” Kel pointed out.

  John chuckled. “Listen closely. We are not the regular federal authorities. The wonderful Senator from Maine’s head on a platter is nice, but we don’t care that much. We’ll get everything from you two we want only you will not get a chance to corroborate anything but an unmarked grave. Where do you gentlemen do your business offshore?”

  After a short hesitation, Pinter said, “Belize.”

  “Outstanding. That’s our favorite banking place too. We shall arrange the changes immediately.” John set his satellite uplinked laptop on the table, readying it for action. “Specific bank, account numbers, identity listings please.”