Kale’s lawyers rushed to his side, helping him regain his feet. Their first outcries were cut off by Grace, who fronted them in no nonsense style. “We have this assault recorded! Back the hell off. You folks cannot run at a federal officer, no matter what exception you create for the attack. Marshal McCarty could have used deadly force. He didn’t. Get your client advised to stay out of our way from this moment on or we frog-march him out of here in handcuffs! Do you understand!”
The lawyers decided to display some aspect of common sense, gesturing for Kale to remain silent, while pulling him off to the room’s side wall. The agent who had been enduring Kale’s yammering assault came over to shake Nick’s hand.
“I’m Geno DeLuca. Thanks for that. It was the best thing happening so far.”
“You’ll find much more after you get into his stuff, Agent DeLuca. Yeah… I admit I enjoyed Alderman Kale’s assault more than you can know.”
“I’ll bet,” DeLuca agreed. “This bust is hot, isn’t it?”
“It will disturb the Chicago killing fields for a while. How much so, will depend on the citizens in the city. If they don’t hold the gains, the people will be right back where they were.”
“Agreed,” DeLuca said with fierce resonance. “If you need anything… anything at all… contact me. I’ll get it done.”
“Good to know, my friend. US Marshals Stanwick and Reinhold need every agent on this case working for justice, rather than the status quo. Any approach from the outside forces of darkness need to be known and highlighted. Chicago is a cesspool of status quo sellouts in authority. We need to at least give the people an opportunity to change this place.”
“Thanks for the respite from being spit on.”
“My pleasure, Gino. It’s hard to describe the pleasure of shutting that turd up.”
Gino walked back to his group of agents, enjoying Nick’s remark.
“That was close,” Grace stated.
“For who? If you and Timmy want to walk around in cesspool central, trying to kiss up and not offend anyone, you children need to retreat again to the coast. The big players call the shots in Chicago, tulips. If you don’t want to run with the big game, turn in your credentials, and see if McDonalds is hiring until they get fully automated.”
“You have an annoying way of putting things, Nick,” Grace said through tight-lipped seething acceptance.
“You and Tim have held up this far. I sense this interlude was exactly why you had me fly out here to oversee. How’d I do?”
Grace shrugged, looking around. “We’re searching instead of standing around with our thumbs up our asses. I admit you did pretty well.”
“Here comes Kale again, with lawyers,” Tim remarked, keeping eyes off the approaching crew. “Stay in bounds, Nick.”
“Uh… no.” Nick smiled with eyes locked on enraged target, seeing camera people edging along the outskirts. “I see the setup. Do you have his assault on your iPad, Grace?”
Startled, Grace retrieved her iPad, entering the network video feed. “I have it, Nick.”
“Good. Hand it to me when I ask, and stay out of this unless I ask for assistance.”
“Understood,” both Tim and Grace acknowledged.
Spike Kale approached with finger jabbing at Nick, a knowing smile on his face. “You sucker-punched me. You won’t get away with it twice, McCarty.”
“If you’re dumb enough to assault me, I will indeed plant your bloated face into the floor. I see you brought the cameras. Focus on this, Spike.” Nick accepted the iPad from Grace with the assault by Kale. He watched as the cameras focused in on the small replay.
“How dare you record me without my permission,” Kale blustered, but the exact video numbed him to a point. He gestured angrily at his lawyers, who were obviously by their reactions unknowing of the video.
“Marshal McCarty… ah… has you running at him in the video, Sir. Any law enforcement agency can record actual events when in an official capacity. I-”
“Shut up!” Kale pulled a fist back to strike his lawyer. Nick snatched his wrist.
“No hitting, Spike.” Nick released Kale, but not before Spike had a taste of the strength hovering below the surface. “It would be wise to await the conclusion, Alderman. You haven’t seen anything yet. We will be revealing all our findings to your lawyers, along with what we were alerted to by the late Tito Palentes. He had quite a lot to say on the disc provided anonymously about your involvement.”
Kale swung at Nick in a fit of rage, incomprehensible at the time with federal charges mounting.
Nick slid sideways, snatching Spike’s wrist. He locked Kale’s arm at the bicep, ripping downwards with the wrist grasp, catapulting Kale to the floor, smashing all air out of the man. The entire room halted movement and sound as they listened to Kale’s ragged breathing. Grace held her iPad aloft.
“In case any of you Kale people forget what you saw, remember I have a video of it, any Alderman Kale adjustments with the facts will put you in jeopardy. Believe this! We will prosecute.” Grace pointed at the lawyers. “Please take your client to a place out of the way and explain to him the seriousness of his second attack on a federal officer.”
Kale’s team of lawyers righted the groaning man with difficulty. “This…this isn’t over, McCarty! You don’t know who I am. You soon will. I will rip everything you love apart!”
Kale’s lawyers tried unsuccessfully to hush their client. Nick chuckled. “Threatening a federal marshal, in the course of his duty, Marshal Stanwick. Explain what our very ignorant contestant has won.”
“Federal prison with the threat on video for all to see,” Grace said.
Nick gestured his friends away from the startled team of Kale associates. “Come, Marshals Stanwick and Reinhold. We shall see firsthand what other ugly truths we’ve uncovered in the course of our well-earned investigation.”
“How do you do this shit, Nick,” Grace whispered in fierce tone. “You annoyed that walking troll into assaulting you twice with his lawyers standing next to hm.”
“It’s a gift. Rachel, of course, labels it a curse and an albatross around her neck. I like to think of it as a truth tool. Once a person’s inner rage blows the lid off the temp meter, truth flows like lava down the sides of the volcano.”
“You were only teasing him with the charges, right?”
“Why the hell would I make light of a crime propelled by the mouth of a racist troglodyte from hell. I will indeed testify and include all incidents in my report. If he accepts the added charges in a plea, I’ll be happy not to push it.”
“Fine,” Grace accepted the inevitable.
“Can we at least offer it in our words,” Tim asked. “When Kale’s lawyers see the case in total, they will beg him to take the plea offer we give him. The final wording will be yours. Is that acceptable?”
“Absolutely.”
* * *
Grace gulped down a swallow of her drink with a somewhat annoyed look. “I know we asked you in on this, Nick… but wow… that was an incursion into Chicago political bullshit I did not need.”
Nick toasted and sipped his Bushmills. “Boo hoo. You have the FBI task force under your control. Every one of those agents wanted to take down the entire corrupt liberal machine. Talk about entertaining – watching the bigwigs in the Chicago hierarchy get schooled when they tried to prevent Kale’s downfall illustrated why our operation needs done daily. I picked out six of the convening Aldermen who should immediately be investigated. We whupped ‘em but good today. The whole menagerie of corruption will be back in force within a month if the citizens allow the same brand of idiots to fill the vacancies. I’m going home tomorrow. You have Kale and a whole bunch more of his fellow gangsters dead to rights. They’re on the run. It’s too bad you and Tim don’t have the jurisdiction to clean this damn city up.”
“I doubt we’d live that long,” Tim replied. “Visiting here in an official capacity makes me yearn even for Sacramento. Our new office appo
intment in San Francisco reminds me of Chicago. They’re very close to being sister cities of corruption.”
“The only thing holding San Francisco back from joining Chicago is the weekly death toll,” Grace said. “It’s a beautiful city, but if they saturate it with terrorist mutants from the Sand as you describe them in your books, it will be another Chicago. It may be that the number of homeless bums in San Francisco offsets Chicago’s gangs.”
“They’re hell of annoying,” Nick replied. “The last time I took Rachel and Jean for a city visit, it was the best of times and the worst of times… the worst being for terrorists.”
“The black on black murders and drive by innocent maiming and killing appall me,” Tim stated, having dived into his drink of choice. “The fact they accept this killing field across a major city like Chicago is incredible. Where’s the Black Lives Matter assholes here to prevent the wholesale killing in reality, rather than their imagined bullshit of a rogue police agenda?”
Nick chuckled. “That margarita drink you’ve shared with Grace has loosened your tongue, Timmy. These acolytes of authority everywhere, never for a moment consider the citizens put at risk in their cities of liberal occupation. They disarm them. They put them at risk to gangs, and corruption. They corrupt every facet of their lives… and then they own everyone.”
“So… martial law under Attila the Hun types is the only way we regain what we had,” Grace annunciated as the drink infiltrated her consciousness.
“Nope. Only citizens recognizing the need to defend themselves against political corruption, avarice, extortion, and thugs,” Nick replied, straightening as a gang of eight hooded thugs invaded the Residence Hotel deli bar. “Loosen your damn weapons, my friends. We’ve been targeted.”
Nick’s demeanor put Tim and Grace on somewhat inebriated attention. Nick shifted into the smiling demeanor of a predator waiting for its prey. Nick inexplicably drained the rest of his drink. He watched the approach of the thug brigade with a killer’s instinct. Nick considered many avenues of actions, as he calculated everything in advance of the confrontation. He stood as the hoodies approached with the hotel greeter trying to intercede on their approach. Reading the nametag on the greeter, Nick motioned her away.
“Back everyone away, Fran… right now!”
Fran, a black waitress from the Heights, did as told, seeing the intent on the faces she tried to dissuade from their approach. Other customers fled at her motions and whispered warnings. The hooded thugs approached without fear, as if they knew something else no one else knew. The hoodie in front gestured at Nick’s standup greeting with a snorting chuckle of derision.
“You…you Nick McCarty?”
“That’s me, tulip. What the hell are you going to do about it?”
The front guy stared at Nick, not seeing anything other than his hands at his sides. “We here to make sure Alderman Kale’s reputation in the neighborhood don’t get dissed, whitey.”
“Alderman Kale will be going down on multiple felonies for many years in the federal pen. What brought you bunch here in public?”
Nick’s unafraid front made his accuser step back a bit. He made the usual comical, gang plethora of disparaging gestures. “I see you don’t communicate well, junior. Last chance, homies. Reach for the pistols or march your huckleberry asses back out on the street.”
The front hoodie poked his finger at Nick while reaching for the butt of an automatic in his waistband. “You don’t know me! I-”
Nick pistol whipped him to the floor. He glanced at the rest with anticipation. “Well now… here we are… either pull them pistols… or whistle Dixie.”
A snarling gangster behind his pistol-whipped cohort, reached with a muttering invective of promise, heralding the weapons grabbed at from behind him. Nick fired, planting two of the gangbangers who cleared their weapons. The rest stopped grabbing for weapons with blood and brain matter spraying them. They reached instead for the ceiling, hands in surrender. By then, their two companions were dead, each with a .45 caliber load in the head from Nick’s model 1911, twitching slightly in their last death throes. Tim and Grace drew their weapons, covering the survivors.
Nick holstered his weapon but kept his hand near it. “I see you social media warriors have no idea of the difference between common sense and survival, or right from wrong. You bunch have neither the mental capacity or the guts to take on three federal agents in a bar. If you do, go for it. Maybe you’ll get noticed. Maybe, you’ll just get forgotten as the skin bags you are.”
“We’re done… we’re done!”
“Well… we’ll see. I don’t like the sights and sounds of our negotiations so far. My US Marshal cohorts and I want to know a few details about this assault. You figured eight was enough. It wasn’t. It would be best to tell us who sent you. Otherwise, I take a couple of you with me and find out the answers the hard way.”
“We…we got orders from Spike. He say if the three of you go away, he free and clear.”
“I have it, Nick,” Grace said, holding her iPad aloft. “I think you were insulting the bag of rocks when equating them with Kale’s brain.”
“Small doubt about that,” Nick agreed. “On your knees, fingers laced behind your stupid heads. We’ll get the local Blue to escort you into detention cells awaiting processing as domestic terrorists.”
“What? We ain’t no damn terrorists!” The speaker only complained after joining his four cohorts in the ordered position. Sirens howled in the background as if highlighting Nick’s promise.
“You eight gangsters attempted to murder three federal officers in a public place on orders from a city Alderman suspected of associating with terrorists and the former drug kingpin, Tito Palentes,” Tim explained before reading them their rights.
“You geniuses thought we’d be dead and all of you would stay on the down low for a time until Kale told you the coast was clear,” Grace added after they mumbled acknowledgements. “Taking hits on federal agents from a man working as a foreign agent means an extra bit of trouble, kids. Here’s your escorts now.”
An hour and a half later, Nick finished writing a check to the waitress for a thousand dollars. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience, Fran. Give this to your restaurant owners, so they know it didn’t cost them any business.”
“You already paid all the customer tabs and gave me five hundred cash, Nick,” Fran replied.
“That was your hazardous duty pay. Thanks for cooperating with the police. I doubt they’ll need your testimony but it helps to get some corroboration of events.”
“Those ‘bangers were here to kill you and your friends. Did I hear right? Did Spike Kale hire them?”
“You heard right. Mr. Kale will be going to prison for a long time. I’m hoping his replacement will be a newcomer with law and order in mind.”
Fran slapped Nick’s shoulder, snorting amusement. “That’s funny. Law and order in Chicago. That’ll be the day.”
“Hey… the Cubs won a World Series. Rumor has it the Devil is making ice sculptures in hell even as we speak.”
Nick grinned as Fran walked away, loudly enjoying his retort. Grace and Tim joined him at his position near the servers’ counter.
“Hell of a celebration,” Grace said. “I talked to our task force leader. Gino will have the survivors separated until they can be taken into federal custody. My hunch proved out. Having you here eliminated weeks of enduring the moaning Kale, claiming he was being framed, and the fawning media creating a halo for his head.”
“You can bet he’s not the only one needing to be frog-marched from city hall,” Nick replied. “My work here is done. I’m going home.”
“Thanks for not shooting all of those assholes, Nick. We released the video to the lawyers showing you waited until the two you shot were already beginning to take aim,” Tim said. “Grace got a good video sequence of the guy you pistol whipped reaching for his weapon. At least we won’t be fighting off a bunch of Ferguson type lies as to what happened.”
“If we had been anywhere but in a public place, I confess there would have only been one side to the story. Am I clear of this mess or not?”
“The locals are more than satisfied,” Grace replied. “We’ll call you if there’s a problem or you need to come back for any reason. Kale’s done after this. We’re going to meet with the lawyers tomorrow and fit him for his orange jumpsuit. His bail has been revoked and the police arrested him again at his home, including the media being on hand to film his frog-march to the squad car.”
“Not to mention we took a bunch of gangsters off the streets,” Tim said. “Three of them are in other drive-by murders, two you already sent to hell today. I guess this ends Muerto’s visit to Chicago, huh?”
“Ask him, wise-guy. I’ll see you two on the flipside.” Nick shook hands with his US Marshal confidants and left with a wave at Fran.
* * *
Deke jumped Nick the moment he stepped through the door to the amusement of everyone waiting for his return celebration. Nick wrestled around with the joyful dog for a few more moments before ordering calmness from his canine drinking buddy. Quinn hurriedly crawled to his Dad, who picked him up from the floor. He hugged Rachel and Jean. He waved off everyone else.
“Glad to see you all. I want my deck view and a Bushmills before we go over the McCarty state of the union address.”
They adjourned to the deck, where refreshments and a veggie tray awaited them.
“I knew this would be your first stop,” Rachel said. “The fog took a detour getting here at sunset. I bet getting here away from the arctic makes you sorry you ever left.”
“I have to admit,” Nick replied while filling a Deke dish with beer, “that is one cold ass city in more ways than one.”
“Rachel got her notice from the school board,” Tina said. “Those idiots are actually pressing the matter. If I raised a kid who picked on other kids, I’d kick the shit out of him or her. I would be humiliated going into a principal’s office after my kid joins into an attempted bullying beat-down. I could say a lot more than what I did in the office. It was damn embarrassing that six black kids think it’s okay to beat a lone white kid, or anyone for that matter.”
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