The Avenged

by Charles Prandy

  Two Weeks Later

  DAYLIGHT POURED INTO THE hospital room that I was checking out of. I’d spent the past two weeks at the Washington Hospital Center, healing from the beating that I’d taken at the judge’s beach house in Rhode Island. I underwent eight hours of reconstructive surgery to fix the damage that was done to my face. The doctors weren’t sure if I’d ever regain full sight out of my left eye, but they were optimistic.

  During the eight-hour trip back to Washington, Angela told me that Carmen had saved her life twice that night. After I went after the judge, Angela turned to find Nathan, looking in every room of the house, but she couldn’t find him.

  “It was like he had just vanished,” Angela said.

  She was making her way back down the stairs when Nathan came out of nowhere and elbowed her in the face. She fell down and dropped the gun. He picked it up before she got her bearings and was getting ready to shoot when Carmen stabbed him in the back with the hunting knife that Nathan had used to cut me up. Angela was able to maneuver the gun away from him and then put three bullets in his chest.

  When we got into the city, I told Angela to drop me off a block away from the hospital. I was going to turn myself in and didn’t want them implicated in any way in the killing of Faraji Owusu or the judge and his men.

  “It’ll work itself out,” I said. “I’ll be ok.”

  “I can never repay you for what you’ve done for me and my brother,” Angela said.

  She wrapped her arms around me so tight that I cringed in pain.

  “Sorry,” she said. Her eyes were filled with tears.

  “You’re the one I can’t repay,” I responded. “I’d be at the bottom of the Potomac right now if it weren’t for you.”

  “Take care of yourself,” Angela said.

  “You too.”

  I closed the door and Carmen blew me a kiss goodbye.

  When I entered the Washington Hospital Center, some people gasped at my grotesque sight while others just stared as I limped to the information desk.

  “My name is Detective Jacob Hayden. I need help.” Then I fell to the ground.

  One hundred thirteen

  CHIEF RODNEY WATERS, a thirty-one-year veteran of the police force, entered my room wearing his blue and grey police uniform. Chief Waters was a large African-American man of six feet four inches and close to two hundred sixty pounds. He was known for being a hard-ass and running the department straight by the book.

  For the past two weeks, two Metropolitan officers had stood in front of my door while the department investigated the claims I made about Judge Frank Peters and his money laundering and weapons smuggling business.

  I was sitting at the edge of the bed when the Chief walked in. I instantly stood, but the Chief made a motion with his hand for me to sit.

  “How you feeling, Jacob?”

  “Better, sir.”

  “Your face is healing nicely, although I don’t think you’ll be hearing any whistle calls from women anytime soon.”

  I smiled. Two weeks after the surgery, my face was still bruised, but a lot of the swelling had gone down. The doctors told me that I’d need to go through months of rehabilitative therapy and that most of the scarring would go away, but not all of it.

  “Jacob, I’m going to cut to the chase. May I sit?”

  “Sure.”

  Chief Waters pulled a chair from the desk across the room and sat in front of me.

  “The department has decided not to press any charges against you, and the DA has decided not to indict you. After careful research, we dug deeper into your claims and found out that Judge Peters had a network of operations going all through North and South America. Frankly, I don’t know how he was never on anyone’s radar after all this time.” The Chief cleared his throat. “Because of you, nine officers have been arrested as accomplices of Lieutenant Robert Polenski, two of whom were detectives at your station.

  “We were able to subpoena Stephen Carter’s flash drive from Bank of America, which itemized detailed transactions over the past six years. I’m not sure if you knew this, but Stephen had recorded conversations between himself and Judge Peters that directly implicated the judge in almost every transaction that was recorded on the flash drive.”

  “No, I didn’t know that, sir.”

  “We’re also holding Tim Johnson in protective custody. He knows the names of others who are implicated in this goddamn mess.” Chief Waters leaned closer, “Frankly, Jacob, you’ve opened a can of worms that will not only affect the Metro Police Department, but several departments across the country.”

  Chief Waters stood and pushed the chair back to its original place. He walked over and extended his hand. “You’ve done a fine job, Jacob. I’m just sorry that you had to endure so much pain. No one on the job should ever have to go through what you went through to stop a criminal.”

  “Thank you, sir. That means a lot coming from you.”

  “No, thank you, Jacob. My door is always open for you.”

  Chief Waters turned to walk out, but then stopped before he left the room, “Oh, and there’s a car waiting for you downstairs to take you home.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Forty-five minutes later, I climbed out of a black stretch limousine in front of my house. I hadn’t been home since that awful night of Theresa’s murder and was wondering how I’d react to being there again. I turned the front doorknob and immediately, Henry barked and jumped up and down.

  “Henry, how’d you get here?”

  I knelt down and picked up the growing chocolate Lab. Henry licked me all over my face and even got his tongue in my mouth once or twice.

  “Okay, okay, I’m glad to see you, too.”

  I put Henry down and sat on the living room couch. “You can do this, Jacob.” I looked to my right and stared at the spot on the floor where I had tripped over Theresa’s body. My heart sunk but I didn’t let myself cry. Be strong for Theresa, because she’d do the same for you.

  I walked to the kitchen and saw a stack of mail on the counter. I knew that my in-laws had probably come by the house in anticipation of my return. I sifted through bills and junk mail and then came upon an envelope the size of a card. I opened the envelope and pulled out a card with a large heart on the front, and the only words were a handwritten message that said, “Thinking of You.” There wasn’t a return address on the envelope and I knew that the card must have come from Angela. I hadn’t heard from her in two weeks and suspected that I’d probably never hear from her again.

  I sifted through more junk mail until I came upon an envelope that didn’t have a return address, but had my name and address handwritten on the front. The envelope didn’t have a postage stamp, so I wondered how it had gotten mixed up with the rest of the mail. I opened the envelope and saw that a letter had been written to me.

  Dear Detective Hayden,

  Let me introduce myself by saying that I cannot tell you my name. You do not know me, but you waved to me once, which really made my day. You see, I’ve been following your career for the past few years and you’ve really made an impression on me. That’s a good thing. Before I get into the meat of this, I want to say that I’m sorry for the loss of your wife. I know you loved her very much. I also know that you were able to kill the bastards that did that to her. Good for you. You and me might be cut from the same cloth. Time will tell on that, though. Now, to get to the good part.

  You’ve been chosen, Detective Hayden. Just like the rest of them. I’ve chosen you. And I only choose the best. Let’s just say that you will soon be a part of a game that I like to call “Life or Death.” No one has ever beaten me at this game. How can they? I’m the one who made it up. The rules of the game are simple: if you beat me, then you live. If not, then you die. But don’t worry, Detective Hayden, I won’t start the game with you until you are one hundred percent ready. I know that you’ve just come home from the hospital and that you need your rest. So rest up, my friend, and give little Henry
a big hug for me. You just might be the first one to beat me.

  Sincerely yours,

  Anonymous.

  P.S. I thought that of the others, but I was wrong.

  I put down the letter and saw that Henry was staring at me. “Did you write this?”

  Epilogue

  I DIDN’T SLEEP MUCH my first night home. The house didn’t feel the same without Theresa there. The bed smelled too much like her even though it’d been weeks since she passed away, so I tried to sleep in the guest room, which wasn’t much better. I dozed off from time to time, only to quickly wake up in cold sweats. I saw every hour pass: three, four, and then five. Finally, at six, I got out of bed.

  I took Henry for a walk around the neighborhood. The New Year had recently passed and some of the houses still had their Christmas decorations up. I’d received cards from some of my neighbors while in the hospital, which reminded me that I needed to stop by and thank them once I got my strength up. My emotional strength more than physical.

  The morning air was cold, so I was happy that Henry took care of business pretty quickly so that we could hurry up and get inside. I knew the next few weeks were going to be tough because I’d not only have to endure physical therapy, but I’d have to begin the process of packing away Theresa’s belongings. How could I do that? I hadn’t decided what I’m going to do with them, but knowing Theresa, she’d probably want me to donate them to Goodwill or a similar organization that would give the clothes to the less fortunate. She was truly a saint.

  Now in the kitchen, I leaned against the counter and sipped on a cup of coffee. The house was quiet. Too quiet. Even when Theresa was at work and I was home alone, the house never seemed this quiet or empty. I had noticed yesterday when I came home that there was an emptiness that I’d never felt before. I thought about it for a while and decided that when Theresa was alive, her energy was alive as well, and radiated throughout the house even when she wasn’t here.

  I started to think some more and my mind was taken back to Camille Johnson, the mother of the teenager, Melvin Johnson, who had been murdered in his neighborhood over five months ago. I remembered how heartbroken she was over the loss of her son and how I told her that I’d find the man responsible for killing him. I had made a promise to her, and now, more than anything, I understood the importance of closure.

  I grabbed my keys, and fifteen minutes later, I was in front of her row house. It was almost seven in the morning, not an appropriate time to visit someone, but I felt she needed to know who had killed her son and why. As I got out of the car, I saw her open her front door, wearing dress slacks and a black button-down coat. She didn’t notice me at first, but when she did, she stopped dead in her tracks.

  “Detective Hayden?”

  “Hi, Ms. Johnson, it’s been a long time.” I walked up to her and shook her hand. “I’ve got some information for you regarding your son’s death. Do you have a minute?”

  “Of course. I was getting ready to leave for work, but I can tell them I’ll be a few minutes late.”

  She looked at me and I could tell that she wanted to say something about the bruises on my face.

  “I’m okay,” I said. “It’s just been a long six months.”

  “Well, why don’t we get out of the cold and maybe you can tell me about it.”

  She turned around and headed back to her house. As we walked up her porch, I asked her, “So how have you been?”

  “There are good days and bad days. I miss my son. But the one thing that gets me through all of this is,” she stopped and turned to me, “the one thing that I can never forget, is that one day I’ll see him again.”

  I nodded and smiled, “I understand.”

  I really did.

  The End

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Steven Cribby, Lewan Hutchison and Sherman Gray for taking the time to read and offer your insights into making The Avenged a more complete novel.

  Other Books by Charles Prandy

  Jacob Hayden Series

  Book 1: The Avenged

  Book 2: Behind the Closed Door.

  Book 3: Life or Death

  Book 4: Within

  Stand-Alone Novels

  The Last of the Descendants

  To be notified of future works by Charles Prandy, please go to www.charlesprandy.com