Electing To Murder: A compelling crime thriller (McRyan Mystery Thriller Series Book) (McRyan Mystery Series Book 4)

by Roger Stelljes

  Kristoff’s partner put his earbud into his ear and the two of them did a quick com check. “I will let you know when I’m at the back door,” Foche said as he pushed himself out of the passenger seat and onto the sidewalk. Kristoff watched him quickly walk back up the sidewalk and turn left into the dark back alley.

  • • • •

  The Judge finished his third bourbon as the wheels touched down at Holman Field in St. Paul, the small commuter airport just southeast of downtown St. Paul. For the small jets the campaign used, Holman was a better option. It allowed for quicker departures and arrivals as you didn’t need to fight through the crowds at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

  The jostling of the landing also caused Wire to spring awake.

  “I thought you couldn’t sleep on planes,” the Judge joked.

  Wire rubbed her eyes, “I usually can’t.”

  “Sometimes when you’ve been going non-stop for days on end, your body just shuts down,” the Judge noted as he pulled his cell phone out. “That’s why I gave the kids the night off tonight. I need them rested and sharp for the last three days.” He looked at the display and snorted. “Jeez, I give Sebastian a night off and he still leaves me three messages.”

  “He really can’t shut it off, Judge,” Wire answered as she looked at her phone. “Hmpf.”

  “What?”

  “I have two messages from him as well.”

  They both dialed their voice mails.

  They both listened.

  Both became very worried.

  “Judge, I’ve got a bad feeling.”

  • • • •

  Montgomery turned left onto Berkeley from Cretin and drove slowly down the block, looking to his left for the house numbers and finally seeing the numbers for McCormick’s house under the porch light to the left of the front door. The front of the political operative’s home was lit up brightly, the porch light on, lights on in the front of the house as well as the sunroom on the side.

  He pulled the car over to the right curb and parked. Two days on the run made him cautious and he sat in the car and observed his surroundings. Nobody had turned to follow him down Berkeley and he didn’t notice any vehicles approaching the area. Vehicles dotted the sides of the street in both directions as well as the cross street Finn in front of him. It was quiet and he checked his watch, 10:21 p.m.

  After another two minutes, he reached behind his seat and grabbed his backpack and pushed himself out of the car.

  • • • •

  “Damn it,” the Judge growled.

  “Not answering, right?” Wire replied.

  “No.”

  Wire expertly weaved her Acadia through the four lanes of traffic on Interstate 94, traveling just west of downtown, approaching Snelling Avenue, less than two miles from the Cretin exit. “Something is up, Judge. It is unlike him to not answer. Try Shelby.”

  The Judge tried Shelby. “No answer.”

  “Try Sally Kennedy and see if she knows anything.” Wire swerved out to the far left lane around a grouping of traffic and then veered hard back right, over to the right lane and roared up the Cretin-Vandalia exit.

  • • • •

  “Montgomery is at the front door,” Kristoff said into his mic. “He’s going inside.”

  • • • •

  Mac pulled out of the parking lot for the Bella Eatery and turned left onto Hennepin Avenue and headed back over the Mississippi River and into downtown Minneapolis, holding Sally’s left hand. Her cell phone started ringing. She let go of Mac’s hand and reached for her purse on the floor and pulled out her phone.

  “That’s odd,” Sally mused.

  “What?”

  “The Judge is calling. Probably wants to make sure we’re on for tomorrow.” Sally answered her phone, “Whoa, whoa, easy, Judge, say that again?” Sally looked over to Mac with a worried look.

  Mac’s grip tightened on the wheel when he saw the look on Sally’s face. She was a cool customer, always, but she was clearly concerned. “Judge, I’m going to put you on speaker. I’m with Mac. Go ahead.”

  “Mac, I need your help.”

  • • • •

  McCormick and Shelby showed Montgomery into the dining room. “Can I offer you anything to drink or eat?” Sebastian asked.

  “No, I’m good,” Montgomery answered although he looked anything but good. The political blogger had a three-day-old beard, appeared haggard and looked like someone who needed to eat and then get some sleep.

  “I’m very sorry about Jason,” McCormick offered solemnly. “I haven’t seen him for a long time but he was a good guy.”

  “Thanks for saying that.” Montgomery sighed. “I’ve been having a hard time processing all this. I can’t believe what has happened to us.”

  “Do you know why Jason came up here?”

  “Yes. He came here to meet with you.”

  “Why?”

  Montgomery took his backpack off his shoulder. “Everything I need to show you is in here.”

  • • • •

  “McRyan is on his way,” the Judge reported.

  “What’s his ETA?”

  “Ten maybe fifteen minutes. He was over having dinner just north of downtown Minneapolis.”

  “He may not be there in time.” Wire punched the accelerator and burst through a yellow turning to red light at the intersection of Cretin and Summit. As she approached the intersection with St. Clair, she took a hard left.

  “Dara, he lives on Berkeley.”

  “My gut says to go in the back.” Between Stroudt’s murder and what she saw in DC earlier in the day, she knew that there were people looking for Montgomery, dangerous people and she was on her own. Walking up to the front door didn’t seem like a good play.

  Wire pulled over to the curb on St. Clair just short of Finn. Parked, she immediately reached in the backseat into her nylon backpack and pulled out her Sig and two magazines. She slid one magazine into the Sig and put the other in her coat pocket. Next, she pulled the slide and chambered a round and then pulled up the back of her black leather coat and slipped the gun into the back of her blue jeans. Wire opened her door and looked back to the Judge. “Stay here,” she ordered. “I mean it.”

  • • • •

  Montgomery sat at the dining room table and waited for his laptop to start up. McCormick sat to his left at the table while Kate kept standing, looking over his shoulder at the computer. “So you’re not going to believe who we saw at this cabin in Kentucky,” Montgomery said excitedly.

  “Let me guess. Heath Connolly and a few others,” McCormick replied.

  Montgomery sat back from the laptop, his jaw dropping open, looking at Sebastian. “How did you know?”

  “We had someone down there as well. She followed Connolly from DC. Our question is who were you following?”

  A man wearing a black mask burst into the dining room from the kitchen, a pistol with a suppressor in his hands. He shot Montgomery between the eyes.

  • • • •

  Wire was across the alley and twenty feet from the back door, carefully making her way up the back sidewalk when she heard the deadened, but unmistakable suppressed sound of a gunshot.

  A woman screamed.

  • • • •

  “Kate, go, go!” McCormick yelled as he pushed up from his chair and jumped at the shooter, who put two into Sebastian’s chest. McCormick fell forward into the shooter.

  “No! No!” Kate screamed as she ran for the front door.

  Foche pushed McCormick off of him, stepped forward and pivoted right to face Shelby who was reaching for the knob to the front door. He raised his Walther.

  The first shot hit Foche in his right shoulder. It jerked his body back and to the right and Wire’s second shot hit him in the upper right chest and the third shot in the middle of his chest, blowing him back into the dining room wall.

  • • • •

  Kristoff saw the first flash and then two more quick
light flashes from Foche’s silencer, light flashes you would only notice if you were looking for them. He was waiting for the fourth when he heard the Pop-Pop-Pop and saw the three muzzle flashes.

  That wasn’t right.

  “Foche! Foche!” he pleaded urgently into the mic. There was no response. “Francois! Francois!”

  This wasn’t right at all.

  • • • •

  Wire moved quickly to the shooter, gun pointed straight at him. He was unconscious but not dead. The man was bleeding from his chest. She reached around his back for a wallet but he wasn’t carrying one. Wire looked back to Shelby who ran over to Sebastian. She rolled him over onto his back and Wire saw the blood and bullet holes in his white dress shirt, two shots to the heart. Her friend was dead. To Sebastian’s right was Montgomery, lying on his back, a bullet hole between his eyes.

  In the eerie quiet of the house, Wire heard a car door slam. She noticed the earbud and cord running down the shooter’s neck. Then she heard footsteps on the sidewalk running along the front of the house.

  There wasn’t much time.

  “Kate! Kate!” she whispered to Shelby who was holding McCormick’s hand in hers. “We gotta get out of here.” Wire looked at the backpack and laptop and asked. “Are those Montgomery’s?”

  “Y… y… yes.”

  “Put the laptop in the backpack and let’s go.”

  Shelby was frozen.

  “Now, Kate!” Wire whispered urgently.

  Shelby snapped out of it and grabbed the laptop, slipping it into the backpack while she followed Wire to the back of the house. Wire took a quick look out. “Stay right behind me, right behind me, do you understand?”

  Shelby nodded.

  Wire pointed across the alley. “We are going to run right across the alley, between those two houses. My Acadia is parked on St. Clair. It’s running. The Judge is waiting. Ready?”

  Shelby, still crying, sniffled and nodded.

  The two slipped out the back door, hustled down the steps and sidewalk and reached the edge of McCormick’s garage. Wire peeked around the corner of the garage to her left. She grabbed Shelby by the arm and dragged her forward and whispered urgently: “Go! Go! Go!”

  Shelby sprinted across the alley. Wire was right behind when the headlights lit her up from the left. Coming hard and fast down the alley was a black SUV.

  “Go!” Wire yelled to Shelby. Wire stopped on the far side of the alley, set her feet and fired at the SUV, hitting the windshield three times, causing it to veer left into a wood fence. She looked back to McCormick’s and she could see two bodies approaching the back door from the inside and they got a glimpse of her.

  Wire sprinted after Shelby who was through the two houses. “Get in the backseat! Get in the backseat!” Wire ordered. As Shelby jumped into the backseat, Wire ran around the front of the Acadia and quickly looked back for pursuers. Seeing none, she jumped into the driver side. She threw the SUV in gear and punched the gas and accelerated east on St. Clair, looking alternately forward and in the rearview mirror. “Judge, keep an eye on our six.”

  “What the hell happened, Dara?” the Judge demanded. “Where’s Sebastian?”

  “He’s dead.”

  • • • •

  Mac was cruising twenty above the speed limit, his light flashing, as he sped east on Interstate 94, crossing over the Mississippi River when his police radio burped, “All units be advised. We have a report of shots fired on West Berkeley Avenue, between Cretin and Finn.”

  “That’s Sebastian’s block!!” Sally wailed, terrified for her friends. “Mac, we gotta get there.”

  “Hang on.” Mac buried the accelerator and watched the needle quickly pass one hundred miles per hour. Then he punched a button on his cell phone. “Dick, get over to Sebastian McCormick’s house fast as you can.” Mac gave him the address and a quick rundown of the call from the Judge and the shots fired call. “And get a hold of Riles and Rock. We’re going to need the help. This Stroudt thing just blew up. Way up!”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “Where is the first shooter?”

  Mac accelerated south down Cretin Avenue, a patrol unit falling in behind him with the rollers going and siren pushing everyone to the side. At Berkley, Mac turned hard left and accelerated down the block.

  “Second to last on the left,” Sally directed.

  Mac pulled up in front of the house. He reached in the center console and grabbed a flashlight and pulled his Sig from his belt. “Stay in the truck.” Sally nodded, terrified.

  The patrol unit following him pulled in right behind Mac. Another unit approached from the east, having come down Finn Avenue from St. Clair. Sirens in the far distance would provide additional reinforcements in a few minutes.

  The four uniforms on the scene were out of their cars, weapons drawn and flashlights in hand and turned on. McRyan quickly scanned McCormick’s house. The lights were turned off with the exception of a dim light in the sunroom on the house’s left side. Mac turned to the uniform cops and tilted his head towards the house. The uniforms all nodded and Mac led them up the front steps and pulled open the front screen door. Two uniform cops went in and to the left and two others went straight ahead up the stairway to the second floor.

  Mac moved inside, his Sig pointed straight ahead, his left hand folded underneath his right holding the flashlight. He heard “clears” being yelled by the uniforms as they searched the house. The detective moved to his right and into the dining room. Immediately, he noted the silhouettes of the two bodies, one lying on the floor to the left of the dining room table and the other at the front end, tangled with a dining room chair. The body at the front had a bullet hole between his eyes. Adam Montgomery. Mac put his light on the body laying to the left of the dining room table and immediately recognized McCormick with two gunshots to his chest. He leaned down to check for a pulse and didn’t feel one.

  Where was Kate Shelby? Where was the Judge?

  More “clears” were bellowed throughout the house but no reports of bodies. He panned the dining room with his flashlight left to right. To his right there was a blood smear on the far wall of the dining room, running down to the floor. Panning the light down, there was a pool of blood on the wood floor. As he inspected the blood pool he could see a void, where a body might have been, leaning against the wall, sitting on the floor.

  The uniform officers searching the house returned to the front foyer, reporting the house was clear, no additional bodies found. Mac led everyone back out the front door as two more patrol units arrived.

  “Okay, listen up.” Mac pointed to one officer, “Call it in, two homicides. We need crime scene and the coroner right away and more units.” To the second officer: “I want a large perimeter around the house, the whole yard. Get the tape up fast. Shots fired in this neighborhood will draw the media double quick. We need to keep people back. So once the tape is up, let’s get the cruisers blocking the approaches.” The two officers nodded and double timed it to their squad car. To the other two patrol officers he ordered, “Start a quick canvas and see what people heard and saw. We’ve got people out on their front steps now, lights are coming on, let’s get to people quick. If anyone saw anything, I want to talk to them or I want them talking to Lich, Riley, Rock or another detective. They’re all on their way.” The two officers nodded, with one taking McCormick’s side of the street and the other the far side.

  Sally jumped out of the Yukon and came running up to him, panic written all over her face. Mac took a deep breath and looked down briefly. She saw it and her eyes began to water and her hands went to her mouth. He holstered his gun and walked up to her. “I’m sorry. Sebastian McCormick is dead.”

  “And Kate? What about Kate, and the Judge? What about the Judge?”

  “They’re not in there, Sally.”

  A look of partial relief washed over her face.

  “That doesn’t mean they’re still alive, honey,” Mac cautioned. “Why don’t you see if you
can reach either of them on the phone?”

  Mac took out his own cell phone, turned his back to the street and dialed Chief of Police Charlie Flanagan, who lived half a mile away. “Chief, we’ve got a scene developing. You’re going to want to be here.” Mac gave him a quick rundown and the address. As he hung up, he heard dueling squeals of tires behind him. He turned around to see Lich, Rockford and Riley arriving on the scene. Right behind them were detectives Frank Franklin, a/k/a Double Frank and two of Mac’s cousins, Shawn and Patrick, in plain clothes.

  “Holy cow, Dick! You really called the cavalry,” Mac quipped, noting the massive backup arriving.

  Lich stopped and spread his arms, “Partner, you had that ‘calling all cars’ tone in your voice,” Dick replied, his arms spread open as if to say “what?” “So tell me, what the hell happened?” Lich asked, handing Mac a pair of rubber gloves.

  “I’m working on it,” Mac answered and gave them a quick rundown on the phone call with the Judge, the shots fired call a few minutes later, his dash to the scene and his quick search of the house. He finished with, “We’ve got two bodies inside. One is McCormick.”

  “Is the other that Kate Shelby?” Lich asked.

  “Thankfully, no,” Mac answered. “The other is Adam Montgomery.”

  That caught Lich’s attention. “Stroudt’s business partner? The guy we haven’t been able to get a hold of or find? Are you sure?”

  Mac nodded.

  “What did those two stumble into?”

  “I don’t know,” Mac answered. “But Judge Dixon does and if he’s still alive, he and I are going to have a fuckin’ direct conversation about it.”

  “Detective McRyan?”

  Mac turned to see the uniform cop that was setting up the perimeter calling him from the left side of the house. “I think there is something you should see.”

  “Rock and Riles, take the plain clothes and hit the door to doors. There are a couple of uniforms who have started. See if anyone is worth talking to. Keep everyone out from inside until crime scene gets here.”

  Mac and Lich left Rock and Riley to organize the door-to-door and followed the uniform cop, named Skrypek, around to the back of the house, down the back sidewalk, past the two-car detached garage and into the alley. “What do you have, Pecker?” Lich asked.