by Ian Worrall
“Don’t know. Everything just died one after the other,” one of the uniformed officers says to her.
She rolls her eyes. “Yeah, tell me something I don’t already know.”
The other cops stand there dumbfounded.
“Got nothing else to say?” she asks.
Detective King looks up at the SWAT team leader pointing her finger. “Do you have any answers?”
“No, ma’am.”
“It’s Detective.”
The SWAT leader shakes his head apologetically
“Call in to HQ and get tow trucks out here” Jessica says, Torres is going to have my ass for this one, she doesn’t add as she turns back to the van where she sees the male cops checking her out in the window reflection. Pigs. As a black woman in a traditionally white male-dominated work force, she has had to work harder than most to gain the respect of her superiors and the acceptance of her colleagues. With some exceptions, like the men checking her out here, she’s gained it and then some. Nothing is going to take away from me what I’ve earned, she thinks as she slams the van door behind her.
* * *
Sitting in the comfort of his home study, Jack Quincey closes his laptop. A program installed on police cars three months ago enables the department to track the activities of their officers’ use of the vehicles. A skilled hacker can get into the program and disable the cars. A fine job well done, he tells himself as he leans back in his chair sipping on rum. Press a few buttons and another easy twenty grand. It also enables him to let his controllers in the Russian Mafia know of any police car location; one of the many ways he has kept the Russians at least two steps ahead, which has kept his retirement fund full and growing larger.
* * *
Thirty minutes after leaving the hotel, Melissa parks her car three blocks up from her next target. Looking out her window, there is not one single No Parking sign in sight. Either they were stolen or never installed. She checks the side mirror. The scratch at the bottom aligns perfectly with the reflection of the curb, the exact distance required. Getting a parking ticket in this neighborhood on this day would not be good.
She grabs a small cylinder from her glove compartment, lays it on the passenger seat, then changes into a pair of sneakers one size bigger than her normal shoes before she leaves her car. Pulling on the door handle three times, it’s locked. She cocks her ears for any noise. Just the sound of early morning crickets.
As she turns from her car, she checks around her. She sees no early morning joggers or dog walkers. The street workers must have gone in for the morning. This time there will be no one around. She arrives at her target’s home smirking as she observes his so-called security sleeping in a chair outside of the garage. Apparently even a criminal mastermind, or wannabe in this case, needs to spend good money to get good help.
She walks around to the side door of the garage, picks the lock, and gains access. Entering, she sees the three cars—a Mercedes Benz, a BMW Z4 Roadster, and an Audi R8. With the last three weeks of tailing Gary, she knows that on this day, Tuesday, he will be taking the Audi out to see his mistress. And most importantly it will be without his seven-year-old daughter in the car.
Melissa was adamant with Danil that only Gary will die. No collateral damage, especially not a child. Nevertheless, it’s a perfect day to do a murder or three.
Sliding underneath the car, she places the small cylinder next to the driver’s side brake. Twisting then pulling on it three times to make sure the magnet will hold, she then turns on the receiver. It’s a small bomb with enough force to destroy the wheel but not enough to kill anyone else.
Pulling herself out from underneath the car, she tiptoes as she leaves the garage, locking the door behind her.
* * *
The sunrays on the face of Karissa Lanskey wake her from a restful slumber with her head on the well-muscled and tattooed chest of Danil Burlomov. She wakes him with kisses to the lips as she straddles him.
“What are you getting me for breakfast? Or should we have dessert again?”
Danil kisses her back as she runs her fingers through his jet-black hair. “Personally, I’d like a workout first.”
Placing one hand on her chest and the other on her groin, he spins her around so she is lying across his chest. Lifting her off him, the bed sheets fall from around her as he starts bench pressing the naked woman. She grabs his arm, barely getting her hands around his thick forearm, and starts giggling.
“One, two—you’re a light workout, dear—three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.”
Setting her back down on his chest, he rolls her off him and kisses her on the top of the head. “Order whatever you want for breakfast. I’ve got to get to work.”
“I thought you own the hotel?”
“I have other business interests I need to attend to. I’ll call you when I can see you again.”
“I love you,” she says before they kiss for several seconds. I hope you love me too, she thinks before Danil lets her go, and then enters the hotel bathroom, turning on the shower. One of his many shadow companies owns the hotel, which has so far kept any forensic audits from tying his illegal activities to him. Laundered money helps keep a lot of people employed, providing a great public service with the jobs he creates and keeping the small-time thugs in line.
* * *
Twenty-three minutes after leaving Gary’s home, Melissa stands waiting on the side of a two-lane highway. Her car is parked about thirty feet off the road, a remote location where opposite her is a guardrail that blocks a 400-foot drop. In one hand, she holds a tablet computer and in the other she has her travel mug of coffee.
While practicing her stone-faced look in the reflection on the screen of her tablet, she sees a blip. Along with the bomb, the device she planted allows her to track her target on her tablet.
Just five more minutes. Patience is a virtue in her line of work.
Four minutes.
Three minutes.
Two minutes.
At one minute, she can see the view of the car with the naked eye. Fifty seconds to live, Gary Taylor, and you don’t even know it.
Forty seconds as she puts her coffee cup on the ground, taking care not to spill it.
Thirty seconds. She can practically taste the smell of the forty thousand dollars cash she’ll be getting for this job.
Twenty seconds, she can almost see his face.
Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
She hits the activate button on her tablet.
Inside the car, Gary Taylor feels the jolt from the explosion like a small landmine. He yells out, “What the –” The scream of the metal on asphalt drowns out his words as he feels the car tip to its side and he loses control, careening towards the guardrail. He screams out more curse words when he sees smoke and sparks shooting out from underneath his car as metal grinds against asphalt.
The car slams into the guardrail with enough force to break through but not enough to go over the edge. It has stopped with three-quarters of it on solid ground. Despite being stunned by the airbag deployment, Gary turns the car off. With it being a front-wheel drive, he couldn’t back out of the predicament he was in.
Looking in the rear-view mirror, he sees a woman walking towards him. He sighs in relief that he is going to be saved. He rolls down the window as she stops at the side of the car. Eyeing her up and down, hot chick. I’m gonna tap that if she gets me out of this.
“Don’t know what happened, but help me out and I got something for you.”
“I happened, Gary Taylor.”
“What do you mean? How do you know my name?”
“I’ve got a message from Danil Burlomov.”
He changes from smiling to wild-eyed and breathless. He fumbles at the door handle as he sees her pulling out a small metal canister. She points it at his face.
“Fuck with my crew, I’ll fuck you worse.”
She sprays the cyanide mist into his face. As he gasps
for breath his body starts shaking, the cyanide preventing him from being able to absorb oxygen. Within seconds he collapses onto the steering wheel, sounding the horn. Melissa pulls his head off the wheel and feels for a pulse. He’s dead. Melissa snaps a picture of the dead man on her phone and texts the picture to another number.
Whistling to herself as she makes her way to the back of the car, she braces herself in a low stance and starts pushing with all her weight. The car inches forward, and within thirty seconds it rolls over the ledge, tumbling back over front.
She walks to the edge, taking a few seconds to admire her work. She looks at the wreck of twisted metal and shattered glass on the rocks below. What a shame to waste such a beautiful car, she thinks as she turns away from the cliff then runs across the street to her car, picking up her coffee and tablet off the dirt. She upends her coffee cup, finishing it off as she takes her seat in her car.
Unzipping a cooler bag on the passenger side floor, she uncaps a smoothie meal replacement drink and then drives off towards home. Three weeks on this job. Maybe he’ll let me take a break.
* * *
As he enters an office of an electronics store, Danil’s mobile phone pings. He pulls it out and sees the picture of Gary Taylor dead in his car. Erasing it from his phone, he says to Anton Chekov, “A thorn has been clipped.”
“Good news,” Anton says. He hands Danil the report on the earlier altercation Valeri and Sergei had with the police.
“We do have a snitch, but Quincey came through for us,” Anton says.
“Still running smoothly then,” Danil replies.
* * *
Turning on his mobile phone, Quincey sees he has a text message:
Got the information yet?
He answers back:
It will be at the dead drop that I get my money for this job
The return answer comes a few seconds later:
The money will be there 2am tomorrow
Leaning back in the chair, he pours himself another glass of high-quality rum and takes a sip, swirling it around in his mouth, buttery smooth. A perk to being a dirty cop? You get to have some of the best Cuban rum for free. With the embargo on, it was a premium. With the potential for normal relations between Cuba and the US, he might be able to get it legally.
The knot tightens in his stomach. He feels the unease of being a cop tied to organized crime. Despite all these years, it never went away. It started innocently enough, just a coffee here and there. Then getting dinners with the wife paid for. Cadets were warned in the academy not to ever accept gifts from criminals, but as a young couple, they didn’t have a lot of money to pay for nights out with new children.
The whole thing continued until he realized he was under the thumb of Alexei then, and now Danil Burlomov. That realization too little too late. His fate will be tied directly to theirs. He had to do something to make sure nobody would find out, coworkers framed. He cried at the funeral of his dead partner, Calvin Stiner. Just three more years and I can take early retirement. A non-extradition treaty country like Bhutan sounds great.
Chapter 2
D etective Mitchell Burnlee flashes his badge and people step out of his way as he walks up to the front desk of the Hotel Lacroix. A concierge is giving directions to a guest and the front desk staff are typing on their keyboards.
“Detective Burnlee,” he says. Checking the name tag on the lapel of the tall lady, he continues, “Cheryl, we were called about the dead body in your parking garage.”
She points him towards the elevators to her right. “That elevator there. Take it down to P1. Security will meet you there.”
“Thanks, Cheryl.”
Two minutes later, the police detective steps off the elevator where he meets a musclebound hotel security guard.
He greets the security guard, reading his name tag. “Dan, were there any reports of an argument down here?” he asks as they walk toward the body.
“No. Someone just walked in on him when they were bringing their luggage up.”
While Mitchell crouches down next to the body, the security guard gags as he covers his mouth and nose against the stench of vomit at the mouth and liquid fecal matter that has pooled at the dead man’s feet.
“How do you stand the smell?” the guard asks him, seconds before he pukes into a garbage can.
Mitchell grimaces as he does. I hope you didn’t destroy evidence. “Ten years of these scenes numbs your senses to it.”
“Do you think he OD’d, sir?” the guard asks.
Mitchell shakes his head. “There’s no needle by him. He might have shot up somewhere else, or did a different drug. Or just the years of abuse caught up to him.” Years of police work have brought him to many scenes where unfortunate victims of drug abuse have ended up like this.
“Could he have tried to rob somebody and they fought back?”
The detective again shakes his head. “Don’t see any bruises on his face other than where his head hit the ground.” He points to the small blood pool near the forehead.
Standing up, he points to the security camera in the ceiling.
“How good’s the video here?”
“Usually pretty good.”
“Usually?”
The guard shrugs his shoulders. “We’ve been having problems with it the past couple of days.”
“What kind of problems?”
“The picture freezes, over several cameras.”
“We’ll check it out anyway.”
Mitchell’s phone rings. The caller ID shows his partner, Jackie Cruze, is the caller. “On your way?”
“Got another call about a DB. Meet you at the station.”
“Any idea what happened?”
“From here it looks like it might be Gary Taylor’s car.”
“What do you mean from here?”
“He’s at the bottom of a four-hundred-foot cliff.”
“Accident?”
“Doesn’t look like it. There are parts of a blown tire up the road. Along with skid marks and gouges where the car made a mess of the asphalt.”
Mitchell raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Well, if it’s an accident, it makes our job easier.” Despite the job of having to uphold the law, police are like the public in that they don’t have a lot of sympathy for a criminal who dies, regardless of whether the death is natural or otherwise. They make the choice to engage in criminal activity, so they do bring it on themselves to a point.
As Mitchell ends the phone call with his partner, the coroner and crime scene analysis team arrive. A call comes over the guard’s radio.
“Front desk to security.”
“Go ahead.”
“You and the cop need to get to room 720.”
“Is there a problem?”
“Not going to say it over the radio.”
“Ten-four, then. We’ll be on our way.”
Mitchell turns to the team that has just arrived. “Get him bagged ASAP. We might need you guys again.” He takes a set of cloth booties from one of the analysts.
Five minutes later, Mitchell and the security guard are outside of room 720 talking to the housekeeping supervisor, a heavyset woman in her mid-fifties with an attitude to match her girth.
“So, what’s the deal?” Mitchell asks her.
“Dead guy in the bathtub,” she says as she looks at her watch and then crosses her arms over her chest.
Two dead bodies in the same hotel on the same day? There are no coincidences, ever.
The housekeeper opens the door to the room as Mitchell puts on a pair of plastic gloves and the cloth booties. Walking into the bathroom, he sees the naked body of Mike Cairn lying face down in the bathtub. On the counter, his wallet is open, revealing his driver’s license beside a set of dishes. That’s not natural. He pulls out his phone and makes a call.
“Hey, Dave, as soon as you’re done, get up here to room 720. Got another dead body. Hope you got room in the van.”
Mitchell walks out of the bath
room to the door of the room. “Were you the one who found the body?” he asks the housekeeper.
“No. One of my staff did.”
“Went in with a Do Not Disturb sign on the door?”
“When he didn’t check out, they thought he might have tried to skip out on the bill. Need the room for the next guest.”
“That guest will need a different room. And I need to speak to that person.”
“She’s scared of talking to –”
Mitchell puts his hand up, interrupting her. “I don’t care about her immigration issues. Got a dead guy in here.” Turning to the security guard, “I will need to speak to everyone beside, below, and above the room.”
“For a dead guy in a bath tub?” the guard asks.
Mitchell points to the dead body. “Something tells me this is more than that.”
Mitchell takes a last look at the dead man. The body is far more pale than usual, no lividity, couldn’t have been dead that long. His hair is not wet. Neither is the bathtub. No running water. With his eyes scanning the room, he takes the whole scene in.
Bed is too neat, so there was no guest. The ID is set up like someone wants us to know who this guy is. Everything is too tidy for a single guy.
“OK, I’ll make it happen.”
The elevator down the hall opens. The coroner with the investigative team steps off and walks down the hall. Mitchell takes off the booties and puts them in an evidence bag that is held open for him.
“So, you got room for two?”
Dave replies back, “Yeah. Think these are related?”
Mitchell shrugs. “Who knows.”
The coroner takes a body bag off the stretcher. “It’s going to be a busy day for the ME’s office. Two inside of an hour.”
“Actually three.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. The wannabe drug lord Gary Taylor went off a cliff.”
Dave gives Mitchell the thumbs up. “Tax payers have saved a lot of money then.”
Mitchell laughs. “One way to look at it. Just the same, when you get both of yours back to the ME, have them run a tox screen on the blood first, particularly this one. Something doesn’t seem right here.”
“Will do,” Dave replies.