I turned up the cool air and the radio, anything to keep me awake. Brenda’s words of caution came through, be careful on the roads, come home safe.
Another two hours went by, and the tunes on this station kept me awake.
“Breaking news…”
It sounded like the new allergy medication commercial that inundated the airwaves these days in Detroit. I had my hand on the radio to change the station when I realized it wasn’t an advertisement.
“There’s been an assassination attempt on the State Governor of Michigan…”
Attempt? I turned up the volume. What the hell were they talking about? I had shot her skin-to-barrel, bullet-to-brains.
“…law enforcement isn’t saying too much at this time. But she was found in a hotel room in Niagara Falls, New York.”
That son of a bitch wasn’t supposed to go in until mid-morning.
The earlier nausea returned with a vengeance. My chest heaved for a solid breath. My hands gripped the steering wheel, my eyes welded to the road. My heart palpitated, and I questioned whether I was having a panic attack.
How could I have failed? It didn’t make any sense. Unless I was set up to fail? My family.
Oh, shit!
I picked up my cell. If Christian heard the broadcast, he would come after them.
The road sign read Chatham-Kent. I was still an hour out. And I still had to get across the border back to the States.
“Pick up!” I yelled into the hollow ringtone. It went to the machine. “Shit!” I dialed again. More ringing.
Where the hell were they?
The dash read three fifteen. I pressed the gas pedal to the floor.
-
Chapter 14
NIAGARA FALLS, NEW YORK
SUNDAY, JUNE 13TH, 3:30 AM
MAJOR CRIMES DETECTIVE DAVE CLINTON had the case that would advance him to Sergeant. As he looked around the hotel room that had been Governor Behler’s, a smirk cut into his lips. He would find the son of a bitch responsible for this and put him behind bars for life. He could see the headlines now.
“Detective Clinton?”
“Yeah.” He turned to a CSI tech who was thin enough Clinton knew he could likely bench press him.
“I think the guy we’re looking for is a professional.”
“It’s too early to assume anything. Keep looking.” Clinton dismissed his colleague with a wave, returning to evidence collection.
Nothing could be presumed or assumed. Clinton needed facts to cement this case.
Governor Behler had been escorted to County General where she was deemed critical and fighting for life. According to the attending physician she had a probability of making it through. When they refused to attribute percentages, Clinton knew it wasn’t a good thing. Right now it was a game of wait and see. But he would treat the case as a homicide unless the good news fairy intervened. Solving attempted murders didn’t warrant as much clout as solving successful ones.
And he didn’t have time to waste. This had been a blatant assault on the life of a State Governor. The FBI, the Michigan State Police, and the New York State Police were already called. There were more offices of law enforcement involved than Clinton cared for. With different branches came territorial conflict. Clinton likely had precious little time to get answers before any of them would rush in and take over. He’d wager the FBI would be the first to assert control.
A staff member of The Grandeur found Behler when he came to deliver food to the room. His name was Paul Hensal. Clinton had some uniformed officers hold him in the hallway. He wanted to see inside the room first. And now he had, it was time to start doing the real work that involved investigative skills and not the aid of technology to match DNA coding and fingerprints. If Clinton was going to get any immediate answers, it was with Hensal.
Clinton stepped into the hall and found two officers stationed outside the door. He didn’t see Hensal. “Where—”
“Room next door, Detective. That way.” The one young officer gestured to the right of Behler’s room, and then let his hand come down to rest on his holster.
“Get your hand off that thing unless you have course to draw it, or lose your badge for being reckless.”
The officer lifted both his hands. Red saturated his cheeks.
“Why’s the kid next door?” Clinton asked.
“The Grandeur didn’t want us all in the hall. They comped the room.”
“I don’t give a shit what The Grandeur wants.” Clinton held up a pointed finger and swiped it to take in the area around them. “You get this entire floor sealed off. I don’t want anyone coming or going. Do you hear me?”
He nodded, almost too quickly. Clinton didn’t respect those who didn’t think for themselves. He viewed this officer—he paused to read his badge—number 8329 as one who could be easily manipulated.
Clinton headed to the other room but stopped when his partner came toward him. Her stride carried a message, as did her facial expression. They were partners for six years, which in cop life equated a small eternity. Her name was Sonya Wingham, and her skin next to his was a creamy white. The guys in the division termed them their salt and pepper team; Clinton was disappointed by their lack of originality.
“Whatcha got?” He asked her.
She stopped a few feet in front of him. Both hands braced on her hips. “They’ve got security cameras and are pulling the footage now.”
DETROIT, MICHIGAN
IT TOOK HOURS FOR BRENDA TO FALL ASLEEP. She kept thinking about how she was going to approach this with Ray in the morning. He had to be cheating on her. There was no doubt in her mind now. Why else would he go away last minute and order a tux? How was he going to explain that to her? Her stomach rolled as she assumed he’d leave the tux at the other woman’s place.
A single tear fell down her cheek as she lay there trying to sleep. Anger suppressed more from falling. She needed rest to have the energy to confront him. The last time she saw on the alarm clock was one, and it felt like she had just fallen asleep.
At first the ringing phone morphed into a dream mentality, but it just kept ringing.
She rolled over, groggy and still half asleep. What she saw at the end of her bed made her stop—paralyzed with fear.
The man wasn’t Ray. She could tell by his frame. Her hairs rose on her entire body. Her breath stalled. The man’s eyes were watching her.
She had to reach the phone. But she couldn’t will her body to move. The phone rang again. The blue LCD screen cast eerie shadows in the room.
The man wasn’t moving. He was just staring. She took her eyes off him only for an instant and reached out for the phone. It was only three feet away. She could get it, pick it up, and tell the caller she needed help.
The man came toward her.
Her scream hurled from her toes.
The man grabbed her by the back of the head. He pressed a cloth against her face, and she smelled a sweet aroma. She could still hear the ringing phone as her arms and legs went limp. Her perception of sound began to dull, but not before more screams made it through—the kids’. Then she heard Ray’s voice as if out of nowhere.
The answering machine?
Brenda willed herself to scream, but it was as if her mouth and tongue were frozen. She tried to move. She was a prisoner in her own body. Her eyes fell heavy. Everything went black.
CHATHAM, ONTARIO EN ROUTE TO DETROIT, MICHIGAN
STILL NO ANSWER. I drove like an NASCAR driver thankful I didn’t have many other cars to weave through.
One hour away.
It may as well have been twenty. I tried again.
Come on. Answer.
Still nothing. If they killed my family, I would make it possible for one man to take them all down. I depressed the number on my phone—Christian’s direct line.
DETROIT,
MICHIGAN
CHRISTIAN HATED KIDS. The little one put up quite a struggle for his size and age. Ingo had to slap him around a bit to get him to stop squirming. Once the cloth was in place, he fell asleep.
Christian imagined the kid not waking up. Kids were trouble. But when it came to bargaining power, they held the key.
That’s probably why he chose to take care of the wife. It hadn’t been hard, and the repeatedly ringing phone had worked to his advantage. It distracted her and gave her hope that she could escape the strange man at the end of her bed.
Hope could be like that—blinding and deceiving. And empowering to those who made hope out of reach. Christian smiled.
Maybe that’s why he had decided to make his own future—no one else could make it for him. And if one was too weak to make their destiny, then they deserved others to write it for them.
“This is the last one, boss.” Berto carried the dead weight of the teenage girl over a shoulder like an oversized sack of potatoes. For the man, brawn didn’t equate with mental prowess. But he was willing to please, and for that Christian kept him around.
Ingo closed the door of the Escalade after Berto inserted his cargo.
“Her hair smells like lilac.” Ingo inhaled the air that filtered behind her as a lion stalks its prey.
“Keep your hands off her!” Christian turned on his man. That young lady could be a strong bargaining chip. She was the only daughter. And girls were special to their fathers, weren’t they? And if that were not enough, she was the firstborn.
“Boss,” Ingo said.
Christian knew he stood there seemingly staring into space, but he was thinking. He would get to know her quite well.
“We should get moving—”
Christian pulled out a Desert Eagle and held it at the man’s gut. His words calm. “Don’t you ever fuckin’ rush me. You understand?”
Ingo nodded. His eyes went large with panic and fell downcast to the paved driveway.
Christian held the gun there for another thirty seconds to emphasize the point—no one told him what to do.
He went back to contemplating in silence, his gun still held in one hand, but it was now down at his side. His men filtered into the Escalade.
Christian affectionately traced a hand down the black exterior of his ride. The street lights refracted off it. His thoughts were on Ray and how he had done quite well for himself getting set up in a decent neighborhood. He put The Family money to good use. It would work out to Christian’s advantage tonight, too, because his vehicle wouldn’t stand out among the hundred other SUVs; not that anyone in the neighborhood seemed to be awake. And if they had been, they wouldn’t know what to make of it anyhow. If a prying neighbor did get involved and called the cops, Christian and his men would be long gone with the entire Hunter family before law enforcement arrived.
Christian’s cell rang. A smile spread on his lips when he read the caller ID. No one said the man was stupid. He pressed the ignore call button and slipped it back into his pocket. He rapped his knuckles on a back window of the Escalade. “Just one more thing to take care of.”
EN ROUTE TO DETROIT, MICHIGAN
“SHIT!” I POUNDED THE STEERING WHEEL. Christian sent my call to voicemail. I could tell by the clipped ringtone.
Fifteen minutes away.
I almost didn’t want to go home. I couldn’t handle finding them murdered in their sleep. My head felt faint. Every mile brought me closer, but it wasn’t happening fast enough.
Even with limited traffic on the roads, the cars that were, moved slowly.
I tried the home phone again. I needed to believe they were still alive. I had seen the work of Christian before, firsthand. I was paid for discretion and skill. Christian possessed no conscience of right and wrong.
All the morbid scenes of my past played through my mind as a fast motion slideshow—faces strewn, blood spatters, broken bones, separated appendages, torture conducive with war crimes. But as all these paraded through, at this moment, I couldn’t allow myself a fraction of time to consider them having been inflicted upon my loved ones. I knew Christian was capable, but I hoped that he would give me some consideration based on what I had done for him eighteen years ago. I thought of the five hundred thousand. Maybe if I gave it back the present failure could be redeemed.
Then I thought of Yvonne. She was only fourteen. Christian and his men would love young girls. My stomach churned, and I vomited into my empty coffee cup.
-
Chapter 15
DETROIT, MICHIGAN
SUNDAY, JUNE 13TH, 4:30 AM
EVERYTHING LOOKED THE SAME FROM the outside. But the early morning air felt tattooed by the lingering presence of evil. I took a deep inhale trying to derive strength to move through the threshold. My legs felt weak and grounded. Procrastinating wouldn’t change what had happened. To prepare myself, I had to picture my nightmare. Images of them being raped, stabbed for sadistic pleasure, bullets to their faces…I had even known the Russos to decapitate those who betrayed them. I vomited into the garden bed outside the front door.
Somehow, I willed my legs to move. Then my pace quickened. “Brenda!” I went through the house, a man afraid he had lost everything. I saw the blinking light on the machine.
One message. It would have been mine.
The house was silent. Oh God!
“Brenda! Yvonne! Max!” I yelled all their names hoping that I had simply overreacted to everything. Maybe this was a nightmare and not a reality. Maybe my tired eyes had closed on the road; I got into a car accident and was in a coma.
Oh God, please let that be the case.
I went to Max’s room first and found it empty. My breathing slowed, and my heart rate intensified.
“Yvonne!” I yelled her name as I ran down the hallway. Her door was open. That was not a good sign. She always kept it closed for privacy. She wasn’t there.
It felt as if four walls were compressing in on me. My chest was tight. My breathing—soft, broken inhales and exhales. I breached our bedroom door and my breath stalled.
Blood was everywhere. I gasped for air.
With each deep inhale, a vise-like grip restricted my airflow, reducing my lung capacity for the next. It must have been sheer adrenaline alone that made it possible for me to make it the six feet to the bed.
There was someone under the covers. I attempted to steady myself.
For the amount of blood that saturated the white duvet, I could find all of them under there. My brain communicated with my hand to lift the cover back, but I couldn’t bring myself to act.
I stood there for seconds, maybe minutes, trying to come to grips with what I had done. If they were dead, it was because of me. I stared down at the bed and distinguished one impression. Only one person was in our bed.
The blood was still wet, not tacky. The kill was fresh. I had just missed Russo’s men. I don’t believe in coincidences. I believe in cause and effect. To the Russos, the cause, my failed assassination attempt, would result in the effect, my being punished for my failure.
I pulled the duvet up. What I saw took the strength from my legs. I fell to my knees and raised my arms heavenward yelling like a primitive animal.
-
Chapter 16
NIAGARA FALLS, NEW YORK
SUNDAY, JUNE 13, 4:30 AM
DETECTIVE DAVE CLINTON DIDN’T LIKE LIARS. And Hensal had to be. “You’re telling me you just found her like that?”
He chewed on the end of a finger. There wouldn’t be any nail left if he kept at it.
“You just happened upon her room?” Clinton stood above the hotel staff member while he sat on a sofa chair.
“We received a call. She wanted eggs Benedict.”
“And it’s your normal service? To offer that at midnight?” He frowned. “Most hotels wouldn’t serve anything at that
hour.”
“We aim to please our guests.” His eyes cast to the floor too fast to be believable.
“You aim to please? So you shot her because she asked you to—”
“I didn’t. Believe me.”
Clinton didn’t need to believe one syllable coming from the kid’s lips. He knew the video feed was being evaluated as he spoke. Wingham had returned to the security room of the hotel. Her specialty was diplomacy. He didn’t operate within the same boundaries. That’s probably yet another reason why they made a good team.
She had already called Behler’s office to find out whether she always traveled with a bodyguard. Just because it was recommended didn’t mean dignitaries never ditched them, but first he had to be cleared. Surprisingly, the message hadn’t been returned yet. Clinton had a feeling Detroit’s PD was doing their own investigation.
Hensal rubbed at his throat. “Can I have a glass of water?”
Clinton stood there with one hand on the badge he wore on his hip. He made eye contact with the one unie at the door and looked to the sink. He followed the silent directions.
“Who made the call downstairs for food?” Clinton asked.
“A man.”
“At midnight?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have a recording of this request?”
“Like I said, talk to Karen from the kitchen. She took the order. See…” He fished into his uniform shirt pocket and extended a copy to Clinton. He pointed at the writing. “That’s hers. Question her.” The uniformed officer handed him the glass of water. Hensal took it and drank as if he’d been wandering the desert for hours.
Clinton dropped the order slip on the table and took a seat across from Hensal. “She’s not the one who found Behler. It proves nothing to me other than an order was taken. You could have come in here, made the phone call, rushed downstairs to get it, came back up here to deliver it and make the find.” Clinton attributed finger quotations to the last two words.
“I’m not that smart.”
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