by Michael Kerr
They lay down on separate beds. Debbie did not believe that she would be able to sleep, and was amazed to hear Logan lightly snoring only a couple of minutes later. Her mind was being bombarded by the images of her attackers, and of her mother being gunned down, and most of all by the wide-eyed expression of fear and lack of comprehension on Kelly’s face. And then the mental fatigue caught up with her and she drifted into light and troubled slumber.
Jade had almost reached the tall galvanized steel gates, which were set into a fence that was topped with razor wire and could have graced a military base. She was beginning to relax, although the little girl was making her angry. Kelly had cried a lot, but was now chanting, ‘Mommy…Mommy…Mommy’, nonstop in a high-pitched voice that was causing Jade to lose her temper.
“Shut up, you noisy little bitch,” Jade shouted, but Kelly just upped the volume. Jade red-misted a little and lashed out to slap the tot hard across the face, stunning her into silence for a few seconds, before she started screaming again, louder than before as red finger marks blossomed on her otherwise pale cheek.
Stopping in front of the gates, Jade waved to the guard in the small gatehouse behind them.
Charlie Moore recognized Jade. Vince Palmer had phoned him less than fifteen minutes ago and told him to expect her, and to let her in. He hit the green button and the gates slid smoothly back in their tracks and Jade drove in and stopped in front of the pole barrier and waited for the gates to close behind the SUV.
“You’re working late, Miss. Jade,” Charlie stated as he came out of the gatehouse brushing cigarette ash off the front of his pants. He was wearing a creased blue uniform with a patch on the breast pocket of the jacket that had NCT embroidered on it in bright yellow letters. The peaked military style cap he wore was a couple of sizes too small and seemed to float on his thick and crinkly graying hair.
“Yeah, Charlie, I’m putting in the overtime,” Jade said to the affable security guard. “I’m saving up for a cruise in the Caribbean, and I plan on doing it in style, in a first-class cabin with a balcony.”
“That sounds like a fine plan,” Charlie said as he raised the pole and watched as she drove beneath it and headed for the main office, where she parked in Mr. Cady’s slot, which was nearest to the entrance door.
Charlie was no fool. He knew more than most people gave him credit for; knew that Mr. C was a nasty piece of work with his dirty little fingers in a lot of the bad shit that went down in Fort Myers. He also knew that Jade was his current piece of skirt on the side. The dumb broad didn’t seem to realize that her ‘best before’ date was probably almost up, and that she would soon be traded in for a younger and sleeker model. Women seemed to think that their power over men was their pussy. They were right, but there was plenty of it out there for the taking. After working for Mr. C for over eight years, Charlie knew to keep his eyes and ears open, but his mouth firmly closed. He was on decent pay, didn’t have to break sweat, and so minded his business. He pretended to be what he had once overheard Cady call him; a good old nigger.
NC Transport was open 24/7. In the main its operations were legal, delivering and collecting goods nationwide, though mainly in the southern states, complying to the letter of the law with required regulations. But the hidden source of its tax-free revenue was generated by the transportation of drugs, weapons and people. Moving legal merchandise from A to B was just a front, though in itself a profitable enterprise.
Jade roughly picked Kelly up and took her inside the large office. A young guy in shirt and tie and wearing rimless glasses got up from his chair at a work station and smiled at her. He looked like a college kid with his clean-shaven good looks and a spiky haircut with bleach tips.
“Would you like a cup of coffee?” Will Fleming said to Jade.
“No, son, I’d like for you to take this rug rat to wherever you keep the kids. If it starts screaming for its fucking mommy again I think I’ll shake it to death.”
Will gulped and picked up a handset. Phoned an extension and spoke to one of the guys that worked in the ‘Bunker’ and asked him to send someone to collect a package.
Jade put Kelly down on the floor and sighed with relief. Her part in this fuckup was now over. She went over to the coffeepot, poured some into a fresh paper cup and added creamer and a sweetener. It was gritty and too strong, but good and hot. She sat at a desk next to Will’s and decided to check in a hotel for the rest of the night. There was no way that she was going back to her apartment until the guy that had been chasing her was taken care of.
Five minutes later a middle-aged woman wearing a white lab coat arrived at the office in a small Kia. She had ultra short bottle blond hair and a face that had been filled with far too much botox and collagen. Her forehead was as smooth as glass and her top lip was abnormally fat and protruding, and would have looked just fine on a catfish, but not on a human being.
Carla Melville nodded to Will and Jade, before scooping Kelly up from where she was asleep on the floor with her thumb in her mouth. The hard-faced bitch left without saying a word, which suited Jade just fine. Perhaps she was dumb as well as plug-ugly.
Vince and Larry arrived a few minutes later in the Dodge. They drank coffee and ran through what had happened with Jade, after Vince had told Will to get lost for ten minutes.
“You need to drop out of sight for however long it takes us to find this bum,” Vince said to Jade. “I just got a call from guys that went to your apartment building. Lenny is dead and Al has probably got a fractured skull. The good news is that my Jag was picked up and is fine, apart from having slashed tires.”
“Will one of you give me a lift?” Jade said. “I’ll stay at the Hilton Garden on University Drive. I know the night manager. He’ll fix me up with a suite, and I like the grill there.”
Larry nodded. “Let’s go,” he said.
“I’ll call the boss and let him know the state of play,” Vince said.
Larry frowned. “What state of play? We’ve got no idea where Logan has gone. He could be parked across the fucking street for all we know.”
“He wants the kid, and we’ve got her. She’s the ace in the hole,” Vince said. “He isn’t going to do anything that would put her at risk. He’ll contact us again and try to make a deal. And when he does we’ll agree to it, and then kill him.”
“Maybe,” Jade said. “I know that you two are good at what you do, but so is he. So far he’s won every round. You have no idea what he’s capable of, and thinking that he’ll walk into a trap is taking him too lightly.”
Vince grinned. “Nice little speech, Jade. What would you do?”
“Put myself in his position. Think of what he will do next.”
CHAPTER TEN
THE sun was still low and the trees in front of the burnt orange backdrop of sky were silhouetted as Logan parked the pickup on the dirt lot that fronted Cody’s Country Store and got out. He would’ve walked to the store, but he needed to buy a few things.
“You’re an early bird,” a voice said from the shadows at the back of the long, wide room that was packed with what seemed to be shelves and racks full of anything anyone might want or need.
Logan reached the oak counter to be confronted by a guy taller and heavier than he was: a ruddy-faced giant with a full red beard and hair scraped back in a ponytail.
“I’m Tom Cody,” the owner of the store said. “Who might you be?”
“I might be Logan. I can smell coffee, is it for sale?”
“Everything you can see or smell is for sale, Logan. How do you take it?”
“Black.”
Tom stepped to the right, out from behind the counter to a recess that had a large coffeemaker gurgling like an asthmatic suffering an attack. He filled a large ceramic mug that had a confederate flag decal on it, and held it out for Logan to take.
“There you go,” Tom said. “The best bean juice in the county.”
“Thanks,” Logan said before sipping the brew and nodding his approval
.
“You’re welcome. You just passing through?”
“Yeah.”
“Figures. I only see locals as a rule. Where are you staying? Don’t tell me you spent the night at Jethro’s.”
“It was there when I needed it. “He told me where your store was.”
“And what is it you need now?”
“Some clothing, and something to eat and two coffees to go. I have a friend staying at the motel with me.”
“I can fry you up some bacon while you browse,” Tom said. “How does that sound?”
“Like an offer I won’t refuse.”
Tom Cody grinned. He had taken an instant liking to Logan; could see that he was a private man that no one would probably ever really know. Some wells are a lot deeper than others, and Logan was one of those wild and dark horses that weren’t for breaking. Tom thought that beneath the veneer of casual geniality Logan generated, was a man that you wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side of.
Cody’s Country Store had been built by Tom’s great grandfather, Clem, back in 1901, and an old tin sign above the front door had a picture of Queen Victoria painted on it, and the legend: Established 1 January, 1901, which was the day Victoria passed away.
Not a lot about Cody’s had changed down the years. There had been the addition of a gas pump, and a large extension at the rear in which Tom lived with his third wife, Gail, who was a modern day hippie, played acoustic guitar badly, and was still a fan of Bob Dylan and the late Janis Joplin.
The store stocked hardware, clothing, groceries, dry goods, fish tackle and bait, beer and a lot of other goods that country folk thought of as essentials.
While rashers of bacon sizzled in a huge cast-iron skillet, Logan picked out some fresh clothing for himself, and a slightly bigger rucksack that was durable, lightweight and water-resistant, to replace his old and now bullet-holed pack. He then selected clothing that he thought would fit Debbie. He just held up women’s jackets and shirts and jeans and guessed at the sizes, taking into account that Debbie was approximately five-foot six and quite slim. He also added a bar of soap, toothpaste and brushes, a bottle of shampoo and a couple of combs, then stacked the pile on the counter.
“You on the lam?” Tom said as he cut thick slices of bread from a loaf that Gail had baked the previous day.
“Do I look as though I might be?” Logan said.
“I just got the notion that you were in a fix, and thought you were courting trouble.”
“I am, but not with the law,” Logan said. “I’ve got into a dispute with a firm in Fort Myers, but I’ll deal with it.”
“Sounds heavy. Do you have the means to defend yourself?”
Logan nodded as he watched Tom put the sandwiches together and wrap them in first wax paper and then aluminum foil. He also filled two plastic cups with coffee and fitted lids on them, before pricing up what Logan was buying and bagging it up in paper sacks.
“That’s you all set,” Tom said after Logan had paid in cash. “I’ll help you out to the car with this.”
With the goods in the passenger side of the pickup, Logan was about to drive off when Tom said, “We do great ribs, burgers and fried chicken from just before noon till dusk out back on a big smoker BBQ, if you’re still in this neck of the woods later.”
“Sounds too good to pass up,” Logan said. “See you later, Tom.”
When Logan got back to the motel, Debbie was sitting on the end of the bed wearing the long shirt and her now clean, dry shorts. She had switched on the TV for noise, but was not watching it.
“I got us some breakfast,” Logan said as he placed the coffees and sandwiches down on top of the dresser. “And I picked up some clothes and toiletries.”
They ate the still hot bacon sandwiches, drank the coffee, and both felt better for it. Debbie had not realized that she was ravenous until she smelled the food and coffee. When Logan had left in the pickup she had felt terribly alone and desperate. Without him she had no hope of getting Kelly back. With him, she felt safe, and could believe that it would all work out for the best. He was at this moment of time the only thing that was stopping her from going insane. His strength seemed to uplift her spirits. He exuded an aura of dependability that she needed to feed off to help her face the fact that hoodlums had turned her life upside down.
An hour later, Debbie had showered again, using the soap and shampoo, and had then brushed her teeth. While she dressed in the clean, new clothes, that almost fit her, Logan was outside, sitting in a plastic chair next to the closed door, soaking up the warmth of the morning sun and deciding on his next move against Nick Cady. There was only one objective, to get Kelly back alive, and he would do anything and everything necessary to achieve that goal.
He cared for Debbie. There was something very delicate about her, in the way that Audrey Hepburn had appeared to be, and yet he had come to appreciate that she possessed a great deal of quiet inner strength; the ability to endure life’s inevitable lows. She had been through more in the last twelve hours than most people would be able to take on board without breaking, but had kept her head. He wanted to hold her, hug her and promise her that everything would be okay. But he held off putting doing it into action, because there would be no divine intervention to aid them. He would do his utmost to help Debbie, and hope that his best would be enough. He hadn’t intended to become emotionally involved, he never did, but sometimes it happened, and that disconcerted him. Feelings could become a distraction. That got him to thinking about the one time he had come close to giving up his chosen, nomadic life. He had fallen in what he supposed was love with Kate Donner in Colorado, and had found it hard to walk away, especially because she wanted him in her life. Kate had said, ‘If I was a psychologist I’d peg you as having lost a lot in life, and that you feel vulnerable, so have decided that if you keep people you care for at a safe distance, you can’t get hurt’.
Kate had been more wrong than right. He hadn’t lost a lot in life, due to never having let relationships with women become more than brief encounters. His deepest losses had been his parents, a boyhood pal, colleagues in the Marines and NYPD, and a mongrel dog that he’d called You, probably to depersonalize it to an extent, unsuccessfully. When You had died he’d taken it hard and become truly conscious of the fact that nothing stays the same or lasts forever. And Kate had also been wrong in thinking that he was in some way vulnerable. He didn’t put himself in a position to feel helpless or beyond being able to deal with whatever life threw his way.
That he still cared enough to become involved with other people’s troubles did bother him, though. He had long since decided that it was his failure to save a friend from drowning in a pond on Staten Island that had left him with a guilt that ‒ although unfounded ‒ had changed him. He couldn’t just be a bystander to wrongdoing that was causing someone decent to suffer grief or pain; didn’t want to live with the knowledge that he could have taken action but chosen to walk away. It was part of his complex makeup, and he doubted that he would ever change, and that didn’t worry him one bit. You have to get on with being who you are, not try to be someone you’re not.
“Thanks for the breakfast and the new clothes,” Debbie said, coming out of the room and standing in front of him.
“You’re welcome,” Logan said, staying seated and checking her out. She was wearing a white T-shirt with Cody’s Country Store printed across the chest, a pair of blue jeans that were a good fit, and a pair of red keds.
Logan flinched slightly as Debbie leaned forward and gave him a quick kiss on the forehead. She frowned at him and said, “I won’t bite you.”
Logan smiled. He didn’t know what to say, because he didn’t do anything for thanks or kisses. Just did what he thought needed to be done.
“What have you decided?” Debbie said, wishing that she had asked him to pick up a pack of cigarettes. She only smoked three or four a day, and could live with the fact that these days the habit was treated by the majority of people like a crim
e against society.
“I thought we’d call in at the store later for a barbeque,” Logan said, standing up to tower over her. “Then head to Fort Myers and find someone to tell us where Kelly is, so that I can get her back.”
“You think you can do that…find someone who will tell you?”
“Yeah. I’ve got the address of the transport company that the guy who was assaulting you gave up. That’s where I’ll start. But I want you to check in a hotel until I’ve dealt with the situation.”
“I can’t do that. I’d go crazy wondering what was happening.”
“You’d be in the way,” Logan said. “I need to do this without having to worry about your safety. These people are armed and dangerous.”
“You have more than one gun, and I can shoot straight. I wouldn’t get in your way.”
“It would be better if—”
“If I was with you,” Debbie cut in. “Put yourself in my position. Would you sit on your ass in a hotel room and chew your nails or pace the floor worrying yourself sick if it was your daughter?”
Logan sighed. Arguing with a distraught woman was a pointless exercise. He would have more success trying to turn back the tide, or flapping his arms and thinking that he would be able to fly. He decided to work on her slowly and do his best to make her see sense, because it was almost guaranteed that when he attempted to rescue Kelly there would be bloodshed.
“We’ll see,” Logan said.
It was past noon when Debbie got in the pickup, while Logan went over to the doublewide to hand in the room key.
Jethro opened the door and took it from him. “Heading somewhere nice?” he said.
“Miami,” Logan lied.
“Too crowded and multiracial for my taste,” Jethro stated as he shut the door on Logan.
A few minutes later, Logan was parking at the front of the store. He climbed out and could smell the wood-scented aroma of meat being cooked. They followed the almost invisible trail of smoke around the side of the store, to see Tom Cody standing in front of a massive outdoor grill, turning large cuts of rib-eye steak over, and rolling cobs of corn with a pair of tongs.