Murder on the Front Nine

by Steve McMillen

  “Not yet, let me go call her while you call Marty.”

  Bill bolts out of the office, a strong sense of dread weighing him down.

  Once Bill leaves, Barry punches in Marty’s number. Marty tells him that Mickke D asked if they had met before and he told him not that he could recall. Barry thanks him for the information and tells him to get back to him if he hears from Mickke D again.

  Bill puts a call into Detective Susan B. Wallace and she says they are still working on the information but it is certainly looking as if Paul is the John Doe killed in the wreck. Once she is positive, she will get back to him. She is very pleasant this time around.

  Bill goes back to Barry’s office and they compare phone calls. Barry seems to be much calmer once he learns that the assassin is most likely dead.

  As Bill leaves, he turns and asks, “What are you going to tell Mickke D if he calls and asks you about Marty Vette?”

  “I’ll tell him the truth, I didn’t know Marty was there until we started to investigate the death of Trever Byers, and then I’ll ask him why he wants to know?”

  “Sounds good to me. By the way, if Mickke D is working for the judge, what does this do for our plans to get the map from the judge?” Bill tries to read Barry’s face but Barry turns toward the window.

  “I really don’t know,” Barry says slowly. “I would think we need to be very careful if he is involved. Why don’t you put together some ideas and I will too. We’ll compare notes once we know for sure the assassin is dead.”

  His voice is monotone, his face, reflected in the window, expressionless. Bill wonders where the friend Barry once was has gone.

  Barry was not disclosing the truth when he tells Bill he didn’t know Marty was at Bald Head Island until after the assassination of Trever Byers. He pulls a file from behind the plant in front of the window. He opens it and stares at a recent friend search he’d printed from the Internet. What would Bill think if he knew Barry was lying to him, that he’d picked Bald Head Island because Marty was the police chief there? He seems to be lying to everyone these days. The map had better be worth it.

  Marty owed Barry big time. Barry helped Marty get out of a shooting incident while they were at Fort Bragg. A recruit was shot while on maneuvers and Marty was going to be the scapegoat. Barry intervened and got the charges dropped.

  Marty was not pushing the investigation because Barry had called him right after the shooting of Trever Byers and convinced him that the shooting was a matter of national security and that SIL would handle the case. It was payback time. Marty kept Barry advised during the entire investigation.

  The following afternoon Bill receives a call from Detective Wallace in Charleston.

  “Mr. Cutter, it looks as if you were right, our John Doe is your Paul Hills. We traced him back to a Las Vegas dentist who had filled one cavity. Except for that one filling, we found no trace of the man whatsoever.”

  “That’s great, can you send me that information in an e-mail?

  “I certainly can, and again I apologize for my attitude during our first conversation. If you’re ever in the Charleston area, please stop by and say hello. Lunch is on me.”

  “Thanks detective, I may take you up on that someday.”

  Bill goes directly to Barry’s office with the good news. Good news for Barry, but Bill is wondering if it is good news for him. Barry doesn’t need anyone to watch his back now. The assassin is dead.

  “That’s great news. Let’s see if we can put together a plan to get the map from the judge. I have been doing some research on the Internet and if we can find the shipwreck where the coins came from, it could be worth millions.”

  Bill has never seen Barry this excited about anything except maybe on one of their vacations when they were actually out in the ocean searching for sunken treasure. Maybe he has been wrong about Barry, but then again maybe Barry needs him to help with the treasure hunt. Barry can’t do it alone and he doesn’t trust anyone else.

  Then there is the other unknown factor: How is Mickke D going to play out in this whole thing? He has a funny feeling that Barry is not going to let anyone get in the way of finding the shipwreck and the treasure.

  Chapter 41: One Less Witness

  Barry and Bill leave the office around 4:00pm and walk down the small incline toward the parking lot. The parking area is tree lined and not easy to see from the office, which is about two hundred yards away. Barry is feeling good since it looks like the assassin is dead and he can move on to treasure hunting.

  He asks Bill if he would like to stop and have a beer on the way home and Bill agrees. They decide on The Bluebeery Pub. Barry goes to his SUV. He opens the door and sits down. His Special Forces trained ears hear a click. He immediately calls Bill on his cell phone and then he begins to sweat.

  Bill calmly answers, “Hey, did you change your mind about a beer?”

  “Come over to my vehicle right now and keep your eyes open.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Just get your ass over here right now.”

  Bill gets out of his car and walks over to Barry’s vehicle, which is about thirty yards away. As he gets close, Barry opens the door but does not get out. Bill notices sweat beads on Barry’s forehead.

  “You don’t look good, are you sick?”

  “I heard a click when I sat down on the seat. Look under the seat and tell me what you see.”

  Bill gets down on his knees and looks. What he sees makes him start to sweat. There is a compression detonator charge directly beneath Barry’s seat. He armed the charge when he sat down. When he gets up or moves the wrong way, bang he is dead.

  “Holy shit, if I were you, I would not get out of that seat for a long, long time. There is a compression charge under the seat and it is armed.”

  Just as Barry reaches for his cell phone to call 911 and the bomb squad, the first shot blasts into Barry’s vehicle. Two more rounds ricochet off the pavement next to Bill, stinging his face and body with a spray of rocky shards. The shooter either just has a handgun or he is a terrible shot.

  Bill pulls his weapon and fires a couple of shots in the direction of where he thinks the shots are coming from. “Don’t go anywhere, I’ll be right back and if I were you I would return fire or he may just walk up here and shoot you.”

  He turns and sprints up the hill toward the office.

  Barry grins and places the call to 911. He un-holsters his weapon and starts firing in the general direction of the assailant. He is afraid to turn his body and fire because he may set off the bomb.

  More shots pierce Barry’s vehicle as Bill reaches the building and goes directly to his office. He grabs his sniper rifle off the wall rack, opens his desk drawer, puts one round of ammo in the rifle and puts several shells in his pocket. He tells everyone in the office to stay where they are and to get down on the floor. He runs down the steps and out the back entrance.

  He has a good idea of where the shooter is located so he circles the area and ends up parallel to where he believes the shooter is firing. He lies down on a small knoll and begins searching through his scope. He spots the shooter about seventy yards away and he is still firing his handgun at Barry’s vehicle.

  He calibrates his scope and sets his finger on the trigger. He has not fired his rifle in several years but he trained hard for moments just like this. The shooter stands up and points the gun at Barry’s vehicle. Bill takes three deep breaths, holds his breath for a count of three and squeezes the trigger. The shooter goes down. The quiet and stillness all of a sudden rings in his ears.

  He yells at Barry, “Are you all right?”

  Barry does not answer but waves his arm out of the vehicle window. Bill pulls his handgun, slings the rifle over his shoulder and goes toward the shooter’s location. He cannot see him but he knows he hit his target. When he gets there, the shooter is not moving. He checks and there is no pulse. He looks at the shooter’s face and does not recognize him.

  He had reacted
to the situation. He did his job. Then another thought crosses his mind. If he had not reacted and just taken cover somewhere, would the shooter have eliminated his problem and killed Barry? Would Barry have tried to get out and been blown into little pieces? He guesses he will never know. He stops by his vehicle, puts his weapon in the back seat and makes a mental note to be sure to clean it.

  The police, EMS, and bomb squad all arrive at about the same time. He explains what he found under Barry’s seat to the people in charge. The bomb people suit up and look. They confirm what Bill has described to them.

  After about fifteen minutes, they devise a plan. First, they carefully remove the driver’s side door along with the passenger door and passenger seat. They bring in their medium blow-up air mattress that they use for jumpers and place it beside the door and even with the bottom of the vehicle. Next, they carefully place a harness around Barry so that when the time comes, they will yank him out of the SUV and onto the mattress. There are ropes attached to the mattress so that the minute Barry’s body touches the mattress they will pull it and him away from the vehicle. They also erect a steel mesh tent around and over the SUV to help contain an explosion if it occurs. The only open side is where Barry is sitting.

  That was the easy part, now for the compression charge. They believe they can push the detonator down a fraction of an inch without setting off the device. Next, they find a 12 x 12 inch piece of 1/8 inch steel plate and drill two holes on each edge of the plate. The holes are to attach bungee cords to the plate and then to the underside of the seat. The idea is to create enough pressure to keep the detonator down when they yank Barry out of the SUV. The attachment of the steel plate and cords would be much easier without large cumbersome bomb gloves working in a confined area.

  An hour after they first arrive, the bomb squad has everything in place. Bill and everyone except the people yanking Barry out of the vehicle and the ones who will pull the mattress move away from the area.

  At the last minute, they cover Barry with a piece of the steel mesh tent and a bomb suit full-face helmet. They put bomb boots on his feet and wrap his legs from the knees down. Then they start the countdown.

  On three, everyone yanks and pulls. All present hold their breath and close their eyes. There is no explosion. The steel plate holds the detonator plunger in place.

  It takes Barry about twenty minutes to get everything off and to thank everyone who helped with the undertaking. Barry’s SUV is carefully loaded into an enclosed bomb trailer and driven away. The police ask him to look at the dead shooter to see if he knows him. He looks and tells the police he has never seen the man before.

  Barry looks over at Bill and says, “Nice shot, Mr. Cutter, I guess I owe you one.”

  “Just doing my job Barry, do you need a ride home?”

  “Yes, I do smart ass and I’ll need you to pick me up in the morning, also.”

  Bill is not sure his saving Barry’s life actually matters that much to Barry anymore. Barry’s loyalty seems to lie at the bottom of the sea with dreams of treasure and gold.

  They both look under their seats before getting into Bill’s vehicle. On the ride to his house, Barry is smiling inside. He did know the shooter. It was Glenn Griffin. Why was Griff trying to kill him? The only answer he can come up with is that the assassin actually did call him for a reference and then later told him about the park in Vegas. However, there is a good side to this story. With the demise of Griff, that only leaves Dean Rutland and Bill who know about the arranged killing of Trever Byers.

  Chapter 42: Mandi Lee

  Mandi Lee Byers is on her way to her monthly meeting. Before she leaves home, she receives an e-mail from Mickke D saying that he thinks Dean Rutland ordered the hit on Trever.

  She is a very pretty, petite woman, 5’1” and not much more than one hundred pounds soaking wet. Most of her professors at Duke Law School did not think she would ever make it as an attorney. Most thought her diminutive figure would work against her. They did not know Mandi Lee very well. She finished in the top 10 percent of her graduating class and she became a real bulldog as a prosecuting attorney.

  She did not marry Trever Byers until she was forty. He was almost fifteen years older than she and just about ready to retire. I guess you might say it was an arranged marriage of sorts. She needed someone with Trever’s background to benefit her later and the best way to control that person would be to be sleeping with him, legally.

  Actually, she grew very fond of Trever during their six-year marriage. She was very distraught when she learned he was dead. She almost blames herself for his death.

  She found out that Dean Rutland was looking for someone to act as a consultant for Senator Brazile’s investigation into offshore drilling. She managed to get her husband’s name mentioned in a conversation with Dean and the rest is history.

  Mandi Lee works for the Defense Department as an assistant attorney and has little to no status there. Very few people notice her, she makes very little money, but of course, the government has great benefits, including health care.

  Her bank account is very sparse, well at least her American bank account. Her main source of income is a monthly check deposited in a bank on Grand Cayman Island. It comes from a shell company set up by the CIA. Mandi Lee Byers is a CIA operative working at the Defense Department.

  It was her job to try to convince her husband to approve offshore drilling because the CIA wants to use the production platforms as a foundation to mount their new hush, hush underwater radar/sonar system, which is able to detect the movement of underwater terrorism threats.

  They plan to pay the oil companies to allow them to attach a new safety device on their production platforms. Funding for the project will not come from Congress. The CIA does not want the program to go public.

  Mandi Lee actually thought that the CIA killed her husband when they found out that he was going to give a negative report to Senator Brazile. Her handler assured her that this was not the case. She is pleased when Mickke D calls her. She wants to know who killed her husband and why.

  She walks into a McDonald’s, orders a cup of coffee, and sits at a corner table. Ten minutes later another woman comes in, orders coffee and sits down at her table.

  Mandi Lee looks up and says, “Hey Liz, how are you?”

  Liz Woodkark smiles and replies, “Pretty good Mandi, but I do have some questions for you.”

  Liz is in her early fifties, strawberry blonde hair, a great body, and striking features. She stays in shape, has a great tan and looks as if she should be living in Key West, not Washington, D.C.

  “Sure, what do you want to know?”

  “I had an opportunity to speak with Dean Rutland the other night. He was fishing around and quizzing me about who Trever was working for at Justice.”

  “Let me guess, since this took place at night, did the quizzing take place in bed?”

  Liz replies in her best Gone with the Wind southern accent, “Why, Mandi Lee, how could you think such a thing?”

  “Just in case I’m right, how did he rate on your one to ten scale?”

  Liz laughs and says, “I gave him a seven. Not bad, but not toe tingling terrific.”

  Liz regains her composure and continues, “Have you talked to anyone other than that Mickke D guy about Trever’s employment at Justice?”

  “No, and when I talked with him, I said I knew nothing about the Justice job. And by the way, I received an e-mail from Mr. MacCandlish today saying that he believes Dean Rutland ordered the hit on Trever.”

  Liz gets a perplexed look on her face. “Why, that no good bastard. I’ll take care of that situation myself.”

  “Any more questions Liz, I have a hair appointment.”

  “Not for now, I may have an assignment for you in a couple of weeks. I’ll let you know.”

  “If I need to get married again, make sure he’s rich and young. I’m ready to try being a cougar.”

  Liz just smiles, picks up her purse and leaves th
e restaurant.

  Mandi Lee grabs her coffee and follows Liz out the door. Once outside, they both look around for anything or anybody that looks out of place. They then walk away in opposite directions.

  Chapter 43: The Attack

  It is around 9:00pm and I am home alone relaxing and reading a mystery novel by T. Lynn Ocean, a local author. I’m wearing my red boxer shorts, Ohio State tee shirt, and moccasin slippers. After reading a few chapters, I sometimes slip and in a vain moment, I picture myself as Mike Hammer with a wide brim hat, a moustache, and a cigarette dangling from my mouth. Well, I guess maybe not the mustache and cigarette but definitely the hat.

  My cell phone rings and suddenly I return to the real world. My caller ID shows unidentified, but I flip open the phone anyway. It could always be a work-related real estate call. The voice on the other end is garbled but I think the voice sounds familiar.

  “Hold on a minute, let me get outside. I have poor reception inside the house.”

  I go outside to the deck. For some reason, on the way out, I gaze at the sky and watch it fade to velvet dusk. There is a smell of storms in the air, a distant flash of lightning and the faint sound of thunder. A chilled gust of wind whisks my face, leaving me in a tranquil and seeming calm. That calmness stays with me as I sit down at the table on the far end of the deck and speak into the phone, “Okay, now who is this?”

  “Mickke D, its Barry. Why couldn’t you leave well enough alone?”

  My calmness all of a sudden vanishes. I feel heat rising to my checks. “Nice to hear from you Barry, but what are you talking about?”

  There is a strange echo coming from the other end of the phone as he continues, “I’ve had several calls about you asking questions concerning Trever Byers’ death. I thought we ended that investigation?”

  I guess I have my answer as to who is going to show up after I opened the can of worms with Dean Rutland, but why had I failed to see or believe what now seems so clear? Maybe Paula Ann was right. Pops is too old for this stuff.