by Erik Carter
Briggs scowled, didn’t respond.
Never, ever amused.
“He’s in his thirties,” Laswell continued, his tone more serious.
“Well into his thirties.”
“We have Assets in their forties, their fifties, and—”
“Yes, and all of those individuals began in their teens and twenties. They had time for training.”
“He’s been trained. He was law enforcement.”
Briggs scoffed. “City cops aren’t trained assassins.”
“You know Nakiri trained him as well.”
“So you said. And for, what, four weeks?”
Laswell looked away from Briggs’s intense stare. “Three weeks.”
Briggs shook his head, the disappointed father figure. “This is your experiment, Laswell. And it’s on you when it implodes.”
“My experiment is going pretty well so far, wouldn’t you say? Now that he’s eliminated Glover, Suppressor is one kill away from completing his first assignment.”
“So our new Asset was a local cop, working undercover in the Farone crime family, when he crossed paths with our very own Nakiri, yes?”
“Correct. The Farone crime family that has since become the Burton gang.”
“What was our man’s name before?”
“Jake Rowe. He killed four men in eight hours.” Laswell paused for a half moment, for dramatic effect. “After being shot.”
Briggs nodded, put a hand to his chin. “Mmm-hmm. That might impress me had Rowe not been caught.”
“They murdered his fiancée. The man deserves his vengeance.”
“I don’t disagree. But you should have made him a Benevolent Cause. That’s why we do what we do, isn’t it? You could have let Rowe slaughter those men, called it a BC assignment for Nakiri, and then we could have put him in witness protection. Yet you turned a local cop into an Asset. What the hell were you thinking?”
“He has it. You should trust my judgment.”
Laswell wasn’t often defiant with Briggs.
But he was now.
Briggs was right, though—Silence Jones was Laswell’s experiment. A long shot. And, yeah, maybe Laswell had overstepped his bounds a tad. So he would restrain his swagger, tame his playfulness, be respectful.
Briggs’s attention returned to the wall, and the small office was quiet again. No sounds from the hallway past the closed door behind them; the sixth floor of the building was nearly untenanted. Laswell could hear his and Briggs’s wristwatches.
Briggs turned. “And now you’ve turned his vendetta of revenge into his first assignment.”
“A test run, if you will.”
“The last one remaining for Jones to eliminate is Burton himself?”
“That’s correct.” Laswell checked his watch again. “And if he doesn’t do so soon, we’re all going to be in for a world of hurt.”
Briggs nodded, steepled his fingers beneath his chin. “I want you to tell me exactly how this Jake Rowe turned from a workaday police officer to a methodical killer overnight.”
“Yes, sir,” Laswell said humbly.
And he started in on the story of Jake Rowe’s transformation.
Chapter Four
Three months earlier.
Tension pulsed at the man’s temples, pinched the back of his neck, as he sprinted down the alley, his mind flooding with conflicting thoughts—this gruesome chore he’d been tasked with; how the hell he was going to get out of doing the chore; and if he was going to get shot in the process.
His name was Jake Rowe.
The man who would become Silence Jones.
The change that was to come wouldn’t be solely a reconstructed identity. There were massive physical differences too.
Jake’s face was rounder, less defined. Unlike Silence, Jake bore a prominent mole on the right corner of his jaw, which was not sculpted at a sharp angle to his neck like Silence’s. Jake’s physique was toned—from many self-indulgent hours in the gym—but not yet chiseled.
And Jake Rowe could speak. Clearly and without pain. And he did so fervently, especially when his words tried to keep pace with the tumultuous storm of thoughts in his overactive mind.
In the final months of Jake’s existence, he was known by a different name, Pete Hudson, the identity he’d assumed for his undercover assignment within the Farone crime family, an organization that added even further to his list of monikers, gifting him a traditional mobster nickname, one based on his tendency toward loquaciousness.
Loudmouth.
Pete “Loudmouth” Hudson.
The Farone family had changed Jake’s life in a short time, and it was the reason he currently found himself bounding down an alley of crumbling asphalt lined with dumpsters and littered with garbage and potholes, the sky sliced and diced by utility lines.
Jake’s chest heaved, and his feet ached as they pounded the pavement. His toe caught in a pothole. A splash of water on his shoe. His arms windmilled as he stumbled forward a few steps before regaining his balance.
Ahead was his target: Mr. Ranga, owner of the laundromat on the other side of the alley. Indian American. Forties, short, and doughy, in a flannel and cords. But even though Jake was in far better shape, Ranga had spotted him early and gotten a jump on him.
Jake looked back. His partner on this job, Charlie Marsh, was behind him by maybe another thirty feet, struggling to keep up. Even though Charlie was several years younger than Jake, he was nowhere near his fitness level and also several inches shorter. His face was tortured, big strands of his wavy hair flopping all over his sweaty forehead. Poor kid. They’d been chasing Ranga for almost three blocks.
They zoomed past a windowless stretch of brick building with a green roll-down loading dock door. There was a wooden fence to the right with an open doorway, and for a moment, as Ranga pulled in that direction, Jake thought he was going to make a run for the exit. Instead, Ranga took a left into a cross alley.
And disappeared.
“Shit, Pete!” Charlie said. “We lost him.”
“No, we didn’t.”
Jake slowed as he approached the corner. A blind corner. He took out his Colt Detective Special, a small revolver that he’d chosen especially for his undercover alias at the beginning of the assignment. A belly gun seemed the perfect weapon for a car thief.
He hadn’t wanted to draw on Ranga. But he had to now. His life was in danger.
Charlie’s footsteps pounded up beside him, came to a shuffling stop. Jake glanced over, found Charlie’s big, kid-like eyes looking up at him. There was more fear in them than should have been in the eyes of a supposed career criminal. Charlie should have gotten out of this lifestyle when Jake told him to, a couple days ago in New Orleans when he had a golden opportunity.
The damn fool.
“Come on,” Jake said.
A deep breath and he cleared the corner, found a similar alley in front of him. Graffiti and mildew stains tarnished the walls. A metal fire escape to the left. A tall chain-link fence at the far end. Wind scraped a crumpled piece of newspaper in the corner. There was the pungent tang of rotten garbage.
But no Ranga.
Maybe Charlie was right. Maybe they had lost him.
Then a small ping of something glancing off metal. Jake’s eyes went to the roll-off container in the back, a massive rectangular block of rusty steel.
And saw a pair of eyes peaking around the corner.
Jake and Charlie bolted, Jake immediately building a sizable lead once more.
Ranga scrambled for the fence, and Jake saw that the hands at the ends of his wildly swinging arms were empty. Just as Jake had predicted, Ranga wasn’t the gun-toting type. So Jake shoved his tiny revolver in his back pocket as he sprinted to the back of the alley.
He made it to Ranga right as the man reached the top of the ten-foot fence. He grabbed Ranga’s flannel with one hand, the fence with the other. Ranga raised a foot and smashed it down. Jake pulled back, but not quite in time, and Ra
nga’s shoe scraped against the edge of his jaw. A sharp pulse of pain.
But Jake still had a firm grasp on his shirt.
He yanked hard, using his six-foot-three frame to torque the smaller man off the chain-link. Ranga fell to the asphalt and rolled, taking Charlie out in the process, bringing him to the ground as well.
Jake was the only one standing now, and in the moment when Jake’s back was turned to Charlie, when Ranga’s eyes went widest, when the man clearly thought he was about to be tortured, murdered, Jake pulled up on the bottom of his shirt, revealing the black plastic box poking out from the elastic of his underwear. The digital recording device. His “wire.”
Ranga’s quivering eyes flashed to the device then back to Jake.
I’m a cop! Jake mouthed.
A pause from Ranga. Then the tiniest sign of understanding. A small nod. But his eyes didn’t look any less frightened.
Jake grabbed two big handfuls of Ranga’s shirt. “Listen up you, piece of shit! You’re gonna have the two grand tomorrow plus twenty percent interest. Aren’t you?”
Ranga continued to look at him with those wide eyes. “Twenty percent? I can’t—”
“Aren’t you?”
“Yes! I will, yes!”
Jake feigned a bit of struggle, an excuse to twist his hips to the right, reposition himself so that his back was to Charlie again. He gave Ranga a wink.
“And you’ll meet us downtown,” he growled and immediately mouthed a few more silent words: Downtown police station.
Another moment of hesitation from Ranga. He gave a fraction of a nod before replying.
“Yes, yes! Tomorrow. Downtown,” Ranga said, nodding vehemently now for Charlie’s benefit.
Jake stood. “Good. Then run along, asshole.”
There had been several moments like this where Jake had to either feign tough guy or somehow weasel his way out of the violence that was part of life within a crime family. He didn’t know how many more excuses he could make, how many more punches he could fake.
Fortunately, he wasn’t going to have to worry about that any longer.
The department was pulling him out of his undercover assignment that night.
The interior of Charlie’s 1985 Ford Taurus smelled like body odor, French fries, and dry-rotted foam, all of it mixed with a sharp chemical pine smell, courtesy of the tree-shaped air freshener dangling from the mirror. The seats and dash and door moldings were grimy to the touch—dusty in some areas, sticky in others.
“Dang, Pete,” Charlie said, slapping the steering wheel with appreciation. “I’ve never seen you get so hard-edged with a guy. This might just get you back on Burton’s good side after what happened in New Orleans.”
Charlie slowed for a stop sign, checked left and right, loose strands of his hair swinging across his face, then sped up again, never completely stopping.
“I don’t give a damn about Burton’s good side,” Jake said. “He doesn’t run the Farone family. He only thinks he does.”
Charlie took one hand from the steering wheel, used it to rub at his forearm. “Burton’s gonna make a move, man. Don’t you think? I mean, that’s what it looks like to me, like he’s gonna challenge Sylvester for control of the family. Oh, jeez, Pete, what are we gonna do? If Burton takes over, he’ll make life a living hell for us after what we did in New Orleans.”
Jake turned to him. “What I did in New Orleans. It was me. You were just along for the ride. If any flack comes our way, I’ll be the one to absorb it.”
Charlie smiled weakly, a bit of relief in his eyes.
“Besides,” Jake continued, “I told you to get out of this life while you still could.”
In New Orleans a couple days earlier, when Jake had taken actions that cost Lukas Burton a significant amount of money, Jake had seen an opportunity for Charlie to get out of the criminal life. As a cop, Jake couldn’t turn a blind eye to the crimes he’d seen Charlie commit, but he could get the kid out before he got himself hurt. Charlie was a decent soul, the sort of person who had a short life expectancy in the criminal world.
The Taurus puttered louder as it gained speed, pulling onto the I-110 on-ramp. It listed to the side on its spongy suspension, and Jake grabbed the grimy window crank for support.
“Maybe Burton doesn’t run the show just yet,” Charlie said as they merged into the streaks of headlights and taillights. “But he might soon enough. And we’ll be in for a world of hurt.”
Chapter Five
Jake stepped into the warm glow of the Farone mansion and was struck by the smells of well-oiled leather, musky colognes, furniture polish, brandy, wine. The place reeked of power and tradition—a jarring difference from Charlie’s Taurus, which he’d exited moments earlier, its scent one of scarcity.
The place was old wood, all of it—the walls, floors, ceilings, moldings. Big rectangles of dark brown. The gloss of high-shine varnish. The only break in the rectangularly wooden nature were the arches that topped the doorways and windows, as well as the wrought-iron balustrade that encircled the second-floor balcony, which looked down upon green leather chairs, long sofas, antique tables, spacious rugs.
Several people had gathered in the great hall, and they were split into two groups with a clear demarcation between the unofficial, unspoken divisions.
Ruckus energy emanated from the west side of the room, by the inlaid shelves heavy with sculptures and paintings and books, where Lukas Burton and his hangers-on had congregated.
Nine of them. Cocky grins. Sharp, spiking belts of laughter. Hulking figures that leaned against tables and walls, ambling legs crossed in front of them. Rough hands squeezing tumblers of liquor.
Burton was in the center of the group, and he laughed suddenly, deeply, booming over the din of the boisterous men surrounding him. His severe, handsome face tilted back, thin lips stretching wide. He smacked one of his companions on the back.
Jake turned back to his own group, eight people. There were laughs on his side of the great hall as well, but they were quieter and flavored by unacknowledged apprehension.
They were near a set of bow windows that looked to the lush, expansive lawn, which was well lit, making it look crisp and bright against the inky nighttime sky and the dark forest on the other side of the road.
Jake looked away from the stars and the wispy clouds, across a courtyard where, fifty feet away, there was another set of windows, drapes open, bright light pouring into the night.
The library.
Floor-to-ceiling shelves full of stately hardbacks. Chairs and little tables. More polished wood. C.C. would be in there somewhere, but he couldn’t see her. She must have been lying on her favorite sofa, as she was prone to do.
He pictured her stretched out, covered with a quilt, her dark curly hair splayed on a tasseled throw pillow, eyes squinted with concentration as she studied an esoteric tome—seventeenth-century philosophy, perhaps, or a biography of Houdini’s wife, or a Moroccan cookbook.
Charlie approached. He picked at a fingernail. “This is not good, Pete. Just look over there. Burton and his guys might as well be their own gang.”
Jake glanced back across the broad no-man’s-land of hardwood floor, twinkling with points of light from the chandelier above. The other group’s boisterous loitering continued. Burton’s arm was draped over Christie Mosley, the only female in the room. Her gray eyes looked out from beneath choppy bangs, shining with the energy she was absorbing from all the other, gawking eyes.
Her dress was a beacon for the attention, a dark brown number that tightroped the line between elegant and trashy, leaning toward elegance, as Christie’s noteworthy curves conformed to the surroundings in the same way as the sophisticated glass vase glowing under a spotlight on the shelf behind her—both shapely forms with sinuous lines that pleasingly dissected the austere linearity of the mansion.
Christie was one of two people who were constantly in orbit around Burton. Currently, they both flanked him—Christie on one side, and on
the other, Clayton Glover, a pit bull of a man, with a squarish face, prominent nose, and squinting eyes. He smiled up at Burton.
Charlie continued picking at his fingernail. “I’m telling ya, Pete, it’s coming soon. Burton’s gonna take over the operation. What are we gonna do?”
Before Jake could respond, another man moved toward him. A silver tray with several glasses of white wine and one bottle of Heineken was perched on the outstretched fingers of his white-gloved hand. He wore a three-piece suit—black jacket and tie, gray vest.
The beer was especially for Jake. He didn’t care for wine. He also preferred a burger to a ribeye. C.C., as lovingly as possible, described him as having an “unrefined palate.”
He smiled as he grabbed the beer. “Thanks, Saunders.”
The butler nodded.
Saunders was seventy or so, gray hair, stout frame, English with a pronounced accent, and had been with the Farone family long before Jake’s brief tenure. For decades, actually. His background was mysterious, but Jake knew Saunders had been an RAF mechanic during the war. While he’d served honorably, Saunders spent his hours out of uniform in a not-so-honorable fashion, earning side money as hired muscle for a London crime outfit. From there, he’d hopped across the pond and somehow ended up in Pensacola as the embodiment of some strange fantasy of Joey Farone’s—that of having a proper British butler.
Saunders played the part well, tilting his chin up just so, saying “sir” hundreds of times a day. But to an intuitive person like Jake, it was obvious the old man had developed a persona, nothing more. There was a whole lot of spirit—and potentially danger—bubbling under that black suit. Perhaps that was an additional reason Joey Farone hired him.
Saunders recognized and appreciated that Jake saw through the facade. And he displayed his respect by not calling Jake “sir.” Instead, Jake was a “mate.”
Jake motioned toward Burton’s group. “What do you think, old-timer?”