The Ruthless

by David Putnam

  I stepped over to a poplar tree with a thick trunk for cover, put my back to it, and looked around. He had to be close by watching what I’d do. People came and went from the offices, cars drove on the street, and the birds sang under the bright summer sun. I stuck my hand under my work shirt to the stock of the .357 and walked to the truck. I touched the radiator grill. Yep, still warm, almost hot. I peered in the cab. Wires hung from the ignition. The inside was spotless, the carpets vacuumed, the dash without a speck of dust and gleaming, no fast-food wrappers or any extraneous personal items like a dream catcher hanging from the mirror. Showroom clean. Except one item. A cheap blond wig sat in disarray on the seat. The wig also left there on purpose. Why wouldn’t Johnny Sin dispose of the wig unless he wanted me to see it, to thumb his nose at us? To thumb his nose at me.

  Long striations marred the right side of the truck, exposing silver metal dented from impact. Curled bits of paint still hung from the fresh damage. I moved to the rear of the truck, looked around, then knelt and pulled a switchblade from my boot. I sliced the rear tire. It hissed. The back of the truck tilted down. I put the blade back and walked to the meeting.

  I came out onto Firestone Avenue and checked up and down the busy street as I made my way to the address and to Suite A. Less than two blocks away, the 605 Freeway crossed over Firestone Boulevard, the boundary between Downey and Norwalk.

  I found the right office and entered the expansive, well-appointed lobby. Four white leather couches in the center and large contemporary paintings on two walls set off all the dark wood everywhere else. I stopped. What the hell was going on? This wasn’t an auto parts store. I spotted the building legend and went over to check the name on Suite A: “Manfred and Manfred Attorneys at Law.” This was a law office? Was Johnny Sin really an attorney? Was his real name Manfred? He sure made the right moves at the right times like someone well versed in the law. Why would he give up his true identity without good reason? He hadn’t made a wrong move yet—why now? I wanted to back out and give this new twist some thought.

  He’d left the card the night before to set up the meeting. He said no guns for good reason. No ambush would occur in digs like these. Curiosity got the better of me. I walked deeper into the lobby to the double mahogany doors with the brass plaque to the side that simply stated “Suite A.” I took a breath, turned the knob, and entered.

  I’d been in many law offices over the years for various depositions and other legal matters, and this one was no different. Yet, I still couldn’t shake the feeling of being out of my element. I dealt strictly with street thugs. I knew how they acted, knew how they walked and talked, how they thought, and most important, which way they would jump before they knew themselves. I knew nothing about this world and how to survive in it. This was exactly how Johnny Sin would want his opponent, set back on his heels and made to wonder which way was up.

  The receptionist sat behind a desk, a fiftyish woman dressed in subdued business attire and stylish glasses. She glanced away from her computer screen and looked me up and down, assessing.

  “Mr. Bruno Johnson?”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  IN THE LAW offices of Manfred and Manfred, I stood before the receptionist in denim pants and my khaki truck driver shirt, underdressed and two hours early to the meeting. “Yes, that’s me.”

  She picked up the phone and spoke in low tones. She hung up. “Ms. Franklin will be right out.”

  “May I use your phone, please? It’s a local call.”

  She eyed me suspiciously, as if I may have crapped the bed. “Dial nine and please make it brief.”

  I turned my back to the woman and dialed TransWorld. When RD picked up, I told him where to find the forest-green Ford F150.

  “Jesus, Karl, how the hell did you find it so fast? This is great.”

  “Get forensics on it right away. I would really rather that you drive out here and handle it yourself to make sure it gets done right.”

  “I’m on it. Where are you going to be?”

  “On a follow-up. Stay close to the phone. I’m going to be calling soon for backup. Put the team on alert.”

  “Roger that.”

  I hung up before he could ask any more questions.

  A light-skinned African American woman in a charcoal-gray suit with a matching pencil skirt and medium black heels came from the hallway. In a past life, before she went to law school, she could’ve been Ms. Hometown USA or fifth or sixth runner-up in the Ms. Universe contest.

  She extended a delicate-boned hand while displaying a pasted-on lipstick smile. “I’m Marjory Franklin, it’s so nice that you could join us.”

  She somehow managed to say it without a hint of sarcasm.

  I took her hand. “I think I’m in the wrong place.”

  “No, you’re not. This way, please.” She turned and headed back from whence she came. I followed in her perfumed wake, an essence of lilac that quickened my step to get more.

  “Is Johnny Sin already here?”

  She stopped. Pulled her shoulders back. She turned and said, “Excuse me?”

  “Johnny Sin, that’s why I came, you know, for the meeting.”

  “Is that a real name?”

  “Uh-oh. I think I’m in the wrong place.” I turned to get the hell out of there. Nothing good can come from being in a law office when you have no idea why. The kind of law this office practiced could strip a person naked just as fast as the IRS.

  “Excuse me.”

  I turned back. She’d again offered me her hand, and this time the thrown-on smile came with a hint of promise like to a sailor from a siren on the rocks. I didn’t take her hand and stood there conflicted, not by her feminine wiles, but by curiosity to find out exactly what was going on.

  “We have some light refreshment, and I promise this will only take a minute of your time.”

  I smiled. “So this isn’t going to hurt?”

  She winked. “Not a bit.” Confident she again had me hooked, she turned and continued. I followed along, the perfect wayward puppy looking for his mother.

  Something wasn’t right: the business card with the address, the forest-green Ford truck parked three blocks away, and Johnny Sin and Jumbo asking for this meeting. She opened an office door with her name on the wall next to it and stepped aside to allow me to pass.

  I stepped inside.

  I could have played a half-court basketball game in her office, with its high ceiling and abundant square footage. The room had been decorated to impress and accomplished the mission with a spartan taste in furniture. She moved behind her all-glass desk and sat down, her back to a tinted window that ran the entire wall. Outside, the sun shone on an exterior quad that contained a Japanese rock garden, a small waterfall that gurgled, and perfectly trimmed topiary animals. She held out her hand. “Please have a seat.”

  “Thank you, but I’d prefer to stand. Now that you got me in here, please, tell me what’s going on.”

  She opened a manila file on her desk as a tease. “First, would you please show me some identification?”

  I took out my wallet and handed over my driver’s license. Her smile disappeared. “Why, this says your name is Karl Higgins.”

  “That’s right—who did you think I was?” I had a complete legend made up to work the sting.

  “I … ah … my receptionist said you were Bruno Johnson.”

  “Who?”

  “There’s been a terrible mistake.” She stood. “What are you doing here?”

  I put on a dumb expression and pointed in the direction of the wall. “My car broke down, and I just came in to use the phone. Johnny Sin doesn’t work here? I thought he worked here.”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry for the confusion.”

  The interior door opened. Out came a voice. “No. No. No, that’s him. That’s Bruno Johnson. He’s yanking on your dick, lady.”

  And in came Derek Sams.

  My breath caught. What was he doing there? A miasma of emotion made the world sp
in and the floor tilt.

  Sams said, “Told ya, you left a note on his door with just the address he’d get curious and come lookin’. He’s always stickin’ that fat nose where it doesn’t belong.”

  I recovered from the shock, gritted my teeth, and took a step toward him. He lost his smile and jumped back. Ms. Franklin hurried round her desk, the flat of her hands pushed outward. “Hold it. Hold it.” She spun on Derek. “I told you to stay in the other room, that was the deal.”

  “I didn’t want to just hear this,” he said. “I wanted to see it. I wanted to see the look on the big man’s face when I finally took him to his knees. I wanted him to see that I outgunned him but good.”

  She reached down to her desk and into the file.

  Seeing Sams, hearing his worthless words, dumped me into a fugue state. I hadn’t stopped moving toward him, instinct telling me what needed to be done.

  Ms. Franklin slapped a paper to my chest. “You’re officially served with a protection order. You cannot come within a thousand feet of my client. And while under this order you are not allowed to carry a firearm. You’re not allowed to call or contact my client in any manner or you will be in violation of this court order and arrested.”

  Derek smiled again. He sucked his teeth the disrespectful way hoods did on the street that said “fuck you.” “Good thing you’re not with the pooolease anymore, Johnson, or they’d have ta give you a rubber gun and put you on the desk. What do you think of that, Mister Big Assed Bruno Johnson? I kin just see you ridin’ a desk. Too bad, huh?”

  I looked down at the paper she held to my chest and relieved her of it. “A protective order? What are you talking about?” I read the single sheet of paper. I knew all about protective orders. I wrote plenty of them while working patrol on calls for service for domestic violence. I wrote them for battered women who needed relief from abusive husbands. Derek Sams was an ignorant street thug too stupid to make a smart play like this. What the hell was going on?

  “Hah, look at the big man. Looks like I got him good. I stumped him for sure. Same as if I pulled the gunny sack over his big head and beat him with a club.”

  His words helped pull me out of my funk. I crumpled the pink sheet and tossed it. “This is just a piece of paper and if you think that it’s going to—”

  Ms. Franklin picked up the file folder from her desk. “We took a full deposition from our client in case something happens to him. We are filing a lawsuit for punitive damages, cruelty, duress, torture, kidnap, false imprisonment, and emotional and physical abuse. I’d advise you to seek legal counsel before you say another word.”

  I took a step back, again stunned. “A lawsuit?” Sams had managed to get out of custody and out from underneath a slam-dunk manslaughter charge. Now he had found a way to pull me into court? He’d turned the tables, gone on the offensive, and caught me flat-footed.

  “Yes, a lawsuit to recover damages. And again, I’m advising you right now that if anything happens to my client, I will personally seek criminal charges against you. Now, please leave this office.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  I DIDN’T MOVE from where I stood in Ms. Franklin’s office. I just stared at Derek Sams. How could he be standing there? How did he get there?

  Three years earlier, with dark intent, I grabbed him up from the street in front of a pager store on Central Avenue and took him for a ride. He was dating my daughter, Olivia, at the time and had put her in jeopardy twice. Due to his nefarious ways, crazed cokeheads with guns held her against her will in a rock house. The second time, he took her to dinner while carrying a gun. Like any concerned father, I wanted to protect my daughter. I just wasn’t sure how. That night I had set out to permanently solve the problem with a little blood and bone.

  But I erred. My mistake. A simple one really: I’d spoken to him when I shouldn’t have. I should’ve put a piece of tape over his mouth. At the time he came off as nothing more than a soft, vulnerable kid, the kind of victim I worked hard to champion my entire career. In the end, I couldn’t do it. I put him on a bus to Barstow to go live with his father. I gave him a stern admonishment never to return and what the consequences would be if he did. My lack of the proper corrective action that night was one of the biggest mistakes of my life. Had I carried through with what I intended, my daughter and grandson Albert would still be alive. We’d still be a family. I was ashamed of my lack of fortitude, at my inability to protect my family. I never told anyone what I had done.

  Except Dad. When I told him, he reassured me that I’d made the right choice. But the right choice for whom? Surely not for Olivia and Albert.

  Now, in the office, Derek appeared different somehow, older, mature. He’d filled out, even since the night I’d caught up with him at the Green Spot Motel in Victorville and crushed his fingers in the doorjamb until he told me the truth about what he’d done to grandson, little Albert. Derek stood six feet tall, a hundred and sixty pounds, and he’d let his Afro grow long while in jail fighting his manslaughter case. He had not cut it after his release. He had pale green eyes behind light black skin sprinkled with freckles. People in the ghetto labeled this common look as a “strawberry.”

  In those sparse few seconds, I stared him down. What struck me odd and would forever change my view of him was his five o’clock shadow. I had not noticed it before. In my mind I had always seen him as a kid, a misguided child.

  Olivia had been nothing more than a kid trying to get by in an adult world, so I had equated the same for him. She worked hard to raise her two twin boys and this … this creature had ruined all of that. But the light beard now made Derek Sams a man, it brought him firmly into my world, it made him subject to all the penalties the real world afforded people who violated the law, who violated the sanctity of family.

  I let loose a lazy grin.

  “What are you smiling at, big man? You got nothin’ to smile about. You lose big-time. I’m going to own you. You understand? Own you. I’m gonna take your car, your house, everything you got. Even that dumbass ratty shirt on your back.”

  “Did Johnny Sin help you out with this? I know you don’t have the brain power or the funds to pull it off.”

  “Who? What are you trying to say? I thought this up all on my own. Me. And I got money. I got a crew on the street slingin’ rock for me.”

  Ms. Franklin put a restraining hand on Derek’s chest. “Take it easy. He’s just trying to antagonize you. Don’t say another word.” She turned back toward me. “Get out.”

  “Tell Johnny, when you see him, I’m coming for him.”

  Derek said, “I don’t know no Johnny Sin. What the hell are you talking about?”

  I’d regained control of my emotions. I’d said it to check his reaction in search of the truth. I couldn’t read him, though. He seemed genuine in his response. But that couldn’t be. To have the forest-green Ford F150 parked three blocks away was too big of a coincidence, and I learned the hard way to never believe in coincidences.

  Unless Johnny Sin had just been following me.

  Ms. Franklin kept one hand on Derek’s chest and pushed a button on her desk phone. “Call the police.”

  The receptionist replied, “Right away.”

  “Why are you working for this guy?” I asked her. “Do you know what he’s done? He’s a despicable lowlife who doesn’t care about anything but his own skin.” I wanted to say that he killed children, but those words proved too dark to bring into the light of day.

  She removed her hand from Derek’s chest and spun around, her eyes flashing angrily. “I do know who I’m working for. I’m doing it because every person needs access to a voice.” She reached down and took up Derek’s left hand. His three crushed fingers had not healed properly and had turned into gnarled tree roots. Thinking he knew more than the doctor, he probably took the splints off too soon. “I do it because of this. Because people like you run roughshod over the victims of this world who can’t defend themselves. You, sir, are nothing more than a s
treet thug who exploits the weak.”

  My breath caught. For a brief moment her description fit me like a glove. During my entire career, I had worked hard to champion the rights of children and of those who could not defend themselves. Her accusation cut me down and challenged my core beliefs. But the sight of Derek’s smug expression snapped me out of it.

  “He’s anything but a victim. Do you know what this man did to my family? Or do you even care?”

  Her anger faded a little. “We’re not here to debate the issue. You’ll get your chance in court.”

  I smirked.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing. I just realized it’s his left hand. If I had thought it through that night, and played it smart, I would’ve done his trigger finger on his right hand.” I held up my hand and worked the index finger and thumb to mimic firing a gun at him. I winked.

  Her mouth sagged open in shock.

  I turned and walked out.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  I CAME OUT of the building into the bright sunlight. I’d let the moment in Ms. Franklin’s office get away from me. In front of Derek’s attorney, I had as much as admitted to crushing Derek’s fingers. Now they would have an easy path to winning their civil judgment. Another error. Proof positive that when emotionally involved in a situation it is always a good practice to back out and let someone else handle it.

  A horn honked. And honked again. I held my arm up to shield the glare until my eyes adjusted. A dark gray Taurus with smoked windows pulled a U-turn in the middle of the street and parked at the curb three feet away. The side window whirred down. “Get in the car, asshole.”