The Ruthless

by David Putnam

  “Johnny Sin beat a friend of mine. He might not make it. I just came from there. That’s how I found out Johnny knows I’m a deputy.”

  “And you’re telling me you don’t want to take this place head-on?”

  Thinking about what Sin did to Nigel made me want to throw caution to the wind. But that’s exactly what Sin wanted. We wouldn’t catch him flat-footed; he’d be waiting for us.

  In all my years working with Wicks, I had always been the voice of reason keeping him from burning down the world. That was the second reason why he kept me around, to keep at least one foot of his placed firmly in reality. Not this time. I no longer had to worry about the brass in the aftermath second-guessing poor tactics. In a few hours I wouldn’t have a badge. And Johnny Sin, more than anyone else, deserved to have his world burned down.

  “Tonight, I’m with you all the way.”

  “Now you’re talkin’, buddy boy.”

  “I need a gun.”

  “Glove box, there’s a Glock with an extra mag. How do you want to do this?”

  I pulled out the Glock and press-checked for a round in the chamber. “How about like Encinitas?”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  “YOU THINK THAT’S better than driving through the front window? I don’t.”

  Wicks’ cell phone rang. He picked it up. “Yeah.” He listened.

  I watched his eyes as he looked straight at me. They hardened as he said, “Is that right?”

  The word had already gone out about what had happened at the pager/cell phone store on Central.

  He clicked off still staring at me. “We’re going to have to talk after all this is over.”

  “Yeah, I figured as much. I don’t have a problem with it. I just want to make sure my dog’s okay first. That’s not asking for much.”

  He didn’t answer.

  I opened my cell and dialed the number to Harry and Sons Oil to Nuts. Someone picked up but didn’t say a word, their breathing normal.

  I made my voice urgent. “Cops are on the way. Get out! Get out!” I hung up.

  Ten seconds later headlights came on around the back of the store and lit up the cinderblock wall to the rear. A large truck lumbered into view. I dialed James Barlow’s number. He picked up on the first ring.

  I said, “Okay, you’re up. It’s a large truck coming your way. Watch your ass, they’re armed and dangerous.”

  “Got it.”

  Wicks said, “Hey, what are you doing? This is supposed to be our takedown.”

  The truck blew by, three people in the cab. Painted on the side in a professional elegant style were the words, scrolled in red in an arc over the top of a city’s skyscrapers, “TransWorld Logistics.” This was the load truck Johnny was going to drive to the gun deal. He had a sick sense of humor.

  Wicks started the car and put his hand on the gear shift to throw it in gear. I stopped him. “Wait, our target isn’t in the truck. He sent the truck out as a decoy, a distraction so he can weasel out. Keep your lights off and drive around back. You better hurry.”

  Wicks took off, the car accelerating fast. Behind us automatic gunfire ignited in a string of rapid pops from multiple guns that lit up the night. LAPD had engaged the truck. The gunfire continued after the first volley.

  “Damn.” Wicks slammed his fist on the steering wheel. “We picked the wrong end of this thing. All the action’s back there.” He whipped the car around to the back of the building.

  Jumbo and Johnny Sin came out the back door on the loading dock. Johnny fired a handgun. His round spider-webbed the windshield. The round came at an angle and embedded in the back seat

  “This is more like it,” Wicks said. He skidded into the loading area and bailed out while Johnny let go with two more rounds, the noise loud in the enclosed area.

  Jumbo threw his hands in the air and lay down. Johnny disappeared back inside. Wicks bounded up the concrete steps to the door, his hand on the knob when he turned, expecting me to be right there with him.

  I held my ribs tight and ran out into the alley away from the loading dock door. I ran along the side of the building and came out into the front. Johnny had exited the front door seconds before and was running across the parking lot with a gun in his hand.

  I stopped and yelled, “Hold it.”

  He stopped dead in his tracks still facing away. His back stiffened as he slowly turned. He held the gun in his hand down by his leg. I couldn’t read his eyes behind his sunglasses—his intent.

  “Don’t do it. Drop it.”

  A slow grin crept across his face.

  His gun rose in a flash.

  I let go three quick rounds from a gun I’d never held before. The gun popped and kicked in my hand. Two rounds thudded into Johnny Sin’s chest. He grunted, flew backward, and skidded along the asphalt. He was on his back and didn’t move.

  Wicks burst out the front door, gun up, eyes wild. He took in the scene. “God damn you, Bruno. You played me. Bogardus must’ve been in the truck, and I missed him, too. I got dick in there and you got to take the shot out here.”

  I slowly walked up on Johnny Sin, who didn’t move at all. When he hit the asphalt, his gun had skittered away. I stood over him. Blood stains grew wider in the light-blue material of his security guard uniform. I couldn’t see his eyes behind the sunglasses and maybe that was better. An uneventful end to a violent man’s reign.

  Three cars zoomed up and skidded to a stop. LAPD. James Barlow appeared at my side, breathing hard. “You okay?”

  That’s what Wicks should’ve asked instead of his mentally deficient rant about missing out on the shot.

  “Yeah, I’m good. Anybody hurt at your end?”

  “Amos caught some shrapnel in the face from a bullet fragment, but that’s it. All three crooks are down hard. Is this the guy?” He pointed to Johnny Sin, who still hadn’t moved and continued to bleed.

  “Yeah, that’s him.”

  James Barlow stepped in close, grabbed Johnny’s limp arm, flipped him over, and knee-dropped the center off his back. Through clenched teeth he said, “Procedure states all suspects involved in an OIS are to be handcuffed.” He handcuffed Johnny Sin. He turned him on his side and slapped the sunglasses away to get a look at his face. Johnny’s eyes were slits exposing only the whites. A trickle of blood ran down the corner of his mouth.

  Paramedics pulled up with rotating red lights, no siren. They got out and went to work on Johnny. I continued to look on, numb. Derek Sams’ parents had legal custody of Alonzo. Dad had shot and killed Derek Sams. I wasn’t a cop anymore and I was going away to prison.

  Three paramedics worked on Johnny, their hands a blur.

  Wicks put a hand on my shoulder and tried to spin me around. “Hey, pal, we need to talk.” I pulled away and held my ground close to Johnny Sin.

  James Barlow sensed the tone. “Leave him alone.”

  “Stay out of this, pal. Bruno, we’re going to talk right now or I’m going to cuff you.”

  James Barlow shoved Wicks. “Back off. Cuff him? Are you out of your mind?”

  One paramedic used a sharp pair of scissors and sliced up the length of Johnny’s pants, cutting off his clothes in a search for other injuries. Johnny still lay on his side while the other two worked on his entrance and exit wounds. The paramedic exposed his right buttocks. The pale white skin on his ass cheek was marred with red ropy scars. The kind of scars I’d seen before and that could only come from one source. A dog bite.

  Jessica Lowe had said William Butterworth had a scar on his butt. She described it as an old bullet wound.

  Johnny Sin was William Butterworth, aka La Vonn Lofton. He was the one who’d killed the judge and his wife. He’d killed Twyla.

  Then it all made sense. Butterworth had also come after me and started with Olivia. He had been the one to overdose my beautiful daughter. Junior Mint had been there that day and taken a bite out of Butterworth’s ass. That swatch of bloodstained denim of Dad’s came from Johnny’s pants. T
hat was why he told Nigel my real name. There was never going to be a gun deal. The whole time he’d been playing me, making my life a living hell. And if I had to guess, Butterworth had also been the one pulling the strings on Derek Sams, telling Derek the moves to make with the attorney.

  Wicks came over for a closer look. “What is it?”

  “It’s William Butterworth, La Vonn Lofton.”

  “You’re kidding me. Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Son of a bitch, we closed both cases at once.”

  I turned to walk away. Wicks lost his smile. “Hey, buddy boy, where do you think you’re going?”

  “My dog’s hurt. I need to go see to him.” I also needed to tell Dad about Butterworth and about how Olivia had not taken her own life.

  “Sorry, no can do. I have to take you in.”

  James Barlow stepped in between us. “You have to do what? Why?”

  “No,” I said. “It’s okay. I do have to take care of what he’s talking about. And I promise I’ll do it as soon as I see to my dog.”

  “Can’t let you do it, Bruno.”

  Barlow put his hands out, blocking Wicks. “Go ahead, Bruno. I’ll stay here and talk with him.”

  “Hey, pal, you don’t want to get in the middle of this. I’ll kick your ass.”

  Did anyone else looking on, the paramedics or the other LAPD officers, notice how Wicks and Barlow looked like father and son? I couldn’t allow them to go to blows.

  “Wait. I’ll go with him.”

  “You sure, Bruno?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure. Come on, let’s go.”

  I walked with him back to the car behind the auto parts store; Wicks didn’t say a word. We got in. I grabbed Wicks’ hand and cuffed it to the steering wheel, and in the same fluid motion, reached in and pulled his Colt .45 and his set of cuffs.

  “Ah, man, you’re making a big mistake here, Bruno.”

  “I’ll turn myself in. You have my word. I just need to talk to my father first.” I got out and moved around the front of the car to his side. He was scrambling to get his cuff key in the handcuffs. I punched him in the face as a distraction, grabbed his free hand, and cuffed it to the outside mirror.

  “That tears it. You better run, Bruno. That’s all I gotta say, you better run far and fast because I’m coming after you.”

  “I’m sorry it had to end this way.”

  I left him in the car and went in search of my dad to tell him what had happened—to tell him goodbye.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Early on in my career as a young police officer, I believed novels and movies were overwrought with story lines involving hit men or contract killers. I thought people who took money to kill another existed, just not as frequently the world of drama would have us believe. Until a murder with a hit man struck our family.

  My aunt Carol and cousin Danny were involved with the Mexican Mafia, selling tar heroin. I had no idea. They seemed so normal at family gatherings. My favorite uncle, Don, found out about their nefarious ways and told them to stop or he’d turn them over to the police. Aunt Carol—his wife—and cousin Danny hired a hit man from Orange County by the name of Cornelius to take him out.

  Uncle Don was a supervisor for the Metropolitan Water District in Indio. Cousin Danny and Cornelius made a fake emergency call about one of the water plants. When Uncle Don got out of his car to open the gate, they shot him in the back of the head. There was little evidence of the crime for the prosecution. The police put a wire on my cousin’s girlfriend and obtained a conversation about the crime. Of course, there is much more to the story.

  Cousin Danny was seventeen at the time and was tried as an adult. He was convicted and sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Only that’s not the way it works in California. After forty years in prison, the governor released him. After forty years, cousin Danny is free, and my favorite uncle, Don, is still dead.

  During my career, I became aware of two other contract killings. Only one of those was solved. The girlfriend of the killer was scared to death of her boyfriend. When he went to jail on another matter, she walked into a police station and told them about the unsolved murder.

  The story line in The Ruthless depicts the murder of a judge and his wife. This really did occur in San Bernardino County. The method of the murder and the lack of evidence points strongly to a hit man.

  In The Ruthless, Bruno Johnson goes undercover as Karl Higgins in a sting operation to bring down a huge illegal arms operation. Not even his family or his former cop colleaugues know that he is still a Los Angeles County sheriff deputy.

  During my career, we used a variety of sting techniques to catch various types of criminals. In the more extensitve operations, federal and state grant money was available to lure the informants. I personally participated in two fencing stings similar to the one described in The Ruthless. Both were highly successful.

  On another occasion, I wrote a search warrant for a house in the high desert that was selling rock cocaine—and a court order to use some rock cocaine from an adjudicated court case that had been sitting in our evidence locker. We executed the search warrant on the rock house—ironically, the “rock house” was constructed with a river rock exterior. We arrested several dealers and seized their rock coke. Then we set up shop selling “our” rock cocaine. We had a wild time with this endeavor. The prospective buyers would knock on the door; we’d answer and invite them in. The rock coke was spread out on a table in different-sized plastic baggies. They would select a bag; we’d hand them the rock; they’d hand us the money; then we’d arrest them. One crook was so high when I showed him the badge that he pushed it away—his focus still on the table filled with baggies of coke. He said, “Maybe I want that one instead; it’s bigger.” I showed him the badge again, said, “You’re under arrest.” He again pushed it away. “No, man, I want to trade this one for that bigger one.”

  In that sting, I realized that we had our prey cornered—something that doesn’t happen in the wild kingdom. The crooks we let in were not searched beforehand and could’ve been armed. Several, once cornered, turned on us with weapons, and we had to confront them.

  In one of my other favorite stings, we had CalTrans build a fake sign that looked like any other highway sign. This one was eight feet by four feet with a blue field and white letters that read, “Narcotic Checkpoint Ahead.” Narcotic checkpoints are strictly illegal in the U.S. We didn’t put up a checkpoint; we just put up the sign. Signs aren’t illegal.

  We posted the sign on I-40 in a known narcotic corridor. Farther along, where the nonexistent checkpoint might be, we parked a marked cop car with its overhead red and blue lights rotating. Then we sat on the off-ramp located between the sign and the cop car and watched all the craziness. We had one cop perched in a cedar tree at the bottom of the ramp with a video camera recording the cars running the stop sign as they made a left turn to go over the freeway and get back on the highway in the opposite direction. That’s when we pulled them over—using the stop sign violation as probable cause.

  We didn’t have enough cops to stop everyone who turned around, but we arrested several heavyweight fugitives. We also made several large smuggling cases. One of my cases—a trunk full of naracotics—trailed in Barstow court for three years—some folks out of Oklahoma who’d come to California to buy their dope. They hired heavyweight attorneys who kept postponing the case. One time, yet again waiting on this case to go, I got into a use of force right in the courtroom, but that’s another story.

  All along that off-ramp, the cars that pulled off tossed their contraband, mostly open containers—alcohol, narcotics, narcotic paraphernalia, and weapons. The ramp was littered with these items. It looked like the aftermath of a huge rock concert. It was great fun, like shooting fish in a barrel.

  ABOUT THE TELEPHONE ROBBERY

  I lived next door to and became good friends with a kindly old gentleman who had worked forty years for the phone company. He told me
stories of phone booths and of the millions and millions of coins he dealt with throughout his career and of the many cons used by reprehensible individuals to steal that money. He worked in some of the worst areas of Los Angeles collecting the coins where he was in constant fear of being chunked over the head and mugged for his bags of coin.

  ABOUT BRUNO GETTING SUED BY DEREK SAMS

  During my thirty-one years as a police officer, I was sued thirteen times. This was more than the average, but the kind of people I chased, once cornered, did not, as a rule, stop and throw up their hands in surrender.

  ABOUT THE BRUNO JOHNSON SERIES

  The Ruthless is the fourth and final Bruno early-years novel, finishing off the prequels to the real-time Bruno series, which begins with The Disposables. The four early-years novels begin with The Innocents—Bruno is a young cop when he finds out he is the single father of a baby girl, Olivia, who is placed in his care. That little girl grows up as Bruno battles a tough, brutal career throughout The Reckless, and The Heartless, and culminates in the The Ruthless.

  Having read The Ruthless, you, the reader, can imagine what comes next.

  That takes us to the first (in order of publication) Bruno novel, The Disposables. Current day Bruno is an ex-cop, and now, an ex-con. He no longer has Olivia, but he has a grandson, Alonso. He will do anything to protect this child—and other children.

  The Replacements, The Squandered, and The Vanquished follow as Bruno is called back to Los Angeles County, time and again, to exact justice—and to save children.

  The next Bruno Johnson novel after The Ruthless, The Sinister, will continue the current day Bruno series, where The Vanquish left off.