Night Sun

by Tom Barber

  It worked.

  ‘Both their mothers died when the kids were young,’ Blair went on to explain. ‘They lost their fathers less than twelve months apart and they each went off the rails after that happened. They could’ve been working decent jobs and have had normal lives by now, but Nicky got sent to prison and my step-daughter ended up addicted to drugs and found herself behind bars too a few years after him. They’ve both thrown everything good they ever had away.’

  ‘What was in that safety deposit box on the truck?’

  ‘Something of value to me.’

  ‘That seems clear. Which was?’

  ‘What does any of this have to do with you finding this man you’re after?’

  ‘Me and my colleague are viewing this whole breakout as one big case.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to ask Kat that when you find her. If she isn’t already dead.’

  ‘I can’t believe you’re still insisting on going,’ a woman said to her husband, as they drove along Station Road in Pennsylvania. The two had been arguing almost non-stop since they’d woken up and caught the news on the TV before setting out on the road for a planned short break away.

  ‘I’ve got two days off, I’m not spending them stuck at home.’

  ‘You hear that?’ she asked, pointing at the radio. ‘Bank robbers murdering people out there and you’re taking us to a remote lake house. What are we, in a horror movie? Was this all part of the deal when you booked the place?’

  ‘Sure, they took twenty percent off,’ he bit back.

  ‘What if some convict breaks in when we’re there? What’s it gonna cost us then?’

  ‘Could that happen, Daddy?’ their eight year old daughter asked fearfully from the back seat.

  ‘No, sweetheart.’

  As her parents’ argument continued, the girl looked out of the window and sighed. This was shaping up to be a fun trip. ‘Mom, can I watch a video on your cell?’ she asked. ‘Mom?’

  The woman up front didn’t answer, the adults’ voices fading as the car slowed. Two police cruisers were positioned either side of the road ahead, but as they drew closer, the family in the approaching car saw the cruisers were riddled with bullet holes.

  ‘Mom? What is it?’

  ‘Don’t,’ her mother said to her husband; she’d caught hold of his arm as he went to unclip his seatbelt. He looked at her, then drove the car slightly closer. It was then they both saw what appeared to be dried blood on the road.

  Some of it was spattered across the yellow line dividing the lanes.

  ‘Call 911,’ he told his wife immediately, staring at the cars, but she didn’t answer and he saw why.

  Three armed men had just emerged from the woods beside them and were approaching the car.

  ‘You don’t have to tell me what was in that deposit box,’ Marquez persisted with Blair, still standing on the stoop to the woman’s upper-middle class suburban home. ‘But just do me a quick favor instead; explain why your own stepdaughter would try to steal from you. Seems a little unusual, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Not at all. Kat’s an addict, same as my ex back in Indiana. You’ll know from your line of work, these people will take anything not nailed down to get another score. I stopped tolerating behavior like that a long time ago.’

  ‘Hitting a bank truck isn’t exactly sneaking twenty bucks from your purse.’

  ‘Kat’s never been a strong character. She was sick a lot when she as a teenager. Underweight. Unhealthy. And she was a daddy’s girl, which meant she learned things from him. I don’t mean like how to ride a bike or shoot a basketball.’

  ‘So what do you mean?’

  ‘This isn’t something I usually share.’ She paused. ‘My husband did time in prison himself when he was young. He was hustling people, working scams on the street, and got caught. Kat inherited that trait. She looks for the easy way out rather than working hard. Always has done. A weak girl turned into a lazy addict of an adult. After Thomas died, I discovered she’d started medicating with prescription drugs. She barely graduated high school and began slacking as she got more depressed; I was forced to ban her from the house and cut her off when it became clear she was stealing from me and spending the money on pills and alcohol. Now she’s robbing bank trucks and committing federal crimes. Getting herself shot in the process.’

  ‘Do you talk?’

  ‘No, and we never will again after this. I’m done with her. This whole mess is her biggest screw-up by far, but it’s not the first illegal act she’s committed. Our relationship broke down years ago after she started using and getting into trouble. I don’t associate with pill poppers and junkies. Like I just told you, we left that behind back in Indiana when Alaina’s father decided to leave.’

  ‘Kat hasn’t been rearrested since she was released from ORW over three years ago. They’ll have drug-tested her, so she must’ve stayed clean.’

  ‘Or she’s been using someone’s else’s piss,’ Blair snapped. Marquez was taken aback by the woman’s sudden flare of temper and coarse language, at odds with the cool elegance she’d projected until that moment. ‘Even if she isn’t downing prescriptions anymore, her lifestyle’s finally caught up with her. She’s going down.’

  ‘You’re happy about that?’

  ‘Of course I’m not, but she needs to face the consequences of her actions. We all do.’ Blair stopped talking, her brown eyes staring directly into Marquez’s own. Having to talk about Kat seemed to have rattled her; she straightened and removed her arm from across the door. ‘There, I’ve said my piece. Are we done?’

  ‘Is this your number?’ Marquez asked, showing the woman the details Richie had given her. Blair nodded. ‘I’m not gonna be in town long, but might want to chat again. The police here or US Marshals are also gonna need to ask you more questions.’

  Blair didn’t respond and stepping back, closed the door without another word. Marquez turned and left, walking to the corner where her taxi was still waiting.

  Least we can count out Kat coming here looking for help, she thought, as she got inside the cab and the vehicle drew away.

  ‘GET OUT OF THE CAR!’ Brooks shouted at the man, woman and child in the SUV on Station Road in Pennsylvania, the couple’s argument forgotten, the family looking at him, Billy and Lupinetti in terror. ‘OUT!’

  The two adults reached for their door handles with shaking hands while their little girl sat frozen in horror, unable to move; Lupinetti was standing guard on the road, looking both ways for more approaching traffic, but it was as he looked back up in the direction heading west that he saw a black 4x4 had appeared on the brow of the hill.

  The vehicle had already stopped and there was a figure standing beside it, something in his shoulder. The car had police lights in the front fender, but it wasn’t just the 4x4 that Lupinetti recognized.

  It was the man beside it.

  ‘GET DOWN!’ he warned Brooks and Billy, just before a muzzle flashed followed by the report of a gunshot echoing around the area. Billy had reacted to Lupinetti’s shout but not fast enough and he shouted in pain as blood sprayed in the air, the bullet ripping through the outer flesh of his arm.

  Inside the family SUV, the woman and girl screamed but the husband was suddenly galvanized into action and slammed the car into Reverse. The vehicle started to pull back fast, the man steering erratically away from the three fugitives, who were no longer paying them attention, instead separating and returning fire on the man in the distance who’d moved back behind his 4x4.

  Crouching behind the Ford, a rifle from the trunk in his shoulder, Archer saw the SUV reversing wildly towards him so he kept blasting at the convicts ahead to draw their fire, giving the people in the car a chance to pull back and escape. Twenty seconds ago, he’d crested the brow of the hill in time to see the unmistakable figures of the brothers and Frank approaching the vehicle with weapons raised, Brooks and Billy still dressed as CHPD cops; but their attention on the SUV meant they’d missed seeing him arrive, get o
ut and retrieve then load the rifle from the trunk.

  He’d targeted the Loughlins first, wanting Frank alive, but now Archer was forced to duck behind the Ford as the intensity of their fire increased, two of the tires on the recently-repaired police 4x4 taking hits and sagging. ‘Not again,’ he muttered, swearing to himself, knowing he needed the car. As the family’s SUV drew level with him, the two adults and child staring at him in terror, he waved them backwards and shouted: ‘POLICE! GET OUT OF HERE!’

  The man didn’t need the order repeated and swung the vehicle around then sped away from the firefight, but then the gunfire ceased and Archer risked a look in time to see the two Loughlin brothers running towards one of two police cruisers littered with bullet holes parked across the road.

  ‘KILL THAT SON OF A BITCH!’ Billy screamed, clutching his wounded arm. Brooks spun the wheel of the shot-up car, the vehicle having to do for the moment until they could steal a new one, but then bullets suddenly hit the cruiser from another direction. As he ducked, Brooks saw one of the local officers from the Winnebago shootout was still alive and was leaning against a tree, blood around his mouth, his face white as he fired awkwardly with a sidearm he’d just pulled from an ankle holster.

  Despite this latest distraction, Lupinetti hadn’t taken his eyes off Archer, frantically trying to work out how he could have tracked them here; at the same time, he saw him run for the trees to his left, seeming to be planning to use them as cover to work his way closer while the Loughlins were distracted.

  ‘It’s the cop who shot Craig!’ he shouted to the Loughlins, desperate to get their focus back on Archer. Hearing Lupinetti and realizing he was right, Brooks slammed his way out of the car, used the door as a shield and unloaded his rifle at his youngest brother’s killer with a fresh savagery, the weapon echoing as it spat out empty shells, gun-smoke clouding the air around him. With his uninjured arm, Billy lifted his handgun to kill the officer in the undergrowth still firing on them, but rifle fire from Archer forced him down in his seat, the bullets ripping through the windshield.

  Desperate to escape the NYPD cop on his tail as well as the brothers, Lupinetti saw the Loughlins were now fully engaged battling the two cops, which presented an opportunity he’d been waiting for. Billy was the first to be aware of the other cruiser speeding off.

  ‘HE’S SPLITTING!’ he shouted to his brother who didn’t answer, too focused on killing Archer.

  Down the road, Archer’s rifle clicked dry and he pulled back behind a tree to reload, but by the time the fresh magazine was in, the shot-up cop car was taking off down Station Road towards NY State.

  He moved back onto the road and aimed the rifle, but the cruiser was already too far away.

  He kept running down the tarmac towards the officer who’d been firing from the tree-line on the other side of the road, but he’d taken another couple of bullets and was dead. Then he saw three more cops were lying there too, dumped in the undergrowth. Once he’d checked each one and found there was nothing he could do for any of them, Archer took a radio to call it in as he watched the two cruisers racing away into the distance. He’d managed to track down Brooks, Billy and Frank again, catching them by complete surprise.

  But with the body count rising this fast, neither he or the local police could afford to lose them again.

  THIRTY FOUR

  In sharp contrast to the Loughlins’ and Lupinetti’s latest violent encounter with area police and Archer, Nicky was managing to keep a much lower profile. After being handed the list of items for Kat’s two vital imminent procedures, he’d secured Dr Tejwani to the other motel room bed with duct tape bought in readiness, making sure the surgeon couldn’t make any noise by putting a strip over his mouth. He gave Kat a quick check too; she was awake but clearly in a lot of pain and only seemed semi-aware of what was going on. He’d given her the last of the oxycodone taken from the biker but could see it was starting to wear off.

  He’d then returned to the store in the doctor’s Mercedes. The man’s phone started going again as he was driving but he waited for it to ring out and a few seconds later a text came up on the car’s interior screen: your brother’s kids already ate most of the potato chips, can you get more? Nicky guessed from the female name that it was the surgeon’s wife; no sign of her being worried yet by her husband’s non-appearance at home, so she hadn’t raised the alarm. Good; that gave him and Kat a bit more time. Nicky parked in the lot at Wegmans and took the phone with him as he quickly walked inside the store, glancing at the Mustang he’d taken from the biker’s scrapyard which he’d abandoned here. By the time it was discovered, he hoped to be long gone.

  He went from aisle to aisle, quickly collecting the items the doctor had put on the list; he wanted to get back to the motel as soon as he could, concerned that the surgeon would find a way to escape from his binds or despite the Do Not Disturb tag over the door-handle, a cleaner working room-to-room might unlock the door and discover them. With Kat deteriorating too, there was no time to waste. Nicky took the opportunity to collect some antiseptic zinc oxide cream as well, his back still sore from getting scraped over the speedbump at Gatlin when he was under the laundry truck. He paid for the supplies at the checkout, then when he got back behind the wheel and drove out of the lot, another store caught his eye.

  ‘Unless you want her to scream so loud they hear her in the next county, she’s going to need something to numb the pain,’ the doctor had warned him. Nicky made a stop outside a Wines and Spirits outlet, Pennsylvania’s strict alcohol laws recently relaxed slightly to allow sales on Sundays, and bought a small bottle of Jim Beam, showing his fake ID when the clerk asked for it. Like in the supermarket and the lot outside the Wegmans, the cameras around the place felt as if they were scorching his skin as they captured his image, but getting hold of these supplies was vital. Last of all, he stopped to buy a Leatherman multitool pocketknife from a Lowes he’d also seen on the drive over here, then drove quickly back to the motel.

  ‘Give her some of the whiskey,’ Tejwani told him once Nicky had returned and cut him free, the supplies in the bag laid out on the table in the room. The prison fugitive unscrewed the bottle, found a glass in the bathroom, and after tilting Kat’s head back tipped the alcohol into her mouth; she was able to put down three pours, coughing from the first as the liquid burned her dry throat. Feeding someone with previous addiction problems oxycodone and liquor in close order wasn’t ideal, but that was a problem for another day. He’d already taken the revolver from her hand and tucked it back into his pocket, before making sure the Do Not Disturb tag on the door outside was still in place.

  In the meantime, Tejwani pulled on some latex gloves and unbuttoned Kat’s shirt before using a set of scissors purchased from the store to snip away the rudimentary padding and bandages Nicky had first applied after they’d split from the truck robbery. Now the doc had scissors in his hand, Nicky wasn’t taking his eye off him for a second. Twelve years in federal prison and all.

  But instead of trying to stab him, Tejwani removed the last of the gauze, put the scissors down and as Nicky took them away, he saw the wound again. The bullet-hole was between two of her ribs on her right side, standing out starkly against the pale smooth skin, but twenty four hours had passed since she was shot which he knew meant sepsis could have already set in, the bacteria from the wound’s internal damage spreading into her bloodstream.

  ‘Turn that light on,’ Tejwani told Nicky, pointing to a built-in light beside the bed. As Nicky flicked the switch, the doctor opened several antiseptic wipes and used them to carefully clean the area around the wound. Then he picked up two pairs of tweezers, fresh from the packet like the scissors. ‘This might take some finding,’ he warned. ‘Get her ready.’

  Nicky took a pillow and positioned it carefully so the end was over Kat’s mouth but left her nose clear. She took the hint and drew in a deep breath before biting down on the fabric.

  He steadied her then nodded to the doctor beside him.<
br />
  Three pours of Kentucky bourbon were enough to render Katherine nicely buzzed, but she still screamed into the pillow as Tejwani pushed one set of tweezers into the bullet hole then released them in order to stretch the wound open, before searching for the metal slug with the second set.

  ‘Nothing?’ Nicky asked anxiously.

  ‘There are shards of rib everywhere; it’s making it difficult,’ he said, before withdrawing the tweezers to reset, leaving the first set in place. Kat started crying; with one free hand, Nicky tipped another shot of whiskey into the glass and she drank it before he put the pillow back and Tejwani dug in for the bullet again, eliciting another muffled scream as Nicky held her still. ‘There,’ the doctor said with satisfaction, his passion for his work making him temporarily forget where he was and the circumstances he was operating under. Nicky caught a glimpse of blood-smeared metal as Tejwani slowly and gently coaxed the bullet out. Once it was free, Nicky eyed the flattened piece of metal held between the prongs of the tweezers.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, before looking at Kat and seeing she was still having difficulty breathing.

  ‘We’re not done yet,’ Tejwani told him. He placed the bullet carefully on the bedside table, removed the first set of tweezers still holding the wound open, then used some clean gauze and more antiseptic to wipe around the entire area, before applying adhesive surgical tape strips and padding to patch the wound. ‘Now that lung needs to be re-inflated.’

  From the time he’d been a high school student over thirty five years ago, Ramesh Tejwani’s parents had taught him the importance of being punctual. His wife was also a creature of habit; they both got up in the morning at the same time, ate breakfast and were out of the door heading for their respective practices at 7:45am sharp, taking turns to drop their kids off at school on the way. The end of the day also followed a routine, and on the occasions that either would be late, they always called to let the other know.