Willis waited until Patterson brought his sobbing under control before telling him that there was a chance he’d be able to go back to his family. “I didn’t bring you here to kill you. One of your hit men murdered an associate of mine and stole a large amount of money that belonged to us. All we want is our money back. If you supervised this assignment and you give us the name of the hit man involved, we’ll let you walk away from here once we get our money back.”
Patterson gave Willis a dubious look. “You’d just let me walk out of here?”
“Why not? All we want is our money. Besides, you wouldn’t be able to tell your Factory bosses what happened. If you did, and even if they believed you when you left out the part of how you betrayed one of your hit men, they still wouldn’t be able to trust you and they’d have you eliminated.”
He accepted what Willis told him. “What if the assignment wasn’t one of mine and I don’t know who the field agent is?”
Willis shrugged. “Then you’re not seeing your family again. Our friend who was killed was named Cam Howlitz. Do you know who was assigned?”
Patterson nodded, a wave of relief relaxing his facial muscles. “That was one of mine,” he said. “The agent’s name is Martin Luce.”
Willis gave him a hard look trying to decide whether he was lying or not, but couldn’t tell. “When was the hit done?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Luce hadn’t reported it yet.”
“How was the hit designated?”
Patterson smiled at that. “Natural causes.”
“Where did the hit take place?”
“I don’t know.” Thin lines grooved Patterson’s forehead as he concentrated to remember something. “The target lived in Scituate,” he said at last, nodding. “Given the designation, I’m assuming the assignment was carried out in the target’s residence.”
Willis straightened up, his knees creaking as he did so. “What’s Luce’s address?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I’d have to access Factory files for that.”
“What’s his phone number?”
“I don’t have that memorized either.”
“How come you didn’t have a cell phone on you?”
“I left it at the office. I guess I didn’t want any of my field agents calling me last night.”
“You’re not being very helpful to us in tracking down Luce.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t what else I can tell you.”
Willis pulled his .40-caliber pistol from his waistband. “You almost could’ve walked out of here,” he said. He flicked the safety off and pointed the muzzle of the gun at Patterson.
“No, no, no!” Patterson screamed. “Look in my briefcase! I have a device you can use to locate Luce! It can track any employee from their badge!”
Patterson looked as if he were about to pass out, and his screaming so vehemently left his voice hoarse. Willis shoved the gun back in his waistband leaving it hidden by his jacket. He took the tracking device from his pocket and powered it on. He had done it earlier, but the screen needed a badge number before proceeding.
“What’s Luce’s badge number?”
“You don’t need it. Press two, six and nine simultaneously for three seconds.”
Willis did as he was told, and the screen changed to show a list of names. He scrolled through it and counted twenty-two names. He then went back to where he had seen Luce’s name. When he selected it, the screen gave him an address in Scituate. He showed the address to Hendrick and Gannier, but neither of them recognized it.
“If you get your money back, you’re going to let me live?” Patterson asked, his voice shaky.
Willis nodded. He lowered himself again into a crouch so he could force the gag back in Patterson’s mouth. Once that was done he straightened up, and with a tilt of his head, signaled for Hendrick and Gannier to follow him up the basement steps. After they were out of the basement and had the door closed behind them, Gannier offered that he couldn’t tell whether the guy was lying or not.
“He could just be playing for time,” Gannier said. “You know, throwing us one of his goons and hoping that we get caught or killed. Or that someone stumbles on him while we’re off on our goose chase.”
“That’s not it,” Hendrick stated, his jaw muscles tightening. “He knew where Cam lived and how he was killed. The guy he gave us, Luce, is the fucker we’re after.”
“Maybe,” Gannier said. “I don’t know. It just seemed too easy getting him to spill his guts.” Then to Willis, “Burke, I thought these guys were supposed to be tough, hardened muthafuckas. This guy was a pussy. What’s going on? Is he on the level or is he playing us?”
Willis scratched his jaw as he considered it, then shook his head. “It was mostly a performance,” he said. “He wants to live, and he doesn’t care if we kill this Luce character. But Luce is still probably who we’re after.”
“He has to be the guy. Especially with him being in Scituate now,” Hendrick insisted.
Willis shrugged. He thought it was likely, but he wasn’t entirely convinced. It was just too easy getting Patterson to tell what he knew. It was also possible that Luce was on another assignment in Scituate and had nothing to do with Howlitz, McCoy, and their money, because it didn’t make sense for him to be there otherwise. If the GPS address had him outside of either Hendrick’s or Gannier’s house, then it would’ve made perfect sense, but not if he was at an address those two didn’t recognize. So maybe Patterson was on the level, or maybe he was simply playing out the cards he was dealt the best he could.
Willis told Hendrick he was going to talk to Finder, which caused the other man’s face to redden and his jaw muscles tightened to where his skin looked like it might rip.
“We haven’t wasted enough time yet?” Hendrick demanded.
“I’ll be talking to him for no more than five minutes,” Willis said, rubbing his knuckles impatiently. It had gotten tiresome to deal with Hendrick, and every minute he spent with him made him question whether it was worth going after the money if the guy was going to act like that. “Which will be a lot less than what we’ll be wasting if Patterson gave us the wrong man.”
Bowser had started to push himself to his feet, and Willis ordered him to lay back down, which the dog did after letting out a few angry grunts in protest. Hendrick opened his mouth as if he were going to continue arguing the point about spending time interrogating Finder. Willis ignored him and headed up the stairs. While he did that, he called Hanley and gave him Martin Luce’s name and asked for an address. Hanley told him he’d call him back.
Willis found Elliot Finder in what used to be a young girl’s bedroom given the posters that were still hung on the wall. Finder was on the short side, stocky. His ankles were taped together, and he was left sitting on the floor barefoot with his arms behind his back and his wrists tied together and bound to a radiator pipe. Only stubble remained of his reddish hair as he had shaved it close to the scalp revealing a bullet-shaped head. Hendrick and Gannier had shoved his socks in his mouth to gag him. Both of his eyes were badly swollen, his nose looked like a lump of raw hamburger meat and the area around his mouth was a bloody mess. Still, he sneered at Willis and maintained his sneer even after Willis detected a glint of recognition in Finder’s eyes.
Willis reached down and grabbed Finder’s jaw tightly enough to make the man wince, and pulled the socks out of his mouth. The Factory supervisor spat out blood and continued to sneer at Willis.
“Look who’s here,” Finder forced out, his voice hoarse and cracking. “A goddamn traitor. Too bad we haven’t killed you yet, but we will.”
Willis was amazed. From Finder’s reaction, he believed that The Factory was killing terrorists. Patterson must’ve told the truth about being misled on who they were killing. It didn’t seem possible that The Factory high command could keep their supervisors in the dark like that, especially given that Willis’s ex-supervisor, Tom Barron, knew all about what was really going on, but it seemed tha
t that was what was happening.
“You haven’t connected the dots yet on who you’re really killing? I could let you die thinking you’re a hero, but fuck that. Tom Barron knew that you weren’t killing terrorists, but just out-of-work slobs, and that The Factory’s real mission is to get the unemployment rate down to something manageable.”
A flicker of doubt showed in Finder’s eyes as maybe at that moment he was connecting the dots on his victims. He spat out more blood, then told Willis he was lying.
“No, I’m afraid not.”
Willis lowered himself and pushed his fist against Finder’s throat, modulating the pressure so that he wouldn’t kill him right away, but he used enough pressure so that Finder knew he’d be dead within a minute. Finder wanted to keep sneering, but he couldn’t. There was too much confusion and doubt mixing in his eyes. He probably wanted to know the truth about who he’d been arranging to have killed. Maybe he didn’t want to die not knowing.
“Unfortunately for you, we took another Factory supervisor. Allen Patterson. I’m guessing you know him?” Willis didn’t wait for an answer. “It doesn’t matter whether you do or not. He told us what we needed to know. That one of his men killed Cam Howlitz. So Patterson gets to live and you get to die.”
“He’s lying,” Finder forced out, his voice barely a gurgle, his face purple.
Willis released the pressure. It took Finder a minute before he was able to regain his breath enough to talk.
“Howlitz was one of mine,” he claimed.
“How was his death designated?”
Finder made a face. “Natural causes.”
“Where did Howlitz live?”
Finder’s face scrunched up more to show how ridiculous he found the question. “I handle over twenty assignments each week. I don’t memorize each of the cases. But Howlitz lived somewhere on the South Shore.”
“Who did you assign to Howlitz?”
Finder hesitated a moment before asking Willis why it was important to him to know.
“Because whoever it was stole a lot of money of ours, and we want it back. You’ve got five seconds to tell me who you assigned before I decide you’re full of shit.”
Finder tried to meet Willis’s stare, but his blood-red eyes weakened and he looked away. “If I tell you, I get to live and Patterson dies?”
“If we get our money back from the guy you give us, yeah.”
“Jeremy Dunson,” Finder said, his voice a cracked whisper.
“What’s his badge number?”
Finder shook his head. “I don’t have it memorized, but he lives in Revere. You’re a smart guy, right? It shouldn’t be too hard for you to track him down.”
Hendrick had taken Finder’s cell phone when they grabbed him. He powered it on and showed Willis a call log that had Dunson’s cell phone number. Indecision weakened Hendrick’s expression, as if he weren’t so sure anymore whether Luce was their guy. Willis forced Finder’s mouth open, and shoved his socks back in to gag him. Willis then led Hendrick and Gannier out of the room. As they walked down the staircase to the first floor, Willis called Hanley and told him they needed Dunson’s home address also. Hanley sounded annoyed that he was being asked for more information, but told Willis he’d call him back when he had the address, and that he was still waiting to hear about Luce’s address. Hanley paused, then added, “This business just keeps spreading. That’s four names now. Four guys you got to take care of.”
“Maybe not,” Willis said. “If our guy stashed the money where he lives, we might not have to do anything with these two.”
“Yeah? And how likely is that?”
“Likely. Doubtful that our guy would’ve had time yet to stash it anyplace else.”
Willis disconnected the call and turned to Hendrick and Gannier. “Either of those two could be who we’re after,” Willis said. “Or it could be someone else entirely. It’s possible these Factory supervisors are briefed on all the targets within their office, not just the ones they’re responsible for. So it could be a different hit man and supervisor.”
“Patterson knew Cam lived in Scituate. Finder could’ve guessed the South Shore because of my accent and Jared’s,” Hendrick said without much conviction.
“Possibly, or maybe he remembered the briefing better.” Willis breathed in deeply and let the air out slowly as he shook his head. “The one break we have is our guy is probably too busy looking for us to find a better place to stash the money. Once we get those addresses, we’ll break in and see if the money’s there. If not, we’ll have to grab both of them and see what they can tell us.”
“What if it’s neither of those two guys?” Gannier asked. “What if it’s like you said earlier, that it could be a different supervisor involved?”
Willis’s eyes dulled as he scratched his jaw. “Then we have a decision to make,” he said. “We either walk away from the money or we squeeze out of Patterson and Finder names of other supervisors in the Boston office. It will be tougher to grab any more of them after grabbing these two, but not impossible. But it’s premature to worry about that now.” Willis whistled for Bowser who had been laying on the floor watching Willis intently. The dog pushed himself to his feet and scampered over to Willis.
“I’ll take Luce,” Willis said. “If I don’t hear back from Hanley in time, I’ll be able to track Luce down as long as he keeps his badge with him and try to intercept him. You two head off to Revere. When I hear back from Hanley, I’ll call you with an address.”
Hendrick gave Bowser a disgusted look. “You’re taking the dog with you?” he asked.
“I’m not leaving him here,” Willis said.
Willis turned from them and left the house with Bowser staying close to his side.
Chapter 12
McCoy sat in the darkened closet sweating profusely. He’d been struggling for almost two hours to maneuver his arms past his ass as if his arms were a jump rope that he was trying to slide underneath himself. When he was in high school he could’ve done it. Back then he was eighty pounds lighter and as thin as a bean pole. He was also a star on the wrestling team, and had a good deal of strength and flexibility. Even though he had put on all that added weight since then and appeared stocky with thick stubby arms, he was still deceptively athletic and somewhat limber. If he had just a little bit larger opening he would’ve been able to do it already, but with the way that psycho had taped his wrists together there just wasn’t that much space.
The fucking psycho. Unless he was dead, McCoy knew that psycho could be back any minute. Maybe someone killed him. Maybe that was why he hadn’t come back yet. McCoy hoped so. He’d given Luce Burke’s address, and McCoy liked Burke’s chances, especially with his dog there to alert him when that psycho got anywhere near his rental cottage. But that would only be if Burke was still hanging around there, which McCoy didn’t think was likely. If Burke didn’t get him, maybe one of the others would. McCoy didn’t give him Charlie or Jared’s addresses. Instead, he gave him addresses for two cops that McCoy had been holding a grudge against since he was eighteen. Both of the cops were tough bastards, both would have a shot against Luce. And if Luce took out both of them instead, at least McCoy would get a little satisfaction knowing that.
He had to take a break. He’d been taking a lot of them lately, but he couldn’t help it. He’d been trying to stretch and lengthen his shoulder muscles, and two hours of that left him feeling as if nails had been hammered into his shoulder blades. It wasn’t just his shoulders. His thigh and calf muscles were cramping, and his arms also hurt like hell. Because of all that, his thumb that that psycho had ripped the nail from barely bothered him.
McCoy took a dozen deep, slow breaths as he concentrated on loosening his muscles and ignoring the pain wracking him. He tried to numb out his mind and not pay any attention to the pain. He took one last deep breath and forced himself to stretch his shoulder muscles to their limit, and goddamn, his arms moved past his ass so that he had his hands under his thighs.
He rolled onto his back and worked his legs and feet through his arms until his bound wrists were in front of his chest. He burst out laughing. That goddamned psycho fucked up. If he hadn’t underestimated McCoy, he would’ve tied him up better, but he fucked up.
With his hands now in front of him, McCoy worked the duct tape from his ankles. He spent a minute trying to rub out the cramps in his legs, and then hobbled to his feet. For a minute or so, he stood unsteadily, barely able to keep his balance. Once he felt like he could move, he opened the closet door and walked out of there.
He squinted against the sunlight until his eyes better adjusted, and then searched through the house for something he could use to cut the tape binding his wrists, but found nothing. The house had been emptied out, and he searched futilely through each room and then the basement, and found nothing. He went back upstairs and used his elbow to break a window in a bedroom in the back of the house. When, or if, that psycho returned, it was doubtful that he’d notice the broken window, at least not unless he circled the house. McCoy used the jagged edge of the broken glass to cut through enough of the duct tape so he could free his hands. He cut the front of his right wrist pretty good in the process, but not enough to kill him.
*
Luce spent longer with the woman than he had planned. Until he finally broke her, she stubbornly refused to give up anything about the man who Luce knew had to be Willis. Early on, she tried lying repeatedly to protect him. They were clumsy lies, although to be fair, even a good liar would’ve had trouble fooling Luce. He was just too paranoid to be lied to. As his interrogation seemingly stalled, he grew anxious to end things with her so he could go after the other two men McCoy had given him, and it didn’t help matters that she passed out on him several times and how difficult it was to bring her back to consciousness when that happened. Whether it was due to lack of sleep or his excitement over finding all that money or a combination of the two, he’d been making too many mistakes over the last nine hours, and he had to keep reminding himself not to be rash. Burke or Willis or Connor, which was the name the woman had been given, he was the one who posed the biggest threat to him. Luce had an opportunity to extract potentially useful information, and he couldn’t throw it away because he was too impatient. So he forced himself to stay methodical, knowing that if he did so, he’d find Willis and the other two men. And eventually he broke her. When that happened, he knew everything she told him was the truth.
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