Deadly Justice: A Legal Thriller (Tex Hunter Book 4)

by Peter O'Mahoney

  Hunter stood behind him, waiting for him to talk.

  “I know you’re angry, Tex. I know Cowan promised the file to you as payment for defending him. He called me about the idea first, and I advised him against it. I said it was trouble, and warned him that you never took a backward step, but he went ahead with it anyway. When I saw you took the case, I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t. You shouldn’t have trusted him.” Schultz paused, ran his hand over the leaves of the tallest shrub, and then looked towards the street. “Martin Luther King Jr. said the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. You always stand up, Tex. No matter what, you always stand up. I respect that.”

  “Why did you let me work for Cowan when you knew he didn’t have the file?”

  “I tried to warn you, but what else could I say? I was a key witness in the case. Any connection to me would have made all that work null and void. Even when you came to me, I couldn’t tell you.”

  “You set him up, didn’t you?”

  “Set him up? That’s a stretch.” Schultz scoffed. “He let us into the club, Tex. It was Cowan who turned off the cameras. He wanted the raid to happen so he could collect the insurance money. It was his plan, not ours. He came to me a year ago, asked me for business advice, and I told him the easiest way to make two million was to spend two years in prison with his specialized Key Person Insurance policy. Then he demanded that I help him set the whole thing up. That’s the world that we work in.”

  “What?”

  “You didn’t know? Cowan paid me to organize the raid from the drug task force. He turned off the cameras, he gave Kokkinos the key to enter the room, he even messaged me to say he was ready for the raid. It was all planned from day one. He was cooking the books for over a year. He was preparing for it. With the contacts John Warden still had on the force, we made it happen. He paid me to tip them off. He knew I could get it done, but he only wanted 500grams of cocaine. Just enough for a year or two in prison and under the threshold for the insurance claim.”

  “But you gave him five kilograms.”

  “I was sick of him. He’s trash. Always demanding things.” Schultz sneered. “Warden and I talked to Kokkinos and saw the opportunity. It was our chance to take him down within the law, and then Kokkinos could swoop in and buy the club at a bargain price. And hand us a nice little commission, of course.”

  “You did this.”

  “He did it to himself. Everyone knew what was happening except for Cowan. You can’t play in the mud without getting your hands dirty. We changed the amount, paid a few witnesses, but in the end, it was still Cowan’s plan. I would’ve loved to have seen the shock on Cowan’s face when the police told him it was five kilograms.” Schultz paused. “We did release Jasmine Langford’s name to you. She became too much of a risk for us after we underpaid her. I’m sorry that I almost got you involved in a witness tampering charge. That wasn’t the plan.”

  Blood surged to Hunter’s limbs. His hands gripped tight. His breathing deepened.

  “Kokkinos is a good man. He treats those girls well.” Schultz continued. “But he’s also a businessman. He wanted the Five-Star. If Cowan went away for a year, and was a million or two richer, then he’d never get his hands on it. But fifteen years, well, that would destroy Cowan’s reputation, destroy his businesses, and Kokkinos could get the club for cheap.”

  “Cowan’s own plan backfired. And you were all in this together.”

  “After the raid, Cowan asked me whether I was involved. I denied everything, of course. I told him that someone in the PD planted the larger amount of drugs during the raid. We set him up for 500grams, just like he asked. I said I wasn’t involved and that someone else was going to testify about the original tip-off. Someone else was Witness A. I explained that the police must’ve seized the opportunity to take him down.”

  “And he believed you?”

  “Of course he did. He had no reason to doubt me. We were tight, and we’ve run this racket for a decade. Power and connections for hire, but it was bound to burn someone in the end. And I must say, out of everyone, I’m glad it burned Cowan.”

  “Except he hasn’t gone down.”

  “I imagine there’ll be repercussions to that fact.” He waved his hand at Hunter. “I’m old, Tex. Much too old to be fielding calls from people like Rick Cowan every week. That guy wouldn’t leave me alone, he kept calling, and kept drawing me into his problems. He would never listen to me.”

  “The justice system isn’t yours to play with. You lied in court, and they’ll be coming after you for perjury.”

  “No, they won’t,” Schultz scoffed again. “You might’ve convinced those twelve fools in court of the set up, but there’s not enough evidence to convict us for it. It’s our word against the word of a stripper. That’s never going to stand up in court, and you know it. Warden and Kokkinos certainly aren’t going to testify against me. There’s no way that any of it will stick.”

  “You paid Jasmine to lie.”

  “I pay a lot of people a lot of money to get things done. It’s the way of the world. It’s how I keep moving forward. But it shouldn’t surprise you. You’ve always known what I’m capable of.” Schultz shook his head, and then turned back to Hunter. “I guess you want the file?”

  Hunter nodded.

  “I kept it all these years and I have a good reason for that, but nothing comes for free, Tex. Give me the location of the girl, and I’ll give you the file. Jasmine Langford can’t get away with what she did to me in the courtroom. She betrayed me on the stand, and I can’t let her walk away. That wouldn’t look good for my reputation. I know you’ve kept in contact with her. My offer, and my only offer, is the girl’s location for your father’s file.”

  “No.” Hunter was firm.

  “Of course that would be your first reaction, but I’ll give you some time to think about it. If you want the file, and if you want to know why I kept it, be at the Mensa Storage parking lot at 10pm with the location of the girl.”

  Schultz began walking back towards the house, before he stopped and turned back to Hunter.

  “And be alone, Tex. I’m too old for trouble.”

  Chapter 41

  Hunter drove out of Schultz’s driveway, and parked further down the road. A teenager bounced a basketball in his hands as he walked past, the noise echoing down the otherwise quiet street. Trees lined the edges of the yards, and Hunter waited, watching to see if Schultz was going to drive anywhere in a hurry.

  Hunter hated that he was being played, hated that he was being led down the wrong path by Schultz, but he didn’t have a choice. If he wanted the file, if he wanted the truth, he would have to play their game. He couldn’t break into a secure facility to steal legal files—he’d be disbarred the second anyone found out. If Schultz had stored the files with his legal firm, the files would be protected by heavy security. He searched ‘Mensa Storage’ on his phone, and found they took great pride in their security. And no doubt the file would be buried amongst years of paperwork.

  When he first became a lawyer, under the mentorship of Schultz, he’d heard about files being buried, going missing, or being ignored altogether. When things were on paper, without the technology of computer tracing, it was much easier to bury a piece of information, redraft another file without the evidence, or run a file through the shredder. It would’ve been easy for those in power to bury any information that made the case against his father any weaker.

  After five minutes of no activity from Schultz’s driveway, Hunter called Ray Jones.

  “Tell me you got the file.” Jones answered the call. “Tell me this is good news.”

  “Not yet.” Hunter responded. “Where are you now?”

  “At home. Watching the internet. Just scrolling through different web pages. Man, there’s some crazy stuff out there. If you’ve got a fetish, it won’t take you long to find it. People can buy anyt
hing on the net. Some people even just sell their time. There’s one guy, who lives on a tropical island, who sells access to a live video stream from his home, just so you can feel like you’re there with him.”

  Hunter when silent for a moment, a thought crashing through his head.

  “Tex? Are you still there?”

  “How long will it take you to get to Highland Park?”

  “Highland Park? I’m at least forty-five minutes away. What do you need me for?”

  “I need you to follow Jerry Schultz. He said he’ll pick up the file tonight once he gains access to the security from his law firm. His version of the story is that the file is stored in a facility called ‘Mensa Security,’ and he wants me to meet him there tonight at 10pm.”

  “Do you trust him?”

  “No. That’s why I need you to follow him. I’m here now, and I’ll keep an eye on the place, but I have something else left to do before I meet him tonight. I need evidence to take Schultz down. I’m not letting him walk away from this, but I need something more than the word of an exotic dancer. Her word won’t stand up in court. And if I bluff, he’ll call me on it.”

  “Alright. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” Jones responded. “Text me the address, and keep me updated if anything changes.”

  Jones ended the call and Hunter looked at his phone, searching through the recent contacts.

  He wasn’t sure what he was going to find in the file, but he had to get his hands on it. When he worked for Schultz, his father’s case came up in conversation numerous times. It was clear now Schultz was testing the water, he was searching to see how much Hunter knew about the case.

  Their working history was troublesome. Hunter was trying to find his way in the law profession, and Schultz was trying to exploit his name. Although the experience of working for Schultz made him the lawyer he was today; it was still a problematic beginning. The sixty-five-hour-weeks, fifty weeks a year, took their toll, and after five years of being exploited for his name, Hunter left the firm on uneasy terms.

  He never trusted Schultz, right from the first day. It was a job and a paycheck for a young man that didn’t have much else. While working for the firm, there were many rumors that Schultz paid witnesses to lie, paid people to change their stories, but nobody was ever able to prove anything. Hunter hated the firm, but it was a start, a beginning to the career he needed.

  Hunter sat in the driver’s seat of his car, scrolling through the contacts, looking for the call on the right date and time.

  Hunter trusted Rick Cowan even less. He never trusted a word the man said.

  He didn’t expect either of them would ever come back into his life.

  When Hunter found the right number on his phone, he made the call. He still had one play.

  He’d won a case. He’d been pushed to the limit.

  But he hadn’t taken down the corrupt.

  Not yet.

  Chapter 42

  Hunter checked his watch: 9:35pm. Twenty-five minutes until Schultz was to arrive. The parking lot was weakly lit, damp, but the recently laid asphalt was seamless. There wasn’t a lump, bump, or crack out of place. The white lines were freshly painted, and the spaces were almost wide enough to fit two cars. A light wind brushed across Hunter’s face as he leaned against the passenger side door of his BMW, and it brought the smell of the nearby mechanic with it.

  The gates to the parking lot were left unlocked. Hunter was sure it was Schultz’s work as well. The secure facility closed at 5pm each day, and there wasn’t even a light on in the warehouse. The main storage building was a long orange shed, with no windows, no skylights, and no easy access. There was a roller door next to the office, which was a separate brick outpost, sitting at the entrance to the parking lot.

  The parking lot was used for all the surrounding warehouses, including a furniture factory to his left, and the mechanics behind him. There were two security cameras pointed towards the middle of the lot—one at the east end and the other at the west. Hunter was sure that for the right price both those camera files could be bought, and he had no doubt Schultz had already done that. Perhaps they were already turned off.

  He’d made contact with Jasmine Langford. He had her location. He still had a move to make, a shuffling of the chess pieces, but he had to get the file out of the secure storage facility first. He had to lure Schultz into the open.

  He placed his hands in his pockets and looked at the ground, contemplating his position. His desire for information on his father’s case had led him down many dangerous roads, but none more so than this one. The eight girls were members of the same school, found buried in the same woodland, each grave barely ten feet apart. They all knew each other as friends or acquaintances, and went missing over a period of five weeks. There were signs of a struggle on each of the girls, signs of the girls fighting back.

  He’d met two of the mothers years ago. After he graduated law school, they contacted him. They talked, he listened. The women sympathized with his plight—they still saw him as the innocent ten-year-old kid who was put through the trial of the decade. They were good people—hard-working, loving, caring. Good families who laid flowers on their daughter’s grave every month, and despite their doubts, still went to church every Sunday. When they met, they asked Hunter not to challenge his father’s convictions, not to take it to appeal, and not to put the families through such heartache again. They wanted to move on. They wanted to close that chapter of their lives.

  Hunter didn’t want to discredit the memories of the teenage girls, but he had to follow that path. He had a hunger for the truth, a desperate craving for the missing pieces.

  A witness stated they had seen Alfred Hunter walking through the wooded area a day before the bodies were found. There was evidence that Alfred had met all of the girls and their fathers. Natalie Hunter attended the same school as the girls.

  The prosecution told a fabulous story in court—a story of how Alfred stalked the girls from his daughter’s high school, how he stalked his friend’s children, how he was an obsessive psychotic man who snapped. It was Alfred who took advantage of the girls, one by one, they said, and killed them all in a ruthless, heartless fashion.

  Despite the lack of strong evidence, the jury bought the story, as did everyone else in Chicago.

  A set of headlights appeared in the night. Hunter looked to the road but the car kept driving past.

  He was wary of any movement. There was an animal, a raccoon perhaps, scurrying near the fence, but not much else. He was surrounded by industrial warehouses, large lots, and the nearest house was at least a mile away. No witnesses. No one to report the sounds of gunshots.

  He checked his watch again. Closer now.

  The call he made earlier had gone well. Just as he expected. Jasmine Langford was willing to listen to his thoughts. She was apprehensive, but determined for the truth to come out.

  He had a weapon in the car. He considered having it on him, but in his experience, guns only escalated tense scenarios, instead of calming them down. It was a risk to leave the weapon in the car, but a calculated one.

  Hunter checked his watch again.

  Closer.

  There was one other vehicle on the street, a truck, parked further down the road. It was parked in the shadows, without plates. Hunter was suspicious. He had to be. He was dealing with dangerous people who thought they owned the law.

  A set of car lights edged down the road. It rolled into the parking lot. It was a black Audi. Not the car Hunter was expecting.

  The car was early, which was also unlike Schultz.

  He expected Jones to be tailing Schultz, maybe a few minutes behind. That was the back-up he needed. Jones had eyes on Schultz for the evening, while Hunter went to a meeting with someone connected to the case.

  Jones had texted to say Schultz was on the move at 9pm, which worked for their timeline.

  Hunter felt sick to his stomach, weak at the knees. If his play went wrong, he would never see t
he file, and he would risk Jasmine’s life. He wanted neither of those outcomes.

  The Audi parked four places across from Hunter. Its windows were tinted, too dark to see inside. Hunter waited, staring at the car.

  He was a sitting duck if there was trouble. Schultz had already proven he did what was needed to get rid of the people that annoyed him. The problem with his profession, the criminal underworld, was that nobody actually retired from it. Nobody really escaped that world.

  Especially people like Jerry Schultz. He was in that world up to his neck. People wouldn’t forget the things he did.

  The door to the Audi opened.

  A person stepped out.

  And the man was holding a Glock in his right hand.

  Chapter 43

  “You.” Rick Cowan stepped out of the Audi, gun in hand, staring at Tex Hunter. “It was you all along.”

  “What?” Hunter replied. “What are you talking about?”

  “I got a call from your old boss Jerry Schultz an hour ago, and he said he could square things up with me. He told me you were coming out here to meet with Detective Holmes, and give him all the information on Lana’s death in my club. You were going to set me up for the death of the stripper.”

  “You’re an idiot if you think I was going to set you up. I’m here for the file.”

  “Schultz said you had all the information about her death, you’ve found all the evidence, and you were feeding it to the police. He said you had a vendetta against me for what happened with the file. And I can see that now. I can see what you’re going to do. You want to take me down.”

  Cowan stumbled, but the aggression was clear. He waved the gun at Hunter, showing off his power.

  “You’re drunk, Cowan. I got you off the charges, you idiot.” Hunter scoffed, and leaned against the car. “I’m not here to double cross you. Schultz told me the file is in that building and I’m here waiting for him. But by the looks of things, he isn’t coming.”