by Ron Fisher
“You gonna’ be the one wearin’ a shoe. Mine. Up-side your head.”
It dawned on me that I was listening to a six-foot-three redneck biker thug and a fifty year-old homicidal manic exchanging brotherly banter like a couple of schoolyard adolescents. How the hell did these two guys successfully run an opioid manufacturing and distribution operation the size and scope of this one? What was I missing here?
“Fuck you, Laverne,” Sonny was saying, and turned his attention back to me. “And fuck you too,” he said, and punched me in the jaw. The bells rang again, playing the same tune as when Laverne hit me, but not nearly as loudly. I remembered that Sonny had held his gun in his right hand, which was now with a broken wrist. He hit me with his left, and the punch was weak, but I pretended that he knocked me out, dropping my chin to my chest. It seemed like the best way to defend myself from another punch.
“Damn, Sonny,” Laverne said. “You don’t understand the principle here. You hurt him to get him to talk. You don’t hurt him so he can’t talk.”
“He wasn’t going to tell us anything anyway,” Sonny said.
I let a minute go by pretending I was out cold, and thankfully Sonny seemed to lose interest in me. They had worse things planned for me, and getting beaten to the point where I couldn’t at least put up some resistance wasn’t what I needed.
“Where we moving to, Laverne?” I heard Sonny ask.
“I was thinking we’d go up to Ray-Ray’s old cabin for a while.”
“That place still standing? Last time I saw it, it was in pretty bad shape. All grown up around it, big gullies in the road leading up to it.”
“That’s what makes it a good place. Don’t nobody ever go up there. It’s been deserted since Ray-Ray stopped keeping it up. We may have to do a little work on it, but I like it looking deserted like that. So, go help Delilah pack things up. I’ll take care of what’s out here.”
Sonny just stood looking at him for a second.
“Now, Sonny,” Laverne snapped.
Sonny jumped into action like he’d been stuck with a cattle prod.
Laverne said, “Bag it all up. Everything’s going with us. And get that Dahlgren Decon decontamination stuff we got and be ready to spray down everything with it. Put on a hazmat suit, and bring me one. Delilah, get yours on too.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
I’d been sitting silently for a time, not talking to anyone and no one talking to me. But no more punches to the face, thankfully. The room had almost stopped spinning.
Laverne had finished counting the money and I watched as he began to fill the three gym bags with it. He turned and looked at me, his light blue eyes as cold and clear as a couple of round-cut sapphires. They say you can see a man’s soul through his eyes. What I saw through Laverne Dollar’s was the emptiness of no soul at all. This man made chills run up my spine.
“Delilah?” he said calling back to his sister. “Fix up an industrial strength cold-shot to go,” Laverne called out to his sister. “Mr. Bragg is going with us and I want him walking. He’s too damn big to carry. We’ll take care of him when we’re off somewhere.”
He’d said that in a voice totally void of emotion. I knew from Vickie Sayer’s research that a cold-shot was a mix of drugs and tap-water, dispensed with a hypodermic syringe. The fact that Laverne had asked for industrial-strength sounded lethal, and was probably the same mix Delilah gave Kelly at the hospital. This time it was intended for me.
I was watching through half-lidded eyes as Delilah came out a few minutes later and handed Laverne the hypodermic needle filled with my death sentence. Laverne took it from her and put it into one of the bags with the money.
“You know that decontamination stuff won’t clean up all traces of the fentanyl,” she said to Laverne. “Should we even bother with it?”
“It might do just enough to keep drug dogs from sniffing out traces of fentanyl if somebody does come looking and gets right up close to the Buick,” Laverne said. “They can’t prove what they can’t find, and we’ll let that high-priced Jew lawyer we got handle the rest.”
“What about him?” Delilah asked, nodding at me.
We’ll let him set there until were ready to go. You and Sonny can begin taking some of that stuff out the back way and putting it in the SUV.”
“The back way?” Delilah said raising her voice. “There’s spiders and God knows what else in that old tunnel. I don’t like going in there. Why can’t we take it out this way. Sonny said they ain’t nobody out there.”
“That tunnel’s a lot easier than hauling that stuff up these stairs. Now do what I say.”
“We can get Wade and his boy to help us,” she said.
“We ain’t gettin’ Wade to do shit. He don’t want anything to do with this, and I don’t want him to. So, get on back there. I’ll be out to help, directly.”
Delilah went back into the other room. Laverne added the last of the cash into a gym bag, and began trying to fit the money counter in on top of it.
For two hours I watched the Dollars, decked out in hazmat suits, continue to box up and remove almost everything in the lab that wasn’t nailed down. They’d left the door between the two rooms open, and I could see them as they made multiple trips through a door in the back into a dark tunnel.
I thought of Alvin. He was probably turning the junkyard upside down looking for me. I could see him hanging Wade Dollar by the heels out an upstairs window of the old farmhouse trying to find me. I didn't know where the tunnel came out, but I hoped Alvin would see the Dollars coming and going. He would need to find me soon because the lab was about cleaned out. The only things left were the bags with the money and needle on the table in front of me. Delilah was spraying down the walls and floors with a pump sprayer, harsh chemical fumes from it making my eyes water. It had to be that decontamination solution they talked about. They were close to wrapping up here and taking me out. In more ways than one.
I’d heard Laverne Dollar say that he wanted me walking out with them when they left, because it would be easier than having to haul my lifeless body out with them. Perhaps that would present the best moment to attempt an escape. But with my eminent death in a hypodermic needle in a bag a few feet from me, could I just sit there and risk Laverne changing his mind? They were hauling boxes and equipment out some hidden escape tunnel, why not a body? I thought about the chair I was in. It was sturdy—but it was wood, and wood breaks. If I could ram myself back into the wall behind me, maybe I could break it and somehow get my hands on Laverne’s pistol, which he kept tucked in his belt. A long shot, but I had no other ideas or options, and sitting around just waiting for things to happen was not something I did well.
I was gathering up my strength to propel my chair back into the wall when I heard a scrunching metallic sound from above, as if someone was opening the trunk lid. Was the older brother Wade or his son Benny coming to join the party?
It was now or never with the chair, I thought. I thrust backward with all my strength, but my taped ankles wouldn’t give me the drive I needed to smash the chair against the wall. I only managed to hit it hard enough to bang the back of my head and leave me dazed and dizzy again.
Then someone yelled, amplified, as if through a bullhorn.
“Sheriff’s Department! Come out with your weapons down and your hands up!”
Laverne and Sonny stood frozen. Then in unison they sprang into action. Laverne came out and gathered up two of the gym bags of money from the table.
“Get the other one,” he shouted to Sonny, ignoring me. They spun and headed into the back room, shutting the door behind them.
The voice from above came again, announcing that this was the last chance to throw down weapons and come out. I recognized it as Sheriff Arlen Bagwell. The offer didn’t last long. Seconds later, a couple of black canisters s came tumbling down the steps, my foggy brain registering the words “flash-bangs” before they exploded and took most of what was left of my coherence.
There was another explosion, this time from the back room of the lab, blowing the separating door off its hinges. Raging flames shot out, blasting me with heat. The lab was an inferno. Had the Dollars self-immolated themselves? Somehow, I didn’t think so. They had gone out the tunnel.
I had no time to think about it as Bagwell and several uniformed deputies in bullet-proof vests and guns came rushing down the steps. The force of the raging fire pushed them back, but they grabbed me, still taped to the chair and with my clothes beginning to smolder, and dragged me up the stairs and out into the cool night, chair and all.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Outside they took the tape off and had me sit on the ground, away from the black smoke and flames pouring out of the old Buick’s open trunk. Bagwell and Alvin hovered around me with deputies and what appeared to be Central town-cops moving busily all around us. Alvin must have seen Laverne take me after all, and called for help. A crazy thought swam through my muddled brain. This had to be the first time in his life that Alvin actually called for the police.
“Who’s down there?” Bagwell shouted to me.
“Laverne and Sonny Dollar, and their sister Delilah” I managed to say.
“They didn’t get out somehow?”
“Maybe,” I said. “There’s a tunnel.”
Bagwell turned and yelled at one of his deputies. “Escape tunnel! Go find out where it comes out.” A half-dozen officers took off in different directions, Bagwell going with them.
“You need medical attention?” Alvin asked. “Looks like you took a couple of licks to the face, and your eyebrows are singed, but I don’t see any other burns.”
“I’m okay. The fresh air is reviving me.”
Alvin was looking at me with a sorrowful face.
“I’m sorry, bro. I let you down. When I came back, you were gone. I went looking for you and was about to go breaking down doors at those houses and getting medieval on somebody when Sonny came riding in on that hog of his. I followed him here.”
“You’ve got nothing to apologize for, Alvin. You’re the only reason I’m not shot full of enough fentanyl right now to overdose a rhinoceros. You brought in the cavalry just in time and saved the day. Thanks, bud.”
“Yeah, but I should have gotten to you earlier. I watched Sonny unlock the trunk and go down inside it. I tried to follow him, but it locked back when he closed it. I couldn’t get in. I was looking around for somethin’ to pry it open when I heard them dogs. They were growling like they were coming for my black ass. I went a row over and climbed in an old wrecked school bus I’d seen—still had its doors and windows. I needed a dog-free zone to figure out what to do.”
“Damn it, Alvin. You shouldn’t have even been thinking about coming after me by yourself. We would probably both be dead right now. That was a heavily armed and crazy bunch down there. Even the sister is scary.”
“That’s what I finally decided,” Alvin said. “I was pissed off, but I ain’t no fool. This ain’t no movie and I ain’t no super-hero. So I called your buddy Sheriff Bagwell. But I couldn’t just sit there doing nothing until they showed up. I tore loose the hand-rail at the front of the bus to fend off them dogs and was going to come back out here. My thinking was that if the cops didn’t show up real soon, I’d start banging on the Buick to get the Dollars’ attention, hoping to distract them from whatever they might be doing to you. If they came up to see who was banging on the door, I’d use the hand-rail to play a little Whack-a-Mole with them.”
I almost laughed at the mental image of that.
“The cops got here quicker than I’d expected. At least one of them did. I saw flashing blue lights coming through the front gate and went to meet it.”
“What about the dogs?”
“I found them surrounding a squad car, a lone cop behind the wheel looking out at the dogs like he might shoot them. I was afraid he was the only one coming until I heard a siren off in the distance and realized more were on the way. One of the dogs lunged at me, and I had to bump him on the nose with the hand-rail, and that backed him off a little. I was ready for him to come back at me when he did the damnedest thing. The cop had left the front gate standing wide open, and the dog took off right through it, and the other dog followed. Looks like the Dollars are such detestable shits they don’t even merit the loyalty of man’s best friend. Them dogs hauled ass at the first chance to get away from them.”
It became impossible to talk as a firetruck, lights blinking and siren blaring came up the path and rolled to a stop as near to the fire as they could get. Alvin and I moved out of their way and went to lean against a wreck that didn’t look too dirty.
Alvin continued telling me his story. “When the rest of the cops got here, I showed them the way to the Buick, with Bagwell firing questions at me every step of the way. I have to hand it to him though, he and his guys crow-barred the trunk lid and stormed right in. Gutsy fuckers, even if they are peckerwoods.”
We watched as the firemen began dragging a hose to the back of the Buick which was still belching smoke and fire. I didn’t think there was enough stuff down there to burn like that. What had I missed?
An unmarked, official-looking sedan pulled in behind the firetruck. DEA Agent Underwood got out, glanced in our direction but walked the other way.
I suddenly remembered what Laverne said about Kelly and grabbed Alvin by the arm. “We’ve got to put someone on Kelly’s door at the hospital. Right now. They want to finish the job they started on her. They’ve already tried once. Yesterday, I caught a nurse in her room about to give her a shot. She took off when I walked in, and I didn’t think anything about it. But when I met the Dollar sister tonight, I recognized her as the nurse. She was going to give Kelly the same thing they were about to give me. And Laverne Dollar implied they’ll keep going after Kelly until they get the job done.”
Alvin thought it over. “Seems to me that they’ll forget about Kelly now since you’ve escaped. What else could she know that you don’t after tonight? This bunch’s been totally busted. All that’s left is rounding the mother-fuckers up.”
Alvin had a good point, and it made me think. When Laverne Dollar said what he did, he was convinced I’d never walk out of there alive. But I was still concerned about it.
Alvin saw the worry in my face. “I’ll take care of it. We’ll get somebody on her room twenty-four-seven until all these mother-fuckers are caught. I can be there part of the time myself.”
We saw Bagwell coming toward us. Trailing him was Agent Underwood.
Bagwell said, “They’re in the wind. We found the exit to the escape tunnel in a shed up by the big house. It looks like they went out a back gate. According to the brother, Wade, they were driving a black Ford Explorer SUV. We got an APB out on them, and anybody wearing a badge within two hundred miles of here is looking for them.”
Underwood was glaring at me.
“You guys are fucking something,” he said, “pulling a stunt like this. What you’ve done here tonight will get any chance of a case we’ve got thrown out of court. There may be more prosecutable crimes here against you than them—breaking and entering, trespassing, cruelty to animals. I ought to lock you up myself.”
“You wouldn’t have a fucking case if J.D. hadn’t found this lab,” Alvin said. “The Dollars would still be down there making pills while you’d be standing around somewhere, scratching your ass and eatin’ Krispy Kremes.”
Underwood stood glaring at Alvin, his eyes filled with rage. I fully expected him to arrest him—or at least try. He’d managed to tip Alvin’s tipping point, and I wasn’t sure Alvin would let him. Whatever was on the Agent’s mind to do, he seemed to get over it. He turned and stormed away, cursing.
I asked Bagwell, “Does he have a point? Will the Dollars get off?”
“Anything’s possible I guess,” Bagwell said, “the way the courts are these days. Agent Underwood has been trying to nail these boys for a long time, and he’s just sensitive about anything screwing it up
for him. I would need to discuss this with the District Attorney, but you being a reporter and discovering this lab by your journalistic investigation, they can’t accuse you of working on behalf of the police, which would be one reason a smart lawyer could get everything found here thrown out in court. We were notified of a possible kidnapping in progress by a man with a legitimate reason to suspect it,” he looked at Alvin, “and from there, everything we’ve done is by the book. Even though the caller was trespassing by being here, and this is private property, we were officially required to investigate. I don’t see a problem with it.”
I hoped he was right.
“I’m sure Agent Underwood will cool down,” Bagwell added. “Especially if, when you write this story, you make sure he and the DEA get some credit. Underwood has his pride.”
“I can do that,” I said. Bagwell would get his share too. I wouldn’t be here if he and his men hadn’t responded to Alvin’s call so quickly.
Very little smoke was coming out of the Buick now, and what there was had gone from black to white. White smoke meant that the water the fireman was pumping in was doing its job. Two other firemen had brought over a steel ladder from the truck and were placing it down the entrance to the lab. The stairs must have burned away, I thought.
Bagwell, Alvin, and I stood and watched them descend into the lab. I noticed they put on respirator masks before they went in.
I turned back to Bagwell. “You said that Wade Dollar told you what make the get-away car was. Does that mean he’s cooperating?”
“He seems to be,” Bagwell said. “We got both him and his son Benny in custody, and Wade is claiming he didn’t have anything to do with the drugs. He said it was all Laverne, Sonny, and their sister. Says it’s been years since he’s even been down in that storm shelter, and to beat all, the plot of land the lab is on belongs to Laverne, not him. When their daddy died, he carved up the property and left them each a piece of it. It’s what Agent Underwood was saying, remember? So, all Wade may be guilty of is turning a blind eye. And I don’t know if there’s a law against that. We’ll see.”
