Returning Fire

by Frans Harmon

  * * * *

  Anstice’s patrol car was in full lights and siren rage, Mace was braced against the dashboard, his mind flipping through scenarios he would likely encounter. The odd chirp from his phone, signaling a VHF call, managed to break through the tumult. He unpacked his phone and pressed the VHF button. “Gavin, we are just five minutes out, over.”

  “We need your help.”

  “Cassandra? You in the Palace Italia?”

  “The Bacchanal, VIP dining, how’d you know?”

  “Peter Mock, but it took me a while to see how the pieces fit.”

  “Well, you were right all along. Your missing women are here, wearing bomb vests and blocking the exits.”

  “I’m about three minutes out.”

  “You hearing this, Gavin?”

  “Yes, pulling up to the building now.”

  “Mace, something else,” Cassandra said, “I’m looking out the window, there is a light on top of the Eddystone that wasn’t there a few minutes ago.”

  * * * *

  Gavin’s SUV came to a screeching halt on Sproat at Park alongside Anstice patrol car. Their vehicles two car lengths short of the Eddystone and within view of a large white box truck parked between it and the arena.

  Gavin sprang from his truck. “I called the MBI watch captain. He’s not budging until we have something solid.”

  Mace exited Anstice’s patrol car and surveyed the scene around him, his eyes stopping on the ascending moon. The sliver of black was growing, covering a quarter of its yellow glow. “Well, this is solid, but it doesn’t matter, we are out of time, and I’m betting that box truck is full of explosives. With the Eddystone wired for demolition, that truck will bring it crashing into the arena and the VIP dining room.”

  “I’m calling for backup,” Anstice said, dipping back into her vehicle.

  “Pop the trunk,” Mace yelled.

  He scrambled to the rear of her vehicle, and from a box of electronics, he pulled out a set of tactical old school Very Low-Frequency communications, earphones with an integrated microphone. “Comm up with our VLF.”

  Gavin grabbed a pair. “I’m going to Coria, if there is anything I can do, she will listen to me, clear at least one exit.”

  Mace nodded.

  Anstice joined them. “Backup is on the way.”

  “Good, get the local cell towers shut down. Sar has triggered every attack with a cell phone, and he’s not likely to change now. Vector the bomb squad on that truck,” Mace said, turning toward the Eddystone.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To the roof to buy us some time.”

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Mace entered the central lobby, the Eddystone stripped of her dignity, the floor littered with discarded remnants of lunches, chunks of plaster, and broken ornate trim. He sprinted to the rear staircase and began a determined climb to the roof. Listening briefly at each landing, he heard only the voices from his past. “Jirair, Jirair Houssain. I just want to talk.”

  On the thirteenth landing, he paused before the narrow stairs leading to the roof. Whatever happens, this nightmare ends here.

  He visualized what was above him. The roof exit sat like a tiny house on a flat plain of asphalt and gravel. To the right was a billboard that once promoted the Eddystone, to the left were the pigeon coops skeletal remains.

  He stepped lightly up the stairs, hesitating and listening at the door, but heard nothing. Mace pressed his earpiece tighter into his ear. He opened the door.

  “Mr. Franklyn, I was about to call you.”

  Sar was standing next to a wheelchair. Its occupant dressed in dark clothes, his head and face swathed in brown cloth, forming a turban and a scarf across his face. Mace took a couple of steps towards them for a better look.

  “Stop right there, Mr. Franklyn,” Sar said, holding a cell phone in his hand, held high over the wheelchair.

  “Who’s your friend?”

  “You don’t recognize, the man you tried to murder, Jirair?”

  “I didn’t—"

  “Save your protest. Now, if you would kindly slide your weapon this way.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  He held his phone high again, rotating it up and down “I’m going to give you a choice. The time is not yet, the moon must be hidden, but if you attempt to stop me, I will do what I must. I can end the lives of the women you seek, as well as those decadents below us. They can pay for your sins, or just you, one for many.”

  Mace looked at the moon, rising in the black sky behind Sar. He reached behind him and removed his Lugar from his back holster. Sar positioned his thumb over the phone’s screen. A quick well-placed shot could end this, but it would only take a reflexive twitch of Sar’s thumb to bring down the building. He needed time. “How do I know that is Jirair?”

  Sar kept his eyes locked onto Mace, and removed the scarf from Jirair’s face, exposing a mummified skull, paper-thin skin, red-brown leather, holding a slack toothy jaw and sunken cheeks. “Ulama, he has been beating you, sees all, knows all, from his nether world. But now, with an offering of infidel hostages, he will be forgiven, rewarded with virgins, and held to Allah’s bosom.”

  Mace grimaced at the site. He ejected the clip from his gun and the chambered round. Slowly placing the Lugar on the ground, he kicked it over to Sar.

  “We have Sharlene and Coria, no sign of Trina,” Mace heard Gavin say in his earpiece. “They’re wrapped in explosive vests, stall. Bomb squad in route.”

  “Have this all figured out, do you?”

  “Ulama speaks to me.”

  “Your spiritual leader, quite a rise for a serial killer.”

  “Come around the stair access. Slowly,” Sar shouted.”

  Mace stepped around the cinder block walls. Sitting on the graveled tar of the roof was a vest, stuffed with explosives. “Put on the vest.”

  Mace stared down at it. “If I don’t?”

  “Time is not on your side. The moon is almost black, when it is, who is spared is out of my hands. Put it on.”

  “Why now? The Tetrad mean that much?”

  “The Tetrad? I have an illness, Ulama said it is time to make amends, Allah is calling us.”

  Mace picked up the vest. He glanced up at the moon, the eclipse was three-quarters across, not more than fifteen minutes remaining. “So, why me?”

  “You did this to Ulama. I loved him; you took that away.”

  “You loved… ah, now I understand the need for penance. The Koran does not allow for men to love men, the way I believe you mean it. But you’ve got it wrong, I didn’t do anything to Jirair.”

  “Put on the vest.”

  Mace put an arm through one side of the vest. “Tell me what you saw.”

  “Jirair’s crushed body, you looking over the edge of the roof. I saw you clearly.”

  “It wasn’t me. It was Lewis Tuller.”

  “That can’t be.”

  “Oh, but it is. Jirair killed Tuller’s sister, but you knew that. He caught Jirair trying to burn her body, gave chase. Yes, I was on the roof, but Lewis didn’t want Jirair arrested, he wanted revenge. He knocked me down and threw your Ulama off the roof.”

  His eyes blossoming large, Sar stared down. “What?”

  In his earpiece, “Vests deactivated, truck safe. Clearing the building. Have not found Trina.”

  Mace dropped the vest. “Where is Trina, Sar?”

  “Right here,” Trina shouted from behind Mace.

  Mace turned. Trina, bound in a bomb-vest, had a gun leveled at Sar.

  “I did everything you wanted. Let you fuck me anytime you wanted. So why this?” she asked, pounding the vest.”

  “Stay back,” Sar shouted.

  “I was good for you, you fat bastard,” Trina said and screaming, charged Sar. Sar backed up to the wall, pulling Jirair’s skeleton with him. “No, back,” he screamed.

  Mace picked up the vest at his feet and tossed it to Sar. Trina careened into Sar, and all thr
ee went over the side of the building. A massive explosion told him Sar’s thumb had found the phone. Mace glanced up at the sky. The eclipse was complete.

  “Mace,” Anstice shrieked.

  Mace rotated, facing her. She wrapped her arms around him, kissing his face.

  “Easy, easy, Bear, leave some for later.”

  “I heard the explosion, I thought…”

  “Yeah, I know, but it was just Sar and Jirair.”

  “Jirair?”

  “Yes, it appears Sar and Jirair were…”

  “Close?”

  “Yeah, well, whatever. It explains the similarities in the staged murders to Jirair’s work.”

  “We still haven’t found Trina.”

  “You’ll find her spread among the other bits and pieces on the ground below. She was being used by Sar, and you know what they say about hell and a woman’s scorn.”

  “Well, I’m glad this is over. I could use some time off, maybe a real vacation.”

  “Hmm, I was thinking the same. In fact, I was thinking of asking you something.”

  A vacation?”

  “Sort of.”

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Standing in the anteroom of the First Presbyterian Church on Washtenaw, Mace beamed and thanked the elderly woman, waving as she drifted away. Gavin approached and gave him a pat on his back, his hand lingering on Mace’s shoulder. “Congratulations, it was a big surprise when I heard.”

  Mace turned and faced Gavin; Coria was at his side. “The way you two fell in and fell out working Sharlene’s case,” Gavin continued, “I would never have thought you too would make it permanent. Shows you what I know about relationships.”

  Coria rolled her eyes and tugged Gavin’s arm. “Dad.” Mace chuckled and reached for her hand, patting it lightly. “Coria, how are you doing? Were you able to get back into Wayne?”

  “I’m doing all right. Going to start spring semester, Dad’s moving to North Corktown,” she said, smiling up at Gavin, “close by, will be nice.”

  “Sounds great.”

  “It’s a beautiful old church,” Gavin said, “reminds me of home, and I do mean Glasgow.”

  Dorian arrived and reached for Mace’s hand. “I’ll add my congratulations, Mace,” he said with a firm shake. We’ll talk later, Emmitt’s boys just completed their background on Salpmore and Archetaus, but right now, I’ve got escort duties.”

  “Right, yes,” Mace said. Anstice came up behind him, kissing his neck, just as a piano began a riff introducing Sharlene’s song, Heavenly Day. “Meet you at the front,” Anstice said, gathering the train of her dress.

  The congregation stood as Sharlene began the lyrics, “Tomorrow may rain with sorrow…” The procession of tuxedoed men, arm in arm with women in pastels of apricot, rose, and mulberry made their way to the altar. Taking their places, the presiding minister stood and approached the couple standing at the center. “Beloved, we are gathered here to witness the exchange of vows between Dr. Helyn Harper and Dr. Daneal Charles that they may be joined in holy matrimony.”

  After the reception dinner, Dorian and Mace took a table on a patio. Dorian removed some folded sheets from his inside jacket pocket. “Seems Jirair Houssain and Sarkus Archetaus were adopted by Dadua Salpmore when they were in their teens. Apparently, Sar became obsessed with pleasing Jirair. Sar was trying to find Jirair and protect him from Tuller when his body came falling literally at his feet. You were the only one he saw on the roof that night. Jirair survived for a few days, and when he died at Salpmore, Sar embalmed him. I think his thoughts of revenge started then.”

  “But why the women, why now?”

  “He had a brain tumor, according to medical records. That could have something to do with it.”

  “You going after Lewis?” Mace asked.

  “Murder is murder, but Lewis Tuller is a citizen of Canada, lives on that side of the twin cities of Sault Ste. Marie. Canuk’s are not fond of our capital punishment for murder, so extradition is a non-starter.”

  Mace nodded. “Considering the circumstances, his sister’s murder, and the vic a serial killer, not an easy case to prosecute.”

  “That about sums it.”

  Anstice joined them outside. “What’s up, partner?” She asked Mace.

  “Oh, glad you’re here,” Dorian said, “I have something else for you two, B&F Investigative Services' first contract

  Anstice hugged Mace. “Exciting!”

  “Yes, I’m sure it is,” Dorian said, “You, start Monday, Alpena. There was a plane crash, up there. Took off from Alpena Reginal, but didn’t get far, crashed in Thunder Bay State Forest. FAA is done with their investigation.”

  “Sounds straight forward, what’s the catch,” Mace asked.

  “Dead body recovered was ID’d as Alpena Township’s Sheriff Hawkins.”

  “There has got to be more,” Anstice said.

  “There is,” Dorian said, nodding, “Dean is not a pilot and was dead before the crash.”

   The End 

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