"Yeah," said Fats. "Another martyr. I'm really hurting here, Matt."
I waved at Logan, and he left to get the paramedics.
"Fats," I said, "the paramedics are going to help you out here, but if you've lied to me, they're going to give you back to me."
Fats just nodded his head.
"We've got less than three hours to find this guy," Jock said. "Any suggestions?"
The three of us were standing on the sidewalk in front of Fats's house. The SWAT team had loaded up in their black SUVs and gone back to wherever they came from. A few Orlando police officers had stayed in the area to calm the neighbors' fears. The ambulance had taken Fats for treatment at a clinic where the doctor wouldn't ask a lot of questions. He'd be held there until we were finished.
I felt sick to my stomach. I'd just stabbed a defenseless man, and I'd have done it again if he hadn't given me answers. Fats was a bloody and dangerous man who'd tried to kill me and my friend Logan. He'd killed poor helpless Wayne Lee, and he had no compunctions about killing a church full of decent people.
He had information that could save a lot of lives, and I knew that harsh tactics were called for-and even condoned. Especially by the people who would have died or lost loved ones if I hadn't acted. I did what was necessary, and I knew I would do it again.
In the process, I had found the beast that lived within me, and I wasn't happy to meet him. It didn't fit with my own view of myself. I'd killed men before, but every time, it was when they were trying to kill me. I had been a soldier in a war and, as terrible as that is, you can always justify your actions as discharging your duty to your country or just trying to survive.
This was different and, while necessary, I didn't think I'd ever have the same benign view of myself again. It was like losing a close friend. The Matt Royal I knew, the fun-loving beach bum lawyer, had died over the past few days, and had been replaced by a monster who was perfectly willing to shoot and stab people. I wondered if I'd ever find my old self again. I was glad Laura would never have to know this new version of the man she'd loved when she was young.
"Joshua could be anywhere," said Logan, bringing me out of my pitiful self-loathing reverie, "or nowhere."
Jock shook his head. "I don't think Fats lied to us. He was too scared of Matt's knife."
"Why don't we concentrate our forces at Lakeside Methodist," Logan said. "As thin as we are, we won't do much good for the other churches. It'd be too easy for the bomber to slip by. Are you familiar with the Lakeside Church, Matt?"
"Yes," I said. "In another lifetime, Laura and I were married in that church."
"Shit," said Logan. "I'm sorry, Matt."
Jock said, "What if we put our troops just around the big churches downtown? If the bomber smells a rat at one, maybe he'll just move on to the church in the next block. If we're wrong, we're going to lose a church any way you cut it."
"What do you think, Matt?" Logan said.
"Sounds like a plan. I think we should be at Lakeside. We can put sniper teams around the square. If we approach him, all he has to do is punch a button or something, and all hell breaks loose. We've got to get him before he has a chance to react. Are your sniper credentials still good, Jock?"
"Unfortunately, yes," he said. "So much for retirement."
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
I stood beside jock in the bell house atop the steeple of the Lakeside Methodist Church. A German made Heckler-Koch PSG-1 sniper rifle rested on a tripod placed on the edge of the half wall that surrounded the small space. The bells weren't used anymore, and loudspeakers placed around the room played a recording of somebody else's bells clanging the faithful to worship. The din made normal conversation impossible.
We had rearranged our forces to cover the big downtown churches. Orlando had once been called the City of Churches, and almost every corner along Rosalind and Magnolia avenues boasted a house of worship.
It all made sense. If Simmermon was going to blow up a church, why not take out his spiritual nemesis in the bargain? He and Tarlington had struggled against each other for the allegiance of the faithful. In Simmermon's crazed mind, Tarlington was the anti-Christ and had to be killed for the good of the faith.
So we had climbed the stairs to the steeple to do a job I had no stomach for. Yet, here I was, ready to kill a boy who had been taken in by a crazed charlatan.
I held a pair of high-powered Zeiss binoculars to my eyes, scanning the crowd below. Other sniper pairs, a shooter and a spotter, were scattered about the area. The first one to catch sight of the bomber was to take him out. I hoped none of the snipers would mistakenly take out an innocent person, but these guys were well trained, among the best in the world, and I thought we'd be okay.
The church was large, and had been built when Orlando was a much smaller city. Office buildings and retail outlets now crowded in on either side, but the large square in front of the church was intact. It was a gath ering place for the faithful and the hangers-on, a place to see and be seen on Sunday mornings.
The only entrance the church used for Sunday services was the front door. This was a tradition dating back many decades. It forced the members to mingle on their way to church. It also meant that the bomber would have to come across the square.
If Fats had given us the wrong information, a lot ofpeople were going to die in the next few minutes, including Jock and me. We had volunteered for the bell tower, since it was our decision to place our resources here. If we were wrong, another church would die this day, and if we were right and let the bomber get by, we would die with this church.
It was nearing the nine o'clock hour. The sun was hot, shining from an almost cloudless sky. The water of the nearby lake was flat, and the tall buildings surrounding it reflected off its surface. The crowd in the square was getting bigger as people stopped to chat with one another.
The radio receiver plugged into my ear buzzed with static. I mentally tuned it out, but then I heard Logan's voice. "Matt, I saw somebody who could be our target," he said. "He's standing almost in the middle of the square. He's alone, wearing a beige suit. Can you see him?"
Logan was moving about the crowd, a roving spotter on the lookout for the bomber. We were all wired into a tactical radio network, so that when one of us spoke, all the members of our team could hear.
I scanned the crowd with the binoculars. Jock put his eye to the Hendsoldt scope fastened to the top of the rifle. He had it set for 100 meters, a distance that was a little longer than a football field.
I saw the figure Logan was talking about. I looked closely, and I knew Jock's scope gave him a closer look than I could get. I wasn't sure if this was our guy.
Jock removed his eye from the scope and said into my ear, "Not him. This guy is in his thirties."
"You sure?"
"Yes. I'm about to kill somebody's son. I've got to be sure."
"Whoever he is, jock," I said, "he's not the son his parents knew. He's been brainwashed. He's a robot."
Jock nodded, but I knew he didn't believe me. He was going to do what he had to do, but it didn't sit well with him.
I spoke into the mic. "It's not him, Logan. Keep a sharp lookout."
"Ten-four," came the reply.
Jock was scanning die square with his eye to the scope. "There," he said. "On the edge of the crowd, over by the lake. Take a look."
I turned the binoculars to where Jock was pointing. This could be the guy. He was in a beige suit, blue tie, and he was about the right age. His coat was unbuttoned. If I gave jock the word, this was a dead man. What if I was wrong?
"Steady," I said. "Let's be sure."
"He's moving," said Jock.
The man was striding across the square, not looking to either side, headed for the front door of the sanctuary. A gust of wind came off the lake. For just a second, it lifted his coat. I saw the vest. "Do it," I said.
The rifle recoiled at the instant I heard the shot. I held the binoculars to my eyes, watching the boy in the beige
suit. Time slowed to a crawl, like in a movie run in slow motion. The back of his head blew out from the force of the bullet entering his brain. Bone and tissue splattered the sunwashed bricks of the square. He dropped with no effort to catch himself. He was dead before he hit the ground. Jock had drilled him through the forehead with a 7.62-millimeter round.
The sound of the rifle caused panic in the square. People were looking around for the origin of the blast. Some dropped to their stomachs, others simply began running. Several people closest to our target were standing over the body, frozen, looks of horror straining their facial features. I saw Logan, moving at a dead run, cross the square. He reached the body, squatted beside it, pulled the coat back, looked up at us and pumped his arm in a victory gesture. His voice came over my earpiece. "Got the bastard, Jock. You got the crazy bastard."
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
Longboat Key is a place to heal the soul. The summer brings a quiet time for the year-round islanders. The snowbirds are back in the north, the tourists are gone, and the key slows to a pace that could be considered glacial.
A month had gone by since the death of a young man on a sun-swept church square in the beautiful city of Orlando. The headlines told of a plot to assassinate the mayor of Orlando, who attended the church, and of a police sniper who killed the would-be assassin. There was nothing about bombers or crazed religious freaks or, for that matter, whores.
The Heaven Can't Wait Spas in several cities were quietly closed down, and the working girls told to leave town. The Reverend Robert William Simmermon was locked in a small cell in a mental institution, and would probably spend the rest of his life there.
Michelle Browne was cooperating with law enforcement, helping them piece together the empire and find the girls who wanted to go home. Most didn't. They liked being whores, and were looking for other highclass venues in which to ply their trade.
Michelle's goons, Charlie Calhoun and Martin Holcomb, were being held on assault and battery charges and would spend some time as guests of the state of Florida.
The girls taken by the Army from Blood Island were drying out in treatment centers in South Florida and would be given the opportunity to rejoin their families. Paul Galls told me that most of the families were so dysfunctional that the girls didn't want anything to do with them. Social Service agencies were being brought in to help the young women.
The Key West bomber would probably spend the next twenty or so years in a federal penitentiary. He had been brainwashed, but he wasn't crazy. Hopefully, by the time he got out of prison, he would have shed his demons.
Fats was going to be in jail for the rest of his life. His wounds had been treated, and he was spending some quality time in the Seminole County jail, a federal prisoner awaiting trial. He kept trying to tell anyone who would listen that a crazed lawyer from Longboat Key had stabbed him, but the FBI assured the reporters that Fats had been hurt in an altercation with a drug dealer.
Jock Algren was back in Houston, playing golf and trying to convince his agency that he really was retired. He reported that the bosses kept nodding in understanding, but he was sure he'd get another call in the future.
Me? Aw, hell, I was doing okay. Peggy Timmons was visiting, with her dad's blessing. She had adopted me as a kind of uncle, and I liked the role.
She was a tough gal, and wouldn't let her ordeal on Blood Island ruin her life. She had arranged to reenter the University of Georgia in the fall, and had plans to follow her dad to medical school. She missed Laura, as did I. It was good to have someone I could talk to about her. I was learning a lot about the life Laura had as a Timmons, and I was glad to know that it had been a good one.
My boat was still in Key West, watched over by the Coast Guard. Logan and I were going to get it the following week. We'd take our time getting back to Longboat Key. The tarpon were running in Boca Grande Pass, and we meant to bag our share. We planned to stay over a few days on Sanibel Island and find out what those people did for fun. I'd heard there was a new restaurant there, named for a fictional character conjured up by one of the local islanders. The food was reportedly outstanding.
So, on a tropical evening in early June, Logan and Peggy and I sat on the patio of Cafe on the Bay, enjoying a dinner of fresh seafood and white wine. Debbie was tending bar at Moore's and hadn't been able to join us. We'd stop by for a nightcap later. Peggy had become quite fond of her, and we all appreciated Debbie's help in rooting out what we had come to think of as pure evil.
A freshening breeze blew off the Gulf, bringing the smell of the sea, and rustling the branches of the banyan trees under which we sat. The lights on the patio were subdued, and Peggy's face was in shadow. She was beautiful, and, I knew, tough as nails.
"What I don't understand, Peggy," said Logan, "is how you got tied up with that bunch of nuts in the first place."
"I'm not sure either, Logan," said Peggy. "I wasn't ready for the freedom I found when I went off to college. My mother died when I was five, and Laura married my dad and raised me from the time I was eight. She was a wonderful mother, but she and Dad were pretty strict about what I could and couldn't do. When I got to Athens, all the restraints came off, and I went a little crazy."
"How did you get hooked up with Simmermon?" Logan asked.
"My boyfriend and I and a couple we lived with in Athens came here for spring break. We had all dropped out of school and were doing drugs and hanging out in Athens. It seemed like a good idea at the time, even if we didn't have any money. We met Jake Yardley on our first day here, and he seemed like a godsend. He took us in and paid for everything for several days. We lived on the beach and ate and drank well. He even had some weed for us. We couldn't believe our good luck."
I'd heard the story before. Peggy had spent part of our week together trying to explain to me, and probably to herself, the disconnect from reality that led her to Blood Island. "Tell Logan about meeting the Rev," I said.
"Yardley kept telling us about this man of God who had a place in his organization for people like us; people who didn't have any other place to go. I was the only one of us with any kind of family, and the other three thought we ought to meet Simmermon.
"Yardley took us to the Rev's motor home over at Robarts. He was a smooth talker; offered us sanctuary," she said, using her hands and fingers to indicate quote marks. "He said we could go with him to a tropical island and live a life of ease. Said God would bless us with everything we needed or wanted. I didn't realize then that the punch he served us was laced with some kind of drug. We were all floating on the Rev's benevolence.
"The next thing I knew, I was on Blood Island, and my friends were gone. The Rev told me they had abandoned me, but that he was going to save me. That all sounded good, until I got sick and got the drugs out of my system. Everything's a little fuzzy about that time, but I must've been on the island for a couple of weeks before they tried to take me to the whorehouse."
We sat quietly, sipping our wine, savoring the evening. Peggy was pensive on this, our last evening together. After a while, she said, "Matt, I don't really understand why you came for me. You hadn't seen Laura in years, and you'd never met me."
"I came because I loved Laura," I said, "and I would've done anything she asked of me."
"Why then, did Logan come? He'd never met Laura. And Jock?"
"They came," I said, "because they're my friends."
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