The Ackerman Thrillers Boxset: 1-6

by Ethan Cross

  Schofield’s grip on the grenades slackened, but Marcus kept hold of them as the killer let go and stumbled backward. Blood poured down Schofield’s face from his shattered nose. His eyes were dazed and glassy, and he nearly toppled over as he staggered away from the fountain in an unsteady run.

  But Schofield wasn’t the only problem.

  Marcus could feel the cross-hairs of a 7.62mm rifle lining up on him and Stupak at that very second, so he drew back his right arm and threw a grenade toward the sniper’s location. His main concern was to distract the man, not blow him up. And unless Schofield’s grandfather was some kind of hard-core Spec Ops rifleman, he’d be hitting the deck the second he saw an explosive flying through the air in his direction.

  “Get to the fountain,” Marcus yelled to Stupak as he jumped over a waist-high black wire fence and headed for the lip of the landmark.

  He pictured the grenade lofting toward the small building, striking the snow-packed ground, and rolling up to the cafe’s outer wall like the world’s deadliest snowball.

  Stupak was on his heels as they slipped over the edge and landed on their hands and knees in two feet of snow that had accumulated in the bottom of Buckingham Fountain’s outer ring. The fountain was only four feet deep, but it was more than enough to provide them with cover.

  The sound of the explosion thumped against his ears as the grenade filled the air with snow and concrete dust and fragmentation projectiles. Marcus felt the wave of pressure in his bones.

  His left fist still held a live M67 fragmentation grenade, but he pulled his Sig Sauer with his right hand and scanned the cafe and park for signs of movement. He didn’t see Schofield. The Anarchist must have made it to cover. But he did see a flash of something in the window of the cafe and dropped back below the fountain’s concrete lip. He was thoroughly outgunned at this distance, pitting his .45 ACP pistol against a 7.62mm rifle. If they were going to stand any chance, he needed to get closer.

  He scanned the interior of the fountain. Normally, water would have been above their heads, but during the winter the fountain was just an empty shell with its pipes, jets, catwalks, lights, and supports all exposed. Snow covered the decorative statues and obscured their details. Marcus couldn’t see anything that could help them, only the ornamentation and framework. No manhole covers indicating drains or tunnels that could lead them to safety.

  Staying low below the fountain’s lip, Marcus moved toward the other end of the bowl. Then he chanced a quick look over the edge. There was a line of benches backed by shrubbery and small trees maybe a hundred feet away. Beyond that was a walkway bordered by a section of the park filled with several large trees. The wooded section butted right up against the back of the Fountain Cafe. If he could reach the benches and then the trees, he could flank the shooter.

  But in order to do so, he would have to cross over a hundred feet of snow-covered open ground, and he would be completely vulnerable and exposed.

  He poked his head up over the edge again and caught sight of Schofield limping from a line of trees toward the cafe. The killer’s impaired movement suggested that he might have taken some shrapnel from the fragmentation grenade.

  Then a bullet ricocheted off the lip of the fountain just to the right of Marcus’s head, driving him back down.

  “Dammit,” he said.

  “This isn’t working out very well,” Stupak commented at his side.

  “You think?”

  Marcus searched for a solution and found one gripped firmly in his left fist. The first grenade had bought them enough time to reach cover, and he assumed that the second would do the same. But if Raymond Schofield was smart enough to realize that Marcus’s throw from even closer had fallen well short of the building, the older man might not take cover as he had the first time. He might take aim and squeeze the trigger instead. But it was a risk they’d have to take.

  “Okay,” Marcus said. “Get ready to lay down some covering fire on that building. I’m going to toss this last grenade and then make a break for the trees. You keep them pinned inside, and I’ll work my way around to their backs.”

  Stupak nodded, a .40 caliber Glock 22 held ready in his right hand. Marcus took a deep breath and prepared to throw the grenade.

  119

  While sitting outside and contemplating how best to secure his target, Francis Ackerman Jr. had heard the familiar sound of gunshots coming from inside the blue house. He had quickly made his way through the yard and peered in through one of the windows in time to see Maggie rushing toward the back door with the bandaged man in pursuit. He wasn’t sure who this fellow thought he was, but nobody messed with Ackerman’s friends.

  “I would suggest that neither of you move,” he said, staring down the sights of his Taurus Judge. “It’s good to see you again, Maggie, but I don’t believe that I’ve had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of your friend.”

  She stared up at him with fire in her eyes and said nothing.

  “What’s your name?” he said to the bandaged man. “Your real name.”

  The man got to his feet. His eyes were intense and bright behind the bandages. Ackerman recognized the look. It was one of utter insanity. The bandaged man’s cracked and burned lips curled up in a snarl of contempt.

  “Listen, friend,” Ackerman said. “I don’t really care who you are. To me, you’re just another cockroach.”

  “You shut your damn mouth. You have no idea the power that I hold.” The man’s voice was harsh and strained but hypnotic and soothing nonetheless. It was a deep Southern baritone that rolled from his mouth like honey.

  Ackerman noticed Maggie’s head whip round toward the bandaged man in shock. “You’re not Irish,” she said absently, almost to herself. “Oh my God, you’re the Prophet. You were faking. That’s why Schofield was trying to kill you. He was just protecting his family.”

  “Schofield has lost his way. But that’s none of your concern, slave. You’ll burn tonight with all the rest in The Great Fire.”

  Ackerman said, “Excuse me. This is all very fascinating. But I’m still here, and I still don’t care who you are or what you want.” Ackerman tossed a syringe of clear liquid in the bandaged man’s direction. It rolled to a stop near his feet on the yellow linoleum. “You have a choice. You can either inject that into Maggie, or I can shoot you and do it myself. Though I would prefer that you do it. She’d fight me and cost me extra time.”

  “Who are you?” the bandaged man said.

  “Does it matter? I’m not sure how it works around here, but normally when someone fires a gun in a populated area, the neighbors call the police. I’m sure they’re on the way as we speak. So although I would genuinely like to hear about this Great Fire that you referred to, I simply don’t have the time. So inject that into Maggie, and we’ll be on our merry way.”

  “What about me?”

  “If you inject her with that, then I’m perfectly happy to let you go about your business.”

  The bandaged man picked up the syringe and gave Ackerman a cracked and bloody smile.

  120

  The distance between the fountain and the line of benches was the longest hundred feet of Marcus’s life. After throwing the grenade, he took off in a sprint toward cover. But with every shot that Stupak fired, Marcus wondered whether the next one would come from the sniper and would tear through his body and shred his internal organs.

  Four seconds passed, and the grenade exploded just after Marcus reached the benches and shrubbery. He didn’t look, but he felt the jolting wave of pressure shoot through his body. His ears rang from the gunfire as the wind and snow pelted his face.

  He wasted no time in heading across the walkway to the relative protection of the trees. Then he weaved in and out among the bare elms until he reached the back of the Fountain Cafe. He hugged the wall of the green and gold structure and edged around to the other side. Stupak was still laying down covering fire at the cafe’s south end and, with any luck, the sniper might not even
have seen Marcus’s dash from the fountain.

  The north side of the cafe, where Marcus now stood, had one window near the building’s front edge. He peered inside. There was a deli counter and chairs, but there was also a man directly opposite him at another window.

  Schofield was nowhere in sight, and that worried him. Last he had seen, the killer had been limping off in this direction. Schofield could have been inside the building, guarding the entrance. Or he could have kept on going right past the cafe while Marcus was sprinting to the trees. There was no way to know for sure. But, in either case, he didn’t have time to stand around.

  The sniper’s back was to him as the older man leaned over the cafe’s sink with the rifle at his shoulder. Marcus took aim and opened fire through the glass.

  Several .45 caliber bullets tore into Raymond’s legs, and the man dropped to the ground, screaming in pain. His rifle clattered to the floor, and he made no attempt to reach for it.

  Marcus wasted no time. He raced inside the building and secured the older man. “Don’t move,” he said. Raymond didn’t seem to hear him. The floor was slick with blood, and Marcus could see that his shots had struck Raymond’s femurs. He would pose little threat. Still, Marcus pulled out a pair of plastic cuffs, secured the older man’s hands, emptied the rifle, and tossed it into the corner.

  Then he yelled out the open window. “Stupak! You’re clear. Get up here.”

  He watched Stupak climb over the fountain’s lip and move toward the cafe. Schofield’s grandfather rolled around on the tile floor and banged his head against the ground from the pain. The bullet impacts had probably broken both his legs and the projectiles’ collision with the bones would have fragmented the rounds, causing more tissue damage. They needed to get him to a hospital, or he could easily die from blood loss.

  “Where’s your grandson?” Marcus said.

  “Go to hell,” Raymond said in a harsh whisper.

  Marcus clenched his jaw and swore. He hadn’t gone through all this just to let the Anarchist escape. Maybe Andrew had been right? Maybe they should have taken Schofield at the hotel?

  Then Marcus thought of the way Schofield had been limping, and he bolted toward the door. Stupak was just approaching as Marcus burst outside and started to scan the ground. He could hear police sirens growing closer. The noise echoed through the park in a Doppler effect and made it impossible to determine from which direction the cops were approaching or how far away they were. The grenade blasts must have finally drawn some attention.

  “What’s going on?” Stupak said.

  “The grandfather’s in there. He’s down. He needs an ambulance.”

  “What about Schofield?”

  “He couldn’t have gone far.”

  “He got away?”

  “Just cover the grandfather and get him some help. I’ll find Schofield.”

  And then Marcus found what he was searching for. The ground was a bright white, and the trail of crimson showed up like a neon sign. He followed the small drops of blood down a set of steps to a path that cut through the park. It led off to the east, toward Lake Michigan.

  Marcus stared ahead as he ran down the path, trying to see through the snow flurries. Bare elms and cast-iron lamp-posts bordered the walkway. The sirens were growing closer.

  He heard a frenzy of angry honking coming from the road ahead—and then he saw him. Schofield was two hundred feet ahead, hobbling through nine lanes of traffic on Lake Shore Drive. Cars were skidding to halts and sounding their horns.

  Marcus weaved his way across the busy road, trying to avoid getting run down. A white Chevy S10 screeched to a stop just a few feet from him, and the wind from a passing semi took his breath away. But then he was across and scanning for his prey.

  Schofield was only thirty feet away now, hobbling toward the waters of Lake Michigan. Marcus wondered where the man thought he was going. Did the killer still have another trick up his sleeve?

  Pounding through the snow with his Sig Sauer aimed at the killer’s back, Marcus closed the distance between them and said, “That’s far enough!”

  Schofield stopped, and his shoulders took on a defeated hunch. But he didn’t turn around. Marcus could see his body shaking as his lungs dragged in short ragged breaths.

  “It’s over, Schofield. Put your hands up and turn around, slowly.”

  Schofield complied, and when he turned, Marcus could see a large gash in his right thigh and holes in his coat where small pieces of shrapnel or chunks of concrete had struck him. All in all, it didn’t look like anything life-threatening.

  “I won’t let you take me alive,” Schofield said. His voice was eerily calm, like a man who had accepted that he was about to die and the world couldn’t touch him. “I know what it’s like to have a parent locked away somewhere, and I won’t put my family through that. Right now, the best way I can protect them is by dying.”

  “Where are the missing women?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Tell me!”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Where’s the Prophet?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Does he have the women?”

  “Yes. He has a small antiques shop on the north side of town, but I doubt that he’s there. You need to understand. I’m not his partner or his accomplice. I’m his pet. He expects me to do as I’m told. He doesn’t share his plans with me. I wish I’d had the courage to kill him a long time ago.”

  “It’s not too late. Help me find him, and I’ll make sure that he never harms another soul.”

  Schofield laughed, but there was no humor in it, just regret. “I tried to kill him once already, but that woman stopped me. Hell, they would have killed him back at the compound when I was a child. The others were turning on him, but he was too smart for them. You have no idea what he’s capable of. He—”

  “What woman are you talking about? The one who stopped you.”

  “Yesterday I tried to burn him alive, just like he ordered me to do to all those women. Just like he did to my friends when I was a boy. But this blonde stopped me.”

  The gun trembled in Marcus’s hands. He hadn’t understood why Schofield had attacked the old man, but now it all made sense. And Maggie’s kindness and sympathy for someone she had thought to be a victim had placed them all in danger. She had delivered the Prophet to his next sacrifices. A vision of Maggie burning alive filled his mind and made him feel suddenly nauseous.

  Schofield must have sensed his unease. “What’s wrong?”

  “Conlan is your neighbor?”

  “Yes, he’s always stayed close to me. Like my own personal devil watching me from the shadows.”

  Marcus kept his gun trained on Schofield but managed to pull out his cell phone. “I think Conlan might have your family.”

  Schofield took a step forward. “What are you talking about?”

  Marcus’s heart thundered with every ring of Maggie’s phone. She didn’t answer. It went straight to her voicemail, and he hung up after leaving a clipped message.

  To Schofield, he said, “Your family is in terrible danger, and if you really love them, you’re going to help me put that bastard in the ground. Now, what was your escape plan?”

  Day Seven – December 21 Evening

  121

  Marcus needed to avoid the police. He had just been engaged in a shoot-out at one of Chicago’s most famous landmarks. His credentials would clear him, but they’d want to file reports and take statements, and he didn’t have time for that. He considered explaining the situation to the officer in charge, but there were no guarantees there. If he got a good cop who grasped the severity of the situation, they might let him continue with his pursuit of the Prophet. But if he got a bureaucrat or a boy scout, they’d insist on following protocol to the letter. Plus, he needed Schofield, and the Chicago PD would never let him waltz off with one of the worst murderers in Chicagoland history.

  So he had found himself moving along the banks of
Lake Michigan in the middle of a blizzard. Schofield had parked his car in a secluded lot beneath Route 41. That was where he had been headed when Marcus had caught up to him, and for the first time, Marcus was glad that Schofield liked to plan ahead.

  The wind off the water was even colder and harsher than what he had experienced in the park, and it drove the snow into Marcus’s face and blew hard into his ears, making them ache. His clothes and shoes were soaked, and his feet were numb and stinging with tiny needles of pain. The exhaust fumes from the cars on Lake Shore Drive mixed with the clean scent of cold air carried on the wind and formed a clashing natural and industrial combination of odors.

  Even though Marcus wasn’t sure if he’d be able to hear over the wind, he tried to call Andrew but received no response.

  After several minutes of slogging through the snow, they finally reached the parking lot beneath Route 41. It was a dark and menacing place that Marcus thought would be somewhere more suitable for a shanty town of cardboard boxes populated by homeless men and women. But instead, someone had decided to fill the space with parking spots for workers in the nearby skyscrapers. He didn’t see any security and imagined that it would be fertile ground for the area’s muggers.

  He still didn’t trust Schofield, even though the lives of the man’s family were on the line, and so he had kept the killer in front of him and one hand on the gun in his jacket pocket. Schofield led the way to a beat-up older-model Volkswagen Jetta.

  “You’re driving. I’ll ride in back,” Marcus said.

  They climbed inside and Schofield said, “I’m not going any farther until you tell me what the hell is going on. Where is my family?”

  “I don’t know. But let’s get something straight right now. You don’t have the right to ask questions or make demands. If you don’t do exactly as I say, I’ll snap your neck and leave your corpse out in the snow.”