Thriller Box Set One: The Subway-The Debt-Catastrophic

by Dustin Stevens

  Sweat ran down over my face, dripped across my deltoids, as I jogged a few steps forward, snapping off two more shots, each slamming into the bed of the truck, as inconsequential as the previous shots I’d fired.

  Feeling the hatred I had for the situation, for the men that had killed Uncle Jep and kept coming after me, I continued pulling even after it was clear I was doing no good, shooting for nothing more than to release the animosity I harbored.

  Round after round I fired, my focus on the enormous yellow phallic symbol, oblivious to the world around me.

  Right up until I felt Lou slam into me from behind, knocking me to the ground.

  And looked up a moment later to see why she’d done so, a second vehicle having emerged from the garage, the barrel of a gun visible through the passenger side window.

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Talula Davis knew exactly how Tim was feeling. Seeing the big yellow truck aimed at her Bronco, looking to finish the job it had started earlier in the day, she felt every last emotion she’d had in front of Charbonneau well to the surface.

  And multiply by a factor of ten.

  A sneer forming on her features, she stopped shooting only for fear of hitting Tim, seeing him rise to his feet and begin marching forward on the truck. Absent of any fear of reprisal, his focus was solely on the response, retaliating for the situation he was in, for the havoc this group had brought upon them.

  Just a few feet behind him, it was only through pure luck that she even happened to hear it.

  A second small squeal, the low hum of an engine.

  Having no more than a split second to process it, to register what it represented, Davis knew in an instant what was happening.

  Earlier in the day, there had been three men inside the truck. One, Tim had shot. The other, presumably, was behind the wheel, intent on finishing the job on her Bronco it had started already.

  That left one more.

  One that was about to tear out of the garage, Tim left standing out in the open before it.

  Shoving herself off her back leg, Davis shot forward, moving in parallel to the car as it appeared from the garage. Mid-sized, black in color, she registered a middle-aged man with red hair behind the wheel just before launching herself forward at the exposed back of Tim.

  Hitting him square, she buried her shoulder into his lower back, wrapped her free hand around his waist.

  Not expecting the blow, his body pitched forward, the firing stopping as his arms flailed before him, his palms barely catching their weight, breaking the fall as they landed in a tangle on the sidewalk.

  Releasing her grip on him, Davis rolled to the side, brittle grass scraping across her skin as she came up on a knee, seeing the driver leaning across the passenger seat, a gun trained their direction, a smile on his face.

  Holding the pose for a moment, he met her gaze before raising the front tip of his weapon to the ceiling and speeding off, leaving nothing in his wake but a shower of debris that used to be the garage door and the last remnants of tire smoke from his partner’s exit.

  Maintaining her pose, Davis held off on return fire, watching as the car exited, disappearing in the same direction as the yellow truck. For almost a minute she stayed that way, adrenaline coursing through her in an amount that was almost strong enough to induce paralysis, every muscle taut, before she released a breath.

  With it came the break from tension she needed, her weapon slowly lowering before her.

  A few feet away, Tim did the same, perspiration on his skin, veins bulging the length of his arms, showing his body was reacting in the same way as hers.

  “Nice hit, Keuchly.”

  In no mood for it, Davis slid her gaze from the road to Tim.

  “Luke Keuchly is the-“

  “I know who Luke Keuchly is,” Davis snapped. Running her gaze the length of him, she added, “You’re welcome.”

  Returning the gesture, he nodded, adding, “You’re welcome, too.”

  For an instant, neither said a word, both silently acknowledging they had helped one another, that it didn’t mean a whole lot considering they were no closer to finding their guys than they were an hour before.

  Shifting, they both looked to the road.

  “Those weren’t the same two guys we saw,” Tim said, flicking a glance her way before taking a step toward the garage.

  “No?” Davis asked, watching him go forward before following, the front yard crackling beneath her feet.

  “Remember the guy you met at the hospital?” Tim asked.

  Thinking back a moment, Davis recalled the brief glimpse she’d gotten of the guy. Thick and full, if she had to encapsulate him in a single word, it would have been young.

  Most certainly not the first thing to come to mind with either of the two that just sped past.

  “You’re right,” she said, her voice low, more of a thought than a statement. Raising it slightly, she added, “And these guys had their truck...”

  Making his way to the corner of the garage, Tim glanced back her way, bringing both hands together, his Beretta poised before him.

  “So where are the other two?”

  As fast as it had ebbed away, Davis felt a spur of adrenaline rise up within her. Jogging a couple steps forward, she could feel her uniform shirt clinging to her skin, sweat pouring from every opening.

  Coming up behind him, she circled in front, passing through the interior of the garage, nothing but a twin pair of dark smudges and an awful stench left inside. Feeling the smoke of their dual exits burning her eyes, she moved in a sideways crouch, going for the rear door.

  Stopping alongside it, she pressed a shoulder against the wall, turning back to Tim.

  “You breach, I’ll clear.”

  A quick flash of a smile appeared in one corner of Tim’s mouth as he lowered his weapon, his hands returning to his sides. Walking in a straight line for the door, he extended a hand, grasping the handle, and said, “I think if there was anybody left alive inside, they would have either left with them or shot us down out front, don’t you?”

  A stab of hostility passed through Davis, her features contorting as Tim pressed the door open, shoving his way on inside.

  With the opening of the door came a host of new smells, ones markedly different from those in the garage, bringing with them an entirely new set of physiological responses.

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  Walking into the ME’s office in Sevierville had been a new experience for Talula Davis. She’d been around bodies before – it was sort of a job requirement, even for somewhere as far-flung as Monroe County – but never something like what she had encountered in the chilled basement lab.

  The chest splayed open.

  The organs in various states of removal.

  The tattered skin flaps that had been Jessup Lynch’s chest.

  Even at that, she would gladly take a morning conversation with Dr. Asay every day for the next week if it meant she didn’t have to walk into something like the back room of the farmhouse.

  The bodies looked to be the other two from the yellow truck that had tried to run them down that morning. Both young and muscled up, they looked like the kind that someone would send in to try and make a point.

  Definitely like the sort that would drive an oversized monstrosity of a pickup truck and paint it bright yellow, looking to put a sign up, drawing attention to themselves.

  Lying side by side on the carpet, their arms hung by their sides, almost as if they were positioned, ready to be placed into coffins. Shot at short range, twin blood circles were stretched across their chests like misshapen red nipples. A few inches each across, they only hinted at the damage that must have been left by the exit wounds, thick puddles of dark blood seeping out from each serving as the proof.

  Though more than enough to be fatal by themselves, a third round had also been placed into each, perfect circles cleaved into their smooth foreheads.

  As for those exit wounds, Davis didn’t need to specu
late, assorted organic detritus sprayed across the wall behind them. Time of death seemingly just minutes before, some of the heavier spots were still visibly wet, streaking south.

  Adding one final touch to the hellish scene was the air conditioner blowing at full capacity, shoving the assorted smells into the rest of the house.

  Even now, twenty minutes later, the sight, the smell, was enough to make Davis’s eyes water as she stood in the front doorway. With the door open, she leaned against it, willing to take the outside heat in exchange for a reprieve from everything behind her.

  With her right hand resting on the butt of her weapon, she stood and stared out, trying to make sense of the day she’d had, of what it could possibly entail moving forward.

  Thus far, she’d been shot at, had her ride wrecked beyond repair, stood witness over a trio of bodies. She’d cursed out her boss, condemned her coworkers, became impromptu partners with someone she barely knew.

  In her back pocket was his cell phone, his instructions before slipping away quite odd, even if they were clear, and a bit unequivocal.

  Puzzling over what they meant, Davis’s brows were drawn in tight as a cruiser appeared at the end of the driveway. Moving slow, without sirens or lights, she could see the enormous girth of Charbonneau behind the wheel, a thinner silhouette she guessed to be Adams riding shotgun.

  Lingering by the end of the drive, they seemed to check over the wreckage of her Bronco for several moments, Davis feeling her core draw tight as she tried to imagine the comments that were being lobbed her way from inside the cruiser.

  Just envisioning them, she felt the same animosity she had unleashed earlier rising within her.

  This was going to be ugly. She could see it already.

  Calling it in was not something she was really keen on doing, but she hadn’t had a choice in the matter. As precarious as her employment status might be, not requesting backup in the wake of the exit by two armed assailants and the discovery of a double homicide would be certain termination.

  Maybe even charges of misconduct, or as an accomplice.

  Drawing herself up tall, she placed her hands on her hips, framed in the doorway as the cruiser eventually slid past the wreckage in the front ditch. Idling forward, it stopped well back from the garage, both men climbing out, looking over everything before them.

  “What the...?” Adams opened, his voice trailing away as he bent at the waist, picking up a few shards of the garage door and examining them.

  On the opposite side, Charbonneau stood and folded his arms over his torso, shaking his head as he looked at the last remnants of the garage door hanging free from the corner. His mustache twitched as he sniffed the smell of charred rubber in the air.

  “Got to admit,” he said, raising his voice, “didn’t think I’d be getting a call from you so soon after that little outburst of yours back at the station.”

  Not caring for his choice of words or the connotation they carried, Davis remained silent, venturing no closer.

  Knowing nothing good could come from it.

  “But now I guess I understand why,” he said. Slowly, he shifted his focus over to her, his face red and sweating, trying its best to hold a glare. “What the hell did you do this time?”

  Just as it had a few hours before, that familiar jolt of anger rose up through Davis. Starting low, it spiked fast and hard, threatening to come rolling out, to tell both of the men before her exactly what she thought of them.

  In case that hadn’t been made abundantly clear already.

  Instead, she raised a finger, motioning for them to follow her inside. Taking a step in that direction, she disappeared through the doorway, peering out the lace curtains, watching as the two seemed to debate things for a moment.

  Not until they begrudgingly started to come forward, each waving their hands about, the sound of their voices just barely drifting in, did she walk on through the house.

  With each step, the smells of death became more pronounced, so much so that she stopped on the edge of the rear living room. Hooking her thumbs into the front of her belt, she put her back to the room, waiting for them to enter.

  It took longer than it should have, was accompanied by a host of unnecessary grunts and noises done simply for her to hear, but eventually they showed, Charbonneau filling the width of the doorway, Adams taking the top vertical portion behind him.

  “On patrol this afternoon, I spotted the yellow truck that had attempted to run me down,” Davis said. “When I approached the front door, two men fled, destroying the garage door on their way out.”

  The story wasn’t quite how things had played out, but at this point, she had determined that leaving Tim out of it as much as possible was for the best.

  They already knew he had been with her earlier. There was no need to make it look like she had brought on a partner without consulting them, especially one that had first arrived by illegally entering an active crime scene.

  “So that’s what happened to your department issue vehicle out there?” Charbonneau said, his tone and his question both making the hatred Davis felt for him become that much more pronounced.

  Of course, that was what he was most concerned with at the moment.

  “After taking fire, I breached the house, attempting to secure the scene,” Davis continued, doing her best to ignore his statement and the insinuation it carried. Jerking her chin back over her shoulder, she added, “That’s when I found this.”

  Each staring at her a moment longer in silence, Charbonneau was the first to react. Stepping forward, he kept his gaze on her, a sneer in place, before walking to the threshold of the rear living room and peering in.

  There he stood for the better part of a minute, saying nothing, his body less than two feet from Davis, before slowly turning his head to regard her.

  “You’re fired.”

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  The drive south from Knoxville had been short and relatively painless for Deputy Marshal Abby Lipski. After a few initial stabs at conversation – all of which were met with little to no enthusiasm from anybody in the car – Marshal Colvin had fallen largely silent, relegating his comments to nothing more than clarifications about directions rendered or the destination they were headed to.

  In the rear, Marshals Burrows and Marlucci had been silent as well, both pounding away at various electronic devices, keeping in close contact with the team back on the plane, all of them scurrying to try and get a handle on Tim Scarberry.

  As best any of them could tell, the calls had been had with Jessup Lynch, the adoptive father that took Scarberry in after the demise of his parents in his teen years. A reclusive sort that lived well below the radar, initial sweeps for property or utility holdings in his name had turned up nothing.

  Not until someone had noticed that he had once been married, the woman deceased, did the notion of trying to track him under her name occur to them.

  From there, things had fallen fairly easily into order. The man might have preferred to stay out of sight, but that didn’t mean he could be a ghost, not in the modern world.

  Of the various items in his name, one was a bank account that paid for the cell phone listed under the name of someone he had served in Vietnam with decades before.

  For most of the drive down, she couldn’t help but wonder how much of this could have been avoided, how unnecessary the entire ordeal felt.

  Witness protection wasn’t a life in exile. If he needed something, wanted someone to look into his uncle for him, they could have done that.

  Would have been much better suited for it than him, at that.

  But he hadn’t. He had exhibited the same prideful arrogance that annoyed Lipski every time she had to be in the same place as him, storming ahead with total disregard for the mess he was making in his wake.

  Such as potentially destroying her career.

  That notion, that thorn that continued to prod deep into her psyche, was the foremost thought on Lipski’s mind as they pu
lled down the wooded lane. With pine and poplar trees lining it tight on either side, very little of the late afternoon sun was visible, the air noticeably cooler as Colvin inched them forward.

  Abandoning the previous line of thinking, Lipski sat up higher in her seat. Reaching to her hip, she felt for her weapon, her adrenaline peaking as a structure emerged before them.

  Two stories in height, it was constructed of dark wood, the roof a glossy metallic green.

  Out front sat not a single vehicle, not the slightest sign of life anywhere on the premises.

  “Marshal Burrows, with me,” Lipski said, the SUV not yet even to a stop. “Marshals Colvin, Marlucci, stay with the car, prepare for a quick evac if necessary.”

  Having no idea what they might find, if there would be any call for a fast extraction, Lipski issued the order more to keep the crowd inside thin. Not wanting to have a marshal that was trained in electronic surveillance and another she had just met riding along, she stepped from the car before either could object, Burrows doing the same behind her.

  Bringing both hands under her weapon before her, she jogged across the short expanse of dirt and pine needles that comprised the front yard, stepping up onto the front porch. The roughhewn boards echoed beneath her feet with every step as she crossed them, going directly to the door and pounding on it.

  “Mr. Lynch! U.S. Marshals, open up!”

  In the quiet of the forest, her voice seemed to carry, birds falling silent above them.

  A few feet away, Burrows stood with his own gun angled toward the ground, alternating glances between her and the front of the property.

  “Anything?” he whispered.

  Listening close, Lipski shook her head, hearing none of the usual telltale signs of movement within a home.

  No footfalls on the floor, no creaking boards, not even a groan from the structure under uneven weight.

  “I’m going in,” she said.

  A grunt was the only response from Burrows as she tried the door, finding the knob solid in her hand. Taking a step back, she positioned her body in a staggered stance, her shoulders square to the door.