The Scent of New Death

by Mike Monson

  Briggs said Schmitz was very generous to his wife, Doris. Whenever a particularly nice piece of diamond jewelry came through one of his shops, he’d bring it home. Briggs said their bedroom alone contained several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of jewelry. Plus, for the last several years, the guy had been buying up and hording all the gold he could find. Briggs didn’t know how much the gold was worth, but he was confident its value was well over one million dollars.

  “Jack Dixon, a friend of mine I’m sure you’ve heard of, is an associate of Schmitz. In fact, they grew up together. They’ve always been close, and Jack’s been to the house many times. He’s got a pretty good idea where all the good shit is hidden.”

  Phil was familiar with Dixon. He’d been a fence for years and had a reputation among thieves for his honesty. He was also known for his habit of inflicting harsh violence on anyone he suspected of cheating him.

  “Jack has us all set up. He knows the house. He knows the merchandise. He’ll even fence it for us. He’s got the alarm codes. Hell, he’s even got a key to the front door. Plus, the family won’t be there, and that’s a guarantee. They’ll be in Europe, beginning tonight, for two weeks—all six of them.”

  “Why me? I’m sure there’re a dozen guys that’d love to get in on a job like this.”

  “This is going to be the biggest score of my life, man. I need someone smart, someone steady, someone I can count on, someone who knows how to keep his mouth shut. Around here, the only person that fits that description is Phil Gaines.”

  Phil never liked home invasions. A botched burglary had led to his one prison sentence. He didn’t like, or trust, Dan Briggs. But, he wanted to get his hands on Jeff and Paige. He wanted his money back. Staying close to Briggs was his best chance.

  Phil knew there was no guarantee this robbery would work the way Briggs claimed. The chances that it would turn into a cluster-fuck, and that he’d make little or no money, were excellent—especially with Briggs involved.

  He was getting old. Phil knew the longer he lived this life, the greater the chances he’d make a mistake and get caught. Simple odds. He’d been a fool to fall for Paige.

  He didn’t want to die in prison. Maybe he could use whatever money he might gain from the robbery to lay low for a long, long time. After, of course, he killed Paige and Jeff.

  “Okay, I’ll do it.”

  “Great. You’re not going to regret this.”

  Relieved to be out of Gaines’ presence, Dan Briggs walked around the corner to his parked Harley. Before climbing on, he pulled out his cell and called Jeff Sweet.

  “He’s in.”

  “Oh wow,” Jeff said. He pinched his cell between his cheek and shoulder as he untied Paige from the bed and dragged her by the leash to sit at his feet. “That is so fucking great. Hey Paige, Briggs pulled that shit off.”

  “Cool, awesome.”

  “You told him the family would be gone?” Jeff asked Briggs.

  “Of course.”

  “And he bought it? I knew that would work. You’re sure he doesn’t suspect anything? That dude makes me nervous.”

  “No way. All he could think about was getting the money and using me as a way to get to you guys. Don’t worry about it. Phil Gaines doesn’t know a thing.”

  “Let’s just hope it stays that way. I guess I’ll have to take you off my shit list, Briggs. What do you think, Paige? Should I let Briggs off the hook?”

  Paige laughed. Jeff tugged at her leash and pulled her onto his lap.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe we should see how tonight goes.”

  “Good point. There’s a lot more he could fuck up. Isn’t there Briggs?”

  “Jeff,” Briggs said. “I swear that’s all I could get for those cars, man.”

  “Briggs, you’re a fucking liar.” Jeff absentmindedly played with Paige’s nipples. “Don’t even try. I’m either taking what you owe me out of your cut of the job or I’m going to kill you. That’s it. So this thing better pay off the way you say.”

  “Jeff, it’s going to be perfect. Believe me.”

  “I’d like to believe you. I really would.”

  “How do you like the picture of seventeen-year-old Jessica?”

  “She looks pretty good, man, thanks. Paige agrees.”

  Jeff twisted and squeezed Paige’s left nipple. Paige stared into his eyes.

  “Dixon and I will meet you and Paige at one a.m. at my house to give you guys the tools and the alarm codes,” Briggs said. “Then, Dixon and I will pick up Phil at two-thirty and go to the Schmitz house. By the time we get there, you and Paige need to have things secure.”

  “We know what to do,” Jeff said. He worked on Paige’s right nipple, dug his nails in as he twisted. “Don’t we sweetie?”

  “Definitely.”

  “Like a fucking script. Right, Paige?”

  “Exactly. Step-by-step and line-by-line.”

  Dan Briggs hung up and called Dixon.

  “You got everything?”

  “Sure,” Dixon said. “Most of the shit I already had in storage, like the rope and the duct tape and the pistols. The stun gun and cattle-prod were a little harder to find, but I got ’em. We’re all set.”

  9

  Phil had refused to learn anything more about Zen from Fudoki Jacob Ginzburg.

  After several years, the old teacher knew that Gaines’ zazen was highly concentrated. He’d never seen an inmate develop such a strong affinity to the practice. Most of the prisoners he’d worked with gave up right away, telling him they were unable to pay attention to their breath because thoughts and images kept intruding, pulling them away into fantasies and schemes.

  From the first day, Phil Gaines sat straight but relaxed, without the fidgeting and obvious restlessness Fudoki saw in most new meditators. In or out of prison.

  Of course, Phil’s mind did wander at times and he lost track of his breath occasionally, but he stayed patient and had no problem quickly returning to the current inhale or exhale. After a year, he rarely lost count of his breaths and almost never had to start over again at one. At that point Fudoki told him to drop the counting and just sit with his breath and with whatever was happening. He told Phil this was known as Shikantaza, which meant just sitting.

  Fudoki was ambitious. He knew if he could turn a criminal like Phil into a serious Zen student—one who would join his center upon release from prison, take the vows of a monk, adopt a new Japanese name, and, eventually, become a teacher himself—his own legacy would grow.

  Throughout their relationship, Fudoki attempted to talk to Phil about the life and teachings of the Buddha. He’d bring up the Four Noble Truths of human suffering, the cause of that suffering, and the cessation of that suffering through following the practices of the Noble Eight-Fold Path.

  Phil always stopped him with the same statement: “Words are bullshit.”

  Phil never told Fudoki about his Pentecostal minister father. A man who talked about God and Jesus and Heaven and Hell constantly and fervently, praising the perfect healing love of Christ, while at the same time beating both Phil and his mother night after night. All he wanted out of his Zen teacher was the chance to sit together in silence and to absorb some of the man’s centered calmness.

  “All your books and ideas are nothing,” he told his teacher one day near the end of his sentence. “I don’t want to hear it. I just want to sit and breathe and know what the fuck is going on. I don’t care if I suffer or not. You think it’s some amazing news that life is suffering? Jesus fucking Christ.”

  “But don’t you want to end all the violence and live in peace and harmony?” Fudoki said. “Don’t you want enlightenment? To be free of suffering? This is what the Buddha’s teaching promises.”

  This was one of the few times he’d heard Phil laugh.

  “Doesn’t matter what I want. I’m going to do what I’m going to do. All the other fucking assholes in the world are going to do whatever the fuck they’re going to do. L
ife is going to be what it’s going to be. Your enlightenment, your freedom from suffering, now that is some real bullshit.”

  Phil studied Fudoki’s eyes.

  “Tell me something. Do you have this enlightenment? Are you free from suffering?”

  “My teacher gave me dharma transmission. When he felt my practice had matured, I was ready to pass on his teaching. Which means that in the seven-hundred-year-old Japanese Soto Zen school, I am considered an enlightened master as well.”

  Phil Gaines glanced toward the open door of the classroom. No guards were looking in or walking by. He rushed at Fudoki. He picked him up out of his chair, pushed his back against the wall, and covered his mouth and nose with his hands, preventing him from breathing.

  He waited two minutes.

  “Tell me, man. How’s that enlightenment shit working for you? Are you suffering now?”

  Fudoki squirmed and fought. Phil waited another thirty seconds before letting him go. Fudoki fell to the floor gasping and heaving, desperate for air.

  Phil returned to his chair and sat in perfect silence the rest of the hour.

  Fudoki left before the period ended without saying goodbye to Phil. He never returned to teach zazen to the prisoners.

  10

  Jack Dixon sat in his ten-year-old Toyota Camry at eleven a.m. He’d parked in front of one of Carl Schmitz’s pawnshops located in a crummy strip mall on Coffee Road. He watched Carl Schmitz pull up and park out front in his brand new black S600 Mercedes Benz. Before heading into the pawnshop, the fat ugly bastard went into the grimy liquor store next door to buy lotto scratchers, a cheap cigar, and a pint of vodka.

  So predictable.

  Wearing his usual uniform of fifty-five-inch-waist khakis and XXXL silk Tommy Bahama shirt, Schmitz left the store carrying his purchases in a brown paper bag. On his way into his shop, he glanced in Dixon’s direction, giving him a nearly imperceptible nod: Jack’s cue to go through the back door and meet the fat man in his office.

  Dixon had three stolen handguns. He regularly bought them cheap from thieves. Schmitz took them from Dixon to sell under the table to felons who had no other way of obtaining firearms. Later, Schmitz would split the profit with Dixon.

  Dixon knew Schmitz cheated him. The fucker had been short-changing him for years. Dixon brought Schmitz deals, not only for guns, but other sought-after stolen goods such as jewelry, power tools, high-end Fender and Gibson electric guitars, vehicles, even a boat every once in a while. But there was no way for Dixon to prove it. He wasn’t around for the final negotiations. He had to take the bastard’s word.

  Dixon felt he should have the three pawnshops, the Del Rio mansion, and the beautiful wife and kids. He should be the one ripping off Schmitz every day—not the other way around. And he knew Schmitz knew it too.

  They’d met as students at Modesto High School in the 1960s. Schmitz ran the student store, where he skimmed cash and embezzled funds using fake vendor accounts. Out of the back, he and Dixon sold stolen merchandise obtained from Dixon’s youthful burglar friends at significant discounts. Theirs was a friendship forged in greed.

  Over the next several decades, their joint business buying and selling both legitimate and stolen goods expanded, going from the student store to weekend flea markets to the first pawnshop. Schmitz was the face of the businesses, the one who got the licenses, and the one whose name was on all the official documents.

  This was because Dixon had a habit of getting arrested for possession of stolen goods, as well as assault and battery. He ended up spending time in the county jail over and over, and even one five-year stretch in Corcoran State Prison. Felons, especially felons who had a history of buying and selling hot merchandise, could not get a pawnbroker’s license in the State of California.

  A stand-up guy, Dixon never implicated Schmitz in any of the cases. He was forced to watch as, year after year, Schmitz expanded his pawnshop holdings, while Dixon always fought to just break even.

  Jack slowly drove his car around to the back of the strip mall. He parked and went through the back door that Schmitz had just unlocked.

  In his office, the fat fuck smoked the cigar and chugged the vodka straight from the bottle as he scraped at the lottery scratchers with a quarter.

  “Shit,” Schmitz said as he threw one loser ticket after another into the trash. “Shit!”

  “Having some bad luck?” Dixon said as he walked in and dumped the bag of pistols on the desk. He couldn’t believe that by the next morning the selfish bastard would be dead and he’d have a third of his hidden fortune.

  11

  Just after four in the afternoon, Jessica Schmitz drove up to her house in a brand-new, bright-red, BMW Z4 two-seater. The car was a high school graduation gift from her father. God, she hated that perverted asshole. But, yes, she’d take his gifts, especially a freaking awesome Beemer.

  She pulled into their massive, half-circle driveway and sighed when we she saw both her dad’s Mercedes and her mother’s Jag already parked. Both parts of the evil duo were home. Shit. Couldn’t they go out and do something ever? Give her a night of peace?

  She’d spent the afternoon with her friend Leann, who was so freaking lucky because both her parents worked all day long and were always out until late most nights socializing or whatever. Plus, they paid absolutely no attention to Leann, which to Jessica was for sure their best quality.

  Jessica could not wait to turn eighteen next month in August and get the fuck out of the house and go off to Cal Berkeley for college. She only wished she’d gotten into a decent college farther away from Modesto. Harvard and Princeton turned her down. Even though she was accepted at Cornell, she refused to go there (as if). No way she’d be stuck in Ithaca-fucking-New York for four years.

  Leann and Jessica watched porn all afternoon. Jessica loved porn. It was a compulsion she didn’t bother trying to explain or rationalize. They got high on Leann’s weed and then used Jessica’s new vibrator to help each other get off. She kept her new toy at Leann’s because she didn’t want to be caught sneaking it past her father.

  Both girls had similar tastes in dirty movies. They liked to watch threesomes—MFF—as long as the dude was hot and had a big cock. They both enjoyed kinky shit. Nothing too hardcore. Just a little light bondage and flogging.

  Even though they kissed, made out all the time, and brought each other to orgasm on a regular basis, they both liked guys. It never occurred to them to think of themselves as a couple, or even as lovers. They were just really good friends. But Jessica did notice that sometimes Leann seemed a little jealous of her other female friends. And that was annoying as shit. Bitch should know they were Best Friends Forever.

  Still high, she felt extra nervous walking into her own house not knowing what bullshit she was about to face from her father or mother. Or both.

  Her fat fucking father was in his usual spot: sitting in his easy chair in the living room watching mixed martial arts fighting on his super-large HD TV. He ate peanuts and drank beer. His shirt was off and he was in his underwear. She was pretty sure her friends’ dads were never this disgusting.

  She could hear her little brothers playing video games in their room. Terrence was seven and Tyler was nine. God, they were so freaking annoying. All they did was eat and play with their Xbox. Both just so fat and stupid. No way either of them was getting into Berkeley.

  Through the sliding glass doors, she saw her mother and her sister, Ashley, lying out by the pool. Ashley was thirteen. Jessica would have felt sorry for her for being so freaking ugly, except for the fact that she was such a little bitch. She was obsessed with sports and all her girlfriends on the volleyball team. Jessica was certain her sister was turning into a total lesbian.

  She tried to scurry behind her dad and up to her room. Somehow he saw her, and, of course, motioned her over by patting his lap.

  “Come say hello to your daddy.”

  “Dad. Not now. Please? I’ve got so much to do to get ready for school
in the fall.”

  “Jessica, sweetheart, you come over and give your daddy some sugar. I miss my little girl sometimes. Don’t you miss your daddy?”

  “Of course I do. But really, please, I’ve got a lot to do. They even assigned us books for summer reading. It’s ridic.”

  She started to walk past him to the stairs.

  “Jessica. Get over here now. Don’t piss me off.”

  Jessica sighed and walked over to her father and climbed onto his lap. She wore a yellow sundress and sandals. She felt paranoid and embarrassed, certain he could smell she’d been smoking weed and know somehow that she’d just come inside her panties.

  Jessica looked outside. Her mother and sister had not stirred. If they came inside she’d be safe—at least for now. Of course, Doris Schmitz knew all about what her husband did to their daughter, but they all had to keep pretending that she was completely unaware. Oh, yeah, right.

  “Ah, very nice. How is my big girl?”

  “I’m fine, Daddy.”

  “Are you being a good girl?”

  “Yes, of course. I’m always good.”

  “Staying away from boys?”

  “Yes, Daddy.”

  Jessica actually was a virgin. Sort of. She’d been penetrated by one of Leann’s dildos, but she’d never had sex with a boy. She’d had plenty of chances; she knew she was beautiful and hot and everything. But, it just didn’t feel right. At least not yet.

  While he talked, Carl Schmitz’s hands were all over his daughter’s body. Touching her arms, her legs, her breasts. He brushed the fingers of his left hand against the outside of her panties, then reached out for his beer and took a long drink and belched. The smell was so disgusting Jessica almost gagged.

  Jessica knew what was expected of her now. Her father placed her hand on his erect penis through the slit in his boxer shorts. She forced herself to drift away while she did the thing he wanted. The thing he’d always wanted. She moved her hand up and down as Carl Schmitz moaned. She shut down and lost any identification with herself within the rhythm of her stroking. Like she was up on the ceiling looking down, and it wasn’t her in the chair at all. It was some other poor, pathetic girl, jerking off her fat, disgusting father while they watched one man pin another man onto his back on the canvas, and then methodically beat in his face as the blood flew, and the crowd cheered.