“916 Tanner Street. Go south down the street, and turn left. Fifth house from the corner.” Then, without missing a beat, “You sure you’re okay?”
“Dandy,” Smith said.
He opened the bedroom door and stepped outside, doing his very best not to fall right back down on his face.
He left Amy’s house the same way he got in—through the kitchen back door. Amy had locked it, but he’d simply jimmied it with his knife. There were no alarm systems in place, and the doctor hadn’t bothered to check every door before she went up to her bedroom.
Smith stepped back out into a mostly dark town of Gaffney and stayed away from the sparsely-located LED lights. He maneuvered his way through the backyards of multiple uninhabited homes, comfortable in the knowledge there was no one inside them. You could tell from the overgrown grass, fading paint, and fallen white picket fences.
Locating Amy’s house was easy, thanks to Travis, who had provided Smith with the address and a way to reach it safely. But Travis had no idea about Aaron, which was why Smith had taken the chance of approaching the former Black Tider. That shared history was why he thought she could be trusted. If he’d been wrong…
But he hadn’t been. That was all that mattered. He hadn’t been wrong about her.
It wasn’t difficult to find where Aaron had been taken. The house where the couple Harris and Janice lived was exactly where Amy had told him it would be. Like Amy’s, Harris and Janice’s was flanked by a pair of unoccupied buildings. As far as Smith could tell, the ones across the street didn’t have owners, either. Aaron’s relocated home, on the other hand, had an LED lamp hanging from the awning over the front porch.
On his way over, Smith had glimpsed a big white two-story house in the distance. It sat in a cul-de-sac, with lights moving around along the rooftops. Guards. Smith was too far to make out how many, but it was more than one.
The Judge’s mansion.
It wasn’t very far. Maybe 500 meters, give or take. A part of Smith wanted to go straight to it and put an end to this. Yes, he’d come here wanting to safeguard Aaron first, but the kid would be safe anyway if Smith took out the Judge. Mary, also.
So why didn’t he?
For one, he wasn’t feeling 100 percent yet. Way, way less than that, if he were being honest. The truth was, he should have waited, healed up a little bit more (or a lot more) before coming back here. Another day. Or two. (Or a week.)
But he hadn’t.
He was here now, and if the Judge had as many men with him as Smith thought…
Go get Aaron. You promised Mary, remember?
He’d promised Mary. Shit. Why had he done that?
Because you like her, obviously.
Goddammit. He liked her. He liked her.
That was a mistake.
He sighed now as he rounded Harris and Janice’s two-story house and stepped into their backyard. There were no fences to hop, which was good because Smith wasn’t sure he could have made it over without fainting.
He stopped temporarily to gather his breath. When he was sure he was feeling better, Smith used the same knife to pry open a back door with a glass window that revealed a dark kitchen on the other side. As with Amy’s house, Smith didn’t have to worry about alarms blaring away when he pushed the door open and stepped through, exchanging the chilly backyard for the comparably warm kitchen.
The house was quiet, just as he had expected. It was already well past midnight, and Harris and Janice would be sound asleep by now. People in Gaffney would have adapted to normal sleeping patterns a long time ago.
Smith walked softly across the kitchen, the rubber soles of his boots barely making any noise against the smooth linoleum tiles. There was leftover food on the dining table to his left, and a recently used wok sat on the stove to his right. There were no lights in here, but Smith could see the glow from the LED lantern hanging over the front porch spreading across parts of the living room, past the doorless kitchen entrance.
He stepped through—
And stopped.
“Mr. Smith,” a familiar voice said. “There you are. I was starting to think you weren’t ever going to show up.”
Twenty-Five
Well, this sucks.
That was an understatement. This did, indeed, suck, but it was way worse than that. The FUBAR type of suck.
He remembered asking someone at Basic what FUBAR meant. The word (or acronym—or was that initialism? He could never get the two straight.) wasn’t something you wanted to hear when you were out in the field doing operations.
“Fucked up beyond all recognition,” was the answer.
Yeah, that about describes this, all right, Smith thought now as he stood with his dick in his hands and nothing else.
They had him.
They had him good.
More than good, actually.
It was real good.
Real fucking good.
Motherfucking real fucking good, but maybe that was putting too fine a point on the situation.
FUBAR described it pretty well.
“But I had faith that you would, eventually. I thought it would be yesterday, but I was wrong about that. Then when I heard about the supposed attack on the north road, I knew that today was the day.”
The only thing missing from the voice was a villainous cackle as the man’s sausage-like hands played with his mustache. But the Judge didn’t have a mustache, and Smith didn’t think the man was capable of cackling without hurting himself.
“So tell me, Mr. Smith. Has this gone the way you though it would?”
No, it hadn’t. Not by a long shot.
It was times like these that Smith remembered a conversation with his mentor.
“You’re not smart,” the older man had said.
Smith had taken offense to that, as well he should have if he even had a tiny bit of self-respect. He had more than that, so he took exceptional offense to the blunt statement.
“Don’t get me wrong, you’re no dummy,” his mentor had continued. “But you’re not Lara. Then again, no one is, but you don’t even come close.”
“You trying to piss me off?” Smith had said. “Because you’re doing a pretty good job of it, old man.”
His mentor had scoffed. “You telling me you didn’t already know that?”
“Know what?”
“That you’re not going to be a Rhodes Scholar anytime soon. Do you even know what that is?”
Smith didn’t, but he wasn’t about to give the other man the benefit of the doubt. “What’s your point?”
“My point is, while you’re no dummy, you’re not going to outthink a lot of people. That’s where that hand of yours comes into play. It, and how fast and how straight you can pull the hog.”
“The hog? What hog?”
“That’s what they used to call a gun back in the old Wild West days. ‘Pull a hog’ meant going for your pistol.”
“A hog, huh?” Smith had found the whole concept more than a little ridiculous.
“Whatever you wanna call it, that’s where you’re exceptional. Better than almost anyone I’ve trained on this backwater of an island.”
Smith couldn’t help himself and felt a little bit of proud there. Oh, who was he kidding? It was more than a little bit. It was a lot. To be told how good he was by a man like Peters was like being anointed knight by the Queen of England herself. Peters wasn’t just any man; he was the man at Basic.
“But I’m not smart,” Smith said.
“You’re not dumb,” Peters said.
“But I’m not ever going to outthink someone.”
“Maybe some, but not all of them. And you won’t have to. Because you will almost always be faster and a straighter shot than them. Remember, kid, it’s not about who shoots first; it’s about who shoots last.”
“Dead man can’t shoot last?”
“Dead man can’t do shit.”
Dead man can’t do shit, Smith thought now as he stared across the living
room space of Harris and Janice’s home at the Judge and his flunkies.
There were two of them (Because of course there would be two of them; assholes always came in threes these days.), flanking the Judge on both sides. The man himself sat on an armchair, maybe because he was too lazy to stand like his underlings. Smith didn’t know how long they’d been there, waiting for him. What would they have done if he hadn’t shown up, he wondered. Maybe sit around in the dark. Or the Judge would, anyway, while the other two would stand guard and look for signs of him.
“Who is the most dangerous man among the Judge’s men?” Smith had asked Travis back at the junkyard two days ago.
Travis had answered Roman, the sniper. Then, when he’d learned Smith had already taken out the man, Travis had replied, “Stephens.”
And it was Stephens on the Judge’s right that Smith kept an eye on now. Stephens wore that same well-beaten Cornhuskers hat on his head like the first time Smith had seen him outside of Gaffney. Stephens wasn’t really standing, he was leaning against a flower-printed wall at a slight angle, his right hand casually resting on the butt of his holstered pistol. A Glock, from the looks of it. Stephens hadn’t drawn the weapon yet, something he could have done before Smith showed himself. Instead, he’d left it in place, maybe because he didn’t think he needed to have it out and ready. Either he was a stupid man or a very arrogant one.
“He’s a stone-cold killer,” Travis had said about Stephens.
“He’s killed before,” Smith had said.
“Plenty of times. When the Judge needs someone gone, Stephens always gets the job. Hell, he volunteers most of the time.”
“Not Roman?”
“Roman’s a sniper. He kills from long-range. Stephens does it up close and personal, and he enjoys every second of it.”
Not stupid, just arrogant, Smith thought now as he eyeballed Stephens back. And maybe, if Travis was to be believed—and Smith did believe him—then Stephens had a good reason to feel confident.
The other flunky, to the Judge’s left, must not have been as convinced about his ability with a gun as Stephens, because he had his weapon out. Not a handgun, which would have been preferable for Smith, but a pump-action shotgun that was up at chest level and pointed straight at Smith’s midsection. Or chest. Not that the exact location mattered, because either place would tear a hole in him. Or holes, depending on what the weapon was loaded with—buckshot or slug rounds.
Smith recognized the other man. He was the oldest member of the posse that had intercepted Smith and Mary out in the wilds not too long ago. Smith still didn’t know his name, but he remembered that the man always stuck to Kyle, the youngster that Smith had killed at Lucky’s. Smith had wondered if they were related or had some kind of mentor-student relationship. Not that he ever asked, or cared.
Right now, as the man glared at him from across the semi-dark living room, Smith got the impression the old man knew about what Smith had done to Kyle, and he was none too happy about it. His forefinger was in the trigger guard of the shotgun, and he had the look of someone just waiting for an excuse to fire.
The reason he hadn’t was probably because Smith’s own Glock was still in its holster and the Judge had given explicit instructions not to fire at first sight. If Smith had a gun in his hand when he stepped out of the kitchen, would the old man have shot him dead? Smith didn’t know the answer to that one, and, frankly, didn’t care. This was the situation he’d found himself in, so he dealt with the reality and not the what-ifs.
FUBAR. Now this is FUBAR, all right.
Smith looked from Stephens to the old man to the Judge…
…then at Aaron.
The Judge had brought Aaron out here to wait along with them. The boy was perched on the big man’s right knee, his eyes wide open as they stared back at Smith. He looked tired, as if he’d been rustled from sleep to join this little charade that the Judge had cooked up for…whose benefit? Smith’s? Aaron’s? The Judge’s?
Did it even matter?
“What’s the matter?” the Judge said. “Cat got your tongue, Mr. Smith?”
Smith didn’t answer. He also kept his hands where they were—hanging at his sides where they’d been since he stepped through the kitchen’s doorless entrance. He didn’t want to give the old man the excuse he was probably looking for to pull that trigger.
Stephens, for his part, just looked bored with the whole thing.
Stay bored, asshole. You won’t be so bored when I shoot you to death.
Smith looked past Aaron’s terrified face and at the Judge. “This all seems a little dramatic, don’t you think?”
“What can I say? I’m a sucker for drama,” the Judge said.
“Me, not so much.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. You were pretty dramatic when you showed up here two nights ago. I hadn’t expected that.”
“No?”
“I’m man enough to admit it. After what happened to Mandy, and having learned you’d survived, I was convinced you’d run. After all, none of this is any of your business. It was always between me and Mandy’s band of ne’er-do-wells. Now between me and Roger’s band of ne’er-do-wells. I was sure you’d focus on that part and leave well enough alone.”
The big man sighed, almost as if he was disappointed with Smith. It was, Smith thought, overly dramatic and clearly done for his benefit. All for the sake of drama, or the Judge would have told either Stephens or the old man to shoot Smith as soon as he stepped out of the kitchen.
Because either one of them could have done that. They could have done that pretty goddamn easily, and Smith wouldn’t have been able to do a damn thing about it.
“My point is, while you’re no dummy, you’re not going to outthink a lot of people,” his mentor had said.
Fuck if Peters hadn’t been right. Smith had thought he’d been pretty clever two nights ago when he came back to Gaffney. Then, again, pretty clever when he sent Gramps and Lorna to attack the north side of town with their armor-plated Jeep while he snuck in. He thought he’d been pretty clever both times.
Not so much, as it turned out.
“It was a nice touch,” the Judge was saying. “The car, I mean. I was surprised when they drove it back toward town. More surprise when the guards told me it had been modified. But then again, those folks at the junkyard are nothing if not scrappy.”
Smith’s eyes snapped from the Judge’s fat face to Aaron’s. The boy looked ready to defecate in his pants. He might have been mute and young, but he clearly knew what was happening. Smith felt sorry for him. The kid had seen more in a week than most people had seen in a handful of lifetimes.
He moved his eyes slightly to pick Stephens back up. The Gaffney man still looked as bored now as when Smith revealed himself. He also hadn’t drawn his weapon yet, even though he could have at any time.
“He’s a stone-cold killer,” Travis had said about Stephens. “When the Judge needs someone gone, Stephens always gets the job. Hell, he volunteers most of the time... Stephens does it up close and personal, and he enjoys every second of it.”
Stephens. The very bored-looking asshole staring back at Smith now, that slight smirk plastered all over his shootable face.
Smith looked back at the Judge. “So what now?”
“Now, you take off your gun belt and put it on the floor,” the Judge said.
“And then?”
“And then you surrender yourself to me.”
“Why? You want to reeducate me, too?”
“I think we both know that’s not going to work with you, Mr. Smith.”
Smith couldn’t help himself and smiled. “You’re probably right.”
His eyes snapped from the Judge’s pudgy face to Aaron’s round and almost cherubic face as it trembled slightly.
Then to the old man with the shotgun.
And finally, back to Stephens.
“Mr. Smith,” the Judge said. “Do you want me to count down from five?”
“An
d why would I want you to do that?” Smith asked.
The big man shrugged. “For the sake of drama. They do this in the movies all the time.”
“You really had this all planned out in your head, didn’t you?”
“Most of it. Enough that I had someone watching the good doctor’s place long before you showed up to wait for her.”
“You saw me?”
“Not me, of course.”
“One of your flunkies.”
“One of my assistants.”
“What’s the difference?”
“One title is more…prestigious than the other.”
Smith smiled. “Nah.”
“‘Nah?’”
“Nah. I don’t think I’ll play your game and drag this out.”
The Judge’s lips curved into a wide frown. “Are you sure? Because I don’t think you’ll like the alternative.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”
“Then how do you propose you surrender yourself?”
Smith’s eyes shifted slightly over to Aaron, still perched precariously on the Judge’s right knee.
“Aaron,” Smith said.
The boy’s eyes lit up. They hadn’t, as far as Smith could tell, ever left his face. He wasn’t sure the boy could even move, and that played into Smith’s decision.
“Close your eyes,” Smith said.
Aaron continued to stare at him, confused.
“Close your eyes, son,” Smith said. “Now.”
Thank God Aaron obeyed and quickly squeezed both eyes shut.
“Shoot him!” the Judge screamed.
Smith drew.
Twenty-Six
It takes, give or take, a second for a person to complete the pull on a gun’s trigger. That is, if they were prepared to do it and simply acted without hesitation.
That was the important part: Simply acted without hesitation.
The problem for the older man with the shotgun pointed at Smith was that he’d been holding that weapon—and it was a heavy weapon, too, much heavier than a pistol—for a while now. Perhaps it wasn’t “long” in the sense that it had been hours, but it’d been more than a few seconds and way more than a few minutes as the Judge played out his little dramatic scene with Smith.
After The Purge, AKA John Smith Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 46
