Dead Man's Hand

by Luke Murphy

  “Rachel, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  She held a Kleenex to her nose and mouth and choked out words through the sniffling and sobs. “I didn’t know if you were coming back.”

  Calvin’s shoulders relaxed and he let out a breath. He wrapped his arms around her and squeezed.

  Rachel shoved him away. “Don’t, Calvin. You can’t just leave like that without telling me where you’re going. I was worried. I was scared.”

  He could see this wasn’t the same woman who had snuck out to talk with her friends just last night. With each minute that passed, with them trapped in this hideout, with each news report about another murder and now the face of a man who was stalking their house, this situation became real and Rachel was finally seeing the big picture. This was serious.

  He didn’t know what to say. A slight smile crossed his face.

  “This isn’t funny, Calvin.”

  Again she turned and walked away, entering their sleeping quarters.

  He chased her. “I know. I’m sorry. I’ve just never seen you worried about me before. It kind of feels good.”

  Without a word, she sat down on the edge of the cot, staring into dead air. He sat down beside her and again put his arms around her. He could feel her rapid heartbeat pounding against his body. She didn’t push away this time. Instead, she nestled her head against his chest.

  “I’m scared.”

  “I know, baby. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  “But what if something happens to you? What will I do?”

  “That won’t happen.”

  She stood up. “You can’t guarantee that.”

  He got up too. “Nothing is a guarantee in life, Rachel. But you have to trust me.”

  “You know I trust you, Calvin. We have a history. We share secrets—secrets that could someday haunt us. I don’t like the violence in your life. I’ve seen too much of it. But I’ve seen the good in you and I want to help you change. You promised our lives would change.”

  “I did make that promise and I intend on keeping it, Rachel. We just have to get through this together. We have to stick together.”

  He smiled at her and she returned it. He hugged her and kissed her gently on the lips.

  “Now let’s go see what we’re up against.”

  She followed behind as he went to his computer to scan the surveillance camera monitors for details of the killer’s face, body type and style of movement. He cross-referenced the pictures against a database of assassins. When nothing came up, Calvin sat back in frustration.

  “Is that the man after us?” She pointed at the screen.

  He nodded.

  Calvin zoomed in on the suspect. The man wore pants and a long shirt, with no distinguishing features visible. Calvin back-tracked the footage and watched the thirty-second clip from the beginning.

  From what he’d seen, his opponent was skilled in tactics and an expert in pursuit, surveillance and evasion. Calvin knew such skills were acquired in the elite military, specifically the Marines or maybe Special Forces.

  Add that in with the bomb skills and the tracking ability and Calvin came to a scary conclusion. This guy was trained by the best. Calvin could use that particular training against him. Time for some very serious, highest-level hacking.

  He hacked a military database, but after the second layer of protection, he was shut out.

  He had a hunch. He called Mike and asked him to hack the Marine Sniper School records. Then he emailed Mike the photos from the surveillance cameras taken today.

  Less than two hours later Calvin received an e-mail from Mike. The attached document was a full file on the killer. A high-ranking NCO sniper gone bad named Baxter had been charged with a mob hit, but not convicted. That was who was after him. Now Calvin and Rachel were pinned down for sure. Baxter would have his rifle and scope on the building within hours.

  Mike wrote two words in the body of the email. “Fuck me.”

  At midnight, Ace was still at the Golden Horseshoe office, a rare event, but he was going nuts. His perfect plan was showing signs of weakness. The assassin wasn’t late calling in, but Ace was on edge all the same.

  At his last check-in, Scott said he had found Watters and that the job would be done without delay. But that was four hours ago and Ace’s sources at the police hadn’t heard anything.

  The phone rang.

  “You better have some good news.”

  “Afraid not, boss.”

  The hit man told him he had played cat and mouse with Watters for a half-hour. Ace listened, his head throbbing harder, as his overpaid hit man recounted his failed attempt.

  He had had enough. These failures had gone on too long. But before he could tell Scott that, the hit man said, “I have an idea.”

  “Forget it. I’m pulling you off. I’ll find someone else, someone more reliable. You will never work in this country again.”

  “No, don’t. Now I know where Watters is and I’ve scoped the area.”

  “How did you find him,” Ace demanded to know.

  “One of Watters’ clients held a grudge. After his run-in with Watters, he’d followed the collector for days until he’d found the location.”

  Ace nodded.

  “Tomorrow is the end. And you’d need a day at least to bring someone new in. So what do you have to lose?”

  Everything, Ace thought. He didn’t like it, but the assassin was right. He needed Watters eliminated now.

  “Call when it’s done.”

  Chapter 35

  It was early Saturday morning and Dale sat at his desk.

  His group was busy living and breathing the investigation, reviewing crime scene photos, witness interviews, 911 calls and forensic, ballistic and post-mortem reports. This case had everyone on edge. The longer it went unsolved, the more challenging it would be to find the real killer or killers. Dale was still not sure if the killers were working together in some way, but it was a very real possibility, given that one killer had killed Watters’ boss and another or the same one was trying to kill Watters.

  His head ached from frustration and his eyes burned from fatigue. He knew that basically they still had nothing solid. He hadn’t expected that after the three perfect murders, there’d be one more and that the second killer had also left no evidence at all.

  Feeling desperate, he pulled the most powerful magnifying glass out of a drawer and used it to study the pictures from the four murders.

  Watters had some answers. But he was still not located after three days of searching.

  Jimmy, who was usually upbeat, looked grim. He ambled across the room and slumped down in a seat. Loosening his tie, he removed his outer jacket, unfastened his shoulder holster and flung it over the back of the chair.

  Dale put away the magnifying glass and dropped the crime scene photos, grabbing the folder titled, “Grant, Douglas—Crime Scene Analysis Report.” He read through the information one more time and threw the folder down, papers scattering onto the floor. He spun around in his seat and faced the bulletin board beside his desk.

  Brought in for the Grant case, photographs of suspects, evidence, crime scenes and theories had been stapled across the board. With the addition of one new murder, the papers had grown and overlapped each other.

  Four perfect murders. So far. That was the hope that Dale clung too—that they were only temporarily perfect and that at some point they’d find something that would actually start cracking one or more of the cases and make them less than perfect.

  Paperwork was a part of the investigation that most cops hated. But everyone knew that many investigations had been cracked by one tiny, overlooked detail.

  “Where would you find a bomb expert, Jimmy?”

  “Military, or a police bomb squad.”

  Dale stared at the board, though by now he had almost memorized it. “What do you think?”

  His partner dropped his paperwork and sighed. “I have nothing.”

  “Hey, Tommy!”
Dale yelled. “Who’d you talk to in New Orleans?”

  The man rummaged through his desk before answering. “Detective Hopkins.”

  “You got a number?”

  The cop scurried over and handed Dale a crumpled piece of paper with scribbled handwriting.

  Dale made the call, hoping the New Orleans detective kept the same pathetic hours he did. He made his request and was transferred to the homicide department.

  “Detective Hopkins.” A hoarse voice, all business, came on the phone.

  “This is Detective Dale Dayton of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.”

  “Ah, I was just going to call you.”

  “Do you have something for me?”

  “That’s the thing. After your officer’s call, we went down to the docks and dusted the entire booth, inside and out. The phone booth had been wiped down and cleaned by a professional. We couldn’t pull one print from the site.”

  Dale wasn’t surprised.

  The New Orleans detective continued. “We kept a camera on for two days—no connection to anyone you named.”

  Dale shook his head. “Thank you, Detective.”

  He leaned back in the chair and stared at the papers on the desk. Was there anything among this collection that would indicate a path to follow?

  Another file was thrown on his desk, this time by an LVMPD intern. “Detective, we got an ID on the prostitute from Pitt’s office. Carey Reynolds, nineteen years old, from Bay City, Texas. Guess her picture on the news caught a tip. We’re doing a background, but so far nothing in her past suggests she was the intended target.”

  Dale nodded. “I didn’t think she was.”

  Calvin sat in silence, reviewing every feed. There was nothing he could see that might affect him, but somewhere Baxter was staking out the house and preparing his next move.

  Baxter would set up a sniper site beyond the range of Calvin’s monitors.

  Calvin had left his fortress once when he’d spotted the assassin. He and Rachel weren’t leaving again. A Kevlar vest was no protection against a head shot. What the killer didn’t know, though, was that Calvin could outwait him. He and Rachel could live without fear, if not in comfort, for a couple of months with their supplies. The killer couldn’t risk exposure and arrest that long.

  At some point, even two months from now, Calvin would have to emerge or have no life at all. Once Calvin did, he would put himself and Rachel in double jeopardy. The police were still searching for him as the primary suspect in Grant’s and perhaps Pitt’s murder. And if the cops didn’t get Calvin first, he’d always know that the killer would pick up the hunt again until the bastard finally succeeded in killing him..

  Did Calvin really want to live looking over his shoulder?

  He was in the most challenging, problematic and deadliest position of his life and he had no plan yet. Somehow, he was going to have to figure out a way to end this impasse safely. Capture the killer without leaving the workshop and risking their lives, or be arrested by the cops. It seemed impossible, but he had the confidence of experience. Except for the prideful mistake that had permanently damaged his knee, he knew that it was at times like this, when the stakes and challenges were the greatest, that he was capable of fully focusing.

  Before, it had been only about him. Now he had to protect the only woman he had ever loved since his mother and that increased the complexity of the situation enormously. He could never again leave Rachel alone as he had when pursuing the killer. Right now, it was a siege and a stalemate and the clock was ticking.

  He left the computer room and went to the most secure part of the safe house, where they kept the cots and air mattresses. Rachel was sleeping. He watched her dream and breathe, deep and slow. A little tremor and cry left her at one point. Calvin thought it was more than a bad dream. He had to focus and finish a plan.

  Two hours later, Calvin sat up. He needed to do some final prep, but otherwise he was ready to act and not alone. The irony of whom he’d chosen as a partner made him chuckle. It was his only choice.

  He dialed. It took over two minutes for his call to be transferred. He waited patiently, knowing that this call was probably causing all sorts of chaos.

  “Detective Dayton.”

  “I’m Calvin Watters. I’m sure you have your technical people trying to trace this call. Don’t waste your time or theirs. My phone is untraceable.”

  He heard fingers snapping in the background. Dayton would continue trying a trace, because Calvin knew he had no reason to believe him.

  “If you are who you say you are, then you know how hard we’re looking for you. Why should I believe you?”

  He told Dayton, in exact detail, the Pitt crime scene and gave details about what he earned as a leg breaker. It was much more than he needed to say to prove his identity and enough to show the extent to which he would cooperate.

  When he finished, Dayton replied. “I believe you are Calvin Watters. So why are you calling me? I doubt you are ready to turn yourself in.”

  “Should I?” Calvin asked with a smile.

  “If you’re innocent, yes.”

  “Do you think I am?”

  “Mr. Watters, you have no reason to believe me, but I’m the only person in this department who thinks you are.”

  That wasn’t the response he expected. His intelligence and years of bill collecting had made him almost a human lie detector. Dayton’s tone and words sounded like the sincere truth. “How can I know that’s really what you think?”

  “To be honest, there’s no way I can prove that. Only you can decide whether you can trust me or not. From the beginning, you’ve always been at the bottom of my list of suspects for Grant’s murder, even while you’re at the top of everyone else’s.”

  “Dayton, for now, I’m going to take you at your word, as you’re going to have to take me on mine. I had nothing to do with Grant’s murder or any of the others—especially not your dead fellow officer. There’s a lot I’ve done that I’m not proud of, but I’m no killer. And I’m without doubt not stupid enough to blow up my own car and commit suicide. Everyone who knows me knows that I’m the only one who drives my wreck of a car. That means the bomb was meant for me and whoever wants me dead is the same person who killed that cop.”

  “Maybe so. If you’re innocent, come in and prove it. You’ll have nothing to worry about.”

  “I’m an African-American former football star who can be shown to have gone bad. Even if I had rock-solid proof of innocence, which I don’t, things wouldn’t go my way in court. This isn’t OJ all over again.”

  Dayton laughed. “Okay, point taken. But if you don’t want to negotiate surrender, why call?”

  “Look, we both want the same thing. Capturing the assassin and removing that death threat is my current number-one priority. I believe that same assassin killed your police officer. So the Vegas Police want to capture and arrest the killer as much as I do. I’ve done my homework on you, Dayton.”

  “Ah, classic military principle—know your enemy,” Dayton said.

  “Are you my enemy?”

  “I’ve already said I believe you’re innocent. So where do we go from here? Do you have any evidence or information about Grant’s real killer, or who is trying to kill you, if it’s a different person?”

  “Like you, I have suspicions but no proof about who murdered Grant, Pitt and the prostitute. But I do have some solid information about who’s trying to kill me. All I’ll say now is that I don’t think the person after me is the same person who committed the first three murders, but the two killings may still be connected. If that’s true, then capturing and arresting the hit man may lead you to the real Grant killer.”

  Now it was the detective’s turn to stop and think. Calvin was sure that his call had caught him totally unprepared.

  “You’ve given me a lot. I’d appreciate it if you gave me a minute to think about where we are now.”

  “Take your time,” Calvin said.

 
; Dale was thinking as fast as he could to catch up and think ahead.

  Watters was desperate.

  He could see that the hit man was a bigger threat to Watters than the police. That was understandable self-interest. If Watters did have information about the hit man, he was offering something valuable. What did he want in exchange?

  Could he trust Watters? Only to the same point that Watters trusted him, assuming that Watters believed what Dale had said about his innocence.

  While he was thinking, one of the phone techs confirmed that the call was untraceable and unrecordable. Now Dale knew just how much trouble it was going to be to bring in Watters.

  They had the same goal, even if their motives were different.

  He got back on the phone. “Okay, you got my attention. I’m ready to deal. What do you want from me, from us, in exchange for your information about the hit man?”

  The call had now gone on for four minutes.

  “I’ve been following the investigations, so I know how little you have. You need me to help you solve this—no offense intended.”

  “One thing at a time. What’s your plan?”

  Watters explained it. Dale thought it had a good probability of success, but it risked lives, reputations and careers. The usual.

  When Watters finished, Dale said, “I’m going to talk to a few members of my team, the ones who have balls and who I trust. Then I’ll see if the bosses will fine me if it fails.” Dale paused, then continued. “No, scratch that. I know they would. So screw them. Anyway, call me in an hour and I’ll tell you if it’s a go.”

  “Fine.” Watters hung up.

  Book Five: Collision Course

  Chapter 36

  At exactly 3:00 p.m. the phone rang. Dale and Jimmy, with the sergeant standing in the background, answered separate phones. “Hello?”

  “It’s me,” Watters said.

  Dale licked his lips nervously. “Okay, we’ll do it.”

  “You are sure you can do your part?” There was doubt in Watters’ voice.

  “Watters, don’t fuck with me. You need this and so do I, so what choice do you really have? Is someone else going to help you, or do I sit back and let them catch you?”