Danger-Close: A Jake Thunder Adventure (The Jake Thunder Adventures Book 1)

by Jon F. Merz

  "That’s right."

  I looked down at the detector, which had an LCD that would glow if there was anything tapping my phone line. It sat dull. Lifeless.

  "So, how about if we meet with them tonight? You can check them out and see if they look good or not."

  "What’s to check out? I trust you, Jake. Believe me, if I had any questions, we wouldn’t be having this conversation."

  "So, you don’t want to meet them?"

  "I don’t expose myself very often, Jake. It’s safer that way, don’t you think? The only time I want to see them is during the actual buy. All right?"

  "Yeah, okay." I hung up and sighed. This was going to be difficult. McCloskey seemed adamant about not risking Lisa’s life during the exchange and I couldn’t blame him. Maybe I could arrange it so just McCloskey was there. We could write off Lisa as being sick. That way her absence wouldn’t seem unusual.

  But only if Darmov didn’t suspect anything. And with a lug like Viktor looking to ease the score, he’d push Darmov on any suspicions he might have. The key was to make everything look seamless.

  I took a hit off my bottle of Jim Beam and leaned back into the chair as the heat of the drink smacked my nerves and oozed into my system.

  Naturally, just as I was starting to relax, my whole world exploded in the guise of a bullet streaking in through my window, shattering glass and missing my right ear by a fraction of a hair’s width.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  There’s something to be said for reflexes.

  Especially when they save your life.

  Growing up, I thought a reflex was the silly feeling you got when my doctor tapped the hammer against my knee cap. It seemed magical back then and all my attempts to locate this weird spot always proved fruitless.

  When I entered the military, my idea of reflexes changed. Discipline honed through years of hard training meant that I now had a set of impulses that would conceivably keep me safe when harm threatened.

  Such was the case when the glass imploded and the first round came streaking in. I shoved myself out of the chair, propelled by my lower gut and hit the floor with a dull thud. I pulled myself along the floor until my desk was between me and the window.

  Above me, the round stitched its way into the wall, leaving a singed trail of gunpowder residue along the pale blue paint and white molding of my office. It just barely missed my autographed picture of Rodney Dangerfield.

  Brenda heard the thud and started into the office. I waved her off.

  "Get out! Someone’s shooting!"

  That’s all it took for her to mobilize. I felt pretty safe behind the thick mahogany of my desk and judging from the angle, the shooter must have been on a rooftop. But since my office was one of the highest points in Jamaica Plain, at least on this part of Centre Street, I felt reasonably sure the shooter wouldn’t be able to get a higher and therefore better angle on me.

  "Cops are coming," said Brenda from the other room.

  I could hear the sirens outside and hoped it would scare the sniper away. I didn’t hold out much hope for them capturing the shooter.

  "Tell them the shot came from across the street. On top of the Foot Locker store most likely."

  "Okay."

  I heard footsteps but stayed where I was. Not sense making myself a target again until the police pronounced it all clear.

  I didn’t have long to wait. Two patrolmen appeared in my office door a few minutes later, their guns holstered.

  "No sign of the shooter."

  I sat up as best I was able. "Gimme a hand getting back into my chair?"

  They did and it felt good to be off the floor. I ran down the details as best I was able to and then helped myself to a few doses of Jim Beam. I poured one for Brenda, too, who insisted she needed it to help her remember why she worked for me.

  McCloskey showed up twenty minutes later.

  "Who’d you piss off?"

  "Who haven’t I pissed off might be the better question."

  "Hell," said Brenda. "You pissed me off just getting shot at."

  I grinned. "Thanks, Bren, that’ll be all for now."

  "Hmph." She downed her shot and left for the day. McCloskey watched her go and then sat down opposite from me.

  "The boys’ll be keeping an eye on the area for a while, but I don’t know how much good it’ll do."

  "Probably none," I said.

  "What are you thinking-warning shot?"

  "I don’t know. They came awfully damned close for a warning."

  "But if they’d meant to kill you, would they have missed?"

  "I wasn’t moving at the time, I’d guess not."

  McCloskey nodded. "That’s what I figured. So again, who have you pissed off?"

  "Could be any number of people. Hell, I’ve got enough folks in my past who'd like to see me dead. Could be any one of them."

  "Could be someone more recent, too," said McCloskey. ""What about Darmov?"

  "Doesn’t make sense. I think my cover’s fine. No reason for him to go about shooting me. Besides, if he wanted me dead, he’d do it in person. He wouldn’t wuss out and use a sniper."

  "Any of Don Woolery’s friends know about you?"

  "I don’t think he had many friends. And none that I’d guess capable of shooting like that. It takes almost as much skill to miss a shot that close as it does to put one into me from across the street on a sunny day like this."

  "So someone who might be familiar with firearms." McCloskey leaned forward. "What about Darmov’s big bodyguard Ð the one you trashed the other night? Think he might be harboring some resentment?"

  "Oh, he’s definitely into the resentment. Guy wants another go-round with me the way you look forward to the new issue of Penthouse each month."

  McCloskey sighed. "I don’t read that magazine much anymore."

  "Lisa find your stash?"

  "No. It’s just the Internet makes things a whole lot easier and it’s all free on the newsgroups."

  "You’re an Internet porn addict? Man, will wonders never cease."

  "Getting back to the question of who would want to shoot you," said McCloskey clearing his throat. "Can you think of anyone else."

  "The only other person in my life right now is Vanessa and unless I’m very much mistaken, delivering multiple orgasms is no grounds for shooting someone with a sniper rifle."

  McCloskey stood up and checked the wall. "I’ll have someone from ballistics over to dig the slug out. Maybe we can run it down and run a comparison."

  "You think it’ll tell you who the triggerman was?"

  "Triggerman," said McCloskey. "Or trigger woman."

  "You can’t seriously think a woman did this, do you?"

  "Hey, it’s the twenty-first century. Anyone can buy a rifle at K-Mart and punch a couple of rounds at anyone they want. Besides, police work has taught me that crime doesn’t discriminate."

  "Nice. You oughta write a paper on that."

  "I just might. You okay? Seriously? You need anything?"

  "I’m okay."

  "I got Henderson downstairs with Stiles. They’ll be taking you home in a bit. I’ll have someone watch your house for a while, too."

  "Won’t do any good. Anyone determined enough to get me won’t be put off by a couple of your guys watching my place."

  "Yeah, well, maybe. But at least I’ll sleep better tonight knowing I tried to cover your ass. You know, just in case you die on me."

  "Nice thought," I sighed. Obviously, someone wasn’t pleased with how I was progressing on the case. I didn’t buy for a second it was someone out of my past. If someone wanted revenge for one of the things I’d done a long time ago, they could have hit me any time before this. The timing just didn’t synch up.

  McCloskey stood up. "All right, well, I’ll have the forensics team come down this evening. You gonna be here for a while?"

  "Got no place else to go."

  "Okay, cool. You talk to Darmov, by the way?"

  "Yeah,
he won’t do a meet and greet with you and Lisa. Says he wants to limit his exposure and won’t show himself until the actual buy."

  "No way." McCloskey shook his head. "I won’t put Lisa in that situation. Too much danger."

  "I wouldn’t push for it, either," I said. "We’ll tell Darmov she’s sick or something like that. Hopefully, if he smells a rat, it’ll be too late and we’ll have him before he can cause any havoc."

  "Hopefully."

  "Hey, hope is all we have sometimes."

  "It better work," said McCloskey. "My ass’ll be toast if it doesn’t."

  "That’ll be the least of our problems."

  "How’s that?"

  "If things go south, we’ll probably be dead."

  McCloskey smiled. "Oh, well, as long as it’s nothing serious." He ducked out of the office, leaving me alone in the fading sunlight. I looked at the bullet scar on the wall and then across the street, trying to backtrack the path of the round as it left the rifle and came in aimed at me.

  Or was it?

  A warning shot would be tough to make in daylight with the sunlight gleaming off the office windows as it did around these parts in the late afternoon. Maybe the shooter just wasn’t that good of a marksman.

  Maybe he did mean to kill me.

  The phone rang interrupting my thought process. I picked it up. "Yeah?"

  "Jake?"

  "Yeah."

  "It’s Vanessa. How are things?"

  "Okay. Someone tried to kill me a short time ago, but other than that, everything is fine."

  "Oh my god, are you serious? Are you all right?"

  "I’m fine. They missed me by a fraction of an inch."

  "Who would do such a thing?"

  "I don’t know yet. It might be related to your case, it might not."

  "My case? But how? Is it that man Darmov?"

  "Probably not. He’s got no reason to suspect me of anything other than what I told him. But it could be related."

  "Maybe it’s someone who was friends with that Don Woolery character."

  "Maybe. Whoever it was that shot at me had their work cut out for them, though."

  "Why?"

  "Tough finding a good vantage point to make the shot. Plus, the sunlight would have made it difficult."

  "What did the police say?"

  "They’ll be digging the slug out of my wall this evening. They might find something when they run the ballistics workup on it." I poured myself another bolt of Jim Beam. "In the meantime, I have to decide whether I want to fix the wall or not."

  "Why wouldn’t you fix it?"

  I downed the shot, feeling a lot better. "I don’t know. Part of me thinks it’s almost like a badge of honor, you know. Might leave it in the wall to help drum up business. You know, impress my future clients."

  "That’s sick, Jake."

  "Yeah, maybe you’re right."

  "I’m definitely right. I’m absolutely sick with worry over this. I never imagined it could escalate to this."

  "You still reeling from what I told you about your sister?"

  There was a pause on the phone. "I’m dealing with it, Jake. That’s the truth of the matter. I always thought I knew her pretty well, but in retrospect, I guess I was a bit mistaken."

  Just a bit, I thought but didn’t say it. "Don’t feel too bad. We’ve all got family members we never really know anything about."

  "It still doesn’t make sense to me, but you were there when Darmov told you. And I guess you’re right that he’s got no reason to lie about such a thing."

  "No reason at all, unfortunately. Unless I hear different, I’m afraid it probably the truth. It might be the only true thing that Darmov says all year, but it does seem likely."

  "When can I see you, Jake?"

  "Probably not for a few days. I’ll be busy tending to the attempted hit on my life. Plus, I’m going to have some company for the next few days."

  "Company?"

  "Police escort. Won’t do much good, but it makes my friends down at the station feel a bit better."

  "I can drop by the office and bring you some dinner if you like."

  I thought about it. It actually sounded nice. But a big part of me rejected the idea. I didn’t want Vanessa stumbling into another hit attempt. She could get killed just as easily as I could. For myself, it was an accepted risk that went along with the job. But she didn’t have to be a part of that risk.

  "No. I’ll call you when I think it’s clear."

  "All right." She sounded upset.

  "Vanessa, I just don’t want you getting hurt is all. I’ll be ready to see you once this danger is past."

  "Call me soon, Jake." She hung up in my ear and once again, I was all alone in my suddenly very dreary office. A faint smell of gunpowder still lingered so I opened the window.

  But it didn’t do much to get rid of the smell of imminent danger.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I got home late that night. The forensics teams didn’t arrive until after six. By the time they dug the slug out of my office wall, done a preliminary crime scene workup, and shot the shit with me for a few minutes, it was past nine when Henderson and Stiles finally got me situated at home.

  I warmed up some leftover Chinese take out and sat in front of the television watching some old Clint Eastwood movie until the eleven o’clock news. There was no mention of the attempted hit which didn’t really surprise me. The vast majority of crime that goes on fails to make the news simply because they don’t know about it.

  I spent some time cleaning my USP and also the .380 Walther PPK I sometimes carry as a backup weapon. It’s small enough to fit in an ankle holster, but thanks to my bum legs, it usually goes up my sleeve along my forearm.

  Around eleven-fifteen the phone rang as I was oiling the USP’s slide. I grabbed it on the second ring, dropping the rag and brush at the same time.

  "Yeah?"

  "Jake?"

  Darmov. How the hell did he get my number? "Mr. Darmov."

  "I just heard about the attempt on your life this afternoon."

  "How’d you hear about it?"

  "I told you I have some friends scattered about the echelons of this city. It’s also how I got your unlisted phone number in case you were wondering."

  "I was."

  "Are you all right?"

  "They missed. That’s the important thing. But not by much."

  "I see." He paused. "Do you want protection?"

  That was rich. Being protected by the guy I was trying to put away. "I don’t think that would look good for me. I’ve got some cops outside of my house right now."

  "I could send Viktor."

  I’d probably die even quicker that way. "That’s not necessary, Mr. Darmov. But thank you for the offer."

  "What about a gun? I could arrange to get you one very easily."

  "I’m all set in that department."

  "Ah yes, I forgot that as a private detective you probably carry one."

  "Cleaning them as we speak."

  "Good." Another pause. "I don’t like the idea of someone taking shots at my employees, Jake. If you find out who did this, I’ll expect you to let me know. Steps need to be taken to ensure that kind of behavior isn’t tolerated."

  "I’ll keep that in mind."

  "Please do. How are you coming on those two couples?"

  "Well, tonight I would have spoken with one of them if that sniper hadn’t tried to whack me. I’ll call him first thing in the morning. I don’t anticipate any problems."

  "Excellent. Try to get his desired child information so I can start working on finding a baby for them, all right?"

  "You got it."

  "Sleep well."

  The line disconnected in my ear and I was left holding the phone. On the television, the weather man predicted rain.

  No shit.

  On one hand, it felt good knowing Darmov apparently had no clue about who the hitter was. He could be a powerful ally in case of trouble. But did I want him
as an ally?

  On the other hand, not knowing who the shooter was put a fresh wrinkle into the polyester leisure suit that was my life. And it meant that I now had not one, but two fronts to keep a watch on.

  I hoped that this business with Darmov wouldn’t take much longer than another week. Any longer and I’d probably be dead. Hell, I might be dead anyway.

  I turned off the television and wheeled myself into the spare bedroom I use for meditation. I sprawled out of the chair and sat on the thick carpeted rug, fumbled for the remote, and turned on some new age music.

  My thoughts drifted in time to the steady drumming beat. It reminded me of the time when I was eighteen and went on my first vision quest out in the Dakota Badlands.

  Back then, things seemed so easy compared to my life now. Survival was all that mattered. And confronting my inner demons on that trip only made things easier, although it also opened the world of adulthood for me.

  I spent two weeks wandering the harsh scrub landscape. I foraged for small bits of food and water among the sheer rock, the gravel and sand, and the small plants that grew only a few inches high. For days, the land refused to yield anything to me, despite my unending hunger and thirst.

  It was only after I stopped trying to force myself on to the land itself, only after I learned how to surrender and accept what the land offered that I found the food and water I needed to survive.

  And when I did, the burning sun, hot days, and cold night no longer affected me.

  When I walked out of the Badlands three weeks later, I hadn’t lost weight at all. I’d gained seven pounds from eating so well. Before I left, I thanked the land for the lessons she’d taught me. I finished my vision quest learning something more important than the ability to gain seven pounds of muscle. I was leaving with an intimate knowledge of what it took to survive in a seemingly hostile environment.

  It was knowledge that would serve me well during my time in the military. And sitting there in the center of the room that night, I wondered why I hadn’t been applying those same principles to my current situation.

  True enough I was facing danger on several fronts right now. Darmov and Viktor were on one side, and on the other, an unknown adversary whose sole appearance convinced me that whoever they were, they were damned serious about putting me out of action.