by Claire Perry
Chapter 4
Claudia looked like a china doll lying in the hospital bed.
Matthew was standing on the outside, watching as they whisked her down a hallway. Why was he always watching from the outside? Why were the people that he loved always ripped to ribbons? For all his training, for all the blood and tears he profusely shed, still nothing he did availed to save them.
As it stood, he couldn’t go any closer. Yet he was anchored to one of the men responsible for her near murder. If there was the slightest chance in Hell that she could be saved from this, then he didn’t dare bring him any nearer.
He had a better idea.
Without a word, he turned to look at Psych Lemur. The guy blinked once, afraid. That was good as far as he was concerned. He needed this guy to come to fear his name. It might scare some conviction into him.
He reached and took a fistful of his hair. The guy screamed. Held that way the entire while it took Matt to unhook and deactivate the bomb vest, it seemed as though the guy would pass out. Like Matthew Erickson would give him that luxury.
It was a terrible cliché to have a torture chamber. Matthew Erickson wasn’t going to need one. He had a truck and a few Tasers he could hook to live car batteries he could use as a torture device on the back seat.
He tugged him up and strapped him down. The guy was struggling, crying like a little girl.
“This nickname you’ve come up with. It’s agonizingly stupid. What’s your real name, kid?”
The guy sputtered and raised his hands in apology.
“I just–I just–I didn’t mean–”
“Your name! Now! Maybe I won’t hurt you.”
“Marty…”
“Okay, Marty. Now, see these? I could hurt you. I’m not hurting you at the moment, but I could. See, I don’t really want to. I’ve spent my life doling out pain, and I’ve been dealt a crap ton of it myself… You understand, Marty? I don’t want to, but I will if you don’t tell me the name of the guy that hired you to come kill me and my friend, alright?” He talked nervously, half out of his head. He was overly conscious of what he was threatening to do to this boy. The circumstances that led to his retirement from the CIA were riddled with torture experiences of his own, facts too dark for top-secret files. The last thing he wanted to do was be the perpetrator of such a scarring experience.
From his own experience, he knew that the moments leading up to the pain could be just as shaky for the victim as the actual act of torture. He clipped small wires to the front of Marty’s shirt, but avoided clipping them to the batteries. Maybe he’d be able to convince the guy to talk without having to do this?
“Oh my God. You wouldn’t– I mean, come on, man!”
“I would. Unless you answer the question. Come on, son, it’s not that hard.” He spun the other end of the wire with his free hand. The boy watched slack-jawed.
“Okay! It’s so not worth a fraternity dare!” The guy held up a hand, pleading.
Matthew nodded.
“Tell me his name.”
“The one he goes by, anyway? I don’t think it’s his real one. He calls himself Jude Thorn. I can even give you his office number. Oh my God, I’m so dead when they find out I snitched!” He chewed his fingernails and looked down. Matthew lifted his face with hand.
“No, you’re not. Because I’ll protect you from him. That is, until I have him so far beneath the city that they will have to use a bulldozer just to dredge him up for his court date.” Matt smirked. Marty smiled, suddenly calm. He hadn’t hurt him, after all.
“Snitch him out. I’ll let you walk away from this. You could even rebuild your life. Become a new man with the fear of God drilled into you. God will have a little help from me, huh?” Matt held his hands up, willing to negotiate. Marty nodded.
“Right. Do you have paper? I can give you a street address, the cell number he makes us call. I can give you a little something extra that will probably be far more useful for today…” Marty swallowed, breathless.
“I’m all ears, man.” Matthew popped the tab on a can of energy drink he’d laid on the floorboard.
“He’s meeting with Joseph Cornwell tonight at that new Indian restaurant you’d have to be Howard Hughes to eat at that opened a few blocks from the Galleria. Tonight, 7:30.”
Matthew tossed his head back and laughed.
“Looks like I’ve scored a date. You’ve been helpful. Now get lost. Consider cutting your hair and changing your name. Something better than last time, yeah? When in doubt, Google baby naming websites. That’s how I used to make my false IDs. Alright, now get lost. You have my word I’ll watch your back, but trust me on this one – you don’t ever want to see me face to face again in this life.”
Matthew threw the truck’s cab door open and watched as the distraught youth fled the scene. He swallowed and climbed back into the driver’s seat, cutting the key over. How many people would there be that would never see him again in this life? How many innocent souls had yet to be the casualty of this?
He had a few hours before he needed to rendezvous with death. It was safe for him to swing by and see after Claudia now. It was the least he could do for the only close friend he’d ever had.
Chapter 5
The waiters parted like the Red Sea before Moses’ staff when Joseph Cornwell strode into the room.
It was a quiet Tuesday evening, bad for business after the recent uproar at the nearby Galleria. Anita’s was sleeping, the wine cabinet barely touched by the single table of white-suit clad businessmen playing cards that sat next to it.
Joe stood beneath the single crystal chandelier that furnished the center of the room. It had once occupied the Grand Cornwell Theatre that opened just outside the Hollywood limits when his father was the man at the Empire’s helm. He surveyed the room with an air of regret. He’d built it in memory of his murdered wife and unborn child. It was a lavish waste of funds that could have been used in bringing Alice to justice. How many bribes could he have bought with the many plates of smooth sapphire that had been inlaid like average brickwork into the walls? He could have bought off the entire county with the amount of opal it had taken to pave the floor! The fountain that stood in the center – a well-shaped water fixture with stonework that was burnt orange spessartine, with wedges of emerald and amethyst, and rimmed in gold – was worth a king’s fortune. He could have bought off whole governments with this monument and had his revenge!
Somehow, he felt that he was being watched. He froze as winds from the patio blew across his crushed velvet purple suit and knocked his coat tails in the air. It was nonsense! His cursed imagination! He popped his collar and continued to stride towards the man in the center of the poker match. The ruthless Jude Thorn.
“If you take another step, he’ll be dead and all your chances of a Roman execution are out the door with him. There isn’t a threat you could make that could make me blink, so let’s talk on my terms.” Joe felt his nostril’s flare and turned around. He was speechless, cold to his bones with rage. It was Matthew Erickson, leaning against one of several bronze gilded pillars that supported the domed roof. He had a Taurus 380 balanced in his palm, appearing about as conspicuously as a cell phone. He’d been mistaken for one of Thorn’s many body guards, with his entirely black attire the t-shirt reading “SECURITY” in gold letters across his chest.
“Damn you to the darkest part of Hell, Matthew Erickson! I thought we’d killed you!” Joe reached into his coat looking for his own weapon. He’d started carrying a concealed Smith and Wesson Model 29 after his wife’s murder. With chagrin, he remembered that he’d left it with the security officers at the door, as Mr. Thorn didn’t allow firearms at his table – probably because he was a man of horrific reputation that could be assassinated at any given moment.
“Ah, so I’ve outgunned you with a purse pistol like this. That’s sad, my friend. Truly sad. Not as sad as the fact that the guys your boy Thorn there sent to ice me managed to stab Claudia Nagant in the back. Remember her? She’s
my only friend, and I’m to understand that you may have had a summertime fling with her back in ancient history. That right, Romeo?” Matthew inched closer.
“Claudia… What did they do to her?”
“I told you. They stabbed her in the back. Oh, you thought I meant that metaphorically, right? My bad, man. No, I mean the hit man that your boy Thorn sent for me slid a knife into the small of Claudia’s back. She’s in the ICU now. I visited her an hour or so ago. It’s looking pretty bleak. She’ll probably go within the next few hours unless there’s some kind of miracle.”
Joe stood dumbfounded.
“Not as easy to point the finger when you’re the one that’s hired a killer and they’ve taken out someone you cared about in cold blood, huh? Maybe makes you want to slacken Mommy’s noose a little, eh?” His face was like cast iron. Joe began to back away. Matthew cornered him all the way to the room’s fountain that was so massive it drowned out all their conversation. Joe would just as soon die as to scream or call for help. Matthew had him exactly where he needed him.
“Now, seeing as I have the floor.” Matt reached into the pocket of the black cargo jeans that had come with his assumed uniform.
“You can go straight to Hell, Matt. I won’t sleep until my mother is swinging from that noose and dripping her rotten blood all over San Francisco! I’ll have her whacked by extremists if I have to!” Joe was about to try and storm past Matthew, but he reached up and took his throat in a chokehold. He applied no significant pressure – only enough to strike sudden terror in Joe that made him stand deer-in-the-crosshairs straight.
“My little sister died because of your family feud. The woman that came to temporarily fill her shoes is lying on her deathbed. I’ve paid for your mistakes with more than I had to give. You’ll park your ugly keister here and listen to what I have to say before I spirit you away to the Hell I’ve already been burning in for longer than you can wrap your pickled brain around.” Matt dropped Joe on the fountain. He sat there wide-eyed and silent as he fished out a notebook.
“Claudia was caught in the crossfire because she wanted to meet at the Galleria, with a lot of people around to make it sort of a neutral place, and tell me about the evidence she’d found that actually proves your mother’s innocence and someone else’s guilt.”
“Bull–”
“Shut up! I am jury, judge, and executioner at this instant. Do you wanna wind up in contempt of my court, Mr. Cornwell?” Matthew plucked a jagged, rusty, broken knife out of another pocket. It was dyed at the handles indelibly with blood. Joe would have never guessed that it was Matthew’s own, or that this had been the instrument of his own torture. Matthew just wanted this all to end and would expend all efforts at causing hysteria to see that transpire.
He opened the book close to Joe’s face.
“This was in her jeans pocket when they had to cut her out of her clothes to begin stabilizing her. They gave it to me, saying she’d begged them to for the few seconds she was lucid when they were moving her. It must have been important if she woke herself up out of a semi-coma to get it to me. I got to flipping through it. It’s all written in Hebrew, but it has the format of basic notes. This must be the legend to the evidence’s map, man. The way that we can finally settle the Cornwell score and get to the bottom of who really killed my sister and your wife, and why.”
“It’s worthless if we can’t read it, idiot!” Joe spat. Why had he come to him?
“I know a guy who can. A friend of mine that Journey actually introduced me to when I was healing from my time in a torture chamber. His name is Rabbi Benjamin Hewitt. He’ll totally help us. We’ve just got to get to him before Thorn’s lackeys get to me. You’re coming because I want you off the blood hunt and using your resources for the good of humanity like your Daddy would have done. FYI, I knew your Dad. Not very well, mind, but I worked with him a few times. Great man.”
Joe was taken aback.
“Wait. You were tortured?” The concept was humbling.
“Well, you always wondered why I wasn’t really around to protect Journey from the Pandora’s Box your family unleashed. There’s your answer, bro. Want to hold the knife the guy used to empty me? A soul can be carved like diamonds.” He pressed the handle into Joe’s hand. Joe gaped, feeling nauseous. Matt knelt in front of him.
“Look, I get your pain. Believe me, I do. I get that you’re angry and confused. Killing Alice Cornwell isn’t going to bring your wife back or solve the truth behind her murder. If you help me, though, you might be able to get the justice you’re actually longing for. Against the right people instead.”
It was a rare day that Joseph Cornwell could be persuaded. The knife in his hand and the man whose life he’d derailed stooping low enough to actually consider soliciting his help was enough to humble him into a choice.
“Let’s go see your friend, Mr. Erickson.”
Chapter 6
Not a dream. The moment at last. She sat bolt upright in her cot, dogs braying throughout Solitary’s hallway.
“This is how it ends, Alice?” Her thoughts raced Triple Crowns through her fragmented mind. She stumbled to the floor and scrambled for her ball and metal jacks. It was a last stand of ridiculous desperation, but these were the only weapons she’d have to make it.
“We’re moving her to another cell block. Orders from the Commissioner.” A night guard’s voice echoed through the door slit. If that was the case, then what was up with the dogs?
The door flew wide open for the first time in eons. There stood Jude Thorn, several albino pit bulls hooked to a golden chain at his hand.
“Hello, darling. I told you the day would come. I guess I was wrong, though. Not the day, but the glorious night.”
Alice hurled a fistful of jacks into his face. He howled as blood began to poor like the tears of war down his cheeks and drip off his chin onto the snowy crisp tuxedo he’d donned for this occasion.
“There’s something to remember me by, champ!” Alice kicked the wall. The disgrace of it all! She’d survived this long on hope and burned toast only to be fed to fighting dogs? 67 years still didn’t feel like long enough to live, as she was faced with her final moments. Particularly when nearly a decade of these precious years had been stolen from her in here. People who experience near death often complain of terror or catatonia. Alice felt only rage. She kicked the wall a second time with all her strength and spit on the floor.
“Oh, it’s not time to make you a memory or a meal. I will let her be the judge of it. She has more reason to hate you than anyone. Fetch, boys! Take her to your mama!” Jude snapped his fingers. Alice froze. Who was this woman he was talking about?
Jude dropped the chain. The dogs lunged forward, grabbing her by the legs and chest of her faded orange jumpsuit. Alice froze, expecting to be shredded to fleshy confetti by the beasts, but they never hurt her. Gently, they plucked her from her cell and drug her to the feet of the last person she ever expected to see at the end of the hallway.
“It occurs to me, Alice. I’m sure you recognize me, although we were never properly introduced.” She stood beating a riding crop against her palm, smirking like the cat that ate the canary and got away with it.
“Anita!” Alice got up on her knees.
Anita wrinkled her nose. She stood in a pink corduroy skirt and a ruffled white blouse like a schoolgirl.
“The one and only, Alice. Mm, it’s nice to meet you. I imagine you assumed I was dead, huh? That’s why you’re in here, isn’t it? Well, surprise! I’m here!” She giggled and scooped Alice off the floor, taking her face in either hand.
“We’re going to have loads of fun.” She winked, then she jabbed a Taser into Alice’s neck. Alice felt her whole body go limp. Anita pulled a bag over her head. Familiar darkness accompanied her. Electricity and wonder made her light-headed, and Alice Cornwell succumbed to unconsciousness.
Chapter 7
Joe had never been to this side of town. The gates were falling down, with brickwo
rk hip-fences that crumbled like old bread along the sidewalks. Graffiti colored the walls like donut glaze. Dogs sank their teeth full of shredded, wadded paper, casting coupons into the air. Broken liquor bottles scattered the street in glass-grains that made for a poor man’s glitter. This was the street ritz, and the people who dwelt here were down with it.
Matt got out and pulled up his collar. Joe may be in a foreign world, but Matt was right at home here. He tossed Joe a baseball cap.
“Cover your face. You’ll stick out like the Venus de Milo stood up next to a finger-painting around these parts.” He rolled his eyes and slammed his door closed.
Joe pulled the hat snugly down on his forehead and looked up. The old synagogue had once been a tiny bank. The ATM machine had been ripped open and the cash dispenser had been turned into a box of roses that bled into the street like burgundy from the shattered bottle. Joe froze, remembering this place now. The Golden Star of David that hung over the front door gave it away. This is where Claudia had always dreamed of having her wedding.
“Come on. The clock’s ticking, man.” Matt ironically had the keys to this place.
“What? He gave them to me a long time ago, before I had an orange picker’s shanty. I needed a place to crash. A synagogue’s as good a place as any.” He shrugged and stumbled inside.
“Rabbi? Rabbi Ben? Hey, it’s me, Matt Erickson! I know it’s been a while. I saw your Prius in the back lot. I hope that means you’re here, cuz I don’t have your number anymore and I’m kinda in a jam where I can’t really stop to look for it.
I hope you’re not busy, sir. I just wondered if maybe you could read something to me. It’s my best friend’s notebook. I’d have her read it for me, but she’s in the hospital. It’s imperative I have this translated, sir, as the security of many innocents depends on it.” Matt’s voice echoed off the arched ceiling. He spun in circles.
