The Untimely Death Box Set

by James Kipling

  “Dammit,” the man from the State Department said to the captain on the other side of the two way mirror,” it’s the egg we need. We can’t move forward on the treaty until Moscow has the egg back in the Hermitage Museum.”

  “And the men who helped you?” Yuan asked him. “You had a whole team to pull off the bank robbery.”

  “We had them on standby. My family managed to recover much of its fortunes over the years and we used most of it on this operation. Once we’d found those demons, we started to plan. But don’t worry, most of those gentlemen were professionals we hired from overseas. I would expect they are far from your reach.”

  “That remains to be seen,” Williams told him. “So you didn’t expect to find the egg?”

  “We had no idea it was in that second box or how they came to possess it. My guess would be in originated with another prisoner they tried to fleece and they couldn’t break it up. So it stayed in the vault for years.”

  “Bingo,” said the man from the State Department.

  “Don’t worry,” the captain said to the man. “We have several people covering Philly International. Homeland Security is watching for him too. I don’t think he’ll ever get on the plane. He’d have to make it through the body scanners and get that necklace through customs. They’ve all been alerted. Once we have the necklace, we’ll have him too. With both of them on the hot seat, they’ll have to give up the location of the egg.”

  “Unless his brother had slipped out of the country already,” the man pointed out. “In which case we’ve lost both the necklace and the egg.” The captain became silent and returned to the interrogation.

  “So what was your ultimate plan for getting out of the country?” Williams asked him again. “Why didn’t you both flee at the same time?”

  “I was the one who worked with the dogs,” he responded. “I’ve always had a way with dogs, training them came naturally to me. I realized attack dogs would be the best way to get inside the vault once we had the location of which bank they were keeping my grandmother’s necklace in. I took a job with the training center and helped out. Hans made the contact and brought the money along once I told him the place was the right one for what we needed. I knew the police would come looking for them eventually. Their first choice would be to find someone in the area who knew how to train large dogs for security work. So I needed to be around and take care of any loose ends. I brought the dogs back and registered them under different names and fake owners. It was easy to sell them in a few days to people at a discount price. All I had to do was contact a list of buyers we had at the center and tell them I had a great deal. In twenty-four hours, they were placed with families all over the Delaware Valley. But I also had to cover my own tracks. I was in the process of erasing my identity with the company payroll system and making sure there was no record of my having ever worked there. Leonard I took care of with a drug in his coffee. He was on the floor ten minutes after sipping it and I moved him behind the door. And then you two showed up, cutting my plans short.”

  “So just where is your brother right now?” Yuan asked him.

  “Europe,” Louis told him. “I’m waiting for a phone call. When he knows I’m safe, he’ll give me the new location of the egg. I was supposed to pick it up and try to find a way to sell it through a certain contact we made in New York City.”

  “And what happens if you don’t appear to be safe when he phones you?” Yuan said to Louis.

  “Then no one will ever learn the location of the egg. I trust Hans to take care of these things. He was the one who found those two she-wolves. I was the one who came up with the idea to remove their….”

  “Okay,” Williams said to him. “We have you, but we don’t have the necklace or the egg or even clever Hans your brother.”

  “And if he learns I have been arrested he won’t try to contact me. So where does that leave us, Detective?”

  “It leaves us in possession of your body and soul, Mr. Von Danzig,” Williams said to him. “Don’t give me that monocle and mustache crap. My family was from East Prussia, did you know that? Yes, we changed our names when we moved here. It went from Wildstein to Williams; you know the Anglos never did like the krauts, so it was something we had to deal with suddenly. Victory, cabbage and sausage. No singing Watch on the Rhine at Christmas. But we were told about how the local gentry liked to lord if over the farm boys. I grew up with some tales of my own, Ritter. Like the nobleman who had to have his horse cleaned every day with no loose hairs or the stable boy ended up on his knees tongue-polishing boots. Now the boot is changed, Mein Herr.”

  “From what I can tell, Schlot,” Louis said to him, “We still hold all the cards. You don’t have a necklace or an egg and we do. As a matter of fact, why don’t you give me my phone back because how else is my brother going to call me when the time comes to do so? I don’t have a watch, but I think it much is close to three and that is when he was supposed to call me, Eastern Standard Time.”

  Williams glared at the Prussian and didn’t say a word. They were at a standoff and both of them knew it. Each side had something the other needed and there was no way to resolve it by giving it up.

  “Go ahead,” the State Department man said to the captain. “Give him his goddamn phone.”

  A young officer was handed the phone in question by the captain and he stormed out of the observation room. Seconds later, he appeared in the interrogation room with it and handed it to Louis. He turned to Williams. “Captain says let him take the call when it comes,” he said. “And then get the phone away from him right away.” He stormed back out of the room.”

  “I don’t know why you are making such a fuss about those two old women,” Louis said to him. “I’m sure they had a waiting committee in hell when they arrived. If they did what they did to my grandmother, imagine what they must have done to the average prisoner who passed through their gentle care. It seems to me that you could have sold tickets to pay them back in kind. I think the government might have made money off them by putting those two on display and charging people for ten minutes with a knife. Think about it, Detective: your ancestors were smacked around a bit by mine, but what she did makes it all pale into insignificance. Those two didn’t just abuse people under them; they raped and killed them as well. And those who survived had to live the rest of their lives knowing they had been one of the lucky ones to escape with their lives. Saddled with the knowledge of the unspeakable things they had to do to survive. I think my brother and I did the world a big favor killing them. Don’t you?”

  “I think you set yourselves up as a law unto yourselves,” Williams said to him. “But you aren’t the law anymore. You’re not thrilled you killed a mass murderer, you’re disappointed you don’t have first claim on virgin brides.”

  “Oh, is that it?” Louis said to him. “Worried my great-grandfather had some fun with your great-grandmother? If he did, I’m sure it was the best she ever had.”

  Williams stood up and raised back his hand. It was only by Yuan’s grabbing it that he managed not to strike Louis directly across the face. He felt his partner’s steel fingers across his wrist.”

  “Don’t,” Yuan said in his ear. “He wants you to do it because he’ll have a reason to press a law suit and you’ll lose your job.” Williams lowered his hand and sat back down in the chair.

  “You’re smarter than you look, Detective,” Louis said to him. “I was sure you were going to strike me. But you didn’t. You disappoint me.”

  And then the cell phone in front of Louis buzzed.

  “Yes, everything is fine,” he said. “No, nothing serious to report. Yes, I know the place; I’ll let you know when I have it in my hands. What time? Okay, I’ll let you know one way or another by then. Bye.” He cut the connection and handed the phone to Williams.

  “That was my brother,” as you might have expected,” he said to him. “He just told me the location of the egg. Now are you going to take me th
ere so I can get it?”

  “Why would we do that?”

  “Because if you don’t I will never reveal the location. Oh, I suppose you could follow me around the clock and hope I don’t give you the slip and get it myself. Perhaps you could successfully charge and then convict me with the crime of murdering both those women. I don’t think so, when I tell the world who it was that I killed and how they’ve been protected by your government, I could swing this thing so both my brother and I would be heroes.”

  “What do you mean ‘protected’?” Yuan asked him.

  “Haven’t either of you figured it out yet?” Louis said as he leaned back and smiled. “This case goes much deeper than either of you two realize. I’m certain your government has leaned hard on both of you to resolve it not because they want justice done, but because they need the egg to conclude a trade deal.”

  The captain heard the teeth grind of the state department man next to him. So this was the big effing deal after all.

  “You really need to learn other languages, you know,” He said to him. ‘It’s been in the Russian press as to how Moscow had tried for years to get that Fabergé egg back into their collection at the Hermitage Museum. However, Washington doesn’t want to be dependent on Arab petroleum any longer, so they are willing to buy from their former enemies. Funny how it all works out. Russia wants a guarantee that it the State Department is bargaining in good faith so they want the egg, which they know we’ve tracked down to a hidden location in Philly. It was very easy to contact the Russian embassy and tell them how we could provide them with the egg after we found it. Took us all of ten minutes to discover what a hot little item we’d found. Now, if you please, bring the man behind the mirror out and have him cut a deal with my lawyer so I can leave. You will never be bothered by me again and I won’t have to put up with your cologne either. Mein gott, this day has been so depressing.”

  “Would this be the egg you are referring to?” Yuan said to him as he brought out a box from the pocket in his jacket and sat it down in front of the nobleman. Yuan popped the lid and showed him the intricately fashioned Fabergé egg. Louis’ jaw dropped as looked on in shock.

  “How…how…” was all he could say. Even the lawyer was left speechless.

  “The egg!” the state department man yelled in the other room, “somebody get that damn egg!” Two plainclothes officers nearly collided trying to get to the next room.

  “Someday you’ll have to tell me the full story of what the captain said when he hauled you into his office,” Williams said to his partner as they chilled at the local diner. “I have to admit, that was too damn funny when all of them ran into the interrogation room.”

  “What pisses me off,” Yuan said to him, “is that we both know Louis and his brother will walk over this. They have that shit-hot lawyer who will paint them as victims. God knows those women were monsters and the brothers being touted in the media as plague killers, not the psychopaths they are. I guess it all depends on how you spin it. Shoot a twelve-year-old kid on the street for stepping on your shoes and you’re a gangster. Torture to death two elderly women who were prison guards at a Nazi camp and you’re a hero.”

  “”But you have to admit, there is no equivalency,” Williams said. “I’ll give them that much.

  “You want to know how I figured out where he had stashed the egg?” Yuan asked Williams as he leaned back in the chair. “Admit it, you are just dying to find out. You want to hear my ‘Ancient Chinese Wisdom’.”

  “Oh, cut it out, how did you know?”

  “I watched him when he ran. The first place he went to was a small pillar on the edge of the road made out of granite slabs while you were chasing him. He didn’t stop at it, he kept on going. But he made sure to glance at it as he ran past. Only then did he cross the street and keep on going. I was on the phone with the ambulance company while I watched you chase after him. I thought it was a little bit odd that he detoured to the stone pillar before crossing the street. So, after the ambulance arrived, I walked over to the pillar and looked at it. It wasn’t solid. The pillar was made up of granite slabs which were used to cover up a pump of some kind. I guess the property owner thought it would look nicer that way. I felt around the base of the slabs and found a small box concealed under the lower piece of the pumping installation. It was strapped in with plastic bands and made to resemble part of the pump assembly. But it was a small cache used to hide the egg. I opened the cache and inside it was the box I showed Louis when we had him in the interrogation room. Inside the box was the egg.”

  “Okay,” Williams said to him. “I understand how you found it, but why did he tell us his brother had the location secret? Why the big deal about not revealing the location until his bother called?”

  “He was buying time and trying to cut a deal. He knew where it was, he’d placed it there himself while working for the training center. He knew the State Department needed the egg badly to cut the deal with the Russians. So he hoped to hold out until they gave him some kind of amnesty.”

  “In the end, he didn’t get a thing,” Williams pointed out. “Do you think they’ll be able to find his brother in Europe?”

  “Hard to say, plenty of places he can hide and he has that necklace to use as collateral. I’m sure he’s broken it up for the gemstones by now. There were some big rocks on that necklace.”

  “At least Leonard turned out alright,” Williams pointed out. “Did you have a chance to talk to him after he came home from the hospital?”

  “Yes, I did. He told me this is the reason he prefers working with dogs as opposed to people.”

  They both had a good chuckle over that one.

  Book 5: Gone

  Chapter One

  Damianos. It is Greek...meaning--the tamer.

  Detective Andre Russell still hadn't quite gotten used to the nickname his colleagues in the police department had given him. It was absolutely a compliment but with it came pressure to be able to keep the criminals that ran around San Diego under control. He had done a fairly good job of it so far, but there had yet to be a real beast to tame. San Diego was a relatively quiet city over all. In fact, sometimes he felt like a Greek word meaning “the dog trainer” would've been more suited for him.

  It was his conviction they all admired. He saw San Diego as his responsibility and his duty to keep it clean from any monsters.

  That was what worried Damianos sometimes.

  Taming the worst beasts the human race had to offer was one thing; the tough ones who made a name for themselves inflicting pain and committing crimes. He was used to locking them up in a big cage and never giving them the key.

  They no longer worried him. Damianos could handle them.

  In generally quiet San Diego, it was the creatures below the surface—the rats hidden, infesting the foundation of the city, unseen and nearly impossible to ever truly be rid of.

  **

  After all, rats had a habit of scratching their way into places they don't belong.

  Though, one place one would never expect to find them was the last house on the street, owned by a man named Leon Edward.

  The house was a very large old home, one might even call it a mansion. For decades, it had struck awe in those who had seen it for its sheer size alone but had seemed to be a dying giant, its structure slowly withering away. However, that had all changed the day and older gentleman moved in.

  Mr. Edward, had lived there nearly five years and in those five years had seemed like a man on a mission. When it came to taking care of the house, he had worked tirelessly like clockwork. His almost ritualistic efforts to restore the house to its former glory had not gone unnoticed by his neighbors.

  Thanks to him, the yard was well-tended and watered regularly. The lawn was mowed every Saturday. The flowers were changed according to their seasonal blossoming.

  Leon Edward was man who never deterred from his pattern, despite his gray hair and slowing walk.
<
br />   So, it was quite odd when he hadn't been seen for a week, and his disappearance, like his hard work, hadn't gone unnoticed by the neighbors.

  The plants weren't looking quite as vibrant as usual. The lawn's grass seemed disheveled and unruly; the house's stubble in need of a shave. Rolled up newspapers were strewn across his driveway. The mailbox was on the verge of overflowing.

  The house itself seemed to mourn him in his absence.

  **

  Lillian Adams lived across the street from Mr. Edward in a house that wasn't nearly as impressive as her neighbor's.

  Every day, she found herself looking out her living room window while Mr. Edward moved with surprising swiftness throughout his property, tending to all the aspects of his home. Lillian was always impressed by the man's vigor, especially for his age.

  It must have been the twelfth time she had looked out her window that morning. It was Saturday so she kept expecting to see Mr. Edward round the corner of his house with his lawn mower in tow.

  Though, it was almost noon—and Mr. Edward was nowhere to be seen.

  It wasn't just the lawn. She had taken notice that no one had picked up the papers in his driveway. It was all very odd, considering how Mr. Edward's routine was usually so—routine. It was one of the only things she could really count on being the same. It gave her a very uncomfortable feeling in her stomach.

  Lillian wanted to find a reason to march across the street and knock on his door. Maybe some of his mail had accidentally been put in her mailbox. Maybe she just had extra brownies and no one to eat them. Any reason would probably do, as long as it got him to open his door so she could at least know he was okay.

  Mr. Edward was an older man, after all. She couldn't help but worry that he might have fallen. From what she'd seen, he didn't have much family. No one to really check in on him, make sure nothing was wrong.