Justifiable Homicide

by Waggoner, Robert C.

  6

  The organization was coming together. They now had in LA Robin Eggar, Special Forces trained with a grudge against any and all unfair elements such as drug dealers; Joy Listy in St. Louis a mercenary that loved money and the excitement of the kill against the trash of society; and down in Miami Brian Refuta who once upon a time was a damn good FBI man turned mean against perps who really didn’t deserve any rights in his opinion. Nowadays he struggled against the drink as a low rent PI scrounging a living with whatever came along. The jewel was found in Chicago where Toni Listy was recruited as a computer wizard with a bag full of hate for the government who put her behind bars for hacking. She would prove invaluable to the organization as they were soon to meet in Vegas.

  ***

  January in Las Vegas is cold and windy. However in a hotel room less than five stars sat eight members of the VO group getting the formalities out of the way so they could get down to business. They all knew it was a risk to meet together and that someday some cracker jack FBI guy would put the pieces together. No matter, by then it would be too late and the hope was that applied media pressure would institute a change in the judicial system. Not a one of them believed this action would change the complexion of the complete system, but all were willing to take that risk.

  The weather talk out of the way, Number One cleared his throat and spoke, and “Who wants to begin? I’ve just heard from Number Two that he has some progress to report. But first let me say this. I’ve secured some funds from which we can draw upon to keep the operation moving. We can use bank to bank transfers, but once we are discovered, and we will be someday, the trail will lead to our, shall we say, mercenaries. The deposits will come from outside the country. I have here bank account numbers from two banks. Memorize and destroy. All right then, let’s hear from all of you starting with me”

  Number One from Miami gave his rendition of Brian an ex FBI man who lost two brothers to drugs and now was ready from his private investigators practice to redeem his loss on the drug world. Then he told the group they were ready to begin when given the green light. Number Four from St. Louis gave her report on Joy Listy a real live mercenary who was for hire and loved to take out some bad guys.

  Five and Six both had a list of potential hits and then it was Number Two from LA’s turn. He reported his man ready to be unleashed and gave all a background on Robin Eggar. Eggar, he told them had already begun with a payback on the hospital where his wife died of cancer in too much pain. Also he’d taken out some drug dealers since then. He was military trained and had nothing to lose.

  Numbers Seven and Eight from San Francisco and Seattle both produced a list of names for consideration to disappear from society quietly. The room also went quiet as all thought what the future might bring in the days and weeks to follow.

  All stayed the night and the next day departed for home and work on Monday. Number One had given an e mail address to memorize and told them through this mail, which was untraceable through a hacker mercenary with a debt to pay back the system which put her behind bars, then had the gall to try and hire her, was in their pocket. The stage was set and Monday was the first in a series of murders around the States that went mostly unreported.

  7.

  Toni Tether our petite hacker from upstate New York, sat in her small motor home, a hand me down from father who had scaled up to a forty footer, in front of her computer. Toni had just six months ago been released from jail on hacking charges in Chicago. Her wealthy father was a cousin of Number Five in New York City. Number One in Miami had obtained her release taking responsibility for her. After she hit the free world he told her what he needed from her and she readily agreed. Toni at twenty eight had a hard on for government intervention in people’s private lives. Computers were responsible and if she could do something to help, then she was all for it. The plan was for her to keep moving in her motor home and field e-mails and report on what investigators were doing to trace the upcoming crimes against known drug lords, repeat offenders and included were child molesters at a class three level.

  This is how it worked. The first assignment came in from Seattle requesting assistance on a certain name. Toni then wiped out that mail and mailed Joy Listy the information, such as name, address description with a picture from police files. After confirmation of received, she wiped out the information clean as a whistle. With the latest in satellite internet, Toni could send and receive at any location she desired.

  Joy, on her hand held computer, received the first mail and memorized address and the picture of the intended hit in Seattle, Washington. She cared less who or what he’d done; it was simply a job to her. Pay was excellent and the benefits quite good.

  All she needed now was some weapons. Mercenaries have a special place in their world. One place is in a magazine where coded words known only to their members are places where you can obtain weapons. For Joy, Chicago was the nearest place and she traveled by train to check out the security on board a train. Security was nil; no one would notice her. Unlike airports where cameras and diligent security guards pawed through your belongings, train travel was void of most of that annoying stuff.

  Staying in a low rent hotel in two days she had what she was looking for. A Russian sniper rifle, a 12.7mm KSVK full muffled piece complete with the very hard to obtain, high quality ammunition, that came at no small price. In addition, hand guns of matching Glock nine millimeter of type ballistics couldn’t be traced; also silenced.

  Joy took the train from Chicago to Seattle via a sleeper berth arriving two days later on a cold wet Seattle January morning. She told the taxi driver to find her a middle priced hotel. By noon she was standing in her room watching the drizzle fall on a dark cloudy grey day. In the lobby she noticed a brochure about the Space Needle and decided she could view the city from there having lunch. Bundled up in warm weather clothes she took a taxi and up the elevator she went looking out at the Puget Sound and the city spread out before her. A nice skyline, she thought, but why would anyone want to live in this dreary climate; as she was escorted to a waiting table. Joy was pretty much a vegetarian and ordered salad and fruit. Now like a hundred times before she went over her mark and who it was and where he lived, as that would be her next move. She would rent a car and look for the opportunity to make the kill.

  Her mark was a wealthy insurance guy in his early forties with multiple drunken driving charges who recently beat a vehicular homicide charge killing a wife and her three children on a freeway exit failing to make the right hand turn on a street after exiting. He plowed into her driver’s door with his luxury SUV. He got off on probation shocking the survivors and the rest of the population in Seattle. Joy smiled and thought that the guy’s clock was ticking and about to stop.

  The mark lived in Bellevue a bedroom city for the wealthy across the lake from Seattle. At four pm Joy sat down a block away from her mark’s house. From her computer she’d obtained his make of car, license number, and color; and from his driver’s license, his picture and size. She remembered he was a good looking guy obviously married with kids. That made no difference to her cold heart. She did feel a pang for the family of the victims who died at his drunken hands and for a bonus she was going to take out the lawyer who got him off. Serve the bastard right, she thought while darkness closed in early in the Pacific Northwest. Lights were coming on in the neighbor hood and about six pm he drove into his driveway as the electric garage door opened and his new SUV disappeared inside. Joy drove off and would return in the morning to see how he left and follow him to work or wherever he went, like maybe to a restaurant for coffee and to meet a few cronies.

  8.

  Down in LA Robin Eggar a few days ago received his hand held computer and instructions how to use it along with a name for starting his career as a hit man. He grinned at the thought of him being a hit man. One difference between him and Joy, he wanted the mark to know why and to feel the pain while he died. Bitterness ran deep in his soul and to believe on
ce there was a God, he cast that thought out of his mind a long time ago.

  Robin Eggar lived in a nondescript house in a similar neighborhood where nobody bothered neighbors for a chat or a Sunday BBQ. His job was working as a tire man at the local chain tire store. He never was much on talk and his fellow employees rarely had a conversation with him. He was never late and did his job. Now while he sat in an old rocking chair fingering the computer and learning how to use it, he read the screen for his first hit. The name was not familiar to him as most Spanish names sounded strange to him. This guy was a big time drug man selling to schools with mules fronting for him.

  Rocking back and forth he looked at his watch and thought there was plenty of time to check out the address. He saw part of his instructions was a website to navigate and specific sites on recent drug imports from Mexico and South America. Robin dialed in the address and found it up one of those wealthy canyons rich people inhabited, taking their life in hand with multimillion dollar home, built on stilts precarious with the precipitous geography of the area. More than one home slid down a mountain after a deluge of rain.

  Two hours later driving up the steep hill of some weird name he located the home at the top of a mountain straddling the V of the steep canyon. The home appeared to sit on air as only round metal stilts probably filled with cement kept the home from falling a thousand feet into the canyon below. No way could a climber scale the almost vertical hillside the house dissected. After driving by and then turning around at the very top of the mountain, he slowly drove by again looking for security both physical and mechanical. Seeing neither one he drove back down the mountain and had a hamburger until he thought it safe to drive back up half way and use a spotting scope that could see the brand name on a cigarette at a thousand yards. From the driver's window he looked at the supports holding the house up and smiled knowing what he needed to take out the drug lord.

  Back home Robin made a list of what he needed to make the hit. The short list was plastic explosives with timers and climbing gear to cross the side hill to the supports. Where to park his vehicle was a problem until an idea crossed his mind. He simply would raise the hood pour some water on the ground under the radiator making it look like the driver walked down the hill to find a mechanic or a towing company. One question bothered him and that was to affirm the mark was home when the house succumbed to gravity. Robin remembered behind the steel gate a long limo was parked. He would just have to wait until the limo climbed the hill and parked, wait a half hour and set off the remote.

  9.

  Joy Listy sat on a very quiet street in Bellevue, Washington about one hundred feet from her marks driveway on another dark and drizzly day in Seattle. Her watch said six thirty am and a few lights were on in the neighbor hood signifying another day was coming. When a car did come by, which was rare, she slid down in her seat and let it pass. No one was walking their dogs on a nasty day like today. The paper man came loading up the mailboxes that sat in a cluster every so often on the street. Joy thought if her mark walked the short distance to the paper, she could take him out there. If not, she would follow him to his work and leave the body for his associates to talk about over morning coffee. Joy saw kids leaving for school either driving their own cars or by the ubiquitous soccer moms doing their duty around the country.

  Not a person paid her any attention as they went about their business. At eight thirty the garage door of her mark raised letting in the grey morning light. Joy ran her window down and still watching picked up her sniper rife in case he fetched the paper. A light drizzle fell on her long sleeve arm as she stuck the nose of the rifle out the window. Her mark’s luck had just run out as he walked to pick up his paper for the last time. Joy glanced up the street and in her mirror as no traffic was in either direction. As the mark picked up the paper he turned and Joy placed a bullet in his head. He did a half turn and crumpled to the sidewalk. Joy calmly stuck the rife on the passenger side floor, put her car in drive and drove off leaving a rain coated killer of mother and daughters on the sidewalk.

  10.

  On a warm sunny afternoon down in Los Angeles Robin sat an intersection where the canyon road took off up the mountain and the main street continued around the valley below. Robin had been up the mountain once to see where the limo was and it was gone. That was hours ago and as darkness fell, he still sat in the fast food burger joint parking lot waiting for the limo to return. The weather was unusually warm for a January and a nice wind came off the ocean bringing with it clean air for a change. Robin was dressed in his camouflage gear and all of what he needed filled his back pack. At ten pm the limo passed up the canyon road and Robin applied black to his face. Double checked his eighteen shot 9mm and ten minutes later drove slowly up the canyon road. At the top of the mountain the limo sat in the driveway and Robin could hear music coming from the house. He drove on up to the top and turned around and drove back down where he had previously noted a place to park where even a drunk would not fail to see his car with the hood up.

  Robin made ready his pack and with a plastic hammer so as not to make noise, he drove in a long steel rod to secure a safety rope to transverse the side hill. On his feet ice boots with long side spikes enabled him to make the three hundred feet to the supports without a lot of trouble with the steep side hill. A climber’s axe in one hand and a shorter axe in the other Robin made it across to the supports without mishap. Mexican rock music filled the air as he placed his first charge of plastic on one of six supports. Shorter supports beyond the middle next to the earth he ignored. The six supports held up the majority of the large house and that is where twenty minutes later he had set all six of his charges and went back one by one for a double check. Sweating he made his way back using the axe and rope stopping only once as a car went by. Climbing onto the road breathing hard, Robin felt a grin coming on. He quickly wiped his face, took of his night gear, put on some sweats, closed the hood and turned on the sending unit. He wasn’t in any hurry so he drove back down the mountain, turned around and drove back up to make sure the limo was still parked in the driveway.

  Driving by nothing had changed and on the way back, Robin stopped and looked back up and down the mountain for traffic finding he was alone on the road. He took a deep breath and pushed the red flashing sending device and the sky changed from black to yellow and red under the house. First the house sagged and through the dim light of night, Robin saw the house tumble down the steep hill sending clouds of dust and pieces of house down the mountain. Looking back at where the house once stood, he saw an electrical flash now and then. Robin drove down the hill whistling a nameless tune.

  11.

  In Miami Brian on a Tuesday morning received a UPS package. Sitting at his metal desk that looked like it was government surplus, with only a phone on top of it next to a large pewter ash tray, used a pen knife to open the package. His hands were shaking a little from too many cigarettes and coffee, not from drinking. Since Saturday night with the meeting of his new boss, he cut back on his drinking. Inside he found a hand held computer, two used 9mm with ammo and instructions how to use the computer.

  Brian rubbed his chin of stubble and from somewhere deep in his past training focused on the job at hand. Two refills on the coffee and a half pack of cigarettes used in the ash tray later he sat back in a creaky old desk chair and put it all together. First thing he did was check his mail. Detailed instructions memorized he acknowledged with a code and signed off. His instructions told him about a middle level coke dealer who time and time again escaped the jail time he was due. His mark lived in a rundown neighborhood familiar to Brian. He was on probation so the address was probably good he lived there.

  Brian made a plan and left to check it out. It was an hour later parking his less than new dodge minivan he sat looking at the slum apartment that housed his mark. Those who saw him observed a slovenly looking guy raising a pint sack containing ice tea and not booze to fool the lookers. Then later he laid his head back faking a nap
while watching the comings and goings through open doors of the apartment house. In this hood it was mostly illegal immigrants from Cuba, and South America including Mexico. Brian saw a group of about five come out and hang around the stairs high five’s around and Brian homed in on the leader which was his mark. Two took off down the street and his mark and two body guards strolled to a waiting car. Brian grinned as the pale yellow low rider took off in a cloud of blue smoke, but not speeding. Brian followed at a safe distance because it was not hard to follow a canary yellow low rider.

  Along the way stops were made openly with guys coming to the car looking suspicious as packages and money exchanged hands. Ironically one drop and pass was in front of a blue and white seeing the cop look over and shrugged his shoulders and kept driving. How to catch this guy alone was on Brian’s mind. His mark sat in the back with the other two guys in front. Maybe I’ll get lucky he thought while tailing the yellow canary onto the freeway. Brian perked up wondering why they would be driving down the freeway. Maybe getting a new supply or going to a party, lots of questions and no answers. A half hour later they pulled off on a dark exit where the side traffic was light. Brian hung back even further as the low rider after about a mile pulled into a dark looking bar with a naked girl flashing, advertising what lurked inside.

  Brian pulled over and saw the three guys walk into the bar ready to party it looked like to him. Might be a long night he thought. Brian’s eyes popped open less than a half hour later as the three dudes climbed back into the low rider and turned back to the freeway. Brian slouched down as they passed but knew he wasn’t in their thoughts as he followed once again the canary onto the freeway. Brian was about to give it up when the yellow low rider let out a big belch of blue smoke and pulled off the not so busy side of the freeway. A brain storm hit Brian as he signaled and pulled off in front of the low rider. By now the three dudes had the hood up and Brian walked back giving the impression he was a good guy out to help. His three day beard growth and slovenly look helped as the three guys relaxed while he smiled and asked if he could give some help.