Revenge Story

by Julia Broussard

“Dispatch,” said Watson into the radio, “one Lincoln six.”

  “One Lincoln six go.”

  “I need a ten twenty-eight on a white BMW sedan. California license BROKER 1, vanity plate.”

  “Roger, one Lincoln six. Stand by.”

  A few seconds passed while the dispatcher ran the license number. “One Lincoln six,” came the response. “Vehicle registered to Wayne Hargrove, Eureka address. No wants or warrants.”

  “Roger,” said Watson. “One Lincoln six out.” He looked at his partner and tapped his fingers nervously. “Just some locals. Rich folks, no doubt.”

  “Everyone freeze!” Ben shouted. He leaped over the counter and approached the bank manager. “Tell everyone to stay off the alarms,” he said, leveling the BAR at her head. “If I see a single cop pull up outside, I start shooting people.”

  The young woman stood up from her desk and put her arms into the air. “Do what he says,” she said in a loud voice. “Do not trigger the alarms.”

  Ray Morris took a spot near the front door, where he could keep watch on the few early-bird customers now cowering on the floor of the lobby. Another customer walked in and Ray grabbed him, throwing him to the floor with the others. “Stay there,” he ordered. “Keep your head down.”

  Ben marched the bank manager over to the vault cage. There was a door with steel bars. “Open it,” he ordered.

  The woman’s hands shook as she pulled out her key and inserted it into the lock. She missed the lock and tried again, unsuccessfully. “What’s your name, ma’am?” said Ben. He took the key from her hand and opened the cage door smoothly.

  “My name?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Penny Appleton.”

  “Okay, Mrs. Manager. Go on in. I want the money,” he said. “Now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The woman led him to a grey upright safe the size of a refrigerator. She pointed to it. “In there. It’s all in there.”

  “Open it, please.”

  She spun the dial on the safe one way, then another, and then rotated the handle, swinging it open.

  Ben grabbed her by the collar and shoved her to her knees in front of the safe. He laid the barrel of the heavy rifle on her shoulder. “Now if you put any dye packs or bait money into this bag I’ll blow your brains out, you understand?”

  “What bag?”

  Ben pulled out a black garbage bag and dropped it on the floor. “This bag. I know what bait money and dye packs look like, so don’t try it. Now get the goddamn money into the bag, every cent.”

  “Yes, sir.” She reached up and removed a few bundles of bills from the top shelf, setting them aside on the floor. “That’s all the bait money,” she said. “And the dye packs.”

  “Smart girl. Now put the rest of it into the bag.”

  The frightened woman pulled row after row of bundled cash from the remaining shelves and stuffed them into the garbage bag. She held the bag up for Ben without looking at his face. “That’s all of it, sir. Except for what the tellers have in their drawers.”

  Ben pulled her to her feet and hefted the bag. It was surprisingly heavy. I was right about this place and the big cash drops, he thought. Must be close to a half-million bucks. “We’ll forget about the tellers, Penny. You did well. Now get back out there and sit down on the floor,” he said.

  She walked out of the vault cage and sat down near her desk. Ben leaped back over the counter with the heavy bag of money and smiled at Morris. “See? Told you it was easy. Let’s go.”

  Outside the bank, another call came in to the stakeout car. “One Lincoln six,” said the dispatcher.

  “One Lincoln six go,” Watson answered.

  “Additional on your white BMW with the BROKER 1 vanity plates. A man claiming to be the owner just called it in ten twenty-nine Victor. Details are still coming in, but he said he was the victim of a home invasion. Officers are in route to the victim’s home, code three.”

  “Dispatch, one Lincoln six,” said Watson. “You have the address on that Beamer registration?”

  “Two sixteen Elk River Road.”

  “Shit!” Watson said, smacking his partner on the shoulder. “That address is right near the shootout. They’re in the fucking bank!” He shouted into the radio, “Dispatch! One Lincoln six. Those murder suspects are inside the First National right now, main branch. Requesting backup. One Lincoln six out goddamnit!” He dropped the microphone. “Let’s go!”

  Both men jumped from the car with their shotguns at the ready and ran across the street toward the bank.

  Ben and Ray emerged from the bank with their weapons hidden under their coats and calmly headed for the BMW. They saw the two cops instantly.

  “Take this,” said Ben, handing Ray the bag of money. “Get to the car. I’ll cover. Hurry up.”

  As Ray Morris ran for the BMW, Ben brought up the BAR from under his coat and squeezed off a loud burst. Bullets splattered the pavement around the officers, missing them, but forcing them to duck behind a parked car two slots back from the BMW.

  One of the cops fired a shotgun blast at Ray, hitting him. The force spun him around like a ballet dancer doing a pirouette. He fell to the pavement near the passenger door of the BMW and grabbed his leg. “I’m hit!”

  Ben dodged a couple of shotgun blasts tossed his way and ducked low, running for the car and firing his BAR at the same time. The heavy bullets punched through the metal and glass of the parked car where the cops were hiding. The officers returned fire with their shotguns, blowing out a storefront window behind him. He slammed another magazine into the BAR and fired a second time, hitting one of the officers, who staggered back and collapsed into the street. Shoppers and passersby ran for cover, screaming and shouting. Somewhere up the street, two cars crashed into each other and car alarms blared up and down the block.

  Ducking behind the front of the BMW, Ben took a quick glance at Ray, who was lying on the sidewalk near the passenger door of the car. “Get your lazy ass off the ground! Get in the fucking car!” he yelled.

  Ray stayed low and opened the passenger door, throwing the moneybag into the rear seat after some effort. His leg was covered in blood and his face was ashen. He crawled inside and shut the door.

  The other cop continued firing shotgun blasts at the BMW, but the car parked between them was making him miss.

  Ben ran around to the driver’s side of the BMW and fired off a long burst at the remaining cop. The cop ducked even lower behind the car he was using as a shield and Ben saw him cramming more shells into his shotgun.

  “Come on, Ben!” Morris shouted from the car. “Let’s go!”

  Ben emptied the remainder of the magazine at the cop and then opened the door and tossed the BAR into the back seat on top of the moneybag. Then he took a grenade from his pocket and pulled the pin. He lobbed it high into the air with an expert toss and watched it hit the roof of the car where the cop was hiding. It rolled off toward the trunk area and exploded with an ear-splitting crack. “How do you like me now, you bastard!” he shouted, pulling out a pistol.

  A couple of seconds later, the cop stumbled out from behind the parked car. Blood was streaming down his face and he was holding both hands over his ears. The shotgun was on the ground.

  “Ben! Come ON!”

  Ben took careful aim with his pistol and fired several shots at the officer. The bullets spun him around and the cop finally collapsed in the street near his partner. Ben jumped into the BMW and started it, pulling away from the curb. As he glanced into the rear view mirror, he saw that neither of the cops was moving. “I think I got that last one good,” he said as they sped away.

  Karen Morris could hear shooting, and then a loud bang that sounded like a firecracker. She sat in the driver’s seat of the motorhome and waited. Her heart was racing and she subconsciously reached over and took the MP-5 submachine gun in her hands, placing it on her lap. A moment later, she spotted the white BMW coming into the parking lot. She saw immediately that some
thing was wrong. Ray was leaning his head against the passenger side window and grimacing in pain. She started the engine on the motorhome as they pulled alongside.

  Ben opened the side door on the motorhome and helped Ray inside. “He’s been hit in the leg.”

  She started to get up, but Ben held up a hand. “I’ll take care of him,” he said. “You drive.”

  “Ray!”

  “I’m okay!” Ray shouted back. “I took a few shotgun pellets in my leg, that’s all. Just go.” He crawled to the rear of the motorhome and fell onto the bed.

  Ben took a quick glance outside to make sure no one was watching them, and then threw the weapons and the moneybag into the motorhome. He shut the side door and sat down on the floor. “Okay, Karen. Move us out of here before the cops show up. Nice and easy. Not too fast now. We don’t want to draw attention.”

  Karen put the motorhome into gear. “Where to?”

  “Go out to the main drag there and turn right,” said Ben. “Just follow Highway 101 north until I say otherwise. We’re going about thirty miles, and then we’re turning off.”

  Sergeant Ackerman lifted up the sheet covering Officer Pierce, took a quick glance, and then dropped it back into place. Pierce was dead. Just like the Elk River Road shootout, steel-jacketed rounds from a BAR had penetrated his body armor easily. The street was blocked off now by more than a dozen patrol cars. He watched as the ambulance carrying Officer Watson sped off toward the hospital. “How’s the other one?” Ackerman asked Captain Nester, who was standing nearby.

  “He’s unconscious. The medics say it doesn’t look good. He’s got shrapnel in his skull and a bullet wound just under his vest.”

  “I want roadblocks on both ends of the 101 highway,” said Ackerman, “at ten and twenty mile intervals.”

  “It’s going to take a while,” said Nester. “We had most of the available units staking the banks.”

  A uniformed patrol officer ran up to them. “Sir, we found the BMW abandoned at the Safeway around the corner.”

  “Any witnesses see what vehicle they switched to?” said Ackerman.

  “We’re interviewing people right now, sir. So far, it doesn’t look like anybody saw them.”

  “Goddamnit! We have to find these guys, and quick!” Ackerman said in frustration. “Get Air One and Two up right now. One goes north, the other south. We’ll tell them what they’re looking for as soon as we get an ID on whatever vehicle they switched over to.”

  “Yes, sir.” The officer sprinted off to give the order.

  “And make sure you tell them our perps have a goddamn Stinger missile with them!” Ackerman shouted.

  Ben finished picking the last piece of buckshot from Ray’s leg and dropped the bit of lead into a bowl of water. “Only three pieces of shot,” he said. “You’re lucky it wasn’t in your face.” He examined the leg carefully. “None of them went in more than a quarter of an inch. Must have been some ricochets off those concrete steps outside the bank. You’ll be okay in a couple of days.” He spread a heavy layer of antiseptic paste over the wounds and began wrapping the leg with a roll of heavy gauze.

  Ray grimaced. “Hurts like hell, though.”

  “I’m sure it does,” said Ben. When he finished with the gauze wrap, he put the supplies back into the first aid kit and tossed the kit onto the bed. “I say we find out how much money we took from that bank.”

  “Go ahead,” said Ray, sitting up on the bed.

  “How’s it going up there?” Ben called out to Karen.

  “We’re about ten miles north of town,” she said.

  Suddenly, another call came over the police radio that caught Ben’s attention. He picked up the radio from the bed and turned up the volume. “Quiet!”

  “One Mary Twelve...two witnesses reported that the suspects left the parking lot in a large Toyota motorhome...”

  “Goddamnit!” Ben yelled.

  “What is it?” said Karen.

  “Someone spotted us switching over to the motorhome. We have to get rid of this thing and find another vehicle quick,” said Ben. He shook his head. “Hmm. Maybe they knew about the motorhome. You know, those cops were already staked out at the bank when we got there, and something set them off. I don’t think it was a bank alarm, either. I think those two we left back at the house might not have waited until noon, after all.”

  “What do you mean?” said Ray.

  “We weren’t inside that bank more than a minute and a half,” said Ben. “Something tipped off those cops and I think it might have been a stolen report on that Beamer. And that means they know this motorhome came from the same place. They’re already on to us.” He turned toward the front. “Karen!”

  “What?”

  “The next town up the road is the exit for Arcata. Take the exit and go down the main drag. There’s a used car dealership at the end of town, with a strip mall about a block past it. Park us at the strip mall.”

  “What for?”

  “We’re going car shopping,” Ben said. He grabbed the black plastic bag and dumped the bundles of cash onto the floor. “Let’s see what we have here,” he said. He began counting them and dropping them back into the bag. There were scores of them. “Holy shit,” he said. “I think we hit the jackpot guys. Mostly hundred-dollar bills in packets of ten thousand dollars each.”

  Karen Morris turned in her seat and saw enough bundles of cash on the floor of the motorhome to fill two shopping bags. “Oh my God,” she whispered. “How much do you think is there?”

  “Hang on and I’ll tell you.”

  A couple of minutes later, he gave his report. “We’re changing up the plan,” he said. He sat back and shook his head in disbelief. “We don’t need to hit any more banks for now. There’s about seven hundred and forty thousand dollars here.”

  Ben groaned at the pain in his leg. “Well, that works for me,” he said. “I just want to get the hell out of here.”

  “I’m taking the exit ramp,” said Karen.

  A couple of minutes later they rolled into the parking lot at the strip mall. Karen parked the motorhome between two large trucks and shut off the engine. “Okay,” she said, “we’re here. What now?”

  “Let’s take a walk,” said Ben. He had switched his short blond wig back to his long hair and beard disguise. He handed Karen a pair of sunglasses. “Put these on,” he said. “We’re going to take a walk down to that used RV place and have a look around.”

  “Don’t you think it’s risky to buy another motorhome, Ben?” said Ray from the back. “They’re going to be checking every one they see.”

  “We’re not going for another motorhome. I think maybe a camper and pickup truck will do us just fine. I saw a couple of them in the lot when we drove past. And where we’re going we won’t be the only ones driving a camper.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “Today is Friday and the start of Labor Day weekend. We’re going to take 299 over to Highway 96 and just wander over the mountains to Yreka,” he said. “We can catch Interstate 5 north over there and the next thing you know we’ll be in Seattle.”

  Ray pulled out his forty-five automatic and laid it on the bed. “Just hurry it up over at that car lot,” he said.

  “We’ll be back as quick as we can.” Ben peeled off the paper band from around one of the cash bundles and stuck the bills into his pocket. “Ten grand should do it,” he said. “All right, Karen. Let’s go.”

  Sergeant Ackerman walked into the ready room at the Eureka CHP office and slammed his clipboard on the desk near the front of the room. “Wake up!” he said. “Listen up!”

  The officers sitting in the room suddenly snapped to attention.

  “We just put out an APB on a white Toyota motorhome. That’s what our cop-killers are driving now,” Ackerman said. “Apparently, they did a home invasion just up the hill from where the Elk River Road shootout took place. Those sons-of-bitches were watching us from a goddamn picture window the whole fucking time!” He passed
a hand over his eyes and steadied himself. “For the record, I want these crazy assholes either dead or in custody by the end of the day. The F.B.I. just put Ben Cummings and the Morris couple on their top ten list, and they’re sending up another fifty agents from San Francisco to assist in the manhunt. Road blocks are already in place along Highway 101 in both directions, as well as most of the arterials.” Ackerman shook his head. “I know everyone’s tired,” he said, “but these people...these people...they’ve already killed three good men and another one is seriously wounded.”

  “Sergeant?” someone asked from the back.

  “What is it?”

  “Everyone’s been talking about the weapons they’re packing. Automatic rifles and grenades? LAWS rockets? There isn’t anyone in this room who wouldn’t enjoy taking these guys down, but we need more than shotguns and pistols.”

  Ackerman nodded. “I know. We’re going to issue everyone assault rifles for the duration. If we run short, we can borrow more from the S.W.A.T. team. If we run out of those, I’ll get more from the National Guard, even if I have to steal them like that fucking Ben Cummings did.”

  “That’s good, sir. We’re going to need them.”

  A young woman in a police uniform opened the door and stuck her head inside. “Sergeant Ackerman? Eureka P.D.’s got that suspect vehicle surrounded in a parking lot on the north end of Arcata. The motorhome.”

  “Are they sure it’s the right one?” said Ackerman.

  “Plate matches the one reported stolen in the home invasion.”

  The room emptied in seconds as every officer rushed to their patrol cars.

  “Pick up your rifles from the arms room before you head out!” Ackerman shouted after them.

  Ben drove at a steady sixty miles an hour north on Highway 101. He kept his eyes focused on the road ahead. He knew the police were probably setting up roadblocks and checkpoints from the Oregon border down to somewhere south of Eureka. He hoped the disguises he and Karen had worn when they picked up the camper and truck would be enough to fool the police if they came sniffing around that car lot. He knew the cops would undoubtedly check every dealership in Arcata once they found the Toyota motorhome. He had used a phony ID to buy what they were driving now, a Chevy pickup and camper, and he hoped the cops wouldn’t figure that one out, either. At least not for a few days, he thought. By that time, we’ll ditch this camper rig and pick up something else.