Stillborn Armadillos (John Lee Quarrels Book 1)

by Nick Russell

  "Maybe so. Like I said, crazy people do all sort of things."

  "Is that going to be your defense, Troy?"

  "What the hell you talking about, John Lee?"

  "Is that going to be your defense? Are you going to plead insanity? I imagine with your family's money you could find a high dollar lawyer that might get you off that way. Sure, you'd spend some time in one of those fancy treatment facilities, where you could play tennis all day long or something, but that's better than getting the death penalty."

  "This conversation is over."

  "Like I said, that picture was familiar to me. But I figured whoever that guy was on the horse, he was probably dead a long time ago. Then when I saw that picture of the four of us up on the screen at Mister Donald's funeral, those eyes and that nose and forehead. Your grandpa would've been nineteen or so back then. The family resemblance is amazing, isn't it? You were the spitting image of him when he was a young man."

  "Okay, I'm out of here. If you've got anything else to say to me, you can talk to my attorney."

  "I remember that .308 rifle," John Lee said. "What was it, between our sophomore and junior year, when your dad bought it for you when he took you to Montana to go deer hunting? You came back with that big old ten point buck. Your old man's still got it hanging in his den. What did you say it went field dressed? Three hundred pounds or something like that?"

  Troy didn't respond.

  "You always were a hell of a shot. I remember when we were kids plinking with .22s, you were the best shot of any of us, even with open sights. I imagine with the scope it wasn't hard at all, was it?"

  "John Lee, you're crazy."

  "No, we've already had that conversation. You're the one who's going to plead insanity. Otherwise they're going to take you to Raiford and stick a needle in your arm."

  "Are we done here? I already told you, if you want to say anything else to me..."

  "I don't think you meant to kill Ray Ray. You're too good a shot for that. The way he was twisted in the seat, those folks from the state think he turned to look in the back for something just as you pulled the trigger. There was no way you could have prevented that. Well, except for not shooting in the first place. No, I think the first time, out there at the construction site, you were just reacting without thinking. You heard about those bones and you remembered how your grandpa used to talk about the war and how much he loved killing the Japs. When we were kids, that was exciting. I also remember him talking about riding hard on the niggers. Back then I thought he meant making the black folks at the company work hard. But I was wrong, wasn't I, Troy? No, he was one of the camp captains. And he liked it. He liked having that kind of power. Maybe he couldn't kill Japs anymore, but who was going to miss a stray nigger now and then?"

  "Don't talk about my grandfather that way, John Lee. You don't know what the hell you're talkin' about. That man was a hero! He fought his way halfway across the Pacific."

  "No, he didn't," John Lee said. "He went in right at the tail end of the war, and when I was able to pull his records from back then from the Department of the Army, they said he never saw any combat. He spent his time guarding prisoners in the Philippines long after the shooting was done there. But I think he got a taste of it then. Who knows? Maybe one of them tried to escape and he shot him? Or maybe he just shot a couple of them because he wanted to. I figure Japs were just another kind of nigger to him. Who cared if he killed one now and then? But apparently somebody did care. He got a General Discharge. That's what they give you when you're unfit for service, but they can't prove you did something bad enough to court-martial you for."

  "You shut up! You shut up right now!"

  "Or what, Troy? Are you going to kill me like you did Ray Ray? Oh, that's right, that was an accident, wasn't it? But running down Mister Donald, that wasn't any accident. I showed that old man the picture on my phone, the picture of your grandfather. He said he didn't know who it was, but he knew. I blame myself for that as much as you. When your dad said your grandpa was too old to bother, I told him about the old man I talked to. A man who was a lot older than him, and still sharp as a tack. When we do talk to your grandfather, I wonder what he's going to have to say."

  "Grandpa is batshit crazy. He could say anything, that doesn't make it real!"

  "So anyway, here's the way I see it. You heard about those skeletons we found, and either your grandpa told you about killing them men or you'd figured it out before, I don't know. But the way that old man used to talk, I think you knew. That's why he was out there when they were widening the road so long ago. He thought the road crew back then was going to dig them up, but they didn't. But over time the road expanded. Hell, they even started calling it a highway. Then they went and widened it again and uncovered your family's dirty little secret. Did you think firing a couple shots our way was going to make us forget the whole thing? Then when you realized how stupid you'd been, that's when you shot at Greg Carson's car, and then at Ray Ray. You were thinking that would throw us off the trail and we wouldn't connect the two things, right? Who cares about some guys that got themselves killed a lifetime ago when somebody's shooting at deputies today? And as terrible as Ray Ray getting killed was, it totally took the focus off those skeletons, didn't it?"

  "I'll say this for you, John Lee, you're wasting your time being a cop. You ought to get yourself a typewriter and start writing detective stories, because you've got one hell of an imagination!" Troy walked back to the driver's door of his Mercedes and opened it. "Now like I said, and I'm telling you for the last time, anything else you want to say, you say to my attorney."

  "I hope you hire yourself a good one," John Lee said. "And I wouldn't wait too long to call him. Because I've got everything I need to convict you and I'm taking it back to D.W. right now. I guess maybe that grandfather of yours is too old to prosecute, but I really hope the stress gives the old bastard a heart attack so he can burn in hell."

  "Don't do this, John Lee."

  "I'm just doing my job."

  "I can make it worth your while. How much? Name your price."

  "You might be able to afford to buy fancy cars and boats and even women like Jolene Thompson. But you'll never have enough money to buy me, Troy."

  "We're friends."

  "I don't have friends who are murderers."

  "Please, John Lee, I'm begging you. I never meant to kill Ray Ray. It was just like you said. He moved at the last minute just as I was squeezing the trigger. And Mister Donald? Come on, he was like a hundred years old. It's not like he had long left in this world anyhow, and who's going to miss an old nigger anyway?"

  "Come on back here so I can put handcuffs on you, Troy."

  "That's not going to happen. Not today, and not ever."

  "You're under arrest for the murder of..."

  The gun had been in the door pocket of the Mercedes, a .40 Smith & Wesson semi-automatic. John Lee saw it in Troy's hand as he turned back to him and was already diving sideways when the first shot rang out, the bullet passing so close by that he felt the hot buzz from it on his face.

  John Lee rolled behind the back of the Mercedes and pulled his Browning from its holster.

  "Drop the gun, Troy."

  "I'll see you in hell before I do that!"

  John Lee rose up and scooted to the passenger side of the car as Troy came around the back end, pistol at the ready.

  "Drop it!"

  But Troy didn't drop it. Instead he pointed his gun at John Lee. The deputy felt the Browning's recoil as he fired three quick rounds. The first one hit Troy in the chest and staggered his old friend backward, but he managed to raise his pistol again. The second and third shots hit within three inches of the first, the jacketed hollow point bullets shredding muscle and tissue on their deadly path. Troy's gun dropped from his limp fingers and he fell backward onto the hood of John Lee's Charger, then slid to the ground.

  The distance between them had only been ten feet at the most, but it felt like a mile as
John Lee cautiously approached, ready to shoot again if necessary. One look told him he didn't need to do that. He slid the safety up on the Browning to engage it and holstered his weapon. He stepped over Troy's body to get to his radio and called the dispatcher.

  "This is County 16, officer involved shooting on Washington Road two miles east of town. Suspect down."

  "10-4, County 16, units responding. Are you okay, John Lee?"

  He wanted to tell Sheila that he wasn't okay, that he didn't know if he would ever be okay again. But all he said was, "Suspect is down. I'm not hurt."

  Epilogue

  John Lee was put on two weeks paid administrative leave while the Florida Department of Law Enforcement conducted the investigation into the fatal shooting of Richard Troy Somerton. There was some question about why he had chosen to confront Troy Somerton alongside a road instead bringing him to the Sheriff's Department or at his office, but nobody questioned his explanation that he wanted to save his old friend from embarrassment in the event that John Lee was wrong in his accusations. After all, everyone in the county was accustomed to handling the rich and powerful Somertons with kid gloves. But the video and audio from John Lee's dash camera and body cam made it obvious that the deputy had no choice, and had only resorted to deadly force when the murder suspect refused to surrender and had attacked him with a handgun. When investigators executed a search warrant at the dead man's home and found the scoped Remington Mohawk .308 bolt action rifle used in the shootings, there was no question about Troy's guilt. John Lee was cleared of any wrongdoing in the case and allowed to go back to work.

  He delayed his return to uniform by one day so he could attend the joint funeral of the three men whose remains had been discovered on Turpentine Highway. Shania Jones, wearing a conservative black dress and heels, attended the funeral. John Lee liked the way she looked in it. Not many women in Somerton County wore dresses any more, except to church and funerals. She told him she was sorry that they had not been able to recover enough DNA to identify the murder victims. "It's just been too long. Time and weather and the elements destroyed anything we might have been able to find."

  "That's okay, I know you tried," he told her. "That's all any of us can do."

  There were only a half dozen or so people at the funeral and they had all left except for the two of them, lingering to watch the common grave being filled back in.

  "If it's any consolation to you, I hear the old man is bragging about how he and his posse chased them down and taught them a lesson. That should be enough to get a conviction, shouldn't it?"

  "I wish it was," John Lee told her. "But he's also telling people about how he was riding on the same tank with General Patton when he rolled into the concentration camp at Auschwitz, and how he helped raise the flag on Iwo Jima. Swears he's one of those guys in that picture of the flag raising. Also swears he shot Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas after he assassinated John F. Kennedy."

  "So he's not competent to stand trial?"

  "At his age, what good would it do?"

  "What about the lady that's suing you and the county for you almost shooting her kid?"

  "It's not going to go anywhere," John Lee said. "That's the least of my worries."

  "Hey, you were exonerated for the shooting right?"

  "Yeah."

  "So except for your messed up love-life, and the fact that the Chief Deputy still wants to kick your ass, and that you've got that pretty blonde deputy friend of yours standing on the sidelines, what else do you have to worry about?"

  The cemetery workers had finished filling in the grave and were patting the dirt down with the backs of their shovels.

  "I'm worried that when I take you to dinner tonight, you're going to find some place that serves sushi."

  Turn The Page For A Sneak Peek At The Gecko In The Corner,

  The Second Book In The John Lee Quarrels Series, Coming Soon!

  Pain. A depth of pain he had never experienced before. A depth of pain he had never known existed. The beating had been terrible, but it was only the start. At some point he had passed out and his tormentors had stopped hitting and kicking him and had waved an ammonia capsule under his nose to bring him back to consciousness. Then they brought out the pruning shears.

  They didn't take off his left pinkie finger all at once. That would have been too quick. And too kind. Instead they had removed the tip, then used the same ammonia capsule to revive him while they took off another section. He had passed out a third time and once more they had brought him around, the acrid smell of the ammonia ampule doing its job, awakening him so he could experience the agony as they finished the job.

  ***

  How long had he been driving? Hours only, but it seemed like days. He wanted to stop and sleep, but he knew if he did they would find him. Not those two, they were dead. But Torres had more where they came from and he knew whoever he sent for him this time would be even more brutal.

  How much further? Could he make it before fatigue and pain and loss of blood took their toll and his abused body finally gave out like an old jalopy that had been pushed to its last mile before finally disintegrating into a heap of rusted metal and rubber and glass with it's oil and gasoline and grease spilling out onto the blacktop, just like his blood was leaking out of him? He looked at the GPS, finding it hard to focus his eyes. Three more miles. Three more miles was nothing. He could do that. He had come so far already, what was three more miles? Three more miles might as well have been the distance from the Earth to the Moon. If he could just pull over and rest for a few moments. Just close his eyes and rest.

  No! He knew if he stopped he would never move again. It was only three more miles. He could make it.

  Chapter 1

  When he first saw the gecko on the wall in the corner of his bedroom a week earlier he was going to catch it and put it outside. But it had been too fast for him. Three times he had tried to snatch it and three times it had scurried out of his reach. Frustrated, had gone into the kitchen and found a plastic flyswatter.

  "Don't kill it," Beth Ann had pleaded.

  "I'm not gonna kill it, I'm just gonna knock it out so I can throw it out."

  "Don't do that, John Lee. They're good luck."

  "No, rabbits feet are good luck. I've never heard of lizards being good luck before."

  "I bet rabbits don't think their feet are so lucky, if people are always killin' 'em so they can hang them on those little chains."

  "I never thought about that," he admitted. "Hold still, you little bastard."

  John Lee slapped at it with the flyswatter and missed. The gecko ducked behind the corner of his dresser.

  "And even if they ain't lucky, they eat bugs. Long as he's here you won't have no bugs in your house."

  "This is Florida, Beth Ann, there are always going to be bugs in the house. And so what if he eats them all? I've got a lizard in my house instead of a bug. Is that any better?"

  "Just leave him and come back to bed. I promise I'll take your mind off of it."

  "I don't like Magic watching us in bed. I damn sure don't want a lizard watching us."

  "Come on, John Lee, come back to bed."

  So he had, and Beth Ann had had been right. It only took a few minutes for him to completely forget about the gecko.

  Since then he had come to grudgingly accept the freeloading lizard. Mostly because he couldn't catch the damn thing anyway. So they seemed to have come to an agreement of sorts. As long as the gecko kept the insect population in control and minded its manners, John Lee would think of it as a living bug zapper. But the first time he found it in his bed there was going to be hell to pay.

  Magic, his 100 pound protection trained German Shepherd, had not been as quick to welcome their new roommate. But over time the dog stopped growling at the gecko, though he followed it with his eyes whenever it moved.

  John Lee was asleep when the dog growled, waking him up. But it wasn't the noise he used to signal his displeasure with the gecko. This was a l
ower, deeper growl. One of warning. One that there was trouble nearby.

  The red numbers on the digital clock on his nightstand said 3:28. He swung out of bed and walked into the darkened living room. Beside him, Magic growled again.

  "What is it, boy? Somebody out there?"

  He peered through the wood Levolor blinds. It had rained earlier and the moon and stars were hidden behind the thick clouds cover. Even so, he managed to see the dark shape of a strange vehicle in his driveway.

  Going back into his bedroom, John Lee pulled on a pair of jeans and a dark blue T-shirt and slipped his feet into tennis shoes. He went to his spare bedroom and retrieved his Bushnell Lynx night vision binoculars and returned to the front window. The car was still there, a silent trespasser.

  Kneeling down at the bottom of the window, he pushed the blinds up enough to be able to see out and trained them on the car. The green tinted image showed somebody inside, sitting behind the wheel unmoving.

  John Lee called the Somerton County Sheriff's Office and when the dispatcher answered, he said, "This is John Lee. Who's on duty tonight?"

  "Maddy and Barry."

  "Are they busy?"

  "Maddy's working a one car accident out by the EZ Rest. A couple of kids ran off the road and into a ditch. No injuries. Barry's at the Harris place. Tom caught a couple of kids siphoning gas from his pickup and was holding them at gunpoint. Did you need something John Lee?"

  "I don't know. There's a car parked in my driveway."

  "Do you want me to see how soon I can get somebody out there?"

  "No, not yet I'm going to go out and check on it, see what's up."

  The dispatcher's name was Tony Ramsey and there was concern in his voice when he said, "Don't do that, John Lee. Let me see if I can call somebody at home to give you some backup."

  "It'll be okay," John Lee assured him. "I've got my dog and he's pretty good backup. I'm taking my radio with me. If you don't hear from me in ten minutes, called out the cavalry."