Going Twice

by Sharon Sala

  * * *

  Hershel spent the afternoon in a little park far away from his motel, sitting on a bench under a shade tree with a book in his lap and a sack of roasted unshelled peanuts beside him. Over time he’d gathered quite an audience of birds and squirrels, all vying for some of the treats. He shelled a nut for himself and ate it while shelling more for the birds, then threw still more nuts, shell and all, for the squirrels. He watched them fighting over the goodies as if their lives depended on it, even making side bets with himself as to which ones would win.

  But he was beginning to get anxious again. He could almost feel the rain in the air, although the impending thunderstorm was still several hours away. The large white puffy clouds made shadows on the ground as they passed overhead, and every time he felt one move between him and the sun, he shuddered. It reminded him of when he and Louise had been trapped on the roof after the rains had gone. The sun had come out, turning on the heat in the already flooded city and turned the floodwaters into a kind of witches’ brew of floating debris, dead animals and human bodies. The news choppers periodically flew over, filming aerial shots of the massive destruction. He and Louise had waved at them, beseeching them for help, and begged the already filled up boats that passed to stop for them, as well. “We’ll be back,” they all said, but no one came until it was too late.

  When the wind began to change, Hershel stood up, emptied the peanuts onto the ground and headed for his van. He couldn’t sit there any longer with the memories. He had to move.

  It was nearing six o’clock in the evening when he finally got back to his motel. He had a sack of barbecue baby back ribs and French fries for his dinner, and a liter of root beer. Tonight was a night for hunting, and he didn’t need anything alcoholic blurring his senses.

  He ate in front of the television, using a washcloth for a napkin, and when it became too messy, he just got up and washed it out and used it again. The local newscast replayed a clip from the FBI’s last news conference, and then the rest was once again all about the hooker he’d killed and not him. They were showing clips of where Janet Good had lived with her family, and what she’d looked like. A pretty young woman with three kids and a husband, but in those old pictures the smile on her face never reached her eyes. He thought back to what she’d looked like when he shot the Taser in her face. She’d lit up then, all right, but from fear, not joy.

  It pissed him off that they had only mentioned him once, and he decided if the thunderstorm and rain were severe enough, and lasted long enough tonight, he would make a statement with his victims that would not be overlooked.

  Finally he finished his meal, gathered up all the scraps and went outside and tossed them in the Dumpster. Back in his room he washed his face and hands a couple of times to get rid of the barbecue smell and the grease, then eyed the ugly stitches in his face. For two cents he would take them out right now and be done with it, but he got distracted as he went in search of the phone he’d bought earlier. It was time to start calling the number Roger Taliaferro had given him and hope that old Connie picked up.

  * * *

  Conrad Taliaferro would have made a good survivalist, if that kind of thing had been popular in his youth. He hated the “establishment,” disregarded laws he thought unjust and had nothing to do with two-faced people. Most of his family fell into that last category quite nicely.

  After he’d defeated his loving family’s attempt to have him committed indefinitely and get control of his money, they’d all made nice and made up. But they weren’t fooling him. He knew they would do it all over again if they thought they could get away with it.

  But, since he’d been born into this most disagreeable world, he had learned early on to use it against the people who ran it and made himself rich in the process.

  He was a brilliant investor, an inventor of many things electronic, and the entire second floor of his home was devoted to computers and everything that went with them. He had every high-tech gadget on the market and knew how to use them, and for several years, unbeknownst to anyone but his employers, he had been writing programs for computer-controlled weapons belonging to the United States Army. He also developed, copyrighted and distributed high-tech computer games. His family had no idea how much money he’d made on those alone, and he had no intention of telling them.

  So when his phone began to ring and he saw it was his son, Roger, he almost didn’t answer. However, they hadn’t talked in nearly six months, and getting a call out of the blue made him answer, thinking maybe someone in the family had died. If they had, he hoped it was his nephew Wayne, the one who’d come up with the concept of “having Uncle Conrad put away.”

  “Hello.”

  “Dad! Hi, it’s me, Roger.”

  “You are my only child, therefore the only person on the face of the earth who would call me Dad, and I also recognize your voice, so the remainder of your greeting was entirely unnecessary.”

  “Yes, well…beyond the usual put-down, I needed to tell you something. A man called me earlier today. Said his name was Junior Wardley, and that you’d been in Stately Hill together. Said he was coming through here in a few days and wanted to visit with you. He wanted your phone number. I knew you two must have known each other at some time, since he asked me if you’d gone to Florida after you left Stately Hill, because that’s where you’d told him you were going. Oh…he also called you Connie. No one calls you Connie, but I thought it might ring a bell with you.”

  Conrad’s interest had been caught the moment Roger said Stately Hill. He’d only made friends with one man in that place, and that man was now high on the FBI’s Most Wanted list—and his name wasn’t Junior Wardley.

  “So did you give him my number or not?” Conrad asked.

  Roger cleared his throat. “Well, yes, I did, but I also told him that you might not answer, so if you see an unknown number pop up on your caller ID, it’s most likely him and you don’t have to answer.”

  “Does the fact that I have an unlisted number mean anything to you?” Conrad asked.

  Roger cleared his throat again. “That’s why I’m calling you now. If you don’t want to talk, don’t fucking answer the phone. Nice talking to you, Father. We must do lunch sometime.”

  The click in Conrad’s ear was abrupt, but he had gotten the message. Roger had done something stupid by handing out his father’s unlisted phone number and wanted to be absolved. Conrad snorted as he hung up the phone. If Roger wanted absolution, he could go to a priest.

  But it had aroused Conrad’s interest in a way nothing had in years. He had liked Hershel Inman and felt sorry for the man, even empathized with him in a way he’d never empathized with anyone before. And the man had a hatred for the establishment that went far beyond the disgust Conrad bore. If Junior Wardley was Hershel Inman, he wasn’t frightened at all. Despite Hershel’s violent method of righting the wrongs he’d suffered, he and Hershel were kindred spirits, and he couldn’t wait to find out what the man wanted.

  * * *

  Hershel sat down at the little table in his room with his throwaway phone and the list he’d made, which consisted of the goal he hoped to achieve, his bank account number, the tracking number of the account and the phone number of the bank. He didn’t know if Connie would get hostile, berate him for what he’d become and hang up, or even threaten to tell the police that he had called. But there was an outside chance he might be interested enough in sticking it to the establishment to help Hershel see this through.

  He glanced at the time. Close to 7:00 p.m. They were in the same time zone, so he hoped this wasn’t too early to make the call. He punched in the number, and when it began to ring, his heart skipped a beat. Moments later he heard the well-remembered sarcastic rasp of Connie Taliaferro’s voice.

  “Is that you, Hershel?”

  Hershel gasped. “What the fuck, Connie? Have you turned into a
psychic on me?”

  Conrad laughed, then choked and coughed, because it had been so long since he’d laughed that it took his breath away.

  “No. My son, Roger, had the good sense to give me a heads-up call to warn me that he’d given out my unlisted number to a total stranger. I never knew any Junior Wardley at Stately Hill, but there was only one person there who called me Connie. Needless to say, you have been busy since we last met. What the hell’s going on with you? Have you lost your ever-loving mind?”

  Hershel frowned. “Probably. Louise says I’m crazy.”

  Conrad was silent for a moment. “Uh, isn’t Louise your deceased wife?”

  “Yes, but she won’t stay dead. She’s on my ass every day for something or other.”

  Conrad sighed. So now he got part of Hershel’s problem. The man was not only still mad at the establishment but also slowly losing his mind.

  “Sorry to hear that,” Conrad said. “So, since it’s hardly possible for us to go to dinner together, why the call?”

  “I need a favor, and you’re the only person I know who could make it happen.”

  Conrad’s conscience told him to hang up the phone, but his anti-establishment self was curious. “What is it?” he asked.

  “I’m fairly certain the government has flagged my bank account back in New Orleans, and I can’t get to my money, the money I earned, my pensions and my Social Security, not to mention the insurance money on my house that washed away. I can’t get even one cent of it without giving myself away. When I die someday, all that money I earned and paid taxes on will go right back in the government’s pocket. Is there a way I can get it transferred somewhere without anyone knowing it happened? I’m not asking you to participate in what I’m doing, just to tell me what to do. I just want what’s mine.”

  For Conrad, it was the “going back into the government’s pocket” that turned the tide.

  “What made you think I would be willing to aid and abet one of the FBI’s Most Wanted?”

  Hershel’s voice was shaking. “I was remembering all those nights in Stately Hill when we were in straitjackets and doped out of our ever-lovin’ minds.”

  Conrad shuddered, and then took a deep breath. “I’m going to need specific information.”

  “What will it cost me?” Hershel asked.

  Conrad thought of the millions and millions of dollars he had stashed in the Cayman Islands.

  “Nothing. Just consider it a gift from one old friend to another, and then don’t ever call me again.”

  “Deal.”

  Thirteen

  Hershel’s elation was at an all-time high. He didn’t know how Connie had made it happen, but as of thirty minutes ago, he was almost a half-million dollars to the good.

  It began to rain about an hour after sunset. First just a little shower, like a heads-up notice of what was coming, but it was enough to get him on the move. He had already scouted out the places that would most likely flood, and had his rifle and ammo between the seats of his van. He’d put away the Taser. No more close-up kills or hauling bodies back to the tornado site, because they would be watching for him now, and besides, he’d already planted that field.

  Since the brown mullet wig had been rained on before, it seemed like a good choice to go with it again. He got ready inside, then put a knee-length hooded poncho over his clothes and made a run for the van. As he backed up, he paused in the parking lot, gauging which way he should go, then drove south. The glow from the streetlights highlighted the swiftly growing deluge as he moved through the city streets. Soon water was running fast along the curbs and into the sewers, sweeping trash and debris along with it. A stray dog ran out of an alley and in front of his van with its tail tucked between its legs, looking for a place of refuge. Hershel frowned. No one should be allowed to have a dog if they weren’t going to take care of it.

  You’re a fine one to start being critical, Hershel Inman, when you’re out looking for someone to kill.

  “Hello, Louise. I figured you’d show up today. It’s our anniversary. We’ve been married forty-seven years today.”

  What did you get me for our anniversary, Hershel? Oh. Let me guess. A dead body. Is it a man or a woman this time? Never mind. I don’t want it. You need to take it back…back…back…

  “Louise! Can you hear yourself? What’s with this echo business?”

  He waited for an answer, but as usual when he had a question, she disappeared.

  The rain was coming down so hard now that he could barely see to drive, and he pulled over to the curb to get his bearings. When a flash of lightning snaked across the sky, it lit up the surrounding area enough for him to see the river. He could also see that the street leading in front of him was already flooded. The streetlights highlighted the swiftly moving water where the streets used to be, but most of the houses were dark, already abandoned in the face of the rising flood. Only a few had lights on inside, and he didn’t know if that meant the residents had left the lights on when they left or if some people had refused to evacuate.

  He drove as far as he dared, and then parked against a curb to watch the houses on the off chance that someone might step outside. If any laggards were still at home, eventually they would have to come out, because the swiftly rising water was lapping at their steps and would soon be running beneath their doors.

  He turned off the engine and sat in the dark. As he waited, he calmly loaded his rifle, then attached the night-vision scope.

  Thunder rattled the windows. The occasional lightning strike lit up his view. And the rain kept coming down.

  It was almost an hour before he saw a door open in one of the brightly lit houses. He watched intently through the downpour as someone stepped out onto the porch. His heart started pounding as he moved to the back of the van and slid the side door open. Without ever getting out, he put the rifle to his shoulder, located his mark through the night-vision scope and without hesitation pulled the trigger. The sound of the gunshot was less than a pop in the downpour as the man dropped where he stood.

  Hershel waited. Moments later a younger man came out. Hershel saw the man’s mouth open as if to scream, and pulled the trigger again. The second body went down as quickly as the first.

  And still he waited. When the third person came out, he could see it was an older woman, holding a child by the hand. He took aim at the woman and, even as she was screaming, put a bullet in her mouth. The child disappeared, and Hershel didn’t care whether it was in the water or in the house.

  Still riding an adrenaline high, he pulled the side door shut, rolled the rifle up in a blanket, shoved it beneath the seat and drove away. He left the flooded streets and drove all the way through the city out to the far west side of St. Louis. It was past time to let Agent Benton know he was still on the job. He got the phone out of the glove box and turned it on, noted it was low on power and kept his text brief.

  This isn’t about killing a prostitute. It’s about a good woman who died because of people like you, but no one seems to remember why this is happening.

  By the time he turned off the phone, he was emotionally spent. He turned around and drove all the way back to his motel, and took the rifle inside with him. He stripped off his wet clothes and proceeded to clean the gun thoroughly, then put it back together and packed the night-vision scope inside the bag with his wigs.

  Satisfied by what he’d accomplished, he took a shower, hung his clothes up to dry and crawled into bed. The last thing he thought before he fell asleep was that the media wouldn’t be talking about Proud Mary anymore.

  * * *

  Wade was dreaming that he was standing at a curb with a toddler in his arms. They were listening to the jingle of the approaching ice cream truck when he suddenly woke to the fact that his cell phone was ringing. It was 3:00 a.m. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good.<
br />
  Jo’s phone began ringing, too. She turned on the light and sat up to answer.

  “What’s going on?” she asked as she picked up her phone.

  Wade shrugged. “Hello?”

  Jo echoed, “Hello?”

  “Sorry, guys, it’s me conference-calling to keep this brief.”

  “Tate. What’s up?” Wade asked.

  “We just got a call from Chief Sawyer. Someone killed three members of one family tonight. All three bodies were found on the porch, and there was a kid, about six years old, inside the house, hiding under a bed. He told the police that thunder did it.”

  “And they’re telling us this because…” Jo asked.

  “The M.O.’s different—all three were shot in the head from a good distance away, in the dark—but it was during the worst of the storm, on the verge of washing away.”

  “You mean their house was flooded?” Wade asked.

  “The whole neighborhood is flooded. In fact, it’s cut off from the rest of the city and they’re taking people out by boat as we speak.”

  “And why do we think it’s the Stormchaser?” Jo asked.