by Michael Kerr
Pointing the crossbow almost vertically up at the figure, Tom loosed the arrow, for its head to pass through the rifleman’s scrotum and travel up into his bladder, slicing through tissue before lodging in his intestines.
Timing over millions of things that happen every second of every day produce an outcome that would have been different if some form of intervention had not altered the course of what would have been people’s destiny.
The spring mechanism hammered the metal firing pin into the back end of the bullet, igniting a small explosive charge in the primer. The primer then ignited the propellant, which occupied about two thirds of the bullet’s volume. The pressure of resulting gases forced the bullet down the rifle barrel.
The rifle moved a fraction before the bullet completely left the muzzle. The arrow had struck Alan in the instant that he had pulled the trigger, and the small but deadly bullet’s trajectory had been affected. The fastest bullets travel at around 1800 mph, which is about three times the speed of sound, and like a supersonic jet fighter, they make shock waves as they roar through the air.
Tom heard the noise, and knew that the shooter had taken his shot. He fitted another arrow to the crossbow and raised it to fire again.
Alan was lifted up on to his toes as a spiking and terrible pain erupted in his balls and stomach. It was beyond his ability to disregard and manage it. The rifle fell from his now limp hands as he fell sideways out of the tree, to twist slightly and slam onto a waist-thick branch that grew out from the massive trunk.
Tom watched the rifle hit the ground butt first and fall over, and then the shooter appeared, hit the branch, folding back over it; his backbone snapping, severing his spinal cord, before he slithered off it and lay moaning on a thin carpet of mulch, knowing that his injuries were catastrophic and would almost certainly prove fatal.
Tom stood over the man. Looked down and was satisfied that he no longer presented a threat. Blood was running from the side of his mouth, and a thin red liquid ribbon of it was leaking from his left ear. Tom got no pleasure from what had transpired. Nor did he feel any empathy for the shooter. The big rifle was scoped, and the shot had been fired. He was positive that Logan would be dead. It would now be up to him alone to save the little girl.
As he made to walk away, a hand shot out and fingers encircled his right ankle.
Alan had felt his back break. And seeing the crossbow in the man’s hand was enough to know that the pain in his guts was from an arrow that had been fired up at him. He was going to die, but didn’t want to lie in the dirt and suffer for an unknown period of time. Grabbing hold of the man’s ankle he whispered, “Finish it, please.”
Tom raised the heavy crossbow one-handed and placed the tip of the broadhead arrow against the crippled, dying man’s temple and triggered it.
Alan felt an explosion in his skull, but it only lasted for an instant. Death was the most powerful painkiller in the world. It negated all physical and mental discomfort and further suffering.
Drawing his handgun, Tom followed the link fence back to the open gates. His mind was full of jumbled thoughts. A memory of his father came back to haunt him: Ralph Cody had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and gone down hill quickly. By the time his weight had dipped below ninety pounds he was bedridden and just waiting for the end. There is probably nothing more dismal than watching the decline of someone that you love as they are trapped in the process of dying. Like the man he had just killed, Tom’s dad had asked him to finish it; said that he’d had enough and that had he been a dog, then the local vet would have given him the needle. But Tom had not been able to do it. Mercy killing for humans was still illegal. The law in its wisdom seemed to want people to go out hard and slow. He and Gail had tended to his father, relieved, when he had slipped into a coma three days before he died.
Tom kept low and jogged to the rear of the Mercedes. As far as he knew, Nick and Karen Cady, Jade, and the little girl, Kelly, would soon return to the car. And when they did he would shoot the gangster dead and be done with it.
Logan saw the muzzle flash. It appeared from the trees over three hundred yards away. There was no time to move. No time to even think. No time to react. The large caliber bullet struck as his brain formed the thought that this was it, and that he was about to become a part of history.
The turbulence the bullet made as it ripped through the humid air caused a thunderous sound as it missed Logan’s head by less than an inch. The hard-tipped slug cut through a timber support and carried on, out into the wetlands behind the tower.
Karen ran across to where Kelly was now sitting on the floor; her little body shaking, shoulders heaving as she cried. On her knees in front of her, Karen embraced her gently and told her that she was safe now and would soon be back with her mommy.
Nick took his chance and got up and ran for the stairs, to leap down them three at a time. He almost made it to the first landing when a tread gave way beneath his right foot with a loud crack and he fell through the gap, catching his chin on the next step as he fell to the ground. He was too intent on escaping from Logan to feel the pain in his bottom jaw, and ignored the fact that his ankle twisted and was sprained as he hit the ground. Up and running, he headed in the wrong direction, weaving across the open space and up the rise that led up to the rim, expecting a bullet to hit him in the back as he threw himself over the top. There was no sign of the Merc. He was disoriented, so just headed for the nearest trees, hunched over and limping as his brain demanded that he acknowledge the pain in his ankle and jaw.
Logan could have taken a shot. He kept low, expecting another bullet to be incoming, and watched as Cady ran away from the tower. Holding the Glock two-handed he aimed through the now large gap in the rails that Jade had unwittingly made before falling to her death. He wanted to pull the trigger, but held off. Cady deserved to die, but Logan didn’t want to shoot an unarmed man in the back, especially in front of his daughter. There was something in his psyche that stopped him. And where could Cady go? He was heading in a direction that led to swamps and lagoons, not the highway.
Tom waited a couple of minutes and then jogged forward from the car, keeping low as the tower came into view. He stretched out on the ground and saw a figure ‒ that he thought to be Cady ‒ running north, to what was little more than wilderness. And he could see figures up in the top of the tower, and one looked too big to be anyone but Logan. He grinned. The sensation of being on his own with unknown problems to solve, evaporated. Standing up, he strolled down to the base of the tower. There was a jacket folded on top of a wide wooden rail, and on top of it was a semiautomatic pistol.
Logan took Kelly from Karen and made his way carefully down the stairs. Karen followed on. She was in a bad place. Her life had been radically altered by the events that had taken place since Logan had walked into her office. But she thought of what Logan had said to her. He was right, she was not in any way responsible for what her father was. Did her mother know? Had she been happy to live the good life off the criminal activities of her husband, insensitive to what he did and condoning it by enjoying the wages derived from the sins he committed?
“I thought you were dead,” Tom said to Logan. “A guy in a tree took a potshot at you with a scoped rifle at the same time that I nailed him with an arrow.”
“You must have hit him as he fired and spoiled his aim,” Logan said. “What about the other one?”
“Taken care of. Do we leave them where they are?”
“No, we’ll bury them. And the woman is dead. She’s at the other side of the tower. Took a header from the top.”
Logan set Kelly down on the ground, picked up the gun and then checked Cady’s jacket. Nothing. He probably kept his wallet in a hip pocket of his pants.
“Take the gun,” Logan said to Karen. “I want you and Kelly to stay in the car until we’ve done what we have to.”
“I don’t want a gun,” Karen said. “Whatever my father has done, I’m not going to shoot him if he comes back
.”
As Karen climbed into the passenger seat of the Merc, Logan and Tom went back to collect Jade’s body, to carry it into the trees. They used fallen branches to dig a long, shallow grave in the soft ground, and laid Jade and the two men that Tom had killed in it, after searching them, and filled it in and dragged a large, rotting tree trunk over the disturbed area. There was no reason why the bodies should be discovered any time soon. It was in no ones interest for anyone involved to report the incident that had taken place in this out-of-the-way spot. Certainly not Cady, who was now hopefully up to his waist in a gator hole, of which there were many in the sawgrass marshes. Logan thought that being devoured alive by a large alligator would be a fitting end for the gangster.
Cady was hunkered down in the trees, looking across to where he could see his car. He had watched Karen get into it with the child. Logan and his accomplice had gone back to the far side of the tower and carried Jade’s body out, to take it through the gates and into the wood behind the fence. He was tempted to run out across the large expanse of long grass and drive the car away, but didn’t because Logan could’ve taken the keys, or return while he was out in the open. It was too risky. He waited and watched. Eventually the two men returned to the car, got in and drove off.
Following the tree line until he reached the gates, Nick jogged along the track, keeping to the side. When he reached the road he expected to find the SUV that Larry and Alan had driven here in. There was no sign of it. Fortunately, he had slipped his cell into his right-hand pants pocket. He called Wallace (Ace) Moran, who’d been over in Miami for a couple of days negotiating a deal for coke with Columbians who were getting greedy and pushing the price up to an unacceptable level. Ace had been instructed to renegotiate or seek out a new supplier.
“Hi, Nick, I just got back an hour ago,” Ace said. “Where are you, at home?”
“No, I’m somewhere north of Everglades City, near a one-horse town called Copeland.” Nick said. “I’m on foot and need picking up.”
“What happened?” Ace asked.
Nick gave him the long story short: just the pertinent details of what Logan had done, and which road Ace should take out of Copeland to the signs on the leaning post.
“I’m on my way,” Ace said. “Do you know what this Logan character is driving?”
“He took my Merc, but they obviously had another vehicle. And he has my daughter with him. I don’t want her put at risk.”
“We’ll come in two vehicles,” Ace said. “If we spot him, I’ll have him tailed.”
“Make it quick,” Nick said. “The fucking mosquitoes out here are eating me alive.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
THEY stopped halfway along the track. Tom got out and went to get the Pathfinder, to reverse it back out from where he’d hidden it.
Logan followed Tom half a mile further along the back road. Stopped the Merc and told Karen to step out of it with Kelly. He then drove it into the forest, not in the least concerned as he scraped the bodywork against trees. When he was satisfied that it was out of sight he wiped it to remove any prints and walked back to the Pathfinder.
“What about the Explorer?” Tom said.
“Drive back to it and we’ll hide that as well,” Logan said.
Twenty minutes later they were back in Copeland. Logan pulled in a slot outside a general store, gave Karen a few bills and asked her to go in and purchase some new clothes for Kelly. Said that he and Tom would be in the small coffee shop next door.
“We got the girl back,” Tom said as they sat on stools at a window-facing counter that gave them a clear view of Main Street. “Now what?”
“We return the Pathfinder to your neighbor, Merle. Then we go to your place, and I’ll take Karen to Sanibel in the pickup. Why don’t you call Gail and tell her that Kelly is safe, and that she and Debbie can head back to the store.”
“How will Debbie be able to explain what happened from the time when all this kicked off at her mother’s house?”
“She can tell the police the truth, up until when I came on the scene. I’ll ask her to say that the guy that saved her was stocky with long black hair and a scar on his left cheek. And that he dumped her in a motel and told her to sit tight. Next thing she knew, he came back with Kelly, drove them both to your place and dropped them off. All you and Gail know is what she told you.”
“What about the guy in the barn?”
“He’s more scared of Cady than of us or the police. All he’ll want to do is vanish. I’ll drop him off near a hospital in Fort Myers. What he does after that is his problem.”
Tom frowned, took swig of his coffee and said. “What are you going to do?”
“Finish it,” Logan said. “Cady’s smart. He may well find his way back to a highway and make contact with someone in his outfit. He’ll probably be back in Fort Myers before me.”
“Are you planning on killing him?”
Logan hiked his broad shoulders. “I guess so. Walking away isn’t an option. It would bother me to think that he was still in business. I like full closure. When it’s done I’ll call the police and tell them about what really goes down at Cady’s transport company.”
“I’ll come with you. You need―”
“Thanks, but no thanks, Tom. You’ve done more than enough. Just look after Debbie and Kelly till they can go back home. Debbie’s mother’s body will no doubt be still lying on the floor. It’ll be a crime scene for a while.”
Tom could tell that Logan would not back down and change his mind. He wanted to tie up the loose ends on his own and in his own way. With any luck Cady had panicked and would become lost and die in the ‘glades. That would be a fitting end for him to endure.
Karen and Kelly entered the coffee shop a few minutes later. Karen was carrying a large brown paper sack by its folded over top in her left hand, and was holding Kelly’s hand in her right. She put the sack down on a stool.
“Coffee?” Logan said to Karen.
“Please.”
Logan hunkered down, smiled at the little girl and said, “Would you like a soda, Kelly?”
“Yes, please,” she said. “Where’s my Mommy?”
“We’re going to meet her as soon as we’ve had our drinks,” Logan said.
Tom phoned Gail. Told her that they’d got Kelly back unharmed, and that they would be at the store in two to three hours, and that she and Debbie could head back home.
“Put Kelly on the phone,” Gail said, then passed her cell to Debbie.
“Kelly…Sweetheart, are you okay?” Debbie said.
“Yes, Mommy. I’ve got some new clothes, and I’m going to have a soda.”
Debbie burst into tears. The sense of relief made her so weak in the legs that she had to sit down on the bed in the motel room.
“Why are you crying, Mommy?” Kelly said.
“Because I’ve missed you so much.”
“I’ve missed you, too. Can we have pizza for tea?”
“Of course we can. See you soon, baby.”
Not long after, Tom was behind the Pathfinder’s steering wheel, driving north, and was as unaware as Ace Moran when they passed each other under an hour later.
Gail and Debbie had left the Silver Sands Motel a few minutes after receiving the call from Tom. Debbie was on tenterhooks. A part of her had thought that she would never see Kelly again; never know what had become of her. Never be able to share so many experiences with her as she grew up to be a teenager and then an adult. The thought of that had been almost too much to bear. It was incomprehensible to attempt to imagine how parents that lost children could somehow find a way to absorb the loss and get past it. The pain of it was too overwhelming to incorporate. If Kelly was not being returned to her, then life would no longer have any meaning.
Gail stopped at a diner halfway back to Alva. There was no rush. They had a meal and started to relax. Tom, Logan and Kelly were safe. The ordeal was over.
Or was it?
Boo Mercer dozed fitfully.
The deep, nagging pain in his leg did not abate, just pounded rhythmically in sync with his heartbeat, but he had no choice but to somehow find a way to accommodate it. The light had faded; darkness fell and seemed to last forever. There were sounds of nocturnal life, not only from outside the barn, but within it. He heard scurrying feet, squeaking and squealing, and was convinced that what he decided were rats would seek him out in the bed of the old pickup and tear him to pieces. Fear and pain were a dreadful combination. It was by far the worst night of his life.
Dawn arrived, and Boo twisted his head to the right and drank some of the tepid water from the bowl. He felt marginally better and needed to do something. The two men might have thought it over and decided to kill him, if and when they returned. He edged backward, using his uninjured right leg to propel him, moaning as the movement caused his broken left leg to explode with renewed bolts of pain. He thought that he may pass out, but didn’t. He managed to rise into a sitting position with his back against the rear of the cab, to look round at his surroundings. There was a door facing him, no more than twelve feet away. He needed to somehow climb out of the pickup and get to it. It took another ten minutes to turn and make his way to the tailgate. He rested, and saw a flange of rusted metal projecting from where a bolt had rotted through at a join in the side.
The sweat was bubbling out of Boo’s scalp, to matt his thinning hair and run down his face, due to the pain he was suffering, not the heat. It was still cool in the stale air of the large barn. And yet he grinned as he turned and shunted backwards, to raise his bound wrists behind him and seek out the sharp sliver of metal with his fingers, to then place his wrists over the spot and saw through the tape. It only took a few seconds. His hands came apart and he ripped the tape off and rubbed his wrists to get full circulation back into them. A minute later he had pulled the pins that were fixed to chains to secure the tailgate in an upright position, to push it with his hands to knock it back and down with a loud thump of metal on metal.
