Jake Hancock Private Investigator mystery series box set (Books 1-4)

by Dan Taylor

  “Thought so.”

  “Thought so what?”

  “That the video doesn’t exist.”

  “It does. Any moment now an associate of mine is going to send me a link to the video and an access code, which you’ll be able to use to see the video for yourself.”

  “I’m a patient man, so I’m going to let this play out for a couple minutes or so, then I’m going to get really pissed.”

  My phone vibrates. “Here it is now.”

  “Okay, Jake, whatever you say.”

  “Just give me a second and I’ll read the address and access code from the screen for you.”

  “Shoot.”

  I do.

  When Leo speaks next, it’s clear he’s playing it cool. “Nice touch, by the way.”

  “What?”

  “The access code.”

  I laugh like a crazed person. “Fuck you Leo!”

  “We’ll see who’s laughing when I find that the video you sent me is of some dork’s hamster running in its wheel or whatever.”

  I hang up.

  Three minutes later Leo phones back.

  “Okay, how did you do it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  The worry in his voice is full-blown now. “That’s some sort of fake, right?”

  “No, I figured you guys were going to kill her anyway, so I did it myself. Completed a turnover as well, while I was at it.”

  “Can we please fucking stop with the sports metaphor?”

  “As soon as you know I’m not fucking around. I don’t like to lose, Leo. I’ll do anything to win. I think you know that now.”

  He sounds weak. “Okay, I got it.”

  I go to speak, but I’m interrupted by Leo coughing, groaning.

  “You okay there, buddy?”

  “How can you…be so—”

  “Cool about it?”

  “Y…yeah.”

  “At this point, Leo, I’m beyond caring. I’m rub-my-own-shit-in-my-face crazy.” I give him the bat-shit crazy laugh again. “I’m a piece of dynamite left next to an open flame. I’m nitroglycerine pasted onto the ass of a five-year-old who’s enjoying his Saturday afternoon jumping on a bouncy castle.”

  He’s quiet.

  “Stay with me, Leo. Repeat what I said.”

  “You’re…you’re ready to explode.”

  “The exact wording.”

  “Something about some kid shitting dynamite as he bounces on a bouncy castle.”

  “That’s not what I said, Leo.”

  “I kind of zoned out when you said it.”

  “Okay, I’ll let you off just this once.”

  “Okay…”

  “Now it’s your turn to listen to me.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “We’re going to meet up, you’re going to hand over Randy and Mary, and you’re going to let me go. When Regan is buried, her estate dealt with, I’m going to transfer this money back to whoever the fuck wants it in Africa. I have no use for it.”

  “None of that can happen.”

  “I don’t think you quite understood me. Let me explain. You remember I met your guy Charles at Extreme Bowl?”

  “I remember.”

  “While we were chatting, some ditsy blonde feigning being a tourist came up to us, pretended to mistake me for Orlando Bloom, wanted a picture taken with me. Thing is, she wasn’t just some random chick. She was someone I arranged to be there. She used one of those phone apps that takes a picture with both the front and back camera simultaneously.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “Well, it exists. The result of that little photography session was that Charles took a picture of himself, which that ditsy blonde sent to a top computer hacker and researcher. He’s already found out everything about Charles, who he really is, and so on. It wasn’t difficult for him to take it further and find out everything about you.”

  I lied. I haven’t heard from Scottie McDougray yet.

  I wait for Leo to respond, but all I can hear is what sounds like water splashing in a pool as someone cries for help, like someone drowning.

  “Leo, are you vomiting?”

  It continues, so I pull the phone away from my ear in disgust.

  After thirty seconds or so of this, he speaks. “Jake.”

  “Still here.”

  “You don’t understand, you…stupid son of a bitch.”

  “Well make me explain, Leo.”

  He pauses. “I don’t have Randy and Mary.”

  25.

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN?”

  “I meant what I said. I don’t have Randy and Mary, you dumb fuck. And you’ve just fucked us all.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Stop saying that.”

  “Then stop speaking vaguely. You’re not making any sense.”

  “Charles isn’t my guy. It’s the other way around.”

  “You’re Charles’s guy?”

  “Hold on a second.”

  “Wait…”

  I hear a beep. Leo’s put me on hold.

  After a minute, the phone beeps again.

  “Jake, you still there?”

  “I’m here.”

  “Look at the white Datsun parked over the road to your left.”

  I look, but I don’t see it.

  “There isn’t one.”

  “Your right. I meant your right.”

  Sure enough it’s there.

  “In two seconds it’s going to flash its headlights.”

  It does.

  “Jake, go and get in the car.”

  “No.”

  “Listen to me, Jake. Either get in that car or we’re all dead. You, me, Randy, Mary…Scottie.”

  “Scottie?”

  “You heard correctly.”

  I see Ibrahim’s cab approaching in the distance. He drives past the white Datsun. He’s grinning like a moron. When he sees me, he salutes me.

  “I’m going to call your bluff again, Leo.”

  I hang up.

  When Ibrahim pulls up, I get in the cab. He tries to make small talk, something about speed dial and friend rates.

  “Shut the fuck up, Ibrahim, and just drive!”

  “Okay, sir.”

  He makes a U-turn, heading back towards the white Datsun.

  “Not that way, Ibrahim, the other way.”

  “You said just drive.”

  “I know I did, but not that way.”

  “Let me just drive a bit farther and find a place to spin around.”

  “Don’t do that!”

  But it’s too late. Ibrahim’s head explodes.

  26.

  THERE’S BLOOD IN MY eyes, so I can’t see what the fuck happened, but I do feel the car slow to a halt.

  In the movies, the car would’ve sped off, probably veering off the road and smashing into a parked car. But this doesn’t happen. We just roll to a stop, Ibrahim’s foot no longer applying pressure to the gas pedal.

  I wipe the blood out of my eyes, look forward to see Ibrahim’s head, a large piece of it missing, lolling to one side as he slumps in the driver’s seat.

  I look to my right and see Terry, the guy who accompanied Leo to Denny’s, hanging out the rear window of the white Datsun, a big-ass rifle in his hands.

  I think about getting out, making a run for it, but I wouldn’t get far.

  Anyway, I don’t get to make the decision. The cell I was given rings.

  It’s Charles. “Get in the car, Jake. Pretty please, with fucking sprinkles on top.”

  Resignedly, I get out of the cab, walk over to the white Datsun. Terry gets out, opens the front-passenger door, just like a chauffeur.

  As I bend down to get in, Charles is sitting in the driver’s seat, pointing a pistol at me.

  He nods, but he isn’t looking at me, but over my shoulder.

  I feel a sharp pain in my head, then everything goes black.

  27.

  WHEN I COME TO, I’m in the car, slumped in th
e shotgun seat. I look round to find we’re parked in some vacant parking lot, lit up by beaming streetlights.

  Charles still has the gun trained on me.

  He says, “Rise and shine, sleepyhead.”

  “Where…where are we?”

  “Never mind asking questions for now, fuckwit. I’ll do the talking.”

  I sit up straight, and as soon as I do, I feel someone slap the back of my head. Right in the place I got hit before. I look back and see Terry. “Ow! What was that for?”

  Charles answers for him. “For making him kill a guy.”

  I turn back, and Terry slaps me again.

  “Fuck, what was that one for?”

  Again, Charles answers. “For talking.”

  Another slap. I nearly speak, then realize my mistake.

  “Quick learner. Now listen up, dipshit. Did your script get lost in the mail?”

  I stay silent.

  “You can answer, Jake.”

  Terry slaps me again. I look back, and he says, “For not answering, this time.”

  I turn back to Charles. “What script?”

  “As much of a fuckup as Leo is, I know he explained what was to happen tonight. Terry was with him, remember. You were supposed to play along, do your gigs, then everybody goes home. But you had to start getting smart.”

  “I didn’t feel like taking orders.”

  Charles smiles, as though he finds what I said funny, and then he pistol whips me. Right on the lump that the driver made, too.

  He gives me ten seconds to recover. I spend that time prodding the lump, then taking my hand away, checking for blood.

  “You’d do well to stop running your mouth, kid.”

  “Okay, I’m listening.”

  Charles lowers the pistol, rubs his temples with his other hand. “Fuck, I thought Leo was a competent kid. Not smart, but competent at least. But you were getting the better of him.”

  “Who is Leo? He said something about him being your guy.”

  “I’ve not been completely honest with you, Jake. Leo’s just some hot-shot attorney. He’s involved in this thing in the same way you are. He does his job, you do yours, and everyone goes home happy. You might’ve noticed, he doesn’t make much of a bad guy, not when the going gets tough.”

  “I noticed. And everyone goes home except for Regan and Omar.”

  “My heart bleeds for them, kid. And anyway, isn’t this broad your ex-wife and Omar the guy she’s banging? I thought I’d be doing you a favor. That’s the way I figured it, anyway.”

  “I consider a neighbor donating a cup of sugar a favor. Or receiving a quick hand job from a drunk chick at a party, after she sees I’m a little down in the dumps. But being forced to get my ex-wife and her boyfriend kidnapped, with the threat of death to the two people who mean the most to me in the world, isn’t much of a favor.”

  “Our definitions differ, is all, kid. I say potato—”

  “And I say tomato.”

  “Very clever, Jake. You’re going to need to use that tonight, you’re cleverness.”

  “Before we get to the rest of tonight, I think we skipped over the part where you clear up some of the confusion.”

  He slaps his forehead theatrically. “Where are my manners? So, Leo’s just a pawn in this, the same way you are. I was supposed to be the bad guy by proxy, he the puppet on a string. That’s the way it was going at least, until you turned up the heat, made him vomit like a little bitch, and start spilling some beans. It was at that point I had to start intervening.”

  “So you were listening in to our conversations.”

  “If you’d have farted tonight, I’d have known how loud it was and if you’d left a skid mark in your briefs.”

  I think about that a second.

  “You wondering if I know about how you treated another player in this thing in the bathroom at Denny’s, how you grated urinal cake onto his teeth? Or if I know about your conversation with a Ms. Kate Cans of Glendale? Or about how you got her to take a picture of me, with the intention of sending it to a Mr. Scottie McDougray, a world-class computer hacker and researcher?”

  “I take it by the way you asked me about them, that you know about those events.”

  “I knew you were going to do it before you did.”

  “Then why didn’t you intervene before things got really fucked-up?”

  “Because you were supposed to think that I was just some guy working for Leo.”

  I pause. “Then why meet me at all? Why not just keep well away, mastermind whatever this is from a distance?”

  “Because I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do this.”

  He moves his hand forward, and I flinch.

  “Relax, kid, I’m just reaching out to get this.”

  From my breast pocket, he pulls out a little black box, attached to which is a spring-like antenna with a flashing light atop it.

  He continues, “A tracking device and bug.”

  “Why not just get Leo to plant that?”

  “I couldn’t trust that kid to steal candy from a baby. Anyway, I wanted to meet you.”

  “Are we going to go on a second date?”

  For my smart mouth, Terry slaps me again.

  “That’s the last time, Terry. Man has to be able to think after we’re done talking.”

  I say, “And all these lumps and bruises are hardly doing anything for my looking inconspicuous.”

  “Good point. Duly noted, Jake.” He turns to Terry. “You. Put your hands in your pockets.”

  Charles turns back. Waves the pistol at me as he says, “Where were we?”

  “You were saying something about wanting to me meet.”

  “Further back.”

  “I think you were telling me about the stuff I’ve done since speaking to Terry at Denny’s.”

  “Yeah…so you can forget about Mr. Urinal Cake Teeth doing that thing you asked him to do. And about Mr. Dougray finding everything out about me. He’s been caught. We couldn’t be sure if Ms. Cans had sent the photo to him yet. She’s okay, by the way. If you were worried. We put the fear of God into her and sent her off to carry on with her workout. We’re not big on getting women mixed up in these things. We’re old school like that.”

  I try to play it cool, but Charles reads me like a teenage boy reads a Playboy. “Did I miss one off the list, Jake?”

  “No…no, I don’t think so.”

  “Yeah I did.” He grins, his eyes shining with knowingness. “You’re trying to work out if we know about Regan.”

  I don’t say anything.

  “That little stunt of yours might’ve worked on Leo, but not us, kid. I must admit, you had me fooled the first two viewings. Then I figured that someone was holding the camera, with the way it was waving about, and all. That was the first red flag. The second red flag was the shooting angle. I chuckled when I noticed. It’s like the old levitation trick with the one foot on the floor—film it at the right angle and it looks good. Watch it once, it might trick you, but any cat can work it out after a few viewings.”

  I silently curse the putting on of the duct tape.

  “Good attempt, Jake. You should work on your deranged laugh for your next attempt.”

  “What next attempt?”

  “We’ll get on to that.”

  “Okay.” I think a second. “I still have a few more questions.”

  I hear rustling as Terry takes his hands out of his pockets.

  Charles says, “Not so fast,” then points the pistol at him. He turns back to me. “Go ahead.”

  “Have you picked up Regan?”

  “We got her, yeah.”

  Even the best poker players have tells. Charles blinks a few times, and his grin doesn’t look quite right on his face this time. “Next question.”

  “While we were at the bar, you said you only include people who have a reason for doing the thing you want them to do. That way if they’re caught, and the cops look into it, all the stuff they’ll spill about
you will seem like bullshit. What have you got on Leo?”

  Both Charles and Terry laugh. Then Charles says, “I thought you might’ve worked that out. The short of it, if not the long.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Hate to be the one that tells you this, but Leo was fucking your wife, kid. That’s how he’s connected.”

  28.

  “I CALL BULLSHIT.”

  “Call it whatever you like, kid. Doesn’t make it any less true.”

  I shake my head. “She had no need to go to another guy.”

  “I shouldn’t even be discussing this with you, as I’m not your fucking marriage counselor or your six-pack buddy on a Friday night, but it seems that wasn’t the case.”

  “Regan wouldn’t do that to me.”

  “She did. And for a few months, too. Motels, your place when you were out on cases, McDonald’s parking lots late at night.”

  I look around.

  “This isn’t one, Jake.”

  I slam my head back on the headrest. “I don’t get it. What did she see in that guy?”

  Charles doesn’t answer, just shakes his head. But then says, “Is your heart still bleeding for Omar and Regan?”

  “Don’t tell me she was having relations with Omar while we were married!”

  “Relations?”

  “Banging.”

  “He wasn’t even in the country at that point, dumb wit. Anyway, she had her hands full with Leo.”

  They laugh again.

  “Come on, guys, don’t make jokes about that. She was my wife.”

  “Our deepest and most sincere apologies, kid.”

  “Accepted, but begrudgingly. So what do you have on Leo, you know, to make him do your fucked-up shit?”

  “Regan wasn’t the only broad he was banging on the side. This guy had his dick in places I wouldn’t make you put yours, Jake—old spinsters, women you could mistake for certain marine wildlife, women of questionable gender. I hope you were sensible when you banged your wife. Used a rubber. If not, I’d book myself in at the clinic, if I were you.”

  I nearly vomit.

  “Come on, kid, don’t go all Leo on us.”

  He pats me on the back as Terry snorts with laughter.

  I get control of myself, coughing while holding the back of my hand to my mouth.

  Charles says, “All done?”