Black Angel

by Thomas Laird

  I know they’ll be interested in my foster home upbringing. They will lay blame on the fact that my first two homes were headed by incompetent parents, and they’ll suggest my legal-eagle foster father was a bad influence—especially if they ever find out about his cocaine usage and his bi-sexual proclivities.

  All that is mere happenstance to me. Excuses are simply excuses. I am the man my DNA made me be. I assume my biological father, whoever he was, had some kind of misfiring chromosome that explains my unusual behavior.

  When we killed the two families with those two young girls as highlights, I watched but I never participated. The only killings I’ve done are the men I’ve recruited to do the group assassinations. I was simply a witness in Kuwait and in Chicago and in Mexico City. I never got to see or join in the festivities in California or in Vermont. Those were long-distance assignations, but I did the details and the planning. I procured the hackers who located our participants—on the receiving end, I mean.

  The young girl in the first job in Kuwait City took longer to die than the other girls because we had not yet perfected our technique. We were all learning on the job. So by the time the murders took place in Mexico, we were all very adept at our tasks. I was the director. Thomas and Brandon and the boys south of the border were simply my crew.

  It’s frightening even to me how easy it is to find someone on the Internet who is capable of most anything, including murder. The most foul of all crimes, according to the Bard, William Shakespeare. There are pedophiles in legion on the net, but you’d think killers would be rarer. In the military we were trained to take life, but even in the Corps there is hesitancy to pull the trigger, especially when it comes to civilians. I rather think there are lots of targets out there, people who need to cease breathing. Thomas and Brandon finally figured out the oil ruse, that it was simply a bone to throw at the NCIS in Kuwait and a red herring to toss to the police in this city, Chicago—and in the other sites where we did our community thing.

  Were Brandon and Thomas insane when they shot two adolescent girls, scooped out an eye on each, over in the Middle East, and then murdered and hanged the families of both victims?

  I think not. The act was premeditated. We planned the killings out in detail.

  We were very careful never to let anyone from the military see the three of us together in Kuwait City. I met Carl and Philip at Quantico in OCS before we arrived in the war zone. Then I had to make special arrangements for us to physically get together to organize the raids, as I called them. They had to technically go AWOL late at night, bring civilian clothes with them, and then I picked them up in a ‘borrowed’ vehicle from the base near Kuwait City. I could hardly sign a vehicle out legally without leaving paper behind me.

  I drove us to the sites, over there, sometime after 2:00 A.M. on both occasions. We made certain that no American patrols swung by at the time we were active inside those two homes. The military is very precise with time, and so were we. In and out in forty five minutes. The patrols were famous for arriving and departing on the hour. So we wedged our action between their scheduled pass-bys.

  We were careful to avoid leaving traces. We policed up our Areas of Operations when the shootings were accomplished. Carl and Philip did the excavations of the slugs, we all three retrieved casings, and all of our work was accomplished with latex on our hands. No fingerprints.

  When the boys took turns on the females, they used condoms that were buried later, not flushed so they could float back up in the toilets. No trace of DNA was left for Detectives Koehn and Donato to find and use against us.

  We didn’t press our luck over there. We only did it twice. The third operation could very well have been a charm for our pursuers. I know Koehn was looking at the three of us and at other suspects as well because I had informants at NCIS who didn’t even know they were informants. I’d made a few connections in their outfit as a result of my rank. People talk, even people who are required to remain silent. It’s amazing what a few drinks will do at some officers’ watering hole that attracts ex-Marines who became Navy cops.

  We showed no mercy on those two families in the Middle East, nor did we show mercy to the clan in Chicago. You cannot be weak when you accomplished what we did. You have to have resolve, and you have to have endurance and strength. Once you look at them as cases rather than human beings, it becomes simple to pull the trigger, easy to hoist them off the floor to asphyxiate them. Then you shoot them each, once through the forehead to make sure they don’t miraculously survive the gallows.

  Of course, they’ll insist we’re all insane. However, I know better. Philip was no madman, nor was Carl Thomas. I watched them follow instructions methodically. Neither man was ever out of control. They did things with a purpose; lunatics perform outrageous acts thoughtlessly. We are not mad.

  Nietzche spoke often about the ubermensch, and he wasn’t talking about the cartoon character from the comic books. No, the ubermensch wears no cape, nor does he leap tall buildings with a single bound. He is an extraordinary man, but he appears to be of the herd. His mundane appearance allows him to roam among his prey. He can hunt undetected and undisturbed because he is the neighbor next door. He seemed perfectly normal—every description of a series killer reads thus. They were always chameleon-like individuals; no one ever noticed them. They blended in with the crowd. They were not peacocks with brilliant plumage. Instead, they were ordinary birds, like sparrows. Worker birds, nesting and surviving like every other airborne creature. Occasionally, a bird of bright plumage might make an appearance in the annals of crime, however.

  Except our wings are stronger, our purpose is far more resolute. That was why we soared higher. And if Thomas and Brandon and those two young Mexican men had to be eliminated, at least they soared high in the clouds for a time. They did what few dare to accomplish. They trod where no one is allowed to walk. It was almost like perusing the face of God in the burning bush on Sinai. They looked instead upon the face of the Fallen Angel, the Angel who should have ruled in Heaven. They elected the wrong guy to run this show. Satan understood and understands the human creature far better than the Creator with various names. Lucifer was far more psychologically attuned to us than God ever was or shall be. We are not good by nature. We are weak. We do not desire to do the right thing. We wish to do what is self-serving and pleasurable. What gives us pain is what determines the God-like scenario.

  I’m no Satanist, but I’m a big fan.

  I made my way by wired money from my attorney foster father to free myself from Desert Storm. Finding my way out of Kuwait City and out of the war was complicated, but not impossible—obviously, for here I am! I made my wait from the Middle East through various ports of call, and then on to Paris, and from Paris to Canada, and from the northlands back into the States, before I briefly toured Mexico. It only took money and the proper connections—all of which my third foster parent has plenty of. He defends scum, Vietnamese gangs in Los Angeles, New York and Chicago. He has advocated for the Italian Mafia in New York and Chicago, and he has done legal chores for the Russian Mob in Chicago and Detroit.… Oh yes, and for the Irish Outfit in Boston. He has done legal work for them all, but strictly for the money and for all that good-will publicity for helping the underprivileged in the inner cities of America. He’s one helluva guy, my old man. All that aside, the Zurich account is the source of my funds. It is no legitimate bank, of course, so they are highly trustworthy.

  I got my new identities from an excellent forger in Amsterdam, one of my stops prior to Paris and Canada. He works for the Vietnamese, primarily, so he is very trustworthy. I was warned not to eliminate him after he fixed me up. The Vietnamese have a very unique code of honor when it comes to whacking their employees.

  I stayed in Canada only briefly. Perhaps six months. I am now John Charles Moran, but I can become Randy Jackson on demand, also. The Dutchman gave me alternate IDs. I switch off regularly.

  I considered plastic surgery to alter my facial feature
s, but I declined because disguises are so much cheaper. The fact is I hardly ever use beards or mustaches because I’m officially and legally dead. The Marines have declared me deceased, and no one argues their verdict since the Humvee was turned to ash on that road in Iraq, along with two unfortunate brother Marines who had to make my demise look authentic. I know Koehn was suspicious about the lack of remains in my case, but it’s amazing the heat that Willie Peter, white phosphorus, can generate. He was smart enough to have his doubts, along with his partner, Donato. But Donato still serves in the NCIS, last I heard, and last I heard, he was back aboard The Intrepid , headed for Portugal, if my information is accurate. And it almost always is.

  It’s amazing what the various Mafias and Tongs can come up with if I come up with the cash.

  My foster daddy does it for the money. Every fucking thing he does is cold-hearted and calculated. He can’t bullshit me. This is the big-fish-eats-the-smaller-fish planet. We’re all predators, but some of us have more finely-tuned skills. I was a killer before I ever reached the Corps. I’ve been a flesh-eater long before I partook of animal meat. I’m a cannibal, when it comers right down to it, though I don’t literally partake of my victims’ bodies. I just enjoy watching them fade out. I like looking at them as they evaporate in front of me. It’s the ultimate muscle, watching them leave this earth. I have the power, and power is everything. All those adventures, getting out of Iraq and Kuwait—they were nothing, nothing compared to the adrenalin rush of watching one of my subjects be dismissed from this life. If I’d been David Crowley, I would’ve killed me. Nothing worse than a leech, no? But he was weak because in some weird way he had gained affection for me, and I suppose it was easier for him to support me financially than it was to have me waxed and disappeared. Here I am, so I guess you have your answer. I always sort of liked him, though. He gave me anything I wanted, and he stayed out of my personal business. I could have been incarcerated for statutory rape in my senior year in high school, but he maneuvered me out of trouble on that incident by paying off the girl in question.

  There was also a Driving under the Influence thing that he got me free from, so I guess you could say he was a doting daddy.

  I’m hunting the cop, these days, but I have my sights on Carl Thomas as well. I have excellent intel from the Russians in Chicago, and I’m sure they’ll relocate Carl for me shortly. It’s a matter of time before I find my young acolyte. Then I’ll make him vanish, too. Killing a cop is a more serious matter, though. Even with my dad’s connection here and throughout the world, murdering policemen is frowned upon. Draws too much heat; gathers too much publicity and attention. Usually someone swings from the yardarm for whacking a homicide detective, and I’d prefer I not be the swinger in question.

  Getting away with it has always been the issue. You can kill anyone in this world, if history teaches us anything. Weren’t those the words of wisdom according to Michael Corleone in Godfather II? It’s just a matter of proper planning. You can kill the Son of God and skip on it, if you’re smart. You can liquidate two Kennedys, and maybe the right guys went down for it. Same for Martin Luther King. Did they really get the right shooter? Maybe. I know. Conspiracy theories are for the nutcases.

  But I know very well that justice is an illusion in this world. Pleasure is the real matter at hand. Not just sexual pleasure or the high induced by alcohol or other substances that produce a rush. Drugs and alcohol were a brief phase for me. I tried near-strangulations with a few hookers in Las Vegas, but nothing ever came close to the buzz of my current “occupation.” I’ve got lots of money and nothing but free time.

  Poor Will Koehn. He seems to be searching for himself. I watched him at the museum, looking for something, perhaps someone like me.

  And all the while, his prey was his predator. I was right behind him, watching, waiting. There’s no hurry to do him. If I did it right away, there’d be no building excitement, no buzz, no thrill. It’s like premature ejaculation. Ruins the whole experience. It has to have a buildup that literally builds up before the amazing climax. No slam bam thank you ma’am in my trade. No, I get my money’s worth.

  I watched Thomas and Brandon kill three entire family units. I watched them be raped, shot and hanged. I watched the girls be blinded en route to dying. I watched the two younger men relieve the children of their flowers, of their innocence. It was something to behold, something you’ll never see at the movies or read about in a book.

  Call it evil? I call it the way of reality, the way of the authentic world. The powerful dominate the weak. It is the way our script is written. Darwin had it right, but it wasn’t just in the animal kingdom that his theory applies, because we are indeed animals ourselves, clever beasts, but animals nonetheless.

  Detective Will Koehn will be a challenge. I might even work my way through his family and his current lover, Hannah, and there was a serious connection to an FBI agent, I have been informed.

  There are lots of bodies to walk over before I arrive where I’m headed.

  23

  His friend’s name is Arkady Kormelov. Jack calls him Kady, but his girlfriends call him Arkasha. He’s originally from Moscow, but he emigrated to the States in 1989, and so he speaks English fluently. Jack says he inherited his sense of Americanization from his paternal grandfather, who emigrated here after World War II. The grandfather actually had to be smuggled out of the Soviet Union because Stalin wasn’t friendly to the notion of Russians going AWOL to America. The old guy got here, though, and his grandson Arkady dreamed of following the old man to the New World, and his dream finally came true in 1989.

  The one unfortunate footnote to the whole saga of the Kormelov family was that Arkady was and is a member of the Russian Mafia, here in Chicago. They are not rivals to the Italians yet, but they’re creeping upward because of their ruthlessness and their brutality.

  Arkady came to know Jack because of a burglary investigation, back in 1990. Clemons and his partner caught the guy who boosted Arkasha’s 1977 Mustang, and they caught him cold with the Mustang on his hot little hands. Arkady was not the type to allow the cops to do his own legwork, but he appreciated the speed and success of my partner and Jack’s old partner in the apprehension of the booster and the return of the ’77 Pony. They became “friends” as a result of Jack’s busting that car thief, and Arkady is the sort who never forgets a “friend.”

  In other words, he became Jack’s informal informer, and when something goes down that doesn’t connect to Arkady and his crew directly, he passes along information to Clemons. He’s helped Jack a few times since the car incident.

  We meet at the Denny’s on Broadway at 3:30 A.M. It’s almost empty, here in the restaurant, and that’s why Kormelov agreed to the meet.

  He’s a big-boned, muscular man. No waste, no fat. He’s probably 6’ 3” and he’s got a small waistline for a male. Broad shoulders, full head of black, straight hair with a blue sheen to it. I think Jack said he was Cossack. From the Steppes or some damn thing. The horsemen, you know, with the Russian wooly hats.

  His eyes are a cornflower-blue. Odd color, but fascinating especially if you’re an admiring woman, I’m guessing. Jack says he does very well with the ladies, and I can see why.

  “How you doin’?” Clemons says as he shakes his hand. The three of us sit in a booth in this nearly deserted Denny’s. It’s a twenty-four-hour joint, so it seemed ideal for our meeting here.

  “I’m fine, Jack. You?”

  No trace of an accent. Perfect English, just as Jack told me it would be.

  “You think maybe you can help us, Kady?” Jack asks him as the waitress lays three menus before us. She’s in her forties, a little mileage on her face, but the body looks good. No waste on her either. But the only one of us she eyes is the Russian. Then she walks away with her order pad after we’re done with her.

  “Help you? You know I’ll help you, Jack.… This man got my 1977 Ford Mustang back to me in just four days. Did you know that?”

&n
bsp; “He’s told me. Yes,” I answer.

  “Your friend is a serious man like you, Jack?”

  Clemons looks at me and smiles.

  “Maybe he’s a little too serious, Kady. He is in love with a woman ten years older than him.”

  Arkady Kormelov smiles at Jack and then at me.

  “Older women are more patient with us, Detective Koehn.”

  He has gargantuan hands. They’re hands that could snap a man’s neck. When he talks about women, I can’t picture him being gentle with a lover.

  Jack has told him my name and apparently more than that.

  “They know what they want and aren’t afraid to tell a man. Now with a young bitch, it’s always a fucking guessing game.… What can I do for you two fine policemen that won’t get me fucked in my ass?”

  Jack laughs out loud.

  “You know our deal. I can’t look the other way. I won’t,” he tells the Russian.

  “I know our deal. I know how this game is played. But you might return me a favor, if it does not compromise either one of you.”

  He has a quick wit. He has natural, street-wise intelligence. I don’t know if he’s literate, too, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Arkady were an educated man.

  “What favor?” Clemons asks.

  “Immigration. I have a cousin who wants to defect to this country. Do you know anyone in INS?”

  Now we see the deal-maker. He does nothing unless it means gain, profit. The Russians truly have embraced our way of life in America. He’s become an entrepreneur.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact, I do,” Clemons grins. “Been dating her, on and off, for a month or two.”