Final Target

by Jack Young

  The mayhem at the station caused Davy to pause a moment as a half a dozen officers ran out of the station door. The officer who wasn’t gunned down pointed at Davy and they all began firing at him. He tried ducking and putting the car in gear, but a few bullets hit him in the side and in the neck. “Fuck.” He finally put the car in gear and mashed on the accelerator before peeling out. The officers continued firing at him. On the police scanner, he heard an officer describe his car and the direction he was driving.

  Davy sped towards the rendezvous, but he was feeling woozy from the blood loss. As he turned off the street, he could see police vehicles beginning to leave the station in pursuit of him. When he rounded the final corner before the rendezvous, Davy could see Paden’s truck. He was trying to drive as fast as he could and seemed to have lost sight of the police following him. He took the turn too fast which threw his body into the car door. He’d taken a bullet in his shoulder and side, but those didn’t hurt or worry him as much as the one in his neck. He was holding his neck trying to slow the bleeding, but it wasn’t working. The blood wasn’t squirting out though which he knew was good. He hadn’t been hit in an artery. The blood loss still weakened him and he wasn’t sure how much more strength he had left.

  Paden’s truck was off to the left of the path and Davy slammed on the brakes, opened the door, and fell out onto the ground.

  Paden barely made it to his truck when Davy skidded to a halt. The car’s door flung open with Davy falling out onto the ground. Paden rushed to him and helped him to his feet. “Fuck. You’re bleeding everywhere.”

  Davy’s face was ashen-looking and ghostlike. “I hear it happens when you get shot.”

  Paden hurried him to the passenger side of the truck, buckled him in, and then drove off. The truck was parked with enough concealment that when Paden came back onto the road, it was on some deserted part of the road. He drove normal as they began making their way out of town.

  “Hang in there, Davy. Hang in there.” Paden tried to remain calm as he drove, but he knew Davy was in need of serious medical attention.

  “Big.” Davy’s voice was little more than a whisper.

  “What?”

  “Big John.”

  “Call Big John?”

  Davy shook his head.

  “No?”

  Davy took a deep breath. “Someone else...”

  “Where?” Paden could tell Davy was having difficulty breathing.

  “At the station.” Another deep breath.

  “What?”

  Davy struggled to get the words out, but in a whisper, he managed a little at a time. “Another shooter. Cops thought it was me.”

  “The cops shot you?”

  Davy gave a slow nod.

  “Someone must’ve known what we were doing.”

  “Big John.”

  “Big John?”

  “Only one who knew.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Same with…Target.”

  “Well, Lanny did.”

  Davy shook his head. “Not Lanny.” He almost passed out, but Paden hit a bump in the road that caused Davy to continue. “I think I was supposed to be killed at Target, too.”

  “And you think Big John set it up?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t kill that girl and he had to.”

  “That was a while ago.”

  Davy looked at all the blood on him. “Fuck.”

  “Hang in there.”

  “Dump me somewhere and get out of here.”

  “Just dump you?”

  “You don’t have time to do anything else.”

  “You’ll die.”

  “Too late for that.”

  “There’s gotta be a hospital close by. I’ll dump you there.”

  “No time. Just find a spot to dump me.”

  “Shit.” Paden pulled off onto some dirt road. He found a grove of trees with a farmhouse in the distance. He parked the truck and walked over to the passenger side. He pulled Davy out and sat him up against a tree. “This good?”

  Davy nodded. It was a slow nod. “Yeah…now go.”

  “You sure you don’t want me to get you help? Maybe someone at the farm?”

  “No...go.”

  Paden wasn’t sure about this, but he could see the life leaving Davy’s body. “Beers on the lake?”

  Davy smiled. “Yeah.”

  “Jenkins?”

  “Yep.”

  Paden gave him a nod and climbed back into the truck and drove away. He looked in the rearview mirror and saw Davy slump over to one side and slide onto the ground.

  35.

  After getting the rundown from Gerry about what happened in front of the station, Joe and Jacobs went down to where an officer had spotted the Camry. It was a short drive and when they arrived, Joe parked them away from the scene next to a police cruiser. A young man and woman were there already processing the scene. Between the shooting at the cabin and at the station, the techs had to be split up.

  The car was full of bullet holes on the driver’s side and as Joe walked closer, he could see blood covering the majority of the driver’s seat. “That’s a shit ton of blood. Could anyone survive a blood loss like that?”

  The nearest crime scene tech, the woman, figured Joe’s question was directed to her. “It is a lot of blood, but if they receive medical attention soon, they’d be okay.”

  “But, he’ll need that attention ASAP, right?”

  “Oh yeah. If he’s still bleeding out…It’s been, what, nearly thirty minutes since the shooting? He wouldn’t have much longer.”

  Jacobs hollered to one of the patrolmen. “Call all the area hospitals and clinics. If they’re out of our jurisdiction have them call us anyway. They might be treating one of our suspects.” He looked at the tech. “We gotta lead yet? At the station they were sifting through CCTV footage. You guys get any of that yet?”

  The other tech who was taking photos with an iPad came over to him. “I just got a few emails while taking photos.”

  Jacobs pointed to the iPad. “You gonna check those emails?”

  The tech poked at the screen several times until he found what he was looking for. “Okay. I got three different angles from different cameras. Here’s the one with the best shot.” He handed the device to Joe.

  Each of Joe’s kids had iPads and he and Darcy were familiar with how they worked. The video was cued up to where all Joe had to do was touch the button to get it to play. The video must’ve been edited to show when the shooting started. Before the shooter in the Camry began firing, flashes were seen from a Suburban parked on the other side of it in the Safeway parking lot. The officers in the video began firing at the Camry and the driver began shooting back. Both shooters shot up an officer and whoever they were bringing in. The driver of the Camry began driving away from the station, but with difficulty. They caught a glimpse of the driver’s face.

  Jacobs pointed to the video. “Go back and freeze on the driver.”

  Joe did and zoomed in as well. “Shit.”

  “Yeah. Carlyle. Fuck! And we had him here not long ago, too.”

  Joe stared the video again. “Listen. Both shooters in this video stop. Just before Davy drives off. Listen. It’s faint, but you can hear it.” Joe rewound the video a little and started it back up to where they both heard a little pop.

  Jacobs tapped the iPad. “Go to another angle. One that shows our guys and Brady out front.”

  Joe clicked on a couple of other videos until he found what he was looking for. When the heavy firing ceased, he saw Brady standing by himself. They both watched as he was shot in the left cheek and the back of his head went misty-red, and within the same second of impact a single, faint pop in the distance before Brady fell. “What do you think, Papa Bear? Third shooter?”

  “Yeah. Sniper shot.”

  “The shooter in the Suburban didn’t seem to be trying to hit anyone in particular. Looks like he hit our guys and Davy did
, too, while spraying bullets. He may have gotten Brady once, but the head shot came from further away.”

  Jacobs nodded. “From wood line behind the Safeway and CarQuest, right?”

  Joe nodded. He and Jacobs went back to their vehicle and drove around to the wooded area to get a look at the station from that angle. Joe pointed at the station. “That’s not too far is it? I mean I used to hunt as a kid and could hit something from here.”

  “Evans was in the Army, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Infantry?”

  Joe nodded. “He was a regular grunt and been out for twenty years.”

  “No sniper shit?”

  “Not from what I could find. But, you know, we connected him and Davy to the Target shooting and more than likely they killed those two at the farm, plus the bodies around Davy’s shed. We saw Davy drive off in the video, so I’m betting the wood line shooter was Evans.”

  “I ain’t betting because I’m positive of the same thing.”

  Joe began walking into the woods. “So, he takes his shot from near here and goes into the woods to the other side. Before we left them, one of those crime scene guys said they found another set of fresh tire tracks. That must mean that Davy met someone-Evans-on the other side and they probably drove off together.”

  “Sounds about right. Does Evans leave the rifle and stuff or hump it all back to their rendezvous point?”

  “Good question.”

  Jacobs chin-pointed to further into the woods. “This spot is too open. If I were gonna shoot, I’d be a little further back. Let’s take a walk and see what we can find.”

  “Sure.”

  Both detectives made their way to area they thought would be a good spot to fire from. Joe pointed off about ten yards ahead of where they were standing. “Look.” He approached with caution. “Yep. Someone was lying here. And look. You can see where the shooter backed away and started running.”

  They walked on opposite sides of what appeared to be where someone ran. They didn’t get far before they came across the rifle and a cellphone. Jacobs pointed back to where they came from. “Call someone down here to collect this shit and work this area.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll stay and keep the scene secured.”

  “What do you think?”

  “What do I think? I think prints will come back from the rifle and phone matching Evans’ prints. I think he and Carlyle are long gone and Carlyle is dead. Evans probably ditched the body somewhere and he, himself, is in the wind. I think we ain’t got shit.”

  “Yeah, but we still put out an APB for both of them, right? Them and the Suburban and its shooter?”

  “Well, yeah, but you know as well as I do that the Suburban will show up torched and with no DNA.”

  “But, we still gotta, right?”

  “Even when there’s no use.”

  “Even then.”

  Jacobs let out a long, deep sigh. “Thirty years I’ve been doing this. I’ve put a lot of bad guys away.”

  “To serve and protect, right?”

  “Yeah. To serve and protect alright, but, man, sometimes I hate this fucking job.”

  Epilogue

  Paden waited months to make this trip and he decided to time it for the middle of the night. He sat in a black Taurus he stole from a Wal-mart parking lot in Bozeman. He was dressed all in black, from a black watch cap down to a pair of black tactical boots. There was a silenced Glock 17 on the passenger seat fully loaded. There were four other magazines loaded and packed into the compartments throughout the vest he wore. It might have seemed a little much because he was only after one target and one bullet would suffice, but he had to get to the target first.

  During the months he stayed at the Jenkins’ cabin, Paden followed the aftermath on the news. Brady’s death was chalked up to a gangland shooting with multiple suspects; Paden and Davy were included in that list. The other suspects were people Paden never heard of before and thought they were included as some kind of police tactic to see who knew those involved. After a couple of weeks, the news reports became shorter until they disappeared altogether.

  The one thing in all of the news that wasn’t mentioned-especially since there was still an APB out on him-was if Davy’s body was found. Paden felt a serious sense of remorse for leaving Davy like he did. Davy had lost so much blood and was weak. Paden swore the last image he had of Davy slumped over by that tree meant he’d died as he drove away.

  Paden thought back to what Davy said about the hits at Target, and on Brady, and how they were both hits on him for not killing that pregnant girl. Throw in a power move to take over Brady’s operation and get rid of Davy and that would’ve been two birds with one stone.

  Paden shut off the engine to the car and left the door unlocked as he exited. He would need a quick getaway and messing around unlocking the door would slow him down. He grabbed the pistol and took a deep breath before making his way to the house. There was sure to be guards there at this time of the night, and Paden wasn’t sure how many there would be. The closer he walked to the house, he remembered there wasn’t a gate or anything, just a long driveway and he could see a couple of guards sitting on the front porch and some in a parked car.

  The car was at the end of the driveway. Paden was sure he could make his way to the house without having to deal with the two men he saw sitting in the car, but he didn’t want to take any chances. He moved quick and was to the car before the two sitting in the front noticed. It was a nice evening and both had their windows rolled down. This made it easy for Paden to shoot them both in the head before they even saw him.

  Paden looked around for signs of anyone watching and then headed for the house. He took aim and shot both guards on the front porch. He tried the front door in case it was unlocked because he knew people who never locked their doors. It was locked, but worth a try. As he approached the house a moment before, Paden had noticed a light was on at the back.

  He eased himself around the house ducking under windows and watching where he stepped. There was a light on that lit up most of the backyard. Paden held his pistol at the ready. He almost laughed thinking it would be his luck that a party would be going on in the back and his little invasion would soon be over because he would be outnumbered and killed. There was no noise coming from the back which made Paden feel safe enough to continue.

  As Paden rounded the corner to the back yard, he heard a gurgling noise coming from the back deck and remembered there was a hot tub there. He took a quick peek around the corner and thought he saw someone in the hot tub. He continued and crouched as he walked up the short set of steps and onto the deck. The deck was lit up and he could for sure see someone in the hot tub.

  He knew how wooden decks were always squeaky and this one was no different as Paden ascended. As he stepped, he scanned the back yard to make sure there was no one watching. His scanning ended with the hot tub which was going full blast. A large-bodied man was half in and half out of the hot tub. Although he couldn’t see the face, Paden knew who it was.

  He presumed the man was dead because he didn’t seem to notice Paden’s presence nor could he see the man’s chest rising or falling. With his pistol in firing position, he made his way closer to check and confirm whether the man was dead or not. What Paden saw was Big John with a bullet in the middle of his forehead. The back of his head was leaking out onto the deck behind him. Paden lowered his pistol and shook his head. Someone took this moment from him and he wasn’t sure if he was pissed or glad.

  Paden turned to leave and the back door of the house leading to the deck opened. He brought his pistol back up to firing position and aimed it at the person who walked out onto the deck. “Easy. Easy now.”

  The person was a man. He was dressed similar to Paden except he wore a black mask. He held his hands up. “You take it easy now.”

  The voice was familiar to Paden. When it registered where he’d heard it before, he was in doubt. The man began to lift
up his mask. Paden raised his pistol. “Whoa now. He’s dead over there. I didn’t do it.”

  The mask was all the way off and Davy stood before Paden. “I know you didn’t. I did. I just came out here to ask what took you so long.”

  THE END

  Acknowledgments

  Wow! What a ride, huh? When I sat down one Sunday afternoon in October of last year with a pencil and a white legal pad of paper, I didn’t know what kind of story Final Target was going to be. I just knew I had to write it. What started out as two old friends rambling about not looking into a bag turned out to be a wild and bloody story of love and revenge.

  Thank you to those who read early drafts of this and helped point out its flaws and made suggestions to cultivate a much better story. Any technical flaws or “Yeah right, that wouldn’t happen” kind of moments are my faults and not theirs.

  As usual, I want to thank my wife, Angie, and our two children, Gracie and Jackson. Thank you, guys, for putting up with my crankiness as a result of 0400 writing sessions and my nonexistence on the mornings of weekends and days off. Without your support, I don’t think I would’ve had the drive to finish. I love you three so much.