by Jason Trevor
“You guys are some seriously dumb motherfuckers, you know that?” barked Sims.
“You gonna talk to us like that?” scowled Biggie, glancing in the direction of the two men by the door and the suit-lady, who were obviously their bosses.
“He’ll talk to you any way he wants if it will make you idiots listen!” snapped Franks.
“You four dunderheads are the only Blood Brothers left standing. Every one of your friends is either on a slab in the morgue or in the hospital, which is where you should be with that foot,” Sims continued, frowning at Biggie. “Bone died today from the trauma to his head and legs. Toad is in a coma and on dialysis. He will never walk again if he ever wakes up, and Cornbread probably won’t ever walk again, either,” he turned and looked Bullet in the eye. “Your big brother, Tony, is barely alive and still may not make it. If he does, he’ll be eating through a straw and living in a wheelchair from now on. Thump is missing half of his leg. Crank took a bullet directly to his heart as he was running for cover. Joey is literally in pieces. You four are marked for death, and you’d better wake up and realize that you can’t outsmart, out-tough, or outrun this guy. Your only hope of surviving until the weekend is to work with us,”
“Eat shit,” declared Kanya. “Stick me back in the clink and put him in there with me. He won’t survive the night,” She tugged at the collar of her orange jail jumpsuit.
“Shut up, K” grumbled Biggie. “They ain’t puttin’ no man in there with you,”
“Fuck you, shrimp. He blew up my man. His ass is mine,”
Le sighed and ignored their argument, steering the conversation back on task.
“You still don’t know who you’re dealing with here. We can put him in general population with a hundred dudes as bad as y’all, and my money is on him being the only one vertical when the dust settles. This guy is a heavily trained, battle-hardened soldier with serious combat experience. He’s taking you apart, one at a time, and I promise that each of you is on his list,”
“Whatever. Nigga ain’t got to me yet. Just a little scratch on my face,” smirked Needle.
“He will, dumbass!” argued Bullet. “Y’all call me Bullet ‘cause I’m the fastest gun of all of us, and this guy dropped everyone around me tonight before I could even see what was happening,”
“He missed you, didn’t he?” Needle rolled his eyes.
“He only misses on purpose,” interjected Lt. Lakefield. “He let you live so you could watch the others die. He wants to live in your head, rent-free. If there are any brains at all living in there with him, you’re going to start cooperating so we can get him off of the street,” The little woman, silent until now, sighed loudly. This wasn’t getting anywhere, so now she had to do the unthinkable. She lowered the legal pad and leveled her gaze at the four of them.
“I’m Brittany Scott, with the Harris County District Attorney’s office. I’m authorized to offer immunity to you each on any testimony you give that helps catch this guy,”
◆◆◆
“Joe! Hey, Joe! Come here! Look at what Becky just did!” Rebecca’s voice was unmistakable. It had always conjured images of angels singing to Joe. Jamie giggled from somewhere out of sight. Joe half-opened his eyes and smiled from the hotel bed.
“What, hon? I’m tired! I’ve been working really hard and things have been dangerous…” He hesitated to tell her what he had been up to and thought better of it, “…at work,” He wanted to shut his eyes tight and wait her out for a few more seconds of sleep, but then he saw her. She walked across the far side of the room, past the twilight sun of dusk filtering through the curtains, and Joe found himself breathless. He loved the way she moved when she walked, her young frame draped over by her favorite nightshirt, just snug enough to show the contours of hips and breasts that had been expanded from child-rearing. He surrendered and started to sit up. “What did the baby do?” he mumbled sleepily through a sly grin, admiring her form.
The beautiful moment was suddenly shattered by an old familiar voice, shouting angrily in Slovakian. “To je moje mesto!”
“Then why are there a hundred bodies buried in a shallow grave on the other side of that hill?” Joe jumped out of the bed and yelled back. “If it’s ‘your town’ you can tell me why their lives had no value, you sick sonofabitch,” he growled and then snapped up straight from his fighting crouch, remembering Rebecca. “Becca? Rebecca! Where are you?” He started to panic and darted across the room to the window, ran over to the bathroom, then back to the balcony door to check outside. Reality struck him as the cobwebs cleared from his sleepy head. “Aw, crap,” He found himself alone in the hotel room, no different from being alone in his bedroom, and sunk helplessly onto the bed, gripping his head in his hands and angling it slightly to look at the soot-stained photograph of his family on the desk. His cell phone rang and he snatched it up without looking to see who was calling. “What?” He was irritable from brutal old memories invading his space and his sleep once again.
“Joe, there are three more bodies in the morgue. You’re making it very hard to represent you,” Joe collected himself and took a few seconds to absorb what William had just said.
“I told you what you were signing up for, Bill,”
“I know, but it’s not as easy as I thought,”
“This is a war. That means maximum enemy combatant casualties and minimum collateral casualties. How’s my record so far?”
“Pretty damned good,” William was forced to admit.
“Pretty damned good,” repeated Joe. “Almost perfect,”
“And what happens when the police finally corner you? How many of them are going to get hurt?”
“Zero,”
“How can you be so sure?”
“The police didn’t have anything to do with Foster’s death or anyone else that those animals have hurt while they roam the streets, doing as they wish with complete impunity. If the police corner me, I’ll go willingly and leave the rest up to you,”
“It’s more likely that they’ll catch a break or find a witness and then issue a warrant for your arrest,”
“If that happens, I have a plan,”
“Oh, you have a plan? Care to share it with me?”
“Not all of it, but I’ll tell you what you need to know. The first thing they will do if that happens is call you, right? Because they have no idea where I am,”
“That’s the usual procedure, yes,”
“Just drop a dime to me, and I’ll handle the rest,” Joe assured him.
◆◆◆
“Detective! Detective Sims! Can I speak to you for a moment?” Cody was hustling from the door of Houston Police Headquarters toward his unmarked cruiser, parked by the curb on Travis Street. Whoever this guy was, he had obviously been waiting for him. He began walking alongside the detective and matching his brisk pace, holding up a wireless microphone. He had a press badge and ID card dangling on a lanyard around his neck with a CNN logo on them. They were joined a few seconds later by a cameraman following at arm’s length, almost running to keep up.
“No comment, and I don’t do ambush interviews,” The reporter ignored him and continued.
“Are you the detective investigating the vigilante attacks on Houston street gangs?” Stony silence from Cody as he tried to walk faster. “Do you think the vigilante would be so active if the police department had focused more resources on curbing gang violence?” Still nothing. “Do you have any suspects? Do you think that the sniper who shot up the auto shop in Third Ward last night is the same person who committed a drive-by last week and set off a bomb in someone’s house?” Cody was getting agitated. “Do you think this would be happening if you had quickly solved the case of the carjacking and shooting in Midtown last month? Does it bother you that public opinion seems to be with the vigilante?” Cody became visibly angry hearing the last two questions, just as he arrived at the door of his car.
“All open cases are given ample resources and energy. No matter what the
outcome is of any investigation, it is never okay for someone to take the law into their own hands. The person or persons responsible for the recent violence in Third Ward will be found and arrested. Now get out of my face,” he jumped in his car and slammed the door before the reporter could spit out another question.
◆◆◆
“So, what did we get by convincing the last four to turn snitch?” Lieutenant Franks asked, leaning as far back in his desk chair as he could and lacing his fingers behind his head. Brittany Scott and Lieutenant Lakefield sat across from him in a pair of decidedly less comfortable chairs than the one he occupied.
“Biggie and Bullet are talking. Needle and Kanya haven’t had any contact with Danton and don’t know anything useful, so they’re still pretty combative. They just want to use the deal as a get-out-of-jail-free card. Unfortunately, none of them knows much more than what we already have,” Brittany skimmed through her shorthand notes on the legal pad. “He drives a beat-up old suburban with shiny new wheels and bumpers, plus unpainted ground effects. Biggie’s description is closer to him than what we had, but he failed to correctly pick him out of a photo lineup,”
“How did you get a photo for a lineup?” Franks raised an eyebrow.
“Sims pulled his driver’s license photo,” answered Lakefield.
“Does it actually look like him?”
“Not much,” admitted Johnny Le as he walked into the office. “Sims and I just got done shaking the four of them down again. No joy. They’re under guard in the conference room on the homicide deck, but can’t stay there forever. One more thing. Sims told me that he was accosted by a CNN reporter with a cameraman this morning. The story may be moving from the local paper to the cable news today,”
“What did he tell them?” Franks sat up, suddenly concerned.
“Basically, to fuck off. He says they were just starting to get under his skin when he jumped in his car,”
“Sims has been on the force for a long time,” piped up Lakefield. “He won’t compromise the investigation. What do we do with the four dingleberries up in homicide? We haven’t got grounds to hold them, and they won’t willingly stay around the clock in a conference room,”
“WitSec?” suggested Le.
“The marshals will laugh at us and hang up, with the useless little bit they have provided. Plus, the DA and judge will never sign off,” Brittany shook her head.
“Well, let’s break up this party for now,” moaned Franks. “LT, you hang back and we’ll call the Cap on speaker,” he leaned over to Lakefield. “Maybe we can get him to authorize a hotel room and around the clock guard,”
◆◆◆
“Good, I’m glad you’re here,” William barged in through the hotel room door as Joe opened it. “I was almost to my office when a guy in the DA’s office who used to work for me called. I hustled straight back here to tell you,”
“Good morning to you, too! Chirped Joe, pouring another cup of coffee from the tiny pot above the mini-bar. He had been up since William’s call the night before, smoothing out details on the ongoing project in the Energy Corridor via his laptop, and was ready for a break. Sleep wasn’t an option at the moment, lest he be visited again by cruel visions of his family or a grungy Balkan personality cult.
“HPD swept up the last four blood brothers from the street and jail yesterday. They gave them an immunity deal if they help bust you,”
“Interesting. I doubt they can help much-“
“One blew the photo lineup and the others swear they’ve never seen you,” William interrupted. “That’s all I know so far, but I’ve got eyes and ears around there,”
“Okay, this just means that I need to step up the pace. Time to stop toying with them and put them on the other side of the grass,”
“They’re sequestered in the Courtyard Hotel across from HPD on Main with a 24-hour guard. You won’t get near them,”
“I’ll leave the lawyering to you. You leave those things to me,” Joe stated flatly.
Chapter 21
The blue Charger leaned sluggishly around the final corner on Joe’s route back to his house and he tapped the accelerator for one last lunge of horsepower, then coasted the rest of the way. As he rolled just past the driveway, he veered crookedly in the street and stopped, then backed into his driveway. A white pickup truck with red stripes down the sides was parked at the curb. The arson investigator was there, as he’d said he would be in a voicemail left for Joe a day earlier.
Climbing over the safety cage’s angled door bar to get out of the car, Joe took off his glasses and wiped the sweat from his face and head with an open hand. The Charger didn’t have air conditioning, but he felt like driving it today. Forgoing the 5-point safety harness dangling behind the driver’s seat could have gotten him a ticket, but he had decided to chance it, just as he had done every time he drove it on the street. The belt would get more use if he could make it to the track more often.
“Mr. Danton?” A man in heavy boots, jeans, and a black tee-shirt with a Houston Fire Department logo on the front ducked under the crime scene tape stretched across the open front door. An arson investigator’s badge was clipped to his belt.
“I’m Joe Danton,” he extended a hand as the two approached each other on the front walk.
“John Conyers, HFD Arson,” the man introduced himself as he gave Joe a beefy handshake. He had bits of soot and dust on his shirt and jeans, and wet rings encircled his armpits. The house was also not air-conditioned in its current state.
“Got a final report for me and my insurance company?” Joe got straight to business.
“It’ll be ready by the end of business today. I just needed to take one last look here, so I thought I would have you meet me,” The broken floor tiles, melted rug, and bits of glass crunched under their feet as they walked in. “People usually have a few last-minute questions or comments for me before I button up my report, so I ask them to come to the site of the fire on my last visit,”
“Nah, just a Cliff-Notes version of the report will be fine for now. I’ll call my insurance adjuster and tell her that your report will be in her email in the morning,”
“Definitely arson. The fire was started on the outside wall on the south side of the house, at about chest height. Someone walked up, held a lighter to it until it caught, and then walked away,”
“Simple as that?”
“Simple as that, except we don’t know who. Do you have any enemies? Pissed anyone off lately?”
Joe frowned. Detective Sims had gotten to the investigator. This wasn’t just a courtesy meet-up. It was a fishing expedition.
“No, although Sergeant Detective Sims seems to think otherwise,” Joe gave him a hard look to show that he had no reservations about shutting him down quickly.
“I guess that wasn’t as subtle as I had hoped,”
“No, it was perfectly subtle, but I don’t do subtle. You’re better off being straight up with me,” Joe wiped the sweat from his brow, then turned and wandered down the hall toward a bedroom.
“In that case, they want to know what’s in your safe. I got the feeling that they’ll seek a warrant to drill it if you don’t open it willingly,”
“It’s got multiple glass re-lockers. If they try to drill it, they’ll never get it open. Doesn’t matter. I’ll open it for you right now,” He turned on his heel into the room, making a creak and a crunch on the burned floor.
◆◆◆
The whoosh of air-conditioning was a welcome relief from the heat as John started up his truck and headed down the street, peering in his rearview mirror at Joe standing by the sleek blue Charger, looking after him. He grabbed his cell phone and tapped a few buttons.
“Homicide, Sims,” came the almost immediate answer over the truck’s Bluetooth.
“It’s Conyers. I just parted ways with Danton,”
“Did he suspect anything?”
“He was onto me almost as soon as I said the first sentence,”
“
I thought he would be. The guy’s pretty slick. So, nothing on the shootings?”
“Not a damn thing,”
“Was he cooperative about the safe?”
“Walked right to it and opened it when I brought it up,”
“Anything for us to match?”
“Negative. All long guns. No .223, no .45, no 6.5, nothing full auto, and definitely not a grenade launcher. Just a couple of hunting rifles and an AK. .243, 12-gauge, .410, single-shot .22, stuff like that. One helluva arsenal, but nothing that matches your crime scenes,”
“Yeah, I guess that would have been too easy. I wouldn’t keep a gatling gun or a grenade launcher in a bedroom safe, either,”
◆◆◆
Once the arson investigator was around the corner and completely out of sight, Joe waited another full minute and then doubled back into the house. He crunched down the hall to the side door and cut across the dog-run into the relatively unscathed garage. Yanking the nylon cord, he pulled down a folding ship’s ladder to the garage crawl space and hustled up into the tiny attic. Pulling a small flashlight from his back pocket, he shined it around at the boxes of clutter and stored Christmas decorations. Nothing was where he had left it. Streaks and lines of disturbed dust and dirt were the tell-tale signs that John Conyers had been there, leaving no stone unturned. He pushed and shoved giant plastic Tupperware tubs and wireframe reindeer around until he found the box he was looking for. It was behind his backpack from a walk on the Appalachian Trail in his twenties and the flaps were folded in such a way that it had clearly been opened, but the box’s contents were undisturbed. He laid the box down, dumping the contents onto the plywood decking. At the bottom was a faded, torn, and very old Adidas shoebox. Joe grabbed it and tossed the top aside, revealing contents that had not seen the light of day in years. It was leftover fireworks from the 4th of July before the death of his family, saved for a subsequent new year’s celebration that never came. It was all toddler-friendly stuff: paper tanks and hens, shower cones, and a few packages of Jamie’s favorite, sparklers.
