WALKABOUT - Taking a Mulligan (21 - 25)

Walkabout

Taking a Mulligan

Wayne Baker writing as Austin Jett

21

Sheriff Bridges opened his cell phone. There was a voicemail message from Larry Brown, owner of the local junk yard. Larry was a shady character. Ran a junk salvage yard which also served as a chop shop and a dog fighting venue on his property. The sheriff turned a blind eye to it, and Larry gave him a cut of the action. That and the pick of the litter whenever his Tosa Inu bitch had pups. Larry would keep and feed the dog, train it to fight. Sheriff Bridges enjoyed watching the fights from Larry’s “Executive Suite”, a ratty office with an acrylic two-way mirror set above the pit. It was always good to have a dog in the fight.

Every now and then, Larry felt a sense of civic duty. From the sound of the voicemail, apparently today was one of those times. “Yeah, it’s me, Larry Brown. I had a guy come by ‘bout a half an hour ago—GOD DAMN IT LEON, PUT IT BACK!—‘bout half a hour ago, wantin’ to know could I fix his Dodge truck. Said it was banged up pretty bad. Said he hit a cow out on Davis Meyer Road. One of the Amish’s. So anyways, I said sure, and—GOD DAMN IT LEON! I DONE TOLD YOU—” and then the message timed out.

The sheriff turned west and headed toward Larry Brown’s place. While driving, he found Perry Winter’s name in Contacts, made the call.

Perry Winter’s cell phone rang. “Hello, Mike.”

“Perry, we need to talk.”

“Meet me at Trudy’s. Ten minutes.”

“Make it an hour. I need to drop by Larry Brown’s place on the way back into town.”

22

Perry Winters was seated in a corner booth in Trudy’s Uptown Diner. Sheriff Bridges slid in opposite him. Before they could exchange greetings, the waitress appeared out of thin air. “What can I get you today, Sheriff?”

“Just a coffee, thanks.” Sheriff Bridges waited until she was out of earshot. “Sorry to keep you waiting, Perry. It took a little longer than I thought it would at Larry’s,” he said. “Larry’s got a honey badger out there. Don’t ask me where he found it. I don’t want to know. He’s going to put it up against a couple of dogs next week. The dog owners pay an entry fee. Two grand apiece. Larry matches it. Last one standing wins. Winner takes all. Of course, with all the gambling, Larry wins even if he loses.”

“You gotta give it to Larry,” Winters said, “He’s an entrepreneur, and a hell of a promoter.”

“Anyway, just before I got there, Larry’s cousin Leon got the honey badger out of its cage,” The sheriff laughed as he spoke. “He wanted to pet it. It bit him on the nose and jumped out of his arms. It didn’t get outside the shop, but it damn near tore the building down.” The sheriff chuckled. “Larry was pissed. And Leon’s bleeding like a stuck hog.”

Winters had just taken a sip of water, and it came out through his nose. He sat there, simultaneously laughing and choking with the image of Larry and Leon chasing a honey badger. “Oh, God!” he said, wiping tears from his eyes. “Leon!”

The sheriff waited for Winters to get over the choking spell. “On a more somber note, Larry gave me a lead on that hit and run that killed the Carmichael twins.”

Winters raised an eyebrow. “Larry Brown’s a snitch?”

“Larry is what he is and he ain’t what he ain’t,” Sheriff Bridges said. “He is a career criminal. But, he is also someone I can count on when I need him. So yeah, I tend to look the other way where he’s concerned. That’s the way it works. But, Larry ain’t someone who will repair a truck for cash money under the table, no dealing with an insurance company, so that a hit and run driver can get away with killing two little girls. He did take two hundred bucks cash up front, got the address where he could come pick up the truck with his wrecker later tonight. I’ll follow along, and make the arrest, make it look like I’m following an anonymous tip. Gotta protect Larry’s credibility as a badass.”

“So that’s what you wanted to tell me?” Winters asked. “I mean, I am glad to hear it, but …” he leaned in, raised his eyebrows and lowered his voice, “anyone I know?”

“Can’t talk about it. Shouldn’t have said anything. Keep it to yourself. And, no, that’s not why I wanted to meet with you.”

“Okay, what then?”

“The security guard at Lanter Construction, a guy named Hamilton—”

“Tyler Hamilton? Dianna’s husband?”

“You know him?”

“Not very well. His wife goes to our church. Nice lady. Don’t see him there, except maybe on Easter. A security guard, you say? I thought he was a pilot.”

“Anyway—”

“No, now that I think about it, I remember Dianna saying he’d retired from flying, some time back.”

“Okay,” Bridges sighed heavily. “Whatever. He’s the guy who was working security out at Lanter Construction the night that your son and my niece were . . .”

“Associating with the wrong sort of people,” Winters said.

“Exactly.”

The sheriff waited while the waitress set his coffee on the table for him. “There you go,” she said with a smile. “You want creamer for that?”

“No, thanks,” he said.

“Either of you need anything else, just let me know.”

Sheriff Bridges nodded. “We will.” She went to another table, and he turned his attention back to Winters. “Seems this guy Hamilton’s found a video camera.”

“Where at?”

“On your property. In the pasture out behind your crematory.”

“What the hell was it doing there?”

“Beats me,” the sheriff said. “Look, Perry, I looked, and this camera has something you need to see.”

“Okay, let’s have a look.”

“Not here. I’ll leave now. You wait a few minutes, then come meet me at the Target parking lot.”

23

At the southwest corner of the Target parking lot, far from any other vehicles or shoppers, Perry Winters slid into the front passenger seat of the Sheriff’s cruiser. “What’s with all the cloak and dagger, Mike?”

Sheriff Bridges handed him the camcorder. “See for yourself. Just hit the play button.”

It was dark. Maybe in a park. A young girl in a short skirt walked up to a lump of something on the ground and stopped. “That’s my niece, Shelby,” Sheriff Bridges said.

Whoever was operating the camera began speaking to someone. “Check it out! She’s standing right over him.”

“And that voice belongs to my son, Jimmy,” Winters said.

There was some off-camera snickering by at least two people as the girl poked the lump with the toe of her shoe. The lump on the ground moved. It was a man, a homeless guy, by all appearances.

The off-camera voice of Jimmy Winters said, “You believe this? She’s letting him look right up her skirt!” The snickers gave way to laughter.

The homeless man sat up, engaged the girl in conversation. She turned and walked—sashayed, really—toward the camera. As she got close, in better light under a streetlamp, Shelby Meyers came close to the camera and spoke directly into it. “He said okay,” she tossed her head back, laughing. “He said he’ll do it.”

“All right!” another off-camera voices said.

“You recognize that voice, Perry?” the sheriff asked.

Winters shook his head.

“I can’t believe she actually did that!” Jimmy’s voice again.

“Okay,” Winters said. “That was interesting, but not really all that much to it.”

“Oh, but wait,” Sheriff Bridges said. “There’s more.”

The next video was a bit of a shock to Winters. The sheriff had already seen it once, in his cruiser, so it didn’t have quite the impact as the first time. Still, it made him very uneasy.

Two homeless men, punching, kicking, gouging and grappling on the ground. A half-dozen or so young people shouting encouragement, laughing. A royal blue party van in the background, loud music coming from its audio system. Occasional lightning flashes.

“Bum fights,” Winters said. “Kids find a couple of homeless guys and give them a few bucks to kick one another’s teeth in. They get it on video, then post it on the internet.”

“What’s this world coming to?” Sheriff Bridges shook his head. “Every time I think I’ve seen it all . . .”

One of the men gained a distinct advantage over the other, and began pounding his opponent mercilessly. No one stepped in to stop it.

The man on the ground, in desperation, grabbed a rock and brought it square against the head of his attacker. And the fight was over.

Lots of cheers, whooping and shouting. And then, someone said, “Dude, I think this guy’s dead!”

Winters looked at the sheriff. “Idiots!”

“It gets worse,” Bridges said. And it did. The two men watched as the video continued. The argument over money. The discussion about the merits of calling 911. Jimmy Winters saying that he worked at the crematory.

And then, later, one more video clip. The chasing down of the lone survivor of the fight. Darkness, mostly. The only light came from headlamps on ATVs, occasional lightning, and a searchlight. That clip ended before they could catch him.

“I’m guessing this fellow they are chasing was the one that the security guard at Lanter Construction saw.”

Bridges nodded. “No doubt.”

“Anyone besides the two of us seen this?”

“Hamilton swore to God he hadn’t looked at it.”

“That’s good.”

“Except that when I picked it up at his house, it was fully charged and turned on.”

“We can’t let this come to the surface, Mike. It will destroy both our families,” Winters said. “Not to mention it could lead to other things coming to light. Things that could be very damaging to us both.”

“I agree.”

“Any idea who the other kids were? The ones that were off camera?”

“Shelby tried to lie at first. Made up some bullshit story about it being fake, but in the end . . . Well, she’s my sister’s baby, so I had to handle her with kid gloves. Let’s just say I convinced her that it was better to tell me than for someone else to find out.”

“So you got names?”

“I did.” The sheriff flipped open his note pad. “There were six, counting Jimmy and Shelby,” he said. “Chuck Coffey—”

“The basketball player? The one going to IU on a scholarship?”

“Yup. Benny Harris. Tina Gibson.”

“Don’t know either one of them,” Winters said. “Oh, wait . . . Tina Gibson . . . Would that be Wade and Cindy Gibson’s daughter?”

“Could be,” the sheriff said. “I’ll check.” He paused, made a note next to the name. “Doug Blanchette.  He’s no stranger to the department. We’ve busted him a few times for possession with intent to distribute. That was his party van. Dumbass kid. No job, drives something like that, with orange stripes that just scream ‘Look at me!’ and then can’t understand why we keep an eye on him. Who can afford a rig like that? You should see it. He’s got a bar and a plasma TV in there. Leather couch. Hell, there’s even a galley and a lav. Gotta be dealing. I can’t wait until we catch the little bastard transporting contraband in that van. I’ll confiscate it and use it for a mobile command post.” Bridges laughed. “Ten to one, he’s the one brought the party supplies.”

“Name doesn’t ring a bell,” Winters said. “That everyone?”

Sheriff Bridges nodded. “Yup. Except, Shelby talked with one of her friends.” He checked his notepad again. “Dani Henderson.”

“Oh, my God!” Winters exclaimed. “That’s our preacher’s daughter.”

“We have to get this under control, right away, Perry,” the sheriff said. “Painful as it may be.”

“I know,” Winters nodded. “And we need to assume the worst with regard to Mr. Hamilton.” Winters slammed the palm of his hand on the dashboard. “God damn it!” There was a long pause. Winters spoke again. “That’s where your friend comes in,” he said. “The one who helped us last August.”

Bridges nodded, grim-faced. “I’ll give him a call.” Then, as an afterthought, “but, just so you know, he’s not my friend.”

24

No two jobs are alike for a contract killer. That was what made it so interesting for the man in the silver Toyota Camry. It wasn’t the act of killing itself. Although he never hesitated to do it, he took no particular pleasure in it. It was the challenges that had to be overcome. The thrill of the hunt. “Improvise, adapt, and overcome,” like the Marines always say. Find a way to get it done. It was never personal, and he kept the suffering to an absolute minimum. It was a matter of professionalism, after all.

This particular job should not prove to be too difficult. All he had to do was stick around and kill the guy, do the one other job, and then go home and pack for his trip.

The hardest part was staying awake until the guy returned in his boat. He powered the Camry window down perhaps an inch, in order to better hear the outboard motor that would signal the approach of his intended target. It helped to think of those he was hired to kill as targets rather than people. And he never once considered any of them to be innocent victims. If they were really innocent, they would not have contracts on their lives. Except for the kids. But, he’d done it in the war and he’d told himself then that they were collateral casualties. Wrong place. Wrong time. Wrong parents. It had only gotten to him once. Now, every year, on the anniversary of his one big mistake, Jared Mulligan visited the grave of the innocent child he had buried in an unmarked grave in Illinois.

He looked at the photograph of the man he’d been sent to kill and thought, ‘Hmm. He looks a lot like me.’ Ironically, under other circumstances, he had killed a handful of other men throughout the country for no pay at all, for no other reason than they bore a striking resemblance to him. But not this fellow. He flipped the photograph over, looked at the name. This was work. And besides, Ty Hamilton had too much baggage.

Why anyone would be out on the water with a storm coming was beyond his imagination. Fishing and golf. Two completely different hobbies, but the people who pursued them all shared one thing in common. They were all raving lunatics.

A mosquito took advantage of the partially-opened driver’s-side window and flew inside the car to buzz around the inside of his ear. The man cursed, pressed a finger inside his ear to mash the mosquito, and closed the window. After a few minutes, the interior of the car began to get stuffy, or perhaps it was his imagination. Even as a child, he had always felt stifled in enclosed spaces. He started the engine. There was plenty of gas in the car, and he could sit there running the air conditioner for hours if necessary. It would increase the level of difficulty somewhat. With the window up and the air conditioner blower on, he would not hear the boat as it drew near. Backed into the parking space as he was, he should still have no problem seeing it.

He’d waited two hours already for this Hamilton guy, but that came with the job. Early on in his career, to avoid death by boredom, he’d learned to bring along a crossword puzzle or a book to help pass the time. Nowadays he carried an iPad with and plenty of e-books to choose from on the Kindle App.

He was more at home in the city, but this remote location did offer its advantages. For one, he could do his job without having to worry about witnesses. In an urban area, he would have to limit himself to minimal consumption of liquids while sitting in the car. When nature called, he would’ve had to make use of a wide-mouth plastic jug, something he never went without on such an assignment. He’d become quite adept at pissing in a jug while seated without getting any on himself. It was an acquired skill, although not one that would ever be found on a resume. Today, though, it didn’t matter. There was no one around, maybe for miles. No need to go without water and suffer dehydration headaches. He’d consumed three bottles, and now it was time to empty his bladder.

He left the key in the ignition—you never know when you’ll need to make a quick departure. As a precaution against locking himself out, he left the door slightly ajar. It would also allow him to get back in more quickly. Unnecessary precautions, perhaps, but precautions were what had kept him alive all this time. He walked a dozen yards or so away from the car to the boat launch, unzipped his fly and began to piss into the river, enjoying the freedom of being able to do such a thing in the great outdoors—it was a guy thing, he supposed—and just as he finished, he sensed rather than heard the presence of another.

Being a professional, he showed no outward sign of fear, nothing to betray any sense of alarm that he felt. He slowly, imperceptibly inhaled deeply, zipped up, and turned around. When he recognized the familiar face, he exhaled, and his shoulders sagged in relief. “Oh, it’s you!” he smiled. “Jesus, you scared the hell out of me.” Then, “What are you doing here?” He saw the hand move, knew what it meant, and dove into the river just as the forty-five caliber hollow point tore into his right shoulder.

25

Ty Hamilton

Heavy thunderstorms were rapidly approaching.  The weather system had come to life as a tropical depression in the Atlantic, built itself up to a tropical storm as it skirted through the Florida Straits, and eventually became a full-fledged hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. After making landfall in the Pensacola area and wreaking havoc on the Gulf coast, it had meandered up through the southern states. What was left of it was now working its way north into the Midwest, making the storm that had blown through my last night on the job look like a non-event. Judging by the darkening sky and the rumbling thunder, it was almost upon me.

I decided to call an early end to my day. The fishing hadn’t been all that good anyway. I’d caught and released a couple of catfish in the three to four pound range. With all the chemical runoff and sewage that gets in the water, it’s just not safe to eat anything taken from the river anymore.

My mind wasn’t really on fishing anyway. I went out on the river, as I often do, to just get away, to have a little time alone, sort things out. On the river, for me anyway, it seems like all things are possible. The river eventually feeds into the ocean. From there you can go anywhere. Do anything. Be whoever you want to be. You are free. All things are possible.

Just to give you an idea, here’s how the day that would forever change my life had started:

I’d just gotten back from taking Pepper for a walk so he could do his business, and was seated at the kitchen table eating cereal when my wife, Dianna shuffled into the kitchen in her bathrobe. She yawned and poured a cup of coffee, then turned her attention toward me. “What are you doing today?”

I shrugged. “Thought I might go fishing.”

“Fishing.” She sighed heavily, scowled and shook her head. “Heaven forbid you go out and look for a job,” she muttered.

“Sorry.” I said.

“And what exactly is it that are you sorry for, Ty?”

“For whatever I did. Or said. Or you dreamed that I did or said,” I replied, adding, “Sorry for believing that this time Travis was going to follow through on something. Sorry I took the security job. Definitely sorry I took the early retirement.” Sorry I walked across the room to introduce myself way back when. But I didn’t say that.

I stood there, imagining a parallel universe where Ty Hamilton had chosen Door Number 2, and stayed single, what his life must be like. Dianna rolled her eyes, slowly shook her head, and exhaled. “So now you wish you were still flying? All you used to talk about was how you couldn’t wait to retire.”

She had me there. For the last few years of my career, I was burned out. Being gone two weeks or more at a time, living out of a suitcase. Missing holidays, birthdays and anniversaries. Battling thunderstorms, gusty crosswinds on snow-packed runways, icing, freezing rain, and fog. Suffering sleep deprivation and, every now and then, a copilot with a bad attitude. Like many airline pilots, I no longer appreciated the good things—flying jets around the world, going places other people only read about or see on television, staying in four and five star hotels, making damn good money. I thought I was burned out on flying. Turns out, all I really needed was a long vacation.

“I just wanted more time at home,” I said as I took my empty bowl to rinse it and put it in the dishwasher, the way Dianna insisted on doing it. Rinse it clean and then put it in the dishwasher. I never saw the point in that, but after thirty-plus years living with a woman, you learn to go with the flow.

Dianna leaned back against the kitchen counter, sipping from her “World’s Greatest Mom” cup. She wasn’t aware of it, but her robe was slightly open, accidentally giving me a peek at her ample bosom.  Seeing her like that, I felt something stirring south of my belt buckle. Despite the fact that we appeared to be heading for another argument, I decided to turn on the old Hamilton charm, make my best move on her, knowing the odds were against success. “And now I can spend some of that time with the woman I love,” I said as I slipped both arms around her and leaned in for a kiss.”

She turned her head. “I haven’t brushed my teeth yet.”

“A little morning breath never killed anyone.” I leaned in again.

“Look, I’m just not in the mood today, Ty.” She slipped out of my grasp and left me standing there.

“Help me out here, Dianna,” I said. “I’m trying to remember the last time you were in the mood. Two months ago? No, longer than that. More like three, maybe four?”

“Enjoy your fishing trip,” she said, her voice dull, monotone.

I reached out, gently placed my hand on her upper arm. “Look,” I said. “Getting fired hurts. Even from a dead-end job that pays peanuts. I’m going to give myself a few days, okay?” I said.  “I need to lick my wounds. Get my head back on straight. I don’t want to just jump at the first thing that comes along.” “Plus, I am a bit overqualified for most jobs . . . You know how it is.”

Dianna wasn’t ready to declare a truce. “I do know how it is, Tyler,” she said. “I know you should be out looking for a job. I know you should sell that stupid boat! And get rid of your motorcycle! Why a man your age thinks he has any business riding around on one of those things is beyond me. I’ll tell you one thing—I’m not going to be the one spoon-feeding you and wiping your ass for the next twenty years if you wrap that thing around a tree and are paralyzed from the neck down.

“And, I know why you don’t want to go looking for a job. You’re used to being in charge. You were a captain for what, twenty years? And the idea of taking orders from someone else is hard for you to accept.”

“Well hell, Di,” I lashed out. “I should be used to taking orders by now. I’ve been married to you for thirty-some years.”

I had done it again. Dianna glared at me. She said nothing, just turned and walked away, back toward the bedroom. The bedroom I would not likely see anytime soon.

I hated to admit it, but she was right. An older guy like me, with my background, would not be inclined to take any crap from some snot-nosed twenty-something MBA middle-management asswipe.

So, that is how people like me end up working security jobs all alone in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere. Except now I wasn’t even doing that. I’d been fired. There is nothing worse than a man with time on his hands.