Loose Ends (33 page)

“Did Damien sanction this?”

“Don't know. But they do know that someone in the club is rattin'. The heat is really on.”

“They had to figure that out once you let them know that we knew who Rolly and Wizard murdered. This doesn't really change anything as far as you go.”

“Yeah, I guess not, but it's getting' pretty damn uncomfortable.”

“We'll look after you.”

“So now what?” asked Danny. “What are they going to do next?”

“I asked. Wizard said we're not to do anything right now. He promised to let me know if that was going to change.”

“You're sure about that?” asked Jack.

“That's what he said. We got orders to sit tight. Wiz did say that things will change after the election. He's confident that he'll beat out Damien.” Lance looked at Jack and asked, “There was somethin' you were going to get me to do?”

“I was going to get you to put more pressure on Wizard and Rolly this week, but things are too
hot right now. We better wait a week or so and see what happens.”

“You're fuckin' right things are hot! Waitin' is fine by me.”

Lance agreed to stay in touch and was walking away when Jack said, “One more thing!”

“Yeah? What's that?”

“Just out of curiosity, are you packin'?”

Lance lifted his jacket slightly to expose the handle of the 9 mm. “You're fuckin' right I'm packin'! If I'd seen another shovel I would've used it to bury you both!”

Jack smiled, then said, “Take care of yourself, Lance.”

Jack and Danny stood in the cemetery and watched Lance drive away. Moments later they heard the metallic sound of a bolt sliding in a rifle.

Jack turned and said, “Louie, you look like a bloody ninja. Except for the white socks!”

Louie looked quickly at his feet. “You asshole! They're black!”

“You weren't sure, though, were you? I don't know, Louie. I think you're getting old.”

“Not so old that I couldn't kick your ass!”

Danny interjected. “Listen guys, if it's okay with you, I want to get going. I told Susan I'd call her and Calgary's an hour ahead of us.”

Jack gave Danny an extra key to his apartment and told him to go ahead. He said he wanted to make sure that Louie didn't get lost in the graveyard and then stop at the office to put in a quick report for Isaac to read in the morning.

Danny let himself in through the main entrance of the apartment building and walked across the lighted lobby to the elevators.

From across the street, Damien and The Suit sat in a car looking out through the tinted windows. The Suit lowered his binoculars and said, “That's O'Reilly!” Damien took a quick glimpse through the binoculars, then picked up a portable radio.

“Pork chop number two just entered through the main entrance.”

Whiskey Jake, who was the president of the east-side chapter, sat in a van parked in the underground parking lot of the building. With him were Sparks, Thumper, and Two-Forty Gordy.

Whiskey Jake thumbed the radio and said, “Copy that.”

A couple of minutes later, Damien gave another message: “Lights just went on. He's in the apartment. It's up to you guys now.”

“No problem,” replied Whiskey Jake.

Damien glanced at Bishop and said, “I'm taking you to your car.”

“No, I want to see it,” said The Suit. “I want to see them beg for their lives!”

Damien grabbed The Suit by the front of his jacket, jerking him halfway across the seat. “You put my family and everyone in the club at risk today! I'm not selling ringside seats here! This isn't a fucking game you're watching!”

Twenty minutes later, Damien stopped a block from where The Suit's car was parked. Neither man had spoken a word. The Suit got out and slammed the door as he left.

Two hours later, Jack drove into the underground parking lot and parked in his stall. A minute later, he opened the metal door leading to the alcove where the elevators
were. He stepped inside and saw that he wasn't alone. The man facing him was wearing a ski mask.

Jack's adrenal glands instantly electrified his body, but it was too late to prevent the solid kick he received to his groin. His knees wobbled as two more men grabbed each of his arms from behind. The pain made him want to vomit.

He was slammed face down on the concrete floor. He could see the square-toed boots of the man who had kicked him. A small piece of leather was curled back off the end of one of the boots. He wondered, briefly, if it was the result of someone being kicked in the teeth, then thought it ironic that he would think of that when he was about to die. A hand jerked his pistol out of his holster, and he braced himself for the shot.

Seconds later, his eyes and mouth were plastered with duct tape. He hands were bound behind his back and his ankles were also wrapped. They found the knife he carried for undercover duties and slid it out of its scabbard. He was then lifted off the ground by his arms and dragged out the door. He heard the sound of a sliding door and was tossed inside a van. Perhaps he had been optimistic, thinking that his life would end so quickly.
They want to know who the informant is first
, he realized.

He felt someone remove his keys from his pocket. Nobody had spoken a word. He heard the sliding door again as some of the men left the van. He had a sickening feeling that he knew why they had taken his keys.

His body rolled against a metal bar under a seat as the van sped away.

Danny was sitting on the sofa watching television when he heard the sound of the key in the apartment door. “Good, you're back!” he hollered. “I feel like a drink.”
He heard the footsteps behind him and said, “I talked with Susan. She's scared but she's okay.”

Danny felt the cold barrel of a pistol in his ear. He snapped his head around, and the barrel of the pistol obscured the vision of one eye. The man holding the pistol was wearing a ski mask. He looked past him and saw two other men. They were also wearing ski masks — and they were also pointing pistols at him.

Jack estimated an hour had passed before the van came to a stop. During the trip, he vowed that he would never release Lance's name. He would quickly give them a few names, then hold out for as long as possible — and finally give them Rolly.

He thought of other things. He wished that he had a chance to tell Natasha that he loved her one more time. He wished that he could apologize to Susan for failing to protect her husband, and somehow to Tiffany, for giving her a life without a father.

The sliding door of the van opened and he was hauled out by the arms and dragged across rough ground before being placed in a kneeling position.

The minutes ticked by and all he heard was the engine noise from a couple of vehicles. He started to lose his balance and felt himself falling forward, but a hand grabbed him by the hair and jerked him back into position. The duct tape was unwrapped from around his eyes.

Jack blinked and strained his eyes to see. Headlights behind him cast light and shadows across a construction site. He stared down at a hollow wall of rough planks interwoven with metal bars. He was kneeling in front of a large pit that had been dug out of the ground to build a basement. The construction was at the stage where the forms had been prepared for the pouring of the cement floor.

Jack looked behind him but was blinded by the high-beam headlights of a van and a car. He glanced down at the feet of a man standing beside him. He could make out the same square-toed boots and realized that his groin still ached. The man was no longer wearing a ski mask and sneered down at him. He recognized him from photographs of the east-side chapter as someone who went by the nickname of Thumper. Two more men approached from out of the headlights, and one of them used Jack's knife to cut the tape wrapped around the back of his neck before peeling it off his mouth. Jack recognized him as a striker from the same chapter. The striker handed the knife to the third man, who commanded, “Leave us!”

Thumper and the striker walked back and disappeared behind the headlights. Jack recognized Damien's face as he stepped closer.

“Do you know who I am, Officer Taggart?”

Jack looked up at his face. “Sure I do, Damien. Please, call me Jack. I hate formalities. Excuse me for not shaking hands.”

Damien did not appear to be amused. “Let's get to the point. What do you think the point is, Jack?”

“The point is, you fucked up this morning by trying to kill my partner and his wife and baby. Now you're fucking up again!”

“I can understand why you would think that. Tell me, why do you think you ended up out here?”

“You want me to give you the name of someone. Good luck. Let the games begin! What will you start with? Water and a cattle prod?”

“Interesting tip. Tell me, Jack, just out of curiosity, what name would you yell out first?”

“Yours!”

A wry smile flashed across Damien's face, and then he said, “That's what I thought. I know we've got a rat in our club. I accept that. It happens, and it is something that will be dealt with. Unfortunately for you, others don't accept it quite as easily as I do, which brings us to the point of our meeting here.”

“The point being?”

“The point being that sometimes large organizations have internal problems that need to be dealt with. You referred to an incident this morning. I had no knowledge about that incident until after it happened. I admit that someone in my organization may have been impetuous. I have since rectified the situation.”

“Impetuous! Is that what you call committing murder? I don't care if you sanctioned it or not. You're in charge, and that makes you responsible!”

“I agree. I must, and do, accept responsibility for what happened. However, it would hardly be fair for other … innocent people to get hurt simply because someone acted foolishly.”

“What are you implying?”

“You're hardly the person to ask what I'm implying! You know full well what I'm saying! You and I are in different clubs, but we're very much alike.”

“Alike? That's bullshit! I don't kidnap and murder people!”

“Kidnap? Murder? I brought you here to save lives! That's the whole point! You need to know that if I wanted you dead, you would be.”

Damien then took the knife and slashed the tape from Jack's ankles and wrists.

Jack got to his feet and asked, “What about my partner?”

“He's okay. Probably relaxing in a tub right now.”

“So you don't plan on committing any murders today?”

Damien leaned close and hissed, “Don't you, of all people, stand there and accuse me of murder! You're only alive because the others didn't figure it out!”

“Figure what out?”

“The switch! When you get home, wash your jacket. You've got an oil stain on the back from crawling under vehicles!”

Jack found himself at a loss for words.

Damien scowled and said, “I bet you and your partner had a good laugh over that one.”

“He doesn't know. He thinks it was an accident.”

“Loose lips?”

“I prefer to call it a need-to-know basis. He didn't need to know.”

“Just as well. Do you give me your word that we're even for what happened this morning?”

Jack thought for a moment, then quietly said, “Yes.”

Damien handed him his knife and pistol. Jack checked the pistol and saw that it was fully loaded.

Damien then yelled, “Thumper! Take him home!”

Jack glanced down at Thumper's square-toed boots as he approached. The man was slightly shorter than Jack and sneered up at him as he got close. Without warning, Jack kicked him hard in the groin and watched as he buckled over and staggered back.

Jack then turned to face Damien and said, “Now we're even for tonight, too.”

Jack felt a tap on his shoulder and was surprised to see that it was Thumper.

“Ya want a piece of me, pork chop?” Thumper asked.

Jack had two months of rage burning inside him. He was eager to release some of it. He handed his gun and knife back to Damien and said, “You're damn right I do!”

Damien and the third man both laughed. Damien whispered something to Thumper, who nodded, then looked at Jack and said, “Okay, pig, let's see how tough ya are!”

Thumper opened with a side kick to Jack's ribs. Jack blocked the kick with his forearm and landed a fist on the end of Thumper's nose. Thumper stepped back, his eyes watering and blood gushing down across his lips. Jack stepped in close to deliver a karate punch to the solar plexus, followed by another punch to the throat. He didn't connect with either. He found himself sailing though the air, and then he landed in the pit dug for the basement.

He scrambled to his feet as Thumper jumped in beside him and planted a boot squarely across his chest. He staggered back, then lunged forward with another punch. Thumper grabbed his wrist and spun him sideways while delivering another kick to Jack's armpit.

Jack felt his arm go numb, and for a moment, so many fists and feet were slamming his body that he believed he was fighting all three men. He realized he wasn't when he was lying barely conscious, face down in the dirt, and heard Damien from above ordering the striker to go down in the hole and help Thumper carry him back to the van.

Jack was still winded and dazed as he was tossed onto the floor of the van.

Damien dropped Jack's gun and knife on the floor beside him and said, “I think I figured out who the rat is, so we really don't have a problem.”

Jack didn't respond.

Damien then said, “Also, for your information, Thumper teaches kick-boxing, karate, and tae kwon do. You should sign up for lessons.”

“Too late. My body just declared bankruptcy.”

Damien chuckled, then softly closed the sliding door and walked away.