The Mourning Missed Read online

  “Maybe we should finish her right now before she causes any more trouble,” the mercenary stated flatly.

  “No, we need to find out what she knows other than what she saw this morning,” the dark man replied.

  “I don’t like having her around,” the first man insisted. “She’s been nothing but trouble and she killed Kalicheq. I didn’t think anyone could kill him. I think we need to get rid of her now and I have no problem doing it. If she’s awake, I’ll knock her out again. Then I’ll break her meddlesome neck.”

  “Then I suppose it’s a good thing I don’t pay you to think, Mr. Matthews,” the dark man said coldly.

  As he spoke they separated to either side of the police car to get in and the tall man passed through a narrow fan of light from one of the overhead fluorescents. The sound of his voice combined with the image of his face made Lilly gasp audibly. Both men stopped and glanced around before continuing into the vehicle.

  Once it had pulled out and left the garage, Lilly sat on the cold concrete and trembled with barely-suppressed rage. Clint did his best to console her, but after the recent chain of events in her life, this shock had sent her mind into a tumbling tumult. The dark man was Jubal Jackson.

  Twenty-Three

  “YOU’RE ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN it was your father?” Samuels asked incredulously.

  Lilly’s mute nod and downcast features were adequate confirmation.

  “I thought you said he lived in a shack on the bayou,” Sarge argued.

  “The man I saw, the man I heard, was my father,” Lilly assured them. “He’s lost at least fifty pounds but that profile and voice are unmistakable.”

  “Do you suppose he’s the man who hit you in the warehouse?” Sarge asked.

  “Indeed he is, which explains why he bothered to catch her when Lilly fell,” Clint shared.

  “And how does that work again?” Samuels asked. “You’re out cold but Clint stays awake?”

  “Apparently my consciousness isn’t affected by Lilly’s state of awareness or mental condition,” Clint offered. “I’m often alert whenever she’s asleep, as I don’t need sleep as you know it. I do seem to require an hour or so of dormancy about once every two to three days, but sleep; no.”

  “And you’re sure he said he was going to question you?” Samuels said worriedly.

  “No, he said he needed to find out what all I knew,” Lilly qualified. “Given the nature of his skill sets from Vietnam, that probably meant torture.”

  They all sat in stunned silence contemplating a man torturing his own daughter.

  “Give me every detail of what you saw in the city warehouse,” Samuels requested.

  “City workers moving hard cases the size of book boxes from pallets in the back of the trailer to city vans,” Lilly confirmed.

  “And they didn’t appear to be light,” Clint added. “Each man walked the case the short distance from the trailer to the waiting van like it had significant weight. If I had to guess, I’d say 40 pounds or more.”

  “Well, a kilo is about the size of a regular housing brick, and a book box is two cubic feet,” Samuels began.

  “And there are thirteen bricks in a cubic foot,” Sarge supplied.

  When both heads turned to him, he shrugged. “I worked at a lumber yard for a while as a kid. So, two cubic feet is 26 kilos of heroin.”

  “And a kilo weighs about two pounds, so the cases were around 50 pounds,” Samuels finished. “How many cases did you count?”

  “I didn’t, I was busy watching the overall...two hundred and twelve,” Lilly began before Clint interrupted her. “I knew you were busy with the big picture, so I focused on the details. The Corrections van was number 91-103, the library van was number 88-007, the fleet vans were numbers 93-119 and 94-202, and the PW van was 90-073.”

  “So, divided equally, 43 cases went into each van,” Sarge finished the math.

  “Except it wasn’t equal,” Clint offered. “The Fleet vans had at least fifty each in them and the Library van was last. I saw about twenty cases left in the trailer as the Fleet vans pulled away.”

  “Sounds like the distribution was separated out even as it was being off-loaded,” Sarge mused.

  “Which makes sense if you have the time and manpower; which they did,” Clint concluded.

  “What I think we’ve all failed to recognize is this: if those 212 cases all held only drugs, Lilly witnessed the transportation of over five thousand kilos of heroin.” He paused to let that sink in. “That’s over ten thousand pounds. And that, boys and girls, would be ten times the 1991 San Francisco bust, which is the biggest heroin confiscation in history to date.”

  “Had to be something else as well,” Sarge exploded. “No way Montrose City, or even the state of Louisiana, uses that much heroin in a week; or even a month. Maybe not even a year.”

  “Who says Montrose City isn’t the infil point for distribution into the central US?” Lilly asked. “Every time I think of this, it takes me back to the relationship between my dad and Hank. Who knows how long this has been going on? Twenty years?”

  “I think it’s time we brought the Feds in on this,” Sarge announced.

  “No, not yet, Marty,” Samuels interjected. “We need to have a lot more details and a lot more solid facts before we go to anyone. When we do, it’ll be straight to my contact at the DEA.”

  “So, what other details and facts do we need?” Lilly asked with more emphasis and attention.

  “Glad to see you coming out of your funk,” Phillip smiled softly.

  “That’s because I’m now pissed off at my old man,” she fumed. “If he’s been involved in the drug traffic in the state for a long time, then he’s partially responsible for the death of at least one of his own sons.”

  “MAJOR SIMMONS HAS AGREED to run the numbers on the vans and find out who they were assigned to this morning,” Phillip offered as they sat in his dining room eating Osso Buco with polenta and drinking Dos Okies Cabernet. “We’ll know tomorrow what chain of command is involved once we connect the dots between who was there and the PC or Hank.”

  Sergeant Aiko is looking into the TEC-9 the merc was carrying,” Sarge added. “He was very interested as to how any gun for hire got one in Louisiana and especially in Montrose City. He really wanted some names but I had nothing to give.”

  “Sgt. Andersen is going to find out as much as she can about the connection between Hank and Jubal,” Lilly interjected. “I can’t even bring myself to call him my father any longer. To think he pretended his wife’s, my mother’s, death sent him into a self-destructive spiral, when all along he was running drugs into this city...the country...”

  She shuddered delicately. “He and I will definitely have a conversation before this is all over. Anyway, Sgt Anderson has connections in the Army from her time in service. She’ll run down the whens and wheres but it could take a while.”

  “Meanwhile, back at the ranch,” Clint began. “Tonto and I will be looking for who these mercs are and what they’re doing in Montrose City. They way they’re all dressed the same and carrying the same weapons suggests an organization. There has to be a connection between the muscle, the military, and whichever cartel is supplying the drugs.”

  “What makes you think you get to be the Lone Ranger?” Lilly asked the room. It was still off-putting when Clint and Lilly had conversations with each other and vocalized them.

  “Everybody knows the Lone Ranger was a tall, devilishly handsome white man,” Clint espoused.

  “Yeah, everybody who only watched it on TV as a kid,” Lilly said snidely. “Those of us who had to get our entertainment for free at the public library know the real Lone Ranger was a black man named Bass Reeves. He was alone because no white man would ride with him, even though he was a Deputy US Marshal.”

  “Many of the Indian tribes of Oklahoma where he was posted to curb lawlessness had never seen a black man, so they thought he was wearing a mask. And thus the legend,” Lilly said, drawing the hi
story lesson to a close. “By the way, he arrested over three thousand criminals in his career and killed 14 outlaws in gunfights, without ever being shot.”

  “Dayum,” Sarge drawled in parody. “Guessin’ I needs to learn a little bits more muh own self.”

  Everyone laughed briefly, and Clint broke the silence after a moment. “How about Kato and the Green Hornet?” Everyone laughed even louder.

  “HOW COULD YOU LET HER get away from you?” the Boss asked.

  “She is even more resourceful than we have given her credit. From the looks of things, she used the jack in the trunk to force the lid open. Matthews and I heard a gasp when we were getting in the car, but passed it off as a rat in the garage. I now believe she was watching from outside the vehicle as we returned,” replied the Dark Man.

  “Which means we must now assume she knows your identity; or at least that you’re not floating in an alcoholic stupor on Grand Bayou,” the Boss replied. “This changes everything. She cannot be allowed to gain any further knowledge of our current arrangement. It could too easily cause serious damage to the network and my organization. She has gotten far closer than I would have ever imagined and now must be dealt with. Will that be a problem?”

  “None whatsoever. She ceased being my daughter the day she joined the Academy.”

  “MAJOR SIMMONS HIT PAY dirt,” Samuels announced as they all sat in his office the next morning. “And, it didn’t take him long. I’m kind of shocked they’ve allowed the organization’s structure to be so easily ferreted out, especially after how organized they’ve seemed.”

  “Maybe they’re just getting sloppy because they’ve been getting away with it for so long,” Sarge replied. “Aiko found out something interesting about the TEC-9s as well.”

  They both looked to Lilly, silently offering her the floor to report any findings the Rangemaster might have passed on. “Nothing on background, as it’s only been 24 hours. She said it could take a while.”

  “I have before me the names of every one of the five drivers from the drug transfer yesterday,” Samuels beamed. “There’s no denying any of them. They signed out the vehicles for the week and the onboard computers tracked exactly where they went. The only thing we don’t have is actual pictures of them in the vehicles.”

  “Which means what, exactly?” Sarge wanted to know.

  “It means, Marty, that I can pull them all in today and question them individually about their activities,” Phillip announced. “I can flip the weak ones to inform on their chain of command. They may be loyal to the boss who’s lining their pockets but, when we start talking jail time, I’ll wager all bets are off. Yeah, I did go there.”

  “Do you need any help bringing them in for questioning?” Lilly asked with a gleam in her eye.

  “Ah, yes; but I’ve witnessed firsthand how you bring suspects in,” Phillip smiled.

  “Clint has mellowed me out considerably,” she offered. Sarge and Samuels waited for Clint to respond, but he was uncharacteristically silent. Sensing the purpose of their pause, she explained. “He’s on down time.”

  “I’m walking warrants through Judge Pemberton’s chambers in an hour,” Samuels shared. “No one will process or even see them except the two of us. He’s my favorite and we go back a long way. Still, I’ll also be making certain that he knows only he and I are aware of them. It puts him on notice that I’m deadly serious about the widespread corruption we’re finding in the city’s employees and the police department.”

  “Well, I found out from Sgt. Aiko that someone is running automatic weapons into the city, specifically TEC-9s. It started about six weeks ago,” Sarge informed them. “There have been two incidents where drug runners have engaged officers with them. In one incident, three officers were seriously injured; one of them probably career-ending. The entire force is up in arms about it. Yet no one seems to know where they’re coming from or how they’re getting here.”

  “So, if we were to question one of the mercs from the warehouse, we might be able to shed some light on that subject?” Lilly asked.

  “Sure, but where are you going to find one and how do you plan to bring them in for questioning?” Phillip asked; concern apparent in his voice.

  “Hey, you don’t want me arresting your city employees, I’ll go find some other way to make myself useful,” she grinned.

  “I just bet you will,” Sarge grinned back.

  Twenty-Four

  “WOW, ARE YOU SURE WE have to go out?” Clint asked as Lilly surveyed her efforts in the mirror. The same wig she’d worn to the pyramid club was now a pony tail at the nape of her neck. The same padded bra stretched the front of the black cable knit sweater to the point of extreme.

  But now she wore skin tight black jeans and sported a black leather jacket over the sweater. Black 16” lineman’s boots were laced to the top of her calf over her size seven feet. Fingerless black leather lifting gloves completed the ensemble.

  “There’ll be time for me to take it all off for you later,” she promised. “But right now, we need to go find the bar where the mercs hang out.”

  “What makes you so sure there is a bar?” Clint insisted.

  “They’re either ex-military or ex-cop; there will be a bar,” she assured him. “Probably a favorite hangout and my guess is there’ll be at least ten of them; maybe a dozen.”

  “Well, let’s go find them. I’ll bet you who’s in control later that we don’t find it,” he teased.

  “I’ll take that bet, because I’m going to be in control regardless,” she promised.

  “Spoil sport.”

  “You can drive if you like,” Lilly offered by way of concession.

  “Oh; ha ha,” Clint grimaced.

  “THIS CERTAINLY LOOKS like a place mercenaries would hang out,” Clint grumbled as they walked in. The bar was on the east side of town, right where the truck stops began on the interstate. It was two blocks north of the highway in a one room, flat-roofed building. The juke box was turned up entirely too loud and was wailing something about thunder rolling.

  “This place has seen more water damage than it has repairs,” Lilly mentally commented to Clint at the odor of mildew, spilt beer, bodies, and general wetness that accosted her nostrils.

  “This is the tenth bar we’ve visited in the last five hours, can it be the last?” Clint complained. “I’m tired of every lush in every place looking at you the way I do.”

  Lilly’s snide remark was cut short by the appearance of one of the guards from the warehouse floor walking out of the men’s room near the front door. She recognized him immediately because his bright red hair, even cut military short, stood out in the dim light. As he walked by, he eyed her once over and nodded appreciatively but didn’t speak. Stopping at the bar, she made a show of scanning the bottles on the back shelf before the bartender made it to her. There was no friendly patter; he just glared as he waited for her order.

  “Hennessey, neat,” she said harshly.

  One eyebrow raised and he went to the top shelf where he pulled down the nearly full bottle. Wiping the dust off with a bar towel, he uncorked it and poured a generous finger in a whiskey glass. She simply stared at it, then him.

  “How am I supposed to warm that with my palm so I may enjoy the true bouquet?” she asked deadpan.

  He turned around and dug in a counter under the bar back, finally pulling a dusty and scratched snifter from somewhere deep in the recesses of the cabinet. Carrying it to the sink, he made a show of washing it thoroughly before he dried it with the same bar towel. Picking up her drink, he dumped the contents unceremoniously into it. A riverboat casino motif adorned the snifter.

  “Fifteen dollars,” he said.

  Pulling a wad of cash out of her front pocket, she peeled off a twenty and graciously handed it to him. “Keep it,” she ordered dismissively.

  Strolling casually through the dimly lit, rank interior, she spotted her quarry from half-way across the room. Stopping at his table, she stood waiting
for an invitation. He locked his gaze on hers with difficulty but said nothing. Finally shrugging, she made to walk away and he broke the silence.

  “Where ya goin’?” He slurred frantically.

  “I was waiting for an invitation to join you but had decided you weren’t interested,” she replied coolly.

  “Oh, ahm interested. I wuz jus overwhelmmmed by yur booty, uh, beauty,” he slobbered.

  “This guy is totally wasted,” Clint said in her mind.

  “Exactly what we’re looking for,” Lilly concurred in silence.

  Sliding into the booth next to him, she made sure the entire length of her leg made contact with his. “What do you say we get out of here?” Lilly vamped softly.

  “Lemme buy you a drink firs’,” he offered.

  “I already have a drink,” she vamped. “What I don’t have is a dick.” Running her hand up the inside of his thigh, she teased her nails across his crotch. He almost knocked her out of the booth trying to stand up but she managed to rise ahead of him. Grabbing her arm, he headed for the rear entrance.

  “Where are we going?” Lilly asked as if confused.

  “Ou’ back to muh pickup,” he explained, as if the answer should have been obvious.

  “Honey, I don’t roll around in a truck with anyone,” she explained as they breached the doorway. “Let’s go to my place where I have a nice, soft, king-sized bed.”

  “Can’; too drunk ta drive,” he explained.

  “That’s okay, sweetie, I have a car and I’ll bring you back in the morning,” she soothed.

  “Naw, gotta stay wisha crew; boshes orders,” he slurred.

  “Okay, have it your way,” she said as she reached in her back pocket for the tazer she had taken from the hospital security guard. Placing it against the side of his neck, she thumbed the button. His startled burp of surprise didn’t get close to the ambient noise level coming out of the bar. Grabbing the collar of his leather jacket, she quickly dragged him around the side of the building next to the dumpsters and the grease trap.