Rum Runner - A Thriller (Jacqueline Jack Daniels Mysteries Book 9) Read online

  He rolled in through the door, impressed how the Mecanum wheels let him enter sideways.

  Then he took a look around and stopped being impressed.

  The shower was normal, except for a chain to reach the spout, and a waterproof chair. The toilet, he forgave. It had safety rails on two sides, attached to the wall, but a lot of shitters had those. Next to it, was a sliding board, and T-Nail knew that was pretty common knowledge; paraplegics needed to slide from their chair to the john.

  But then it got real.

  There was a whole shelf of handicapped supplies. Latex gloves. Jars of Vaseline. Catheters, from tiny ones up to those jumbo Texas-sized muthas. Colostomy bags. Boxes of suppositories and enemas and other freaky ass stuff that T-Nail had never seen before.

  He felt the rage bubble up, start to boil over. All this embarrassing shit, out in the open. Not even in a cabinet. Just sitting out there, for all the soldiers to see. Showing them how infirm their War Chief was. How he was weak. Lesser than they were.

  Bullshit on that. T-Nail pulled out his cell and called Del Ray.

  “Bathroom. Now.”

  Then he pulled off his leggings, and his underwear, and waited for his second in command to show up.

  “I’m here, dawg.”

  “Then get your black ass in the shitter.”

  Del Ray entered. He stood at ease, hands behind his back, staring T-Nail in the eyes.

  “Got a whole wall full of supplies here. You seem to have an unhealthy interest in my bodily functions.”

  “Did some research. Didn’t know what you needed.”

  “I’ll show you what I need.”

  Without using the safety rails or the sliding board, T-Nail lifted himself from the wheelchair to the toilet, and lowered himself until he could balance.

  “This is called the Crede method,” he said, pressing and tapping on his side, pushing against his bladder. He pissed into the bowl. “And this,” he said, raising a finger, “is all I need for the rest.”

  He massaged his rectum and held his breath, pushing hard and bearing down until the shit came out.

  Del Ray watched without blinking.

  “Has your curiosity been satisfied?” T-Nail asked.

  Del didn’t seem embarrassed, or even phased. “The cop is on the move.”

  “When?”

  “This morning. She’s going up to a cabin in Wisconsin. Town called Spoonward, population four hundred and sixty. Out in the boonies, one police chief and two officers. She’s dropping the shorty off with friends, spending some alone time with her hubs.”

  “Got the address?”

  “Address, GPS, and satellite pics. She left an hour ago. Got a team following. What’s the move?”

  T-Nail sucked in a long, deep breath, and let it out slow. “I want to declare war on this bitch.”

  “All-out war?”

  “All-out war. How many soldiers can we send in?”

  “Without suspending any operations, about fifty.”

  “And if we suspend some operations?”

  Del Ray hesitated, then said, “A hundred.”

  T-Nail nodded. “I want more than a hundred. I want the town of Spoonward shut down and cut off. I want her and her man surrounded. I want to own that territory like it’s our turf.”

  “It will cost us.”

  T-Nail grabbed Del Ray by his neck, jerking him down to his level.

  “Tell me, General; how much did twenty years of my life cost?”

  Del Ray maintained his cool. “We’ll get it done.”

  “I know we will.”

  “And her kid? Want to hit the shorty, too?”

  T-Nail considered it, then answered.

  “Anything else?” Del asked.

  “Get all this bullshit out of my bathroom. Don’t want to see none of it again. Dismissed.”

  He released Del, and the man left.

  T-Nail wondered how long it would be until Del Ray made a move against him. He figured he’d have to kill the younger man sooner or later. Too much pride there. Too much ambition. With luck, it wouldn’t be necessary until they’d finished dealing with the cop. T-Nail had been out of the game for a long time and needed Del to get him back up to speed. Be a pain to start over from scratch. He’d also have to start testing the soldiers, gauging their loyalty. Wasn’t nothing he hadn’t done before. Any good leader had to check the rank now and then.

  T-Nail closed his eyes. A peace, one he had never known, settled over him. Very few War Chiefs, in the history of the game, had ever declared all-out war.

  It felt good. Real good.

  It would not feel good for Jacqueline Daniels.

  JACK

  Phin drove. We’d recently bought a Mitsubishi Outlander, and he didn’t look good driving it. He looked like he compromised.

  I was the one who made him compromise, because it had the best safety rating out of the SUVs we could afford. And, for some reason known only to astute psychiatrists, I resented Phin for giving in so easily.

  Could that be part of the problem? He’d been tip-toeing around me since we had Sam, and I didn’t want a pushover as a partner.

  Maybe that was the reason I didn’t mention the cocaine. Maybe I was actually happy he found his spine again.

  At the same time, doing drugs around our daughter was unacceptable.

  Shit. When did life get so complicated? It was almost easier chasing serial killers.

  Sam slept in the back seat; car rides always did that to her. Phin irritated me by fiddling with his iPod shuffle as he drove. I tried to read an ebook, kept losing my place because the music was driving me batty, and eventually settled in to stare at the boring scenery as it passed. Southern Wisconsin, like most of Illinois, was flat plains, about as interesting as watching water boil or glue dry. We passed a gas station, and I told Phin to stop so I could go to the bathroom. When he did, I purposely didn’t go to the bathroom, just to see if he noticed.

  He filled the tank, got coffee, and didn’t notice. Or he noticed, and didn’t care.

  We got back on the road. The bad music and mind-numbing view dragged on and on. Phin made it even more irritating, by humming slightly off tune. I was practically sitting on my hands to avoid leaning over and punching him.

  He glanced at me, perhaps misinterpreting the displeasure in my eyes as passion, and said, “Ya’aburnee.”

  “What?”

  “I saw it on the Internet. It’s Arabic.”

  “What does it mean?”

  He smiled. “It means, I want you to bury me.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “It means, dear wife, that I love you so much, I want to die first. Because if you died first, I wouldn’t be able to handle it.”

  Dumb expression. I wondered if he was still high.

  Sam woke up, a few minutes before we got to Val’s. As always, she woke up rested and happy, two things that seemed to elude me lately. She asked for some pretzels, and her cup, and enjoyed those as we pulled up past Val’s stable and to her two story home in the woods of Lake Loyal, Wisconsin. Phin parked, turned around to unbuckle Sam, and I got out and walked to my friend’s front door, giving it a firm knock.

  “Val!”

  I forced a grin. It was nice to see Val, but we weren’t there to visit. We exchanged a brief hug, and Phin came up behind me and shook Val’s hand.

  “Sam, do you remember Val?” I asked my daughter.

  Sam buried her face in her father’s chest.

  “Stranger danger!” Sam yelled. “Stranger danger!”

  “It’s okay, Sam,” Phin put Sam down. “She’s not a stranger. She’s a friend.”

  Val crouched down to Sam’s level. “Last time I saw you, you were only one.”

  They reacquainted themselves, and Sam quickly accepted her and begged to ride one of Val’s horses. As the discussion ensued, a moving truck pulled onto the front lawn. David Lund, Val’s boyfriend, exited the cab, wearing a worn leather jacket and a Lake Loyal Fi
re Department ball cap.

  “Great to see you again, Jack,” he said, smiling.

  “You too, Lund. This is my husband, Phin.”

  Lund extended his hand and Phin shook it. Jack wondered, quite inappropriately, if Phin could take him in a fight. Probably. Even a domesticated bull was still dangerous.

  “A pleasure,” Lund said.

  “Thanks for watching my little girl.”

  “She’s in good hands.” Lund knelt down to Sam’s level, like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Hey, Sam, my name is David. Did you know there are bears out here?”

  Sam’s eyes got wide and she shook her head.

  “Just a second. I’ll show you.” He reached into the truck cab and pulled out the largest teddy bear Val had ever seen. It was practically Sam’s size and wore a red checked bow around its neck. “This bear is for you. What should its name be?”

  “Harry.”

  “Because he has so much hair?”

  “Because he looks like dickhead.”

  Lund raised an eyebrow. “Did she say dickhead?”

  “That’s her name for Harry. I may have used it a few times around the house, and it stuck.” I squinted at the toy. “You know, the bear does sort of look like McGlade.”

  Val raised an eyebrow at the bear, then asked, “So, do you have all the rules written down?”

  “Rules?”

  “You know. Food. Bedtime. Baths. Allergies. All the stuff I need to know.”

  I shrugged. “She’s highly flammable, so keep her away from open flames.”

  “Huh?”

  “And don’t give her any helium,” Phin said. “She might float away.”

  “No helium,” Lund was pretending to jot it down. “Check.”

  I patted Val’s shoulder, as she looked confused. “Seriously, Val. Just ask Sam what she needs. It’s not like children are so fragile they’ll break from the smallest thing.”

  “I knew that.”

  “Do you guys want to come in for coffee?” Lund asked.

  “Sure. Come in,” Val added. “I’ll throw on a pot. Shouldn’t take long.”

  I shook my head. “We’ve got to get going. Got a lot of hours ahead of us.”

  “Whereabouts you going?” Lund asked.

  “Spoonward. Near the Minnesota border.”

  “Way up in the woods. Beautiful country. But be careful. Hunting season just started. A lot of jackasses out there shooting anything that looks like a deer. And after a few beers, everything looks like a deer.” He cocked his head. “You hear that?”

  Rifle fire, less than a few miles away.

  “That means no antler hat, young lady,” Phin said, giving Sam a tickle. “Promise me.”

  “I promise, Daddy. No taddle hat.”

  Phin gave her a hug and told her he loved her. “Bye, sweetie. Be good for Val and David.”

  “I will. Love you, daddy.”

  “Val,” Phin nodded at her. “Lund.” They shook hands again. Then he walked back to the car.

  “She’ll be fine,” Val said.

  “I know. That’s not who I’m worried about.” I glanced back at Phin.

  “That’ll work out.”

  Lund picked up Sam and Sam’s little suitcase. “How about we go inside and I show you our house?” he asked as he took her inside.

  I watched. I’d been without Sam for short periods since I brought her home. But this was the first time I was trusting her with people other than Phin or my mother.

  For some reason, Val looked as anxious as I felt. I wondered if it had to do with Lund.

  “You having doubts, too?” I asked.

  “Maybe there are always doubts.”

  “Maybe. That would kinda suck.”

  Val laughed. “Yeah, it would. Go work your stuff out, Jack. You’ll do the right thing.”

  “So will you. And thanks for the favor.”

  “My pleasure. God knows you’ve always been there for me.”

  “I don’t know what cell reception will be like up there, but I’ll get into town and call every day. Either we’ll pick her up on Wednesday,” I exhaled. “Or I’ll pick her up on Wednesday.”

  Without my husband.

  SERGEANT HERB BENEDICT

  Herb was an old school living dead fan, going back to the genre’s creation by filmmaker George A. Romero. He saw Night of the Living Dead at a drive-in when he was a kid. Also saw the theatrical releases of Dawn of, Day of, and Return of, and dozens of Italian rip offs. He never told anyone, not his best friend Jack, not his wife Bernice, but he once went to a DragonCon cosplaying Ed from Shaun of the Dead.

  Well, not really. But he’d considered it.

  When The Walking Dead came on the air, in all of its gory glory, Herb was in fanboy heaven. Maybe it was the fact that, as a Homicide Sergeant, he had to deal with real death all the time, so the harmless make-believe of the living dead was a welcome stress reliever. Or maybe there was something inherently cool about being outnumbered and surrounded by a group of blood-crazed monsters while fighting to survive.

  Whatever the case, Herb was hooked. So he burned one vacation week per year binge watching zombies.

  Which was why his phone was off.

  Which was why he didn’t get the message that Terrence Wycleaf Johnson, known on the street as T-Nail, had escaped from a maximum security prison last night.

  Which was why he didn’t warn his best friend, Jack Daniels, that hell was coming for her.

  PHIN

  Expressway.

  No scenery to speak of. Nothing to look at.

  Just miles and miles of road, of other cars, of occasional billboards.

  Jack hadn’t said anything since Val’s. She was either lost in thought, or bored with him.

  Or both.

  Sensing the music was irritating her, Phin turned it off. Instead he listened to the white noise of the engine, the purr of traffic as it passed. Counted the road signs pointing to McDonalds, which seemed to be at every exit. Lost count after eight.

  Checked the GPS. Still two hundred miles to go.

  Two hundred more miles of uncomfortable silence.

  He considered the coke in his pocket.

  Checked the gas gauge.

  They’ll need to fill up soon.

  Went back to counting road signs.

  • • •

  The memory, more than two years old, settled over him like a shroud as he drove.

  Phin had seen the box in her hand. Had seen the engagement ring he’d bought her. The one she’d rejected earlier. He had asked, she had refused, and Phin had thought that was the end of it.

  But it wasn’t.

  She had told him, “I need you to drive me someplace.”

  He’d raised an eyebrow. “Where?”

  “City Hall. If we get the marriage license today, we can be married by tomorrow.”

  Phin wasn’t sure he’d ever known true happiness. But in that moment he did. It made him feel both heavy and light at the same time. Like he was more than he’d ever been.

  “I’ll go put Samantha in her carrier.”

  “Wait. First, I need you to put this on me.” Jack had held out her left hand. “Please.”

  Phin had gone to her. Considered getting down on one knee, but decided he wanted to be face-to-face. Eye-to-eye. Close enough to smell her breath, to memorize every curve and line of her face, to take a mental picture he knew he’d always carry with him.

  “Jacqueline Daniels, will you make me the happiest person on the planet?”

  “No,” she had said.

  “No?”

  “I’ll marry you, Phineas Troutt. But it won’t make you the happiest person on the planet.” Her eyes had begun to tear up. “You’ll have to settle for second happiest.”

  Phin had settled for it. Slipped the ring on her finger. Kissed her like it was the first time and the last time.

  He knew they’d be together forever. Knew it more than he’d ever known anything.

>   True happiness. What a lucky son of a bitch I am.

  • • •

  “What happened to us?” he asked.

  Jack didn’t answer. Didn’t look at him.

  “If we’re done, tell me,” he said. “I’ll move out. Give you a no-fault divorce. I’m not going to take Sam away from her mother. I’ll see her on weekends.”

  The words hurt, deeply, but he kept his voice steady.

  The sights of autumn all around them. Stubbled fields, with copses of leafless trees, cotton clouds pinned to blue sky everywhere. A mile passed. Two.

  “I don’t know what it is,” Jack finally answered.

  “I’ve been patient.”

  “I know.”

  “What are you feeling?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you still love me?”

  She finally looked at him. Her eyes were sad.

  “I don’t know.”

  • • •

  Phin whistled that Helen Reddy song he knew Jack didn’t like. You and Me Against the World.

  Jack ignored him.

  He did it louder, watching her peripherally.

  She gave him her shoulder.

  After a few bars, Phin gave up.

  • • •

  Phin thought about the cocaine again.

  Jack wouldn’t try it. Ever. She hadn’t even gotten drunk since Sam was born.

  Her depression might have been chemical. But she refused to try chemistry to correct it. Never brought it up during routine doctor visits. Never sought therapy. Never discussed it.

  She was a shell that used to be Jack. Or a robot impersonator, who used up all of her energy being a mother, with none leftover for anything personal.

  Phin had stayed the course. He loved Jack, and Sam. He liked being a dad, and was good at it. He was lonely, but he’d been lonely before meeting Jack, so it was a state he understood.

  He couldn’t fix Jack.

  Jack had to fix Jack.

  But Phin was beginning to think that maybe she never would.

  • • •

  This was the wilderness. Real wilderness. Evergreen trees so dense they blotted out the sky, home to wild turkey and mule deer and cougar and bear.