one twisted voice Read online

  “If I have my way they won’t get a cent,” I said.

  “The money means nothing to me. I just want my daughter back.”

  I moved close to Porter and put my arm around his shoulders. We placed our cheeks to one another. “I know, Will,” I said. “But it means everything to those bastards.”

  He turned slowly and our mouths were so close I could feel the warmth of his breath on my lips. It was a struggle not to lean in and kiss him but I wasn’t sure how he’d respond. Maybe I was entertaining fantasy here, and his child was definitely more important than a smooch stolen under the moonlight, but for a second or two I felt Porter was about to reciprocate. His eyes flickered, dipped away, and then came back up with a different spark dancing in them.

  “What are you getting at, Molly?”

  “Will, they’re expecting you to bring the money, but they don’t know I’m here. We need some sort of diversion while I go get Gabby. And I know exactly how we’re going to do that.”

  ***

  The gang had given Porter a ‘pay as you go’ cell phone. It was pre-programmed with only one number to yet another untraceable phone. While I belly-crawled the four hundred yards along a drainage ditch towards the side of the barn, Porter stalled calling the kidnappers. Instead, he crouched in the tree line; killing the time I’d need by preparing himself for the plan I’d outlined.

  I’d got rid of any insignia that identified me as a state trooper, then taken Porter’s black jacket off him to help me further blend with the night. It swamped me, but also helped smooth out my curves, made me amorphous and less recognizable as a human amid the shadows. My uniform trousers were a giveaway, having cream piping down the outer-leg, but there was nothing else for it. All I could do was rub dust over the pale stripes to make them less visible. My utility belt was too cumbersome, so I’d discarded it, and now had my S&W clutched in my hand. Being a revolver, it was prone to jamming if it was choked with dirt, so I kept the gun clear of the floor. The four hundred yards felt like an eternity, and by the time I reached a mound of earth that allowed me to clamber upright my knees and elbows were rubbed raw. It was a pittance compared to the pain Porter must have been enduring.

  A quick glance was all it took. There was a man standing guard at the side of the barn. He was killing time by smoking a cigarette. I could see the tip glowing, swinging side-to-side as he swept the moonlit field for a sign that Porter had arrived. I didn’t suppose he’d stepped outside to spare Gabby breathing in his second-hand smoke, but that he’d been ordered to keep watch by whoever was in charge.

  Porter said four men had invaded his home, and it was unlikely that there were more than that in the gang. A cool million shared four ways was still a substantial sum of money for their troubles; any more people than that and it wouldn’t be worth their time. I wondered which of them the chopper pilot was. Probably the man outside, I decided. He was the guard, the one best positioned to shout a warning then start up the helicopter so that it was ready to whisk his buddies away.

  From within the barn, I heard the jingle of a cell phone. Porter was right on time. Then the breath caught in my throat. A baby howled, woken by the ringing phone. Until that moment, Gabby had been an insubstantial entity, just a name given life by the weight of her father’s pain. Hearing her, her plight struck me, and I realised how much Gabby relied on her daddy and I to save her. We couldn’t fail, we just couldn’t.

  “Come on, Will,” I whispered to myself. “Play your part and I’ll play mine.”

  Gabby howled again. Someone had prodded her, maybe held the phone to her so that Porter got the proof of life he demanded. I’d told him to ask, to help me pinpoint her location, but that wasn’t necessary now. The bastards didn’t have to prod her that hard! I gripped my S&W hard, as well.

  Two men with guns came out of the barn.

  They began walking across the field, while the guard doused his cigarette and moved for the helicopter. That would leave only one other inside, I hoped.

  On the far side of the field I watched Porter walk out, carrying the Samsonite case in his left hand. He was holding his other hand – empty – in the air. His face was taut with suppressed anger. I thought of Viggo, again: this time from A History of Violence and wondered if Porter would react as the character had in that movie when his family had been threatened. I hoped so, because he was going to need that kind of fortitude to go through with this.

  As the two kidnappers marched forward, scanning the field for signs of trouble, and, as the third man prepped the helicopter, I jogged bent almost double towards the barn door.

  Porter stopped, held out the suitcase, and shouted something. From this distance I couldn’t make out words, but the men answered. Suddenly Porter allowed the suitcase to swing open, and hundreds of ten- and twenty-dollar bills scattered on the wind like confetti. The men responded as I’d hoped; torn between dealing with Porter and the money, they had no recourse. They began rushing after the dancing bills. Porter snatched out my snub-nose and I saw the flashes of gunfire before the corresponding bangs reached my ears. One of the men went down on his back, the other tried to draw on Porter but he was rushing forward the gun still blazing.

  There were further shouts from the two men engaged in the frantic duel, more gunshots, and from inside the barn there was a curse. I guessed whoever was holding Gabby was watching through a window and had seen their fortune go up in the air. I immediately stepped inside, lifting my gun. “Police!” I yelled. “Do not move!”

  ***

  Gabby was bundled in a shawl, and was held to the chest of a heavily built woman. She was no beauty, with a face as tough as the barroom brawlers I locked in the cells on a weekend. Porter thought the gang invading his home was all males, but it seemed the brain of the outfit was this tough-looking bitch. Who the hell did she think she was? Ma Baker?

  “Put the baby down and step away.”

  “Go to hell!”

  The woman had a gun in her hand and she thrust it against the bundle in her arm. Gabby howled, and there was no doubt in my mind that the old harridan would shoot the baby. She twisted her face in a vicious scowl.

  “Get out of my way. I’m walking to that helicopter out there, and if you try to stop me I’ll shoot this squalling brat!”

  “No.” Something cold nudged my heart. “You won’t.”

  The woman was a monster, and though she frightened the baby she didn’t intimidate me. I may have only been 130 pounds, but I’d held my own at the tough training sessions dominated by my male colleagues. They could easily throw me around during self-defense classes, and so could this woman probably. But things changed when we were armed. Not a one of them could shoot as well as I could.

  I fired.

  The bullet smacked dead centre in her vicious face and knocked the woman over on her back. Her gun went spinning away, even as I raced forward to snatch Gabby out of her grasp. I lifted the little girl out of the blanket and pulled her into a hug. Her eyes were brown like her father’s, dancing with the same sparks. She gurgled at me, bouncing in my embrace. She was safe and well, and relief flooded through me.

  But only for a moment.

  There was movement behind me, the scrape of a shoe on the hard-packed floor. A shadow loomed even as I was turning to its source, and there was the menacing click of a hammer being drawn back on a gun. The man from the helicopter, I realised, had come back to help fetch their hostage. I tried to cover Gabby, and to swing with my S&W, but could do neither quick enough to save us.

  Bang!

  ***

  Porter leaned against the doorframe, the revolver loose in his fist now that the pilot was dead. He had a patch of blood growing high on his shoulder, but the pain didn’t seem to bother him. His brown eyes were like molten chocolate as his gaze slipped over me and the chuckling bundle in my arms. He staggered forward and I lifted Gabby for him. I expected him to take his daughter from me, but he didn’t, he held us both. Then he kissed Gabby, and when he was done he ti
lted his mouth to mine. Protect and Serve, that’s my motto and I was happy to accept his thanks.

  Author’s note:

  This story is also available as a standalone ebook from Sempre Vigile Press

  WANDERING FINGERS

  “Take your hand off my ass before you lose your fingers.”

  “There’s no need to be like that, I’m only stroking it.”

  “I’m warning you...”

  “Aaw, stop being a spoil sport, will you?”

  “You guys just never learn, do you?”

  “ OOOWWWW!”

  “Problem?”

  “Yes, your fuckin’ donkey just bit my hand!”

  Author’s Note:

  First published at the webzine “Thrillers, Killers ‘N’ Chillers”.

  PAYBACK: WITH INTEREST

  Having his front door smashed in at 5 a.m. was becoming an occupational hazard for Ronnie Stout. The cops always chose that time to execute a warrant, expecting someone like Ronnie to be deep in slumber after a night of booze and women. They thought that they’d catch him with his trousers down: literally. On three previous occasions they’d done just that. After the second time he didn’t bother replacing the locks, so it was much easier this time for the door to be slammed off its hinges. Less damage to contend with afterwards was fitting with Ronnie’s ethos. He kind of expected the cops to come, so why bother making things more difficult for the city’s finest; or for him for that matter? Last he wanted was to be kicked loose from the cells and have to come home to the inconvenience of a full evening’s carpentry. Fuck the hassle, all Ronnie wanted these days was to be left alone, to get a little peace and quiet. He needed to get his fucking head together.

  He heard the crash of the door rebounding from the hall wall, sat up in his bed and adopted the position. He kicked the sheets free from his legs, sat there in his boxers and outstretched his arms; palms open so there’d be no mistakes. Feet thundered up the stairs. Christ, the cops were keen this morning; sounded like they meant real business. Seemed a lot of trouble to find his little stash of weed or the prescription meds he’d boosted from the corner chemist store. Unless this was about that other thing…nah, he thought, how could they have pinned that to him? This had to be about drugs.

  Normally the cops came in shouting, another tactic to confuse and disarm a suspect roused suddenly from sleep. This time they didn’t make a sound, just that of boots on the bare boards of the upper landing. He heard a door thrown open. Something crashed to the ground.

  “Hey, for fuck sakes! Are you lot stupid? I’m in here where I’m normally at.”

  Ronnie shook his head. Probably rookies on their first warrant, he decided. Full of adrenalin and keen to show their sergeant they were up for the job.

  The footsteps slowed, came to a halt on the landing outside his door.

  “Come in,” Ronnie called out, trying to sound jovial. Jovial equalled non-threatening in his book. “The door’s open, officers. I’m unarmed.”

  He just tacked that last morsel on as an after-thought. It wasn’t the same cops who regularly busted him that was for sure, so he didn’t want any stupid mistakes made.

  The doorknob twisted and the door swung open.

  Ronnie was surprised. When a search warrant was executed there was usually a squad of cops on hand. Certainly there was always more than one man. That thought was troubling enough, but nothing like the next thought that spun through Ronnie’s head: “The fuck’s he wearing a ski mask for?”

  The man entered, and it took Ronnie all of about two seconds to realise that he wasn’t a cop and only one man would be leaving this bedroom afterwards.

  The man didn’t say a word. He just sprang forward and grappled Ronnie, throwing him down on his back on the bed. Before Ronnie could squirm away, the man moved in, kneeled on the mattress with one knee shoved between Ronnie’s legs. It was an almost intimate gesture the way the man leaned close. His body was little more than an inch from Ronnie’s bare skin, and Ronnie felt heat waft off him. The ski mask held most of the man’s breath off Ronnie’s throat, but he still felt a whisper of it along his chin as the man leaned close to his left ear.

  “Psst,” the man said.

  At the shocking realisation that his early morning caller hadn’t come to arrest him, Ronnie’s voice had caught somewhere deep in his chest. Now it leaked from him in a breathy exhalation. “Psst? What the hell does that mean?”

  “It’s the sound of your death, Ronnie. Only you won’t hear it. The way Carl Dunn didn’t hear his death coming.”

  The man reared up and showed Ronnie the silenced pistol in his right hand.

  “Oh, my Go-”

  Ronnie never finished his sentence.

  The man caressed the trigger and the bullet in Ronnie’s skull ended everything.

  The gun hadn’t been as silent as promised, it made a noise more like a ball slapping a catcher’s mitt, but Ronnie’s killer had been correct in one respect. Ronnie didn’t hear a thing.

  Jason Corrie had no driving licence. It had been taken away from him after he’d blown three times the legal alcohol limit, after the cops tugged him after a hit-and-run collision. The fuck had the other car been parked there in the street for anyway? Inconsiderate bastards should have known better than leave a motor parked on the same street as his local. The cops had been arseholes. When one fat-faced cop asked him to blow into his little contraption, he hadn’t got the joke when Corrie pulled out his dick and said “Wanna blow into mine?” He’d been arrested for refusing or failing – or summat – to give a sample of his breath and thrown in the cage in the back of a Maria. The same cops had then thrown him in a cell until it was time to be put on the machine by the custody sergeant. Once he’d been tested he was escorted back to his cell and again thrown inside. There’d been a lot of throwing around that night, so Corrie repaid the gesture by throwing up on the fat-faced cop. In hindsight it wasn’t his best way of avoiding a charge, but that’s what he got.

  Luckily nobody was hurt or he could have done time. The judge just slapped him a fine and took away his licence for three years. But that didn’t mean much to Corrie: who needed a fucking driving licence when you were driving a stolen motor?

  He was pissed as well.

  In for a penny in for a pound, he thought. If he were caught he’d definitely go down this time. In fact, he knew he was on borrowed time as it was. The other day, when him and Ronnie Stout burgled the chemist shop, Corrie had been pissed then, too. But he’d still been the one behind the wheel of their getaway car. Safer for them both with the cold snap setting in. But it wasn’t because of the ice he’d elected to drive. Ronnie was as high as fuck on a cocktail of weed, magic mushrooms, and diazepam, seeing funny colours everywhere, and in no state to drive. Fuck, maybe it would’ve been better if Ronnie had been the one driving, cause maybe he’d have seen the red light Corrie ran. Corrie didn’t see the kid on the bike. He only felt the collision, felt the bucking of the wheels as they squashed the kid’s ribcage and forced splinters of bone through his lungs. He’d hit the brakes, but it hadn’t helped. Actually the locked wheels only dragged the kid and his bike along the icy road a few hundred feet, and made Corrie hit the lamppost on the next corner. Corrie had to reverse over the kid to get away, and this time his skull had gone under the wheels. Corrie didn’t give a fuck for the young lad, he was just one of them scrotes off the housing estate anyway, he’d heard, and no miss to anyone. That time of night, riding a bike without lights, the little fucker was probably out robbing, and Corrie decided he’d done his local community a service. He hadn’t expected the noise that people made about the little shite’s death. Why the fuck did any of them care? They were crying about the brutality of the kid’s death. The kid didn’t suffer, he was deaf as a post and hadn’t heard a thing when Corrie had hit him from behind: didn’t feel a thing either, he bet.

  He wondered if Ronnie Stout had suffered when he died.

  When they’d reversed off the steaming pi
le of flesh and bones, Ronnie had been giggling hysterically and Corrie had pulled him over the front seats and nutted him. Only way he could get the drugged-up fucker to shut the hell up. Then Corrie had checked that nobody had witnessed the smash. He was certain that no one was around, but some twat must have seen them and told the scumbags on the estate who’d done their kid in. It was the only thing that’d explain how someone knew to go to Ronnie’s place and put a bullet in his melon.

  Well, Corrie wasn’t going to hang about. Not so no screaming mob could come and tear him a new arsehole. He’d boosted the car – fuck the lack of a licence – with a plan to get the hell out of town. As he drove, he supped from a bottle of Bells whisky he’d shoplifted from a Spar shop, wondering where he should go. Thing was that boy had connections all over the town, he’d never heard of a family as large as the Dunns were – there were fathers, brothers and uncles, not to mention cousins and half-cousins, and cousins by marriage - and wherever he went he’d soon be on their radar.