Jack Keller - 01 - The Devil's Right Hand Read online

  She nodded. She reached up and took his cheeks in her hands. She pulled his face down and kissed him on the forehead. “Make the call, Jack,” she whispered. She turned and left the room.

  Keller dialed the phone. After four rings, the phone clicked. There was a crackle of static and a whirring sound on the line.

  “Hi,” Marie’s recorded voice said. “Ben and I can’t come to the phone right now. Leave a message.”

  “Marie?” Keller said. “It’s Jack Keller. If you’re there, pick up.” Silence. “Okay,” he said. “I need to talk to you. About everything. Call me at the office or on my cell.” He gave both numbers and hung up. He stared at the wall for a moment before standing up and walking back out to the front desk. Angela was seated behind it. She looked up. “She wasn’t home,” he said. “I left a message.”

  “You could drive to her house,” Angela suggested. “You can keep using my car. I’ve got the truck.”

  He shook his head. “It’s an hour and a half from here to Fayetteville,” he said. “And it’s getting late. I’ll try to call again tonight. I’ve got an appointment with Major Berry tomorrow morning. I’ll see her after.”

  Angela’s face brightened. “You’re seeing Lucas again?” she said. “I thought he was doing drug rehab now.”

  “He is. But he said he’d pick up where we left off.”

  “He’s a good man. Looks like your luck may be changing, Keller.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The 9MM Glock spoke rapidly, twice in succession. The slide came back as Marie expended the last two shots into the man-shaped target at the far end of the indoor range. She ejected the spent magazine and set the gun on the waist-high shelf in front of her, pressing the button to bring the target to her on its steel cable. She grimaced as she looked at the target. There was a group of holes in the center of the target’s silhouetted torso, where the center of mass would be. There was another, smaller group in the center of the target’s “head.”

  Better, she thought, but not great. At least I didn’t miss any this time. I really need to practice more.

  She had shot through two boxes of ammo before the gun felt natural in her hand again, and her shot grouping had been awful. But as she relaxed, the old rhythm and flow returned. Draw, tap-tap. Draw, tap-tap. As always, the focus on the simple tasks involved in hitting the target cleared her head. There was something clean, uncomplicated about it. Only two ways for it to come out, she thought. Hit or miss, and it’s in your hands. She looked at the watch lying on the shelf in front of her. Whoa, she thought. Got to go pick up Ben. Lost track of time for a bit. She took a deep breath of the cordite-laced air, the gunpowder stench creating a mild but pleasantly familiar burn in her nostrils, and smiled.

  She packed the gun away in its case and hung the ear protectors on the wall. She walked up a set of creaky wooden stairs and opened the heavy door at the top. She stepped into the bright fluorescent lights of the gun shop. Shiny glass display cases showed off a variety of handguns laid out on dark-green felt, while a forest of barrels sprouted from the brown and black stocks of rifles and shotguns racked side by side behind the counter. A large man half-sat, half leaned on a stool behind the counter, his arms crossed across a considerable paunch. His arms were a riot of dark ink, winding and swirling up his massive forearms and biceps and under the sleeves of his dark green T-shirt. His wind-burned face scowled at the world over a bristling hedge of black beard that reached almost to the crossed arms.

  Marie waved at him. “Thanks, Stoney,” she said.

  Stoney nodded almost imperceptibly. He didn’t look at her and the scowl didn’t change. “Some dude called looking for you,” he said. “Said his name was Stacy. Sounded like a cop.”

  Marie felt a chill in her belly. “Oh,” she said lightly. “He’s a friend of mine.”

  “Uh-huh,” Stoney said. ”He didn’t sound too friendly. In fact, he sounded like an asshole.” He looked at her for the first time. “I told him you weren’t here.”

  She sighed. “Thanks, Stoney,” she said. “It’s nothing, really.”

  “Uh-huh,” he said again. “That why you’re working out here instead of the police range?”

  She tried to smile at him. “I like it here,” she said. “Not as crowded.”

  He grunted and went back to scowling at the front door. Marie walked out to her car. She took the cell phone from beneath the seat. She dialed her home number and punched in the code for her messages when the answering machine picked up. There was another message from Stacy. She fumbled in the glove box for a stub of pencil and wrote the number down on the back of a store receipt she found on the floorboard. She looked at it for a moment, then took a deep breath. She dialed.

  The person on the other end picked up on the second ring. “Stacy.”

  She was surprised at how steady her voice was. “This is Marie Jones. You left a message for me?”

  “Jones,” Stacy growled, “Where the hell have you been?”

  “I’ve been out,” she said.

  “With Jackson Keller?” Stacy asked.

  Until that moment, she had been prepared to tell Stacy that she wouldn’t meet him without a lawyer present. But the use of Keller’s name threw her off her guard. “What about him?” she said.

  “Well, for one thing,” he shot back, “Jack Keller’s got a murder warrant out for him. And for another, you were seen leaving Eddie Wesson’s funeral with him.”

  Marie’s breath caught in her throat. The knuckles on the hand wrapped around the cell phone went bone-white. “What?” she said, the word coming out in a strangled croak. Then she rallied herself. “Maybe I should talk to a lawyer first,” she said.

  “Yeah,” Stacy said, “maybe you should. You can call one from jail when we pick you up. ‘Bye, Jones.”

  “Wait!” Marie hated the pleading note in her voice. There was silence on the other end. Then, “I’m here.”

  “I—I have to get my son from day care.”

  “Oh, don’t worry. I’ll call Social Services to come get your kid.”

  “Please,” Marie’s voice was shaking. “I can talk. Just not right now. Tomorrow. First thing. I promise.”

  Another long pause. “Okay,” Stacy said finally. “Tomorrow. 9:00 AM. Sharp. Your house. And Jones?”

  “Yes?”

  “No lawyers. I even see a Gucci loafer, I’m taking you in right then and there, and your kid goes into foster care.”

  “I’ll be there,” she said. There was a click as Stacy hung up. Marie shut off the cell phone. Then she put her head on the steering wheel and wept.

  Raymond’s house was a one story brick ranch, large and roomy, but not ostentatious. In many ways, he was a cautious man, and he knew the dangers in calling too much attention to himself. The house wasn’t even in his name, and very few people even knew where he stayed. It stood in the middle of a hundred-acre tract of farmland, screened from the main road by a stand of trees. The rich earth around the house hadn’t seen a crop in years; Raymond paid a local kid to keep it mowed flat so he could see anything coming. He stood behind the huge picture window in his living room and clearly marked the progress of the large black Chevy Suburban coming up the quarter mile of driveway. Raymond fumbled in his pocket for the plastic bottle of pain pills. He took one out and washed it down with a swallow from the glass of iced tea on the coffee table.

  “You might wanna go easy on them things,” Billy Ray said. He was sprawled in an oversized recliner across the room. “They’s supposed to be addictive.”

  Raymond didn’t answer. He ran his fingers across his side, feeling the expanse of bandages wrapped around his torso beneath his shirt. The bleeding had stopped, but the wound still felt like someone was holding a red-hot poker into his flesh. He was afraid it might be getting infected. Soon, though, it wouldn’t matter.

  The Chevy pulled up in the gravel parking lot before the front door. Raymond went to the door and opened it. He was shocked to see that the person getting o
ut on the passenger side was Paco Suarez. Geronimo got out of the driver’s side. Two goons he didn’t know exited the rear passenger doors. Raymond relaxed slightly with the knowledge that if Suarez himself was here, it was unlikely that they had come to kill him. Suarez was also careful. He always arranged to be miles away from any bloodshed.

  Raymond and Suarez embraced as Suarez reached the front door. The Latin custom had always made Raymond slightly uncomfortable, but there was no actual warmth in the gesture. It was a formality, nothing more. Suarez stepped back and looked at Raymond. He was a small man, with a narrow, bony face and the merciless eyes of a bird of prey.

  “You don’t look well, my friend,” Suarez said. “You look like you need a doctor.” His accent was barely noticeable. Suarez had received most of his education in the U.S., first in the schools and universities and then courtesy of the U.S. Army in the days when they weren’t picky about who received advanced “anti-insurgency” training.

  “I’m fine,” Raymond said. “Healing, anyway.” He stepped back and motioned Suarez through the door. Suarez stepped back and let Geronimo and the other two goons precede him. Raymond followed.

  Suarez sat on the couch in the living room, Geronimo on his left. The two other men stood flanking the door. Billy Ray got up and gave Raymond the recliner.

  “I have your assurance that this place is safe?” Suarez said. “You have attracted a great deal of attention to yourself.”

  “It’s safe,” Raymond said. “Ain’t many people that know about it.”

  Suarez nodded his approval of this. “And the local police, I know, are still firmly in your hip pocket.” He leaned forward. “Or are they? You are now a hunted man. Can you still do business?”

  Raymond nodded. “My network’s still together. You deliver a shipment to the usual place, and we’ll move it. Guaranteed.”

  Suarez looked doubtful. “What of your other, ah, legal problems?”

  Raymond leaned forward. “There was only a couple witnesses to what happened at that house. The main one I’m worried about is DeWayne Puryear. He’s one of the men who shot my daddy.”

  Suarez bowed his head and raised a hand in sympathy. “A senseless tragedy. Please accept my condolences,” he said. His face hardened. “Had you let us know about this,” he said, “We could have taken steps ourselves.”

  “He was my daddy,” Raymond said. “The job was mine to do.”

  Geronimo spoke up for the first time. “But now you ask for our help.”

  Raymond turned to him. Geronimo was taller than Suarez, and broader, with a fleshy frame and a round baby face. People who looked at him tended to think him soft or foolish. He was neither. Next to Suarez, Geronimo was the most dangerous man Raymond had ever met.

  “Yeah,” Raymond said. “Like you said, things have got out of hand. I need to get out of the country for a while.”

  “That is putting it mildly,” Suarez said. “And what will become of your business?”

  “It’s yours,” Raymond said.

  Suarez’ normally impassive face registered shock for the first time. “All of it?”

  “All of it,” Raymond said. “The club, the labs, the warehouses, even the trucks. All yours.” He pulled a small notebook from his back pocket. “It’s all in the lists right here. Nothin’s in my name, but my lawyer can draw up papers to have it put in any name you want.”

  Suarez leaned back and steepled his fingers beneath his chin. “Just for a way out of the country.”

  “No,” Raymond said. “That’s not all.”

  “Ah,” Suarez said. “And what else?”

  “I want Puryear. I want the other guy that was there, the one who shot my brother. He’s a bondsman out of Wilmington, name of Keller. And there’s one other.”

  Suarez sighed. “This will be the last condition, I hope?”

  “Yeah,” Raymond said. “There was a Latino guy that was helping us. Said his name was Oscar Sanchez.”

  “Probably not his real name,” Geronimo offered.

  “Probably. But he ran out on me. He took my truck.”

  Suarez looked amused. “You want to kill a man over a truck?”

  “No,” Raymond said. “But I want him taught a lesson.”

  Suarez nodded. “Is that all?”

  “That’s it.”

  Suarez thought for a moment. Then he stood up. “Allow me a few minutes to confer with my associates.” Geronimo stood as well. The two men headed to the door.

  Raymond stood up and went to let them out. He almost stumbled from the light-headedness of the pain pills, but caught himself.

  “We’ll let ourselves out,” Suarez said.

  Outside of the house, the Colombians gathered on the far side of the truck. “Guillermo,” Suarez said to the man Raymond called Geronimo, “Your thoughts.”

  “The man is a fool,” Guillermo said in Spanish. “He’s throwing everything away for the sake of killing some two-bit punk.”

  “He’s dying,” Suarez said. “Or so he has convinced himself. The last thing he wants before he goes into the ground is his revenge. And when he goes, what will become of his network? He has the facilities, the people, police contacts…and he is willing to turn them all over for the sake of his vengeance. So,” he said, “we give it to him. Guillermo, take care of this. Use some of your trusted men, good shooters. And do it quickly.”

  “What about this way out of the country he says he wants?”

  Suarez shrugged. “He may survive this,” he said. “When everything is done and all the assets have been turned over, get him on one of our planes. Tell him we’re taking him someplace safe. When you get over the water…” Suarez smiled and pantomimed throwing something, his arms held low so as not to be seen from behind the truck.

  Guillermo responded with an ugly grin. “Before I do, I’ll make him say my name right.”

  Suarez clapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s go in and tell him we have a deal.”

  Angela looked up from behind the counter as the bells on the front door jingled. Angela immediately pegged the two men who walked in as cops. The first one was short and balding. He was wearing a pair of wraparound sunglasses that hid his eyes. The one who followed was tall, broad-shouldered, red-faced. His shades were mirrored. The outside heat had them sweating slightly in their cheap sport coats. .

  The balding man took off his shades. He tucked them in an inside jacket pocket. His hand came out of the pocket with a slim brown wallet. “Ms. Hager?” he said. Without waiting for an answer, he flipped the wallet open, showing a flash of gold badge that swiftly disappeared as he tucked the wallet back in his pocket. “I’m Detective Barnes, Fayetteville P.D. This is my partner, Detective Stacy.” Stacy crossed his arms across his chest. He didn’t show a badge or take of his sunglasses.

  “I’m Angela Hager,” she said, standing up. “What can I do for you?”

  “We’re attempting to locate a Jackson Keller,” Barnes said. “I understand that he’s employed here.”

  “Mr. Keller is an employee of mine,” Angela said guardedly. “May I ask what…”

  “What does Mr. Keller do here, Mrs. Hager?” Barnes interrupted.

  “He does fugitive recovery,” Angela said.

  Stacy spoke for the first time. “A bounty hunter,” he said.

  Angela stiffened. “I’d like to see your credentials, Detective Stacy,” she said. The big man bristled, but at a look from Barnes he reached into his jacket pocket and produced his badge. He flicked the case open, then closed, managing to make the gesture look insulting. Angela sat back, trying to look calm, but her mind was racing. “What is it you want to see Mr. Keller for?” she asked.

  “First things first, ” Barnes said. “Do you know where he is?”

  “It’s his day off,” Angela said.

  “That wasn’t what we asked, lady,” Stacy said.

  “He’s not at his apartment,” Barnes said.

  Angela shuffled some papers behind the counter. “You
seem to know an awful lot about him already,” she said.

  Barnes and Stacy ignored the observation. “Does he have a cell phone number?” Barnes said.

  “First, I think you need to tell me what this is about,” Angela said.

  “You know damn well what this is about, lady,” Stacy grated. “A cop, a friend of mine, is dead. We got a house looks like a fucking war zone and we think your boy Keller is responsible.” He grinned nastily. “By the way, you might want to keep a closer eye on him. He’s screwing someone else.”

  Angela ignored him. She turned to Barnes. “I don’t have any idea where he is.” Barnes started to say something, but Stacy cut him off. “Bullshit,” he said. “You need to think real hard about just who you’re fucking with here, lady. We can make your life pretty goddamn hard if you don’t play ball with us.”

  Angela looked at Barnes. He shrugged. “He’s got a point,” he said mildly. “Interfering in a police investigation is a serious matter. You could lose your bondsman’s license.”

  Angela looked at him for a long moment. Then she began rolling up her sleeve. “Six years ago,” she said, “I tried to leave my husband. He responded by breaking both my legs with a baseball bat and setting me on fire.” She started on the other sleeve. “I was in a burn ward for eight months. I was wrapped in bandages from my neck to just above my knees. The blood and fluid from the burns caused the bandages to stick to me. Every time they changed the bandages, it was like being skinned alive. They changed the bandages twice a day. Every time they did it, I screamed until my voice was gone.” She held up her arms. Stacy’s eyes widened at the web-work of puckered scars on the backs of her hands and forearms. She looked back and forth between the two men’s faces. “When I got out, it took me a year to learn to walk again.”

  Barnes remained expressionless. “Ms. Hager…” he said.

  Angela looked directly at Stacy. Her voice was a whisper. “You think there’s anything….anything….you two can do to scare me, Detective Stacy?” There was a long silence. Angela continued to stare into Stacy’s eyes. He held her gaze for a moment, then looked away.