Abduction (6 page)

Logan got out of the pickup, took his rucksack with him and made his way along the sidewalk.  He kept to the shadows and was partially screened by the Royal palm trees and cars that lined the street.

He caught the slightest glimpse of one of the men entering an alley off the side street, so crossed over and cautiously followed.  His right hand was in a pocket of the fleece he wore, holding the Glock.  He hoped that he would not have to shoot anyone, but was prepared to if necessary.

VINCE
had enjoyed prime rib and salad at Charley’s Boathouse Grill on Estero Boulevard and then gone back to his small, detached house on Crescent Cove Drive, which was next to a fairway of the golf course that was part of the Gulf Harbor Yacht and Country Club.

When Nick had phoned, Vince was in bed, alone.  He chose not to have a live-in partner, or get into a serious relationship with one woman. His view was that the female of the species was after love, money or preferably both.  Maybe the bottom line was that they craved security within a monogamous and equal joint venture.  They all seemed to have the misguided belief that they could change a man that they’d had hooked, as though he was a sea bass they’d reeled in.  He didn’t need a woman as a friend, lover, homemaker or replacement mother.  Being self-contained and in his own space a lot of the time suited him just fine.  That didn’t mean that he didn’t love beautiful, sexy women.  They were like a fine meal, to be enjoyed, but if you were served filet mignon for every meal you would soon tire of it and choose something different from the bill of fare.  And he was not a romantic, but selfish and callous by nature.  Knowing what floated his boat made for a simple life.

Vince had dressed quickly and phoned Alan Norris, who was another Brit.  They had served together in the same fifteen man troop in 22 Special Air Service Regiment ‘A’ Squadron, based at Hereford, and had been on a dozen missions in several countries, which had all been successfully carried out.  They had both been highly trained killers and still were, but for money now, not in service of their country.  Vince had hired Alan to be part of Nick’s operation.  His take on it being that it’s always better to put your trust in someone you know; someone who has watched your back in the past and can be totally trusted.  The Yanks that worked for Cady were capable, but not the best of the best; a few of them would have been better suited as nightclub bouncers, or employed solely as muscle to collect protection money.

“I’ll be with you in ten minutes,” Vince said when Alan picked up. “We need to deal with a problem.”

“Fine,” Alan said and ended the call.

Vince was on the road two minutes later, driving his lunar gray metallic XJ Jaguar on surface streets towards Alan’s apartment.  He carried a Browning High Power nine-millimeter handgun in a shoulder holster.

Alan had been on the Internet, Googling property in the area.  He envisaged working with Vince for Cady to be a long-term gig.  He wanted a pad on the waterfront, not a small apartment in the city that made him feel a little claustrophobic.

Alan was thirty-six, stood six foot one inch, and had the look of the actor Jason Statham.  He had his hair ultra short, due to balding, and liked to sport designer stubble.  He wore expensive casual clothing, and needed the action lifestyle that he had been used to in the forces.  Unlike Vince, Alan had a steady girlfriend, Deana, who thought that he was a financial advisor.  Deana was pressing to move in with him, but he was holding back.  It was difficult to maneuver if you were living a double life.

Dressed in blue jeans, white T and black leather jerkin, Alan was outside on the sidewalk when Vince rolled up in the Jag.

“What’s going down?” Alan said as he climbed in the car and Vince pulled away into the night.

“A straight forward snatch of a woman and her kid went sideways,” Vince said.  “Jimmy, Diego and Jade took them to the motel out on the Babcock road and then somehow attracted attention.  An as yet unknown guy broke in the room and sorted Jimmy out.  Jade got away with the kid, and has made her way home.”

“Do we have a description of the guy?”

“Yeah, the motel manager says he’s white, about six-four, maybe in his forties, and can handle himself.”

“What happened to Jimmy and Diego?”

“Jimmy got shot in the leg, beaten up, and then talked.  Diego made a break for it, fell in a swamp and got killed by a gator.  Larry Kramer had a word with Jimmy, and then capped him for being a grass.”

“Messy.”

“Yeah, Al.  We deserve every dollar Cady pays us.  The whole organization needs overhauling.  Half of his muscle is made up of junkies and ex-cons with no training and IQ’s on a par with armadillos.  They’re tossers.  I’ll have a word with Cady, so that we can upgrade and train them to be a professional outfit.”

Logan kept walking down the alley and past the apartment building with his hands in his pockets, affecting a drunken stagger as he heard a vehicle turn in behind him.  The car’s lights lit him up, and he felt vulnerable until the vehicle slid by and made a right turn farther up on the right.

Jogging to where the car had pulled in to the side lot, Logan stopped at the corner of a retaining wall and watched as two men climbed out of a late model Jaguar.  They were both tall, looked fit, and moved with purpose after first carefully taking in their surroundings.  One was talking on a cell, and as they reached the main door the lock buzzed and clicked open.  They were expected.

It took Logan less than a minute to get to the Jag and puncture all four tires with the knife that had belonged to Diego.  Thirty seconds later Jade’s cell chirped.  Logan answered it but said nothing.  The caller ID was withheld.

“You wanted to deal,” Larry said.

“What’s your name?”

“Larry.”

“Okay, Larry.  Hand the phone to one of the guys that just turned up in the Jag,” Logan said.

There was a pause as Cady’s goons realized that he was close by and watching the building and all activity that took place.

Vince took the cell off Larry.  “What’s
your
name, friend?” he said.

“You first,” Logan came back.

“I’m Vince, and I’m sure that we can sort this problem without any more bloodshed.”

“I’m Logan, Vince, and I’m also sure that we can.”

Vince had the phone on speaker.  Alan nodded and left the apartment with Lenny.  They both screwed suppressors to the muzzles of their handguns as they made their way along the hallway to the stairwell door and walked down to the rear exit.  Larry stayed with Vince and Jade.

“Good,” Vince said.  “What do you suggest?”

“I suggest that you wise up.  There’s an echo, so I guess you’ve got the phone on speaker.  And I heard the door open, so expect one or more of your gofers to be on the way down to see if they can find and deal with me.  You aren’t taking the position you’re in seriously enough, Vince.  You need to know that I’ve eyeballed all of you, and that I don’t take prisoners.  You’re muscle for Nick Cady. You’re a Brit, probably ex-military, drive a Jag that I’ve now got the plate number of to check, and you have a choice to make; send Jade out with the girl, or go to war with me.”

“Listen, old son,” Vince said.  “I don’t know why you’ve got a death wish, but being a Good Samaritan is asking for an early grave.  You don’t know what kind of opposition you’re up against.”

“I’m up against one of you at a time.  And I’ll pick where and when and what order you’ll get hit in.  You won’t see me coming.  That’s how it will go down if you don’t return the girl.  Is it really worth losing whatever you’ve got, Vince, including your life?”

Logan moved as he talked; did a full circuit of the building and decided that any attack would come from the fire exit door that opened onto a walkway at the rear.  They would not risk walking out the front.

He was standing behind one of the concrete pillars that supported the overhanging building, just six feet from the door.

“I’ll have to clear it,” Vince said.  “It’s not my call.”

“Use your loaf, Limey.  Convince Cady that if the girl is not returned, now, he won’t believe the consequences.  Get back to me in five.”

Logan pocketed the phone just seconds before he heard the door open.  Lenny came out first, slowly, and looked both ways.  He was holding a gun.

Moving in what to Lenny was a blur; Logan came out from the left side of the pillar.

Even if you are anxious, alert and half-expecting to be surprised, there is no way that you can be fully prepared for the unknown.  The psychological and then physical response time to any sudden danger is at best half a second.  There is no such thing as a truly immediate reaction.  The brain has to recognize and compute the problem before it can be physically responded to.

In the time that it took Lenny to be aware of the threat and bring his gun arm round across his body, he was already too late, and Logan struck, transferring weight smoothly and evenly from his right to left leg as he hit Lenny in the throat with the straight edge of his hand and then moved to the right, planning to take out the guy behind him.

Lenny made a single croaking sound, like that of a startled grackle, as he jerked backwards into Alan, who instinctively fired his handgun and unintentionally put a bullet into Lenny, which tore through his liver and erupted from his belly, to plow through the side of Logan’s rucksack before compacting with the concrete pillar and mushrooming.

Alan fell to the ground with Lenny on top of him, and sucked in air between his gritted teeth as Logan stamped down hard on the wrist of his gun hand and forced him to release it.

Fluidly, seemingly with casual and relaxed movements, Logan stooped, picked up Alan’s gun by the silencer-elongated barrel and swiped the butt across his left temple, and then the right in an arc reminiscent of a pendulum on an old-fashioned clock.  He relieved both men of their cell phones and wallets, which he planned on adding to his now holed rucksack.  On a whim, he kept the silenced handgun and tucked it in the waistband of his pants.

Vince heard what he knew was a muffled gunshot.  He smiled, and then speed dialed Alan’s number.

“Yeah?” Logan said as he made his way back towards the front of the building. There was a moment of silence.  “Cat got your tongue, Vince?  Did you think that those two assholes would be able to take me out?”

“Okay, Logan.  Enough.  I’ll send Jade downstairs with the kid.”

“You and Larry stay where you are.  Give the phone to Jade and tell her to keep the line open.  I want to see her get in the SUV with the girl and start it up.  And make sure that she is unarmed.  I’ll talk to her and tell her where to head for, while you two organize an ambulance for your buddies.  I think one is probably dead, and the other will be seriously concussed.”

Vince handed the phone to Jade.  He accepted that sometimes you had to bite the bullet and regroup.  Not all missions worked out.  Logan was a force to be reckoned with.  He had them in a bind, and may even be considering calling the police.  This debacle needed to be ended, and the sooner the better.

Vince whispered to Jade, told her what to do, and then he and Larry followed her out of the apartment and down the stairs.  Kelly was fast asleep in Jade’s arms, oblivious to the events that were taking place.

LOGAN
expected a double-cross.  He stayed well back in the shadows behind the wall, from where he could keep the main door and the nearest side of the building and walkway in sight.

Jade reached the door, opened it and came out hesitantly, carrying Kelly.  She looked around nervously as she walked over to the small lot and climbed into the SUV.

“Listen to me very carefully, Jade” Logan said into the phone.  “Whatever Vince told you to do could get you killed.  I need for you to make a monumental decision if you want to get through this in one piece.”

Jade said nothing, just waited for him to spell it out.

“Start the car and go back out onto Sauer Drive.  Approximately a hundred feet past Starbucks on the other side of the street is the old pickup from the motel.  The little girl’s mother is inside it.  Park next to it, get out and hand Kelly over, then go wherever you want to.  I’ll be following you until you make the handover.  Got it?”

“Yeah, but why are you doing this?” Jade said.  “What the fuck do you care about the girl or her mother?”

“They needed help, and I’m it.  And if you were a decent person you wouldn’t have to ask.  Now move.”

Jade switched the engine on, drove out of the lot and along the alley, to make a left on Sauer Drive and approach Starbucks.  She passed by it and slowed to walking pace.  It was make your mind up time.  Did she do what the man had told her to, or follow Vince’s instructions?  Either way was a gamble.

Logan followed on foot, jogging back to the street, hoping that what he had said would be enough to convince Jade to hand Kelly over.

A few seconds later Vince and Larry exited the front door.  Vince led the way round to where he had parked the Jag.  They climbed in and Vince started the car and made to drive off, but braked almost immediately and got out.  All four tires were flat on the rims.  Logan had used forward planning and slowed them down.

“I’ve got the Dodge parked near the coffee shop,” Larry said as Vince phoned for backup to extract Alan and Lenny, and for a tow truck to collect his Jag, as they both ran back round to where Larry had left the car.

It was an easy call in the end.  Jade had considered her precarious position: She could do what Logan had told her to or trust in Nick Cady, who had the resources and manpower to deal with the loner.  Her life was here in Fort Myers, and if she handed the kid back it would be over.  She would have to run and somehow start again in another State, and hope that Nick wrote her off like a bad but small debt that wasn’t worth collecting.  Problem being, he would take her treachery personally and have her found.  Forgiveness was not in his arsenal of emotions.  He always had to get even.  Proof of that had been Conchita Mendoza, a hooker that Nick had found out was holding out on him.  She had been a beautiful raven-haired Mexican girl that had received special attention: a nice apartment, late model car, and the higher end clientele to do business with.  But she had been greedy and held too much back.

It had been Vince Palmer that told Jade what had happened.  Nick had instructed two men to lift Conchita and have her taken to the transport company at the industrial park, where he had personally cut her nose and both ears off, and then removed most of her teeth with pliers after first allowing a dozen of the Hispanic truck drivers to repeatedly rape her throughout the night.  She had been dumped on the sidewalk outside Lee Memorial Hospital on Cleveland Avenue, and knew better than to talk to the police when they were called to the Accident and Emergency department by a doctor.  A month after the incident, Conchita had been found in an alley, dead from an overdose of heroin.  The formally extremely attractive young woman ‒ who had made a living from her looks and figure – had not been able to continue living with such terrible disfigurement.  That was not how Jade wanted to end up.  She slowed, braked, saw the woman sitting in the front of the pickup truck, and then accelerated away, to head for NC Transport off Old US 41, where Vince had told her to take the child.

Logan reached the corner in time to see the ruby-red flash of the brake lights fade as Jade took off at speed.  “Big mistake,” he said into the cell phone.  “You still have time to do the right thing, Jade.”

“I’m doing what I think is right, for me,” Jade said.

“Look after Kelly.  If she gets harmed, I’ll find you and make you wish you’d never been born.”

Jade switched off the phone and drove even faster.

Logan reached the pickup, slipped his rucksack off, tossed it on the shelf behind the two seats, climbed in, and fired it up, to pull out with the steering wheel hard over, to make the tight turn with tires squealing and laying down twin lines of black rubber as he gave chase.  He saw the two men that had arrived in the Jag.  They were running towards the Dodge.

“What happened?” Debbie said.  “Where’s Kelly?”

“The woman that took her still has her,” Logan said.  “But she’s safe, and we’ll get her back.  They have no reason to harm your daughter.”

Debbie felt scared, sick, and was in mild shock.  Her humdrum life had been turned upside down.  She was on some hellish rollercoaster ride.  The distress of seeing her mom shot down in cold blood had been the beginning of a nightmare that she could not wake up from, because it was not some imaginary bad dream, it was really happening.  If Logan had not heard her scream, then all would have been lost.  The big man had so far been her salvation, and so she wanted desperately to believe every word he said.

“Can we phone someone?” Debbie said as Logan scanned the road ahead, unable as yet to spot Jade in the SUV.  “My mom is dead at her house.”

“Your mom is beyond any more suffering,” Logan said.  “If we involve the authorities it will put Kelly at risk.  But it’s your call.”

Debbie hung her head and sobbed almost silently.

Logan said nothing.  He was concentrating on driving, hoping to see the SUV up ahead, and he didn’t know what to say.  There were no words that would change a damn thing.  Debbie was in a bad place, and he knew that she would be attempting unsuccessfully to comprehend what had happened that evening.  Whatever it took, he would find a way to get Kelly back.  That was the only thing that would count.  In the main, and especially when dealing with scumbags, actions spoke far louder than words.

Debbie reached out in the semi-darkness of the cab and gripped Logan’s shoulder.  He took his eyes off the road for a moment and looked at her.  Saw the slight hardening of her expression as she said, “I trust you, Logan.  Do it your way.”

He wanted to tell her that there were no guarantees, and that he couldn’t be one hundred percent certain of how things would turn out, and that shit happens every second of every day to a great many people, but looking in his rearview mirror he saw the headlights of a vehicle weaving in and out of the light flow of traffic, gaining on him fast. There was no time to tell Debbie anything.  He knew that it would be the Brit at the wheel.  It was time to use evasive tactics.  He was not a professional driver, and the old pickup was no match for the larger car that was now only three vehicles back and closing.

Larry grinned.  “The woman is with him,” he said to Vince.  “I’ll ram him, and when he goes off the side of the road I’ll stop and we’ll do a Bonnie and Clyde and turn the pickup into a fucking colander.”

Vince drew his gun, and out of habit released the magazine to check that it was full before ramming it back into the butt with the heel of his hand.

Logan checked that Debbie had buckled up, then stamped on the brake and almost turned the pickup over on its side as he skidded into the mouth of a narrow street, almost colliding with a parked car as he straightened up and accelerated along it, to take the first right, then a left, and switch the lights off before pulling into an alley, to drive until he reached a cross street.  He took another left turn and sped away from the area, to park in the side lot of a closed dental practice.

They sat for five minutes without either of them saying a word.  Logan had nothing to say, and Debbie didn’t know what to say.  She had always been a law-abiding person, basically getting on with her own life and making do the best that she could.  Her personality was moderate, devoid of extreme views on almost every subject.  But that had now changed.  The evening’s events had radically altered her outlook.  Real hatred had been a stranger to her.  She had disliked things, and even some people, and her reaction to her feelings had been to avoid that which she found offensive or confounded her.  Now, she was experiencing a complex amalgamation of fear, hate, anger, grief and helplessness.  Leaning forward, straining against the seat belt, she pounded her small fists against the padded console until her hands and wrists ached, before slumping back.

Logan let her physically vent the temper and sense of vulnerability that was all but consuming her.  He had never had kids, but that didn’t mean he was ignorant to the powerful bond that parents and their offspring felt for each other.  He had been a youngster with a mom and dad, so knew all about emotional family ties.

“I want to kill that fucking woman,” Debbie said.  “I have
never
felt such hatred for anyone in my life. I’ve always believed in turning the other cheek, forgiving whenever possible, and attempting to think that people should be helped to be better; to be counseled and cared for and reformed.”

“That’s because you were on the outside looking in,” Logan said.  “It’s easier to have a liberal overview if you haven’t been on the receiving end of crime and violence.  You’re now on the inside looking out, and it’s personal, and it triggers a whole new set of feelings.”

“Are you absolutely certain that you can deal with these people?” Debbie said, needing to be reassured.

“I don’t believe in absolutes.  If you have a strong enough goal ‒ realistic or not ‒ you aim for it, and if the fates are with you, you succeed.  A lot of what happens in life is to do with timing.  A split-second either way can lead to disaster or salvation.  I tend to have come through quite a few scrapes in one piece, because most of the people I’ve had cause to fall out with have not been able to find me: I find them.”

“Don’t you have a home or family?” Debbie said.

“No.  I move around.  Staying in one place too long doesn’t suit who I am,” Logan said.  “I’ve reached a time in my life where I can choose to avoid what I consider to be constraints.  If there’s one thing I’ve realized, it’s that you need to be happy in your own skin.”

“And you’re happy to just drift?”

“Yeah.  I lived in a small apartment in the Bronx, New York City for what seemed a lifetime.  Leaving was like being born again.”

“What did you do in New York?”

“I was a homicide detective.”

Debbie felt better for knowing that.  Had he been an ex-carpenter or plumber she would have probably lost some of the faith that she had in him. This was a man used to dealing with criminals, and could obviously handle himself.  She considered herself unlucky to have been targeted and to have suffered losing her mom and having Kelly taken from her, but extremely fortunate that Logan had appeared from nowhere to put his own life in danger to help her.

“How do we get Kelly back?” Debbie said.

“We’ll find somewhere to stay for a few hours, get you some fresh clothes, have something to eat, and then I’ll contact Nick Cady and impress on him that handing Kelly back would be in his best interest.”

Debbie knew that she had to curb her crushing need do something immediately.  All she
could
do was attempt to remain positive and put all her trust in Logan.

Logan gave it another five minutes.  Once satisfied that they had shaken the tail he drove east, away from the area, to stop at a small motel off a dirt track on the outskirts of a town called Alva, close to the Caloosahatchee River.  The sign on the main road had been red neon with a couple of letters flickering under a coating of grime.

The Oak Creek Motel was a sleazy eight-unit, single-storey no-tell motel with daily or hourly rates.  It was in the main a ‘check in, make out, check out’ dump used by couples needing somewhere to go for sex.  A few local hookers spent most evenings in it, catering to clients who valued their anonymity, and were not content with a quick fuck or blowjob in their vehicles.

The office/home of the owner was a doublewide at the other side of the small, weed-filled parking lot.

Logan nosed the pickup into deep shadow at the edge of the lot. Got out and walked over to the trailer.  The lights were on, and as he raised his hand to rap on the door, it opened.

“Hi, friend,” Jethro Lewis said.  “You in need of a room?”

“Till about nine a.m.” Logan said.

“That’ll be thirty bucks,” Jethro said as he stepped back and took a key from a unit drawer.  “Number four.”

Logan handed him two twenties, took the key and said, “Is there a store nearby?”

“Cody’s Country Store is a five minute walk east of here on the main road,” Jethro said.  “Tom opens at about six-thirty every morning.  If you call in, tell him that Jethro pointed you in his direction.”

Logan nodded, went back to the pickup, grabbed his rucksack and waited for Debbie to get out.

Jethro had closed his door and gone back to reading an Ed McBain 87
th
Precinct yarn.  He was a night owl who got his sleep through the day.  At sixty-nine years old he was on a slow rundown, doing less of everything that he had once done without a second thought.  His wife had been in her grave for over four years, and his only son, Ray, lived up in Orlando and had disowned him.  Ray was in IT, whatever the hell that might be, and had a nice house, a stuck up wife with buck teeth and a bad attitude, and twin girls that were fat, lazy and spoiled.  No loss.  Fact was, Jethro was as happy as a hog in a muddy holler.  The town council was the only dark cloud on his horizon.  Some of the board was intent on closing the motel down.  The leader of the council was Myrtle Kauffman, the mayor; an old dyke on a crusade to clean up the town and get rid of what she had christened the Oak Creek as a den of iniquity.  It didn’t compute.  What was so sinful about sex, or somewhere to go and enjoy it in privacy?  The only saving grace, for Jethro, was that the vice mayor, Bob Margolis, and councilor Jim Petrie both used the motel on occasion. Bob liked to have threesomes with what may or may not be minors.  Hard to tell these days, when a fifteen-year-old girl could look several years older.  And Jim was married with children, but had a penchant for teenage boys.  It was in both of the men’s interests to support Jethro, who had hinted that he had video footage of them doing what comes naturally.  Thing about folks with a guilty conscience is that they are prone to believe that there
could
be evidence against them.  Deep down an awful lot of people have a kernel of conviction that you reap what you sow.  They keep on doing what drives them, but are running scared all the time, waiting for the ax to fall.