Head Shot (A Thriller): A Crime and Suspense Thriller (12 page)

Thirty-Seven

Large, rolling waves crashed against the harbor's giant, bleached white rocks.  Gulls cruised overhead, looking for a quick meal courtesy of the charter boat captain discarding the morning's bait.

Activity along the pier was minimal, the occasional fisherman leaving his boat, lugging fishing equipment, or a local with a long cane pole and a pail of worms, ready to target the perch that occasionally schooled in and around the harbor's protected water.

A large, heavyset man emerged from one of the boats and walked along the pier.  A baseball cap sat on top of his square head, and his belly, ensconced in a layer of blue flannel, hung over the belt holding up his blue jeans.

Wisconsin and Michigan were consistently ranked in the top five among the United States for obesity among its population.  An easily understood fact considering that winters in the Upper Midwest are long, and fat is easily hidden under heavy sweaters.

The man strolled awkwardly down the pier, his shoulders hunched forward and his back bent by the heavy cargo wrapped around his midsection.

If a person looked closely, though, they would have seen that the layer of fat commonly known as the spare tire, was in fact, unnaturally rumpled and bulged in places where there shouldn't be any bulges.

One would also have observed that the main's awkward gait periodically changed.  Sometimes the man walked more upright, and sometimes he hunched farther forward, as if he couldn't make up his mind exactly how much his belly weighed him down.

Other things, upon closer inspection, were strange about the man. For instance, on the back of the blue flannel shirt, there was a rather significant amount of hair clippings, so much that even the sloppiest barber couldn't miss.  Also, the hair that was tucked beneath his baseball cap was oddly colored.  The majority of the hair was light in color, but streaks beneath appeared to be darker.  Not your typical dye job by any means.

The man strolled around the horseshoe shaped pier, then turned left when he reached the parking lot, and headed for the play structure and swings in the grassy park located between the boat ramp and the swimming area.

A row of benches had been placed kitty corner from the play structure, the small tunnels and slides that children loved and could be entertained by for hours, giving parents a place to sit and commiserate about the lack of time in their lives.

The man sat on one of the benches and gazed out across the park to the clear blue waters of Lake Superior.  The water looked cold in the gray, afternoon light.  Far out toward the horizon, he could see a group of boats scattered haphazardly along a clearly defined line, probably a shelf that supplied the structure for suspended lake trout.

Joe Ferkovich placed his hands behind his head and glanced down at the pillow and blanket stuffed inside his shirt.  The disguise was good, he thought to himself, good enough from a distance at least.

His eye caught movement to his left and he casually glanced that way.  A police cruiser was making its way slowly down the street.  Joe got to his feet to show off his new profile, not wanting the cop to get curious and move in closer.  He adopted his best fat guy walk and crossed back over toward the pier, giving the cop a quick glance that any normal person would do, then headed for the pier.  As the cruiser went by, it kept going, and when it was out of sight, Joe returned to the bench.

It was a relatively nice day, and he figured a mother with a young child should be along any time now.

He could wait a little bit longer.

Thirty-Eight

Lieutenant Benjamin Soergel plunked his lean, muscular frame into the chair facing Chief Trimble's desk.

"Heard the latest?" he asked.

Trimble looked up from a thick sheaf of papers in his hands.

"No, but I think I'm about to."

"Ferkovich killed his buddy, then stole his truck and disappeared.  Mitchell went and talked to the sister but she didn't seem to know anything, but Mitchell thinks she might be hiding something.  What that might be exactly, he has no idea."

Soergel leaned back in his chair and crossed his feet, then idly glanced around the office.  I could get used to this, he thought to himself.  His eyes fell on the short, squat figure of Trimble.  First, I have to get rid of this asshole, though.  Well, the good thing is, he's got no clue I'm gunning for him.

Trimble finished speaking.

"Pardon me, Chief?" Soergel said.

"I was just saying that I'm glad Ray's up there, he's the best we've got, he'll find this sick bastard."

Soergel raised an eyebrow.

"You really think Mitchell's the best we've got?"

Trimble looked across the desk at his next in command.

"You don't?"

Soergel shrugged his shoulders.

"I think he's done some good things, but there's something about him I just don't trust.  And all these leaks to the media.  Where are they coming from?  It just seems like he doesn't run a very tight ship, you know what I mean?"

"Can you blame that on Ray, though?"

"Well, it's his investigation, isn't it?"

Trimble nodded.

"All of the information is going through him, right?"

Trimble leaned back in his chair, as if to say he knew where this was all going.

"I rest my case."

A pause filled the space while Soergel let that thought sink into his boss's mind.  A mind, Soergel thought to himself, that was getting more and more like Play-Doh every day. 

"You know what would really work out well for Ray?" Soergel said, adopting a spur-of-the-moment tone.

"What's that, Ben?" Trimble bit.

"If he can bring in this killer, quickly and painlessly with no more people getting killed in the process, he'll make us all look good, especially himself."

Trimble nodded enthusiastically, then paused.

"I think he can do it, do you?"

Soergel let the pause hang just long enough.  "Sure, I think he can."

"But what if he can't?” Trimble asked.

"Then he'll look bad,” Soergel pointed out.  “But so will we.”

The Chief rocked slightly in his chair, before locking his eyes onto Soergel.

"How's your schedule look?" Trimble asked.

"Busy as always,” Soergel said, trying not to smile.

"I want you up there with Ray,” the Chief said.  “

Soergel started to protest.

"I know, I know, you've got a lot to do and it's his investigation, but let's cover our asses a bit,” Trimble said.  “Just go up and make sure everything's hunky-dory, okay?"

"Well, I don't know how much I can help, but I'll go if you want me to, Chief."

"Just you being there will help, call me when you join up with Ray."

With that, Trimble delved back into the paperwork on his desk and Soergel quietly exited the Chief's office.

He walked down the hallway to his own office.  He’d gassed up the car the night before and had plotted his trip.

He turned and looked back down the hall at Trimble's office.  How much longer it would be before his name went on that door he really didn't know.

But that's what made it all so goddamn much fun.

Thirty-Nine

Beta Giancarlo walked down the main hallway of Global Creative Management's Los Angeles office.

To say that she was rarely called into Marcus Levenson's office would be a gross understatement.  In fact, to say anyone rarely saw him would still be not doing the big man's elusiveness justice.  Hell, Beta knew agents who had been at GCM five years and never been called to see him once.

Marcus Levenson was director of the entire office, overseeing every one of the fifteen agents representing clients.  He was a rail thin man with a smile so false it seemed unworthy of the effort made to create it.  Because he rarely showed his face around the office, the agents had clandestinely nicknamed him "The Shadow."

Levenson's reputation in Hollywood was storied, a classic example of the Tinsel Town triumvirate:  sex, money and power.  Although now approaching eighty years old, Marcus Levenson clung to the only aphrodisiac that hadn't lost its allure:  power.

To be summoned to the Shadow's office meant one of two things.  You were being fired.  Or you were being promoted.  And if you were being promoted, it meant someone else was being fired.

In her four years with GCM, Beta had only met with Marcus Levenson twice.  The first time, he had hired her.  The second time, he had promoted her.  Beta clung to the hope that good things came in threes, rather than thinking that her luck would inevitably run out, even though it always did in this business.

A secretary ushered her through the thick black doors into Levenson's office which was  similar to Beta's in that it featured plenty of chrome and black leather, but the rather dramatic difference was that it was three times the size and had glorious views through the floor-to-ceiling windows.

"Ah, Beta," said Levenson, "please sit down."  He gestured to the chair in front of his desk, and she sank into it, noting humorously how much lower she was than GCM's mysterious director.  Sitting in a chair higher than your visitor was an old power trick. 

Levenson peered at her through his glasses.  She knew he'd had refractive eye surgery and the glasses were non-prescription, worn merely for aesthetics.

"Please describe yourself for me," he said.

She had no intention of being toyed with, and it was time to let him know that.

"Formidable."

He sat and waited, but Beta failed to continue, keeping her eyes locked onto his.

Finally, he laughed and relented.

"Very good, just what I want my newest Executive Vice-President to be.  Formidable."

"Thank you," she said, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"As of today, you will immediately terminate relations with talent not bringing in half a million dollars a year or higher, and assume the talent consolidated by the departure of Ms. Voss and Mr. Birdsall."

Beta showed no emotion.

This was the business.  Molly Voss was her friend, but Beta had no pity, Molly should have a contingency plan and if she didn't it was her own fault.  Dick Birdsall was a complete asshole, good riddance.

"Your attendance will be required at the partner's meetings every Monday morning at 9 a.m.  Thank you."

Beta nodded and left.  There would be no champagne tonight, no wild party, no call home to the proud parents.  It was a business where you were here today and gone tomorrow, and she had no illusions.

First thing was to let her only client not bringing in the dollars Levenson mentioned that he would no longer be represented by ICM.

Beta searched her memory.

She thought Mike Sharpe had said something about going on vacation.  It didn't matter, he would find out the bad news soon enough.  She dropped the matter from her mind, as bigger, grander plans filtered into her highly focused vision.

Forty

Flight 235 from Los Angeles to Milwaukee via Chicago landed at Milwaukee's Mitchell International Airport only fifteen minutes past its scheduled arrival time.

They got their luggage at baggage claim and then collected their rental car.

Mike had rented a Ford Taurus for the trip.  It was more expensive than a compact but far more affordable than the top-of-the-line Caddy the salesman had tried to push off on him.

With its V-8 and roomy interior, the Ford was more than enough car for their jaunt up north, and for their daytrips around the U.P., something they were both looking forward to very much.

"Do you remember where the hell you're going?" Laurie asked Mike, a smile on her face.

"Absolutely not," he said, pulling onto 94 West and then catching I-43 North, the road that would take them all the way up through Green Bay before they switched to the local highways for the rest of the trip through the U.P.

"Hey, that's not a bad skyline at all," Laurie said as they reached an overpass and the lights of Milwaukee's buildings in the early dusk twinkled back at them, before stopping abruptly at the edge of Lake Michigan.

They blasted through the city in a little over fifteen minutes, quickly reaching the wealthy suburb of Mequon.

"Next stop, Sheboygan, the bratwurst capital of the world."

They sped up I-43 and the scenery changed from suburban to rural, the large, North Shore homes changing to country farms and then changing to working farms.  For the majority of the drive, Lake Michigan ran parallel to the highway, capturing Laurie's attention as they shifted from better view to better view.

"This is so weird," she said.  "In L.A., I'm used to the water being on my left when I'm going North, I feel like we're driving South."

Mike hadn't heard that one before, but it made sense to him.

"Are you looking forward to seeing your parents?" she asked.

"Yeah, I haven't seen them in awhile," Mike answered.  "The last time I did, they seemed so much older.  The old man still has a spring in his step, but it doesn't quite bounce as high as it used to.  And Mom is still as sassy as ever, but now she falls asleep an hour or two before she used to."

He set the car on cruise control and settled his foot down for a rest.

"So in a way, I'm really happy to see them, but every time I do, I feel sort of sad."

"Like it's a reminder that you're getting older, too?"

"Yeah, and that I'm not a kid anymore."

"It's only natural, Mike."

He didn't respond.  What was there to say?  His career was going nowhere, he was going to pop the question but there was a chance she would say no, and he had to face the fact that his parents wouldn't always be there for him.  He was facing a crossroads and he knew it.  But he also knew that with Laurie by his side, the rest of his life would be a whole lot better, that he could count on.

"Are you bummed you're not going to be able to watch the show?" Laurie asked him.

The
Nation’s Most Wanted
episode would be airing tonight and Mike had originally hoped to be at Lost Lake Lodge in time to catch it, but the flight had been delayed just long enough to make them miss it.  It didn't matter, really.  He was recording it at home on the DVR.

"Not really," he answered.  "I pretty much know how it turns out," he said, laughing.

They stopped in Sheboygan at the American Club, a five-star hotel that seemed supremely out of place in the blue collar town, and had a quick dinner before hitting the road.

Mike pushed the Taurus as hard as he could, being careful to avoid a speeding ticket. 

North of Green Bay, a half hour from Marinette, Wisconsin, Laurie fell asleep.  Mike was happy to hear her snoring, he knew she'd had a tough photo shoot the day before and he wanted her rested for the beginning of the vacation.  The fresh, northern air tended to make you more tired than usual.

Mike was also grateful for the time to think.  He'd always been someone who enjoyed taking long drives, something he hadn't done regularly since college. 

The bulge of the ring case dug into his thigh, but this time the weight felt reassuring.  Mike didn't want to jinx anything, but he was beginning to think Laurie would say yes.  He was fairly confident she would be caught totally off guard, but Laurie was a woman who seemed to follow her heart, and as long as her heart told her Mike was the one, that she was in love with him, the answer would be yes.

He saw a flash of light to his left and he glanced in that direction.  Twin circles of light shone back at him and he briefly lifted his foot to cover the brake.  There were deer everywhere in this part of the state and he really didn't want to start the vacation with a three hundred pound buck flying through the windshield.

The woods were now thick on either side of the highway and Mike could feel the silence as the darkness crept closer to the road, the tall trees blocking his view of the stars.

He always loved this part of the drive, when you really started to feel like you were away from civilization, deep in the woods, where nature came back to life and you could actually hear yourself think.  So different from Hollywood.

Mike's thoughts quickly turned to his career, or that shabby semblance of a career that he called his own.

He'd often joked to Laurie about moving back to Wisconsin and starting a bait shop or something stupid like that, but the fact was, he was considering moving back more and more seriously.  The cost-of-living was so much better here, as were the schools, the employment opportunities, and of course, lower crime rates.

Or was he just giving up?

Was he acting like a quitter?  It wasn't in his nature to do things half-assed, it never had been.  And a part of him, a big part, wanted to go back to Hollywood and kick everyone's ass, show all of his friends both out there and back home that he hadn't been wasting his time.

But how much more time should he give himself before deciding it was an investment that would never see a return?

Another year?  Two years?  Five years?

Mike abruptly checked his watch and noted with satisfaction that his episode of
Nation’s Most Wanted
was on television right now.  His face was being beamed across millions of homes in America, and he felt a brief surge of pride.  Maybe he shouldn't give up this acting thing just yet. 

Before he could ponder that thought anymore, the Taurus' fuel light flickered on briefly and Mike noted that the fuel gauge was closing in on E.  He knew that he was just outside of Rodgers Bay and that in another twenty minutes, he'd be pulling up the wooded drive of Lost Lake Lodge.  Soon after that, he'd be sitting with a glass of whiskey in his hand talking to his Dad, a roaring fire next to them.

But first, he'd have to stop for gas.

He checked his watch again and cursed silently that they were so close to the cabin, but now they had to make another stop.  He checked in the backseat where Laurie was still fast asleep.

There was a service station right at the edge of town where he would stop.  He would have to do it fast, be in and out, and make as little noise as possible.  He wanted Laurie to wake up at Lost Lake Lodge, not under the self-service pump at a gas station.

He came upon the outskirts of town and saw the small gas station next to a run-down bar.  His stomach was grumbling and he knew his mother would have some food, probably her world-class brownies waiting for him, he could already smell the interior of the cabin, rich with the scents of coffee and woodsmoke.

To Mike, it was the greatest smell in the world.

Well, it would only be a matter of minutes now.  He steered the Taurus toward the gas station.

He'd have to make this quick.