Judgment (20 page)

Macklin stood up slowly. The answers that had eluded him he sensed were within his reach now, swirling around his psyche, ready to come together into one truth.

He walked out the door into the smoke, feeling apart from the activity around him. Firefighters dragged hoses to the flames. A paramedic ambulance skidded to a stop at the curb.

Bits of dialogue crackled in his head.

. . .
We'd hear all this talk but your father just couldn't track down anything
. . .

Gangs are decimating each other over stuff that they hear happened but maybe didn't happen…Maybe you wanna take a swan pe off an overpass, motherfucker . . .

. . .
The mayor told us to kill the cop
. . .

Look, alls I know is that he was asking too many questions
. . .

. . .
Freeze, Macklin.

The gunman's face, the face behind the cracked windshield of the speeding sedan. It was coming into focus.

Freeze, Macklin.

Sliran. The gunman was
Sliran
!

Why would Sliran want Esteban or Macklin dead? How did Sliran fit into his father's murder? Or this attack?

Macklin looked back at the Chicken Shack, remembering Jeffries' words.
I'm gonna help Elliot Wells clobber that son of a bitch Lucas Breen
. . . What had happened to the last guy Elliot Wells had brought in to help him?

He was killed.

In a gang massacre.

The mayor told us to kill the cop
. . .

Shaw was leading a team of paramedics to the Chicken Shack when he saw Macklin, trancelike, emerging from the smoke.

"Mack!" Shaw yelled, angry and surprised.

Macklin, apparently in a daze, ignored him and walked to a police motorcycle. Shaw broke away from the paramedics and ran toward Macklin, who straddled the cycle and kick-started it.

"Stop, Mack," Shaw yelled. "Stop!"

The cycle shot forward and Macklin roared past Shaw, veering away from the traffic-clogged street onto the sidewalk.

Shaw, flushed with anger, watched people leap out of Macklin's path as he raced down the sidewalk.

"That guy just took my cycle!" a voice screamed.

Shaw turned and saw an officer approaching behind him. "Put out an APB on Brett Macklin . . ."

The motorcycle purred to a stop on a side street across from the rear of the police station. Macklin, hidden in the shadows beside a brick building, looked at the police station as if it were Neal Sliran himself. He could feel the hate growing inside him and tightening his chest.

Macklin picked up the microphone.

"Dispatch, this is"—he made up a number—"Unit 232. Patch me in to Sergeant Sliran."

"Roger, 232, stand by," the woman's voice crackled over the speaker.

"Unit 232," a man's voice came over the speaker. "This is Sliran, go ahead."

Macklin brought the mike close to his mouth, a grim smile on his lips. "I'm still alive, Sliran, and I'm coming after you!"

"Who is this?" Sliran barked.

Macklin let him listen to static for a moment. Then he spoke slowly and carefully. "The Jury."

Macklin clicked off the radio and waited. Two minutes later he saw the back door of the station fly open and Sliran rush out, get into a Ford Galaxie, and screech out of the parking lot.

Macklin smiled, gliding smoothly into traffic a few cars behind Sliran.

The Elias Simon inner-city mission glowed in the dark. The building looked to Macklin as though it had been carved out of a block of marble, a one-story square monument to the power of religious television.

Macklin crouched behind the juniper bushes that lined the parking lot adjacent to the mission. He had been there for the last twenty minutes, watching Sliran smoking a cigarette in his car, parked directly across the street from the mission. Sliran tapped the dashboard nervously, casting glances over his shoulder every few seconds.

Macklin was impatient, too. His foot was falling asleep and his head still ached from the crash. And he wanted to go over and break the bastard's neck right now.

He was seriously considering just that when he saw Sliran look over his shoulder again and not turn back.

Peering over the top of the juniper hedge, Macklin saw the beam from a pair of headlights slice the darkness. A black Cadillac limo snaked around the corner towards the mission. Macklin ducked as the lights raked the top of the hedge and the car turned into the parking lot. Sliran, as if on cue, got out of his car, snubbed out his cigarette, and sprinted across the street.

Macklin raised his head again and saw the uniformed black chauffeur emerge. The chauffeur bent down to open the passenger door. Macklin saw the flash of blond hair, the blue suit, the slim, dancer's body. Sliran walked up and spoke to the man in animated gestures. The man turned to speak and Macklin saw his face. Elias Simon.

Macklin raised an eyebrow.
So Simon is pulling the strings. How does he fit in?

The evangelist put his arm around Sliran's shoulder and led him into the mission. The chauffeur sat back down in the front seat of the limo.

The interior light was on. He could see the back of the chauffeur's head. The chauffer was reading a newspaper, spreading it out against the steering wheel. Bent low, Macklin dashed as lightly on his feet as he could to the limo.

He pressed himself close to the back right tire. Reaching into his pants pocket, Macklin pulled out his keys, careful not to jingle them. He picked out a long key and pressed the tip of it into the tire's pump nozzle, letting the air hiss out. Satisfied that the limo wouldn't leave for a while, Macklin dashed stealthily to the gleaming office building of Simon's mission.

Macklin found himself in one end of a portrait-lined hallway leading to a circular central reception area. The hallway smelled of freshly laid shag carpet. Macklin hugged the walls, passing portraits of Jesus Christ, Ronald Reagan, Oral Roberts, and Elias Simon as he quickly moved down the hallway. All the men were seen from the waist up against the same radiant sun. The oval-shaped reception area was lit by the bright moon shining through a rooftop skylight. There was a round desk in the center of the room near a wall-size portrait of Simon holding a Bible against his chest with both hands.

Two hallways branched off from the reception area. One was directly across from Macklin and led to a pair of arched, oak chapel doors with stained glass in the middle. One of the doors was ajar and Macklin could hear the muffled sound of voices from inside.

Macklin bounded in three steps to the chapel doors. He pressed his back to the wall and peered through the crack between the doors. He could see the first three rows of wooden pews. At the front of the room Simon, his arms folded against his chest, was leaning against a podium. Jesus Christ hung from the cross behind Simon and, head lolling on one shoulder, stared down at the evangelist.

Sliran paced angrily in front of Simon.

"Don't bitch at me, Simon. I wasn't the one who let Macklin run all over the goddamn city."

"How did he find out about you?" he asked softly.

"Shit, I don't know. Does it matter? If you had let me kill him the moment he started asking questions . . ."

"Building a case against Macklin would have been a case against us as well. Others could have been led to us. Had you killed Macklin, his black friend would have started to ask questions." Macklin saw Simon's face harden. Simon seemed to be fighting back his anger. "My plan was virtually foolproof, economical and efficient. Macklin would have eliminated any trail we had left. But you have ruined it all with your insipid handling of the Jeffries matter."

Macklin exhaled slowly, a sickening feeling swelling in his chest.
They used me. Everything I've done has served them. All the killing. All the pain.

"Ah, fuck you, Simon."

Simon lashed out, grabbing Sliran by the neck with both hands. Macklin flinched, as startled as Sliran by the sudden strike. "You spineless lump of useless flesh! You have jeopardized everything!"

"It was
perfect
!" Sliran screamed, his hand pulling at Simon's wrists. "It was perfect to get rid of them all in one fell swoop. How was I to know Macklin would escape?"

Simon tossed Sliran back into the pew. "You should have consulted me. Had I known Jeffries and Macklin were connected I would have handled the matter in a more direct fashion." The evangelist, his back to both Sliran and Macklin, ran his hands through his hair and took a deep breath. "You made a stupid, stupid decision. And now you have compounded that stupidity."

Sliran, his face red and panting for breath, straightened up into a sitting position. "Simon, look—"

"
Think!
" Simon whirled to face Sliran. "Think for one
fucking
moment. For once in your life summon some intellect. Why do you think Macklin threatened you?"

"To put a scare in me," Sliran said quickly, "show what a big man he is."

Simon smiled thinly. "Exactly. Now, why would he want to do that?" His voice was acidic and patronizing. "I'll tell you why. He wanted you to panic. He wanted you to run. He wanted you to lead him to
me
."

Macklin spun and saw the chauffeur standing behind him, grinning, a gun equipped with a silencer in his right hand.

"Isn't that right, Mr. Macklin?" he heard Simon yell from the chapel. A chill rolled down Macklin's back. The chauffeur motioned with his gun towards the chapel doors. Reluctantly, Macklin turned and pushed open the doors, stepping into the chapel.

Simon, flashing his famous TV smile, stepped down the aisle towards Macklin. Sliran, surprised, stood up.

"So, you are the troublesome Brett Macklin." Simon looked back contemptuously at Sliran, who was visibly shaken by Macklin's arrival.

"I thought you'd look less like a circus clown in the flesh, Simon," Macklin said.

Simon chuckled. "That's good. You're living up to the brash image I had of you. Don't look so hurt, Mr. Macklin. This meeting was inevitable. You are predictable to a fault. You are here, just as I knew you would be."

Macklin felt broken inside. Simon was right. He had been manipulated from the start.

Simon looked over his shoulder at Sliran. "Luck seems to be on your side tonight, Sliran." Simon met Macklin's gaze. "Your luck, I'm afraid, has just run out."

Macklin sensed the quick motion behind him. The back of his skull exploded with pain and the floor rushed up to meet his face.

# # # # # #

Pain. As the blackness faded, that was the first, overwhelming thing he became aware of. It was comforting. It meant the chauffeur hadn't blown his head off. It meant he was still alive. He concentrated on the pain, using it to visualize his predicament.

A cold, stinging pain radiated from his wrists and coursed down taut, aching arms that seemed stretched to their limit. He shook his feet and felt empty space beneath him.
Shit,
he thought,
I'm strung up.

Macklin sniffed. His nostrils filled with the room's dank, musty odor.

The air was still. A warehouse?
No,
he thought,
the air is too heavy and oppressive.
Something smaller, more enclosed. A garage, a basement perhaps.

He listened for a sound of others in the room. Breathing or motion. He sensed neither. Slowly, he opened his eyes. It took a second for his eyes to focus. A single lightbulb dangled from the ceiling a few yards away. He saw the circuit breakers mounted on the wall, the dust and cobwebs, the boxes and discarded office furniture, the four steps leading up to the door on the far side of the windowless room. A basement.

Macklin looked up and saw that his hands were bound by a pair of handcuffs that, under the weight of his body, had sliced into his flesh. The handcuffs were draped over a pipe that was about the width of a broomstick and stretched the length of the room, a valve interrupting the span about halfway across. He wrapped his fingers around the chain and pulled. The steel bit into his wrist, making him wince with pain. He let go. Blood streamed down his arms and dripped onto the floor.

The pipe, and the cuffs, were secure, as he knew they would be. He was securely, and undoubtedly, Simon's prisoner.

There was a loud clank behind Macklin and the sound of an engine grinding to life. Pulleys squealed as cables went into motion. Macklin twisted and saw the bottom of an elevator shaft behind him, the rising counterweight telling him that a car was on its way down. The elevator car stopped at the lobby level and Macklin heard footsteps approaching the basement door. He closed his eyes as Sliran, Simon, and two of his men came in.

"Bring him around," Simon told Sliran, "and then find out what he knows."

"Gladly." Sliran advanced on Macklin, studied him for a moment, and then put everything he had behind a hard blow to the stomach.

The air rushed out of Macklin and he buckled. Before he could recover, Sliran swatted him across the face repeatedly, snapping his head sharply from side to side.

"Enough." Simon leaned against a stack of cartons. Sliran reluctantly stopped, stepping back from Macklin. He swung back and forth, moaning.

"C'mon, Macky boy. Tell us what you know," Sliran said, grinning.

Macklin's eyes fluttered open. His cheeks stung and his ears were ringing. Tears rolled out of his red eyes as he gasped for breath. "Know about what?"

Sliran raised his hand to strike Macklin but was halted by a strict glance from Simon. Sliran let his hand drop to his side and regarded Macklin with undisguised fury.

"Mr. Macklin, I'm a reasonable man. A pious man. I hate to see a fellow human being suffer. There's no reason for you to suffer." Simon stepped up to Macklin and lifted Macklin's face up by the chin. "I'm going to kill you. Okay? We won't kid each other. You can die easily, swiftly, one bullet though the head. Or, you can die slowly in agony. I can let Sliran here do what he pleases. Put an open flame under your testicles. Snip off your cock with shears and make you eat it." Simon spoke with the casual air of a person discussing the weather. "Perhaps he'll be more civil and just twist off your nose with a set of pliers, or remove your teeth, one by one. Either way, we'll get what we want."