Read Street Justice Online

Authors: Trevor Shand

Tags: #Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, #Thrillers & Suspense, #Crime, #Thrillers

Street Justice

             
Preface

The briny smell of the sea air filtered into Adrian’s nose. The yellow-orange lights of the container yard cast odd shadows. While he was still on solid land he felt as if the concrete below him wallowed like a small ship getting tossed about in the early stages of a coming storm. He reached out to steady himself against a container.

              “You OK?” asked Brian. Brian wore the longshoreman uniform of a hooded sweatshirt under a denim jacket with ratty jeans. Originally the hoodie had been gray and the denim jacket mustard but through exposure to weather, the stains of work and a lack of washing, both articles of clothing wore the non-descript tan color that allows those who've had a tough life blend into their industrial world. Besides needing a good wash, the clothes looked about two sizes too big for his five foot eight inch frame.

              “Yeah, I’m fine,” Adrian said. While he wore jeans and a simple, untucked light blue oxford, by no means fancy, he could not have looked more out of place. His jeans were a deep blue and his oxford had creases down the sleeves.

              “If you’re having trouble here I can’t wait to see you on The Chive,” quipped Mack. Mack was Brian’s partner in crime, literally and figuratively. The two were inseparable. In fact Adrian had trouble telling them apart. They could have been brothers for all Adrian knew though he wondered how much they actually looked alike and how much was the fact they both were a similar height, had scruffy, patchy beards and wore similar clothing.

              The shipping cranes of Seattle’s International Shipping Port loomed over them. The trio wandered through a maze of containers. It was eleven at night, the sun long since down even with the extended daytime of a Pacific Northwest summer day, but the phosphorous lights washed out any stars that may have been trying to shine through. The air held the typical evening chill that Northwest air did even during the height of summer. It could be eighty during the day but as soon as the sun set, the heat was washed away by the constant breeze.

              “I’ll be fine,” Adrian said. He subconsciously removed his hand from the container and lengthened his stride. With his six foot two frame, the shorter men had to pick up their pace to keep up. Brian resumed his spot leading the procession. They rounded the corner of a double stacked shipping container and ran into a shadowy figure.

              Brian fell back slightly. Adrian had to catch him as the smaller man tipped backward. Mack quickly reached into the deep pocket of his frayed denim coat.

              “Wait,” Adrian barked. All four people froze, for a moment.

              Then the shadowy figure took a step forward letting the light wash over him and said, “Heeey, man, do you have a dollar?” The bum was a bundle of rags that made the clothes Brian and Mack wore look like formal wear. Besides the tattered clothing, the newcomer smelled of body odor and stale alcohol. He gave a little smile, exposing teeth that were as much black as white.

              “Get out of here,” Brian shouted as he push the bum backward. He pushed harder than he needed to as a repercussion of the bum startling him. The bum staggered back for a half a step before sprawling backward onto his back. Brian had to take one step forward so as not to pitch forward himself. He stood over the bum glaring and breathing hard.

              Mack brushed past Adrian and wrapped his arms around Brian, “Come on man, let’s go, we have work to do and this ain’t it.” He took a step forward, with Brian still wrapped in his arms.

Brian let Mack move him a step then shrugged out of his hold. Brian continued to stare at the bum for two more steps then turned and stormed off. He shot over his shoulder without looking back, “You’d better be gone by the time I get done with what I have to do because when I'm done I’m coming back to look for you. So help me if I find you…”

Mack dropped in behind Brian. He stiff armed a hand on Brian’s shoulder ensuring they kept their present course, not giving him the option of changing his mind and going back to the bum now. This was not the first time Mack had witnessed Brian’s temper. Adrian fell in behind the two men.

The bum let the threesome get a few feet away then fell in behind them. About a hundred yards later, when the crates opened into a clearing which led to the many ships moored to the port, Brian noticed the bum was still behind them. He whipped around to face him. Mack leaned into his stiff arm, which was now firmly on Brian’s chest. Brian made a halfhearted attempt to swipe Mack’s arm away as he yelled, “I said get out of here.”

“Hey man, I just want a dollar, man,” the bum whined.

“We ain’t got no money for you,” Brian bellowed back, his voice echoing off the metal containers and steel sides of the ships. Brian jumped a little toward the bum but Mack was ready and had no trouble pushing him back once he left his feet. Adrian stood between the bum and the Mack-Brian duo ready to act as a backup to Mack should he lose his grasp on Brian. They did not need to get into this fight right here.

“It’s just a dollar,” the bum said, though this time there almost seemed to be a humorous or mocking tone in his voice rather than the whine he’d had before.

Brian heard the tone and made a real attempt to break Mack’s grip but Mack held strong and wrestled Brian backward. Adrian looked at the duo then at the bum. He reached into his pocket a pulled out his wallet. He only had two twenties for cash. He pulled out one and offered it to the bum. Brian redoubled his efforts to break free when he saw this, “Don’t give that stinking bag of trash anything. I’ll kill you, you piece of shit.”

The bum skittered forward. He tried to put on an air of relaxed casualness but Adrian saw him constantly keeping an eye on Brian and knew if Bran broke free the bum would skitter off. The bum grabbed half of the bill. Before Adrian let go he looked in the bum’s eyes and said, “If I give you this, you’ll leave, right?”

“Yeah man,” the bum said, making only the briefest eye contact before returning to his vigil of keeping an eye on Brian. Brian yelled obscenities in the background. Adrian released his grip on the bill, the bum snatched it and crumpled it into his pocket as he retreated, back first toward the stacks of crates.

Once the bum was out of sight, Brian calmed down a bit. “I can’t believe you gave that shit stain money,” he glared at Adrian.

“I wanted to get on with what we came here to do and it seemed the fastest way to move things along,” Adrian replied calmly.

“I could have kicked that shit heads ass in about thirty second, wouldn’t have slowed us down at all,” Brian countered.

“Still, thirty seconds we didn’t need to waste,” Adrian said and walked towards the ships. He didn’t know which one specifically he was walking toward but the implication was the same, the conversation was over and time to get back to work. Brian shot one more look at the crates, to where the bum had blended back into the shadows, exhaled loudly then turned and jogged a few paces to get back in front of Adrian. Mack fell in behind Adrian again.

As they headed on their way none of them noticed that from the maze of crates the bum continued to watch them go.

Brian led the procession a few hundred yards along the pier to a large metal hulled fishing boat moored portside to the dock and “The Chive” painted in block letters across her fantail. The ship was older, and had a few rust spots, but looked well maintained overall. The lines holding the boat weren’t frayed, the radar and antenna seemed to be fairly modern, the windows were clear of salt. Adrian followed Brian up the gangplank. The wooden boards creaked under the weight of the three men but seemed solid enough. The paint on the railings was worn but there was no rust on them.

Once on the deck, Brian led them to the main deckhouse. Looking up many feet Adrian could see a lone figure at the helm. They entered through a portal that was standing open. Once through Mack closed the portal and spun the wheel to lock it. The small hallway was dark because Brian at the far end blocked most of the light coming from the interior of the ship. Adrian took a step before Mack said, “Hold on.”

Adrian paused and a chill shivered through his body. He knew this point would come, heck, he’d expected it earlier but that was the issue. Brian and Mack had set this meeting up at the last minute. Adrian had no chance to call down to FBI headquarters and request back up. No one knew where he was. If they’d had this conversation earlier, in the car, the parking lot or the stacks of crates and something had gone wrong, he could have run. But here in this tight space he was trapped. But then again, he guessed this is why Brian and Mack wanted to have the conversation here.

“So, you the cops?” Mack asked.

“Do I look like the cops,” Adrian tried to sound indignant. He looked back and forth between Mack and Brian. This allowed him to keep his eye on both of them and he hoped in the dim light they could see his practiced look of self-righteousness. Of course he also thank the dim light because he knew his acting wasn’t great and hopefully the dim light covered some of his nervousness.

“Yes you do, and that’s why I don’t believe you are. Usually when the cops are trying to send a snitch they dress him down to blend in, you’re not too dressed down,” Mack offered, “But you didn’t answer the question. You know you have to tell us or it’s entrapment, so are you the cops?”

Adrian didn’t feel like pointing out that since he worked for the FBI and wore a suit to the office every day this was in fact dressed down. He also didn’t want to point out that their interpretation of the entrapment laws wasn’t exactly accurate. In the end though he went with the truth, and in a formal voice declared, “No, I am in no way associated with the Seattle Police Department, nor have I ever been.”

“You carrying a weapon,” Brian asked.

“Yup,” Adrian replied, “Ankle holster, left leg.”

“I’m going to have to ask you to surrender the piece,” Brian said. Adrian complied, reaching down slowly and pulled out the .38 revolver. He shook is leg to help the pant leg drop back over the now empty holster and handed the piece to Brian. He suddenly felt hands on him, quickly realizing that Mack wasn’t taking his word for that being his only weapon and was now patting him down. But as Adrian had expected, the pat down was more for show that to actually find anything. Mack stopped his pat down mid weigh up Adrian’s thigh so as not to bump into Adrian’s man parts and so he missed the small .22 pistol tucked tight into his crotch.

Once Mack was done, Adrian pivoted and asked with a laugh, “Did you enjoy that?”

This elicited a small chuckle from Brian. Mack said, “Shut up,” to both of them. He squeezed past Adrian pushing him hard against the wall of the tiny hallway. This signified the “security check” was over. Mack pushed past Brian with the same lack of finesse he’d used with Adrian. Adrian stepped toward Brian who melted through the portal at the far end of the hallway and into a galley.

The galley looked much like the rest of the ship, not top of the line or brand new, but well maintained. To the right the counters were an orange-yellow that could only have originated in the '70s. Next to the counters and sink was a full size refrigerator that seemed to be white but was so covered with pictures of men holding fish, images of scantily clad women and scrawled notes it was tough to tell. At the back of the small room was a booth that might fit four if they were good friends. On the table was a bottle of Jameson Irish whiskey, a couple of dirty shot glasses and two empty beer bottles.

Brian headed over to the table and lined three of the shot glasses up along the edge of the table. He then grabbed the bottle of Jameson, unscrewed the cap and started pouring. As he did this, Adrian heard the fridge open and turned to see Mack pulling three Henry Weinhard beers out. Mack crossed in front of Adrian and set the beers on the table. Brian passed out the shots, “May the grass grow long on the road to hell for want of use.”

The three men clicked glasses. Brian and Mack threw down the shots as if they were iced tea. The potent alcohol clawed at the back of Adrian’s throat and felt like it was scrubbing his esophagus on the way down to form a smoldering lump in his stomach. He coughed and his eyes watered.

Mike and Brian slammed their shot glasses and grabbed a beer. They unscrewed the tops and Brian started sucking down the malty drink like the answer to the world's problems lay somewhere at the bottom. Mack handed the open beer he held to Adrian while taking the shot glass. Adrian was still recovering from the shot but managed not to drop the new drink. Mack set the shot glass down, opened the final beer and proceeded to catch up with Brian’s drinking.

Adrian took a single sip of his beer. The other men finished their beers, set the empties next to the ones already on the table. Mack stepped around Adrian and went back to the fridge where he proceeded to pull out three more beers before heading back to the table. Rather than step around Adrian this time he indicated Adrian should sit.

All three men crammed into the table. The thin pad of the seat was lumpy and Adrian thought having nothing on the seat might be better. Brian, sitting across from Mack and Adrian, poured three more shots and distributed them. Mack opened the beers and passed them around even though Adrian was still only one sip into his first. They didn’t immediately drink the shots and the small glass of brown liquid seemed to taunt Adrian. As much as he was not looking forward to another shot, knowing one was waiting there seemed to be nearly as bad.

Brian distracted him by saying, “So how much do you want?” He leaned forward, hunching over and leaning on his forearms.

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