My Mother the Car

*************************************

I hit Thompson's about 10:30 the next morning. I had breakfast via room service first. After three months of goat meat it was just this side of heaven, so I was enjoying it while I could. Bacon, eggs, hash browns, toast, real coffee, even tomato juice with lemon. I left the room feeling far better than I should have.

They were on the fourth floor of a fairly new office building. The protection racket must pay pretty well. The office doors were glass and the waiting room was all chrome, glass, and vinyl. Modern always left me cold, I guess I was a traditionalist when it came to furnishings, but I liked mahogany and leather and comfort and not something that looked like the inside of a refrigerator. There was a long reception desk along one wall facing the doors and they had one of those wall mounted water things behind it, so it looked like water was running down the wall. There were two pretty girls behind the desk, a blond and an oriental. You could see their legs underneath, short skirts, and stockings. They had nice legs.

"Can I help you sir?" asked the blond.

I gave her one of my better smiles. I have been told that my smile resembles a shark getting ready to attack but I thought it was charming.

"I would like to see Mr. Thompson. Is he available this morning?"

"Do you have an appointment?"

"You know I'm not sure. I had asked Jimmy Wallace to set something up for me yesterday, but I don't know if he did. Perhaps you could ask Mr. Thompson and see if he can see me. Tell him I am the one that met with Jimmy yesterday. I can wait over there."

It was about fifteen minutes before they sent someone out to get me. I think he was supposed to be big and intimidating, but all he really managed to pull off to me was big. Going down the hallway he stopped for a minute and put his hand on my chest.

"Jimmy was a friend of mine. Don't think were going to forget what you did to him."

I never liked having hands on me, as you never know where those hands have been, so I broke his wrist. I felt, and heard, it break, but before he had registered it, I had moved back and put my gun to his temple.

"Jimmy and I have a deal. He stays away for a few weeks and I don't kill him. He doesn't talk to me again and I don't kill him. I don't need to think about him again, and I don't kill him. It's a good deal, so don't fuck it up for him. Now show me to your boss' office and you can go get your wrist set."

I put the gun away.

Thompson was a big man also, not as big as the bouncers he had working for him, but large, and he had another one of them there with him that actually looked a little more capable than the two I had met so far.

"Who the fuck are you?"

"Smith, John Smith. Before we start can you have someone run your boy here to the hospital? We had an accident in the hallway and his wrist needs to be set."

I took a seat across from him, grinning slightly, but more along the side wall. Not that I didn't trust them, well actually I didn't, but I didn't want my back to a door, and I didn't want anyone behind me either. I gave them a few minutes to sort out Jimmy's friend.

"OK Mr. Smith you have the floor. What the fuck do you want."

"Simple. I want to know who hired you to put surveillance on the hooker in the hospital."

"I'm not telling you shit. Why don't you tell me who the fuck you really are?"

I swear I must have been living in a bad movie script or some really crappy internet story made up by someone who doesn't know how to write. They all followed the same line and they all end up talking, sooner or later.

"You look smarter than Jimmy, so I was hoping to do this one the easy way. You will talk to me, everyone does, it is just a matter of time. You tell me who your client is, I leave you alone. You hold out on me, I make you hurt. I don't want to make you hurt, I don't enjoy it, but I will do it. You lie to me I kill you. So far, your staff hasn't impressed me all that much, so I don't see you stopping me. This one looks a little more competent than the other two, but I am fairly sure I can take him out and put you down before that 45 in his waistband clears the leather. But then again, the hurt I put on Jimmy was different. Yours would be more painful, and longer lasting. You have more to lose."

"And what if we take you down first?"

"Then you explain why you have a dead federal agent in your office, why you are impeding a national security investigation, and then get ready for the shitstorm that will descend on your head. At a minimum you lose all government contracts you have now, and any in the future, and any cooperation you may have had with the local authorities. Your private contracts also dry up because nobody will touch you. But I don't think they will stop with the minimum."

I could see the wheels spinning in Thompsons head. It wasn't a pretty sight.

"You really a fed, maybe have some sort of identification?"

"Not that I want to share with you, or, for that matter, that you want to see. The less you know the better for you. Do you know Detective Decker down at Metro North?"

He nodded.

"Go call him. Tell him what case I'm asking about and see if he wants you to help me. Go ahead, I will wait in here."

He didn't like being dismissed from his office, but he got up and walked to the door, his shadow a step or two behind him. I waited until he was almost out.

"Thompson." I said when he almost reached the door and he looked back, "I could use a cup of coffee while I'm waiting. Black, no sugar."

He was swearing on the way out but about five minutes later the oriental girl brought a cup in. It was good coffee, black and hot, just a little weak, and I enjoyed watching her ass twitch as she walked away.

He was back in about twenty minutes, alone.

"What did Decker tell you?"

"He doesn't like you, thinks you're an asshole, but he strongly recommended I tell you whatever you want to know. He gave me the impression that if I didn't even leaving the country wouldn't help me. He seems to think you would find me wherever I went. And when you did find me it would be bad. He also said he is out of this one, it is above his paygrade, so I am essentially on my own. So, what do you want to know?"

"Who hired you and what were your instructions?"

"The actual person that hired me is Jeffery Parker. He is head of security for a local investment firm, RBA Securities, that invests money from Silicon Valley in the film industry. They package together the money from the rich techs upstate and provide private backing for the movies the studios are raising money for. In addition, they often arrange parties and other events so the two sides can meet, especially the prospective actresses. This isn't a cheap operation though, last year alone they processed through over three billion dollars in funding."

"What did he hire you to do?"

"Just watch the hooker in the hospital. Let him know if anyone comes to visit her and who they are. Tell him if she wakes up."

"Why you?"

"Look, we mainly do event security, VIP security, that type of thing. We have provided security for many of their events and a few of their clients over the years. We are discreet, we tend to look the other way for the most part. If someone wants to snort something, or hire a few hookers, we don't blab about it. I assume he just wanted someone discrete to watch her, see who contacted her, but I didn't ask why. His own security operation is small, it mainly exists just to coordinate with others, so he needs to farm out work. I think he has a guy or two working for him but that's about it."

"So, would looking the other way include watching a hooker being beat into a coma or dropping off her body?"

"No. There are lines we don't cross. We don't say anything if they want to do drugs or hire hookers, but we don't provide them. If I catch any of my guys doing either they are gone. We may get physical if the job demands it, but we don't beat innocent people for fun or profit. And we wouldn't stand by and watch a girl being beaten half to death. None of my guys had anything to do with this one."

I thought it over. I think he had been straight with me. So, I was going to be straight with him.

"Jimmy's on vacation for a few weeks, more for his own protection than mine. I didn't want him doing something stupid requiring me to kill him. Your out of this one also. Call this Parker fellow, tell him your done with him, for good. You can tell him as little, or as much, about me as you want to, it doesn't matter. He won't be around long anyway. Don't provide security for him, for anything, if you do you will lose people. Just walk away."

"That's it? Were even?"

I considered him for a minute.

"As long as you told me the truth, I don't see a need to go further. If any of my friends ask me, I will tell them you were helpful. If you have any more of Jimmy's friend's around talk to them so they don't do anything stupid. So far, I have been nice, but if I run into any of your people, I will stop being nice. Understood?"

"Got you. If you run into any of my people, they won't be working for me any longer, and I will make sure they know that. Personally, I want to keep as far away from you as I can."

I actually understood what he meant, as there were times, I didn't want to be near myself all that much either. I showed myself out.

*************************************

Parker had a nice apartment on South Hill. I had my security jammer going so no video cameras picked me up as I entered around 22:00 hours. I did a quick walk through; the apartment was empty. I checked the closets, the only clothes were male so either he lived alone, or his partner was male also. I later determined I was correct on both counts. I found a nice comfortable chair in a dark corner and waited. I was good with waiting in the dark and waiting in general. Once in Lebanon I had waited three days to get a shot off on a high-ranking member of Hezbollah. Three days in a cramped smelly crawlspace above some burned out apartments but the target arrived, and I put him down with one shot from 1,600 meters.

They came in around 02:00. They were both half drunk and the partner was giggling as they raced to the bedroom, stripped off, and jumped in bed. I let them grunt and groan for an hour or so until they both dropped off to sleep then went in to check on them. Both were sprawled naked on the bed. Parker was in his mid-thirties, but the partner barely looked eighteen, probably some boy toy he had picked up for the night. The kid was lying ass up on the bed with his legs apart and cum leaking out of his asshole, so it was a quick matter to jab the needle in the fleshy part of his ass and give him a full dose. We use a combination of drugs that resemble a roofie so any blood test would show a regular date rape drug. I gave him enough to keep him out for eight hours, or maybe longer.

I grabbed Parker by the hair and dropped him to the floor. The impact woke him up, but I helped it along with a couple of kicks to the gut. He started coughing and then puked on the floor. For the head of security, he was soft, he probably rarely got his hands dirty.

"We need to talk."

"Who the fuck are you? What do you want?"

He had a whiny nasally voice. This was just getting better and better.

"Smith, John Smith."

"You the one that put the scare into Thompson? I can't believe that asshole sold me out."

"I had a nice chat with Mr. Thompson I guess he decided some things aren't worth dying over. He suggested you might be able to answer some questions for me."

"I'm not telling you shit. You can't scare me like you did the others. Just get the fuck out before I have your ass handed to you on a platter. I have connections in this town."

Like I said I must have been stuck in a bad movie script. They all seemed to be repeating the same tired clichés over and over. But had it really come to this, being threated by a greasy naked faggot sprawled in his own puke on the floor. I grabbed him by the hair again and jerked him to a sitting position, put my face inches away from his, and spoke right in his eyes.

"I don't come from this town. No one you know, no connection you have, is going to go anywhere near this one. Your one chance to walk away from this is to cooperate and if you don't do that you will spend the rest of your life in federal prison being raped by your cell mates."

He wasn't going to prison but I didn't need to tell him that. Depending on what he told me I doubted he was walking out of here.

"What kind of deal are you offering me?"

"You tell me the truth and you won't see the inside of a prison. Now why were you having the girl watched?"

"We wanted to know if she woke up. We wanted to know if she remembered what happened to her."

"Do you know what happened to her?"

"Yes."

"What were you going to do if she woke up and remembered?"

"We didn't know. Probably try to pay her off to be quiet. She's a smart girl I think she would have gone for the money over revenge."

"And if she didn't?"

"We hadn't decided. We had never faced a situation like this things had just spiraled out of control."

"Why don't you tell me the whole story. Start from the beginning."

"We were having a party for some movie people and money men from the Valley. We were working on a deal to finance a new action film and we had a few of the working girls there. Brad Jones was there, you know the one that did all the actions films back in the nineties, and he had slipped off into one of the upstairs rooms with the hooker for a quick blow job when his wife walked in on them. To say she was pissed was an understatement. The rooms were equipped for fun and games, so she grabbed a big strap on and went after the girl. The two fought for a minute but I held her down and helped her strip her. I didn't think she would hurt her too much, but she really pounded into her, front and back. Brad just sat there watching, I think he was getting off on it, but it didn't do anything for me. when she started bleeding I convinced her to stop and hustled them both out the door. Then I wiped the girl down with some alcohol wipes and put some clothes on her and took her out to drive her home."

"We were walking across the parking lot when out of nowhere this Escalade came up and smashed into her. It then turned around and took another run at her, running over her arm, before speeding off. Brad was in the passenger seat and his wife was driving. When I got to the girl she was out cold, so I put her in my trunk, drove down towards the skuzzier part of town, and dropped her off in an alley. When the cops found her, we decided to put the surveillance on her, thinking if she woke up we could buy her off. If she didn't wake up it was just as well."

So, there it was. Just a hazard of her work and my team was safe. I knew the Admiral would be pleased and wouldn't begrudge a little more cleanup time. I told the asshole to get to his knees.

He knelt up on the floor, facing away from me. I think they read their own scripts too often out here, that they can do whatever they want and get their money to buy them out in court. Or that I was too noble to shoot him in the back. But in a way he was right, I had no intention of shooting him. I took his right hand in my left and pulled it down behind him, as if to cuff him, then drew my knife across his throat from left to right and pushed him forward. I could hear the gurgle as the blood pumped out, but it didn't last long. I'd cut enough throats, human and animal, in the Middle East to know he wasn't getting up from this one. Somehow, though, I felt I had let him off easy.

I dragged the boy toy off the bed and smeared his right hand in the blood, then wrapped it around the knife. I almost felt bad for a few seconds using him like this but hell, he was a pretty boy, and liked taking it up the ass, so prison might be good for him. Besides I still couldn't reconcile my head around the giggling. I mean what type of man giggles. I vacated the apartment and used a burner phone to call it in to the locals. The set up looked a little too pat but I could get someone to drop some hints that it would be best not to dig in too deeply.

*************************************

I was sitting with her in the hospital two days later then the breaking news came on. It appears that nineties action film star, Brad Jones, and his wife, had been killed when their Cadillac Escalade ran off the road and exploded in flames. Both of them were burnt to death in the resulting fire. Drugs and alcohol were suspected as contributing factors. I hoped they were now roasting in hell.

As I was sitting there holding her hand her eyes flickered. Then they opened and they were still the most beautiful shade of cornflower blue I had ever seen. I smiled at her.