Joel Goldman - No way out

“And Nick, Frank, and Jimmy went along because they needed the money.”

“They were wiped out. The banks wouldn’t loan Frank and Nick another dime, and Jimmy couldn’t find work. It was a simple plan. It should have worked.” She started to cry, the tears coming fast, easy, and honest, but they were for her, not for him.

“I didn’t want any of this to happen,” she said. “I just wanted to get the money. Grandma still owed more than a quarter of a million dollars for my mom’s medical bills. She’d leveraged the house and everything else she owned. If we didn’t come up with the money, we’d end up like the others.”

“What happened to the money you got for the construction materials Frank Crenshaw moved?”

“I hid it at the house.”

“Why didn’t you split it up with the others? Everyone was broke. Didn’t they need the money?”

“Yeah, but I needed to keep them in the game more than they needed a few bucks. We were going to get top dollar for the guns, enough to get us all back on our feet. It would have worked, too, except Frank shot Marie.”

“You must have thought you were the luckiest girl in the world when Terry murdered Frank because there was no way you could have convinced him to keep quiet.”

“It wasn’t supposed to happen like that. Everything just got out of hand.”

She and Adam Koch were reading from the same hymnal.

“Actually, things started to come unglued when Jimmy Martin picked his kids up to take them for ice cream. You just didn’t know it.”

She winced, like she’d been slapped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Jimmy took his kids out for breakfast the day they disappeared. He was supposed to be stealing copper for you, but he couldn’t pass up the chance to be with his kids. I’ll bet you called him to see if the job was done and he told you he’d get to it later. That’s the way Jimmy did things. When he told you he had his kids, you told him to drop them off with you and pick them up when the job was done. Then, when he got busted, you realized you had a big problem if Jimmy talked, so you went to see him and told him that if he said a word, he’d never see his kids again.”

“No!”

I opened my cell phone and read the text message from Superintendent Fibuch. “Then why did you go see Jimmy at the Farm the day he was arrested and once a week after that?”

“I would never hurt those kids, never! I was going to give them back as soon as I got the money for the guns. I swear I was!”

“But Mendez wouldn’t pay your price, and you decided to hold out, make him sweat.”

“I couldn’t believe it! He wouldn’t pay, and Terry wouldn’t either.”

“People like Terry Walker and Cesar Mendez don’t negotiate like that. When they say take it or leave it, they mean it. It’s easier and cheaper to kill you and steal the guns.”

She wiped her face on her sleeve, forcing a smile.

“But it can still work out. Everything can still be okay. We can tell the police what I told you, that I didn’t know anything about the guns, that it was all Brett and the others.”

“That’s why you put two extra bullets in Terry. You didn’t care that he jilted your grandma fifty years ago. You wanted to make sure he was dead because he was the last one besides me who could tie you to all of this.”

“For God’s sake, Jack. I’ve saved your life twice. You owe me!”

“Not that much. Why would I let you walk away from this?”

She stood, her face grim, her lips peeled back.

“To save Evan and Cara. Back me up, and as soon as the cops say that everything’s cool, I’ll tell you where to find them and you’ll be a hero all over again.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then no one ever sees those children again. I’ll go to my grave, and their parents will never know what happened to them. You have to choose, Jack. If you want to save those kids, you have to save me first.”

“I don’t think so.”

“I’m not bluffing, Jack. I’ve got nothing left to lose.”

I used the cord from a floor lamp and the belts Terry and Brett had been wearing to bind her to a kitchen chair.

“You know what people like you always forget? There’s no such thing as a simple plan. There are too many moving parts and too many things that happen that you never thought could or would. Like you paying the utility bills for this house even though it’s vacant, in foreclosure, and Nick didn’t have the money.”

Her eyes widened. “How could you possibly know that?”

I smiled. “See, that’s what I mean. It never occurred to you that when you left your office unlocked I’d walk in, look at your computer, and find the connection between Nick Staley and Forgotten Homes LLC. And I’ll bet you never thought I would break into your office tonight and steal your mail, but I did. I saw the utility bills addressed to Forgotten Homes and saw that the accounts were current. Nick didn’t have the money, but you did and you paid the bills.”

“The bank demanded that I keep the power on.”

“I believe you,” I said, walking out of the kitchen.

She strained against the belts. “Where are you going?”

I gathered my gun and Terry’s and the Redhawk. “Upstairs to get Evan and Cara.”

She slumped in her chair, defeated. “How did you know?”

“One of the bills was from the cable company. I doubt that the bank made you order Disney movies. At least you let the kids watch TV while they were locked away upstairs. After all, how much fun could they have, especially after you boarded up the windows? Be sure you mention that to the judge before he passes sentence.”

There were two bedrooms upstairs, both of them locked. I knocked on the door at the top of the stairs and heard the same hurried footfalls as when I came in the house.

“Evan and Cara, my name is Jack. Your mom sent me to bring you home. Move away from the door.”

I waited a moment and kicked the door open. They were huddled together on the bed, wearing pajamas, arms around one another. A lamp on a nightstand next to the bed provided the only light. Stuffed animals and other toys were scattered on the floor along with empty McDonald’s bags. A small television sat on a dresser, the screen blank.

“You’re safe now, but I want you to sit tight until the police get here.”

I left them to go back downstairs. I had to call Adrienne Nardelli, Quincy Carter, Lucy, and Joy. I was buzzing with adrenaline, and, for the moment, I wasn’t shaking. I made it to the top of the stairs when I heard a familiar voice.

“Hello, Jack,” Braylon Jennings said. “Walk down slow and easy and keep your hands above your shoulders.”

He was standing in the front hall next to Cesar Mendez, who was aiming a shotgun at me, one of his men from earlier in the evening backing them up. They were too happy to see me, Mendez taking my guns when I reached the bottom stair, emptying them and dropping them on the floor.

Jennings said to Mendez. “Go see what’s upstairs.”

Mendez cocked his head at the other man. “Alvaro,” he said, passing Jennings’s order down the line.

“I told you to go,” Jennings said to Mendez, “not Alvaro.”

Mendez screwed his face tighter than the grip on his shotgun, swallowed, and trotted up the stairs. It was Jennings’s way of reminding Mendez of the pecking order and telling me how wrong I’d been about Jennings.

He was on the Nuestra cartel’s payroll, sent by the home office to find the guns Mendez had promised. He needed Brett Staley to do that, which was why he had made certain Quincy Carter let Brett leave the hospital Sunday night and why he pushed so hard to get Roni released from jail when Brett went off the grid.