The Shack series

Chapter 13

It wasn't hard to find him at all.

The office building Dave Cunningham worked in had security guards, cameras and too many people to count going in and out at all hours.

His sleek new apartment building had a great view, very nice amenities, like a weight room, a pool and a sauna. What it didn't have was good security or very many tenants, yet.

I gave Dave a couple days to relax, then grabbed a clipboard, some plain blue coveralls and a jacket.

I knocked on his thirtieth-floor apartment door.

"Yeah, what is it?"

I looked at my clipboard. "David, um, Cunningham?"

"Yes."

I'm with Mark's Glass, gotta see if we have to replace one of your windows."

"It's a brand-new building.

"Yeah, well, code says one window has to be tempered glass. The code required tempered or laminate glass for floor to ceiling windows like yours. Builder screwed it up all over the place, used only laminate. We're just going to swap some of them out. Safety requirements, you know?"

Dave looked back at his windows. "Safety?"

"Yeah, Laminate is really hard for fire fighters to break out, so the tempered glass is used to allow them entry. They have special hammers or something with hard ceramic tips. Metal hammers don't do so well on tempered glass; the ceramic ones shatter it right out."

I pulled my sunglasses out of my pocket and held them up, then rotated them sideways until black bars appeared on the widow to the right. "See those lines? Temper marks, you can see them with polarized glass. I just need to get the specs on that window and I'll be out of your hair."

He stepped back and let me in. "I didn't know that."

"Yeah, nobody does. Teenagers figured out the ceramic thing, though. Break the ceramic off spark plugs to bust out the side windows on cars. Call 'em ninja rocks. Some kind of physics thing."

He blinked. "That's actually kind of interesting."

"Yeah, it is, isn't it? Let me show you something really cool." I pulled the .45 out of my jacket and leveled it at him. He gawped in shock. "Hands where I can see them, Jackass. Keep quiet."

I sat him down at his desk. "You and I are going to have long talk about why the Damn you're trying to have Delaney killed."

He wasn't particularly brave. I promised him if he cooperated I wouldn't hold him for the police. He just wanted a head start to get away. Dave Cunningham explained everything. Little of it was surprising or particularly original.

I had him take thorough notes on his computer.

After we were done, I felt the ceramic shards in my pocket. "Let me show you a cool trick, Dave."

*****

State Senator Charles Morris stormed in, flicked his desk lamp on and threw his briefcase down in obvious annoyance at a really long day. I let him sit down at his desk and waited while he arranged the few things on it "just so."

"Having a bad day, Chuck?"

He face went pale as soon as he saw me sitting in the wingback chair in the corner of his office. He yanked the top drawer open instantly and I could hear his manicured fingernails scrabble against bare wood.

"It's not there." I held the handgun up. "Springfield XD-S. In .45. Not a bad little gun." I pulled the magazine and cleared it. "You really should keep a round in the chute if you plan to use in for self-defense in the office. Don't worry, I'll give it back. I promise."

"What do you want, Lester?"

"We need to talk, Chuck." I leaned back. "This is really kind of Damned up. I mean, you took my wife and my daughters, but we've never even been in the same room at the same time. Until now."

I could see him decide to play it cool. "What could we have to talk about? Charlotte dropped you and moved up, your kids dropped you and moved up."

"I don't know, 'up' is kind of relative." I studied him, watching tiny beads of sweat form on his upper lip. "You're gonna hate prison, Chucky." As he recoiled from the thought, I drove on. "Soft hands, soft mouth, soft, well, probably everything. They're gonna Damnin' love you there. I'll bet you're gonna be wearing a mop-head wig and Kool-Aid make-up in a week. You'll be awful pretty. I hear they like to knock all the teeth out of the pretty ones so they can't bite down."

He turned a bit green and started to reach for the phone. "I..."

"Don't bother. Cops are already on the way. Dave is dead. Poor man couldn't handle the guilt. Did a thirty-story dive out his apartment window. Looked like a Damning full-gainer to me, but I never really watched the Olympics much. Except for women's beach volleyball." I shrugged. "Who wouldn't watch that? Dave hit that rain grate walkway outside his building. The one women keep catching their high heels in? Looked like he went through a food processor. Morgue team probably had to use a sponge-mop to pick him up."

I could see him calculating and a hint of a smile signaled that he'd reached an obvious conclusion. "Too bad. He must have been up to no good."

"Oh, he was. He thought that maybe if Delaney died at the hands of a Damning g**g in a failed k********g, you'd get a massive surge in sympathy votes. The election would be a walk-over." I thumbed rounds out of magazine and dropped them in my shirt pocket; there were little metallic clinking noises each time I dropped a bullet in. "The g**g just thought they could find a way to make money off of her instead. Getting paid twice for the same s**t. That's the problem with amateurs, no focus, ya know? It all went wrong when Charlotte put a tracker in her phone and sent me after her. But her death could still be milked for political capital, so he pushed the g**g to finish the job. They'd already taken half the money, anyway."

Charles stared at me evenly. "If he's dead, then that's that, isn't it, Lester? It's over."

"You'd think so, wouldn't you? But Dave sent an email just before he jumped. To you, talking about how murdering Delaney was a bad idea and that both of you were wrong about it. He went on and on about how guilty he felt about it. How you'd come up with the idea when you learned he had a friend who was a g**g member. That might not have been so bad, but he accidently sent it to Tara, too. Same last name, it's an easy mistake." I held the last bullet up and studied it.

"You son of a b***h. You sent that email."

I shrugged. "Doesn't really matter, does it? They'll look into it and everything, and I mean every-Damning-thing, will come out." I put that last bullet back in the magazine. "What I don't understand is how you can just Damning decide to kill her."

His eyes reflected nothing but hate. "She isn't mine, I had a vasectomy. Charlotte and I 'entertained' a lot with the Senior Partners, and she ended up pregnant."

"Dave told me. He talked a lot before he jumped. Had a lot to get off his chest. Nice little firm you've got there, Shitweasel. And you brought Tara into it? I ought to Damning kill you just for that."

He held his hands up defensively. "Nothing like that has happened with her, she isn't senior enough yet."

"You mean that your little crew of Damnsticks aren't sure Tara wouldn't lodge a complaint or sue the firm yet." I shook my head. "I can eat Damnin' roadkill, but breathing the same air with you turns my stomach. I know why you convinced Charlotte not to abort Delaney. I think Dave called it 'optics.' Nice happy family pictures make you more electable. Only she wasn't the daughter you needed, was she?"

"She was embarrassing. Stupid, undisciplined. She spent more time in suspension than in school. She was a goddamn nightmare. She's no daughter of mine."

I felt rage boil up. "You really think it's all about blood and who donated sperm? But you're Damnin' right about that, after all. She isn't your daughter. She's mine now."

I tossed the empty g*n down on the desk in front of him and held the magazine up. "One bullet, Chuck. That's what I'm offering you. One. Damning. Bullet. The police are probably on their way here already. Once they get here, it's all over. You can't run. Tara's here and she knows everything, right down to how you promised a couple senior partners you'd pave the way for her to 'entertain' them. She's already with Charlotte. By now, they have your money locked down so Damning tight you'll have to blow a drunk for a quarter to make a phone call."

He looked down the hall with dawning horror.

I grinned and leaned over him. "So here's your Damning choice, you piece of s**t. Shoot me in the back when I walk out and spend the rest of your life warming some giant Aryan Nation lifer motherDamner's bed until you die of AIDS. Or, maybe whatever is left of the NCWB catches up to you first. Your s**t got a Damnload of them killed. I'm pretty sure I've taught them not to Damn with me, so they'll want to make an example of you. They'll do it real slow."

I tapped the magazine on the desk. "Or, you can do the right thing for once in your Damning life."

We stared at each other for a long moment, until a distant sound started to build. Sirens.

"Sounds like time's just 'bout up, Shitstain. I almost hope you shoot me. I'd die with a smile, happy knowin' what's gonna happen to your soft, pretty a*s in prison."

I let the magazine drop in front of him with a clatter and walked slowly out the door. I was halfway down the hall when I heard the single shot.

The door to the sitting room opened slowly, Charlotte framed in the doorway. "I didn't know, Les."

"Didn't know or didn't want to know, Charli? You had to realize something was up."

She dropped her gaze to the floor and stood silent until Tara pulled her back to let me through. Tara had her lawyer face on. "You need to leave before they get here... Dad." At that last word, a sad, hesitant smile crossed her face, but it was gone in an instant. Charlotte noticed, and she closed her eyes for a second as I walked out.