Justice for Hire (29 page)

Annie leaned forward. “Are you talking about MK-Ultra?”

“Yes, yes. That’s what it was called then, but that was just an offshoot of the struggle that has gone on forever.”

“The elite against the rest of us?”

“Not against us. For us. The goal of the elite is to make the world a better place for everyone.”

Jake laughed. “That sounds like communism, or fascism, to me.”

“Not at all. Some people call it elitism. Call it what you want, it’s for the best.” Wolff continued in a defiant voice. “There are others out there, and they will eventually prevail.”

Jake shrugged. “If they do, you won’t be there to help.”

Wolff shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. I would gladly give my life for the cause.”

Annie spun her head and listened intently. She could hear the door down the hall opening. “Craig’s here,” she whispered.

Chapter 62

Friday, August 26th, 3:11 PM

JAKE STOOD, whipped across the room, and nudged Wolff’s forehead with the muzzle of the pistol. “Don’t say a word.”

Wolff stiffened, and resignation showed in his frightened eyes as he peered upwards. Jake held the weapon in place until the newcomer’s footsteps sounded outside the room, then pointed it toward the doorway and waited.

Craig’s hands shot up by instinct as he stepped in the room, and then he froze, his mouth open and speechless.

“Come on in,” Jake said, waving the gun.

Craig looked at Wolff, at Annie, at David, and then back at Jake.

Jake kicked a chair over to land beside Wolff. “Sit down.”

Craig moved to the chair, sat down uneasily and frowned at Wolff. “How did this happen? Why didn’t you lock them up when I told you to?”

“I’m sorry, sir, but they shot me.”

“Where are the guards? Where’s Muller?”

“I . . . I don’t know, sir.”

Jake said, “We’ve taken care of them. They won’t be bothering us anymore, and neither will you once the police get here.”

Craig glared up at Jake, murder in his eyes. “How did you find us?”

“Quite easily. We followed the signal of your trackers.”

Craig scowled and spun his head toward Wolff. “You said it was safe.”

Wolff was silent.

“This is quite an organization you have here, or should I say, had here,” Jake said.

Annie turned in her chair and faced the villains, papers in her hand. “You’ve ruined a lot of lives.”

Craig gave her a black look.

“Wolff already filled us in on your plans.” Annie waved the papers in the air. “And I see you’ve documented everything very carefully.”

“I’m sure the police will be grateful for that,” Jake said.

Annie’s voice took on a disgusted tone as she continued. “You used all these kids, and had them kill in cold blood in your lust for power.”

“And what about the innocent victims?” Jake added.

“They weren’t innocent,” Craig shouted, and looked toward the hallway as if expecting one of the thugs to rescue him. No one did, and he turned back and looked frantically around the room.

“The rest of your underlings are safely locked up,” Jake said.

Annie looked at Craig and pointed at David. “What did he ever do to you?”

Craig shrugged.

Jake put the pistol to Craig’s temple, leaned in, and gritted his teeth, their faces inches apart. “Did you even know the names of the kids you used? All those innocent lives you destroyed for your own selfish purposes?”

Craig didn’t answer and moved back uneasily as Jake withdrew the weapon, straightened his back and looked in disgust at the two lowlifes.

Jake looked at his watch. The police would be here soon, and it would be all over. For them, that is, but not for the families of the victims. Their pain would never stop, and though they would see justice, it would never be enough.

Craig took advantage of Jake’s temporary lapse into thought and lunged at the big man. Jake fought to hold onto the pistol as Craig struggled to wrestle it from his grasp. Craig would normally be no match for Jake, but he was desperate, and desperate people do desperate things.

A stray shot could be fatal, and Jake attempted to point the pistol upwards in case it fired. “Everybody, get down,” he yelled, and Annie and David scurried toward the hallway.

Craig had a solid grip and was trying to turn the barrel of the gun toward Jake when it fired. Glass shattered as the bullet smacked through lab equipment and embedded itself in the wall beyond.

Chemical fumes filled the air as they fought for control of the gun. Jake brought the elbow of his free arm crashing into the side of Craig’s head, and the murderer’s grip loosened. One more swing of Jake’s fist and blood shot from his opponent’s mouth and nose as he crashed to the floor.

Craig lay on his back, unmoving, defeated, and bleeding.

Jake caught the acrid smell of burning chemicals and he whipped around. The broken flask of liquid had spread across the desk and was engulfed in flame from the Bunsen burner. He looked around for a fire extinguisher. There was none.

The sharp smell stung his nostrils and burned his lungs.

Whatever was in the beaker was burning hot, as flames caressed the wall behind the bench, and were becoming dangerously close to a pair of gas cylinders. More cylinders were under the bench, and if the flames reached them, it would be all over.

Thick black smoke wafted upwards, dissipated and began to fill the room with pungent fumes.

Jake pulled Craig to his feet. “We have to get out of here.” He turned to Wolff and pointed toward the hallway. “Move.”

“No, no,” Craig shouted. “We have to save my father’s notes. He spun and glared at Wolff. “Help me.”

Wolff dashed over, began pulling the binders and notepads from the shelf above the desk and stuffing them in a briefcase.

The flames sputtered and fizzed. The fire was spreading downward and outward, and Jake found it hard to breathe. He gave one last plea to the madmen and dashed into the hallway.

Annie and David had opened the cell doors and Annie was herding two young boys toward the exit. David followed, with Jake close behind, the flames working their way up the hall behind them.

There was an explosion as they raced through the garage, and then another explosion rocked the roof sending rainbows of ash and flame high into the air.

The door burst open and they breathed in the fresh air.

Chapter 63

Friday, August 26th, 3:25 PM

ANNIE RACED across the gravel until she could no longer feel the heat on her back, and then turned and faced the inferno. They were safe, but Craig and Wolff would be lucky to make it out alive.

David stood close beside her, his eyes wide with wonder as he observed the out of control fire.

Her arm was around another boy, perhaps fourteen or fifteen years old. She had freed him from his prison, and he stood close to her, shivering in the warm air.

Another boy stood close by, and was in awe, watching the fire.

But where was Jake?

She looked around frantically. He had been behind them when they raced from the barn. She asked David, “Did you see Jake?”

David pointed to the raging fire. “He might be still in there. I never saw him come out.”

Annie looked in horror. If Jake was still in the barn, there was no chance he could get out alive. The roof of the garage was buckling under the weight of the burning timbers, and chunks had already fallen loose and crashed into the garage.

“Stay here,” she said, as she dashed to her right and glanced along the outside of the barn. No Jake. She raced to the left, but he wasn’t there either. He was nowhere to be seen.

He must be still inside.

She moved as close to the fire as she could. “Jake,” she called, again and again.

No answer.

Flames were licking around the exit door and the metal frame was beginning to melt under the intense heat. The large wooden door had burst into flames and it wouldn’t be long before it, too, was totally consumed.

It was too late for anyone still inside.

The large garage door burst forward, flaming wood and charred splinters flew upwards as a fireball ascended from the roof, far into the sky.

Smoke followed the path of the airborne flames, and billowed upwards, expanding and filling the air with soot and flaming embers.

Then, there was a sudden roar, like the sound of an angry bull, and the Escalade burst through the door, lunged forward, and ground to a stop beside Annie.

The window zipped down, and Jake stuck his grinning face out. “Anyone call a cab?”

Annie looked at him in disgust, frowning deeply, her hands on her hips. “I can’t believe you risked your life to save a car.”

Jake jumped out and opened the back door. “Not just a car,” he said, as he dragged a trussed-up thug from the back seat. “But I had a passenger, too.”

Annie smiled through her relief. She couldn’t understand why risking your life to save a valuable vehicle was stupid, but risking your life to save a worthless thug, was heroic.

She didn’t bother to try and figure it out. She was too busy hugging her hero.

~~*~~

OVER THE crackle and whoosh of a barn being consumed, police sirens screamed as three cruisers roared up the laneway and spun to a stop. Uniformed policemen poured out.

Hank pulled up behind the cruisers and jumped from his car. He stood for a moment and observed the fire before joining the Lincolns.

“What happened?”

Jake said, “They had a lab in there. It caught fire when we were wrestling for a gun.” He filled Hank in on the rest of the story. “The problem is, all of the evidence went up in smoke, along with most of the bad guys.”

Annie sighed, and said, “When David and I opened the cell doors, the guard and Dr. Muller were still out cold. We didn’t have time to help them.”

“I tried to get back to them,” Jake said. “But the fire was too fierce. I couldn’t even get close.” He glanced at the burning building. “Whoever is left in there, it’s too late for them now.”

Another siren sounded and a fire engine pulled in close to the building. Soon, a futile stream of water was pouring onto the inferno, but it was too late. The building was nearly gutted, and all that would remain would be four charred bodies and an empty concrete shell.

“We may never know the full extent of what went on here,” Hank said.

“It may be better left buried,” Jake said. “It was a horrifying nightmare, and it’s over.”

“It’s not over for the victims,” Annie reminded him.

Hank sighed deeply. “It never will be.”

Epilogue

Saturday, August 27th, 11:00 AM

THE DOORBELL BUZZED and Annie showed Hank into the living room. He settled back in the easy chair as Jake strolled from the office and dropped into the couch beside Annie.

“I just wanted to fill you guys in on what we discovered,” Hank said.

“You couldn’t have found too much,” Jake said. “That barn was destroyed completely.”

“Sure it was, but we searched Craig’s house, and his office, and we found some amazing information.”

Jake leaned forward.

Hank continued, “Apparently, Wolff filled out periodic reports for Craig, and we found many of them in his office, some dating back several months. We were able to piece together a good idea of what was involved, who the victims are, and the reasons they were chosen.”

“What about the killers?” Annie asked.

“We’ll eventually figure out who the John Does and the other boys are, and in the meantime, David is united with his parents.”

“It seems we got there just in time to save him. He was spared most of the worst,” Jake said.

Hank said, “Yeah, but he got a good enough dose to straighten him out a bit. He was in tears when he finally saw his parents, and vowed to listen to them and do whatever they asked from now on. He’s just happy to have escaped. His parents couldn’t thank me enough.” Hank laughed. “I had to explain to them they were thanking the wrong guy, and it’s you two who saved the day.”

“Tell us about Cheryl,” Annie said. “What’ll happen to her?”

“The psychiatrist has made a number of recommendations. He’s confident, over time, Cheryl will recover her memory, and he recommended she not be prosecuted. At the time of the murder, she was unable to understand the nature of what she did, and lacked the capacity to appreciate the criminality of it.”

“So, that means . . .?”

“She won’t be prosecuted. And that goes for the girl who tried to kill you as well. I’m sure she’ll be diagnosed the same, and after some intensive treatment, she’ll recover.”

“Cheryl’s parents must have been glad to hear that,” Annie said.

“Yes, they were delighted, to put it mildly. I told them you’d be dropping by today.”

“Wolff told us, what he was doing, was just the tip of the iceberg, and there are more out there with the same mindset as him. He called it ‘the cause’.”

Hank sighed, “I’m sure there are more like him, but fortunately, details of the procedures they used on the victims were destroyed.”

Just then, Matty came charging into the room. “Hey, Uncle Hank.” He turned to his father. “Hey, Dad. Catch any bad guys lately?”

Jake grinned. “Yeah, one or two.”

A Note to the Reader

THIS STORY, although fictional, could have happened. The American and Canadian involvement in trauma-based mind control techniques during the 1950s and 1960s is well documented.

Known as MK-Ultra Project Monarch, the techniques to manipulate people’s mental states and alter brain functions included the administration of drugs and other chemicals, hypnosis, sleep, food, and water deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse, as well as various forms of torture.