The Midtown Murderer (18 page)

Chapter 42

A chill raced up
Trent’s spine. “Ah, Jesus, Priest.”

Priest’s
tone was clipped and professional. “You’re the number-one suspect; the first order of business is that I take you in. An investigative board will get to the bottom of this. Determine if you’re innocent or not.”

Trent was incensed. “You think I set this
up?”

“That’s not for me to decide
,” Priest said, tossing Trent a pair of nickel-steel handcuffs. “Put ’em on.”

“You’re one of the killers, aren’t you?”

“No.”

Trent clicked the cuff on his right wrist. “At least let me keep my hands in front.”

“Contrary to procedure, but that’s OK. Now ratchet that cuff down tight and get the second one on.” Trent complied and Priest opened the passenger door for him.

Trent lowered himself onto the bench seat. “Now what?”

Priest kept his gun pointed at Trent’s ribs. “Fasten that seatbelt. I’ll call Clay when we stop for gas.”

“
You trust him?”

“God help us if we can’t.”

Trent stared out the window toward the forest, but it was already lost in a heavy band of darkness. Then he remembered what he had told Radcliff in his apartment about not caring. It wasn’t exactly true. There were days when he hungered for his idyllic life of old. His job as a police officer; the feeling of accomplishment he got from being the best officer he could. And the comradely. Such stabilizing forces in his life. But more than anything there was Sylvia. And the expectation of a long and happy life with her.

But there wouldn’t be a
ny more Sylvia. Or police work. Have to get rid of this depression, he thought. How? Perhaps if I meet the right woman. Or find the Way. But first I gotta get the fuck out of Atlanta, he was thinking when Priest stopped at a run-down convenience store/gas station on the way back to the interstate.

“Stay put, Palmer. I’ll start the pump and make a few calls.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Trent said, sinking into the seat and thinking how isolated the station was.

Priest
filled the tank, fetched something out of the trunk, and then walked to the store. He pushed open the bi-fold door to a phone booth and tried to make a call; then he dropped the phone and ducked inside the building.

Trent was marveling at a collection of
weather-beaten rocking chairs clustered around the front porch of the store. He was thinking he was trapped in a Norman Rockwell painting
when he heard car tires crunch on the gravel driveway behind him.

He
twisted the rearview mirror so he could see better. The streetlight shone on a gold-colored sedan directly behind Priest’s car. The wheelman had curly salt-and-pepper hair and wore tortoise-shell glasses. His passenger was combing his sandy-colored hair back. When Trent got a good look at them, a chilling sense of recognition flashed through his mind: The clowns!

The wheelman hurried out of the car
. Nursing a pump-action shotgun, he moved determinedly toward the station.

The passenger
racing toward Trent gripped a Smith and Wesson 357 Magnum in both hands. “Hands on the dash,” he snarled. His breath left a white vapor on the cold air.

Trent raised his handcuffed
wrists.

The man rested his elbows on the door
and casually pointed the barrel at Trent’s chest. He wore latex gloves and his wraparounds sat crooked on his face. “Trent Palmer,” he said coldly, “the cat with nine lives.” Then he added, “Too bad all of them are used up.”

“
You Bubbles or Flowers?”

“Officer Dana.”

“You’re a prick with or without your water balloons.”

“Now, now, Palmer, that’s no way to speak to an officer of the law. You behave and I’ll make your death as painless as possible.”

“You and Butler will burn in hell.”

“
Out of the car,” he said, pointing his gun at Trent’s face. “Hands on the hood; now spread your legs.”

Dana jammed the gun behind
his ear and patted him down skillfully with his free hand. “Stay put,” he said impatiently.

“What’s it all about?” Trent
asked, glancing over his shoulder.

“A financial arrangement,”
Dana said, eyes gleaming with satisfaction. “One more payoff and I’ll be drinking Mai Tais in the French Polynesia for the rest of my days.”

“Let Chloe go.”

“Don’t know what—”

The door to the convenience store opened and Roe gave Dana a straight-arm wave.

Dana grabbed Trent’s upper arm and spun him around. “You run; I’ll waste you now.”

“Someone might stop for gas.”

“One thing at a time,” he said, flicking his eyes left and right. “Get moving.”

Roe held the door open and Dana pushed Trent down onto the
dirty wooden floor. Roe scanned the parking lot and said, “Take Priest’s keys and move both cars around back; put out the Closed sign when you’re done and lock the door.”

Dana
stared at a pool of fresh blood that had rounded the corner of the counter and soaked into a frayed carpet. “Where’s the owner?” he asked, fixing Roe with a conspirator’s grin.

“Dead,” Roe said
savagely. A Winston dangled from the corner of his lips and smoke curled around his ear. He rested his shotgun against a red and white popcorn machine. “Don’t worry, there’s no closed-circuit TV. Palmer’s gonna make it look like a robbery gone bad. Now hurry up.”

“Sure, boss,” Dana said, spitting a stream of chewing tobacco. “
On my way.”

Trent heard groaning and his eyes fell
to Priest. He was bound with duct tape to a folding chair; his head hung down. Blood streaked his forehead.

“You’re gonna kill Priest
,” Roe said, pointing a pistol at Trent. “When the cops find the suicide note I wrote for you, everyone will think you went postal.”

“
Why do this?”

“There are forces at play here
,” he said with a shrug. “Conspiracies and schemes so twisted they make the Kennedy hit look like a fairy tale.” Roe slapped Trent open-handed. “Bottom line, you’re dispensable.”

Trent immediately shot his handcuffed fists at
Roe’s face. The punch was a good one and knocked off his glasses; he fell on his butt on the floor and his pistol discharged. The bullet shattered the glass door of a tall drink cooler.

Roe scrambled to his feet and wiped blood from his nose. Then he backed Trent up against the lottery stand and jammed the
still-warm barrel into his mouth. Trent could taste oil and warm metal. It’s over, he thought. The last sound you’ll hear is the gunblast . . .

“I’m going to kill you,” Roe whispered wetly in his face. “And if you don’t shoot Priest, I’ll kill Rikki.”

A cowbell tinkled and Trent glanced at the door. Dana scanned stealthily out the window. Then he locked the door. “What was that, boss?” he asked, looking at Roe’s bloody nose. He glared at Trent. “Time to end this shit. Get the fuck outta here!”

“
Agreed,” he said, jamming his gun into Trent’s ear. “It’s bottom-line time, Palmer.”

“Here ‘ya go, Palmer,” Dana said, handing him a gun. “Keep the barrel pointed at Priest or Roe’s gonna blast ‘ya.”

Trent was slack-jawed.

“Do it, Palmer!” Roe
screamed. “Or Rikki dies!”

Priest’s head snapped up and he raged at Trent. “You’re not man enough to pull the trigger!”

“Shoot him,” cried Roe, waving wildly with his pistol.

“Now!” Priest roared. “Right here,” he yelled, nodding at his chest. “Do it!”

Dana’s lips curled back cruelly. “Pull the trigger!”

Trent locked eyes with Priest, and the pistol roared in his hands
. Priest went over backwards, knocking down a stand of Little Debbie Cup Cakes and Twinkies.

Smoke curled from the barrel, and the pistol slipped from Trent’s hands. When the reverberating gunblast
faded, Trent slumped to his knees. His shoulders sagged and he bowed his head.

Chapter 43

“
Stupid prick,” Roe exhaled, picking up the pistol with a paper towel. “I should kill you now; but we need you for one more job.”

Roe turned to Dana
. “Smash the cash register,” he said. “Then we’ll haul ass.”

“
OK—”

The second gunshot was a short crack. Dana lurched forward
with a strangled cry as a red streamer of blood burst from his back. Roe dove for cover behind a crate stacked with cases of Miller Highlife.

Trent grabbed Priest
by the shoulder and dragged him behind an old-fashioned metal bodied drink cooler.

“My gun,” he moaned
, his pant leg drawn back enough for Trent to see the ankle holster that he had drawn the gun from.

Trent knelt and stared in amazement at the bullet-proof vest that had saved Priest’s life. “I prayed you had it
on.”

“Hurry, Palmer,” he wheezed. “The gun . . . Oh God
; ribs broken . . .”

Gotta get
the big man out of here, Trent thought, gripping the concealable nine-millimeter Beretta with his cuffed hands. He raced in a crouch around the corner of the drink cooler. Dana was crawling toward the checkout counter. Trent shot him in the thigh; his feet kicked wildly and his hands clawed at the floor.

Trent leaped behind the drink cooler and covered Priest, knowing what would come next.

Roe let loose a couple of charges from the shotgun. Thunder coughed from the barrel; the slugs punctured the metal face of the drink cooler with metallic tinks and soda pop bottles fizzed. The plywood wall splintered and fluorescent tube lights burst. Trent and Priest crouched low, trying to avoid the ricocheting pellets and debris raining down.

Roe
turned and fired and the plate-glass window dissolved in a shimmering waterfall. Then he fired a volley of shots at Trent and Priest with his pistol. He waited for a second then bolted for the shattered store window.

Trent dove out from behind the drink cooler
. He squeezed off four shots. The bullets danced up Roe’s back; he twisted in a shower of red spray, knocking over the popcorn machine before collapsing across the jagged window frame.

“
My shirt pocket,” Priest wheezed.

Trent fished out the key and uncuffed his wrists. “C’mon,
big man, time to go.”

“See what
. . . they’re doing.”

Trent
peeked around the corner. Dana was crawling like a drugged turtle around the counter, and Roe was slumped across the window with a spreading pool of blood beneath him. “One dead and one wounded. It’s over.”

Trent lifted Priest to his feet and
walked him through the wafting gunsmoke to Dana. He was on his knees holding tight to a floor safe like he was trying to pick it up; frothy blood foamed out the bullet hole in his back.

Trent knelt beside him
. “Chloe Lee,” he said, “where is she?”

The overhead fan cast thin slices of shadow
over the side of his face. “Never had the Asian girl,” he said, his eyes wide open. Pink bubbles popped between his lips. “Can’t figure that one . . .”

“Who’s the Midtown Murderer?”

“Shifty bastard . . . whoever he is,” Dana said, spitting up blood.

Trent
kept his eyes fixed on the man’s eyes. “Where the hell is Chloe?”

Priest waved him quiet. “Did you kill Ramsey?”

Dana winced like he had heartburn. “. . . took out her team. Scorched them . . . But . . . killed her . . .”

Trent looked at Priest.
“Butler?”

Dana
was breathing in short, wheezing spasms. “But—” he said, gurgling blood. Then he was gone.

#

Trent jammed his foot on the accelerator and the Crown Vic shot across the parking lot, the tires squealing and the underbody scraping the asphalt as he wheeled over crumbly potholes onto the road.

He
took the bends in the winding country road at breakneck speeds, steering the car toward Atlanta. “Call headquarters on the car radio,” he said to Priest with a cautious glance in the rearview mirror.

The evening was pitch black with occasional snow. The wind pounced off the land in great gusts, and icy blasts rattled the car.

Priest was slumped against the window clutching his chest. “Can’t . . . chance it,” he said through gritted teeth. “Killer might pick it up . . .”

“Priest, the killer is Butler!”

“If we call . . . they’ll close the net. I have to get to the station . . .”

Trent spotted a
n interchange in the distance that would deposit them onto the interstate. “I’ll take I-85. That’s the fastest route.”

Priest coughed and stirred. “No. Only a matter of time before they set up roadblocks. Take
19 south; it’s deserted . . . The turn is just past the John Deere store.”

Trent decided to quit trying to outthink Priest. He nodded and said, “
Show me where.”

Priest pointed and Trent made the turn. As he accelerated on the narrow
blacktop he glanced in his rearview mirror. Two state police cars with light bars flashing sped past in the dark toward the shootout.

What a day,
Trent breathed, as the blaring sirens faded. The tops of the skyscrapers were clearly visible ahead, gleaming palely against the sky. Its lower levels were indistinct, merging into a fog that had settled over the city.

He
turned a thirty minute trip into twenty and was coasting into Midtown when Priest reached for the microphone that was in a cradle bolted to the dash. Trent grabbed the microphone and pulled the connection from the radio. Then he stopped on a side street off Monroe.

“
I’ll call you an ambulance, Priest. But first I’m getting out.”

“
Y-you’re resisting arrest; have to come in . . .”

“
No. You deal with your scandal. I’ll find Chloe.”