WALKABOUT 2 - The Back of Beyond (Part 12)

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67

Messerton, Illinois

Coming around a curve in the road during his routine patrol in rural Hudson County, Chief Deputy Darryl Washington noticed another department cruiser a couple hundred yards ahead pulling onto the oil lease road leading to the crime scene where the remains of a child were recently found.

Washington braked to a stop, took a minute to think. The crime scene investigators had already completed their work. With any luck, there would be a match on a missing child, giving some sense of closure to a family somewhere. A bit more luck, maybe they could someday make an arrest. But he wasn’t betting on it. There was no reason for anyone in the department to be poking around here now. Unless someone had misplaced something. That happened every now and then.

Washington turned onto the oil lease road and stopped. Leaving his cruiser positioned so as to block any exit, he stepped out and quietly closed his door, proceeding on foot for another hundred yards or so. As he neared the end of the lease road, he could hear police dispatch chatter coming over the other cruiser. A few yards more, and he saw it, recognizing it immediately as the chief’s unit. What would he be doing out here?

Washington stayed put, standing behind the trunk of a walnut tree.

“You’re sure this is the spot?” Chief Rodgers asked.

Alan Kincaid nodded. “Somewhere around here, give or take a few yards.”

“Damn it, Alan,” the chief growled. “I need to know. Is this the spot or not?”

“Yeah. I’m pretty sure,” Kincaid replied. “Right about there, where you’re standing.”

Chief Rodgers laid the decayed floral arrangement on the ground so it was partially covered by grass.

“And the license plate? Where was it?”

“Over there, lying on the ground by that stump,” Kincaid pointed to a spot a few yards from the chief’s cruiser.

“Let’s put it down and get going,” Chief Rodgers said. “I don’t like doing this.”

“The end justifies the means, Chief,” Kincaid said as he dropped the plate at the base of the stump. “If you can break the case and it gets you re-elected, it will be worth it.” Together they headed back toward the cruiser.

Using the trunk of the walnut tree for cover, Deputy Washington pointed his duty weapon at his boss and said, “Planting evidence is a crime, Chief.”

68

We pulled into a dirt parking lot in front of an old half-dome hangar constructed of corrugated tin. From decades of baking in the sun, the exterior paint on the hangar was faded and peeling. I noticed a couple of old airplanes that looked as if they’d never fly again and a high-wing single-engine Cessna Caravan turboprop tied down behind the hangar. Beyond it, I could see a short dirt runway.

“Looks like Flynn’s already here,” Peter said. I don’t know why the comment seemed odd to me. Why wouldn’t a biker become a pilot? I suppose I always imagined they went everywhere on their motorcycles. Yet, here I sat with three of them in a car.

Several motorcycles and a couple of vans filled the lot. A couple of derelict vehicles, a 60’s vintage four-door sedan and a bed truck with, of all things, a decrepit boat on a trailer with flat tires hitched to it sat on the perimeter of the parking lot, maybe a hundred feet or so from the hangar. The campervan looked out of place as it pulled into a spot marked “Reserved.” I wondered why the club chose to be in such a place.

As if she’d read my mind, Simone said, “Our club is based out of Sydney, with affiliates all over Oz. We have a bit of business here in Coober Pedy to attend to now and again, and a few local members. ”

Peter and Archer escorted me inside, with Simone close behind. It took a few seconds for my eyes to make the adjustment from bright sunlight to the darkened inside of the clubhouse.

The first thing I noticed was the bar on the opposite side of the room. Probably thirty feet long, with a brass foot rail and a number of barstools, a slender fellow with a scraggly goatee stood behind it, serving drinks. The place was packed with people, ranging in age from late teens to mid-fifties. Some were at the bar, while others played pool or lifted weights. Despite its rundown exterior, the interior of the old hangar was impressive.

No one seemed to notice me. Apparently, people being brought to the clubhouse against their will was nothing out of the ordinary. Archer shoved me into an overstuffed couch, facing a large screen television mounted on the opposite wall. In the far corner of the room was a terrarium with a snake lounging inside. “Sit there,” Archer said, pushing me down onto the couch. “Don’t move. And keep your mouth shut. Flynn will be out directly.”

I nodded. Maybe before this was all over, Archer and I would get a chance to settle our account. Maybe not. Right now it didn’t matter. Archer went to the bar, joined his mates for a drink. I sat there, as ordered, dividing my time between watching the Australian Rules Football game on the big screen and observing the assorted individuals in the clubhouse. Archer was entertaining several of his fellow club members, raising his eye patch, inserting a forefinger into his nostril and then out through his empty eye socket. I had no idea you could do that.

The ratio of men to women was, I estimated, about two to one. Same as the tooth-to-tattoo ratio. The men wore torn denims, T-shirts and vests covered with patches. They were a rough-looking bunch, and I didn’t like my chances of walking away unharmed. Whenever one of them would look at me I would divert my attention back to the television.

I’d been there maybe twenty minutes when a door to my left opened and a fellow with an athletic physique came into the room, flanked by four bodyguards. I recognized the face as an older, battle-worn version of the young man wearing the cap and gown with Daniel in the photograph back at Kathleen’s house. The room fell silent as Dexter Flynn approached me.

I felt my jaw drop when I noticed another person in the group, a woman, bruised and bloodied, as she stepped from behind Flynn. I blinked a couple of times, trying to come to terms with what I saw. “Hello, Mr. Hamilton,” Jasmine Figueroa said. “I’m glad to see you’re still alive.”

69

Messerton, Illinois

As a deputy carried out the last box of his personal belongings, Hudson County Police Chief Rodgers turned to face Chief Deputy Washington. “Here’s my resignation. I’m sending a copy to the mayor and the county council. The department’s all yours now, Darryl.”

Washington took the envelope, laid it on the now empty desk. “Sorry it had to end this way, Chief,” he said. “I was looking forward to beating you in the election.”

Rodgers nodded. “Yeah, me too, although I think I would have won.”

Washington shrugged. “We’ll never know.”

“Kincaid already resign from the reserves?”

Washington nodded. “He didn’t waste any time.”

“You won’t say anything about this? That was the agreement. Alan and I resign, you run unopposed, and what happened out there yesterday goes away.” Rodgers reminded his former second in command.

Washington said nothing. Let the awkward silence hang.

Finally, Rodgers sniffed, said “Good luck,” and offered his hand.

Washington stepped past him without shaking hands, opened and held the door for the former chief. “I may not always have agreed with you,” he said, “but until yesterday I respected you.”

Rodgers opened his mouth but no words would come out. In silent humiliation, he lowered his gaze, and walked through the door in shame. 

70

I hadn’t known Jasmine Figueroa very long. A year and a half, maybe two years. During that time, I’d spent a grand total of two or three hours with her. She was the lover of my other daughter, Raquel, with whom I was estranged. I recognized Jasmine’s perfume at the masquerade party on the ship, and again in port at Sydney Harbour. I actually called out her name there, but she kept on walking and I later convinced myself I was imagining things. Apparently not.

So it had to have been Jasmine who told the Death Adders all about me not being Jared Mulligan, but rather Tyler Hamilton, from Page, Indiana. That explained how they knew about me. I was still at a loss for why she would have done it.

Flynn stepped forward, nodded to one of his men, who grabbed me by my lapel and pulled me up, standing on my tiptoes pinned against the wall with my collar restricting my airway. “So which is it, mate?” he said “Mulligan, or Hamilton? Or maybe both?” The room was quiet now, as everyone there watched to see what would become of me.

How best to answer his question? I decided to try honesty. “Hamilton,” I croaked. “Your people have my daughter. If you let her go, I’ll let you live.”

Flynn laughed, and as if on cue, so did everyone else in the clubhouse. Except for me. And Jasmine.

My nostrils flared, my jaw clenched. I was furious with Jasmine for selling me out to the Death Adders, telling them about Shelby so they could get to me. Why? What was she doing in Australia anyway? And why in God’s name was she here, with these people? Without thinking, I looked to her and blurted out, “Did you tell them about Raquel, too?”

71

Asking Jasmine if she told the Death Adders about Raquel was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. I knew it the moment the words left my mouth. I saw the pained expression on Jasmine’s face. Flynn’s eyebrows raised, indicating this was new information. He stepped back, leaned toward another of his men, and whispered in his ear. The man nodded and left.

Flynn said to me, “Have a seat then . . .” he paused, cocked his head, as if studying me . . . “Mulligan. We have a bit of club business to attend to, then we’ll have a nice chat. He looked to Jasmine, indicated with a slight movement of his head that she should join me.

Her hair was dark now, and at first I didn’t recognize her. “What are you doing here, Jasmine?” I said. She had obviously been roughed up by the bikers. “By the way, you look like hell.”

“Thank you for pointing that out,” she said. “They mistook you for a hired killer. Jared Mulligan.”

“I already figured that part out. That still doesn’t explain your involvement with these . . . these . . . people.”

“Mulligan had a partner.”

I was about to ask what that had to do with her, but then it hit me, like a baseball bat right between the eyes. “Oh.”

“I was part of an elite assassination team in the military, Mr. Hamilton. Few people knew we even existed. The public likes to think only men are cut out for that sort of thing. The truth is, as a woman, I can get closer to some targets than a man can. Learn their secrets before dispensing with them. When I got out, my career options were limited. My resume won’t get me far in the corporate world. I tried to get to Flynn at the cemetery after the funeral for his friend, the photographer on the ship you came here on.”

I swallowed hard. “I have to ask, Jasmine. Is Rocky involved in all this?”

Jasmine shook her head. “No. She has no idea what I do for a living. She thinks I work for a real estate development firm, and I have to travel a lot. Pisses her off she seldom gets to come along.”

“So that’s what brings you here?” I said, then as an afterthought, “Wait a minute! You mean you do actually take her with you on your . . . what do you call them, hits?”.

“Only a couple times,” Jasmine said matter-of-factly. “She was never in any danger.”

I shook my head, trying to come to terms with this new information.

Jasmine said “We—the real Jared Mulligan and me—were hired to kill Dexter Flynn. But in order to do that, it was necessary to get close to him.”

“Well, congratulations,” I said. “You’ve certainly managed to do that.”

“The photographer who went overboard on the ship? He was a close friend of Flynn’s.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said, remembering the photographs at Kathleen’s house.

Jasmine paused as a couple of Death Adders drew near, then went on past us to go outside. A blast of heat poured into the room when the door opened. When there was again enough distance between any potential eavesdroppers and us she continued. “We were supposed to eliminate Daniel Seton. Flynn would be at his funeral, and we would take him out there.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“I tried, but you weren’t—I mean, Jared wasn’t there to help. Things didn’t go according to plan, I had to improvise, and well, here I am now. With you.”

“And thank you for that, before I forget,” I said. “Why in the world would you bring me into this? And Shelby?” Why ask why?

“You inserted yourself when you assumed Mulligan’s identity,” she said. “Why would you do a thing like that? You know your family thinks you’re dead, now, don’t you?”

“Yeah, well. It’s a long story. Things got out of control. So they think I’m Mulligan, and they are going to do what? Kill us both for killing Flynn’s friend? And Shelby, for good measure?”

“That pretty much sums it up.” Jasmine took a deep breath. Let it out. “I tried to tell them you had nothing to do with any of this, that you were not Mulligan. I thought if I told them who you really were, they would believe me, but they didn’t buy it. They still think you’re Mulligan. It’s common practice. Standard operating procedure, you might say.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Always use a false identity for work. The real you is the person you are at home, in your real life. You know . . . when you aren’t working,” she said. “Or the other way around. The real you is your job, and your alter ego is the one at home. Either way, it’s a double life, and you are acting much of the time, pretending to be someone you are not.”

“So your real name isn’t Jasmine Figueroa?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“I don’t understand. Is Rocky part of your cover?” I could feel my blood beginning to boil. Bringing my daughter into her tangled web of lies, endangering her.

“Raquel and I met when I was on a job. My client introduced us, using my professional name. We hit it off. One thing led to another.” Jasmine bit her lip, sighed. “I couldn’t very well tell her the truth, that when we met, I was operating under an assumed identity while fulfilling a murder for hire. I’m so sorry.”

I almost believed her.

“They pressured me, Mr. Hamilton.” There was a slight quiver in Jasmine’s voice now. Whether it was genuine or not, I couldn’t tell.

“How did they get to Shelby?”

“Like I said. They pressured me. They wanted leverage, a way to bring you in. I can take the physical abuse as well as any man, but everyone cracks eventually. They would have looked into my personal life. I wanted to protect Raquel, and I knew you would as well, so after they knocked me around a while, I gave them Shelby’s name. Flynn and the Death Adders have connections all over the world. They must have reached out to some associates, another gang in the Midwest, maybe. Or someone they do business with.”

“How did you know about Shelby?” I asked.

“Raquel told me.” That came as a shock to me, and Jasmine saw it. “You don’t honestly believe your family doesn’t know about her, do you?”

“Rocky?” I said, trying to come to terms with this news. “Raquel knows?”

“That’s why she is, or rather, was, so cold toward you.”

“And now she thinks I’m dead.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, you will be soon, anyway, unless I’m wrong,” Jasmine said. “And I’m seldom if ever wrong.”