Honorable Assassin (26 page)

Terry stood on the edge of the cliff,
revealed and exposed. His fear was not for himself but for those
few he had become fond of. Gordon had pushed him so gently he had
not seen the edge of the precipice. Now there was no choice but to
take the offer of assistance or go over the edge. He could not
refuse the free hand.

~~~

Chapter Eleven: The Free Hand

The roles of the two men were somewhat
reversed, but only partially so. Gordon MacMaster acknowledged that
the operation was Terry’s and Terry admitted he was only partially
ready to pull it off. The Aussie had done the reconnaissance and
the Scot had the experience. If there had been any chest puffing or
leadership challenges as there so often are among young men, then
the operation was doomed to failure from the beginning. Gordon was
Terry’s senior by about 10 years, and he would have walked off in a
New York minute.

This is not to say that either man was all
that comfortable with the arrangement. To date, the only man Terry
trusted was Uncle Ginger, and he even began to question his loyalty
at times. MacMaster had not mentioned Ginger so Terry felt sure
that he did not know of his existence. Terry intended to keep it
that way.

It was difficult not to like Gordon
MacMaster. The Scot would teach, not preach. He had a zest for life
that extended well past his assignments, but he was never reckless.
He and Terry reveled, drank and danced with the ladies but he
refused to go out in Sydney. It was Gordon’s insistence that he
would work better from behind the curtains. If he were identified,
the contract would be out on him.

Regardless of the Scotsman’s assertion that
he was going after Randy Arganmajc as a cathartic balm for his
conscience, Terry wanted to make sure there was no doubt in his
mind. He observed his former mentor and new partner very closely
when he described the Bacchanalia and the red head’s reaction went
quite a way toward soothing his fears. Planning began immediately
and much to Terry’s dismay, he found that he was still learning at
the feet of a master. There was no question that the operation
should be undertaken. It was Gordon’s contention, however, that
they should be paid for a job of this size and Terry did not see
how.

The children chained in the basement were
from poor families. Sometimes they were sold into slavery;
sometimes they were kidnapped. There was no reward offered for
their return. Once freed, they would have nowhere to go but nowhere
was better than where they were. There would be no financial gain
from that side of the equation.

For MacMaster’s part, he had watched Terry
carefully before approaching him. In the time they had worked
together in the service of their erstwhile employers, Terry had
impressed him as being focused and efficient. He listened well and
learned quickly. It was not that Gordon had been looking for a
protégé, he was simply after the reward he would get for bringing
in new talent. What he did know was that personal revenge was a
very messy business and he needed to be sure that Terry could
display the necessary detachment when the chips were down. The
young Australian would need a lot of coaching and direction but he
already had the motivation and drive, and he had that other thing,
that natural talent that came from nobody knows where. MacMaster
would leave himself an avenue of escape if things got too messy and
he needed to allow Kingston to be sacrificed. He hoped it would not
come to that but was steeled against its possibility.

Terry was against using the authorities on
the job. He had never worked much with the police and was not about
to start. He was willing to listen, however.

The call went in June 21, 2001 as a fire in
the basement of 4747 Euripides. While the street patrol had been
paid off, the fire department had not. There was a big row between
the guards, the police and the firemen. There would be
repercussions along the chain of command.

The second call to 4747 Euripides came in
two days later but it was a different scene this time. The front
door of the building had been blown in by some sort of explosion
and the front rooms were on fire. The guard who had been standing
outside the front door was unconscious but alive. Again there was
discord between the guards and the firemen. This time the police
did not try to stop the fire department from accessing the scene.
The guards would not let anyone in the basement but the station
chief had the run of the house other than that.

The third call came in the following day.
This time there was an acrid smoke pouring from the basement. There
was no question but that the fire crew was needed but the guards
were refusing to let them in. The compromised police were standing
like gelded roosters, not knowing what to do, until the argument
escalated and one of the guards opened fire.

Without knowing enough English to understand
why the fire trucks were there, and with specific orders to never
allow non-members into the basement, Hassim was immovable. One of
the smoke-eaters grabbed a fire axe and headed for the basement
door with all the intentions of smashing it down and stopping the
argument. Hassim shot him. That was all the nerves of the crew
could take, and it was as far as the police were willing to go.
They turned their weapons on Hassim and dropped him where he stood.
They tried to stop the fire fighters from smashing down the new
door, but it was too late. They were addressing the second door by
then. The third door opened by itself and two Yemeni nationals ran
out as the fire department ran in. They did not see the five other
men who rode the freight elevator up to run out the back. The smoke
was thick and caustic, but it was not deadly, not that any of the
men in the dungeon could have known that. What was deadly was the
confrontation they ran into when they charged, fully armed, out the
back door of the building. The alley was full of police and fire
fighters trying to get through the back door. The lack of a common
language hindered any communication between them as the guards
exited. Then the bullets started flying. It was never determined
who had shot first, just that there was a bloodbath in the alley.
The Investigators did their best to piece together what had
happened but never really got that good a handle on it. Two
constables, one fireman and all five guards were killed. Three
other firemen and a constable were injured in the rain of fire and
lead.

The real story was the inside of the
basement: the 15 live boys and the 3 dead ones. It turned out the
smoke came from some kind of improvised smoke bomb with a timer.
The bomb had been delivered in a crate of noodles.

The two Yemeni men who had exited the front
door were the only adults who had escaped the simulated fire. Oddly
enough, the police report said they had tried to overpower the
officers on the way to the regional station. The police had no
option but to shoot them. The city launched a full investigation
but there was no one to prosecute. The owner of record was a Greek
corporation who had rented the buildings to an Arabian man and had
no more business with it. They were not liable for what the man did
with the buildings.

Once Bacchanalia was exposed for what it
was, the pictures of Randy Arganmajc entering the building became
valuable. It didn’t really matter that the photographs were fakes.
They were delivered to the Riggers Club in his name in a sealed
envelope along with a note demanding a large sum of money. The
money was to be delivered personally to a location on the docks
where it would be exchanged for the negatives and the remaining
copies.

The location was chosen carefully. The docks
were fronted with little shops and pubs. It was a very trendy
neighborhood with a church at each end of the boardwalk.

There had never been any intention, on
Randy’s part, of paying for the pictures. He did not work that way
and never had. The man who showed up with the briefcase had been
made up to look like Randy Arganmajc but was not. The two men who
followed him were dressed as though they wanted to look like Mafia
hit men. They even wore hats and trench coats.

There had never been any intention on
Terry’s part of trading pictures for money. He knew it was not
going to happen. When the man dressed as Randy Arganmajc reached
the wrought iron bench painted so gaily red, the telephone in the
booth next to him rang. He was clearly unsure about picking it up,
the reason for which was obvious once he did finally talk into the
receiver. He did not sound like Randy Arganmajc in the least.

The clearly American voice on the other end
of the line told him to set the case on the bench and open it. The
case was supposed to be full of money but Gordon would have been
shocked if it had been. The man’s refusal to open the case proved
it was empty or perhaps filled with explosives.

It was not a long shot from the church
steeple to the two men conspicuously smoking on the boardwalk, but
it did require finesse. Terry had decided that leaving one of the
three men alive was an acceptable plan. The two Hollywood rejects
were in his sights and they went down, one after another. The .223
slugs were chosen carefully for the job since they would not have
enough velocity to exit. It was not a guaranteed kill shot but that
didn’t matter.

The man at the telephone was looking in the
wrong direction. He did not see his two bodyguards drop to the
deck. His wakeup call was when a slug slammed into his leg. He
howled in pain. The other two had not even had that option; they
had gotten a clean head shot each and were dead on arrival. The
crowd milled around the victims, they were concerned and wanted to
help. Everybody wanted to get a look at what had happened. Nobody
saw the men leave the churches at each end of the boardwalk.

Of course the newspapers were all over the
story. “Sniper On The Loose” capped the stories of the day. There
were plenty of witnesses to interview and the police could not put
a lid on this one.

The Troy brothers were furious, but not as
angry as their main man, Randy. They had been hit so many times in
the past year that it was having a real effect on business. Abel
Troy suggested to his brother that they needed to replace Randy,
but Adam vetoed the suggestion. He was convinced, as was Randy,
that the recent incident was some punk emboldened by the success of
the Irishman. The survivor was certain that the man on the
telephone had an American accent and the MO was different. The
weapon was different and the target was different. The Irishman had
been eliminated and now they faced a new problem.

The Irishman had never attempted to extort
money from the mob, which was what made him so dangerous. He had
not wanted anything but destruction. This new threat wanted to make
himself rich, and that would be his undoing.

Randy had not explained to his superiors
what the photographs were, simply that they were compromising. When
the copies of the photos reached their desks, it gave them pause.
They did not want to be associated with the scandal that surrounded
the Bacchanalia Club, that was a given, but more than that they
began to question the character of Randy Arganmajc. Of course,
Randy insisted that the photographs were faked, as they were in
fact, but that did not clear his reputation.

Those at the top of a corporation seldom
know what is happening on the floor. They hire others to manage
that section of the business. The top managers never hear about the
little things; they hear about the disasters. A good top manager
will be in touch with key elements at the lower level of the
pyramid, in the trenches so to speak, but this sort of relationship
needs time to grow. The lower-level employees need to know they can
trust their well-heeled colleagues. If this level of trust has not
been gained, the manager will only get what the middle managers
want him to get. Very often they get, “everything is fine. We will
take care of it. Do not worry about us.” And the numbers from the
accountants punctuate the statements.

The Troy Brothers had not been in the
trenches for a long time and they did not want to be. Their
legitimate businesses were overshadowing their seedy pasts and they
liked it that way. When they got the photographs of Randy Arganmajc
entering the Bacchanalia Club, it proved more than his lack of
character; it showed that the photographer had some knowledge of
the connection between the men. That could be more dangerous in the
long run than whatever sordid perversions Randy engaged in.

The next letter Randy received at the
Riggers Club was less cordial.

Mr. Arganmajc,

You have double-crossed me and your men have
paid the price. You must have thought I was a joker or someone to
dismiss out of hand. I assure you I am neither. The cost for the
photographs has doubled and there will be no further contacts
between us until this money has been paid. I assure you that if
there is a replay of our previous encounter the next to die will
certainly be you.

Take an aluminum briefcase with the money
inside and meet me at the clubhouse of the Bardwell Park Golf
Course on Saturday at noon. If I smell a rat, I will deliver the
photos to the newspapers.

Find enclosed a new photograph.

The letter was not signed. The new
photograph was of one of Randy’s kept women walking from her car to
her door.

Randy Arganmajc knew the game way too well
to think one payment would fix the problem. Extortionists never
stopped until they were stopped by any number of methods. Randy had
not dealt with an extortionist in many years. The last man who had
tried to extort money out of him ended up stuffed into a sewer
pipe. Randy had not paid him money, nor would he pay this man
money.

The parking lot of the Bardwell Park Country
Club was out of sight of the clubhouse, out of sight of the road
and surrounded by trees. The guard shack was by the road. The
mobster made note of the fact that the man he was here to see knew
he was a member. He exited his car and took the briefcase to the
clubhouse with him. He felt much less exposed once inside.