A Necessary Evil(45)

“I said it’s your turn.” Franklin held a gun flush against his skull. “Speak up now or I will kill you slowly and painfully. This jury is your only hope.”

Collin nodded. He felt the sudden urge to wet himself. “All right. All right.”

Bruno walked over, pulled out a knife, and cut the ropes which bound Collin’s feet to the chair. Collin held out his hands, expecting the baldheaded thug to cut his hands free too. But he just shook his head and smiled, revealing tiny Chiclet teeth. Collin lowered his bound hands and bowed his head. He drew in a deep breath, let it out, and began.

“I was born in 1978.”





Chapter 23




Kurt



He dragged himself into the station around eight thirty. After a fitful night of sporadic sleep—his FitBit registered only three hours of REM sleep—he was in serious need of a caffeine infusion. He trudged over to the coffee machine and poured the thick, black roast into a too-small Styrofoam cup. Normally, he added a little cream and sugar, but today, he wanted the full caffeine effect, so he drank it black.

“Hey, Whiskey,” Lonnie shouted over his shoulder. He was sitting with his feet kicked up on his desk, scrolling through his Facebook feed, as usual. “Late night? You look like shit on a stick.”

“Shut up.” Kurt tossed his keys onto his metal desk, and they landed with a loud clank. He gingerly lowered himself into his chair. His back was acting up again. Too much stress.

Lonnie pulled his feet down and scooted his chair closer to Kurt’s desk. “No, seriously, man. No joke. You look awful. I’m really worried about you. You okay?”

Much as Kurt hated to talk about serious matters with Lonnie, he really had no one else to unload on, so he figured—what the hell? “Yeah, I look like crap because I feel like crap. This damn thing says I only got about three hours of sleep. My back is killing me. And I still have no idea where Frankie Cartwright is hiding Collin McAllister.”

“Sorry, man. Here.” Lonnie reached into his pocket, pulled out an orange plastic prescription bottle with a white label, and emptied a round, blue pill into his palm. He held it out toward Kurt. “It’s a Percocet 30. It’ll help with your back pain.”

Kurt considered the pill briefly. He’d been offered narcotic pain medicine by his doctor following his surgery, but he’d declined, afraid of becoming addicted like so many of the criminals he encountered in his day to day job. But now, less than a year shy of retirement and in an enormous amount of pain, he asked himself, what was the worst that could happen?

Kurt held out his palm, accepted the tiny pill, threw his head back, dropped it in his mouth, and washed it down with a big swig of super strong coffee.

There. That ought to set me right.

“Now, as for how to find Franklin Cartwright before he kills that psycho McAllister, I’ve been thinking. Do we really, really want to stop him?”

Kurt shot Lonnie a steely glance and tilted his head.

“Now, hear me out before you preach at me about right from wrong.”

“Fine, I’ll listen. Give me your best argument.”

“Okay, see, the way I figure it, Cartwright is doing us all a huge favor. This McAllister sicko is the worst of them all. Not only did he kidnap and hold that girl, Mollie, hostage, but he murdered six girls over the past two years. We saw the proof in that weird scrapbook of his.”

“Yeah, but that still doesn’t mean—”

“You said you’d hear me out, man.” Lonnie gave Kurt a serious look.

Kurt gestured for him to carry on.

“Anyway, like I was saying, if we find him and arrest him, he’ll probably lawyer up before we can get a statement out of him. If he’s got family money—and based on that farm, I’d say that’s a pretty distinct possibility—he’ll hire some bigshot, slimy attorney to represent him. You know the kind. We see them in here all the time shutting down interviews. So, he’ll hire one of those slick bastards, and if he’s good enough, he may just be able to get him off completely. Even if he gets time, you know it won’t be enough. And he’ll serve his sentence at some cushy, minimum security facility…what do you call them?”

“Prison camps,” Kurt answered.

“Yep. That’s it. A damn prison camp. Had one perp get sent up for murder early in my career. You know where they sent him? One of those so-called camps in Florida. And this dude shot his wife in the back when he found out she was screwing around on him. Cold-blooded murder, and he gets to sit around, watching cable television, sleeping in a ‘dormitory,’ and playing pool all day long, with an ocean view. It’s just stupid. I’d hate to see that happen with this guy.”

“That still doesn’t mean we can let Frankie do whatever he wants to him. We are police, Lonnie. We can’t turn our backs on murder. Besides, weren’t you the one giving me hell a couple days ago about going soft on Frankie?”

“Yeah, but that was before. Now, I can see why someone like our old friend might have the right idea.”

“We can’t let people turn into vigilantes. No matter how much the so-called victim may deserve it. I can’t believe you’re seriously saying this.”

Lonnie shrugged. “I’m just saying. If the old dude—no offense…”