Return of Jack Collier (Chapter Twenty-Four)

The Return of Jack Collier

A Jack Collier Story

By Brett N. Lashuay

 

 

Last week’s entry can be found here.
 

Chapter Twenty-Four: Just Looking After You

 

Alice Liddell’s Journal

 

 

            I was called into Jim’s office today to talk about my relationship with Jack. That was not a fun time. I didn’t know why he had called me, but when I saw Paul Krendler sitting in the other chair I knew it was going to be trouble. I felt my guts twist up and all the blood in my body just went straight to my cheeks.

 

            “You wanted to see me?” I asked.

 

            “Yes Alice, come on in,” Jim said, trying to smile a little. “Have a seat.”

 

            I sat down in the only free chair in front of Jim’s desk, glancing at Krendler and watching his eyes as I did. He didn’t really watch me though, he looked sort of embarrassed. I looked at Jim again and he tried to smile again.

 

            “Relax Alice,” he said, trying to be reassuring. “You’re not in any trouble. It’s just we’ve got to talk to you about something.”

 

            “What is it?” I asked. These two men looked so worried and embarrassed I wondered what could be going on if I wasn’t in trouble.

 

            “You’ve been going to Michigan quite a bit in the last few months,” Krendler told me. “Six times in the last four months.”

 

            “Using my own funds,” I said. “On my own time. Weekends and a holiday break.”

 

            “That’s not the problem,” Jim interjected.

 

            “You’ve been seeing quite a bit of a certain private detective,” Krendler announced, looking more uncomfortable. I know heterosexuality makes him queasy, but he should be able to deal with it better.

 

            “Is there a problem with that?” I asked. “How do you even know? Have you been following me?”

 

            “Of course not,” Jim said, smiling his big wide aw shucks smile at me. “We have been keeping tabs on Mister Collier though.”

 

            “Why are you keeping tabs on Jack?” I asked, “He’s not an interesting person to the bureau, is he?”

 

            “Not as such,” Krendler said rubbing his knuckles together, “but we have kept tabs on him since that seven with one blow incident.”

 

            “Why?” I asked. “Or am I not supposed to know about that?”

 

            “We’ve just made sure that we know about him,” Krendler said. “He made some powerful enemies and we would like to know if anything develops around him. We have the police looking out for him, particularly since he got out of the hospital.”

 

            “Since the man who shot him was released, he might be in some danger,” Jim smiled. “Unless you think that it was that little girl who shot him.”

 

            “So why does that lead to you asking me to come in here and talk about my relationship?”

 

            “Alice,” Jim tried to sound paternal, which always comes off as patronizing. “We’re just a little worried about something. We want you to be aware of a few things.”

            “What?” I asked. “What about my relationship with Jack Collier interests you?”

 

            “Are you aware that Collier has other women of significance in his life?” Jim asked.

 

            “Other women?” I asked.

 

            “His secretary spends at least three nights a week at his home,” Krendler said.

 

            “Debbie nursed him back to health,” I said, feeling that pit in my stomach reach its way into my intestines.

 

            “Then there is another woman, a psychologist who deals with troubled teens I believe.”

 

            “Karen is an old friend of his,” I said, and I must have been nervous because I started adding unneeded details. “She understands him. They discuss some of his issues. I suppose if you’ve built up a jacket on him you know he’s got some depression issues.”

 

            “Oh Alice,” Jim sighed and I could see him sort of deflate as he did so. “Come on now.”

 

            “Okay,” I nodded. “Suppose I say I know, then what?”

 

            “You know?” Krendler asked.

 

            “What if I do Mister Krendler?” I asked him, looking directly into his eyes. “What then? What do you want to do about it then?”

 

            “Well that would make photos useless,” he smiled, but it looked fake and worried.

 

            “Are you watching him that closely?” I felt the worry growing again, they say they don’t do that sort of thing anymore but one never knows. “Have you been spying on him?”

 

            “No, no,” Jim smiled and laughed and was trying his damnest to give me the country boy charm that made him really a very likeable boss. “Just one or two shots of who was coming and going. All legal to check up things.”

 

            “What is going on Jim?” I asked. “Why are you looking into Jack Collier? Further more, why are you telling me about it? And why is Mister Krendler here for you to tell me my sort of boyfriend might be cheating on me?”

 

            “Mister Collier has a somewhat erratic history,” Krendler said. “He has annoyed some people that don’t take kindly to being annoyed. We can’t prove it, but we’re fairly certain that he was in Texas the day Cole King killed himself. Just the suspicion of that should have Red King hunting him down with a platoon of gunmen. He turned up in Chicago with Cole’s cousin who was suspected of being with Cole before his death. He then managed to out tough one of Red King’s scarier lawyers and the girl is still with Collier’s people in Chicago. In surveillance of Pete Piper, Collier turned up yesterday and we think accepted a commission to recover Piper’s daughter, who was kidnapped three days ago.”

 

            “And what does all this have to do with you telling me?” I asked.

 

            “Alice,” Jim abandoned all pretense and let his voice take on seriousness. “I need to know that you know about these developments in Collier’s life. If you’re feeling betrayed by him.”

 

            “I don’t think it’s anyone’s damn business for me to look into my private life but me,” I snapped at him.

 

            “I know you’ve always kept your private life private.” Jim said. “I’m trying to look out for you.”

 

            “That’s very noble Jim,” I said. “But I don’t need looking after, I’m a big girl.”

 

            “I know,” he said. “But you’re also one of the better agents in my office. I just want to make sure that no ones going to hurt you.”

 

            “No one’s hurting me sir,” I told him.

 

            “Maybe we should have a few moments Paul,” Jim told Krendler.

 

            “I understand,” Krendler stood and left the room, and it wasn’t until the door closed behind him that I allowed the tears to burst forth.

 

            “What the hell Jim?” I asked as the damn started to burst.

 

            “Krendler brought it to me and I didn’t know quite what to do with it,” he said. “I’m sorry. I should have thought of a better way to tell you.”

 

            “What business is it of anyone?” I demanded. “I’ve never used bureau funds, I don’t even flash my I.D. to get through the lines at the airport faster.”

 

            “Alice,” He waved a reassuring hand in my direction,  “it’s not that at all. I just wanted to make sure that he wasn’t hurting you.”

 

            “Well, what if I know?” I demanded again as I snatched at the tissues on his desk. “Huh? If you know about Karen you know how she lives. You know she’s got two children by the guy she lives with who is married to another woman and they all live together and as I understand it all sleep in one king sized bed together. I mean what do you think is going on there?”

 

            “I didn’t know about that,” he said, his face reddening deeply. “I only knew she was a shrink who helps teens.”

 

            “Sexually confused teens,” I told him wiping at my nose. “She helps kids who don’t know if they’re gay, or straight or bi or what decide what they want to be.”

 

            “Oh,” he said. “And you know about them spending the night?”

 

            “Yes,” I nodded. “You guys didn’t notice that while I was spending my holiday vacation Debbie spent half the nights at Jack’s place while I was staying there?”

 

            “Didn’t watch him that week,” he said sort of sheepishly. “We’ve only been watching sporadically. It’s just he’s been doing things this week so we know about him.”

 

            “I’ve just outted myself, haven’t I?” I asked, thinking that years of being very careful just went down the tubes in ten seconds.

 

            “It’s not like I have this room wired for sound,” he said. “No one knows you’ve said anything but me.”

 

            “I know that I’m not the only woman in his life,” I told him, forming my words carefully. “It’s not a problem and I doubt it will lead to problems in the future.”

 

            “Do you want to talk about it?”

 

            “No,” I shook my head. “I want my private life to remain just that. Private.”

 

            “They didn’t mean to pry,” he apologized. “They were supposed to keep an eye out for anyone hassling Collier, and happened to notice by mistake more than anything.”

 

            “I understand,” I told him. “It happens sometimes. If we could though, I’d rather this remained a private matter. I promise I won’t let it interfere with my work.”

 

            “I’m not sure how possible that’s going to be,” he said. “The other thing that I wanted to talk to you about was this new Piper kidnapping and who we suspect to be behind it.”

 

            “And the fact that you think Jack is involved there,” I said.

 

            “I’m not sure,” he said. “Collier sent a bunch of his people to Banbury Cross again, I guess they think she’s being held down there, but that’s not our information. However, as long as you’ve worked on Red King I don’t want you off this case because of a personal issue.”

 

            “We can keep it quiet,” I said. “Just between us.”

 

            “Not forever,” he said.

 

            “But for long enough, surely.”

 

            “I suppose so,” he said looking at the files in front of him.

 

            “Thanks Jim.”

 

            “If you want to talk about it sometime, I am here.”

 

            “I know,” I said. “I’ve gotten as far as I have by keeping myself to myself.”

 

            “Makes people think you’re cold,” he repeated the line he’d said to me a thousand time. “Wouldn’t hurt to warm up once in a while.”

 

            “I keep my warmth for home,” I told him, because he’d be disappointed if I didn’t by this point. “But I appreciate that you cared.”

 

           

 

The Return of Jack Collier (Chapter One)

The Return of Jack Collier

A Jack Collier Story

By Brett N. Lashuay

 

 

A quick catch up: Jack Collier is still in a coma, after being shot by Jill Piper at the end of Jack and Jill. While we were waiting to see what would become of him, his secretary Debbie told us a surprising story which changed how we’d look at him and his past. We begin with Jack’s fate still very much in question as we begin…

Chapter One: Coming Up For Air

Debbie's Story, Part One

 Debbie’s Story

A Jack Collier Story

By Brett N. Lashuay

 

 

Part One

November 8^th

These are Days

Jack & Jill (Part One)

Jack & Jill (A Love Story)

A Jack Collier Story

By Brett N. Lashuay

 

If you want to see the past, you can read In The Cabinet Here

 

 

 

Part One: Meet Jill

 

            My shrink smokes. He doesn’t do it in the office, you can’t smoke in offices. My dad tells me that you used to, but that it more or less became verboten right before I was born. That was his word, verboten. I wouldn’t use a word like that, I have standards.

 

            I can smell it on him though, while it pervades every sense of his being, until all I can think of when I think of him is the smell of tobacco, it’s oddly not that bad with him. It’s a strangely comforting smell, the smell of a man who you know had to go out into the parking lot and smoke a cigarette in his mercades before he could see you. It’s nice to know that he’s got flaws to, I think that prevents me from thinking he’s judging me.

 

            “Well.” He said, smiling his yellowed tooth smile at me. “How would you like to start?”

 

            “I don’t know.” I shook my head, my hair falling into my face again.

 

            “Would you like to talk about the kidnapping? The detective?”

 

            “Jack.” I said, hating to hear him called by a title. “His name is Jack. I don’t like anyone thinking of him as the detective. It makes him sound slimy.”

 

            What I wanted to say it that it makes him sound like he was some kind of low thug, a piece of muscle that was just doing it for the money. I wanted to tell him that he was like a knight, but not some white shinning armor type like Galahad or Lancelot. He was like a real knight, with blood on his tunic and dents in his armor. You would never see him wearing velvet robes or marching with the Order of the Garter, because he would be too busy fighting evil and saving maidens. He’s like one of the real knights of old, someone Geoffrey of Monmouth would write about.

 

            You can’t say things like that though, because it sounds stupid. That’s what he said anyway. Jack told me that it’s one thing to write poetry, because sometimes you need to get things out, but showing it off and reading it just sounds dumb. I was sort of offended by that, but then he also told me that it lets people know where they can get at you because poetry is all feeling. That’s one of the things that made me fall in love with him, that he understands poetry, but that he thinks it makes you too vulnerable to attack to share. Something in life hurt him, something made him paranoid and I wish I knew what it was.

 

            “Okay.” The shrink said, bringing me back to my narrative. “Jack then. Do you want to talk about him?”

 

            “Not right now.” I said, shaking my head and then pushing the bangs out of my face again because every time I shake they fall down. It’s annoying, but I don’t like how my bangs look trimmed.

 

            I have to keep coming to my shrink, and I have to talk about the events I’m going to tell you about. Dad said that I don’t have to keep coming here, now that everything is taken care of, but I think it might help. I need help processing how I feel, and I need to deal with it. Jack would say I need to deal with it, so that I can leave it behind and never touch it again.

 

            See, I was kidnapped and raped. I went through what I’ve been told is Stockholm’s Syndrome and fell in love with the man that had kidnapped and raped me. Then I was rescued by the finest example of humanity I’ve ever met, an then he was shot and he’s probably going to die in that hospital bed he’s hooked up to now.

 

            “Would you like to talk about something unconnected to that for a moment?” He asked.

 

            “I just don’t want to talk about Jack right now.” I told him.

 

            Since he’s famous and I know you’re wondering, Jack Collier didn’t kidnap me, he didn’t hurt me, he saved me. I fell in love with Jack too, but it’s a pure love. It’s not some farcical sort of fluids pumping through parts of my body, or passionate embraces in the back seat of his car, it’s better than that. It’s the sort of love that in better days would lead to a girl stitching banners for her love. I would weave him banners if I knew how to sew, but I think he needs something else right now. What he needs is to get better, but I don’t know how to make him better.

 

            If this were a tale of old chivalry, my tears on his wounds would be enough, or a kiss from my lips upon his own full mouth. He wouldn’t allow that though, he would never allow it. He’s too good, too noble, too pure for this very ugly and sullied world and too pure for me. So I keep coming here, to try and work out how I can help him by helping myself. I can either try to re-purify myself for him, or I can help bury him if he doesn’t make it.

 

            That’s part of why I have to write this, so that people will understand what happened to him if he doesn’t make it out of this alive. People have to know why things have transpired to reach these ends, or they won’t understand why I love him.

 

            “Should we talk about Mister King then?” He asked, but I was staring off into the distance foe a moment. “Jill?”

 

            “Yes.” I nodded. “We can talk about Cole for a bit.”

 

            “How did you meet him then?”

 

            “Daddy.” I told him, which is true but perhaps you don’t know how true really.

 

            That, I suppose, is why we’re here, aren’t we? You want to know about Cole King and how he ended up where he did. My creative writing teacher in high school would call this an interesting introduction, saying that it sets up a hint at the conclusion that makes the reader want to know more. He was always saying things like that though, so I’m not sure how much we should take stock in his pronouncements. Still, it’s important to start somewhere and I wouldn’t want you reading this story thinking that I don’t end up okay by the end. I would hate to have you thinking that I don’t get out, because I do and it’s the most wonderful man in the world who saves me.

 

            “You’re father worked with Mister King, is that right?”

 

            “They sort of worked together.” I told him, leaning my head back against the cushion. “Daddy was using Cole to help with the other side of his business. You know what I mean?”

 

            “You mean with the things that your father was accused of?” He asked, trying to be so polite about it.

 

            “Yes.” I tried not to roll my eyes. “Cole was bringing the workers for him. Daddy hired Cole to help with getting those Mexicans to the farms. We didn’t know how Cole was getting them.”

 

            “When did you first meet him?” He asked, leaning back, hoping I would start to tell a story.

 

            So why shouldn’t I tell a story?  That’s why we’re all here, isn’t it? So I can tell the story? I need to tell you this, because if Jack doesn’t pull through, then he can’t tell you himself. So I’ll start with Cole, I’ll start with how I met Cole and how daddy brought him into our house.

 

            Cole King was a big fat Texan, only he wasn’t really from Texas at all. Someone told me that he really came from Minnesota or someplace like that. He was the sort of guy who moves to Texas and then buys a big hat and cowboy boots and wears a six shooter in a holster on his hip. He even spoke in a fake hick accent, but that didn’t bother me so much at first because he mostly talked to daddy when he was brought to the house.

 

            I thought at first he liked to see daddy at the house because we live on this big estate of land. We’ve got deer out there, foxes and skunks and lots of rabbits and things. Cole and Daddy went hunting and shooting out there all the time. I suppose some day I’ll figure out why men like to shoot guns, but it’s a mystery to me as things currently stand.

 

            Daddy liked to have Cole around because he was a big fat jolly sort of guy. You know, he was always laughing and joking and being really witty only not. How can anyone deal with a man who thinks that the best joke in the world is to have someone pull their finger while they fart? If you want to expand you repertoire of dirty jokes, you just have to stand around Cole for a while. The problem is they weren’t even funny. They were just like an excuse to say bad words. It was kind of sad really, that this guy who was only a few years younger than my father liked telling these stupid jokes and my father always laughed as if he’d never heard them before in his life despite the fact that he only has about six of them. I’ve heard the one about the nymphomaniac hermaphrodite so many times I could tell it in me sleep. However, I have standards that rise above jokes that have a punch line like “So the doctor said ‘I guess you’d better go fuck yourself’” thank you very much.

 

            Daddy never thought Cole even looked in my direction, but I could always feel him watching whenever he was around. I always felt like changing my clothes if he was around, no matter what I was wearing I wanted to put on a burkha if he was coming over. It always made me feel kind of sick, that he was looking at me like that. And when he’d compliment me, and tell me how pretty he thought I looked, it just made me want to go hide in the woods. I don’t know how Daddy missed it, but Mom didn’t. Mom didn’t like him, and Mom thought that Daddy should just get rid of him.

 

            The problem was Mom was in Paris when Cole came over that day on his own. I should have run, I should have hid in the woods, but I didn’t. I just stood there and let him grab me, I didn’t even really struggle when he tied me up and put my in his car. I was too scared to struggle, I was terrified in fact. It doesn’t make sense to say that I thought he would kill me, because I should have run if I thought that. I guess I thought he would hurt me really bad before he killed me if I tried to run.

 

            He threw me into the back of his Hummer, and then went back into the house. I waited, just trembling in the back seat, wondering what he was doing. When he came out, he had something in his hands that he threw over my head into the back of the truck. Then he put a pillow case over my head and tied it around my neck so I couldn’t peak at anything. Then he got into the front and started driving.

 

            He never said a word to me, not for the entire trip. He just grabbed me, wrapped me up and took off. It’s probably taken me longer to tell you about it than it took for him to do it.     

 

 

In the Cabinet

In The Cabinet

A Jack Collier Short
By Brett N. Lashuay

 

The previous story, Liberty’s Child, can be found here.

 

Day One: The Check

 

            Officially, I suppose this story really starts in the beginning of August. It was in the heat of August that the first woman of the night was found in the Rouge River. Of course no one ever calls them that anymore. Woman of the night is an outdated euphemism that really isn’t needed in these enlightened days. These days we have different terms, but as most of them prove that I was lying about these days being enlightened please leave me with my earlier used phrase.

 

            When I first read the story, that a dead woman had been found in the Rouge, I had to question whether she was dead when she went in or if the pollution had killed her.  Jokes like that aren’t really funny, but this one got a lot less funny when the details about her death came out. The woman had been badly mutilated, and the story was she had been carved up with all sorts of geometric patterns and things like that. She had also been infected with bubonic plague before she died. Someone had deliberately infected her with the Black Death and then cut her up into little pieces.

 

            I have to say that I didn’t really pay much attention at the time, because I was busy with my own things. The events of July had left me wondering what I really wanted to do with my life and if I wanted to do it in Troy or even Michigan. After the way things had been going I was losing my enthusiasm for living in the state where I was raised. There are only so many of your old friends you can see leave the state or die before it starts sounding like your only choice.

 

            The main problem with that of course is where would I go and what would I do?

 

            I would have to work, but setting up somewhere else would require a big risk since I was used to having people know me. Would I be able to set up somewhere else? Would I be able to get work if I couldn’t get my own office together again? Would I even want to go on being a detective? These were the problems I was presented with. I’ve never been very good at using my own initiative, I need a prod from someone, but there was no one to prod or encourage me.

 

            When the second body was found in late August, I was deeply into my funk. I didn’t think about the serial killer at the time because I was too into my own problems. I was walking through the office in a gray fog of my own making. I wasn’t living anymore. I was just wandering in a shadow existence, waiting for the light to return. I still didn’t bother much with the story when the third body was found either, but the fourth piqued my interest a little.

 

            The fourth body was a city councilman who had been killed in much the same way as the first three victims had been. The difference was that he had been found in his home, and that his family was in the house sleeping at the time. One of his children died of the plague two days later in a hospital. That had been something so unusual as to make even me poke my head up and take notice. When another city official was killed in their home, I was almost interested, for two whole days.

 

            I had other things to do though. This office of mine isn’t just someplace where I sit around waiting for someone connected to a show to call me asking for help. I’ve got as full a compliment of clients as any other private detective who doesn’t advertise and actively discourages people from going to them for advice. Still, sometimes someone manages to stumble on me by accident and I have to go to work. I was working on a burglary for most of August, and then in September I had three cases that hardly require mentioning here.

 

            The sixth victim turned up in early October, this time it was a kid who worked at a grocery store. He had been hung upside down from a sign in front of the store. His throat had been cut and he’d bled out, but the rest of the pattern was there. The police and Feds had sprung into action and had already arrested six people, some of whom were even in the same city as the kid when he got killed.

 

            On the same day that learned about this, I had a very interesting development in my life. I was sitting at my desk, trying not to scream about the pain in my leg and arm. I was unaware of the extra pains that cold would bring about in my leg, arm and side from being shot. During that first winter the wounds were still fresh so the effect of the weather was lost on me. When autumn came around with its cold winds and rain though, oh how I felt it then. I started taking a small bottle of ibuprofen with me when I left the office, just in case the pain came back.

 

            The problem is that the pains are rather regular, slow and throbbing things. Screaming about the pain, no matter how bad it might be, seems a little silly if it came on slowly through the day. A scream always struck me as something you do when the pain is sharp and sudden. When the pain comes on slowly, from across the room while explaining exactly what’s going to happen when it gets there, screaming seems a little silly. I could moan, or groan, or make whimpering noises, but I doubted that Debbie would give me any sympathy for being a whiner. So instead I kept most of it to myself and only mentioned it when it was really bad. This meant I talked about it only once every two hours or so, because otherwise it would have become a running commentary about how constant the pain had become.

 

            So I was sitting in my chair, hoping I wouldn’t have to do any work today when the phone rang in Debbie’s part of the office. A moment later the phone rang in my part of the office. I reached out with my left hand and scooped up the receiver.

 

            “Jack Collier,” I said into the phone.

 

            “Salutations!” the woman’s voice on the other end announced. She’s not insane, she just has a fancy way of saying hello. “How are you my dear boy?”

 

            “Hello Char.” I said back. “I’m doing alright I suppose. Where are you this time?”        

 

            “I’ve been working with a lad in Paris,” she said. “He has great potential.”

 

            “Well good,” I told her. “What can I do for you then?”

 

            “I wanted to ask about young Wilbur,” she said. “I heard he was killed and that you avenged his death.”

 

            “I wasn’t really avenging his death, so much as the young woman he was attached to,” I admitted.

 

            “But you did kill the woman who killed him?” she pressed.

 

            “Yes, I did,” I admitted again and then decided to needle her a little, “I thought you might have heard about it. It made all the local papers.”

 

            “News travels more slowly than you might suppose,” she said. “Even in this day and age.”

 

            “Don’t I know it?” I muttered.

 

            “He was a terrific boy,” she said. “At least he was terrific as far as I was concerned.”

 

            “Well, rest assured, I did kill her.”

 

            “Delightful,” Char said, and I could see her single nod of determination in my head. “How are you?”

 

            “I think they’re going to yank my license soon.” I told her with an odd sense of grim satisfaction. “I pissed them off in July, and I haven’t been doing anything to endear myself to them.”

 

            “Why would you do that my dear?” suddenly her tone changed entirely, reminding me that you never really stop being one of Char’s protégés. “You are very good at having people like you. It is the one skill that never seems to abandon you. I’ve only seen people extremely jealous of you dislike you.”

 

            “Maybe they’re all very jealous?”

 

            “Why have you been trying to annoy the sort of people who take licenses away my dear?”

 

            “I don’t think I want to do this sort of thing anymore,” I tried not to grumble or whimper. “It’s not been as much fun as I always thought it would be.”

 

            “And if you lost your license, and therefore your office, how would that help things?” her tone had become the same instructive tone she used that weekend she told me about how her younger cousin liked to be kissed on the cheek, near her ear.

 

            “I’m kind of getting to the place where I don’t really care anymore,” I managed by great strength to not actually whimper. “Every time I’ve tried to protect someone this last year, they’ve died. I’ve managed not to actually let the bad guys get away, but it’s never turned out right.”

 

            “What would you do for money?” she asked.

 

            “I could probably find something to do,” I sighed again, because I can. “I’m not sure I’m all that worried about it.”

 

            “I see,” she sounded serious now and I could just about see her reaching for those gold framed glasses that made it look like a phoenix had landed on her face. “Look, let me make a call or two.”

 

            “Char…” I started, but didn’t finish because I really didn’t want to tell her not to help me.

 

            “Tut-tut my dear,” she said. “Maybe I can arrange another line of employment for you or something.”

 

            It was two days, and another body later, when the man came. The Metro-Detroit area was in a tizzy by this point, with a full blown maniac serial killer on the loose. I still hadn’t entered that case, but I somehow knew that wouldn’t last. I would probably be asked to rescue a kidnapped daughter who would turn out to be the next victim that I would inadvertently shoot or something. I almost thought of just starting to look into it myself, just to put my thumb in Talbert’s eye and make him revoke me.

 

            I was sitting behind my desk, wondering if it would actually rain today or not. The wind was getting up and the clouds were threatening a good sized storm which might last out the rest of the day. The door opened and Debbie came through the doorway. She slinked across the floor like she expected it to leap up and devour her at any moment. I watched her with interest as she came towards me, because it’s hard to watch her with anything but. She was looking over her shoulder as the closed door behind her.

 

            “There is a Frenchman in the office,” she said hesitantly, as if she expected me to bite her. “He didn’t make an appointment but says he’d like a few minutes.”

 

            “Okay,” I nodded slowly. “Show him in.”

 

            He was impeccably dressed and looked like he had never once experienced wind or inadvertent weather. He had the kind of smugness that only a person who has never had any problems of his own can generate. There was not a single silver or black hair on his head that would have come close to being even slightly out of place. He held a small suitcase with him, which he set down next to the client chair before he sat down. When he sat he readjusted his suit so as to avoid any creasing. I couldn’t help but notice that his suit probably cost more than my car, which itself was a fully restored ’46 Hudson Super Six and worth a bit. Even if I threw in the cost of the Mini which had been completely trashed in July I was probably still not up to the cost of that suit.

 

            “Good afternoon Mister Collier,” he said, with a stronger accent than Liberty Freedom used when talking to me. “My name is Renault, as far as you need to be concerned.”

 

            “You took the name of a car company?” I smiled and laughed a little. “How very apt of you, visiting the Motor City and all.”

 

            “When I am in England, I am Mister Citroën,” he said with a smile and both of us had a little laugh over that.

 

            “Okay,” I composed myself. “What can I do for you Mister Renault?”

 

            “I am not a representative of the French Government,” he said grabbing at his case with a motion so fluid and perfect I decided never to piss him off. “I wish to make that clear.”

 

            “Okay,” I nodded.

 

            “The French Government does not do this sort of thing. They do not put prices on people’s head,” he opened the bag and reached for something in it.

 

            “Okay,” I said and my guts tensed up for the gun he would be pulling out in a moment.

 

            “I just want to make sure that is understood before I give you this.” He held an envelope out of me. I didn’t actually see him pull it out, his movements were that smooth. One moment his hand was in the case, the next it was before me with a while envelope in it.

 

            I took the envelope and opened it. There was a check for two million seven hundred thousand Euros in it. In the note section for the check was something of a chilling note, “Seven with One Blow.” A cold spike ran through my already hot and tensed bowels, but that just confused everything. I’m fairly lucky I didn’t shit my pants or something.

 

            “What the hell?’ I asked.

 

            “There is a note,” he said pointing at the envelope, and indeed there was a note.

 

            “The note is written in French though,” I said looking at it. “Maybe you could explain quickly.”

 

            “Andrew Robert Kilian, also known at Chester A. Cat was something of a problem. As was Sarah Waters, who was known as Amy Cooke and Amy Heart. Heart was wanted dead by someone who isn’t the French Government and they were ready to pay one million Euros for her death. You may notice there are values next to each name. When you add up all the values, you get the amount on that check.”

 

            “So for defending myself, I get two point seven million bucks?”

 

            “I think you’ll find under current exchange rates it’s three and a half million dollars.”

 

            “Did she put you up to this?” I asked pointing at the check. “I mean this note here?”

 

            “Mrs. Freedom did mention that the phrase had some meaning,” he said running his index finger along his chin.

 

            “Liberty?” I asked.

 

            “Yes,” he nodded and stood.

 

            “But Liberty didn’t tell you about this, or you would have been here months ago,” I said tapping the envelope on the desk. “Charlotte Arachnial put you up to this. Liberty just confirmed it.”

 

            “Yes. It was Mrs. Arachnial that alerted us to the fact that a significant number of our troubles were taken away in a single day,” he said adjusting his suit jacket, a suit like that needs a lot of maintenance. “The French Government would thank you if they had anything to do with this whatever. The fact that LION and UNICORN both seem to have been dealt quite a serious blow was helpful as well.”

 

            “Well, it was Church who drummed them both out of town. You’ll have to thank him for that,” I smiled at him and put my hand over the check so he couldn’t get at it too easily. “He didn’t like them fighting over his crown.”

 

            “I think not,” he smiled. “A criminal of his kind would be too much, even for me to deal with.”

 

            “I understand,” I said.

 

            “I suspect you do. Good day Mister Collier,” he said and walked out of my office and out of my story.

 

            I looked at the check and the letter, which said that I’d earned the money by trying to save a young woman I totally failed to save anyway. The money could be used to get me away from this situation though. Char had clearly made some important phone calls, but when you are Char, you can make phone calls like that. With good investment, a simple ten percent annual income would be more than enough to live off of. I could walk away completely and just let my millions grow up around me. There would be enough to pension Debbie off too if I wanted to. I could just move away somewhere and never let anyone come near me again.

 

            And then what? Having that kind of money would be pretty sour, since I would remember that I had it because of a total and complete failure on my part. I tapped the check on my desk, making sure the desk remained supplicant and thought about what to do with it. I could just burn it, or possibly give it to some children’s charity or something. Char wouldn’t like that though and I had to think of her. Not that I didn’t come by the money honestly, Char would never make people give me anything I didn’t actually earn. If someone representing someone who was Not the French Government wanted to give me money for killing Amy and her crew then Not the French Government must have really had prices on their heads and just hadn’t noticed that they were out of circulation until Char told them. Either that or they thought the situation was such that they didn’t actually need to pay until Char informed them that it was one of her former pets that had done it.

 

            I sat scowling at the check for what seemed like a days, but was probably only a couple of hours, when I heard the phone ring in the outer office. There was silence for a while, then eventually the door that separated my office from Debbie opened and Debbie stepped through. She looked good, but she always looked good.

 

            I must say that although she and I had never been romantically connected, I loved her. She looked like she had just walked out of a movie from the late forties, and if I had lost every friend I ever had I would still have her. I barely noticed her this time though, because I was scowling at my fortune.

 

            “Rebecca Hain would like to see you tomorrow,” she said, and stopped when she looked at my face. “You okay?”

 

            “Huh?” I asked looking up.

 

            “You just look like you were told we’ve been fired and we’ve got twenty minutes to get to Mexico.”

 

            “That,” I told her tossing the check across the desk, “\would be good news by comparison.”

 

            She picked up the check and then looked over it at me with eyes the size of saucers. I thought she was going to come around the desk and smack me, but instead she looked back down at the check. Her pink tongue darted out from between her red lips and moistened the bottom one, which is a distracting thing to have happen in front of you.

           

            “You and I must have a long discussion about our varying definitions of good and bad news sometime,” she announced.

           

            “You mark my words,” I informed her, “that check will prove to be nothing but a distraction.”

 

This is part one of thirteen, come back next week for part two and every Thursday until we're done to see what happens next. If you get lost, one of the tags here should help you. The Cabinet tag will take you to the story while the Jack Tag will take you to Part One of every story we post here.

Jack Collier Omnibus (Part Two)

This is the second story, which came after Hard Boiled Christmas.

Wonderland
Part One: Mister Rabbit
Part Two: A Simple Job Goes Wrong
Part Three: A Trip to Wonderland
Part Four: The Surprise Egg
Part Five: Awaken Dream Child
Part Six: Aiding and Abetting
Part Seven: The Hotel
Part Eight: Alice in Wonderment
Part Nine: Putting Together Pieces
Part Ten: Trail’s End
Part Eleven: Time Gentlemen
Part Twelve: Settling up

Jack Collier Omnibus (Part One)

I've done this post for LiveJournal and Wordress versions, but I haven't done one for Blogger. The reason is that doing these is the quite nearly the dictionary definition of tedious. That's why I'm doing them in stages.

So here is the collection of the first story...
Hard Boiled Christmas
Day 1: Christmas Again
Day 2: The Fat Man
Day 3: History
Day 4: Lunch at the Mall
Day 5: The Car and The Agents
Day 6: Solstice Yule
Day 7: Lunch
Day 8: Mithras
Day 9: Church
Day 10: Cliffhanging
Day 11: Mr. Frost
Day 12: The Man in the Brown Corduroy Suit
Day 13: Talk of Rings
Day 14: Old Joe’s Pawn Shop
Day 15: Church in the Office
Day 16: Where Do We Go Now?
Day 17: Dinner and a Show
Day 18: Standing in the Snow
Day 19: Where Have You Been?
Day 20: Sandy Cloose
Day 21: The Same Gun
Day 22: Mr. Smith Goes to Hell
Day 23: The Two of Us, Alone
Day 24: The Exciting Climax
Day 25: The Last Day

Liberty's Child (Day One)

Liberty’s Child

A Jack Collier Mystery

By Brett N. Lashuay

 

Look here to read Wonderland

 

Day One: June 20^th

 

            I must say, I wasn’t happy to be in Marrakech. I’m not fond of North Africa as a general rule actually. It’s hot, it’s dusty, and if Henry had been able to speak Hovitos I wouldn’t even need to be here. Tracking a man selling stolen treasures from South America in places like this isn’t exactly easy. I knew this was the only place he could sell it though, even though it took me a while to get here. Still, I was here and that was enough I suppose, but it didn’t help with my annoyance. I mean, I’d managed to bring my piece home, why couldn’t he? No, I’ve got to go traipsing across the world looking for his damn rival.

 

            The problem isn’t finding a shady bastard, the problem is finding the one who stole for profit the thing that you’d rightful swiped for a museum acquisition. If all I wanted to do was beat up thieves who were selling things they shouldn’t be selling, I could just start punching people in the street at random.  About the only thing you’d have to do is avoid the natives, they’re probably just people going about their business. Any visitor is probably a thief, a fence or a thug who works for one of the other two.

 

            This gave me some trouble for the first few days, but I spotted my target with a bit of luck and discovered where he was staying. All of which led me up to the spot I was in now, standing next to a door so that when he walked in I could nail him. The heat of the place was getting to me, but I had to wait until he returned from his showings for the day because this had to be done in private.

 

            The room in the old town was small, consisting of a small wooden table and chair and a single bed. The blinds on the window had been pulled, but the job had been incomplete and blades of light were falling on me as I leaned against the wall and waited for him to come back. An overhead fan spun listlessly over head, failing to cool the room by even a degree. If anything, the fan was helping heat the room by pushing the hot air down to where I was, making sure I didn’t have a moment to cool down.

 

            I’d been waiting here for nearly an hour when I finally heard a key hit the lock on the room’s single door. I tensed myself up, letting my muscles bunch and tighten. The door swung open and the Frenchman walked into the room. I put my right hand on the door and pushed it closed. His head turned to his right from the sound, which was a mistake because I was coming for his left. I punched him in the left kidney and as he started to shout I got around him and hit him with my right fist across his jaw. He dropped the bag he was carrying and fell to the ground. I gave him a quick kick in the stomach to keep him on the floor and then decided to give him another kick in the face, just so I could say that all four limbs were in on it.

 

            I reached down to the floor and grabbed the bag, taking it the two steps to the small table to check it. It had been wrapped up in a bath towel that had itself been stolen from a Holiday Inn. He’d covered the statute in black enamel paint, to hide the fact that he was carrying a golden idol. I reached into my front pants pocket and grabbed the balisong I’d bought. I couldn’t go around with a gun, because I didn’t need that kind of hassle here, but I needed a weapon. Fortunately there was a kid selling these cheap knives in the street for three dollars each. If I buried the knife in the sand for a thousand years it might become priceless, but I doubt it. The movement on it was actually pretty good as I did the trick of opening it one handed that Tracey had taught me so many years ago.

 

            My eyes flipped back to the French archeologist who was just starting to try and sit up. I turned the statue over, and found it was mostly hollow, which would explain why Henry was so bad as guessing its weight. The inside had even been covered with the black enamel, but it was a fairly simple job to scratch along an edge and show the gold underneath. I wrapped the statue back up, secure in the knowledge that I had the real thing and wouldn’t have to come back later. I turned to look at the man who was on the floor looking up at me, the blades of sunlight slashing bright strands across his face.

 

            “You don’t come looking for this again, do you?” I flipped the knife closed again.

 

            “No,” he said shaking his head.

 

            “Good,” I nodded and tossed the re-wrapped parcel into the bag. “Then I won’t have to cut you to ribbons.”

 

            I turned away from him, opened the door and walked out. I was ready for him to come down the stairs and cause trouble, but evidently he wasn’t. I got out into the street, still expecting him to do something, but I melted into the crowd without a single utterance. I wasn’t in the clear of course, because it was very likely that the people he was in talks with to sell the silly thing to would still want it, but I was nearly there.

 

            I felt like I was being watched the whole time, but I resisted the urge to glance around me every ten seconds or to sweat more profusely than I already was. The heat was bothering me, even though it would actually be worse at home because without the humidity you barely got a chance to notice the sweat before it was gone.

 

            It took me half an hour to get to the new city, another twenty minutes to get to the courier’s office. Sal never had a store front in any of the cities where he kept offices, which sometimes seemed like every city in the world that could cope with having air conditioning and modern offices. He always had a small office in some modern building that had sprung up in the last five years or so. I have no idea how many offices he has, beyond the ones I’ve been in, but there are a lot of things I don’t know about Sal. Still, the firm of Sal Melina, Private Shipments has never let me down yet. When it comes down to it, Sal could have his office in a horse stable, dress like the a clown or scream state names along with their capitals every two minutes and I’d still leave my packages with him. The simple fact was that if you left something with Sal, it got where it was going.

 

            Walking into the office building was heavenly, the initial blast of cold air was enough to raise goose bumps on my skin, but after that it was cool, clean air. Suddenly, I wasn’t in North Africa anymore, I was simply in the business world. There were men and women in suits, discussing business affairs, worrying about how much money they were making. I went to the building’s registration, found the floor and walked to the elevator.

 

            There was a good looking young woman sitting at the single desk, her dark hair twisted into an attractive braid, as it always had been. That was the nice thing about coming to Sal, everything about his office was reliable, right down to Anja. She stood and smiled at me as I came in and set the duffle bag down on her desk.

 

            “Hi Jack,” she said with a smile.

 

            “Hello Anja,” I said putting my hand on her left hip and sliding it round the small of her back to give her a hug.

 

            “Is it going to Troy?” she asked as we parted.

 

            “No,” I said shaking my head. “The University.”

 

            “Can’t Henry manage to get anything home on his own?” she asked.

 

            “I don’t think so,” I said, “Maybe he’ll start reclaiming things on his own. Also, if the French Secret Service comes around, which they won’t, we know nothing about this right?”

 

            “Of course not,” she smiled.

 

            I smiled back, and there was a lot that could have been said in those smiles. Of course if either of us was going to say those things, we would have said them by now. We would have said them in Paris or Bangladesh, or any of the other places where she’s been when I needed a courier. It might seem odd that the same woman, desk and chair is always here when I give Sal enough time, but then Sal is an odd guy. It suddenly occurred to me that he could be right there in the second office.

 

            “Is the boss here?” I asked Anja.

 

            “Do you need him?” she asked, skillfully not answering my question in any way.

 

            “No,” I shook my head, “Not really.”

 

            I reached into my pockets and my finger touched the closed knife. I took it out and held it out to Anja, who took it and looked at it. She raised her dark eyes up to me and raised her left eyebrow, which is a trick I just can’t do. She held it up to show it to me and then spoke the question in her eyes.

 

            “Should I send this with it?” she asked.

 

            “Sure,” I said nodding. “It’s going to be on his expenses anyway.”

 

            “Okay then,” she said and smiled. “See you next time Jack.”

 

            “See you next time,” I agreed as I walked through the office door and headed out into the North African heat.

 

            Another two days and I’d be in Casablanca, and from there I’d get a flight to Detroit Metro. Sunday night, I would be sleeping in my own bed and Monday morning I would walk into the office. I wondered if Debbie would be there, or if I should call ahead. Part of me was sure she was in the office waiting for me to arrive and part of me thought that she was just hanging out with friends or going to the beach or something. I decided to surprise her, see if she was going to the office without having to. I left the modern office building, back into the dusty and hot streets of Marrakech. Soon I would be back at home, and then I could start to finally work out what the hell I was going to do with the rest of my life.

 

 

 

 

This is part one of twenty-three, come back next week for part two and every Thursday until we're done to see what happens next. If you get lost, one of the tags here should help you. The Wonderland tag will take you to the story while the Jack Tag will take you to Part One of every story we post here.