Showing posts with label B.R. Stateham. Show all posts
Showing posts with label B.R. Stateham. Show all posts
Monday, July 9, 2012
A Twist Of Noir 690 - B.R. Stateham
FUNNY, REALLY FUNNY - B.R. STATEHAM
“They’ll kill him, Smitty. They’ll kill my son. He won’t tell’em where the money is. He can’t tell ’em. He knows nothing about it. I stole the money. And I can’t give it back to ’em. I used every dime of it to pay the medical bills we racked up while he was in the hospital. Funny, isn’t it? I steal money from the mob to pay off my son’s medical bills. And my son dies anyway. Funny. Really funny.”
That was two hours ago. The confessions of a small-time hood, who actually loved his family. Loved his only son. The world is cruel, son. Nothing fair about living if you’re piss poor and there’s no one around to help pull the strings. You’re just another chump in an ocean of chumps. A fool in a graveyard of fools.
The kid was ten years old. A thin, sickly kid with the smile of an angel.
His only sin was his father was a small-time cog in a big city mob. A small time hood with not much brains.
“Where they hiding him?” he asked, eyes as black as stellar black holes boring into the face of the grieving father.
“Over on Vermont in that empty gas station there on the corner.”
Smitty nodded, slipped dark shades over his eyes, and left the grieving father standing in the middle of his apartment. The drive across town in a light falling rain was almost surreal. Neon lights from a thousand different signs reflected off the wet streets in vivid splashes of brilliant color.
A half block away from the corner of Vermont and Rose he pulled over and turned the engine off and sat in the dark for a moment.
Swift. Harsh. Ruthless. That’s how you succeeded in this line of business, Smitty thought to himself. Show no mercy. Offer no excuses. Walk in—do the job—leave and don’t look back. Never look back. In the darkness of the car a thin snarl of an unseen grin bent his lips back. Reaching inside his coat he pulled out a Remington .22 caliber semi-automatic. From a different coat pocket he withdrew a bulky-looking fluted silencer and screwed it onto the end of the four-inch barrel. And then he opened the door and rolled out of the car in one fluid, cat-like motion.
He had a knack. A talent. A natural gift. He moved like a feral animal from one shadow to the next in the brief walk it took from his car to the empty gas station and not once did a sliver of light reveal his presence.
Gripping the bulky weapon casually in his gloved right hand he moved up to the back door of the gas station and lifted his left hand and rapped twice on the door.
The door opened just a sliver—a bright lance of light flooding into the dark night. And into the sliver of yellow light the shoulders and head of a semi-tamed gorilla drifted. He didn’t hesitate. Lifting the weapon up in one smooth motion he put a slug directly into the man’s right eye and then stepped back and used a foot to kick the door wide open.
Inside were three other gorillas. All three were scrambling to their feet and reaching for their weapons when Smitty stepped in and pulled the trigger three more times. Puft! Puft! Puft!
Two dead. One almost dead. Walking over to the one living Smitty kicked the man in the face to get the man’s attention and stared down into the man’s pain-wracked face.
“Tell your boss he’s an idiot. Kidnapping a kid of one of his most loyal soldiers and thinking he’s going to get his money back is stupid. I took the money. Your boss weaseled out on paying me for my last job, so I decided to pay myself. Got that? Yes? Make sure you tell your boss when you see him.”
Just to make sure the wounded gorilla did remember Smitty slammed a foot hard into the side of the man’s face again.
Be ruthless. Never look back.
BIO: B.R. Stateham writes hard-boiled noir. He’s almost as old as dirt, but it doesn't stop him from thinking up dark, mean stories to entertain the little kiddies in the dead of night.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
A Twist Of Noir 557 - B.R. Stateham
IN ABOUT FIFTY YEARS - B.R. STATEHAM
Dark eyes surveyed the room, a deadly little smile spilling out of his lips in the process. H found himself standing in the inner sanctum. The most secure place in the entire casino. The boss himself. To his right and sitting behind his desk was a fat little man with a shiny bald spot on the top of his head and three chins bobbling around like a turkey’s giblet. He was leaning over his desk counting out a wad of money–in hundred dollar bills–his lips moving as he counted. Behind the fat man was a troglodyte with heavy, thick arms, and the wired bristles of bushy eyebrows covering what little of a forehead he had above his dull eyes.
Smitty, a hand lifting up to unbutton the one button to his sport coat, turned his obsidian black eyes back toward the fat man and the money.
“Jesus, I’m glad you got that little bastard, Smitty. Can you believe it? They hired him...him of all people...to take me out. That little fucker! Tell you the truth, it’s freaking brilliant. I didn’t know the little guy was a killer. I thought he was a damn good bookie. Made me a ton of dough. A ton of dough. How did you know it was him?”
“You’re a cautions man, Gibbons. You don’t go out much. And when you do, you go out well protected. So if someone put a contract out on you and felt confident the hit was going to come down, it’d had to be someone who could get close to you.”
“The kid,” Elroy Gibbons growled, shaking his head angrily, then reaching for the fat stub of a cigar smoldering in a glass ash tray beside the money box setting on the desk. “But like I said, I wouldn’t have thought he’d be the guy in a thousand years. What tipped you off about the kid? He certainly doesn’t look like a killer to me. What was it? What was it that he did which told you he was the hired gun?”
“Like I said, fella, you’re a cautious man. You don’t take any unnecessary chances. If a gunman was going to kill you, he had to get up close to you. Really close to you. Like...say...as close as I am to you right now.”
There was something in the tall man’s soft whisper. Like a sudden gust of unexpected frigid cold. Just enough to make the fat man, cigar between thick lips, suddenly look up and at the man standing in front of the desk dressed in the gray slacks and gray sport coat and black buttoned collared shirt. There was a gun in Smitty’s hand. A nine millimeter Glock. The gun belched out fire and smoke. The sound of the gun going off deafening. Behind the fat guy the dull witted thug caught the bullet one button up and a half inch to the left of his sternum. The bullet slammed him back into the office wall and he slid down, lifeless, a look of shock on his face, leaving a smear of dark blood on the yellow painted wall.
“You!” shouted Gibbons, pushing himself back in his chair and leaping to his feet, fear as palatable as Chinese curry clearly written all over his face. “You’re the hit man! But...but...I hired you to protect me! Why did you kill the kid?”
“He was my ticket here. You needed to see someone dead. I said I’d take cash only in such transactions. Besides, the kid was hired to bump you off. The only thing was, the kid wasn’t up to it. Said he wasn’t going to do it and was gonna go to the cops. He became a liability. So he had to be dealt with.”
“Who? Who put the contract out on me? And...and...and come on, Smitty. We can make a deal here. I can give you money. Lots of money if you’ll forget your little deal and come to work for me.”
A deadly smear of malevolent amusement played across the dark eyed man’s lips. Behind him, on the other side of the office door, he heard men shouting and then the footsteps of several running down the hall toward the office door. But they would be too late. Gibbons had a door made to take the battering of a tank before it gave in.
“You want to know who want’s you dead? In about fifty years, when she joins you in Hell, talk to your wife.”
“Smitt...!”
The second gunshot was equally deafening. The bullet yanked the fat guy off his feet and hurled him through the office window behind him. Smitty, holstering the Glock underneath his left arm, stepped around the desk, swiped a thick pile of one hundred dollar bills off the desk and smoothly leapt out of the window and disappeared into the night of the dark alley.
Yeah. About fifty years. It’d take about that long for a good looking...and suddenly very rich Ellen Gibbons...to finally shrivel up into an old bitter hag and eventually die of natural causes. That’s the way it usually worked with women like that.
BIO: B.R. Stateham is physically sixty-one years old. Mentally, who know how old he is. He writes noir, hard-boiled police-procedurals, and a little fantasy. And like most writers of his ilk, stone-cold broke from his efforts.
Dark eyes surveyed the room, a deadly little smile spilling out of his lips in the process. H found himself standing in the inner sanctum. The most secure place in the entire casino. The boss himself. To his right and sitting behind his desk was a fat little man with a shiny bald spot on the top of his head and three chins bobbling around like a turkey’s giblet. He was leaning over his desk counting out a wad of money–in hundred dollar bills–his lips moving as he counted. Behind the fat man was a troglodyte with heavy, thick arms, and the wired bristles of bushy eyebrows covering what little of a forehead he had above his dull eyes.
Smitty, a hand lifting up to unbutton the one button to his sport coat, turned his obsidian black eyes back toward the fat man and the money.
“Jesus, I’m glad you got that little bastard, Smitty. Can you believe it? They hired him...him of all people...to take me out. That little fucker! Tell you the truth, it’s freaking brilliant. I didn’t know the little guy was a killer. I thought he was a damn good bookie. Made me a ton of dough. A ton of dough. How did you know it was him?”
“You’re a cautions man, Gibbons. You don’t go out much. And when you do, you go out well protected. So if someone put a contract out on you and felt confident the hit was going to come down, it’d had to be someone who could get close to you.”
“The kid,” Elroy Gibbons growled, shaking his head angrily, then reaching for the fat stub of a cigar smoldering in a glass ash tray beside the money box setting on the desk. “But like I said, I wouldn’t have thought he’d be the guy in a thousand years. What tipped you off about the kid? He certainly doesn’t look like a killer to me. What was it? What was it that he did which told you he was the hired gun?”
“Like I said, fella, you’re a cautious man. You don’t take any unnecessary chances. If a gunman was going to kill you, he had to get up close to you. Really close to you. Like...say...as close as I am to you right now.”
There was something in the tall man’s soft whisper. Like a sudden gust of unexpected frigid cold. Just enough to make the fat man, cigar between thick lips, suddenly look up and at the man standing in front of the desk dressed in the gray slacks and gray sport coat and black buttoned collared shirt. There was a gun in Smitty’s hand. A nine millimeter Glock. The gun belched out fire and smoke. The sound of the gun going off deafening. Behind the fat guy the dull witted thug caught the bullet one button up and a half inch to the left of his sternum. The bullet slammed him back into the office wall and he slid down, lifeless, a look of shock on his face, leaving a smear of dark blood on the yellow painted wall.
“You!” shouted Gibbons, pushing himself back in his chair and leaping to his feet, fear as palatable as Chinese curry clearly written all over his face. “You’re the hit man! But...but...I hired you to protect me! Why did you kill the kid?”
“He was my ticket here. You needed to see someone dead. I said I’d take cash only in such transactions. Besides, the kid was hired to bump you off. The only thing was, the kid wasn’t up to it. Said he wasn’t going to do it and was gonna go to the cops. He became a liability. So he had to be dealt with.”
“Who? Who put the contract out on me? And...and...and come on, Smitty. We can make a deal here. I can give you money. Lots of money if you’ll forget your little deal and come to work for me.”
A deadly smear of malevolent amusement played across the dark eyed man’s lips. Behind him, on the other side of the office door, he heard men shouting and then the footsteps of several running down the hall toward the office door. But they would be too late. Gibbons had a door made to take the battering of a tank before it gave in.
“You want to know who want’s you dead? In about fifty years, when she joins you in Hell, talk to your wife.”
“Smitt...!”
The second gunshot was equally deafening. The bullet yanked the fat guy off his feet and hurled him through the office window behind him. Smitty, holstering the Glock underneath his left arm, stepped around the desk, swiped a thick pile of one hundred dollar bills off the desk and smoothly leapt out of the window and disappeared into the night of the dark alley.
Yeah. About fifty years. It’d take about that long for a good looking...and suddenly very rich Ellen Gibbons...to finally shrivel up into an old bitter hag and eventually die of natural causes. That’s the way it usually worked with women like that.
BIO: B.R. Stateham is physically sixty-one years old. Mentally, who know how old he is. He writes noir, hard-boiled police-procedurals, and a little fantasy. And like most writers of his ilk, stone-cold broke from his efforts.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
A Twist Of Noir 472 - B.R. Stateham
A KILLER’S KILLER - B.R. STATEHAM
Confetti rained down from the arena’s rafters in a white Wyoming blizzard. People were dancing in the aisles, blowing cheap toy kazoos, their faces painted with various portraits of bliss and ecstasy. The crowd was wild, raucous, and jubilant. Banners of their candidate littered the arena from rafters to restrooms, along with hundreds of balloons and tons of paper ribbons. Women, men, small kids kept breaking out into spontaneous cheering as they waved their handheld signs up that said:
Adam Goldstein Is Our Man
and
Goldstein Will Clean Corruption Out Of City Hall
Jubilation.
Joyous delight. A fresh breath of air.
In a tightly contested race for mayor Goldstein won. Won...somehow, against a politician bought and paid for by the mob. An honest man winning a rigged race the city’s biggest crime boss had paid millions to lock up. Goldstein was as the placards indicated—an honest man determined to cleanse City Hall of all the graft and corruption which infested its polished marble floors like a pandemic infection.
And because he was honest—because he was going to keep his word—he was going to die for it. Die tonight. In the midst of this crowd. At the pinnacle point of his triumph.
Already the killer was in place and approaching the salubrious politician.
A good man was going to die tonight. Die in front of his fans, his family, and millions of people watching on television. Unless...unless...
Coal black eyes, as black as a madman’s nightmare, spied his intended target standing on the podium. Around him the candidate’s family members and friends waved and danced to the music blaring through the auditorium’s speakers. In the faces of everyone were the portraits of unbridled happiness.
On the face of Smitty, a beaming smile worthy of a front-page spread in the local newspapers.
Quietly, with the efficiency of a pro, he made his way through the bumptious crowd and climbed the steps of the podium. Effortlessly, he slipped past family members and political party bosses and approached his target. As he neared he slipped a hand into his sports coat and pulled out the heavy metal ring and slipped it on his finger.
Ice for blood running in his veins he stepped up to his victim’s right side and threw a hand over the man’s shoulders. With a violent jerk, he pulled the man in close in a vice-grip of a bear hug.
Grinning and shouting like the others, a big button on his lapel saying I’M FOR ’STEIN, he leaned forward and shouted in the man’s ear. “This is not your lucky day, buddy!”
No sooner had he finished giving the hit man his greeting when the hand with the deadly ring slipped from the man’s shoulder and slid up to the killer’s exposed neck. The noise of the crowd drowned out the man’s sudden yelp of pain as the needle bit deep into flesh.
Stepping back, Smitty watched his victim turn, a hand holding his neck, his eyes filled with unmingled disbelief. Even as he watched the poison was taking its effect. The man staggered, tried to reach out and grab his killer, color draining from his face. But it was too late. Too late. The man collapsed to the floor dead before his heat hit the podium’s wooden planking.
At the top of the podium stairs, Smitty turned and looked at the newly-elected mayor standing alone in the single bright Klieg light beaming down from the rafters. The crowd was roaring with applause and love at the man.
Smiling, both hands above his head, Goldstein waved and mouthed ‘Thank You!’ to the crowd.
A killer killing a killer. An evil little smile played across Smitty’s lips as he turned and descended the stairs. Yes, he thought to himself pleasantly, there is justice in this world after all. Sometimes an honest man can beat the odds. But only with help. Only with help.
BIO: B.R. Stateham writes noir and a few other genres just for the hell of it. At sixty-one, the author thinks someday his ship will arrive and he’ll actually make some money writing about killers, cops, bad men and bad luck. But he’s not going to hold his breath.
Confetti rained down from the arena’s rafters in a white Wyoming blizzard. People were dancing in the aisles, blowing cheap toy kazoos, their faces painted with various portraits of bliss and ecstasy. The crowd was wild, raucous, and jubilant. Banners of their candidate littered the arena from rafters to restrooms, along with hundreds of balloons and tons of paper ribbons. Women, men, small kids kept breaking out into spontaneous cheering as they waved their handheld signs up that said:
Adam Goldstein Is Our Man
and
Goldstein Will Clean Corruption Out Of City Hall
Jubilation.
Joyous delight. A fresh breath of air.
In a tightly contested race for mayor Goldstein won. Won...somehow, against a politician bought and paid for by the mob. An honest man winning a rigged race the city’s biggest crime boss had paid millions to lock up. Goldstein was as the placards indicated—an honest man determined to cleanse City Hall of all the graft and corruption which infested its polished marble floors like a pandemic infection.
And because he was honest—because he was going to keep his word—he was going to die for it. Die tonight. In the midst of this crowd. At the pinnacle point of his triumph.
Already the killer was in place and approaching the salubrious politician.
A good man was going to die tonight. Die in front of his fans, his family, and millions of people watching on television. Unless...unless...
Coal black eyes, as black as a madman’s nightmare, spied his intended target standing on the podium. Around him the candidate’s family members and friends waved and danced to the music blaring through the auditorium’s speakers. In the faces of everyone were the portraits of unbridled happiness.
On the face of Smitty, a beaming smile worthy of a front-page spread in the local newspapers.
Quietly, with the efficiency of a pro, he made his way through the bumptious crowd and climbed the steps of the podium. Effortlessly, he slipped past family members and political party bosses and approached his target. As he neared he slipped a hand into his sports coat and pulled out the heavy metal ring and slipped it on his finger.
Ice for blood running in his veins he stepped up to his victim’s right side and threw a hand over the man’s shoulders. With a violent jerk, he pulled the man in close in a vice-grip of a bear hug.
Grinning and shouting like the others, a big button on his lapel saying I’M FOR ’STEIN, he leaned forward and shouted in the man’s ear. “This is not your lucky day, buddy!”
No sooner had he finished giving the hit man his greeting when the hand with the deadly ring slipped from the man’s shoulder and slid up to the killer’s exposed neck. The noise of the crowd drowned out the man’s sudden yelp of pain as the needle bit deep into flesh.
Stepping back, Smitty watched his victim turn, a hand holding his neck, his eyes filled with unmingled disbelief. Even as he watched the poison was taking its effect. The man staggered, tried to reach out and grab his killer, color draining from his face. But it was too late. Too late. The man collapsed to the floor dead before his heat hit the podium’s wooden planking.
At the top of the podium stairs, Smitty turned and looked at the newly-elected mayor standing alone in the single bright Klieg light beaming down from the rafters. The crowd was roaring with applause and love at the man.
Smiling, both hands above his head, Goldstein waved and mouthed ‘Thank You!’ to the crowd.
A killer killing a killer. An evil little smile played across Smitty’s lips as he turned and descended the stairs. Yes, he thought to himself pleasantly, there is justice in this world after all. Sometimes an honest man can beat the odds. But only with help. Only with help.
BIO: B.R. Stateham writes noir and a few other genres just for the hell of it. At sixty-one, the author thinks someday his ship will arrive and he’ll actually make some money writing about killers, cops, bad men and bad luck. But he’s not going to hold his breath.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
A Twist Of Noir 446 - B.R. Stateham
SEE YOU IN HELL - B.R. STATEHAM
Originally published at ThinkingTen earlier this month
See you in hell.
Those were his last words, spoken in defiance just before the .50 caliber high velocity bullet struck him in the chest and vaporized him into a red mist, a mist that expanded in the air exponentially and coated the cement wall behind him like a madman’s surrealist painting.
Vladimir Sokolov. Russian mobster and purveyor of pain. A killer to the core. And someone who wanted to take over the drug traffic currently controlled by Gino Mancini.
Not that Gino Mancini was a choir boy. But the Italian mob had been in the city for generations. They were family. They knew the town. Knew the citizens. Knew what they could get away with and what would bring down the heat. Knew the rules.
Not so with the Russians. They were fresh immigrants raw and unsophisticated. Ex-KGB and Spetsnaz killers who decided to bring their talents to the States and cash in on the lucrative drug traffic trade.
“Here’s a hundred grand, Smitty,” Gino said pointing to a large, expensive leather satchel sitting on the floor of the stretched Lincoln limo. “Down payment. Another one hundred fifty G’s are yours if you can take out Sokolov permanently. But it won't be easy. The guy’s got an army of goons circling him like frickin’ maggots wherever he goes. Getting in close is going to be damn near impossible.”
Black eyes as dark as the inner well of a black hole looked down at the bag and then back up at the frail figure of the Italian mobster. Gino Mancini looked like someone’s grandfather. Looked like an Italian gardener. Except he wore tailored suits of imported Egyptian cotton and had a thing about wearing heavy gold rings embedded with big diamonds.
Smitty said nothing as he collected the leather handles of the heavy bag in one hand and opened the car door with the other. Stepping away from the stretched limo, satchel in hand, he watched in silence as the black limo drove away—the image of Mancini’s aged face staring up at him through the door window vividly in his mind.
Time to go to work. Time to let Sokolov know he was a hunted man.
Twelve hours later, Smitty strolled out of the men’s restroom of an empty warehouse with a bloody switchblade in one hand and a white cloth—part of an expensive linen shirt—in the other. Using the shirt to wipe the blood off the weapon, Smitty paused, half-turned and stared at the restroom door and grinned with the vicious leer of a laughing hyena. He needed information about Sokolov’s habits—of his peculiarities. He now had it. Thanks to Sokolov’s number two man in his organization. Thank you, Viktor Puskin.
См. вас в аде. See you in hell.
It did not take long for the Russians to find Puskin’s body. It didn’t take long to hear the rumors that a hired killer with amazing black eyes who called himself Smitty was hunting. It didn’t take long for Sokolov to react. Within an hour after discovering Pushkin’s body, half a dozen gunmen spread through the city like an influenza epidemic hunting for Smitty.
All six were found dead twenty-four hours later. All six brought down with a sharp knife and a slit throat.
Sokolov got the word, roused out of a deep sleep by a shaken, petrified underling, and shot the messenger between the eyes in a fit of furious disbelief. But, after cleaning up the body and belting back two stiff drinks of vodka, he decided perhaps it was time to go into hiding. Time to bury himself in his fortress hideout.
Four carloads of his goons escorted him to the warehouse district just outside of town. Fifteen goons surrounded him the moment he got out of his car. Only one building within a mile was near the empty warehouse which was Sokolov’s fortress.
But a .50 cal. will travel farther than a mile and be just as deadly when it hits its target. A kill shot a mile away. Not impossible. Not for death to complete. Somehow Sokolov knew. Knew the moment he got out of the car and walked to the cement wall this was the spot. This was where he was going to die. Turning, he stared at the building a mile away—stared straight into the oversized sniper’s scope Smitty was staring into and mouthed the words in snarling defiance.
См. вас в аде.
See you in hell.
BIO: B.R. Stateham is a sixty year old kid who likes to think of himself as a writer of good noir fiction. Murderous Passions is the first novel of a police-procedural series featuring detectives Turner Hahn and Frank Morales. A Taste of Old Revenge will come out in 2010 through the auspices of Shadow Line Press.
Originally published at ThinkingTen earlier this month
See you in hell.
Those were his last words, spoken in defiance just before the .50 caliber high velocity bullet struck him in the chest and vaporized him into a red mist, a mist that expanded in the air exponentially and coated the cement wall behind him like a madman’s surrealist painting.
Vladimir Sokolov. Russian mobster and purveyor of pain. A killer to the core. And someone who wanted to take over the drug traffic currently controlled by Gino Mancini.
Not that Gino Mancini was a choir boy. But the Italian mob had been in the city for generations. They were family. They knew the town. Knew the citizens. Knew what they could get away with and what would bring down the heat. Knew the rules.
Not so with the Russians. They were fresh immigrants raw and unsophisticated. Ex-KGB and Spetsnaz killers who decided to bring their talents to the States and cash in on the lucrative drug traffic trade.
“Here’s a hundred grand, Smitty,” Gino said pointing to a large, expensive leather satchel sitting on the floor of the stretched Lincoln limo. “Down payment. Another one hundred fifty G’s are yours if you can take out Sokolov permanently. But it won't be easy. The guy’s got an army of goons circling him like frickin’ maggots wherever he goes. Getting in close is going to be damn near impossible.”
Black eyes as dark as the inner well of a black hole looked down at the bag and then back up at the frail figure of the Italian mobster. Gino Mancini looked like someone’s grandfather. Looked like an Italian gardener. Except he wore tailored suits of imported Egyptian cotton and had a thing about wearing heavy gold rings embedded with big diamonds.
Smitty said nothing as he collected the leather handles of the heavy bag in one hand and opened the car door with the other. Stepping away from the stretched limo, satchel in hand, he watched in silence as the black limo drove away—the image of Mancini’s aged face staring up at him through the door window vividly in his mind.
Time to go to work. Time to let Sokolov know he was a hunted man.
Twelve hours later, Smitty strolled out of the men’s restroom of an empty warehouse with a bloody switchblade in one hand and a white cloth—part of an expensive linen shirt—in the other. Using the shirt to wipe the blood off the weapon, Smitty paused, half-turned and stared at the restroom door and grinned with the vicious leer of a laughing hyena. He needed information about Sokolov’s habits—of his peculiarities. He now had it. Thanks to Sokolov’s number two man in his organization. Thank you, Viktor Puskin.
См. вас в аде. See you in hell.
It did not take long for the Russians to find Puskin’s body. It didn’t take long to hear the rumors that a hired killer with amazing black eyes who called himself Smitty was hunting. It didn’t take long for Sokolov to react. Within an hour after discovering Pushkin’s body, half a dozen gunmen spread through the city like an influenza epidemic hunting for Smitty.
All six were found dead twenty-four hours later. All six brought down with a sharp knife and a slit throat.
Sokolov got the word, roused out of a deep sleep by a shaken, petrified underling, and shot the messenger between the eyes in a fit of furious disbelief. But, after cleaning up the body and belting back two stiff drinks of vodka, he decided perhaps it was time to go into hiding. Time to bury himself in his fortress hideout.
Four carloads of his goons escorted him to the warehouse district just outside of town. Fifteen goons surrounded him the moment he got out of his car. Only one building within a mile was near the empty warehouse which was Sokolov’s fortress.
But a .50 cal. will travel farther than a mile and be just as deadly when it hits its target. A kill shot a mile away. Not impossible. Not for death to complete. Somehow Sokolov knew. Knew the moment he got out of the car and walked to the cement wall this was the spot. This was where he was going to die. Turning, he stared at the building a mile away—stared straight into the oversized sniper’s scope Smitty was staring into and mouthed the words in snarling defiance.
См. вас в аде.
See you in hell.
BIO: B.R. Stateham is a sixty year old kid who likes to think of himself as a writer of good noir fiction. Murderous Passions is the first novel of a police-procedural series featuring detectives Turner Hahn and Frank Morales. A Taste of Old Revenge will come out in 2010 through the auspices of Shadow Line Press.
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