Raw Vengeance (The Rich Fordham Series) Page 2

  “Sounds like one of our boys in blue just lost it,” she admitted, without wanting to elaborate.

  “If he’s a cop headed to the mayor’s office, why would he announce it on the Internet?” Rich asked, even though he had a strong suspicion as to why.

  Rhonda dodged the question. “People do crazy things every day.”

  Rich smiled at the dodge. “You should run for union spokesperson someday.”

  The shape of a red car in the fast lane with three blue and white squad cars trailing behind it came into view. Rich whisked out his cell phone and made a thirty-second phone call. When the phone conversation ended, he said to them, “My studio producer filled me in with what she thinks is going on. We’ve got the green light to go live.” Rich twisted around and said to Gabe with a smirk, “Kind of interesting that the Mustang he’s driving could have more than five hundred horsepower, and we’re gaining on it.”

  Gabe returned the smirk. “Something’s not right.”

  “Are you both ready to go?” Rich asked. “I want to begin filming and go live in thirty seconds.”

  Gabe nodded in agreement. The thirty-thousand-dollar professional-grade Sony video camera was his baby. He removed the lens cover and turned the power on. The digital display lit up on the side; a moment later, the menu’s start icon quit flashing, indicating it was warm. He steadied it on his shoulder, peered through the viewfinder, and then adjusted the focus, zoom, and aperture.

  Rhonda looked at herself admiringly in the rearview mirror and decided she was good for television. “I’m ready, sugar. Just tell me when.”

  Gabe felt grateful the glass screen could be opened so it wouldn’t obstruct his view with the lens. “In three, two…” He put his index finger in the air and pointed at Rich.

  Rich turned sideways in his seat with a handheld microphone and began, “I’m Rich Fordham with WSNO news riding along with one of Chicago’s finest, Officer Rhonda Diaz.” His voice was edged with excitement. “Chicago police have been informed that one of their own has made a threat against the mayor of Chicago, where we believe he is headed. All we can tell you is the police are looking for former Chicago P.D. officer Wes Kines, and he is a person of interest. Earlier today, we learned Kines was terminated from the Chicago police force after a round of budget cuts were put in place by the mayor and the city council.” Rich paused to get a visual on the Mustang, then added, “We have been in pursuit for ten minutes, and the Mustang just came into view. We’re doing over a hundred miles per hour, and the suspect’s vehicle has shown no signs of slowing.”

  Just then, Rhonda swung the car hard left to avoid a driver who thought he could merge back into traffic and sneak in behind the pursuit vehicles, but failed to see their squad coming from behind. The abrupt move bounced Gabe and Rich off the passenger side windows. “Sorry ‘bout that.”

  Once he regained his composure, Rich resumed his rundown. “That was a close one,” he said, then looked toward the chase vehicle. “We’re a quarter mile from Kine’s Mustang, and the real estate between us shrinks each moment. It shouldn’t be long before we join the back of the pack.”

  Just as they started filming again, Wes’s Mustang veered hard right onto the exit for West Lake Street and threw up a plume of dust as it drove onto the shoulder, narrowly missing a cruiser attempting to block the route. The muscle car slowed for traffic waiting at the light and made a sweeping right turn as it cut off a bus and a commuter car coming from its left. The squad cars snaked their way through the maze of cars as they tried in vain to keep up.

  Rhonda picked up her CB and said, “Dispatch, this is Unit 640. Is City Hall undergoing a 49 for the 25?” She turned and explained to the camera that a 25 is a suspicious vehicle and a 49 is an evacuation.

  A moment passed before the dispatcher answered her question. “10-4,” he responded, robot-like.

  “What does that mean?” Rich asked her.

  “Means that if our man is stupid enough to try anything, he’s in for a huge surprise.”

  Rich continued his play-by-play report: “As you can see, in front of us looms downtown Chicago. We just passed the river and have less than four blocks to go. We got hung up in traffic and lost some distance, but the CPD still remains within a half city block of the suspect.” Rhonda gunned it through the intersection, but failed to slow down in time before she rammed the Chevrolet Impala patrol car in front of her who had braked to avoid traffic. The collision slammed them against their seat belts and sent the other car fish-tailing wildly. The other driver corrected and sprinted ahead in pursuit.

  “Sorry again,” Rhonda said apologetically as she gassed it.

  “You keep saying that,” Rich laughed. “Mack, don’t get us killed, okay?”

  “Don’t you worry about a thing. Mack is gonna take good care of you boys.”

  The Mustang hooked a right onto LaSalle and made its way through the late afternoon traffic. Finding Chicago’s City Hall could not have been easier for Wes, as a trio of police cars were parked on the front sidewalk blocking the main entrance. A half dozen men and women dressed in riot gear had taken up a defensive position behind each vehicle. He jerked the wheel hard left and yanked the e-brake as the car slid sideways and came to rest with the nose pointing directly at the set of doors on the opposite side of the street. Throngs of business people ran for cover as police barked out instructions to evacuate the area.

  Rhonda and the other three squad cars lined up bumper-to-bumper, blocking his escape route. She jumped out and ran to the trunk, where she pulled out a tactical vest and a shotgun, then took refuge behind the left front wheel. In five seconds, she had her pistol pointed in her outstretched arms and her elbows rested on the hood. Her shotgun leaned upright against the car’s rocker panel, within reach. Meanwhile, Rich and Gabe both exited to the left and took up a position near the left rear quarter panel. They crouched high enough over the trunk to give them both a good view. Gabe had been filming for the last ten minutes and gave the signal for Rich to continue.

  “To get you caught up on what’s going on, we were in a high speed pursuit which ended dramatically here at City Hall. The Ford Mustang sits menacingly in the middle of the street with its engine running. It’s obvious to those watching that the suspect is either unsure of what to do next or is trying to intimidate the officers. He has made no demands—”

  Fully automatic gunfire rang out from the suspect vehicle’s window, interrupting Rich’s live feed. Bullets peppered the cruisers and broke windows in a violent display of firepower. The shots boomed and echoed off the surrounding high-rise buildings. The Mustang revved its engine, spun its wheels, and sped under hard acceleration toward the patrol cars. The officers guarding city hall had barely enough time to jump for cover as the Mustang t-boned their cars. The kinetic energy bounced the car’s rear into the air like its namesake before it came to rest in a pile of twisted metal. A gash permeated the radiator, gushing a plume of steam into the air. Then all went silent.

  Every officer ran for cover when they saw Wes lay cover fire with his Colt M4 Carbine as he jumped out the window and ran at breakneck speed toward the front door. The ten paces between him and the government building became a no-man’s land as he shot at anything that moved. In a fit of rage, he yelled like a madman as he tried in vain to open the all-metal doors that were chained shut.

  Rhonda seized the opportunity to fire off several rounds. Two of her shots hit their target—one in his shoulder blade and the other in his lower back.

  A burning, unfathomable pain erupted in Wes’s back as he struggled to stay upright. Seeing his options were limited, he ducked into the tight space between the Mustang and the cruiser with his back to the police. His head and vision spun out of control from the alcohol and adrenaline. He was surrounded. The people who once were his friends and drinking buddies suddenly had their sights trained on him. There had to be another way in. “I am not the enemy!” he shouted as he tried to stall. “My war is not with you, it’s with
the people inside. They are the enemy!” Bargaining was his only hope. In a trained motion, Wes propped himself onto a knee, aimed, delivered another volley of bullets, and immediately ducked back down. He reloaded and waited.

  The police made a drastic error by letting Captain Roy Tomke get on the bullhorn. Roy was the last person able to ease the tension. “Give it up, Wes. You’re surrounded,” he ordered gruffly. “You have five seconds to surrender, or we’ll open fire.”

  “Well, guess what, asshole? My gun’s bigger than yours.” Sometimes your best offense is a good defense. Wes plucked two smoke canisters from his belt and flung them to his left on the sidewalk leading around the building’s perimeter. Within seconds, the area became enshrouded in a dense haze. Then he made his first tactical mistake. Wes sprung from his hiding spot and sprinted north up the sidewalk along the building in hopes of remaining undetected. Unexpectedly, he popped from the smokescreen into the clear. He hadn’t thrown the canisters far enough to avoid being seen. The cops delivered an onslaught of bullets as he returned fire. He felt and heard the pop! pop! pop! of bullets as they pelted his entire body.

  Rhonda adjusted her aim and fired, dealing the fatal blow. A mass of lead tore through the front of Wes’s head, exploding it into a distorted mess of flesh and blood. The wall beside him was splattered with bits of his remains. He died before his body hit the ground.

  *****

  Whenever the media broadcasts a live scene where there’s a chance something morbid may occur, they give the video anywhere from a three-to -five-second delay. Viewers of WSNO were spared the horror of seeing a cop, albeit a rogue cop, die on TV. Rich and Gabe took a moment to take in the grisly scene as the police secured the area with yellow tape.

  “Why did he do it?” Rich asked Rhonda, hoping she would see the implications.

  “What? Go after the mayor? He’s pissed he got the axe, that’s why.”

  “No, that’s not what I meant,” Rich said, trying to get his point across. “He posted a farewell message online and drove slow enough on the freeway for us to catch up. The Mustang could have done well over a hundred seventy-five, but he kept it at one hundred, and he wasn’t wearing any armor. Wes wanted this to happen. He wanted to kill the mayor, but this looks like a classic case of ‘death by cop.’ This was a message.”

  She nodded without saying anything.

  “You know what the damnedest thing is?” Rich continued. “Mayor Cogan isn’t even in town.”

  CHAPTER 3

  A day after the police shooting, Rich found himself struggling to get back into his normal routine. Witnessing the officer’s death had given him a serious gut check; it was the first time he’d seen someone die. He knew if he was to reach his goal of becoming an international correspondent, he’d need to develop a thicker skin. Desensitizing oneself to death wasn’t something that happened overnight. That evening he worked out an extra hour, then stayed up until three in the morning polishing off a fifth of whisky in an attempt to get the images out of his head.

  Rich’s medium-sized cubicle, located near the middle of an expansive room on WSNO’s third floor, felt smaller and more confined, although nothing had changed. Animated conversations from across the room and other extraneous stimuli dulled his senses. Being hung over didn’t help, either. He sighed heavily and wished he could transplant himself into the picture of Cancun on his computer. Today blows.

  He went to take a sip of coffee and realized his Styrofoam cup was empty. Rich chucked the handwritten message from his producer, Sarah Kinney, condemning his war-style reporting into the wastebasket. Although the network was obsessed with high ratings—and the ratings during his stunt quadrupled—the lawyers and sponsors controlled the network’s content. They didn’t want to pay for medical bills or lawsuits. The producers preferred watered-down material, because it wasn’t good business to scare viewers. For every murder story, they needed a human-interest segment to give people a warm, fuzzy feeling.

  To take on the kind of gritty stories Rich wanted to cover wasn’t in WSNO’s best interest. After only a few months of working there, he recognized this invisible barrier. In his opinion, the network had potential, but lacked imagination and was stuck in its ways. If Rich were to progress as a journalist, he’d need to prove himself at the local level first.

  A change of scenery and a recharge were in order. He stood up, glanced around, and made his way to the break area to get another cup of coffee. When he was almost to the coffee maker, Wayne Vale, WSNO’s senior investigative reporter and management golden boy, beat him to the pot. At forty-eight and single, he was the main obstacle between Rich’s ability to prove himself and his dream job at a more prestigious network. Wayne always took the meatier stories and left the scraps for Rich and the newbie reporters to fight over.

  “Rich,” he said coyly, with his southern accent, “great coverage on the death-by-cop story. Very compelling. That was epic reporting, truly epic.” Wayne’s condescending tone made Rich want to tear the other man’s guts out, but instead he smiled. Rich knew better than to react to what he had just heard. Competition among reporters at the local network television level was fierce, and Wayne sensed that Rich was a force to be reckoned with. To his credit, Wayne was a brilliant reporter; after twenty-plus years at WSNO, he was accomplished at everything from research and interviewing a subject to anchoring and writing.

  “Thanks, Wayne. I appreciate that. Coming from you, that means a lot to me. How’s life with Ashley? Is she treating you okay?” he asked straight-faced. Wayne had carried on an affair with the CEO’s wife, Ashley. She had spread a rumor that Wayne was impotent and lousy in bed after he broke up with her.

  Wayne glared at Rich and mentally strangled him. He was used to people kissing his ass and bending over backward for him. This little ass needed to be put in his place. “You know, asking questions like that and having an attitude is going to get you nowhere except out the door. I have considerably more sway here than you do.”

  The moment to finally debate with Wayne had arrived. Challenge accepted. “I think that was a threat, Wayne, and this whole time I thought you were a happy-go-lucky guy, someone who couldn’t care about a peon like me,” Rich said.

  “You’re right about the peon part, at least.”

  “What does that make you? A miserable, middle-aged prick who has to bed his boss’s wife to get ahead? I thought only insecure women sleep with their boss to get ahead.” Without giving him a chance to retort, Rich started to walk past him. Just as he was about to pass, Wayne put up an arm and grabbed Rich by the shoulder, nearly clothes-lining him.

  “Your ass is mine,” Wayne said, close enough to Rich’s ear that he could feel the heat and smell the remnants of Wayne’s morning breath. “If I so much as see you look in my direction, you’re done. Got that?”

  It took every ounce of Rich’s mental strength not to break the man’s arm. Instead, Rich cocked his head at him and showed his toothy, shit-eating grin, then returned the penetrating stare. “Haven’t you figured it out yet, Wayne? You’re right where I want you. Great hair, by the way, very metro.” Wayne immediately released his grip. Rich patted him on the cheek and walked off.

  CHAPTER 4

  “I told you ten times already, Mom. How many more times do I have to tell you? I don’t want and I don’t need protection.” Tyler Cogan’s assertion to his mother, Shantell, was more of a protest than a question. Because he was the son of a prominent mayor, she thought he should have two bodyguards with him at school, an idea that caused friction between the two.

  The clock on the microwave read seven-fifteen a.m. He finished breakfast and got his textbooks in order. Today was the first day of his sophomore year at a public high school, and they were bickering like old times. Having gone to a private middle school, the transition back to a public school would be a culture shock for Tyler. Shantell had made the choice for him. When she formed an exploratory committee to run for the Presidency, she thought it would look better to the
press if he went to a normal school like a normal kid.

  Although Shantell was only in the second year of her first term as Chicago’s mayor, she dominated the straw polls. Her constituents and colleagues liked her tough talk on abortion, immigration, and healthcare. Her status as a business owner and an African-American single mother who was bringing up a child on her own made her popular with minorities and women. Being the mayor came easily, and she relished the power and media attention. As a regular commentator on conservative talk shows, her popularity skyrocketed. It was only a matter of time before Tyler would undergo media scrutiny regarding his sexuality—something for which Shantell had a plan.

  Shantell was tired of the bickering and the power struggle between herself and Tyler. She had better and more important things to do than argue constantly—things like testing the waters for the Oval Office. “Tyler, damn it, why are you such an idiot sometimes? Why can’t you learn to do what I say and not question my authority?”

  As the mayor, Shantell was used to everyone doing what she said and jumping when she gave an order. She thought her son was a lost cause. At twelve, he had come out of the closet and admitted to being a homosexual. Shantell had seen signs of his sexuality, but dismissed his effeminate behavior as a passing phase he’d grow out of. As a Baptist, it was her moral obligation to enroll him in an academy that specialized in converting gay kids to straight. Tyler lasted an entire week before he skipped out; to him, it was a condition that didn’t need fixing. He had male and female friends, but he found himself attracted to other male teens. When the feelings of arousal toward boys first surfaced, he had been in complete denial and told no one, especially not his mother, because he knew she wouldn’t approve.