RUFF STUFF

RUFF STUFF

A

Novel

by

smcallis

This is a work of fiction. No similarity between any person living or dead is intended, and any such similarity is purely coincidental. All characters © 1992 by smcallis

Chapter 16 NOT GIANTS, BUT WINDMILLS. “Lea, what will we do now?” Lea sat emotionally spent. Ivan was dead; Lea shot him through the head, the Russian’s brains now redecorated the south stairwell wall. The other Russian, the fat one, Boris, he was dead; half his head lay ripped from his body. Lea was alone. Her friend, her confidant, Guy Painter, he was somewhere down stairs, a billionaire industrialist, was now the enemy. Lea lay crippled, busted up, exhausted on the sixth floor of the Henry B. Horner building. Lea opened her eyes, surrounding by children. The deaf child, Luka, her sister Shaila, and two other children, Kayla, she was four and Shontrell, the only boy was six. The children stood around her, they pressed against her, and presented her with the Ruger―as if it was some mythical exalted weapon like Excalibur. Lea flipped opens the cylinder and shook her head. The weapon was empty, useless there were no more bullets. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. She never signed up to be the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Now these children looked to her for protection, they regarded her as some kind of Paladin, a guardian angel, a knight in shining armor come to rescue them. Lea was none of those things. It was Luka, dear precious brave Luka. It was Luka who pressed into her hand Grandfather’s pistol. The very same M11911A1 .45 caliber pistol that Grandfather had used at Stalingrad, Nuremburg, La Spezia, Berlin. At first Lea didn’t believe it―the pistol Lea had left behind in room 629―The refrigerator death room. How Luka, a small little deaf child possessed the courage, the bravery, the intestinal fortitude to re-enter that terrible room, a room where two men already lay dead. How one little girl posses the foresight to enter a room where men sought to suffocated and profit, all for sixteen numbers savagely tattooed on her leg. How one small girl, a brave little cracker girl, could enter such a room, retrieve Grandfather’s gun―A weapon even unto itself, carried a heavy burden, an imamate instrument of monstrous murder and death. Lea wasn’t even sure she possessed such courage. The truth was, Luka was one brave little girl. Grandpa Doc said so himself, “I could teach you to shoot, one day Frauline.” Luka did not associate the decades of murder and death wrought by the pistol. She only knew the happy times, the days spent in Grandpa Doc’s apartment. It was her Grandfather’s gun. The Colt, the M1A1 .45 caliber auto pistol, clad in the finest .99 silver, engraved with all manner of fantastic Aztec pictographs. Lea sat on the floor, surrounded by four children. She held in her hand her Grandfather’s pistol. Shaila fetched a bed sheet, for now, her broken arm was temporarily bound to her side. Four desperate children, seven bullets, and Guy Painter waited down stairs. “Let’s get this thing done.” For the first time in her life, Lea pulled back the slide on her Grandfather’s pistol. It was a religious experience, the weapon actuated with a smooth precision that belied its fifty-year age. There never was such a gun, her Grandfather’s gun. “Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.” Lea descended the stairs, entered the foyer and stepped out into the courtyard of the Henry B. Horner building. She wasn’t particularly afraid of Guy. Guy wasn’t what you might call a real gangster; he was a consummate corporate kind of person. He let other people do his dirty work. Lea had done his dirty work for years. Without his Russians, Lea half expected Guy to flee the scene, yet the limousine sat there parked, intransigent. Guy wanted that money; he wasn’t willing to give up so easily, twenty million dollars was a lot of money . . . What bothered Lea the most―what Lea wasn’t quite sure she could do, was kill Guy. Guy was her friend, for the past ten years Guy had been her confidant, a mentor. She wasn’t quite sure if when the time came, she could kill Guy, even after his betrayal, even after all he had done. Lea stepped out into the open. “Guy Painter! I have come for you.” Disheveled, with her blonde hair matted in blood, her right arm bound to her chest in a bed sheet, Lea Swift struck a less than a menacing pose. “Lea!” Guy appeared in the distance, more than seventy-five yards separated them. His Russian goons were dead. Guy had enough horse sense to know that if Lea appeared, his goons were dead. His driver fled after the first shots. Guy was alone, facing the one person in the entire world he least wanted to confront . . . next to that Nazi bastard, Lea Swift was the most dangerous person he knew. Guy was not a tough person; he was not a gunman or a thug. He understood business; he was a billionaire, a corporate financer. Guy hired people like Lea Swift, people to do his dirty work. Now he found himself confronted by his very creation, a consummate gunfighter, wounded, but still very dangerous. His .32 caliber AMT automatic felt very small and inadequate in his pocket, but it was all he had, and all that stood between himself and Lea Swift. His spirits were buoyed somewhat when he observed Lea’s arm bound close to her chest. “The bitch is wounded.” This gave him the only opening he needed. “Lea, we can talk this thing out. This was all a big misunderstanding, Boris, Ivan, those fucking Cossacks, language barrier. Thank God you’re all right!” Guy caught sight of the four brown-faced cracker children hiding in the shadows of the foyer. “Oh―Children, if it’s the children you’re worried about. We can take care of the children . . . education, housing, consider it done. I just need one little thing from you Lea . . . One of the children . . .” Guy saw the gun, a silver gun. Lea continued to advance. She raised her Grandfather’s pistol. “Lea! You don’t understand, we can work this out . . . the hospital, you said you wanted to go to the hospital.” Lea shot Guy Painter at seventy-five yards.

* * *

GRAVEL CRUNCHED UNDERNEATH LEA SWIFT’S FEET. She advanced towards the fallen Guy Painter. Guy lay writhing on the asphalt of the playground of the Henry B. Horner Projects. Shot through the knee, the pants of his 8000-dollar Amari suit was torn and bloodied. Just to be sure, Lea had not missed, she shot to maim. Guy struck a pathetic figure. Crumpled on the ground, his left leg twisted at such a grotesque angle. The .45 caliber bullet had pierced his kneecap and blow off his patella. Whether he would ever walk again was less open for speculation as to whether he would live ten more seconds. An angry Lea Swift continued to advance towards her fallen foe. Gun smoke curled from the silver pistol of her grandfather’s gun like an angry dragon. Lea stood over Guy. He was a spent and defeated man. The billionaire investment banker stared straight into bore of the .45 caliber silver pistol. “I should fucking kill you now, right where you are.” “Lea, please.” Guy said weakly. “Tell me now, muthafucker, tell me why I shouldn’t just fuck’n kill you? I fucking loved you. You were my best friend Guy.” “Lea, we can work this out, I’ll pay you . . .” “You fuck faced Irish prick!” Lea kicked Guy so hard in the ribs he rolled over and groaned. “You think I want your money? Your dirty money? That little girl back there, how the hell are you going to pay her back? You molested her, you abused her, you and your fuck-faced goons tried to suffocate her! No, you’re going to jail my friend. You’re going to sit a long time in Jackson with a soap-on-a-rope . . . kidnapping, drug running, international money laundering, not to mention murder for profit, murder for hire.” Lea signaled back toward to foyer. Shaila brought Lea’s combat webbing. Lea decided she liked Shaila―Note to self―in five more years, hire Shaila. “Cuff him, squeeze ‘em tight, make sure you hurt him.” It was then Guy made his move, the last move of a pathetic and defeated man. He reached for his pistol. His intent was to take the slim black girl hostage. Lea was ready for him, she anticipated his treachery. She already knew exactly how and where she was going to hurt him. Two more bullets, two more .45 caliber slugs tore into Guy’s body. Lea did not intend to give Guy the satisfaction of a martyr death. No, this was kneecapping of the first order. The first bullet shattered his jaw; the second took off the first three fingers of his right hand. Guy was alive; he was fucked-up, but still alive. “That ought to shut you up! Cuff him, Shaila, we’re done here.” It was Noah, Noah Washington who wrestled Guy to his feet and did the actual cuffing. “Mr. Forrest, he called me, he said you might be in some kind of trouble . . .” A lasting relief came over Lea’s face. “Take me home, Noah.” It was over.

EPILOGUE

ALL DURING THE LONG DRIVE BACK from the hospital, the city lights of Detroit sparkled in the night sky. Lea Swift lay curled up with her head cradled in Brad’s lap. Noah drove on, silently. Lea lay curled up on Brad’s lap. Was she a sleep? “Lea?” “Mmm?” “Lea Marie . . . did I ever tell you I loved you?” “Hundreds of times.” “Will you marry me?” Lea smiled coyly, “I love you too darling, after all, we do have a ready made family . . . can we go home now?” The four children slept in the back seat. Lea too fell fast asleep.

FIN