No Justice
by Darcia Helle
Copyright © Darcia Helle 2008
Revised 2010
www.QuietFuryBooks.com
[email protected] This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the author’s written consent.
No Justice is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely accidental.
This ebook contains bonus material! At the end, you will find:
Interview with Darcia Helle
The Story Behind The Story of No Justice
Excerpt from Beyond Salvation (A Michael Sykora Novel) by Darcia Helle
Short Story from Love and Loyalty (and other tales) by Maria Savva
Excerpt from Trevor's Song by Susan Helene Gottfried
For my husband and best friend, Michael:
Thank you for the inspiration.
Every now and then a person is lucky enough to cross paths with someone that is at once a perfect fit. For me, you are that person.
Chapter 1
Let him laugh. One more hour and he’d be dead.
Michael Sykora put the binoculars down on the empty passenger seat. The man he’d soon be killing went by the name Alan Nystrom, an alias, of which he had three others. His real name, the one he hadn’t used in over 20 years, was Bruce Renwick.
More laughter. Good to know that Renwick was enjoying his last day. Soaking up the sun on the golf course, making jokes with his buddies. Would Renwick, if given the choice, pick golf as his last hurrah? Doubtful, though the choices people made often baffled him.
Michael was being paid $40,000 to dispose of Bruce Renwick. Twenty of that had already been deposited into his offshore account. The other half would be received upon completion. His price had been a little higher for this job since the client had chosen the method of death. An indulgence Michael had allowed this time. Though after what he’d found while rummaging through Renwick’s home last night, Michael would gladly take this trash out for free.
Calling Renwick an animal would be a grave insult to the non-human world. Renwick was a pedophile. A predator of the lowest sort. The last child he’d raped, an 11-year-old boy, had hung himself afterward because the shame and trauma had been unbearable. That boy had not been Renwick’s first victim. He would, however, be the last.
The next day Michael had been contacted. The boy’s father did not want Renwick given the chance to walk away. Not ever. He had to be wiped off the earth before the police finished their investigation. That call had come five days ago. Michael had inside information that a warrant would be issued for Renwick’s arrest tomorrow morning.
Renwick would be dead this afternoon.
***
Bruce Renwick, as Alan Nystrom, strode confidently toward the clubhouse. The man had an odd stoop, like he was training to be the hunchback in a play or something. His hair was that shade of brown that women called mousy and his eyes were covered by small round glasses reminiscent of John Lennon. He wore tan shorts and one of those polo shirts in blue. To all the world he appeared as a harmless geek.
The locked metal storage unit in his garage had told a different story. Michael had checked. He liked to be sure before he killed. Death wasn’t something he could take back. The pictures had confirmed more than he’d needed to know. Renwick would not be a mistake.
Michael set his binoculars on the seat beside him and did his best to stretch in the cramped car. He’d been sitting in this parking space for 11 minutes, having moved once Renwick had finished the 18th hole. Now he had a perfect view of the clubhouse, as well as Renwick’s silver Saab.
The clock continued to tick on Renwick’s life.
Eighteen more minutes passed. Then Bruce Renwick, golf bag slung over his shoulder, emerged from the clubhouse. One of his golf buddies walked beside him. They headed toward the parking lot.
The other man, a 40-something balding executive type, parted company with Renwick as they moved toward their respective cars. Michael turned the key in his ignition. He pushed the gear into reverse, kept his foot on the brake.
The executive climbed into his car. A bright yellow Volkswagen. He tooted once, then pulled out. Renwick lifted his hand in a wave as he kept walking. Fortunately for Michael’s purpose, Renwick liked to park his Saab in the back of the lot, far from everyone. He was also one of those guys who parked diagonally across three spaces at the grocery store so that no one would ding his car when opening his or her door.
Michael glanced around him. The strip mall had been fairly busy this morning. Right now, however, he was alone. No one had parked close to him. No one was outside. The timing couldn’t have been better. He tucked the binoculars under his seat. He would no longer need them.
His heart sped up. Just a slight increase but enough for him to notice. His breathing remained even. He watched.
Bruce Renwick held his key chain. He pressed the button on his remote to unlock his doors. The alarm chirped off. Then the trunk popped open. He slid the golf clubs off his shoulder and placed the bag inside the trunk. Then he pushed the trunk lid closed.
Back around to the driver’s side. Renwick reached out, gripped the door handle and pulled. A grimace, probably from the heat inside the car. He smoothed his hair back, adjusted his glasses, then slid inside.
Michael eased his foot from the brake. Renwick yanked his door closed. A moment passed. The engine caught. Then a deafening blast that shook the pavement. The vibration reverberated through Michael’s hands as he gripped the steering wheel. Thick smoke, orange flames. Bits of metal rained down around the blaze that had once been Renwick and his car.
Screams from the golf course. Michael calmly backed out of his parking slot. No one looked his way. The billows of smoke were far more entertaining.
Once out on the main street, Michael took his cell phone from his pocket. Not his usual phone but the disposable one with the prepaid card. The boy’s father had one just like it. Michael dialed his number. When the father picked up, Michael said, “It’s done.”
The squeal of young children playing sifted into the silence through the connection. The father had taken his advice, making sure he had a solid alibi. Yesterday he and his wife had driven up to Georgia to stay with family. They had told police that they needed to get away from their house and the memories. No one could blame them. Their son had hung himself in their garage.
Now the father said, “Good. Thank you.” A pause, then, “How did it go?”
His voice had that gravelly quality that came from too many cigarettes and sleepless nights. There was also something sadly robotic in the way he pronounced his words. Michael had killed the monster but he could never bring the child back. The man and his wife would never be okay.
Michael said, “You don’t want details. It’s better that way.”
The client hadn’t been after the usual vengeance of extreme pain and suffering. He’d wanted Renwick’s body ripped apart. Shredded, was how the client had put it. He’d wanted to be sure there was nothing left for Renwick’s family to mourn over.
Michael would have liked to give the man the details. He deserved that much. But he’d explained from the start, knowing too many details wasn’t a smart idea. The cops would inevitably question him. After all, Renwick had raped his son. Caused his suicide. Therefore, the less detail he was sure of, the easier it would be to lie.
“Right,” the father said. He cleared his throat, probably wiped away tears. Then, “The balance will be taken care of today.”
From the client’s offshore ac
count to Michael’s. No paper trail for the police to trace. “Thank you,” Michael said.
Sirens wailed in the distance. Michael said, “I’m sorry. I hope you find peace.” Then he flipped the phone shut and rode the rest of the way in silence.
Chapter 2
The police claimed to be looking for the person or people responsible for Bruce Renwick’s murder. After all, murder was a crime, even when the victim was a child molester. But in reality the only person saddened by Renwick’s murder was his mother, who now had reporters camping outside her front door. Rumor was she’d locked herself inside with a few bottles of cheap vodka. The police had no leads, no suspects, and no real interest. Justice had, in fact, been served.
That was the gossip coming from the Fifth Precinct. Michael scoffed at the part about justice. The score might have been evened on some bizarre playing ground. However, justice did not exist. No matter how many pedophiles and rapists he killed, he could never give the victims back their lives. He could never stop the ache the families carried with them.
An eye for an eye and all that. His only true accomplishment was in removing another predator from the earth. Saving a few lives from future destruction. Maybe that was enough.
People sometimes told him it would all make sense in the end. Like complete clarity came at the moment of death. He didn’t believe that. How could you see children dying and women being raped, then say it’s all part of some grand design? A master plan handed to us at birth. No, none of this would ever make sense.
Michael pushed a strand of blond hair off his forehead. Five days ago he had celebrated his 34th birthday by blowing up a car, along with a human being. If people knew that about him, would they see him the way they saw Bruce Renwick? A man to be despised? Feared? Put away in a cage and forgotten about?
He wondered about that with a vague sort of detachment. What most people thought of him meant nothing. He valued their opinion about as much as he valued dog shit on the bottom of his shoe. Scrape it off and go on your way.
Ruby nudged his office door open and poked her head inside. She had skin the color of cocoa and a body that had stored too many donuts. And he loved her the way he imagined that most people loved their mothers.
Ruby’s eyes always danced with delight, as if she was privy to a magical secret. Looking at her, you just had to smile. And he did that now as he said, “Hi Ruby.”
“Well?” she said.
“Well?” he said back.
She moved into the room and planted her fists on oversized hips. “Michael Sykora, don’t you be giving me no lip.”
He tried to bite back his growing smile. “Wouldn’t dream of it,” he said.
“A good looking guy like you ain’t got no business being single,” she said. “You sit here holed up in this office like the world would tilt wrong if you weren’t looking.”
“I go out.”
She wagged a finger at him. “Business trips, business meetings. They don’t count. When’s the last time you had dinner with a lady that made butterflies flutter around your stomach?”
Michael didn’t have to think about that. The answer was two years, three months, and five days ago. The last time he’d seen Christina alive. She’d been brutally murdered that night. And his world had turned on its axis.
“You promised you’d quit early tonight,” Ruby continued. “Call Isaac. Go out and have some fun.”
Of all the people in the world, Ruby was one of the few whose opinion of him did matter. He wished he could be honest, tell her what he did during his so-called business meetings and business trips. Oddly enough, she’d probably understand. Two years ago, on that same night he’d lost his fiancé, Ruby had lost her pregnant daughter-in-law. Isaac, her son, had lost his wife and unborn child. Therefore Ruby understood the need for retaining balance in this world.
Michael shook those thoughts off. He said, “I’ll call him.”
“His shift ended at four,” she said. “He’s home now.”
“Okay, I get it. I’ll call him this minute.”
Ruby winked and said, “About time you got some sense about you.”
***
Michael sipped his beer while Isaac lined up his shot. The pool balls smacked together and number four sank into the left corner pocket. “Got you now,” Isaac said.
Purple Rain played on the worn jukebox. Three men still in their work uniforms sat at the bar, their voices rising with each beer they drank. Two young women dressed for attention giggled in a nearby booth. And one lone old man sat on his usual barstool examining his whiskey.
They had reached that hour between the daytime drunks and nighttime partiers. A hodgepodge of faces preparing for their weekend. Some looking forward to it, some dreading it. And for others like himself, a mixture of both.
While lining up his next shot, Isaac said, “My mother made you call.”
“She didn’t make me,” Michael replied.
Isaac gave Michael a look that said he knew better. “She’s worried about you.”
“I know. No reason for it, though.”
Isaac tried the shot, missed, muttered, “Damn ball.”
Michael finished his beer and set the empty bottle on a nearby table. He said, “How are things with you and Nadine?”
Isaac grinned, causing the dimple on his left cheek to sink deeper. “Good,” he said. “Great, actually.” He shook his head, turned away and took a long swig of beer. Then, his voice softer, he said, “I think I’m finally getting over the guilt. You know?”
“Gwen would have wanted you to live your life,” Michael replied. “And to be happy.”
“Yeah. It’s hard, though. You know that. But Nadine, she does make me happy.”
Michael lined up his shot. He said, “That’s pretty obvious. And I’m glad. I like Nadine.”
“What about you? You ever plan to move on?”
Michael snapped the pool cue through his fingers. The 12 ball spun its way into the side pocket. “You’re starting to sound like your mother,” he said.
“That’s not an answer. And insulting me won’t make me shut up.”
“I have moved on.”
“Did I miss it?”
Michael got into position for his next shot. One of the women at the table across from them, a 20-something brunette exposing enough cleavage for Playboy, winked at him. He dropped his gaze to the table. “I’m busy,” he said. “I’ve got my business.”
“Yeah, yeah. Designing software. Great career. That going to be your entire existence?”
The other woman got up and sauntered toward the jukebox. She oozed sexual tension. Michael focused on the pool balls. He took a shot, sank it, said, “I date.”
“Beyond one-nighters?”
“Occasionally.” A rap song Michael couldn’t identify blasted from the jukebox. He glanced at his friend of nearly 30 years and wished, not for the first time, that he could be honest. But it wasn’t like he could go telling a cop that he killed people as a side job and that it had begun consuming his time. And his life. Best friends or not, that wasn’t something a guy did.
“You want another beer?” Isaac asked.
“I can’t get past it,” Michael said.
“Been two years.”
“Christina was my world. I just can’t connect to another woman the same way.”
“And you never will,” Isaac said. “It’ll be different. But that doesn’t mean it won’t be as good.”
“Yeah…”
“Aren’t you the one who just told me that Gwen would’ve wanted me to go on with my life? Be happy? Christina would’ve wanted the same for you.”
“Don’t be using my words against me.”
“Then maybe you ought to start taking your own advice,” Isaac said.
“I’ll take that beer now.”
Isaac rubbed the stubble of black hair on his head. “Don’t be cheating while I’m gone.”
“Are you kidding?” Michael said. He poked Isaac playfully with th
e pool stick. “I put you to shame as it is!”
Isaac flipped his middle finger in the air as he strode to the bar. Michael turned away, closed his eyes, and wished the world could make sense for just one brief moment.
Chapter 3
Another week had crawled to an end. Fridays brought a melancholy, sometimes gloomy mood. Fridays reminded Michael that the weekend stretched out ahead of him. Days with too many empty hours to fill.
Two years was a long time to still be wallowing in the loss. But it wasn’t like he was grieving. The pain had receded, as had the memory of Christina’s face, her laugh, her voice, her scent. All that was distant now. What remained, hovering just beneath the surface, was the emptiness.
At first it had bothered him that he couldn’t feel anything deeply anymore. He couldn’t seem to care. But over the past few months he’d let the emptiness take over, deciding he wasn’t meant to love anyone else. Spoken aloud that would sound tragic, like a Shakespearean play. And that was funny since Michael didn’t necessarily believe in the concept of soul mates or one true love. All he knew was that the loss had left him hollow and he couldn’t seem to fill the void.
So now he sat staring at his computer screen and the program he’d been working on all morning. A silly game for young children, designed to help teach them to read. Instead of working on the graphics, he was thinking about being called “dad” and whether he’d ever hear a child utter that word to him.
Ruby popped open his office door. She wore a bright yellow sleeveless dress that rode just above her fleshy knees. No doubt the designer had intended the dress to be worn by the enviable tall, thin blonde. The fact that Ruby was short, heavy, and black didn’t faze her in the least. That happened to be one of her most endearing qualities.
“Lunch time!” Ruby announced.
“You go ahead,” Michael said. “I’ve got to work the kinks out of this program.”
She folded her arms across her ample breasts and drilled her maternal eyes into him. “You been at it more than four hours already. Even geniuses need a break, you know.”
“I know, Ruby. But I’d like to finish this today. Besides, I’ve got the entire weekend to rest my incredible brain.”