The Prey Bites Back: A Jesse Watson Mystery Book #8 (11 page)

“I’m sure they
already know
Preston
was there,” Jonathan said, looking over
at the clock on the wall. “If we know, they know. We need to find out if
Preston
is in custody.” He motioned to Shark, who turned and
walked outside.

“Where’s he
going?” I asked.

“He’s going to
check the status on
Preston
.”

“Where? In the
front yard?”

Jonathan chuckled,
Shark smiled. “No, Jesse. We have a rather sophisticated setup in the Hummer.
We can run a check on anyone, anywhere, in a matter of minutes.”

Less than five
minutes later, Shark returned. “They’re looking for him in connection with the
murder of Mae Bridges, but he hasn’t been picked up yet.”

“It’s your
call, Billy,” Jonathan said. “We’re here to protect and serve right?” He looked
over at Mom. “You might want to leave the room, Minnie, because I’m getting
ready to get down and dirty. You might not want to hear what I have in mind.”

“I can handle
anything you throw at me,” she replied with confidence. “I think I’ll stay. Gavin
Preston almost killed Jesse, so I’m pretty much in agreement with whatever you
want to do. I’m tired of bad guys trying to kill off my loved ones. So, fire
away.”

Jonathan looked
back at Billy. “Why don’t you let us go out and whack him? Save us a lot of
time and trouble.” He chuckled. “We’ll dispose of his body, and I guarantee you
his remains will never be found.”

“What remains?”
Shark jokingly asked. “We don’t leave anything behind.”

Shark had a
deep voice that carried a lot of force. He reminded me of a guy I’d seen in a
movie once. The only difference was that he didn’t have the bulging belly, and
he definitely wasn’t overweight. He was as strong as an ox.

Mom flinched
and said, “You mean, kill him?”

“That would be
my guess,” Helene said, adding to the conversation.

“We’d burn in
Hell!” Mom squealed. “We can’t just kill him in cold blood. I won’t be a part
of it. I say we turn our information over to the cops and let them take care of
the problem. The evidence is right here in black and white.” She looked at
Billy and then at Jonathan. “We’re not killers!” She shook her head in
disbelief. “Maybe I should’ve left the room when I was told to.”

“Oh don’t act
so surprised, Minnie,” Helene said. “What do you think these guys do? Use harsh
language? No. They terminate for a cause.”

“What the hell
does that mean, Helene?” Mom shot back, angrily.

You’d think
someone had just hit the pause button on real life, because everyone’s mouth
dropped opened and stayed that way. Well, except for the terminate-for-a-cause
guy. He was more baffled at our reaction than he was at Mom’s use of a curse
word. He didn’t get it. You see, my mother never, ever cussed. She hated the
use of foul language, so for her to come back with the h-word used in that way,
was a real shocker. It surely got our attention.

“I’m so sorry,”
Mom said, her tone remorseful. “I never talk like that, but sometimes you can’t
control what comes out of your mouth when you’re in shock.” She looked around
the room, going from one face to another. “If murder is what you have in mind,
I’m leaving now.” Billy started to say something, but she stopped him. “I’ll go
home, lock all my doors, and sleep with a gun, but I won’t stand by and watch
you commit murder. I’m sorry. I just can’t do it.” She looked at Jonathan. “I
know I said I’d go along with whatever you had in mind, but that didn’t include
murder.”

It was time for
some damage control, and we all knew it.

“Minnie,”
Jonathan said as he walked over to her and put his arm around her shoulders
ever so gently. “We’re guys. We talk trash. It’s just our way of getting
through a mission. We’re not going to kill anyone.” He looked at Shark who
immediately shook his head in agreement, and then he looked back at Mom. “We
kill for God and Country, no one else.”

Shark, the
scariest looking one in the bunch, went over to Mom and spoke softly in his
deep voice to her. “Don’t let Jonathan fool you, Minnie. May I call you
Minnie?” She shook her head submissively. “We’re just pussycats.” He slowly
reached out and took her hand in his. “We’re here to protect you. We know Gavin
Preston is a killer. He’s still out there and he’s a threat to your family as
long as he is. He tried to kill your daughter. Don’t you want us to get him off
the streets? We won’t bump him off. I swear to God.” He put his other hand to
his heart as if he was making a promise to the man upstairs.

What a sight to
see—Mom being consoled by the most unlikely person in the room—a big black guy
whose body was made of steel and had a name that conjured up images of being ripped
to shreds and then eaten alive. Shark… that should tell you something.

Jonathan’s
buddies weren’t the kind who tried to appease a person; they used brute force
instead. Yet, here was this guy, who could make you pee your pants just by
looking at you, calming Mom’s fears. It was at that point I realized Shark was a
man to be reckoned with. He could charm you and make you believe anything, but
underneath that façade was a killing machine. But don’t get me wrong. He’s one
of the good guys.

“I don’t want
anyone murdered,” Mom said to Shark. “I want us to solve this case without
killing anyone—unless it’s in self-defense—and I want those criminals behind
bars.”

“Then let us do
our job,” Shark pleaded. “We’ll be good boys, I promise. Don’t let anyone fool
you. We’re tough, but we’re not murderers. We’re lean, mean, fighting
machines.” He gave Mom a sheepish, beaming grin, showing a mouth full of pearly
whites.

“I’ve heard
that one before,” Mom snickered. “You’re not so tough after all, are you, Mr.
Shark? You guys were just pulling my leg. Shame on you! You scared me half to
death.”

“It’s just
Shark,” he said to her. “But you can call me anything you want, Minnie.”

“Shark is
fine,” she replied. “I like that name. Scary, but cool.”

Her fear that
we had all turned into murderous lunatics was now gone, thanks to the smooth-talking
ways of a roughneck called Shark. He’d won her over.

Mom pointed her
finger at Jonathan and admonished him. “Don’t you ever play a trick like that
on me again, Jonathan Blackhawk! I believed you!”

“All right,”
Billy said as he picked up the paperwork and slid it back into the folder.
“Here’s how it’s going to play out.”

We milled
around him, waiting for instructions. I knew that whatever he was about to say was
going to be sugar-coated for Mom’s benefit. She could play the role of private
investigator, but she’d only go so far.

Billy looked at
Jonathan and said, “The first thing we need to do is send someone to pick up
Eddie. I don’t like the idea that he’s laid up and by himself.”

Jonathan
motioned to Shark, knowing that Mom had warmed up to him, and said, “Is it okay
if Shark takes you, Minnie?”

“I’m ready.
Where’s my purse?”

After Mom and
her new buddy Shark left, we got down to the nitty-gritty.

“We’re not
turning any of this information over to the sheriff.” Billy looked at me. “It
proves we’re not on hiatus, and there’s the question of how we obtained it.” He
handed the file to Helene. “Would you mind putting this on my desk?”

Helene took the
folder and replied, “Sure, but when I get back I’m going to fix breakfast.
Y’all need to eat. Can’t kill someone on an empty stomach.” She walked away laughing
at herself, proud of coming up with such a smart, timely remark.

“I’m starving,”
Jonathan said. “Gotta eat something before I go out and kill someone.” Then he
winked at me.

“As if it would
hurt you to miss a meal,” Helene wisecracked from down the hall, and then broke
out in laughter. She yelled back, “I take that back. I need both my arms.”
After that one, she laughed so hard I thought she was going to choke.

We took a seat
at the table and sat down with the idea that Billy would continue discussing
his plan, but I had ideas of my own. I spoke up first.

“We know we’re
going after Gavin if the police don’t have him locked up already. We’ll torture
him in some secluded bunker, and then we might just put him out of his misery
if need be.”

“We’re not
going to kill him, Jesse,” Jonathan chuckled. “We’ll dump him off naked and
penniless in some third world country. He’ll never get back to the states.”

“That’s a
relief,” I said. “I’m all for putting as much distance between us and him as
possible. Dump him in
Afghanistan
for all I care. I would like to rough him
up a little first. You know—payback.”

“If this isn’t
a nice conversation to have at breakfast,” Helene said while placing steaming
cups of coffee in front of us. “Do I get to punch him a few times?”

“Wouldn’t it be
cheaper and quicker to just dump him off the top of a mountain?” I asked
Jonathan.

Helene walked
back to the kitchen. “Breakfast will be ready soon. Gotta feed these killers
before I lose a limb.”

Billy cracked
up first, and the rest of us followed.

We had just
finished breakfast when Athena and Thor barreled through the doggie door in the
laundry room, barking and snarling. When they reached the table, they stopped,
sniffed the air, and then went to the front door and sat down. Thor whimpered.
Athena started howling like a wolf.

“I was
wondering where you guys were, but now I wish you had stayed there. What’s
wrong with you two?” I had to yell to drown them out. “Stop it!”

They ignored me
until the house phone rang. They stopped barking and sat staunch, their eyes
glued to it.

“Thank you,” I
said to them as I got up to answer the call. “It’s a little hard to talk above
that racket.” I picked up the portable phone and before I could say anything, I
heard Mom’s voice in the background, crying and screaming. My heart skipped a
beat. “Mom! Mom!” I yelled. Panic was strangling me. “Are you all right? Mom! Someone
answer me!”

Finally, Shark spoke
into the phone. “This is Shark, Jesse. Eddie’s been attacked, but he’s going to
be okay. Your mom isn’t taking it well. She’s a little upset at the moment.”

“I can tell.
She keeps screaming something about killing someone. Is she talking about Gavin
Preston? Has he been there? Did he beat up Eddie? That son-of-a…”

“I need to talk
to Jonathan,” Shark demanded. “Put him on the phone… please.”

Mom kept screaming
in the background, “Kill him! Kill him! Shark, you have to stop him! I want
that man dead! Kill him!”

Shark tried to
calm her down, but it wasn’t working. She was outraged.

I knew exactly
what had happened and what she wanted. She wanted Gavin Preston dead. Anger can
change everything. Now she was the one who wanted revenge.

Chapter 7

Eddie had been watching TV,
his leg propped up with a pillow, a glass of iced tea in his hand, when he heard
someone at the back door. He figured it was Mom, so he didn’t try to get up.
When he finally turned around to look, the man was standing there with his hand
raised. He cold-cocked Eddie up side the head, dragged him from the chair, and
pinned him to the floor.

Eddie’s in his late
sixties, served his country for four years in the Army, and after that went on
to serve citizens as a police officer. He retired several years ago and now
spends his time serving my mother. At least that’s what he tells people when
they ask what he used to do for a living. He’s not a large man. Age does that
to a person. He’s about five-eight and weighs around a hundred seventy pounds,
almost the same as my mother, except she’s a few inches shorter, weighing in at
about one-fifty. Since neither one has size and strength going for them, they
have to rely on their wits and the 9MM Billy had provided for each of them. Neither
weapon was close by when Eddie was attacked.

The intruder knocked
Eddie around, but didn’t batter him as badly as he could have. He wanted this
beating to be a lesson to the rest of us. He told Eddie to call off the dogs,
or next time, he’d kill him and his busybody old lady. It happened so fast, the
only thing Eddie could remember about the man was that he was big with awful
breath and evil eyes.

Mom was angrier
than I’d ever seen. She kept saying that if they had arrived twenty minutes
sooner, they would’ve caught the man in the act. Instead, they got there just
as Eddie was being loaded into the ambulance. It seems the guy dialed
9-1-1
and then tossed the phone on the floor next to Eddie and said,
“Better get help before you die of old age.” Mighty nice of him.

Our crew congregated
in the hospital waiting area, quietly discussing our next move. Shark and Mom
were with Eddie, the kids were safe—that’s the first call Billy made when we
found out about Eddie’s attack—and Gavin Preston was still out there, most
likely planning how much more damage he could inflict upon us.