The Liberty Bomb

The Liberty Bomb

Copyright By Gary L Morton, 2017

Published at Smashwords by Gary L Morton

Category: Action, Mystery, Suspense, Detective Novel

Length: 100,000 words

*About this Book: Private investigator Joe Holiday follows a dangerous case involving a mix of Islamic terrorists, Satanists and intelligence agencies. The novel is a suspense novel with a comedic aspect.

Table of Contents:

Part One: Terrorists Come to Town

Part Two: The Drone Hit

Part Three: Terrorists on the Job

Part Four: The Factory

Part Five: Surveillance

Part Six: Shopping the Bomb

Part Seven: Betrayal

Part Eight: The Delivery Men

Part Nine: The Big Bang

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Part One: Terrorists Come to Town

A hazy fall afternoon surfaced. It was gray and anonymous. The city felt like a safe space, but one that would deflate as soon as something rude arrived to disturb the stagnant air.

On the waterfront, Joe Holiday walked out of the Amsterdam Brew House and went for a stroll along the damp boardwalk. His woman, Josie, had left on a plane earlier in the day so his thoughts were of the long boring days ahead. He would be indoors and absorbed in investigative work most of that time. Halting, he looked out at the lake for a while and thought it over. The sound of a cell phone and the heavy footsteps of another man ended the peace so Joe left the railing and walked away.

The cell phone rang with a shrill penetrating tone, much unlike the soft and slimy voice of the big man that answered it. This was the voice of a man that always had spittle on his lips, and a thick tongue that slowed the words.

The call was encrypted and from Saudi Arabia. The caller spoke in quick words and in English. His accent was barely detectable. Andras, you didn’t get the men past the interview stage. I don’t think it matters.

It matters to me, Bilal. It would be much better that way, doing things the easy way and avoiding the rough stuff.

Listen, Andras. We wanted your company inside, but it isn’t necessary if you succeed with the others.

True. They bought the resumes but there is a roadblock. The phone interviews went well. So did the interview with the personnel director. He is a man that likes to be called by his first name, Johan. He told our three men he was hiring them but something went wrong. Someone blocked him. We heard that the company has an investigator, checking people out. Someone private they use for background checks. I will get the name. We need this guy out of the way to get inside clean.

Okay, but you said you cracked into the company files. Personnel files and some other vital documents weren’t present. That means you’ll have to grab that personnel director. He keeps the personnel files somewhere, vaulted in electronic storage or somewhere in the cloud. So once you have that Johan fellow, then you use his access to make any needed changes to those files. You can also get the name of the investigator.

Yeah, everyone is getting smarter these days. Corporations expect hackers and have security workarounds so that all you get is useless information. If I take this personnel director, it can’t be messy. We do not want to arouse suspicion. I’ll give you an update before I erase him. However, that won’t likely be necessary for a while. I have ways of making people cooperate. Using him would be a plus. The story is different with the investigator, whoever it is. That person registers as way too smart. I’ll make him disappear. If it turns out to be a woman, we’ll have some fun doing it. But I’m almost certain it is a man. Perhaps we’ll find an inventive way to off him. Something that will confuse the police. We’ve used that strategy before and it works better than simply disappearing someone. The police always dig on disappearances, but not on strange cases they can’t comprehend.

We have some lovely ladies that will arrive soon to join the men. They are part of the cover, too. You’ll receive a text on it soon.

I want to clear up this small problem before dealing with that.

Okay. Get on it. Send in an estimate on the expenses. Money isn’t a problem. We are going to punish Canada for daring to meddle in Arab affairs. We promised it and it will be done. Do this right and you’ll be very rich.

Andras clicked off his cell phone and ended the connection with the Saudi. He used the name Bilal, a cover identity. Andras wondered who he really was … maybe someone high up in the Saudi elite. This person had organized and funded successful missions in the past. Unfortunately, for him, this one would be successful in a way he would never expect. He decided to head home and do some planning. The other operations had been in the USA but this one was right at home. To protect the end game he would have to be more careful.

+++

Andras looked around the bunker, and he meant to sigh, but it came out as a wheeze followed by a cough. He’d been feeling great and now the damn lung condition had to return with maximum irritation. Another thing that irritated him was the painting of Hitler on the wall across from him. It reminded him of his past and the senseless violence of it. Back then, he’d been a bit like a brown-shirt thug though not right wing or a Nazi type. Nowadays he had goals and as a Luciferian, a larger vision motivated him. The Nazi setup of the room was temporary, just to fool some terrorist guests. They were Muslims, extremists. He despised them. They made the most brutal Nazis look civilized in comparison. The mere thought of them turned his stomach, but there would be pleasure in deceiving then destroying them. A faint smile came to his lips. He took a big slug of beer and shouted for his right hand man. The spray of spittle gave Hitler a wash.

A tall man came through the curtain and sat quietly beside Andras. His features were classic Arab and complimented his modern style of dress, neat haircut and whisker shadow. Andras, do you have to call me Jalal all the time? I’ve been called Jay since I was a kid.

It’s for the benefit of our guests. Don’t forget that your role is in being a cultural bridge between them and us. They see Jalal, a man with the similar extremist beliefs as them. They must continue to believe your Western look is merely a disguise. You’ve done an excellent job so far. I worry more that they will see through me.

No way. They haven’t seen through you. You disgust them but they have respect for you because they think you hate this society just as they do. They definitely believe you are an honest sponsor who thinks he somehow benefits from terrorism. Don’t be offended, but sometimes you even convince me that you are a right wing Nazi kook.

Andras chuckled. By the way, what in the fuck are their names again?

Their names are Shahlah, Mahir and Muhab.

Stupid fucking names. What about the big white one with the red hair? How does he get a name like Dahir?

You mean Mahir. He’s really Randy White. He converted to Islam a dozen years ago and he’s a veteran of terrorist wars. He’s been over there so long he’s more Muslim than some of the natives. Long slow torture and street combat are his specialties.

Ah, and he somehow missed his trip to the Muslim Valhalla.

He won’t be missing it this time.

True enough. Okay. Turn him back into Randy White. I remember now. That is the Western name on the doctored papers our government contact created. Shave that stupid red ring beard off him and change his clothes. He’s not to wear that ridiculous Muslim cap anymore. And get some clothes for them.

Sure, I was getting to that anyway. I did get them clothes for the job interview but they changed back out of them. I’ll tell them we are underway. They use their Western names and Western dress only from now on.

They seem sloppy. They’re supposed to be pros.

Jalal laughed. I’ve been having a great time since they came. I know how they think. I used to be Muslim, remember? I have also met their type before. They all look sloppy, but they get the job done.

Make sure they don’t find out you are a backsliding Muslim or they might slit your throat.

Just so you know; they believe that they are inherently superior to you, and that they are manipulating you for the cause. They think about the same of me, as I am not a veteran of terrorist wars. I would have said I was but didn’t want to be caught up in lies. They have ways of checking.

Don’t overrate them. They are three saps. They’ll find out the hard way about our superiority.

Sure. So let me get back to them and clean them up. One more thing. This invisible Canadian government contact. The Saudi provided it, but I don’t like it. They cleared the men brought in, established IDs for them here. But we’ve never seen this guy. It must be someone powerful inside the security establishment, and those types of people can’t be trusted.

Andras nodded. Our friend Bilal told me not to worry about that. Their man on the inside here is interested in money only. Perhaps we should drink to fools and their money.

The two men tapped their beer bottles together for a toast. Let’s toast to something better. To the Fatherland, Jalal said. On second thought, make that the Fatherland and Allah, as both are serving our purposes.

+++

A thundercloud broke and rain pounded the junkyard. Johan woke listening to it drum on tin and wood. He heard hard slaps like wet canvass continuously hitting the outside wall. Wet scrub scratched against the tiny slit window. A tree branch cracked in the wind, then a door slammed. Johan tensed. He didn’t want his kidnapper to return. Given some time, he might figure out a way to escape. But he doubted it. He felt weak. He was about as far from being an action hero as a man could get. The idea that came to his mind was victim. Soft and easy and his captor despised him because of it. He’d seen it in his eyes, the look of a strange observer, owlish all-seeing weirdness.

The memory of those eyes startled him as much as the rattling rain outside. They were dark eyes filled with unrestrained moodiness. This sort of man might decide to do anything that popped up from the vast expanse of evil ideas filling his head. Johan hadn’t seen the man’s face because of the ski mask, but he could picture it; apish and brutal, belonging to a member of some warped branch of humanity that was morally defective yet owning malignant intelligence.

The lighting flashes at the narrow window stung his bloodshot eyes. His head ached with pressure and a feeling of being squeezed that the humidity worsened. In the first minute, he had remembered his captor but failed recall key details of own identity. That was bad, and when the pressure eased and he did remember, it made it worse.

Johan knew this place was a junkyard. He’d gotten a brief glimpse of it while being dragged from the pickup. It had been warm and dry then, no rain or sign of it. So he’d been out cold for while. Waking, being alive was unexpected; he’d been sure the man would finish him. What he didn’t know was why the man had kidnapped him. It didn’t add up. He had a soft job as personnel director for a large demolition firm. It had always been possible that someone would come after him, but it would be someone he knew. Someone he had fired. Someone the company had declared obsolete. Someone with nothing left but rage. There had been many angry people, but they hadn’t returned with anything other than lawyers. Sometimes they found other high paying work, but they usually followed a downward spiral that included booze, drugs and defeat.

He didn’t know this man. He was certain he’d never met him. He was not the sort that would be one of their employees. This man had been wearing a ski mask but no disguise could hide the things that made him distinct; the twisted mouth that the mask had failed to hide, the limp, the deformed left arm and his incredible brute strength. Johan screened people like him out, unless they got in as the janitor or something. Perhaps he’d met another employer’s requirements, an employer that wanted a hit man. It was common in the movies and in books, but it likely didn’t happen in real life. Thinking it over didn’t make him happy. It looked too easy for someone to make him disappear. And he knew the company brass. They’d rather see him buried and forgotten than get bad publicity in the news. He didn’t trust cops either. They’d probably pull the spike out of his head and say he died of a coronary. Who’d want to spend money pursuing the killer of some obese white guy with a heart condition? He knew he wouldn’t. He’d done rotten things himself to save money for the company. The most usual thing was to terminate people at the top of the pay scale, if they weren’t invaluable.

It had all arrived unexpectedly, beginning at the DQ Grill & Chill, which was about the safest place on earth to be … located on the highway just inside the city, on a long neon-bright strip lined with junk-food joints. There were gang and criminal neighborhoods but they were to the north and the west. Too many fat cops pulled into the DQ for criminals to see it as a stomping ground. The food strip was beside a neighborhood where people earned enough to get fat and lazy and then die of a coronary. If they saw men in ski masks, it was dead cold outside or a dream or a movie. And unfortunately, for Johan, he hadn’t noticed the man in the mask until it was too late.

He had been sitting inside under nuclear-bright florescent lights, eating a bacon-cheeseburger with fries and a chocolate-extreme blizzard cake. It was a meal made so tasty by salt, sugar and fat that the guilt about breaking his diet faded with the first bite. The only reason he noticed the battered old pickup pull in was that he’d been looking that way, glaring with disapproval at a black woman that glittered with five pounds of junk jewelry, and shook fifty pounds of jiggle as she tried to quiet her screaming brat child. I’ll never look that bad, he had been thinking, giving his belly a pat, and then he noticed the pickup pull in over by the closed-off patio, parking out by the road when there were spots right near the entrance. The back of it was loaded with improperly secured junk and the vehicle looked in bad need of a safety check. The soot on it doubled for a paint job. He couldn’t see the driver, just a shadow beyond the dirty windshield, and he didn’t get out. Since there was a white trash neighborhood not too far off, Johan figured the driver would be from it. Maybe he’d just pulled into the lot to doze for a while. He didn’t have to see him and he forgot about him as he focused on his meal.

Now, with a battered head, he realized how stupid he had been. The creep had obviously tailed him, watched him, and he hadn’t suspected a thing. He remembered stepping out of the DQ due to urgency as the meal went down fast but not well. Just outside he stepped left and released a bomb of a fart followed by a balloon-bursting burp. Then his face reddened as he realized the black lady and her kid had stepped out behind him. He heard her cursing at him but he didn’t look back as he walked to his Cadillac Escalade.

It wasn’t warm out but being overweight and on blood-pressure medication that raised his body temperature caused to him sweat even in the fall. With the gas attack, he would leave all the windows open to spare the vehicle the torment of his body odors. At the car, he stopped and looked around. There was nothing to see except other fast-food places in the long highway lake of neon glare. The new Five Guys Burgers & Fries was picking up business and Church's Chicken and Steak’n Shake were absolutely killing the Golden Arches. He loved this neighborhood, but the night view was actually better from the Arches because he could see up and down the strip. Dunkin' Donuts, his favorite place, was across the road. The only residential part of the area he could actually see was the peak of a lonely house poking over the high wall running along the back of the DQ. But that didn’t change his opinion. He knew the suburban houses were in there, and that the people that lived in them weren’t the type that frowned at well-off white guys driving giant Cadillac SUVs.

He noticed the dusty pickup still parked there and wished the cops would pull in and chase the guy off. One of the great things about the strip was that there were no downtown panhandlers or street trash. But there were still trash people with money to buy junked vehicles. They were the mobile ones, the smarter ones. Even filth had its higher levels.

After starting the car, he noticed that he was low on fuel. Unfortunately, the vehicle was like its owner and had an appetite like Godzilla. Though Johan drove the priciest car, he fueled it at the cheapest guzzle place. The beast didn’t work well on anything other than premium and he didn’t need an app on his phone to know Joey Joy’s Petro Station always had the lowest price. That meant a trip slightly out of the neighborhood. He got well off the strip and followed a line of cars past the bungalows on Havelock before taking a left down Passmore Road. That took him past the edge of the white trash area and into the fuel station.

Joey Joy’s wasn’t the classiest gas station. Out on the highways they had monster stations that looked new and luxurious. Joey’s looked more like he had made his own signage. Because he had some way of keeping prices lower, he drew enough big rigs off the highway to leave Passmore with potholes the size of craters, and combined with the bright yellow bug lights, that he used even in winter when there were no bugs, it was like pulling into a station on the moon. None of this bothered Johan. The big vehicle could handle rough roads with ease. It certainly wasn’t a Smart Car or like the rattling pickup behind him.

The sight of the pickup jolted him, as did a grinding pothole and he swerved in and nearly hit the pumps. Totally pissed, he decided to let the attendant serve him while he glanced over at the pickup. It had pulled over by the repair garage at the back with its nose sticking out so that was all he could see. He couldn’t see the occupant, just the dark shadow of a man behind the windshield. Johan scratched his head. Is that guy following me? he wondered. Naw, it can’t be. Just coincidence, maybe. Maybe it was the meal or that his mind was unable to register anything out of the ordinary, but he still let it pass, shrugging it off as nothing.

Johan tipped the attendant and had him dash in and grab him a pack of Kings. That took a long minute. As he waited, something buzzed through the air above his windshield. His eyes followed it and he leaned over to the passenger side. Huh, he sputtered. The thing was one of them drones. He’d seen them on TV but never around his neighborhood. He watched as the drone drifted around the side and landed in the back of the pickup, among junk.

For Christ sake, he said.

Pardon me, said the boyish attendant. He held out the pack of Kings.

Did you see that drone?

Yup.

Who is that man in the pickup? Why is he flying a drone?

The attendant looked over. Don’t know who he is. I’ll deal with him in a minute.

He gives you any trouble, call the police. I know his type, all no good.

As Johan pulled out, a big rattling rig came in. The attendant marched toward the pickup, but Johan’s view was cut off. Be nice to get a look at that man in the pickup, he thought. But getting back home was a bigger thought so he horse-backed the Caddy through some killer potholes and headed for the shortcut down Everson Ave. He was a block down it before he noticed the upcoming traffic jam. Lights flashed from a police car and roadblock at an accident scene ahead. Johan needed to swing around and get free. He would have to back up because he’d rolled too close to the Nissan ahead of him while looking on to the accident. The Caddy rocked from a hard brake; he checked the mirror just as a huge Chrysler did exactly the same thing to him, nearly hitting his rear bumper.

Johan bellowed out the window. Get off my ass, tailgater! And he was in luck. The driver was a birdlike old woman, and she quickly reversed and gave him room. As soon as Johan had backed off the Nissan’s tail, he did a nasty turnaround of the sort where one drives right over the sidewalk. He turned on the front lawn of a house, and hit the horn so a group of kids coming up the sidewalk would get out of the way so he could get back on the road.

After narrowly avoiding a collision with a newspaper box, Johan escaped the scene and was soon breathing easy on Clarke Road. He breezed through a kilometer of dilapidated houses and stores before hitting a dark tract with closed industrial complexes on both sides of the road. He found it amazing the way the city could locate hidden pockets of rust belt amid mostly wealthy areas. But Clarke was okay as it was a shortcut. People weren’t coming here, they were escaping the area or being stamped obsolete as the jobs went to China and wouldn’t be coming back. He figured a final phase of decay was necessary before refurbishment. It always happened that way. And he was still figuring that when a drone buzzed his windshield.

Johan swerved out in the other lane and was lucky that nothing was oncoming. The drone dipped in front of him again but he held steady, checked the mirror and spotted the pickup behind him. Johan flipped his cell phone into the dash holder. It was just a matter of getting the guy’s plate number and a description of him, if that was possible, and calling it in to the police. Things were working out. He got a partial plate right away, and then the drone distracted him as it flew right in front of the windshield. It hung there for a moment then it dropped something it had been carrying – a paint bomb that immediately obscured his vision and caused him to swerve off the road. Luck was with him initially as he hit the drive-in to one of the derelict warehouse complexes, then it turned against him as he went off the edge into a weed-filled ditch. Gravel, earth and scrub scuffed the left headlight and fender as he came to a sudden stop.

The airbag didn’t’ deploy, but the long scrape had definitely done solid damage to the car. Enough to take Johan’s road rage to the max. The Cadillac was on a tilt. He managed to open the door, squeeze out and rush to the top of the ditch. He figured that the pickup had fled and he’d be stuck raging at the darkness. But it was there. It had pulled over quick, and the sight of it caused him to throw his fists in the air. ‘Motherfucker!’ he shouted as he charged forward. As fast as he did that a man emerged from the vehicle and Johan saw a ski mask, a crooked arm, and the iron bar that hit him and put him out cold.

+++

The rain continued to pour. Johan’s head hurt. He felt a raw goose egg on the left side and a big scab of congealed blood and matted hair. He wondered if the bastard had wanted the Cadillac. He could see through a tiny sliver of cracked glass. Rain danced in a junkyard. This place was a shack and even the window was mostly boarded over and covered with tin. He wasn’t bound but he was unsteady on his feet. He got to the door and tried it. Locked but with some play. He could tell by the feel that a solid bolt held it from the outside. All trying to get through the window or door would do was make nasty noise and alert the man.

If this was about the car, the kidnapper was probably going to kill him. It would be the best way of making sure he didn’t go to the police, and the man probably thought he had the plate number on the pickup. The Cadillac was present; he could see it parked out there by a stack of old drums. Judging from the big scrape down its side it was hurting as much as his head.

Everything out there looked old and rotten. There were weeds, mud with fast food containers and cans trampled into it, another hut-like structure with peeling paint and miscellaneous items bursting out of an open door. Even if he got out of this shack, escaping would be difficult. Just over the highest mound of junk, he saw tree branches spilling over a tall board fence. Rusted posts at the top of each section of fence were strung with barbed wire.

Humidity, stress … sweat poured down Johan’s brow. He swept it off then it got worse because he heard slow heavy footsteps approaching … the crunch of a can, a rattle of tin. Then the footsteps went right past and faded in the sound of the rain. He wondered how a place like this could exist. The company he hired for was a demolition outfit, one of the biggest in the nation. They brought the old down to dust and made way for the new. The whole point of it was to make sure trash lots and derelict buildings didn’t blight the landscape from sea to sea. But from what he could see just looking through a tiny crack, it looked like maybe the trash and rubble of all those places had been hauled and stored here.

He went back to the door. It was fastened tight but he could tell that the wood was somewhat rotten. If his captor was far off, he might be able to tear it open, ease out and work on an escape. With so much junk, there were probably hiding places in it. He could use many things as a weapon. That was certain. Bashing the masked creep’s head in with a rusty pipe would be sweet. Johan could picture it – blood and rust, a plump dead body in the wash of the rain.

He began to work on the door, the rotten wood seemed about to give so he leaned into it and threw all of his weight into his shoulder, producing a big crack as the door flew open. The hasp and lock flew into the mud and he staggered into it as well and then caught his balance. He looked up and around him. A figure stepped into view, dark and evil. The same guy and still wearing a black ski mask. His feet slopped forward in the mud. He wore big rubber boots, he lifted the large object he was carrying, and it roared with sound. A chainsaw … Johan staggered back and nearly fell over in the mud. He was so terrified he ran back inside the shack and cowered.

As fast as it had started the chainsaw shut off, and the masked man stepped in the doorway.

Who … who the fuck are you? Johan said.

The man answered without hesitation. I’m what you call a terrorist. You are now working for me.

But … but, you don’t look like a terrorist.

Really. Then what do I look like?

A serial killer, a psycho maybe.

What, a serial killer? Why you piece of shit. I’ll show you.

Johan cowered with his back pressed to the wall. He didn’t know what to say. The masked man’s eyes had turned black, almost like he was demon possessed. He saw evil in them but not rage. He’d put the chainsaw aside and now pulled something from his coat. Johan expected a pistol and to be shot, but item the man took out looked like a cross between a glue gun