Hack, page 7
Maybe it isn’t Nukowski after all, but just someone who’s lost, he thought hopefully, but knew better.
More likely, Nukowski was getting his bearings. It had been, what, at least five years since he was there last, and a lot had changed. Then, the only structure was a piss-yellow double-wide trailer with a bowed axle mounted on cinder blocks, no outbuildings, and an overgrown pasture full of rusted-out farming equipment. The trailer was gone now, and in its place stood a two-story log cabin with a shiny metal roof and wraparound porch and attached garage. The pasture was mowed and dotted with various stainless-steel sculptures of grizzlies, bison, and wolves that Dilworth created in his machine shop and sold online around the world.
Any doubt Dilworth had about who was in the vehicle vanished when the passenger door sprang open and out stepped a wiry bantamweight with a limp mullet whose hips and rounded shoulders rolled like waves when he walked. It was Nukowski all right.
Dilworth grabbed a pair of jeans from a bedside chair, pulled a ragg-wool sweater over his head, stepped into a pair of ropers, and tucked a .32 revolver into the small of his back. He opened the front door just as Nukowski set his foot on the bottom porch step.
“Long time no see, Grant,” Nukowski said, bounding up the stairs and thrusting out a powerful hand.
Dilworth ignored the gesture and said, “When’d you lose the ankle monitor, Nuky?”
“Ha-ha,” Nukowski said.
“What are you doing here?” Dilworth demanded. “At this time of night. Can’t be anything good.”
“Is that any way to greet your former partner?” Nukowski said and leaned back against the porch railing and looked around. “I swear, you’re prosperous, Grant. I hardly recognized the property at first, but when I saw those sculptures, I know’d it was your place. You always talked about metalworking if you ever got ahead. You should at least give me a little credit for getting you back on your feet.”
“Only to nearly get me killed.”
“You survived, didn’t you?”
As much as he tried to put it out of his memory, Dilworth knew if not for Nukowski, he likely would have died well before his time. Nukowski had found him living on the streets of Detroit when he was young, alone, and scared. For food, Dilworth waylaid KFC customers carrying buckets of chicken as they exited the restaurants or wrestled bags of groceries from old ladies as they made their way to their cars. He was always careful not to injure his victims if he could help it.
A photo Dilworth had saved from that time in his life showed him emaciated; his ribs poking through a ratty T-shirt; his eyes lifeless, sunken, and dark as the bottom of a well. Nukowski had given him a place to live, fed him, and taught him how to chop cars, cook meth, run guns, and steal credit card numbers online. They were small-time hoods who flew under law enforcement’s radar for the most part, but two scores at the end of their crime spree changed that.
Nukowski had been tipped off that a Mexican mule was in Detroit with a cache of cocaine for distribution in the Midwest, and he, Dilworth, and another accomplice, a woman, staged a car accident with the mule’s vehicle as it turned onto a ramp for Interstate 94. Nukowski pistol-whipped the mule, and they made off with ten kilos of pure cocaine. After they cut and resold the coke on the street, the take was split three ways, with each pocketing nearly $75,000. Dilworth used his proceeds to buy the farm where he now lived with his wife and daughter.
That would have been the end of Dilworth’s criminal career had not Nukowski strong-armed him into making one last run to St. Louis to deliver stolen guns to a motorcycle gang, the Rivertown Rebels. Unbeknownst to them, they walked into a sting by the Missouri Compliance and Investigation Bureau and had to shoot their way out. Two undercover officers, one a thirty-one-year-old woman with a husband and twin toddlers at home, were killed in the firefight along with three members of the motorcycle club.
Dilworth and Nukowski escaped and were never identified, but the case remained active, and the killings hung over the pair and knitted them together forever. Dilworth blamed Nukowski for the botched operation, and their parting was acrimonious.
“Who’s your friend?” Dilworth asked, chinning toward Cooley.
“Don’t worry about him. He doesn’t know anything.”
“He knows where I live.”
“Couldn’t be helped.”
“I’ll ask again, what do you want?” Dilworth said and let go of the door handle with his right hand and slid two steps to the left of Nukowski to create space in case he needed to draw the gun.
“We need a vehicle.”
“What’s wrong with the one you’re driving?”
“It’s a little too popular for my taste.”
“There’s a used-car lot in town. O’Neil’s. You probably passed by it. They can fix you up. They open at nine.”
“No paperwork.”
“What’d you do?”
“Believe me, the less you know, the better,” Nukowski said. “You do this favor for me, Grant, and we’re done. You got my word on that.”
Dilworth heard a disturbance from inside the house and flinched, and Nukowski pushed off the railing and cocked his head toward the front door.
“Who’s inside?” Nukowski asked.
“It’s Pontiac, my German shepherd.”
“How come he didn’t bark when we pulled in?”
“He’s old. Deaf, half blind, and stove up. It’s all he can do to scoot his ass across the floor.”
Nukowski threw Dilworth a you better not be fucking with me look.
To distract him, Dilworth said, “I’ll make a call. There’s an old, abandoned homestead about four miles back on the east side of the road. Your new vehicle will be behind the barn this time six days from now, fueled. Leave the van with the keys in it. It’ll be chopped before daylight.”
“That’s my ol’ pard,” Nukowski said and edged slowly backward off the porch. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he looked up at Dilworth. “You ever see Sara again after the coke heist?”
“Sara? No, never did,” Dilworth said. “Why?”
“Oh, no reason,” he said with a soft chuckle. “Just wondered, is all.” Nukowski climbed into the idling van, and Cooley nosed it back down the rutted lane. The van braked and Nukowski cranked down the window. “Don’t make me come back here a second time, Grant, if you know what’s good for you,” he called out before the van rolled on. Threat delivered.
The front door cracked open. “That Nukowski?”
“Yeah,” Dilworth said.
“Jesus.”
“Yeah.”
A gust of wind caught the hem of Sara’s patchwork-quilt robe and parted the front, revealing a pair of long, silky legs, black bikini panties, and a 12-gauge Winchester pump shotgun pressed up against her right thigh.
Chapter 15
December 24, Washington, DC
Nik glanced down at his trilling phone as he stepped inside the elevator in Newshound’s parking garage. It was Dick Whetstone. Nik hit the End Call button and patiently waited for the alert informing him that he had a voice mail. It was the eighth call in the last few days from his editor, and each time, Whetstone left Nik a lengthy message, which he summarily deleted without opening. Nik reasoned if he avoided the calls and messages, then Whetstone couldn’t actually fire him, at least not until he returned from his West Coast media junket. And as appealing as the prospect of firing Nik might be, Nik knew Whetstone well enough to know he was not about to cut his all-expenses-paid travels and vacation short to accomplish it.
Nik had already blocked all incoming text messages from Whetstone’s mobile number and had his emails automatically routed to a junk mail folder, which was emptied routinely. Nik knew his actions were grounds for dismissal and that Whetstone would likely sack him the moment he set foot back in the office. By then, Nik hoped the Trident story would have taken on a life of its own.
But, with Whetstone’s looming return and DC grinding to a halt during the holidays, it was a race against time, and Nik needed help. Which was why he summoned Mo, Mia, and Frank Rath for an early-morning meeting at Newshound’s offices on Christmas Eve.
It was officially an office holiday, but Nik needed to bring the trio up to speed on his reporting and make it clear to them that they could be jeopardizing their jobs by remaining on the Trident story.
Nik made a pit stop at Sugar Shack Donuts & Coffee before heading to the office, and the sweet smell of freshly baked pastries and the earthy aroma of just-brewed coffee reached the conference room thirty seconds before Nik. Mo’s head snapped up from its resting position on the conference room table when he scented the coffee.
“Bless you, son,” he said groggily, eyes bleary. Despite the temperature being barely above freezing, Mo was dressed in cutoff jeans, a ripped Gold’s Gym T-shirt, and flip-flops.
“Late night?” Nik asked.
“Stayed too long at the Third Edition,” Mo croaked.
“You know what they say,” Frank said, helping himself to a cup of coffee.
“No,” Mo managed to answer. “Tell me?”
“Dogs that chase cars and men who close down bars don’t live long lives,” Frank said philosophically and stabbed a couple of donuts.
“That’s rich, coming from you,” Mo said.
Notwithstanding years of heavy drinking, smoking, and an unhealthy diet, Frank Rath looked remarkably fit for someone pushing seventy. There wasn’t a trace of gray in his tar-black hair, and he was as lean as a whippet. That was on the outside. On the inside, it was an entirely different story. Frank’s kidneys were failing.
Mo had inadvertently learned of Frank’s condition one day when he overheard a phone call Frank was having with his insurance provider. Frank had sworn Mo to secrecy about it, but one night, when he had too much to drink, Mo had let it slip to Mia. Frank had not shared his illness with Nik, nor had Mo or Mia breathed a word to their colleague.
A voice sang out, “Did I miss anything?” It was Mia. She was as cheery as Mo was hungover.
Dressed in green cargo pants, hiking boots, and a long-sleeved plaid shirt with a red kerchief knotted around her neck, her dark hair braided in the back, Mia looked like a park ranger, which was fitting since she apparently planned to lead a hike up Maryland’s Catoctin Mountain with two dozen young, single professionals who subscribed to her podcast—Dateline Washington.
“Grab a cup of coffee and snag a donut before Mo eats them all,” Nik said. “We’re just getting started.”
After Mia took a seat, Nik began: “Before I share with you where the Trident story stands, you need to know that there’s a very good chance I’ll be fired for pursuing the story when Whetstone returns. He has explicitly ordered me to, quote, ‘leave it the fuck alone,’ unquote, or words to that effect. I’ve chosen to ignore his wishes. I have every reason to believe he’s serious and will carry out his threat. Each of you needs to understand you could be risking your careers if you decide to work with me.”
It wasn’t much of a speech, as speeches go, but Nik had rehearsed it on his drive over to the office that morning. He didn’t know how’d they react, and as he looked around the table, he was a little unnerved by the silence. The only sound was Mia tapping out a group text message to her fellow hikers that she would be running a few minutes late. Frank stared out the window and scratched his chin, and Mo’s head remained planted on the table.
The stillness was shattered by a thunderous, window-rattling burp from Mo, followed by: “Fuck it, I’m in.”
“That was impressive,” Mia said, fanning her nose and face with her hand. “I can’t belch like that, but, yeah, sign me up, too.”
Nik turned to face Frank. “One way or the other, this is probably my last rodeo, so, sure, why not,” Frank said.
Nik wasn’t certain what to make of Frank’s comment. He made a mental note of it and would follow up with him later.
“Good,” Nik said and proceeded to tell the three about what he had learned from Maggie and Sam, without revealing his sources. When he was finished, he said, “I’m going to write a quick story on the new information, and after that, I’ll hand out assignments. I realize it’s your day off, so I’ll text them to you. We should avoid using company emails to discuss the story in case Whetstone has access to our accounts. I’ve secured all the necessary permissions for platforms and systems, so there’s nothing he can do to stop us from publishing the story, and he can’t kill it after it’s on the site or social media.”
After the meeting, Nik hurried back to his desk and began composing a story. He had promised his parents he’d be home for Christmas and had a flight booked for later that afternoon. Never a particularly fast writer, Nik worked diligently and sent the finished story over to Frank in record time, along with images of the van lifted from the video that Maggie had supplied. Less than forty-five minutes later, the article and pictures were live on Newshound’s site.
Manhunt Underway for Suspects in Trident Office Park Explosion
Pair Linked to Killings in Indiana?
By Nik Byron
Newshound Deputy Editor
Authorities have identified an older-model van seen at an Indiana truck stop where two people were killed as one similar to, if not the same as, a vehicle that was spotted exiting Trident Office Park shortly before a devastating explosion leveled buildings and left several people dead earlier this month.
The truck-stop victims—a seven-year veteran of the Indiana State Police’s highway patrol and a 29-year-old female store clerk—were each shot once with a high-powered handgun.
It is not clear what provoked the shootings.
According to sources, investigators used sophisticated software to compare video from both the Trident and truck-stop crime scenes and have determined the men seen in the van share “similar structural and facial characteristics.”
The driver of the van was described as having an elongated neck with a wedge-shaped head. The passenger’s head was characterized as square, and he wore his hair in what is considered a mullet style—short in the front and sides and long in the back.
The van is described as a late-1970s Dodge Street Van, either white or a faded green.
In a related development, sources tell Newshound that investigators are now confident that Cal Walker, the CEO of OmniSoft Corporation, was not killed in the explosion, as initially feared.
Walker was seen on video entering his Trident Park Office building just prior to the blast, and it was believed he was buried in the rubble when the building collapsed. However, the owner of a country store near the office park said Walker was sitting in his car in the store’s parking lot when the explosion occurred.
Walker and OmniSoft are in a long-running legal battle with the federal government, alleging government employees stole the company’s proprietary monitoring software and forced it into bankruptcy. There has been unconfirmed speculation on a number of internet sites that OmniSoft and Walker were targeted in the Trident explosion, but with the unrelated killings in Indiana, authorities have pushed back hard against those rumors.
While investigators now believe Walker is alive, they do not know his whereabouts.
Authorities have concluded that a gas pipeline in the office park was tampered with prior to the explosion, and they have questioned a number of potential suspects, but no arrests have been made.
The blast is now responsible for the deaths of seven people, four of whom died while being treated for injuries at Georgetown Hospital, and three still unidentified bodies recovered by rescue workers. Several other victims remain hospitalized.
Chapter 16
December 24
Hawk hated loose ends. They could get you killed if you weren’t careful, but loose ends were what he had a fistful of.
By all rights, Cooley and Nukowski should have been killed in that Trident Park explosion along with Cal Walker. Instead, all three were alive and on the run.
No use beating himself up about it. He’d have to improvise, but that’s what he was trained to do, from the deserts of Iraq to the craggy outcroppings of Afghanistan and dozens of black sites in between. He had no idea where Walker was. He’d gone to ground after the explosion, but that was okay. Hawk would eventually find him and deal with him later.
The more pressing problem was Cooley and Nukowski. There was a manhunt underway, and given the bloody trail those two fools were leaving in their wake, even the Blind Boys of Alabama could cut their track eventually.
He figured the pair was holed up somewhere, probably with one of their militia buddies. It didn’t matter, though, because, as a precaution, they had agreed to meet at a prearranged location after the bombing, and Hawk knew exactly where they were headed. He planned to be there when they arrived. He’d personally see to it that those loose ends were tied up permanently this time.
Chapter 17
December 28, Northern Virginia
Three days after Christmas and feeling more than a little roly-poly from all the cookies and heavy meals he had consumed at his parents’ house, Nik spilled out of his Land Cruiser before it came to a complete stop and lurched across Courthouse Road, nearly falling as he bounced up a set of icy steps to the Circuit Court of Arlington, Virginia.
A pretrial hearing was scheduled that morning in a lawsuit filed against King Kobe, the packaged food and Wagyu beef mogul who was accused of mixing horseflesh in with the high-end delicacy before selling it to local restaurants. As much as Nik wished he’d never heard of the guy, he felt an obligation to continue reporting on the story.
Nik slid into a pew near the back of the courtroom just as the judge exited his chambers and took the bench. The owner of the Bluebird Restaurant, a Northern Virginia landmark, was suing King Kobe—whose real name was Curtis Spinks—for fraud for selling him beef that had been tainted with horseflesh. Lawsuits were also starting to pile up in the District of Columbia, but this was the first one to receive a hearing, and Nik wanted to be on hand to hear how the judge ruled on the defense’s motion for a directed verdict to dismiss the case.
