Dormer's Awakening

I sat motionless in my black Mercedes Benz 600 sedan. I was carefully watching the front door of a club called Static, which was located a block up the street from my parking spot. Because my car had tinted windows, was not parked near a streetlight, and had not moved for two hours, some passersby assumed my car was unoccupied. Given that it is a Mercedes 600 meant it did attract a modicum of attention from your garden-variety drug addicts and car thieves as well as the harmless luxury car enthusiast. Those few who demonstrated too keen an interest were quickly dissuaded to investigate further when I thrust my Glock 22 out of the window and hissed, “Fuck off,” in a “Queen’s” British accent (think of way M speaks in the James Bond films) that I have cultivated over the years.

I was wearing my usual garb that evening. My ensemble featured black Ralph Lauren slacks and a matching sports coat, a dark violet Bobby Jones silk golf shirt, black Giorgio Brutini slip-on shoes, a silver Rolex, and black Cartier sunglasses.

I was beginning to get restless. I loathed sitting still in one place for long periods of time. But, my car made my life easier in that regard with its Bose stereo system, a dashboard DVD, and so many seat controls that the positions in which I could affix myself were nearly innumerable. I am not imposingly big but not small either. My car easily accommodates my 6’3” 180 pound body. I tuned the radio to the local classic rock station (my latest musical obsession) and was pleased they were playing When the Levee Breaks by Led Zeppelin.

I was parked just north of the downtown bar district under a highway overpass. It was quiet for a Saturday night. I could hear the electrical hum of the streetlights and incandescent storefront signs. The sound of the interstate was a constant background noise and only the occasional shout or spate of yelling would disrupt the calming symphony of soft, urban noise. It was only a few minutes after 9:00pm, though. Things would liven up significantly in the next few hours.

I turned my attention back to the door of the club. A line of would-be clubbers was beginning to form outside. At some point later in the evening, some poor soul standing in that line would be assaulted, robbed, or killed. It was simple statistics. The reasons for his or her misfortune would vary. A man may flirt with the wrong girl, be affiliated with the wrong gang, or just be in the wrong place at the wrong time. In my many years of life, I have often mused whether human beings are innately violent or if it is a learned behavioral modification. I lean towards the latter. Some people are just plain psychotic, the result of some unfortunate chemical imbalance or congenital predisposition. Others, however, are kind and caring when younger but eventually become products of their environment such as having an abusive father, growing up in a tough neighborhood, possessing a proclivity to cave to peer pressure, or simply the need to feel normal in an abnormal environment. Humans can be simultaneously complex and one-dimensional. I have a soft spot for people who become ensnared by the unenviable circumstances of their lives, suffer for using poor but well-intentioned judgment, or associate with the wrong people due to their life situation. While violence can be good for my business, it is deleterious to the soul. It took me awhile to reconcile that maxim. I had to accept that before I could do my job, something unfortunate had to happen.

Officially, I am a security consultant. Unofficially, I strive to deliver what justice I can in an unjust world while avoiding legal blowback. I’ve been in this business for a very long time. With help from my loathsome father, I developed a distaste for cruelty and injustice during my formative years. He had a penchant for barbarity and arbitrary cruelty. It wasn’t long after I started my security firm that I realized I had found my life’s calling. My business model is pretty simple. I contract myself out to provide security and/or muscle to low-level scumbags who in turn lead me to higher-level scumbags. If I do my job effectively, eventually each level of scumbag is “eliminated” in a manner that deflects all suspicion away from me. The people I was impatiently waiting for now would fall into the low-level scumbag category.

I finally heard the familiar click-clack sound of bargain-brand dress shoes approaching the passenger side of my car. I could smell the cheap bourbon on his breath and the sweat drenching his equally cheap suit. My passenger door opened and closed loudly as Peter McGowan, one of the more odious scumbags with whom I work, plopped his sizeable ass into my leather seat. I always feared he would leave a stain. He took a quick draught from his flask.

“Would you please turn on the fucking A/C?” he grumbled. “It’s the middle of August for Christ’s sake. How are you not sweating?”

I complied slowly and deliberately, a subtle display of annoyance with his demanding tone.

“Perhaps if you weren’t a fat alcoholic, you wouldn’t get so overheated,” I said derisively.

He threw a punch at my face that I caught in my hand. I slowly put his hand down on his knee.

“You don’t want to walk down that road,” I said menacingly. “Now let’s get on with it,”

“I will walk down that road if you insult me you little prick,” Peter growled angrily.

The insult was a mistake on my part. This was no time for infighting, so I apologized.

“I apologize for the insult, Peter,” I said trying to sound sincere. “I was out of line.”

My apology elicited a terse ‘thank you.’

Peter was a lieutenant on a special narcotics squad tasked with reducing the flow of narcotics in the city and the ancillary crimes related to the narcotics trade. In the eyes of the mayor and the police chief, he was a tough-nosed cop who, since the formation of his special task force, had significantly reduced drug trafficking and drug-related crime. It was true that he had achieved much and earned the accolades and praise. But, he didn’t do it in an honorable fashion. He did it in a manner befitting the inept inebriate he was. He struck a deal with the largest network of dealers and systematically assisted in the elimination of the competition using a hit squad that was comprised of the eight officers on his task force. I had been assisting him for the last few weeks. As much as I loathed our clandestine meetings, Peter had been a steady source of business and intelligence since he signed his blood contract with the notoriously brutal MS-13 gang. I was using Peter to get to the MS-13 hierarchy. But, Peter had grown discontent with his arrangement with MS-13. Alcohol, greed, and stupidity are a lethal combination. Overthrowing a chapter of one of the largest narco-gangs in the world requires extensive planning, finesse, and allegiance development with key organizational lieutenants. It also requires lots of muscle and money to secure peace and eradicate any seeds of dissension once you assume power. Peter was of the misguided notion that once the head of the snake was severed, everything else would just fall neatly into place.

Peter wiped his face and brow with a handkerchief. His face was red, and his breathing was labored.

“You are a model of fitness,” I said facetiously. “Before you throw another punch, understand I am advising you, not insulting you. With that said, how in the world do you expect to oversee all the narcotics trafficking in this city if you have to spend half of your time at the hospital getting your pacemaker tweaked?”

It was a fair question but one he was not in the mood to entertain.

“Fuck you, David. I have a plan. Soon, I’ll be at the top. No more heavy lifting for this McGowan boy. I’ll just have to sit back, make sure the drops add up, keep the coyotes at bay, and try not to spend my fortune on hookers.”

“And here I was worrying that you hadn’t thought all of this through,” I responded dryly.

“That mouth of yours is going to get you into trouble one day,” he retorted. “Have you seen him yet?” Peter asked to change the subject.

“Not yet,” I replied. “But my guess is that he is in there already.”

“How could he be in there already if you’ve been sitting here watching for two hours but haven’t seen him?” Peter grumbled.

“The club has more than one entrance, Peter,” I responded.

He was Mateo Calderon, a.k.a. Muerte en Movimiénte, or Death in Motion, the top shot caller for MS-13 in the Richmond, Virginia territory. He was notoriously brutal and savage. There was a story that circulated about Mateo and this old, blind man who owed Mateo thousands for “escort services” provided. The guy refused to pay, claiming the vig was so exorbitant that it bordered on robbery. Mateo sent some of his muscle to persuade the blind gentleman that the vig was fair and that not paying was not an option. The elderly gentleman told them to piss off because he was blind and dying of lung cancer and therefore not afraid of death. Violence or torture would have surely hastened his death and then, to him, the principal and the vig were no longer issues. Mateo was talking to one of his lieutenants about how to inspire the old-timer to pay, and in passing the lieutenant mentioned how the old man loved his Seeing Eye Dog. Mateo saw the solution to his problem. He orchestrated a classic motivational tactic made infamous in the movie The Godfather, but instead of putting the head of a prized horse in the guy’s bed he put the head of the black lab. The old man paid up the next day. I had already decided that, if circumstances permitted, Mateo was going to die slowly and painfully. That was contrary to my normal style but some people earn an exception.

Two gray Buick Centuries drove slowly past my car. Each car had four men inside. They drove a block past Static, did a U-turn, then drove back towards my car and parked parallel to me across the street. The driver’s side rear door of the lead Buick opened and a hulking man wearing a light gray suit jostled his way out of the back seat. He was about 6’5” and probably tipped the scales at around 260. He had a three-inch scar on his left cheek, walked with a slight limp, and had enormous hands with fat fingers. His name was Tony Rozetti. He was one of Peter’s task force members and better known as Tozo. Shortly after, all occupants of the two Buicks were standing in the street. They were the eight members of Peter’s task force. Tozo slowly made his way across the street. I lowered my window. He rested his arms on my doorframe, leaned his head into the car, cramping my space in the process, and winked at Peter.

“Hey, there’s my beast, my killer,” Peter said with a smile. “How’s the wife, Tozo?”

“She’s old and flabby in all the wrong places. Plus, she won’t stop riding me about my lieutenant’s exam. Evidently it’s time for new carpet. Funny thing is, she is going to henpeck me into a heart attack and then she’ll be broke and homeless.”

Peter laughed heartily.

“Does she have life insurance?” he asked Tozo.

“She does through her work,” Tozo responded. “But the bitch has her sister as the beneficiary.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Peter said in disbelief.

“You should have her sit down and then start hammering nails into her non-writing hand until she names you as the beneficiary,” I suggested. “Once that is done, cut her into small pieces, take the body parts and a wood chipper to the end of a dock, and feed her to the fish and crabs.”

They both looked at me like I was Ted Bundy, which I found interesting considering some of the butchery I’d witnessed them commit. Maybe, when a wife is involved, such extremism is taboo. I had no idea how the brains of these buffoons functioned, and I really didn’t care.

“That’s messed up, Dormer. That’s my wife you’re talking about,” Tozo replied reproachfully.

I quickly opened my car door, which forcefully knocked Tozo to the ground. The small dent in my door panel was a small price to pay for the opportunity to humiliate Tozo in front of his peers. As he was getting to his feet, I reached down and gripped the underside of Tozo’s chin. In a muffled voice, he was demanding that I let him go. I slowly turned his head so he could see the entrance to Static.

“Mateo and his crew just pulled up,” I indicated calmly. I turned his face so he was looking at me again. “And if you lean on my car again, you should expect more than a few scrapes and bruises,” I whispered in his ear.

I added insult to injury when I stepped over his prone body as he laid in the street cursing at me. Peter emerged from the car and waved to the other guys to join us. I met Peter at the trunk of my car.

“That was uncalled for, David,” he chided.

“He deserved it. End of discussion,” I rebutted tersely. “Peter, let me refresh your memory. You came to me for help with this little coup of yours, and one of my conditions was that I would not accept any disrespect from your crew. You agreed to those terms. If you have developed a sudden desire to alter our terms to allow for your Neanderthals to treat and talk to me however they wish, then I want an additional ten percent and you have to be willing to live with the consequences of my anger. So, what will it be, Peter? Mateo is waiting. Tick tock, tick tock.”

I stood motionless, my eyes fixed on his face, awaiting his answer. Peripherally, I could see Tozo was furious and could hear him telling the others that once we took down Mateo, he was going to put a bullet in the back of my head.

“David, this is not the best time for internal discord. I’ll hold up my end of the agreement, but I need Tozo levelheaded and in the game. So I am asking, as a favor, that you apologize for knocking him to the ground.”

“Is he menstruating or something,” I asked.

Peter rubbed his eyes with his index finger and thumb and looked exasperated.

“Please, David,” Peter implored.

I looked at Peter and I felt pity. I pitied his life. I pitied his soul. At the time, he had been with the Richmond City Police for thirty-eight years. He didn’t make lieutenant until six years ago. Peter was always going to be a C student.

“I’ll do it for the sake of our business relationship,” I responded with a smile.

Peter called everyone together to discuss the game plan. There were ten of us. Based on our intelligence sources, we estimated that there were probably fifteen of Mateo’s men in the club and based on earlier surveillance, I posited that two of Mateo’s henchmen would be handling bouncer duties, two would be guarding the back door, three would be at Mateo’s side at all times, and eight would be milling about, drinking at the bar, or playing cards in a backroom. There were only four of us that Mateo and his crew wouldn’t recognize. I was one of those four. Peter decided that one guy would hang around the auxiliary bar near the entrance and close the doors when the shit hit the fan. Another guy would stand near the door to the illicit poker room and one guy would find a good vantage point and firing position on the second floor’s, wrap-around balcony. My job was to create the diversion. Peter and those of his guys that would be recognized would make their way up the back alley, take out the guards posted at the back door, and rush in wearing ski masks once I and the other party crashers ratcheted up the violence. We split into two groups. Peter and the guys who would be entering via the alley doorway walked on the sidewalk across the street from Static while the other three and I walked on the same side of the street as the club. Our initial job was to keep the doormen and any bouncers around focused on us so as to not arouse any suspicion while Peter and the others quickly made it across the street and into the alley. Before we began to make our way down the street, Peter informed me that I would be with Tozo. He reiterated that he needed the job to go well. He needed it to go well because he was a degenerate gambler and according to my private investigator he was under suspension pending the outcome of an internal affairs investigation and a civil lawsuit. He put some college student in a coma after the young man rear-ended his brand new Buick.

I asked Peter if he was certain that Tozo would not be recognized. Peter assured me that all of Tozo’s work was done behind the scenes and he would not be recognized. I thought it was a mistake. I told Peter that someone like Tozo, because of his conspicuous build, the number of hits he’d made, and the savageness of his hits eventually develops a reputation on the street behind the scenes notwithstanding. He brushed aside my demur. But, as I have intimated before, Peter does not possess bountiful mental acuity. Like it or not, I would be walking with Tozo and that displeased me. I was concerned he would not be able to contain himself and would run his blubbering mouth at me, trying to get a rise out of me right before we were going to attempt to muscle our way into a club occupied by some of the most psychotic and dangerous MS-13 gang members I had ever had the displeasure of knowing.