As we left our story yesterday, there was a knock at the door. “Open up, police!” I told Rodney to hide in the bathroom, then John opened the door and 2 police officers came in. “Your ID please,” I said. “That is rich,” said the first officer, “a polite criminal.” He then picked up a piece of paper off the bed. I took it from him. “ID, or leave,” I said again. He took it out and flashed it for about half a second.

“No, I want to look at it,” I said, “or you leave right now.” He opened it up again. “Satisfied Lieutenant?” he asked. I grabbed it from him and tossed it on the bed. “It is a fake!” I said firmly. He put his hand on his gun, but Crystal had hers out first, and pointed at the officers head. John had his gun out quickly too and held it to the other officers head.

Then Ralph took their guns and other “tools”. “You will be in trouble for this!” said the first officer. “Not as much as you are in right now,” I said, “now, roll up your sleeve.” “No,” he said. So Ralph helped him a bit, ripping his sleeve. “What do you think?” I asked Ralph. “Looks genuine to me,” he replied, “the Major will enjoy this one.” He then called the Major and told him a couple of Malcolm’s men had arrived and were trying to play rough with us.

He then hung up and said, “looks like our boss is going to talk with your boss.” Soon my phone was ringing. “Hey Lieutenant, Malcolm here,” he began, “seems there has been a little miscommunication here. I did not know you were from Victor, I was told you were from Sherman.” I had no idea who Sherman was however. “I can guess where that info came from,” I said.

“Clue me in, I would like to know,” he said, “I do not like being played for a fool.” “It would have been Carnival,” I told him, “a couple friends of mine were killed and I am trying to find out who did it. Carnival does not like having me around, so he has been trying to get rid of me, in various ways.” “Not surprising, he is not too smart,” he said, “but to take on Victor, that makes him stupid.” “I agree,” I said, “know where I might find this guy?”

“Nope, he is tough to track down, or I would have done away with him long ago,” he said, “but I will make sure my boys stay out of your way from now on.” He then called the first ‘officer’ and told him to get far away from me. They left in a hurry after apologizing. After they left Carver arrived. “I saw you had guests,” he said, “so decided to wait until they left.” “That was a good idea,” I said, “but they were not real cops, they were Malcolm’s men.”

“Malcolm was never bright,” he said, “but going against Victor is total foolishness. Oh, little MC is with the girls right now.” “Good,” I said, “how is he doing?” “Fine, tough little guy,” he said, “that vet was trying to call someone though, but I stopped her in time.” “Good,” I said, “I wonder who she wanted to call? Could not have been Malcolm, maybe that Sherman guy, or the real police.”

I then told Rodney to come out, which he did. He recognized Carver right away. “This is the man that kidnapped Sky and kicked MC,” I said, “but he is going to help us out now, right Rodney?” He looked terrified at the sight of Carver. “Not to worry,” I said, “I promised to let you go, and I will keep that promise.” “Okay, Carnival is not far away, about 20 minutes from here,” he said, “I will give you the address.”

“Not so fast,” I said, “you can take us there.” He reluctantly agreed. We waited for the other 4 men to show up first and only had to wait another 10 minutes. One of the men was Clarence, he had been helping the others since he knew the people they were helping. I told Saranna and Macey to stay with the cats and guard our paperwork. The rest of us went to our cars and Rodney took us to the building where Carnival had his office.

“Yes, that is the place,” said Crystal. I told Rodney to beat it, before I changed my mind, then we went inside. His office was on the main floor. His secretary said he had just gone out. One of the men that came with Clarence, nicknamed Tiny (who was almost as big as Rock), broke the door right off its hinges, but Carnival was not there.

I asked if anyone else was in the building, but she assured us there was no one else. So we went around to make sure, then beginning with the top floor and working our way down, we set fire to the building. The secretary was told to leave and just go home. Angel took her phone first though.

It did not take long and that 4 story building was completely engulfed with flames and we were long gone. It was an old building and burned very nicely. But we still do not know where to find Carnival. We got back to our hotel and coming into the room I could see that Saranna was very worried…

To Be Continued.

©2023 Steve McLeod.