The Forgotten Holocaust

Chapter Fifty-Eight

‘I don’t believe it,’ Wylie said, watching through the blinds as the lights drew steadily closer. ‘He’s just driving right up to the house. Fucker’s as bold as brass.’

‘Guy’s got some balls, gotta give’m that,’ O’Rourke muttered. He had beads of sweat breaking out on his brow. He puffed out his chest. ‘All right. Let’s take care of business.’

O’Rourke drew his Colt Python from the shoulder rig. Corcoran racked a round into the chamber of his Remington pump with that bright, crunchy snick-snack that had put the fear into a million hearts. Moon quietly pressed off the safety of his M4 and swapped glances with Ritter. Both thinking the same thing. Fuckin’ cops. On another day, they wouldn’t have hesitated to gun down the whole stinking bunch and do themselves and the world a favour. The people you had to work with.

‘What the hell’s he doing?’ Finn murmured, watching from another window. But as the dazzling lights drew up close to the house and he recognised the vehicle, he deflated like a punctured ball.

The Dodge Ram.

It wasn’t Hope. Big Joe was back.

‘Oh, shit,’ Finn said under his breath.

He watched, paralysed, as the pickup truck stopped outside. The lights and engine died. The old man got out, showing no apparent stiffness after his long drive from Kansas. He was in his travelling clothes, jeans and denim jacket, and had a sling bag over his shoulder. He lingered for a moment to stare at the four vehicles parked outside his house, and Finn saw his face crease up into a deep, dark frown that Finn had seen before.

‘Oh, shit,’ he said again. He swallowed.

The sound of the front door opening; heavy, deliberate footsteps in the hall. Then Big Joe walked into the room, stopped and glared from under beetling white brows at his son and the armed men inside his house.

‘I thought you were in Topeka,’ was all Finn could think to say at first.

‘What the hell’s this?’

‘Let’s go in the other room, Daddy,’ Finn said, stepping over and anxiously taking his elbow to steer him back through the doorway. Big Joe resisted, then emitted a long, low sound like a snarl and let Finn guide him across the hall to the room opposite, which Big Joe used as a TV lounge.

Big Joe looked grim. ‘I come home early and there’s a bunch of gorillas with guns in my house. You owe me an explanation. Let’s have it.’

‘It’s none of your concern, Daddy. I got some business to take care of, that’s all. You keep out of the way, now, before you go and get yourself hurt.’

‘Don’t you Daddy me. What business? You wouldn’t know business if it crept up and chewed your butt off.’

‘Now listen, Daddy—’

‘I want these people out of my home right now.’

Finn flushed. ‘No way.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said no way. This is a meeting. These are my associates.’

‘Associates,’ Big Joe said, clenching his teeth. He gripped Finn’s arm. ‘Associates my ass. You think I never saw a bunch of cheap hoods before?’

‘That’s the police chief in there.’

‘Exactly. You think I’m blind, boy? Think I can’t see what this is?’

The hold the old man had on Finn’s arm felt like a steel pincer. ‘Let go.’ Finn wrenched his arm free and backed away.

‘What’s the matter with you?’ his father seethed at him. ‘What the hell are you into? This what I brought you up to be? A goddamn criminal?’

Finn felt something break inside him and the anger gushed out. ‘Oh, it was easy for you. You made something of yourself. What about me? How’m I supposed to make my way, with your reputation hanging over me? You ever stop to think about that?’

‘I always knew you were a coward and a cheat. Now you’re fixin’ to kill a man right here in my own home. That’s what this is, right? An ambush.’

‘I—’

‘This is what you call your business. This is what you do when my back is turned. Don’t lie to me, boy!’

‘He — he knows our secret, Daddy. I did everything I could, but he knows. I can’t let it go any further.’

Big Joe’s eyes bugged in fury. ‘So that’s it. You opened your big mouth. You let it out.’

‘No! I—’

‘Not a soul,’ the old man rasped. ‘Not a living soul ever knew. I’ve been keepin’ it locked up like the holy of holies since twenty years before you were even born. Now you just up and spill it right out. You got horseshit for brains, son? Don’t you know what’s gonna happen to you if folks know the truth about our family?’ His big fists were clenched as he advanced on Finn.

Finn unholstered the revolver from his belt. ‘I’ve taken enough abuse from you. All my life you’ve been putting me down.’

Big Joe showed him yellow teeth as he kept on coming. ‘I put you down, boy, you won’t be getting back up again.’

‘Don’t you come any closer, you hear me? Back off!’ Finn pointed the gun and thumbed the hammer.

But Big Joe just glanced disdainfully at the revolver. He seemed eight feet tall. A granite mountain looming over Finn, ready to fall on him like a million tons of rock. ‘What the hell are you going to do with that? You gonna smoke me? You gonna ventilate the old man with your roscoe? Huh? Show us all what a big tough guy you are? Huh?’ He kept prodding Finn in the chest, shoving him back harder each time.

‘I’m warning you …’

Big Joe regarded him with pure disgust, as if he could spit blood at the very sight of him. ‘You shame me, Finn McCrory. I shoulda strangled you the day they pulled you out of your momma, God rest her soul.’

Finn’s back was against the wall. He could retreat no further—

Big Joe lunged to wrench the gun from Finn’s hand—

The stunning BOOM of the magnum seemed to drive all the air out of the room. For a terrible moment, Big Joe stood rocking on his feet, staring in speechless apoplectic disbelieving rage at his son who’d just shot him. Then his eyes rolled down and he saw the blood. He staggered back a step. One knee buckled first, then the other, and Big Joe twirled and hit the polished floor face first with a crash almost as loud as the gunshot.

Finn stared down at him. Stared at the revolver in his hand.

The door burst open. Ritter ran into the room, stopped and looked down at the inert hulk of Big Joe.

‘I didn’t kill’m,’ Finn said, talking loudly like a deaf person over the ringing whine in his ears. ‘Hope did. We all saw it, right? Hope came here and murdered a defenceless old man. You’re a witness, Ritter.’

Ritter said nothing.

The blast of a second gunshot made them turn. It had come from the other room.