Chapter 22 — Checkout at 11

Steve prepared to check out of his room at a Dayton motel. Actually, it was a stretch to call it a 'motel.' A ‘no-tell’ would have been more appropriate, as the rooms were frequently rented by the hour to working girls or couples having an affair.

It disgusted Steve to stay in a room like this. It smelled of old cigarettes, spilled beer, and hurried passion, with just a hint of stale urine thrown in for good measure. At one point the room had a red carpet, but years of neglect had turned the carpet almost black. The wallpaper was badly stained, the TV didn’t work, and there was mildew growing in the shower. In other words, it was nasty.

On a lark, he once turned on a black light in a similar room to see how much organic material had been left behind by previous occupants. What he saw was so horrifying that he was forced to drape towels over the chair and sleep sitting up that night. When renting this sort of room now he immediately sprayed it down with Lysol, wore disposable surgical booties on his feet, brought his own sheets for the bed, and used lots of hand sanitizer.

Still, the room was what he needed. He wanted to pay in cash without raising suspicion, and Dayton was far enough away from Milford and the Cincinnati Water Works that the investigation would probably never reach here. He did what he had to do, and that’s why he got paid the big bucks.

His weapon backpack lay open on the bed, holding several guns. First, there was a .38 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver that was fully loaded with ‘Rusky-Popper’ ammo. These cartridges were originally developed by the Russian mob and they cost Steve a whopping $6.50 apiece. They were a combination incendiary/explosive round that self-destructed milliseconds after they impacted their target. That not only made for a gaping wound with lots of internal damage but also destroyed or distorted the bullet so badly that it was impossible to run a ballistic test to see what gun had fired it.

Next was a .40 caliber Glock, identical to the guns that FBI agents carried. Alongside it was four clips loaded with ammunition that had been stolen from an FBI field office. Finally, there was a Colt M4 carbine, which was the weapon given to FBI field agents when they needed heavier firepower.

Copying their guns was not the perfect solution to hiding his shots among the FBI fire, but it was the best solution Steve had. The agents in Milford should be carrying Colt M4’s, but even if they weren’t there was an excellent chance that at least one of the Milford cops would have one. Besides, the FBI typically didn’t run ballistic tests on bullets fired by the ‘good-guys.’ And considering the primary FBI agent assigned to Milford was on his payroll, unless someone else discovered something unusual at the crime scene it would get buried and not investigated.

Steve had already planned where he wanted to set up at the warehouse and where he wanted the police to set up. The front of the warehouse, and customer parking, were on the south side of the building. The employee parking lot, and a gravel truck access drive, was on the east side, and the loading docks were on the north. The shallow water table in Milford flowed from west to east. Steve wanted the police and FBI to hide in the woods to the east and at the south-east corner of the building, wait for the truck to leave the loading dock area, and blast it apart on the gravel drive. The truck should be loaded and ready to leave about 19:30, so the setting sun was going to be at least partially in the policemen’s eyes during the shoot-out.

When he left the motel, Steve detoured towards the Cincinnati airport so he could verify that the rental truck was in place. He didn’t stop, or even slow down, as he passed by the truck, he just wanted first-hand visual confirmation that the truck was in position.

He arrived in Milford at 15:27 and parked his car at a fast-food restaurant. He hung a pair of binoculars around his neck, put on the weapon backpack, popped some pain pills, and began the 3.7-mile hike to the warehouse. Yesterday he had mapped out one route in and two routes out, all three routes going through woods wherever possible.

Steve was about twenty minutes into the hike, walking along a wash that ran behind a small cluster of shitty little houses owned by shitty little people, when he saw a young girl playing in the woods ahead of him. She had messy blonde hair and a dirty face. Steve estimated that she was approximately 4’2” tall weighed about 60 pounds and was eight or nine years old. Today was a school day and he had not expected to run into children.

The girl started walking towards him. “What are you doing back here, mister?”

Steve needed to brush her off quickly. If that didn’t work, he would have to take other precautions. “I’m a bird watcher," he said, holding up the binoculars. “I’m afraid you need to stay away from me so that you don’t frighten the birds.”

“Oh, please, mister!” she said, as she got nearer. “I love birds. I can be quiet. I promise I can. My brother says that sometimes he doesn’t even know I’m in the room.”

“No," said Steve. “I don’t think so.”

“But I’m bored, mister. There’s nothing to do back here and there’s nobody to play with. I want to see the birds. My brother says that the dinosaurs didn’t all die, that some of them turned into birds.”

Steve didn’t like undisciplined little kids. He made sure his children and grandchildren always toed the line and expected other parents to do the same. It was time for a change of approach with this brat. “Where do you live little girl, and what’s your name?”

“I’m Pam, and I live in the blue house one road over.”

The little girl could easily identify him now. He looked around and confirmed that she was alone. “Does your mother know you’re back here playing, Pam?”

Pam looked down and scuffed the dirt with her toe. “Well, she knows I’m outside. She told me to get the hell out of the house and let her rest. My stepdad brings home medicine sometimes that makes them both sleepy. My brother says it's best to play somewhere else when they’re taking medicine.”

Steve nodded, sympathetically. “Oh, I see. Is your brother back here playing with you too?”

“No. He’s a hero somewhere over in a desert called Eye-Rock.," she replied with a big grin.

Steve grasped his binoculars. “Well, Pam, if you want to be a bird watcher you have to be able to climb trees. Do you know how to climb a tree, Pam?”

“Oh, sure I do. I’m really good at it, but my brother says I’m going to break my fool neck one day.”

“Isn’t that sweet," Steve said. He waved his arm around. “Well, pick a tree that you want to climb, Pam, and I’ll help you get up. As soon as you’re secure in the tree I’ll let you look through my binoculars.”

“And that will make me see birds?”

“Yes, Pam, you’ll see birds. You may even see dinosaurs.”

She excitedly picked a tree with some low branches and Steve gave her a leg up. Ten seconds later Pam was about five feet off the ground. In another six seconds, she was laying on the ground with a fractured skull, bleeding from her ears, not breathing.

Steve held very still and listened for anyone running or calling out. When he didn’t hear anything, he walked cautiously away from the scene, being careful not to leave an obvious trail. The police might eventually catch on that this wasn’t an accident, but by then he would be far away.

Steve didn’t like hurting kids, but you never really knew for sure if they were harmless or if you were walking into a trap. He learned a long time ago that when it came to kids, sometimes you just had to play it safe. If Pam’s brother was serving in a war zone then Steve was certain that he would agree...well, he would agree in general, if not in this particular instance.