Dangerous Deception - Aaron Solomon (reading like a writer .TXT) 📗

“Nikki!” My engineer, William Zirkle quipped as I stepped inside the train crew area at the Illinois Northern Railroad Blue Island division’s North Hook yard. “Good to see you again, my lady.” The golden brown rabbit and I hadn’t seen each other for quite a few days since we both had our holiday nearly a week or so ago and I had taken a little trip on Amtrak to visit my family back in LA. His crystal blue eyes lit right up like an X-mas tree on the day we both returned to work the following Monday. I smiled back at him. “Will, my main man!” I replied. “How was your vacay down in the capitol working for ya?” “Pretty sweet.” He answered with a grin. “But absolutely nothing could compare to my home sweet home right here. Especially when I’ve got nearly all the right ones to spend just about every day with.” “I heard that.” I said. “God bless a good stablemate.” Not wanting to waste another second or more diddly daddling, we made our way out to our train of the day positioned on the ready track and took our places in the cab of pooled Norfolk and Atlantic SD70MAC 7794 before getting the all clear and finally leaving the yard about ten to thirteen minutes later with our manifest of more than fifty cars, bound for our destinations of Springville and beyond.
 

William

After the many hours and days of the daily hustle and bustle along the railroad, the weekend had finally arrived and it was once again time for some downtime at home with just me, myself, and I and a little television to enlighten my already positive mood and keep up with some current events up to date. I did some channel surfing for a good while then finally stumbled across a rather interesting bulletin on the news about two employees from the BNSF Railway who apparently were suspected of being in the ever so popular criminal business of coke dealing and were now wanted by both local and federal authorities around the entire state of Illinois. It also seemed a good chunk of money was being offered for the bounty but I didn’t care one bit about that. These two saps had just committed an act of treason and paper would be the absolute last thing on my mind if I was planning to go after them. I decided to give Nikki a ring who responded saying she would look more into it the first opportunity she got which fortunately wasn’t at all long of a wait. At around 12:01 that afternoon, my doorbell rang and there stood Nikki with the most inquisitive look on her face as I invited her inside my humble abode. “Hey.” She greeted, taking a seat next to me on the sectional. “Got the names and histories of those guys on the news and boy do they both seem like bad news bears.” She explained to me first about the black bear, Donald Mintz, who was some rich prick originally from the Hamptons who came to Chicago after his half million dollar corporation went bankrupt and joined the rail industry as a way to make a little extra dough alongside gambling and other illicit activities he had taken part in on the side. On the other paw, the leopard was a street rat named Tobias Karlson who secretly had numerous ties to various crime syndicates all around the city. I was surprised they let someone of his caliber and background even think of joining the rail industry. I guess as long as it wasn’t rocket science, they let anyone get into everything on the planet these days. “Alright.” Nikki said after discussing the plan. “I’ve got my main girl on this too. I’ll give her a call as soon as were on the road and we can swing by her place to meet up. It’s time to catch us some peeps.”
 

Leslie

I made contact with my dear and closest friend, Nikki once again and her compatriot, William to make our way steadily down to the One Flight Up club over in the Little Italy section of downtown. It was here that both Mintz and Karlson jointly owned the club along with Karlson’s crime family and we were going to pay them all a little visit. Nikki gently eased her Hyundai Sonata toward the parking space outside the main entrance of the club but soon had to stop dead behind another parked sedan and keep her distance as both Mintz and Karlson were boarding Mintz’s black BMW just in front of the main entrance doors. I kept eyes on the two of them as they shook paws in a brotherly like fashion and drove off slowly down Taylor Street where Nikki silently pulled us off and stayed as hot as she could on their tail without alarming them. We continued to follow them out of the city and all the way to Aurora where they then turned and pulled into a pretty high class looking community surrounded by acres of land with lush green grass and trees on all sides down a path that led to a good sized cabin deep in the shady woods that the pair parked just alongside of in a nice little carport. “Alright.” William said, opening the back seat door. “Guess it’s time to get into the swing of things.” “Indeed.” Nikki replied affirmatively and put the car in park before stepping out and slowly making her way around to the cellar door of the immaculate cabin with William and I following suit right on her heels behind her. Using my master lock picking skills, I cracked the cracked the combination lock off with incredible ease using a small butter knife and some sewing pins I had in my pocket and slowly made my way down the stairs to the inside of the basement and then paused to find and flip on the light switch over in a lonely corner to the right. “Woo! Just as I suspected.” Nikki said, wrinkling her nose at the full meth lab on a long table over in the left corner of the room. “You could smell this thing a mile away.” “Guess that explains how the two of them could even come close to affording this kind of roof over their heads.” William concluded. “That’s for damn sure.” I replied. “You sure as hell don’t make this kinda dough doin just your everyday gig.” We slipped silently up the basement stairs and made our way into the living room where we found the pair having drinks and conversing with each other quietly upon our approach. “Jig’s up, boys.” Nikki said. “It’s time to answer for your devious deeds.” “Oh, fuck!” Karlson exclaimed. “You,” Mintz spoke up. “You… have got some balls.” “Yes we do.” William retorted and then made a quick dodge just as the leopard stepped forth and took a heavy swing at him that nearly grazed his left ear. He stood up and returned with a hard punch of his own, sending a solid right hook straight into the leopard’s temple that rendered him lights out almost instantaneously. “You’re not taking me alive.” The bear said, pulling his Glock from his belt and placing it up to his temple. “Not on my watch you don’t, slick.” Nikki said, slipping agilely behind him and wrapping her paws tightly around his throat. She held on tightly for a few moments and I delivered a knockout smash to the back of his head that did the trick and sent him toppling over to the floor like a sack of potatoes. William whipped out his cell and called up the Aurora PD where they arrived on scene no less than three minutes later and began to send their two pinhead Larry catches of the day on their merrily way down to their new homes of the Illinois state correctional facility. As for us, it was time to call it a day and prepare for another long and hard day of work on the job tomorrow morning.

Publication Date: 11-02-2015

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