Bennie and the Ace of Hearts

Chapter 11

Bennie

What the hell is that damn beeping, I tried to open my eyes. Where the hell am I? I felt the pain in my gut, God, I hurt all over. What happened? Then it all started to come back to me, the dock, being kidnapped, being shot. I reached up and pulled the oxygen tube from my nose and felt someone holding my other hand. I turned to see Adam sleeping in the chair beside my bed. God, that made me feel better, for the first time since Grams died, I had someone that I wanted to care about and that cared about me. I am so glad he was the first person I saw when I opened my eyes.

A nurse walked in, “Mr. Harlow, you can’t just pull that out.” She took the hose and started to coil it up. “I guess you are breathing on your own just fine, how are you feeling?”

I tried to speak, “like shit.”

The commotion caused Adam to stir, “Bennie!”

I croaked, “morning sleeping beauty.”

The nurse checked the rest of the monitors and said, “I’ll go let the doctor know you’re awake.”

A tear rolled down Adam’s cheek, “you scared the hell out of me. I am so sorry.”

I squeezed his hand, “why are you sorry, you didn’t shoot me.”

He shook his head, “I know, but they were after me. I should have been in that warehouse, not you.”

I said, “yeah I know, I heard Butterfinger getting chewed out by the boss.”

Adam looked confused, “who’s Butterfinger?”

I chuckled, “the guy I left tied up in the storeroom, Reese’s Pieces, Skittles, whatever his name was.”

Adam said, “you mean Tom Reece? Why did you call him by those candy names?”

I grinned, “because it pissed him off and it tickled me.”

Adam rolled his eyes, “well, they have him in custody, Smith was shot by Dan, he didn’t make it and they picked up Boothe, he is being questioned by Dan’s guys.”

I remembered a little more, “what about the woman, I think she’s the real boss.”

He said, “yeah, we were starting to figure that out, Dan was going to question her just as I got the call that you were out of surgery, and I came here.”

I asked, “who is she?”

Adam answered, “Wendy Cabot, John’s ex-wife, Gavin’s mom.”

I looked at Adam, “his mom? That bitch had her own son kidnapped?”

Adam said, “calm down, we’re not sure, like I said, Dan was going to question her when I left.”

I relaxed a little bit, at least they had her in custody, another memory surfaced.

I panicked, “where’s my car?”

Adam chuckled, “we called your mechanic, he came and picked it up.”

I sighed, “thank you, I'm glad you thought to call Keith, he's the only other person I trust to drive her."

He said, "well, I did have to drive from the alley to my office, I hope that was ok."

I narrowed my eyes, "yeah, I guess I trust you too, thanks."

Another thought entered my mind, "Oh shit, Gavin how is he? Did he get his insulin in time?”

“He’s ok, he had what he needed in his car, John grabbed as soon as we got to the shipyard. He’s pretty shook up and was worried about you, but I think he will be fine.” Adam tells me.

I breathe a sigh of relief and look over at Adam, I see his blood-stained tux and shirt. I say, “damn, your new tux is ruined, I’m sorry.”

He looked down, “that’s ok, we’ll just have to go for another fitting, I’m sure Chad won’t mind.” He gave me a grin.

I chuckled, “yeah, and I’ll need a new one too, mine seems to have a hole in it. Remember you said we could go commando on our next fitting.”

Adam shakes his head, “maybe you just worry about healing first, then we’ll deal with getting new suits.”

The doctor came into the room, “the nurse said you were awake, how are you feeling?”

I answered, “not the best right now, but I guess it’s better than being dead.”

He nodded, “that is true, you were lucky, the bullet missed most of your vital organs. You lost a lot of blood, if the ambulance would have gotten you here 5 or 10 minutes later, it may have been too late.”

I sighed, “well, now what doc?”

He said, “we’ll keep you here for a couple more days to make sure no infections set in, then you will need a couple months to heal. You need to take it easy for a while, no lifting and bending. Do you have someone to help you?”

Before I could answer, Adam said, “yes, he will stay with me.”

I turned to Adam, “how about you stay with me, I think I would be more comfortable in my own place.”

Adam said, “we can talk about that later, is there anything else we need to do doctor?”

The doctor said, “yes, but we can go over all that before Bennie is released, I’ll come back and check on you this afternoon, if you need anything let the nurse know. Be sure to get some rest.”

A few minutes after the doctor left, Dallas came into the room.

He saw me laying there, “oh damn, you look like shit.”

I raised an eyebrow, “thanks, so do you.”

He hung his head, “sorry, that just slipped out. Bennie, I am sorry, I didn’t mean to do it.”

I thought a second, “didn’t mean to do what?”

Adam explained about the thugs showing up at the office and Dallas told them to find the guy in a tux driving a T-Bird.

I turned back to Dallas, “all because I made fun of your shirt?”

Dallas sighed, “I said I was sorry, I didn’t think things through, I should have told them I didn’t know where Adam was.”

Adam said, “ok guys, let’s not worry about this right now, you guys really need to try to get along.”

I looked at Dallas, “it wasn’t your fault, you didn’t know what they were going to do. Just remember though, I will bust your balls about this every chance I get.”

Dallas let out another deep sigh as Dan came into the room. Dallas said, “I’ll go get us some coffee.”

Adam said, “thanks Dal. Hey Dan, so where are we?”

Dan started to fill us in, “well, they are all singing like canaries, each trying to get the best deal. Reece was first, he’s just a thug for hire, he had no idea what was going on. He said he was paid $5000 to grab Adam and bring him back to the warehouse, where the boss was going to “talk” to him. The boss never gave him a description, so he had no idea he grabbed Bennie until it was too late. Smith was the one that called Gavin and said he worked for his dad and wanted him to come to the dock. Same as Reece, he didn’t really know what was going on.”

Adam asked, “ok, so were Boothe and Cabot’s ex working together?”

Dan took a sip of the coffee that Dallas had just brought in, “at first they were.”

Adam raised an eyebrow, “at first?”

Dan nodded, “yep, Wendy Cabot came to Boothe, she wanted to set her ex-husband up. The original plan was to get him to let them use one of his containers to bring a load of drugs into the country. Boothe was then supposed to call the authorities and tell them that he suspected drugs and let the dock be raided. Since the container was leased to Cabot, they assumed he would be arrested.”

I asked, “so John Cabot knew nothing about this?”

Dan shook his head, “nope, he was just told to order a partial container load, they would fill the rest. He was told that if he cooperated, his kids would be safe, the ex-wife had all the schedule info for the kids. They never intended to hurt the kids. They also paid Cabot for their share of the container, to keep him quiet, but he was more worried about keeping his kids safe.”

Adam said, “so the ex-wife wanted Cabot out of the way, for what, just to have Gavin to herself?”

Dan said, “that and she was jealous. When she and Cabot were married, they had several failed businesses, once they split and he got remarried, his luck changed. His new business took off, it didn’t hurt that his new in-laws were loaded and pumping money to him. Wendy Cabot was broke and barely getting by.”

I asked, “so why didn’t the first load get busted.”

Dan smiled, “here is where it gets fun. While they were waiting for the first container, Boothe did some research and figured out what the drugs that were coming in would be worth. He didn’t tell Mrs. Cabot but he sold the drugs and never called anybody to raid the dock. Once the FBI started to look into things, he kept getting tipped off to our raids by my predecessor, we are still checking to see If he was involved. He kept this up for the last two years, he started to pay Wendy Cabot off, so now everyone was happy.”

Adam thought for a minute, “so what changed, I mean it sounds like things were working. John Cabot was getting paid for the use of his container, Wendy Cabot was getting free cash to keep her mouth shut and Boothe was making all kinds of cash. What happened?”

Dan looked at Adam, “you.”

Adam furrowed his brow, “me?”

Dan nodded, “you started looking into that hack in Cabot’s computer, you started to nose around the dock, Boothe was afraid you were going to figure out what he was doing, he panicked.”

I asked, “why did they grab Gavin?”

“I couldn’t get a good answer on that, I think Boothe went rouge again, he wanted another insurance policy in case things went bad, with either of the Cabots.” Dan replied.

We all sat there a minute, just trying to understand what we all had just heard.

Dan said, “well, I need to get back to the office, the DA is coming in an hour, and I need to give him all the info so he can decide what charges to file and against whom. I just wanted to let you guys to know what was happening and to make sure Bennie was ok.”

Adam stood, “thanks Dan.”

He turned to leave, “we are probably going to have some questions for you and Bennie, you will both probably have to testify at the trials too.”

“No problem, just call and let us know when.” I replied.

Dallas stood, “I guess I better get back to the office too. I am sorry Bennie and I’m glad you are going to be ok.”

I said, “thanks Dallas, try not let any more bad guys know where I am.”

Adam shot me a look, “Bennie!”

“Sorry Dallas, thanks for stopping by. I know it wasn’t your fault.”

Dallas walked out, “thanks Bennie, get some rest.”

Adam sat next to me, “I really wish you two would try to get a long.”

I smiled, “we do, we love each other, this is just how we show our affection to one another.”

He sighed, “yeah, I guess so, you two are a lot alike.”

I scoffed, “except that I am so much more adorable than he is.”

Adam rolled his eyes, “of course you are.”