The Fourth Monkey: A twisted thriller you won’t be able to put down - J.D. Barker

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listening to the various pops and creaks his tired fifty-two-year-old body made in protest.

      The sun had begun its ascent, and light peeked in from between the closed blinds of the bedroom window. Funny how quiet and gloomy the apartment felt without Heather around.

       Went to get milk.

      From the hardwood floor his alarm clock blinked up at him with a cracked face displaying characters no longer resembling numbers.

      Today was going to be one of those days.

      There had been a lot of those days lately.

      Porter emerged from the apartment ten minutes later dressed in his Sunday best — a rumpled navy suit he’d bought off the rack at Men’s Wearhouse nearly a decade earlier — and made his way down the four flights of stairs to the cramped lobby of his building. He stopped at the mailboxes, pulled out his cell phone, and punched in his wife’s phone number.

       You’ve reached the phone of Heather Porter. Since this is voice mail, I most likely saw your name on caller ID and decided I most certainly did not wish to speak to you. If you’re willing to pay tribute in the form of chocolate cake or other assorted offerings of dietary delight, text me the details and I’ll reconsider your position in my social roster and possibly get back to you later. If you’re a salesperson trying to get me to switch carriers, you might as well hang up now. AT&T owns me for at least another year. All others, please leave a message. Keep in mind my loving husband is a cop with anger issues, and he carries a large gun.

      Porter smiled. Her voice always made him smile. “Hey, Button. It’s just me. Nash called. There’s something going on near Hyde Park; I’m meeting him down there. I’ll give you a call later when I know what time I’ll be home.” He added, “Oh, and I think there’s something wrong with our alarm clock.”

      He dropped the phone into his pocket and pushed through the door, the brisk Chicago air reminding him that fall was preparing to step aside for winter.

       2

       Porter

       Day 1 • 6:45 a.m.

      Porter took Lake Park Avenue and made good time, arriving at about a quarter to seven. Chicago Metro had Woodlawn at Fifty-Fifth completely barricaded. He could make out the lights from blocks away — at least a dozen units, an ambulance, two fire trucks. Twenty officers, possibly more. Press too.

      He slowed his late-model Dodge Charger as he approached the chaos, and held his badge out the window. A young officer, no more than a kid, ducked under the yellow crime-scene tape and ran over. “Detective Porter? Nash told me to wait for you. Park anywhere — we’ve cordoned off the entire block.”

      Porter nodded, then pulled up beside one of the fire trucks and climbed out. “Where’s Nash?”

      The kid handed him a cup of coffee. “Over there, near the ambulance.”

      He spotted Nash’s large frame speaking to Tom Eisley from the medical examiner’s office. At nearly six foot three, he towered over the much smaller man. He looked like he’d put on a few pounds in the weeks since Porter had seen him, the telltale cop’s belly hanging prominently over his belt.

      Nash waved him over.

      Eisley greeted Porter with a slight nod and pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “How are you holding up, Sam?” He held a clipboard loaded with at least a ream of paper. In today’s world of tablets and smartphones, the man always seemed to have a clipboard on hand; his fingers flipped nervously through the pages.

      “I imagine he’s getting tired of people asking him how he’s holding up, how he’s doing, how he’s hanging, or any other variation of well-being assertion,” Nash grumbled.

      “It’s fine. I’m fine.” He forced a smile. “Thank you for asking, Tom.”

      “Anything you need, just ask.” Eisley shot Nash a glance.

      “I appreciate that.” Porter turned back to Nash. “So, an accident?”

      Nash nodded at a city bus parked near the curb about fifty feet away. “Man versus machine. Come on.”

      Porter followed him, with Eisley a few paces behind, clipboard in tow.

      A CSI tech photographed the front of the bus. Dented grill. Cracked paint an inch above the right headlight. Another investigator picked at something buried in the right front tire tread.

      As they neared, he spotted the black body bag among a sea of uniforms standing before a growing crowd.

      “The bus was moving at a good clip; its next stop is nearly a mile down the road,” Nash told them.

      “I wasn’t speeding, dammit! Check the GPS. Don’t be throwing accusations like that out there!”

      Porter turned to his left to find the bus driver. He was a big man, at least three hundred pounds. His black CTA jacket strained against the bulk it had been tasked to hold together. His wiry gray hair was matted on the left and reaching for the sky on the right. Nervous eyes stared back at them, jumping from Porter, to Nash, then Eisley, and back again. “That crazy fucker jumped right out in front of me. This ain’t no accident. He offed himself.”

      “Nobody said you did anything wrong,” Nash assured him.

      Eisley’s phone rang. He glanced at the display, held up a finger, and walked a few paces to the side to take the call.

      The driver went on. “You start spreading around that I was speeding, and there goes my job, my pension … think I wanna be looking for work at my age? In this shit economy?”

      Porter caught a glimpse of the man’s name tag. “Mr. Nelson, how about you take a deep breath and try to calm down?”

      Sweat trickled down the man’s red face. “I’m gonna be pushing a broom somewhere all because that little prick picked my bus. I got thirty-one years behind me without an incident, and now this bullshit.”

      Porter put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “Do you think you can tell me what happened?”

      “I need to keep my mouth shut until my union rep gets here, that’s what I need to do.”

      “I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.”

      The driver frowned. “What are you gonna do for me?”

      “I can put in a good word with Manny Polanski down at Transit, for starters. If you didn’t do anything wrong, if you cooperate with us, there’s no reason for you to get suspended.”

      “Shit. You think I’ll get suspended over this?” He wiped the sweat from his brow. “Jesus, I can’t afford that.”

      “I don’t think they’ll do that if they know you worked with us, that you tried to help. There might not even be a need for a hearing,” Porter assured him.

      “A hearing?”

      “Why don’t you tell me what happened? Then I can talk to Manny for you, maybe save you the pain of all that.”

      “You know Manny?”

      “I worked my first two years on the job as a uniform with Transit. He’ll listen to me. You help us out, and I’ll put in a good word, I promise.”

      The driver considered this, then finally took a deep breath and nodded. “It happened just like I said to your friend here. I made the stop at Ellis right on time — picked up two, dropped off one. I ran east down Fifty-Fifth, came around the bend. The light at Woodlawn was green, so there was no need to slow down — not that I was speeding. Check the GPS.”

      “I’m

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