Chapter VI

h . . . So that was the plan.  I knew she was going to show up sooner or later" thought William.  He let her get almost to Sharons bed, then spoke.

"I was wondering how long it would take you to get in here" he said softly.  Pushing the curtain aside, he stepped into full view of Lela Padian.  But by now, he was used to these kinds of situations, and the sight of her gun aimed right at his face didn't rattle him.

"At least, Sharon and I will die together Lela" he said softly.  He was looking right down the barrel of a .40 caliber Glock 23.  Why aren't you carrying one of the pistols you had shipped into the US illegally?  Or better yet, why don't you have one of the Death Vengeance weapons?"

"Don't you move or I'll shoot you right where you stand" she growled.  "I guess you are aware that my sister, Grace, just took out Paige, Melinda and Billy.  Looks like you'll be joining your other friends in hell real soon.  Grace is very good with a gun, but she never could quite match me" she finished.

"So," replied William slowly.  He wanted to get as much information from her as he could while he had the chance.  With her thinking she had the upper hand in the situation, she would answer any question he wanted to know.  "When did you start targeting cops?  When Chief Amanda Williams brought your scummy brother down like a dog?"

"No, before that" she answered.

"Or was it when they hung your dad for murder, selling off donor organs to rich folks in Japan and the US, blackmailing the two top doctors in the country, burglary, rape, and incest?"

"If you know so much, why are you asking me all these questions?" she spat back.

Without so much as the slightest waver of the Glock, she started fumbling with something in her pocket.  "I'm going to give this syringe of Fentenyl to your pretty little wife, then, when she goes into cardiac arrest, I'm going to let you watch her die.  If you so much as breath heavy I'll drop you."

William never took his eyes from Lelas eyes, as she pulled the cap off from the syringe with her teeth and slowly began to ease over to the bed.  She was nearly ready to slip the needle into the IV drip tee on Sharons arm.  Suddenly, Sharon grabbed Lelas arm and violently jerked her down on top of herself, bringing her right hand up with a bedpan and literally rang Lelas bell.

The loud 'gong' sounded like a church bell and twice as loud.  The bedpan flew out of Sharons hand and now free from the weight of the bedpan, Sharon unleashed the fury she had been holding back for years over the whole DV incident and what they'd been through.  All of it came out in a micro second.

She might die within seconds, but poor Lela was going to experience some good old hellcat fury!  Sharons right fist came up breaking Lelas nose just as she pulled the trigger on the Glock.  Lela was trying to get loose from Sharon who was beating her face to a bloody pulp.  The gun fired again.  All this happened in a split second, before William could cross the room and wrest the gun away from her.

Upon hearing the bedpans initial gong, then clattering on the tile floor, gunfire and the immense struggle going on in Sharons room, Hank bowled through the nurses so mightily one went to the ground.  He busted around the corner with his own firearm drawn.  William was on the floor in a desperate wrestling match with Lela and she was proving quite a handful.

Lela had just wriggled out from under William but she was unable to break free of his grasp on her.  Hank crossed the room in two bounds and dove right into her bowling her off her knees.

He came up under her chin with his XD and pushed it deep into her flesh.  Now, HE was just as mad as Lela!  Lela stopped struggling and went limp.  Hank didn't move but laid there beside Lela, his left arm around her back, his body pinning her right arm to the ground.  She had lost her gun in this melee.

William grabbed the cuffs off Hank and cuffed her left wrist squeezing it as tight as he could, then when Hank moved, brought her arms together forcefully deliberately hurting her.  He was acting very unprofessionally, but, at this moment, he was more of an unprofessional and mad citizen than he was a cop.

By that time hospital security busted through the door along with the the hospital paid full time police officer.  Seeing the blood everywhere and on Hank as well as William, they called for the physician in the emergency room.  He checked Sharons condition first, resetting the IV, putting some bandages on her hand and checking her side wound.

The physician left when he had packed Lelas flattened nose, sewed up the cuts around her eyes.  Nothing he could do about the teeth.

Within a half hour of his taken leave, Lane, Len and Melinda came through the door.  Melinda being the ever loving mommy, was towing baby ammenities.  Sharon was very happy to see her baby boy, and over-smooched him while the tears flowed.

In just moments Len had taken custody of Lela whose face was turning colors and beginning to swell.  She would make a fine booking picture.  And she would be facing some felonies which could be the death penalty.

Almost as abruptly as it began, the murderous rampage against the Police force had ceased.  But not before two died and several had been wounded.  But finer police work had never been performed in the city of Stillwell Creek!  The three known criminals caught that night, all within an hour were connected.

Paige was placed in the room with Sharon and both would be released within two days.  Unbeknownst to anyone outside The Team, both had their firearms with them.  Finally, they'd started playing for keeps.

Will was regaining the strength from the blood he'd lost.  And he had the neatest crease going across his forehead ending in his hair line.  Sharon was home but off work again.  And everything seemed to be going alright, but there was a palor to the sun.  A darkness followed William everywhere he went and over everything he did.

The weapons and The Codes disks still had not been located.  When the place was searched time and again where Lela said Danny had hidden them, nothing was turned up, not even a trace.  But, a little slip of paper in a thin little book called Anarchy, in very small print was a coded message.

Hours and hours of questioning of the three women netted little of importance with the exeption of the clue about the location of two shipments of guns.  Unraveling these clues and the ongoing investigation of the DV codes was driving Williams life.  One day it seemed as if he had come up against an unscaleable block wall.

Then by chance, he was looking through a stack of birthday cards for the umpteeth time which had been secured from the hospital room at the house Mary lived with Lela and Alex lived.  One from a PO Box on the opposite side of town from where Mary lived caught his eye.  Mary obviously cherished the cards she received from several people, most of which were her children.  But this card seemed to have an odd flavor of handwriting, but the verbiage was kind of intriguing.

It was in the form of a little poem someone had written, and William laid it aside from the rest of the cards to check it out again.  All the cards had been dusted for fingerprints, and even now, William handled the cards with gloves.  But in the poem were words rhyming with Danny.

Happy Birthday Mom

When company comes a'callin,
all over yourself don't be fallin.
Don't be sitting your fanny
acting like an old granny
Because no one besides you and your love
can call such blessings from above
All the toys many,
of Jack, Moe and Manny, are in their place,
set by Grace
without and within covered
to never be discovered
like your beauty and love hovers
as with any mother.

"Now who in their right mind would send something like that to their mother unless it was some kind of special code?"  William thought it had some connections with Danny.  The problem is, they'd never discovered who Danny was.

Was he even her son?  A relative?  A friend?  A make believe invisible friend?

Numerous trips to the jail to question the prisoners netted nothing.  Only now, there was another huge problem.  Their lawyer was involved and simply by the way in which he reacted, he had designs on The Codes as well.

William and most of the 'Team' had already expericenced how far one would go to get those codes.  And death always followed closely with those codes.

The dump where the Padians lived was torn down piece by piece, the concrete removed, and the entire lot dug up to a level of three feet.  Nothing to indicate where The Codes were.  When his phone rang Len reported that the address listed on the PO Box was the address of the house they'd just torn down.

Although he didn't realize it yet, he already had the formula for finding The Codes.

Lane was looking through some pictures of the house, and was captivated by the room in the detached garage that was a makeshift Drs. office.  The name Padian had come up once in a court case where a convict had claimed he had been fixed up by a Dr. Padian.  He had explained the 'hospital' was at her house but didn't know where her house was.

He had been shot while in some kind of mixup with some turf warriors and woke up in the hospital.  Later he was taken out and delivered to his own house all while he was sedated.  Since details were quite sketchy, he had just shelved the information and promptly forgot about it.

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