Chapter 23 #2
“No. My name is William Bill Will Liam Williams. My great-great-grandfather on my mother's side started this ridiculous thing of calling every son William first and then a second name. So, William Henry is my uncle, for example. My father didn’t want to be told what his son would be called, but it was causing a rift in the family. When I was born, he decided to make his point and called me by most of the derivatives of William. Luckily, he left out, or didn’t realize he’d missed out, Billy and Willie.
Family gatherings were a nightmare as he insisted on using my full name at every opportunity.
We didn’t have many family gatherings, as you can imagine.
They always led to an argument. I don’t know what he would’ve done if I’d had a brother. ”
“Good job you don’t have any sisters!” Vortex splutters between his laughter.
“Oh, but I do. I have four. Wilhelmina, every one of them. Willa, Billie, Wilma and Willow. I think he ran out of ideas when it came to Willow. Mother won’t talk about it.
It’s probably the only thing I’ve ever heard my parents raise their voices or genuinely argue about.
” Officer Bill sighs and shakes his head.
“I don’t know how many more times in my life I will have to explain that.
I might just have it printed on cards or something and just hand them out. ” He smiles at the thought.
“Well, Bill, I think we can leave you with this piece of trash and Carlos. We found some cash that I was going to hand over to our treasurer, but you can have it as evidence if it will help?”
“Treasurer?”
“Yes, we’re from the Bitter Slayers MC. I’m Cannon and the slippery one there is Vortex. We should exchange numbers, and then if either of us needs help to clear more trash, we can keep in contact.” I hope he will take me up on this, as it’s always handy to have a law enforcement contact.
“Yeah, why not. If you message me though, be careful with the wording. Probably better if we talk more than we text, if you catch my drift?” Telling me his number, I give him a call so he has my number.
Griller and Breaker return Carlos, unconscious, and surprisingly he doesn’t look any the worse for wear.
Griller throws him in the back of the Caddy with Big Ugly.
Speaking from the side door, Breaker says, “He knows nothing more than we do, except for one thing. He doesn’t believe that the drugs are direct from a cartel.
He thinks there is a middleman somewhere because the senator is always complaining about the price changing.
Stephan is trying to contact a cartel directly.
If he does, he’s going to go from a big fish in a little pond to a little fish in a freakin’ big pond overnight.
They won’t take long in taking over control of his operation and using him as the fall guy if anything goes wrong.
” Breaker is shaking his head, and I know what he’s thinking.
We don’t need a cartel getting its foot in the door of our town.
That will become very messy, very quickly.
“Senator? What senator? Who is this Stephan?” Bill is not as knowledgeable as he could be, so I make a suggestion.
“When you get off shift, Bill, give me a call. We should meet up and share our intel. We may learn a lot from each other.”
“I’m done in fifteen minutes. I can meet you somewhere as soon as I’m done and change out of my uniform. How about the diner between here and Stirlingsville?” He looks at me hopefully, and I have nothing else to do, so why the hell not.
“What are you going to do with these two?” I ask pointing to the two sleeping beauties in the vehicle.
“I’ll get someone out here to give me a hand, and I’ll book them in at the station.
I know one of the other guys is just as pissed off with all this as I am.
I’ll still be at the diner, just a few minutes later.
Is it okay to bring along another like-minded officer?
Or would you rather we kept it to just us for starters? ”
“If you trust them, I’ll trust them. Do you want this cash as evidence?” I reach into my pocket for the stack of notes I took from Big Ugly.
“Nah. Give it to your treasurer. With no drugs to show where they got it from, they’ll just have it handed back to them.
” He turns to the Caddy when a scuffle breaks out in the back seat as both his prisoners awake at the same time.
He leans into the rear of the vehicle, slips his weapon from its holster and points it at them.
“If I see either of you in this town again. I will blow your head off, put a gun in your cold dead hand and claim it was self-defense. Do I make myself clear?”
Carlos definitely believes him as his head shakes like one of those Hawaiian dancing things you have on your dashboard. Big Ugly doesn’t look convinced until Bill pulls the slide on his Glock, effectively cocking it ready to fire. This persuades Big Ugly, and he nods.
“Get out of town and stay out.” Bill steps away from the vehicle and allows them to scoot out of the rear and into the front of the Caddy.
As it drives away he grins. “That saved the wasted effort of booking them in only to watch them walk out an hour later. Felt better too. I’ll see you shortly at the diner. ”
Bill walks away and we all have a quick chat about what’s just happened and how Pres will feel when I tell him about it. Breaker, of course, points out that as Vortex and I will be going to the diner, it will be down to him and Griller to do the honors.
I give him a grin, saying, “Oh, yeah. So it will.”