The Leveler

By James McLaughlin

When our world suddenly crumbles apart we are faced with multiple options. We can choose to accept responsibility for our own failures, change what needs to be changed, pick up the pieces and start all over again. Or, we can choose to hold everyone else responsible for our failures and seek revenge. The Leveler is a failed man who chooses not to accept personal responsibility for the miserable way his life has turned out. Pursued by rookie homicide detective Beebe Lawless, The Leveler goes on a week long killing spree seeking revenge against those he feels conspired to ruin his life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: James McLaughlin
• Release date: Jun 7, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458000163

James McLaughlin

His lifelong love of reading coupled with an overactive imagination fueled the creation of Jim McLaughlin's novels. Starting with comic books as a kid, Jim is never without a good book at his side. A career move to Chicago was the spark that ignited the story behind "The James Charade". The economic downturn set in motion the central theme in "The Leveler". "Two Billion Reasons to Kill???" features Burton James, the popular character first introduced to the world in "The James Charade".Born in Iowa and raised in Prairie Village, Kansas, Jim spent the majority of his career in the medical equipment industry, working for large companies before plunging headfirst into the wonderful world of entrepreneurship by starting and selling two successful medical equipment businesses in the Kansas City area.Now retired, Jim spends his time reading and writing. He loves to travel with his wife, is addicted to water sports, is lousy at golf but still likes to play, and spends his spare time in his bead studio where he practices the age old art of lampwork.Jim's favorite authors are Catherine Coulter (www.catherinecoulter.com), Lawrence Sanders (may God rest his soul), and Robert B. Parker (now writing in Heaven with Lawrence Sanders).

Book preview

PROLOGUE

The Leveler sat alone; in the grimy kitchen of the dilapidated house he rented for peanuts in the middle of nowhere. He occasionally shifted his attention from the Kansas City Star spread out on the battered and greasy kitchen table before him, to the screen of the thirteen inch black and white television he’d picked up at a garage sale for ten bucks. The television received an acceptable picture, provided he moved the rabbit ears just so, but only if he kept a flag of tin foil on the tip of each antenna. Like everything else television didn’t really matter that much to him anymore. He only watched the local news to listen for evening updates to the stories printed in the morning newspaper.

He had started smoking and drinking again, generic cigarettes and the cheapest beer he could find. Almost broke, it was all he could afford. As he smoked and drank he studied the paper for stories of interest. Whenever he found an article that fit neatly into his plan he cut it out and laid it aside. Later he would add the clippings to the files that were stored in a box in his secret room.

The deep voice of the handsome television newscaster caused him to lay the newspaper aside for the moment and concentrate on the screen of the small set.

Another local company has filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection. Our roving reporter, Lisa Martinez, interviewed Franklin Joyce, the Chairman and CEO of CapCom Incorporated, outside the Federal Courthouse today.

The picture changed to a shot of the petite and popular television personality standing next to a tall well-dressed man with a full head of perfectly groomed silver hair. Mr. Joyce, can you predict the outcome of the bankruptcy filing? How many jobs will be lost? Can CapCom recover? Martinez asked her questions in rapid-fire succession.

Joyce answered her without pause. I feel confident that CapCom will recover. We’ve retained Bill Paige and his team to lead the turnaround effort. He brings a great deal of experience to the table. As far as jobs are concerned, we hope to keep any reduction in force to a bare minimum. His comments sounded rehearsed and insincere, his tone of voice hollow, emotionless.

Martinez thanked Joyce and then turned to the camera as he walked away. Let’s hope Bill Paige can work the same magic with CapCom that he’s performed so many times with other large corporations struggling to outlast the current downturn in our economy. This is Lisa Martinez reporting live for channel 12 in front of the Federal Courthouse building. Now back to you in the studio.

The Leveler felt his chest tighten when he heard Bill Paige’s name. He turned off the TV, rose from the table, dropped his half-smoked cigarette into the empty beer bottle, and tossed the bottle in the general direction of an overflowing box of trash in one corner of the kitchen. He placed the disemboweled newspaper on top of a growing stack and carried the newly harvested articles to his secret room, to add to his collection.

Once inside the small cramped space he switched on a battery powered lantern hanging on a hook he’d fastened to the ceiling.

A small table sat at one end of the secret room, a table he had constructed out of the leftover materials he used when he built the false wall inside the bedroom closet. It was sturdy but the surface was unfinished and rough.

A large cardboard file box sat in the middle of the table. He sat down on a short stool and removed the lid from the box.

The box contained manila folders, carefully hand lettered to identify the contents of each file. They were labeled Lawyers, Lawmen, Prosecutors, Judges, Jailers, Reporters, Politicians, Bureaucrats, Supposed Friends and Lovers, and Executives. Some of the files contained newspaper articles that told the stories of high profile men and women who had gained public notoriety for one reason or another, some good and some bad. Others held handwritten notes, business cards, and photographs.

The Leveler sorted his latest news clippings by category, then placed each in its corresponding file folder. All articles pertaining to a given individual were paper clipped together. The Politicians and Executives folders bulged. In comparison, most of the other files were relatively thin. The Jailers file was empty, except for a single scrap of paper with a name scrawled on it. He removed a thick paper-clipped stack of articles from the Executives file and placed it on the table. The articles chronicled the recent work of Bill Paige.

A black nylon daypack hung on the back wall of the secret room. He removed the pack from its hook and filled it with items stored on a set of shelves at the opposite end of the room, items he knew he would need for what he was going to do later that evening.

He had planned his first strike to take place on a near moonless night. The thin sliver of sunlight reflected from the surface of the crescent moon should provide just enough light to navigate cross-country in the dark. The temperature hovered slightly below the freezing mark, and a thick band of clouds was slowly moving in from the southwest. Snowfall was predicted to begin after midnight, but The Leveler would be home in bed long before the first flakes fell.

Dressed completely in black he felt confident he would be nearly invisible from a distance. He locked the front door of the house and walked to his late model pickup truck.

The Leveler set his pack on the seat next to him. He started the truck engine, shifted into gear, and drove slowly down the rutted lane that led away from the isolated old farmhouse. He accelerated slightly after he turned onto the gravel road, driving carefully in the direction of the interstate highway. Once on the interstate he followed it east until he crossed the state line, leaving Kansas, entering Missouri. A short distance further he exited the highway and followed a familiar route on residential streets, eventually arriving on a street behind the home of Bill Paige, the most ruthless son of a bitch on the face of the earth.

CHAPTER ONE

Tuesday, Jan 20

6:00 PM

The Leveler rolled his truck to a stop in the upscale Hidden Lakes housing development and cut the lights. He parked in front of a house that was in the framing stage of construction, the first one to be built on the street of very expensive home sites. He unzipped his daypack, removed a pair of thin leather gloves, and put them on. He withdrew a .38 caliber revolver from the pack and put it in his right coat pocket. A small can of pepper spray he’d stolen from the locker of the night security guard at work went into his left coat pocket. He felt inside the pack for his ski mask. When he found it, he rolled it up and placed it on his head. He’d spent hours practicing pulling the mask down with one hand so it completely concealed his face, except for his eyes and mouth. When he filled the daypack earlier in the evening he carefully wiped each item with a white cotton towel, intent on erasing any trace of his fingerprints.

He opened the door to his truck. A piece of electrician’s tape over the button in the doorframe prevented the dome light from coming on. He slid from the truck, placed the single ignition key under the floor mat, grabbed his pack and eased the door shut. He left the truck unlocked. He double checked his pants pocket to make sure he had his spare ignition key, then walked quickly past the house under construction and turned in the direction of the Paige home, three lots down and on the opposite side of the number ten fairway of the Hidden Lakes Country Club golf course.

It took only a few minutes to walk to a position directly across the golf course from the Paige’s home. He paused next to a grove of small trees to study the house. The back of the house was illuminated by the glow of lights shining through windows on the main floor. Both the top and bottom floors were dark. He could barely detect movement inside the huge structure, someone moving about a room he guessed to be the kitchen.

The backyard of the house west of the Paige home was brightly lit with floodlights, but the house and yard to the east were completely dark. He decided to approach the target house from the east side, the dark side. He moved quickly across the frozen winter-brown zoysia grass of the golf course, and then ran in a crouch up the lot line to the back corner of Paige’s house.

Built on top of a hill, the rear of the home was three stories. The main living area opened onto a massive deck, the lower level onto a patio. Both the deck and the patio spanned the entire width of the house. Six sliding glass doors provided access from the lower floor to the patio. Since there were no lights on inside the lowest level The Leveler was able to move freely from door to door, without fear of detection, in the dark shadows cast by the deck above his head. He found each door locked, and suspected a burglar bar further protected each.

He retraced his steps back to the dark side of the house and examined a window that opened into the ground level. The bottom of the window opening was chest high. Provided he could get through it without triggering an alarm, the window seemed to present the best point of entry. The Leveler dropped his pack to the ground, unzipped it and located his pry bar. He used the sharp end of the bar to slit the screen in the self-storing storm window, and then in one quick motion pulled the screen free from its frame. He covered the curved end of the pry bar with the towel he had used to wipe away his fingerprints and gave the storm window a hard rap. The window cracked but didn’t shatter. He hit it a little harder and the single pane fractured into a dozen large pieces. He carefully removed the broken pieces of glass from the window frame and laid them on the ground.

He used the muffled pry bar to break out a pane of glass in the double hung window, and then reached in and unlocked it. He slowly raised the window as high as it would go. He held his breath while he waited for the wail of an alarm. He counted in his head from one to sixty, but no alarm sounded. He replaced the pry bar and towel in his daypack, slung it over his shoulder, hoisted himself up and over the windowsill and dropped quietly to the floor inside the house.

The Leveler landed on a concrete floor in a storage room that was separate from the living area. He removed his flashlight from the daypack and turned it on. He scanned the room, keeping his fingers spread over the lens of the flashlight to subdue the light. The room was unfinished with a wide door that led into the main house. He tried the door. It was not locked. He turned off the flashlight and put it back in his pack.

The door creaked loudly when he opened it. He stood in the doorway of the storage room and waited, expecting lights to come on at any moment as someone from above came to investigate the sound. No one came.

He walked cautiously into the lower level and peered into the darkness. Midpoint in the room a wide staircase rose to the first floor. Light from the main level of the house filtered down the stairs, providing enough light for The Leveler to navigate the large room.

He moved silently to the sliding glass door nearest him, unlocked it and raised the security bar. He slid the door open an inch, and then turned towards the stairs. The thick pile carpeting concealed the sound of his footsteps as he crossed the room and began his ascent to the main floor of the house.

Halfway up the stairs he paused and drew his revolver. He opened the cylinder to double-check that the gun was fully loaded. His hands shook slightly as he examined his weapon. Satisfied, he pulled the mask down over his face, removed the can of pepper spray from his jacket pocket, took a deep breath, and continued his climb to the first floor.

CHAPTER TWO

Tuesday, Jan 20

6:30 PM

The stairs from the lower level led up to a large entry hall. Soft light fell from a huge crystal chandelier suspended from the ceiling twenty feet overhead. The Leveler hesitated on the top step, straining to hear the sounds of people. He could hear the sound of a television program coming from somewhere towards the rear of the main floor. He stepped into the entry hall and moved to the bottom of the stairway that curved to the top floor of the house. The upper floor appeared to be completely dark and deserted. He looked through a doorway near the bottom of the steps, into a small office. It was dark, vacant. A large formal dining room lay in darkness off the opposite side of the entry hall, directly across from the office.

He crept softly through the entry hall towards the rear of the house and entered a living room. Through a wide, arched opening on one wall of the living room he could see a woman working in the kitchen. He could hear her humming as she set the table. The odor from a pot of chili bubbling on the stove permeated the air. A television set in a corner of the room was tuned to CNN.

He watched her stop at the kitchen island, to pour a glass of white wine. She was putting the cork back in the wine bottle when he made his move.

Don’t move and keep quiet he snarled, holding the gun out in front of him as he rushed into the kitchen. He cringed when the wine bottle slipped through her hands, smashing on the slate kitchen floor. It shattered into a thousand jagged pieces.

The Leveler advanced closer to the woman and sprayed her in the face with pepper spray. He stood over her when she dropped to the floor, watching coldly as she coughed and gagged, trying to catch her breath. He watched her flail about on her back. Blood began seeping from small cuts on her hands and arms caused by the broken glass from the wine bottle.

He pocketed the gun and pepper spray, and then with one hand under her arm, yanked her to her feet. Who else is in the house? he demanded in a harsh whisper.

All Bonnie Paige could do was shake her head no.

Nobody else? he asked again.

Her eyes were clamped shut and tears streamed down her face. All she could do was shake her head no.

Show me where your bedroom is.

She pointed in the direction of the living room.

He dragged her from the kitchen to the living room and quickly located a short hallway that led to a bedroom that was as big as his house. He pulled her over to the bed and forced her to sit down on it. Lay down and roll over on your stomach, he commanded.

He didn’t wait for her to comply. He shoved her onto her back then roughly rolled her onto her stomach. He pulled a pair of handcuffs and a roll of duct tape from his pack. He cuffed her hands behind her back and bound her ankles tightly together with the tape.

Leaving her alone for a moment, he went into the master bathroom and returned with a hand towel and a washcloth. He folded the towel lengthwise and duct taped it over her eyes, taking four turns of the tape completely around her head. Long strands of her hair tangled in the sticky tape.

Bonnie Paige began to tremble and whimper with fear.

When is your husband due home? Where are your sons? His words echoed in his head when he spoke, as if someone else was speaking.

She coughed and cleared her throat. My husbands due home any minute. The boys won’t be home until late, she managed to reply, her voice quivering like that of a small child about to burst into tears.

He didn’t respond. He jammed the washcloth in her mouth then picked up the tape and took a couple more turns around her head, gagging her so she couldn’t call out to warn her husband when he came home. He hogtied her ankles to her wrists so she couldn’t roll onto her back.

He figured Bill Paige would park his car in the garage and then enter the house through the kitchen. He walked back through the kitchen and located the door to the garage at the end of a long hallway. On either side of the hall doors opened into a pantry, a laundry room, a half bath and a coat closet. He opened each door but settled on the bathroom. He went in and sat down on the toilet to await the arrival of his victim, pushing the door almost all the way closed. The small room smelled like lavender. He liked the aroma. It helped him relax.

He held Bill Paige partially responsible for the loss of his job, him and the bleached blonde bitch that headed the human resources department for his former employer. When the economy soured his employer contracted with Paige’s firm to consult in restructuring the company. A few months later The Leveler was out of a job. He despised Paige for who he was, and for what he did.

According to a recent news article, Paige and company had saved at least a dozen large corporations from financial failure over the past two years. In the process he had cost tens of thousands of people their jobs. For what? He did his work so that the handful of rich fat cats who owned shares of the mismanaged companies would not lose their shirts. Meanwhile, the little guy took it in the shorts. The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. Bill Paige was nationally known as the king of corporate downsizing. For his efforts he lived like a king.

The Leveler didn’t have to wait long for Paige to come home. From his hiding place he could hear the sound of the automatic garage door opening, then closing. He heard a car door slam shut and the door from the garage to the house open and close. He rose from his seat and pulled the gun and pepper spray from his pockets. He could smell the cigar smoke that wafted from Paige as he walked by the partially opened bathroom door.

CHAPTER THREE

Tuesday, Jan 20

7:00 PM

Bonnie, I’m home, Bill Paige announced loudly.

The Leveler slowly opened the bathroom door and stepped into the hallway. He hoped Paige would head straight to the bedroom to change out of his formal work attire, and he wanted to be right there, to see the look on his face when he discovered his wife lying on their bed trussed with duct tape.

Paige did not notice the broken wine bottle on the floor as he strode purposefully through the kitchen and living room, in the direction of his bedroom. The Leveler silently followed a dozen steps behind.

When Paige reached the door to his bedroom, The Leveler quickly closed the distance between them and gave him a mighty shove forward.

Bill Paige was not a big man, but he was quick and agile. It would take more than a hard push from behind to knock him off his feet. But The Leveler was a big man, and very strong. His shove projected Paige clear to the edge of the bed.

Paige hesitated for a moment when he saw his wife, then reeled around to face his attacker. He yelled, Who are you! What are you doing in my house? His face was red with rage. He made a sudden rush at The Leveler, only to be met with a vicious kick between his legs.

Paige dropped to his knees, his face twisted with pain. The Leveler kicked him again, directly under his chin, breaking his jaw. The force of the kick knocked him onto his back on the floor. The Leveler walked closer to the fallen man and sprayed him with pepper spray. Paige lay flat on his back on the floor, moaning in agony, gasping for air.

The Leveler hesitated, to get his breathing under control, and then began a rehearsed recitation, something he was glad Bonnie Paige would hear. Maybe it might help her understand what a slime bag her husband was, and why he deserved to die. Bill Paige, you are on trial for the damage you have done to the lives of thousands of people. You think you are so great, so smart, and so powerful, but you’re nothing but a self-serving egomaniac. You make tons of money at the expense of the common man. You live like a king while the little guy suffers. Do you have anything to say for yourself before I render my verdict?

Who in the hell are you? Paige managed to utter between his tightly clenched teeth, unable to open his mouth even a fraction of an inch.

I am the prosecutor, the judge and the jury. I find you guilty as charged, and I sentence you to be permanently downsized.

The Leveler leaned close to Paige. His hand shook violently as he fired a bullet into the head of his prone victim from a distance of two feet. The roar of the gunshot reverberated through the large house. The acrid smell of burned gunpowder filled the air.

He stood over Bill Paige for a moment, and then dropped the gun next to his lifeless body.

He moved quickly to the bed, picked up the roll of duct tape, and wrapped Bonnie Paige’s wrists tightly together. She lay motionless as he removed the handcuffs and put them into his pack, along with the tape roll.

He stood for another moment gazing at what he had done. His breathing was ragged and shallow, and he felt dizzy. He thought he might vomit.

He closed his eyes momentarily and willed his mind to regain control of his body, then stooped down next to Paige’s body and patted his suit coat, looking for his wallet. He found it, in the left inside pocket. He removed the wallet and put it in his pack.

As he rose The Leveler caught the glint of gold on Paige’s left wrist and hand. He stooped again and slid a heavy watch from the dead man’s wrist, and a gold pinky ring with a single large diamond from his little finger. He put both items in his pack and zippered it shut.

The Leveler’s heart was pounding, and his face was soaked with sweat under the ski mask. He picked up his pack and hurried back through the house. He descended to the lower level and exited by the sliding glass door he had left open earlier.

CHAPTER FOUR

Tuesday, Jan 20

11:00 PM

The 911 emergency call came into the Kansas City, Missouri central dispatch at 9:30 PM. The first patrol officers to arrive at the Paige residence called for backup, secured the house, alerted the homicide division, and put in a call for an ambulance. The homicide detectives assigned to investigate didn’t arrive at the murder scene until almost 11:00 PM.

Detective Bruce Malone could spot the Paige home from a mile away as he drove up with his partner-in-training, Detective Beebe Lawless. The flashing red, white, and blue lights of two-dozen squad cars, fire trucks and ambulances cast an eerie glow in the overcast night sky.

Malone tried to jockey his unmarked car to a position close to the house, but was forced to park a block away due to the crowd of emergency vehicles parked every which way in the street. Three news vans were on the scene, their