Organized Justice

By I K Spencer

Zachary Thornton's life essentially ended two years ago when his wife and twin daughters were gunned down in cold blood for witnessing a mob hit but he can't end the pain until he sees his family's killer brought to justice, one way or another. Thus, it is no surprise when he jumps at an offer from a mysterious stranger promising to both avenge the murders and give him a reason to live beyond vengeance. Unfortunately for Zachary, accepting the offer could be the worst mistake of his life, with deadly results.

• Language: English
• Publisher: I K Spencer
• Release date: Feb 21, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311660633

I K Spencer

I. K. Spencer lives in New Hampshire with his wife and family pets. He is currently working on several projects, including the next book in the Guardsman series. When I. K. is not writing, he works as a software engineer.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Monday, December 10, 2001

Zachary Thornton glared at the clock on his computer screen in a futile attempt to make it go faster. It read ten-fifty, and he normally waited until at least eleven before slipping out for the only highlight of his workday—his lunchtime workout at the gym across the street. In his mind, he screamed at the clock's display to change but the small black numbers did not waver. Finally, the clock flipped to 10:51 and he forced his eyes up to the middle of the screen to the window containing his latest software development project.

The software held his attention for a few seconds but then the letters and numbers grew blurry and faded to nothing as his mind wandered, the program code replaced by fleeting images of an attractive woman and two adolescent girls. Afraid the images would make his eyes water, he took a deep breath and swiveled around to stare out the window of his cubicle. Outside, the steady traffic splashed through the December slush on the street below.

The snow had changed over to drizzle, and he could already see patches of green along the sloping grass next to the building. A thin blanket of pristine white had covered the ground during his morning commute, but now everything seemed gray—the slush-covered ground, the thick clouds, and even the misty air. He hated rain during the winter and would rather the temperature stay below freezing from November to April than put up with winter rain. He didn't mind rainfall in the other three seasons, but rain in winter—besides making everything a mess—depressed him all the more, and he certainly did not need more reasons to feel sad.

Still, the view out the window was better than staring at the computer screen the entire day. In the past he had complained about the glare from the window and preferred a cubicle with more privacy but in those days he could work for hours without even glancing at the clock. That point of view seemed so strange now. These days he would go crazy without the window, though sometimes the thought of losing touch with reality brought a measure of comfort.

Pushing that troubling thought aside, Zack turned around to check the clock and breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing that the display read two minutes past eleven. He waited another half-minute for the hallway to clear, then hurried from his cubicle, covering the thirty feet to the back stairwell quickly with his long-legged strides. He did not slow until he heard the fire door click shut behind him. Only then did his breathing return to normal.

He did not fear someone would see him leave for lunch so early; he couldn’t care less and doubted any of the other engineers at the small software company did either. In fact, he felt certain that they preferred he not come in at all. He slipped from the building like a thief in the night because he wanted to avoid the sad, uncomfortable reaction that would undoubtedly greet him should he happen to run into any of his coworkers on the way out. That had turned out to be the common trait across the variety of greetings he encountered from anyone familiar with his tragic situation. Many nodded, some always seemed to feel compelled to speak to him, more than a few pretended not to see him, and a few even looked angry—he assumed for bringing down the workplace atmosphere—but everyone looked as though they were cursing their bad luck for having blundered into the pathetic office widower. He had grown to despise that look and did not know how much longer he could stomach seeing it day after day.

He trotted from the building to his car in a light rain, dodging puddles of gray slush. The health club, housed in the hotel behind his company's building, was close enough to walk to but even in good weather he drove, not wanting to risk the chance of bumping into anyone from the office out for a noon stroll. He turned on his wipers and it took barely a minute to cut across the parking lots to the hotel's side entrance, which led to the club. A small number of members habitually exercised at lunchtime and the raw weather had further dissuaded those looking for any excuse so he was not surprised to find a spot right next to the door.

Once inside he approached the reception desk, smiling as he handed his membership card to a chunky woman gossiping with one of her girlfriends on the telephone. She barely glanced up as she took the card, punched in the membership number, and handed it back, talking into the receiver all the while. A couple of years earlier such rude service would anger him but now he preferred being invisible, although he doubted most of the club's employees knew his situation. For some mysterious reason, at least unknown to him, the staff turned over at an incredible rate. Not that he cared but during his five-year membership each position had changed faces a number of times. The present club director, a perky brunette with a know-it-all attitude, was the third person in five years to manage the small facility. Receptionists lasted only a few months.

Taking a towel from the chattering woman, Zack walked down the hallway into the men's locker room. He located an empty locker in a quiet corner and started to undress. A few other men, mostly retirees, moved between the lockers, the showers, and the sinks in various stages of undress. With two retirement facilities nearby, the seniors tended to dominate the morning crowd, which gave way from eleven to one to people like Zack, who worked out through their lunch hours. The older men kept up a steady banter and paid him little heed as he changed into his gym clothes—running shoes, loose-fitting shorts, and a tank top.

He exited the locker room and continued along the hallway to the lone exercise room, which held free weights, the latest weight machines, and a wide variety of aerobic apparatus. One other smaller room was used for group exercise classes, but he avoided the area like the plague, knowing the classes tended to draw more chatty types. Though small and underequipped compared with most health clubs, the facility's location suited him and the turnout rarely reached a level sufficient to cause him to have to wait long for any of the equipment.

He pretended to study the workout chart in his hands as he moved through the room to avoid having to greet anyone. Unlike the staff, the membership included many long-standing members and no doubt at least a few were familiar with his tragic story. From the corner of his eye, he noted perhaps a dozen other people working out, a lot for that hour, including two or three regular faces. The rest were either recent members or hotel guests, who received day passes for each night of their stay.

Moving first to one of the stretching mats, Zack commenced the workout by completing a sequence of flexibility exercises, stretching his arm muscles, shoulders, and back. In recent years he had taken more care about stretching and despite having lifted weights for nearly half his forty years, he had yet to suffer anything more serious than a mild muscle strain. After stretching, he moved to the weight machines and spent the next half-hour working his arms, shoulders, back, and abdominals. He focused on his upper body with the weights, figuring his legs received enough of a workout from the twenty-five miles he ran each week.

While exercising, he stole glances of the club's other patrons, mainly the females. He passed over the young supermodel types in favor of the more mature women with generous curves. Perhaps it was the age difference but he just couldn't picture being with a woman under thirty and, since he sought only the fantasy, the picture meant everything. Thus, he ignored the young mothers and pretty coeds in their skimpy outfits and furtively watched the women his own age or older, fantasizing about physical encounters with them while he exercised. Thankfully, women of all ages, shapes, and sizes tended to display their bodies in skintight spandex so his imagination did not have to work overly hard.

In truth, he wanted more than just the fantasy but very few women desired an impromptu sexual fling with a complete stranger, despite the prevalence of such encounters in the movies. Though over two years had passed since the terrible day Kathy was taken from him, he still could not even imagine loving another woman, ever. Pure lust fostered his explicit daydreams and the faces of the women in his fantasies were always blurred or in shadow, an insignificant detail.

After finishing his upper body workout, Zack made a quick trip to the locker room to trade his lifting gloves and chart for a cassette player and headphones. Returning to the exercise area, he hopped on one of the treadmills, which faced a wide mirror. As he stretched his calves, his gaze moved around the room using the mirror and as expected, caught a few exercisers scowling at him. He barely noticed the dirty looks, which would be a common occurrence throughout his five-mile run.

Although most exercise enthusiasts he saw at health clubs appeared outwardly friendly and encouraging, he knew that underneath, many were competitive and motivated by guilt. As a result, he always sensed an undercurrent of repressed anger floating around such facilities. As a younger man he hadn't enjoyed working out either, but years of repetition had now ingrained the habit so deeply that he had come to look forward to his visits to the gym. Few of his fellow exercisers on any given day shared his attitude, however. Thanks to aggressive and misleading advertising as well as the emergence of fitness as a status symbol, novices perpetually made up a large percentage of any health club's membership, and most brought unrealistic expectations—the perfect combination for failure. Some newcomers did the minimum their conscience allowed, scowling throughout. Others pushed themselves too hard in an effort to reach their impossible goals. In a few short weeks, both types typically had begun to search for excuses to quit, so longtime fitness buffs like Zack presented an unwelcome reminder that staying in excellent shape was achievable. Most of the unhappy exercisers just gave him dirty looks but over the years, a few had spoken to him. Once a sixtyish woman on the treadmill next to him had advised him that he did not need to do so much and he couldn't count the number of times he'd heard the comment, You're making me look bad. A smile usually accompanied the phrase but often the speaker's voice carried an edge as well.

He ran at a slow pace for a few minutes, then stopped the treadmill. That drew a few smiles until those watching realized he'd just been warming up. He stretched again, donned his earphones, and cranked the treadmill up to an eight-minute mile pace. Five miles represented a relatively short distance for him so he tended to push himself harder. By the end of the five miles he would be running at a seven-minute mile pace, much slower than competitive runners but faster than most casual joggers.

As usual, Zack labored for the first mile or so—his awkward, forty-year-old legs in pain and his chest heaving for breath—until his body responded. Then, as if by magic, the pain receded and his gait became more fluid. And for the first time that entire day, he smiled. He loved running, or, more accurately, had learned to love running. He could probably find some physiological explanation in a medical text but after logging thousands of miles over many years, running now made him feel strong and more alive, yet somehow peaceful at the same time. Even more important of late, the exercise also provided a few hours of much-needed escape during the week. He pressed the play button and began to daydream as Bill Chinnock’s Badlands cassette played through his earphones.

When the treadmill's distance display showed five miles, Zack noted the elapsed time and shut off the seventies rock tape. Over the next five minutes, he edged back the speed on the treadmill until he could jog, then walk. Once the speed reached three miles per hour, he shut off the machine and grabbed a rag and spray bottle from a nearby shelf. He glanced in the mirror as he wiped down the machine and noticed a familiar figure climbing onto one of the elliptical exercise machines by the entrance. Paul was one of only a few members that he knew by name. He had exchanged pleasantries with the man for a couple of months before Paul had finally introduced himself, just a few weeks ago. Zack knew nothing more about the man though guessed, from the way he talked, that he might be retired.

Hello, Paul. Zack nodded as he walked by the silver-haired man, realizing the words were the first he had spoken aloud that day.

Hello, my friend. All done? I guess I'm later than usual. Paul grinned, his head bobbing up and down above the panel of the exercise machine. He had a ruddy complexion and wore a neat salt-and-pepper mustache. He was thin but possessed a bit of a paunch and Zack guessed him to be in his late fifties or sixties. His accent bore a touch of New York City.

Back to work, Zack replied, nodding again.

The older man gestured toward one of the televisions suspended along the mirrored wall. Can you believe this?

Zack looked up at the TV, which portrayed a woman reporter talking into a microphone in front of a large cathedral. The sound was muted but the graphic, Church in Crisis - New Allegations, made the nature of the story all too clear.

I swear it's an epidemic, Paul said, disgust in his voice. I hope they root out every one of those sickos and lock 'em up!

And throw away the key, Zack finished the thought, shaking his head. Actually, he favored an even more permanent solution, considering child abuse an intolerable crime worthy of capital punishment. He had never understood why the country allowed such vermin to prey upon its most important and treasured resource.

Exactly, Paul agreed. Though with the church's money I bet they get a slap on the wrist, if that. More likely a cushy job at The Vatican.

You are probably right, Zack granted and lifted a hand in farewell. Gotta run.

Well be careful out there. It's nasty.

I know. Maybe I'll leave early today.

Paul raised a thumb, grinning. That's the idea. Turn a negative into a positive.

Zack smiled. Good point. Well, have a good workout.

I'll try. Have a good one, my friend.

Zack nodded again and walked away, heading over to the stretching mats. As he stretched the various muscles in his tired legs, he wondered if Paul knew his situation. From the older man's easy banter the likelihood seemed doubtful, but sometimes he sensed a flicker of something akin to empathy in Paul's dark eyes.

Returning to the locker room, he stripped off his sweaty clothes and headed for the shower. Alone for the moment, he paused before the mirror, checking his reflection. His body glistened from the vigorous workout and he was pleased with his flat stomach and muscular arms, legs, and chest. Though tall at a couple of inches past six feet, he was small-boned so for most of his life had felt frail. His gaze drifted upward to his face and he grimaced. He liked the looks of the short beard and mustache, especially the way it covered his weak chin, but little else. He supposed some might consider his blue eyes a good feature, but his forehead seemed too big and his sandy-colored hair had started to thin, a flaw apt to worsen. Kathy had often called him handsome but didn't all wives say such things? He would describe his face as plain, at best.

After a short steam and a shower, he dressed and, ignoring the urge to just leave, returned to his office. There he spent much of the afternoon staring out the window or gazing at the pictures on his bulletin board. A few of the shots featured Kathy, but most of the photos were school pictures of the girls, from cute preschoolers with missing teeth to pretty young women starting high school. Every year he put the new school pictures in his wallet and added the previous year's editions to his cubicle wall. In the photos, he could see nearly the entire progression of his daughters' short lives. He knew he should take the pictures down, but he could not summon the will to do so, as if leaving them there kept alive the possibility that new pictures could still be added.

At five o'clock he shut off his computer, picked up his briefcase, and left for the day, again waiting for the hallway to clear. Outside the precipitation had stopped but the air still felt damp. The early winter sunset didn't help the gloomy day end on a positive note. At least with the parking lot dark he didn't have to wave goodnight to any coworkers heading out to their cars.

He turned on the radio for his short commute, tuning in a Boston AM sports call-in talk station. He had no interest in current music—seemingly comprised of only rap, boy bands, over-age rockers, or silicone-injected divas with digitally enhanced voices—and the oldies elicited too many memories so that left little to choose from. That anyone called the abusive hosts amazed him, but the callers were entertaining enough to distract him from his thoughts, at least for short periods of time.

Zack turned west out of the parking lot and carefully made his way home along slick secondary roads. He lived in a small, one-light village twenty minutes from his office, located in the small city of Nashua, New Hampshire. His community was still fairly rural but, as typical of most southern New Hampshire towns, the small family farms and apple orchards were fighting a losing battle against housing developers hungry to meet the endless demand for new homes. He and Kathy had entertained the idea that they might stay forever when they moved over from Nashua six years earlier but if the rate of development didn't slow, the town's pastoral beauty would soon be replaced by suburban sprawl. None of that mattered much now, though.

He downshifted the Subaru as he neared his driveway. As expected, the dirt track was under water so he slowed to a crawl as he turned into the narrow opening in the woods. He drove slowly through six inches of water for twenty yards, then the muddy road rose from the temporary pond. Kathy had often lobbied to pave the long, uneven driveway but he favored the dirt track, muddy holes and all, perhaps because it stirred childhood memories of the entrance to a lakeside camp in northern Maine his grandparent's had once owned.

After another hundred yards the Subaru's headlights picked up the taillights of Kathy's Jeep Wagoneer, then the woods parted and he could see the silhouette of the tall A-frame beyond. He pulled up beside the Jeep, a vehicle he hadn't even looked inside in over two years, and blinked as the sensor light on the side of the house kicked on, illuminating the two vehicles and the short gravel walkway that led to the front porch. The image of a wilderness camp persisted; the woods came right up to both sides of the narrow house and thick woods, dominated by tall white pines, covered the entire five-acre lot except for a small weed-filled lawn off the back.

Avoiding puddles of slush, Zack walked from the car to the porch and unlocked the front door. Inside he flicked on the lights and turned up the thermostat before shrugging off his coat. He passed through the kitchen, grabbing a wineglass and ignoring the blinking light on his answering machine, and moved to the living room, which occupied the back third of the first floor. In the far corner of the living room, he sat down in a large recliner and turned on the light on the adjacent table. Besides the lamp, the table contained a half-full bottle of wine and a stack of books. He carefully filled the wineglass to the rim and took a sip before grabbing one of the books.

The open space featured a wide sliding window facing the back of the house and large stone fireplace filling the opposite wall. A leather couch occupied the space under the large window and a variety of mismatched but comfortable chairs, including the recliner, stood along the two remaining walls, with an entertainment center in the corner near the hearth. The floors were hardwood and natural wood paneling finished with high-gloss polyurethane covered the walls, both do-it-yourself projects he had finished in the last few months.

Besides the expansive living room, the first floor of the A-frame included a long, narrow kitchen/dining room, a full bathroom, and a small office/den that he had converted to a bedroom. Upstairs were another full bath and three bedrooms, the large master bedroom occupying the space over the living room.

For the next hour, Zack read and slowly sipped the wine. The phone rang a number of times, but he did not stir. He never answered the telephone and called others only when absolutely necessary. He used email as much as possible, finding it far easier to fake being upbeat on that medium than on the phone.

He made the Malbec last. He allowed one glass of wine upon arriving at home, then he would have to put the book down and go deal with the answering machine. The restriction was one of the many self-imposed rules that governed Zachary Thornton's life and made it possible for him to function at all. He let the last few drops of dark wine sit for ten minutes before finally emptying the glass.

Rising with a scowl, he returned to the kitchen. He pressed the play button on the answering machine and began fixing his dinner. The first two messages were sales pitches, which he tuned out, but his stomach instantly tightened as he recognized the District Attorney's Boston accent beginning the next message.

Hello Mr. Thornton, this is Tom Pinelli. I just wanted to give you an update on the status of the case. All in all I think things are going well. A pause followed, so long that Zack, wondering if the tape had jammed, looked up from the potato he rinsed at the sink. The appeals judge has found a minor issue in the trial judge's handling of the case, but it is nothing to worry about. The issue is very unlikely to have any bearing on the outcome of the appeal, which should wrap up in a week or two. Feel free to call me if you want more details. Good night.

Zack realized he was holding his breath and slowly expelled the air from his lungs, feeling his pulse relax at the same time. Anything dealing with the trial made his head throb and his chest pound. His blood pressure had probably risen through the roof. Another sales call and a hang-up followed the D.A.'s message but then the sound of his mother-in-law's voice made Zack grab the counter for support.

Hello, Zack. This is Stella. I hope you are ... well. How about this weather? I bet you got a foot of snow up there in the north country. Roger is putting up a few Christmas decorations and it reminded me that we should set up a time to get together. Of course, you are welcome on the twenty-fifth but you are probably going up to Maine. Anyway ... call me when you get the chance. Bye.

He loosened his death grip on the counter and wiped away a tear with his sleeve. She meant well, wanting to stay connected, but seeing them was hell. He respected Kathy's parents, but over the years he'd never attempted to get closer to either of his in-laws, and now the only thing they had in common was a sense of loss too painful for any of them to discuss. Every meeting since the funeral felt forced and awkward, filled with long, uncomfortable silences. Still, for Kathy's sake he would dutifully make plans to visit them sometime over the holidays.

His dinner, consisting of plain canned tuna, ready-to-eat raw carrots, and a microwaved potato; was ready barely two minutes after the messages finished playing. Cooking held no interest for him but he liked to eat healthy meals so his staples included quick items such as potatoes, instant rice, ready-to-eat raw vegetables and salads, canned tuna, and frozen cooked shrimp, which he thawed in the microwave. He rarely used the stove except to boil water for rice or pasta.

Zack carried the bland dinner back into the living room, returning to the recliner. He poured his second and final glass of wine for the evening, again filling it to the rim. Food might only be fuel to him but alcohol was an entirely different matter, the accompanying temporary escape extremely tempting. He had spent much of the first few months after the funeral drunk but came to realize that a few hours of oblivion were not worth the hell that followed. During that time he had also stopped exercising, gaining over twenty pounds in the process, but the healthy lifestyle he'd held to before the tragedy eventually won out. After the first few months, he had gradually cut back on the booze and returned to the gym, the habit too deeply ingrained to abandon.

Absently eating his evening meal, he spent the next two hours lost in his latest book: a paperback mystery. He had always read books for pleasure but now had become a voracious reader. He liked novels best—anything except love stories or tragedies—but read a great deal of nonfiction as well. He knew a shrink would categorize his dependence on reading as another way to escape reality but, unlike drinking, at least that diversion wasn't damaging his liver. Frankly, without a way to escape, he didn't think he could go on.

Popping the last carrot into his mouth, he carried the empty wineglass, dish, and silverware into the kitchen and washed them at the sink. He then rinsed the items and placed them in the drying rack, which contained the few utensils he ever needed. He wiped down the counter where he had fixed the meager meal, completing the minimal cleanup effort. The Spartan kitchen he maintained contrasted sharply with the way the room used to look; Kathy and the girls tended to use the counter as a desk and it was forever cluttered with school books and papers along with dirty dishes and food that did not fit in the crammed cupboards. Now, only the drying rack disturbed the expanse of gleaming counter space.

One more unpleasant task awaited Zack before he could return to his reading. After heating a cup of tea in the microwave, he returned to the living room and picked up a cardboard box from the granite slab that served as a hearth for the room's large fireplace. He carried the box back to the recliner and pulled out a stack of Christmas cards, along with Kathy's address book. He had already written half the cards he planned to send, but he'd resolved to mail them by the eleventh, which left the rest of the evening to finish the other half. He flicked on the television as an alternative to the lonely silence and set to work.

Actually, the task had proved less difficult than expected. After the first few, he had crafted a common paragraph that he used in nearly all the cards, with some minor adjustments depending on the recipient. In each card, he copied the message: Hope this holiday season finds you well. As you know, the last couple years have been very difficult but I am coping as well as can be expected. Work is going well and I am staying busy. Have a joyous holiday with your loved ones and best of luck in the New Year. The difficult part had proven to be the signature. Writing his name alone at the bottom of each card brought a fresh stab of pain and guilt. He had considered signing all their names but figured that would not be appropriate, a sign that he was still unable to move on with his life. Though certainly true, he didn't want friends or family worrying about him. In truth, all of their friends had originated through Kathy so only his family's opinion mattered.

Zack finished putting stamps and labels on the envelopes just as the ten o'clock news commenced and he hurried over to shut off the TV. He watched little television in general but particularly avoided the news, which regularly covered the case and often splashed pictures of his family across the screen during the reports. He got ready for bed, laid out his clothes for the following day, then climbed into the twin bed he had procured for the makeshift bedroom on the first floor. He read for the next few hours, finishing the mystery and starting another novel set in ancient China. Finally, well after midnight, he felt exhausted enough to fall asleep. He had learned, after many nights of misery, that if he tried to sleep before he started to nod off he ended up weeping long into the night. That would start a downward spiral he didn't want to think about. He switched off the bedside lamp and mercifully, fell asleep quickly.

Chapter 2

Saturday, December 15, 2001

Zack rolled over and opened his eyes, instantly wide-awake. He glanced up at the clock, hoping he had slept past eight but knowing that would not be the case. The display read 7:20 and he sighed, pulling the covers over his head. An instant later he noticed his erection and hurried out of bed as bittersweet images of making love to his wife flashed through his mind. He quickly flipped on the light and turned on the radio, anything to chase away the too-painful memories. Before losing her he had occasionally dreamed about other women, but now her sweet face alone always haunted his nights.

He had thought that if he had sex with another woman, the painful longing might diminish but recent visits to two prostitutes in Boston did little to quench the fire, probably because those awkward encounters paled in comparison to the passion he experienced with Kathy. One of the hookers barely moved during the act and the other behaved like a porno actress, as though she were in mid-orgasm the entire time. On the whole, he preferred the bored prostitute; at least she was being sincere. After the second visit, he realized that sex with a hooker could never ease the physical yearning he felt for Kathy and he knew there would be no third attempt. If anything, he now missed their lovemaking even more.

Cursing such thoughts in his present condition, Zack dealt with the problem by turning on the cold water in the shower. He yelped as the icy water hit his chest but at least the resulting physical pain swiftly swept away all thoughts of sex. He endured the frigid torture for the few minutes it took to bathe and wash his hair.

Later, dressed in weekend clothes of jeans and a flannel shirt, Zack sat at the kitchen counter and worked on a list of things to do while he breakfasted on granola and yogurt. The list was long and detailed. On weekends he needed to stay busy or, with so much free time, he could sit for hours and brood, which might lead him to the bottles of wine kept beneath the sink in the kitchen. Another of Zachary Thornton's many survival rules. Perhaps he should collect them all into a book. Rules to Function with Chronic Crushing Grief seemed an apt title.

After breakfast, he donned a leather jacket and went out to his car. The morning sun filtered through the leafless trees surrounding the house, warming the air to a typical mid-December temperature of just above freezing. The driveway had become a sea of mud and he hoped for more snow to cover the brown earth and withered plant-life. It forever amazed him how much a layer of snow could spruce up the winter landscape.

Backing the car out through the receding pond at the end of the driveway, he headed toward the center of town. He took a single bag of garbage to the dump, stopped at the ATM for cash, then drove two towns over to a grocery store to shop. There were other markets closer, but he wanted to lessen the chance of running into anyone he knew.

At the store Zack worked quickly, filling the cart in just a few minutes. It was not so much that he hurried but that he purchased large quantities of very few items. Filling a shopping cart took no time at all if you loaded it with quantities of food such as two dozen cans of tuna, two cases of wine, twenty pounds each of potatoes and carrots, a dozen bags of ready-to-eat salad, twenty pounds of frozen cooked shrimp, and an armload of assorted pastas and sauces. He made only a dozen or so stops throughout the entire store and pushed the heaping cart up to the checkout aisle less than fifteen minutes after entering the store. The checkout girl's open-mouthed stare was another reason he tended to do his unusual brand of food shopping in stores where no one might recognize him. Thankfully, he shopped for food this way just once a month, adding a few perishable items such as fruit and dairy products each week.

He returned home to put away his groceries, then left again, this time heading for the traffic-laden retail area of South Nashua, which included an outlet for seemingly every chain store available in the northeast. He avoided the area, especially around the holidays when traffic slowed to a crawl, but his craving for books drew him to the two mammoth bookstores located there. He borrowed from the local library, but their number limits did not match his frantic reading pace. He grabbed lunch from a fast-food drive-through, then spent a couple of hours in one of the bookstores, walking out with over a dozen paperbacks and a few audio books.

His final errand of the day involved a visit to the local hardware superstore, located down the street from the bookstores. The warehouse-sized store seemed to have an endless number of aisles but, a regular customer, he knew the layout well enough to work there. During the last six months, he had renovated every room on the A-frame's first floor and now had moved to the family room in the basement. Even though he seldom set foot in the glorified storeroom, he'd started tearing out the dark paneling affixed to the lower half of the walls to brighten up the windowless space. He also planned to trade the threadbare old carpet and discolored dropped ceiling, both items from the house's original construction in the seventies, for a light-colored wood floor and new ceiling.

Zack accepted without concern that the home improvement projects mainly served as another means for him to stay busy. The problem was that he would soon run out of rooms to refurbish. He hadn't touched the upper floor yet but he couldn't even think about changing the girls' rooms or his and Kathy's bedroom or even the upstairs bathroom, still cluttered with all their cosmetics and accessories. He could barely face dusting and vacuuming up there, a duty he performed religiously every other weekend even though the chore left him weeping each time. The four rooms remained untouched except for the twice-monthly cleaning, though he had given Kathy's mother a few things asked for by the grieving woman. He would never forget the day his own mother and one of his sisters had shown up unannounced one rainy day a few months after the funeral with plans to go through the rooms for him. He had initially hidden the horror their proposal caused him, but his mother's persistence eventually broke down his limited self-control. He'd finally blown up, threatening to throw them out if they did not leave. Since then, he had allowed no visits from anyone in his family, fending off their attempts with phony excuses. He had apologized later, but everyone in his family still treated him as though he were made of glass.

Back at the house by four, he spent the next few hours working in the family room. He finished stripping the paneling from another wall and worked at patching the battered drywall underneath. By the time he stopped to fix dinner, he'd filled all the holes from a five-gallon tub of spackle. He had two more walls to strip and prepare before he could start painting.

After a dinner of shrimp and pasta, Zack had another unpleasant chore to finish before his evening reading could commence. The next day he planned to drive up to Maine to attend his family's annual Christmas gathering and he needed to prepare, although not the gift wrapping and cooking that would occupy most people on the eve of such an event. He had already taken care of those two tasks but needed to get ready in another way.

Sitting at the kitchen table with a pencil and a package of index cards, he began by writing the name of each family member on a separate card. With two brothers and three sisters plus their families, the stack of cards with names had grown quite tall by the time he finished. He then went through the cards and jotted down topics of conversation under each

Reviews for Organized Justice

[Hilly Pomeranz · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Loved it! I have trouble finding readable thrillers so am very pleased to have come across this one. Imagine, a suspenseful plot that is believable and has a female lead who isn't purely a sex object and love interest for the male lead. I highly recommend this book, especially if you're tired of predictable thrillers.

[EdnaX · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I think this is an unusual offering for this genre. If you want a lot of visceral action, this book probably isn't for you because it is light on that. There is plenty of suspense but it's more cerebral than most thrillers. Very dark and sad too.

[Callie_L · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This wasn't at all what I expected from the cover and description. This has plenty of action and suspense but so much more - powerful emotions, a complex relationship, and wonderful characters. Be prepared to cry.

[Aileen2015 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Outstanding! Especially the premise and characters. And this is the rare book in this genre that is both suspenseful and believable.

[UrnieB · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The book is about a grieving father whose entire family was murdered. He gets recruited by this organized vigilante group and with that the suspense builds and keeps building to a completely unpredictable ending. I loved that this didn't follow the typical thriller pattern yet was very suspenseful still. I also thought that Zack is one of the most believable protagonists I've ever seen in this genre and not the typical know-it-all, macho, special-ops figure.

[Vera_Arrington · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I agree with the other reviews but for me the most important aspect is that it's not all about action and suspense. There is a powerful emotional struggle going on and that created more suspense for me.

[Quarrels · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The main character is my kind of personality - sad, logical, subtle, complex, and smart. Not your typical type A, macho action figure. The concept is unique and I found it suspenseful and difficult to put down.

[PalmerTurner · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I give this book A's for imagination, uniqueness, likable/interesting characters, and pace.

[OprahSez · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is a very unique book, especially for this genre. Anyone looking for something different will probably like this. The only negative for me is that I thought it was a little slow during the training part.

[JuleaDa · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Excellent!! Finally a thriller with a believable plot and characters.

[Ned_York · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'd recommend this book to anyone but especially if you're tired of having to suspend believability when reading the thriller genre. I never once had to do that and along the same lines, I also appreciated that the author doesn't have the characters make jokes in dangerous or scary situations. That always takes me right out of the story and it's very common in this genre.

[MaandyHast · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The protagonist is a grieving husband and father who lost his entire family and though we can't know what that is like, the portrayal of this horrific situation in this novel seemed plausible to me and it made him a very interesting and likeable character from the start. It builds suspense slowly but realistically, unlike most thrillers, and even though it does build suspense slowly, it did not at all make it a slow read. On the contrary, I never wanted to put it down.

[Gearaldine · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book is terrific! It's one of those rare books that I know I'll read again. It's a page-turner and thankfully, unlike, most books of this genre, which are very formulaic and have completely unrealistic, over-the-top situations and dialog. This book has none of that but is still very suspenseful.

[SalenaOrs · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's suspenseful but unlike the typical thriller, which I appreciate because that's rare. It also has likable and realistic characters and always kept me wanting more.

[TaraEll_33 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I liked it and it was very well written and hard to put down. Zachary is a memorable tragic hero figure.

[Daurwin · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I loved it! Vengeance/vigilante justice stories interest me and this is one of the best since Gladiator. I loved the unique premise too.

[frencinew · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The certainly was hard to put down and unpredictable, I agree with the other reviewers.  It's a great story and well written but it's also dark and sad so be prepared for that.

[crystophar · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was great! I never wanted to put it down. Such a unique idea and Zack is a very compelling and interesting character. Realistic too. Good suspense from start to finish.

[BradleyDe · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book! Most thrillers are predictable but not this one and the ending is a complete surprise. Zachary is a memorable anti-hero.