The Devil's Angel: Max Strong

By Mike Donohue

Every saint has a past, every sinner has a future.

This is Max on the precipice. In 2007, Max is still Michael Sullivan, a young man in Boston working construction. But Michael is no ordinary young man. He has a talent. He can get you anything. He can steal anything. He sets up jobs that always go smooth and clean. It's a talent that has brought him to the attention of dangerous people and pushed him deeper into a life of crime.

Growing up on the streets, he never knew another way. You did what you had to do to survive. But now he finally can see a different future. He's married and will soon be a father. He wants a life for his family far from the dangerous and paranoid Boston underworld. But that world isn't about to let those special skills go. Not without a fight.

One last job. One chance to escape. One desperate gamble.

It's not a sin to cheat the devil.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mike Donohue
• Release date: Dec 18, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393877769

Book preview

Prologue

July 2002

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As Marty stepped over the hose that ran across the gravel path and disappeared into a small vegetable garden, he had a strange thought. It wasn’t the first strange thought he’d had recently, but he didn’t want to pause to consider what that might mean. He mentally pushed it away. He stepped up onto the single warped step that led up to the door. The rotting and moldy wood gave a soft squeak and the thought resurfaced like a stubborn cowlick.

The thing nobody tells you about being a criminal is the quiet. It’s always so quiet. Most of your work, the important parts, definitely the stressful parts, are always done in the quiet.

Too much quiet in my life recently, Marty thought, as he peeked through the back window into a deserted kitchen. The kind of quiet that had a texture, a thickness, that could build into a low, constant static that filled your head and sang in tune with the blood in your veins. He knows how crazy that sounds. This time, he waves his hand in front of his face as if he can physically brush the thought away. But it persists. How does quiet have a sound? It’s nuts. But he knows that it does. Knows it for a fact and right now, as he slips the simple latch lock with a credit card and pushes the door open, it is roaring in his ears.

His throat clicks as he swallows and stops to listen in the doorway. He steps all the way into the kitchen and onto a worn linoleum floor. He feels Kenny move in behind him. He fights off an urge to ask Kenny if he hears the silence, too. He knows that won’t go over well. Kenny already thinks this whole endeavor is some kind of crazy setup. They might have known each other as kids on Glendale Avenue but that was a long time ago. Kenny doesn’t know him now. Not really. He’s pretty sure Kenny might not like the question and he needs Kenny for the next part.

The kitchen smells, not completely unpleasantly, of spices, cooking oil, and dish soap. Marty can see a single plate, a glass, and a pan drying in a rack near the sink. He sweeps his small penlight quickly over the rest of the kitchen space. A yellow refrigerator, electric stove, and countertop microwave fill the space around the sink. No dishwasher that he can see. Two cabinets mounted on a wall. Some additional storage under the counter. A small table, maybe big enough for two, but showing just one placemat now takes up the rest of the small kitchen. It’s all older but neat, orderly, and well maintained.

He knows there’s no dog. Just like he knows old Sara Anglin is the only resident and she’s sleeping upstairs with both her hearing aids popped out on the nightstand table beside her dentures. Even if she were to wake up for the bathroom, or for a drink of water, he doubts she would hear anything.

Still, something about the quiet makes him whisper to Kenny. Check the hutch in the dining room for silver. He points through the doorway to the left. I’ll take the living room.

He kept the small penlight pointed down and does his best to stay clear of the windows. No reason to give any insomniac neighbor a reason to call the police, or worse, come over and check things out.

He worked quickly but methodically. It was second nature. He’d searched plenty of places before. He doesn’t find a whole lot he thinks will be valuable. The television is a flat screen, more modern than the things in the kitchen, but he’s not some two-bit hood, he’s not here for the TV. He lifted a silver frame off a bookshelf and looked at the old re-colored wedding photo in it. The frame is heavy. He drops it in the bag, then takes it back out and flips it over. He takes the photo out and lays it back on the shelf, drops the frame back in his bag.

Jesus Christ, Marty. What are you doing?

He can feel his old self, his rational mind, trying to jump up and take back control but he ignores it. Better to stay numb. He feels a desperate urge in his gut to get back to the bottle he has in the car. It’s how he’s been getting through the days.

He spots Kenny’s shadow as it moves back into the kitchen. He takes another quick look around, pulls open a few drawers, finds nothing but some loose change, a couple remotes, and dog-eared TV guides. He meets Kenny back in the kitchen.

Anything? he asks.

Grabbed the silverware. Looks legit, but I’m not an expert. Also found a box of coins and a book of mounted stamps. Might be something. Couple of the coins are gold.

Shit. That’s it? I got nothing but a silver frame. I was hoping for more. What we got isn’t worth the risk. Not for me. This is chump change. I need more.

Sometimes it works that way, Marty. You’re panning for gold when you go in blind. Sometimes you get a nugget, sometimes you get sand and rocks. Kenny shrugged. Time to go?

But he wasn’t going in blind. Not completely. Marty looked around. It was a small house, a short rambler, likely built just after WWII. A one and a half story clapboard tract home that was more functional than fun. Many had been torn down over the years, but outlying pockets of the city were still full of the little boxes. They’d cleared the first floor, skipping only the half bath off the central hallway.

I’m going to check upstairs.

Are you nuts? No reason to risk that. Even if the old bat is totally deaf, if she wakes up, she’s not blind. These houses are on top of each other. She screams and we’re cooked.

We won’t be cooked. At least, I won’t. Marty gave a thin smile. You wait outside. Stick close, though.

Kenny shook his head and said something too low for Marty to hear. Kenny was probably right. Hell, he was definitely right but in for a penny, in for a pound. He hadn’t come this far and risked this much for stamps and coins that might be practically worthless.

He slowly climbed up the stairs, pausing slightly on each step to let it take his weight. Hearing aids or not, he didn’t want to make any unnecessary racket.

As he expected, the second floor was just a short hallway bisecting a bedroom and a bathroom. He glanced in the bathroom. Empty. He turned and paused in the bedroom doorway. The eaves slanted sharply down toward the front of the house and weak moonlight filters through a single window that faces the street. Two single beds are against the right-hand wall with a small bedside table between them. No dentures or hearing aids that he can see, but there is a short glass of water. Only the bed closest to the door is occupied. Marty can see a halo of white hair peeking out from under a ruffled coverlet. He can hear the consistent burble of a phlegmy snore.

He moved slowly into the room. To the left, opposite the beds is a closet with two accordion doors, both currently closed. Next to the window is a large armoire. He goes to the armoire first. It has a large cabinet on top and two drawers below. He opened the cabinet first and there is a sharp snicking as the magnetic catch released. He turned and looked at the bed, but Sara Anglin didn’t stir. He turned back. The cabinet is filled with sweaters and smelled strongly of mothballs. He shut it and pulled open the first drawer on the bottom. Inside were three velvet-covered boxes and he felt momentarily vindicated, but they only hold a purple heart and two rosaries. He puts them back. The bottom drawer held polyester pants in a variety of colors. He walks to the closet, slides open one door and sees a small safe sitting at eye level on an in-built shelf.

Jackpot. He murmured. You don’t lock up knick-knacks in a safe.

It’s small, maybe a foot and a half wide and a foot and a half deep. The type of thing you’d find in most chain hotel rooms. Marty guessed a son or a daughter had bought it for Mom’s valuables when home health care workers visit or other service people were in the house.

There’s an electronic keypad to enter a code. He pulled on the handle, but it’s locked. He tried 0000, no luck. Same with 1111. He didn’t think it would be a complicated combination. Not for an elderly woman to remember. He thought about the photo downstairs. Maybe a wedding anniversary? But how would he figure that out? Maybe just take the whole thing. He tried to lift it but it’s bolted to the wall. Shit.

The quiet was getting to him again. He can feel it building like a wave. Eventually, asleep or not, you will feel someone else in your house, someone that doesn’t belong. Some deep reptilian part of your brain will ping out a warning and alert you to danger. He needed to get out soon.

He tried 1234, nothing. He wondered how many false tries it allowed before it locked down for good. He punched in 4321 and doesn’t have to worry about it anymore. The light went from red to green. Still simple but slightly better than not changing anything at all. He pulled open the door and found a pile of documents. A will, some bank and other financial records. He put those aside and found more promising jewelry boxes stacked neatly at the back. He pulled out a slender one covered in soft, dark blue fabric. He opened it. A pearl necklace. He lifted the necklace out of the box. It’s heavy. He’d bought his wife, well, soon to be ex-wife, a pearl necklace on their honeymoon in Hawaii. He rubbed two of the stranded pearls together and feels a little grittiness. These are the real deal. He put it back in the box and dropped it in his bag. He doesn’t check the rest, just filled the bag with all the boxes in the safe plus an envelope of cash and then gets the hell out of there.

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Daniel The Ghost Hogan was two hundred yards away in Mrs. Anglin’s neighbor’s yard. He was leaning against a disintegrating garden shed that smelled like fertilizer, peat, and mice. He held a Nikon digital camera with a long and fast zoom lens that could shoot in the dark. Or so he’d been told. He didn’t know much about cameras, certainly not as much as he knew about guns, but just like guns, in the end, it was simple, point and shoot.

He used it now to snap photos of Marty Creeger and Kenny Whiles exiting Mrs. Anglin’s back door, each carrying a bag clearly bulging with something. Hogan shook his head. He hadn’t really believed Carter when his boss had told him what Whiles had said, but Hogan wasn’t one to question orders. Earlier that night, he had found a couple good spots to set up and, like most things, it turned out Carter was right. Hogan had a series of photos of the men arriving and now he had them exiting.

Hogan moved away from the shed and silently followed the men as