Hollywood Sacrifice: Broken Monarch, #2

By Tom Schneider

"A non-stop ride through reckless romance and vicious assassins with the lights of Hollywood for a blood-soaked background. Schneider breathes hard-boiled noir, and the novel oozes with classic charm." 

An exclusive men's club, a deadly ritual, a struggling dancer, and a hunted man Hell-bent on justice. 

In 1984 when Monarch Program assassins track and hunt Glenn, he makes a new friend that could help him turn the tables and become the hunter, but first, he may need to help her. 

As a struggling dancer at the Hollywood Showcase, Casey's desperation to raise money for her sister's surgery leads her into the arms of the same threat facing Glenn. 

Together they discover the evil they face is more horrific than imagined. Can either of them survive? Will they save each other?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tom Schneider
• Release date: May 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223526025

Book preview

Who gives any of his children to Moloch shall surely be put to death... And if the people close their eyes to that man when he gives one of his children to Moloch, and do not put him to death, then I will set my face against that man… and all who follow him in whoring after Moloch.

- Leviticus 20

Chapter One

Thursday, July 5, 1984

2:00 PM, The Wishing Well, Henderson, Nevada

---

His body shook, a chill ran up his spine and squeezed the back of Glenn’s neck, as a guy in jeans and a black leather jacket entered the bar and pulled the door closed behind him. He watched him examine the perimeter and locate the exits. It wasn’t a normal customer. This time of day they had only drinking on their minds and beat a direct path for the bar. This guy was there for something else. He got half-way to the bar then turned toward the jukebox and put in a single quarter.

The buzz of the neon behind the bar grew louder, interrupted only by the guy’s footsteps toward the bar, in the silence as the turntable loaded his selection. Glenn was standing behind the beer taps and scanned the bar for potential weapons. He spotted the Jack Daniels promotional stuff left behind by the liquor salesman. Glenn watched him from the corner of his eye as he walked the length of the bar toward the woodblock holding an ice pick with Old No. 7 Tennessee Whiskey burnished into the handle. He put his fingers on the four-sided wooden handle and slid it from its block and dropped it in his back pocket. He knew if he stayed long enough they’d find him, again.

The guy took a seat at the bar and showed no interest in playing the table-top video poker machine set into the bar-top. The Greg Khin Band’s, The Breakup Song began playing. Glenn, nodded his head in approval. Maybe he had the guy wrong.

How ya doing? Glenn asked as he walked to his end of the bar. The guy sat silent with his hands in leather gloves, with his fingers sticking out, on the bar and his head hung down, almost as though he were in prayer or meditating.

What can I get ya? he asked as Glenn stood in front of him.

The guy raised his head and stared him in the face.

Screwdriver.

Glenn grabbed a glass, filled it with ice and pulled a cheap well vodka from the metal shelf behind the bar.

Absolute.

Good choice, Glenn said as he picked up the Absolute bottle. The guy didn’t look Glenn in the eye but stared ahead. Glenn put the drink on the bar in front of his mystery guest. 

We'd been living together for a million years

Ah ah ah, ah ah ah ah ah

But now it feels so strange out in the atmospheres

Ah ah ah, ah ah ah ah ah

And then the jukebox plays a song I used to know

Ah ah ah, ah ah ah ah ah

And now I'm staring at the bodies as they're dancing so slow

Ah ah ah, ah ah ah ah ah

They don't write 'em like that anymore

They don't write 'em like that anymore

Oh

Now I wind up staring at an empty glass

Ah ah ah, ah ah ah ah ah

'Cause it's so easy to say that you'll forget your past

Glenn approached his guest and poured him another.

Good tune, you picked there, bud.

You forget your past, friend?

Glenn laughed, Me? No, wish I could.

The past always comes back to visit.

Behind the bar Glenn put his hand on the neck of a gin bottle.

Yeah, I’ve noticed that, too.

He turned his head and looked Glenn in the eye.

What if I offered you a choice?

You have a choice for me? Glenn asked.

One of them will let you forget your past, forever.

Glenn’s mind flashed back to putting on gear with other soldiers. One of them looked at him with the face of the guy at the bar.

Did you ever serve in Nam, friend? Glenn asked him.

Follow the white rabbit, he answered.

Glenn realized Gray was still trying to figure out a trigger phrase that worked on him, but that knowledge died along with his handler when they had her killed. He saw the top of the circle of flames that surround Vishnu sticking out from the top of the guys shirt. The guy took a drink of his cocktail as Glenn pulled a bottle from the rack and swung it at the guy’s head, while yelling Wrong fucking trigger.

The guy blocked it with his left forearm, threw the glass in Glenn’s face and dove across the bar on top of him. Glenn slammed the guys head into the sink, under the bar. Then flipped the guy on his back in the narrow space behind the bar and crawled out from under him. He grabbed Glenn’s ankle and drew a gun from inside his jacket.

Glenn kicked with his other leg and the gun fired. Glenn was on his back as the guy climbed to his knees and dove. From his back pocket, Glenn slid out the icepick and thrust it forward into the guys chest as he landed on top of him. The warm blood ran down the pick and onto his hand.

Glenn pushed him off and onto the floor beneath the bottle trays. The guy coughed blood and fell unconscious. Glenn rinsed off the blood in the sink and then ran to lock the front door. He dragged the guy by his ankles to the back door and wrapped him in tablecloths then carried him to the trunk of his 1971 black Dodge Charger. 

Back inside, he mopped up the blood. Glenn put the Jack Daniel’s ice pick block in his pocket and walked to the register. He opened it and stared. Then closed and locked it. He left the keys behind the bar and walked out the back door. 

They had found him. It was time to leave Henderson and get away from Vegas. He needed a larger city he could blend into and disappear, at least until he had a better plan. He wouldn’t be able to stop them from coming by killing them off one-by-one. Eventually his odds would run out. He needed to take out the one sending them but he couldn’t do it while he was in their sights. 

He got in the Charger and drove out of town, through downtown Vegas toward California.

Chapter Two

Friday, July 6, 1984

10:00 AM, Washington, DC

---

On the wall near the window hung a painting of a young girl wearing a blue dress, standing on a red floor, with the back of her hand facing the viewer held up over her left eye. Director Gray was standing on top of the console in front of the window, with his shoes off, holding a golf club in his hand when his secretary called over the intercom to say Deputy Director Zimmer was on the line. He mumbled and tossed the four-iron to the couch, climbed down, put on his shoes like he was living in Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, and sat down at his desk.

Glenn was always Robert’s problem, but since Glenn killed him, Gray inherited him as his own. When Glenn almost took Gray out in Montauk, the year prior it became personal. His involvement there led to the closure of the base and the whole shutting down of the Montauk project. It took a full-year to move all the sub-projects to other locations.

What the fuck do you mean he’s gone? You had his home location, his work location, the ten fucking square miles where he lives his pathetic little existence. We had one of our best guys on him and he’s fucking gone? What does he say?

I know that. Our fucking guy, what does our fucking guy say?… He’s gone, too? What the fuck is going on? Find him. Find fucking both of them.

Gray poured Grand Marnier into a snifter, gave it a swirl, and swallowed it down. He took off his shoes,  carefully wiped them with a cloth napkin from the wheeled-food cart, and placed them neatly side-by-side on the floor, then climbed onto the console. He opened the blinds and cursed at the bird shit streaking the window.

Fucking sky-rats.

The top section of the window tilted enough to get his arm out. He reached down with his club and swung at the Robin’s nest sitting in the ledge’s corner. The mother bird squawked and fluttered around as he swung and sent the nest and eggs dropping to the street below. He climbed down and fixed another snifter full and sat down at his desk under the art he took from Robert’s office. The painting with the giant black demon eating children made him smile. Gray leaned back in his chair, put his feet on the desk, and took another swallow from his glass.

He took another call on the speakerphone.

John, how the hell are ya, you old devil?

Good you?

Never had a bad day. You know me.

Yeah, I know you and I can remind you of a few, in case you forgot.

Ah, you son-of-of-bitch. Are you coming this weekend or not?

I’m still trying.

You’ll thank me, John. It’s the best weekend of the year. Get out and have some fun. You’ll feel eighteen again.

You’ve got nice girls there?

The best. Young–just how you like them. And John the other stuff, I’m telling you it’s the fountain of youth. You’ll be hooked.

It’s not a drug, John. It’s natural.

Listen get this other mess cleaned up so I can relax this weekend then will ya?

I’m on it. We have him in our sights; we’re gathering some intel and waiting for the best time, no worries.

All right, let me go. I’ve got things to do.

Okay, John. I’ll see you this weekend. Be careful.

Hey, remember John, do what thou wilt.

John hung up, Gray peered through the window as the bird stood on the ledge and crapped. He picked up the pencil holder from his desk and threw it across the room and hit the window.

Chapter Three

Saturday, July 7, 1984

11:00 PM, Venice Beach, Ca.

---

Glenn wanted to see the Pacific Ocean on his way, to wherever he was going. Since they found him he knew it could be a short trip. He felt an impending doom, like his time was running out. Gray was gunning for him and he knew he wouldn’t stop sending more killers until he was in the ground. He missed his chance of getting Gray once and he feared he wouldn’t see another. Taking refuge in knowing Gray wanted him alive, at least long enough to torture, was over. Gray caught him once already, and it didn’t go as anyone planned, now it was obvious he was just as willing to take him dead.

It was night when Glenn got to Venice Beach. He parked and walked out in the sand toward the water. He thought about the relationships he had and that he never had the chance to walk hand-in-hand on the beach. His