Runner-up 2

Evelyn whispered into her cellphone, cloistered away in the kitchen.

“Hermie, I’m hiding in the pantry and some lunatic is pointing a gun at Tony. Please, you’ve got to get over here. Somebody’s going to get shot, and I don’t want it to be me.”

“I know, sweetheart. I’ve been watching the entire scene. There are a couple of problems walking up the drive right now. Baby Doll and I will get there as soon as we can.”

He’d already called out the dogs. His boys would be there any time now. But Hermann Hauser had to act quickly.

A quick flick of Hauser’s eyes to the central closed-circuit monitors in his study showed Genie and Ernesto at the door, a gun at Genie’s back. Two thugs in black hoodies were slinking in behind them. The camera overlooking the dining table captured a more ominous scene of Charlie Bonner swirling a glass of Scotch in one hand while keeping a gun aimed at Tony Falco.

What a motley crew, the former FBI agent kept thinking as he holstered Baby Doll and made his away toward the front gate of his house across the street from the Falco residence.

Hauser had something as good as his gun Baby Doll on his side. He had the drop on them. No one knew who he was; the surprise factor in his favor.

Hauser likened himself to one of L.A.’s famous sleuths to the stars. But this scenario was even better to the bored, yet rich, former cop with Hollywood credits to his name.

The irony made him laugh out loud. Bonner and Falco watching Genie and Ernesto and the two henchmen as he watched the scenario unfold from his own hidden cameras he’d planted at strategic places inside Falco’s home. Even in the guest bathroom. Especially the guest bathroom.

Hauser hadn’t seen this much action in years, and it almost brought tears to his eyes when he thought about the prospects.

“Hurry,” Evelyn said, crying into the phone. “I’m scared.”

“Stay put,” Hauser said. “The cavalry’s gonna make a charge.”

Bonner captivated Falco with his wit and a gun. But even Bonner tired of the stalemate with the sleazy congressman. And it seemed a party was in the making with Genie, Ernesto and Palmieri’s henchmen headed for the front door to Falco’s Beverly Hills home.

“I need to eat something. I feel like I’ve been drinking this same Scotch for five days,” Bonner said. His ice was melting in the amber solution sitting before him on Falco’s ridiculously grand dining table with place settings for 20.

“Where do you want to go?” Falco asked. “I could use a bite myself.”

“Come on, congressman,” Bonner snorted. “Check your kitchen. You’ve got a closet full of food.”

That’s the moment Ernesto shoved Genie through the door. Genie stumbled in her 4-inch heels and clattered to the polished mahogany floor. The clatter brought Bonner and Falco running.

“You’ve got to the count of 10 to tell me what’s on the flash drive I took from your wife,” Ernesto threatened, “or watch her brain splatter all over this tidy room.”

“What’s on the flash drive is probably going to get at least one of us killed,” Bonner said. “Guess you didn’t see the two strong-arm dudes sneaking up behind you.”

Ernesto thought Bonner was bluffing.

“If lives are at stake,” Ernesto said, “then what ever’s on that drive has to be worth a wheelbarrow full of money, and I want a piece of the action.”

Bonner shot back, “People in hell want ice water too, don’t they?”

David Futch is a former writer turned Florida fishing guide who moved to Santa Monica last year to continue writing. The two-time runner-up in the novel contest “now wants to land the big one.”