Short Story – Chicago Juice, Milwaukee Run

My latest short story ‘Chicago Juice, Milwaukee Run’ has just been published in the seminal online magazine Apocalypse Confidential. My previous stories ‘The Beach Blonde’ and ‘Bahamian Rhapsody’ were also published in Apocalypse Confidential, which I heartily recommend as one of the best reads online.

Here’s the opening to the story:

The message to kill me went out at 7:30.

Mayor Faison was a guest of the I-Team on Channel7 Eyewitness News. Three decades in the job, but old Freddy Faison still looks great in front of the camera. Dig those porcelain teeth and Italian silks. Faison was fielding questions from Chuck Goudie. The balls on this guy. The Faison Mayoralty was the most corrupt in the Windy City’s history: a dubious distinction akin to being the worst anti-Semite at a Nuremberg rally. Goudie’s investigative reporters covered political corruption and organized crime. By appearing on the show, Faison was sending a message that he had nothing to fear.

Except he did fear someone. Me. His driver. Terence Baumgartner III. 

“Mayor Faison, you’ve been in office for twenty-eight years,” Goudie stated. “Is there any possibility that you won’t seek reelection?”

“You know what they say Chuck, in Chicago the only term limits are how long the politicians spend in jail.”

Cue studio laughter. Yeah, smile you smug cocksucker. Too bad a sex worker and mother of three Jackie DeLaurentis can’t smile. Struck and killed by a police car. Driver exonerated. Then there was Ricky Glover: disgraced journalist turned citizen blogger. Dead by overdose from a drug problem no one knew he had. Finally, there was Harold Tafler. Accountant. Mob associate. Found floating down the Chicago river. Coroner ruled it a suicide. The water’s hard in the Midwest: Two of Tafler’s fingers were broken and his body was covered in bruises. What do these unholy trinity of cadavers have in common? They all worked for Faison and they all tried to rat on him. They had stories to tell about kickbacks, bid-rigging, sweetheart deals, you could even use Chicago’s finest for murder-for-hire, providing Faison got his cut. All work done on the premises.

Faison thought he had plugged the leak, but a rumor was circulating on the street. Tafler had kept details of every crooked deal in a ledger. He had names, numbers, the whole damn thing. Did it really exist? The tough bastard hadn’t given it up under torture. I had the ledger. I had the juice on Faison. Tafler had saved my life, at least for now. But he hadn’t done it for me. He knew he was dead when the Mayor’s men found him. Tafler refused to give up the ledger because he wanted to see Faison get sent down from beyond the grave. 

You can read the full story here.