The Way of Things

The Way of Things

by

Tony Milano

Smashwords
Edition

This book is a work of
fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the
author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any
resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.

The Way of Things. Copyright
© 2014 Tony Milano. All rights reserved. This ebook is licensed for
your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or
given away to other people. If you would like to share this book
with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each
recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or
it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your
favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for
respecting the hard work of this author.

For Aidan

You are my
Motivation

Chapter
1

Chapter
2

Chapter
3

Chapter
4

Chapter
5

Chapter
6

Chapter
7

Thank
You

About Tony
Milano

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Spiderhead

Some days are better than
others. This did not feel like one of those days. It was six in the
morning on a rainy day in New York and the city's finest were
already at work, in fact they had been up all night. That is how
stakeouts work. The department likes to keep things simple, just
two detectives sitting in a car, no backup, just a cup of coffee to
keep the wheels of justice rolling forward.

Detective John Nash and his new partner
Detective Tommy James have been keeping an eye on The Green Dragon
restaurant in Chinatown. It is a known hangout for Chinese
mobsters, unlike the street thugs you see on the corners, only the
truly connected Triads have access to what this restaurant has to
offer. The city documents will tell you that a little old couple
from China owns the place, but every cop and criminal knows who
really owns it, Chenglei Chung.

Chenglei Chung is a big time Triad leader
from Hong Kong. It is estimated that he is in the top one hundred
of the richest men on the planet. You gotta love a rags to riches
story like his. He started out as a bagman for some no-name boss in
Hong Kong and worked his way up the ranks by dealing drugs, selling
guns and murdering other mobsters when it was necessary, until
there was only one more step on that ladder, his boss. Rumor has it
he tossed his boss off of the second highest building in Hong Kong
while his boss's wife watched and screamed, he liked the screaming
so much that he threw her off next.

John Nash was a highly decorated New York
City police detective. He made his bones just recently during a
bank robbery that he stumbled across by accident. He was standing
in line at First National waiting to talk to someone about his lost
debit card when three masked men rushed into the bank. They shot
the door guard before he could say anything. In less than two
minutes they had everyone face down on the ground and they were
attempting to crack the big safe in the back. Not a very bright
thing to do in the middle of the day on a Tuesday. There was easily
twenty customers and employees in the building. John managed to
call his Police Chief on his cell phone and get the building
surrounded before the crew could get their slimy hands on any of
the loot.

The whole event lasted about thirty minutes
and ended with SWAT coming in the back door and dropping the two
members of the crew that were working on the safe. John managed to
distract one of the crew by dropping his badge on the floor. The
masked man flipped out when he saw the badge and he got close
enough to John for him to wrestle the gun away from him and get the
guy in a choke hold, it was not pretty but it worked just the same.
For his actions he received a few medals and he got to shake the
hand of the Mayor.

John was not always a New York cop, he
started his career in San Francisco walking a beat like any other
rookie. He did not mind doing the little work like looking for pick
pockets during parades or directing traffic when the system went
down. To John it was all a part of being a cop. He loved it.

His wife, Victoria, did not share his
enthusiasm for the force. She had been with John since he was in
the Army and to her this was just another version of that horrible
experience. She used to stay up late at night waiting for him to
come home from long deployments overseas. She would sit there
looking out the window waiting for his car to roll up the driveway,
it never did. Sometimes the phone would ring and she would be too
scared to answer it for fear of the news that he had been killed in
some country that she had never heard of, or worse that he had been
captured.

When John joined the police force Victoria
was happy for him but as time went on she found herself doing the
same routine as before, sitting and waiting. She thought that John
would spend more time at home when their baby girl, Lucy, was born.
But that is just not how the real world works. John felt the burn
to work harder and to start climbing the ranks up to detective.
Eventually he ended up on the Asian Task Force. It was a great
promotion and it was also a bit odd for an over six foot tall
knuckle dragger from Scottish and English descent to be on this
task force. He stood out like wolf at a sheep convention.

The car shook back and forth as the street
sweeper went by. John barely noticed as he stared at his coffee. He
had that thousand yard stare, the kind only a battle-tested solider
can appreciate. He was deep in thought. Still plagued by the
memories of a lost love, the memories of what could have been. What
he felt should have been. Memories of a life that was stolen from
him. Just when everything was working out, just when he was finding
something to live for again, stolen.

John was plagued by the thoughts of his wife
Victoria and his little girl Lucy. His work had gotten the better
of him, he was getting obsessed with capturing the big guys, the
big fish, the whales, the ones that always got away. It was that
obsession that led to the biggest mistake of his life, the one that
hurt his career, the one that led to the death of his family.

John was getting too close to a major player
in the Triads. He thought he had all the bases covered, he greased
the palms that needed grease, he had all the information he needed
to make the bust of a lifetime. But he was wrong, he was careless.
He had the whole department geared up for a major raid on a
warehouse where an illegal gun shipment was arriving. The Russian
mob had sold some major fire power to the Chinese Triads and John
had the inside scoop on it all. It was close to midnight and a ship
had just dropped off a cargo trailer and the Triads were unloading
the shipment into small trucks to be delivered throughout the city.
A joint task force involving the FBI, ATF and SFPD all swarmed in
to stop those trucks. Over fifty officers dressed in tactical gear,
automatic weapons and state of the art surveillance equipment
overpowered the unorganized Triad thugs that were moving boxes.
Everything went as planned and pallets of firearms and explosives
were seized and they never made it to the streets. It was a great
day for John.

On the way home, John called Victoria to let
her know everything was okay and he was on his way home. He knew
something was wrong when she did not answer the phone. It was
almost two in the morning, maybe she was asleep, maybe she did not
hear the phone, maybe everything was fine. His gut told him
otherwise. He sped home and got there just in time to see his wife
and daughter on the front lawn, on their knees with their hands on
their heads. It was an execution. Two Chinese thugs, dressed in
jogging suits, gold chains and running shoes stood behind them with
machine guns. Just as John pulled up they opened fire, slaughtering
Victoria and Lucy. The machine guns were loud but John could still
hear the screams from his family over them. As John got out of his
car the machine guns were turned on him. He dove back into his car,
laying on his floorboard he quick checked his gun from his holster
and pulled a backup pistol from the glove box, he was locked and
loaded.

The bullets drilled holes in John's car like
it was made of paper. The air was filled with glass and metal, the
smell of gun powder and antifreeze was overwhelming. He waited for
a break in the gun fire. There it was, he leaped out of the car
duel wielding pistols blazing as he ran at the two gunmen. Ducking
for cover they scurried into their black Town Car with John running
after them shooting down the street, in just a few seconds they
were gone. John ran back to his wife and daughter. They were
already dead. John held them tight as he cried to himself. It would
be easy to blame God for this one, but John knew that God wanted
nothing to do with this mess that John created, all the blame was
sitting on his shoulders alone. A few moments had gone by and
police cars were on the scene, lights and sirens blasting through
the now silent neighborhood. John's neighbors had called the police
and they arrived to see John on the ground holding his family,
there was blood everywhere, the house was peppered with bullet
holes. John was a wreck, shock had set in and it took three
paramedics to get John to let go of the bodies.

It took a month for the department shrink to
let John get back to work, he was complaining, but John knew he was
not ready to be back at work. He could not get the screams of his
family out of his head. Still, he had to do something other than
just sit alone staring at the walls. Through some of his
connections in the Asian Task force he found out that Chenglei
Chung was the Triad boss that had put a contract on John's family,
in a show of power to get John to back off. John was angry, but he
was also broken. He was not acting like his normal self, he started
drinking heavily and getting into fights with complete strangers,
well, at least the drinking was new.

Some detectives in the department tried to
help him out of this hole he was digging, but he was in too deep
already, money had come up missing and all fingers pointed at John.
The sad part was he could not even remember if he had taken it. He
knew his time was short so he decided to resign, instead of getting
removed from the force in shame. Soon after, he felt that he had to
get away from the memories, a change had to be made. He decided on
a move to New York City. No real reason for New York, no more
thought went in to it then a dart hitting a map on the wall. It was
okay he thought, maybe he could lose himself in the city that never
sleeps. That was the plan at least. It did not take long and John
was back on the force, this time in New York City.

"You still here John?" John snapped back to
reality. "Yea, I'm here." He glanced at his new partner who had
been talking the whole time. "I was just thinking, but I'm back
now. So, Tommy you married?" John looked at Tommy trying to see
into his soul. Who was this kid? He came out of nowhere and now
here he is, sitting in the same car as the best detective the force
has seen in years. This kid must be some kind of a Hotshot. "Nope,
you?" Tommy looked sincere with his question. Could he be the only
person in the department that has not heard the story? Hard to
believe, but still he looked sincere. "Never had time for that."
John was lying through his teeth. Tommy did not flinch. Was this
kid playing some sick game or was he the last honest man in New
York? "I hear you....How much longer?" Tommy was young and
impatient. Two things that can get you killed when you are not
expecting it. "Anytime now" John really meant to say soon, but that
was too optimistic for John. "How long have you been chasing this
guy?" Tommy had just finished his coffee and was ready to get
moving. This stakeout was taking too long for Tommy. But this was
John's gig, Tommy would have to wait. "Six weeks....I already lost
one partner to Chung." John was being honest, a rarity for him. "I
heard about that." Tommy was not backing down. "You should know, I
asked to be your partner." That got John's attention. John looked
at Tommy, he saw his soul staring back. John smiled with approval.
All he could think was Hotshot.