Mark Clodi Read Free

see red and blue lights flashing in the early morning light. A cop. Instinctively he hit the brakes and slowed his truck down to the posted speed limit. The police officer had his cruiser parked on the shoulder of the road behind some unlucky motorist. Max couldn’t resist taking a quick glance to see what was happening.
    The police car was parked behind a white four door sedan. The driver’s door was open but Max could not see the owner of the vehicle. Or the cop for that matter. Maybe they were on the other side of the car changing a tire. Or perhaps, in the dim morning light and based on the fact he was doing fifty five miles an hour he had just failed to notice them. Either way, Max was happy it was that guy, and not him, who had gotten the early morning ticket.
    The last ten minutes of his drive were uneventful as he passed the usual landmarks; Mile High Stadium, the Gates Rubber factory and a few other exits before finally getting off of the freeway. A few minutes later Max had turned into his normal parking spot and killed the engine. Even though there were a hundred or so empty parking spaces Max always steered his truck to the same spot every morning, Monday through Friday. It was one of those "creature of habit" kind of things.
    As he walked towards the side employee entrance that provided the shortest distance from the parking lot to his ground floor cube Max went over his to-do list for the day. First he had to email his buddy and see if...
    "Max! Did you hear me? The dispatcher wants one of us to go to the main entrance and wait for the police. Since I'm on the phone that leaves you. Get going, I think I hear sirens."
    That is how his day had begun, simple, quiet, normal. It had now evolved into something as far from his daily routine as he thought it could get. Pushing open the door to the hallway he wondered what he would find next.
     
    Chapter 3
    The hallway was as quiet as church on a Friday night, that was not good. The main entrance was past Max’s desk and though he hated to do it he stopped by and picked up his ‘office’ bat. Signed by Steve Garvey this Louisville Slugger was a minor prize among the items in Max’s collection, not too valuable to keep in his shrine at work, just impressive enough to ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’ his co-workers. Now if Garvey ever made it into the hall of fame, the bat would become something more treasured and might have to be brought home for the ‘wall of fame’ that Max was slowly building next to his mantle. For now it should prove useful if Fred or Nancy came calling. He made his way to the front doors of MAC co. without seeing anyone. The security guard the company employed to sit at the desk in the lobby didn't start until seven forty-five, so this was not unusual.
    Without seeing anyone? Something was definitely wrong, a few phones were ringing, he did hear a muffled conversation, but he saw no one. In an office building, during business hours? On a Friday? Sure, sure it was only seven in the morning, but a few of the regulars should have been in by now. Max held his bat and waited, shifting his grip around, looking at the number ‘six’ on the end of the handle and the ‘Good luck, Steve Garvey’ in faded ink near the top of the bat. Bloodstains, were now pretty evident from Max’s grip, he looked around, thought for a moment, propped the front door open with a trash can and then ducked back into the hallway towards the men’s room. It had only been a couple minutes, no way the police could get here that quickly with the rush hour just starting but he didn’t want to take a chance of missing them.
    Stepping into the men’s room the first thing Max saw was a pool of dried blood on the floor in front of the handicapped stall. That door was closed, but not completely. Max stopped, looked around and slowly lowered the tip of the bat down onto the floor then used this to lower his body down and get a look under the stall door. Two sets of legs, one,