The Way of Things by Tony Milano Page A

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