Jack Frost

by Diane Capri

  She poured coffee into the three mugs, inhaling the comforting aroma, which helped steady her resolve and cover the antiseptic odors that overwhelmed the place.

  “Bring mine over here, Fern.” Judd was leaning against the wall. He had an unobstructed view of Walsh on the table and the doctor standing eight feet away.

  Judd still held the pistol in his right hand. It would be easy for him to raise it and shoot. No one could possibly miss a target from such a short distance.

  Fern’s hands began to shake again as she carried the mug and the snacks across the small room, passing the food to Judd. “Micah, your coffee is on the counter there.”

  “Thanks,” the doctor said, without looking up.

  He had inserted an IV into Walsh’s right arm while she’d been in the kitchen. He’d also cleaned the wound on Walsh’s left arm. He must have stitched the gash before he’d applied the clean dressing. He’d cleaned the grime from his patient’s face, too.

  Micah checked Walsh’s vital signs again as Fern moved to sit in the visitor’s chair in the corner. She wanted to ask how Walsh was responding to the antivenom, but she was afraid to hear the answer.

  Instead, she watched as Micah worked without pause. Her mind wandered. She’d lost track of how much time had passed. It felt like she’d been sitting in the same chair for days.

  Her mind began to wander. Walsh. The dapper, friendly man Fern had enjoyed chatting with at the prison just yesterday. Walsh had been one of her easier clients. She’d genuinely liked him.

  He’d made no demands, which was unusual and distinguished him from the other inmates she’d inherited. Every now and then, he’d asked for a favor. Small things. Make a phone call or send a text to his family. Confirm flight times so he could arrange visitation. Stuff like that.

  When she’d caught that first glimpse of him slumped over the Land Rover’s steering wheel out in the field, his face had been grimy and contorted with pain. She could have been mistaken about his identity, given the panic and hysteria of the moment. But she wasn’t.

  Walsh had an oxygen cannula in his nose that hadn’t been there before she left the room. His breathing was ragged and labored. In a hospital, he might have been intubated right away, Micah had said.

  The automatic cuff on his arm continued to monitor Walsh’s blood pressure. When it completed the current cycle, the machine flashed a seriously low blood pressure warning.

  Judd didn’t seem to notice. But Micah did.

  Micah pulled an old-fashioned blood pressure cuff from the drawer and applied it to Walsh’s right arm. He put the stethoscope in his ears and pumped the bulb to inflate the cuff.

  The ragged breathing became more pronounced. Walsh began to wheeze as if his windpipe was blocked.

  Fern noticed his lips looked blue. So did his fingertips.

  “Can I help?” she asked.

  “Just stay out of the way,” Micah said, attention fully focused on Walsh.

  The tension in the room changed from taut to frantic.

  Judd stood up straight, no longer slouching against the wall, watching intently. His eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared. He said nothing. But his hand gripped the pistol tighter at his side.

  The doctor began working furiously, moving around the small room, pulling and setting equipment, and applying it to Walsh’s body.

  One thing after another.

  Time and again.

  Each effort failed.

  Fern glanced at the clock. Micah had been working a long time, making every effort to save Walsh.

  Dr. Warner refused to give up.

  Sweat broke out on his forehead.

  He worked until he was exhausted, and still he tried.

  Until his patient wheezed a final, tortured breath.

  Micah exhaled at the same time.

  His shoulders slumped, and he hung his head for a few seconds. Then he raised his face and gazed directly into Judd’s eyes. “I’m so sorry, but—”

  Before the defeated doctor finished his sentence, Judd pointed the Glock directly at his chest and fired three times.

  Fern jumped from the chair, dropping the coffee mug to the floor, and screamed as she rushed toward her friend, the good doctor. “Micah! Micah!”

  Dr. Warner crumpled onto the floor. Fern bent down beside him.

  Judd calmly fired one more shot, directly into Dr. Warner’s head. Then he grabbed Fern’s bicep and yanked her to her feet.

  He shoved her through the doorway and poked hard in the center of her back with the gun, growling like a wounded animal. “Move it. Now. Let’s go.”

  “Go where?” Fern said, sobbing as she stumbled toward the back door.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Saturday, May 14

  Newton Hills, South Dakota

  7:45 p.m.

  After Smithers said they’d located Olson’s farm truck and teams were on the way to Dr. Warner’s office, Kim asked, “Have you recaptured all of the inmates except Keegan?”

  “Chief Mitchell just told me we’ve got three still at large,” Smithers replied.

  “Who are they?” Burke asked.

  “Petey Burns, the kid you ran off the road after he stole Fern Olson’s car. Keegan. And Keegan’s pal Liam Walsh,” Smithers said ticking them off on his fingers. “With Denny dead, that’s all of them, according to the intel we have from the prison.”

  “And Walsh was one of Olson’s clients, too. She met with those three yesterday afternoon. Just before the jetliner crashed into the prison,” Kim said slowly.

  Burke nodded. “Which makes Olson the link between them.”

  “Seems like it,” Smithers said. “We’ve been all over her background, along with her clients. She seems to be the weak tie, at least. At this point, we can’t say whether or not she played a bigger role.”

  “Got anything that’s stronger tying these three guys together?” Kim asked.

  Smithers raised his eyebrows. “Like Reacher, you mean? We haven’t been focused on that question. Possible, I guess.”

  Kim shook her head. “I was thinking about Keegan. Can you tie Petey Burns to Keegan?”

  Burke said, “Burns is a geeky car thief. He’s good at his job but not good enough to stay out of prison. Keegan’s a mob boss. An old fashioned gangster. Savage as they come. Walsh was one of his captains. What would Petey Burns have to do with Boston’s Irish mob?”

  Kim shrugged, the all-purpose gesture she’d learned from Gaspar. “It feels like Burns was a distraction, doesn’t it? He just happened to steal Olson’s car. Which, early on, led Mitchell and the others toward Rapid City instead of north toward Newton Hills.”

  “Very early on. Before Bolton PD could get enough backup in the field.” Smithers nodded slowly, considering the implications. “When Keegan and Walsh and Denny were headed north.”

  Burke said, “And while Olson was stuck inside the prison lobby. Which is looking a little too convenient at this point, isn’t it?”

  “Right,” Kim said, working things through in her head. “How long had Keegan, Walsh, Denny, and Burns been locked up at Bolton?”

  Burke said, “Keegan and Denny were inside the longest. More than ten years. Walsh arrived two years ago. And Burns has maybe been a guest of the feds a few months, at most.”

  “What are you thinking, Otto?” Smithers asked.

  “It’s just a theory.” She took a deep breath and shoved her hands into her pockets. “We’ve been assuming this prison break was a crime of opportunity.”

  “Reasonable assumption. Not exactly the kind of thing it would be easy to orchestrate.” Burke shook his head. “A jetliner crashing into the prison instead of hitting the runway seems like a once in a lifetime lucky break, sure. But the inmates in the exercise yard seizing the chance and hightailing it out of there in the chaos that follows seems like a no-brainer.”

  “What if it wasn’t?” Kim asked.

  “What if the crash itself wasn’t a fluke?” Smithers replied.

&nbs
p; “Right. What if the crash was engineered that way? Then some of the prisoners take advantage of the chance,” Kim said, thinking aloud. “But others already had an escape plan in place.”

  “And Olson was facilitating all of it?” Burke asked.

  Kim went quiet, considering the implications. Smithers and Burke did the same.

  Smithers was the first to break the silence. “So Keegan is the mastermind. Olson’s the facilitator. Let’s go with that. Where does that leave us now?”

  “Logically, there must be a rendezvous point,” Burke said, head cocked. “They must have had a plan to connect somewhere.”

  “And then what?” Smithers said.

  Kim had watched them catch up with her thinking. Three logical FBI special agents trained in criminal analysis should reach the same conclusions.

  Burke finally said, “Canada. They could drive from here. It’s not that far.”

  “Harder to drive across the border when there’s a manhunt going on,” Smithers said. “All the crossing checkpoints have been blocked since the prison break happened.”

  In the silence that followed they were all thinking the same thing. The border between the U.S. and Canada was the longest land border in the world. It was watched by the governments of both countries more carefully than most people knew. Which didn’t mean the surveillance was perfect. No government project ever is.

  Which meant that Keegan and the others could cross it without being caught.

  “Right,” Kim said, nodding. “So they’d fly deeper into Canada. In a private plane.”

  No one suggested flying a private plane undetected into Canada was impossible. Because they all knew it could be done. Traffickers of all sorts of contraband had done it many times before. All the pilot had to do was avoid the air traffic control radar.

  It was as simple as turning off the transponder and flying low. Probably two thousand feet above terrain would do the job. Which would burn more fuel. But easy enough in a private jet. Something like a Gulfstream G4 had enough range to fly low for a long time. Certainly long enough for Keegan’s needs.

  Burke nodded and said, “Makes sense.”

  “They’d need a specific point to meet up. Somewhere a private jet could land and take off again without drawing too much attention,” Kim said. “Is there someplace like that around here?”

  Smithers shook his head. “There’s not much of anything around here. That’s why the prison facility was built here in the first place.”

  “Okay,” Kim said. “But somewhere close by. Close enough to drive to. Something old and unused, preferably.”

  “There was a place like that back when Reacher was here. An abandoned military airstrip, I think?” Burke said. “But it was destroyed back then, wasn’t it?”

  Kim nodded. “Yeah. So that’s not it.”

  Smithers said, “How would Keegan know about a place like that?”

  “He probably wouldn’t,” Kim replied, breathing a long sigh. She straightened her posture and stretched her neck. “But Olson would. Or she’d know how to find such a place. Because she’s lived here all her life.”

  “I can’t go chasing around the countryside looking for abandoned airstrips. I’ll ask Mitchell about it. He’ll follow up,” Smithers said, pushing off the porch rail.

  “What about her cell phone? Did you get the records yet?” Kim asked.

  “Still waiting. We have the warrant. The phone company is dragging its feet,” Smithers said, swiping a big palm over his head and cupping the back of his neck. “The phone is locked, too. We haven’t been able to break the security yet.”

  “But you will,” Kim said, smiling.

  Smithers nodded and headed toward the back door. “For now, we’ve found Olson’s old truck. We’ll find her. And then Olson will tell us the rest. She killed Denny. Even if it was self-defense, she’s going to want to be cooperative.”

  Burke said, “Sounds like a plan.”

  “Keep in touch,” Smithers said before he went inside and closed the door behind him.

  Kim said nothing. All theories had flaws and there were several in this one.

  Would Olson flee to Canada and leave her son behind? Not likely.

  So would she circle back to collect Noah first, before she met up with the others? Maybe.

  What was Olson’s motivation here, anyway? Kim didn’t know enough about her to divine a solid incentive.

  And where did Reacher fit in?

  “We’re not needed here. They’ve got plenty of hands on deck now,” Kim said, pulling the Boss’s phone out on her way down the porch stairs. She pushed the redial and listened to the incessant ringing for a while before she hung up and slid the phone back into her pocket.

  “He’ll call when he can.” Burke followed, easily catching up with her shorter stride about halfway to the Navigator. “Where are we going?”

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Saturday, May 14

  South Dakota

  8:20 p.m.

  Fern didn’t notice the beauty of the spring evening. Driving north, about thirty miles from Newton Hills, the sun dipped low in the western sky casting a warm glow over the South Dakota hills.

  She loved her home state. She’d been born here, married, and raised her son here. There were easier places to live. More hospitable climates. States with convenient services. But for Fern, rugged South Dakota would always be home.

  She’d never thought much about death or dying until she’d lost her mother. Even then, her busy law practice and taking care of Noah and her dad had been enough to keep her thoughts from darkness.

  Until today.

  Since Judd shot Officer Miller this morning, Fern had been terrified.

  She was barely holding it together, and she knew it.

  He probably knew it, too.

  Judd opened the glove box and rooted through the papers stuffed inside. “We need a map.”

  “I’ve lived in South Dakota all my life. We don’t have a lot of roads and I know most of the main ones. Where do you want to go?” Fern hated the tremor in her voice. She’d tried to control it but failed.

  Judd was crazy. Until she could get away from him, every cell in her body would remain taut with fear.

  He ignored the question and continued to shuffle through the stuff Micah had shoved into the glove box.

  After a while, Judd found a paper map. It was creased and grimy and torn in places.

  Micah had probably used it to find remote, unspoiled hiking and fishing spots and stuffed it into his pockets for easy reference. The map looked about thirty years old. But an old map of South Dakota was just about as good as a new one.

  Judd jammed all the junk back into the glove box and refolded the map to study nearby roads.

  Fern’s mind turned to practical matters to cope with her constant fear. Judd had already displayed a terrifying lack of patience with any show of emotion. Pushing his patience was a bad idea.

  If she wanted to stay alive, she had to keep her wits about her. She knew that.

  First things first.

  Where the hell were they going?

  He’d be smart to head to Canada. Get out of the country.

  Canada was a big, wide-open place. And if he should be discovered there, the Canadian government probably wouldn’t extradite him because he’d be facing the death penalty here in the U.S.

  With a fake passport, Judd might live in the U.S. undetected for years. But it would be easier to do in Canada. From there, he could travel to other places in the world, too.

  So if Judd made it to Canada, he’d feel safe. If she helped him get there, maybe he wouldn’t kill her. Or hurt her family. She hoped.

  Fern had been to Canada several times in her life. Beautiful country. Nice people. Living in Canada would be no hardship for a guy like Judd.

  She and Noah had driven to Winnipeg once on vacation years ago. The drive time was about ten hours from Bolton on the interstates.

  But the highways were better an
d faster than the county roads they were traveling on now. It would take longer to get to the border if they stayed on the secondary roads.

  They were probably headed toward a closer crossing point at one of the small Canadian towns across the border from North Dakota. Judd would probably have a better chance of slipping through law enforcement.

  But all the border crossing checkpoints would require a passport. Judd probably had a counterfeit with a false identity. Fern didn’t carry her passport in her purse. Which meant she didn’t have it with her. They wouldn’t let her cross.

  How would Judd deal with that? Not well, probably.

  Fern kept both hands on the steering wheel, mostly to prevent shaking as she considered her limited options.

  Before his Land Rover was damaged, Judd’s plan might have been to cross over to Canada in the dark through the forest. The Land Rover probably would have handled the drive along a dirt road somewhere near the border. This Jeep didn’t seem up to the task.

  Dr. Warner’s SUV was a serviceable but battered ten-year-old Cherokee with more than one hundred thousand miles on the odometer. The green body paint had dulled and faded over the years.

  He’d been an all-around sportsman, so the cargo area was filled with hiking, hunting, and fishing equipment, which kept knocking around back there whenever she hit a pothole or made a sharp turn.

  Judd sat silently in the passenger seat with the folded map and the pistol, which didn’t settle Fern’s nerves at all. He wouldn’t hesitate to use the gun. She’d seen him kill twice today, shooting at point-blank range. No reason to believe he wouldn’t do the same to her.

  But probably not until they reached his destination, since he couldn’t drive. He’d need her until then.

  She needed an escape plan before they reached Canada. Because at that point, she’d be utterly dispensable.

  Fern noticed a road sign on the right. Mission River was three miles ahead.

  She glanced at the fuel gauge. “We need to get gas. After Mission River, we won’t find another station for a long time.”