The Man Who Walks Away

by Dan Ames

  They sat in silence until a third man entered.

  He wore standard issue Army BDUs and assumed a deferential posture toward Crawford. His name tag said Lucas.

  “What the hell is going on?” Crawford barked at him, before he had a chance to even sit down.

  “I’m afraid Dr. Aldrich and I haven’t had a chance to discuss the situation,” Lucas replied, nodding his head toward the unkempt man in the dark suit.

  “Well, discuss it now then for Chrissakes!” Crawford said, his tone filled with exasperation.

  “There is no reason for alarm,” Dr. Aldrich said. He had a subdued voice, almost clinical and robotic. Probably to hypnotize his patients, Crawford thought.

  “We had a minor breach in security, I know that,” Lucas said. “But that loophole, if you will, is now closed. We are in the process of reclaiming any assets that were unwittingly dispersed.”

  Crawford rolled his eyes.

  “How did it happen?” he asked Lucas.

  “We perhaps underestimated the skills of the men involved. They were able to take out two guards, breech the security perimeter, and escape into darkness,” Lucas explained while Dr. Aldrich sat, looking bored with the discussion. “By the time we learned they’d absconded, it was too late. But we’re zeroing in, in terms of location. This will be resolved quickly and quietly.”

  “It better be,” Crawford said.

  Aldrich laughed quietly and even rolled his eyes.

  Crawford slammed his fist down on the table. “I’m going to see to it that you are shut down,” he said to the doctor.

  “Not possible,” Aldrich replied, his voice still calm and mechanical. “That can only be done by those above you in pay grade. You are powerless. Impotent, even.”

  Lucas recoiled visibly as he watched Crawford’s tanned face turn crimson.

  “Listen, you mealy mouthed piece of shit,” Crawford growled. “If you don’t get your act together, I’ll see to it you never work for the military again. Hell, maybe you’ll never work for anyone, ever.”

  “Is that a threat, General?” Dr. Aldrich answered, his voice icy.

  Crawford ignored him and turned to Lucas.

  “Get this cleaned up, or you’ll be tossed onto the trash heap along with this batshit loser.”

  He stood and stalked from the room.

  After a long pause, Aldrich sighed and turned to Lucas.

  “Why did you lie?”

  11

  The room smelled of blood and death. A metallic, almost coppery odor, combined with the basest scents the human body can produce.

  Especially in death, when the body releases everything it has.

  There was no doubt in Sheriff Melanie Bordeau’s mind that she was about to embark on a case unlike any other she’d ever experienced.

  Of course, she thought of her critics, when it came to said experience.

  Or lack thereof, according to them.

  She was young, her 30th birthday was still three months away, and many claimed she only got the job because her father, Henry Bordeau, had been sheriff for the past three decades.

  As she surveyed the carnage in the room, though, all thoughts of her critics disappeared, blotted about by the sight of horrific, violent death.

  This had clearly been no ordinary shooting. This had none of the hallmarks of a drunken disagreement among hunters gone wrong. Or a neighborly squabble turned deadly.

  No, this was something else.

  The room was relatively bare, with some rustic furniture that had clearly seen better days. An open kitchen was off to the right, with a tiny stove and a makeshift countertop. Two wooden stools sat near the counter. To the left of the furniture was a pile of blankets and some firewood that looked like it had been hastily gathered.

  Transients? Bordeau wondered.

  Careful not to touch anything and disturb evidence, Bordeau stepped closer to the first victim, a dark-skinned man. His hands were tied behind his back. He’d clearly been savagely beaten, his throat slit, multiple stab wounds and maybe even tortured. Although she doubted he’d lived long enough to endure much, judging by the size of the slash across his throat.

  Behind him, on the floor, were two more bodies. They were both males, but younger. It was hard to tell as they were covered in blood and both of them had been shot in the head. They too had been bound.

  Bordeau noticed a blanket between the two sets of bodies. She poked it with the tip of her finger.

  It was wet.

  She walked around the bodies, studied the worn wooden floor and spotted several shell casings. They were a size she wasn’t familiar with but they didn’t look like typical hunting cartridges.

  Also, she noticed there was no real sign of struggle. The woman who had been killed behind the house must have gone there under her own power, or possibly dragged. But she had definitely been killed outside.

  Outside, she heard the sound of a vehicle approaching and slowly backed from the room.

  At the front of the building, another officer had arrived, along with a van carrying the county coroner. He would process the scene, and gather any forensic evidence.

  Bordeau’s mind was already working through the logistics of what may have happened here.

  She knew this was no conventional homicide.

  No, something else was involved.

  Either drugs.

  The military.

  Or both.

  12

  Nash felt like a house that had barely survived hurricane-force winds.

  He’d just gotten off the phone with his commanding officer who had threatened him with everything from physical harm to sexual assault to eviction from the army.

  The message had been abundantly clear: get your troops in order or you’ll be the one on the firing line.

  Now, he stood watching as Dawkins and Blatch finished preparing for their next operation.

  The command trailer was starting to smell like a locker room that hadn’t seen a janitor in weeks. They’d had a large pot of coffee and the air was a mixture of fresh coffee grounds, gun oil, and male sweat.

  Nash wondered how much longer they would be stationed out here. Until the job was done, probably.

  And then what?

  He wondered, but in his line of work it didn’t pay to look too far ahead.

  Instead, he studied his men.

  Dawkins seemed fine, but Nash couldn’t stop looking at Blatch. Something about the red-haired man seemed off.

  “You okay, Blatch?” he asked him.

  Blatch glanced up, a bit too quickly, his blue eyes slightly wider than normal Was he anxious, or desperately trying to appear innocent, Nash wondered.

  “Yeah, why?”

  Nash stared him down until Blatch went back to assembling his gear.

  Dawkins finished first.

  “Ready,” he said.

  They both waited for Blatch to finish and then Nash brought them over to the operations table where a map had been pinned to the top.

  Nash tapped a valley no more than five miles away.

  “I was just briefed and the latest intel has Zotz possibly arriving here,” he said. “We’re not sure the exact time, but word is it should happen within the next twenty-four hours.”

  “If this guy’s so dangerous, how is he able to move around like this?” Dawkins asked. “It’s crazy.”

  Nash didn’t have an answer ready. “That’s for the big chiefs to know, not us little Indians,” he said. “All I know is we need to be there and nail this nutjob to the wall.”

  “So Zotz is a terrorist? Here to recruit others? Or meet with a cell he’s already established?”

  “That wasn’t in the briefing,” Nash said. “Above our pay grade. But it’s safe to say that whatever he’s got planned, it’s big and will involve a lot of innocent people being killed. Unless we kill him first.”

  “Let’s do this,” Blatch said.

  They mustered out into the vehicle but Nash was still wondering what w
as wrong with Blatch.

  He seemed distracted.

  In their line of work, distraction was deadly.

  13

  Sheriff Bordeau studied the forensic report.

  The shell casings appeared to be 9 x 19mm Parabellum – a standard military cartridge.

  The footprints at the rear of the house also appeared to be from a military-type boot.

  They had yet to find any form of ID on the dead bodies and the more detailed analysis of any fibers would take at least a few days. There was a backup at the crime lab, as always, and even though it was the first multiple homicide in the area in years, Bordeau didn’t think her case would be expedited.

  The door to her office opened and a shadow fell across the room.

  She glanced up and saw her father standing in the doorway.

  “Hey,” he said.

  Henry Bordeau was a legend in the county, and physically he lived up to the myth. It seemed he was almost as broad as he was tall. He was like a buffalo wearing a cowboy hat.

  Even though he was over seventy years old, he still had an air of solidity, giving off the impression that he would be here long after you, no matter the age difference. His face was craggy, partially hidden behind a thick beard and a bulbous nose whose spider veins were probably half-full of his favorite scotch.

  The big man dropped his bulk into the chair across from his daughter’s desk. He looked around the office and she imagined he was envisioning the way he used to have it, with his mounted fish and hunting trophies.

  “Heard you caught a quadruple,” he growled at her.

  “Sure did,” she said. “A bad one. Torture. And we think one of the vics, a woman, was raped, too. That’s classified, though, so don’t tell anyone.”

  Her father shook his massive head.

  “Sick bastards,” he said. “Do you think it was hunters?”

  The transient population of hunters who came and went in the area during various hunting seasons often had a bad reputation among the locals. They were known to ignore game laws, get drunk in town, and in general treat the place like it was one giant hotel room they could trash on their way out.

  “Don’t think so,” she said. “But we don’t have much yet in way of evidence. Just a hunch.”

  “You need any help?” he asked.

  Melanie Bordeau was tempted to roll her eyes but she kept her face straight. She knew the old man just wanted to help, but she’d been very clear about not wanting him to overstep his bounds ever since she was elected sheriff.

  “Not yet, but we’ll see what happens.”

  He nodded, obviously disappointed but keeping it to himself. He heaved himself out of the chair and went to the door.

  “Be careful,” he said. “It sounds like maybe more than just a one-off. Especially if they didn’t get what they were looking for.”

  She watched her father walk out of the office and voices greeting him on his way out.

  Melanie thought about what he’d said.

  Maybe they didn’t get what they were looking for.

  How did he know she suspected there was more than one killer?

  14

  After her father left the office, Bordeau thought about what she'd learned from the initial report.

  This part of the country was definitely pro-gun. Not just because of the hunters. But also, homeowners. Home defense was a serious issue and westerners preferred to take matters into their own hands, literally. Nearly every home out here had a rifle or shotgun hanging over the fireplace, or a big revolver under the bed.

  Guns were everywhere in the West.

  Plus, there was no shortage of ex-military in the area with all of the army bases scattered around. This region was perfect for the government to build installations in the middle of nowhere. Wide, vast deserts nearly entirely devoid of population were often the choice of military planners who wanted to be able to develop certain things in private.

  Bordeau, or more accurately, her father, had known plenty of ex-military people now living in the region.

  But in the back of her mind Bordeaux seemed to remember something. An incident at a local bar involving a mysterious loner who may have been ex-military, maybe even special ops.

  Bordeau racked her brain trying to remember the incident.

  She went onto her computer and accessed the incident files from the past year or so, entering keywords like special ops, military, lone man, etc.

  Nothing came back.

  Where had she heard the story about the bar?

  It had to have been at Rooster’s, the main bar in town. Bordeau’s friend Connie ran the place, maybe that was where she’d heard the tale.

  Bordeau got up from her desk and headed for her squad car.

  She would drop in at Rooster’s and see what she could find out.

  15

  Bordeau drove into downtown Independence Springs, and went several blocks south, past a laundromat and a Chinese restaurant until she came to the parking lot for Rooster’s.

  The bar was a low-slung building probably erected in the seventies, with a fake Spanish tile roof and a six-foot rooster perched over the entrance. Every year around high school graduation some kids would always get the idea to try to steal the rooster. That is, until they met the razor wire surrounding it, as well as the motion lights.

  Not to mention, the squad cars that regularly patrolled the area on graduation night.

  Bordeau parked her squad car and went into Rooster’s. It had a long bar on one side, some pool tables, a jukebox and a half-dozen tables and chairs. On the walls were reprints of old western paintings, shootouts with cowboys, mostly Remingtons or Russells. Bordeau could never keep those two artists straight.

  Her friend was tending bar.

  "Hey Connie."

  Connie Higgins was a lean, athletic woman with blonde hair and a chiseled face. Bordeau had known her for several years and the two had become friends, bonding over being in charge of their respective businesses. The sheriff knew her friend was divorced, a brief marriage to a college sweetheart, and the two often talked about the lack of qualified candidates in the romance department of little Independence Springs.

  After they exchanged some pleasantries Bordeaux said, "Hey, do you remember telling me a story about a guy hassling you and then another guy kicked his ass in the parking lot?”

  Connie put a glass of sparkling water with a lime in front of Bordeau. She cocked her head to one side and squinted her hazel eyes as she tried to remember.

  “Yeah, actually I do remember,” she said with a smile. “I didn’t see it happen, but the rumor is the guy put an awful big hurt on Ronnie Kudlow. Remember him? Caveman kind of guy always loose with his hands?”

  Bordeau did remember him.

  “It was great, because Ronnie never set foot in here again. Heard he moved up to Denver, thank God.”

  “And you thought that guy was some kind of special ops?"

  "Yeah, I remember that.”

  “Did he tell you his name?”

  “Yeah, I remember that because he said it was Tallon, and I said, you mean like the claw?” Connie said, holding up her fingers and hooking them. “And he laughed and said it was with two Ls. As in Tallon.”

  “Interesting,” Bordeau said.

  “Yeah, the funny thing is, I never saw him again, either. I could’ve sworn he said he lived in the area but I had never seen him before and he hasn’t been in since. Which is a shame because he was a looker,” Connie said, shooting Bordeau a lascivious wink.

  Bordeau laughed, they made small talk and when she finished her sparkling water, she left.

  Back in the office, Bordeau logged onto a database of citizens taxpayer records and found the name Michael Tallon. She saw his address and knew it was on the outskirts of town. It could possibly be that little adobe ranch she’d always admired from a distance.

  Bordeau thought about it and it sounded to her like this Tallon was maybe some kind of vigilante. Not afraid to take the
law into his own hands.

  And if he had a special ops background maybe he might know of other military people in the area.

  Bordeau closed her browser window, got to her feet and went out to her squad car.

  She would pay Michael Tallon a visit first thing in the morning.

  16

  “There’s no way Zotz is in there,” Dawkins said.

  They were on a narrow, two-lane highway barely one step up from a dirt road. It wound its way north and south, skirting major valleys, but dipping in and out of draws and taking huge, sweeping curves. When the road had been made, it had clearly been constructed on a small budget because every obstacle was avoided, rather than eliminated.

  “Probably not, but information may be,” Nash answered. “Hope for the best, plan for the worst.”

  Blatch was driving and they were a half-mile behind their target: a nondescript motor home with several large antennas on its roof.

  They were in a black passenger van with four-wheel drive and oversized tires. They were ready for battle, on edge.

  “Up there, you know what to do,” Nash said, pointing ahead to a spot in the distance.

  The road topped out on a ridge and then descended into a long, narrow valley. Once the van was at the crest, they could see all the way down the valley, at least three miles and the road was clear.

  Blatch gunned the van and they pulled up alongside the motorhome. Dirt and dust were spewing from beneath the motorhome’s huge tires making visibility difficult. Smaller stones and pebbles bounced off the side of the van, sounding to Nash a little too similar to small arms fire.

  “Go!” he shouted.

  Behind him, Dawkins slid open the side passenger door of the van as Blatch pulled the vehicle so close Nash could reach out and touch the motorhome’s rear taillight.

  Dawkins timed his jump and leapt from the van onto the rear ladder of the motorhome, his assault rifle strapped to his back.