by Nick Thacker
Black, large SUV, simple stock tires with no embellishment whatsoever. A man sat in the driver’s seat of the SUV, sunglasses and a dark suit.
There was nothing I’d seen in my life that screamed ‘government issue’ more than that guy and that car.
34
ON ANY OTHER NIGHT I wouldn’t have even blinked if I’d seen such a sight. I would have noticed it, I was sure, as I had been trained to notice things like that. But I wouldn’t have cared. I would have driven past, maybe thinking it was an odd sight, but nothing really out of the ordinary. After all, the government types like this certainly did engage in waiting around and looking at the scenery, ostensibly on some sort of secret mission. It was only a matter of probability that I would eventually see one in action.
But this scene was different. The fact that there was a government-issued SUV driven by a government-issued driver, sitting in the most obvious spot on the most out-of-the-way road in the country, told me this scene was very different.
They were watching the road. They were watching me. And they weren’t the people that took Hannah and murdered her brother. They were the people who were supposed to be on my side.
But I also knew these government types weren’t wanting anyone else to be on their side. The man in the car had spotted me, and that meant I was now marked. No different than a mark, except that they weren’t going to try to kill me. They’d try to pull me off, get me away from their territory. But if I refused, then they’d kill me.
FBI, DEA, possibly even CIA, depending on how big this Crimson Club business had gotten overseas. Didn’t matter to me which one it was, as I didn’t want anything to do with any of them. There wasn’t a ‘lesser of three evils’ here, in this situation.
I needed to shake them. They’d pegged Joey’s car and were probably pulling it up now in their database. They would know within an hour that I was friends with one of them, or at least a casual acquaintance. They would assume he had mentioned something to me and I was down here checking it out, a civilian taking on contractual duties for a federal agent. A huge no-no if it wasn’t approved by the big boys.
So I had a new problem, and this one became more urgent. I passed the SUV but stared at it in my rearview mirror. It didn’t move, but I could almost feel the guy’s head inside swiveling slowly, keeping me in his sights all the way down the hill on the other side of the bridge. I sped up, taking the turn south a bit faster than I should have, and came upon the gate of Hannah’s land.
It was massive, and it was immaculate.
The gate itself was like walking through an entrance to heaven itself, all weathered but in a perfectly acceptable way, the whitish stones peeking out from behind the gently manicured foliage of South Carolina coastline. Palms, brush, and other bright green vegetation, all blackened in the night light, culled back to form a natural opening to a large block of land just between the road and the ocean.
I’d been to Hunting Island State Park once before, but I had never noticed the gate. I realized that it would be easy to miss even during the day if you weren’t looking for it. It sat back a ways from the road, the thick forest filling in the gaps. I slowed the car and pulled off.
The gate was open, so I turned harder and pulled through, between the twin columns of stone. There was no moniker, no designation of any sort. I figured the Rayburns picked up their mail somewhere in town, or they just had a courier service deliver it personally. No reason to call undue attention by broadcasting the fact that this was the entrance to a fine residence.
The road turned to gravel, also white and perfectly placed in even spatterings of tiny rocks that stretched straight ahead for a hundred feet. There was grass on both sides of the road, and it was the lushest I’d seen in a long time. It wasn’t the most difficult task in the world to keep grass green in South Carolina, but I had the feeling it would be from now on, after getting a look at Rayburn’s work here. I wondered how many hired hands it required to keep the grass cut and fed.
After the white gravel road turned a bit it dumped into a much larger gravel parking lot, like a solid stream of tiny rocks that finally dumped out into a pristine, untouched lake of white rocks.
There were cars in the lot, which told me I had guessed correctly: people were here getting the estate ready for the funeral on Sunday. Probably not in the middle of the night, but they were at least inside.
And the estate.
My God, the house was amazing. I had seen mansions before, all gaudy and garish and poorly constructed, and usually designed to serve the singular, disgusting purpose of attracting attention from exactly the kinds of people who built mansions designed to attract attention. The vicious cycle of American prosperity.
But this house was different. It spoke to me the way the interior of poor Marley’s had; it gave me that strange feeling of nostalgia I got when I thought about what I wanted my bar to become one day. This place had it in spades. It was absolutely gorgeous, in an understated way. In fact, it was the way it was all understated that made the point. There were no non-load-bearing decorative columns, no ridiculous fat-necked railing posts running around a monster patio on the fourth floor, and no oddly shaped windows. The lighting was perfect, as well. Flood lights from the ground illuminated the sides of the monstrous estate, while brighter spotlights from the areas where the roof met the sides of the house lit up the driveway and parking lot.
There was a symmetry to it, yet it pulled the eye to the north, to the left side of my field of view, toward the ocean. I could taste the salt air on my tongue and hear the waves crashing far in the distance, in what was this house’s backyard, and I was in heaven.
I stopped the car, middle of the road, and got out. I took it in, breathed it in deep, ignoring the pressures and the situation that surrounded this house. Just for a moment. I needed this moment.
I loved this house, and I hadn’t even stepped inside.
And I wouldn’t.
I couldn’t go into the house. Not yet. There were people there who would ask questions of me I couldn’t answer, and I had no reason to be there now for a funeral that would happen in a couple days. Aside from that, the lookout SUV had clued me in to the fact that there were probably agents milling about the grounds, waiting for a ‘suspicious fellow’ like me to wander in, look around, and basically ask to be interrogated.
It was early enough in the game for me that I might not be apprehended if I just got back in and drove away. They might think I was just checking things out, surprised about the revelation I’d learned from the lady in the bar that there was a mansion on the state park island. That’s what they might think, if they were already caught up in an investigation of the other people looking for me.
If the government folks were also early in the game, however, they might feel the need to grab me anyway, just to get the numbers up and start asking questions. They got a little fidgety if they didn’t bring in some fresh meat every now and then to rough up a bit, and I was positive I looked pretty damn fresh. An older guy driving a beater up to a mansion for no good reason was more than a good enough reason for them.
So I wouldn’t go in. Not yet. There had never been a plan I’d liked, but even if there had been one now it would have changed the moment I saw the SUV. I needed to regroup, to get back to Joey. I needed to think things through just a little more, figure out where they would have Hannah, and then move in without getting nabbed by the feds.
Instead of driving toward the mansion, then, I drove around it. I wanted to see the grounds, get a feel for the place, and the parking lot I was on seemed to go all the way around the house anyway. I took it south, around the front of the building, then turned left at the southern tip of the house and came around to the back of it.
There were more cars here, parked parallel to one another along the side of the gravel parking lot. I looked to the right and saw the ocean, suddenly there and suddenly massive. I never got fully used to seeing the ocean. The infiniteness of it, just a never-ending swa
th of blues and greens and browns, the same water connecting this foot of land with all the other coastlines of the world.
The wind had picked up a bit, and I could hear it whistling up and around the stripping in Joey’s windows, and again I caught a whiff of the salty air. There was a strong part of me that just wanted to stop and live here forever, ignoring the fact that it wasn’t my house and I was probably not invited. It was all so perfect. I couldn’t understand how Hannah had ever left this place.
I drove north again on the backside of the house. I still hadn’t seen anyone, but the cars told me there was activity inside the house, some sort of setup and preparation for the funeral. One car had the name of a local funeral service company on the side of it, another truck had a catering company’s name wrapped around it.
I got to the north side of the house and noticed a smaller gravel trail split off from the parking lot. I slowed the car and followed it down with my eyes. It seemed to be a simple path cut through the brush, bending around a couple trees and winding its way toward the beach. Another structure sat at the end of the path, and just on the other side of the building I saw the yacht. The path and the structure were lit with the same lights as the house, and it made for a miraculously appointed garden walkway.
The boat was massive, a size perfectly scaled to match the unbelievable house whose shadow I sat parked in now. I couldn’t see the entire boat, but the stern of it stuck out twenty or so feet from the boathouse, allowing me an unobstructed view of the back side of it.
The Wassamassaw. I recognized the name and wondered if Rayburn had named his boat after the small town a few hours north. An old American Indian tribe from around here, I thought. A good name for a boat, I figured, and the boat was plenty long enough to fit a name of that size. I knew nothing of boats, but I liked what I could see of this one. It was white like the gravel paths and roads and the house itself, and the gate out front. All of it matched in a perfect symmetry of color harmony, the white a perfect base for a few splashes of carefully planned colors. From what I could tell, the yacht had some light blue on it as its accent color, including the Wassamassaw lettering. I could see a few deck chairs, and at least two stories spanning the entire length. The entirety of it was blown out in brilliant light from the deckhouse, and I wondered if it was bright enough to serve as a beacon for incoming ocean vessels.
I wanted to see more, but now was not the time. I pulled out again and turned around the northern side of the house, then headed back up the road toward the gate.
Hannah deserved a house like this, and I intended to get her back to it. I didn’t yet know how, or when, but I was absolutely positive that I would succeed.
35
“JOEY?”
“STILL HERE. EVERYTHING OKAY down there?” It had only been forty-five minutes since I’d last spoken to him, so he was probably wanting me to fill him on my progress. I wanted to, but that could come later. Right now, I needed to let him know about the other guys who had showed up.
I switched the phone to my other ear as I drove. I sped up, pushing the clunker to what had to be near its limit. The tiny sedan bucked and groaned in protest, but eventually obliged and hit 85. I was in a hurry, though I still didn’t really have a great idea of what the hell I was going to do.
“Yeah. How’s it going for you?” It was a stupid question — Thursday night (or Friday early morning) at my place was like a Monday lunchtime at a Chili’s in a bigger city. The only difference was we were usually open a bit later.
“Stupid question. Pretty dead. McNaab and Pennington are here, complaining about the crappy fishing. Few others came and went, nothing special. How are you?”
“Been better. I’m on my way back. We can talk more in person, about an hour until I’m in town. Can you meet me out back? I want to keep it under the radar as long as possible.”
The car swung left in the lane, thanks to a strong gust of wind blowing in from the ocean. I felt the automobile lean into the opposite lane, urging me to give up and just let it happen, but I stubbornly yanked the wheel to the right and spun it straight again.
Two cars appeared behind me, one from the left side of the road, and another from the right, and took up position a few hundred feet behind me. I watched for a few seconds and realized that they had sped up. They were matching my speed, yet keeping a healthy distance.
More of these government types.
I couldn’t tell if one of them was the grunt I’d seen posted up just before the bridge, but considering I hadn’t seen him again when I’d left the Rayburn estate, I figured he was one of the two cars tailing me.
I had work to do, and these guys were getting in my way. As long as they tailed me and nothing else, we didn’t have an issue. But I’d been tailed before, and I knew there was usually a reason for it. You didn’t follow someone wherever they went if you were just curious about who their hairstylist was.
I smacked a palm against the steering wheel and focused again on the conversation at hand. “I got two bogeys behind me. Government types, and they’re looking into the same crap we are.”
“Think you can shake them?” Joey asked.
“Well sure, but that ain’t going to get them off us forever,” I replied. “I’m going to need help, Joey.”
I said it in a way I knew he could interpret. I could almost hear the silent nod of his head on the other end of the line. “You got an ally here, boss. You know that. Don’t even have to ask.”
“I do,” I said. “This time, especially. We’re dealing with more than one mark, and now the feds are involved. I’m not sure how stinky of a dog turd it is we’ve dug up, but we can’t just bury it again and call it a day.”
“What do you need?”
“I’ll need you, for one. Probably best if we closed up early tonight, and I wouldn’t expect we’d be back and ready for action by tomorrow afternoon. Think you can make up a sign that says as much?”
“Sure thing, boss. I’ll get the marker and whip up a ‘gone killin’’ sign.”
I laughed. “Perfect. Might want to make up a ‘got dead’ one too, just in case.”
Joey paused. “You really think we’ve got someone that serious we’re dealing with?”
“They killed her brother, Joey. And they didn’t do it in a way that seemed thoughtless, if you know what I mean.”
“I’m with you. Still, what do they —“
“This isn’t the type of group that’s going to just put up a ransom note, wait for the money, and —“
This time I paused, even cutting myself off. I frowned, then glanced in the rearview once more to check the progress of the folks tailing me. Still a football field behind me, and so far staying put. They hadn’t flashed their lights or anything, so I assumed they were tailing me, and not just wanting to eventually pass me. I breathed in a sharp breath, held it, then let it out.
“I just… I just thought of something,” I said. “Hang on a sec.”
“I’ve got a couple new arrivals who just walked in, actually,” Joey said. “Call me back in a minute?”
“Sure, that’s fine. I need to think about this. I think I figured something out. Let’s just meet up behind the bar. Keep it subtle, Joey.”
“You got it, boss.”
The connection quit and I flipped the phone together again and tossed it onto the ripped, faded passenger seat. The ceiling fabric was hanging down, bubbling onto my head just enough to make it slightly annoying. I punched it, knowing it wouldn’t do a damn thing, and found out I was correct.
The cars behind me sped up slightly, coming within fifty yards of my bumper.
“Getting a little too close for comfort, assholes,” I whispered.
I focused on the road, wishing the car could handle another 15-20 MPH, if only so I could get into Edisto sooner. There wasn’t a chance I’d be able to outrun the vehicles behind me unless they were four cylinder models made prior to 1991, and there wasn’t a chance of that happening unless the government had suddenl
y and inexplicably gotten a lot more frugal lately with their print-on-demand money.
I had mentioned something to Joey that was now nagging at me. Something I’d thought about briefly earlier, but only for a flash of a moment. It wasn’t even significant enough at the time to return to the thought, but when he’d brought it up it reminded me of my conversation with Hannah’s captor.
‘This isn’t the type of group that’s going to just put up a ransom note, wait for the money, and —‘
I didn’t think they were — this was an organized, planned, and well-executed mission undertaken by professionals. It was obvious they wanted control of Rayburn’s company, Crimson Club, or at least the piece of it that engaged in the unscrupulous activities that had initially caught my father’s attention. And because of that, I had assumed they weren’t interested in money in the form of a ransom.
But it had gotten me thinking a bit. What if they were, in fact, setting up a ransom? They still wanted something, or they wouldn’t have captured Hannah.
I shuddered as I realized the truth of that statement. There was really no other use for her than as a bargaining chip. They needed her for something. If they hadn’t had any use for her, she’d have ended up skewered to the wall in the same fashion as her brother.
So they’d taken her, and they’d meant to send a message using both her and her brother. The message was directed at me.
Which meant they wanted something from me.
I had written off this truth because, at the time, it hadn’t seemed like the simplest explanation. The simplest reason I could come up with at the time they had taken Hannah was that they wanted me dead. A sort of payment for her life. I had meddled in their affairs, and they wanted their revenge for the mess of things I’d made for them.
Maybe it was a life-for-a-life arrangement. I’d taken out their young gun, back behind the bar, and they wanted revenge for him. All of those things made sense at the time. They still did, and I wasn’t about to write off the idea that maybe they did want to get rid of me, just because they’d get their shits and giggles from it.
