by Dale Mayer
She wrinkled her face up at that. “I didn’t know anything about it.”
“Where’s Colton?” George asked, suddenly frowning. “He survived, didn’t he?”
“Yeah, he’s fine. That cold water didn’t seem to faze him. He’s here at the hospital with me.”
“Thank heavens for that. I thought I heard him onboard the cruiser, but I don’t even know that I asked about him.”
Such shame filled his voice that she just smiled. “Hey, George. You need to look after yourself now. It’s a mess.”
“It’s a bigger mess than you know. This is a military mess …”
“One who was military but more recently a civilian was just shot.”
“Right, Andy,” George said. “And I doubt he’ll be the last one before this is cleared up.”
“The commander will sure be pissed when he finds out what’s been going on under his nose. He’ll get to the bottom of it.”
“That would be good. Somebody sure needs to.”
Kate looked around, wondering where Colton was.
“Are you waiting for Colton?”
“Yeah. They went to meet a friend of Andy’s, somebody who is dealing drugs.” She slid George a sideways look. “Sound familiar?”
George winced. “Let’s hope they do more than just meet him because somebody needs to get to the bottom of all of this, and fast.”
“Yeah, you’re right there.” Kate got up and walked to the hallway, looking up and down, but she saw no sign of Colton yet. She turned back to George. “Are they feeding you?”
“Yes, I don’t want for anything. I’m fine. I’m healthy. I’ll make it,” he said firmly.
“I’m glad to hear that,” Kate said with a big smile. “Now I need you to survive.” She opened up all the cupboards in the room, but she found no clothing for George. Frowning, she said, “We’ll have to get you some clothing from the base.”
“That would be good,” George said. “I mean, if I’m under attack again, I’ll come out buck naked if need be, but I’d feel more comfortable if my Johnson was covered.”
At that, Kate burst out laughing. He grinned at her. “Let’s see if I can find anything here. Maybe in the lost and found.”
“Okay,” he said, “maybe ask at the nurses’ station.”
Kate headed down the hallway to the nurses’ station. She found a receptionist or maybe a head nurse. She didn’t know; she didn’t understand the uniforms here. She asked if there was any clothing for George. When the woman understood the question, she frowned, shook her head and said, “Only what he came in with.”
“Which was nothing unfortunately,” Kate said.
“Let me check the lost and found.” She came right back with a large black bag, saying, “This is all we have.”
“May I take it to his room?” Kate asked. “That way we can see if anything will work for him.”
She nodded. “Bring back what’s left when you’re done.”
Kate took the bag to George, still lying in bed. “We’ve got this to work with,” she said, holding out the bag. Carefully she dumped it on top of him. And, between the two of them, they managed to find a T-shirt and a pair of shorts. They found no underwear and no socks for him.
“Well,” he said, as he looked at his toes, “I won’t have much to cover soon anyway.”
“You won’t be running for a while, but this will give you something to wear, just in case.” Kate piled everything back into the black bag. “If you’re good with the T-shirt and shorts, I’ll take the rest back.”
“That’s fine. I don’t know what happened to my underwear. You’d think they would have left those on.”
“I know, right? We’ll get you some from the base. This is only in the case of emergency.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” he said with a heavy sigh. “But you’re right, it gives me something. Not very much but enough that I could make a run for it, if I have to.”
“You need to try walking first,” she said with a nod to his damaged feet. “You may very well find you can’t run for your life.”
*
Colton and Troy ran down the stairs, choosing that over the elevator, and bolted out the back door to the parking lot. As soon as they hit the lot, they separated, with Troy going to the shadows to keep an eye on Colton and his meeting. Colton, not knowing who he was looking for or where he would find him, headed toward the far end of the lot, figuring anybody looking at a drug deal would stick to the shadows. But he couldn’t guarantee that.
As he’d come to learn, many people working in the world of drugs were fine upstanding citizens with reputations that kept them front and center. But they weren’t always the most forthcoming about their drug habits. And they always had dealers in the background. As he walked all the way to the back, he saw no sign of anyone. He leaned against the cement wall and crossed his arms, keeping himself visible, just in case. He could see Troy moving between the vehicles up ahead. When a sound came from his left, he glanced casually over to see a male of around fifty, standing with his hands on his hips, his eyebrows raised.
Colton raised his eyebrows and looked directly at the man. “Hey.”
“No fucking hey with me,” the dealer sneered. “How did you get my number?”
“Off the phone,” he said. “You want to talk drugs or no?”
The guy looked around hurriedly. “What the hell are you, suicidal? None of this is brought out in the open.”
“Andy was pretty verbal about it.”
“Andy was a fucking idiot,” the man snapped. “And, if you’re thinking I haven’t heard he’s dead by now, you’re wrong.”
“Good,” Colton said. “Then we’re on the same ground.”
“And what ground is that?” the dealer asked suspiciously. “And why the hell did you contact me? You don’t look like a user.”
“No, but I might be a supplier.”
An odd stillness came over his face. “Shit,” he said, glancing around. “The plane went down, I heard.”
“It did,” Colton said quietly. “And, yes, the cargo was lost.”
“It was a dummy run anyway,” he muttered.
He spoke just barely loud enough for Colton to hear. His eyebrows rose. “Interesting,” he said. “Three people almost died on that flight.”
“Yeah, I heard,” he said.
“Interesting gateway.”
“Coming in from the north, nobody else expects it, but an awful lot of the population lives within just a few hundred miles. Much less regulation and a lot fewer eyes.”
“All the good points,” Colton admitted. “Interesting,” he repeated.
“Hey, you got to do what you got to do.”
When Colton looked back again he saw a small snub-nose revolver pointed at him. “Is that the gun you killed Andy with?”
“I didn’t kill Andy,” the dealer said, taking several steps back. “But you are not a user, and I don’t think you’re a supplier either. You didn’t come with any goods.”
“Of course not,” Colton said, laughing. “I don’t know you from anyone, and I do know Andy is dead. So why would I bring anything here to a meeting with you?”
The guy sneered. “I don’t like anything about this. You turn around and walk away, and you forget you ever saw me.”
“If I turn around and walk away,” Colton said calmly, staring him down, “you’ll put a bullet in my back.”
“Hell, no, but I might just put one between your eyes.”
And, with that, Troy, who had slipped down the vehicles after seeing the gun, came up behind the man. And just as the gunman lifted his weapon and pointed it right at Colton’s head, Troy took him down. With him on the ground, the handgun now tossed off to the side, Troy sitting on the guy’s back, pinning his arms underneath him, Colton said, “Now we want to have a talk with you.” He pulled out his temporary burner phone and contacted the commander. “You want to bring in the local police on this one?”
“I don’t want to, no
,” he said. “But that is a citizen and not one of my men, so, yes, stay where you are and keep him there. I’ll have the cops to you in just a few minutes.”
“Will do,” Colton said. “Keep in mind we don’t know if the cops are clean.”
There was a hesitation in the commander’s voice as he said, “No, but I have to follow proper chains of authority, and I hope the people I’m calling understand that too. Generally they don’t have a drug problem here.”
“Well, one has been uncovered. I can tell you, this one is a dealer, Andy was one of the dealers, and supplies have been coming through the base, so it will be a little hard to keep this hush-hush once this guy starts talking.”
“If he starts talking.”
Colton hung up and motioned at the man and said, “The cops are on the way.”
The guy just laughed. “Like that’ll make a fucking difference.”
“Why is that?” Troy asked. Jerking him up to his feet, they secured his arms behind his back while Colton picked up the handgun. He studied it and nodded.
“Same model that put that bullet in Andy’s head.”
“I didn’t do it,” he said. “A few of those are around town. A guy was selling them about four years ago, and a bunch of us bought him out.”
“Interesting,” Colton said. “Who else would have one?”
At that, the dealer fell silent.
“And why is it we won’t get any satisfaction out of the police?”
The look on the guy’s face wasn’t what Colton expected though. All the bravado was gone, and instead there was only fear. “I won’t make it that far,” he said. “I’ll be taken out.”
“Maybe you better start talking now then,” Colton said. “Just to make sure you have a voice in what happens to your future.”
“No,” he said. “Once you take me into the station, I’m done for.”
“Bad cops?” Troy asked from behind him.
The guy shook his head. “No, the goddamn cops here are too damn squeaky clean. You don’t understand what it’s like here, how many people don’t own their own land. They just kind of live and borrow as needed.”
“So why would you want to mess with a nice system like that?” Colton asked.
“Because they’re all so innocent,” he said. “We can move a lot of drugs through here.”
“But through here is still through nowhere,” Troy said. “You could have taken them to England and had a distribution network all through Europe.”
“They get to England, but we can also hit all the Nordic countries and Russia. And we’re coming down from Europe on the topside. It might take a little longer, but it’s safer, with fewer roadblocks and fewer people in the know. You generally find the country folks are a little more naive when it comes to drugs. Hit any major port, and it’s a damn puzzle to get stuff moving.”
“And yet you say you’ll be taken out if we get you to the police station.”
“Once they figure out I’m being taken in, they’ll assume I’ll talk,” he said.
“But who is they?” Colton asked.
“Those above me,” he said, his shoulders sagging in defeat. “I’m already a dead man. You can bet somebody is watching us.”
In the distance Colton could hear emergency vehicles coming. “That might be the cops now. Who killed Andy?”
“Not me.” He looked up, smiled and said, “You still haven’t figured it out, have you?”
“Not all of it,” Colton said slowly. He needed more answers and desperately needed this guy to talk but wasn’t sure what the magic was to get him to loosen up that tongue.
“That’s because it’s right in front of you,” he said. “You can’t see it, and you’re looking right at it.”
“We know a couple pilots were involved, and they are in the custody of the military and have been since they were turned in,” Troy said.
“Sure, but more will replace them.”
“More military personnel?”
He shrugged. “It’s a huge population to tap. A lot of users among the military—and a lot of dealers too. But the minute you get a network like that, you always get a couple who rise to the top.”
“Right, the ones doing the drug running,” Colton said.
His suspect nodded. “That’s one way to look at it.”
“And, of course, it has to be somebody at the Greenland base.”
The man nodded again. “You’re getting warmer.”
Colton and Troy exchanged hard glances. “Who set up the pilot for this last run?”
“Them,” he said with a hard emphasis.
“And that’s because they were afraid George would do something and you’d lose the product?”
“Yeah,” he said, “but more’s coming in soon.”
“Except for the bad weather.”
“There’s always bad weather here. It’s one of the reasons the base isn’t overrun with military resources, and that works really well.”
“Does it move from one military branch to the other?” Troy asked.
“It’s pretty easy to do that too. The military network is vast and is already in place.”
“But it has to start somewhere. Any idea where it’s coming from?”
He raised his gaze. “You got to be kidding me? The volume of drugs coming out of the US is massive.”
“Sure,” Colton said, “but how are they getting into the US?”
“That supply train has been moving steadily for decades. You’ll never stop that one. It’s a matter of getting it from one place to the next. The military provides a lovely global network.”
Colton and Troy exchanged more glances. The guy was right. United States military bases were all over the world, and they did Joint Task Force operations with military units from multiple other countries as well. It was probably pretty simple to piggyback on that. “Did you guys have anything to do with blowing up the plane?”
The dealer shook his head. “I didn’t know anything about that.”
“Was it sabotage? Or was it the pilot?”
“I suspect both,” he said. “If they didn’t trust him, if he argued with them or told them what he might do, or maybe he sabotaged the plane on his own to get out of it. Or maybe it was a suicide mission. I don’t know. He wouldn’t be the first.”
“Wouldn’t be the first what?”
“To take his own life to get out of this hell. Once they get their claws into you, they learn everything they can about you and your family, and it’s either follow their path or not.”
As Colton went to ask something else, cop cars pulled into the parking lot toward them.
“Well, it’s trouble now.” The guy stared glumly. “I might yet get out of this,” he said, “but I can’t get out of it without blowing this wide open to get protection from the cops, then it hitting the news too.”
“The media isn’t likely to pick up your arrest, is it? Are you wanted?”
He shook his head. “No, but gossips are everywhere. And the network on this island is unbelievable. Within five minutes of being booked into the police station, my head will be numbered.”
With misgivings, Colton watched the cops load up their man. As one of the cops walked over to talk to him, Colton said, “I need an ID on who he is.”
“That’s Eric Strange,” the cop said. “What’s your business with him?” His suspicion was obvious, but as Colton and Troy explained what was going on, he relaxed and said, “I have instructions to move the information up the chain as it happens. I believe the commander will contact you as needed.”
“I can only hope so,” Colton said. He and Troy watched as the vehicle took off with Eric Strange in the back seat.
“Do you think Strange is right?” Troy asked.
“Unfortunately I think he probably is. He might not be marked right now, but tomorrow or the next day, yeah, it’s possible. If this is as big of an operation or jumping point as he makes it sound, an awful lot is at risk.”
“An awful
lot is at risk, but it also means a pretty big deal if we can get it stopped,” Troy said.
“What do you think he meant,” Colton said, as they walked back toward the hospital, “about not seeing what’s in front of us?”
“I’m afraid he means the base. Like whoever is masterminding this is somebody we’ve already spoken to.”
“Great. The good news is,” Colton said, “the shipment wasn’t full of drugs, so there’s no point in going through a recovery operation. And another plane is coming in soon with more.”
“Right,” Troy said. “Something else we’ll have to brief the commander on.”
“Let’s collect Kate and head back,” Colton said. “She’ll need food, and it’s been a long day already.”
“Productive in many ways though,” Troy said. “One dead man, one captured man, and George is awake.”
As they wandered back up toward his room, they could hear George and Kate inside. When they walked in, she looked up, and a big smile crossed her face. Colton felt his heart warm in response. He held out his hand, and she slipped under his arm and gave him a big hug. “There you are,” she exclaimed. “I was starting to wonder if you were okay.”
“Not to worry,” he said. “It’s all good.” He looked over at George and smiled. “You’re looking better than the last time I saw you,” he said with a little emotion in his voice.
George reached out a bandaged hand and said, “I want to thank you for saving my life.”
“I’m not exactly sure what happened,” Colton said. “So I’m not sure if you’re responsible for the plane being ditched or not.”
“I was partly responsible,” George said. “The end result was not at all what I had planned, so I’m not sure if it was my actions that did it or not, but I definitely didn’t want to bring that plane into the base.”
“If it makes you feel any better,” Colton said, “we just spoke to one of the men involved in this mess, and he said your plane didn’t have any drugs on it. It was a test to see if you were trustworthy.”
“I guess I failed that then, didn’t I?”
“Exactly,” Colton said with a smile. “On the other hand, I’m sure the military is happy to hear that.”
“They aren’t, however, happy about something else,” Troy said, leaning against the doorway. “Apparently the base is being used as a jumping off point for distribution on the northern network.”
