The Red Zone
Page 26
The detective's face was intense. Cody could see his scowl through the reflected light of the windshield. Kratch niftily avoided Cody without even slowing down and pulled out into the traffic with his tires squealing. Cody slammed his own car around, banging the undercarriage on the curb as he went up and over it. He barely noticed the impact. He did not want to lose sight of Kratch.
The detectives dark blue Crown Vic turned onto Southern Boulevard and headed west. Cody lost sight of Kratch at the turn. He ran a red light with his horn blaring and veered through traffic, cutting someone off to make the turn onto Southern. Kratch's car was already out of sight. Cody hit the accelerator. The road was straight and flat. Cody could see the next four lights in a row. They were all green. The fourth one turned red. Cody pressed on. Suddenly a red flashing light jumped out at him from the traffic ahead.
It was Kratch, using his car light to get through the red. The third light changed. Cody jumped onto the median to get around the stopped traffic. Angry horns blared. He forced his way out into the intersection. His heart pumped in his chest like a sledgehammer. Cars shrieked and skidded; two collided, with the smash of large cymbals. Glass exploded. Steam hissed. Cody moved through the chaos untouched and punched the accelerator again once he got to the other side. The fourth light changed back to red again by the time Cody got there. He flashed his headlights and leaned on his horn, forcing people out of his way. By the time he hit open road, he could just make out the form of Kratch's dark blue sedan in the distance. The car's light was off now as it raced westward through the verdant cane fields and swampland. Cody bumped it up to ninety and still he couldn't close the gap.
He saw it coming. He leaned on his horn and flashed his high beams. It was no use. A slow-moving dump truck suddenly pulled out from a side road. Another car was coming in the opposite direction so he couldn't pass the truck. Cody locked up the brakes and closed his eyes. The car seemed to lift up off the pavement and float. The front of the rental car smashed into the back of the truck and crumpled like an accordion.
Madison pulled into a parking space directly in front of the sheriff's office.
"I don't like waiting in the car," Luther grumbled.
"It's best," she told him. "I'll be out in five minutes. If he can't keep the whole thing quiet, we'll find another way, but believe me, if we can get his help, we'll get to your brother a lot sooner and a lot easier. Where else are we going to get a boat?"
Madison didnt tell him that she was also counting on the sheriff for a certain amount of protection should Leeland lose control.
Inside, Mira, the secretary, looked up from a paperback novel and pushed the cats-eye glasses up on her nose.
"I'm Madison McCall," Madison reminded the woman. She didn't look the sort to have remembered.
"Sheriff's out," Mira said, bored. It was evident that she hadn't heard the news that Madison had reportedly been killed, either that or she didn't much care.
"Is there any way we can get in touch with him?" Madison asked. "It's important."
Mira rolled her eyes before picking up the old rotary phone. "I'll call him.
"feah, it's Mira," she said into the phone, "is the sheriff there? Well, tell him he's got someone here to see him," she said impatiently, "it's official business, I guess. Okay, thanks."
Mira handed the phone to Madison.
"Hello?"
"Emmit, this is Madison McCall."
"Huh?"
"Its Madison McCall, I'm Luther Zorn's attorney--"
"Yeah, I know," Emmit said. "You're in my office?"
"Yes, I need to see you right away. I need some help."
"I thought, I mean, I heard on the news--"
"Yes," Madison said, "I know. I'm alive, though."
At this Mira rolled her eyes twice. Madison turned her back.
"Can I meet you somewhere?" she asked.
"Yeah, well, I'm right across the street," Emmit said. "Come on over."
Madison walked into the diner. Every person, except an old fisherman at the counter, turned to stare. Emmit rose like a telephone pole from his booth in the back and stepped out into the aisle with an embarrassed smile. His cheeks turned pink as all eyes went from Madison to him. It was a small town, and he knew his wife would hear about this before he got home.
"Hello," he whispered in a low conspiratorial tone that made Madison glance around. She wondered why, if he was so uncomfortable, he hadn't simply met her outside.
They slid into the booth, and she leaned across the table toward him, bumping her forearm into the pewter stand that held the large but nearly empty glass of a chocolate malt. A young bucktoothed waitress hovered.
"Nothing for me, thank you," Madison said, dismissing her.
When the girl was out of earshot, Madison leaned forward and explained the situation as simply as she could. She wanted Emmit's word that he wouldn't call in any other law enforcement people before she told him what she needed.
"So you're saying you're in a pinch?" Emmit said. He felt like a drunk on his tenth drink. It was too late to go back. Everyone around him would be talking, he knew, but he couldn't take his eyes off Madison McCall. People would talk regardless, so he simply enjoyed the thrill, a woman of her caliber asking him for help, the chivalrous knight.
"I am."
"All right," Emmit told her. "I think you should try to convince this guy to turn himself in and you definitely need me with you. I don't have to tell you how dangerous he is. But, yes, whatever it is you need from me, I'll do, so long as it isn't illegal."
"I need a boat," Madison said.
"A boat?" Emmit raised his eyebrows to the upper edges of his pie-shaped face.
"Yes, Luther's brother is camped out on the west shore of the lake. The only way there is by boat. Can you help?"
"I've got a boat," Emmit said.
"Can we go now?" Madison asked.
"Yes," Emmit said, getting up abruptly. He flipped a ten onto the table and fumbled for his hat. Instinctively, he also felt for his gun, patted it gently, then left it alone. He strode out of the diner, ducking his head and blushing as if to give silent apology to the patrons who knew him and suspected he was up to no good.
Madison and Luther followed Emmit in their car to his house. They waited for him parked in the stone and oil street. He had a sixteen-foot tri-hull with mottled olive-green seats in its open bow and a ninety-horse Mercury outboard strapped to its stern. Emmit hitched the trailer right up to his old Plymouth cruiser. The house was partially blocked by an old oak tree that wept Spanish moss, but Madison heard the screech of rusty springs as Emmit's wife barreled through the screen door and out onto the porch in a pink cotton maternity jumper.
"Emmit!" she shrieked. "What on God's green earth are you doing with that boat?"
Emmit stood in the driveway and pulled off his hat like a kid caught in the act of shoplifting. He shifted nervously from foot to foot and puckered his lips before building up his resolve and answering her firmly with a single word: "Business." Then he plunked the hat back on his head and got into the Plymouth without another word. Madison started her car and fell in behind Emmit as he eased out of the driveway and down the street back toward the middle of town and the public boat launch. Emmit's wife, pregnant and irate, was too dumbfounded by the unusual happenings to speak. She simply stood there on the porch with her fists clenched, a disheveled strand of dark hair on her forehead, and her mouth hanging open.
Chapter 47
For some reason, the air bag hadn't deflated and Cody was pinned in his seat. The stink of the bag's explosive fumes made him gag. The shock of the impact made him wonder what the hell he thought he was doing, chasing a policeman across the state on the hunch that it had something to do with his wife. He felt blindly for his duffel bag on the passenger seat next to him. The impact had thrown it into the dash, but it rebounded right back into the seat, only upside down. Cody got it flipped over, and after struggling with the zipper, he pulled out the .357.
"Get back!" Cody shouted as best he could into the bag.
The man stepped back and Cody aimed the gun, closed his eyes, and fired. The shot made the man outside jump. The bag deflated. Cody pulled it to one side and started the car. The engine caught. He threw it into reverse and backed away from the truck, which appeared to have sustained nothing more than a bent car-catcher, the metal bar that extended down from its rear bumper. Cody rolled down his window.
"You okay?" he asked the shocked truck driver.
The man nodded, too stunned to speak. Cody put his car into drive. It rattled and shook, but it went. He pulled around the truck and went as fast as the crumpled car would take him in the hopeless pursuit of Kratch.
The road turned bumpy and rough, making Cody's wobbling front end that much harder to control. Engine warning lights lit up the dashboard like a video game. Fortunately, it wasn't more than thirty minutes before the highway turned right into the main street of the small town called Canal Point. Cody's head swiveled from side to side, as he looked desperately for a sign of Kratch or his car. He came to a small intersection, Route 441 going north to the town of Okeechobee or south to Belle Glade. Cody stopped and looked both ways. He hated coin tosses.
It made more sense at least to take the main street to its end. It looked as if the water was right up ahead. Cody rolled through the intersection. The street rose up to the height of a big levee and ended finally at a public boat launch. There were a few vehicles there, mostly pickups and an old Plymouth police car, parked in the shade of some large oaks, each with an empty trailer behind it. Off to the right and halfway down the east edge of the bank, there was a little marina, built from faded barn board, that sat on a small cove where the canal and the lake met at the locks. There was a single gas pump on the side of the building that looked as if it could service both cars and boats. An old circular white Texaco sign, now faded yellow, swung in the wind from a bent and rusty pole. Outside the old gray building, amid more sun-faded pickups, sat Kratch's now dusty Crown Vic. Cody eased off the main road and down the bank into the dirt spot next to Kratch's car, then got out and made for the low shabby building.
Kratch almost ran him over on his way out of the marina.
"Hey," Kratch said in surprise. "What are you doing?"
In his hand he held a package that contained a compass he'd just purchased.
"I saw you come out of the station and I followed you," Cody said. "I tried to catch up."
Kratch's good eye assessed the battered front end of what he presumed was Cody's car. He shook his head in disbelief.
"What do you want?" Kratch said impatiently.
"I want to know what you're doing," Cody said. "I thought it had something to do with Madison, the way you came out of the station. We almost ran into each other. Madison's alive."
"What?" Kratch said, his genuine surprise as evident by his expression as by the tone of his voice. "What?" he said again.
"Madison," Cody told him excitedly, "that wasn't her in the morgue. I just came from there. She's alive. I think she's with Luther Zorn. That's who you're going after, isn't it?"
The wheels in Kratch's head spun so fast it made him nearly giddy.
he said finally, "I know where he is."
"Then Madison must be there, too," Cody said. "I'm coming with you."
Kratch looked from Cody to the docks, where a teenage attendant was filling a rental boat with gas. Kratch took a pair of sunglasses from the inside pocket of his coat and put them on his face, hiding his wandering eye.
"Then come on," Kratch said before turning to make his way down a rickety set of stairs to the dock.
Cody raced back to his car and pulled the .357 from the front seat. He jammed the gun into his pants. Kratch was watching him from the dock below, but when Cody started to descend the stairs, Kratch turned his attention to the attendant, who was running through the operations of the battered old Boston Whaler. Kratch nodded to the kid and told him he'd rented before. He loosened his tie and took off his coat.
The kids eyes widened at the sight of Kratch's leather shoulder strap and the big Glock that rested under his arm.
"I don't know if you know it, mister," the kid said, tugging at a faded old John Deere hat that he wore backward, "but they're calling for a storm, so I wouldn't want to go too far if I was you. I don't know if Clive inside told you. Clive, he rented to a guy the day one of them hurricanes blew through, Andrew, I think. The guy was from Ohio, and, hell, they never found him. Clive didn't care . . . he's got insurance and all. It's supposed to be bad is what I'm saying . . ."
Kratch looked off to the west. The wind was stiff and something was brewing on the horizon, there was no doubt about that. The rest of the sky was clear though, except for the high ceiling of wispy clouds that did very little to fend off the glare of the sun.
"Thanks for the tip, kid," he said.
Kratch fired up the boat's engine without another word. When Cody stepped off the dock and onto the boat, Kratch barely gave him time to take a seat before he reversed out of the berth and slammed the boat forward toward the lock that would raise them up from the canal to the level of the lake.
Cody watched the murky water churning in the wake behind them. The kid stood next to the pump, watching them. Their boat idled into the cavernous lock, and Kratch tied up to one of the mooring lines that hung down from the concrete walls like stray threads.
The lock's twenty-foot steel doors swung slowly toward each other. Just before they closed completely, Cody glanced back again and saw that the kid was still standing there, only now he was pointing toward the western sky. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
Cody turned to see if the kid saw something new that he hadn't. Everything looked the same except for an angry crow that was perched on the highest peak of the dockmaster's shack cawing furiously at them all. Before Cody could turn back to see if that was where the kid had been pointing, he heard the dull gong of the heavy doors locking into place with the synchronization of the gears in an enormous clock chewing up time.
Chapter 48
The sun dipped suddenly behind the fast-moving front of dark clouds. The light became otherworldly. The air was heavy with the smell of the oncoming storm. The darkening sky rumbled discontentedly and lightning cast itself down from the gloom at irregular intervals. Madison set her jaw and pursed her lips. She whispered a silent prayer. The closer they got, the more she sensed the imminence of danger and the more she was convinced that something was about to go terribly wrong.
On the shore, Leeland stood erect in a pair of camouflage fatigues and an olive-green tank top. His size and musculature were not at all unlike Luther's. He had the three of them fixed in the sights of his binoculars. Emmit idled down, and Luther waved his hand in greeting. A broad smile lit Luther's face, but Madison could see the tense lines of worry at the corners of his mouth. The wind, strong all the way across the lake, began now to roar. Random flecks of rain spattered them along with small twigs and leaves. The boat rolled up onto the shore atop the crest of its own wake. Leeland caught the bow and lifted it, pulling the boat even farther ashore with almost inhuman strength. Luther hopped over the edge, splashing into the shallow water, and Madison started to climb out as well. Luther turned to help her.
Instead of coming to meet them, Leeland circled around the other side of the old boat until he was even with Emmit.
"Hi," Emmit said with an embarrassed smile.
' "Hi," Leeland replied, as he pulled a Browning 9mm from the back of his pants and put a round through the sheriff's left eye. The back of Emmit's head exploded, and he fell to the floor of the boat in an unkempt heap of long limbs. It was as quick as it was unexpected, and the frozen expression on Emmit's dead and damaged face still registered the smile of his greeting.
Madison screamed, "Oh, my God!"
Luther clutched
her to him instinctively.
"Jesus!" he moaned. "Leeland, what. . . what, man? Why? Put that gun down!"
Leeland rounded the front of the boat, leveling the gun at Madison as he did. His face registered nothing more than the pleasant smile of a man who was glad to see his long-lost brother.
"It's a trap, Luther," Leeland said matter-of-factly. "These people are working against you. She's in on it, man. Step back and let me do her."
Madison cringed and hid her head in between the bands of muscles in the middle of Luther's back.
"She's with me, Leeland!" Luther screamed. "Stop it, man! Stop it!"
"Luther, it's a trap, man. Move out of my way," Leeland ordered. "They told me. They told me all about her, and that guy's a cop."
"I know he's a cop," Luther said in disbelief. "He was helping us, man. He gave us his boat. Oh, Jesus, Leeland, man, you killed him . . ."
"She's in on it," Leeland said, unfazed.
"She's not," Luther pleaded. "It's them. They're fucking us, man. They're trying to get me put in jail."
"Its her!" The brother pointed with the barrel of his gun, his face now locked in a scowl.
"It's not!"
Leeland fumbled with his free hand. From his front pants pocket he extracted a folded letter. He held it out as proof positive.
"It's right here, man," Leeland said. "You told me to follow these people. You told me I had to do what they said. You told me they were helping us both and I could trust them, man. Trust is a big word, big brother. You told me to trust them, and they told me to kill her!"
"Leeland," Luther said, dropping his voice, but filling it with passion. "It's me, man. It's Luther. Listen to me. I'm telling you, forget the letter. Listen to me now. Listen!"
Leeland looked at him.
"Well," he said, regaining his smile with a shrug and jamming the gun back into the waistband of his pants, "you can't be too sure about the cop anyway. You can never trust those people. I know, believe me. It's better this way. How the hell are you, brother?"
Leeland hugged Luther warmly. Madison stepped back a pace into the ankle-deep water and fought the urge to run.