First to Find

by Mark Gessner

  "Browser history?" she asked.

  "Yeah that's right, there should be some menu on the browser that lets you see the last pages that he viewed," said Jason, who'd taken the phone back from Eric and sent him back to his game.

  "Oh, yeah, okay, yeah here it is," she said. "Oh shit, there's a lot here," she said, then after a few more clicks, "Job postings mostly, CNN, and, oh here's a cache page. It's the last thing he looked at. I bet this is it."

  "What?" asked Jason.

  "Karst Area," she said, "it's a new cache, uh let's see, a few miles from here. It's got a gold piece. Kurt's not interested in first-to-find but he'd go for that gold. He's broke."

  "Okay, I see it. Looks like one of the Krager twins tried it yesterday. I'll call him. I'm headed that way, I'll meet you at the park," said Jason. "Oh and be careful, those Karst areas can be treacherous."

  Chapter 72

  JUDI PULLED UP TO the entrance to the park. Nipper sat in the passenger seat, riding shotgun. Technically he wasn’t allowed to ride up front due to the airbag danger, but he was very old and each year he got away with breaking a few more rules than the year before.

  A small sign on the fence by the entrance declared that the park was on LCRA land. Judi stopped the car at the side of the park road, just short of entering. She switched off the convertible, removed her Glock from its holster, popped the magazine, ejected the round from the chamber, and locked the whole mess in the center console box. It wasn't strictly legal to store it there, but she didn't want to get caught carrying in the park and have a class C misdemeanor on her record. Despite repeated attempts by the legislature to repeal it, in some buried statute in the parks and wildlife code, all LCRA land was declared off-limits to licensed concealed carry, and they didn't have to post.

  She restarted the car and pulled it a hundred feet past the entry gate into the parking lot, parking it next to Kurt's truck. She got out of the convertible. Nipper bounded out behind her and sought out the nearest plant to pee on. She locked her car, then checked the Expedition. It was locked, and a fine film of dust coated the windshield. It'd been here since yesterday.

  "Kurt!" she yelled.

  Nothing. A few hundred feet to her left, a turkey buzzard squawked in protest as it soared down from its perch on a high-tension tower and flew away.

  She grabbed a park map from a dispenser on the wooden signboard, rousting a small green skink lizard, which peeked out from under the map holder, stopped for a second, cocked its head at her, puffed out its neck, then skittered down off the signboard and across the gravel into a stand of cactus. Nipper was still busy marking the new park and didn’t even give chase.

  The signboard displayed a larger, color version of the park map and some more information and photos of the Karst caves, plus a laser-printed sign saying that the park wasn't yet open to the public.

  Judi didn't have a GPS receiver, but there was a topographic map on the cache page she'd printed, with a little red X marking the place where the cache was supposed to be located. The X was located a few hundred feet from the largest Karst cave in the preserve.

  According to the comment he posted on the cache page, Krager’d had trouble finding the cache, maybe it was in the cave. He wouldn't have found it if he blindly followed his GPS and didn’t look at the park map. Typical computer geek.

  Chapter 73

  FROM THE COVER OF a stand of cedar trees, Max watched. He waited until Judi and her dog walked away from the car onto the trail to the cave, then he circled around behind her car. In the back of his mind he could still hear her nine-millimeter hollowpoint slug whistling past his ear. He had to avoid a direct confrontation and a chance for her to draw and fire on him again. He tried the door. It was locked. He pulled out his knife and sliced through the soft-top on the passenger side and slipped a hand in to unlock the passenger door. Once inside, he put a hand on the console box to steady himself as he reached across and under the steering column to pop the hood release. He looked around under the hood briefly, then pulled the distributor cap and plug wires and tossed them away, behind a cluster of agave plants. He lowered the hood gently, then pushed down on it until it clicked closed. He relocked the passenger door. From the driver's side, the slice in the soft-top wasn't visible.

  Chapter 74

  USING THE MAP, JUDI found her way along the trail to the Karst cave. Nipper found it first. He stood near the entrance and looked down, confused. He wasn’t used to seeing people below him.

  "Kurt!" Judi yelled.

  "Down here!" he yelled back. The sound was faint, and Judi could tell that he was a long way down in the hole.

  "Are you okay?" she asked, pushing Nipper aside and looking over the edge.

  "The killer's up there, watch out!" he yelled.

  Judi looked around, saw no one. She heard nothing, save the wind in a stand of cedars, and the whine of the occasional horse fly.

  "I don't think he's here anymore. I don't see anyone," she said.

  "He's up there, alright. You gotta get me out of here and fast," he said.

  "I could shoot off the lock but I'm afraid it might ricochet into the cave. I have a tire iron in my trunk," she said.

  "Be careful!" he yelled.

  Judi ran back down the trail to the car to get her gun and a tire iron. Gun first. She unlocked and opened the driver's door. Nipper, thinking they were going for another ride, jumped into the passenger seat. Judi slipped in after him, then reached for the console box.

  Max ran up from behind the wooden signboard, with a six-inch knife in his fist, teeth bared. Nipper heard his footsteps and barked in surprise.

  Judi heard the running footsteps on the gravel parking lot, then twisted her head to see a crazed figure coming at her. There wasn't enough time to get her gun. She slammed the door, fumbled the key into the ignition with one hand as she pushed the lock down with the other. The car wouldn't start. Shit. She pulled the key out and jammed it into the lock on the console box. She yanked the empty pistol out of the box, pulled it from its holster, then fumbled for the magazine. Max banged on the glass, then slashed at the roof. The knife plunged within inches of Judi's head, one swipe actually touching her hair, then the blade lodged in the soft aluminum of the ragtop framework. Max struggled with both hands to lever the blade out of the frame.

  Judi ducked, slammed the magazine into the pistol. It jammed halfway in. She’d inserted it backward. She yanked it out, rotated it, then slammed it back in again. She released the slide while rolling flat onto the seat across the center console box. The shifter knob poked rudely into her lower back.

  The ragtop was in tatters. She raised the Glock with both hands and fired one shot blindly into the jagged hole in the top, then fired a double-tap at the crazed figure through the driver's side window, shattering it.

  Max saw the gun come out, darker, bigger, and louder than the last gun he'd faced. In slow motion he saw the gaping black well in the barrel looking big enough to crawl into. At the bottom of that well he thought he saw a glint of the copper teeth on the hollow face of death.

  The first shot exploded over his head, the second one slammed him on the upper arm, a hard burning punch. The third shot whistled past his right ear, he felt the wind, and he was gone. He abandoned the stuck knife and ran.

  Judi jumped out of the car screaming. She followed Max a few yards; she aimed at his back, but held her fire. He was fast into the cedars, jumping side to side as he ran to avoid the cactus patches and Judi’s aim. Nipper stayed by her side and barked at Max’s retreat. He was too old to give chase and he knew it.

  Judi ran back to the car to get the tire iron out of the trunk, being careful to see that Max didn't come back. Tire iron in one hand, gun in the other, she ran back along the path to free Kurt.

  Chapter 75

  MAX RETURNED TO THE car to retrieve his knife, then stole back to his hiding place in the cedars. He sat on his motorcycle. He checked his wound. It hurt like hell but it wasn't serious, just bleeding like a m
otherfucker. The slug punched clean through, taking a small chunk of his left triceps muscle with it. He wrapped a red bandana around it to staunch the flow. Through the trees, Max saw Judi working to free Kurt from the hole, but he didn't dare get close to her again, since he had no weapon equal to hers. He couldn't sneak up either because the gravel would betray his footsteps.

  He straddled the motorcycle, flicked out the kick-start lever, and just as he was about to kick it, he saw the ancient bottle of Old Grand-Dad that he'd been storing his urine in, looked at the gas tank of his bike, and came up with a better idea.

  Chapter 76

  "IT WON'T BUDGE, THE lever's not long enough," she screamed.

  "Try kicking it," he yelled, standing in the bottom of the hole, looking up at her.

  "No that won't work, there's nothing to kick," she said.

  "Go ahead and shoot it then," he yelled.

  "I'm afraid it will hit you," she said.

  "You gotta get me out of here before he comes back," he said, "Shoot the lock!"

  "I know I hit him; he's bleeding," she said.

  "Yeah but you’re not sure he's dead," he said, "Shoot the lock!"

  "Okay, try to get up against the wall on this side," she said, pointing to the side where she was standing. She stood up and looked around to make sure Max wasn't coming. She didn't see him. Propping the lock up and away from the grate with the tire iron, she fired across the top of the grate into the lock mechanism. The lock bounced but despite a smoking hole in the center of its mangled body, did not open. The tire iron clattered to the bottom of the hole, nearly hitting Kurt.

  Kurt climbed to the top of the hole and handed Judi the tire iron through the bars. She tried wedging the lock again with the tire iron, and this time was able to pry it open. She flipped the grate up and reached in a hand to pull Kurt out.

  Just as Kurt placed a foot out on the ground outside the hole, the prickly pear nearest the hole exploded in a bright orange searing ball of fire.

  Chapter 77

  KURT AND JUDI WERE showered with flaming gasoline, shards of burning broken glass and chunks of singed cactus. The back of Judi's shirt caught fire. She rolled on the gravel to put out the flames, driving cactus needles into her skin. She screamed, and Kurt patted the flames out with his bare hands, driving burning cactus needles into his palms.

  In her haste to put out the fire, Judi dropped her Glock.

  Kurt scooped handfuls of sandy dirt and gravel and threw them on her shirt until it smoldered and the fire was out.

  While Kurt smothered the flames, Max ran up from behind a wall of cactus and jumped up on Kurt from behind, like a child playing piggy-back, then held his blade under Kurt’s chin. Kurt dropped to his knees under the sudden weight, grabbed Max’s knife arm with both hands and pulled the knife away.

  Nipper stopped his barking and lunged at Max, biting him savagely on his knife wrist. Max held on to the blade as Nipper began a vicious tug-of-war with the punctured and bleeding wrist, growling deeply through clenched red teeth, his lips drawn back in an angry snarl. He might have been too old to chase, but an old dog was never too old to bite.

  Kurt rolled over on top of Max and punched him in the face, breaking his nose with a wet snap like the sound of a branch breaking. Max howled in pain but did not waver in his attack.

  Judi crawled away and retrieved her gun. She followed the ball of rolling and fighting arms, legs, and paws with her sights, but held her fire, knowing that there was a good chance the bullet could go through Max and kill or injure Kurt.

  Max rolled on top of Kurt. Nipper gave a hard tug, ripping a strip of flesh off Max’s arm, and he dropped the knife.

  The two men struggled on the ground, first Max on top, then Kurt, then Max. They rolled into the cactus patch, reversed direction across the smoking ground, then onto the grate, across the trapdoor, and back onto the ground.

  Nipper leapt into the fight again and snapped his jaws down on Max’s ear, then gave a vigorous shake. Max shrieked, sat up, straddled Kurt, then threw his arms up to fight off the dog.

  Judi saw her shot.

  She held her breath. She lined up her sights on Max's head. Her hands were shaking. Her sights bounced, first covering Max's head, then Kurt's. She was about to drop the gun and give up when she remembered the auxiliary laser sight. Without lowering the muzzle, she flicked her trigger finger forward.

  A brilliant red spot played across Max's eyes. He saw the blinding starburst and in that instant he knew he was dead, unless he moved--and fast.

  Judi's trigger finger pressed against the trigger face. The Glock's trigger safety disengaged and the trigger started its deadly rearward travel.

  The laser spot pooled, frozen inside a bead of sweat on Max's forehead. His mouth open, his tongue pressed the back of his front teeth, to form the N sound in the word "No” The laser reflected in Max's pupils, dilated, looking off to one side planning for escape.

  He wasn't going to get away this time.

  Chapter 78

  THE STILL MORNING AIR was shattered by a woody CRACK that echoed off the cedars, through the prickly pears, and rolled out over the hill country southwest of Lake Travis before dying out. The flies startled, stopped their buzzing, then resumed.

  Max saw a white starburst, then his vision closed down until he could only see as if through a tunnel. He fell limp onto Kurt’s chest and wheezed out a spray of blood.

  Standing over Max was Jason Heckmann, who’d burst through the cactus at the last minute, following through on a swing with his custom carved hickory hiking stick.

  Kurt rolled hard and pitched Max’s stunned body into the sinkhole. Max mustered up enough consciousness to grab the grate on the way in. He dangled by his fingertips over the cave. Nipper charged the hole and snapped at Max’s fingers. The killer dropped into the pit.

  Kurt slammed the grate, and jammed the tire iron through the hasp. Jason pulled on the iron until the hasp bent and couldn’t be opened.

  Judi flicked her index finger out of the trigger guard and lifted the Glock up and away with both hands.

  She breathed again.

  Chapter 79

  Later that summer

  KURT PUSHED THE THROTTLE lever forward. The Bayliner dug into the dark green water and the motor kicked up a cool white spray out from behind the stern as the bow rose. The passengers held on to anything they could grab to avoid being tossed off into the wake.

  "Hey, take it easy there Captain, you don't want to wreck her," said Ratkus, being careful not to spill his beer.

  When they had motored out to the cliffs on the edge of the lake, Kurt killed the engine and Jason dropped the anchor. The guests plopped off the side and treaded water in the cool green, then swam off a dozen feet toward the rocky shore.

  "Did you hear anything more about the killer?" asked Maari, when they'd climbed out onto the rocks and found a flat place to sit. Ratkus and Jason tossed a nerf football back and forth in the shallows at the base of the rocks. Judi climbed up and sat next to Kurt, propped up on her elbows, soaking in the sun. The day was cloudless and even though it wasn't yet noon, it was already pushing ninety degrees.

  "Yeah," said Kurt. "I just got back from the first trial, out in San Francisco. Let's just say the rest of his old bosses won't have anything to worry about for a very long time."

  "Was it just old bosses? I thought there was one guy that didn't fit in with that pattern?" said Maari.

  "Yeah, Navarre made a long list of anyone who'd ever done him wrong at work. The first guy, that park ranger he gassed, he was a co-worker from back when Navarre was sixteen," said Kurt, "and you wouldn't believe how petty the beef was with that guy, I mean it was really trivial shit, some juvenile taunting, you or I wouldn't give it a second thought, and it was from twenty years ago, when they worked together on a golf course back in PA. But Navarre, he'd remembered and stewed about it all that time. It was like it was always fresh in his mind. I’m guessing it will be pretty much the same for the
rest of his victims, if any of those cases make it to trial."

  "Man, that's creepy. Makes you stop and think. So what was the deal with the dogs and the jars of urine? Did you ever find out about that?" asked Ratkus, heaving the sopping-wet nerf ball toward Jason, landing it two feet in front of him and spraying him with cool lake water.

  "Yeah, they had a shrink come in for the defense and try to paint this guy as an abused child, like that would excuse what he did or something. Turns out he'd been attacked by a pack of dogs as a kid, then from the trauma or being catheterized in the hospital, when he came home he was a bedwetter. His mother couldn't stop it with beatings, so after awhile she forced him to drink his own urine whenever he wet the bed."