The Devil's Anvil

by Matt Hilton

  I wondered how far the people in the car would travel. Perhaps they were going to the cabin – which couldn’t be too far away now – and there I’d get a chance at taking their vehicle, or at least items that I could use while I trekked out of the hills to the main road. I was uncomfortable at the idea of stealing, but when it was a case of needs must, then I’d just have to put my morals on a back burner. I had to make a decision: did I backtrack down the road, find the fork and the second route to the cabin, or did I forge through the woods to the second road? The second route was much shorter, but the going tougher in my present condition.

  In the end, the decision was taken from me.

  Before I could strike out in either direction, a figure materialised from out of the dappled shadows below me and stood eyeing me, as tense as a wild animal caught in the open. The person lifted something to his face, and I knew he was calling in backup. The engine noise halted. In seconds it roared again and I realised the driver was heading at speed to join the searcher on foot.

  I looked for a weapon.

  The mossy boulder was heavier than I was; I had my choice of small pebbles or rotted twigs.

  My run of bad luck didn’t appear to be getting any better.

  19

  The figure waited until the car was making its way up the trail towards us before taking a tentative step forward. I didn’t run or try to hide. There was no point. Even if the newcomers were dangerous I’d have simply looked a fool trying to do so, so it was better that I stay put, conserve what energy I had left and wait for a more opportune moment to act. But it wasn’t necessary, because with that one step the figure emerged from a deep pool of shadow and I instantly recognised his red coat. It was Adam, younger of the two private investigators I’d met the previous day. The SUV approaching was Adam’s Escalade, and it stood to reason that the one driving it was his older partner, Noah Kirk. They’d had the presence of mind to bring the SUV as opposed to Noah’s saloon with the sticky brakes, so maybe they weren’t as inept as I’d first thought.

  We’d parted on decent enough terms, and I thought I’d been forgiven for my strong-arm approach with them when first we’d met – even Noah had shrugged his shoulders and rubbed at his head when I apologised for clubbing him unconscious – so hopefully we could remain on good terms now. You never could tell. I’d taken it as fact that they would hang around the farm because they still had a job to do, but I wondered if they’d been got to by the Jaegers and if they were here to finish off what the Procrylon team hadn’t. I didn’t believe either man had it in them, even if it was only to clean up a crime scene and lose a corpse deeper in the woods. Still, I wanted to feel them out before fully relaxing my guard.

  Noah pulled the Escalade alongside Adam and they conversed through the window. Adam turned and peered at me. I stood facing them, attempting to look as if I wasn’t ready to drop. Trying to look tough. Adam raised an open palm to me. I lifted my chin, inviting them to come forward. The motion sent pain stabbing from my skull down the side of my neck into my chest wound. Static prickled along my hairline, and sweat flooded my face.

  Noah drove the SUV slowly, following Adam as he approached on foot. The younger man could tell that I was hurt, his mouth hanging open at my dishevelled appearance. It hadn’t occurred to me that the blood on my clothing and hands was also all over my face.

  ‘What the hell happened?’ Adam croaked as he stood ten feet distant, as if afraid to approach in case my condition was catching. He glanced at Noah, and I followed his gaze. The older guy looked equally shocked. Both stared back at me.

  ‘It’s not as bad as it looks,’ I lied.

  ‘You could have fooled me!’

  I didn’t reply to Adam. I still wasn’t sure about their motive for trailing me to the mountains.

  The door clunked as Noah got out of the SUV. He didn’t move further, just stood there with one hand resting on the open door. I noticed that he’d taken my advice and strapped two fingers together. ‘Man, you’re a mess. How the hell are you still standing?’

  I shrugged off his concern, but even that small action almost sent me reeling. I squeezed my hands into fists, concentrating on pushing back the blackness edging my vision. ‘Never mind that. How’d you find me?’

  Noah and Adam shared a glance, and Noah elected to tell the truth. ‘We followed you here.’

  ‘Last night?’

  ‘Yeah. Last night.’ Noah’s mouth formed a tight grimace. He probably expected to be asked why the fuck they hadn’t come to help sooner.

  ‘You saw the guys chasing me and Billie, then?’

  ‘We saw the first guy follow you from the farm.’ Again Noah elected to take things no further.

  ‘You watched what happened to him?’ I eyed them both steadily in turn.

  ‘We were back a-ways,’ Adam said, ‘so we didn’t see what happened. We only got close enough to see after his car went down in the canyon.’

  ‘I didn’t hear you following us,’ I said, thinking out loud.

  ‘We parked out of sight in the mist and crept in,’ Adam admitted. ‘By then that guy’s car had gone off the road and we saw you checking it out.’

  So they’d hadn’t actually witnessed our fight, my accidental killing of the man and then sending his car off the road, only the aftermath; and they’d misread it. That suited me. As far as they knew the guy had driven off the road in the mist. Either that or they weren’t stupid enough to admit what they’d actually witnessed for fear I turned on them. If I was the type to do away with them to cover up my crime, there would have been little I could have done then, but I chose to make them no wiser. ‘He tried to force us to stop; he wanted to take Billie.’

  ‘We figured as much,’ Noah said.

  It went without saying that Noah and Adam had witnessed the team arrive at the farm earlier, the only reason they were in position to follow the guy who’d subsequently chased me and Billie. They must have set up surveillance on the SUV, watched it follow Billie and me and slipped in covertly on its tail. They must then have followed us to this part of the forest, only to be overtaken by those pursuing us.

  It was as if Noah read my mind.

  ‘We’d just pulled off the road when we saw that green panel van and a couple more SUVs converge on the trail at the bottom of the mountain. We kept our heads down, and looking at you it’s probably best we did.’

  He was right. If they’d shown themselves then the Procrylon team would have assumed they were assisting us and taken them out of the picture. I was sure that the Jaegers and their pals wouldn’t have left any witnesses alive: considering what they planned for Billie.

  ‘We were lucky not to be spotted by the dudes in the helo,’ Adam put in. ‘It buzzed us a couple times but it was too dark for them to spot us among the trees.’

  ‘Looks like you weren’t as lucky,’ Noah put in. Finally he’d stepped away from the car, not too close, but near enough that he could see me clearly. ‘Shit, man! You’ve been shot!’

  Dumbly I followed his gaze to the bloody hole in my jacket. I poked a finger at it, but was careful to avoid pressing on the bandage beneath. ‘More than once,’ I said.

  My admission was enough to galvanise them. They came towards me. Maybe it was simply mawkishness and they wanted a closer look at my injuries, or maybe they genuinely wanted to help. I held out a bloody palm to slow them down. There was something troubling me, and I still wasn’t certain that Noah and Adam could be trusted. ‘You say that you weren’t spotted, and yet those bastards knew where me and Billie had gone . . .’

  ‘What?’ Noah said, offended by my unspoken suggestion. ‘You think we told those guys where you were?’

  Adam made a harsh sound in the back of his throat in support of his pal.

  ‘How else could they have found us so quickly?’

  ‘Hell, it doesn’t take too much figuring out. It’s not as if there are that many turn-offs from the highway between Baker’s Hole and Hope End. Anybody with a map could h
ave plotted where you’d got to in no time.’ Previously Noah had looked ready to offer a steadying hand, but now he shoved his hands in his coat pockets.

  ‘I just bet you were carrying a cell phone,’ Adam put in. ‘Guys who can source a helicopter and half a dozen vehicles in such short time can probably trace a cell phone signal.’

  ‘No signal,’ I pointed out, with a nod to the surrounding hills.

  ‘Doesn’t mean a thing,’ Adam argued. ‘The CIA can trace a signal even when your cell’s turned off. As long as the battery and the SIM card are in the phone it can be located easily enough.’

  He wasn’t far wrong, but I didn’t believe that was how the Jaegers had tracked us down so quickly.

  Noah shook his head, as if he was thinking the same way. But then he squinted, and thumbed over his shoulder back down the trail. ‘That’s your rental stuck in the mud back there, right?’

  ‘Yeah.’ No point lying, not when they’d already followed the car here.

  ‘I just bet it has an anti-theft device installed, some kind of transponder so that it can be located if stolen.’ Noah gave a self-satisfied smile at the frown I wore. ‘I guess that before that guy went off the road, he gave them your licence number, and they discovered it was a rental vehicle. Like Adam said, they’re resourceful. Some hacker on their payroll probably got into the system and was able to lock on to the car’s beacon.’

  Noah had just won some respect, and I wasn’t grudging about it. ‘I hadn’t thought of that.’

  ‘You just thought the worst of us, even after we’ve risked our asses to come help you?’

  ‘Forgive me,’ I said, ‘getting shot makes me grumpy.’

  Adam snorted out a laugh. ‘I wouldn’t say you’ve been a barrel of laughs since we met you.’

  I tried to smile at his wit, but couldn’t. But maybe my attempt was enough for them because they came forward, Adam supporting my left elbow before I shrugged him off. ‘That’s the bad side,’ I told him. Then to show my appreciation of his help I offered him my right elbow and he hooked it around his shoulder. They assisted me to their car, and good job that they did because I’m unsure if I’d have made it under my own steam. ‘Do you have anything to drink? Water preferably.’

  ‘Coffee,’ Noah offered. ‘Got a couple flasks of the stuff when I was in Hill End last night. Might not be hot now, but it’ll still help warm you through.’

  I was more concerned with rehydrating. Ordinarily caffeine was a diuretic, but there was plenty research that said the liquid content to caffeine ratio made a difference, and there was enough fluid to counteract any adverse effects in your normal cup of coffee. Plus, I liked coffee. ‘Great,’ I said. ‘You got any sugar?’

  Noah looked slightly abashed, but not because he had a sweet tooth. He owned up to a forgivable crime. ‘I almost emptied the coffee shop of their sugar sachets. That boy over there can’t get enough of the stuff. I’ve seen him suck the stuff direct from the packet.’

  ‘Got to keep my energy up,’ Adam said. ‘It’s cold and damp out in those woods.’

  ‘I told him he’s going to get diabetes if he’s not careful,’ Noah went on, and Adam muttered in denial, something about being healthy as a horse. ‘Probably why I have to keep feeding you goddamn sugar cubes.’

  It was all small talk as they loaded me in the back seat of Adam’s Escalade. The pain in my chest was tremendous, but I diverted my attention to checking for the promised flasks of coffee. I ordinarily drank it black, with nothing. The sugar would help stave off the effects of shock, and maybe give me some of that energy that Adam talked about.

  ‘You should lie down,’ Adam said.

  ‘Don’t fuss over the man,’ Noah scolded him. ‘He knows where he’s most comfortable.’

  Sitting upright wasn’t a matter of comfort for me, but an attempt at stopping any further bleeding. If I fell asleep, my wound opening while I slumbered, I’d likely bleed out long before I reached the kind of medical assistance I needed. Noah mentioned something about a doctor’s surgery in Hill End.

  ‘No doctors,’ I said. ‘Take me back to Billie’s place.’

  ‘You need a doctor,’ Noah argued. ‘In fact, we should take you somewhere with an ER, let alone a small town practice. You need that wound treated, and in case you need surgery . . .’

  ‘It’s not as bad as it looks,’ I reiterated.

  ‘Your head looks like it was hit by a mallet,’ Adam said as he clambered in the driving position. ‘What if you’ve a fractured skull?’

  ‘I haven’t. I wouldn’t have lasted this long if there was any major damage.’ Even to my own ears I didn’t sound convincing. ‘Look, guys, if you want to help, just take me to Billie’s; there’s stuff there that I can use.’

  Noah gave up arguing, nodding at Adam to do as I asked, while he clambered in the front passenger seat. He passed back a thermos flask of coffee after twisting off the lid. I noted that though his first two fingers were strapped – legacy of me dislocating his index finger that time – but he seemed untroubled by pain. ‘Cup?’ he asked, offering the plastic cap.

  ‘I’m fine with just the flask.’ I only had one good hand at that moment, and would need Noah to pour for me if I elected to use the cup. I put the flask to my mouth and drank directly from it. The heat had gone out of the brew as Noah had warned, but it was still warm and went down easily. After being sick my throat was raw, but it was a mild sting at most, and getting the coffee down me far outweighed any discomfort. I barely tasted it. By the time we came to my abandoned rental car, and Adam negotiated a way past it with two wheels on the embankment on the opposite side of the road, I’d finished the first flask. I handed it to Noah, who offered the second thermos. ‘Not just now,’ I said. If I drank another litre on top of the first I’d probably be throwing my guts up again in no time. ‘Some of that sugar wouldn’t go amiss, though.’

  ‘You should have dissolved it in the coffee, it would have got into your system faster,’ Noah said as he hunted for the stash of stolen sachets.

  ‘I’ll do that with the next flask, but that isn’t really why I want sugar.’ Without further explanation, I shucked out of my right jacket sleeve and worked it off round my back, before easing out of the left sleeve. I’d left the bulletproof vest unfastened, so could still get at the impromptu bandage beneath my torn shirt. It was sodden with blood. ‘Rip a good handful of those packets open, will you, and pass them back to me?’

  Adam glanced frequently in the rear-view mirror, intrigued by what I planned. Noah could watch, but I wished the driver would keep his eyes on the road. ‘Don’t go running us off the trail, Adam,’ I warned.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked, as I dragged aside the bloody bandage and disclosed the wound. I glanced in the mirror and watched his eyes pinch. He hissed in sympathy.

  ‘Believe it or not,’ I said, accepting some opened sachets from Noah, ‘but sugar is one of the oldest antiseptics known to man. Honey’s better, but I guess you didn’t think to grab a jar when you were in Hill End, eh, Noah?’

  I wasn’t making stuff up. Sugar and honey had been employed as an effective antiseptic for thousands of years, and were even now endorsed by modern doctors and veterinarians to treat serious injuries where there was significant skin loss, or flesh and tendon damage, when pharmaceutical antiseptics had failed. The simple natural remedy could even relieve pain and help seal the wound, through the process of dehydration of the surrounding tissue. As a soldier I’d used sugar on my wounds in the past.

  ‘Did you get the bullet out?’ Noah asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘and thankfully it was in one piece. No fragmentation, but that’s not the only worry. Tiny bits of my clothing will have been pushed into my flesh when the bullet hit. They’re too small to see, but they’re there, and they can kill me if I don’t get this clean. If I don’t disinfect the wound now the fragments of cloth will cause infection and the wound will be running with pus in no time.’

  ‘Jesus, spare m
e the gory details, will ya?’ To give him his due, Noah didn’t turn away and continued to tear open and pass back packets of sugar when I needed them. Adam on the other hand had seen enough. He kept his eyes on the road while I poured granules into the open wound until I had a sticky mound in place. Ideally I required a fresh bandage, clean gauze and such, but things would do for now. We’d be back at the farm soon enough. There I could better tend my wounds, and begin organising how I was going to get Billie back.

  Despite needing to stave off my own death, Billie’s liberation from her captors took priority.

  20

  We took extra care on our approach to the farm. Procrylon wanted Richard Womack, and taking Billie was only a side-project of their plan to capture him. It made sense that they would send someone back to guard the farm in case Richard turned up in the meantime. Yet it seemed that we’d beaten them to the idea, as we didn’t spot anyone in hiding, and a quick scout of the farm showed no sign of trespassers. Noah and Adam had become my allies, and they moved without question for the house with me. The door was still locked, the way that Billie had left it.

  ‘How do we get inside?’ Adam wondered.

  ‘How do you think?’ I mimed kicking the door open.

  ‘Won’t Billie be pissed at us for breaking her door?’