Free Fire

by C. J. Box

  By his estimate, he had looked at more than three hundred vehicles thus far on his screen. Although that was a lot of cars, he knew he was lucky that the three days he was viewing were so late in the season and the number of visitors was at its lowest. Yellowstone received 3.5 million visitors in the summer, and he could only imagine the traffic count in mid-July. Of the three hundred-plus he had looked at, there were thirteen dark SUVs. Of the thirteen, six were black. Five of the six had Wyoming plates. He bookmarked each of them before proceeding, since he had no idea how many target vehicles he’d end up with after looking at the whole tape.

  The camera angles from each gate were different, he noticed. The focus from the Northeast and East gates was more on the license plates, so the vehicle and registration could be identified later if the driver failed to pay the entrance fee or had commercial cargo and didn’t declare it. The South Gate camera had a wider field of vision and included not only the plate but also the grille and front window. If the glass wasn’t tinted in the vehicle, he could see the driver and passenger, and sometimes faces peering over the front seat from the back. Joe had no idea what the vantage points at the North and West gates—from Demming’s missing computer—were. He was under the assumption that whoever had bushwhacked her had entered the park from one of those two entrances, which is why they took her computer.

  Which meant that he was probably wasting his time.

  Nevertheless, he continued until he was through. Then he went back to study the shots he’d marked. All were from the South gate, via Grand Teton Park and Jackson. He remembered a ranger in the Gardiner clinic lobby saying Demming’s call specified that the SUV she pulled over had Wyoming plates and a rental sticker. Maybe, he thought, he had something.

  The first of the five black Wyoming SUVs had a single driver and no passengers and the plate WYO 22-8BXX. County 22 was Teton County, or Jackson. The driver was male, mid-fifties, silver hair, serious. That in itself was interesting, since most of the shots Joe saw were of harried tourists with a carload of family members. But a single driver didn’t match the profile. He forwarded.

  The second and third matches were families. A pudgy man in an Australian drover hat manned the first, his anxious wife at his side, kids and dogs peering over the front seat. Joe discounted them, as well as the second shot of an enormously fat contingent of five, two of whom were gnawing on what looked like turkey legs.

  The fourth black SUV was WYO 22-8BXX again, which got Joe’s attention and he sat forward in his chair. This time, there were two profiles in the vehicle, which he could now identify as a GMC Yukon. Unfortunately, the sun hit the windshield and obscured any identification of the driver and passenger. Joe checked the date. Two days before. The day Cutler was killed. He searched for the time stamp and found it: 5:15 A.M.

  “Nate,” Joe said, “I may have something.”

  Joe did a quick calculation based on spending a week in Yellowstone driving the figure-eight road system. If WYO 22- 8BXX entered the park at the South entrance at 5:15 A.M., it could have been at Sunburst Hot Springs by 6:30, a half-hour before they were to meet Cutler. It worked.

  “Oh man,” Joe said.

  “What?” Nate asked.

  “I may have them,” Joe said, puffing furiously on his cigar. “They may have taken the wrong computer. I may have them right here, coming up from the South entrance.”

  “Jackson,” Nate said, snorting. “That figures.”

  Joe fast-forwarded to the fifth and last bookmark.

  There it was, WYO 22-8BXX again. From the day before, the day Judy Demming was shot. They had come back. There were two of them again, and despite the sun on the windshield and the smoked-glass windshield, this time he could see their profiles. The driver matched with the first shot: lean, silver-haired. Whoever it was was back again, three times in three days. The passenger was harder to see because of glare on the glass, but there was something about his silhouette, the tilt of his head, the jut of his jaw, that seemed strangely familiar to Joe. Inside his head, alarm bells went off. He realized he was shaking not only with the cold but also with excitement.

  “I know this guy,” Joe said.

  “Who is he?”

  “I’m not sure. But there’s something about him. I’ve seen him before. I just can’t make him out on the screen.” Joe wondered if he could send the image to the Wyoming DCI in the morning for enhancing. He didn’t know if they worked on Sundays. He doubted it.

  The cabin door opened and Marybeth came out.

  “It’s cold out here, guys,” she said. “You can come in now. The girls are in bed.”

  “Joe thinks he’s figured something out,” Nate said.

  “Maybe,” Joe said.

  “Aren’t you going to offer me a cigar?” Marybeth asked, looking from Joe to Nate. Joe couldn’t believe it.

  Nate opened his “Fuses and Toilet Paper” box, and she took one. Joe watched in amazement as she clipped off the tip, lit it, and blew out the smoke.

  “Good,” she said.

  “You’re smoking a cigar,” Joe said, dumbfounded. Marybeth raised her eyebrows at him as if to say, Why not?

  “This is real interesting,” Nate said, holding up a sheaf of paper. “I might have found something too.”

  “Sounds like we’ll be up for a while,” she said.

  “I ALMOST MISSED it,” Nate said once they were inside and had spread the documents out on a table. Sheridan and Lucy were in bed sleeping, lumps amid strewn covers. “I was concentrating on this Swiss company called Genetech. They’re the ones who have the bio-prospecting permit in Yellowstone Cutler told us about. Judy couldn’t remember the name. Remember the ‘million-dollar slime’ they found at Sunburst that’s used for genetic typing? They’ve made millions off of it, according to these documents and what Cutler said.”

  Joe took the cover sheet from the Genetech file and read it over. Based in Geneva, the company was partially owned by the Swiss government but had majority private financing. Genetech’s bioengineers were also researching hot springs microbes in New Zealand and Iceland to try to mine more useful microbe thermophiles, but as yet could not find a match for the particular specimen they’d found in Yellowstone.

  “Would the microbe be worth killing over?” Joe asked rhetorically.

  “Absolutely,” Nate said. “The company’s made a fortune so far exploiting it.”

  “So we have a suspect?” Marybeth asked. “A Swiss bioengineering firm?”

  “That’s what I was thinking at first,” Nate said, “but I’ve changed my mind. I don’t think this has anything at all to do with Genetech, other than they were the company that originally found the microbe and obtained the permit to harvest it from Yellowstone.”

  Joe explained to Marybeth what Cutler had told him about the permitting process—how sloppy and controversial it seemed to be, how environmental purists like Rick Hoening and others were opposed to it.

  “I tend to agree with them,” she said. “If it’s illegal to dig a mine, hunt, or do any logging in a national park, how can you justify taking microbes for commercial purposes? I don’t know enough about it to have an opinion either way, but it’s not consistent with their policy, is it?”

  “Nope,” Nate said.

  “Then why would the Park Service grant permits to companies to do this kind of prospecting?”

  “Bucks,” Nate said. “Parks always need more money.”

  Joe was beginning to get what Nate was driving at.

  “So we’ve got Genetech, who has a permit extending another five years to exclusively harvest this particular microbe,” Nate said, digging out a copy of the agreement. He showed them where it was signed by the superintendent of the park as well as the chief ranger. “But it seems there’s another company in this pile of papers Marybeth brought with her that desperately wants a permit as well.”

  Nate turned to Marybeth. “Where did you get this particular list of companies?”

  She nodded to Joe.
/>   “I saw the names on binders in Clay McCann’s office,” Joe said.

  “Okay,” Nate said, his voice rising, “that’s the connection—Clay McCann. Now we come to a company called EnerDyne.”

  This was the file Nate had waved in the air earlier. He summarized it: “EnerDyne was incorporated just last year in the State of Colorado. The incorporation papers are filed with the secretary of state there, and Marybeth was smart to print out the documents when she did her search. EnerDyne has several floors of offices in downtown Denver, a pretty large payroll, but no income as yet according to the records.”

  “How can they stay in business?” Joe asked.

  “I’m getting to that,” Nate said, excited.

  “Please get to it with your voices down,” Marybeth cautioned, gesturing at her sleeping daughters.

  ACCORDING TO THE papers filed with the Colorado secretary of state, Nate said, EnerDyne was a research, development, and engineering firm created to implement coal gasification projects throughout North America.

  “Coal what?” Marybeth asked.

  “Gasification,” Joe said. “Turning hard coal into gas that can be transported in pipelines and distributed. I remember reading about it back when we had the mineral rights dispute around Saddlestring. Energy companies have been trying to figure out how to do it economically for years. The technology is there, but it’s too expensive to do in a cost-effective way, at least so far. They’d have to build big plants to turn the coal into gas, and since coal only costs pennies per ton to mine and ship, it doesn’t make financial sense.”

  “That’s right,” Nate said. “Wyoming and other states have billions of tons of coal in the ground. There are seams of coal in the West that are miles thick and stretch across half the state—the largest deposits in the world. If that coal could be made into gas, it could solve all of our energy problems and change the face of the economy. We could be energy independent.”

  “My God,” she said.

  “If it could be done cheaply,” Nate said, “it would be what everybody wants.”

  “But nobody has figured out how to process coal into gas that way,” Joe said.

  “Which is why it’s significant how EnerDyne plans to do it,” Nate said. “It says here their plans are proprietary, but they do have to leak a little the general concept of it to the SEC in order to be listed as a public company and to attract investors. And what it says here is ‘EnerDyne is the leading company in the world in a new method to organically gasify coal.’ ”

  “Organically?” Joe said.

  “Think about it,” Nate said.

  Joe and Marybeth exchanged looks, and it seemed to hit them both at the same time.

  “Microbes,” Joe said. “They want to find a microbe that will react naturally with coal to produce gas.”

  “They think they can find it in Yellowstone,” Marybeth said.

  “And maybe they have,” Nate said.

  “Flamers,” Joe said. “Free fire.”

  Marybeth looked at him.

  “There’s a little seam of coal near Sunburst geyser. It’s next to the flamers Hoening talked about and I went and lit.”

  “Oh, man,” Nate said, and whistled.

  “Maybe someone figured out that the microbes in Sunburst were reacting with that stream of coal to produce gas just under the surface. And if that particular thermophile was introduced to one of those miles-thick seams of coal Nate was talking about . . .”

  “It would be worth billions,” Nate said.

  Marybeth said, “But they’d need a permit to do it. And if they thought there would be a protest by environmentalists to block any new permits, that might definitely be worth killing for.”

  It took a few minutes to sink in. As Joe thought about it, many of the previously floating facts started to drop into place, to become links in a chain of a new theory.

  “Who are the company officers?” Marybeth asked softly.

  Nate found the incorporation papers. “Layton Barron is the CEO. I’ve never heard of him. In fact, I’ve never heard of any of these people except for the last one. We’ll have to do more research, I guess.”

  “Nate . . .” Marybeth prompted, “I’ll do the research as soon as I can get to a computer. But in the meanwhile, what are the names?”

  “Oh. Okay. Layton Barron is the CEO. Michael Barson is the CFO. Katherine Langston, VP of development. C. T. Ward the Third, VP of operations. Any of those names ring a bell?”

  “Nope,” Joe said.

  “This last one will. Guess who’s the attorney of record?”

  “Clay McCann,” Joe said.

  “Got him,” Nate said.

  Marybeth started to say something but stopped abruptly and cocked her head. “I hear someone coming,” she mouthed. Joe sat back and stopped breathing. He heard it too. Gravel crunching. Footfalls outside the cabin, getting closer.

  Nate had his .454 out, cocked, and aimed at the door in one liquid movement. Instinctively, Marybeth rose and moved into the shadows between the beds of her sleeping daughters.

  The knock on the door was light, barely audible.

  Joe stood, Nate behind him and to the side.

  “Your weapon,” Nate whispered.

  Joe drew the Glock out of the holster, worked the slide as quietly as possible, then kept the gun pointed down in his right hand as he approached the door. He hated being in a situation where his family was right there, behind him, exposed.

  “Yes?” Joe asked, keeping his voice calm.

  “Mr. Pickett, it’s Simon. I saw the light on . . . . I’m sorry to bother you, but you’ve an urgent message at the hotel from Mr. Lars Demming. He thought you were still in the hotel, and insisted I come get you.”

  It sounded like Simon, Joe thought. Nevertheless, he motioned for Marybeth to get down and checked with Nate, who had his pistol raised in two hands, eye level, ready to fire if necessary when Joe cracked open the door.

  Joe pulled it open quickly and stepped back, keeping the Glock loose at his side, ready to raise it.

  It was Simon, off-duty in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, and the desk clerk looked into the muzzle of Nate’s .454 with absolute terror.

  “Sorry,” Joe said to Simon. “You can put the gun away, Nate.”

  “Are you sure?” Nate asked.

  “I’m sure.”

  JOE APOLOGIZED TO Simon as they crunched through the gravel on the way to the hotel. Several times, Joe had to reach out to steady the desk clerk, who was shaking so badly he had trouble walking.

  “That’s a first,” Simon said. “Like something out of a Western movie.”

  “You get used to it out here,” Joe said, distracted, his mind racing with what he’d learned about EnerDyne and Clay McCann.

  The old-fashioned black telephone sat ominously on the front desk, and as Joe approached it he tried not to think the worst. Maybe Judy had taken a bad turn, maybe she died. Maybe someone had gotten to her in Billings . . .

  “Joe Pickett,” he said as he picked it up.

  “Joe!” Lars sounded unexpectedly buoyed. “I’m damned glad they found you.”

  “Me too. How’s she doing?”

  “Much, much better. The doctor said a full recovery is pretty likely. I’m just so . . . happy.”

  “Thank God,” Joe said, feeling weight he didn’t know was there lift off his shoulders.

  The line was silent for a moment, and Joe thought perhaps the connection had been lost. Then Lars spoke softly. “I’ve really got to apologize to you. I said some bad things to you, and I’m sorry. Judy has been filling me in on what happened, how you stayed with her and made sure she got sent here so no more harm could come to her. I didn’t understand before. I’m just real damned sorry I said what I said.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Joe said, knowing how hard it was for a man like Lars to say those words. “Apology accepted. I’m just glad she’s doing all right.”

  Lars said, “Better than all right. She’s si
tting up, talking, eating even. Except for those damned tubes, she looks pretty good. Beautiful, even. Yes, she looks beautiful.”

  Joe smiled. He could hear Judy’s voice in the background saying, “Oh, stop it, Lars.”

  “She wants to talk with you,” Lars said. “That’s why I called and woke you up. Well, that and to apologize.”

  “I was awake,” Joe said. “No problem.”

  “Oh, one more thing. Judy says she gave you my truck to use.”

  “Yes,” Joe said, not expecting what would come next.

  “Keep it as long as you need it,” Lars said. “I don’t mind. We’ll be here another couple of days. I got one of my road crew guys to pick up Jake and Erin to bring them here.”

  “Thank you. I’ll take good care of it.”

  “Watch the transmission,” Lars said. “Sometimes it slips. I need to replace that pressure plate in the clutch—”

  “Lars,” Judy said in the background.

  “Okay, okay,” Lars said to Joe. “Here she is.”

  Joe waited.

  “Hey there.” Her voice sounded tired but strong.

  “Welcome back,” Joe said. “I was worried.”

  “I’m tough,” she said, which made Joe smile again. He was surrounded by tough, good women.

  “When we were in the clinic,” Demming said, “you came into the room and asked me who the shooter was. I could hear you but I couldn’t talk.”

  “Yes.”

  “I can now. It was James Langston.”

  “The chief ranger?” Joe was stunned, but it made sense now why Langston had been so interested in where Joe was staying while at the same time making a point not to meet with him.

  “I saw him clearly. I thought he was there for backup, obviously. The dispatcher didn’t say who was coming, so I assumed . . .”

  “Wow,” Joe said. “And you’ll testify to it?”

  “Of course. But I still can’t believe it.”

  “Neither can I,” Joe said, “but this thing is big. And it just got bigger.”

  “What should we do?”