Tahoe Hijack

by Todd Borg

  “I’m going to give you one more chance to tell me where the key to the Jeep is. You will answer clearly. If you don’t, I’m going to put all my weight onto your head, which will mash your nose back into your brain. I can’t remember what they say. Either it kills you outright or you end up drooling on yourself for the rest of your life.”

  “In my pocket.”

  I picked him up. Walked him the six short steps to the side of the Jeep. I took his hair in my right hand and his left ear in my left.

  “Reach into your pocket and pull it out.”

  He did so.

  “Now step into the Jeep and start the engine. And remember that if you decide to drive away suddenly, your ear and scalp will stay with me.”

  Gaver swung his leg over the door sill of the open Jeep, and sat on the seat, his head bent sideways under my grip. He started the Jeep.

  “Now get out.”

  He climbed out.

  “Where do you keep your weapons?”

  “Armory.”

  “Where is that?”

  “Building next to the bunkhouses.”

  “Is that the south group of buildings? Down the ravine from the Quonset building?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The other men who were here earlier, are they in the bunkhouses?”

  “No. They went home.”

  “How do you get into the armory?”

  “I dunno. It’s always locked. Only Davy has the key. He’s been gone a couple days. We ain’t heard from him.”

  I turned Gaver away from the Jeep and faced the cabin.

  “Time to run,” I said.

  “Really? You’re letting me go?”

  “I’m helping you to go. All you have to do is run. Ready. Set. Go.”

  Gaver ran. I held onto him just long enough to direct him to the cabin wall, then trip him at the last moment. He hit head first and dropped.

  I got in the CJ-6, turned the headlights down to the parking light position and drove away by the yellow glow, past the Quonset building and down the ravine. I’d walked this part of the trail in the dark several hours before. In the headlights, it looked different than I imagined. When a light appeared down below in the distance, I turned off the parking lights.

  I came to the bunkhouse. The light I’d seen was a dim yellow insect bulb above the bunkhouse door. There were two vehicles parked out front, an old Blazer and a new Ford pickup. Big Bear the Bouvier was in the Blazer. The pickup appeared empty. Lights were on inside the bunkhouse. A figure went by inside. Then another. Fast movements.

  I could go in and get my head blown off. Or I could go get reinforcements.

  I cruised on past at coasting idle, not hitting the gas, which would make engine noise, and not touching the brakes, which would flash bright red across the area. I came to an open gate in the razor-wire fence and followed the trail as it curved down to the left. When I could no longer see, I turned on the parking lights and again drove by the yellow glow. After a quarter mile of twisting and turning, I decided it was safe to turn on the headlights.

  I went faster than I should, came to the highway, turned left, and was at my own Jeep twenty seconds later.

  I parked the CJ-6 off to the side, ran to the oak tree, and found my key by feel.

  I got in my Jeep. Spot jumped around. I started the engine and shot back up the highway. Spot’s nose was all over me as he puzzled out the mysteries of rotting deer guts and maggots and vomit and bourbon and Big Bear the Bouvier and unwashed men and an unfamiliar woman wracked with terror.

  I spun into the narrow opening and retraced my route, heading back up the trail toward the compound. At the appropriate times, I switched to parking lights only and then drove with no lights. I coasted to a stop off the trail a good distance before the bunkhouse, and turned off the Jeep.

  Spot and I got out and moved into the darkness behind the oak that was closest to the bunkhouse. Both the Blazer and the Ford pickup were still there.

  The bunkhouse door opened. A man stuck his head out and looked around. He radiated tension. He turned back inside. I heard a muffled shout.

  “Are you ready? Okay, I’ve got the girl! You two are my cover. One on my left, one on my right. Ready? Go!”

  The door opened. Two men ran out, each holding assault rifles. They stopped ten feet apart, watching the darkness, rifles up and ready. Into the gap between them came the other man holding Anna in front of him. He had one arm around her waist. She flopped, barely able to make her feet move. His other hand held a pistol. They were all in the wash of the yellow bug light above the door behind them. I couldn’t see any of their features.

  “Spot!” I hissed into his ear. I shook him to communicate the sense of urgency. I made a pointed gesture at the man on our right, then raised my arm back up. “See the suspect?!” I whispered louder. “Find the suspect!” I dropped my arm in the hard gesture that I’d used to train him. “Find the suspect and take him down!”

  Spot shot off through the dark. I picked up a rock, took careful aim, threw it hard, then sprinted forward. The rock hit the end of the bunkhouse building just behind the men. They all jerked around, looking behind them.

  Spot was now in the light, up to full speed, closing like a torpedo on the gunman to the right. I ran an arc to the left.

  The first man to turn back around was the man who held Anna. “Look out!” he shouted.

  The other men turned around. Now that I was up close, I could see that the rifles were AK 47s. They raised them toward Spot, but it was too late.

  Spot had already made his attacking leap, leaving the ground at a low angle. Spot’s man tried to raise his rifle against Spot’s chest. But Spot’s jaws closed on the man’s upper arm, and they went down.

  I focused on the other man. He had his rifle up, aimed at Spot and the other man, reluctant to fire and hit his comrade. I charged on. He heard me and turned. But I was on him. He tried to swing his rifle. I grabbed it, pushed it up against his neck and ran him back into the bunkhouse.

  A shot exploded as if to blow open the night. Louder than most rifles. A big-bore handgun behind me.

  I hugged the man, his rifle stuck between us, and turned him around so that he was between me and the man with Anna.

  The shooter turned before I could see his face, pushed Anna into the truck, jumped in after her, and started the engine. The truck’s wheels spun and shot gravel as it took off down the trail.

  I looked past the man I was hugging and saw Spot on top of the other man, his mouth on the man’s shoulder, his growl sufficient to shake your chest. The man lay on his back. He’d stopped struggling in order to keep Spot from biting harder. But he was inching his rifle into position so he could get the muzzle up into Spot’s chest. I ran my man backward toward a boulder, then let go of him at the last moment while hanging onto his rifle. The man hit the boulder and went over backward.

  I turned, took two fast strides, and swung the rifle like a baseball bat. The barrel hit Spot’s man on the abdomen. He grunted and let go of his rifle. I picked it up and turned around.

  The man behind the boulder was reaching for his knife. I pointed the AK at him. He moved his hands out to his side.

  Spot sensed that the game was over and let go of his man.

  “Spot! Hold the suspect!” I shouted and pointed.

  Spot’s man rolled away.

  “Hold the suspect!” I shouted again.

  Spot grabbed the man’s calf muscle and bit down. The man screamed. Spot growled.

  I held two rifles. I took the magazine out of one, pulled the bolt handle back to eject the cartridge in the chamber, threw the pieces out into the brush. I gestured at the man on the ground behind the boulder.

  “Get up.”

  He slowly stood. He was in his mid-thirties. Unkempt. Dirty.

  “Over to the wall of the bunkhouse. Spread wide.”

  He moved slowly, got into position. I patted him down. Found his knife and threw it far.

  “Over to my
Jeep.” I pointed.

  He walked over.

  “Stand by the front passenger door.”

  He did as told.

  I kept the rifle on him while I opened the door. The duct tape that Diamond had given me was still there. I pulled it out. I directed the man back to the bunkhouse. “Back against the wall.”

  “I just did that,” he said, sullen, like he hadn’t just tried to kill me and my dog.

  I jammed the rifle butt into his jaw. He collapsed in the dirt.

  “Get up!”

  He stood, rubbing his jaw, and got back into position against the wall.

  “Spot, let go.”

  He wagged his tail.

  “Let go.”

  He reluctantly let go, turned toward me, and wagged harder.

  “Good boy! Good job!” I pointed the gun at Spot’s man. “Up against the wall.”

  He limped with great drama and spread his arms and legs.

  I found no other weapons on him.

  I had them walk into the bunkhouse. Made one tape the other to a bunk bed. Very thorough. Had him truss his own feet to another bed. I finished his arms and quickly checked the first man, then put tape over their mouths.

  “Let’s go, Spot.”

  FORTY-FIVE

  Spot and I ran to my Jeep, jumped in and raced down the trail and out to the highway.

  I had no clue that specifically indicated which direction the man with Anna might have gone.

  But I had a hunch that he’d want to get to the freedom of a highway. Interstate 80 was a good distance to the north. Highway 50 was closer to the south.

  I turned south. The dashboard clock said it was 3 a.m. The Gold Country Highway was deserted. I ran the Jeep as fast as the tight curves would allow, Spot struggling to hold his footing in the back seat.

  My breaths were short, my heartbeat fast. The tension of the past few hours had knotted my stomach and back muscles into coiled springs. The stress of nearly saving Anna and then losing her again was burning a hole in my gut.

  I tried to take a deep breath. Then another. Clear the head. Calm the emotions. Get the brain back to a space where there was room to think.

  The man with Anna had a long lead. I wasn’t going to catch him soon if ever. I wasn’t going to catch him by simply driving fast. I could only guess where he might go. Other than the compound, the only other obvious location was Harmon Halstead’s Good Fix Garage. But it was too obvious. The man with Anna would never go there.

  I tried to revisit everything I knew about the case in an effort to guess which way he’d turn when he got to Placerville.

  To the west was Sacramento and not far beyond it, the Bay Area. Nine or ten million people would make it easy to disappear.

  To the east was the Sierra, a vast landscape of mostly-deserted mountains.

  As I reconsidered everything I’d experienced in the previous days, I noticed that one thing about the case kept being a central feature. I didn’t know why. But everything kept coming back to Tahoe.

  Grace was murdered in San Francisco. But Thomas Watson, her supposed murderer was found in Tahoe. Grace’s daughter Anna was chased and escaped to Fresno, but she was ultimately kidnapped in Tahoe. The Red Blood Patriots were based in the Gold Country foothills, but their leader was found dead in Tahoe. The man who brought me into the situation did it by hijacking a boat in Tahoe. The journal that supposedly held secrets mentioned an important man who recorded the Chinese laborers. And when a curator at the Oakland Museum found an Edward Weston photograph that fit the description, she thought it looked like it was taken during the building of the Vikingsholm Castle in Tahoe.

  When I came into Placerville, I turned left on Highway 50.

  East.

  Toward Tahoe.

  FORTY-SIX

  I dialed nine-one-one.

  The dispatch woman who answered was another unfamiliar voice. New hires.

  “Owen McKenna calling. I need a conference call set up between Sergeant Bains at El Dorado County, Sergeant Martinez at Douglas, and Commander Mallory at SLTPD.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, please repeat your name and department and tell me why you are calling.”

  I tried not to yell, but I had trouble staying calm.

  “A woman’s life is at stake and I need to talk to those men now. Any one of them will vouch for me. HURRY!”

  “Hold on, please, while I try to connect.”

  I was racing up the ridge above Placerville toward Pollock Pines. If it took too long, I’d drop down into the river canyon to the east and be back in cellphone shadow. I went past the Apple Hill Café at 80 miles per hour, high beams on, trying to watch for the eye-glimmer of the ubiquitous deer.

  What seemed like several miles later, the dispatcher said, “Sorry for the wait, sir, I’m still trying to connect.” Then, “Sir, I have Sergeant Martinez on the line.”

  “Diamond,” I said. “I’m coming up Fifty from Placerville…”

  “Sir, I’m sorry to interrupt, but Sergeant Bains is on the line.”

  “Hey, Bains,” I said.

  “McKenna,” he said.

  Then another voice. “Yeah?” Rough. Older. Groggy. It was Mallory.

  “I’m reporting on Anna Quinn, the woman who was abducted from Lacy Hampton’s house. She’s currently being held captive in a new Ford six-pack pickup, plate unknown, color very dark, possibly black, no topper. Vehicle is freshly washed. I believe the suspect is driving east from Placerville on Fifty. Suspect is armed and dangerous. I don’t know his destination. I’m hoping you can put officers at the choke points on the South Shore. In Meyers at the base of Echo Summit. On Emerald Bay road out by Camp Rich. On Fifty in Stateline near Edgewood.”

  The highway peaked, then pitched down into the curves that led to the bottom of the American River Canyon, where the road began the long, final climb to Echo Summit.

  “You got an ID on this suspect?” Mallory said.

  “No.”

  Mallory made a loud, frustrated sigh.

  “You got a guess?” he said.

  “Only that he belongs to the Red Blood Patriots and is likely the murderer of the Patriots’ leader Davy Halstead.”

  Bains said, “The man whose body you found out at…”

  His voice evaporated as I followed the highway down around a piece of the mountain. I looked at my cell. The signal was gone.

  Thirty minutes of high-speed driving later, I crested Echo Summit and saw the light bars of three sheriff’s vehicles on the turnout. Their spots were turned onto a shiny black pickup. An older couple stood talking to two deputies. I pulled in and got out, announcing my name across the dark.

  “McKenna,” a familiar voice said. “Over here.”

  I found Bains standing by his Explorer, talking on his radio. He clicked off and pointed toward the older couple, then stopped and scrunched up his face. “Jesus, what’s that smell?”

  “Run-in with a deer carcass,” I said.

  I could see Bains frown in the dark. He took a step back.

  “Anyway,” he said, “Mr. Blake Weschler and his wife Nan were getting drowsy so they stopped for fresh air.”

  I realized what he was about to say. “What kind of car were they driving?”

  “Expedition. White.” He handed me a Post-it. “I wrote down the license plate.”

  “How long ago did they call it in?”

  “That’s the thing. They didn’t. The suspect took their cellphone, too. They flagged down another car.” He pointed toward a small red Nissan in the dark where two young men stood leaning against the hood. “José and Jorgé Romero from Davis called it in,” Bains said, using the correct hor-hay pronunciation. “When we got here, the Weschlers estimated that the suspect had taken their car about fifteen minutes prior. That was ten minutes ago.”

  “And the pickup?” I said.

  “Reported stolen in Stockton two weeks ago.”

  “Were you able to contact Diamond and Mallory?” I asked.

  “
Right away. But that still wouldn’t have been soon enough. If the suspect drove fast, he could have gotten all the way past the Stateline choke point before Diamond’s boys knew that he wasn’t in a black pickup.”

  “So he could be anywhere,” I said.

  Bains nodded.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  I headed down the grade from Echo Summit, through the lonely, dark curves of early morning, past the avalanche-control artillery tower on the left, and onto the floor of the Tahoe Basin where nearly everyone was asleep. There were so few cars out that it should be easy to spot a white Expedition with a crazed driver and his broken female prisoner. I wasn’t that far behind.

  But the Tahoe Basin is huge, and it would be easy for him to park and hide on a back street or lift another car. I didn’t have a clue what to do next.

  Out of habit, I turned on Pioneer Trail, the faster route to Stateline and the east side of the basin. As I drove through the dark forest, the pressure building within me was intense. My gut clenched. I gripped the wheel as if to crush it. I wanted to lash out, to race up the highway and find the killer, force him to the side of the road, jerk him out of his vehicle.

  I tried to revisit the standard principles of investigation. Sort out the case into what you absolutely know, what you believe you know but can’t prove, what is mere supposition, and what is possible but unlikely.

  There were only a few things that I absolutely knew. Anna had been in serious danger ever since she met her birth mother. In the beginning, before I knew about Anna, everything that had happened to her suggested that Nick O’Connell was her tormentor. And after Nick tossed his helper over the edge of the Dreamscape and then accidentally followed him into the water, everything pointed to Davy Halstead. Then Davy was found dead. Then another person connected to the Red Blood Patriots imprisoned Anna at the Patriots’ compound, and, after I attempted to rescue her, snatched her from my grasp and disappeared. That’s all I knew for certain.

  Everything else was a murky soup surrounding blurred entries in a journal from another century, markings in Chinese that suggested that Grace’s ancestor might have accumulated a treasure. And ever since Nick the Knife had heard Grace talking to an author who wrote about the history of Chinese miners, Thomas and Nick and Davy had all been fixated on the possible treasure. And they all believed that Grace had told Anna about it.