The Shadow Broker (Mr. Finn Book 1)

by Trace Conger

“There’s no lights on the boat, so you’ll have to go by the moon. It’s actually pretty bright out here at night with the stars and all. Unless it clouds up. There’ll be a flashlight in there, but I’d only use that in an emergency. Unless you want the entire lake to know you’re out here. Binoculars too, but those won’t help you until you get close to the island. There won’t be any boat traffic once the sun goes down, so you won’t have to worry about that.”

  Wallace watched the island. “Okay, I think I’m good,” he said.

  Mitch eased down on the throttle and crisscrossed the lake in the same calculated pattern he took to get to the island.

  MITCH PULLED THE DOT-E TO the dock and tied her off. He pointed at the aluminum boat tied to the other side of the dock. “There’s your boat. Ain’t nothing fancy, but it’ll get you there and back in one piece.”

  The aluminum boat was half the size of the DOT-E. It had a built-in bench across the back and a single raised red-leather seat that rotated three hundred sixty degrees in the front.

  “The battery is charged and the trolling motor is already on the back,” said Mitch. “Just connect the red clip to the positive and the black to the negative. She’s easy to maneuver. Just move the motor in the opposite direction you wanna go. You’ll pick it up real quick.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s got three speeds. Slow, slower and stop. But it’s quiet. Probably looking at an hour’s ride both ways, so factor that into your time. Tie it back to the dock if you want or take it with you. I don’t care either way. You already paid for it.”

  “Okay, thanks for the help, Old Timer. How do I get hold of you if I need something else?”

  “You don’t.”

  WALLACE ATE DINNER IN TOWN and waited for the sun to set. He parked his Mustang in a church lot a quarter mile past the town dock, lifted a black backpack over his shoulder and walked along the road until he reached the public boat launch. Wallace saw the Navigator in the same parking space where it had been earlier. Mitch’s aluminum boat was still tied to the dock.

  He made his way to the boat, climbed in and connected the trolling motor like Mitch had explained. He untied the lines, took a seat on the rear bench, turned the throttle until it clicked three times and watched as he eased away from the dock and out into the darkness of Meddybemps Lake.

  Mitch had been right. The boat was slow but quiet. The moon wasn’t full, but it provided enough visibility to navigate the lake without the flashlight. Wallace slowly moved through the water, keeping to the route Mitch drew on his map. The only other sounds were the humming motor, the faint rippling of the water churning behind the boat and the brushing of the high treetops as they swayed against each other in the night breeze.

  Wallace stayed fifty feet from the shoreline, his gaze switched from shore to water and back, keeping an eye out for large rocks that could turn his prop into an unintended anchor. Halfway through the journey, he cut the motor, grabbed the binoculars and scanned the lake for any other boats. He thought he caught a glimpse of something on the water, but it didn’t have any lights and was too far away for Wallace to identify what it was. It could have been another floating tree limb. Wallace had already passed a half dozen. Satisfied he was alone, he switched the motor back on and headed northeast.

  After an hour, Albert’s island appeared a few hundred yards out in the darkness. Wallace clicked the motor off and grabbed the binoculars again. The cabin’s lights were on, but he couldn’t see any movement inside from such a distance. The two carriage lights on the end of the boathouse cast an eerie glow onto the lake surface. They’d provide a good navigational beacon to approach the dock. Wallace scanned the lake behind him but again saw nothing.

  He clicked the motor into second gear and crawled toward the island. He stopped at one hundred yards out and reached for the binoculars once more. The lights on the cabin’s lower level were still lit. Through the lenses, he could make out a television, also on, and a red futon-type sofa. A thin trail of smoke rose into the night sky from the stone chimney. He looked over the rest of the island. Through the thick trees, he could detect the small structure that Mitch said was a single bedroom. It was dark.

  Turning back to the main cabin, Wallace watched the living room windows. Still no movement. He scanned the lake another time, set the binoculars down behind him and eased the motor into first gear. Wallace crouched down to stay as low as he could. The boat inched toward the boathouse. Five minutes later, he pulled up to the dock.

  Wallace switched off the motor and grabbed the dock with his hands to prevent the aluminum boat from knocking into the wooden planks. He set his pack on the dock and slowly lifted himself out of the boat and onto the smooth cedar. He grabbed two white rubber bumpers from inside the boat and slipped them between the boat and the dock to kill any knocking and then tied off the front and rear of the boat on two cleats.

  Wallace crouched at the end of the dock and pulled a MAC-10 from his pack. He listened to the gentle lapping of lake water against his boat. The cries of a loon erupted somewhere nearby. He walked around the dock to the edge of the boathouse and looked in. A red-and-white boat hung from a hoist several feet above the water, and an aluminum boat, much like his own, was tied to the other side of the boathouse.

  He walked across the dock to a path that led through the woods to the cabin’s front door. The path was soft, covered with decaying needles that had fallen from the tall pines above. He crept up the path, but stopped when he heard the sounds of people talking. Then laughter. Wallace knelt on the ground and listened. More laughter, but not the laughter from people having a conversation. It was the muddled, low laughter of a sitcom’s laugh track. The television.

  Wallace gripped his weapon tightly in his right hand as he passed the one-room shack. Tighter still as he took his first step onto the main cabin’s front porch. One step and then two. No creaks. A screen door opened into the cabin. Wallace peered inside. The television stood atop a bookcase in the corner. The reception wasn’t great but probably the best it could get on an island in the middle of nowhere, Maine. A coffee mug was on top of the end table next to the red futon. He opened the screen door, walked into the room and slowly closed the door behind him, being careful not to make a sound. He raised the MAC-10 in front of him. His right hand on the grip and trigger. His left secured the underside of the weapon. He approached the TV, stopped and looked at the coffee cup. Black coffee filled to the brim. Wallace picked up the cup. Ice cold. He returned the cup, raised his weapon and scanned the room for someone he knew wasn’t there. Lights and TV on, front door unlocked and a cup of coffee long cooled.

  “Decoy,” he said to himself.

  I CREPT OUT OF THE shack and sneaked into the cabin’s front door just as Wallace set down the coffee cup on the end table. He spun around and I dialed my .45 on his chest. He started to raise his weapon.

  “That’s far enough,” I said. “Toss the piece on the couch.” Wallace hesitated. “Toss it. I’ll kill you before you level it.” He slowly set the weapon on the red futon and backed away.

  “Happy?” he said.

  “I’ll be happy when you’re on the bottom of that lake, with fish swimming through the bullet hole in your head.”

  “Is that what you think is gonna happen?”

  “I do, but first you’re going to tell me where Bishop is,” I said.

  Something caught Wallace’s attention, and he snapped his head toward the large front window to look at the lake.

  “He’s holed up in some fancy RV park,” he said, staring back at me. “Dunbar’s got his place covered, so he can’t go back there. As far as I know, he’s still in the RV. Course, I haven’t see him in a few days on account of having to drive halfway across the country. You knew I was coming?”

  “I did. Found the GPS tracker on my car.”

  I’d spent a lot of time at Albert’s lake house. At least one week every year as a kid. During that time, I learned to recognize a lot of lake sounds. The subtle dif
ferences between a smallmouth bass and a white perch breaking the lake’s surface. The varying pitches of a common loon call and a black-throated loon call. Sounds most wouldn’t notice, let alone identify. But one of the most recognizable lake sounds is an aluminum boat tapping against a wooden dock. Such boats wear away wooden docks. My father drilled this sound into my head at an early age. If my brother and I didn’t secure his boat properly to the dock, he’d belt our asses. If he heard that sound before we did, he’d come swinging. That’s why it was easy for me to identify the sound as it fluttered up through the trees, across the front porch and into the doorway where I stood.

  I didn’t like that sound, especially paired with whatever Wallace saw out that window. Wallace wedged two bumpers between his boat and the dock when he got here. I watched him tie them from the shack. Those knots were tight.

  “If you knew about the tracker, why did you have to drag me all the way out here?” said Wallace. “Couldn’t we just have had this out in Cincinnati? Two fucking days in the car. A man ain’t supposed to sit that long in one place.”

  “Sorry about that. Too many people looking for me. Had to get out of Ohio for a while. And it’s easier to hide a body out here. Also had to fish out twenty grand that my father sunk under the boathouse.”

  “Your father ... He got white hair and a shitty attitude?”

  I smiled. “That’s him,” I said.

  Wallace looked past me out the front door. The aluminum boat I heard a moment ago was faint, but the branch that cracked in the woods behind me wasn’t. The sound was no more than twenty feet away. I turned to see if anyone was behind me and heard Wallace bolt from the living room. I managed to get two shots off, but only plugged the wall. Wallace made it into the adjoining sunroom, kicked through the screen in an open window and ran into the woods. I scooped up his MAC-10 so he couldn’t double-back for it, and I followed him out into the darkness.

  I heard Wallace fighting with the brush, heading around the house and toward the shack on the other side. I cut him off in the other direction. As I rounded the corner, Wallace fired two shots from a second weapon he must have had tucked into his waistband. The shots landed close enough that I could feel the splintered wood as the slugs slammed into the cedar siding next to my head, dropping me to the ground and sending the MAC-10 down a dirt slope and into the lake. I sprung to my feet, darted around the corner again and crouched in the dirt, my .45 up in case he followed.

  I listened as his heavy boots snapped twigs and then thumped across the dock. I sprinted through the woods, taking a second path to the boathouse. I couldn’t see him when I reached the dock. He must have ducked inside. The boathouse had two entrances, no doors, just cutouts where doors would have been had Albert installed them. I approached the side entrance and peered in. Nothing. More thumping and as I turned around, Wallace slammed a boat hook into my shoulder. The business end missed me, but the wooden handle rapped my collarbone and knocked me against the boathouse wall. He pulled the boat hook back to swing again and I dove at his midsection, sending both of us onto the dock, and dropping my .45 in the process. I heard it bounce on the wood planks behind me, but there was no splash. I landed on top of Wallace and grabbed his collar with my left hand, pushing hard against his neck with my right, trying to find his carotid artery and choke him out. He had me by maybe thirty pounds, but when a man’s fighting for his life, that doesn’t matter much.

  He grabbed his .38 from somewhere under him, but I dislodged it with my knee, knocking it into the lake. He drove a fist into my ribs, but from the ground he had no momentum. A weak strike. He snapped his arm up, knocking my hand away from his collar and escaping the chokehold. He pulled his knees to his chest, shoved both of his boots under my stomach and pushed me off with enough force to knock me onto my back. The hard corners of my .45 jabbed into my hip. Wallace grabbed the boat hook and charged. I reached around, snatched my weapon from underneath my hip and sent two rounds into his gut. He staggered backwards, but didn’t go down until I put a third round through his neck.

  Using the wall as a crutch, I gripped the .45 tight and checked Wallace. Blood trickled from the front and back of his neck. The shot went straight through. I exhaled for the first time in what seemed like minutes. Grabbing his leg, I dragged him into the boathouse, leaving a crimson trail on the dock. I searched Wallace’s pockets for his cell phone, expecting it to be smashed to shit, thanks to our dance on the dock, but it was intact. The corner of the screen showed one bar. The end of the dock was the only place on the island to get reception, and even one bar would be enough. I opened the phone’s call history and found Bishop’s number. Two rings later, he answered.

  “Is it done?”

  I rubbed my collarbone and winced. “If you’re referring to Wallace’s insides staining my dock, then, yeah, it’s done,” I said.

  “I thought you’d be dead by now,” said Bishop.

  “You’ll get one more chance because I’ll be there in two days to kill you.” I tossed the phone into the lake. My head spun like I’d just stepped off a Tilt-A-Whirl. I looked at Wallace’s body splayed on the dock, the blood pooling around him, and leaned toward the lake, waiting to empty my stomach, but it didn’t come. My stomach and hands were still.

  I checked Wallace again and found his key ring in his other pocket. A silver cobra with red ruby eyes grinned at me. I slipped it into my pocket and headed back to the house. As I came around the corner of the boathouse, a woman standing on the dock raised a handgun and took aim at the vital organs inside my chest. My muscles tensed as she steadied her aim. She braced the weapon with both hands and lowered her stance. She knew what she was doing.

  Then, a crack.

  The deer rifle’s blast echoed through the trees. The sound lingered for a moment after the bullet slammed into her head. The blow knocked her to the side. She was dead before she hit the planks.

  Even in the darkness, I could make out the mahogany boat in the distance. A moment later, the motor revved, the bow raised into the air and the boat buzzed toward me.

  Mitch tossed me a line and I tied it off beside the two aluminum boats already there.

  “I didn’t know you were that good of a shot,” I said.

  “I’m not. You’re lucky she was standing still.” Mitch eyed the boats. “Looks like a goddamn marina around here.”

  “Only expected one,” I said. “How long you been out there?”

  “Long enough to see you needed some help.”

  “I told you I could handle it.”

  Mitch pointed to the woman sprawled across the dock. “Looks like it was goin’ real good for you.”

  “Yeah, not exactly sure where she came from.”

  The woman with the hole in her head wore a black track suit. Her long dark hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. Mitch stepped into the woman’s boat and reached for a red purse stashed under the steering wheel. He opened it and flipped through her wallet, finding her driver’s license.

  “Jackie Northman,” he said. “From Detroit.”

  Dunbar’s tail. He knew I was here too.

  “How many people you got after you, son?”

  “Too many,” I said.

  Mitch climbed out of Jackie’s boat and onto the dock.

  “So what we got here?”

  I pointed to Jackie. “Just this one and the guy inside the boathouse.”

  “He dead?” said Mitch.

  “Last time I checked.”

  Mitch scanned the lake. “So two bodies and two boats,” he said. “They ain’t gonna move themselves.”

  I took a minute to collect myself after almost getting bludgeoned to death by a man I’d expected and then plugged by a woman I hadn’t. Mitch and I piled the two bodies into Jackie’s boat.

  “What about all those shots? You think anyone will call ‘em in?”

  “Doubt it,” said Mitch. “Not many people on the lake in September. And those who are don’t really care. Probably just think it’s me fishing.”
Mitch turned back to the bodies. “You got something to weigh ‘em down with?”

  I walked into the boathouse and returned with the two cinderblocks from Albert’s haul and the two anchors from underneath the workbench.

  “Those’ll do,” he said.

  Mitch handed me an old bowline from under one of the seats in his boat. We climbed into Jackie’s aluminum boat. He untied her line, switched on the trolling motor and took us out to the deepest part of the lake while I tied an anchor and block to each body. The motor’s hum sounded like a swarm of mosquitoes following us out into the blackness.

  Mitch pointed to my hands. What knot you using there?” he said.

  “The right one.”

  “You’re as stubborn as your father.”

  We reached the deepest part of the lake, and Mitch cut the trolling motor. We heaved the bodies one by one overboard and watched as the weights dragged Jackie and then Wallace down into the inky depths of Meddybemps Lake.

  “You still dumping toilets out here?” I said.

  “Every now and then. Gotta put ‘em somewhere.”

  “What else you got down there?”

  “You don’t want to know,” he said.

  I nodded. “I think you’re right about that.”

  WHEN WE RETURNED TO MY dock, Mitch tied Jackie’s boat to the back of his and handed me the line.

  “Give me some slack till I get out there a ways so I don’t catch this in the prop,” he said.

  “What are you going to do with it?”

  “I’ll tow it back to my place and strip ‘er for parts. Then, I’ll cut a big whole in ‘er and put ‘er on the bottom.” He looked at Wallace’s boat. “If you can tie that one up in your boathouse, I’ll be by tomorrow to get it.”

  I fed the line out in my hands. “What are you going to do with that one?”

  “I’ll put ‘er back on the trailer. Guess Wallace won’t be needing it.”

  “Speaking of Wallace,” I said, reaching into my pants pocket. “There’s a sixty-eight Shelby Mustang somewhere out there. It’s yours if you can find it.” I tossed Mitch the cobra key ring. “I’ll call you in a few days and give you the name of someone who can scrub the title for you.”