No mercy

by John Gilstrap

  “You’ll make me look like Superman.”

  Irene shook her head. “Not at all. I’ll use a little fiction to reinforce what we both know is the truth. You’re the best law enforcement professional that this community has ever seen.”

  Gail laughed. “Oh, now you sweet-talk me. You’ll help to lock in my career, and all I have to do is sell my soul.”

  Irene folded her face into a concerned frown. “A career is a poker game, Gail. You can’t expect to win every hand. Sometimes you have to fold to preserve resources for the future.”

  Gail studied Irene. “How do I know you’re not bluffing?”

  “You don’t,” Irene said. “But I’m not. I’ve got it all-the cards, the cash, and the table. You really, truly want to sit out this hand.”

  “And what about the other murders?” Gail asked. “The Caldwells? I can link Jonathan Grave to those deaths via the Hughes family.”

  The news clearly startled Irene, and Gail was sorry that she’d said anything. “I don’t believe you,” she said. “How are they linked?”

  Sensing the upper hand and loving it, Gail smiled. “I don’t believe I’ll share that with you,” she said.

  Irene shook it off. “I don’t know who this Jonathan person is,” she lied, “but whatever you think you know, I guarantee you’re wrong.”

  “Yet you’ll stipulate, I assume, that Stephenson and Julie Hughes are connected to the Caldwell murders.”

  Irene hesitated. Gail could almost see the gears whirring in her head as she tried to work for position.

  “I’ve already spoken to the investigating officer in Muncie, Irene,” Gail said, sealing the deal. “He wants to nail the Hugheses. His Hugheses are the parents of Thomas Hughes. Jonathan Grave rescued Thomas Hughes and killed the Patrones in the process. That links them all.”

  Irene stood. Her features iced over. “Sheriff Bonneville,” she said as she walked toward the front door, “I’m going to offer one last bit of advice, and I’m going to beg you to listen to it carefully.” She turned.

  Gail suppressed a shiver.

  “Know when it’s time to stop pushing,” she said. “There are some answers to which you simply are not entitled.”

  She let herself out.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Detective Weatherby sat on the front corner of the ancient metal desk, one foot on the floor and the other swinging in an exaggerated display of pated his hand.

  Jonathan accepted it, and the detective’s grip closed like a talon. “But about that killing thing,” Weatherby said, trying to pull Jonathan in closer but damn near getting pulled off the desk himself. “I meant what I said before. Vengeance is mine, saith the Fairfax County Police Department. You start hurting people, and I guarantee I will become your very worst enemy.”

  Doug put a hand on each of their chests and pushed them apart. “Enough!” he commanded. “Jesus, Weatherby, what’s with you?”

  “I just want your friend to know that we don’t need his help.”

  “I have no intention of helping you,” Jonathan said. “You have my word.”

  The detective’s grip relaxed and he scowled again at the double meaning buried in Jonathan’s words.

  Doug Kramer said, “I don’t know who you think this man is, Weatherby, but he’s not your enemy. Hell, as far as I know, there’s no one alive who thinks of him as an enemy.”

  A double entendre of his own, Jonathan thought. Just how much did Doug Kramer know about his business?

  “You need somebody to vouch for his character,” Doug went on, “you just ask me. I’ve known him since we were kids. He’s not someone for you to worry about.”

  Jonathan pulled his hand away. “It’s time for me to go,” he said. “Thank you for your kind words, Weatherby.”

  The detective stayed behind while Jonathan led the way back to Doug’s cruiser. When they were inside and on their way, the chief asked, “As bad as you feared? Ellen, I mean?”

  Jonathan looked at him across the console and sighed. “Worse.”

  Doug kept his eyes on the road. “I’m really sorry, Dig.”

  Jonathan nodded and joined him in watching the lane stripes on the Beltway zoom past. They remained silent all the way to the I-95 turnoff before Doug started talking again. “You know, Jon, there’s not a soul in the Cove who’s not hurting for you over what happened to Ellen. It’s just not right.” His voice was at once serious and soft. Jonathan wasn’t sure he’d ever heard that tone before.

  He felt his throat thicken. “Thank you.”

  The cop’s eyes shifted from the road to bore right through his passenger. “I’m not done yet. If there’s anything I can do to help you-I mean, anything, you just let me know, and it’s yours.” He started looking at traffic again. “I’ve never known much officially about the work you do, but most people in town know about the work you used to do. There’s been talk about why you quit early, but the Cove is proud of you, Dig. Proud and pleased to call you their friend. You know what I’m trying to tell you?”

  Jonathan shook his head. “I’m not sure I do.”

  Doug sighed. “And I’m not sure how to tell you, because it’s not something I can tell you, if you catch my drift. I just wanted you to know that under circumstances like this, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do, and whatever that means, you’ve got friends who’ll back you up.”

  Jesus, Jonathan thought, Doug just offered to cover up a murder.

  Gail opened her front door and found Jesse Collier standing there, slightly out of breath. “Thanks for coming,” she said, and ushered him inside.

  “Thanclarified.

  “Fine,” she said. She tapped her keyboard and the screen filled with an aerial photograph. “This comes from the SkysEye network,” she said, “and it’s only about an hour old. I think this is Ivan Patrick’s playground. Brigadeville, right? It’s the only patch of real estate that came close to fitting what your friend in the alley told you.”

  “Andrew Hawkins,” Jonathan reminded her. SkysEye was a commercial mapping company that anyone with the financial means could access for the going rate of twenty grand a year for an open license, plus a usurious tasking fee every time they wanted a picture. The private satellite network was a recent startup headed by Lee Burns, one of the original Unit members who hadn’t seen action in two decades. At various high and low orbits, SkysEye satellites could count the dimples on a golf ball anywhere on the planet. Lee’s largest customers came from the petroleum industry, which used the network to locate the kinds of geological formations that looked like money. Given the founder’s background in Special Forces, Jonathan worried that Lee might have sold his services to a few bad guys over the years-after all, finding geological formations wasn’t a lot different than precision targeting-but he’d have never stated his concerns aloud. He owed that much to a brother in arms.

  What was most remarkable about the SkysEye imaging-what set it apart from other commercial sites-was its ability to provide real-time imaging that refreshed every four minutes. Through extrapolation and a little guesswork, you could determine whether a particular piece of real estate was currently occupied, how many vehicles were there, whether or not there was an active power plant, and a host of other details that were of value to an invader. It was nowhere near as helpful as the SatCom images he’d used back in the day, but it was a close second.

  Accessing the pictures was only the beginning. The real trick lay in manipulating the images to deliver the highest resolution. The raw images were little more than a tableau of treetops, the thick foliage making ground details difficult to discern. To learn useful details, Venice superimposed a thermal imaging view that showed the presence of three dozen individual buildings of varying size and shape. Using that data, a smart CAD system was able to make an accurate sketch of the entire area. The overall layout reminded him of old Army posts from the days of the Indian wars. An open space anchored the middle of the complex, with most buildings arranged in concentric
ovals. In the back corner, far from the other structures, two buildings stood alone.

  “They look like munitions storage,” Jonathan observed, pointing to the screen.

  “They’ve got themselves a damn city,” Boxers said. “We can’t take that. Not the two of us.”

  Truer words were never spoken.

  The next step in building the computer image was to superimpose data from the public record onto the satellite image. That way, they could locate the known roads, as well as-if they were so inclined-the location of the septic fields, the aquifers, and even family burial plots. If it was in an accessible database, they could put it on the map.

  Finally, with the entire infrastructure in place on the screen, the program used data from the U.S. Geological Survey to add elevation data. When Venice was done, they had a three-dimensional rendering of the area that could be rotated in any direction, for either a plan view or a more useful elevation view.

  “No fuckin’ way,” Boxers said.

  And it wasn’t just a matter of real estate. The map showed the heat signatures of several dozen people sleeping in the various walking along the street. The two of them together would undoubtedly spook his prey.

  He didn’t have to wait long. Within a minute, he heard the sound of a door opening and closing, followed a few seconds later by the sound of a substantial lock being turned. A moment later, he saw the woman he’d been waiting for. She turned the corner to walk up the hill where he was stationed, but on the opposite side of the street. She walked hurriedly, with her head down. She looked preoccupied to Charlie, oblivious to him or his car or the night air or anything else that was not going on inside her head. He waited for her to get fifty yards ahead, and then he followed. He stayed on his side of the street; he never tried to close the gap between them.

  He thought about how easy it would be to wreak havoc in a town like this. Watching her navigate the night as if there were no danger lurking, he thought about how easy it would be to take her. To have her. No doubt about it, she was hot in her own right. All he’d have to do, he wagered, would be to walk up to her and ask her for the time. She’d stop to help and then he could make her pay for the mistake. He imagined it was that way for everyone in this little burg. People who’ve never known violence never stop to think about it. It was the kind of naivete that conquerors dreamed of.

  But tonight, his mission was not conquest; it was intelligence gathering. This was the night when he would come to know his enemy.

  His earbud buzzed, “How’s it going?”

  “Keep the channel clear,” he hissed, hoping that his annoyance came through. If he needed help from Frick and Frack, he’d ask for it. Meanwhile, he just wanted them to quietly do their jobs.

  He was across the street from a church now, St. Katherine’s Catholic. It was a big place with spires and the kind of traditional architecture that you just don’t see much anymore. As the Alexander chick walked past, she slowed and looked across the vast lawn, as if hoping to see someone.

  Her pace slowed even more as she approached the walkway that led across an even bigger lawn and then to the wraparound porch of a mansion that made Tara from Gone with the Wind look like a guest cottage. The place had to be 12,000 square feet, and it seemed to stretch forever. It was difficult to make out details in the darkness, but the house painted a hell of a stain against the sky.

  Charlie found himself staring in disbelief as he watched his prey climb those stairs, navigate the walk, and then disappear through the front door. “Just how successful can the private investigating business be?” he mumbled aloud.

  Gail Bonneville had to admit that she loved the town. Fisherman’s Cove was the kind of place she thought of when she thought of a quaint riverside refuge. She loved the fact that New World efficiency had not yet run off Old World charm. She could see why a man like Jonathan Grave would be drawn to a place like this, even if she couldn’t begin to wrap her mind around why a town like this would want a man like Jonathan Grave as a resident.

  “I wish I knew what those guys were up to,” Jesse Collier said yet again. When they’d arrived in Fisherman’s Cove forty-five minutes ago, they’d noticed the Mercury parked across the street from the firehouse that served as the offices of Security Solutions and according to the public record also doubled as Jonathan Grave’s residence. From that very first moment, they’d assumed that someone else was surveilling the place, but they couldn’t be certain if they were working for Grave or against him.

  Rather than litter the street with a second susations through the very kind of diplomacy that he pretended to hate. He’d also seen him wreak a special kind of havoc after the other side failed to realize that the “negotiation” was in fact the terms of their surrender. Boxers was the wrong guy to point a gun at.

  Glancing at his GPS locator, Jonathan pointed up the hill and they started walking.

  “Suppose they don’t want to fight?” Boxers asked.

  “Then we’re carrying way too much firepower.”

  “No, I don’t mean now. I mean at all. Suppose they’re not up for this battle you’re planning?”

  Jonathan had thought about that. “Everybody’ll fight if the stakes are high enough,” he said.

  “But not everybody’s good at it.”

  Jonathan shrugged. “If it falls that way, we’ll all share a righteously shitty day.” He could speak this bluntly because it was Boxers. Both of them had stopped worrying about death a long time ago. “We’ll have to train them, and hope they can shoot straight.”

  Thomas Hughes was living a nightmare.

  Over the course of a single week-no, less than a week, six days-he’d gone from getting his knob polished by Tiffany or Christine or whatever the hell her real name was, to getting kidnapped, shot at, and now living out here in the middle of nowhere. Just the three of them-like the happy family they’d never be.

  And if that wasn’t a thick enough shit sandwich, the police thought they were murderers. Oh, yeah, and his dad was some kind of WMD trafficker.

  They called this special corner of hell “the lodge,” but it was really a cabin. Built of hewn heavy timbers, and designed to look a hundred years older than it actually was, the place had a certain Abe Lincoln look to it. The lodge itself sat on a footprint of 20 by 30 feet, and was more or less an unadorned rectangle. A second floor had been raised somewhere along the way on the back half of the house, providing additional sleeping space. When Thomas was little, Mom and Dad took the upstairs for themselves while he was consigned to the sofa in the “living room,” which was separated only by an imaginary wall from the “dining room,” which in turn sat adjacent to the way-out-of-date kitchen in the back of the house. Without gas or electricity, cooking power came from the logs that they piled into the wood stove.

  It was stiflingly hot in the summer, and freezing cold in the winter (kerosene heaters and fireplaces couldn’t touch the February chill). Thomas hated this place. Once he’d gotten his driver’s license and access to his own car, he’d stopped coming. Keep your primitive and your rustic; give him new and shiny any day of the week. At least give him running water. And a toilet that was more than a hole in the ground.

  Presently, Mom and Dad were at it again, blaming each other for all the crap that was going wrong. They kept screaming at each other about a plan. They needed to have a plan.

  Well, Thomas had mapped out a pretty nifty plan for himself: he was getting the hell out of here. He was done with Chef Boyardee and boredom. He was done with hiding. He didn’t have a dog in this fight. Even if he did, wasn’t it way harder to hit a moving target than a stationary one?

  The barn full of synthetic smallpox complicated things for his parents, but the more he thought about it, the more he realized that he didn’t care about what happened to everybody else-not even to the poor bastards that got spr’d been able to read a musical score the way most people read books. The dots and spaces on the page converted directly to music in his head. His parents and friends
called it a blessing, but to him it was equal parts curse. By reading the music, he was blessed to hear a perfect performance every time. When he performed, however, there were always flaws, most never heard by the audience, but they resounded like errant cymbal crashes in Thomas’s mind.

  The peace of the music couldn’t dislodge his anger, though. Not today. And the anger was the thing that could break him. Intuitively, he knew who the real evildoers were in all of this. He knew that the focus for his anger should be Christine Baker and Fabian What’s-his-name-the people who started it all-but he found himself reserving his ugliest thoughts for his own father. He was the conduit through which all of this awfulness had flowed. But for him, Thomas would still be blissfully stressed over academics. But for his involvement in this weapons bullshit, things would be normal. If those guys had just managed to kill his dad at the time of the ransom transfer He hated himself.

  Movement.

  He didn’t know if he’d heard it or seen it, but something happened in the tall grass over to his right. The music went away, and he was one hundred percent tuned into reality. Could it have been a snake? A cougar, maybe? They’d found evidence of a big cat up here, and The man launched himself with the speed of a lightning bolt, rising out of the grass-out of the ground itself, it seemed-and hitting Thomas hard in the middle, knocking him backward and driving the wind out of his lungs. He tried to yell, but before words could form, a gloved hand attached itself to his mouth, killing the words and threatening to extend the favor to the rest of him.

  He arched his back and tried to defend himself when his attacker said, “Thomas, stop.”

  The familiarity startled him. He stopped squirming as he tried to place it. No, it couldn’t be.

  “It’s Scorpion,” the voice said. Right away, Thomas’s gaze shifted to the man’s eyes-the feature he remembered most from that night. Holy shit, it really was.