by Scott Blade
“Let me ask you something. Was it just the men who said she was beautiful?”
Collins said, “I don’t know. I didn’t ask them. I’m just giving you a general statement from what I see in the report, here.”
“Did you see her photo?”
Collins touched the screen, exited the document, and pulled up a jpeg file. He stared at it and flipped it, so Watermoth could see it.
It was a digital copy of Molly Lee’s driver’s license.
“She’s good-looking.”
Watermoth did not look.
“I’ve seen her already.”
Collins put his phone down. Then he slipped it into his pants pocket.
“Joanna, what are we really doing in here? You got access to all this already. I know an agent like you has probably already seen it.”
Watermoth walked back to the open garage door. She looked out, saw Ryman smoking, leaning up against his Tahoe.
She turned back to Collins, and pointed at Mike Lee’s vehicle.
“We’re not here looking for clues about Lee.”
“What are we doing here?”
“Notice anything strange about Ryman?”
Collins shrugged and said, “He’s an asshole.”
“Yeah, that he is, but what else?”
“I don’t know.”
Watermoth waited.
Collins said, “He doesn’t seem to be interested in looking around here for clues.”
“More than that. He has shown zero interest in it.”
“So what? He’s a DEA SWAT. Those guys aren’t into police work as much as they are a tool for capturing and raiding meth cook houses.”
Watermoth asked, “You got a partner?”
“I do. But our department is stretched thin. He’s on something else right now.”
“You been with him a while?”
“Four years.”
“You like him?”
“He’s a pain in the ass. But he’s okay.”
“You got his back?”
Collins said, “Of course. He’s my partner.”
“What if someone murdered him?”
“What about it?”
“What would you do?”
“I’d want to get them!”
“Arrest them or kill them?”
Collins paused a long beat, and then he said, “Both. Either.”
“That’s why we’re here.”
Collins said nothing.
“Ryman’s partner was murdered by his wife two nights ago, and he doesn’t seem to even care about looking for clues at the crime scene.”
Collins looked back out the door at Ryman.
“You think he knows something? Was he involved?”
“Maybe. I’m just saying we’re not just here for clues about Molly’s whereabouts. We’re here to see how Ryman behaves.”
“He’s not doing good so far on that front.”
Watermoth nodded and said, “So far, he hasn’t even come up to the house. Like he feels guilty.”
“What do we do?”
“I’m telling you because I need your help.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Just get my back. And watch him.”
Collins said, “You got it.”
CHAPTER 29
AT NIGHT, Widow stayed in his tower, and watched the wildfire burn far to the south. He had Turkish coffee brewed out of a pot of boiling water. Not bad. He ate an MRE of chicken alfredo and two rolls. He and DeGorne talked on the walkie until the battery died. He plugged it into the charger and walked along the balcony wrapped around his fire tower.
He saw the light from her lookout coming from the east. He found a pair of binoculars and watched her. She paced and watched the fire from the south. Eventually, he saw her kick back in bed. She read for a while, until she seemed to have fallen asleep.
Widow thumbed through the field manual until ten o’clock at night. He called it lights out and crashed. He briefly woke up at midnight. He had to go down to the outhouse. Afterward, he was trekking back up the spiraling staircase, when he noticed DeGorne’s light was on.
His walkie had powered up. He checked the time. It was ten after midnight. He grabbed the binoculars and looked over at her. He found her looking back at him through a pair of her own binoculars. He waved at her. She waved back.
His walkie crackled.
“Can’t sleep?” she asked.
“Couldn’t hold it.”
“Couldn’t hold what?”
“You know.”
“Oh. Yeah.”
Widow said, “It sucks having to get up out of bed and walk down fifty-one stairs and a hundred feet to the bathroom.’
“You counted it?”
“I counted the stairs, not the feet. I guessed that part.”
“Weirdo.”
Widow smiled. He wondered if she could see it from there.
“You don’t have to go down to the outhouse. You know?”
“I don’t?”
“No. You don’t.”
“How you figure?”
“Widow, you’re a man. This is the middle of nowhere. God’s green woods. You can pee anywhere.”
“I didn’t think about that.”
“Next time, just go over the side. That’s what I do.”
“You do?”
“Duh. I’m a woman. But I ain’t no lady.”
“How do you do that?’
“Do what?”
“How do you go over the side?”
“I thought you were smart?”
“I never claimed to be.”
“You knew an awful lot about my gun, earlier. You seem to remember the protocols of this job well enough.”
“Yeah, from like a million years ago.”
“Still, you remember it, right?”
“Some of it. I don’t remember being neighbors with a beautiful woman.”
She said nothing to that.
“Danvers must be killing himself that he’s missing time out here near you.”
“No pun intended? I hope.”
“Nothing intended.”
“We did get along well. He’s a nice old man. Loves nature. Not much of a nighttime companion.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“He was always up at the crack of dawn. He’s a grandpa, you know?”
“What’s that got to do with nighttime?”
“You know. Morning people are morning people because they go to sleep early at night.”
“And not you?”
“Not me. I wake up halfway through most nights. I stay up late. And I wake up late. What about you?”
“I sleep whenever I can. Daytime or night. Makes no difference to me.”
“Is that because of the military?”
Widow shrugged to himself. He said, “I guess so. They teach you to sleep when told. They teach you to be awake when told. You’re even told where and when to piss.”
“It sounds awful.”
“It wasn’t. It was fantastic, actually.”
“Why did you quit?”
“My mom was killed.”
“She was? That’s horrible. I’m sorry.”
“It’s over now.”
“How long ago?”
“Only a few years. But it seems like she’s been gone forever.”
He heard a wolf howl in the distance, like the first night at the Ranger Station. And then he heard another.
“Those wolves. They sound close,” he said.
“They’re not.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t. They might be close. I just didn’t want you to have nightmares.”
“Funny.”
“They come out at night. They usually stick near Hooters.”
“Hooters? There’s a restaurant out here?”
She laughed over the walkie. Widow listened. There was something about her laugh. He liked it. Then he noticed something else. It was the sound of suction, the sound of g
lass clinking, and the sound of liquid pouring.
DeGorne said, “Hooters is west of you, south of Nickel Lake. It’s not really called that. It’s a combination of Two Mule Hill and Screech Point.”
“These names. Screech Point?”
“Because it’s a forest with a dense population of Western screech owls.”
“So why do you call it Hooters? The owls?”
“No, I call it Hooters because there are two big hills out there that look like boobs.”
Widow smiled and said, “Danvers was missing out.”
“How so?”
“You’re hilarious, DeGorne.”
“Thanks. I think so.”
They were quiet for a moment. Widow held the binoculars down at his side. Then he heard the radio crackle again, and the glass clinking sound, and DeGorne drinking something.
“What’s that?”
“What’s what?”
“Are you drinking?”
“You caught me. Yes. I’m having a drink.”
“What is it?”
“Vodka.”
“You drinking it with ice?”
“Yes. I put a cup of water in the freezer and crack ice chips from it.”
“Clever.”
“Tell me something, Widow. Why aren’t you married?”
“I don’t know. Guess it just never happened for me.”
“It’s not worth it. Trust me. You’re better off.”
Silence.
Widow asked, “Mind if I ask you something?”
He heard her take another drink. And she must’ve finished it off, because then he heard her pour another glass.
“Shoot,” she said.
“How did you get that black eye?”
More silence. This time it seemed to last forever. Widow picked the binoculars up to his face and looked at her tower. He saw her drinking out of the glass, staring off in the distance, like she was lost in thought.
He said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to get personal.”
She said, “My husband did it to me.”
“I’m sorry. I hope that’s why you left him.”
She took another drink. He listened to her breathing, then swallowing.
“I leave him every summer to come here. But it is why I started taking this job, five years ago. And I’ve been doing it every summer since.”
“He knows where you are?”
“He never knew. I told him I had a job, but I lied about the what and where.”
“Did you leave him this time for good?”
“I’ll never see him again. I’m sure of that.”
Widow said nothing.
DeGorne said, “He wasn’t always that way. He used to be a good guy. But he got mixed up with the wrong people. You were in the NCIS. Maybe you can relate. He worked in law enforcement too.”
“I knew guys who couldn’t handle the pressures. Sure.”
“You don’t strike me as the type of guy to hit a woman. Especially one you love.”
Widow told the truth. That’s what he always did.
“I’d hit a woman, under the right circumstances.”
“What circumstances?”
“She was trying to kill me or someone I loved.”
“You’re talking about self-defense, no-choice scenarios. I’m talking about like in an argument or just for kicks?”
“No. I’d never do that. I was raised in the south by a single mother. Believe me, that kind of thinking would never even cross my mind.”
“I knew you weren’t like how he was.”
Widow listened.
He asked, “Was?”
DeGorne stayed quiet.
“You talk of him in the past tense.”
DeGorne stayed quiet.
“Did something happen to him?”
“I’m tired now. I’m going to hit the hay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
And she was gone.
CHAPTER 30
WIDOW WAS CERTAIN that he was not supposed to be fishing in Nickel Lake because he’d read in the field manual that it was required to have a fishing license. And he did not. But he couldn’t help himself.
The next morning, he woke up, bright and early, and took Danvers’ fishing rod and tackle box, along with the pack full of gear, and the ice axe, on a fishing expedition.
He caught five nickel trout and threw back five nickel trout. As was required, even if he had had a fishing license. After fishing, he set out to explore the west and south and planned to end his day in the east.
That morning, he skipped breakfast, but when noon rolled around he stopped and ate beans out of a can. Afterward, he wrapped up the empty can in a brown paper bag, with his dirty fork. He returned it to his pack to throw away later.
He drank two bottles of water by midafternoon. By then, he’d already passed through the west and the south. He had explored the creeks, a basin, and a valley. He’d found an open cave and he followed the winding manmade trails until he was in Thunder Gorge, which threaded beyond the eastern foothills of Gray Wolf Mountain and led straight to DeGorne’s fire lookout.
Along the way, he found several lockboxes. All numbered. All locked with a combination lock. The lockboxes were listed in the field manual. It was for the fire watch crew to leave supply items for each other. However, mostly he found interest in letters left to future fire watch crewmen. Previous fire lookouts had used them as time capsules to communicate with people from the future. They began with the date each message was handwritten. The oldest one he found was way back from nineteen thirty-two.
It started with introduction of the author and ended with a riddle. That riddle was later answered by the next fire lookout and replaced with a riddle of his own making.
Widow liked to ignore the answers and try to answer them himself.
By nightfall, he was in the east and he had hiked to five miles away from DeGorne’s fire lookout.
They had had radio silence. Up until late afternoon.
“Weirdo. Are you there?”
She said weirdo like Widow. She made it sound similar. A pet name. Widow wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
“I’m here.”
“How is your day?”
“Great,” he said, and he told her all the things he had down. And all the exploring he had done. Starting from the west, turning to the south, and heading east, until he was basically five miles away from her.
“Wow! You did a lot!”
“I wanted to see as much as I could today.”
“Glad, you didn’t waste any time. How come yesterday you didn’t make this kind of progress?”
“I looked at the map this morning. Planned out what I would do. I memorized it.”
“Good. Did you remember to do the checklist? That’s important.”
“I did.”
“Well, I wish I was that productive. I didn’t even get out of bed until nearly noon.”
“How can you sleep in out here?”
“I had some help from a Russian friend.”
“I know. We spoke last night.”
“We did? Oh, God! What did I say?”
“You don’t remember?”
“Not really.”
“It’s all good.”
She was quiet for a beat. Then she said, “Where are you now?”
“Thunder Gorge.”
“You’re very close to me.”
Silence, again.
“Did you plan that?”
Widow stayed quiet.
DeGorne said, “Do you want to come over? I can whip up a home-cooked MRE for us? For dinner?”
“I’d like that a lot.”
She was quiet another beat, like she was considering what she was getting herself into by inviting him over to her place.
She said, “Yeah. Come on. I’ll take another aspirin and we can hangout, watch the fire tonight. From here it looks huge.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“So come on.”
She clicked off the ra
dio. Widow smiled and looked to the east. He could already see her tower. It was small and seemed farther away than his own lookout, but it was there.
He continued down the trail.
CHAPTER 31
WATERMOTH AND COLLINS drove to Seattle and Ryman followed. Staying close behind. Staying within range. He never let them out of their sight. Which was fine by Watermoth. She’d had strong suspicions of his motives ever since she first laid eyes on him. But she had been told to play nice. Also, told to keep her guard up.
She could have ordered Collins to speed up, to flash the light bar on the roof of his Washington State Police Ford Escape, but she didn’t. She didn’t want to lose Ryman. She wanted to keep him at arm’s length. But in separate vehicles. This way she could speak with Collins without worrying about Ryman overhearing.
They drove into the city. It was twenty-one minutes past six in the evening. The California Wildfire was all over the cable news stations, the local news, and the radio. The fire had raged on for weeks. Over two hundred thousand acres of land burned. National Wildlife and Forest Firefighter teams had let it rage on as a controlled fire, necessary to purge and start over.
The anchors on Collins’ radio said that Wildlife authorities feared the fire was headed far north into California Redwood country.
Plenty of kindling there for it to burn, Watermoth thought.
Collins said, “We’re almost to your field office. Anything you want to say while Ryman can’t hear you?”
“Not much to say. The DEA won’t give us much on him or his function in the SWATters exactly. And Molly Lee seems to be a ghost.”
“We asked everyone we can think of. No one knows much about her other than the fact she lived there.”
Watermoth shrugged.
She asked, “And you’re sure your guys found nothing at Portman’s house?”
“Nothing. House was empty. Ramas claimed that his wife left him. Not too long ago.”
“And where’s she?”
“I told you. She’s in Miami. With her sister.”
“Sorry, been a long day.”
“She hasn’t heard from him. She sounded worried though.”
“Have Miami PD keep an eye on her.”
Collins turned the wheel into traffic, merged into the fast lane, and glanced at the rearview mirror. Ryman was tight behind him.
“He’s good.”
“DEA. They do a lot of tailing.”
“I always thought their job was pretending to be buyers to bust drug dealers.”
