***
It took a couple of hours to get the bunker tidied up and fit for human occupation notwithstanding my having to completely rattle snake-proof every square inch of our living space. I went through the motions to appease Amy as she stood on the ladder to observe. Amazingly, there was cellular telephone coverage thanks to a series of towers the government had installed in rural parts of the province over the last decade. I pulled a pair of small Nokia boxes out from inside one of the lockers and tossed one to Amy.
“Pay-as-you-go cell phones,” I said, ripping open my box. “They’re already set up with about four hours of talk time each. You’ll use yours to keep in touch with me if anything happens.”
She arched an eyebrow. “What kind of anything are we talking about?”
I grunted as I slipped the battery in the back and pressed the small red button powering the phone. “I think you’ve got a pretty good idea of the kind of shit we’re in, Amy. That phone is for your safety – I don’t want you calling anyone but me on it. I’m texting you my number, once you’ve got it, save it to speed dial.”
She blinked a couple of times and did as I instructed. So far, Amy hadn’t been a drag on things and that was a pleasant surprise given that I normally prefer working alone. She hadn’t once complained about her treatment despite the fact that she was basically a captive of my shitty situation, and she’d gone out of her way to be helpful. Christ, it was almost like having a sidekick … almost. She didn’t have a clue about who or what I truly was, and outside of the gunplay inside my flat – any reasonably sane person would have bolted the moment they saw someone pull out a gun, but not Amy. She seemed to be tough as nails, a quality I admire in people, and that got me thinking: why hadn’t she run?
I poured a cup of coffee from an aluminum percolator and sat down at the end of the small folding table. Amy held her mug of coffee between both hands and blew on it.
“You could have bolted and you didn’t.” I said as I fished a cigarette out of the package. “It doesn’t add up.”
She raised her eyes up from her mug and said, “What doesn’t add up? You told me I had to go with you, remember? You said the cops would be looking for me after your little shootout.”
I gulped down a mouthful of coffee and grimaced. It was bitter and about three times too strong, but at least it was hot. The temperature is always about ten degrees cooler when you’re next to the Atlantic Ocean. Hiding out in a damp concrete bunker drops it a further ten or so degrees.
“True, but I wasn’t holding a gun to your head – you could have tried to some distance between us. You could have gone straight to the cops and ratted me out – how come you didn’t?”
She fiddled with the handle of her mug, all the while avoiding my gaze. “You aren’t a bad person, Reaper. You might be involved in some shady dealings and maybe what you do to pay your bills can be violent and terrifying, but you aren’t a stone-cold killer. You have a good heart and all the rough exterior stuff, well, it’s not the real you. I can see the real you and I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t know that Tim Reaper or whatever the hell your real name is wasn’t someone who genuinely tries to do the right thing.”
Amy thought I had a good heart? That took me by surprise – I’m not exactly a shining beacon of tolerance and understanding. I took another swig of my coffee and then glanced at my watch. I was no further ahead in dealing with either Father Butler’s killer or the reason he’d sought me out in the first place.
“It’s getting late,” I said, pulling out my cell phone. “I’m going up top to give the one person who can probably exonerate me from that priest’s murder a call. You might as well get some sleep.”
She nodded and reached for my hand which I pulled away at the last second. I liked this girl, probably a bit too much. I didn’t want her to come within a whisker of knowing my true nature and though we’d been intimate the night before – that was sex. Whatever has happening between Amy and me beneath the cold concrete of my bunker was something else entirely.
“Hey … it’s okay, Reaper,” she said soothingly. “I know you’re probably not the kind of guy who wants to get too close to a woman.”
I relaxed my hand for a moment. I looked into her eyes and what I saw was warmth and compassion and a softness that made me want to forget about the shit storm I’d dragged both Amy and Sparks into.
“I don’t drop my guard, Amy … it’s hard for me to- “
She gave my hand a tight squeeze and smiled warmly. “And it’s hard for me, Reaper,” she said in a voice that was filled with honesty. “But I want to make you a promise, okay?”
I nodded slowly. “Okay … what kind of promise.”
She climbed out of her chair and pulled me up to my feet. I was surprised at how easily I followed her lead and in seconds I was standing in front of her, gazing into her incredible eyes. She placed both hands on my face and pulled me against her lips, kissing me softly. I kissed her back as my hands found their way to her waist.
“I promise that you are a good man, Reaper,” she said softly. “And I promise that whatever secrets you might be carrying beneath all those layers and layers of self-protective armour, they’re safe with me. I’m not going anywhere … got it?”
“Got it,” I said, even though a big part of me was torn between wanting the girl to run like hell from me and wanting her to stay. “Maybe you should hit the hay – I’m going to make that call.”
“Alright,” she said, squeezing my hand again. “Maybe I’ll get a good night’s sleep, who knows?”
“Yeah, Amy … who knows?” I replied.
***
I sat on a cold granite boulder atop the bunker, the moon bathing the entire forest in a soft blue glow. I had just gotten through the craziest day I’d experienced since I crossed over, and for me, that’s saying a lot. All around were the sounds of the night, as a chill breeze blew off the ocean carrying a faint hint of rain. I didn’t bother lighting a cigarette and instead, I punched Carol Spark’s cell number into my pay-as-you-go. It rang twice and then she answered.
“Hey, Sparks,” I said wearily. I could almost hear her teeth grating together.
“One second,” she answered in a sharp voice. In the background I could hear what sounded like a bus passing by followed by a slamming car door and then silence. “Okay – I can talk now. Before you say one stinking word, I want to know why we found Emil Vachon along with two other men all shot in the freaking kneecaps and one guy with a knife stuck in his left eye all at your flat.”
I sighed heavily. “Yeah, Sparks, about that … I took in a wayward working girl last night because her pimp was going to cut up her pretty little face. He didn’t take a liking to it, so he brought back-up to my place. They had every intention of killing her and, well, trying to kill me, but I kind of beat them to the punch.”
“You sure as shit did, Reaper,” she grumbled. “Don’t make plans on getting back into your flat any time soon because our forensics people are scouring every inch of the place after they saw you on the security cameras at the Archdiocese office. Where the hell are you, anyway?”
“A safe house that’s off the grid. So I’m the number one suspect, then?”
“Oh, ya think?” she said, her voice oozing with sarcasm. “The city police and the Mounties are looking for you. Christ, it’s only a matter of time until the powers that be start poking their collective noses into my business because they know that I’ve been in contact with you in the past. When that happens, I’ll be officially fucked. Now what the hell are you going to do about it?”
This time I did fish out a cigarette. I lit it and breathed in a mouthful of smoke. “It might be the guy who shot at us two nights ago. I have a theory he’s same person who whacked the padre so I have an interest in finding him. Since I don’t have a clue who the shooter is, I’m probably going to have to figure out a way to draw him out into the open.”
“At what cost, Reaper?” she barked into her phone. “There was a g
unfight at your bloody flat! Innocent bystanders could have been killed!”
I grunted. “Yeah … oh, I’ve got someone with me, too.”
“You took a hostage?”
“No – her name is Amy. The, uh … working girl Emil Vachon was going to cut up. She’s still with me.”
Sparks started to chuckle. She chuckled so hard that it eventually morphed into a fit of near maniacal laughter. “I don’t fucking believe this,” she snorted. “Every cop in the province is looking for you and you’re holed up with a freaking hooker!”
I felt my temperature begin to rise and I took a deep breath because Sparks sounded heartbreakingly close to cutting me loose – that or coming after me herself. “It’s not like that, Carol,” I said trying to keep the anger out of my voice. “I’m not hiding away and getting my rocks off – I’m protecting her because whoever the shooter is would have eventually found and killed her to get to me. I didn’t have a freaking choice in the matter – she’s with me because she’s got nowhere else to go.”
The line went silent for a moment and then Sparks said, “Okay – that much makes sense. But surely you know that she’s in more danger the longer she’s with you, right?”
“Yeah – but at least if she’s with me I can protect her. It’s all I’ve got right now, Sparks – I’m nearly running on empty here. Have you any new information on either Butler’s killer or the dead angels?”
“Yes and no,” she said. “We’ve learned that whoever killed the priest shot him with the same caliber ammunition as was used at the cemetery. The rifle we found in the crypt was clean – the serial number was filed off and there were no prints. The nine millimeter slugs they found embedded in the cement can easily be traced to your guns and that’s another reason why I’m under suspicion myself – it won’t be long until they link the rounds found at the crypt to the ones in your frigging flat.”
Damn. I felt like a puppet on a string and I silently cursed the day Father Butler decided to drop that stupid envelope containing the angel’s feather into my mail slot. I banged the cell phone against my forehead as I tried to think of who the shooter might be and all I could come up with was Dane Woollcott’s description of a short, bald man in a grey suit with horned-rimmed glasses, and how I didn’t know anyone who looked like that.
“The facts are these, Sparks,” I began. “Someone is after me. An attempted hit on me and a dead priest all tells me this guy is linked to the Church. I think he’s trying to kill me to keep me out of this investigation. It’s the only explanation I can think of. I gotta smoke him out, Sparks, and that means I need your help.”
The phone hissed and popped for a moment and for half a second, I thought that I might lose the connection. “What’s your plan, Reaper?” she said sounding altogether frustrated.
I took another drag off my cigarette. “I’m off the grid and that means that whoever the shooter is will probably start tailing you in hopes of finding me. I want you to lead the guy here and -.”
She cut me off. “You want to use me as bait? Perfect! Hell, I might as well paint a target on my forehead!”
“It ain’t original, Carol,” I said. “But at least it’s a plan. Will you do this for me?”
“Do I have a freaking choice?” she groaned. “Where do you want me to lead the guy?”
I hesitated for a moment because I knew that Sparks was at her wit’s end and I needed her right now more than anything. “Near Three Fathom Harbour, eleven o’clock tomorrow morning. Head up grid road twenty-three for about two miles and then stop when you get to the old granite quarry. Stay in your car and if there’s any shooting, I want you to hightail it out of there.”
“And if he doesn’t show?” she asked.
“He’ll show – you’re his best hope of finding me, and when he gets here, I’m going to throw him a wee little surprise party.”
“Alright, Reaper, this better work.”
I stubbed my cigarette onto the concrete and exhaled heavily. “It’ll
work – it has to. Oh, and Sparks?”
“What?”
“Better throw on a vest just in case I’m wrong.” I said.
Sparks chuckled again and said. “You’ve been wrong since all this shit started, Reaper. Why should I expect anything less?”
17
If I was going to have any hope of ambushing the shooter, I’d have to out-stealth a seasoned professional.
Not exactly my strong suit, stealth. I’m more of a full frontal assault, both guns blazing and where the hell is my flamethrower kind of guy.
The site I’d chosen to trap the shooter was an abandoned stone quarry that had been out of business for the past twenty-five years. It was shaped by an enormous cul-de-sac with fifty-foot-tall granite walls and a bottle neck for an entrance. The bottleneck in the road was a cut-through that had been blasted in the rocks, and it stretched for about five hundred meters. If I could tie up the bottleneck with Sparks’ car, I’d be able to cover the entire area leading up to the entrance with a scoped rifle assuming he didn’t spot me. The downside, of course, would be that the shooter might want to take a shot at Sparks instead of me. It was a gamble, but I didn’t have a whole hell of a lot of choices.
Then there was the issue of what to do with Amy. It would be risky for her to accompany me to the quarry, so I decided the best thing would be for her to wait it out in Das Bunker. She’d probably protest, but she’d already been in one gun battle in the last twenty-four hours, she didn’t need to get stuck in another one.
With this in mind, I headed back inside to break the news to her. When I slid down the ladder, I noticed that she’d kept an oil lamp going and she’d slid two air mattresses together. It was still chilly inside and when I slipped out of my jeans and t-shirt and into the double sleeping bag, I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that Amy was nude. So, being the egalitarian kind of guy that I am, I took off my boxer shorts.
I slid my right arm underneath her warm skin and she stirred gently as she shifted her backside against me.
“I fell asleep,” she said with a slight yawn. “I didn’t think you’d take so long.”
“There were things to do,” I whispered, inhaling her scent. “There’s going to be things to do in the morning, too, and I need you to trust me again.”
She spun around to face me and ran her fingers along the center of my chest. “I don’t think I’d ever stopped trusting you. What do you need me to do?”
I stroked her hair and said, “I want you to stay put inside the bunker for a few hours – there’s going to be a strong chance of more gun play and I don’t want you anywhere near that.”
She nodded. “The guy who’s after you – he’s coming, isn’t he?”
“Yep – and I’m going to put a damper into his plans. He’s a pro, Amy – it’ll be too dangerous for you to be out there so it’s best you stay back.”
“How do you know he’ll come?” she asked. “How do you know he isn’t already here, for that matter?”
I shrugged. “Because he would have made his move by now – that much I’m certain. I’ve got a friend coming tomorrow – someone you can trust as much as you trust me.”
“Who is it?”
“Detective Sergeant Carol Sparks – she’s helping me on a case and she’s already been involved in one shootout with the guy. Because you and I have done a disappearing act, the logical thing for shooter-boy to do is to tail Sparks, so I’ve arranged a meet-up back at that granite quarry we passed on the way in. She’s going to block the road at a bottleneck and I’ll be hanging back ready to take him.”
“So you’re going to kill him?” she said grimly.
I shook my head. “Not if I can avoid it. I need to capture and question him – at least that’s my plan.”
“And if you don’t? Then what happens?”
I pulled her close and stroked her hair again. “I’ll take him alive, Amy. You can count on it. In the meantime, just stay inside the bunker and wait for me
– can you do that?”
“Yes,” she said with a hint of worry in her voice. “I can do that.”
***
I left Amy shortly after sunrise, and God love her, she didn’t turn it into an emotional affair.
Because I was familiar with every square mile of the terrain surrounding my safe house, I’d selected the highest point of the cut line nearest the bottleneck where Sparks would be blocking the road. It was littered with house-sized boulders that offered good cover in case there was any shooting and an unobstructed view of more than three miles of grid road. I’d be able to see the dust plume from oncoming vehicles and because time was of the essence, the shooter would have to drive up to at least a mile or so from the bottleneck if he was going to get into position for an attempted hit.
I decided the best thing for me to do would be to fight fire with fire. In this case, I was armed with a silenced Parker Hale M85 Sniper Rifle. It was accurate up to nine hundred meters and it had a wide angle scope, more than enough range for me to clip him in the leg.
An arc of grey cloud filled the sky, but thankfully the rain was holding off. There’s nothing worse than lying in wait for a target when it’s pissing buckets. I was cloaked beneath a khaki tarp just in case the heavens opened up and I’d brought a sandbag to use as an arm rest because lying in the prone position for hours on end isn’t exactly comfortable. I checked my scope just as my pay-as-you-go buzzed in my pocket so I pulled it out to read that Sparks was on her way. I reckoned I had about forty minutes until she reached me, so I munched away on a granola bar, satisfied that my perch would offer the best possible chance to take the guy out.
What I didn’t expect was another encounter with the divine. I’d just taken a last bite on my breakfast my when head started spinning. A wave of nausea splashed up my windpipe and into my throat and it was all I could do to keep myself from vomiting right then and there. The grey morning light disappeared and suddenly I was awash in blackness, as if the sky itself had learned of my plans and decided it didn’t want any part of them. The cool breeze coming off the ocean immediately ceased and within seconds, all I could hear was my breathing accompanied by the constant thrum of my heartbeat.
Immortal Remains: A Tim Reaper Novel Page 14
