Mercy River

by Glen Erik Hamilton

  “We won’t shoot each other. And you’ll probably get away before the Feds arrive, if you haul ass.”

  He glanced at the highway without apparent anxiety. “They can’t save you, either. You’re already dead. All of you. That fat general and his tainted brood, sneaking away to hide. Perhaps my men will skin them like rabbits.”

  “You’re a fierce bunch, all right. Are those three rejects all that’s left of your army?”

  The madman actually smiled. A calm lift of the lips, like a teacher being patient with his slowest student. The closest thing to emotion I’d seen from Jaeger.

  “We are reborn,” he said. “The money we took from you means victory. Land, church, guns. Those who have strayed will return to the fold. Every warrior sent to prison finds a dozen more seeking direction. Incarceration makes fertile soil for our truth. Within a year the First Riders will be ten times as strong as we ever were. Mercy River shall know us again. They must understand the cost of their deceit.”

  “Understand like Erle? What tipped you off to him?”

  Jaeger’s smile slid away as quickly as it had arrived. My grin took up the slack.

  “You never figured out old Erle was playing both sides, did you?” I said.

  “It doesn’t matter. The scum was struck down. Just as you will be.”

  Over his shoulder, I saw the First Riders exit the rest stop. Within seconds they were running toward us across the lot, desperate to protect their leader. Jaeger noticed my divided attention.

  “I’ll be coming for you, Shaw.”

  “You won’t like what you find,” I said, and let my foot fall on the accelerator.

  Forty-Six

  Jaeger hadn’t suspected Erle, or killed him. That theory had been superficially confirmed with Constable Wayne Beacham’s suicide note, but now that I’d heard it directly from Jaeger himself, other guesses and facts started arranging themselves into a neater order. The picture they formed had me rethinking Beacham’s role in Erle’s death.

  Those notions kept me occupied for the rest of the drive, and even kept my mind off my bruised chest cavity. At least Jaeger would be similarly distracted. The possibility that I’d called in an anonymous sighting on a wanted fugitive at a rest stop on Highway 26 would force the son of a bitch to backtrack and seek another road into Griffon County.

  My body wasn’t the only thing ailing. The Dodge had begun making a rattling sound on each acceleration. Maybe ignition timing, maybe a valve problem. My truck had over two hundred thousand miles on the odometer, a number I’d added a fair chunk to over the past week.

  Mercy River had subsided to its normal drowsy rhythms. Happy hour on a Friday night added only a few more cars cruising the streets. The reader board at the school touted bingo 5:30, and townspeople were already drifting into the gym.

  The inn was even more abandoned than the roads. Most of the room lights were extinguished, including those behind one specific window on the third floor. I made my way around the building and picked the lock of the rear door to walk quietly up the back stairwell.

  I didn’t know for certain that Daryll had kept his room. But the big man seemed to live at the inn, and I doubted he’d found new accommodations. I stepped lightly down the hall and unlocked the door.

  Still his. Tomato juice and protein powder waiting in vain on the dresser, closet full of triple-XL clothes.

  No huge duffels full of weapons, however. Damn. I had hoped that Fain’s team hadn’t taken everything for the score in Seattle. If it came down to a fight with Jaeger and his men, I wanted an M4 or at least a combat shotgun, something with more range than the Browning on my hip.

  I checked under the bed. No weapons, but I found plastic storage bins full of a granular powder, and boxes of clay pigeons. I realized the powder must be the phosphorescent explosive they’d made for their shotgun targets. Volatile stuff. It might come in handy. I washed a canister of protein powder down Daryll’s sink and filled the canister full of the sand-like mix.

  Behind the dead man’s hanging clothes, I found a leather carrying case with what was certainly a rifle inside and unzipped it eagerly. I nearly laughed out loud with disappointment. The rifle was a bolt-action Remington with mossy camouflage finish. Not even a scope. The Remington would be great for plinking cans at long distance or hunting for venison, but unsuited for modern warfare.

  Beggars and choosers. The rifle was empty. I zipped the case closed and searched the room for .30-06 rounds, only to be let down again. Nothing.

  At least I knew where to find plenty of ammunition. Erle’s Gun Shop. I slipped out the back of the inn with my new rifle and the canister of flash-bang.

  I’d expected the gun shop to be as quiet as the rest of the dead-end road, but as the Dodge rattled to a stop, the door opened and the lean form of Henry Gillespie, Esquire, stepped out of the windowless store. Crap. He motioned to me, and I joined him.

  “Would have thought you’d left town,” he said, shaking my hand.

  “I did. Events brought me back.”

  “Ah. Wayne’s funeral, I expect.” His jowly face clouded. “A terrible thing. I still can’t understand it. How is Susan?”

  I figured Dez would want me to give a publicly acceptable response to her husband’s death. “She’s holding up.”

  “Of course.”

  He stepped aside and ushered me into the shop. With all the lights on—and the bloodstains gone—it was close to welcoming inside.

  Paulette stood near the worktables, removing items from the pegboard and adding them to orderly piles in front of her. She wore a white-and-gold sweatshirt with the image of Dolly Parton today instead of the Man in Black. She laughed at the sight of me.

  “Look who it is,” she said.

  Gillespie’s head pivoted between us. “You two know one another?”

  “He’s my protégé in the custodial arts.”

  An elderly man sat in Erle’s office chair. His wizened frame made Gillespie’s seem robust by comparison. The clear plastic tube of an oxygen tank looped under his nose and led down to a shoulder bag beside him on the chair. There was room for both the tank and his narrow butt on the chair, with inches to spare.

  “Van Shaw, this is Bob Bell,” said Gillespie.

  “Erle’s cousin?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said. “Pleasure to meet you.”

  “Bob and I are trying to determine what to do with all this,” Gillespie said, sweeping an arm around the room. “To hold a sale or take a job lot offer from another dealer.”

  “That’s why I came by, to see if the shop was open,” I said, lying only a fraction. “I need some ammunition.”

  Bob Bell’s shrug was as light as the flutter of a butterfly. “Whatever you like.”

  I found a box of .30-06 on the shelves behind the counter and brought it forward.

  “Don’t mind selling any and all of it, if you’ve a mind,” Bell said to me.

  “You’re not keeping the shop?”

  He gave a wheezing laugh. “Can’t run things myself. Henry here doesn’t care for guns.”

  “Maybe you found yourself a buyer, Bob,” said Paulette, nudging me. “Go on. Bidding starts at a dollar.”

  “What about family?” I said. “They could run it for you.”

  “Hardly any left. Just my boy—my foster son. He’s a busy fellow, working with his Army friends here and everything.”

  A son with the Rally. A local, and a Ranger too, I could assume.

  Oh boy.

  I was suddenly gaining a new perspective on recent events in Mercy River.

  “Your son looks after you,” I said to Bell, “over in Grant County?”

  Paulette nodded. “I told you Erle’s cousin lived there.”

  “My boy makes the time somehow,” said Bell.

  “And I’ll bet he came to see you while he was on leave from the Rangers, too,” I fished.

  Gillespie was back to gazing at me oddly.

  “That’s right,” Bell said. �
��I’m proud of him. Served his country and he volunteers here to boot. Better to help young Army families than my old carcass.”

  I placed a fifty on the counter. Bell waved, barely removing his hand from the armrest.

  “Take the bullets. I meant what I said. Everything must go.”

  My private tour of Erle’s garage popped into my head.

  “I need a car,” I said. “My truck out there is about down for the count.” I couldn’t have the Dodge giving out on me at a bad moment.

  “Erle did have a couple of vehicles,” Bell said. “I’ll beat Blue Book price on ’em.”

  Paulette encompassed every sly thing in the world in her grin.

  “I expect I know which vehicle our friend here would like,” she said.

  I expected I knew, too.

  Forty-Seven

  Twilight edged the sky toward its tipping point. Dark enough that, from my vantage on the crest of the long hill two hundred yards above General Macomber’s house, I could make out the shapes of amber lampshades behind drawn curtains. But still light enough that fingers of smoke drifting from the chimney of his little cave-like dwelling showed white against the black asphalt of the road beyond.

  No shadows passed the windows. Macomber wasn’t fool enough to expose himself. The more I considered the house, the more its inviting glow seemed like just that—an invitation.

  I switched my focus to the hillside itself. Judging which outcroppings of rock and clumps of scrubby trees might offer the best cover, the best angles.

  One spot stood out, about halfway down the slope. A squat boulder had rolled down the hill on some long-ago day and been trapped in a copse of pine trees, which had grown around and over the rock. Not only did the boulder and trees offer a good line of sight to the rear and side of Macomber’s house, it was a few quick steps from another rocky prominence with better coverage of the front of the house and the road. That would be my choice, if I aimed to keep watch.

  I retreated behind the hill and made my careful way along its crest, until I’d gone far enough to risk another look. The boulder was below me now, off to the right. No longer visible in the growing dark and with the thick scrub in the way. But the pine trees above it marked the spot. I tightened the strap of the rifle case over my back and crawled over the crest of the hill.

  The surface was more dirt than loose rock, which helped to silence my movements as I moved slowly down the slope. Thickets of brush made good cover. Belly-flat and face-first down the hill, like a spider. The angle actually eased the constant throb in my chest a little, encouraging new blood flow into the clotted bruise. I stopped every few feet to listen.

  Perhaps half an hour had elapsed since I’d started my descent. Slow enough progress that the chirrup of crickets around me never ceased. No hurry at all. If I was right about my guess, and too hasty to confirm it, I might catch a bullet in the head as a prize.

  Twenty yards from the boulder, I heard a shift of boot on sand. Someone adjusting their position for comfort. I waited, the minutes stretching out. The sound didn’t reoccur. Whoever it was, they were good at keeping silent. But not as good as me.

  I inched forward. Ten feet away now. I lay in a short ditch. A worm’s-eye view. Close enough that the shapes of the trees and the boulder were distinct against the night sky. And the man. I clocked him as he turned, a skull-crusher harness on his head holding his night vision in place, the goggle of the NOD like a stunted horn.

  It wouldn’t be Macomber or the wounded Fain taking watch, and this guy didn’t have enough hair to be Zeke Caton.

  “Rigo,” I whispered.

  A scrape and a thump, as he hit the deck. He didn’t speak.

  “Hold your fire,” I said. “It’s Shaw.”

  “The fuck?” his harsh whisper came back. “Show yourself.”

  I raised my hands above the ditch. “Peace.” A soft click as Rigo adjusted his opticals to get a look at me in the darkness. He spat out a string of impassioned and impressive curses.

  “You’ve got a damn death wish, Shaw. I could have blown your head off.”

  The reverse was also true, and we both knew it.

  “I want to talk to you,” I said.

  “You snuck up on me for a conversation? You’re warped.”

  “Watching the house for Jaeger was my original plan, but you got here first.”

  Rigo hummed assent. “The enemy of my enemy is a friend, that it?”

  “That depends on who you think the bad guys are.”

  He shifted his position to watch the house. His whispered answer, when it came, was all the softer from him being turned away. “Not you. The captain shouldn’t have burned you, Shaw. It was wrong.”

  Rigoberto wasn’t his usual taciturn self. Maybe it was being away from the group, or being in the dark. Or he was keyed up for the coming fight.

  “I gave Fain hell about it,” he said. “Never yelled at an officer before. But that doesn’t make up for leaving you there. Is Pak okay?”

  “Yeah. I cut him loose, him and his girl.”

  “Jesus.” He said it like he was giving thanks. “I been checking the news. We didn’t get anybody killed in Seattle.”

  “I know.”

  “I’ve been holding on tight to that fact. I was a cop. Once. And now I’m the guy shooting at cops. Not to take them down, but how the fuck would they have known that? Daryll’s dead. Fain damn near. He won’t go to the hospital. And we left brothers behind. Worst day of my life, Shaw. Worse than Nangarhar or even Tangi Valley. No damn question.”

  “But you haven’t left.”

  A moment passed. “You’re here, too, man. Is that just to save your own skin?”

  “No.”

  “What, then? Not to back us up.”

  “Is the plan to kill Jaeger when he approaches the house?”

  “Snake rears its head, you have to cut it off.” Rigo said it so fast, I wondered if he had been repeating the thought like a mantra. “Right?”

  I didn’t have an answer for that, either. The former police officer, trying to stay on the side of the good guys any way he could. Talking himself into crossing a point of no return.

  “Are Fain and the others in the house?” I said.

  “Ready to light it up. Macomber, too, if it comes to it.”

  “When you change shifts, I’ll go down with you.”

  He finally turned away from the road. “You’re not killing Fain. No matter what he did to you, we will stop that shit cold.”

  “I’m not here for Fain, either. I have to talk to your team about something else. And I need your help.”

  I laid it out for him. The swearing Rigo had done before was nothing compared to what came out of his mouth now. But he listened.

  Forty-Eight

  General Macomber let Rigo and me in through the sliding glass door.

  “Sergeant,” he said, flat-footed at the sight of me. “Unpredictable as always.”

  We walked into the dining room of the house, where an assortment of shotguns and pistols were laid out on bath towels on the oval table. The metal barrels glinted under the teardrop lights of the hanging chandelier.

  Zeke carried a CamelBak filled with water, ready for his watch on the hill.

  “What the fuck is Shaw doing here?” he said.

  “An alliance, I hope,” Fain said from his seat in the overstuffed easy chair, his words hardly audible over the spruce logs crackling softly in the fire next to him.

  “We could use good news,” Macomber agreed. The old bear moved a little more slowly than usual. The fringe of hair around his ears was unkempt.

  “I ran into Jaeger and three of his men on the highway,” I said. “He’ll assume I called the FBI on him.”

  Fain hummed thoughtfully. “Then he’ll be forced to take back roads to get here. And he’ll be even more cautious.” If the general was tired, Fain appeared six long steps past that. The waxy tone of his skin had jaundiced.

  “You let Jaeger go? Again?” Zeke l
ooked at the general. “We don’t need this pussy.”

  “Yeah, we do,” Rigo said, handing his carbine with its night scope to Zeke. “It could be days before Jaeger makes a move. We can’t cover the house in two shifts and stay sharp.”

  “That’s Daryll’s deer rifle,” Fain said as I set the leather carrying case on the table. “Where did you get that?”

  “From his room. I didn’t think he’d mind my aiming it at Jaeger.”

  “A good choice if you’re defending covered wagons.” At death’s door, Fain had acquired a sense of humor. Their team was full of new tricks tonight.

  “Jaeger might decide Mercy River is too hot and change his destination,” I said. “He’s also after your family, General. Are they still with relatives?”

  “Yes. But not at their home.”

  “You can’t assume that’s enough. Jaeger has time and plenty of money. If he can’t find your family himself, he can bribe someone who can. Or hire people to track them, if they’re on the move and using credit cards or bank machines. It’s not difficult.”

  “I’ll call them,” Macomber said. “Make sure they know what to do. In the meantime, our best chance to take Jaeger is here, on home ground. I appreciate your coming here to warn us.”

  “I also wanted to ask you some questions.”

  “I got to get into position,” Zeke said, headed for the back door.

  “Hold up. You’ll want to be here for this.” I turned to Fain. “That morning Erle was shot. You and Zeke met at the coffeehouse when it opened. You saw Constable Wayne up at the top of the dead-end road.”

  “Those aren’t questions,” Fain said.

  “Then Erle texted to say the coast was clear.”

  “Yes, dammit.”

  “Did you read the text?”

  He started to answer, then stopped and thought again. “No. But I was there when Zeke’s phone beeped.”

  “Okay. So Zeke received a text, and walked up to the road, but by then Henry Gillespie was bending Wayne’s ear. Yeah?” I prompted Zeke.

  “That’s right,” he said.