Death Roe

by Joseph Heywood

  “Vehicle’s back in the trees,” he told McCants. “Let’s call the Troops, get backup. He’s not the most stable individual in the world.”

  “Fuck the Troops,” she said, getting out. “This is personal. Let’s do a front-back,” she said. “I’ll yell at the house, see what he does.”

  Service knew better than to argue with her and got into position behind the house.

  He heard McCants shouting out front. “Koski, we know you’re in there!” Service heard the crack of a bullet followed by its sonic boom, and his first thought: Candi. Then, Fuck, that was at me!

  He dropped to the ground and fumbled for his SIG-Sauer. Seconds later he heard a crash, another shot, and a lot of cursing. He got up and charged the house with his light in hand.

  McCants had Koski on the floor and was pummeling him, the man holding his cuffed hands above him to protect himself. Service grabbed her by the collar and pulled her away.

  “Fucking psycho bitch!” Koski screamed.

  They called the county to tell them they were transporting a prisoner to Escanaba. Service helped McCants blot the blood off her face. The cut was beginning to coagulate.

  They put Koski in the front seat and strapped him in. Service rearranged her gear and squeezed into the backseat of her truck.

  “We should have driven the Willys, cuffed him with the loose hooks,” Service said.

  “Well, we didn’t,” McCants said.

  “I’m just saying.”

  “Don’t fucking second-guess me.”

  “We should let the deps haul him in.”

  “Bullshit! It’s my job, he’s my prisoner. Fucking psycho bitch?” she said to Koski, letting out a grunt. She reached over and thumped him with her finger on the side of his head, making him wince.

  “Candi.”

  “I didn’t hurt the asshole. Maybe if you paid more attention to things, this sort of shit wouldn’t happen.”

  What the hell was she talking about? “You’re not making any sense.”

  “Right; you’re the only one who knows all the answers.”

  The truck swerved. “Keep your eyes on the road,” he said.

  “I mean, what’s so damn difficult about taking care of the people you care about?” she said. “My goddamn heart is coming apart and you don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Youse guys need privacy, youse can just drop me off anywhere along here,” Koski said.

  “Shut the fuck up!” McCants shrieked, and Koski flinched.

  Passing through Rapid River, Koski got up the nerve to talk again. “Youse two like an item, or what?”

  Grady Service jabbed the man in the back of his head with the heel of his hand.

  After getting the man fingerprinted and processed, McCants cleaned her head. The cut wasn’t bad. They got two butterflies from the jail’s first-aid room, closed the wound, and stopped at an all-night coffee joint on Ludington Street, Escanaba’s main drag.

  “You knew it was a bear,” she said, after sipping her decaf.

  “The sound wasn’t right. I didn’t know it was a bear, but I thought maybe it wasn’t a man.”

  “You should have told me.”

  “You moved too fast.”

  “How fucking long are you supposed to wait?”

  “I’d wait to see a silhouette or something.”

  “I’m not talking about Koski,” she said.

  “You handled him good.”

  “Not that asshole. Us. I can’t keep my mind on the damn job because of you, and I tell you we’re not working out, and you don’t have a damn thing to say, one way or the other.”

  “You’re still pumped on adrenaline.”

  “Goddamn right I am.”

  “I think we’re doing okay,” he said reluctantly.

  “There’s a huge difference between thinking and knowing, Grady, and if you don’t know that, you’re clueless. I’ll drop you at your truck, and then maybe we need to take a time-out.”

  He was smart enough to know that there was no acceptable response to this, and he kept his mouth shut and drank his coffee.

  They were in the truck leaving Escanaba when his cell phone rang.

  “You’re going to like this call,” Roy Rogers said. “Vandeal reported in with his lawyer today. Fagan didn’t. The judge will give his lawyer until Monday to get him in.”

  “That just just gives him three more days to run,” Service said, clicking the phone shut.

  “Bad news?” McCants asked.

  “The last year or so, it’s been nothing but,” he said.

  78

  Monday, September 12, 2005

  MARQUETTE, MARQUETTE COUNTY

  Zhenya Leukonovich called. “After Fagan went AWOL, Mr. U.S. Attorney Manny Florida went ballistic. He accused New York of malfeasance and they accused him of professional incompetence. It took ten days for the accusations and counter-allegations to stop and to get the FBI on the case. As expected, they traced Fagan to Costa Rica. Mr. Florida and the Bureau were in the process of seeking extradition when Costa Rican officials called and announced Mr. Fagan was in their custody and the U.S. could come claim him at its earliest convenience.”

  “Did they say why they grabbed him?”

  “He was implicated in a conspiracy involving unspecified environmental felonies. Apparently you can murder anyone except a politician in Costa Rica and they will make extradition difficult, but their environment and ecotourism are sacrosanct. Mr. Fagan is not the class of immigrant they seek. Technically the charge against him is purchasing property without being a resident, or even having filed paperwork toward that end. Astonishing, yes?”

  “I guess it sucks to be Fagan,” Service said, grinning. Apparently del Rio had been listening during their meeting; he was pretty sure the case reports he sent had sealed the deal. “Are they fetching him now?”

  “The U.S. Marshals Service has been given the task. Mr. Fagan will arrive in Miami September fifteenth, where New York personnel will take possession. Zhenya finds it most sad to reach the conclusion of this case. She grew attached to the resort and company. Perhaps we will have another opportunity for collaboration.”

  “Never say never.”

  “Of course. Never is a theoretical and rhetorical construct with no statistical basis, the equivalent of proving a negative or a totally motionless object.”

  “Took the words right out of my mouth.” He had no idea what she was talking about, but Z was Z and he truly liked her. Didn’t understand her, but liked her and had learned to trust her.

  As soon as he hung up he called a travel agent and got all the times for Costa Rica arrivals in Miami. There were four flights, spread out over the course of the fifteenth. He booked a flight for the fourteenth, despite the travel agent’s vehement warnings about hurricanes. He understood her concern: Katrina had struck Louisiana and Mississippi less than two weeks earlier, and the media were still gagging out post-storm horror stories.

  79

  Thursday, September 15, 2005

  MIAMI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA

  The travel agent booked a room for him at the Miami International Airport Hotel. A room with a king-size bed was a hundred and fifty bucks, but he didn’t care. The hotel was inside Terminal E, right at the airport, which made it convenient. He flew in on the fourteenth, checked into his room, and went down to the lobby bar to sit among the travelers and the potted palms. He sat at the bar and was joined by a woman who introduced herself as Gal Sal, a forty-something realtor, and borderline anorexic. She matched him Jack for Jack, and smoke for smoke

  “How do you make your living?” Gal Sal asked.

  “Professional observer.”

  She eyed him suspiciously. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard that o
ne.”

  “I get paid to watch things, report whether they go right or wrong. You know, the way the Indians always had a few guys sit out the battle to watch what happened and carry the news back to the tribe?”

  “Indians down this way,” the woman said, “Semen-Holes? I heard they fought us white people to a standstill. Me, I’m from Long Island. What do I know from Indians? What’s the most interesting thing you’ve seen?”

  “I once watched a wolf mother teach her pups to dance.”

  She grinned. “Yeah, what dance?”

  He shrugged. “I’m from Michigan. What do I know from dances?”

  “You make cars in Michigan.”

  “Fewer and fewer.”

  “Japs,” she said touching her glass to his.

  “Real estate, eh?”

  “The most precious money can buy: Me.”

  “You sell it?”

  “Technically, I suppose it’s more of a short-term lease.”

  “Tough job,” he said.

  “Better than my last one. I flew Blackhawks in Desert Storm. The government paid me so it could fuck me over. I decided to become an independent contractor. Pays a whole lot more and the working conditions are better. You want to observe what I get paid for?”

  Service liked Gal Sal. “I’ll have to pass.”

  He woke up the next morning with a slight headache, showered, shaved, and went to find the Transportation Security Administration office. He talked his way in to see a shift supervisor named Wagner, showed his badge and credentials, explained what he wanted.

  “Extraditees are taken to a holding cell in the security holding area we call Gitmo North. They stay there until their forwarding flight, but you can’t get in without specific authorization, which we can’t grant. But you can wait outside.” Supervisor Wagner had the air of a package expediter.

  Fagan came in on the third Costa Rica flight of the day. The marshals escorted him down the hall to Gitmo North. Thirty minutes later Roy Rogers and another man came out with Fagan cuffed and in tow. Rogers’s jaw dropped when he saw Service, who walked up to Fagan and blocked his way.

  Fagan had a full head of hair, a short, compact man with a perpetual sneer and dark eyes that served more as a mask than lenses. “Refugio Seguro,” Service said. “Guess it wasn’t either.”

  “Who the fuck are you?” Fagan asked.

  “A friend of Roxanne Lafleur. When you get inside I’m going to make sure the fudge-packers give you a proper welcome and a lot of attention.”

  Fagan looked at ECO Roy Rogers. “Who is this asshole?”

  Grady Service smiled and walked away. This wasn’t the outcome he wanted, but it would have to do. Closure was closure.

  Rogers caught up to him. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

  “I bet.”

  “We got a call from a woman named del Rio. She knew everything about Fagan. How do you suppose that happened?”

  Service shrugged. The two men touched fists and Service watched them lead Quintan Fagan down the hall. The judge had given him eighty-seven months. His failure to report would add a couple of years, which potentially could keep him out of circulation for almost a decade. It was a lousy trade for a life, but it was something.

  His flight back to Detroit wasn’t until the next morning. Gal Sal was in the lobby bar on the same stool where he’d left her last night. “Observe anything today?” she asked.

  “A miracle,” he said.

  “That’s cool,” Gal Sal said. “Way cool.”

  “You?”

  “No miracles in my business,” she said.

  80

  Tuesday, October 18, 2005

  SLIPPERY CREEK CAMP

  Karylanne was back in school, but had skipped classes from Friday through Tuesday and brought the baby over for the weekend, escorted by Shark and Limey and Gus. McCants was also there, as was Newf and her twelve very active pups, which looked wolflike enough to be purebreds. He hadn’t seen Cat in days.

  Grady Service loved having all the animals around, despite the bedlam. One night he sat down and figured the animals would probably grow to an average weight of a hundred pounds each, which meant he’d have to feed more than a half-ton of eager, active canines daily. The cost wasn’t a concern. SuRo Genova had identified a wolf-dog sanctuary in Wisconsin to take all of the animals, and he had arranged through Marschke to provide a substantial grant to the sanctuary, not just for his animals, but for the entire operation, enough to secure the place’s future for at least five years.

  The Fagan-Piscova case was done, but some loose ends remained.

  Early that morning he’d driven to Limpy Allerdyce’s isolated compound in southwest Marquette County.

  “Youse ain’t been around much,” the old poacher said.

  “Been busy. I ran into Honeypat.”

  “Youse fuck ’er?” Allerdyce asked without a pause.

  The old man was disgusting.

  “Nah,” Limpy said quickly. “Youse’re da Boy Scout. Told youse I din’t do nuttin’ to her. I changed my ways.”

  There was a time when he’d suspected that Limpy had murdered Honeypat. He did not apologize for having entertained that thought, but owed it to the old man to let him know he now knew he’d told the truth.

  Visit to Limpy complete, he returned to Slippery Creek and placed a call to Benny Baranov, who answered the phone on the second ring.

  “Baranov.”

  “Grady Service, Benny. You’re not out fishing?”

  “I have been for early steelhead once or twice. I have had interview for job as caretaker for rich man’s property close to Onaway. I am finalist. I gave your name as personal reference.”

  Service started to complain, but stopped himself. His gut told him that Benny was a good guy pushed to desperation, doing the best he could, given his circumstances. “That’s good. I hope you get it. Did the ticket disappear?”

  “Yes, no problem.”

  “I thought you’d want to know that Vandeal and his boss are both in prison. Our report-all-poaching operation sometimes pays rewards for information leading to arrests and convictions. I put you in for a reward. I can’t guarantee you’ll get anything, and if you do, it won’t be large, but it’s our way of saying thank you.”

  He heard Benny’s voice catch. “Spasibo.”

  “Let me know if you get that new job, and take care of those girls.”

  “Yes, of course. I have your card.”

  Service hung up and felt pleasure. Dropping Benny’s ticket and not confiscating his equipment had turned out to be one of the smartest moves he’d ever made.

  He sat with Little Mar in his lap. She frowned as she looked up at him with her huge blue eyes.

  The puppies were all trying to gang up on Cat, who had reappeared and was on her hind legs and angrily smacking at them. “Dammit, Newf, get your kids under control.”

  One of the puppies, the largest male in the litter, wriggled up to Service’s leg and put his head next to the baby. “I guess you’ve got a fan,” he told his granddaughter.

  Newf looked at the cat and her pups and showed no interest in intervening in the fracas.

  The baby reached up to touch her grandfather’s chin.

  “Geez-o-Peto,” Shark said. “Youse’re cryin’ like a little girl, Grady!”

  “Yalmer,” Limey Pyykkonen said in a shrill whisper, “will you ever learn to keep your mouth shut?”

  It was warm, in the high seventies, the tail end of Indian summer. Winter would soon arrive and the long, brutally cold months would begin. The love of his life was dead, as was his son. Roxanne Lafleur was dead. Fagan and Vandeal were in prison, and he would retain the U.P. as his responsibility. He still had all his friends. He and Candi were no longer an item
, but their friendship would survive—he hoped. Most important, he had Karylanne, whom he considered his daughter, and he had Little Mar. Grady Service looked down at his granddaughter, and for the first time in a year and a half, felt nearly at peace. Everything is perfect, he told himself.

  “Bampy?” his almost ten-month-old granddaughter said loudly, enthusiastically, and clearly, with perfect enunciation.

  Well, almost everything.