“Slow?” I asked him.
“Not many people around here. Every six months or so, there’s new miners, but after they get their junkers fixed up they drove in on, they don’t do much driving until they’re leaving the area. Not much business.”
“Sorry to hear that,” I told him truthfully, because I understood being in business for yourself, and sometimes it sucked.
“Naw, it works out for me. I make enough to keep the bills paid and me in beans, bullets, and Band-Aids.”
I grinned real big when I heard that.
“Better to be a sheepdog—”
“Than one of the sheep,” he finished with a chuckle, looking me over again, before Tina and Opus running by caught both of our attention.
“Your wife?” he asked.
“Soon,” I told him, watching as her hair bounced, one hand reaching up to pin her glasses back in place with Opus running circles around her slow jog. “I have to meet the parents and officially ask for permission.”
“Congratulations, bro. Best be prepped to meet the dad.”
“Prepped for about everything, I hope,” I told him.
“Salt Lake City, you headed to PrepperCon?” he asked.
“Yeah? You going, too?” I asked, not surprised by this turn of events.
“I want to, but nobody to watch the shop. I hear there are going to be some fantastic bug-out RVs there.”
“I saw that,” I told him, thinking of the military vehicles that had been retrofitted and rebuilt to be every prepper’s wet dream of RVs. “I’ve got an RV, but nothing as hardcore as those, that’s one thing I want to see while I’m there, that and there are some authors I’d like to meet,” I admitted.
“Yeah, I hear A. American is going to be there,” Stan told me while he turned the clipboard around. On it was a filled-out estimate.
I signed it. “Me too. I’d like to get a couple books autographed,” I admitted.
“Well, I’ll get back at it,” he said, as Tina went jogging past again.
I told him that was fine and headed outside. I could hear Tina and Opus’s feet pounding the rocky ground as they made their way around the building. I waited and stretched some, feeling sore and, part of me, the part I usually ignore, wanted to join them in the run to loosen up my muscles. I shook my head at that thought, knowing this sudden health kick of mine was somewhat inspired by Tina and her influence.
“Going to join us?” she called as she came into sight.
“Not dressed for it,” I told her as Opus gave me a playful bark as if to tell me to join in the run.
“Okay, one more lap for me,” she said as she was almost around the building again.
I waited and looked out at the mountains. I don’t know how high up we were, and honestly, I didn’t know if we were still in Wyoming or part of Utah. The receipt for the hotel would tell me, but that was in the van. Still, I stretched some more, feeling the constrictive clothing I was wearing. Blue jeans, a T-shirt… real life clothing. Not like my daytime pajamas I was used to. Maybe I was changing? Engaged, ready to meet the parents and—
A gunshot crackled from a distance, the sound rolling over the hills. It sounded far off, probably somebody taking a potshot at a deer or elk, whatever they had out here.
That made me wonder if they were in season and after a moment, decided it didn’t matter. I headed back inside as Tina and Opus rounded the corner again. I held the door open as she slowed down, but Opus went running in ahead of me, turning circles till Tina walked in, brushing her hair out of her eyes.
Surprisingly, she just wiped her forehead, and that was the extent of her warmup. I know she would probably walk around a little more to make sure she wasn’t sore and properly cooled down, but she gave me a quick peck on the cheek and was watching the local news, that had looped the earlier footage.
“Did you know you and Opus made the local news?”
“I saw that,” I said, feeling a little foolish to hear the story being played out. This would be another thing she’d use to poke fun at me.
“Good thing we left when we did. Sounds like this is the biggest thing to happen to this town in a while.”
“Probably is,” I admitted. “Looks like a sleepy little mining town with one bar, a gas station, and a general store.” I flopped into a chair just as the report ended.
Tina sat on my leg and leaned back, wrapping her arm around me, pressing her cheek against mine, giving me a half hug. I squeezed her back till she made a wheezing sound and Opus was immediately there, his teeth pulling gently at the fabric of my shirt. I knew the pressure would increase till he was ripping, but as much as he was my buddy, I appreciated the fact he would go all out for Tina. I let her up, and she scooted over to get her own seat.
At least with us traveling, whoever had been trying to break into the mini-storage wouldn’t worry her, nor the guy who’d got out of prison. If anything, I was more worried about what had happened with my Mac. Which reminded me… I got my cell phone out and navigated to the TeamViewer application and started the process of logging in remotely. The cell phone service here on top of the world seemed decent, but it took forever for my computer to connect. Once I logged in, I saw nothing had been messed with, and I let out a big sigh of relief.
“Everything okay?” Tina asked me distractedly, watching a news report on the TV.
“Yeah, was just checking on my computer. Nobody has left me any creepy YouTube videos up.”
“Russians probably hacked you,” Tina said, and I looked up at her, and she caught my gaze and laughed softly. “Gotcha!”
“Brat,” I said under my breath, and Opus gave a chuff of agreement.
I checked on the files I’d uploaded that morning with the motel Wi-Fi. They were in my Dropbox folder like I thought they were. As soon as I fired up my SurfacePro, my new update with Dragon would see the files, automatically transcribe my recordings while on the road and then when I slowed down, I would edit and add the information to the manuscript. Last night had been a little too… lively. Opus had forgone the bed for a while and slept on his stomach, facing the door.
“Hey, that guy is fast,” Tina said, and I looked up to see Stan walking our way, wiping a rag across his hands.
“Only one tire needed to be replaced. The spare,” I told her as the glass door pushed open, Stan walking behind the counter.
“All set,” he said, starting to punch things up on a computer and then looked at me. “Cash or charge?”
I was about to tell him charge when my cell phone rang.
“Charge,” I mumbled pulling my wallet out of my pocket and hitting the answer button, wedged the phone on my shoulder to pull my wallet out.
“Hello?”
“…Congratulations, our records show that you’ve been selected to receive—”
I put my wallet on the counter and terminated the call.
“Telemarketer?”
“Worse,” I muttered. “Scammer.” I pulled out my card.
We said our goodbyes after paying him, and I pulled the van out and turned onto the service road. Opus didn’t feel much like sleeping but instead gave me a soft bark, letting me know he was excited or happy about something. Tina immediately babbled in baby tongue to him and rubbed his ears. I found the on-ramp within moments and was accelerating up the grade. I could see the top, but it would take a little while to get there. One thing I noticed out west, the speed limits were crazy fast. There was no way I would feel comfortable going over 80 miles an hour in the wintertime with these mountain highways potentially iced.
The van’s motor seemed to do well with the grades, and I watched the temperature gauge in some of the worst instances carefully and was doing so now, to make sure I didn’t blow a gasket as the engine downshifted and the RPMs revved as we climbed, my speed slowly peeling away. Obviously, I wasn’t the only one having an issue and put my blinker on to pass a blue van who was creeping up even slower than we were.
“We’re going to be there soon, are
n’t we?” Tina asked.
“Yep.”
“Give me your phone, it’s time for you to do a Facebook Live event.”
I groaned, but I fished the phone out of my pocket. I was glad I was wearing a hat today and had the lightweight zip-up camo hoody I used in the fall in Michigan. I knew it would be cooler in the higher elevations and was glad I’d thought to pack it. Then again, I was going to lose it a couple states south as we moved through the desert and then into Arizona.
“You ready?” Tina asked, getting my phone ready to capture the right side of my face in profile.
In truth, my fans had loved the more human side of my Facebook interactions. After the news today, I worried that situation might go viral as well. Still, if it helped me sell more books…
“Yeah babe,” I muttered, patting her on the leg.
13
Rick
Salt Lake City is breathtaking. It’s a modern city built up in what looks like a valley, surrounded by mountains. On our way in, Tina pointed out some spots to pull off for pictures, but the closer I got, the more urgently I wanted to be there.
Even with all the delays and extra stops, we were still a day early. I knew I should have called ahead of time to reserve a hotel room, but figured I wouldn’t worry about it too much. I found out the hard way that Utah is huge into prepping, and it’s more than the large Mormon population. It was a way of life, and PrepperCon was pulling in vendors and customers from all points of the compass.
I ended up getting a room that wasn’t labeled a suite, but it was a suite. Two beds, a built-in Jacuzzi tub in the middle of the room with a walkout patio with its own glass doors. It even had a kitchenette, a small apartment sized kitchen with everything needed to cook right here in the room. They hadn’t even blinked about Opus, pointing out where the dog area was for when they were outside, and reminded us to pick up after our four-legged buddy.
“Oh, wow,” Tina said turning around, taking in the view before running and flopping in the middle of the king-sized bed, the one near the patio windows.
“Yeah, this place comes with a great view,” I said, and then under my breath, “It better have, with what they’re charging for it.”
“So how long do you want to stay?” Tina asked.
“I don’t know,” I told her. “I wanted to ask you. PrepperCon is going to be a two-day thing, maybe two and a half. We still have like eight days till we need to be in Arizona. I figure it’s a ten to twelve-hour drive to your parent's house. Stay here for PrepperCon, maybe mosey down that way when we feel like it and see the sights?”
“I thought preppers were supposed to have plans? With backup plans to their plans and two is one and one is none, so you probably have three or four plans already. So, what is it?”
I hesitated for a moment or two. “Well, coming out this way was sort of your idea.”
“So, you’re going to blame your lack of planning on me?” she said, and pointed at me. “You’ve been wishy-washy. Whatever I want? What if I just want to spend time with you, doing something we will remember forever?”
“I like that plan,” I told her, crawling on the bed and stopping near her.
I was amazed, a king-sized bed is huge. Like, it could easily fit both of us sleeping starfish style. Opus could take his portion anywhere, and there’d still be room for another dog. Hmm… That thought had me smiling, and Tina took that as an invitation and rolled my way. I pulled her in close. Opus, being the furry ball of jealousy and protectiveness, took that as an invitation to leave his post near the balcony’s glass doors to come bounding across the room and jump on the bed. He pushed his snout between me and Tina, and gave us a kiss.
“Get off,” Tina said, giggling and trying to cover her face.
“Opus, come on man. You’re cutting in!” I admonished him, and he backed up, still standing on the bed, and sneezed at me.
“Ok, I know you’re not really cutting in, but you interrupted something that might have been a lot of fun!”
He let out a soft bark, knowing not to go full volume inside hotels for some reason. I’d have to ask Tina about that now that I noticed it. Was it part of his training or was it something he learned in general? At the Mini Storage and the motorhome, he didn’t have a volume control. My phone rang again. I looked at it this time, seeing that it was from the mini-storage.
“Hello?” I said like a brilliant conversationalist.
“Hey Rick, this is Char. Just checking in. How’s my girl?”
“About to be ravished by a travel-weary stranger,” I snapped, and choked back the laughter I almost let loose by the look on Tina’s face.
“Uh, TMI kid… TMI. Hey, her phone’s battery must be dead. I was just calling to say that Detective Stephenson arrested a young man and woman who were breaking into places in the area. He said that the man matches the description of the one who tried to break in here.”
“That’s good news,” I told her, a weight lifting off my shoulders, “I’ll let Tina know.”
“Good. That girl never used to let her phone die all the time. I’m blaming it on you!”
“Bye, Char,” I said.
“Later, Tater.”
Tater?
“How're things?” Tina asked me, scooting as Opus finally decided to lay down, albeit in the middle of us.
“They arrested two people who were breaking into local places. One of them looks like it was the guy trying to get into the mini storage. Stephenson let Char know.”
“Ohhhhh la la,” Tina said batting her eyelashes.
“Yeah, but for a minute there I thought he was making a run at you,” I admitted.
“Oh, you’re the jealous type, are you?”
“You should know,” I said leaning up over Opus and kissing her.
Opus put his paws over his snout and whined softly.
I walked around with Tina for a while, but I needed to get some work done. I’d never left my dictation to sit for two or three days. If something went horribly wrong in the program, I’d have to re-listen to the recording to see what I was trying to say. That’s why when Tina wanted to go for a jog, I told her I would stick behind. She took the mutt with her, so I took the opportunity to call downstairs and order a twenty-three dollar hamburger with fries and an eight dollar Budweiser. Having been poor so long, having money didn’t really change the cheapskate in my soul, and I cringed at the price but confirmed I really wanted it and set up my computer at the snack bar, behind the small kitchenette and plugged in.
I got onto the Wi-Fi and was pleasantly surprised at the speed. Almost every hotel I’d ever been in had one Wi-Fi connection, and everybody was on it at once, and the speed was pretty horrible. A ton better than 4g, but still not great. This was great. In fact, it was almost as good as the internet I had upgraded at Tina’s before I moved in. I hopped on Facebook a moment and saw there were over a dozen people who had messaged me earlier while I was driving and my notifications from the live stream were breaking the internet.
Most of it was fans congratulating me on an epic trip, or how they loved to see the pictures, a few were from old school friends. One was in Colorado and told me if I had a chance, stop in, and he’d show me some epic hills to climb. I checked out his Facebook page and saw that he’d taken up mountain climbing and had slimmed down quite a bit from how I remembered him in high school. I made a mental note because our journey out of the mountains might take me through parts of Colorado, or we could always backtrack two hours and go through the Mile High City then go south. We had days to burn, and Tina had made me understand she wanted me to have fun too, because she was.
I figured she just liked playing on my social media, but that detail I kept to myself. I finished looking at and commenting back on everything and then checked my emails. My VA had been doing more and more for me, and I saw a few things forwarded from her to my personal account that needed my attention, but it wasn’t something I had to do right away, just for later in the month. I kept those and then w
rote a note back to her when she asked me when I was going to get ‘Bearly There’ to her. That was what I was working on.
I was interrupted by the knock and went out and got my food, remembering at the last second to tip the guy who’d run the food up. I’d seen that in the movies, but I’d never really been one to live large, so I gave him a five, figuring that was probably appropriate for a thirty-dollar-ish meal. I took a swig of my beer and sat back down, dragging and dropping my recordings into the folder Dragon would use to auto-transcribe. It immediately went to work.
My phone pinged, and I picked it up. I’d closed Facebook on my computer, so the alert went there. It was another message from a fan or somebody random, and I was about to ignore it and dig into my burger when I decided to procrastinate a little bit longer.
Thinking that I thought of a little Yoda, chiding me, “Procrastinate much, work you will not finish.” Yeah, I got it, but I was curious and unlocked the phone and opened the message, knowing I was going to mute it in a bit.
It wasn’t somebody on my friend's list, it looked like a scammer profile. The picture was of a young woman, and I was almost ready to unleash my snark on her depending on her opening lines when I realized she’d sent two picture messages instead. One of them was of Tina, walking down a sidewalk, Opus happily following her. The second picture right under that was the one the GEICO had commercial used for a while, with a more modern-day song. It was a stack of money, with eyeballs.
Somebody’s watching me.
I shut down the app and thumbed Tina’s name in and hit dial, fighting the urge to puke. Behind me, her phone rang. I cursed, remembering she’d turned it on after it got enough charge, but I hadn’t realized she’d left the damn thing on the nightstand. I took a deep breath and then patted myself down. I had my newer Beretta, a 92fs, and it was smaller than the first one I had bought, so it was easier to conceal. Two magazines sat on the nightstand, and I grabbed those, my van keys, made sure I had the room key in my front pocket still, and stuffed it all in as I ran out. I barely hit my full speed when it was time to stop for the elevator, but I opted for the stairs instead.
Opus Odyssey: A Survival and Preparedness Story (One Man's Opus Book 2) Page 9
