by Nina Bruhns
So, she was expecting it when, checking the tension in the fence wire, he said, "I want you two to stay here. Find someplace to hide yourselves and the horses while I go in and nose around."
Toby, however, was not. "No way, man! I'm coming, too!"
"Not possible. I need to get in and out quickly."
"What about your probable cause?"
Roman scowled at the boy. "What about it?"
"How are you going to explain just accidentally climbing through barbed wire and finding whatever's in there? You need an informant and a witness." He darted RaeAnne a glance. "An impartial witness."
The hair on her arms stood up. "Oh, no." She held up a hand. "Uh-uh. You are not leaving me alone again. No way." She shook her head vigorously. "Just look what happened last time."
Roman scowled at her.
"Well, then it appears we're all going in," Toby said.
Roman's gaze lifted to the mountain peaks and searched them, seemingly for some kind of sign. Apparently he didn't find one. "All right, fine. But you both do exactly as I say. No exceptions."
She nodded obediently, along with Toby.
After secreting the horses behind a tangle of bushes, they approached the fence. Naturally they hadn't brought wire cutters. Using their riding gloves, they each took turns holding the strands of razor-sharp wire apart so the others could slip between them and into the forbidden territory.
Once in, Roman took stock of their surroundings and whispered, "Stick together."
No problem there. RaeAnne wanted to grab his hand and hang on for dear life. She restrained herself, but stayed so close she smacked into his back when he suddenly stopped.
"Damn!" he muttered. "I can't believe this."
"What?"
"A trip wire!"
She looked at him blankly. "In the middle of a forest?"
"We must be getting warm," Toby said, gingerly stepping over the nearly invisible obstacle.
"Wait," Roman said. "I want to see what it's attached to."
She didn't like the sound of that. She had visions of spears flying out of nowhere and skewering them like shish kebabs. She sighed with relief when they found nothing more sinister than the wire's end tied to the trunk of a sapling.
"Still, keep your eyes open," Roman said. "This could just be a warning."
Sure enough, the next thing they spotted was a bear trap, sitting in a small open area, jaws open and ready to snap off an unsuspecting limb. Nasty…
"This is getting spooky," Toby murmured, visibly shaken.
"I'll say," she agreed. "What do you all say we turn around?"
"I don't think so." Roman peered at a cleared path ahead of them. "We're almost there. Can you smell it?"
"What?" She and Toby eyeballed each other, lifting their noses to the wind. Okay, there was something unusual about the way the forest smelled here. A trace of spiciness in the air…
"Grass?"
"Cannabis. Whoa!" Roman grabbed her around the waist and Toby by the shoulder. "Don't move!"
She didn't. She didn't even breathe. She was too petrified. Roman was definitely serious about not moving. His arm was a band of steel around her and she could see Toby wince from the grip of his fingers. Suddenly she realized what Roman had seen.
They were surrounded.
By transparent strands of fishing line hanging from the trees all around them. Suspended from the lines were clusters of viciously barbed fish hooks, which blended nearly invisibly into the forest scenery. Her pulse went into hyperspace. She felt like she was in one of those World War II movies where the unsuspecting star suddenly found himself in the middle of a field of land mines.
"What do we do?" she squeaked.
"Stand very, very still. We're okay as long as we don't get hooked."
The whole thing was surreal. Hundreds of tiny, shimmering filaments filled the air in every possible direction except straight back, and even there they blew back and forth across the path they'd just taken.
"My guess is they've been dipped in some kind of poison."
Oh, great.
The silvery lines drifted in the breeze, some as low as ground level. It would be a pretty sight, if it didn't spell instant death. Or maybe a slow, lingering death. Neither sounded appealing.
"Next time leave me behind," she muttered. "No matter how much I complain."
"Gloves," Roman prompted with a wry smile, and they all obeyed instantly. He glanced around, then peered ahead into the forest in the direction they were headed.
"You can't be serious," she said, reading his intent.
"Will this help?" Toby asked, offering up a Swiss army knife from his pocket just as Roman carefully stooped down to produce a blade that had been tucked inside his boot.
She wanted to kiss them both.
"Cut the ones beside us," Roman directed Toby. "I'll get the ones in front."
Just as he was about to take a step forward, she noticed something strange in the dirt ahead of them. A subtle shift on the ground. A shadow, or… Whatever it was, a small cluster of pine needles simply disappeared into thin air.
"Stop!"
Everyone froze.
"The ground. There's something weird with it." She pointed to where the needles had vanished. "There."
Roman studied the area she'd indicated. Then, being careful to avoid the fish hooks, he plucked up a nearby branch. With it, he poked the ground in front of them. Suddenly there was a rustle and a whoosh of dirt, and a large, gaping hole opened up at their feet.
At the bottom of the pit, arranged in neat rows, stood an army of sharpened bamboo spikes.
She was going to faint. The blood drained from her head so quickly she had to grab Roman's arm before she toppled into the hole.
"Damn," he swore. "I should be at the bottom of that." Instinctively she pulled him closer, away from the horrible pitfall. "I should—for bringing you two into this place."
"How were you to know?" she whispered. "This is sick. Crazy. Nobody could have predicted we'd run into stuff like this."
"You're wrong," he murmured. "It was right there in front of my face the whole time. I should have realized."
"I don't understand. Realized what?"
"Vietnam."
* * *
It was a satisfying sight that greeted the trio after they'd cut and worked themselves around the fish hooks and pitfall. Roman grimaced, taking in the freshly tilled rows of black earth, the foot-high green seedlings waving in the breeze, the smudge pots, and the brown camouflage netting suspended over the whole field like some giant prop left over from the set of M.A.S.H.
He'd recognized the setup immediately from old reports out of Mendocino County. Numbers of ex-Vietnam vets who'd gone slightly over the edge had taken to the woods stateside after the war, making money in a way that suited their war-ravaged minds. The booby traps were a dead giveaway. And hadn't he noticed how everyone involved in this case had long, gray hair? Well, everyone except O'Donnaugh.
"Paydirt," Roman muttered, surveying the orderly, compact field tucked in amidst a disguising ring of pines. "Now we've got you, you bastards."
"Not exactly," a familiar voice said from among the trees. "Now we've got you."
Pritchett. Slowly Roman turned, pushing RaeAnne and Toby behind his back.
"How touching," Pritchett said, watching the maneuver as he emerged from the foliage, a Mossberg automatic resting in the crook of his arm. "Too bad your noble gesture won't do your friends any good."
Pritchett's three henchmen stepped out also, carrying automatic weapons, all predictably aimed. Roman decided not to go for the Colt Python, tucked safely in his waistband as usual.
"But I must say, I'm impressed. Nobody has made it this far in a long time."
"Two years isn't so long," Roman answered, the final piece of the puzzle falling neatly into place.
"What are you talking about?" Pritchett asked, suspicious curiosity making his weapon tip downward a fraction.
Just as h
e'd thought. "Jason Danforth. He had a pocket full of your harvest when he died." Roman started to inch his hand toward the Python.
The automatic jerked up angrily. "I told you, we had nothing to do with his death."
He halted the movement. "I know. I expect we'll find the murder weapon among the duty shotguns at the sheriff's office." Roman slowly folded his arms across his chest and cocked a hip, ignoring RaeAnne's gasp. "Even so, it looks bad for you."
The man snorted and motioned the others in closer, wordlessly directing them to aim their guns at RaeAnne and Toby. "You think it's a coincidence this operation's survived for over three decades?"
Roman shook his head amiably, striving for a calm mien under his cold sweat. "No. You're pros, I'll give you that much. But you aren't dealing with some corrupt hicksville sheriff's deputies anymore. This time it's the FBI. If three people involved with the case mysteriously disappear on your land, trust me, you're as good as fried."
The henchmen shifted nervously on their feet, looking to Pritchett for a denial. None came.
So, Tecopa hadn't been responsible for Danforth's murder. Or shooting at RaeAnne and him at the site, he'd wager. As soon as he'd seen the booby traps, he'd figured that one out—and should have done so sooner. These guys were far too organized to bury a dead man in the manner Danforth had been, and the same went for RaeAnne. If Pritchett and his cadre of Vietnam vets had wanted her dead—or killed the Fish and Game warden—their bodies would never have been found.
He sidled sideways to block RaeAnne and Toby from their gun sights. "Give it up, Pritchett," he fished. "So far you've only killed animals. Nobody gets the chair for poaching."
"We aren't part of the poaching," Pritchett said, bolstering Roman's theory. "That is the sheriff's office's gig. We deal strictly in weed." But Roman could see the man was seriously weighing his options.
"There must be a tidy fortune sitting in some offshore account, just waiting for you to escape the country. But that ain't gonna happen if you start killing women, kids and FBI agents." For RaeAnne and Toby's sake, he prayed he could pull this off.
"What are we going to do, Sarge?" asked one of the henchmen, confirming Roman's theory that this whole business had started between army buddies long ago, deep in the steaming jungles of an unwinable war. "Execute 'em?"
His heart bled for all the young kids whose lives had been lost, or changed forever by the horrors they had experienced—among them his own father. For the first time since learning of his dad's criminal activity, he thought maybe, just maybe, there was a reason for his father's descent into moral corruption. Not an excuse, never that—a person was always responsible for his own actions. But maybe a reason he could live with.
"He's right." Pritchett considered. "Shooting an FBI agent could complicate things."
Roman noticed the man didn't mention RaeAnne or Toby. Nor did he seem to have any ethical qualms, merely legal considerations. Both bad signs.
The lumberman regarded him. "I guess it's time to disappear, eh, Mr. Federal Agent Man?"
Roman stared right back. "Which one of us?"
"You tell me."
He was torn between suggesting a deal to allow the bastard to escape—he'd do pretty much anything to save the lives of RaeAnne and Toby—and telling the drug dealer he'd better kill him now, because there wasn't a place on earth far enough away to hide from justice. His justice.
Because a sick, clenching nausea had gradually seeped into his gut over the past few minutes along with the certain knowledge that Pritchett had been a factor in his father's fall into the dark side.
Oh, yeah. It was personal now. Very personal.
Standing right in front of him was the man who no doubt held the key to finding Roman's father—dead or alive. And if he was smart, he'd hand over that key without having to be persuaded.
"What's it going to be, Pritchett? Stupid or smart?"
Pritchett never got the chance to answer. They were both distracted by the far-off sound of a strange musical rhythm. Sort of like … steel guitars? The melody started softly, barely discernible above the normal sounds of the forest. Pritchett narrowed his eyes, sweeping his gaze over the sheer rock faces of the surrounding peaks, which echoed the jangly sounds back down at them.
Roman looked, too, wondering what the hell was going on. The three henchmen had frozen in place at the first notes, and he could see their eyes widen, a rabid look coming over them. The strange music grew louder and louder, accompanied by a deep, steady, whoopfing sound. Whoopf, whoopf, whoopf, whoopf.
"Incoming!" one of the men suddenly yelled, and all three dropped to the dirt, scrabbling for cover, waving their weapons crazily at imagined attackers. The only one of their captors who didn't move was Pritchett. He stood stock-still, white as a puff cloud, watching the horizon as if in a trance. Slowly, the whirling rotors of a helicopter appeared, rising heavenward over the trees, slicing through the air like the swords of retribution.
Roman's jaw hit the ground. Behind him, he heard RaeAnne suck in her breath and Toby give a low whistle. Then the air was rocked by a twangy voice singing out, "Nevermore to go astray, this will be the end today of the wanted man. The wanted maaaan!"
Roman couldn't help it. A grin split his face, and as he drew his weapon unnoticed, he laughed. Okay, so it wasn't Wagner, and the tiny sheriff's helicopter wasn't a Huey, but the result had been just as effective on the bad guys.
There was only one person on earth nuts enough to stage such a delightfully twisted rescue.
Bugs.
Hallelujah, they were saved.
And it was just chaotic enough for Roman to get away with murder.
From behind, he pressed the Python into Pritchett's neck and leaned his mouth close to his ear.
"Tell me where my father is," he hissed.
* * *
Chapter 15
«^»
To RaeAnne's surprise, Dawson consented to make the arrests jointly with Philip O'Donnaugh. Roman said it was only fitting—bringing full circle one of those cosmic coincidences he hated.
RaeAnne wondered. Roman seemed particularly anxious not to be involved in the final arrests. Considering he'd worked just as hard on the case as Dawson, she thought he deserved just as much of the glory. But she wasn't about to question it too much if he'd rather spend the day riding down the mountain returning the horses with her and Toby, than file reports in quadruplicate at the sheriff's office.
She hadn't been too shocked to see Philip's face peering down from the rescue helicopter. Roman had frowned when her ex-boyfriend jumped onto the ground right after Bugs, but she hadn't been able to disguise her smug smile. It would be so sweet tonight to have Roman admit aloud he'd been wrong about Philip.
The four of them and Toby were watching Dawson take off with the first two bad guys in the helicopter. They had several minutes before it returned and Philip made the second trip with the others, and Bugs hiked in to do an initial forensics check of the marijuana field.
"Man, was I glad to see you guys," Roman shouted above the racket as the helo took off.
"You'd already left for another case. What made you come back?" RaeAnne asked Bugs, prying her gaze from Roman's face. He seemed unusually preoccupied for some reason. And much more somber than he should be at the successful conclusion of his case.
She knew he was still upset about having put her and Toby in danger, but thought he'd be happier about everything being wrapped up neatly. Did he still harbor uncertainties about Philip? Or perhaps he was thinking he and RaeAnne would soon reach the conclusion of their time together, as well?
"The rescue was O'Donnaugh's suggestion," Bugs answered with an infectious grin.
If possible, Roman's face became even more dour.
"I tracked Bugs down, but getting here was a joint effort," Philip countered once the helo was out of sight. "We both figured things out about the same time and knew we had to find you quickly. But the music was his idea."
"Figured what thi
ngs out?"
Surprisingly Philip looked none too pleased, either. What the heck was going on here? A scowl was frozen on his face and RaeAnne could swear wisps of the storm clouds from the mountains had gathered around his ears, though that was probably just an optical illusion.
"It was my father."
Roman's wandering attention snapped onto him. "Excuse me?"
"After you told me all that stuff last night, I realized the initials on those papers had to be my father's," Philip explained. "He was sheriff for almost twenty years before me, and must have been part of the poaching ring until he died some years back."
"Of course," Roman muttered. "A Philip Sr. And he had long gray hair, I suppose."
"Come again?"
Roman shook his head. "Never mind. I should have guessed. God knows where my brain was." She hid a smile as he gave her a look.
Bugs grinned wider. "Tell me about it. I only got suspicious when I ran the background checks on our prime suspects for Danforth's murder. When they all came back with combat experience in Vietnam—in the same year—I ran the other units in-country for the same area and time, and found myself staring at a couple other familiar names."
"The deputies?" Roman asked. He knew it. He'd known this whole mess had to be somehow tied together.
"You got it."
"Already arrested," Philip informed him tightly. "Two of them spilled their guts about the poaching, hoping I'd let them go."
It looked like it was on the tip of Roman's tongue to ask if he had, but apparently he thought better of it and said, "A man who'd admit his own father was a criminal? I doubt it."
A wave of sympathy swept over RaeAnne for both Philip and Roman. That was a situation she wouldn't wish on her worst enemy, yet here were two men she loved, both enduring it.
"I'm sorry," Roman said, and sounded like he meant it.
"No, I am. My third deputy—the young one—confessed to participating in the beating you took. I arrested him, too. For assault."
"I'm sorry for ever doubting you, Sheriff O'Donnaugh." RaeAnne's eyes swam at Roman's words. She slid her arm around his waist and he pulled her close. Philip's gaze went to the proprietary hold on her for a split second, then darted away and he shrugged. "De nada."
