by Ilsa J. Bick
Something was a little screwy here.
Unless this is the National Guard. They were the logical choice for backup.
“Who is this? Are you National Guard?” As soon as the words flew from her mouth, she wanted to call them back. Idiot. Don’t give them the right answers.
As if reading her thoughts, the voice came back, “Yes, ma’am ... Sixty-Third ... giment ... Libby ...still on ... tower?”
If she was hearing this right, they were a regiment out of Libby, which tallied. She had patients in Libby. This guy was also asking if she was still at the fire tower. Of course, she would be, considering the weather and the girl. She wondered why he even needed to ask.
Before she could reply, the voice prompted. “You said ... and rescue ... already there?”
“Yes.” She bit back the next question though she ached to ask: Do you know a guy named Mark Mitchell? If Mark was legit, these guys ought to know or be able to find out, right?
“Hold on.” A pause. “Ma’am ...” A wash of static and then the voice burbled to the surface again. “We ... not aware ... of search and rescue ...” More static. “Your location.”
Oh, holy shit. She’d been right, after all.
“Ma’am?” A pop and then a stretch of clear air. “Is he there now?”
“Yes.” Her grip was so tight on the unit it was a miracle the radio didn’t shatter. Her tendons were wires. “I’ve got him cuffed and locked up. It’s a long story.”
“Ma’am”—more fizzle—“idea why?”
“It has to be about the girl,” she said, parsing the meaning. Who was she talking to, by the way? The guy never had identified himself.
“What”—fizzle, fizzle, pop—“she said?”
“She’s still unconscious. What do you want me to do?”
“Sit ... help”—crackle, sizzle—“way.”
Sit tight. Help’s on the way. She should be relieved. Why wasn’t she? She waited. There followed a much longer pause of dead air, as if whoever this was had toggled off to confer. After a few seconds, the voice returned. “Be there ... a few ... first light.”
They would be here by dawn. “Okay.” Mark ought to be awake just about then, too. She wished she knew if these were the right guys, or the wrong ones. No, what was she thinking? They had the right answers. They were National Guard from a real post in a real town. They knew who she was, and where. They knew about the girl. Relax. She was going to sign off when she thought, Fool me once.
“Are you a command center?” Command centers or incident commands were designed to ferry messages back and forth between operational units. She knew because Josie regularly regaled her with stories of her various search and rescues. “Can you patch me through to the sheriff’s office?”
A pause, a pause, more static, and then, “Afraid not ... directly. We can relay ...”
“That would work, and I can hold.” She pulled in a deep breath. “Would you ask if they can call Deputy Peter Cooper?”
“Hang ...” Pop. “Peter Cooper?”
“Yes.” Her heart was rabbiting in her chest. “I need him to feed my dog, Soldier.”
“Hold.” That, she got loud and clear. She listened to dead air, the thump of her heart, the sudden buzz of window glass as fists of wind grabbed the lookout. Finally, the voice came back. “Ma’am ... lucky day. Deputy Cooper ... right there. He said ... not to worry ... take care of the dog.”
She filled in all the missing pieces: Ma’am, this is your lucky day. Deputy Cooper was right there. He said for you not to worry, that he’d be happy to take care of the dog. Or something like that.
Right. This was just so her lucky day.
She remembered to sound relieved, injected a note of perkiness because, hey, she was just a dumb girl, right? “Thanks!” She didn’t know how to end a conversation on a radio. “Okay! Thanks again! Out.”
Then she stood for a long moment, radio still in hand, her gaze focused on nothing, her mind working feverishly over what she knew.
Mark was lying, duh. Mark had spent a long time out here going over something with someone. Had that been the same person with whom she’d just spoken? Who had that been, anyway? They’d used military call signs, but it didn’t automatically follow they were military. In some ways, it didn’t matter.
What mattered was they knew her.
Mark had probably told them. The voice also mentioned the tower, which meant they also knew where she was. She should’ve caught that, too, because the voice had asked if she was still in the tower, but she’d been so relieved, she never put it together: she’d not mentioned her location.
They knew where she was, and they were coming.
Pocketing the radio, she headed for the door.
Time for answers.
13
The girl was still out but looked better. After hanging another IV bag, Sarah reached a hand to the girl’s forehead. Warmer than her own, so the kid was running a fever, for sure, but she wasn’t burning up. That was something.
Mark, whom she’d dragged from her bedroom and deposited unceremoniously by the kitchen table, was snoring. She stood over him a few seconds then opened her bag. Selecting an unopened vial of naloxone, she retrieved a small syringe. Mark was lean but tall and muscular, so ... one-seventy-five? One-eighty? She did the calculations in her head, popped the vial’s plastic top, gave it a scrub with an alcohol swab. (Habit. The guy’s arm could fall off, and she wouldn’t bat an eye.) Poking the needle through the vial’s rubber membrane, she drew up what she thought was probably the correct dose. She could always follow up with more.
The dogs were giving Mark the once-over. Daisy was particularly interested in his crotch, and Soldier was busy washing Mark’s face and neck. Dogs lapping their owner’s faces and mouths always gave her the willies. Honestly, people, they wash their butts with those things. She hoped Mark got something evil. A nice tapeworm would be good.
“Okay, back up, guys,” she said, nudging the dogs aside. “My turn.”
In the end, it took three sticks. She wasn’t sure she was unhappy about that. Jabbing a nice sharp needle into the guy gave her a nasty little squirt of satisfaction. Perhaps thirty seconds after the third jab, Mark suddenly snuffled, his heavy snores hitching like a pig noisily snarfing a trough of slops. His face twitched; his eyelids jerked; he let out a long groan.
“Come on.” She toed the small of his back with a boot. “Wake up.”
“Uhhhh.” Cranking up his lids, he gave her a bleary stare. The right half of his beard was matted with half-crusted drool. The left was still flecked with dog spit. “Wuh the fuh?”
“My sentiments, exactly.” She butted his back again, a little harder this time. Where was this Nasty Sarah coming from? She was usually so nice. “Focus, asshole. We need to talk.”
“Wuh?” She saw the moment his arms strained and the sudden sharpness in his eyes as he realized what she’d done. That, more than anything, seemed to sober him fast. “Wuh yah doing? Wuh ...” Struggling to a sit, he slicked his lips and then grimaced. “Gah, what the fuh? I got dog hair in my mouth. What the fuck did you do?”
She gave a harsh caw of a laugh. “It’s not obvious? Let’s just cut to the chase, okay? I’ve been through your pack.” Besides the gear in his medic’s pouch and bag and a tangle of straps that she thought must be that personnel carrier Pete once mentioned, the rest was mostly standard survival gear: power bars, emergency blankets, fire-making equipment, wire for snares, hooks for catching fish, even a cell phone as well as a CD that could double as a signal mirror. She’d spread all this on her kitchen table along with the ammunition she’d discovered. She selected a box now. “You’ve got this and two full magazines plus three more for that Glock. What, you’re expecting a war?”
“Just like to be prepared.” Mark was clearing, fast, and his tone was becoming more sarcastic, edgier. “And congratulations. You know handguns.”
Asshole. Hank carried a Glock, though not this model. She’d known as s
oon as she pulled the weapon from its holster. “Yeah, point and shoot. Good for me, bad for you.” Slotting the weapon back into its holster, she hefted the rifle. Lighter than she expected, the thing was a bolt-action and weirdly skeletal-looking with a shiny steel barrel mounted in a greenish-gray camo chassis with a collapsible stock and a bipod near the front to steady the weapon. “I’m not an expert, but this looks custom-built to me. And you’ve got this.” She held up a long, dark-olive tube that screwed onto the rifle’s barrel. “I’ve never used a silencer, but I’ve seen plenty.”
“A lot of hunters use them.” Mark’s eyes had gone cobra-flat. “Saves our ears.”
“Yeah, and I bet a lot of snipers don’t want to lose their hearing, either. Plus, the noise would give away your position. What I couldn’t figure, though, was why? Why shoot this girl? Why track her here?” Why not kill her? She kept that to herself. No point in giving Mark any ideas, although she bet he’d considered precisely that. “I didn’t get it until I found this.”
She held up a Baggie. The plastic still retained a residual pickle and peanut smell. The sandwich was gone, probably eaten by Mark, who’d reused the bag for something quite different.
Nestled inside were about twenty quarter-sized, tightly-wrapped plugs. Each was about twice as long and again as wide and reminded her of oversized ear protectors, the kind a shooter might screw into each ear. Pulling on a pair of disposable gloves, she unzipped the bag and fished out a plug. The plug was plastic, not a balloon or condom but close, and dipped in wax, which was discolored with light, rusty-looking smears. Inside the plug was a densely packed off-white powder.
“Heroin?” She held up a plug. “Or is this cocaine?” From what she remembered, though, cocaine was much whiter. “You know, it’s not that important, although there is something really interesting I want to show you.”
Using forceps, she lightly scraped flecks from a packet onto a small white plate. From her own medical kit, she pulled a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, added a few drops, and then held out the plate.
“See how the peroxide’s all bubbly? That only happens with blood. So, this girl?” She hooked a thumb. “She’s carrying these in her gut, isn’t she? That’s why you wanted her alive, although it’s clear from these plugs and this blood, you’re not above slicing and dicing. What did you do, shoot another kid? Maybe two girls took off together, and you took down one, but our girl here got away?” Another thought. “That’s why you were so focused on whether our girl had bowel sounds. Once you figured out her gut was still working, I’ll bet you thought, hey, why stress, let nature take its course because hacking her up would be, you know, messy.”
He showed only a sliver of a smile. “I’m not the squeamish type.”
She wanted to smack him. “Where’s Hank?”
Silence.
No, scratch smacking him. She thought of his Blur in her pocket. Two can play at the slice and dice game. “I know you ran into him. You had to. You had the sandwiches.”
“Would you believe I found those on a rock?”
“No.”
“God’s truth. The zip ties, too. About three-quarters of a mile from here before the gully where I picked up your tracks and the dogs.”
She sensed this part was true. Hank had detoured? That would be something he might do. A more thorough search of that area might yield clues about the girl. She could see him passing by the turnoff and thinking, Just a quick look. “Did you see Hank?”
“From where I grabbed those sandwiches?” Mark shook his head. “No.”
There was something off about that answer, but she couldn’t say why. “How did you know to come here?”
“For a vet, you’re pretty stupid. There was, you know, snow?”
Tracks, right. “What was your plan?”
“Wait. I figured I had some time. Like you said, why stress? Plus, I’m not stupid. Pretty woman, all alone and snowed in. You were interested. I could tell.” He let out a nasty laugh. “I wish you could see the look on your face. We can still have some fun.”
It bothered her she was so transparent. She changed the subject. “Who’s with you? Where are they?”
“What you see is what you got, Sarah. I came alone.”
“That’s bullshit. I’ve been up to the tower. I’ve seen the map.” She held up his radio. “I traced your route back to the border. What, did you guys come down from Canada? Why’d you detour at Fortine? Were you meeting up with someone?”
“Would you believe I only wanted a cup of good coffee?”
She shook her head. “You went out of your way. It’s not the most direct route to Dead Man, that’s for sure. You had to backtrack afterward.”
“It’s really good coffee.”
“Uh-huh.” But he knew about the coffee shop, which meant he knew the area. Interesting. How many times had he made this trek over the border? “Who came with you?” She waited a beat. “You couldn’t possibly herd a couple of girls muling drugs all by yourself. I know you had help. I talked to your guys.”
“What?” That seemed to wake Mark up. It could have been the drugs or the cold, but she thought fear was what made his face go white as milk. “You did what? You talked to them? Jesus. You bitch. You stupid bitch. Which them? Which ones?”
Which them? That stopped her. “What are you talking about? Your guys, of course.”
“Oh Jesus. Oh Christ.” He was breathing hard now. “Which channel?”
“I’m sorry?”
“What are you, deaf as well as brain-dead?” At his shout, the dogs scrambled to their feet. “Which fucking channel?”
His sudden vehemence rattled her. “What difference does it make? Channel 21 ... no, 21.8. Why?”
He was already shaking his head, moaning, “Jesus, we are fucked, we are totally fucked. My people communicate only on Channel 6 and at very specific intervals. If there’s an emergency, we send a coded message and then move to Channel 10.”
“You move to ...?” My people? That explained why the radio was originally set to Channel 6. Whomever she’d spoken to must’ve been monitoring frequencies, hoping to get lucky. Jesus, how many Marks were out there? “Why?”
“You want to know why? Grab a scalpel, cut open a plug.” When she only stared, he rapped, impatiently, “It’s heroin, okay? Wear a mask. Don’t let the dogs breathe it in.”
She did what he said. When she fileted a plug, powder spilled out ... as well as a half dozen transparent bits she first thought might be glass until she fished one up with forceps.
And saw the sparkle.
“There are twenty packets. That was one kid. You’re talking an easy half million, maybe more. Now, multiply that by a factor of twelve,” Mark rasped. “You get it, now?”
She did. Holy shit. The girl on her cot was packing a fortune in heroin ... and diamonds.
“Who are these people? The men I talked to?” she asked. “Who’s coming?”
Mark’s gray eyes were the color of ash. “The guys who are going to kill us both.”
14
Kate came back to herself slowly, surfacing like a diver who’s had to stop at various decompression points to avoid the bends. Her awareness teetered. She had to hang on. One misstep, and she’d tumble back into oblivion. Even half-in and half-out of this world, she knew this feeling, this slippery slithering sensation as her mind slewed and scrambled for a foothold on what amounted to glare black ice. She had felt it twice in her life, once as the earth dropped away beneath her, Afghanistan and all that had happened in Cham Bacha falling away as she was buoyed up and up and up. The second was when she’d gone apeshit during a training exercise, and Vance’s men put her down. A wonder they hadn’t turned her off, pulled the plug then.
Something nagged. Something buzzed at her left ear, and she tried to move a hand to brush the noisome thing away—only to discover her hands wouldn’t obey.
With that realization, the pain followed, a horrible throbbing fit to split her skull. She moaned, tasted blood in
her mouth and then the gluey mess of a clot from where her teeth had gashed her tongue when her jaws snapped down.
“Kate, thank God.” The insectile whine resolved into Jack’s voice. “Come on, honey, wake up.”
“Nuh” was all she managed. Her eyelids creaked open. She expected darkness. Instead, the ruddy glow of firelight filtered through one wall of a two-person tent. She watched as a man-sized shadow slid from right to left over fabric. Someone outside. From the very faint edge of tomato and cayenne, they’d posted Chili Mac as a guard, just in case.
She lay on her right side. From the hard contours under her shoulder and hip contrasted to the soft folds of down and nylon, she knew they’d laid her out on an air mattress and used a sleeping bag, probably her own from the scent, to cover her up. Her hands were bound together at the wrists behind her back and secured with zip ties. Whoever had done that—probably Oz, she could see him enjoying that chore—had made the ties too tight, and her left hand was already numb. Her legs were also bound at the ankles with tough paracord.
Cautiously rolling her head to one side, she grimaced at the pressure on the gigantic goose egg Oz had gifted her. Searching the darkness above, her eyes came to rest on a faint silvery glimmer. She knew at once this was a grommet showing through a frayed seam, the same she’d spotted several days ago when she realized the nanobots—those busy, busy bees—had enhanced her eyesight.
She was in her own tent. Her gaze came to rest on her pack nestled in a corner. They’d searched through her things. Prudent. In their shoes, she’d have done the same. Was there anything to find that was a game-changer? Well, yeah, her spare legs with their crampons. One look at the circuitry would have them scratching their heads. The only identification she carried was a veteran’s ID, legit even if she never set foot in a VA hospital again or a PX.
