by Jeff Carson
Back then, Tora Bora had been described by the Western media as an impregnable fortress, rumored to have over two thousand troops housed in an elaborate tunnel system, with underground roads large enough to drive tanks through, a fully operating hospital, ventilation systems, ammunition stores, even a hotel. And, of course, Osama bin Laden.
What allied forces had found was completely different. Though they knew bin Laden had been there, in the end he’d slipped away, and the infrastructure they found was less than earlier described by the media. Rather than an elaborate feat of engineering, they’d found a system of limestone caves naturally carved out by water over the millennia, a couple of hundred cold and hungry troops, and a few haphazard piles of ammunition.
“What were those guys doing in Tora Bora? Weren’t we completely withdrawn from that area years ago, after the battle?” Wolf asked.
General Haines didn’t answer for a beat. “Yeah, I admit that these men being there is … strange.”
Wolf let the silence hang for a beat, then asked, “Can you send me the files of these men?”
“And leave a paper trail leaking out of my office to a no-good deputy in the middle of nowhere, Colorado? I think not, Sergeant.”
“Technically, it would be a digital trail. And that’s sheriff now, sir.”
“Not to me,” Haines answered.
Wolf doodled on the corner of his paper. “Okay. How about just where these guys are from, and I’ll do my own dirty work from there.”
There was another muffling of the phone, and a minute later Haines came back.
“Jeffries was from Delta, Colorado. Hartley from Boise, Idaho. Quinn, Reno. Richter, Glenwood Springs, Colorado.”
“Glenwood Springs,” Wolf said as he wrote.
“That close to you?”
“It is.” Wolf set down his pen. “I appreciate your help, sir.”
“Anytime, Sergeant. You know I’m here for you anytime. I was sorry to hear about your brother last year.”
“Thank you, General. When you retire you’ll have to come over to Colorado. I’ll take you fishing.”
“Sounds like a damn good plan.”
They hung up and Wolf looked at his notes. He stood and opened his office door and stepped out. The squad-room windows were darkened, but the room itself was ablaze with fluorescent lights humming overhead.
Deputies Rachette, Patterson, and Wilson were sitting on the edges of desks laughing at Jack, who was standing in the middle of them and telling a story.
“Jack,” Wolf said. “Let my deputies work.”
They all stopped and looked at Wolf.
“Rachette, how’re the festival grounds looking?”
“Good. Everything’s getting set up. We’ve got the parking lot cordoned off, entrances and exits as planned. Perimeter lighting is set, which we’re going to check out tonight. We worked with Jen Beasley all day, and she’s saying everything is looking good.”
“All right. Otherwise, all quiet?” Wolf gave a quick glance toward Jack.
Rachette caught Wolf’s meaning. “Yeah, all quiet. Nothing suspicious as far as we could tell. Jack helped us out all day … well, he helped Patterson out all day. I think Jack has a new girlfriend.”
Jack turned red and glared at Rachette. “Tsss,” he said in retaliation.
They all smiled as Jack shrunk away to look at a piece of paper on Wilson’s desk.
“You going home?” Rachette asked.
“I don’t know.” Wolf had been thinking about that. Ever since half his house had gone up in a ball of flame last fall, it had transformed from a disaster site, buttoned up under plastic through the cold months, to a slowly progressing construction site. He had a small section of the house he’d been using as a sort of indoor camping spot, and to bring Jack in there was borderline child abuse. Even if that weren’t the case, Wolf’s house wouldn’t do for safety. Not until any and all danger was eliminated.
That meant Sarah’s parents’ house, where Jack had been staying exclusively for the past few months, was not a good option either. Wolf wasn’t prepared to spread the potential vulnerability to other family members.
Wolf reached down and plucked the sketch the Glenwood Springs artist had done with Jack off the top of Wilson’s desk.
“Sorry I couldn’t do better, Dad,” Jack said, watching Wolf.
Wolf looked at the sketch. Nothing stood out. The hair was covered by a winter cap, the eyebrows neither dark nor light, thick nor thin. The face was square with colorless almond-shaped eyes, with flat lines for lips. It was a plain, nondescript representation of a Caucasian male.
Wolf set it down and shrugged. “Like the Garfield County sheriff said, you were firing a pistol at the guy, in a high-stress situation, at night. I doubt an experienced police officer could do any better.”
Jack looked down at the carpet. “I still bet I would recognize him if I saw him, though.”
And that was the problem, Wolf thought. He looked at Jack and sighed. “How do you feel about doing another night of camping?”
“Where?”
“Here.”
Jack shrugged and smiled. “Sure? What do you mean?”
“We’ll sleep in my office,” Wolf said.
“What? No, you guys can stay with me,” Rachette said.
“In the butt-hut?” Wolf asked. “No thanks.”
Rachette’s face turned crimson.
Patterson eyed Rachette and cracked a smile. “The butt-hut?”
Wilson rocked back in his chair and howled with laughter.
“But I appreciate it,” Wolf said. “We’ll be comfortable here. We’ve got showers, and we have all our camping gear. Rachette, you’ll be in charge of the volunteer orientation tomorrow.”
Rachette glared at Wilson for a beat and stood up straight. “You got it. There’s eight of them coming, total, right?”
Wolf nodded. “Three from Vail, three from the Summit, and two from Glenwood.”
Wilson looked at Patterson. “That’s three from Vail PD, three from Summit County SD, and two from Glenwood Springs PD.”
“Got it,” Patterson pulled a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “Thanks.”
“She’s from Aspen, dude,” Rachette said. “She knows what we’re talking about.” He ignored Wilson’s glare and turned to Wolf. “Aren’t you going to be there tomorrow?”
“No, I’ll be gone in the morning. And I’d like it if you guys took Jack again.”
Rachette shifted and glanced back at Patterson. “Wilson and Baine are going to be there, too. Right?”
Wolf looked at Rachette. “Not tomorrow, not for setup. You’ll have thirteen deputies and officers at the festival grounds for a time tomorrow. No sense stacking it anymore. We’ve gotta have a patrol in town, too, until Friday night.”
Rachette nodded, unable to hide the disappointment in his eyes that he was stuck with the rookie once again, and, by the looks of it, Patterson read his expression easily enough.
Wolf took a deep breath and looked at Patterson. “Patterson, your father.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Yeah?”
“He’s an entertainment lawyer, right?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Kind of a big deal, right? He’s worked with some celebrities in his time?”
She hesitated. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“So you’ve met some of those celebrities, right?” he asked.
Rachette sat back on the edge of Wilson’s desk and watched Patterson.
“Ye-es?” Patterson tilted her head.
“So like, Kevin Costner, he’s up there in Aspen sometimes?”
She nodded, and Rachette raised his eyebrows.
“Tom Cruise?” Wolf asked.
Patterson nodded again.
“TC?” Rachette shifted, knocking over the cup of pens on Wilson’s desk. “Shit, sorry. You’ve met TC?”
She eyed Rachette. “TC? Yeah, I’ve met Tom Cruise. I didn’t know he went by …”
Wolf walked wi
th Jack to his office and shut the door. His work was done for the day.
Chapter 23
“South, check.”
“West, check,” Wolf responds.
“North, check.”
“East, check.”
Wolf is sweating even harder now. There is a pull on his left shoulder, and a dull ache. It must be that an insect bit him inside his ACU.
He ignores the pain and turns to the right. There is movement outside the jungle wall, and he walks toward it.
“I’ve got movement on the west jungle wall. It’s a kid,” Wolf says into his throat mike.
Wolf fights to wade through the long grass, like the blades are wrapping his legs. Like he’s wading through tar.
He sees that the kid is carrying an orange backpack, about half his size, and he has something in his hand.
Wolf realizes what he must do, and he raises his rifle.
The kid looks straight at Wolf, and Wolf can see him clearly behind the crosshairs in his scope lens.
It’s Jack.
…
Wolf sucked in a breath and sat up, and then rolled onto his right elbow, clenching his teeth to fight the throbbing in his left arm. His entire upper body was drenched in sweat, and the nylon sleeping bag underneath him was cold and wet.
Jack stirred next to him, rolling away from the racket Wolf was causing.
A thin sliver of dim light peeked from under the closed wooden blinds of his office, and a bird was calling incessantly somewhere outside.
He checked his watch—5:20 a.m. He climbed out of his sleeping bag, put on jeans, gray T-shirt and Carhartt hooded sweatshirt, and padded down to the locker room.
The bandage on his arm was soaked in blood, so he unwrapped it and carefully peeled off the final stretch of sticking gauze. Underneath were thirty-six crosshatches of dark-blue stitches, with pieces of stiff thread jutting out in places. The skin surrounding the wound was such a dark blue it was almost black, and it faded outward to a sickly yellow, and finally to his normal olivine skin color.
He cleaned the wound vigorously with soap and warm water, and re-wrapped it, then took a shower, being careful to keep it relatively dry. In the shower he winced as he stretched his arm out in front of him, then to the side and down, and then up again, and decided he wouldn’t use the sling for the day but would take it along just in case.
When he was washed and ready, he quietly packed his sleeping bag, letting Jack sleep off his exhaustion from the previous days’ events, and walked out into the squad room.
It smelled like fresh doughnuts, undoubtedly brought by Tammy, and coffee. He gratefully took some of each and headed out to his Explorer. There he checked in with Rachette, who was pulling into the lot, and then drove out of town to the south.
He climbed Williams Pass, avoiding deer milling alongside the highway on the Rocky Points side and a herd of elk that wandered across the road on the other side. He crossed to the west on County Road 31, and then started north on Highway 82.
He drove through the posh town of Aspen, through Basalt, and north through Carbondale. Finally, an hour and fifteen minutes after he’d left Rocky Points, he entered the city of Glenwood Springs.
The red sandstone hills surrounding the town were verdant with junipers, low shrubs and grasses.
Wolf continued onward to the north edge of town and passed over I-70, where steam billowed onto the roaring interstate from the hot-springs pools that made the town famous. He turned onto a frontage road, and entered the parking lot of the Glenwood Springs FBI field office.
It was a nondescript building, looking like any modern commercial office building one might see in any part of the US. There was no sign for the FBI on the Plexiglas box sign on the front lawn, only what looked to be some law firms and an insurance company.
He walked in, went up the stairs, down the carpeted hall, and through the glass doors of the FBI suite. A large half-moon desk waited inside, and a receptionist in a red dress looked at him over her eyeglasses, and then continued to pound her keyboard. Her phone rang and she turned away from Wolf to answer it.
Wolf waited patiently, and watched men and women walk past an open doorway, into what seemed to be their equivalent of the SCSD’s squad room. They were all dressed in slacks and button-up shirts, wearing paddle holsters with SIG Sauers or Glocks. Some carried coffee, and a few laughed and conversed loudly.
Then he saw Luke. She was walking straight toward the doorway, looking in an empty coffee travel mug. She swerved between desks with swaying hips, walking with a spring in her step. Her straight brown hair was down, looking more auburn today than he remembered. She wore black slacks that fit her perfectly, and a slim-fitting suit jacket that was splayed open, showcasing a white blouse that cracked open to show tan skin beneath.
She stopped abruptly when she saw him, sending her hair tumbling across her face. There was a flash of surprise in her eyes, and then they narrowed.
“Can I help you, sir?” the receptionist asked.
Wolf turned to the receptionist, who was scrutinizing Wolf with a critical eye. Wolf was dressed casually, probably too casually, with his old jeans, gray T-shirt, and hooded sweatshirt, and he didn’t blame the woman for being suspicious of his intentions.
“I’m Sheriff David Wolf, of Sluice County.”
“Sheriff Wolf,” Luke walked fast out of the doorway. “No sling today? You’re a fast healer.” She held out her hand and Wolf shook it.
“Thanks, Gwen. I’ll … talk to the sheriff.” Luke held a hand toward the door he’d just entered from and began walking.
Wolf watched her. “Don’t you want to go inside?”
She shook her head and opened the door, then waved out to the hall and looked at him.
Wolf walked past her, catching her familiar scent.
She walked next to him, keeping her eyes on the gray carpet ahead. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I was just stopping by to let you know how my investigation was going, and to see if you wanted in.”
She gave him a look like he’d just belched. “Really? And how’s your investigation going?”
“I found out who the four missing men were in Tora Bora. I’m just stopping by on my way to Brian Richter’s family’s house, and then I’m off to Delta to talk to Jeffries’s family.”
She stopped and closed her long eyelashes, then tilted her head to the asbestos tiles of the ceiling. “Let me get my stuff. I’ll meet you outside.” She turned and walked quickly down the hall.
Wolf walked to the stairs and went outside. He stood by his SCSD Explorer and took in the sun. There were some approaching clouds in the west. The wind that had kicked up so fierce the day before must have brought in a cold front, but for the time being it was gorgeous.
She came out and walked straight to Wolf, then looked past him into his driver’s side window.
“I’m not going in that,” she said, and then walked away down the parking lot.
Wolf looked through his window at the passenger seat. It had a few wadded-up napkins on it and some multi-colored sprinkles from the doughnut he’d eaten earlier. The two cup-holders had four coffee cups stacked one within another. He didn’t need to look at the floorboards to know she had a point.
He locked his SUV and walked after her, then hopped in her already-running Tahoe. She backed up and they headed out onto the frontage road.
Wolf sat quietly with growing interest as she drove through town and took three turns without consulting notes or a map.
“You know where Richter grew up?”
“I grew up here,” she shrugged. “And I looked up the house on Google Maps earlier today.”
Wolf nodded. “All right. So you were planning to see his mother today?”
“That was the idea,” she said.
“I found out that Richter had a sister, too. Lives in Chicago.”
She nodded like it was old news.
“And Richter’s brother?” Wolf asked.
She looked at Wolf and narrowed her eyes. “What about him?”
“He’s Garfield County Sheriff’s Department. Were you going to talk to him?” Wolf asked.
She looked at him like he’d just spoken a foreign language.
“What?” Wolf asked.
“We can’t talk to him.”
“And why is that?”
“I checked in on him this morning, and he’s in Rocky Points today, helping out the Sluice County Sheriff’s Office with their music festival.”
“Oh,” Wolf said.
Chapter 24
Sergeant McCall pulled into the parking lot of the Mountain Goat Bar and Grill, and parked facing Grand Avenue, the main thoroughfare through the old part of Glenwood Springs.
He sat watching out his window as citizens drove by, and then jammed their brakes with wide eyeballs as they noticed him in his Sheriff’s Department SUV. After a few minutes of the entertainment, he stepped out into the cool air. The clouds had rolled in, and it was going to get chilly. Even colder up in the mountains.
He looked at the Mountain Goat, a squat, red-brick building with tastefully carved wood trim, and felt a surge of pride.
The Mountain Goat Bar and Grill had been Sergeant McCall’s establishment for thirteen years now, ever since he’d sold his controlling share of his drug-trafficking business for a quarter-million to a man he simply knew as Dragon.
On paper, he had nothing to do with the place. It was owned by a corporation, whose sole member was his kid brother, and he was a silent partner. McCall’s name didn’t show up anywhere, but there was no dispute between him and his brother about who owned the place.
There were never any disputes between him and his brother. Their bond was forged by blood and was unbreakable.
Forged by blood. McCall thought about what was happening now, and how far he’d come. How far they’d come. And how close they were to a better life.
It had been thirteen years ago, when he was twenty-three, when he’d made his money with drugs and decided to become a cop to hedge his various interests. But ten years before that, at only thirteen years old, he’d been forced to become the man he was now—a man who did what it took to survive.
