Ham

by Dustin Stevens

“Have to be,” Monte says. “Industrial district, this time of night, and the place is buzzing. Cars going by, people out taking strolls.”

  “Looks like the damned Venice boardwalk out here right now,” Dwayne adds.

  Working his jaw to either side, Lima nods. From the moment he’d gotten the call, there had been a rough working outline of what Spiers was putting together in his mind, this now filling in the final few holes that remained.

  Spiers was likely telling the truth when he said that the woman had called and wanted to turn over the money. Or make an exchange. Or have a meeting. Or maybe she hadn’t called at all, Spiers merely getting a fix on her location.

  That part didn’t matter. What did was the fact that he had probably gone back to the station and told them there was a major deal going down. Lots of drugs and money involving the people that had beat his ass and shot his partner.

  Once he got everybody all fired up and running to this spot with guns drawn, he then slipped out the back, swapped cars, and was off to grab the woman and the money in private.

  Leaving Lima and his crew to get nabbed and take the fall.

  By the end of the night, he has the money and has gotten rid of the person that took it, and the only people that can finger him are either dead or in prison.

  “Son of a bitch,” he whispers, his lips hardly moving, the words just barely audible.

  To his left, Bocco glances over, nodding once before returning his gaze to face forward.

  “What do you want us to do?” Dwayne asks, his voice penetrating the quiet of the car, pulling Lima back to the conversation.

  Twenty minutes ago, Lima wouldn’t have been positive how to answer the question. The reason he had first approached Spiers and had entered into such an arrangement was to honor Luis’s memory. To simultaneously clean up the streets — ensuring that future tragedies didn’t occur — while at the same time amassing the capital to reinvest in their community.

  Such a strategy made sense. It kept anybody else from getting hurt.

  This was something else entirely.

  Even if Lima didn’t see a way they could possibly walk away from it at the moment.

  “If you can get away clean, do so. If not, sit tight until things clear. We’ll be in touch.”

  Chapter Sixty-Five

  Three times since leaving the I-210 and heading north, Jensen Spiers has been forced to pop his ears, a direct result of the pressure brought on by the elevation change. The last sign he saw pointed out they were more than three thousand feet above sea level.

  If forced to guess, he would imagine they are probably closer to four at this point. The temperature display on the dash shows the outside air to have plummeted almost ten degrees in just twenty minutes.

  The road they now sit on is labeled a state highway, though it is little more than a winding two-lane working them through the Angeles National Forest. With a speed limit of just forty-five miles an hour, the last car they passed was miles before.

  Thick forestation is pressed in along either side of the road, the occasional gaps caused by deep ravines plunging hundreds of feet to the forest floor.

  “Where the hell are we?” Lucas asks, voicing the thought for both of them. Propped in the passenger seat, his features look even more sallow bathed in the pale light of the front dash. Seated in a stiff and awkward manner, he leans angled toward the far door, the top of his flattop pressed against the window.

  In his hand is Spiers’s cell phone, the tracking display pulled up on screen.

  How much use he will actually be should anything occur is debatable. Never would Spiers have asked his partner to leave his hospital bed, though there wasn’t a chance he was going to turn down the option of having a second gun present.

  Not after what happened in that motel room, the reminder of it fitted uncomfortably across his face or staring back at him each time he glanced into a mirror.

  “The closest thing to Idaho Southern California has,” Spiers replies. His voice is lowered as he slows to make yet another hairpin turn. Clinging closely to a rock wall, he eases them through before punching the gas, the big engine rumbling as they continue to climb.

  In his periphery, he can see Lucas glance his way. “So you think this is a setup? Lure us out into the woods and try to do whatever they did to Hendricks?”

  Scrunching the side of his face slightly, the expression tugging at the mask splayed across his face, Spiers replies, “Maybe if this is where she wanted to meet, but remember, she suggested the warehouse.”

  Shooting a finger toward the phone in Lucas’s hand, he adds, “She doesn’t know we have that, has no reason to think we’re about to show up.”

  “True,” Lucas says, conceding the point. “Best case, she won’t even be here.”

  To that, Spiers doesn’t bother replying. By now, any hope of a best case is far behind them. All he is hoping for is to mitigate the damage as much possible. Show up and find his wife and stepdaughter sitting alone in a tent. Later get a call from Lucy wondering where the hell he disappeared to and saying they nabbed Lima and his guys.

  An ending that will still be rough as hell and require a fair bit of smoothing out on his part.

  “How far to go?” he asks, flicking his gaze to the phone for an instant before returning it to the road.

  Lifting his head from the window, Lucas draws the phone up before him. Using his index and middle fingers, he enlarges the image on screen, staring at it a moment before saying, “Almost there. Less than a mile to go.”

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Somehow, I know.

  Hidden deep in the Angeles National Forest, it is not the first call of an engine I have heard all evening, straining to make it up the steep incline. It is not even the first pair of strobes I see piercing the darkness, headlights lighting the path ahead for anybody driving past.

  But still, I know.

  I know by the whine of the oversized engine of whatever vehicle is coming my way, and I know by the aggressive manner in which it is being driven.

  And I also know that I am not ready.

  My guns are still stowed in the back of the SUV. The long-sleeved neoprene shirt I’d used to stay hidden in Idaho is wadded up beside them.

  Making it even worse, the vehicle is locked, making any attempt to get them that much harder, the parking lights flashing each time I unlock it.

  Bitterness passes through my system, accompanied by the realization that I have messed up again. My reliance on the tracker I placed on Spiers’s sedan was predicated on that being the only car he would use, which is stupid as hell. The man is clearly operating well outside of normal parameters.

  My goal was to lure him up here into the woods, making him think I was going to be at the warehouse in Montebello and hoping he would take the bait of Amber’s skin tag.

  And I knew that if it worked, there wasn’t a chance he would go to the warehouse alone. He would bring in backup, or a SWAT team, or the damn National Guard, everybody wanting to get at the person that had shot his partner.

  The part I had forgotten was that while that was going on, the only way he could hope to get up here was by slipping out the back, swapping cars, climbing into something that couldn’t be tracked, and heading this way.

  Standing on the far edge of the makeshift campsite, I don’t bother waiting for the truck to arrive. Pushing off my back foot, I sprint straight ahead for the fire ring in the center of the small clearing. Crossing the short distance in seven hard strides, I slide to a stop beside it, bits of wood and gravel from the forest floor biting through the canvas pants I wear, chewing into my lower leg.

  Reaching straight for the cargo pocket along my thigh, I extract the lighter Mikey placed inside the bag he left for me. Holding it at the base of the vertical pyre I assembled, I spark the flint, calling it to life, an inch-tall flame springing from the tip.

  In the air, I can hear the engine grow closer, the pale glow of headlamps getting stronger. Rising in a small arc
above the top of the trees, the illumination stands out against the total darkness of the mountain sky, pinpointing the location of the vehicle as it draws ever closer.

  My hands remain steady as I extend the lighter through a pair of openings on either side of the teepee structure I have built. Passing the lighter quickly by, I touch the flame to the gas-soaked rags at the base, the accelerant catching on contact. The acrid scents of fuel and smoke both rise instantly, burning my nostrils, as I rise from my knees.

  Hurtling myself back across the opening, I duck through the cover of trees encircling the fire, receding far enough back that I don’t need to worry about my silhouette being visible.

  Perspiration covers my exposed arms as I settle in along the base of a pine tree. It drips over my eyebrows and down my cheeks, lines the exposed scalp on either side of my head.

  I can feel the cool night air picking at it, a slight tingle permeating my upper body.

  Pulling in air through my nose, my pulse is elevated, a result of the adrenaline seeping into my system. A direct callback to a time years before, sensation ripples the length of me, my fingers twitching slightly.

  Using the thin array of boughs lining the bottom half of the tree as cover, I stay in a crouched position, weight balanced evenly, ready to move at the first chance.

  Careful to look past the flames dancing in the foreground, to preserve my night vision as much as possible, I remain tucked here, well hidden from sight.

  I listen as the engine grows ever closer, pushed as hard as the road will allow, before backing off. The angry gnashing of oversized pistons falls away, the driver finding what he is looking for. Spiers no doubt has his tracking system pulled up on a handheld screen before him.

  Much like I’ve been watching his movements all evening, keeping tabs on a car sitting somewhere in a garage, he’s been doing the same. Coming ever closer, using my foolishness against me.

  Letting off on the gas entirely, the whine of the engine is replaced by a pair of brakes. Sounding brand-new, they squeal slightly, followed by the trajectory of the front headlights shifting.

  Swinging wide, they cut a sharp arc through the forest, barely able to penetrate the dense vegetation. Based on their positioning, I guess the truck to be pulling in right beside my SUV, the glow of the lamps disappearing, the sound of the idling of the engine the sole way I even know they have stopped.

  Parked like that, they have ensured there is no chance of me getting back to the guns I have stowed nearby.

  In the exaggerated darkness brought on by the loss of their headlights, I remain crouched, listening for any sound.

  Reaching out, I wrap my fingers around the trunk of the tree. Clenching firmly, I feel every muscle in my upper body draw taut, my jaw seizing. Slowly, I push my breath out through my nose, entire upper body quivering, driven by despising the mistake I just made and loathing for the man I know is about to appear.

  The number of people in this world I care about — have ever cared about — can be counted on a couple of fingers. Right now, all of them are tucked away on a farm in Idaho, relying on me to put down this threat.

  To do whatever I must to remove Jensen Spiers and whatever shit he’s tangled in from their lives forever.

  So be it.

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  For a moment, Jensen Spiers turns the headlights off. Parked alongside a silver Subaru Forester, he stares out at the forest before them, so thick it looks almost impenetrable in the darkness, nothing but a black curtain spread wide in either direction.

  Reaching out, he does the same for the engine. Without the light or the rumble, he sits with his heart racing. Sweat stings his eyes, settling into the corners, following the unnatural curves of the mask encasing his face.

  Fighting the urge to wipe it away, only to send another ripple of pain through his head from touching the tender area, he instead reaches out, flipping the headlights back on. Bright to the brink of being white, the halogens illuminate the world before them.

  Scads of individual trees overcrowd the area. Almost all pine, their age and circumference vary greatly, as does their color from dark green to rust brown. Layered upon each other, nearly every gap is plugged by the ones behind, the beams sitting up high barely able to get past the first few feet.

  Snaking through the center of it is a footpath, a narrow trench broken through the canopy, heavily matted with pine needles.

  “Good call,” Lucas whispers, placing the phone face down on the dash. Pulling his hand back, he reaches for his hip, pausing halfway there to ask, “We going in hot?”

  If the call earlier is to be believed, the woman with the wide mohawk from The Sundowner is currently at a warehouse in Montebello. Any moment now, she’ll be nabbed by Lucy and his squad, either going quietly in handcuffs or putting up a fight and getting a nightstick shoved up her ass.

  Given his preference, Spiers would opt for the latter, the former putting her into a position where she might start sharing far more than he would like.

  Of everything, that was the only part he was concerned with before deciding to make the drive into the mountains.

  At the same time, he can’t imagine the woman simply leaving Amy and the girl out in the woods. No matter if they did go to Idaho, in the years he’s known them both, never has he seen them show any inclination for camping. Or nature. Or even being outside when they weren’t within easy reach of a pool or beach.

  “For sure,” Spiers whispers. Reaching under the seat, he extracts the case taken from his sedan, popping the hasp and sliding out the P220.

  Feeling the unfamiliar gnarl of the grip, his hand tightens around it, his gaze again tracing the world before them.

  “Recognize the SUV?” Lucas asks.

  Flicking his gaze quickly to the side, Spiers sees a standard midsize model, the shape and color the same as a million others in Los Angeles County. If he’s remembering correctly, Stepanovich has something similar. As does his neighbor.

  And so many more, there’s no point in even trying to decipher this one from the others.

  The vehicle the woman had been driving at The Sundowner was a black Explorer. Different in almost every way save the category it fell under, there was no way of knowing if it belonged to the same person or some camper that was about to have their night interrupted in a most unpleasant way.

  “No,” Spiers replies, returning his gaze to face forward. “See anything?”

  Each of them continuing to assess, looking out at the dense vegetation, Lucas replies, “Nothing.”

  Grunting softly, Spiers extends his left hand for the door. “You sure you’re good here?”

  Making no effort to hide his glare, Lucas raises his gun in his left hand. Using his right to work back the slide, he chambers a round, the metallic click pronounced inside the cab. “Like you said, one way or another, this needs to end.”

  Giving the handle a tug, Spiers slides out. From the elevated position of the cab, he falls a few inches before hitting the ground, the gravel of the turnout crunching beneath his feet.

  Crouching a few inches under the momentum of the drop, he stands with knees bent. Closing the door behind him, he places his back against the side of the truck, gun extended in both hands before him.

  Taking a step to the right, he moves for the front of the truck. The cool metal of the body against his arm, he slides around the front, the sound of the engine continuing to work through its last gasps still audible beside him.

  “Smell that?” Lucas asks, appearing opposite him. Stiff and upright, the gun is cradled against his abdomen, a pained expression on his face.

  Once more, Spiers considers his partner and wonders if allowing him to come was the right call.

  “I can’t smell shit right now,” Spiers replies, not bothering to add that his nose is so busted he can’t even breathe through it. “What is it?”

  “Smoke,” Lucas answers, turning his body to face forward. “And maybe some kind of fuel. Gas or something.”
>
  Peering into the trees, Spiers tries to spy some bit of fire, some tiny tendril of a flame penetrating the thick copse of trees.

  Best he can tell, there is nothing, the density and the harsh glare of the headlights too much to see past.

  “Fan out,” Spiers says. Using his chin, he gestures toward the path. “Stay close to the path. I’ll do the same.”

  Glancing over, he adds, “They’ve got a car and a fire. They’ve got to be here somewhere.”

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  Following the enormous truck east along the I-210 had been easy. Even in the late evening, there was enough traffic flowing away from downtown that Lima and Bocco could hang back on the freeway. Ducking between semitrucks and using the steady traffic at the various exits, they were able to glide seamlessly between hundreds of late day commuters.

  Not that it seemed like their effort was necessary, the truck sitting in the outside lane and humming along at eighty miles an hour, never once altering course until turning off to head north on the 39.

  From there, things had gotten a bit more difficult. While the first mile or so was the standard roadside fare, replete with fast food offerings and gas stations, things thereafter grew sparse.

  Businesses became neighborhoods, filled with single family dwellings.

  By the time they started their initial ascent into the mountains, even that much had receded. The landscape changed from brown and arid to dense canopy, the Angeles National Forest seeming to almost swallow the road they were on.

  Now more than a half hour after turning off the interstate, they continue their march through the woods. Careful not to run up on Spiers from behind, they are forced to go no more than thirty miles an hour.

  Riding in silence, both peer to either side, looking at every tiny turnoff and cutout along the side the road, using the faint glow of the low beams to scour for the blue truck.

  “What do you think?” Bocco asks. Lifting his foot from the gas, he wrestles the wheel to the side, maneuvering them through a sharp turn before straightening out again.