by C. J. Box
Singer had a police scanner in his SUV, and as they patrolled the forest near Swann’s they’d listened to the sheriff’s dispatcher. Monica Taylor had called repeatedly. The dispatcher told a deputy of the calls from the mother saying her children weren’t home yet from school. The calls were treated as routine, the assumption was the kids would likely show up later that night. There was no sense of urgency yet.
Newkirk felt numb, as if he weren’t really there. He was tired, dirty, hungry. He hadn’t been home all day. The first glass of beer from the pitcher Gonzalez had brought to the table affected him on an empty stomach. He poured another and topped up Singer’s and Gonzalez’s glasses. The beer tasted crisp and good.
“This is a critical time,” Singer said, keeping his voice low, “before all hell breaks loose. If those kids stop someone for a ride or show up at a house …”
“We’re fucked,” Gonzalez said, finishing the sentence for his former boss.
“Yes.”
“Where could they be?” Newkirk asked.
Singer and Gonzalez simply stared at him, as they did whenever he asked an unanswerable question.
“The sheriff probably won’t take it seriously until tomorrow,” Singer said. “He’ll give it some time. It’s obvious they think those kids will show up at home tonight.”
That was why he’d ordered Swann to go into town and stake out the Taylor house. Swann knew where they lived and could contact Singer via cell phone if the kids showed up. Sofar, there had been no call.
“I think they’re hunkered down in the woods,” Gonzalez said. “There’s a lot of country out there to get lost in. Nothing but trees all the way to Canada.”
While they’d patrolled, Gonzalez had kept remarking on the absence of houses, the lack of lights back in the forest. It struck Newkirk as an odd observation, but understandable given the circumstances. Gonzalez and Singer kept to themselves. They rarely ventured out of their trophy homes, and made it a point not to get to know their neighbors. The thick forest insulated them from human interaction, and their locked gates kept out passersby. Both lived in woodland fortresses with satellite television and Internet, wells for water, backup power generators at the ready. The only time they went to town was to transact necessary business—banking, groceries, whatever—and get back. They socialized with each other and the other ex-cops who’d come up together. Newkirk was different, and proud of it. He was the youngest of them, was married, and had kids at home. Two boys and a girl, all involved in school and sports. Newkirk and Maggie had met other parents, other families. They traveled to soccer and basketball games with locals, had gotten to know and like some of them. Newkirk liked to think of it as “making an effort.” In a sense, he felt he was the only one of the ex-officers who actually lived here. The others were strangers by choice, although Swann was known to roam around town occasionally. Not Singer or Gonzalez. That’s why they were always asking him where to find things, like the Sand Creek Bar.
Newkirk often thought bitterly that Singer and Gonzalez, by keeping to themselves the way they did, could create unwanted suspicion. It was as if they were bunkered in their hilltop mansions, looking down on everyone below them. Especially Singer, who rarely ventured out. It was as if he’d done his time with the human race and had no more use for it. And while people up here minded their own business, they didn’t like being held in contempt—they wanted to be liked. Newkirk, for his part, found himself liking them, getting along. Singer, by holding himself above them, could create unnecessary animosity. It just hadn’t happened yet.
“So what the fuck do we do?” Gonzalez asked Singer.
“Just let me think,” Singer said.
After taking his baseball cap off, running his fingers through his hair, and putting it back on, Newkirk watched Singer. Singer was the man in charge. The lieutenant was the most icily efficient commander Newkirk had ever served under, even in the Army. Singer was the man the department turned to when a case was spiraling in the wrong direction. The man was a fixer, the guy you brought in when a situation had turned into a cluster fuck. Singer brought his calm with him, but the downside of his façade was that palpable feeling of something tightly coiled up just beneath the skin, like a high-tension spring that continued to wind tighter, capable of being released with a snap to strike out like a serpent’s head. Newkirk had seen that happen twice and never wanted to see it again. Singer was preternaturally unflusterable, his voice rarely over a whisper. He was the kind of guy who got quieter and colder the worse things got, as if his concentration alone would cut a swath of reason through chaos; that only he was capable of thinking with clarity. Thing was, he was right. When Singer was in charge, like he was now, he was a marvel to watch. There were no wasted motions, no wasted words. He absorbed the vagaries of the situation, processed them, then flicked out commands and expected them to be obeyed. He missed nothing. But there was a profound deep-seated bitterness in Singer, and Newkirk had been there, on the LAPD, as it happened.
There had been a minor scandal, one of many, within the department. That particular one involved the loss of impounded vehicles. Several vocal inner-city leaders had complained to an on-the-make television news reporter that cops were taking or selling cars owned by racial minorities that had been impounded due to traffic violations. The station led with the story for four nights straight, and Singer was assigned the interdepartmental investigation. He determined that the people at fault weren’t officers but city contractors charged with towing the vehicles. Despite this finding, the television news reporter had his own agenda and edited Singer’s comments in such a way that he sounded not only incompetent, but complicit. The edited report, complete with new questions asked by the reporter that were dubbed in after the interview, aired during sweeps week in Los Angeles, and Singer was referred to as “Stammering Singer” in news columns. The lieutenant, who had never had his reputation questioned before, was furious and asked the department to take action against the reporter and the television station, to at least defend him in public. The outgoing police chief, who later wound up being hired as an expert commentator for the network affiliated with the local station, bunkered down. Singer felt betrayed, and the dedication and passion he had felt toward the department took a 180-degree turn. He was never the same after that, and the quiet and effective hatred he had once focused on criminals and spineless politicians pointed inward toward his employers. Only those close to him—his immediate subordinates—knew of the sea change. Like everything about Singer, the shifting of loyalty from the department to his small circle of men was swift, decisive, and devastating. The LAPD never knew what hit it.
Although Newkirk was physically outmatched by Ex-Sergeant Gonzalez, who sat at the table beside him, it was Singer, a head shorter than Newkirk, he feared the most.
Gonzalez let Singer think and sipped his beer. As always, he had chosen the chair with his back toward the wall so he could keep an eye on everything in front of him. Gonzalez was a big man. He worked out daily in his home gym, and he wore jeans and tight black T-shirts that called attention to his thick arms, barrel chest, and massive hard belly. Gonzo was dark, smoldering, and violent. He fostered his image and persona. He was the kind of police officer, and man, who projected a dark malevolence even when he performed a simple, normal task like opening a door for someone or smiling at a joke. People around him, even strangers, always seemed relieved that Gonzalez had not decided to harm them. He had a way of looking up from hooded eyes that chilled the blood. Gonzalez was never troubled by doubt in his own judgment and never hesitated to follow up with his own kind of justice. He was the creator of the infamous L.A. mutilation known as the “guilty smile,” where a man’s cheeks were ripped back from the corners of his mouth to his ears. When the victim’s face eventually healed, the mutilation made it look like a wide, clownish smile.
Singer had barely touched his beer. Newkirk and Gonzalez had emptied the pitcher, and Gonzo tried to get the attention of the bartender by lifting i
t whenever he thought the man looked over.
“What we’ve got to do is get control of the situation,” Singer said softly, almost to himself. “We can’t wait for things to happen, then react. We’ve got to get ahead of it so we can steer things in our favor.”
“Like waiting for that motherfucker to look over and get us a pitcher,” Gonzalez said.
Newkirk sighed. “I’ll get it.”
He approached the bar. There were only two other drinkers, a skeletal man in stained Carhartts who looked like an old miner, and a much younger man in a brown UPS uniform. Newkirk perched between them and put the pitcher on the bar.
“What was it? Coors?” the bartender asked, rousing himself from where he leaned against the backbar and watched Sportscenter on the television mounted to the ceiling.
“Yes,” Newkirk said. He shot a glance at the old miner, who nodded at him then went back to watching the television. The UPS man seemed to be waiting for Newkirk to say something. Oh no, he thought; a talker.
“Don’t get too close to me,” the UPS man slurred. “I’m radioactive.”
“You are?” Newkirk asked pleasantly, but in a way he hoped would be dismissive.
“I’m fucking poison. I might rub off on you, and you don’t want that.”
Newkirk shifted to look him over. He was built; solid, tight clothes, thick thighs, but a broad friendly face. Newkirk guessed six-two, two-twenty. A brass-colored name tag on his uniform read TOM BOYD. It was unusual to see a package delivery employee in uniform so long after the workday was over. He remembered the truck outside.
“Don’t you have to turn your truck in at night?”
Tom snorted. “S’posed to. But instead I pitched camp right here on this stool when I got done with my route. Right, Marty?” he said to the bartender, who had tilted the empty pitcher to fill it with beer from the tap.
“Yes, Tom,” the bartender said wearily. Newkirk got the impression Tom had already talked Marty’s ear off.
“I’ll take care of that pitcher,” Tom said, fishing a wad of bills out of his pocket and slapping them on the bar. “And another double Jack for me.”
“You sure you need another one?” Marty asked.
“What are you, a bartender or my fucking counselor? A knife could drop out of the sky at any second and kill my poor, pathetic ass. So pour ’em!”
Marty shrugged, and Tom shook his head in drunken exaggeration. “That’s right. That’s right.”
Neither Newkirk nor Marty said anything, not wanting to encourage him.
“I’m poison,” Tom said again. “I’m fucking radioactive. Everything I touch turns to crap.”
Tom was one of those guys, Newkirk thought, who was practically begging to be asked what was wrong and wouldn’t give up until he was.
“Women problems, eh?” Newkirk said, not really interested.
“Is there any other kind? I mean really?”
“Just call her. Let her talk it out and keep your mouth shut while she does. That’s what works for me.” To emphasize his point, Newkirk raised his hand and rotated the wedding band on his finger.
Tom said, “I tried to call her a while ago, and she hung up on me. She said she was waiting for the sheriff to call back and to get off her line. It’s bullshit. That kid is just getting back at her by not coming home. I used to do that shit all the time.”
Newkirk felt a trill race down his spine. “Why is she waiting for the sheriff to call her?”
“Her kids didn’t come home from school,” Tom said, rolling his eyes, smiling ruefully. “Somehow, that’s my fault.”
“What did you say her name was?” Newkirk asked, knowing Tom hadn’t said it yet.
“Monica.”
“Monica Treblehorn? I know her.”
“No, Monica Taylor.”
“Don’t know her,” Newkirk said.
“Consider yourself lucky.”
“What’d you do?” Newkirk asked conversationally.
“Pissed her off,” Tom said. “Forgot to take her little mama’s boy fishing, so she fucking threw me out. Threw me right out. Her and that little bitch daughter of hers—they conspired against me.”
Boy and girl, Newkirk thought. Taylor.
“So they went on their own, huh?” Newkirk said, realizing as he said it that he should have kept quiet. Tom hadn’t told him the kids were on their own. But no matter, Tom didn’t catch it.
“Took my SIX-HUNDRED-DOLLAR SAGE ROD, too!”
“That sucks, doesn’t it?”
“Let me give you a little bit of advice, my friend,” Tom said, reaching out and gripping Newkirk’s arm. “Don’t go out with a woman who has kids.”
“I’m married,” Newkirk said. “I’ve got kids of my own.”
“Then don’t go out with her,” Tom said, smiling stupidly. “They’ll all conspire against you. They’ll win, too. We’re outnumbered by the women and the kids and the pansies. We’re endangered species, us men, just like that fucking owl that stopped all the logging in the woods.”
“Hear hear!” the old miner shouted from the end of the bar, raising his glass.
“Tom,” Marty said, handing the pitcher to Newkirk, “advice is frowned on in this place.” To Newkirk, Marty said, “Keep it on the tab?” Ignoring Tom Boyd’s offer.
“Yes, and buy my new friend here another,” Newkirk said.
When he returned to the table, Newkirk said, “You won’t believe who I just met. Monica Taylor’s boyfriend. And we’ve got a problem. He said she’s waiting for the sheriff to call her back. Things might be moving faster than we thought. I’m guessing they’ll form a search team to look for those kids. What if they find them?”
“Jesus Christ,” Gonzalez whispered angrily. “Does everybody know?”
“Not like that. He just talked with her,” Newkirk said, shaking his head. “He says she threw him out of her house tonight.”
Singer looked at Newkirk, his face expressionless. Then, oddly, a tight faint smile.
“This isn’t a problem,” he said. “It’s an opportunity.”
“What?”
“See how his mind works?” Gonzalez said with admiration.
THEY WAITED until Marty cut Tom off. While Tom pleaded for a last drink, Gonzalez and Singer slipped outside.
Newkirk settled the tab at the bar while Tom stumbled from table to table on his way to the door.
When he got to the parking lot he saw Singer and Gonzo standing with Boyd in the light of the single pole light. Tom was leaning back against the UPS truck. He heard Gonzo say, “You sure you should be driving, mister?”
“I’m fine,” Boyd slurred. “Besides, I ain’t going home. I’m going to Monica’s. We got some things to straighten out.”
Newkirk approached them. He could see something square and long protruding from Gonzalez’s back jeans pocket. As his eyes adjusted to the gloom, he recognized what it was from his days on the force. It was called a “Stun Monster,” 650,000 volts. The department had banned them after some guy died, but that never mattered to Gonzo.
Boyd said, “It’s nice of you fellows to help, but I gotta go. Where you guys from, anyway?”
“Guess,” Singer said.
Boyd cracked a drunken smile. “I’d guess L.A. Like half the new fuckers up here.”
“Right you are,” Gonzalez said, stepping toward Boyd as if to assist him into the UPS truck. Newkirk saw the stun gun in Gonzalez’s hand and caught a glint of the metal electrodes wink in the lamp’s light. Gonzo plunged it into Boyd’s neck, and the electricity arced and snapped like furious lightning. Boyd dropped like a sack of rocks half-in and half-out of his driver’s door.
Boyd’s muscles twitched violently as they pushed him all the way into the truck and dragged him between the rows of parcels in the back. Boyd’s leg kicked out spasmodically, and his boot caught Newkirk on the shin, nearly dropping him. Newkirk could smell the awful stench of burnt flesh in the truck from Boyd’s neck. The stun gun had short-circuited Boy
d’s neurotransmitters, so the UPS man had no control over his muscles and limbs. Or sphincter, which released.
“Strong motherfucker,” Gonzo grunted, rolling the body over and cuffing him. “Stinky, too.”
“You drive,” Singer said, handing Gonzo the keys to the UPS truck. “Follow me.”
“Cool. I’ve always wanted to drive one of these things,” Gonzo said.
In his white SUV, with the headlights of the UPS truck filling the rearview mirror, Singer turned to Newkirk, said, “This was a gift. Now we can control the situation.”
Newkirk had no idea what he was talking about. He shoved his hands under his thighs so Singer couldn’t see them shaking.
DAY TWO
saturday
Saturday, 8:45 A.M.
AFTER PULLING two calves during the night, feeding his cattle at 5:00 A.M., and a big breakfast of steak, eggs, and coffee, Jess Rawlins showered and put on a jacket and tie and his best gray Stetson Rancher and went out to start his pickup. The sky was clear of clouds, although mist from the rain the night before hugged the grass and sharpened the smell of alfalfa and cow manure from the hayfield. The clouds would move in again in the afternoon, he guessed. He carried a boot box full of documents and put it on the passenger seat.
JIM HEARNE was waiting for him in the lobby wearing a sport jacket, tie, slacks, and boots. Jess still wasn’t used to the new bank building even though it had been there for five years. The new building was impressive, with its big windows and modern furniture, but he preferred the old one, the elegant, cramped, two-story redbrick structure on Main, with its dark interior, muted lights, and hardwood floors. It had once been called the North Idaho Stockman’s Bank. That was three name changes ago, before it became First Interstate and was now open on Saturdays. The Rawlins family had banked there since their initial homestead in 1933.
“Jim.”
