by R. A. McGee
This time, Porter’s silence wasn’t a ploy. He had no idea what to say.
Fifteen
“Scarlett, what do you mean, ‘drug men’?”
“The guys that make the drugs,” she said, like it explained everything.
Porter just looked across the bike at the girl.
“Pima was out hiking around one day and she found the place. She saw a bunch of… you know, stuff. Tube and containers and stuff. The stuff our resource officer showed us when he had the meeting to tell us to stay away from drugs.”
“Meth?” Porter said.
“I don’t know, I don’t do that stuff.”
Porter thought back to the waning months of his law-enforcement career. There had been some new trends in the cooking of methamphetamines, both in the ingredients the cooks were using and the setups of their stills. They were trending smaller and smaller. Where the first meth operation he’d ever busted had taken up most of the inside of a mobile home, he remembered once arresting a man who’d managed to make a passable batch in a single two-liter bottle.
The problem was, meth cooking was volatile; there had been plenty of tweakers who’d blown themselves up in the pursuit of the next batch. There had been whispers around the agency, particularly from some of the Midwest sub-offices, that the smart cooks were moving the labs outside. Hiding them in the middle of nowhere.
If the drugs exploded, no one died in a trailer fire. If the cops stumbled across them, they were on land that didn’t belong to anyone. It was supposed to be the next phase in meth cooking, but Porter had gotten out before he’d witnessed any of it firsthand.
“You girls found a meth lab,” he muttered.
“I guess so. But that was part of the fun.”
“Fun?” Porter said, louder than he should have.
Scarlett stopped for a second and looked at him. “Yeah, fun. We really liked the area. It’s so pretty. Those guys never saw us there anyway. We’d hide our bikes and we would climb high in the trees. They never knew we were there.”
“And that’s all you did? Watch the guys?”
“Sometimes Pima would take pictures of them with her phone. She said she’d show her dad one day, when she knew he wouldn’t be mad at her.”
“Cause her dad’s FBI?” Porter said.
“Yeah. Pima said the bad guys should go to jail. We were gonna tell eventually.”
Porter exhaled and ran his hands over his head. He wondered if he’d ever done anything so stupid when he was young, quickly deciding that it wasn’t possible. “You realize these types of people will kill you if they catch you, right?”
“We never got caught; why would we worry about it?” Scarlett said, a perfectly rational thirteen-year-old.
“Could you pick the guys out if I showed you pictures?”
“What?”
“If I had a picture, could you tell me who they are?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe? We usually don’t get a good look. There’s a big one, even bigger than you. A couple skinny ones. I don’t know, Pima has pictures.”
Porter nodded. The mountain air blew again and he wished he’d taken more time to find his hoodie. “Can you tell me where this place is?”
Scarlett chewed her lip again. “Then people will know we were out there. Maybe they will think the drugs are ours, you know?”
“No one will even know you told me,” Porter said.
“You promise?”
“I swear. I’ll lie if anyone asks me how I found the place.”
“Do you think something happened to Pima?”
“No telling, but I want to check it out,” Porter said.
“Okay, let’s go,” Scarlett said, wheeling her bike toward the trunk of the Yukon.
“Negative,” Porter said. “You aren’t going.”
“Don’t you want to go?”
“Yeah, but if it’s like you said it is, you shouldn’t be there. Hell, you should never go back. Get my point?”
The girl nodded. She pulled out her smartphone and walked closer to Porter. “When Pima first found the place, she saved it as a location on her GPS and then sent it to me so I could find it. Here.” Scarlett held up the phone and Porter copied the coordinates into his GPS and saved it.
“Good. I’m going to look into it.”
Scarlett straddled her bike, pulled her hair back and then stuffed it under her helmet. “You swear you won't tell anybody I told you? Pima’s folks? My mom?”
“I can keep a secret,” Porter said.
Scarlett looked at him and held out her hand, pinky up.
Porter held out his pinky, intertwined it with her tiny finger, and shook it.
“You can’t break that, no matter what,” Scarlett said.
“I never lie.”
Apparently satisfied with the pinky promise, the girl rode off, leaving Porter alone with the myriad of new decisions he needed to make.
Sixteen
Back in the Yukon, windows rolled up, his first instinct was to drive straight to the location Scarlett had given him and check things out. He looked up at the sun, which was dropping rapidly lower in the sky, the late-fall days not yielding long hours of light.
It wasn’t a great idea to go out into unfamiliar woods at night.
He believed Scarlett had gone to look for Pima. If she had simply been hurt or stuck, her friend would have gotten help. So, either Pima wasn’t out there and it wouldn’t matter when he went, or she was still in the woods hiding out.
While it was going to be a cool evening, it wasn’t kill-you-overnight cold yet. Judging by the warm clothes Scarlett wore and the fact the Newtons seemed to provide well for their children, Porter imagined Pima had sufficiently warm clothes on. If she was out there, it was because she wanted to be. Better for him to check in the light of day.
It didn’t hurt that he didn’t want to run into any meth cookers in the dark.
He briefly considered calling Spaulding and having him go check it out, but changed his mind quickly when he remembered the ineptitude of the sheriff’s deputies. Better to keep them in the dark unless he actually came up with something.
Mind shifting back to himself, Porter dropped the truck into gear and slowly circled around the town, looking while he could in the fading light. Before long, he drove past a motel he remembered seeing on his drive in.
He should have asked Claudette where a good place to stay was. It was always best to rely on local info for things like that. Between the burger and her smile, he’d been a little too distracted to think about the hotel plans, however.
In the absence of a recommendation, he figured one place was as good as another. Porter pulled into the parking lot of the motel with its half-lit sign. It was a small establishment, with all outward-facing doors. The building wrapped around a courtyard like a horseshoe, with an empty pool in the middle. Porter pulled into the mostly empty parking lot, taking his choice of spaces.
In the middle of the horseshoe, just below the empty pool, was a small building with wooden siding. Porter pushed his way through the door, a cowbell announcing his entrance.
“You guys like your cowbells around here, huh?”
A young man pulled his face out of a magazine. “Cheaper than an alarm system.” The kid was clean-cut, with short brown hair and freckles. The placard on the counter said his name was Sam and that he was the assistant manager.
“Assistant manager? You’re doing okay for yourself.”
“I’m the only employee, other than the maid,” the young man laughed. “They figured they’d give me a nifty title instead of a raise.”
“Nice. Got any rooms?”
“I think I can rustle you up one,” he said, pointing to a pegboard full of keys.
“How much?”
Sam pointed to a laminated piece of paper on the counter in front of him. “This month it’s thirty-nine ninety-nine. Weekends go up to eighty-nine ninety-nine.”
“Why so much? Are the weekends that exciting?”
> “The next few weekends, at least. The leaves are changing, and tourists are suckers for that kind of thing.”
“Not you?” Porter said.
“Nah. Been here my whole life, seen the leaves dozens of times. Bunch of idiots stomping all over the woods; me and my friends stay out of the way.”
“Spend a lot of time in the woods?”
“Sure,” Sam said, leaning against the counter. “Me and my girl go out a lot, hiking and trail running. Mountain bike sometimes when we’re feeling brave.”
“You know your way around pretty well?” Porter said, pulling out his smartphone.
“As good as I can, I guess. There’s a bunch of space out there. It’s easy to get lost.”
Porter looked around at the lobby and got one of the cheap area maps out of its plastic holster on the wall. He showed Sam the coordinates he’d gotten from Scarlett. “How easy is this to get to?”
The young man turned the map around and after a few moments, grabbed a pen and circled an area of the map. “That’s the national forest. Not hard to get there, easy to find parking. The problem is,” he said, tapping his finger on the map, “it’s a long haul back here. Take you a couple hours.”
“Fun. Okay, Sam, mark me down for a couple of nights.”
“Yes, sir.” The young man didn’t bother with any paperwork or ID. He asked Porter which room he’d like, and Porter asked for one in the middle somewhere. The young man obliged.
“Room Fifty-Five. One of our best.”
“Really?”
“Nah. They’re all the same. Tell you what, if you’re still here this weekend, I’ll give you the weeknight rate. You aren’t some tourist; you must be a real outdoorsman if you want to be hiking in there.” Sam tapped Porter’s map.
Porter folded the map up. “I guess we’ll see.”
He thanked the young man and left, walking past his truck and across the lot to room 55, testing the door handle.
When he turned, movement on the main road outside the motel drew his eye. A sheriff’s office sedan rolled by. At this point, it was too dark to see through the tint, but Porter didn’t have to guess who was inside. He resigned himself to going back in the morning and talking to Spaulding about his new stalkers.
Or maybe he’d throw them the beating he’d promised.
When they’d rolled off, he opened the door and stood a moment. It was no frills, but serviceable. Under the front window was a noisy A/C unit, and in the middle of the room was a rock-hard queen-size bed.
The bathroom had generic tile and a tiny window for ventilation. It wasn’t the upgraded suite he’d slept in last night, but it would do.
Satisfied, Porter pulled back the sheets to check for bedbugs. An old habit, but one he couldn’t shake. Then he took the comforter off the bed, wrapped the TV remote and the small phone from the end table in it, and stuffed the mass into the top drawer of the squat dresser.
He stepped back outside to his truck and pulled his duffle bag out. Porter left his truck parked in the spot away from his room, and walked back through the parking lot.
After he’d closed and locked the door, and pulled the dresser in front of it for good measure, Porter dug through his bag and pulled out a bottle of Lysol and doused the room with its spray, not stopping until he started to cough.
He’d seen a documentary about the types of germs found in hotel rooms, and it had scarred him. Now he took no chances.
The documentary had also said the dirtiest, most fecal- and sperm-covered items in a hotel room were the phone and the television remote.
He opened the drawer and sprayed some on the balled-up comforter inside to be sure.
Porter showered, thinking of the new information he’d received from Scarlett, as well as the topography lesson from Sam. He was no woodsman, but he figured he’d be okay.
He dried off and was asleep the second his head hit the pillow.
Seventeen
Eventually, the group let Pima out of her room. Laura Bell had told the men she was doing it and no one could stop her. Richie put up a fight, until it was decided that Pima would have one of her legs tied to a chair so she couldn’t run away.
Pima was hesitant at first, figuring it was a trick and they were going to kill her, but she was thankful to be able to see the daylight from the living room and sat so quietly that she hoped people forgot she was even there.
Whether they actually forgot or not was debatable, but they did grow comfortable enough around the girl in their midst to speak openly about much of their business. That scared Pima the most.
She didn’t know who they were, not really—just a couple of names—so the hopeful side of her thought they could let her go and she couldn’t ever snitch on them.
The terrified side of her hoped they weren’t just being open because they planned to kill her regardless.
Richie was pacing around the trailer, pointing his finger at Seth. “That’s not enough, you idiot. Big Man says we need more.”
“Well, I’m working on it, Rich. I can’t make the shit cook any faster than it does.”
“Working on it, my ass. When’s the last time you went to the spot to even check it out?” Richie said. He walked back and forth in front of the seated Seth, who had his feet up on a ratty couch.
“Not since I grabbed that little bitch.”
“See, that’s your problem,” Bart said from the kitchen. “You don’t take this shit serious.” As always, he was head-to-toe in camouflage.
“You better watch your mouth. This is family business, and you ain't. You keep pushing me and I’ll—”
“You’ll what, tweaker? Huh? You come over here and I’ll push your shit in,” Bart said with a smile.
Pima tried to think about what that meant, and decided she didn’t want to know.
Seth shot to his feet and Richie pushed him back down. “Not now.”
“But Rich, that piece of shi—”
“I said not now.”
There was quiet in the trailer for a few minutes. Pima thought she could hear Seth grinding his teeth.
“Okay,” Richie said, standing still for a minute. “Bart, tomorrow morning I want you to go check the spot. See how much we can harvest. I need a count.”
“Come on, Rich, you know I’m going bow-hunting in the morning. Deer season ain’t but so long.”
“And? Hunt, then go check it out. I don’t care what you do, but you better not come back tomorrow if you can’t give me a number, got it?” Richie stepped toward the kitchen.
“You should send that fiend of a brother of yours,” Bart said, pointing at Seth. “I gotta waste my time on this shit.”
Seth shot to his feet again. Before he could speak, Richie pushed him back to the couch. “Bart, get the hell out of here.”
Pima watched the man in the camo slam the front door open and disappear into the yard.
“Why do you let him talk to me like that?” Seth said.
“Because he’s right,” Richie said. “This is your mess, you should be handling it.”
“I’m just saying, I don’t know why you keep him around,” Seth said, arms crossed in front of him. “We don’t need him.”
Richie reached down and grabbed his brother’s face. “I keep him around for the same reason I let you keep Dusty around. Because when the shit jumps off, there needs to be more than two of us. You’re family, baby brother, and I love you. You, me, and Laura Bell—keeping us safe is all that matters.”
Richie paused for a moment and stared at his brother. Pima saw Seth avoiding eye contact.
“You know what kind of numbers the Big Man is talking, right?”
Seth nodded.
“If we don’t come up with that, he’ll hang us out to dry. It won't be any time until the Mexicans have this place crawling with hit men. We can’t take that on alone. We need Bart and Dusty if we have to go to war. But what we really need is enough crystal to keep these guys off our backs. Got it?”
“I know, Richie,
damn.”
“Are you sure? Because if you want, we can get out of the big leagues. Go back to selling those asshole bikers a pound or two a month. You want to go back to that?”
“Hell, no,” Seth said.
“All we need to do is prove we can handle this demand. This one load and we’re set. We’ll be flush with cash and always have somebody to sell our shit to. The Mexicans have an endless supply of money. Let’s make sure we’re the people they buy from.
“In the morning I have a couple things to look into. I want you and Dusty to get as much equipment together as you can. I’ll meet you guys out at the spot and we'll spend the day setting up new stills. We’ll hit our deadline no matter what. You with me, baby brother?”
Pima watched as Seth looked up at his brother and nodded his head.
“Good. I gotta go make a call.” Richie stepped out of the trailer.
Pima watched Seth dig around in his pants and pull out a glass pipe, then scratch a lighter a couple of times until it caught fire.
The trailer was filled with the sickly-sweet smell of his drugs again.
Pima held her breath for as long as she could.
Eighteen
An errant beam of sunshine knifed its way through the worn blinds and hit Porter in the face. He wasn’t asleep. He’d been awake before his alarm went off, thinking about his hike in the woods, his mind running through contingencies and worst-case scenarios.
No point in waiting any longer.
After trying to drain the hotel’s entire supply of hot water, he dried, dressed, and was out the door, scooting the dresser just enough to let him leave. Porter cut across the parking lot to his truck, sunshine warm on his still-wet beard, then fired up his truck and pulled out.
The GPS took him the most direct route, through what passed for traffic in the small town. After a series of turns, one leading him through the national forest, he came to a small dirt parking lot. He stepped out into the cool morning air and lifted his tailgate.
He dug through his clothes, looking for something that would be warm, but not too warm, as his large frame was sure to start sweating when he moved around. He’d almost detoured to buy a pair of proper hiking boots, but decided against it. Trying to wear a brand-new pair of boots before they were broken in was a recipe for chewed-up feet. Porter stuck with his Chucks.
