by Robin Lamont
“God, you’re cynical. How dare you belittle our efforts. We’ve had successes, you know.”
“Successes? You’re more naïve than I thought. Listen, I don’t have a thousand fucking Twitter followers, but today I can save an animal from being tortured to death. You can’t say that.”
“How does your way change anything in the long run?” Jude flashed back. “Talk about being naïve … you can’t make people see the value of animals by breaking the law. You don’t change a cultural mindset by freeing one fox.”
“It sure makes a difference for that fox. But that’s only part of it. You have to make people sit up and notice, and sometimes you have to get up in their faces. And that’s exactly what we did in Colorado and what we’re going to do in Louisiana.”
“So you can be a radical hero? An outlaw?”
“I break the laws because what they’re doing to animals is diabolically wrong,” responded Colin bitterly. “And I cannot let them get away with it.”
“But it’s not the real world!” cried Jude.
“Okay. Let’s talk about the real world. You know what’s going to happen in the real world, don’t you?” He snatched the book from her hand and flipped to the last page. “This right here about Oona? It’s going to set off alarm bells for the cops and lead them right to my father.” He jabbed an irate finger at the diary. “This maniac killed hundreds, probably thousands of innocent animals for the thrill of it. And you’re going to put my father in jail?”
Jude was silent. He was right. Ben had assured her he would turn himself in, but was she going to be the one to bring the cops down on him before he was ready?
Just then, Finn began to bark. Jude peered over the wall and saw him holding his tail high and stiff – a warning she knew well.
“Someone’s out there,” she rasped. “You’d better go. Now.”
Colin pushed her toward the ladder ahead of him, but she drew back. “Just you,” she said. “Look, I don’t know who it is, but if the FBI found out about the cabin, they could have tracked us from there. For me, all they can do is make life difficult and get Gordon pissed off at me. You’re a different story.”
Through the trees, they could see a flickering light, and Finn’s bark became more insistent.
“Go, go,” hissed Jude, fear taking hold. “They’ve got guns, Colin.”
He waved a truce flag by holding out the diary to her. But she pressed it back into his hands. “Take this. I’m not going to say anything about your father. But if you’re caught, you might need it.”
He leaned in and put his forehead against hers. “It isn’t over for us,” he said.
“No,” breathed Jude.
Colin wrested himself away and clambered down the ladder. Night was falling as fast as the snow and Jude never even saw which direction he ran. She thought that if she could stall the FBI for a few minutes, the snow might fill in his footprints so there would be no sign of him at all.
She gathered up the sack with the remaining dog collars and put it in her backpack. Then she descended the tree stand and grabbed hold of Finn’s collar as she waited for the bobbing light to get closer. The last thing she needed was Finn to attack someone – possibly a federal officer.
Holding her ground and putting her hand up to shade her eyes against the bright beam, she called out, “You can see it’s just me and my dog. I’m not armed. I’m holding on to him out of caution, but he’s not a problem.”
There was no response, just the continued approaching light now pointed at her face. Finn had stopped barking, but a menacing growl rumbled deep in his throat. She yanked on his collar to shush him.
It was weird. They should have identified themselves by this time; that’s what cops did, wasn’t it? Shout out instructions to put your hands up, don’t move, right? But no one said a word. For a moment she welcomed what seemed to be indecision – it would give Colin more time. She tried to extend it by identifying herself. “My name is Jude Brannock. I’m an investigator. I have a driver’s license in my backpack if you want me to get it out.”
The light switched off. Still blinded, Jude squinted, trying to see how many men were there. But only one figure took shape, and it said, “Tie up your dog.”
Icy adrenaline shot through her as she recognized the voice. “Listen, Cash, it’s not what you think,” she said.
“I’m not paid to think anything, Cowgirl. Now tie up your friggin’ dog before I shoot him. And I will.”
“He’s not going to–”
“Do it now or he gets a bullet.”
Jude heard the click of the hammer on his pistol. “Okay, okay.” She retrieved a long leash from her backpack, then clipped it to Finn’s collar and walked him to a nearby tree. She talked to her nervous dog all the while, reassuring him that everything would be all right. But she didn’t believe it. How had he followed her? What did he want? How dangerous was he right now? Then she tried to form a plan. Talk, keep talking until you know what he wants, and just in case, tie a loose knot in the leash.
As if he heard what she was thinking, Cash said, “Don’t mess around. Tie it good. If he comes at me, I will kill him.”
Jude hesitated, but ultimately yanked the knot tight. Finn would normally do what she said, but the second he perceived she was in imminent danger, he’d go after Cash. She turned back, keeping her voice calm to keep Finn from lunging.
“I guess you know by now I’m not a travel agent,” she said. “I’m really sorry I told you that I was, but I had a job to do in Stanton that had nothing to do with you, and I had to maintain this–”
“Shut up,” he cut her off.
“This has nothing to do with you.”
“You played me, you bitch,” he snarled. “Nobody does that to me. Nobody, you hear?”
Jude was scared. They were in the middle of nowhere and her worst fears about working undercover had come true. Not only did her mark know he’d been deceived, he felt humiliated, and he had no reserve when it came to killing animals. “You know, when I first saw the light, I thought it was the FBI. They put a tail on my car today,” she lied, “so they probably followed me here, too.”
“Nice try, Judy or whatever your name is. There ain’t nobody within ten miles of us. So you’re some kind of animal rights person? We thought you were.”
“Look, I understand you’re angry. You have every right to be. All I can do is apologize, but I promise you, it’s not personal. This was never about you.”
“You used me.” There was a steel edge to his voice that raised the hairs on Jude’s neck.
“I’m sorry, Cash.”
He seemed to let that settle before saying, “John Tripp wants a word with you. He also wants Eberhardt’s diary.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Bullshit.”
“I’m serious. It’s not here.”
“This is the only place it could be. You must be pretty smart to figure that out. I figured it out,” he boasted. “Just didn’t know where his tree stand was.”
“I’m telling you the truth. It’s not here.”
He motioned with his hand to give up her backpack. She did as she was told and set it on the ground. Still pointing his gun at her chest, he crouched and rifled its contents. Jude thought her best course of action was to keep him talking. There wasn’t much chance that anyone was coming to her rescue. He might give her an opening to say or do the right thing to get out of this jam.
She asked him, “Is the diary for Tripp or for your boss Bud Grimes?” When he didn’t answer, she continued, “They have a lot to lose in this, but you don’t. Not unless something happens to me. You’ve just been doing what Grimes tells you to do. No one is going to hold you responsible for that.”
“You got no business meddling where you don’t belong.”
“And the U.S. government has no business lying to
the American public,” burst out Jude. “And you have no business killing thousands of innocent animals and covering it up.”
He retorted, “To the contrary, doll. That is my business. You don’t know shit about livin’ out here.”
“I know enough to cost Bud Grimes his job. But you don’t have to lose yours, Cash. If you help me, I could put in a good word for you.”
“Oh yeah, I’m going to help out some animal rights freak,” he jeered.
Frustrated at not finding the diary, he upended the backpack and dumped all its contents in the snow. “What is this?” he demanded, emptying the sack of dog collars.
“They’re from all the dogs Eberhardt trapped and buried.”
Cash tossed them aside in disgust. He turned his attention to the tree stand. “He kept it up there, didn’t he? Come on, let’s go look.”
Jude protested, but he spun her around and pushed her up the ladder in front of him. In the tight confines of the platform, she pointed out the blue cooler and said, “He kept pieces of his trash animals in there.”
Even Cash recoiled at the stench. “What the fuck for?”
Now was not the time to explain about Eberhardt as a serial killer, so she simply said, “Look for yourself. It’s not here.”
After he rummaged through the cooler, failing to find it, he shoved the revolver into his belt and started to roughly pat her down.
“Get your hands off me!” cried Jude.
But Cash continued his probe, feeling for the diary under her thick coat, feeling for other things as well. “We never did finish what we started,” he growled into her ear.
“Don’t do this, Cash,” warned Jude. “You don’t want to spend the rest of your life in jail. Cooped up in a cage. No more wild. No fresh air. Just metal bars.”
She’d hit a nerve, and he backed away. He swept the rest of the platform with his foot to make sure the diary wasn’t hidden in a corner, then went down the ladder and waited for her.
Once on the ground, Jude scavenged the snow for some of the things he’d strewn about – an extra pair of socks, her phone, and when Cash’s attention was diverted by the agitated Finn, the satchel of dog collars.
“Get up,” instructed Cash. “You’re coming with me.”
“Where?”
“I told you, Tripp wants to see you.”
“What about Finn?” A germ of panic had sprouted and was growing quickly. “We can’t leave him here.”
“He stays.”
Jude straightened and took a bold step toward Cash. “I’m not leaving without my dog,” she stated.
“Fine,” he said, swiveling and aiming his pistol directly at Finn.
“No!” screamed Jude. “I’ll go. Don’t hurt him.”
Cash eyed her coldly and motioned her ahead. She started on the path with Cash at her back and Finn’s protesting barks burning a hole in her chest.
She rationalized that if Cash had meant to kill her he would have done it already. But with each step, the alleged meeting with Tripp seemed less likely. If Cash hadn’t committed a crime before, he certainly was now, and he had to know she’d go to the police – if she got free. The idea that she was to become the next victim of Shoot, Shovel and Shut-up seemed the more plausible scenario. Jude began to look for a chance to escape.
He’d left his ATV far enough away that neither Jude nor Colin had heard it approach. Cash instructed her to get on. He started it up and drove on his own tracks back through the woods. It crossed Jude’s mind to try overpowering him from behind, but she let that idea go quickly – he was much stronger and he had a weapon. She was afraid to vault off while the vehicle was moving, imagining a broken leg that would make escape impossible. They turned onto a wider trail, which offered a vague hope that they would eventually end up on a road where she had a chance of finding help. But Jude decided to take any opening that presented itself.
It came when Cash veered a couple of feet off the trail. The ATV’s tires could navigate the four inches of snow on the trail, but when he tried to avoid a tree limb, one of the front wheels dipped into an unseen hole, nearly toppling them. The abrupt stop jolted them both forward, slamming Jude into Cash’s back. The engine stalled. He sat still for a moment and cursed.
As soon as he dismounted and knelt down to inspect the undercarriage, Jude bolted.
“Hey!” he yelled. “Get back here.”
Encumbered by her backpack, Jude lurched in the direction they had come, trying to keep her feet on the fresh tire tracks where the snow was packed. Cash came after her. The beam of his flashlight danced wildly from the path ahead of him to the bulls eye on her back. But she dared not go into the woods on either side. At least here she could run.
“Don’t be an idiot,” he shouted. “You won’t make it out of here by yourself.”
She kept running, her breath coming in gasps. She could hear and feel him gaining on her. It was only a matter of a few seconds before he brought her down. No more time. Jude veered from the open trail and plunged into the cover of the woods. Holding her hands in front of her, she staggered through brush and saplings that whipped her upper body and face. Her shoulder slammed into a tree trunk that seemed to spring out of nowhere, spinning her around and nearly knocking her down. Thirty yards behind her, Cash’s light winked through the tree branches.
He called out another warning, “You’ll freeze to death, Cowgirl.”
Jude looked around, aware of how easy it would be for him to track her in the snow. A series of black shapes rose out of the white powder. Rocks. She wouldn’t leave footprints on rocks. On all fours, she scrambled over the boulders and then up an embankment. When she looked back, she saw Cash’s light flicker below. For a moment it looked as though he might climb up after her, but he retreated. Fearing that he was going back to get a rifle or a stronger light, she started running again. But seconds later, over her own hard breathing, she heard the ATV rumble away.
In the ensuing, surprising silence, Jude dug out her cell phone. It had some battery life left, but there was no service. She slowed to a walk, trying to stay parallel to the ATV trail – until she found Finn. Her boots made whooshing noises each time she took a step, and to her own ears it sounded loud. Every so often she stopped and pushed back her hood to listen for footsteps behind her, while the powdery snow accumulated on her hair and eyelashes.
Soon her path was cut by a small stream. The sight of it caught her off guard because they hadn’t crossed a stream that she recalled. She decided that she must be going in the wrong direction and changed course. She began to sweat under her parka. Her ankle twisted on one awkward step, and she forced herself to slow down to avoid the roots, rocks, and broken branches buried under the snow cover. She couldn’t afford a more serious injury. The only good news was that the snow had let up, though huge clumps dropped from the upper branches. A front was coming through, driving the fast-moving storm away, and moonlight peeked through the racing clouds. It felt like she was heading toward Finn, but she had yet to come across the ATV tracks, or any other tracks for that matter.
The even ground gave way to an incline that kept stretching upwards, testing Jude’s knees and pounding heart. But she climbed, hoping to see a road or a house from the summit. Finally, she reached the top, only to see more forest below … miles and miles of forest. Snow had gotten into her boots and her hands were ice cold in her wet gloves. The wind was sharp. She was glad for the extra layer of fleece under her jacket, but now, aware that she was shivering, it didn’t seem nearly enough.
She hadn’t allowed herself the luxury of reflection. But it came now. I’m in trouble. I’m in big trouble. Panic threatened to take hold.
Then in the moonlight she spotted a patch of black in the distant landscape. It had to be a body of water. Probably Lake Freedom. I have to get to Finn. She fumbled with the zipper on her parka, trying to close it further, but it wa
s up as far as it could go. Her shoulders ached from the weight of her backpack. Jude headed downhill, the lake her target.
She walked for another twenty minutes before she fell. The ground simply dropped away and she slid down an embankment, landing in a heap. The full body slam hurt like hell, and rising through the pain was an intense fury. Lying on her back, looking up into the starlit black sky, it erupted. “Why?” she screamed. “Why do you have to make it so hard?” Silence was her answer. “Yeah, I’m talking to you, God, or whoever you are. Don’t you care? I thought you made it all, the land, the water, the animals. Are you going to let them all die? Don’t you fucking care?”
That’s when she heard the wolves. The same careening howls that a week ago had sounded so eerie and beautiful now sent waves of fear coursing through her. One second they sounded far away, the next very close as the echo of the howling pack cut through the night. Jude knew full well that there had only been two fatal wolf attacks on humans in the last hundred years, but she had nothing to fight back with if they decided she was prey. There was only one thing to do – keep walking. Jude sat up and opened her backpack. She fished out the extra pair of socks, her phone, and the dog collars and stuffed them deep into her pockets. Everything else was meaningless. She got to her feet and ditched the backpack.
She never got to the lake. Over the next hour, the vast landscape of Idaho swallowed her, sapping her energy, her body heat, and her courage. Every once in a while she heard a wolf or a coyote. But mostly, all she heard were trees groaning like old hinges and her own faltering footsteps. After awhile, even her senses shut down. She couldn’t feel her fingers and toes, her body was exhausted. All she wanted to do was lie down, just for a minute, just a minute, that’s all. But somewhere inside she knew that if she did, she would never get up. Survival meant one more step.
She entered a pine forest where the trees towered above her head. The moon was bright and filtered through the branches, casting shadows everywhere. One more step. To her right, a large shadow moved at the edge of the trees with the stealth of a panther. Her breath quickened. It was a wolf or some large animal. The shadow slunk along the ground tracking her. Jude tried to speed up, but her legs wouldn’t go any faster. Then suddenly, it bounded out from behind a fallen tree and leapt at her.