Hawke's Target

by Reavis Z. Wortham

  “You can get in trouble for texting in school?”

  She grinned. “When you’re texting the answers. This kid must have been too close to someone who cared.” She tapped her phone with a fingertip. “Look, here’s the screenshot Gomez sent.”

  Granddad Frsnk has me. Fetlizer brn nr Gunn.

  She turned the phone off. “I figured that was supposed to be Frank. The next word looks like fertilizer barn, whatever that is.”

  “I hope we find out from these folks.”

  “Do you think we’re stepping out of bounds here?”

  “Probably, but I don’t like that we can’t get hold of Sonny. If these people are part of the problem, it’s justified.”

  “If they aren’t?”

  He killed the engine and they detrucked. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  A whip-poor-will called, as if in celebration of the cooler weather.

  Perry Hale locked the truck. Dressed in camo and carrying battle-slung ARs, the two experienced veterans geared up and disappeared into the dripping woods, moving fast and surefooted as cougars. Halfway toward their destination, Perry Hale paused and checked his GPS. “The Wadler place is about two hundred yards that way.”

  Yolanda adjusted her own ballistic vest and scanned the woods around them. She spoke in a whisper. She still couldn’t shake the feeling of foreboding. “This feels a little weird for me to be creepy crawling up on a house in this country.”

  “Illegal as hell, too, but I’m worried sick about Sonny. There’s no other reason for him not to call in by now other than he’s in trouble. The only thing I know to do is work with what we have. If this guy has anything to do with it and Sonny’s inside, we’ll get him out.”

  “What if it’s just a kid calling for grins?”

  “It’ll be the last time.”

  “We need to get in and out before the cavalry shows up.” Yolanda used her elbow to point down the highway as they crawled over the pipe gate. “The county sheriff and his men might be here any minute.”

  “If anybody else shows up, or a pro team, split and meet at the truck. I left the keys on top of the passenger tire, in case I don’t make it and you have to split.”

  Her white teeth flashed. “Let’s keep positive thoughts.”

  They soon saw a glow through the dripping trees and worked their way toward the huge clearing. Lightning bugs sparkled across the yard. Crickets filled the air with their chirps. Night birds called. A television program blared through windows open to admit the cool night air.

  Angling her rifle into the darkness, Yolanda mouthed the words in Perry Hale’s ear. “I sure hope there’s no dog.” They were both soaked from the waist down from the wet underbrush.

  “There’s usually at least one to a house, but I doubt it could hear anything over that TV. If one pops up, I’ll shoot it and we take the house as fast as we can.”

  She bit her bottom lip. “What if it’s just a country family settled in for the evening?”

  He heard the caution in her voice. “You know, we’re way beyond bounds here.”

  “Then we duck out as fast as possible after saying we’re sorry.”

  “You want to back out?”

  She paused. “No. We need to find out what they know about Sonny. I just hope nobody pulls out a gun.”

  “Hell, I would if somebody came sneaking up to my house. I’ll take this side where the cars are parked. The way the house sits with this end to the road, I ’magine these folks either go in through a carport door, or around back. The front door is mostly for show. You go in there.”

  “You country people are weird.”

  Perry Hale’s voice was resigned. “I won’t argue that.”

  They adjusted the earpieces that would allow them to communicate and separated. Despite his sense of urgency, Perry Hale crossed the dirt road and moved between the cars with glacial speed. Rifle to his shoulder, and muzzle down, he kept one eye on the ground and the other on the open windows.

  Unlike his own people 250 miles away in North Texas, the Wadlers apparently didn’t close their drapes until night. Every window was an opening into their world. Surprised that they didn’t have a dog, Perry Hale circled around the corner, past a well-used firepit, and onto the back porch, staying below the level of the windows.

  He pressed his back to the outside wall and peeked inside. A man in a wheelchair fidgeted in front of a large flat-panel television. A very pregnant woman was curled on the sofa beneath a cloud of cigarette smoke. She rose, startling him, and walked through the living room and into the kitchen.

  Seeing the room was clear, he went to the next window and found her opening a beer that she sat on the table beside a bowl of ice cream. She drew deep on the cigarette and laid it on the edge of a Formica table, ignoring an orange ashtray only inches away.

  The next windows opened into empty bedrooms. The only one he couldn’t see into was a small fixed glass set high in the wall. Probably the bathroom. By the time he got to the corner of the house, he squatted and peeked around the edge.

  He pushed the comm button on his chest. “At the corner.”

  “Me, too.” Yolanda was in the same position. She waved when he stuck his head around the corner. She hadn’t seen anything, either. Perry Hale spoke softly. “Clear except for a pregnant woman and an old man.”

  “We going in?”

  “Yep.” He jerked a thumb. “You see if the front door’s open. I’m going in the back. I doubt that one’s locked.”

  “If it is?”

  “Kick yours open if you hear me do the same. Be careful. That girl in there’s close to having a baby, and I don’t want to scare her any more than we have to.”

  “Yes sir. Stay frosty.”

  Perry Hale returned to the back door. He tried the knob. It turned. Taking a deep breath, he stepped inside and found himself in a utility room containing a washer, dryer, and a chest-type deep freeze. Shelves against the back wall were full of canned food. A wooden pocket door was halfway open, spilling just enough light to see.

  He peered through the crack to see the elderly man had turned his wheelchair away from the television that was booming the History Channel.

  The TV covering the sound, he slid the door back and entered the living room, leaving muddy footprints on the linoleum. Wincing at the volume, but thankful for the covering noise, he crossed behind the man who never knew he was there. A quick glance around revealed the front door standing open. Yolanda was inside.

  Perry Hale stepped into the kitchen with a finger to his lips. “Take it easy. We’re not going to hurt you.” The young woman standing beside the refrigerator started at the sight of the stocky man only feet away. He gave her a smile and held out a palm. “We’re law enforcement.”

  She crushed out her cigarette in the half-full ashtray on the table. “I wondered when y’all’d finally show up.” She drawled her words as if from a southern plantation movie.

  Yolanda stepped through a door at the opposite end. “House is clear on this end.”

  The young woman’s head spun at the sound of a female voice. “Y’all DEA? FBI?” Neither answered and she shrugged. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know. I can even tell you how they’re moving the drugs, if you’ll just cut me a break.”

  Yolanda raised an eyebrow and gave her a smile. “We’re here for information all right, but not about drugs right now. That can wait. You alone?”

  “Yep, just like always, me taking care of that feebleminded old man in there while ever’body else is out cattin’ around.”

  “Do you know anything about a man being held here against his will?”

  “I know of a girl held like that. Me.”

  Yolanda’s eyes flicked to Perry Hale, then back. “Who’re you?”

  “Donine.”

  Perry Hale closed the kitchen blinds. “Last name?”

  “Was Buckley, been a damned Wadler for the last six months.”

  “Well, at least we h
ave the right house. You’re being held hostage here?”

  “Yeah.” Donine lit another cigarette, ignoring Yolanda’s frown. “Held by family and this damned baby inside me. Y’all ATF?”

  “Nope.” Perry Hale threw a glance back into the living room to see the confused old man was once again facing the television. “We’re looking for someone named Tanner, and a Texas Ranger.”

  “Tanner’s my husband, what he is of one, but like I said, ain’t nobody here but me. Why would there be a baseball player here, anyway?”

  Perry Hale leaned forward. “Not that kind of Ranger. A real Texas Ranger lawman. One who wears a badge and a gun.”

  “Oh. Naw, nothin’ like that.”

  “Who’s that in the living room?”

  She snorted. “Marshall Wadler, what there is of him. The last man to cross Daddy Frank. Nobody in his right mind does that. He’s the old man’s son! Daddy Frank beat him damn-near to death with a tire iron and left him in that chair, but anyway, he don’t count.” She twirled a finger around her ear. “Crazy as a bessybug now. Been that way for a couple of years.”

  “The Ranger we’re looking for is named Sonny Hawke.”

  “That sounds like somebody on TV.”

  Perry Hale had to grit his teeth. “He’s not. Tell me about Frank Wadler.”

  Her face hardened at the name. “Daddy Frank? I figured you’d know all about him since you’re here.”

  Yolanda stepped forward. “Sit down if you need to.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Holding her protruding abdomen, Donine eased down into a chair. “You’re awful pretty to be the law.”

  “Thanks. Is your husband with Frank?”

  “Daddy Frank. That’s what ever’body calls that mean old bastard. No, Tanner left a little while ago, and I’ve been waiting for him to get back.”

  “You know where he went?”

  “I never know where that prick is.”

  Perry Hale closed the dusty Venetian blinds and backed against the kitchen counter to keep an eye on both doors. “What’s the fertilizer barn?”

  He saw Donine put two and two together. “You think Tanner’s there or your Ranger? How’d you find out about that?”

  “Tanner sent someone a text saying Frank took him there.”

  Donine’s eyes filled. “If somebody gets took to the fertilizer barn, they’re gone for good, vanish in the river out back for the gators ’n snappin’ turtles as a washtub. You’re tellin’ me that’s where Tanner is or maybe your Ranger friend, you’re gonna need more people and a lot more bullets, and y’all need to hurry.”

  Yolanda took out her cell phone while Perry Hale spun his finger in frustration. “Get to talking.”

  Chapter 47

  Unlike other parts of the country, Texas doesn’t have huge expanses of wilderness, other than the Big Bend area southeast of El Paso. The vast majority of the East Texas landscape is chopped into a patchwork quilt by roads, highways, fences, pastures, and cropland. Greenbelt forests spread for hundreds of miles through this landscape like arteries, consisting of meandering courses of rivers, creeks, ravines, washes, and swamps linking farms to communities to towns to cities.

  Lucky for me the part of the Big Thicket was close enough to the Texas/Louisiana border that the thickly wooded properties offered all the cover I needed as I put distance between myself and the guys who wanted to turn me into Swiss cheese. There was no safety in hiding in one spot for any length of time, and I needed to find Sheriff Buck Henderson. The goal was to keep moving until I could get cell service and call him, or have Perry Hale and Yolanda come pick me up, which was my first option.

  I worked my way through the trees until I found what I was looking for. A game trail.

  That gave me some relief, and I followed it along the path of the now-rushing creek. Animals take the easiest way through the woods. They move with a minimum of exertion, and the well-worn pathway allowed me to move as quickly as if I were following a highway.

  Truthfully, animals do the same in our cities and urban neighborhoods, running streets and alleys at night when traffic is light and everyone’s buttoned up tight in their homes. They follow those same greenbelts and parks and use the underground storm drains that city planners so thoughtfully provide.

  Unfortunately, none of the trails I followed were as straight as a road. The distance “as a crow flies” is deceptive. Sometimes the trail veered toward the creek or back uphill, or away from cover and into open pastures, forcing me to move more cautiously. I stopped frequently to check my reception, but the words No Service were driving me nuts.

  The rain slacked off and moved away. Trees and bushes dripped as thunder diminished and eventually stopped. It grew lighter as the clouds broke up to reveal a pale sky as fresh as a daisy.

  Bobwire fences became my biggest frustration. I ran into three of them within half an hour, telling me that I wasn’t truly in the wilderness, something I already knew, but far away from help. We grew up calling them bobwire, but by any name, they were a pain in the ass. Tight wires forced me to climb over, slowly, so I wouldn’t slip and catch myself on the sharp barbs. Old, loose wires were easy to slip through, but they had the frustrating tendency to catch the back of my shirt.

  I ducked through a rusty bobwire fence that seemed only to separate trees. After that, my steady pace aided by the game trail ate up the distance. Again, the path turned and I crossed a shallow gully, spooking a deer that flashed its white rump and disappeared into the underbrush. I almost shot him before realizing what he was.

  That same wet underbrush became thicker as the trail faded into an impenetrable mass of blackberry vines. Game trails sometimes merge and diverge, depending on the terrain. Bobwire fences won’t impede a whitetail deer, they’ll either jump it, or slide on their bellies under the bottom strand.

  Half an hour later the path led toward even thicker tangles of blackberry vines and dense stands of understory brush. The brambles grabbed and tore at my exposed skin. I had to stop several times to extract myself from the thorns.

  The trail intersected a muddy ravine and followed the sloping bank. The underbrush thickened even more and suddenly the dense woods abruptly opened up and I found myself beside a two-lane overpass. I checked to see how many bars I had on the phone.

  Too low in the bottoms and still no service. Dammit!

  A clear path led across the opening and alongside the sluggish river that churned with fresh runoff. I thought it might be the Sabine or the Trinity, but that was only a guess. It passed under the road suspended over the thick gruel of muddy water. I paused at the edge of the pines lining the highway, listening. My light-colored shirt and jeans were far from camouflage, and it wouldn’t take much for one of the bad guys to see me skulking along the side of the highway.

  Movement attracts attention.

  Tires whining on pavement gave me enough warning to squat down in a thicket of yaupon hollies. I had an idea that I’d wait to see what kind of vehicle it was, then come out and wave them down, hoping they’d see me in their rearview mirror.

  It’s a good thing I didn’t run out and wave my arms like an idiot, because as it came closer and passed, I recognized the jacked-up monster truck I’d tangled with earlier. It drove at school-zone speed as four armed men scanned the edge of the trees.

  I took my hat off and settled down behind a vine-covered log with just my eyes peeking over the top and the Colt in my hand. There was too much vegetation between me and them, so they passed without slowing and I stayed still until the road was empty.

  Slipping the automatic back into the holster, I listened for approaching cars. Sure the coast was clear, I sprinted down the bank and under the overpass, nearly plowing into a black man of indeterminate age dressed in faded coveralls. The pistol was back in my hand and pointed at his chest. “Don’t you move. Who’re you?”

  I don’t know if he’d been on the business end of a pistol before, but he did everything right. He stood stock still beside a co
ncrete column without moving a muscle, a rifle cradled in his arm. He didn’t move. “Hidy. You don’t intend to shoot me, do ye?”

  “I don’t want to.”

  All his teeth on the left side were gone, making his speech mushy, but he was clear to me. “I ain’t who you’re runnin’ from, that’s for sure.”

  “Put them hands on top of your head.”

  “Can I lean my rifle against this here tree? I’d hate for it to get full of mud’n trash.”

  I relaxed, knowing he wasn’t one of the men who were after me. “Slow. Then get your hands up.”

  “You gone shoot me, deputy?”

  He’d seen the badge on my shirt, and I lowered the pistol. “I’m not a deputy and I don’t believe so. What are you doing standing under here?”

  “I’s jus’ squirrel huntin’.”

  “Bullshit.” I made the pistol disappear.

  “Well, I live over yonder a little piece,” he nodded his head, “and heard a lot of shootin’ out here. I figgered I’d wait here and see who came by. I got more sense than to stand in the rain. Who’re you runnin’ from?”

  “Most ever-body for the moment ’til I figure out who’s who.”

  A car hissed down the highway and slowed. We instinctively glanced up. An engine idled, and a door opened. Maybe they were back. I drew the .45 again and held it toward the sound. We relaxed at the hissing sound of water splashing on already wet ground as someone relieved themselves on the side of the road. The door slammed and they pulled away.

  Back to my new friend. I liked the guy who seemed to be trying to live his life. “You’re hunting out of season.”

  “I don’t know persacktly when that is. I jus’ try to stay to m’self. Like I said, I live jus’ right over yonder.”

  “Umm humm. Most folks would hide in the house if they heard shooting outside the door.”

  “Well, my house ain’t much, and I don’t intend to get caught inside if somebody come in a-shootin’.”