“Remember I sent you the laptop because I might need your help on something?” Rex said.
“I do.”
“I just sent you several data sets I want you to take a look at.”
“What is it?”
“All the individuals and blood banks listed by the American Association of Blood Banks, along with the last six months donor records, and usage statistics—how the blood was broken down, where it went, what type, and to who and when,” Rex said.
“Um, I don’t even know what blood type I am. I don’t see how this falls in my wheelhouse.”
Rex chuckled. “Most people don’t know their own blood type. Moms typically know they’re children’s but not their own. Cray cray.”
“Still,” Ramage said. He wondered if Rex had children, maybe a young daughter? Where else would he have learned the saying cray cray? Or was he the one out of touch? Maverix had used the term only yesterday.
“There are two thousand two hundred and nineteen institutional blood banks in the US, and roughly ninety-five hundred individuals in the AABB registry, and they make the data messy. I’ve also sent you some basic information on blood storage, length of storage, and all the different blood types and their derivatives and how they fit into the data set.”
“You make it sound easy, so why me?”
“First, its anything but easy. There’s whole blood, blood plasma, and an entire menu of combinations and creations, each used for different things and in a different way,” Rex said.
When he didn’t continue, Ramage said, “And second?”
The FBI man sighed. “We don’t know what we’re looking for. The computer models are showing weird shit, and I’m worried something might be up. The contamination of the blood supply as a terrorist tactic is something nobody wants to think about, but…”
“Do you think there’s something there?”
Rex didn’t answer right away, and Ramage wondered if he was running his fingers through his hair or staring out a window. Was it dark where he was?
“Do what you do,” Rex said. “Cast your inflexible gaze upon the antifreeze of the human race and tell me what you see.”
Ramage lifted his eyebrows, but Rex wasn’t there to see.
“We’ll talk again in a couple of days?”
Rex made it sound like a question, but it wasn’t. “Sure thing,” Ramage said, and tapped ‘end call.’
Ramage reached RT-6 an hour after sunup, and turned east, walking alongside a narrow drainage ditch that ran along the highway. Devil grass and scrub pine packed the sides of the road, the gentle breeze bringing the sweet scent of bacon and smoke.
A road sign read, Soldier Summit, 1 Mile, and below POP, but there was no number listed. Population zero? That didn’t bode well for a good breakfast and help getting to Price, though the smell of roasting pork was a strong motivator and forced away rational thoughts. RT-6 changed to State Street, and he came to a crossroads with a sign that said East Street. Ramage had seen better maintained roads, but he’d seen worse. There was a house with a lawn of devil grass at the end of the street, and several foundations and collapsing structures along the road.
Ahead on his right there was a gas station with a large parking lot, which had one car parked in it. A green sedan of unidentifiable make and year was next to the station’s main building, which had two mechanic’s bays, doors closed, and a small office with a grimy window. Two old style gas pumps stood out front.
Ramage made a right on East Street, passing over the culvert running along the road. Flat dirt hardpan ran off to the east, and an open field extended behind the gas station to the west, and it was pocked with sagebrush. There was a maze of streets to the north, but only the one house. It was as if the gas station had once employed many more people, and whoever had started Soldier Summit had aspired to create a town. As Ramage walked around he saw folks had made a good run of it. He counted fourteen abandoned foundations. Perhaps it had been a family operation? A kind of compound? It brought back bad memories of Texas.
The rifle slipped off his shoulder and Ramage decided it was time to abandon the weapon. Walking around with a rifle on your shoulder didn’t exactly say peaceful and friendly, and would certainly draw attention, especially when carried by an out-of-towner. And he was in possession of a murder weapon.
He ventured into one of the house foundations, a cinderblock stoop still visible where the front door had been. He jacked back the gun’s bolt and pulled free the .22 shell. He dropped it in a pocket, slammed home the bolt, wiped the gun down with his shirt, and hid the weapon in a pile of debris under a piece of plastic that would keep it dry. Next he opened his pack, pulled free the Magnum, wiped it down, and placed it under the plastic with the rifle. The snubby .38 was in his waistband, and before he put it away, he reloaded it with the bullets at the bottom of his pack and put the extra bullet in his pocket with the .22 shell.
Nobody walked the streets or approached him, and when he passed the house no faces peered through windows, no gentil old man came out to greet him. There were no stray dogs, no cats, and the gentle push of the chill breeze was Ramage’s only companion as he walked through the forlorn neighborhood, working his way around to the back of the gas station.
He emerged on State Street west of the station, so he backtracked, this time taking the direct approach. Nothing moved as Ramage stepped down off State Street onto faded blacktop and made for the office. He slipped between the two ancient pumps and noticed an air horn hanging from a lanyard next to a squeegee pail filled with water so black Ramage thought it might be toxic. He lifted the horn, but waited, expecting an alarm to sound.
A pump jockey didn’t emerge from the station, and there were no signs of life amidst the line of storage trailers next to the main building. He looked in all directions, feeling like a thief, and pressed the button on the airhorn.
A sharp chirp echoed through the stillness, rolling away like a wave of heat across a desert. Ramage waited. Nobody came. He lifted a pump nozzle from its cradle, flicked the metal arm that engaged the pump, but didn’t press the trigger on the nozzle.
Still no bell sounded, and nobody came. He flipped the control arm up, put the pump handle back in its cradle, and blew the horn again. Nothing. He checked the door to the office. Locked. There was no sign, no lights. Ramage figured the guy who worked the joint lived in the last occupied house, and it might take him a few minutes to pull himself from whatever daytime TV he was involved with.
Ramage stood by the front door and waited. He pulled his phone, intending to call the mechanic, but he had no bars. He stepped away from the building, holding his phone up, and one bar appeared.
When he saw the number 2319 stenciled in white on the gas station’s dirty office window Ramage realized he didn’t really need the station’s proprietor. The station’s address was 2319 State Street, and that would be enough for Hector to set his GPS.
He moved further away from the building, holding up his phone, and he was almost back to the highway when a second bar appeared like the second of three cherries on a slot machine. He dialed Hector, the DriveME driver that had brought him to the Whispering Pine. The guy picked up on the first ring and said he was just outside Price, so it would take him a half hour or so to get to him.
Ramage found a warm spot in the sun and dropped to his butt. He didn’t see any soda machines, but there was what looked like a water spicket on the side of the building, and he got up and went to it. It squeaked and cried as Ramage turned it on, but after a few seconds of flowing brown, the water cleared and he put his mouth under the faucet and drank, being careful not to get his jacket wet. With the sun arcing across the sky the temperature had gone up ten degrees, bringing it to a balmy forty-two.
When he was done, Ramage turned the water off and walked up to the highway to wait, his gaze constantly drifting to the only active house. He couldn’t imagine leaving the pumps unattended, especially on a main road.
Twenty minutes later a man of
huge girth and immense height folded himself through the station’s office door, gazing at Ramage. The guy waved a white handkerchief, but didn’t step away from the open door. Had the guy been watching him the entire time?
A red Honda appeared over a rise to the east. Hector.
Ramage waved to the big guy and started walking east. Hector made a right on East Street, like Ramage had, but instead he circled around, pointing the car south.
The Honda’s window slid down as he approached. “Hey, Ramage, you get around for a dude without wheels,” Hector said.
“Put it on my tombstone, brother.” Ramage hopped in the passenger seat.
“Where to?” Hector put the car and drive, pulled to the end of East Street, stopped, and glanced right, then left.
“Price,” Ramage said, and he leaned back in his seat, and was asleep in moments.
Chapter Ten
Ramage’s phone buzzed and vibrated. He rubbed sleep from his eyes as he sat up, his back screaming, stomach twisting. The incoming call window on his phone said Manny’s Garage. He swiped receive call and said, “Ramage.”
“Hi Mr. Ramage, this is Manny over at the garage, calling about your truck?”
“Yup.”
The sun was a blistering eye glaring down on the frozen landscape. RT-6 cut through the hamlet of Spring Glenn, and there was a copse of trees to the east shielding a rural community from the highway. Empty cultivated fields, dark and covered with frost, ranged to the horizon to the west. Ramage pictured what the fields must look like in summer, like an oasis in a desert.
Industrial buildings, dirt parking lots, and a gas station fleeted by as Ramage listened to the mechanic.
“Oddest thing I’ve ever seen. All your air hoses were… damaged,” Manny said.
“Damaged?” Ramage sat up straight, staring through the windshield. A golf course appeared to the west, and they reached a fork in the road. Signage indicated that the left path led to a town called Carbonville, the right fork Price.
The cabbie veered left and said over his shoulder, “Faster this way.”
The mechanic sounded sheepish, and said, “Well, not damaged exactly.”
Ramage waited.
“Someone cut the hoses.”
“Are you sure?” All kinds of images and ideas swirled in the building chaos of Ramage’s thoughts. Probably Rolly.
“No doubts,” the mechanic said. “Some had holes, but several were cut clean, a nice, neat edge. No way it happened naturally.”
“At least you know the problem,” Ramage said. He saw himself leaving Utah in Big Blue by the end of the day. He could deal with Rolly on the road as the dipshits were sure to follow. “We’ll be good to go today, then?”
The mechanic sighed. The kind of sound that told anyone who heard it that disappointment was forthcoming. “Thing is, I don’t have all the hoses I need. I called Provo, and they’re sending a guy out by the end of the day tomorrow.”
“End of the day tomorrow? Its two hours away? I’ll go get the parts myself,” Ramage said, but he had no idea how he’d manage the trip.
“It’s not that. The supply place doesn’t have two of them and needs to wait on an overnight shipment from a supplier. No worries. I’ll take care of it Saturday morning and you can hit the road.”
“Can’t you duct tape the hoses? Their mostly air and pollution control after all,” Ramage said.
“You could if you wanted a thousand-dollar towing bill when one blows. Your Kenworth isn’t exactly a compact car.”
Ramage’s phone vibrated. It was Anna. “Fine. Thanks,” he said to the mechanic. “I’ll touch base tomorrow.”
“Wait,” Manny said. “The hoses are expensive. I know I haven’t—”
The phone stopped vibrating. “Shit,” Ramage said.
“Sir?” the mechanic said.
“No, not you.” Ramage dug out his wallet and gave the guy his credit card number and clicked off.
To the east the outline of Carbonville could be seen, cars moving about, dust clouds and machines moving as things were fixed and built. To the west the open plain stretched to the horizon, dark green patches of juniper and devil grass like blemishes on fruit.
“Almost there. Any idea what happened at the Whispering Pine?” Hector asked.
Ramage’s hackles rose. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason. There was just a bunch of commotion. Ambulances. Cops. Looked like a mess. You going back to the truck stop?”
“No,” Ramage said. He didn’t know where he wanted to go, but he knew it wasn’t there. Not yet. Rolly probably had someone watching the place and he wasn’t ready to deal with him, not without a plan.
RT-6 ran through houses now, a hamlet called West Wood, and they passed Castleview Hospital, and behind it the massive cross marking the Church of Latter-day Saints. A thin river trailed along the road’s eastern side, and beyond it the town of Price sprawled out in a random pattern of streets.
“You know what?” Ramage said. “Price can wait. Can you loop around and take me to the church we just passed?”
“Sure thing.”
Hector made lefts and rights as he worked his way through freshly painted houses with manicured lawns and perfect blacktop driveways. Extensive flower beds, no doubt fed by expensive irrigation systems, lined the front of most of the houses. Some of the homes had red brick accents, which seemed uniquely unoriginal in a land of red rocks. The place looked like a suburb of San Diego, not the red rock nothingness of eastern Utah.
The development around the church was a step up from the surrounding area, most likely all the homes owned by prominent members of the church. Hector pulled to a stop. Houses with massive lawns surrounded the modest looking house of worship, which had parking lots on both sides. There was an elaborate front entrance, with two side entrances serving each parking lot.
Ramage got out and grabbed his pack. “How much, my friend?” Ramage had called Hector directly, so DriveME didn’t get a cut.
“Fifteen sound fair?”
Ramage gave him a twenty, and said, “See you when I see you.”
The Honda tore off with a chirp of rubber and Ramage stared at the church.
He wasn’t a religious man, and he usually left people to their follies, but something about Marie and her four husbands piqued his interest, and what better place to find a little quiet space to think and call Anna than a church? The chapel had been his favorite place when he was in the military a thousand years ago. The priest had asked him once why he came if he didn’t pray or believe in God. His answer, “You’ve got AC and the brass leaves you alone in here,” brought a smirk to the pastor’s face, though he’d done his best to hide it.
The inside of the church was elaborate, but by no means excessive, unlike the flamboyant excess of their fellow God-fearing brethren. Ramage was raised Catholic and had been in many churches, and he always thought the Catholics were divas with their gold candlesticks, elaborate robes and hats, the fancy chains and rings. It was all a little to showy for him, like he was watching a play. Just like the pageants the Mormons performed.
The door creaked as it closed behind him, the scent of incense irritating Ramage’s nose. The church was empty, and Ramage dropped his pack, took a seat in a back pew, pulled his phone, and called Anna.
“Hi, catch you at a bad time?” Anna said.
“Not at all,” Ramage said. “I was talking to the repair guy.”
The church was silent, and he could’ve literally heard a pin hit the carpeted floor.
“And,” she ventured.
He panicked for a second as he considered what to tell her. On one hand he’d made a commitment to never lie to Anna. It was very important to her. She’d made that very clear. On the other hand, what would telling her about the hoses achieve? It would lead to Rolly, and then she’d be worried, would want to help, and the situation would get worse, not better. He was conflicted, a new feeling he didn’t like.
He went with a classic lie of om
ission. “There were issues with a few of the air hoses. He said everything will be wrapped up by Saturday morning.”
Anna sighed, and Ramage pictured her in his mind, the sagging shoulders, worry lines creasing her face, the disappointment, then…
“Saturday? For a hose?” The tone of her voice made her displeasure palpable.
“It was more than one hose.”
“So? Two hose clamps. A screwdriver. I could do it. What aren’t you telling me?”
“He doesn’t have the hose he needs. He had to have it shipped in, won’t be here until tomorrow night.”
She said nothing.
“You think this is what I want? I’ve got no place to sleep tonight.” He cursed himself. Too much information.
“Why can’t you sleep in the truck? The hotel?”
“I could but the truck stop is really noisy and the hotel is full tonight.” He changed the subject hoping she’d let the line of questioning go. “How are things there?
“I’m hearing rumblings, but nothing has happened that I know of.”
“What do you mean, rumblings?”
“People talking at the diner, Lucy’s.”
Ramage waited.
“It’s like you said. Portable Thrones, HRI Holdings, the compound’s operations—they’ve all been shut down, or Carl Jr. has been removed from the business’s management team, but his real estate, some of his online scams, stuff like that, are still going. I heard some guy asked Terrance at the phone store for protection money.”
“Protection from what?” Ramage said. He really wasn’t surprised at what he was hearing, just that it was happening so fast. A snake still wriggled, even after its head is cut off, at least for a little while.
“And I think someone took a load of sand last night.”
“Are you shitting me?”
“Nope,” she said. “Makes sense when you think about it, no? The drivers and low-level guys that didn’t get swept up are out of work. Perhaps they’re used to a certain lifestyle that’s not conducive to being broke. You know the type,” Anna said.
Sandbagged: A Theo Ramage Thriller (Book 2) Page 7