Sandbagged: A Theo Ramage Thriller (Book 2)

by Edward J. McFadden III

  Karma walked by Big Blue and its load of huge metal tubes and pumps, working her way around back to the service area. Both clear bay doors were closed, no trucks inside, but the light was on in the office. An old red Peterbilt sat waiting before one of the closed doors. She faded into the shadow of the building, leaning against the cold brick, pretending to scan her phone. Karma watched Manny with an app that turned her cellphone camera into a low-grade telescope.

  Manny was on the phone, holding a piece of paper. He was agitated, his arms moving in wide circles like he was trying to fly. When he hung up, he tossed the paper on the desk and leaned back in his chair, and this commenced a half hour ritual of coffee drinking and bacon consumption.

  An hour later Manny opened a bay door and rolled the Peterbilt inside. She waited, hoping he wouldn’t close the door, but once the truck was inside, the door went down with a zip and a bang. Karma watched Manny putter around the shop for a half an hour, collecting tools, parts, and another coffee. Finally, he descended into the pit that allowed him to work beneath the truck without putting it up on a lift, which is preferable when working on oversized trucks.

  She waited as long as she could, expecting the snail-like mechanic to start the repair, maybe even focus before she distracted him. Karma strode toward the shop’s office door. If it was locked, she had a decision to make.

  Karma pulled the door open, and a bell chimed. She moved fast, slipping through the office into the work area, calling out as she went, “Manny? Manny?”

  He grunted. “Achsishhhh… coming.”

  “No, stay where you are… It’s O.K. I just have a question,” Karma said.

  Manny said nothing, and no sound came from the pit.

  She worked her way around the semi. “I just wanted to know what the deal is with the blue Kenworth? The driver has gone silent and I’m waiting on that shipment.” Knowing Manny would probably know what the stuff on the Skeeter’s trailer was, she added, “I’m the project manager in charge of installing all that crap at the drill head, and we’re going to be big time late.”

  Manny screamed up from the pit. “I’m waiting on parts. He should be good to go Saturday morning. Best I can do.”

  “Perfect. Thanks for the information.”

  She made sure the bell rang loud as she left.

  Back in the car Karma decided it was time for breakfast. She was tired of eating oatmeal and reconstituted eggs. Gloria at The Dive told her about a small, private joint in West Wood three minutes away. A place most folks didn’t know existed. Sounded perfect, that was except for the name, Meat Man. With the Skeeter’s truck not even close to being ready, and Rolly running around town like an infant, she felt she could slip away for an hour.

  She drove slow, the weapons in the trunk unregistered and loaded. Utah was a gun state, but that didn’t mean they allowed its citizens to carry loaded Uzis in their trunks. She was outside Price in two minutes and pulling up in front of the Meat Man a minute later. She parked and headed for the side door the way Gloria had told her.

  The room was small, only one other table was occupied by an old couple who paid her no attention. The cook came, The Man proudly displayed on his apron, she ordered, and he disappeared, reappearing eleven minutes later with her food.

  An old guy entered, sat down, and the same process was repeated. Karma was eating, coffee pushing away her stress, when the Skeeter walked through the door.

  Ramage scanned the room like the Terminator, his gaze drifting over those present like they were exotic foods at a buffet. He was offered the center table, which was the only option because the other free table sat six. Karma had chosen her table so she could have her back to the wall, and the law of averages said the Skeeter would choose the seat closest to her, which would put his back to her in favor of seeing everyone else in the room, as well as the entrance.

  That’s exactly what the Skeeter did. There was nothing on the walls, no reflective surfaces to take advantage of, so she watched the back of his head using her dark cellphone screen.

  When the Skeeter was done ordering, and The Man had gone, she got up and left, her eyes locked on the western wall so Ramage couldn’t see her face. It didn’t really matter, and he’d gotten a brief look when he’d entered, but she didn’t want him to recognize her when the time came, and he met her for the first and last time.

  She parked the Chevy at the end of the drive and waited for the Skeeter to come out. She followed him as he walked through town, stopping at a place called Tiki’s Snacks, Ammo, Gifts and Sundries Trading Post. Ramage didn’t make it inside before he was met, and the two men walked around the back of the building. Karma considered moving in, but before she could decide the Skeeter and the shop guy came back out front and entered the self-described trading post by the front entrance. Fifteen minutes later the Skeeter came out, walked to the rear of the building, and reemerged moments later driving a battered green Dodge pickup. She looked away as the truck slipped past her.

  She grabbed the gear shifter and paused. Following served no purpose. He had to come back to his truck, and she needed to give Rolly time to get his shit together, but patience wasn’t her strongest quality.

  She dropped the car in gear, spun the wheel, and pulled the Traverse out onto the main road, the pickup disappearing around a curve. Karma followed the Skeeter through West Wood, Carbonville, past the golf course to the west, and around Spring Glenn. Things opened up after that, and Karma pulled off the road and backed the car up against a thicket of scrub pine where she was hidden but could still see oncoming traffic. Unless the Skeeter took the long way around, he’d come back this way.

  She didn’t have to wait long.

  Two hours and twenty-one minutes later the pickup tore by her, and Karma rubbed her eyes. Had there been two others in the cab with the Skeeter? And… it couldn’t be. What the hell was she looking at? She lifted her phone, swiping and tapping as she fought to get the pickup in frame as it trailed away into the distance.

  There were two monkeys in the pickup’s bed.

  Karma waited as long as her jumping nerves would allow, then followed at a discreet distance. He dropped his four passengers, two men and two chimps, at Hotel Price, then proceeded to hit every bar, convenience store, and smoke shop in town. It took an hour. He spent the most time at The Dive and The Wobbly Cactus, Price’s two main pubs. She’d been in The Dive, but she’d yet to frequent the Cactus. She’d have to change that. Any place that had the guts to put Wobbly in their name was a place she needed to check out.

  After running all over town the Skeeter stopped back at the hotel, were he stayed for three hours, presumably catching some sleep. At 5:17PM he headed to the Red Rock Truck Stop, where he checked in with Manny and had an early dinner. Then he went out to his truck, which was right where he’d left it. He scrambled inside, presumably collected a few things, locked up, dropped his key at Manny’s, and retreated to the pickup.

  Ramage circled around to the front of the lot and parked the rental out front where every passing vehicle could see it.

  Like Karma, the Skeeter didn’t need to wait very long.

  Rolly and Shelly rolled by the truck stop twenty minutes later in the rented Charger, followed by a Chevy Tahoe filled with five guys. The motorcade posse drove by once, and Ramage didn’t hesitate. The Skeeter pulled out onto RT-6, pointed the truck west, and sped off.

  Like a moth to a flame, Rolly and his helpers followed, almost on the Skeeter’s bumper.

  Karma wished she could watch the fight, but she’d know who won soon enough. She drove back to her spot outside town, hid behind the thicket of pine, and waited for the victor to return.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The sun had started its descent to the horizon, a bruised sky nesting above the western horizon like oddly colored smoke, when the posse showed. Shelly drove a black Charger, Rolly next to her, a truckload of thugs trailing after.

  Ramage started the Dodge, his hand poised over the gear control arm.


  Shelly, bandaged beak and all, didn’t even try and pretend she hadn’t seen Ramage. She did a three-point turn and came back to the truck stop, pulling into the lot and heading straight for Ramage. He counted four… no, five in a black Tahoe.

  Seven against one. Seemed fair.

  He dropped the pickup in gear, checked his mirrors to make sure there were no innocents walking across the parking lot, and put his foot to the floor. The old Dodge choked, coughed, and lurched forward, the engine racing as it sucked for air and fuel. Ramage backed off the gas a hair and the engine growled, bald tires chirping. He jerked the wheel, pointing the truck at the Charger and Tahoe. He’d always enjoyed playing chicken, mainly because he always won. The pickup shook and rattled, Ramage’s hands vibrating as they gripped the wheel, knuckles red.

  The Charger slid left and fell back so the two approaching vehicles were side by side.

  Ramage thought it was a smart move, it limited his ability to veer off at the last moment. While he respected the maneuver, it had no impact on his plans. When the pickup was fifty yards from the Charger and Tahoe Ramage jumped on the brake and the truck squirmed to an awkward stop, smoke filling the air. He slammed the gear shifter up, and the Dodge surged backward, bucking and heaving as Ramage spun the wheel and backed over a curb, across a thin plant bed filled with creeping juniper, and came to a skidding stop facing the exit.

  He dropped the pickup into forward and eased the gas pedal to the rusted floorboard. The truck didn’t cough and argue, but instead growled and tapped as it picked up speed, Ramage swinging the vehicle out onto RT-6.

  The black Charger and black Tahoe hung back and gave him some space, which was exactly what Ramage had figured Rolly would do. Follow him out onto a stretch of RT-6 where there could be no help and run him off the road.

  And Ramage was going to let them.

  The Pickup vibrated as he kept the truck at an even sixty-five miles per hour. Wind whistled through the closed windows, the tick of the engine becoming more pronounced. He needed to take it easy on the truck. Last thing he needed was a breakdown before he got to the ambush site.

  When Ramage was a boy, he’d loved the original Star Trek TV show. He watched an episode every night after The Honeymooners. The chimps, Ralph and Alice, brought Star Trek to mind, and gave him the outline of his plan. His favorite trek episode of all-time was Arena. In it, Kirk is transported to a planet by himself to fight another ship’s captain to settle a dispute. Kirk and the lizard-like Gorn captain fight, one on one, to the death, using only what they can find in the natural environment. Ramage had guns and bullets, but there were lesson’s to be learned from those memories of a twelve-year-old boy, and hours of daydreaming about how he would’ve beaten the Gorn.

  He checked his rearview and the two black vehicles were back a quarter mile, like secret service trailing after a president who wanted the illusion of freedom. His backpack sat on the seat beside him, along with the snubby .38. The Remington one-shot rifle was propped against the passenger door. He’d hidden his laptop above the dropped ceiling in the boy’s hotel room, same way he had at the Whispering Pine. That was one thing he’d couldn’t afford to have stolen or destroyed. Everything else…

  He’d caught a couple hours sleep and spent an hour looking through the data Rex had sent in case the FBI man called. The data had made his head spin, and Ramage found himself reliving old experiences: when he’d given blood, gotten blood, been in a hospital, seen blood bags hanging from those poles next to patient beds, Anna reupping her donor card. Thousands of gallons of blood, thousands of people, yet everything seemed to balance out. Almost too well.

  The pickup raced through Carbonville and out into the sticks.

  The Charger and Tahoe tightened their grip and moved in closer. No matter, he was almost to the spot. This was his third time on this stretch of road, and he had the perfect spot picked out. He only hoped he could find it in the growing dusk.

  Rock walls striated various shades of red rose from the hardpan on both sides of the road, the failing sunlight splashing over the sandstone, tiny sparkles of quartz blinking like diamond specks.

  Castle Gate, which was up the road thirty miles, was a regional tourist attraction. It was an abandoned ghost town, and Ramage had had enough of those, but the area around the old mining colony was exactly what he needed. “Never fight a land war in Asia.” The theatre in which one fought was as important as the number of men one had, or the type of weapons they carried.

  The heights of the Wasatch Plateau and Uinta Mountains gave way to plains and basins with red rock-studded canyons, and endless thickets of pine and underbrush, tall monuments of stone sticking from the vegetation like the wilderness was giving the world the finger. Giant spires of stone, like those built by children on beaches and playgrounds all around the world, rose from the pine and devil grass coated hardpan like forlorn sentinels, casting long shadows over the fading day. In the distance the foothills rose into the mountains, frost and a light covering of snow dusting their tops like sugar on a donut.

  His stomach growled.

  The road bent as the pickup passed through a narrow cut in the land. Ramage lost sight of the vehicles behind him, and that was his cue. He eased up on the foot pedal, letting the Dodge fall to sixty miles per hour. The wheel vibration eased, and the temperature gauge drifted back over two lines.

  Ramage peered into the gloom, the dash clock reading 6:49PM. He’d timed it perfect, almost too perfect because he was having trouble seeing the turnoff.

  Two sets of headlights approached from behind, their light blossoming in the haze.

  He slowed a little more, letting the truck coast down to fifty miles an hour, Ramage scanning the side of the road for his landmark.

  As they’d done during the game of chicken, the Charger fell back and to the side, so the two vehicles covered both sides of the road. Engines roared, the glow of headlights intensifying as Rolly and crew came on.

  A chunk of red sandstone loomed on the side of the road and Ramage spun the wheel, the truck screaming and squeaking as it threw gravel and dirt, skidding off the road and bumping down onto the hardpan. He eased the gas pedal down and the truck hopped and jumped over the uneven terrain, the undercarriage catching devil grass and scrub pine. Scratching, like fingernails on glass, filled the truck as the sharp evergreen leaves tore at the Dodge’s faded paint.

  Ramage killed the headlights and looked in the rearview.

  As predicted the Charger had come to a hard stop, its front end in the shallow culvert next to the road. The Tahoe had an easier time. The SUV glided over the hardpan, the culvert nothing but a minor bump. The Chevy bounced along for a quarter mile before it turned around and headed back to the Charger.

  The delay would only give him a few minutes, and hopefully that was all he’d need.

  From the road he’d seen a mesa-like hill with a thicket of tall evergreens atop it like hair. Patches of pine trees and occasional desert willows pocked the empty dirt-packed plain, the truck leaving a clear trail, just like he wanted. He zigzagged, leaving a confused and scrambled track that headed toward a spire of stone. When he was five hundred yards away from the rock formation, he brought the truck to a stop and killed the engine. Behind him the Tahoe pushed over the open range, headlight beams swaying and shaking.

  Ramage grabbed his guns and backpack, which contained power bars, water, his cell phone, some rope, a knife, the two boxes of ammo, and a cheap set of night binoculars that cost him forty-six bucks at Tito’s. He got out of the truck, the wash of the approaching headlights creeping through the darkness. He slammed the door, locked the truck with the key fob, dropped his keys in a pocket, zipped said pocket, and broke into a jog, leaving the pickup like a signpost. Rolly would spend five minutes approaching cautiously, only to find him gone. What he’d do then, Ramage didn’t know, but he had a pretty good idea.

  Rolly was a punk, and most punks are born that way and never grow beyond their initial state of asshol
e-ism, and Ramage figured Pepper was no different. He’d have one of his goons slash the rental’s tires, or pry open the hood and mess with the engine. He had no illusions. Ramage wouldn’t be leaving in the pickup.

  Light bloomed over the devil grass and pine, the blackness receding before him, the approaching headlights filling every empty space. He dodged behind a rock and paused to catch his breath, peering back the way he’d come.

  As Ramage had figured, the Tahoe crept forward, high beams on. It stopped twenty feet from the pickup, and the sound of a window buzzing down echoed over the desolate plain. Ramage was two hundred yards away, but in the stillness of the flat basin sound carried. The .38 was stuffed in his waistband, and he sighted the rifle on the Tahoe. He considered firing at the Tahoe’s gas tank, but at two hundred yards, with obstructions, in the dark with only the truck’s headlights as illumination, the odds of a hit weren’t good.

  He’d left clear footprints in the loose packed sand, as close to a marked route as possible without hanging trailblazing signs. Rolly would follow in the Tahoe, which he would think was the safe bet, smart, and would conserve energy. That was exactly what Ramage wanted.

  A dark shadow hung out the back passenger side window of the Tahoe, firing an automatic weapon, the sound of gunshots, and the twang, snap, and thwap of bullets hitting metal ringing over the plain as the pickup was peppered. Tires blew, glass shattered, and metal tinkled and cracked, the truck sinking on its frame.

  Ramage had one clear thought before he ran: good thing I took the insurance. The pop and crack of machine gun fire chased him through the night as he wove in and out of patches of devil grass and scrub pine. He was digging in hard, leaving a clear wake behind him in the sand, steadily making his way into the foothills, toward the spire of stone rising from a mound of rubble half a mile distant. He heard the Tahoe’s engine race and the headlights swung around like a funhouse, bouncing up and down, knifing through the vegetation, and shooting into the sky like spotlights spinning above a marquee.