by David Archer
“And did you find one?”
“Yep. Bought the old Howerton place today.”
“Lonnie Howerton’s old place? Wow, I didn’t think they’d ever get that sold.” She suddenly got an odd look on her face. “You did hear about Lonnie killing himself there, right?”
Noah nodded. “Yeah, and I heard it’s haunted, but then I heard that story is not true. According to the sheriff’s office, Lonnie died in the hospital.”
Amber shrugged and rolled her eyes. “Believe whatever you want,” she said. “My dad went out there and thought about buying the place, but when he went into the kitchen he said it was like walking into a refrigerator. Spooked him so bad he just turned around and walked out.”
“Was that before or after they redid the kitchen? It’s all brand-new in there, now.”
“It was before,” Amber replied. “My dad said he could still see bloodstains on the floor and the cabinets around the sink. He said it got so cold he could see his breath, and that’s why he decided to get out of there.”
“Well, I’ll be moving in within a couple of days. Next time I’m in here, I’ll let you know if I have any spooky experiences, okay?”
The bartender nodded as she wiped down the rest of the bar, but then a voice beside him said, “Rex Madison?”
Noah turned the barstool around again and found himself looking into the eyes of the sheriff. “That’s me,” Noah said.
“I’m Dan Redford,” the sheriff said, “County sheriff. Everybody here tells me you tried to stop this, and I wanted to tell you how much we appreciate that.” He glanced over at where the paramedics were still working on two of the other boys who had managed to survive. “I also heard a lot about some of your earlier experiences. Billy says he checked out your story and it comes back true. Are you the kind of man who can do what needs to be done and keep his mouth shut about it?”
Noah lowered his eyebrows and looked hard at the sheriff, feigning confusion. “Keep my mouth shut? I’m not sure I know what you mean, Sheriff. All I did was try to keep somebody from getting killed, you know?”
The sheriff turned back to him and grinned. “I think you know exactly what I’m saying,” he said. “But maybe this badge is making you nervous. Guess I can understand that. Don’t worry, I’m pretty sure you’ll catch on right away.”
The sheriff touched the brim of his Western-style hat and then turned and walked back over to Morgan’s men. Noah couldn’t hear the conversation, but each of the men glanced his way more than once. It lasted a few moments, and then the sheriff and one of the men turned and walked out the front door of the bar.
Scott Forney came walking toward Noah, and he had an unusual look on his face. He almost looked like he was trying to decide whether to stand or run, but he didn’t hesitate. As soon as he and Noah were face-to-face, he took hold of Noah’s arm and pulled him to a spot where they were unlikely to be overheard.
“Listen, Rex, I’m not sure what’s going on,” he said. “Seems like everybody in this thing suddenly thinks you’re some hero they been waiting for, something like that. Your sister ever tell you about the Morgan Mafia?”
“Yeah, she did,” Noah said. “I understand that was Morgan himself whose son got shot?”
“That’s right,” Forney replied. “Everybody who was watching pretty much agrees that Ralphie would be dead if it wasn’t for you, and I guess the doctors at the hospital think he’s going to be back to normal pretty soon. Somebody checked the security video footage, and it looks like you yanked him backward just as he was about to fire, and that’s what brought his aim up so the bullet only grazed Ralphie’s head. If you hadn’t, that bullet probably would have gone through one of Ralphie’s eyes.”
“Any idea why he pulled a gun? I mean, that seems like a pretty stupid thing to do in such a simple little argument.”
“I agree with you, but you just never know with a tweaker. He might have had a grudge against Ralph, or maybe he was just at that stage where he was in a rage at everything and everybody. I’ve seen that in meth heads many times.”
Noah shrugged. “Well, if I helped, I’m glad. Maybe the word will get around and it will help me get that job you were talking about.”
“Well, actually,” Forney said, looking around once more to make sure no one could overhear them, “that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Billy talked to Morgan about you, said he thinks you’d be a good addition to our little organization. The sheriff got here after they had left, but Billy got to talk to him and he thinks the same thing, so I got sent over to try to recruit you. If you’re interested, the pay is good—you start out at two grand a week—and you don’t have to worry about going to jail, because the cops all take their orders from the same people we do.”
Noah had let his eyes go wide and was grinning. “Two grand a week? Who do I gotta kill?”
“That’s the kicker,” Forney said. “If you want the job, the first thing you gotta do is finish off Benny Smoot.”
Noah feigned an expression of shock. “Do what? This is BS, man—I just met you and you want me to kill somebody for you?”
“Hey, like I said it wasn’t my idea. Jimmy called, he said he looked into your eyes and saw a killer. You do this, you kill Benny, and you’re going to end up eventually riding high in the organization. Everybody starts at the bottom, but if you do this you won’t stay there very long.”
Noah looked around. “Geez, man, there’s still a half-dozen cops in here. If you’re playing me, they can haul me off to life in prison, or worse, if I do that.”
Forney turned and waved a hand until he caught the attention of one of the deputies. “Hey, Collins,” he yelled. “Come on over here for a minute.”
The deputy named Collins turned and came their way, and Noah was surprised at the size of the man. He probably stood six foot eight and would’ve easily weighed three hundred pounds, but there wasn’t an ounce of fat on the man anywhere. He walked up to them and looked down at Noah and Forney.
“Hey, Scott,” he said. “This the new guy?”
“I’m trying,” Forney said. “I told him what Jimmy wants, but he’s a little nervous about doing anything with you guys standing around.”
Collins looked at Noah. “Here’s what you need to know right now,” he said. “Jimmy Morgan runs everything around here. If he wants you to do something, you can either do it or suffer the consequences. As far as illegality and all that, that’s not really stuff you need to worry about. Jimmy is the law, as far as we’re concerned. Now, I know he wants you to snuff out Benny. If you do, that will prove to him that you’re the man he thinks you are, and you will be well rewarded. If you don’t, that’s fine, but don’t ever be stupid enough to talk about it.” Collins patted him on the head like a little kid and then turned away. He walked back to the other deputies and said something, and then all of them walked out the front door.
Noah looked over at where Benny was sitting, his face ashen and his body trembling. All of the anger that seemed to have triggered the shooting appeared to be gone, and he was realizing what he had actually done. Sure, he had managed to wound Ralph Morgan, but he had also signed his own death warrant. It didn’t take a genius to figure that out, and Benny was no fool.
“You want it done right here?” Noah asked Forney.
“Probably be better if you take him out in the middle of nowhere. Make it someplace where he’ll be found, but not necessarily right out in plain sight. As soon as the body is discovered, we’ll be in touch.” Forney looked at him for another moment, then turned and walked away.
Noah walked over to Benny and reached down to grab his arm. “Come on, Benny,” he said. “You and I have to go take care of some business.”
The skinny drug addict whimpered as he walked along beside Noah, but even as scared as he was, the big black Charger caught his attention. Noah put him into the passenger seat and then walked around to get behind the wheel.
When the engine fired up, Benny smiled. Noah put t
he car into gear and drove out of the parking lot, made his way through the eastern end of Eureka Springs, and followed Highway 62 toward Berryville. He remembered seeing a spot with a lot of old cars on the side of this road and drove directly to it. He turned in and cut his lights, glad that there was no other traffic on the road at that moment. He slowly cruised the Charger around behind the big garage and got out, then walked around the car and opened the passenger door.
Benny looked up at him. “This is where you’re gonna do it?”
Noah nodded. “It’s nothing personal, Benny,” he said. “Just something I have to do.”
Benny started to cry, and Noah reached in to take hold of his arm. He halfway expected a fight, but Benny didn’t have it in him. He got out of the car and let Noah lead him around behind an old ’47 Cadillac that had seen better days.
Noah put him into a sleeper hold and choked him out, then snapped his neck while he was unconscious. Benny would never awaken from this final nap.
Noah got back into the Charger and waited until there was no traffic in sight before he started the car and pulled out onto the road. He didn’t turn his lights on for a quarter mile.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Since it was already four in the morning, Kate was up when he got home. She was in the kitchen drinking coffee and smiled as he walked in.
“Hey, bud,” she said. “You look like you had quite a night. Is that blood on your shoulder?”
“A bit,” Noah said. “There was a bit of a fracas at the bar tonight, but I think it accomplished what I was out to do.” He told her the story of what had happened and watched her face as he did so. When he finished, she was already shaking her head in disbelief.
“Do you have any idea how many federal agents have come in and tried to get into that organization? Nine—the answer is nine—and do you want to guess how many of them are dead?”
“Nine?” Noah asked.
“Exactly. And here you come—you just waltz in and stumble into just the right circumstances. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I mean, I’ve heard rumors about you, how you pull off absolutely impossible missions, but I never believed I’d actually see it happen. Good Lord, Rex, this is incredible.”
Noah nodded. “I agree with you,” he said. “I was planning to spend weeks trying to find a way in, and nobody could have predicted that something like this would happen. Now all I have to do is wait until the body is found, and then we’ll see what happens.”
Kate shivered. “You just said that like it was no big deal. ‘All I have to do is wait till the body is found.’ You really don’t feel anything when you kill somebody, do you?”
Noah shook his head. “No,” he said, “I don’t. That part of my psyche is somehow shut down. It’s because of something that happened when I was a little kid.”
Kate’s eyes were big and round. “I really don’t think I want to know,” she said. “Look, I gotta get to work, and you need to get some sleep. Sleep, they used to tell us in the academy, is the most important weapon in any arsenal. The more rested you are, the more effective you can be.”
“I think they stole that from the Jason Bourne stories,” Noah said. “But that doesn’t make it any less true. I’m headed for bed, now.”
“Good idea. I’ll see you this afternoon, if you’re awake.”
Noah nodded and headed for his bedroom. He lay down on the bed and closed his eyes, and a minute later he was sound asleep.
He had The Dream again. He woke up in his own bed and rolled over, to see a beaten and bloodied Sarah sitting up and staring at him. “Noah, you have to find me,” she said. “You have to save me.”
“But I already did,” Noah replied. “I found you in China and brought you home.”
Sarah stared at him, with blood running from her nose and mouth. There was blood all over her clothing as well, and she simply shook her head. “No,” she said softly, “you didn’t.”
As always, that was the moment when he awoke for real. He sat up in bed and drew a deep breath, and instantly realized where he was. It had only been The Dream again, the one he had over and over since he was able to bring her home. No one knew about the dream, not even Sarah, herself, and Noah was keeping it that way. He knew enough about dreams in psychology to realize that this dream must represent something in his subconscious, some knowledge he had that he was not aware of. He suspected that his subconscious mind was trying to tell him that there was some part of Sarah that didn’t get away from the torture and interrogation in China, some part that he still had to save.
He shook it off and picked up his phone to check the time. It was only a little after six, so he rolled over and went back to sleep.
He was awakened again at nine by the ringing of the phone. He picked it up and saw that it was Scott Forney calling.
“Hello?” Noah said.
“Jimmy wants to see you,” Forney said. “Meet me in the front corner of the shopping center parking lot, the one next to Walmart.”
“What, now? Man, I’m trying to get some sleep.”
“Sleep when you’re dead,” Forney replied. “When Jimmy calls, nobody sleeps in. Meet me in twenty minutes.” The line went dead.
Noah stood and checked himself over, decided he didn’t have to have a shower right that moment, and went to the bathroom to take care of other morning necessities. A quick shave made him look presentable, so he pulled on some clothes and transferred everything from the pockets of the pants he’d worn the night before.
The big black Charger pulled into the parking lot of the shopping center right on time, and Noah had no trouble spotting the one car sitting alone at its farthest edge. He pulled up beside it and powered down his window, and Forney smiled as he looked the car over.
“Holy she-it,” he said. “Man, what a car. You build ’er yourself?”
“Nope,” Noah said. “Some of the investments I made before I went to prison paid off. I bought this and a few other things, and just blew the rest of it on that haunted house.”
“Well, it’s way cool. Listen, when we get to Jimmy’s place, just be sure to be respectful to him. Trust me when I tell you that’s not something you want him upset about. He’s going to probably tell you what a good job you did with Benny and offer you some kind of position in the organization. It won’t be quite at the bottom, but you’ll have people over you to answer to.”
“Okay, no problem,” Noah said. “Why couldn’t you tell me that over the phone?”
“Because if anyone finds out I gave you a heads-up on this, I’m going to get my own ass in the sling, and Jimmy’s got somebody who listens in on phone calls around here. Don’t say anything on the phone that you don’t want Jimmy to know about. Trust me, sooner or later it’ll come out.”
“Gotcha,” Noah replied. “So, how do I get there? Do I follow you?”
“That’s the plan. Just follow me and we’ll be there in fifteen minutes.” He powered up his window and started the car, a late-model Buick. Noah put his own window up and turned the car around, ready to follow.
The ride actually took about twelve minutes, and they came to a guard shack that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. Forney stopped and spoke with the guards inside, who then motioned for Noah to go ahead and follow Forney. He eased past the guard shack and followed Forney’s Buick for another three minutes before they came to the house.
It was large, but not the kind of place you would expect some self-proclaimed king to occupy. This looked more like a large farmhouse, built to accommodate a family with a dozen or more children. Noah parked his car beside Forney’s in the large gravel driveway, then stepped out and followed him up to the front door.
Two men opened the door, and Forney stepped inside. Noah started to follow, but the men stopped him.
“Need to put your hands on the wall,” one of them said. “Nothing personal—we just got to make sure you’re not carrying.”
Noah shrugged and put his hands on the wall indicated, then ignored the in
dignities of being frisked. A moment later it ended, and the same man told him to come on inside. Noah followed him and found Forney waiting to lead them farther into the house.
The entry foyer led into a hallway, and then another hall crossed it. Forney took the one to the right and then immediately stepped into a nicely appointed office with Noah on his heels. Jimmy Morgan sat behind a large oak desk, and he looked up as the two men entered.
“Scott,” he said, “shut the door and bring our guest on inside. You boys want a drink? I got cold beer, I got whiskey, I got vodka, you name it. If I ain’t got it here, won’t take me five minutes to get it.”
“Beer’s fine,” Forney said, and Noah echoed him. Morgan passed them each a bottle of the most popular local brand and motioned for them to take seats in the big chairs facing his desk. When they were settled, he turned and looked at Noah.
“Rex Madison,” he said. “Twenty-six years old, grew up in Zanesville, Ohio. Several minor skirmishes with the law during your teenage years, but then you hit the big time just a little while before your twenty-first birthday. You were one of five people named as suspects in the death of DEA agent William Prior. The feds couldn’t come up with enough evidence to prosecute any of you directly for murder, so the best they could do was a conspiracy charge. I guess they thought it was going to put you away for a long time, but some federal judge decided five years was enough on a conspiracy beef. That sound about right?”
“Close enough,” Noah said. “The judge wasn’t trying to give me any leniency, though. There was some error in the paperwork when they filed the charges against me that limited the sentence to not more than five years.” Noah shrugged. “Sometimes I think I got a little angel up there somewhere, just keeping an eye on me.”
“From everything I read about you today, Rex, you must’ve been a model prisoner in Beaumont. Says the only thing you ever got into any trouble over was sneaking food out of the chow hall. I’ve known a couple people who did time at Beaumont, and they were always in some kind of trouble.”