by Coyle, Matt;
Whoever it was, McCafferty, Bates, or Rollins, hadn’t been able to kill me in two tries. I couldn’t give him a third. Maybe one of them had been in the car that passed by me. Locked and loaded and coming to finish the job. I’d left my Smith & Wesson in the trunk with the shotgun, fearing a vehicle stop by a nervous cop who might see the bulge in my jacket and go SWAT on me before I could show him my conceal permit.
A decision to save my life now might cost me it.
If I stayed in the car, I’d die. A fish floating belly up in a barrel. I had to get to the trunk.
I angled my arm up across the dashboard below the view of the windshield and pulled the keys from the ignition. The dome light. If it went on when I opened the door, I’d die. I reached up around my head, opened the glove compartment, and searched blindly for the Maglite flashlight I kept there with my good hand. Got it. I held the black Maglite by the bulb end and slowly raised it toward the switch for the dome light. Shit. I stopped. I couldn’t remember if the “Off” side of the toggle switch was to the left or right. I held my breath and pushed the handle of the flashlight onto the left side of the toggle switch. The night stayed black.
Maybe I’d survive.
I started to count to three in my head.
The passenger door whipped open on two.
Oak Rollins, gun in hand, stared in at me eye to eye.
CHAPTER FIFTY
I LUNGED FOR the gun, but Rollins grabbed my arm with his free hand.
“Crawl out.” He yanked me out of the car from a squatting position, as easily as a father pulling his son from a car seat. He held the gun at his side in his other hand. “Stay low. Somebody’s got a rifle up there.”
Rollins was saving my life, not ending it. At least for now.
I knelt on the wet sidewalk, head below the bottom of the car’s window, and grabbed my left bicep with my right hand. Blood leaked through a slash in my coat, matched by one in my arm. I clamped my hand across the wound. It hurt, but I’d live. The bullet had nicked me, leaving behind a gouge but no lead.
Rollins leaned his back against the side of the car, head low. Dressed all in black. Black watch cap on his head.
“You hit?” Rollins looked at my hand clamped to my arm.
The sky pelted down rain on us.
“Flesh wound.” I looked down the street beyond the Mustang. “What happened to the car that came up behind me?”
“Up the hill around the bend.”
“Those headlights saved my life. Where the hell did you come from?” Rollins had appeared out of rain-soaked midair. How? Why? Maybe he and the shooter were on the same team. Maybe this was some sort of ploy to get close to me and find out what I knew. Maybe waterboarding hadn’t been enough.
“That’s not important now. If you live through the night, I’ll tell you.” Rollins rolled down onto his stomach and army crawled to the back of the Mustang. He peeked around it up at the house on the hill. He crawled back to me. “Stay here. I’m going to take out the shooter.”
“Are you out of your damn mind?” I grabbed his arm. “He’s on higher ground with a rifle. Plus, there may be more than one up there. Townsend’s in there and I doubt he’s the one with the rifle.”
“One shooter. It’s not Townsend.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Townsend’s not a killer. The man with the rifle is.”
“Who is he? Bates?”
“I’m not sure,” Rollins said.
I didn’t believe him.
“I’ll call the police.” I pulled my phone from my pocket. “Let them get SWAT up here and take down the shooter.”
“This is an unincorporated area. It will take the San Diego Sheriff’s Department a half hour to get out here.”
“What’s the rush? We lay low and live.”
“He won’t wait. He’ll either come for you now or run and kill you later. We gotta move.” Rollins crawled back to the rear of the Mustang. “He may already be on his way down here.”
“I’ve got a gun in the trunk.”
“How’s the arm?”
“Workable.”
“You open that trunk and the inside light will go on and you’ll be dead before you get the gun out.” Rollins pulled something out of his pocket. “We need a diversion. I’m going thirty yards down the hill. Keep your eyes on the front door of the house without popping your head up as a target. As soon as you see a beam of light hit the front door, pop the trunk, and get the weapon out.”
Rollins crawled over the sidewalk to the brush that ate up most of the distance between the large plots of land. The nearest house was a hundred yards down the street. Lights blared from the gate opening to the driveway, but their illumination only spread thirty or so feet. The area around my car and the distance between it and the house on the hill was charred black and the rain’s sizzle was the only sound.
I strained my eyes to follow Rollins through the brush, but lost him after ten or fifteen seconds. Good. If I couldn’t see him, hopefully the shooter couldn’t either. I crawled to the back of the Mustang and peeked around it up at the house. If the shooter had a night-vision scope, I was presenting a target. I changed my angle every ten seconds.
A circle of light hit the front door. I pushed the trunk button on the key fob. The trunk popped open. I bolted up and grabbed the shoulder holster with the .357 and dove back behind the car.
The night stayed silent except for the hush of rain.
I gripped the Smith & Wesson in my right hand and crawled to the front of the Mustang. I peeked around the front tire up at the house. The oval of light still shined on the front door. I strained to hear footsteps through the rain, anything. Nothing but the constant hiss.
“Cahill.” Rollins’s voice.
He jogged toward me on the sidewalk. Upright. An easy target if the shooter was still up there.
“Get down!”
“He’s gone. He either thought he killed you or didn’t want to risk sticking around to make sure.”
“How can you be so certain?” I felt the Magnum heavy and ready in my hand.
“He didn’t shoot at the light and you’re still alive.”
“What about Townsend?”
“Let’s go up and take a look.”
“What if he has a gun?”
“We’ll have two.”
Rollins’s certainty bothered me. He knew much more than he was willing to tell me. Because he knew the players? Or because he was on their team? My life might depend on me finding out.
I grabbed some duct tape from a duffel bag I kept in the Mustang’s trunk and wrapped some around the gash in my jacket. The blood flow had eased to a gentle weep. The pressure from the tape over the wound stung me into hyper-alert.
I followed Rollins down the hill to retrieve his flashlight, which he’d mounted on some rocks and aimed at the door to the house that Townsend had entered. He crossed the street and headed up the long winding driveway up to the house. Rollins was sure we were out of danger. I wasn’t. So I walked directly behind him up the hill, keeping his massive body between me and the house the whole way up. I figured it’d take a pretty damn big caliber bullet to go through him to get to me.
I didn’t feel the least bit cowardly, either.
Rollins finally took some precautions when we crested the hill. We each circled around the back and looked through windows into bedrooms. Too dark to see anything, but no human shadows. Rollins checked a sliding glass door to the back patio. Unlocked. Instead of entering, he shined his flashlight around the patio and then beyond it. A lawn, then a ring of trees stretched out behind the house sloping up a hill to a wooden fence at least fifty yards away.
“That’s the way the shooter left.” Rollins pinned the light on the faraway fence. “He probably had a vehicle parked up on the hill back there where the street loops around.”
Rollins opened the slider, and we both entered. I kept my gun in front of me. Rollins kept his holstered. He led us through a kitchen in
a darkened house with the flashlight. We made it to the foyer. Ben Townsend lay next to the front door. The left corner of his head was missing above staring eyes. The blood around his head had already stopped pooling.
The orange flash when he entered the house. A silenced pistol. Someone knew Townsend was coming and had laid in wait. Because I’d rattled him and he made a phone call.
I fought back bile rising in my throat. I’d seen death before. Too much of it. People I’d killed. People I cared about who died because of mistakes I made. People in between. Still, I never got used to it.
Thank God.
Rollins stared down at Townsend. Darkness hid his expression, but he didn’t seem surprised. He didn’t seem anything. Except that he’d grown used to the sight of death.
“Who killed him, Rollins?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.”
“Let’s clear the house then get out of here, Cahill.”
He started down the hallway. I followed. We checked each bedroom, using only the beam from his flashlight. They’d all been ransacked. Dresser drawers hanging open and clothing strewn on the floor.
“Staged,” Rollins said after the last. “This was murder made to look like a burglary gone wrong.”
That was the first thing he’d said that I believed 100 percent. We went back to the kitchen where we’d entered through the sliding glass door.
“Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“You touch anything?” He grabbed a dishtowel off the counter.
“No.” I hoped none of my blood had eased out under the duct tape and dropped onto the floor.
We exited through the sliding glass door and Rollins wiped down the handle with the dishtowel. We hustled back to my car and got in out of the rain. I pulled out my cell phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling the police.”
“What will that accomplish?”
“Oh, I don’t know, catch whoever killed Townsend. We both know Bates is involved. We’ll bring the whole damn thing down.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Bates will have an alibi and Townsend’s death will be ruled a murder in the commission of a robbery. You’ll have put yourself in the area after you followed Townsend here fifty miles from his office and some of the blood from your wound probably dripped onto the floor. You really want to take your chances with the police?”
“What’s your game, Rollins?” I held my gun in my lap. Rollins’s was in a holster on his hip.
“No game. Just practicality. What if we let this thing play out? See if Bates or his wife report her father missing.”
“I don’t like it. We’ll be withholding information in a murder investigation.”
“There is no investigation, yet.” Rollins’s face blending in with the night. I could only make out the whites of his eyes. They told me nothing. “Let’s talk to Brianne and see what she thinks before you call the police. I’ll meet you back at the hotel.”
“What hotel?”
“The Marriott in La Jolla. I followed Brianne there from her house after I had to give you a nap.”
“Why?”
“Because I know they’ll come for her. When they do, I’ll be waiting.”
“You’ve been using her as bait?”
“No. I’ve been protecting her. Just like I promised Jim I would.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
WATER SPLASHED INSIDE the car through the two bullet holes in the windshield. The wipers made it worse with steady deposits. Every third wipe water would splash off my chin. Spiderwebs spiraled out from the holes about an inch or so. I could see where I was going, even at sixty-five miles per hour in the rain, but I doubted any cop who saw my car would believe me.
I called Brianne.
“Are you still out in Pine Valley?” She sounded worried. “Did Townsend meet with anyone?”
“I’m on my way back to the hotel. Are you there yet?”
“No. I’ll probably be there in ten minutes. Is everything okay?”
“Yes. How well do you know Oak Rollins?”
“I used to know him pretty well. We used to go on vacations with him and his wife. Why?”
“I need your help with something. I should be back to the hotel in about forty minutes. Take George out for a walk or a drive and wait for me to call you and tell you when to go back to the room. Don’t go back to the room unless I call. Okay?”
“Rick, what’s going on? I don’t like this.”
“Oak’s coming to the hotel. I need to know if you think he’s telling the truth or lying.”
“What? Why?”
“I just need your help. I’ll explain later.”
“Why can’t I be there when he gets there?”
“I’m not sure it will be safe.”
“What’s going on, Rick? What happened out at Pine Valley?”
“I ran into Oak. He might be on our side. He might be on theirs. I need your help to find out.”
* * *
I’d dropped Rollins at his SUV, which had been parked down the street from the death house. He said he had to stop by his hotel before he met me at the Marriott. Maybe to meet with his partners, McCafferty and Bates. Or, maybe I was just paranoid. I’d earned it. Either way, I’d be ready when one or all of them knocked on the hotel room door.
I parked in the hotel garage and pulled something from a duffel bag in the trunk and then hustled up to the room.
George greeted me at the door when I went inside. He was supposed to be with Brianne on a walk.
“Brianne?” I stuck my head in the bathroom. “Brianne?” Empty.
I walked over to the window and pulled the curtains back to check the patio. She wasn’t there either. My stomach turned over and sweat beaded my hairline. I called her phone. It went straight to voicemail.
“It’s Rick.” My mouth sucked dry. The words came out raw. “Where are you? Call me.”
I scanned the room for anything missing or out of place. I didn’t know what I expected to see, but nothing stuck out. Brianne hadn’t made it back to the hotel. At least not up to the room.
Rollins had admitted he’d tailed Brianne. Claimed he’d done it to protect her.
She wasn’t protected now.
Had Bates and Dwight McCafferty gotten to her? Kidnapped her or worse? If they had, Rollins might be the only hope I had of getting Brianne back alive if he wasn’t with them right now. But why was I still alive? Rollins could have killed me when he opened the door to my car and plenty of times after that.
Something didn’t fit.
I called Brianne again. Voicemail. I paced the room. George matched my strides. He looked worried, too. I called the number I had for Bates. Voicemail. Did he have Brianne? Is he on the way over with Rollins to finish the job? All I could do now was wait.
Twenty minutes later, someone double knocked on the door. George barked and shot his hackles. I quieted him and put him in the bathroom, then checked the peephole.
Rollins.
I studied Rollins through the hole. Blank face. Calm. He looked down both ends of the hall. He didn’t look to be ready for battle.
I was.
Rollins held a small duffel bag in his right hand. The other hand, relaxed at his side. I opened the door and stood back from it to let Rollins’s massive frame pass by me. I let the door close and stuck the barrel of my Smith & Wesson in the middle of his back. He stopped mid-stride.
“Drop the bag.”
He did. I kicked it against the wall. I kept the barrel against his back but switched to my left hand. Pain shot along the gouge in my arm all the way up my neck. I reached under Rollins’s jacket and pulled the Glock 9mm from the holster on his hip and shoved it into the waistline of my pants behind my back. I patted Rollins down. Clean.
“Hands behind your back. Kneel down.”
“You’re making a mistake, Cahill.”
“Not my first.” I pushed the barrel harder into his back. “Kneel down.”
> He knelt. I pulled a pair of steel handcuffs from my coat pocket that I’d grabbed from the duffel bag in the trunk of my car. If a cop ever went through the bag on a vehicle stop, I’d go downtown for having a rape kit. There were also Flex-Cuffs and duct tape in the bag along with a lock pick set and a black jack. I feared Rollins might be able to snap the plastic cuffs, so he got steel. No duct tape or black jack. I needed him conscious and talking.
“Raise your arms up behind you, wrists together.”
“You’re wasting time with this bullshit, Cahill. I’m on your side.”
“Hands or it ends here.”
He raised his hands as high as his bulky muscles would allow. I snapped a cuff around his right wrist and cinched it down, then clasped the other around his left. I walked around him and pointed the gun at his forehead.
“Where’s Brianne?”
“I thought she was supposed to be here.” He swiveled his head as if looking for her. “How long has she been gone?”
“I don’t know.” I couldn’t read him for sincere or lying. “Why didn’t you follow her when she left Pine Valley? I thought you were supposed to be protecting her.”
“I knew there had to be a reason the two of you followed Townsend out to Bates’s cabin in Pine Valley. I figured I needed to stick with you if I was going to find the men who killed Jacks.”
“But you were supposed to keep Brianne safe. Or so you say.”
“The best way to do that is to put them all down.” His mouth pulled tight.
“Who are they?”
“Bates and McCafferty.”
“How does Dwight McCafferty fit in? He wasn’t even in your unit.”
“Dwight?” Rollins grimaced. “I’m talking about Doug. Dwight’s got nothing to do with this.”
“Doug’s dead.” I lowered the gun as if on reflex.
“He’s alive.” Rollins shifted from one knee to another.
“I thought he was killed overseas.” I pulled my head back. “That’s the one thing in this whole mess that everyone agrees on.”
Rollins stood up. I aimed the gun at his head.
“Kneel back down.”
“You’ve pulled a gun on me twice, and I’ve sat on my hands and allowed you to handcuff me—”