by Jim Heskett
Layne looked over toward the hallway. He wasn’t sure if it would be better for his room to be untouched, or for it to be changed. He couldn’t predict how he’d feel about either option.
“I need an hour,” George said. “To clean and get settled. You can go in town and see your friends.”
The only “friend” Layne had seen so far had been punchy Paul Clausing at the bar, and he had no desire to catch up further with that guy. “Fine.”
George flashed his eyes at him. “I mean it. Go.”
Thoughts fired a million times per minute as Layne drove back down the mountain. He considered shooting past the town and rejoining the highway to Denver. He’d seen the old man with his own eyes. Everything he had set out to do, he had done. Technically. Layne had intended to say goodbye to his father, but now he didn’t know if it mattered.
Maybe part of him had hoped his dad would have a different attitude, now that he also had a rapidly approaching expiration date. But he seemed no different. The chances of a tearful apology were close to zero, as Layne had suspected.
Some small part of him had hoped his dad would want to repair their relationship. Very small. Layne had never let that hope grow to more than a whisper.
But no, he couldn’t go yet. If he left and George passed, Layne would forever think of the things he wished he’d said that he never had. It had been the same with his mother a few years ago. And they hadn’t been carrying nearly the same amount of baggage he and George had to work through.
Halfway down the mountain, he noted the cemetery, and muscle memory made him pull over. The wrought-iron gate loomed over the entrance.
Layne parked in the main lot. Rows of tombstones looked back at him. A smile crossed his lips when he noted the little building he and his high school friends had deemed “the gravedigger’s shack.” It was a popular make-out spot they’d used when it was too cold to sit outside in the cemetery. He had guy friends who would take girls there, then celebrate the occasion by marking the hardwood floor in one particular spot. A symbol of the conquest, and the person with the most won. Since Layne had dated the same girl for most of high school, he never took part in the gravedigger shack conquest counting competition.
He left the car as fresh snow tumbled from the sky, and he shuffled along the rows. Cemeteries gave him a strange feeling, and not just because of the corpses feeding the worms below his feet. Layne had spent a good chunk of his adult life as a dealer of death. He disliked being reminded of that fact.
So, Layne didn’t dawdle, since he knew exactly where he was headed. The snow crunched under his feet as flakes settled on his shoulders.
Twelve rows down and six across was the Parrish family plot. Spaces reserved for Layne, his brother Randall, as well as their parents. Except Layne’s mother was buried in Denver, his brother was buried somewhere else, and George and Layne were still alive. Four blank headstones sat, all of them wearing a coat of today’s snow.
Except Layne noted something odd. One of the tombstones had writing on it. He dropped to a knee and wiped a gloved hand across it to clear it. In the dim light of the cemetery, Layne had to lean forward and squint his forty-plus-year-old eyes to read the engraving.
The gravestone read:
Here lies Layne Parrish. Brother, son, best friend.
Layne bit into his lower lip as he read over the carving. As far as he knew, he was not buried underneath this tombstone, so he used that as a starting point. No middle name listed, which was odd. And the birth date was correct, but the death date was eleven years ago. He tried to think of how this could have happened. Eleven years ago? Nothing significant happened then that Layne could recall.
Why in the world had someone made a tombstone for him?
“What’s happening here?” he asked the open air.
Then, Layne looked again at the death date. Eleven years ago. The wheels turned in his head and several threads came together at once. Of all the people in the world who could have devised a scheme like this, only one person came to mind.
He stood up and shucked snow off the shoulders of his coat. “Son of a bitch,” he said, then headed back toward the car. Layne knew exactly who to talk to about this.
3
Layne Parrish knocked on the door of Keegan Swiney’s house. Layne had driven back down into town and then past it, where a scattered row of old houses lined the south end of town. The section leading back toward the highway, and away from the mountains. Layne always liked this end of town, because you could see all of both the east and west mountains flanking the valley.
Layne hadn’t seen Keegan’s parents’ house in twenty-five years, but he remembered the number. And since Keegan was one of the few people he’d kept in touch with over the years, Layne felt confident he was at the right place.
The door creaked open. A pair of eyes appeared in the darkness. Deep, green eyes. They hovered in space, unblinking and wet.
The door swung open wide.
"Hello, Keegan," Layne said.
Keegan's jaw dropped, his eyes intense. "Are you shitting me?"
"I shit you not,” Layne said.
Keegan bared his teeth for a brief moment, then he grabbed Layne by the back of his neck and pulled him inside the house for a hug. Instinct told Layne to pull back, but the person grabbing him was one of the few he would ever allow to do such a thing.
Keegan held Layne out at arm’s length, and they grinned at each other for a few seconds. This old friend had plumped a little since high school, as most people had. He still had clean lines on his face and a full head of brown hair, but also the pudge of a beer belly pushed at his sweatshirt.
"Son of a bitch,” Keegan said. “Of all the people to show up at a random time… how did you know I was in town?"
Layne tilted his head back toward the mountain. "You still make gravestones?"
For a brief moment, Keegan scrunched his brow in confusion, then his face relaxed. "Oh, you saw that, huh?"
Layne had noted the death year on the tombstone. It was the year he and Keegan had last spoken with each other. A clever joke, but not something Layne had expected to find at the cemetery. "It's my family plot, man.”
Keegan lowered his head. "I didn't mean any disrespect. I was high and a little angry at you. It’s not easy to stay in touch with jet-setter Layne Parrish. Honestly, though, I forgot all about it. I haven’t set foot in that cemetery in at least four or five years.”
Layne sneaked a few glances around the house. When Keegan had lived here with his parents, the house had been a simple ranch home, clean and well-decorated. Now that Keegan lived here without them, it had taken a different turn. Layne could see an overflowing trash can in one corner, plus empty beer bottles and pizza boxes and used napkins. It was one of the most bachelor-y places Layne had ever seen.
Keegan pointed across his living room, toward the kitchen. "You want something to drink?”
“Do you have… people here? Family? I don’t want to interrupt anything.”
“People? Naw, I live here alone. My parents moved to Orlando about fifteen years ago.”
Layne studied his friend’s pained expression. No doubt there was more to the story, but Layne didn’t want to overstep his bounds. If Keegan wanted to talk about it, he would. If not, he would have to let it go.
“Orlando, huh?”
Keegan chuckled as he shrugged. “I know, right? But they love it down there. Shotgun winters were too hard on my mom’s arthritis.”
“Getting old. Yeah, I do know what that’s all about.”
Keegan leaned over and gave Layne’s bicep a squeeze. “Seems like you’re beating back the sands of time with your fists. Jeez, Layne, how did you get so huge?”
“Sleep.”
“Huh?”
“Yep. Sleep. That’s the bodybuilding secret they don’t tell you. You won’t see big gains unless you’re getting a minimum of eight hours per night.”
Keegan frowned and held up one arm. He flexed his bicep, whi
ch didn’t do much to stress the limits of his sweatshirt’s fabric. “Odd. I sleep all the time and I’m still weak. Maybe I need to sleep more.”
“Maybe so.”
“Right. Beer?”
Layne did want a beer, so he allowed Keegan to escort him across the room to sit at the kitchen table. Layne tried to visualize what it used to look like in here. He remembered patterned yellow wallpaper, now replaced with pale blue paint. The weed leaf poster framed on the wall probably hadn’t been there before, either.
Keegan grabbed a couple of Face Down Brown Ale bottles from the fridge, then opened both of them with a bottle opener nailed to the kitchen cabinet. He squinted at a calendar taped to the fridge door and mouthed something to himself before he turned back to Layne.
Keegan slid into the chair and held out the beer.
"It's good to see you again," Layne said.
“It’s good to be seen. How is Texas treating you?”
Layne pursed his lips for a moment. Layne had a cover story that the US government had provided for him, to keep anyone from knowing his real occupation. But it had been a while since Layne had needed to use it.
“How long has it been since we talked? Ten years? Eleven?”
“About ten,” Keegan said.
“How do I sum up a decade? I moved to a Denver suburb, got married, had a kid, divorced, retired. That’s the fewest number of words I think I can use.”
“Is the kid with you?”
Layne shook his head, and then he took out his phone and scrolled to Cam’s pictures. “She’s in Denver with her mom this week.”
"What are you doing here?" Keegan said as Layne thumbed through pictures of Cameron Parrish.
Layne thought about the touch of suspicion he'd heard inside Keegan's tone. He pocketed his phone. “My dad is dying. I suppose I came back to Shotgun to see if it was true. That was my intent, but now I’m not sure anymore.”
“It’s true. George has been in a bad way. Your dad has just been so strange lately."
Layne sipped the beer and eyed his old high school best friend. "What does 'strange' mean?"
Keegan made a face as he scratched a fingernail at the corner of the beer’s label. "George's been like an ogre since the stroke. He’s had a couple of rage episodes, a couple of dust-ups with people in town. Most people stay away from him."
“Is he drinking a lot?”
Keegan shook his head, then his eyes flashed up at Layne, sending a pulse a fear into him, for some reason. "But there's something else."
When Keegan didn't seem forthcoming with the details, Layne turned up his palms and raised his eyebrows.
"I don't know how to tell you this, Layne, but your dad is into something. Something serious."
"Into what?”
Keegan winced. "I'm not sure how much I should say about it. There's these guys who’ve been coming into town lately. I don’t know what to call them. Some of them are bikers, some not. Some are skinhead types, some are clean-cut. There's no common thread except for them all being white and male, plus the tattoos, but not even all of them have those tattoos."
The hair on the back of Layne's neck stood at attention. He already had a strong idea already of the answer to his next question. "What about the tattoos?"
Keegan pointed to a spot on his neck an inch below his left ear. "Not like your tats. Most of them are in this spot around here. Looks like an eagle with spread wings and with open claws at the bottom. It's hard to describe."
The raised hair on Layne's neck now turned into a shiver skulking up and down his spine. "I know exactly the tattoo you're talking about. How is my dad involved with these people?"
"What do you know about them, Layne?"
"If it's who I think it is, it’s the group of people who call themselves Disciples of the True America. Tell me how my dad is involved with these people."
Keegan made that pained face again, squinting against the light over his kitchen table. "A couple weeks ago, one of those neck tattoo guys came into town. We see them from time to time, sometimes in packs, sometimes alone. Most people don't say much about it. You know how it is here. We don't get much tourist traffic or dollars anymore, since the ice climbing school closed.”
“It did?”
Keegan gave a slow nod. “It’s all boarded up and blocked off. Probably nothing but a bunch of marmots and stray cats live there now.”
“That’s too bad. I’ll bet it put half the town out of work.”
“It sure-as-shit did. But one of those 'Disciples' came to town recently. He parked his car at the hardware store, and then he disappeared."
"Disappeared?" Layne asked.
Keegan nodded. “But here’s the kicker: the car stayed at the hardware store for three more days. Then, a couple of people saw your dad park his truck in the hardware store lot, then he approached that missing guy’s car, got in, drove off. And no one has spoken about it since."
Layne sat back and sipped his beer as he thought about what this could mean. Why in the world would George Parrish move a car for someone in the Disciples? How would he even have keys? Did he know who these people were?
"What are you thinking?" Keegan asked.
Layne drained his beer and then scooted the empty bottle to the middle of the table. "I think I need to figure out what's going on here."
4
Beckett sat back from his telescope and wiped his eyes. This late at night, squinting into the little lens always hurt after a minute or two. If he were looking up at the sky to track constellations, that would be different. The darkness up there made the light stand out. But Beckett had pointed his scope at the town, where the lights from the few businesses open in the evening were enough to pollute his view.
But he had watched the stranger in the fancy SUV pick up George Parrish from the bar, then take him home, then drive back down the mountain to visit Keegan Swiney. There were plenty of trucks in this little mountain town, but none as nice as that. Whoever this person was, Beckett didn’t like the way he seemed to gallivant around as if he had the key to the city.
Beckett blinked a few times to let his eyes adjust, then he peered through the scope again. That car left Keegan Swiney’s and drove back up the mountain.
Beckett tented his fingers and sighed. He slid the wooden panel back into place so he wouldn’t give away his position. Now that he’d sealed up the window, he turned the light back on. They had to be careful about being spotted in this building, at least in front of strangers like the man in the fancy truck.
Beckett had spent his time in the military. He’d paid his dues and earned his college tuition, but they had given him much more than that. The military had taught him how to hone his focus to decide the path forward.
He now had a vision.
Beckett had come up through the ranks of his current organization in Denver and Colorado Springs, coordinating trucking routes for his bosses. He’d displayed an aptitude for logistics from a young age and then had fine-tuned that training in the military. If Beckett had a regular job, he’d probably work at a warehouse somewhere, walking around all day with a clipboard in his hand.
But he worked a much more specialized job. Investigating the viability of these mountains. Investigating the viability of Shotgun itself. There were many complications in Shotgun, but there was a lot to like here, too.
Beckett loved his job. Not that the town of Shotgun was some snowy oasis, but he loved the opportunity. In the major cities, federal law enforcement always got involved, and quick. There were too many moving parts, and every criminal organization operating in semi-plain view would eventually fall.
But not here. Not in the backwoods of Colorado. The small towns in the mountains were the last true frontier, because no one paid attention to them. No one thought to check if a militia organization like the Disciples had plans to spread across the small towns until the large cities no longer had the pull to resist.
And that’s how Beckett would build his empire within th
e Disciples. One little town at a time.
But first, he had plenty of business to attend to in Shotgun. The business for his bosses back in Denver, and one for himself. It was no accident he’d pushed for Shotgun as the home of their experiment.
This town held rewards. Secret rewards. And Beckett would find them, sooner or later.
He removed a small box from his backpack on the floor and set it on the table. He opened the fabric-lined box to see his treasure, the two pieces of thumb bone from the first person he’d ever killed. Even before the military, before college. The bully down the street who’d gotten what he’d deserved. Beckett wished he could have held onto more parts, but this was all he could risk.
He liked to look at the thumb bones, both in moments of despair and triumph. It was a good salve for both.
The door behind him opened, and he tilted his head to check the newcomer. Instinctively, he swiped the box and shoved it back into his backpack.
The noise from the first floor of the VFW next door penetrated the open windows on the east side, the music and laughter and the sound of glasses clinking. The indoor climbing building was always much more quiet. A place with office space and meeting rooms to guarantee privacy, as long as the lights stayed low, and they remained careful exiting and entering the building. The underground parking structure helped greatly with the latter problem.
Beckett liked to visit the VFW. As a veteran, no one questioned him when he came and went, or when he brought duffel bags and half a dozen tattooed out-of-towners near the building. Nobody said shit. Maybe some of them even knew he and others used the abandoned ice climbing school for business. But as long as Beckett kept up appearances, he wouldn’t worry about what a bunch of shell-shocked mountain vets had to say about it.