by Jim Heskett
She nods as she removes a folded manilla envelope from her purse. “His name is Elijah Brown. We’ve actually been looking for him for quite a while. He’s at the resort half a mile down the road. We have to move fast.”
And now Layne understands. No, Daphne won’t ruin Layne’s wedding by declaring her love and causing a big scene. She intends to spoil it by using work as a means to distract him. By making him divide his attention.
“Use someone else. I’m busy for the next few days. You’ve known the date of my wedding for months. You agreed to let me have this time off.”
She pushes the folder toward him, but Layne doesn’t lift his arms to take it.
She stands there with the folder hovering in space. The humid air here has made the edges of the paper curl. “There is no one else. And the target’s leaving Hawaii tomorrow, and then we miss our chance.”
“No.”
“Come on, Boy Scout. This is the perfect storm. He’s been all over the world, never popping up in one place for long. He’s here, you’re here, and this is our chance. I know it’s your wedding, and I’m very sorry about that, but I promise this is important.”
“If you’re going to give me a speech about how my country needs me, you can save it.”
The folder hovers there, floating in the tropical air between them.
Layne looks along the beach toward the resort down the street, a concrete rectangle shooting up from the trees. Layne knows the destination is a ten minute jog down the highway, or a two-minute car ride. Why does he know this? It’s part of his job to know things like that. Even though he has no intention of visiting that other resort, Layne’s training and experience told him to evaluate nearby buildings for danger and opportunity. The same way he had cataloged all of his hotel’s entrances and exits and security measures within two hours of arrival.
Daphne stares at him with a twinkle in her eye. “How long would it take you to get there? You already know, don’t you?”
“About ten minutes jogging, about half that if I run full out. Why is this happening now? Why is Elijah Brown in Hawaii?”
She laughs. “You’re not going to believe this, but he’s here for a wedding, too. His cousin is getting married tomorrow afternoon. Then he’s gone.”
Layne stares at the folder but doesn’t take it. “I don’t think so. Get someone else.”
“This has to happen,” Daphne says, jiggling the folder in her hand. “It’s too late to get anyone else here. We have one shot at this, and then he vanishes again, maybe for years this time.”
Layne puts his hands on his hips, glowering at the folder.
12
Layne parked off the side of the road and hiked up the rest of the way to the hilltop. He’d found a secluded batch of trees to hide his car, far enough away from the road no one would see it. Not unless they were looking.
The hilltop itself was a flat area surrounded by dense trees, with clusters of rock outcroppings and broken boulders here and there. Cameron would’ve loved to play the floor is lava in this area.
He wasn’t positive why he was here, even. Molly Waffles had given him a vague clue about this unremarkable spot where the Disciples of the True America liked to meet. Layne hadn’t actually seen any Disciples since he’d been in town. He had only hearsay and second-hand evidence. Not how he liked to conduct an investigation.
But, when he reached the top of the hill, Layne understood why this piece of real estate was so valuable. There was enough tree cover on the grassy peak of the hill to shroud it from satellites or other prying eyes. It had a clear view of the town, as well as other landmarks. He could see the Shotgun waterfall trail to the east, the Big Cat Sanctuary to the north, and Shotgun’s second peak to the west. If someone wanted to get a quick bead on incoming threats, this would be a great place to do it.
Layne took out his phone and made a call. After a few rings, the man known to some as “K-Books” finally picked up.
“Layne Parrish, as I live and breathe,” Harry said.
“Harry Boukadakis, in the auditory flesh.”
Harry snorted a laugh. “What’s up?”
“Are you busy?”
“Not really. Serena is in Monte Carlo, trying to find a Filipino arms dealer. I’m getting blueprints for the hotel he’s staying in, so she can put a bullet in his brain tomorrow.”
“Sounds exciting.”
Harry scoffed. “For her, probably. For me, it’s clicking and scrolling and copying and pasting. Not nearly as much fun, but it spares me most of the danger. You doing okay?”
Layne thought he heard something, so he shifted a few steps over until he was underneath the shade of a tree at the edge of the clearing. “It’s strange. I’m in my hometown. Well, not my actual home town, but where I spent the bulk of my formative years.”
“Layne Parrish’s Formative Years will be a good title for your memoirs.”
Layne chuckled. “Very nice.”
“Is it strange being back? I stopped off in my hometown a few years ago. So much had changed, I felt like a foreigner walking around.”
“Yeah, it’s about as weird being back as you would think. I’ve been reminiscing a lot, which is to be expected, because everything reminds me of something else. But I’m also realizing that most people think ‘closure’ is a box you can check. It’s not that simple.”
“I have no plans to go back home again, to be honest with you.”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t feel like I had to be. My father is in poor health, but he’s as much of an asshole as ever. My old best friend still lives here, but he’s apparently in some kind of extended slump and he’s not doing so hot. Last night, I got into a fist fight with my former football teammate, then we made up this morning after he tried to fight me a second time. Also, my high school sweetheart moved back, too, but she’s a one-armed lesbian who now owns a shooting range in town.”
“I can see your point. It’s probably not how you pictured it.”
Layne rolled his eyes at Harry’s dry humor. “Can you do me a favor, Harry?”
“Of course.”
“A couple weeks ago, a guy parked his truck at the Shotgun Hardware, then he disappeared. Never seen again. But the car stayed, so he didn’t come back to get it, for whatever reason.”
“Do you think he’s dead?”
Layne dropped to one knee to flick a fire ant off his shoe. “Yeah, he’s probably dead. I need to find him, or his corpse, or something.”
“Anything else to go on? Description, exact dates, times? You’re not giving me a treasure trove to work with.”
Layne held his phone out to send Harry the notes where he had collected the facts and his suppositions. “I’m sending you everything I got. It’s not much.”
“Roger that. If I find something deeper, you want me to inform local cops? FBI? Daphne?”
Layne thought about his father’s involvement in this mess. He had driven the missing man’s car away somewhere else, and now refused to talk about it. Any law enforcement attention would also land on Layne’s father.
“No, come to me first, please. Local PD is apparently inept and possibly compromised, and I’m very hesitant to have feds sniffing around until I have a better handle on the situation.”
“Understood, Boy Scout. I’ll text you as soon as I have something juicy. What about Daphne?”
Layne gritted his teeth. “No, all she ever does is complicate things.”
Harry chuckled. “No argument from me on that point.”
“I appreciate you doing this for me. I don’t feel like I have a lot of allies here.”
“No problem. I only have to do you about seventy-five more favors until we’re even.”
“Seventy-four,” Layne said with a smile, and they ended the call. Part of him missed working with Harry and Serena, and even a part of him missed Daphne. For as much drama as his former lover caused, she excelled at managing the team. How she kept them staffed and always with a reasonable budget
impressed him to no end. Layne had heard of other clandestine operations teams like the one he used to work for, but most of them folded after a mission or two. Somehow, Daphne had the power and political maneuvering skill to keep her team running for almost two decades.
Layne snapped out of his memory when something in the air changed. At first, he thought the temp had taken a sudden downturn, but that wasn’t it. Had the smell in the air changed?
There was someone else here.
A rustle in the trees behind him made Layne spin. And he immediately discovered that he was partially correct; he wasn’t alone, but he was the only person on this hilltop.
He found himself looking at a spotted cat, sixty or seventy pounds. This little guy had wandered out of the trees, and now stood thirty feet away, seemingly frozen as it stared at Layne. It must have escaped from the Big Cat Sanctuary.
“Okay, easy,” Layne said as he drew his Colt pistol. “Let’s take it slow. You got nothing to fear from me, kitty.”
From somewhere, Layne heard the whine of a drone, but he didn’t want to take his eyes off the cat. He stood as still as possible, hands at his sides. Wherever it was, it sounded far away, perhaps coming closer. The shape of the hill caused echoes messed with Layne’s ability to pinpoint sounds.
The leopard lowered its head. Steam ejected from its flared nostrils.
“Easy,” Layne said, in a soft and comforting voice. “Take it down a notch, okay?”
The cat’s mouth opened, bearing teeth. A rumbling growl like a motorcycle engine came from somewhere deep within its throat. It seemed to tense, eyes on Layne. It looked ready to attack.
“Oh, shit,” he said. He’d accidentally put himself directly across from an adult leopard who seemed both scared and angry, the worst possible combination. He eased the gun up to eye level to aim. Layne didn’t want to flinch and trigger the cat’s predator instinct, but he didn’t know if he had another choice. Any second now, this beast planned to pounce.
Layne had to act first.
He lowered himself to aim at the same moment the leopard launched toward him. He closed one eye and looked down the sight as the beast sprang into action. Layne settled his finger on the trigger, but he didn’t notice that his finger pad was now wet with snow. When he pressed the trigger, his finger slipped. The gun blasted, but the shot missed the cat, sailing high and echoing all around.
No time to shoot again. The leopard would meet him in a fraction of a second.
Layne ran straight at it. He had a plan B, but no plan C. This had to work. He was out of time and out of space to maneuver.
Layne rushed full speed and lowered his head at the last moment. As he’d expected, the cat raised up, intending to swipe its claws at his head, or maybe to tackle him.
But the move had left the cat’s midsection exposed. Layne drove his head right into its soft belly, and it yelped as Layne’s violent force pushed it to the side.
But he couldn’t stop his momentum. Layne stumbled and then rolled, then his head smacked into a cluster of rocks. Wetness on his forehead. Blood. His eyes wouldn’t open.
He rolled in the snow a couple times, trying to suck in a breath, but feeling too woozy. Then his world turned black.
13
Layne sat up before he could open his eyes. His head throbbed. Aching fingers reached up to his head where he could feel the bump on his temple, but the blood there had dried.
When he blinked his lids open, the intensity of the mid-day light blinded him. He’d remembered snow and gray, but now the sky looked blue.
How long had he been here? Long enough to dry blood, apparently. He tried to study the sun above, but he couldn’t remember the exact position before. He’d been here for a few minutes, at least.
As his eyes adjusted to the light, he checked the area for danger and found nothing in the immediate area that wanted to kill him. No leopard, at least. It had probably thought Layne dead. Fortunately for him, the blow had knocked him out so he couldn’t fight back, or else he probably would actually be dead now.
He retrieved his gun and looked at the trigger, where a wet finger pad had made his shot skew and miss the cat. A sloppy mistake Layne should never have made. A younger Layne Parrish wouldn’t have been so rushed and careless.
And where did the cat go? Why had he heard those whirring drone sounds a few seconds before the attack?
He removed his phone and turned on the selfie camera to check the wound on his head. A small cut, less than an inch long. Layne would probably want to clean it out properly and put a bandage over it, but he wasn’t in any imminent danger of major blood loss or anything like that. He’d seen a lot worse injuries on both himself and others, for sure.
Layne sucked in deep breaths to wash away the remnant of cloudy head as he stared at the east and west peaks of his quasi-hometown. What an odd little town full of odd little people. Layne hadn’t despised Shotgun as a lot of his classmates had. But he’d wanted out, the same as them. And while Layne never joined in activities like spray painting anti-Shotgun graffiti on the football bleachers, he’d understood the anger that caused it.
Could an entire town repress its collective feelings?
Before Layne could answer that question, he heard a sound, a repeat of the one that had woken him up: a car’s tires rolling. Layne looked up to see the grill of a car appearing as it flickered through the trees. In about three more seconds, that car would emerge into the clearing and park somewhere within plain sight. Layne had to move.
He looked around. Five feet to his right was a downed log. It wasn’t much cover, but he had no other option.
Layne hit the dirt and crawled over toward the downed log as the car emerged from the road and parked at the edge of the clearing. A hundred feet away. Layne didn’t lift his head to check, for fear of meeting someone’s eyes. But his muscles ached as he forced himself to stay low.
He crawled over paw prints in the snow until he reached the end of the downed log. Nothing but open space between here and the edge of the clearing. He would find tree cover ten feet ahead, but that meant about one full second of exposure until he’d reach it.
Layne flattened himself and tried to peek back over the log. The car had parked and out stepped a white man wearing a leather jacket and a black bandanna. At first, he only stood there. He squinted at the sun overhead and then took out his phone.
He seemed distracted. Layne flexed his muscles, readying himself to explode into full speed as soon as possible. Either that or start shooting, which he did not want to do.
But, moments later, a second car arrived. From this one emerged another man, much like the first one, but taller and skinnier. Since the Disciples had no standard uniform, Layne couldn’t identify them on sight. But they certainly seemed like Disciples.
There was a good chance he might be able to take both of them on at once. But, what would that gain him? He wanted their information, not their lives.
Maybe they planned to meet over there, a hundred feet away on the other side of the clearing. So if Layne stayed put, they might not notice him at all. But, if they decided to stroll around the clearing for a walk-and-talk, they would no doubt find him. So, his best chance to reach a safe distance unnoticed would be sometime in the next two or three seconds.
Layne waited until they made eye contact. The heavy man walked across the dirt to shake hands with the skinny one. For a moment, both of their bodies were angled perpendicular to him. It was the cleanest getaway look Layne had seen so far.
He burst into action. As soon as their eyes were pointed away, he raced forward, into the trees. Staying low, grinding his lower body and keeping his upper body small and swift. His feet danced over the grass and small rocks and twigs, hoping nothing would crack or snap and give him away.
It took him a fraction of a second to cross the open space, and he found a tree barely thick enough to shield him. His feet planted and his body twisted to assume his new hiding spot.
He nestled behind the
scarred maple, trying to catch his breath while making as little noise as possible. The tree providing cover was thick enough to hide his bulky body, but nothing else. He couldn’t move or do anything but stand fully at attention.
He listened to the two men shuffle through the dirt and grass, then they settled about fifty feet away. Layne closed his eyes so he could focus on listening to their words. With a slight breeze today, any low-volume conversation would be unintelligible.
As he listened, he leaned forward a little, naturally turning his head toward them. But, he snapped back into place. He didn’t even know if they were looking in this direction or not. Layne couldn’t afford to make even a single mistake.
He studied the ground around him to look for anything to help his situation, like a rock to toss as a distraction. His confidence in his revolver had abated somewhat after the misfire with the big cat.
And when he looked down, he discovered a severed head with bullet holes, sitting in the grass in front of him.
14
The defunct indoor climbing facility and the VFW shared an underground parking structure. That’s what made it so easy for Beckett and his men to come and go. Especially since the public believed that the hallway leading into the climbing building had been closed off. And it had. But there was an alternate entrance via the maintenance room next to the parking garage.
He didn’t like endlessly using this building to conduct business. The Disciples didn’t have an official identity in this town, so they didn’t have a headquarters or a “hideout.” Not yet, at least. Once all these complications with the trucks were sorted, none of that would matter any longer.
Beckett parked his car and grabbed the wrapped meatball sub. It was still warm, and if he could get inside and situated in the next three or four minutes, he wouldn’t have to reheat it. That would be an especially annoying challenge, since he would have to slog into the VFW to borrow the microwave, then back again to the climbing building so he could enjoy peace and quiet while he ate.