by JT Sawyer
“Supposedly, Kruger was carrying some steel plates for making fake money and they think he buried them in the canyon somewhere.” She rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Don’t know how that was possible because he was supposed to be unconscious in his overturned car when the paramedics arrived.”
The woman walked around the counter to a small carousel containing DVDs and books. She handed Dev a hardbound book entitled 48 Hours: An American Manhunt by Julie Gonzalez. “It’s all in there—that lady just came out with that book and was through here on an author tour not long ago. A lot of the locals don’t really like the angle she took on the story with all her focus on the Kruger guy but the details of what happened here in Durango are pretty accurate.”
Dev glanced at the writer’s photo on the back. A petite woman in her late thirties with too much red lipstick and a frilly white blouse amidst a backdrop of the mountains. Wonder if she’s the reporter Mitch was talking about?
She shoved the book on the counter and then walked to the aisle with automotive supplies. Dev grabbed a package of wrenches then went into the next aisle and picked up some duct tape. Heading back to the front of the store, she snatched a newspaper off the rack and placed all the merchandise on the counter.
Dev hastily removed a fifty-dollar bill from her purse and paid the woman, thanking her for her help as she exited without waiting for her change. She trotted through the torrential rain and hopped in her rental car. Dev removed the wrenches from the package and slid them into the newspaper then tightly rolled up the entire bundle. She used the duct tape to secure the improvised bludgeon on the sides and at either end then laid the inconspicuous weapon on the back seat.
She sped out of the gas station, heading north towards what she hoped would be the welcome sight of Mitch at Barbara Mulhere’s place but her certainty started wavering with each mile as the details of the past few hours began unspooling in her head.
An hour later, she found the narrow turnoff to the right and proceeded up the bumpy dirt road. The heavy rain had cleansed the road of any signs of vehicle tracks. She continued past the first driveway, which was gated, and the landscaping beyond overgrown. Dev continued up the hill, the overhanging tree branches and heavy rain causing her to proceed slowly. Her phone chimed and she pulled over beside a large ponderosa pine tree. It was a text from Petra with the phone number of Ed Roth.
She thought about what she was going to say, not wanting to sound like a panicked girlfriend to someone she didn’t know and not even clear how she would relay all the information Petra had obtained by what would appear to be dubious methods. Dev decided to wait and instead texted Petra back her location and plan, instructing him to notify Ed Roth in one hour if she didn’t report back.
She reached into the back seat and withdrew the newspaper club. How much more confident she would have felt driving in this remote region with Mitch by her side and a pistol at her disposal. Yet, here she was going in blind in dicey weather without any backup. She thought about calling the marshal again but what if he showed up to Mulhere’s place where Mitch and the others were having coffee around the dining room table? That would only exacerbate old tensions between the two men and make a difficult situation even worse with the still-grieving mother.
She pushed on along the winding road until it ended at a hilltop driveway. The rain had let up a little and she could see Mitch’s truck along with two other vehicles. She breathed a sigh of relief and began to pull forward then noticed a small guest house fifty feet away to the rear of the property. The twelve-by-twenty green building was nestled in the treeline and barely noticeable. Ten feet away from the structure, anchored in the ground in a clearing, was a small satellite dish. Parked next to the door was a dirt bike with a black helmet atop the seat. She stared at the portable satellite dish again. It was the type of military-grade device that she had used herself many times on missions abroad. Why would someone have that here?
Given how overcast it was and how late in the day it was, she also found it odd that there were no interior lights on in the main house. She got out of the vehicle, quietly closing the door and walking up to the front porch. Dev removed the newspaper weapon, toting it like it was nothing unusual. The heavy wooden door was locked. She moved over to the bay windows and peered inside, past the thin veil of white lace curtains. There was an antique lamp lying on the floor next to the fireplace and a green recliner that looked off-center.
She walked around the side of the house and saw a series of drag marks near the rear door that led to where a vehicle had been parked. Its tread marks had disappeared in the rain but she could still make out the depressions of where the tires had been.
The rain was coming down hard, the gutter spout in front of her overflowing as the torrent ran over a bed of gravel that led past the guest house. She caught sight of someone moving inside, his back to the window. Dev bolted across the grounds, taking up a position beside the front door. She peered into the window again. A stocky, blond-haired man inside was busy jamming radio equipment and some rifle magazines into a large duffle bag on the floor.
I’d say it’s time to call the marshal. She backpedaled towards the side of the house. Just as she stepped around the edge, her coat caught on the rear luggage pannier on the motorcycle. She felt it happen but her tactile awareness didn’t allow her to prevent the helmet on the seat from sliding off. It clanked on the rubble before coming to a standstill. Dev held her breath, clutching the newspaper in her hand, hoping that the noise of the falling rain would obscure the sound. She saw the handle on the door begin to twist slowly and heard a floorboard inside creak.
Ah, hell. She knew there’d be no running for cover and she decided to take the fight to the enemy, charging forward and smashing her foot into the wooden door. It crashed into the man, causing him to recoil into the wall behind him. Dev bolted inside, seeing an HK pistol in his hand. She slammed her bludgeon down on the man’s forearm then immediately swung up in an arc, striking him across the neck as the wrenches clanked loose. The tools had served their purpose and she flung the bundle at his face. He ducked and dove for the pistol on the ground but Dev had jumped on his side, applying a chokehold to his neck while trying to hook her heels around his waist.
The slippery fighter pivoted enough to slam an elbow into her ear, which loosened her grip enough for him to scurry away. She kicked the pistol out of his reach under the woodstove. He grabbed a cast-iron poker and rushed at her, swinging in a controlled pattern that indicated he had some measure of combatives training.
She dodged the first blow but caught the second attempt in her left arm, lowering it in time to prevent her ribs from being smashed. Dev knew she couldn’t afford another blow like that and her arm struggled to parry the next swipe. As the man swung, she angled off to her right and drove her open palm into his chin, shoving it upward; then she stomp-kicked him in the chest, sending him into the door frame, the impact forcing him to drop the poker. His head was contorted from the punishing palm strike but he grit his teeth and emitted a guttural shout.
Jesus, he’s like a robot. As he rushed forward, Dev reached for a steel rifle magazine on the table and swung it at his head, connecting with his left temple. She heard something crack and was sure it wasn’t the magazine. The man paused as a red fissure of bone was exposed near his eye socket. She struck him again as he staggered towards her.
“Tell me what you’ve done with Mitch,” she yelled, hitting him again in the skull.
He managed to let out a crooked smile. “He’s gone. You’ll never find any of them again.” His English had a slight accent. The man tried to punch her but his coordination had faded and he tottered sideways.
On the fourth strike, Dev powered everything she had into her swing. The man fell to the side, his bloody head impacting the woodstove in the corner. The bones in his battered skull rippled like a tsunami had rolled across his forehead. He let out a dull gasp then collapsed on the wooden floor.
The adrenaline surging thr
ough Dev’s veins was more overpowering than she could ever remember feeling. She whipped the magazine at the wall and then hissed out a deep breath, slamming her fist on the table. Dev knelt down and checked his pulse, hoping there was some sign of life, but he was gone. She needed more information but the man just wouldn’t stop coming. She had responded according to her training but now the opportunity to interrogate him had passed.
Dev crouched lower and withdrew the pistol from behind the woodstove. She slid out the magazine to check the round count then re-inserted it and stood up. Walking over to the table, she studied the items that were now jumbled all over the surface. There was an open laptop that revealed a series of what looked like six separate sets of GPS coordinates. The lat/long numbers were very similar to each other, indicating that each of the sets were located in close proximity to one another.
She scrolled down the screen and found six names associated with each group of coordinates. Mitch’s was at the bottom preceded by other names, only two of which she recognized from her discussion with Petra. The doctor and the warden, but who are the rest? What the hell is going on here? She thought back to the high-end satellite dish outside and then examined the weapons and magazines, which didn’t bear any serial numbers. She recalled Petra’s description of the former Stasi men who had arrived in Denver. A three-man snatch-and-grab team just like the kind covert abduction units use for securing high-value targets. Why here, though, at Mulhere’s house, and how are Mitch and these other people on the list tied up in all of this? Her mind reeled from the terror of the unknown and feeling so helpless apart from her company’s resources. Where was Mitch and was he still alive? She had briefed families of kidnap victims before but never thought she’d find herself being swallowed up within that nebulous world where your psyche is torn between hope and despair.
Beside the laptop was a topographic map of a narrow canyon. The southern section was highlighted with six “X” marks while an area many miles to the north held the words, “End Point.”
She dialed Petra, instructing him to see if he could locate the six GPS signals she was sending along with decoding the other encrypted files on the laptop. “There has to be a connection with everyone on this list and the arrival of the three former Stasi guys,” Dev said. “Mitch told me about his involvement in the case of Anton Kruger. This must somehow link back to his death—a revenge killing or some sort of retribution by his organized crime syndicate back in Europe—I don’t know.”
“Why wouldn’t they just discretely kill each person they were after then,” said Petra. “You know all too well how risky it is abducting people in public. This is a pretty elaborate operation.”
“Especially for just three guys to pull off—there might be other players involved who haven’t reared their heads yet.”
“I’ll keep digging away at the records and old photos to see what else I can turn up.”
“Copy that. I’m staying put here at Mulhere’s house until I can ‘pick up the trail,’ as Mitch would say.” She tried to take some comfort in the words and she could almost hear Mitch uttering the lines as if he were beside her. Instead she looked out the open door at the rain washing over the sloped surface of stone beside the guest house and felt alone. She hung up and stepped outside, standing under the eaves of the porch while the heavens unleashed a fury of thunder.
Dev typed in Ed Roth’s phone number, her finger hesitating for a moment as she contemplated the coming deluge of events that would unfold once the authorities were called to Mulhere’s place. She glanced over at the motorcycle, pondering her options. What if Mitch is already… She stopped herself in mid-thought then shifted back to a more positive outcome. He and the others had to be taken for a reason. Maybe I should wait and see what Petra can find—those coordinates could be nearby. As these theories ran through the ruffled landscape of her mind, she realized that outside support was going to be needed. To delay involvement would put Mitch at further risk as she tried to navigate the mystery of his whereabouts in a region she hardly knew.
She felt the chill of the cool air stab through her coat. “Mitch, where are you?” she whispered as her finger depressed the send button on her phone.
Chapter 8
Approaching the swinging figure suspended from the tree, Mitch’s eyes were focused upward and he nearly missed the tangled lump of arms and legs hidden in the knee-high vegetation on the ground. He jumped sideways to avoid crushing a slender hand then traced its form up to a dark-haired woman lying in a fetal position next to an older man who was starting to stir.
Mitch pried his eyes away from the startling sight and looked skyward at the now flopping figure of the bound man. The rope holding the man’s ankles was nearly unfurled and there wasn’t much time before he fell headfirst into the jagged rockpile.
Mitch yelled to his rear as Lisa and Brian arrived. “Two more in the grass here—help them out.”
He continued running forward, getting to the tree where the rope was secured on an angle. He noticed the same Vibram pattern from earlier in the loose soil at the base of the tree.
The tie-off point was twelve feet up and Mitch dropped his club and started climbing up the branches of the massive spruce tree, his hands getting coated in sticky sap.
“Cut me loose, dammit,” shouted the thrashing man, whose body was now twirling from his jerky motions. “Cut me the hell loose.”
“Stop moving, the rope around your ankles is coming apart.” Once Mitch had climbed high enough to reach the lashing on the tree, he stopped and glanced over at the writhing figure. “What’s your name?”
“My name? My name is Freddy Fucking Lawsuit to whomever put me here.”
The man didn’t listen and continued to wriggle. Mitch examined the rope at his end and saw it was wrapped one time around the trunk and secured with a new carabiner and an ascender which would make lowering the man easy. “Unless you want your brains spilled out like pudding on the rocks below, I recommend you stop moving.”
The man ceased struggling and canted his ashen-colored face at Mitch as the look of terror erased his façade of bravado.
Mitch had used such ascenders before and was grateful he wouldn’t have to muscle the rope in his hands while risking tearing up his skin. The device was olive-drab and resembled the exact type he had used in the military. He unclipped the carabiner and began feeding the rope through the ascender. The man began moving towards the ground, his head nearing the rocks.
“Brian, I need you to grab this guy and set him down,” yelled Mitch.
The prison warden pulled himself away from the others and stumbled over the gnarly terrain, getting there just in time to cradle the bound man’s head as Mitch completed the descent.
Once the rope was untethered from around the man’s ankles by Brian, Mitch yanked the line down from the branches and removed the carabiner and ascender, dropping them onto the forest floor before climbing down from the tree.
“Welcome to earth, Freddy Fucking Lawsuit,” said Mitch as he walked past the terrified man, who was rubbing his sore ankles from the rope burn.
“It’s Nicholas, but we’ll discuss that soon enough.”
The rest of the group was huddled together as Lisa tried to calm the terrified woman, who was rubbing her glazed eyes in between shrill screams. Once she had calmed down enough to catch her breath, Mitch heard her identify herself as Julie. The other man was leaning against a tree with his head hung low like he was about to vomit. As Mitch walked up, he saw the guy’s face as he straightened up, his tawny-colored fishing vest barely clinging to the green button-up shirt underneath. Daryl Warner—holy shit!
Daryl worked as an intel guy with the Department of Justice in Denver. He had been the go-to guy on anything related to Anton Kruger and Eastern European crime syndicates operating in the western U.S. Mitch had only met Daryl once at the field briefing in Durango before he embarked on the manhunt for Kruger. Daryl was a sharp guy but lived in a cerebral world that rarely extended beyond
his computer keyboard. First Barbara Mulhere, whose son was killed by Kruger then Lisa, who was in the ER when Kruger arrived after his car accident—I’m pretty sure she’s the one. Mitch looked around at the other terror-stricken faces in the group. Then there’s Brian, who worked at the same prison Kruger was held at. Now, Daryl is a part of this somehow. Shit, this is giving me a headache on top of the one I already have. So far, Kruger is the common denominator, only who are these other two? he pondered while staring at the man and woman to his right.
The petite female looked familiar and was clearly someone from the big city with her high-end blouse, painted fingernails, and pricey Italian ankle-high boots with silver buttons. As for the brash figure with the shifty eyes that Mitch had untethered, he seemed like the type of slick salesman that skulks around a used car lot trolling for gullible clients.
“You the fucking cop in charge out here?” said Nicholas, who stumbled up to the crowd and pointed a finger at Mitch. “You look like a cop.”
“I’m not. I just woke up out here like the rest of you.”
“Where are we and who the hell are you people?” said Daryl, who was still leaning on the tree to steady himself. The color in his face was slowly returning and he kept squinting to make out the others around him. His striking blue eyes contrasted with his pale skin.
Mitch walked into the center of the group. He pulled his eyes away from the ground and craned his head up to the canopy. “I’d say we were lowered over the edge of the canyon with the winch system near this immense concrete wall that I saw earlier then carried over to our respective spots.”
“This could be the new dam—north of Durango,” said Lisa. “There’s a concrete dam that was just completed. That is, if we’re still even in Colorado.”
He strained his head back, peering up at the massive stone walls of the canyon. “There’s no trail up and out of here from this location, it seems. From what I can determine from the few tracks on the ground, there were two other people who were involved in carrying each of us to our locations.”