Wildburn (A Whicher Series Novella)

by John Stonehouse

  “You ain't supposed to be in there.”

  Lynch looks over his shoulder. “In my own house?”

  “The scene of a homicide.”

  The young man stares.

  “A man was shot dead in your back yard, Mister Lynch.”

  “I just got home, I just got here. I'm trying to get straightened out.”

  The marshal steps square in front of the doorway.

  Lynch looks at him. “Sheriff's department had a crime scene guy go through all of my stuff. They searched every room.”

  “But nothing's here,” Whicher says.

  The young man sniffs, runs a hand beneath his nose. “What's that supposed to mean?”

  The marshal reaches into the leather tote. “It's all in Lamesa.” He takes out the ziploc, the bag of white powder. “That rental storage unit of yours. You were in there tonight.”

  “Whoa, man.” Lynch holds out the flat of his hand. “I never seen that before.”

  “DEA know you're a dealer—did you know they have a file on you?”

  The young man's eyes widen. “Wait, did you go inside?”

  “I had a judge issue out a warrant.”

  Lynch jabs a grimy finger at the plastic evidence bag. “I never seen that before in my life.”

  Whicher slips the powder back inside the tote. “How 'bout this?” He pulls out the bagged SIG .22.

  The young man stands entirely still.

  “Is it yours?”

  No answer.

  “First thing in the morning I'll have it checked for prints,” Whicher says. “The grips, the frame, the bullets. Prints'll be all over 'em, unless you wiped it all clean.”

  Lynch opens his mouth. Closes it.

  “I'd have a hard time proving you handled it, if you wiped it down But then, a gun and a magazine and all of these here bullets—and no prints...”

  “It's mine,” Lynch says.

  Whicher slides the semi-automatic back into the bottom of the tote.

  “So what if it is?”

  The marshal looks at him.

  “I had it on a drill site—for shooting at rats.”

  Whicher nods slow, eyes the ground.

  “The site in Scurry,” Lynch says, “the place was crawling with 'em. Go ask the supervisor.” He shifts from foot to foot.

  “I guess that all will be just fine...”

  Lynch stares at him. “The man told me to get rid of it. I stashed it with my work gear, after I left.”

  “How about if the bullet fragment they pulled out of Tommy Ray Fallon's head matches with this?” The marshal gives the tote a shake.

  “I wasn't here.”

  Whicher shrugs, lets the tote hang loose.

  “I got any amount of witnesses...”

  “I think you shot him.”

  “I don't need to be listening to this...”

  “What happened?” Whicher says. “You finish work, snort a little bump?”

  The young man shakes his head, cracks an ugly grin. “You think whatever bullshit you want to think.”

  “I think you were here, I think you shot him. Then took off, knowing Juanita would be coming up.”

  “Did you come to arrest me?”

  “I think you had a fight—you and Fallon.”

  Lynch puts a hand to the door.

  “You shot him, took off. Stashed the gun in Lamesa—went to work.” Whicher looks hard into the young man's eyes.

  Brandon Lynch slams the front door shut.

  Twenty minutes later a Chevy Tahoe noses past Brandon Lynch's house.

  Whicher sits watch along the lane in the Silverado.

  The Tahoe slows, the driver looks in on the house. The man behind the wheel is short, a Western hat set on his head.

  The vehicle pauses for just a moment—then moves off again.

  It rolls slow along the gravel lane to Whicher.

  Sheriff McCoy drops the window, pulls alongside. “Skilling told me you came in here.”

  Whicher keeps his eyes on Lynch's house.

  “He in there?”

  The marshal nods.

  “You talk to him?” McCoy says.

  “Some.”

  “Fixin' to do something about it?”

  Whicher glances at the sheriff, he doesn't answer.

  McCoy pushes back his hat, the skin of his face a dark red. “Fire's getting close,” he says. “Real close.”

  Whicher turns back to staring at the house. “I don't intend losing him.”

  “You don't have enough to make an arrest,” the sheriff says.

  “I have a .22 semi-automatic.”

  “You told me yourself, you're buds with the girl's father.”

  Whicher lifts the leather tote from the passenger seat. “I got the gun right here.”

  “.22 is a common-ass caliber, you and I both know that.”

  “If the rifling matches?”

  “What if it don't?”

  Whicher looks at him. “Lynch is a meth-head, and a dealer. That don't bother you?”

  “It didn't bother DEA.”

  “None of this stacks right,” Whicher says, he gives a shake of his head. “What was Fallon doing here?”

  “Huntin' bounty,” McCoy says. “Your girl's a bail skip.”

  “Bail company didn't send him.”

  “You said he knew her, for Christ's sake.”

  “Used to know her.”

  “Marshal, you just keep twisting this the way you want to twist it...”

  Whicher cuts the sheriff a look.

  “Juanita Jones was here,” McCoy says. “Lynch was roughnecking, three damn counties away.”

  Whicher thinks of Butch. He thinks of Juanita. Find the enemy. Sting him. Bring him out.

  The sheriff switches channels on the radio in the Tahoe. “A couple of crews east of here say they're on the edge of calling this an uncontrolled.”

  Whicher stares through the windshield at the light in the sky.

  “Fire's starting to move to its own convection currents,” the sheriff says. “I'm waiting on word from fire command. If this thing hits, you need to head south, don't stop.”

  Whicher nods, raises a finger to the brim of the Resistol.

  “Hit the road,” McCoy says.

  “I heard you. I'll say goodnight.”

  Sheriff McCoy knocks the shifter into drive. “Get the hell out of here. Point your truck south, get on the gas. Don't look back.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The front door of Lynch's house is opening—Brandon Lynch stepping out. His head snaps to left and right scanning the street.

  He walks fast to the Ram pickup, opens up the driver door, throws something into the cab.

  The marshal watches him turn around, go back inside the house.

  One by one the room lights go out. Whicher thinks of the yard, the panel fence—the way out around the back.

  The house sits in darkness now. But the front door's opening.

  Lynch steps out, strides to the pickup—jumps in behind the wheel. He backs out onto the roadway, whips the steering around, heads for the end of the lane.

  Whicher fires up the motor, gasses the truck as Lynch makes a right at the intersection.

  The marshal reaches the turn with the highway—he can just see Deputy Skilling by the cruiser.

  Lynch is driving the opposite direction, headed north.

  Two hundred yards up is the main east-west route into town—a sheriff's department SUV blocking the crossing.

  Whicher hits the throttle, the tires bite.

  Lynch switches lanes—swerves toward a gas station at the main intersection.

  A man steps in front of the SUV—Deputy Pierce.

  Lynch cuts across the gravel apron between the pumps and the road.

  Pierce stands, just watching.

  Whicher slows, sticks his head out the window. “Marshals Service—on federal business...”

  “Road north is closed,” Pierce shouts back.

  Lync
h is already disappearing.

  Whicher guns the big V8—Pierce steps back out of the way.

  Fire is burning in a line two to three miles distant. Spots of fierce, bright flame—trees lit up like candles, branches blackened, like twisted bone.

  In a field at the side of the road, two men are trying to gather frightened horses. The highway dips through a thicket of bull mesquite—Whicher squeezes down harder on the gas.

  The Silverado hits a drift of thick smoke. The road climbs, straightens—the lights from Lynch's pickup just visible ahead.

  At an outlying farm house, a family heaps gear into open trucks and trailers.

  Lynch's brake lights flare—he's slowing, turning, headed east, toward the line of fire.

  Whicher stares after him.

  In the truck's hi-beams he can make out a cattle guard at the head of a dirt track.

  He slows, swings off the highway—follows down into dry scrub.

  Lynch's pickup is a quarter-mile ahead. Across the burning land there's no sign of any fire crew—nobody out there but them.

  Lynch makes another turn.

  Whicher sees a line of withered posts along a ranch road. The road heads straight out toward a burning wood on the flank. Through the open window of the truck the sound of the fire hits him—a blown roar, angry, alive.

  Embers are climbing into the sky above the trees, swirling all directions, tumbling, showering from the air.

  The marshal jabs down on the switch to close the window.

  He stares at the land ahead—flame licking over the road, mesquite and dry grass burning to all sides.

  Lynch's pickup tears forward.

  He reaches the woods, lit up in a hell of smoke and fire and flaring light.

  He can drive along it.

  He can drive it, if he does it fast.

  In the swirling wind, Whicher sees the flames die back—sees the surface of the road alongside the trees.

  The road is clear a second—then lost again in fire and smoke.

  Beyond the woods, there's no way of knowing.

  He can't see Lynch. He can't see him.

  The marshal stands on the gas, the big truck lurches. Waves of smoke shroud the windshield—he bursts through, sees the woods on fire.

  The ranch road is lit in a scatter of burning debris.

  Fire towers in the woods; primeval.

  He can't see him.

  He can't be gone.

  Seconds pass, he grips the wheel—eyes alive, scarcely breathing. Something moves in the radiated light, a silhouette—the shadowed outline of a truck.

  It's driving straight out, away from the woods, into the scrub.

  Whicher wrenches the steering, spots a rutted track, swathes of grass burning along its sides.

  He floors the gas, hits the track, feels his speed rise. Sparking embers flash and blur across the hood.

  The lights on the truck spear out into darkness—then pick out Lynch below on a downhill stretch. Fire is spreading, but some kind of feature runs along the bottom of the slope—a darkened line.

  The pickup's tail lights drop from sight again.

  Whicher's truck beams drill into a void.

  He slams down on the brakes, locks all four wheels—there's just an empty space, dust billowing.

  The Ram pickup is twenty yards down in a creek, in a dry gulch. It's rolled, laying over on its roof.

  The Silverado skids to a halt.

  Whicher elbows open the door.

  Wind and heat and smoke hit his senses. On the far side of the gulch, fire is burning in ragged clumps.

  The doors on Lynch's pickup are open, straight out like the wings of a dead bird.

  Dust and grit and ash scythe through the air—Whicher reaches for the Ruger in the shoulder holster.

  He glances behind—flames are starting to jump the dirt track, light swelling from the burning grass. Wind whips him as he thumbs back the hammer on the big revolver.

  The motor on the upturned pickup is dead, wheels motionless. No sign of Lynch.

  “I'm coming down there,” Whicher shouts.

  Wads of thick smoke curl along the bed of the gulch.

  “You want out of here, I'm coming down.”

  The marshal steps onto the dirt bank—heat and sound building, rolling in waves.

  He scrambles down, breathes smoke.

  Lynch is looking at him—he can see him—he's at the far side of the pickup, trying to crawl.

  Whicher swings the Ruger out in front of him.

  A patch of cherokee sedge on the bank ignites into flame.

  Lynch is dragging himself, one hand grabbing at the loose dirt, the other hand clamped around his leg.

  The marshal jumps into the bottom of the gulch, ears filled with the hiss and roar of burning.

  Lynch turns on his back, clutches his thigh, fingers spread across bloodied fabric.

  Whicher points the Ruger at the young man's chest. “Can you get up?”

  He shakes his head, face twisted in pain.

  “Are you a praying man?”

  Lynch stares, his eyes wild.

  “Now would be a good time to start.”

  Sweat is pouring off of him—Whicher's lungs burn, the fabric of his shirt sticks to his skin.

  Lynch is doubled in the passenger seat of the Silverado.

  Behind them, the land is all on fire.

  The track from the woods is engulfed, the side of the hill burning incandescent.

  “Go down,” Lynch croaks.

  Whicher stares at him.

  The young man locks his fingers around his bleeding leg—the handcuffs at his wrists slick with blood.

  “You just rolled your damn truck in there.”

  “I done it before.”

  The marshal wipes sweat from his eyes.

  “I swear,” says Lynch.

  Along the opposite bank, flames reach into the heated air.

  “Drive in slow. We can make it out.”

  The marshal feels an animal fear, cuts a look in the rear-view—there's no way back.

  “I get too much to drink, I slip the patrol down there,” Lynch says.

  Whicher eases off the parking brake, puts the shifter into neutral.

  “It's dry,” Lynch says, “nothing in it to burn.”

  The Silverado creeps forward, the marshal puts it into four-low.

  He takes a last look left and right. Touches the throttle. The truck drops over the edge of the dirt bank—sliding, skidding sideways by the upturned Ram.

  Wind is surging down the narrow cut of the gulch. Strips of flaming grass curl on the windshield, both banks ablaze.

  Lynch grips his leg, blood oozing. “Please, God...”

  “Why'd you shoot him?”

  “Get me out of here...” The young man lays down flat to his thighs.

  “I told you,” Whicher says. “Start praying.”

  Lynch grimaces, close to tears. “I can't run, if we get trapped...”

  Whicher stares along the hood at the gulch ahead. “Why’d you shoot Fallon?”

  “My leg's gone. Get me out of these cuffs.” Lynch raises his head from his jeans, the side of his face smeared with blood.

  “Did he come for Juanita?”

  “I wasn't there...”

  Above the gravel sides of the creek, a stand of trees is billowing fire. The ground to either side is burning. Flame roils down the steepening banks, the channel pinched-in tight.

  Lynch cranes his neck to see out the windshield. “Please, God...”

  Whicher lifts his foot off the throttle. “What's on the other side of that?”

  “I don't know...”

  “Can we get through?”

  “I don't know, I don't know...”

  The marshal brakes to a stop. “We can't get up, damn it—we can't go back.”

  Lynch stares at him.

  Whicher feels his heart pound in his chest. “Why the hell were you running?”

  The young man shakes his
head.

  “You got nothing to do with any of this?”

  “I keep tellin' you...”

  “You high now?”

  Lynch buries his face into his knees.

  “Son of a bitch...”

  Smoke funnels down the gulch bed.

  Whicher floors the gas, feels the kick of the seat against his back.

  The truck hits a wall of flame.

  Lynch cries out, the marshal feels time slow.

  He stops breathing, sound deadened in his ears.

  There's just the truck wheels turning, steering light between his hands, second after second, dread-filled. Waiting for the catch of earth, for the bank sides to trap them.

  Flames close in, flash out, boil in again.

  They can't be there, in that heat—inside fire.

  Air.

  Black air.

  A rush of air.

  The windshield clear.

  Smoke is pouring from the hood, sound filling up his ears.

  They're clear of the trees, of flames, the channel widening.

  Pin pricks of light are moving.

  Dots of light flashing, red and blue.

  He sees a highway—fire trucks, police units.

  Air fills his lungs again.

  He feels it, holds it.

  Lets it all the way out.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Boy, if you ain't the craziest son of a bitch this side of the Brazos, I don't know who is.”

  Whicher stands on the two-lane, the lights of a firetruck flooding the scattered group of vehicles on the blacktop.

  He holds up Lynch with one arm. “Are y'all taking him, or am I?”

  “I swear to God...”

  “He was resisting arrest, I was in pursuit.”

  “The crew chief saw your lights coming up Whiteflat Creek,” McCoy says. “I don't know how he even saw you—everything the hell on fire.”

  “I wasn't doing jack,” Lynch says.

  “He's in possession of illegal narcotics. He was running.”

  “I told you not to come here,” McCoy says.

  “Federal business, I'll go where I want.”

  A man in a dirty yellow coat and pants approaches, firefighter helmet in his hand. “Sheriff,” he says. He jabs a finger at the wall of fire to the east. “That thing's coming in fast. We need to move.”

  “Alright,” McCoy says. He turns to Whicher. “Give me Lynch. Way you're going, he might not make it out alive tonight.”