Thriller Box Set One: The Subway-The Debt-Catastrophic

by Dustin Stevens

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  The ideal place to leave the SUV and the truck would have been the shopping center. Most places like it have a pretty constant flow of traffic, nobody thinking too much about a couple of cars left sitting overnight. Very rarely did such places resort to towing, and only a fool or someone extremely desperate would ever think to try and steal a car from one.

  The irony of what we were doing was not lost on me, though I freely conceded we were in the latter category.

  The downside for us in doing so was that we needed to switch license plates and we needed to shift our gear into the new ride.

  Both would be near impossible tasks to do at the shopping center, each just asking for some random passerby to spot us and start asking questions. Also out was doing what we needed to and bringing the cars back, as once we got the stolen vehicle away, there was no scenario in which we were returning it.

  Again, the chances of the owner spotting us were remote, but anything above zero was too much to even consider risking.

  As Skye departed I had considered calling out, trying in some way to stop her, before deciding that it was foolish. As it stood, it appeared that I was just dropping her off by her car, a friend bringing her back to her ride and going on my way.

  If I resisted, or even called out, it would only draw attention.

  Letting her depart, I paused just a moment before goosing the truck forward and calling Rae, her picking up on the first ring, just as I saw her pass by the end of the row I was on.

  “Yeah.”

  “Fall back,” I said. “She’s got it.”

  There was a moment of silence, the closest Rae would get to voicing any displeasure to me.

  Not that she had to. I felt the same exact way.

  Once her point was made, she asked, “Where?”

  “Your call.”

  I clicked off the line without further comment. There was no need to second guess what she came up with, no point in telling her to avoid the mall, to be somewhere we could make the necessary transfers without being bothered.

  Nudging the gas once more, I fell in a few cars back from Rae as she exited in the same direction we had come from. In just a span of ten minutes the afternoon traffic had gotten even heavier, the clock pushing just past 5:00, the worst or best time for us to be out in traffic, depending on how one looked at it.

  The worst, in that it was extra heavy, would make movement slow, keeping a visual on each other difficult.

  The best for that very same reason, making it tough for anybody to stay on us once we ditched the cars and they didn’t have an exact location on us any longer.

  It took almost fifteen minutes for us to make our way back to the freeway, falling in with the flow of traffic using the same northern route we’d been on shortly before. Given the heavy congestion of cars entering and exiting, the speedometer never crept above thirty-five as we pushed past three exits before taking a state route to the east.

  Within minutes it became clear that the road was not one of the major arteries to the city, the traffic falling away to nothing within just a couple of miles. Perched up high behind the wheel, I leaned hard on the gas, keeping a constant visual on the rearview mirror, making no effort to put much space between Rae and I.

  Again, for the time being, anybody that was looking for us would see our locations on top of one another anyway. No point in trying to play it off.

  Seven miles out of town, Rae put on her blinker and turned into the Augustus T. Wedman State Park. Demarcated by little more than a tan sign with red lettering gouged into the wood, a two-lane led back away from the road, dense timber abutting it on either side.

  What little sun remained was blotted from the sky above as we entered, the temperature dropping as we pushed into the woods. The scents of pine and damp earth met my nose as we wound our way forward, running without our headlights, despite our darkened surroundings.

  The better part of a mile back from the road, the forest thinned considerably. To our left, a manmade reservoir came into view, the shoreline made from gravel sloping gently down into the water. Up ahead stood a pair of shelter houses, each constructed from bare stilts painted the same tan as the sign out front.

  Roofs of black shingles covered both, a bevy of picnic tables beneath them, a couple of charcoal grates scattered around the perimeter.

  Between them was a small asphalt strip, a half dozen parking spaces lined out in yellow paint.

  Swinging out to the right, Rae pulled into the second spot from the end.

  Leaving one empty between us, I slid into the fourth and killed the motor, listening to it tick and cool for a moment, surveying the scene before us.

  Given the time and day of the week, we were the only people present. Judging by the small amount of parking, and the meager facilities on site, my guess was that the park was a throwaway, the kind of place tacked on to a reservoir to keep the place free of development, with nobody ever having any real intent on using it.

  Pushing out of the truck, I stepped down, the smells I noticed before becoming even stronger, mixing with the smell of the water nearby.

  Compared to what we had left behind in Texas just a couple days before, both the scent and the cool air were welcome changes. Rising onto my toes, I filled my lungs with both before rocking back to flat feet and shoving the truck door closed.

  “YO?”

  On the opposite side of my truck, Rae paused just long enough to nod, a terse movement that let me know she still wasn’t sure about letting Skye be the one to nab a new vehicle.

  “YO?”

  I nodded in reply, following her lead and going to the bed of the truck. The first thing I did was extract a Shakespeare Ugly Stik fishing rod and lean it against the side of the truck, the implement meant to provide some amount of plausibility to a cover story should a park ranger happen past.

  Once that was done, I went through the toolbox and then the cab of the truck, assembling everything that we might need into a tight unit tucked just behind the tailgate, out of sight from anybody that wasn’t staring directly down into the bed.

  Opposite me Rae did the same, clustering everything together before slamming the rear hatch shut and walking toward me. Falling in beside her, we made our way to the closest shelter house, assuming the same position atop a picnic table we had at the rest area, and settling in to wait.

  The same exact thought resonated at the front of both our minds, each wondering if we had made a colossal mistake in leaving Skye behind. The fact that I hadn’t had much of a choice in the matter was immaterial.

  Based on her reaction to the shots Rae had fired, what her next step would be was anybody’s guess. She seemed to understand what she was involved in, grasped that going to the police was a bad idea, especially now that she had nothing in the way of proof.

  Instead of focusing on that, I decided to narrow in on things we could do something about.

  “You heard the conversation back at the stadium,” I opened.

  A moment passed, Rae seeming to decide whether or not to respond, before she said, “Yeah.”

  “Quite a little system he set up for himself,” I said, leaning back and placing my palms flat against the smooth surface behind me.

  “Drop weapons,” Rae said. “Good way of putting it.”

  I knew at the time there was no way Skye would have understood what I was alluding to, and I didn’t especially want to take the time to explain.

  Rae I knew would grasp it in a second, most likely arrive at the same conclusion I had.

  “Apparently that son of a bitch had his sights set on the big time even way back then.”

  To that there was no response beyond a grunt, Rae’s head bobbing just slightly beside me, her gaze pinched as she stared into the woods across from us, most of it already shrouded in shadows.

  It was the same way many of our conversations tended to play out. There was a time I had been the same way as Rae, the two of us coexisting for days at a time
without so much as fifteen words being shared between us.

  The further removed from the service I became, the less I tended to stay cloaked in silence. Never did I ramble on for hours at a time, but I didn’t feel the need to keep every thought bottled up.

  Rae hadn’t yet gotten there. If there was a response to be made, she made it. If not, she would make do with some small gesture to let me know what I’d said had been heard and accepted.

  Nothing more.

  Never was the fact that I had been out longer than her more apparent than when we were talking, time just now beginning to thaw her out a bit as well.

  Compared to where she’d been when she first arrived, this made her seem a veritable chatter box.

  “Doesn’t surprise me the least bit that he had a thing for native women. Bet he about shit his britches when he found out about Skye.”

  Most of the men we served with had similar proclivities, the fact that many had wives or girlfriends never once bothering them.

  What happened a world away stayed there, they always liked to point out.

  Shifting her head a quarter turn in my direction, Rae said, “Wasn’t just the natives.”

  It took a moment for the words to work their way into my psyche, another for my brain to process what it was hearing.

  “No shit?” I asked, pushing myself forward to match her pose, elbows resting on my knees, hands hanging down between them.

  “No shit,” Rae said.

  I didn’t bother asking what had happened, knowing she would have cut his balls off if he got close enough to actually try anything.

  Still, it was the first time I had heard this, the information only adding to the acrimony I had for the man.

  I had spent more time in the last three days thinking about Meyers Jacoby than I had in the last fifteen years, none of it good. Years removed from the incident, free from the overarching thought of owing the man a damn thing, I could finally see things clearly for the first time.

  Each additional thing I heard, from what Skye shared to what Rae just alluded to, only added to the mental image.

  The man was an asshole, someone who’s every move was a calculated step to get him exactly where he wanted to go.

  Whoever got stepped on in the process be damned.

  The only question that remained was what we were going to do about it.

  For the second time on the day, though, our discussion was cut short by a call from Skye.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  In truth, Dawson was surprised it had taken them as long to dump the cars as it had. Given what he knew about Wynn, what his guys had witnessed from Sommers outside the stadium, there was little doubt that the two were very capable individuals. Either one of them would have figured out pretty quickly how they were being tracked, which could only mean they wanted everyone to know where they were headed.

  Directly back to Chicago, the path that was taken being a direct shot from Wichita to St. Louis to Springfield before the trail finally cut off.

  Any further than that, and they ran the risk of allowing Dawson and his men to get too close, and removing all the fun from the game.

  Which, at this point, Dawson had a hard time seeing it as anything but.

  Equal parts chess match and Ultimate Fighter, two sides of extreme skill were being pitted against each other. Both knew where one party was headed, practically daring the other to come and get them.

  Dawson couldn’t help but smile at the notion.

  There did exist the possibility that he was reading everything wrong, that this was all just a head-on collision of misfortune and timing that was playing out around them, but he preferred to think of it as the former.

  Never had he been a big believer in coincidence, and the thought of the two sides standing toe-to-toe seemed infinitely more appealing. Very rare was the case in their line of work, often times their opponents so overmatched that it bordered on boring, the biggest challenge being maintaining professionalism throughout the project.

  Clearly, that wouldn’t be an issue here, a thought that made his nerves tingle, the hairs on his forearms standing in a way they hadn’t in years.

  “What do you think, Boss?” Henry asked over the line, his voice somewhat distorted as it passed through the walky-talky and into the interior of Dawson’s SUV.

  After the incident earlier in the day, it took all of eight minutes for his guys to change the tire on the other SUV. Once it was done they left St. Louis behind, heading on toward Springfield and regrouping around a quartet of Grand Slams at a local Denny’s.

  Given the hour, and the fact that Sommers had already shown she was not afraid to draw on them in broad daylight, they opted to stay back, wanting to at least wait until sundown before getting any closer.

  Throughout the meal they had kept a loose watch on their position, all a bit surprised that the pair had stopped moving in Springfield before eventually reaching the same conclusion as Dawson.

  From there they had lingered over coffee, making sure the truck and SUV they’d been on for the last couple days had finally gone stationary before going to have a look.

  They found the vehicles parked side by side in the back of a movie theater parking lot, each pulled through to the opposite side of a row. No other cars were located within ten spots in either direction, the choice of location and the spots selected both giving the distinct impression that it was a dump and nothing more.

  Without depressing the call button on the walky-talky, Dawson glanced over to Roush. “I’d say it’s pretty clear what happened here, wouldn’t you?”

  “For sure,” Roush agreed without matching the look. “They heard the new Jason Bourne movie was out, wanted to stop and take a look.”

  An involuntary smirk rocked Dawson’s head back, a smile crossing his lips without quite parting them. “At least you didn’t say James Bond.”

  A snort was Roush’s immediate response, followed by, “If it were me, I would have waited a few weeks for the Magnificent Seven remake, but I can’t hate on them for Bourne.”

  Again Dawson nodded, the smile still in place, knowing that both men were making light of what they knew was a busted situation.

  Keying the two-way to life, he said, “Hold tight,” before pulling his cell phone from the console and hitting the most recent entry in the call log. Setting it to speaker phone, the sound of ringing sounded out three times before being picked up, Celek on the other side, sounding like he was out of breath.

  “Celek.”

  In the front seat, Dawson and Roush met each other’s gaze, Dawson raising his eyebrows as Roush rolled his eyes.

  “Yeah, we’re sitting here in a parking lot in Springfield staring at the vehicles of Laredo Wynn and Rae Sommers. Need to know how to proceed.”

  The panting continued a moment before Celek replied, “Can you see Skye Grant?”

  “Can’t see anybody,” Dawson said. “Again, we’re looking at their vehicles.”

  There was no response as Celek seemed to be processing the information, determining either what Dawson was telling him or what to do with it.

  Deciding to hurry things along, Dawson said, “Looks like they finally figured out how we’ve been on their ass all this time.”

  Apparently the extra information was what Celek had been needing, Dawson almost able to hear the moment things clicked into place for him.

  “And they got rid of the cars.”

  “Sure looks that way,” Dawson said.

  “Christ,” Celek muttered, the statement not aimed at anybody in particular, his voice fading away. For a moment there was no further comment before he asked, “Any idea how we track them now?”

  “Track them?” Dawson said, not attempting to hide his surprise that the question was even being posed. “No, we’ve got no idea what they’re in or how far of a head start they have. From here on out, we’re going to have to do this the old fashioned way.”

  “Which is?” Celek asked.

  Extend
ing a hand toward the phone, Dawson gave a look to Roush, silently asking, “Can you believe this guy?”

  Making the same expression, Roush just shook his head, clear that a dozen different thoughts were sitting just beneath the surface.

  “We figure out what they want, and we beat them to it,” Dawson said. He paused a beat, making sure the statement was understood, before adding, “Got any ideas what that might be?”

  “Jacoby gets here tomorrow. You don’t think...?”

  “No,” Dawson said. “These guys are survivors, they’d never be stupid enough to walk into something like that head-on.”

  Beside him Roush nodded in agreement, the gesture so emphatic his beard touched his chest.

  “So...” Celek said, his voice trailing off for a moment. “Just, get back here to Chicago. We’re continuing to dig through the laptop. Hopefully it’ll tip us off about where to head next.”

  Dawson didn’t bother closing the conversation, killing the line and picking the walky-talky back up in short order.

  “Alright boys, looks like we’re headed back to Chicago.”

  “Roger that.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  The place was so low on the lodging totem pole, it could definitely not be described as a hotel. A motel might even be overstating it.

  In no way was it chosen because of its décor though, the location being what we were most concerned with.

  Namely, the fact that there was no chance anybody could possibly find us.

  After Skye showed up at the state park, we transferred our conglomerated gear over into the newly acquired SUV, a black Rav4 with power everything and ninety thousand on the odometer. How Skye had managed to get it, or start it without resorting to hotwiring, I had no idea, and didn’t particularly feel like delving into.

  The thing was big enough, had most of a tank of gas, and smelled faintly of lavender and sativa smoke, neither of which I especially minded.

  While I moved things from the cars to the new ride, Rae removed the front license plate from her car and placed it on the Rav4, stowing the original plates in the back.