Not Forgotten

by George Lee Miller

  I dropped to my belly and crept closer. Nothing moved in the house or in the barn. Sylvia’s Toyota was the only vehicle in sight. Grandpa’s pickup must have been in the barn. If someone was watching from the windows, I would be an easy target approaching the house. It was time to put the Skeeter diversion in motion.

  I put my phone on silent and texted the word go. Skeeter sent a thumbs-up emoticon almost before my fingers were off the screen. He was anxious.

  Moments later I heard the front gate rattle. There was a metal latch, and it sounded like Skeeter was putting all of his three hundred pounds into shaking it back and forth. So far, he was following my instructions to the letter. I heard his pickup engine rev and tires crunching over gravel. More rattling. I hoped he wasn’t overdoing it. Everybody within a five-mile radius could hear the sound.

  I studied the house and the barn. Still no movement. I caught sight of Skeeter’s pickup when it came around the oak mott near the pond. He was driving slowly. Barely above an idle. He wasn’t in any hurry to reach the house. Apparently, no one in the house was in any hurry to come out and greet him. Had Grandpa been there alone, he would have showed himself at the front door, especially if he didn’t recognize the pickup. My plan was to distract Marcus long enough for me to get the drop on him.

  Skeeter parked in front of the house. I could see his face clearly. He was searching the barn from his point of view. Nothing was registering on his face. He looked down at his hands. A message appeared on my cell phone. “Nobody home.”

  I saw movement out of the corner of my eye coming from the barn. I drew my pistol.

  I texted back: “Don’t move,” but he was already out the door.

  His head and shoulders were above the cab of his four-wheel drive. His hands were empty. He had left the efficient Remington 870 on the seat. I saw the barrel of a rifle with a suppresser mounted on the end protruding from the second-story hayloft. I fired toward it. The rifle barrel jumped, followed a millisecond later by a compressed air blast and a sickening thud.

  Skeeter hit the ground. I was close enough to see blood on his shirt. He never saw it coming. I saw his big hand move. He was alive, for now. Memorizing the specs on the weapon hadn’t done him any good.

  I had to get to him fast or it was all over. The vision of my Marine platoon brothers flashed through my head. They stood guard while I was pinned down inside the Humvee. I swallowed that trapped, helpless feeling and forced myself to focus on the barn and the danger inside. I had to keep moving. My mission to save Sylvia now included Skeeter and Grandpa, and I wasn’t going to let them down.

  The rifle barrel poked from the hayloft again, pointed down at Skeeter.

  I fired. My shot hit the wooden window frame. I dove forward, running flat out for the edge of the house. I heard the air blast and felt a bullet zip past my head. I recognized the sound. It was the same shooter. This time I wasn’t running away.

  I flattened out against the worn limestone blocks, then slid around the corner of the house. I had a better angle on the barn. I could see a quarter of the loft opening. The rifle barrel reappeared. I squeezed off two more shots. The barrel dropped from sight.

  Skeeter pulled himself to his knees. He was alive. He crawled to the far side of the pickup. I put two more rounds through the hayloft to provide cover fire. When Skeeter was safely behind his pickup, I peered inside the house. The kitchen was clear. The back porch was empty. I looked through the French doors to the living room. Empty. I checked the back bedroom where Grandpa slept. The bed was made. No sign of him or Sylvia anywhere.

  I swapped out my half-empty magazine for a full one and sprinted for the back door of the barn. The ancient door opened without a sound. Grandpa hated rusty hinges. No shots. No movement. It smelled of dust and horse manure mixed with the pungent odor of fresh meat, as if Grandpa had hung a deer carcass from the rafters to cool overnight. The sun was already behind the western hills that towered over the ranch buildings. Deep shadows made it hard to see into the corners of the barn. I squatted on my heels to give my eyes a chance to adjust. Grandpa’s green John Deere tractor took shape. It still had the hay baler attached and a front-end loader. His pickup was missing. The workbench was scattered with tools. Something was wrong. There was never anything out of place in Grandpa’s barn. The steps leading to the loft slowly came into focus.

  I studied what I could see of the loft opening. There were bales of hay. This time of year, Grandpa had the loft full of hay to prepare for winter. He had another barn near the airplane hangar on the hayfield, but he always filled this one first. It was itchy, backbreaking work to get the bales of hay into the loft. That was my job until I joined the Marine Corps.

  A faint noise came from the support beam in the center of the barn. I inched closer, keeping an eye on the loft. It was Grandpa. He was sitting with his arms tied to the post behind him, facing the front of the barn. I could only see his shoulders and arms, but there was no mistaking his khaki work shirt.

  I didn’t dare call out or get closer, because I didn’t know where the man with the rifle was. I had put six rounds through the hayloft, but I doubted very much that any had hit their mark. More likely, the shooter was waiting for me to show myself in front of Grandpa so he could finish me off. I opened my mouth to breath and waited a full minute.

  With Skeeter wounded and no sign of Sylvia, I couldn’t afford to wait him out. I could only see Grandpa’s arms behind the post and didn’t know if he was wounded. I doubted whether Grandpa would have sat down voluntarily.

  I pointed my pistol up the wide loft stairs and took the first step.

  Nothing. The pungent odor of fresh meat was getting stronger. I extended to my full height, trying to see into the opening. Nothing but hay.

  I heard a metallic click.

  “Nick Fischer,” a familiar voice said.

  I started to turn.

  “Drop the pistol first.” The familiar voice was insistent.

  I placed the pistol on the step, hoping for a chance to dive for it later.

  “Clever. Now, kick it off the step,” the voice demanded.

  He didn’t go for it. I nudged my pistol off the step and heard it hit the wooden floor.

  “Now, face me,” he said.

  I slowly turned around. Detective Peterson stood by the workbench, wearing Grandpa’s khaki shirt and holding a .308 M24 sniper rifle pointed at my chest. It was standard issue for most SWAT teams, Peterson’s former job. His tomahawk features were red from exertion, and a fresh cut marked his sharp cheekbone.

  “Where’s my grandfather, Detective?”

  “That old man’s a tough nut. I’ll give him that.” Peterson wasn’t smiling. He kept the rifle aimed at my belt buckle. I warned you, but you just couldn’t let it go.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Pull up your pants leg. Show me the .38,” he said.

  I had hoped he wouldn’t remember my backup weapon. “Grandpa give you that cut?” Grandpa wouldn’t have given up without a fight.

  “Lucky punch,” he said.

  I showed him the hammerless .38.

  “Take your left hand and pull off the holster.”

  I did what he asked.

  “Now, toss it to me,” he said.

  I calculated the possibility of palming the .38 and firing. The odds were a hundred to one in his favor. At this range he wouldn’t miss. The .308 bullet would explode into my midsection. It wouldn’t be an instant death. I would bleed out for half an hour. I’d watched stronger guys than me die from gutshot wounds before the evac chopper could get them to the field hospital.

  I studied Peterson’s trigger finger. It was tight against the metal. He wasn’t taking any chances. I decided to wait for a better opportunity. I tossed the .38 at his feet. He kicked it toward the back door.

  “You’re pretty good. Never saw that coming,” I said. I needed to buy some time. “How’d you get that sound reduction?” Maybe he would drop
his guard if he talked shop.

  “I used subsonic ammo,” he said, exposing small sharp teeth. “The bullet travels slower. Doesn’t break the sound barrier. I’m surprised you didn’t figure that out.” He sneered, enjoying being in control.

  “That explains it,” I said. I was trying my best to make calm chitchat while thinking about Sam’s dead body slumped on the kitchen floor and Skeeter wounded outside. I waited for my chance. “You got the drop on me fair and square,” I said, shaking my head like I’d been defeated. “Where’s your partner, Ochoa? She in on this?”

  “No, she’s dumb as a door handle. Nice tits, though.” He took a step closer.

  “Yeah, I could tell you were the smarter one of the team. How’d you do it? Did you fake the investigation? How’d you get the ME to rule accidental death?”

  Peterson’s nostrils flared, and his smile vanished. “Why do you give a shit, Fischer?” he asked. “One less knocked-up spic for the government to take care of. Probably saved the tax payers a couple hundred thousand.”

  “Actually, she was the first in her family to go to college.”

  “Big fucking deal.”

  “It was to her mother.”

  “You are a bleeding heart. You’d have never made it as a real detective. You’d have ended up like your daddy, burnt up in a meth trailer.”

  “What the hell do you know about it?” It was the second time someone had compared me to my father. This time it wasn’t meant as a compliment.

  “Everybody knows he waited for a warrant. He should have kicked in the front door and opened fire.”

  “He was trying to save a little girl,” I said.

  “Like I said, you’re a bleeding heart. He let the perps get away.”

  “You don’t know that,” I said. “Nobody knows.”

  “Everybody knew it was an ambush. The little girl was bait. You and your father are suckers for sweet little girls.”

  “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

  “Think about it,” he sneered.

  I knew he was talking about Sylvia. I wondered if she knew she was being used. He looked at his watch. He was on a deadline. Somewhere, Marcus must have been waiting for him. I needed to think of a distraction. He lifted the rifle to his shoulder.

  “You check that scope?”

  “For what?”

  “You missed me three times. Either you’re a piss-poor shot or the scope is off. Which is it?”

  His face turned red. I waited for my chance.

  “I don’t miss,” he said. “Those shots were just to scare you.”

  “What was Sosa, collateral damage?” I asked.

  “You never figured it out, did you?”

  Suddenly, the pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place.

  “Danny did kill Marissa,” I said. “He called Marcus, and Marcus called you to cover it up. He was blackmailing Patrick Allison. That’s how he got control of Allison Oil.”

  “You’re not as dumb as you look,” he said. “But you’re too late.”

  “Why kill Sosa?” I asked.

  “Sosa figured out what was going on. He got greedy.”

  Peterson put his eye to the scope lens. That was the chance I’d been waiting for. It would take a second for his eyes to adjust so that he could focus on me. He had been shooting out the hayloft into daylight from fifty yards away. When he looked into the scope inside the barn, he would see nothing but a blur.

  I saw his hesitation. His eyes blinked. I took my chance. My legs uncoiled like a rattlesnake from a burning bush. I tackled him at the knees. The suppressed .308 bullet whooshed over my head.

  Peterson fell back to the ground. The M24 rifle clattered to the hard plank floor. He grabbed my neck.

  I forced my hands inside his arms and broke his hold. I went for his throat. Both my hands closed around his windpipe. I brought my weight down on his chest.

  “Where’s Grandpa and Sylvia?”

  He didn’t respond. I squeezed harder. His face turned red, then blue.

  “Talk,” I said.

  He gasped for breath and looked like he wanted to say something. I eased my grip and let him have a lungful of air.

  “At the airstrip,” he whispered through his crushed throat.

  I popped his head once against the wooden planks. His eyes closed, but he was still breathing. I stripped Grandpa’s shirt off him. It was the last thing I wanted him to wear on his way to jail.

  I noticed blood on the shirt. There was one hole over the left breast pocket. Dried blood caked the back of the shirt. At least four hours old. The hole was made long before Marcus and Sylvia had arrived. I didn’t like what that meant. A knot formed in the pit of my stomach.

  I searched the bottom floor of the barn and followed the sickening smell to the last horse stall. Grandpa was leaning against the limestone wall wearing a white T-shirt covered in blood. His head was slumped forward. There was a raw hole in his chest. His hands rested in his lap. Both knuckles were scraped. Otto Fischer didn’t go down without a fight. I pulled the string on the bare hundred-watt lightbulb that swung from the rafter.

  Grandpa’s skin was pale, and the creases around his eyes and mouth looked carved in stone. I pulled his body away from the wall and tried to lay him flat. He was already stiff and surprisingly light. I felt a wave of emotion. Tears filled my eyes. I touched his face. He had been my father and my grandfather for many years. The first thought that came to mind was that I had never recorded his stories. What do you say once they are gone?

  “I’m sorry, Grandpa,” was all I could think of. There was no time to mourn. Skeeter was wounded, and Sylvia was still out there. I covered him with his favorite khaki shirt.

  My hands were shaking. I wanted to think his spirit would stick around and keep giving me advice, but I was pretty sure it was already on its way to heaven.

  I heard a sound from the front of the barn. Peterson.

  I ran out of the horse stall and found him on his knees holding my Springfield pistol. When he saw me, he fired. The bullet hit the floor. I tackled him with a full-force body slam. I grabbed the pistol, and we both toppled backward. I sat on his chest and forced the muzzle of the weapon away from my body. He fired four more times, the noise deafening in the small space. The bullets pounded the roof. Finally, I pulled the pistol from his grip. He went for my throat. I grabbed his. Whoever passed out first was going to win. My wounded arm was on fire. My head throbbed and spots flickered in front of my eyes. His face was red.

  “Why? Why’d you kill him?” I asked.

  “You killed him when you took him to the oil rig,” he said.

  I worked my knee up and pressed it down on his chest. I heard a rib snap. Peterson groaned and dug his bootheels into the wooden floor. Then I saw the look of realization come over him—the realization that he was going to die. I was fine with that. I slammed his head against the wooden planks. His face turned blue. Finally, his eyes rolled back in his head. When I let go, he didn’t move.

  I slowly got to my feet and rested my hands on my knees, waiting for the blood to flow back to my head. Peterson’s cell phone chimed. I dug it out of his pocket. The caller ID showed Marcus Lopez.

  “Hello?” I said. There was a long pause. I could hear him breathing. Thinking.

  “Nick?” he asked, trying to cover his surprise.

  “Where’s Sylvia?” I asked.

  “Put Detective Peterson on the phone,” he demanded.

  “Your boy’s dead.”

  “You killed a San Antonio police detective.”

  “He shot Skeeter and killed my grandfather.”

  “He was protecting me.”

  “From what?”

  “Misguided vigilantes.”

  “No one will believe that. Let Sylvia go,” I said.

  “I already alerted SAPD.” His voice was cold and calculating. “They have no reason to doubt me. I’m the future governor.”


  I understood Danny’s fear of him. He had no limits. He didn’t see himself as governor. He saw himself as king.

  “Where’s Sylvia?” I shouted.

  He laughed and disconnected.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Ifound Skeeter under his front fender propped on his elbows and pointing the Remington 870 at the barn. He left a blood-soaked trail in the gravel.

  “Is he dead?” he asked, his voice a hoarse whisper.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Peterson.” I helped him roll over onto his side.

  “Detective Peterson?”

  “The one and only,” I said. “I guess those Saturday church meetings didn’t do any good.”

  “That, and he’s evil.”

  “You need a doctor,” I said. I reached for the shotgun he still held pointed at the open barn door, but Skeeter held it tight. He wasn’t going to give it up. It was the last time he’d ever step out empty-handed.

  “Go,” Skeeter said. “Marcus is somewhere. You have to stop him.” Skeeter was ready to collapse. “Find Sylvia.”

  I ripped open his shirt and found a hole through his shoulder. “You sprang a leak.” He had lost a lot of blood. I could see the exit wound on his back. As far as I could tell, the bullet had hit soft tissue. It didn’t mean he would live. It did mean he had a better chance than I had given him before. He could move, and he was conscious. It took a lot to kill a three-hundred-pound man.

  “Go,” he said again. “I’ll manage.”

  “We have to stop the bleeding.” I found a roll of paper towels in his pickup and pressed it against the wound. There was no way I was going to carry him into the barn. The sun was down behind the western hills. At least the temperature was getting cooler. I sprinted into the house and found a gallon jug of water in Grandpa’s fridge and brought it out to him.