“It’ll be ready in five minutes. Pull up a chair to the bar,” he ordered.
I pulled out a barstool, sitting gingerly, the thigh injury making itself known. “What’s for dinner, m’man?”
“Beef Wellington with roasted asparagus, steamed veggie medley, and garlic bread.”
My stomach growled, a reminder of how long it’d been since breakfast. The last meal Jillian cooked. I blinked back tears, looking at the stainless steel countertop. A plate magically appeared, filled with mouthwatering food. Seconds later, a knife and fork accompanied by a linen napkin.
Without a word, he sat next to me and dug in, not saying a word about the one escaped tear. Taking a deep breath, I ate.
I did the dishes, being careful to line everything perfectly. The cupboards were scrupulously cleaned and labeled, everything had a specific place.
Drying the last dish and putting it away, I turned and saw Barry sitting on the dark gray leather couch, holding a deep red silk pillow.
“It hurts, doesn’t it?” He turned bright blue eyes on me, filled with a remembered pain.
“Yes.” Lying to him wasn’t an option.
“When I found my wife and son murdered I didn’t think I’d survive. But I did. I meted out a painful revenge. The bastards are lost in the woods forever.” Hatred replaced pain, and I felt a deep kinship.
I nodded once.
“There’s a lot buried, things I have to research further. But, Aiden, I found your family history, and why they want the water rights.” His face blank.
“It’s the gold, isn’t it?” I sat and faced him, back against the arm of the sofa.
“That’s part of it, probably a good sized portion, to be honest. Corrine stole a trunk full of gold, worth at least two hundred million at today’s prices. But the water rights have a separate issue.”
I was stuck on the money, blinking rapidly. How big was that damned trunk? “Wait, a legit reason to want my water rights? I thought it was just some men being asses.”
“No,” he chuckled. “You know how the land borders some federal land on the west side of your property?” He rested his head on a fist, elbow on the back of the couch.
“Yeah.”
“Well, the land was recently opened up to cattle grazing. Whoever holds the rights to your water will get a huge amount of money yearly to help keep those cattle on the land.”
“Holy shit.” An inner light went off. “Explains the recent court cases. They all want a piece. But who is so hell bent on the gold? Cornell Smythe isn’t doing it alone. Sorry, but he’s a drunk, and couldn’t organize a march to the latrine.”
He laughed. “Yeah, that’s the part where it gets murky. I’m not sure yet, I’m still looking. Where is the gold hidden?”
I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the whole truth. “It’s on the property, but I just discovered the map. I didn’t get a chance to memorize it before … before Jillian was involved.” I looked out the window behind the couch, the view of snowcapped mountains calming.
In my peripheral, he nodded. “Get some rest, I’m going to keep searching. They won’t find you, I searched the Jeep and didn’t find any kind of bug or tracker.”
Stretching, I stood, shook his hand and went to bed. I’d had enough for one day.
Chapter Nineteen
Morning brought more questions than answers. I tried to hide in the static, attempting to jump into the void, but Jillian’s death refused to leave me alone.
The smell of bacon got me out of bed, and I joined Barry in the kitchen. He placed a plate of scrambled eggs, toast, ham steak, and bacon in front of me. I fell to my knees and offered myself as a slave.
I practically licked the plate, much to Barry’s amusement. Dishes done and put away, he led the way to his technical heaven. Screens showed various webpages, topographical maps, documents, and pictures of the men who’d attacked.
“Where’d you get those pics?” I grabbed one of his cheap office chairs and rolled to stare at the pictures. I recognized them all. Scrolling through several shots, I noticed they were in Dillon. “Barry, these men were in Dillon?” I turned to look at him.
“I managed to get security footage from the various systems. It looks like they were stalking you.” He rolled to sit in front of a three screen set up, the left with moving graphs and things I couldn’t understand. But the one in the middle, it caught my attention. A picture of a woman from the late Victorian era, an old sepia photo, was enlarged. Barry pointed, “Meet your great-great-grandmother. She was one hell of a woman from what I’ve gathered.” The pointer clicked on a link and documents filled the screen. Documents from Charleston and New Orleans, charges being filed against Alistair and Corrine.
The next few hours sucked me into the past. I knew she’d been raped, fairly brutally, but she’d exacted revenge. The man she was supposed to marry had sons, and she would have been his fifth wife. He’d used a knife, leaving her scarred. She’d managed to take the knife away and castrate the bastard. But not before he’d impregnated her with my great-uncle. Alistair knew, and married her, convincing the people of Montana the infant Gerard was his child. Four years later, my great-grandfather was born.
They’d fought the rumors of gold the entire time. She’d stolen a chest of gold, never spent a dime of it, and Alistair buried it on the family property.
“Barry, if it’s true, and these documents back up what I read at home, they are tearing up my property.” I scrolled through more online copies of hundred thirty year old documents. Corrine was one hell of a woman. Pride swelled knowing I carried some of her DNA. She was a fighter, and not afraid of adversity. Accounts of Alistair reminded me of Dad, more of the peacekeeper, and one who empathized with others.
“No, not after the bloodbath you’ve been dishing out. I’m monitoring their communications and activity. They have someone who’s covering their activities. Still trying to find out who that is,” he sounded frustrated.
“What do you need me to do?” I glanced out the window, noting it was past noon.
“Go through more of those documents. Follow your great-uncle. I think he plays a part somehow.” He tapped furiously on the keyboard, muttering, pausing, typing, mumbling a few expletives, and ending with a great sigh. “How the hell did they muddy it so well?”
It was a rhetorical question. I returned to the documents, going through and reading, searching for information. But Gerard disappeared at the age of twenty.
Standing, and stretching to get the kinks out, a noise caught my attention. “Barry, are you expecting company?”
He swiveled in the chair, eyes huge behind the spectacles. “I didn’t hear anything.”
I held a hand up, waiting. There it was. The sound of something large, but not able to avoid the sticks Barry kept spread around the building. “Get in your safe room, Barry. Now. Keep the button with you.”
He grabbed a small fob, and ran to the other side of the room, opening a hatch under a cabinet and tripping down concrete stairs. The door shut, leaving me alone in the room.
I tiptoed until hidden by a wall. The sound of weight on brittle branches whispered. I hoped it was an animal. But the “Fuck me!” whispered on the other side of the door gave it away.
“Shh, asshole.” Another voice. Two of them.
Closing my eyes to hear better, I heard one … two … three … four … five … six … footsteps, in the same area. Possibly a third person.
Ducking close to the floor, I scrambled for the stairs, taking two at time and running for my room. Grabbing the duffel bag out of the closet, I pulled the Sig, loaded it, followed by two hunting knives, a Kevlar vest, thigh holsters for the knives, one for a machete slung behind a shoulder and hung diagonally, and a pants holster in the back of my jeans for the Sig. I stuffed four additional magazines into back pockets, grabbed the heavy night vision goggles, and left the room. Inside Barry’s room, I found the main breaker switch. The front door opened and closed, three sets of footsteps making sq
ueaking noises on the concrete floor. When the door clicked, I flipped the main breaker. Barry’s safe room would come on, the front door would lock them in, and it was pure black as several metal shades closed the windows.
They stopped. I slipped the goggles on, flipped a switch on the left side, and smiled as their faces showed surprise in DOS green. The man in the middle was the one who’d shot my Jilly Bean.
Slipping the machete from the sheathe, I dropped low, and watched as they drew guns. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Not true military training. Probably one of those moronic self-made militias. I’d seen them before. They had no clue about using the environment and thought guns made them soldiers. It would be easy.
I slipped out of my boots, and walked to the far side of the room, blocking their only escape. Squatting low, “So I suspect you morons tracked me somehow and thought I’d be an easy kill.”
All three turned and fired. With Barry’s precautions, none went through the walls. I moved ten feet and stopped to their right.
“Did we hit him?”
“No, dumbass,” I whispered, making it hard to pinpoint my location. Two more shots each. They had standard size magazines in their little 9MMs, and none reloaded. I slipped behind and to their left, “You guys couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn.” I dove behind the one I really wanted, stood as they started swinging wildly in all directions. None noticed they were no longer loaded. I pulled the Sig, shot two in the head, and used the machete to leave a long, open wound down the back of the man responsible for Jillian’s death.
Chapter Twenty
Barry replaced the computer consoles quickly and easily, flipped the main breaker on, and provided a good, sturdy chair to tie the man.
“Try not to get spurts, I only have a few more replacements,” Barry threw nonchalantly over a shoulder. It was easy to forget he had been a vicious interrogator on a few occasions. “And no water boarding. I haven’t snaked the drain and it would harm my electronics.” He started typing furiously on the keyboard.
“You got it.” I tightened the last zip tie. Straightening, I cocked my head, and tried to think why he looked so familiar. His mouth was duct taped, and couldn’t move. Sweat beaded and dripped from his cheeks, many flowing down his neck and soaking the brown t-shirt he wore. Blood from the shallow wound on his back pooled slowly around the chair legs. “Fear stinks. Seriously. But I like it on you.” I leaned close, smiled coldly, “What you feel now is nothing compared to what I have planned. The more you talk the faster it’ll be over.” I went upstairs, grabbed a beer from the fridge and chugged. I thought it was because I hated what I was about to do. Instead, it was because how I looked forward to it. Two more beers, and grabbing a few additional weapons from the duffel, I sauntered downstairs.
“You ready, Barry?” I leaned against the table.
“Hold on, I’m printing some info he should answer. You need help?” Tap, tap, tap.
“Nah, I got this.” I patted his shoulder.
“Awesome. I’m going to listen to some Merle and Dolly. Tap my shoulder if you need some help. Questions are on the printer,” he pointed to the far end of the table. Putting on a pair of Coby noise cancelling headphones, he began to dance in the chair while working on some kind of programming.
I memorized what he wanted, tossed it in the bin, and stood in front of the man. “I’m going to take off the duct tape. Just so you know, screaming won’t help. Nobody lives close, and my friend doesn’t give a damn if you live or die.” I ripped the duct tape, taking several layers of skin from his lips. He yelled.
I took the wickedest hunting knife I owned and slit his shirt down the middle, exposing a well-defined chest. With a flick of the wrist, I sliced across one pectoral, blood welling and making a trail to his pants as he screamed.
“Let’s get started,” I punched his jaw. “First of all, who sent you?”
Tears fell, lips swelling, “I can’t tell you.”
Another long cut from nipple to waist. “Yes, you can.”
He whimpered, biting his lip hard enough to open a wound.
I grabbed the knee of the old BDUs he wore, slicing the material to his hip. I put the hunting knife on the floor, and grabbed a small metal pick. I stabbed it deep into the flesh just above his knee.
He bucked in the chair, screeching to the ceilings.
I took deep breath, and shook my head. “Seriously, you can tell me what I want to know, I’ll shoot you in the head and it’ll be over.”
He finally whimpered, “I don’t know much, honestly.”
“Start talking.”
“We’re supposed to kill you,” he whispered.
“I knew that, genius. I want to know who is giving you the orders and why.”
“I don’t know why!” he cried.
“Not good enough.” I cut open the other leg.
“No, please, no!” He rocked the chair, moving it an inch.
I grabbed the chair, pulling him close, smelling urine, sweat, and blood. Remaining far enough away he couldn’t head-butt me, “You stink. Who is giving the orders?”
“Uncle Cornell.” He looked away.
“Cornell is an alcoholic who couldn’t think his way out of a wet paperbag.” I stabbed a pick into his other knee, standing back and letting him yell. “Don’t lie to me.” I took a few steps back, leaning against the cabinet leading to the safe room. “How’d you find our place?”
“In that bitch’s radio is a tracker,” he panted.
Barry swiveled, whipping off the headphones, “What kind of tracker? I didn’t pick it up.”
I grinned, “So much for noise cancelling.”
He rolled his eyes. “I had one off an ear. I need answers.”
The man looked at Barry, “Please let me go. I’ll tell you everything. Make him stop.”
Barry stood, hand behind his back. “Sir, who do you think taught him how to do this?” He whipped out a knife, and with a lightning fast move, sliced the hostage’s shoulder, effectively severing tendons and ligaments. Blood flowed freely and he paled.
“Good going, I have maybe three minutes.” I gave Barry the look he deserved.
“He shouldn’t have begged. Hurry up, before it rains.” He went back to his consoles.
“Okay, big guy, why’d you kill Jillian Winters?”
“Who?” His eyes started glazing over.
“The redhead yesterday morning.”
“She’s not dead. Cornelius has her, my dad. We’re under strict orders. He wants you broken,” his voice going in and out.
“Why broken?”
“So you’ll hand it all over. All the information to return what is rightfully ours. Stolen.”
“What is rightfully yours?” I stalked closer.
“The gold belongs to my family.” His chin dropped to his chest. “She stole it. All of you have to die. He killed your father because he wouldn’t talk.”
“Why the bloodbath?”
“Because you won’t hand it over, give us what is ours by right.” His eyes closed.
I grabbed his hair, and pulled. “Who is Cornelius? Answer me!”
“He’s got contacts, lots of …”
“Who?” Unable to contain the rage, I slashed deep into his pectoral muscle, seeing bone.
He gave a weak yell as blood spurted on my chest. “I don’t know, I don’t know. Kill me, please.”
“Ask him the last question, damn it, Aiden!” Barry yelled.
“Who is Cornelius?” I shook his head.
But a breath escaped and his body went limp.
“Goddamn it!” I shoved his body backwards, the thump not satisfying in the least. I threw the knife, the tip diving deep into the table, the knife vibrating from the impact.
“Okay, Cornelius and Cornell. Old fashioned names, and southern. I’ll begin searching. You have ten minutes to get yourself under control, and clean up the mess.” Barry went back to listening to ‘70s country music and his programming.
Chapter Twenty One
The bodies were buried next to the men who’d killed Barry’s family, deep in the pine forest around his place. I’d cleaned the weapons, the blood, and took a shower. As the water pounded on sore muscles, I tried to figure out how to find Jillian. She’s alive. My head had a hard time going from grieving with a raging anger to elation I had a chance to save her. If I could figure out who Cornelius was.
Barry cooked a dinner of pork roast, steamed veggies and some kind of artisan bread. My appetite roared and nothing was left. We cleaned and spent the evening watching Pixar movies.
Midnight rolled around and I hit the pillow. The dreams were soaked in blood, and didn’t surprise me. Sunlight streamed through the small window, waking me.
Dressed, fed, and packed, I shook Barry’s hand. “I need to go back, Barry. I have to find her.”
“Go, find her.” He handed me a small phone. “It’s encrypted, the signal untraceable. I’ll call you when I find out who Cornelius is. And Aiden?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful. There’s few of you left, and my heart can’t take any more losses.” He pulled me into a hug, pounding my back. I was going to have a bruise.
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