The Tin Man

by Nina Mason

  Inside, he ordered the drinks, praying he got hers right. As he paid the barista—

  a peelie-wally lad with shaggy brown hair—he asked, “And just where the bloody hell are we, eh?”

  “Lancaster County.”

  Buchanan squinted at the lad, uncomprehending. “And where the devil might that be?”

  The young man grinned like a bloody lunatic. “Amish country, dude.”

  * * * *

  Ten minutes later, Thea came through the door, still looking put out, and tossed the cigarettes on the table. Plopping in the chair opposite Buchanan’s, she said, “Cancer sticks are ridiculously expensive.”

  “Another reason not to go chucking them out of windows, aye?” He kept his focus on the screen, where he’d been scanning the many comments on this morning’s editorial.

  Posted by Jefferson Junkie (2 hours ago)

  Thomas Jefferson wrote: “The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.”

  Buchanan was familiar with the quote and understood what Jefferson was trying to say. Namely, that two things were essential to the survival of a free, self-governing society: the first was a literate, educated, and enlightened citizenry; the second, a press that was free to investigate and criticize the government.

  Sadly, the United States no longer could claim either of those things. More and more, American newspapers were becoming like the state-run propaganda mills of non-democratic nations—countries where journalists who dared to report outside the party line were often intimidated—through threats, abduction, torture, and/or assassination.

  Perhaps the intimidation tactics here weren’t quite so drastic, but there were other, subtler forms of censorship, weren’t there? Discrimination in hiring, fear of reprisal, pressure to comply with company policies. In other words, everyday life inside the shark-tank atmosphere of corporate-run newsrooms. Not exactly a model conducive to press freedoms, eh?

  He looked up, meeting Thea’s scorching gaze, which he’d felt on his face all the while he was reading. “Did you know that the U.S. has fallen to fortieth place on the World Press Freedom Index?”

  The index was a global ranking released annually by the NGO Reporters without Borders.

  Thea nodded, but offered no comment.

  “I’m just saying,” he continued with rising ire. “If we supposedly believe in freedom of the press, how can we justify such an abysmal ranking?”

  “I totally agree,” she said. “And it infuriates me, too. No end. But what can we do?”

  “We can keep fighting the tyrants. That’s what we can do.”

  He returned to the comments, his heart flaring with alarm when he saw the message from Lapdog: Big Brother is watching. Fly under the radar.

  He looked at Thea, who was now using the straw to eat the whipped cream floating on her drink. The sight of it made his groin tingle with interest—a surprising sensation he didn’t welcome under the circumstances.

  “My source says we’re being watched,” he said, squirming in the hard chair, “and that we need to lay low. We should probably replace the SIM cards in our phones with a couple of pre-paid ones we don’t have to register.”

  He’d done that in the airport when he first arrived in New York—to avoid the astronomical international roaming charges.

  “And where are we supposed to get new SIM cards?” she asked, frowning at him.

  “Any number of places,” he said with a shrug. “Best Buy, Radio Shack, AT&T. You can even buy them on E-bay—not that we have time for that.” He twisted around to face the barista. “Would there be a Radio Shack anywhere hereabouts?”

  “There’s one up in Clover,” the kid said, pointing northwest. “That’s not too far.”

  “Can you draw me a map?”

  “Why not use the GPS?” Thea put in.

  “Because,” he said, turning back to her, “not unlike our phones, it’s a bloody tracking device.”

  * * * *

  Clover, Buchanan observed while riding shotgun in his own SUV, had all the trappings of the quintessential small town in Middle America: a Dairy Queen, an old-fashioned movie theatre with a lighted marquee, a farmer’s market, a grange, a VFW, and a Hampton Inn & Suites.

  Using the kid’s map, they located the Radio Shack and, while Thea waited in the car, he scored what he needed. Back in the passenger seat, he popped in the new cards and lit a cigarette while considering what to do with the old ones. He was reasonably certain no one could trace a SIM card that wasn’t installed, but he wasn’t positive. Still, he hated to lose all his stored contacts and messages. Deciding to take his chances, he stuck the old card inside the cellophane wrapper on his cigarette box and tossed it on the dash.

  “Aren’t you the least bit afraid of getting lung cancer?”

  Irritation narrowed his eyes as he hit the gas and steered toward the driveway on the main road. “We’ve all got to go sometime.”

  “Well, if you’re not afraid, you should be,” she said with a huff. “Because more people died last year from lung cancer than from all other forms of cancer combined.”

  Jesus wept. What was she, a paid spokesperson for the American Fucking Lung Association? “And you know this because…?”

  “Let’s just say I make it my business to keep tabs on the sins of Big Tobacco,” she replied.

  He snorted with derision. “If you’re not careful, that could turn into a full-time job.”

  “And yet,” she scoffed, “you support their malfeasance by smoking.”

  He shook his head in dismay. “I thought we agreed you weren’t going to hassle me about that.”

  She snorted with amusement. “You said you didn’t want any shite, but I never agreed not to give it to you.”

  He muttered under his breath as he pulled out onto the main drag, heading back the way they came. Within a few minutes, they were out of Clover and barreling through the countryside, which, except for a few scattered farms and trees, was flat and empty.

  “What is it with you, anyway?” he asked, shooting her a look. “Why are you so bloody militant when it comes to smoking?”

  “Well, if you must know,” she said, licking her lips, “my mother died last year from lung cancer.”

  Jesus wept. Now he felt like a real prick.

  “I’m sorry to be such a shrew,” she offered, her voice thick with emotion, “but I can’t just sit by and watch you kill yourself.”

  “I’m touched,” he said, puzzled as to why she should care, “but the way things are going, I won’t be around long enough to worry about cancer.”

  She shot him a reproachful glare. “How can you be so glib about it? Eight people are dead—people you knew. People who worked for you. And you—that is to say, we—may well be next. And yet, you act as if—”

  He turned on her with a scathing glare. “As if what? Go ahead, Thea. Don’t pull any punches. What were you going to say? That I act as if I don’t give a rat’s arse?”

  “I’m sure you do,” she said, obviously backpedaling.

  “You’re damn right I do,” he bellowed in earnest. “But what would you have me do? Sit around licking my wounds and feeling sorry for myself? If I do that, they’ve beaten me. Can’t you see that? And if I let them win, all those good, innocent people will have died in vain.” He licked his lips, preparing to lob a grenade in her lap. “And you won’t get the best story of your career.”

  The scorching gaze she shot his way turned his balls to dehydrated figs. “Is that why you think I’m here? For the fucking story?”

  “Why else?” he asked, shrugging.

  She folded her arms gruffly across her chest, shifted in her seat, and looked out the window. He could feel the fury
radiating off of her in waves.

  He drove on, feeling vindicated, but holding his tongue. The cool night wind coming through the busted-out window felt good on his face. He was tired and it looked as though it might be some time before he got the chance of sleep. He took a drag before letting the breeze take the exhaled smoke and excess ash. Thea’s silence was deafening.

  “Was it something I said?”

  “Bite me.”

  Brilliant. He’d hit a nerve. Maybe she’d think twice before giving him more of her sanctimonious Shite.

  * * * *

  Quinn Davidson, publisher of the New York News, dashed across the roof of the parking garage. Icy rain bombarding, he sank his gloved hands deeper into the pockets of his camelhair overcoat. A jumbo jet, heading toward LaGuardia, passed over just as he reached his car—a sleek new Jaguar hybrid sports coupe. He barely noticed the airliner’s roaring engines; he was still too caught up in the unsettling conversation he’d just had with Milo Osbourne, his counterpart at Golden Age Media, Inc.

  “Some hot-shot take-over artist has snapped up a controlling bloc of shares,” Osbourne had blurted as soon as he returned his call. “Please, Quinn. I’m desperate. I need you and Titan to come in as my White Knight.”

  Pull his fat from the fire, in other words. The Black Knight, Osbourne claimed, was hell-bent on ruining him. He sounded distraught, which was understandable. It was common knowledge that Golden Age, a family legacy, was the unscrupulous old fart’s raison d’être.

  Davidson never cared much for Osbourne—or his tactics. It galled him no end the way Osbourne deliberately skewed the news to manipulate rather than inform public opinion. Still, perhaps this was opportunity knocking—a chance to set Osbourne on the path toward journalistic integrity. In the end, Davidson agreed to meet later to iron out the details of the deal, including how to clear the regulatory hurdles. Given the newspapers they owned between them, a merger would create a monopoly even the bribe-blinded attorney general couldn’t ignore.

  “Don’t worry about that,” Osbourne assured him. “The watchdogs are being muzzled.”

  Before the meeting, Davidson was heading home to take his kids trick-or-treating around the neighborhood, as he did every year. After putting them to bed, he and Diana—-his wife of twelve years—would enjoy a romantic dinner for two. The thought of her then, still so beautiful at fifty-three, filled him with warmth. They might be an old married couple now, but they were just as much in love today as they’d been on their honeymoon.

  The parking deck, he noticed then, was darker than usual. Had some of the security lights burned out? Ever vigilant about safety and liability, he glanced around, noting with dismay that some of them had been broken. That was when he noticed the van parked several spaces away from his Jag. It was black and the windows were tinted, so he couldn’t see inside. There was an airbrushed image on the side of what looked like a bearded (and naked) Greek God—was it Zeus?—wielding a thunderbolt. There were words underneath. He strained to make them out. Tartarus Taxi. How odd. Tartarus, he knew from his Harvard days, was the purgatorial pit of torture reserved for the worst offenders in classical mythology.

  He felt a fleeting amusement. Some of the guys from the mailroom no doubt passing around a joint. He wasn’t going to bust them—he had toked his share back in the day—but why had the night guard let them into the executive lot?

  Scowling with disapproval, he glanced over his shoulder toward the booth, but his view was obscured by the sleet, now coming down in silver sheets. Damp and shivering, he moved more quickly toward his car, pulling his overcoat tighter around his body. He twirled at the sound of footsteps, freezing in fear when a figure emerged from the shadows. He had on a tan trench coat, hands buried deep in the pockets, and wore outdated sideburns and a shaggy, side-parted haircut. Davidson caught a whiff of something. Was the man wearing women’s perfume?

  The stranger stopped fewer than ten feet away, but said nothing.

  “Who are you?” the CEO demanded, meeting dark eyes. “What do you want?”

  “I am Mr. Wint,” the man said in an accent that sounded Russian or maybe Czech.

  “What do you want?” Davidson asked again, fear cracking his voice.

  Wint pulled a pistol from his coat pocket. Davidson staggered backward in mortal terror. He thought about running, but there was nowhere to take cover apart from his car, and something told him he’d never make it that far. Dissolving into panic, he shrank backward, put his hands out defensively, and started stammering. “Please. Don’t. I’m begging you. I have a family. A wife and kids.”

  “Bully for you.”

  The bullet struck Davidson in the chest, knocking him back. He fell hard on the wet concrete, numb with shock, limbs twitching. The wound seared like a red-hot poker. A crimson circle spread like an inkblot on the front of his starched white shirt.

  Wint knelt beside him. Something glinted in his hand. A box cutter. It hurt like hell when it pierced the flesh of Davidson’s forehead, but he was too far gone to protest. As Wint sliced, blood streamed into the publisher’s eyes. He closed them, flashing on his family. They’d be trick-or-treating without him from now on.

  “Why?” he rasped through encroaching darkness.

  Rather than answer, Wint reached inside Davidson’s camelhair coat, removed his cell phone, and placed a call.

  Chapter 7

  “Are we almost there?” Buchanan flicked a glance toward Thea, still gazing out the window in stony silence. “I’m so knackered I can barely see straight.”

  It had been more than an hour since they argued and the tension between them was still as thick as Scots oats.

  “Do you want me to drive?” she asked. The words were friendly enough, but her tone sure wasn’t.

  “That depends,” he said. “How much farther do we have to go?”

  “We should be getting close.”

  He glanced at the rear-view mirror, expecting at any moment to see the killers. The road ahead was an endless stretch of asphalt—one long drag strip with nowhere to hide. He looked at the gas gauge. It was almost full. He hoped to hell, when the time came, the Land Rover could outrun whatever vehicle might be in hot pursuit.

  “You should get off the main highway,” she told him, “and go in the back way.”

  Buchanan, scoffing, made a quick survey of the surrounding scenery. It was pitch black out and there was nothing as far as the eye could see but trees, their leaves trembling in the wind.

  “Are you telling me this isn’t a back road?”

  “It might look remote,” she said, still facing the window, “but trust me, this is the interstate.”

  “There’s a road atlas in the pocket behind your seat,” he informed her. “Have a look and tell me where to go.”

  “I don’t need a map to do that,” she remarked, smirking as she twisted around to retrieve the map book.

  He flipped on the reading light as she set it on her lap and began thumbing through. A tractor-trailer thundered past on the other side of the metal guardrail. A big green sign sprang up on the right. Its iridescent white letters read:

  Coatesville

  1 mile

  “There’s an off-ramp coming up, should I take it?”

  She studied the map, finger tracing the line of the roadway. “That should take us toward Wagontown, so, yeah, go ahead and get off.”

  He put on the turn signal and moved over, taking the off-ramp, which dropped them onto a two-lane highway. Houses with sprawling, manicured lawns and split-rail fences sprang up on either side of the road. Wee farms with rambling pastures and pristine houses zoomed by on both sides.

  As he sailed past a speed-limit sign, he checked the speedometer. The maximum speed was forty-five and he was doing sixty. Reflexively, he eased his foot off the gas and tapped the brake, slowing to fifty. A few minutes later, he came up behind a car pulling a horse trailer. When he crossed the double-yellow line to pass it, Thea shot him a dirty look.

 
“That’s illegal.”

  Her tone was superior. Buchanan rolled his eyes, but bit back the insult burning on his tongue.

  They passed a school, a church, more farms, towering grain silos, rows of mailboxes posted by the side of the road, awaiting word from the outside world. The trees vanished. A low bank of dark hills appeared on the horizon. He glanced again in the rearview mirror, jolting when he saw a car coming up fast behind them with the headlamps off.

  “Shit.”

  “What?”

  “There’s someone back there.”

  Out of the edge of his eye, he saw her pick up her purse and pull out her gun. Clutching it, she twisted around to look out the rear.

  “It’s a Mustang, I think,” she told him. “Late model.”

  “Can you see anyone?”

  “It’s too dark,” she said, “but they’re gaining on us—rapidly.”

  He tightened his grip on the wheel and hit the gas. The car surged forward. He checked the mirror again. Fuck. They, too, had sped up. He pressed the accelerator to the floor. The Mustang pursued, narrowing the gap. They flew past a sign. White Horse. Another fucking farming town.

  They were pushing ninety and the Mustang was still hot on their tail. Farmhouses, barns, and pastures whizzed past in a blur. A police cruiser went by in the opposite direction, then hung a screeching U-turn. Buchanan floored it. The Mustang vanished instantly. Red and blue lights started flashing in the mirror accompanied by a wailing siren.

  “What are you doing?” Thea screamed. “We’ll be arrested.”

  “Would you rather be shot?”

  Whatever she said next, he didn’t hear. His mind was racing, his gaze darting from the speedometer to the mirror. The cop was gaining. The needle, shimmying, was pushing to the left. He was sweating bullets. His knuckles were white on the wheel. His mouth felt like a sock.

  “What about the guns?” Her voice was frantic.

  “Take mine,” he said, “and stash both of them under the seat.”