Cold Land: A Mystery Thriller

by John Oakes

  Kenny Crowe said Jake had been an undercover cop, and when he figured it out, he left him by the side of the road. When investigators pressed Kenny for more incriminating testimony relating to Jake’s actions in Southern Minnesota and Northern Iowa, they were met with silence.

  “Anyone else get in trouble?” Teddy asked.

  “As far as I know, the second person fired was Chief Berg. He was my do-nothing boss at the BCA. Then Berg’s boss, the Assistant Commissioner of Public Safety, Ron Daley, got canned by his boss, because Daley had known all along about how the Bureau was getting used as a repository for us undesirables.”

  “You were undesirable?”

  “I took a hit to the noggin in a car accident. I wasn’t the same after, but I passed every test, physical and mental. Still, the brass didn’t trust me.” Jerry jutted out his jaw. “They couldn’t fire me or medically put me out, so I ended up at the BCA or what was left of it.”

  “Seems wrong.” Teddy traced an admiring finger down the badges on Jerry’s uniform.

  “The thing was, when the governor demanded answers from the Deputy Commissioner who fired Daley, it turned out there was evidence that he’d known about it all along. In the emails, it was all a big joke to them. The governor accepted the resignation of the Deputy Commissioner the next day, I’m happy to say.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “A woman named Melinda, the BCA’s administrative heart, all but ran the place. Forced her into a retirement package. Could have been worse for her. She’s happy.”

  “Happy for getting pushed out?”

  “Well, see…” Jerry held his hands aloft. “The Commissioner of Public Safety, Linda Sloan, quite shrewdly accepted full responsibility for the BCA oversight and is spearheading an effort to rebuild the Bureau to its former glory. She made this proactive move before anyone in the governor’s inner circle marked her for the chopping block. I guess there’d been enough bloodletting anyhow. Well, Teddy, the governor pledged to divert twenty million dollars in discretionary spending to the effort. Rebuilding the Bureau was all Melinda ever wanted. In a very round-about series of events, she got her wish in spades.”

  “How do you know all this stuff?” Teddy asked, placing uniform trousers on the folding ironing table. “You know what the governor is thinking?”

  “There’s lesson two of public service, Teddy. Being a nice person and treating others fairly for forty years tends to bear fruit.”

  “I try to be a nice person.”

  “Well that’s all we can do, isn’t it, you brillow-headed ass?”

  Teddy looked stunned for a minute then giggled. “So what happens with the bad guys who survived the shootout?”

  “I don’t know about the fellas from Iowa, but Kenny, AKA Kennick Crowe, is gonna serve time in Iowa —the Minnesota prosecutor is deferring the conspiracy charge — just a question of how long. The Iowa prosecutor is offering fifteen years with the possibility of parole after nine. Kenny and his public defender are claiming he was manipulated by proven murderous sociopath Sarah Paulsen. They’ll try and get the time down, but he’ll accept the plea.”

  Teddy wheeled Jerry Unger before a board headed by the Commissioner of Public Safety, Linda Sloan, the Director of Human Resources Arnie Hunt, the director of Affirmative Action and Internal Affairs, Ross Nguyen, the commander of the State Patrol, David Kline, and Darla Wincone the head of the Division of Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement. She gave Jerry the slightest wink as he was rolled to his table before them.

  “Agent Unger,” Commissioner Sloan said. “It is my sincere pleasure to meet with you today. I speak for all of us here when I commend you for your many years of service not limited to the events of November Tenth.”

  Jerry gave a curt nod.

  “Obviously, it would be an understatement to say that the events of that day have had a far-reaching impact on our public safety apparatus.”

  “For the good,” Darla Wincone interjected.

  “Indeed,” Arnie Hunt said. “Jerry, good to see you are still with us.”

  “Hi Arnie. Thank you.”

  “Our main goal today is to understand a significant actor in all that’s occurred,” Commissioner Sloan said. “Jake Adler, formerly of the Texas Rangers.”

  “Still a Ranger,” Jerry protested calmly.

  Darla adjusted her glasses. “He’s on a leave of absence, isn’t that right, Arnie?”

  “That’s right. Leave of absence.”

  “How would you describe Jake Adler?” Commissioner Sloan asked.

  “As a man, I’d describe him as brave, intelligent in a way. What’s the word?” Jerry raised a knuckle to his mouth. “Oh, not that he could tell you the square root of who cares, but when it counts and decisions equal life or death, he makes good ones.”

  “You’d say he’s cunning?” Commissioner Sloan asked.

  Jerry’s mustache bunched to one side. “No. I wouldn’t use a word that sounds so sour.”

  “Would you say he’s honest?” Arnie leaned forward.

  “Yes.”

  “Did he tell you why he was in Minnesota?”

  “It didn’t come up. Seemed to be a sort of professional exchange.” When the board was silent for a moment, Jerry pressed on. “See, we were so starved for resources at the BCA, I wasn’t about to turn away help.”

  Everyone on the board except the State Patrol commander watched Commissioner Sloan react to the statement. She’d avoided punishment, but she’d known to some extent what the Bureau had become and how its resources had been syphoned off elsewhere, for instance, to the State Patrol budget.

  “That being as it may,” Commissioner Sloan said, “who vetted Mister Adler?”

  “Above my pay grade.”

  “Who introduced you to Mister Adler? Who led him to your office?”

  Jerry cocked his head to one side and looked off at the floor as if lost in thought.

  “Agent Unger?”

  “Huh? Oh.” Jerry acted is if he’d just awoken from a nap. “What was the question?”

  “Who introduced you to Mister Adler?”

  “Uhh… Remind me who Mister Adler was?” It was all Jerry could do to keep a straight face. He wasn’t normally one for games in a professional setting, but if he was getting medically retired, why not have a little fun?

  Kline, the State Patrol commander, rolled his eyes and gave a sidelong glance down the table.

  “Jake Adler,” Darla said gently. “The man you recently worked with?”

  “Oh, Jake.” Jerry crossed his hands and set his shoulders straight, looking alert and focused. “He was one of the finest lawmen I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.”

  Arnie and Darla turned to Sloane who was adjusting her glasses and putting her fingers to her temple the way she did when frustrated. “Berg’s already been shit-canned,” Arnie whispered.

  “Why are you peppering this poor man?” Darla asked in a whisper almost as loud as Arnie’s. “You know the governor is giving him a medal this afternoon?”

  “Very well.” Commissioner Sloan looked up. “Agent Unger, were you aware while working with him that Mister Adler’s wife had recently passed away?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “Did he mention it at any point?”

  “It came up briefly, toward the end of the shootout.”

  “During the shootout?” Commissioner Sloan asked.

  “Yes,” Jerry said. “Jake had been shot and was bleeding. He was laying in the road thinking he was dying. He’d pulled out his wallet and was looking at a picture of his wife when I found him.”

  “What did he say?” Commissioner Sloan asked in a demanding tone.

  Jerry’s eye’s darkened. “Commissioner, have you ever seen someone die?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Have you ever held a friend in your arms and watched them lose the blood from their veins and the breath from their lungs?”

  “No.” Commissioner Sloan cleared her throat. “N
o, of course I haven’t.”

  “Well, if you had, and that dying friend had said anything in that moment, you wouldn’t repeat it with a gun to your head, let alone for some jumped up kangaroo court.” Jerry leaned forward. “Whether he begged for his mother or admitted to being the second gunner on the grassy knoll, you’d have some goddamned respect.”

  “Jerry.” Arnie held up a hand.

  “No, Arnie. I’ll not have it. Ask what you really wanna ask, Commissioner. And no beating around the bush.”

  “Fine.” Sloane set down her pen. “Is Jake Adler or was he at any point in your investigation a deranged lunatic?”

  “No. He wasn’t. Are we done here?”

  “Agent Unger, one of your brothers in arms, Agent Nelson, died during this event. We’re only trying to ascertain—”

  “Oh, I know exactly what you’re doing.” Jerry raised his voice. “Same way I know what you’ve been doing since you first came on this job. Nelson died because Sarah Paulsen AKA Lala was a sociopath and Nelson made a mistake.” Jerry jabbed a finger out at Commissioner Sloan. “Nelson made that mistake because temperamentally he had no business being on the force, certainly not in the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. That is a failure of leadership at every level. That’s your failure.”

  Jerry wheeled himself toward the door, stopping feet away from the committee. “I’d sooner go back into a gunfight with Jake Adler by my side than spend one second more talking to you dimwits.”

  “Jerry.”

  “Grow a spine, Arnie. All of you.” Jerry stared them down. “I know who I am,” he boomed. “I know exactly who I am.” Jerry laid his eyes on Kline, the State Patrol commander, in particular.

  Kline held Jerry’s gaze with steely blue eyes and a thick neck whose Adam’s apple rose and fell as he swallowed.

  “And don’t think I ever forgot about you, you shit weasel,” Jerry said. “You least of all.” Jerry turned back to all of them, softening his tone. “Now, if you folks will excuse me, I’m gonna get a medal from the governor, on account of my many bullet wounds, and solving a murder and taking down a conspiracy ring.”

  Teddy rushed up and pushed Jerry out the doors and into the hallway where an impressive figure stood holding a folder and a styrofoam cup of coffee, a middle aged black man built like he could have been a former running back, wearing a tailored suit, cowboy boots and the star and wheel badge of the Texas Rangers.

  “I take you to be Agent Jerry Unger.” The man smirked and held out his hand.

  “I am,” Jerry said, still agitated.

  They shook.

  “I’m Sergeant Tony Townsend.” He laughed, nodding at the door to the meeting chamber. “You would’ve made a fine Ranger, sir.”

  Jerry took a breath to calm himself. “I don’t know about that, but that’s a nice thing to say.”

  “Well, I better be getting in there.”

  “Pleasure to meet you.”

  “Pleasure was all mine.”

  Teddy wheeled Jerry out to the medical transport van and opened the side door. Jerry stood out of the chair, but the attendant held up a hand. “Don’t, sir. We gotta use the lift.”

  “I’m not a complete invalid.”

  “It’s for insurance reasons. If they’re paying for the chair and the van, we gotta use the lift.”

  The attendant wheeled Jerry onto the lift, and hit a button. As Jerry rose off the parking lot, Teddy asked, “This gonna be your last time seeing this place?”

  “Might be.”

  “Feeling nostalgic?”

  “No, Teddy, I’m not. I’m feeling like I can’t stand to look at it anymore. I’m feeling profoundly done.”

  Teddy strapped the wheelchair in place and started up the van. “We got two hours before we’ve gotta be at the Governor’s mansion. Wanna grab lunch?”

  “Oh, but does the insurance say we’re allowed to have lunch?”

  “Well, yeah. So long as you eat in the wheelchair.”

  “Oh, beans.”

  “Fast food, or you wanna go down in the lift inside a restaurant?”

  “Fast food, then.”

  Teddy put the van in gear and pulled into the road. “What was that last part about?”

  “Last part?”

  “The last part of you giving them hell. You called that State Trooper Colonel a… a shit weasel?”

  “Oh, that.”

  “What was that about?”

  “Oh, just something from a hundred years ago. It’s a long story.” Jerry looked at the clock. “Two hours did you say? Well…” Jerry settled back, unbuttoned his uniform coat and folded his hands across his flat stomach. “You see, Teddy, before he was Colonel Shit Weasel he used to be a snot-nosed rookie. He joined the force in the Spring of Seventy-Nine. His first week on the job, he pulls over this old black lady for no good reason. Her name was Ethel Mae and she had a daughter named Retta who turned out to own a fruit packing business. Remember that for later. Anyways, the same day I pull over a speeding delivery truck packed to the gills with boxes of expired bananas…”

  THIRTY-TWO

  Onward

  An overweight man with black bowl cut and a black goatee stuck his head through the door-less doorway and knocked with an obscenely large silver ring. Jake couldn’t think why a man would wear such a large ring unless he’d won a Super Bowl, but he never cared enough to ask.

  “Brought you your things.” Brian entered the room with a milk crate holding Jake’s boots, his belt and buckle.

  “Where’s my hat?”

  “I can double check but this is all the ER gave us.”

  Jake slipped on his boots and his belt, feeling his trousers properly fit to his waist for the first time in five days.

  “Doctor Hart signed you off,” Brian said. “We’ll just have you sign some paperwork and you’re all set.”

  Jake followed him, limping along on his cane. It felt slightly odd to feel his boots under him again, rather than feeling the linoleum through his cotton socks. The front desk faced the common area where morning group was assembling, waiting for Brian to kick it off.

  “I’m off, y’all,” Jake said with a wave.

  An obese black man in a grey sweat suit jumped up and ran all jiggling to Jake and clasped him in a hug.

  “All right, Eustice. Later, Alligator.”

  “See you in a while, Crocodile.” Eustice smiled and backed away.

  A skinny white guy with tattoos on his face and big holes in his ears where his large gauge piercings usually went held out a hand that Jake clasped. “Later, Pete.”

  Pete pulled him into a hug with the other hand. “I’ma be outta this piece in a minute, cuz. I’ll holler at you.”

  “Sure thing.”

  A dozen or so of the other mental patients gave Jake a hug or a goodbye of some kind.

  “You gonna visit us, Jake?” A six-and-a-half-foot-tall African named Manta looked his buggy eyes at Jake and licked his lips the way he did constantly. “You must come back.”

  “Gotta see how things shake out, big hoss.”

  “Bring your gun next time.” Manta’s eyes shined.

  “Probably can’t swing that in the psych ward,” Jake said, giving Brian a glance. “But maybe I’ll bring you a picture on my phone. Remind me to get a phone.”

  After Jake had been released from his Iowa hospital, he’d been brought back to the Twin Cities to answer questions from men and women in suits and uniforms. Though no accusations or charges were made, there were enough murmurs and rumors surrounding the BCA debacle and the Iowa shootout that Minnesota officials suggested the voluntary commitment to the psych ward for testing. It was a gamble for Jake’s future, a gamble he was willing to take, even though Townie and Ferg had their doubts. Ferguson had to go back to Texas, but Townsend stayed in the Cities, visiting Jake each day it was allowed, keeping tabs on the situation.

  The psych ward? It had its merits. Turned out crazy people could be real nice most of the time, and usually onl
y hurt themselves. And if anyone did step out of line, well, there was a couple fellas there to take ‘em off to the rubber room and let them work it out. Most corporate offices could probably benefit from a similar restructuring.

  Jake turned to the front desk and signed his release paperwork. After seven days of somewhat intense psychological screening, he was released at the advice and blessing of medical professionals back into the world. Now Jake had a scrupulously clean bill of mental health he could hold up and challenge anyone to match. He figured there weren’t a whole lot of folks out there, law enforcement or otherwise, who could stand up to days and days of questionnaires, inventories, interviews, personal histories and the like and not see a doctor check off a few crazy boxes on the form in the end.

  Jake walked out into the cool air and found it somewhat refreshing. About thirty seconds later, however, it had penetrated his shirt sleeves and bit into his skin.

  “Oh, holy hell. Where to?” He looked about wintry downtown Saint Paul and figured he should call a cab. He didn’t have a phone yet, so he had to go back inside and call one from the security desk. Eventually it arrived and he hustled out from the emergency entrance doors, as fast as he could on his cane.

  “Where to?” the driver asked. He wore a thick beanie Jake was jealous of.

  “Do you know where the Public Safety building is?”

  “Mmm, no.”

  “Can you search it on your phone? It’s right by a McDonalds to the northeast.”

  “I’m sure we’ll find it.” The driver turned on the meter. “Eventually.”

  Luckily for Jake’s torn up wallet they found the building without too many diversions and Jake paid in cash.

  “Is that blood?” The driver held the ten dollar note aloft.

  “Ass blood,” Jake said. “Keep the change.”

  Jake hopped away on his cane, as fast as he could toward his truck which still sat in the parking lot.

  He got in, teeth chattering, and turned the heater on immediately, rubbing his hands together. He looked down and picked up his Texas Ranger badge, the star and wheel, one of the most beautiful shapes in existence. Jake set it back down in the console and drove to the nearest big shopping mall in Roseville. He searched for the kind of outdoors store people went to when they wanted to do absurd things like camping under a frozen waterfall.