Free Fire

by C. J. Box

  “I think you covered it,” Ashby said. “Except maybe the fact that Joe Pickett and his mystery buddy have been flashing their weaponry out in the open every place they go against Park Service policy.”

  “Oh, that too,” Layborn said.

  “You two are poised to become media stars,” Ashby said, biting off his words. “We’ve got more calls for comment than all of us can handle. Just exactly what we didn’t want—more attention on the Zone of Death and now a fully cooked Zephyr employee.”

  “I think you’re out of line,” Joe said. “Both of you.” He wondered which of them, or if both, had sent the black SUV to intercept Cutler that morning.

  Layborn fixed him with a cop stare, except that one of his eyes peered at something to the side of Joe’s face. “We might just have to pull over and settle this.”

  “Maybe so.”

  “Let it go, Joe,” Demming said. “This is a Park Service thing, you know?”

  “That’s right,” Ashby said. “You have no say here. In fact, I’m thinking of punching your ticket and sending you back home to your governor.”

  Demming shot Joe a desperation glance, pleading with her eyes for him to keep quiet. For her sake, he did. He thought that while he could go home, she couldn’t.

  AS THEY PULLED into the parking lot of the Pagoda at dark, Joe was plotting his moves that evening. Call Chuck Ward, tell him what was going on and what had happened, let him in on his suspicions. Beg for a new vehicle. Apologize for the last one. Call Marybeth. Drink.

  “I want your full written statements by tomorrow morning,” Ashby said. “I’m meeting with the chief ranger and want to be fully briefed. Plus, I would expect we’ll be getting some calls from Washington wanting to know just what in the hell is happening to our park.”

  Ashby said to Demming, “When I asked you to come back yesterday, I meant it. But no, you wanted to continue to play cowgirl to John Wayne here. If you would have, maybe Cutler would still be alive.”

  Demming turned ashen.

  Joe said, “That was low.” He sort of liked being compared to John Wayne, though.

  HE AND DEMMING followed Ashby and Layborn into the Pagoda. Demming looked pale and on the verge of tears she was fighting to hold back. Joe resisted the impulse to put his hand on her shoulder, to reassure her. He thought if he did that it would make her look weak to Ashby and Layborn.

  The night dispatcher threw open the door to the lobby, his headset dangling from where he’d jerked it out of his phone. His eyes were wild.

  “Chief,” he said to Ashby, “you’ve got to take this.”

  “Take what?” Ashby said, grimacing.

  “Stevens from Bechler.”

  “Wait here,” Ashby told Demming and Joe, and followed the dispatcher.

  Five minutes later, he came back. He was seething, his face bright red: “That son of a bitch Clay McCann did it again!”

  20

  JOE FINISHED WRITING HIS REPORT—INCLUDING the news of Clay McCann killing two more people in “self-defense” within the Zone of Death—and had it faxed from the front desk. While he watched Simon feed the pages through, something nagged at him. He needed to talk to Demming.

  Lower-level federal housing was down the mountain from the Mammoth Hotel, a half-mile walk nearly straight downhill. The moon was full and lit the sagebrush-covered hillside. A small herd of elk grazed in the moonlight. Joe could smell their familiar musky smell in the air. He noticed blue parentheses on either side of the moon. Snow was coming.

  The cluster of Park Service housing was built on a plateau on the sagebrush hillside. The houses were packed tightly together with fenceless common yards. The density of the houses was claustrophobic, Joe thought, compared to the vast, empty hillsides in all directions. It reminded him of a government-built anthill in the middle of a prairie. He found Demming’s house by the brown wooden sign outside that said LARS AND JUDY DEMMING and crossed the postage-stamp lawn. A BMX bike leaned against the house. The house was small and looked exactly like every other house on the street. The Park Service had even painted them all the same light green color. Demming’s cruiser was parked next to a jacked-up Ford 4x4 pickup that looked formidable as well as well taken care of.

  A man answered the door. Joe expected someone named Lars to be tall, strapping, blond. Instead, he was short, pudgy, with long sideburns and an acne-scarred face. Smile lines at the corners of his mouth suggested he was always of good cheer. He wore a baggy T-shirt with a silk screen of a wolf on it.

  Joe introduced himself. “Hope I didn’t get you at dinner,” Joe said.

  “Not at all,” Lars said, looking over Joe’s shoulder for his vehicle. Lars was the kind of man who judged other men by what they drove, Joe guessed. “Come on in. You walked?”

  “Yup.”

  “Oh, that’s right,” Lars said, chuckling. “I heard about your Yukon. Quite a story.”

  The television was on in the living room and the house smelled of the fried hamburgers they had had for dinner. It was modest, almost spare, except for the elk heads and antlers on the wall. Joe didn’t know what he’d been expecting. Maybe more books, he thought.

  Lars introduced Joe to Jake, who was watching television. Jake, ten, was a younger, fitter version of Lars, and he self-consciously got up and shook Joe’s hand and returned quickly to the couch. A teenage girl looked out from her room, said hello, and ducked back in.

  “Erin,” Lars said. “Fifteen and surly.”

  Joe nodded with empathy.

  “So, Judy tells me you’re a game warden.”

  “Yes.”

  “What do you think of those heads on the wall?”

  “Nice.”

  “I got seven more of ’em in the garage. I was thinking you might want to take a look at them.”

  People always wanted to show Joe their game heads or hunting pictures. He was used to it. To be polite, Joe said, “Sure, you bet.”

  Judy intervened, coming from the kitchen, drying her hands on a towel. She was out of uniform, and she looked like, well, a mom.

  “I think Joe’s seen plenty of elk heads before, honey,” she said.

  “That’s okay,” Joe said.

  “Really,” Demming said to Lars.

  Lars did a barely noticeable man-to-man eye roll, asked, “You want a beer?”

  “You bet.”

  “Turn the television off, please, Jake,” Demming said. “Time for homework.”

  “I don’t have any,” Jake said.

  Demming gave him a look.

  “Maybe I do,” Jake said, peeling himself off the couch. As he went down the hall, Jake stopped at Erin’s room just long enough to dart in to do something that made her squeal, “Mom! He flicked my ear with his finger again!”

  “Jake, leave her alone,” Demming said, halfheartedly.

  Joe smiled. Just like home.

  Lars returned with three opened bottles of beer.

  “I didn’t really want one,” Demming said.

  “I’ll drink it,” Lars said. “We don’t want to see beer go to waste, eh, Joe?”

  “Right.”

  Joe sat on the couch. Demming and Lars settled in well-worn overstuffed chairs.

  “Too bad about Mark Cutler,” Lars said. “He was a real nice guy. I met him a few times at Old Faithful.”

  It seemed oddly uncomfortable, Joe thought. No doubt both Lars and Demming felt the same. Demming did, he was sure, by the way she lowered her eyes while Lars told story after story about every time he had met Mark Cutler. Most of the tales had to do with Lars’s road crew fixing the potholes around Old Faithful. Demming didn’t interrupt when the stories got too long, deferring to her husband.

  When Lars went to get Joe another beer, Demming said, “Ashby called. I’ve got a meeting with him and James Langston tomorrow. I won’t be with you anymore either, providing they even let you stay. I’ve been reassigned to traffic if they don’t decide to suspend me.”

  “I’m sorry.”
/>   She shrugged. “It gives me an excuse to quit. I wish I could. Maybe I can really try to get into interpretation now.”

  Lars came back and resumed telling stories about each of the elk on the wall, the circumstances in which he’d killed them.

  Joe wanted to ask her how she was doing, but it seemed like the wrong time and place. Instead, he finished the beer because he thought Lars would want him to.

  “I better get back,” Joe said, standing. “I need to call my wife.”

  “Yeah,” Lars said, grinning. “Don’t forget that or there’ll be hell to pay.”

  Joe said, “Marybeth’s not like that.”

  Lars gave him a man-to-man wink, as if to say, They’re all like that.

  “Do you need a ride?” Demming asked.

  “I don’t mind walking.”

  “I’ll drive you back.”

  “Jeez,” Lars said, “haven’t you two spent enough time together?”

  He was joking, Joe thought, but he wasn’t.

  IN THE CAR, Demming said, “You wanted to ask me something.”

  “I wanted to see how you were doing.”

  “Besides that. What was it? I could tell.”

  She was Demming again, the ranger.

  “Last night, after I left you the message about the meeting with Cutler, who did you call?”

  “Ashby. Why?”

  “I’m trying to figure out who knew about the meeting ahead of time.”

  “Do you realize what you’re asking? What you’re saying?”

  “Yes.”

  She drove in silence the rest of the way.

  When he got out, he said, “Be careful.”

  “You too,” she said. “Maybe you ought to go home.”

  “What?”

  She looked over, concern in her eyes. “You seem to have a nice family, Joe, and obviously you care very much about them. This isn’t your fight.”

  “It’s my job,” he said. “Same thing.”

  JOE MISSED HIS family, missed them more than he thought possible, more than he should have given that it had been only four days since he left. When he really thought about them, really dug deep, he wondered if, in his heart, he felt out of his depth and therefore wanted them near him for comfort. Two more days, he thought. Two more days. But should he welcome them to a place where just that morning he’d seen a man boiled alive, had his state car destroyed, and come to a nagging realization that it was very likely that someone on the inside murdered Mark Cutler and could just as easily come after him?

  Maybe that’s what it was, Joe thought. The thought that Cutler had no one to mourn him. No wife, no kids, and a sort-of fiancée he’d made a fleeting mention of. If whoever got Cutler came after Joe . . . he tried to imagine how Marybeth, Sheridan, and Lucy would mourn him. Would it demolish them, change them forever? He hoped so as much as he hoped not. Or would they figure out a way to go on? They were tough, he knew. He wished he were that tough. And now, he thought, sitting in his room at the Mammoth Hotel at midnight on a vacant floor with the half-empty Jim Beam traveler on his tiny desk, he was crossing over a line into a kind of morbid depression he hadn’t felt since, well, since his brother died and his father left them.

  And he realized what the root of his dark meditation was—the reunion with his father. It had brought everything back, most of all feelings of inadequacy, of not being properly rooted. He had forgotten that those feelings dwelled within him.

  That, and the inevitable replaying of what he’d seen that morning as Cutler’s flesh came off his body and floated away.

  Oh, and Clay McCann. The lawyer who had upped his body count to six. The man who would very likely get away with his latest double homicide as easily as he had the first four.

  What, was he losing it?

  He needed Marybeth to tell him he wasn’t.

  And another drink. That would be okay too.

  HE BROACHED THE subject of her not coming when he called home. “Marybeth, there’s so much going on that I can’t figure out,” he said. “The last thing I want to do is put you and the girls . . . into this mess.” He almost said, “in danger” but re-phrased it clumsily.

  She paused a long time before saying, “Joe, I’m a little disappointed in you.”

  “Why?” He was puzzled.

  “How much have we been through together?”

  “A hell of a lot,” he said. “Too much. That’s why—”

  “That’s right,” she said. “We’re good together. Maybe I can help you out. Besides, I’m just about done with that research you asked me to do. I’ll print everything out and bring it along.”

  “Anything interesting?”

  “Not that I can tell. I still have a couple of companies to go. I should have it all done by the time we get there.”

  “I’m thinking of Sheridan and Lucy,” Joe said. “I still feel so damned guilty about what they went through last spring. I don’t want any more of that happening.”

  “Joe, what happened happened. It’s not your fault.”

  “If my job puts them into situations like that, it’s my fault,” he said.

  She didn’t argue, although he wished she would.

  “Sheridan can’t stop talking about going to Yellowstone,” Marybeth said. “Lucy has already packed so she’ll be the best dressed tourist in the park. You want me to tell them we’re not going?”

  Joe thought about it. “No.”

  “Good.”

  “I miss you,” he said.

  “It’s only been a few days,” she said. “But I miss you too.”

  “Besides,” she said, laughing, “my mother is driving me insane.”

  IDLY, JOE REREAD Hoening’s e-mails, hoping that something new would come to him now that he’d spent some time in the park. The exchange between Yellowdick and Samantha Ellerby drew him, and he studied the e-mails and tried to figure out why.

  It was 8 P.M. in California, an hour behind mountain time. Joe used directory assistance to find her number. He caught Samantha in her apartment. She had a flat, bored tone to her voice he found slightly irritating.

  “Who did you say you were?” she asked.

  “My name is Joe Pickett. I’m investigating the murder of your friend Rick Hoening on behalf of the governor of Wyoming,” he said, hoping that would impress her enough to keep her on the line.

  “He wasn’t really my friend, more like just a guy I knew back in Minnesota. I’m surprised Wyoming is big enough to have a governor.”

  Joe thought, Airhead.

  “Still, I’m sure you’d like to help us clear up a few questions.”

  “I guess so. But I don’t have a lot of time to talk. I’m going out.”

  “It won’t take long,” he said.

  “Better not.”

  “Okay, I’ll get to it. I take it you visited Yellowstone last summer.”

  “Yeah.” Her voice was cold. “Geysers, like, big whoop.”

  “Didn’t have a good time, then?”

  “It was cold. There were bugs and way too many animals that can eat you. Not at all my idea of a good time. Plus, Rick’s idea of a great party is, you know, outside. I’m sorry he’s dead and all but, God, like, what a loser.”

  “I wanted to ask you specifically about what you did with him.”

  “I’m hanging up.”

  “No, please,” he said, wanting to smack himself in the forehead. “Let me rephrase that. Sorry. I want to know what places he showed you around the park. He knew the area really well, from what we understand. We think if we know where he went it might help us in our investigation.” He hoped that last bit made more sense to her than it did to him.

  She seemed to be debating whether or not to terminate the call.

  “Look,” he lied, “if it would be easier, we can send somebody over to your place to talk about this. It might be more comfortable for you.” Hoping she wouldn’t call his bluff.

  “I said I was going out. No, okay. It’s okay, I thought you were
asking—”

  “No.”

  “We saw all the sights, I guess. Some big canyons, some trees, a bunch of geysers. Old Faithful. Way too many fat people in shorts. I think Yellowstone ought to have some kind of fitness test you have to pass to get in. I mean, gross.”

  “Did you go to a place called Sunburst Hot Springs?” Joe asked casually.

  “Hmmm, I’m trying to remember the name.”

  “Did you go hot-potting there?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Sunburst. That was actually kind of a cool place. Except it’s illegal, you know. They keep you from going to the really cool places.”

  “Okay,” Joe said, “I’m going to ask you a question but before you answer I want you to know that however you answer it, you will not be incriminated in any way.”

  “Huh?”

  “Was Hoening involved with drugs? I’m not asking about you, I’m asking about him.”

  She seemed relieved and said, “Alcohol only. But lots of it. He was really backward in his thinking. I couldn’t get him to . . . never mind.”

  “So he never used drugs in your presence?”

  “Alcohol. It’s a drug, you know.”

  “Then can you tell me what he meant when he wrote to you”—Joe fished out the e-mail—“‘We’ll have some cocktails and laughs, watch the sun set over Yellowstone Lake, go hot-potting and light a couple of flamers.’”

  “Ooooh,” she said, enthusiasm gushing for the first time, “those things were the coolest of all! Flamers, yeah. They were, like, great.”

  21

  TWO POINT TWO MILLION ACRES, JOE THOUGHT. YELLOWSTONE was that big. And while he now had a plan, he didn’t have a car.