Free Fire

by C. J. Box

  “Dad!” Lucy cried, turning and running toward him with Sheridan just behind her.

  “One big happy!” Nate said, oblivious.

  24

  WHEN THE TRUSTY BROUGHT HIS BREAKFAST, McCann said, “I want to talk to the man in charge of the jail.”

  “You mean Ranger Layborn?”

  “Exactly.”

  “I’ll tell him.”

  “You do that. And take the food back. I can’t eat that crap. Leave the coffee, though.”

  HE WAITED FOR twenty minutes, sitting on his cot drinking weak coffee until the plastic carafe was empty. His stomach hurt and he wondered if he was getting an ulcer. He tried to ignore the video camera aimed at him through the bars outside his cell. It was strange how, at times, he felt people watching him. Like yesterday, when he felt the presence of someone quite strongly, someone new. When it happened he did his best not to move so as not to provide his watchers with anything to see. He wanted to look comfortable, and content, even though he wasn’t. His goal was to show that he could wait them out, drive them crazy. Of course, he knew, as they did, he could walk out anytime. But that was the last thing on earth he wanted to do.

  Out of his view, a metal door opened and closed and he heard footsteps coming. He took a deep breath, straightened his back, set his cup aside.

  Layborn stopped short of the front of his cell and leaned forward, his face an annoyed mask. “What now?”

  “We need to talk.”

  “I’m busy.”

  “I promise you this will be the most important thing you hear today.”

  “You’re an asshole.”

  “And you, Ranger Layborn, need to know which side your bread is buttered. Grab a chair,” McCann said. “Let’s raise the level of discourse. Which means I talk, and you listen with your mouth shut for once.”

  Layborn’s good eye bulged, and McCann thought for a second that Layborn was going to come in after him. Something made the ranger think twice about it, and instead he withdrew his head, turned angrily while muttering curses, and marched back toward the door.

  “If you leave right now without hearing me out,” McCann called after him, “I swear to God I’ll blow this whole thing wide open and you’ll go down with them.”

  Silence. Layborn had stopped. He was thinking about it.

  “I’m not bluffing,” McCann said.

  “Fuck,” Layborn hissed.

  McCann heard the legs of a chair scraping against the concrete. Layborn reappeared reluctantly, raised the chair and slammed it down, sat heavily in it, said, “You’ve got five minutes.” McCann noted Layborn placed the chair far enough from the cell that it couldn’t be seen on the video monitor if anyone looked. He knew there was no sound accompanying the live video feed, so they couldn’t be overheard either.

  “That’s all I need. Are you listening? I mean, really listening?”

  Layborn’s good eye bored into him. His mouth was set; a vein throbbed angrily in his temple.

  “So,” McCann said, “were you the one they were going to send after me? I’d guess so, since you have nothing else to contribute to the deal except your willingness to bash heads. I mean, I wouldn’t guess you’d have much to invest with a park ranger’s salary, right? And they’re not the types who do the dirty work themselves, so they need someone like you, a Nean derthal with a badge. Your trusty told me about the two old men who got beaten last night. He said they were in a room registered to Joe Pickett, but no one knows who they were. That was your handiwork, right?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “So when it comes to me, what were you going to do? Come to my office in West Yellowstone, shoot me in the head? Blame it on the angry locals? Was that the plan? Or were you going to bushwhack me somewhere?”

  Layborn glared at him, then raised his watch to signal that McCann’s time was quickly passing.

  McCann said, “When they didn’t pay or communicate, I knew they went to Plan B. Problem was, they didn’t have a Plan B so they had to come up with one. They’re schemers, but they’re not from the street like I am. I was ten steps ahead of them, as usual. By the time they figured out they had to get rid of me, here I was under protective custody. Maybe they’re finally realizing they’re just not smart enough to proceed without me. That’s something I knew all along.”

  While McCann talked, he watched blood drain from Layborn’s face, even though the ranger tried hard not to react to anything that he said. But the lack of reaction was a reaction in itself, McCann knew. He’d seen it in witnesses on the stand, and in his own clients. Outrageous accusations should be met with outraged denials if the person accused was innocent. Lack of reaction meant guilt. He had him.

  McCann paused, said, “I need you to get a message to them, and you need to get it right.”

  “Who are you talking about?”

  “I think you know. In fact, I know you do.”

  “You’re wasting my time. I don’t like talking to lawyers. Lawyers are the problem, not the solution, is the way I think about things.”

  “Until you need one.”

  “I don’t plan to.”

  McCann chanced a smile. “No one ever does.”

  “You guys are like wolves. You work the edges of the herd and go after the sick and weak.”

  “Wolves are an important part of the ecosystem, Ranger Layborn.”

  “I hate wolves.”

  “Like the ecosystem, our laws are far too complex for mere mortals to understand. That’s why we need lawyers. It’s not like our laws are moral codes—they’re just a set of rules dreamed up by politicians to keep themselves in power and placate their contributors. I’m a lawyer, and I help powerless mortals cope with the rules and sometimes circumvent them. It’s part of our ecosystem.”

  Layborn started to speak, then shook his head, sputtered, “That’s bullshit.”

  “No it isn’t, and you know it,” McCann said softly. “If our laws were honest and based on universal truth, I’d be on death row for six murders. Instead, I can walk out of here any damned time I please.”

  “I wish you would,” Layborn growled. “See how far you make it.”

  “Ah, now we’re getting to the crux of it.”

  “Crux of what? I don’t like this word-game shit.”

  “Of course you don’t,” McCann said. “You’re a simple man of the law. And when I say that, I mean it in the worst possible way.”

  “Are you insulting me?”

  McCann snorted, “Me? Never!”

  “I’m leaving,” the ranger said, rising to his feet.

  McCann leaped up. “Stop!”

  Layborn froze.

  “Tell them the slate is clean again. Tell them. No one knows except us. I took care of that for them yesterday. No charge.”

  Layborn showed no expression.

  “Tell them they have one choice, and one choice only. They can pay me what they owe me or I call the FBI tomorrow and work out a deal for immunity. Got that?”

  Layborn hesitated. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Oh, come on. Sure you do. Repeat the terms to me so I know they sunk in.”

  Layborn stared back with what looked like fear in his eyes. Thank God, McCann thought.

  “Repeat it,” he said.

  “Pay you what they owe you or you talk,” Layborn muttered.

  “Good! And when I say pay, I don’t mean another empty promise about sometime in the future. I want it all, every penny plus the penalty, now. Now! I don’t care what they do to get it. The transfer should be made immediately, in full. Do you understand that?”

  “I guess.”

  “If my banker doesn’t confirm that the transfer has been made within twenty-four hours, I call in the FBI. Simple as that. If they want to negotiate, it’s the same as saying the deal is off. No more delays, no more Plan B’s. Tell them,” McCann said.

  “Tell who?” Layborn asked weakly.

  The lawyer rol
led his eyes and snorted. “Too late for that. I can tell you know exactly what I’m talking about, and you know exactly who to talk to. Why pretend you don’t? It’s just us pals now, Ranger. Just us buddies. And we’ll all get rich, won’t we? In the meanwhile, I want you to personally start working on transferring me out of here to a federal facility. I’ve spent more than enough time in the Yellowstone jail.”

  Layborn shook his head. His face was pale. “All hell has broken loose out there,” he said, mumbling. “You’ve got no idea what’s happened in the last twelve hours. That game warden and the ranger, they’ve done all kinds of damage.”

  McCann thought this was interesting. The game warden? What was it with that guy? Suddenly, he knew who had been watching him the day before. The game warden should have gone away by now, it seemed. The park was about to close, and he was just a state employee. His business card wasn’t all that impressive, after all.

  “I really don’t care,” McCann said after a moment. “I’ve got more important matters to contend with. So do you, I suspect. And so do your bosses, although I’m sure you’d rather I call them your business partners. I hope they’re smarter now than they’ve been so far, don’t you? They need to forget about some stupid game warden and think about me. Me.”

  Layborn looked up. “The whole world doesn’t revolve around Clay McCann, you know.”

  McCann arched his eyebrows, said, “Actually, right now it does. You forget, I’m free to go. All I have to do is walk outside and talk to the first reporter I see. I know they’re out there, Ranger. Imagine what a scoop I can provide! It’ll make the story of the Zone of Death and my first incarceration here seem like small potatoes.”

  Layborn took a long breath, then blew it out. His shoulders slumped; he looked beaten down.

  McCann thought, That was easy.

  For the first time in two days, he allowed himself to visualize himself on that beach with a drink in hand, millions in his account, a girl at his side. Not Sheila, though. Too bad, he thought, he was really starting to like her. Killing Sheila was the only thing he really felt bad about.

  25

  LIKE ANY FAMILY ON VACATION IN YELLOWSTONE National Park, the Picketts did the sights. First the Upper, then the Lower Loop; Yellowstone Falls; Hayden Valley; Fishing Bridge; Old Faithful (where they ate cheeseburgers for lunch in the snack bar because Old Faithful Inn was closed); Fountain Paint Pots. Winter was held off for yet another day although it didn’t even attempt to hide its dark intentions anymore, and the weather was cool and clear. Pockets of aspen performed maudlin Technicolor death scenes on the mountain-sides, and brittle dry leaves choked the small streams and skittered across the road with breaths of wind. Sheridan and Lucy were delighted with the park, Marybeth was cautiously relaxed. Oncoming fall brought out the wildlife. Sheridan kept track of The Animal Count in a spiral notebook, noting elk (twenty-four), coyotes (one), bald eagles (two), moose (one), wolves (two), trumpeter swans (seven), Ridiculous-Looking Tourists (five), and buffalo (eighty-nine and counting). Lucy claimed to have seen a bear but it turned out to be a tree stump, thus was docked ten points in Sheridan’s counting system, which she seemed to be making up as they drove along to ensure that she would win.

  Marybeth played referee and awarded Lucy five points back for “looking cute,” despite Sheridan’s protests.

  Joe tried to join in, tried to relax, but he felt like an impostor. The .40 Glock was clipped to his belt and was uncomfortable. He felt his heart race every time he saw another vehicle, and his palms broke out in a sweat at the sight of a dark one.

  AT NORRIS GEYSER basin, the girls ran ahead on the boardwalk. Joe and Marybeth dawdled, holding hands, letting them get ahead.

  “Your heart’s not in this, is it?” she asked him once the girls were far enough ahead not to hear the conversation.

  “It’s not that,” Joe said. “I really want them to have a good time. I want you to have a good time. This is such a great place.”

  “You’re wound tight,” she said. “I feel like if I let go of your hand, you’d unravel. Is it because your father is here somewhere?”

  He tried to laugh but it sounded like a cough. “It’s not about my father. Well, maybe a little. He’s a distraction, but that’s all he is.”

  “Cold,” she said.

  “He’s nothing to me. I don’t want him involved in our girls’ lives, or in ours. I don’t want them to even meet him.”

  “It might be unavoidable.”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  “And that’s not all, is it?”

  “Nope.”

  “Don’t think I haven’t noticed,” she said softly. “You’ve got your gun with you even though you’re trying to hide it, and you keep checking the rearview mirror to make sure Nate’s Jeep is still behind us.”

  “You saw him back there, huh?”

  “I don’t miss much.”

  They walked along in silence, until Joe said, “It’s hard to believe so many bad things can happen in such a good place.”

  “Stay strong, Joe.”

  “I’m trying,” he said. “There’s so much going on, and so little I’m able to change or figure out. I want Judy to recover. I want my father to recover. I want to know what causes a flamer, who killed Mark Cutler, and why Clay McCann assassinated six people. I want to talk to Chuck Ward and make sure the governor is still engaged and that I’m still employed. And I want to talk to you alone, and to Nate. He’s hovering, as you know. He knows something and he’s waiting for the right opportunity to tell us.”

  Marybeth nodded toward Sheridan and Lucy, who had paused at the railing to stare into the depths of a hot pool. Lucy shouted for them to hurry up so they could see the bones deep in the water. After seeing Cutler’s body, Joe didn’t think he wanted to see any more bones.

  “We’re not here at the best time, are we?” she said.

  Joe pulled her close. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. Having you and the girls here helps me focus. But after what happened last fall . . .”

  “Enough,” she said, but squeezed his arm in appreciation.

  He said, “So I hope you don’t mind that I slipped the desk guy Simon fifty bucks before we left this morning and asked him to move all our stuff to another cabin during the day but not to reflect it on the register. I know that sounds paranoid . . .”

  “Yes, it does, but I appreciate it.” She looked up at him, smiled. “I hope we can find a little time together before I have to get the girls back.”

  He laughed. “Me too.”

  “But we have these darned girls with us.”

  “You’re the cleverest person I know,” Joe said. “You’ll think of something.”

  “Where there’s a will,” she said, letting her hand slip from the small of his back into the back pocket of his Wranglers.

  “YOU HAVEN’T SAID much about your mother lately,” Joe said. “Are things going okay?”

  They drove on the road that connected the upper and lower loop toward the headwaters of the Gibbon River. Joe had noted how pleasant it looked a few days before when he passed, and noted trout rising in the evening. He thought Sheridan and Lucy might like to try fly-fishing there, although both were napping in the car at the moment.

  “I’ve deliberately not said anything,” Marybeth whispered, checking to make sure their daughters weren’t listening, “because all the signs are still there for a train wreck coming.”

  Joe grimaced.

  “She’s had two”—Marybeth made quote marks in the air with her fingers—“arts council meetings in the past week. I asked around and confirmed that Earl Alden just happened to be at both of them. And,” Marybeth said, lowering her voice even further and leaning into Joe’s ear, “they left together both times. The meetings ended at eight. Mom got back to the ranch at midnight.”

  “Uh-oh,” Joe said.

  “Uh-oh is right.”

  “Poor Bud,” Joe said.

  “What’s wrong with our parents, a
nyway?” Marybeth asked rhetorically. “Is it because they’re of that generation?”

  “I believe so,” Joe said. “The first of the Baby Boomers. It’s all about them.”

  “Poor us,” Marybeth said. “We have to put up with those people for a lot more years.”

  JOE BEAMED WITH pride as Sheridan and Lucy assembled their fly rods, tied on tippet, selected their own flies, and marched toward the headwaters of the Gibbon River. He could tell by the set of Sheridan’s jaw that she was determined to out-fish her little sister.

  “Stay in sight,” Marybeth called after them. She’d found a flat grassy spot near the pullout to spread a blanket. There was a bottle of wine in the cooler.

  “If you catch some fish,” Joe said, “don’t keep more than two each for dinner. Release any more than that like I showed you.”

  “That won’t be a problem for Lucy,” Sheridan said over her shoulder, “since she won’t catch anything.”

  “But I still get points for looking cute,” Lucy said, throwing a dazzling smile over her shoulder at Joe, “which won’t be something Sheridan has to worry about.”

  “She’s right, you know,” Joe said.

  “Aaaauuugh!” Sheridan howled.

  NATE PARKED HIS Jeep behind the van as Joe pulled the cork out of the bottle of wine.

  “I guess we need another glass,” Marybeth said.

  “And look,” Joe said, feigning sarcasm, “you just happen to have three. How convenient.”

  Marybeth shot a sly glance at him. “I always have an extra.”

  “Just in case Nate shows up, I know.”

  “It doesn’t have to be Nate.”

  “But he’s the only one who shows up,” Joe said, pouring.

  “True.”

  Joe warmed with the realization that Marybeth now felt comfortable joking about her obvious but now harmless attraction to Nate. They were long past all of that, Joe hoped.