Silent Approach

by Bobby Cole

  Seven minutes later the deputy called and said he saw nothing suspicious. There were a few drawers open, but then nothing out of the ordinary, at least given the state of his own apartment, he admitted.

  After Agent Haden thanked the deputy, he shut the door and walked away. As he sat down in his cruiser, John Allen’s cell phone began to ring inside the barn, but the officer couldn’t hear it.

  Winston Walker was in pain and had been a guest in the emergency room for an hour. He’d waited until almost noon before he had to accept the fact that his knee needed some medical attention. The ER doctor was young, and Winston didn’t like her at all. Her name had almost all vowels, and he couldn’t understand what she was saying. She also didn’t respond to any of his flirts, and that bothered him the most. Accepting rejection was not something he was good at, even though he’d had lots of practice.

  The MRI revealed he hadn’t torn the ligaments, which she explained was good news. He wouldn’t need surgery, but a brace and crutches were in his immediate future. She preferred he stay off the knee for the next few days and suggested that when the swelling went down, he would need to see a rehab therapist.

  Winston didn’t have insurance and didn’t have the cash to pay for the visit. But through the magic of the health-care system, he got all the attention he needed, including more pain meds. The doctor warned him they were addictive and to not take them unless absolutely necessary, and he laughed in her face.

  Once he was discharged, he limped his way back to his vehicle and winced his way back home. As he arrived, he was half expecting the police to be waiting for him, maybe already searching his house, and he was glad he didn’t see them. He wanted to go and help Runt, or at least supervise him to make sure he didn’t mess things up or fail to ensure John Allen suffered sufficiently, but his knee was having none of it.

  The interview didn’t go well for Hoss. Gina proved to be a tough nut to crack and wouldn’t give him any details about how she’d come to possess the chip. Hoss pushed hard, as he needed her to talk since the chip didn’t have a serial number. He knew she hadn’t won it, but he couldn’t prove that she hadn’t or that some sugar daddy hadn’t given it to her. A good lawyer could argue her out of the charge with ease. He was trying to keep lawyers out of this.

  She seemed to sense his nervous tension, and that just made her quieter. She knew how the game worked and was waiting to see what they would offer her. Gina was good at frustrating men, and she would play the game as long as she could. In the end, if she had to give up Runt, she’d do it. He didn’t mean that much to her.

  Hoss needed a break but couldn’t see one on the horizon. His mind circled back to the officer’s comments about seeing John Allen before daylight. That made no sense to him. He decided to let Gina cool her heels in a cell while he went back to his office computer and traced John Allen’s location.

  Hoss had more than twenty vehicles equipped with GPS location transmitters. He double-checked John Allen’s PIN number and carefully entered it into his computer program. The map only took a few seconds to activate, and within fifteen seconds it showed John Allen’s location as Lake Pushmataha. That’s interesting, he thought, having expected to find the Porsche parked at a country club somewhere. He dialed John Allen’s phone number once more, and again it rang and went to voice mail. His next call was to the tribal officer who’d recently seen him.

  “I need a favor,” Hoss said.

  “Anything.”

  “Go ride out to Lake Pushmataha and see if you see John Allen parked near the levee.”

  “Roger that.”

  “I’ll wait on your call.”

  Hoss leaned back in his chair. John Allen could be fishing or sunbathing, though the latter would be surprising. He probably had a woman with him and didn’t want Agent Emma Haden to know. That thought made Hoss smile.

  Sweat was beading all over John Allen as he continued to struggle with the restraints. The stress of the kidnapping and the increasing heat inside the skinning shed were quickly dehydrating him. He had, at least, managed to position a plastic bucket where he could sit on it, which took some strain off his knees.

  He needed to find a way out of here before they returned. If he didn’t, this would be where he died. He wasn’t afraid of dying, not after all he’d been through losing Sadie and their unborn child. He’d often felt like dying over the past couple of years. But with the reality of his death hitting home, he realized he didn’t want to die, especially not at the hands of Winston Walker and his partner. But it wasn’t just his current, dire circumstances that had triggered this reversal. He hadn’t thought about dying in some time. What had changed his feelings, and when had they changed? He didn’t recall a specific moment when he’d felt the shift. All he knew for certain, sitting in the dark skinning shed, hands and feet bound by giant zip ties, was that he wanted to live.

  Suddenly John Allen was overwhelmed by all the things he hadn’t done. He wanted a child to show the world to—to teach to fish and to skip rocks, to coach their baseball or soccer teams. He wanted a wife to love and to share experiences with. He wanted a love like he’d had with Sadie. And along with that thought came the utter certainty that she would want him to move on. That was hard to accept, but he knew in his heart it was the truth. If the situation were reversed, he would want her to be happy and to live a fulfilled life. John Allen bowed his head and said a prayer for strength and courage. The act of praying calmed his mind.

  A few minutes later, John Allen sighed. None of this mattered if he didn’t get out of here today. Right here, right now, it was time to man up.

  His mind slid to Emma. Was she looking for him by now? He knew she’d be trying to call him, at the very least. Just the idea of Emma gave him strength. He didn’t even know her that well, but the image of whom he thought Emma was flowed through the channels of his mind like clear, refreshing river water.

  Hoss answered his phone, expecting to finally hear some news about John Allen’s whereabouts. “Did you find him?”

  “No, sir. I drove all the way around the lake, and I didn’t see his Porsche. I even asked a few people, and they haven’t seen the car.”

  Hoss was confused, as the GPS trackers were usually very accurate. They might be off a few hundred feet at most. “Where are you now?”

  “I’m in the field beside the levee. Right where you said he’d be parked.”

  Hoss scratched his head. “Okay, thanks. I’m sorry to have sent you on a wild-goose chase.”

  “Not the first time, boss,” the officer said with a laugh.

  “Yeah, and it probably won’t be the last. I’ll see you back at the jail,” Hoss said, appreciating the officer’s attitude.

  Hoss stared out the window. Maybe John Allen had found the tracker and had thrown it into the lake. Now that made some sense. It had been two months since Hoss had checked up on him. That thing could have been at the lake for weeks. Hell, he would do the same thing if the chief put one on his vehicle. In fact, he checked his car frequently. He didn’t want anyone to know where he was all the time.

  He thought about calling Agent Haden and letting her know he’d struck out, but he decided that would be implied if he didn’t call back. Hoss needed to get back to the jail and take another run at Gina before she got smart and lawyered up.

  Emma was mad, concerned, and just downright frustrated. Normally on a Sunday afternoon when she didn’t have to work, she had plenty to do at home. There was that long bed of daylilies in her yard that needed to be divided. Sometimes in the spring and summer, she would lie in her happy chair and soak up the sun. Her car needed washing, and the house needed cleaning. She’d also promised herself a six-mile run on part of the Natchez Trace. Emma had options—some she needed to do, and some she just wanted to do—yet what she did was enter John Allen’s address in the GPS of her BMW X1 and start driving toward Columbus, Mississippi.

  She had to see for herself that he was okay. And if he was just hanging out or playing g
olf, she was going to let him have a piece of her mind. In a way she hoped he was playing golf. It was better than the image her worst fears formed in her mind.

  As she drove, Emma called Agent Garner and asked him to call his contact at the Meridian police and have him check with the bartender to see if he’d seen Winston lately. He grunted but agreed because he knew Emma had good hunches, and he’d seen them pay off too many times.

  She then worried about whether Winston had a snitch in the police department. It had happened before. The FBI often withheld information from local police departments for that very reason. You never knew.

  Chapter 30

  Winston positioned a chair where he could see down the driveway and watched for anyone to approach. He figured that somehow John Allen had to have been wired when they were in the bar, and the police should be swarming him soon. He couldn’t understand why they hadn’t already. He thought he had a grasp on police procedures, but this one was confusing to him.

  The knee injury forced him to really sit and think, something he couldn’t recall doing in years and years—if ever. He bounced between moments of paranoia and moments of profound audacity until suddenly he realized he was tired of his life. He was exhausted from trying to stay one step ahead of everybody. The bank wanted to foreclose on his house, and he owed more than it was worth. The magazine-publishing business was a disaster. He owed two printers money and didn’t have any hope of printing another issue. The situation was so bad it had forced him to kill a key employee to keep him from talking. The artifact business was lucrative, but it was getting complicated. He now believed Rosco, the janitor at the Choctaw offices, had set him up, so Winston was glad he’d killed the man. He took stock of his situation and realized he had no wife, no girlfriend, no business, and no real reason to stay in Meridian, Mississippi. Plus, if he stayed, there was a good chance he was going to be locked up.

  Depressed and guzzling a cold beer, Winston thought about leaving—just packing up whatever he wanted to keep and driving off to start over. He could start over someplace where the locals didn’t know his reputation. Suddenly he was excited in a way he hadn’t been since before the magazine started tanking several years ago. Looking around the room, he saw that he didn’t have much. The furniture was cheap and worn. Picking up his iPhone, Winston dialed another misguided individual who would always help him if there was a promise of cash or drugs. Knowing exactly what to say, he made a promise, and help was on the way. The worker was used to odd requests at odd hours. Since he wasn’t doing anything, he was happy to come help. In return, Winston promised him the accessories to make him the hit of the club later that night.

  With a little luck, Winston Walker would roll out of Meridian before sunset. He planned to drive south and stay in Mobile or Fairhope for the night. He could sleep in his Suburban and work his way down to the Keys. That’s where he’d always wanted to live. That’s where he’d start over. There, in the sunshine and surrounded by water, would be an unlimited number of young women aspiring to be models. They would be ripe to take advantage of in more ways than one. He could nurture their careers with advice and specialized photography that he could learn about on the web. He’d make a fake Wikipedia page documenting his prowess and be in business. He’d start over as a photographer for aspiring models. Maybe there’s a digital magazine idea in there, he thought. Digital was the future. He wouldn’t have to pay a printer or postage. The Girls of South Florida. The more he thought about it, the more he loved it. He’d stop at the first Hooters he came to in Florida, pretend he was a well-known photographer, and start working on his con. By the time he arrived in Key West, the ruse would be perfected.

  Winston never thought about Runt again.

  Runt picked the remnants of his chicken meal from his teeth as he drove. He’d never once considered not doing what Winston asked of him. He always did what Winston asked.

  They’d met after Runt had moved back to Meridian to get away from an ex-wife and mother-in-law. He’d grown up near there, but after dropping out of high school in tenth grade, he’d moved to Pascagoula and had started working on the local fishing fleet. He’d been a bait boy and had cleaned fish, working his way up to his dream job on a shrimp boat. There had never been enough money to make it to the next week, but the salt air and the roar of the diesel engines were reward enough. On the water, he hadn’t had bill collectors chasing him or known where to spend the money he hadn’t had. It was perfect. Friday had been payday, and Runt had been broke by Monday.

  By the time he was eighteen, though, he’d gotten a local girl pregnant. After a shotgun wedding, he went to work for her father, sanding and painting boats. The money was better, but he was expected to spend it in ways he didn’t enjoy. They had a single-wide trailer he hated going home to, since his mother-in-law was always there. From day one, they’d despised each other. She knew he was worthless and rarely missed a chance to point it out. All he wanted to do was stay in the bars and drink. He had no idea how to be a daddy to the little boy. He basically looked at the kid and only saw the thing that had ruined his life.

  One Friday night there was rumored to be a Jubilee occurring on the beach near the Alabama line. Everyone in the trailer park left with nets and coolers to go scoop up the bounty of fish and crabs that floated in during this rare event, which only happens along the Alabama and Mississippi coast. Runt was as excited as everyone else about a chance for free food. After packing every cooler he could steal with crabs and flounder, he made a determination that he wasn’t going home to the trailer. He couldn’t take the torturous lifestyle any longer. With a freshly cashed paycheck in his pocket and stolen Yeti coolers packed with seafood, he started driving and ended up back in Meridian, the only other place he knew. He sold seafood and even traded some for a place to live for a week. Happy and homeless, he met Winston Walker, who promised him opportunities to make quick cash and a chance to put his past behind him. Runt admired Winston. He had things, and he knew how to talk to people and get them to do what he wanted. He viewed Winston as a big brother looking out for him.

  Runt started out doing odd jobs and lived in Winston’s pool house until he found a place of his own. He was fearless and would do whatever was asked of him. Winston knew Indians and was like an encyclopedia of knowledge. He knew where they lived and where they should dig to find artifacts. Fascinated, Runt soaked in all this historical information that he’d never heard. The more they dug and found, the more Runt loved it, and soon he was addicted to digging for artifacts. Within a few months, he was Winston’s main digger, capable of finding the locations Winston pointed out on a map and never getting caught by the landowners.

  Runt’s only problem was that he didn’t like sharing all the artifacts. Winston sold everything they found within a few days, but the more Runt learned and understood about the Indians, the harder it was to part with his findings. Careful not to let Winston suspect anything, he’d held a few back each time to slowly build his own collection that he promised himself he would never sell.

  He searched the messy dash for his Skoal as he turned his old Toyota truck into the gate of their hunting club. It would be dark soon, and he had a job to do.

  The digital thermometer on Emma’s car read ninety-five degrees as she followed the GPS that led her to John Allen’s house. When she pulled into the gravel drive, she couldn’t see a barn anywhere, but the GPS was telling her she’d arrived. The gate wasn’t fancy—it was just a rusty farm gate. The road inside the gate crested over a hill, and she wondered whether the barn lay over the horizon. It was the only option that made sense.

  She looked for cows. If she climbed over the gate, Emma did not want to be chased by a bull. She’d done that in college when she and some sorority sisters tried to tip a cow. She hadn’t thought of that in years, and the memory made her smile.

  The gate didn’t turn out to be a problem. As she pulled closer to park her car out of the road, it sprang open. That’s nice, she thought, and drove forward.
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  When she topped the hill, she saw the barn and the Jeep parked off to the side. She parked in the gravel and looked around. There was no landscaping around the barn or the only door, though to the south there was a beautiful pond that had two adult Canada geese and several goslings swimming in the center. The nervous parents were eyeing her suspiciously while the youngsters swam in a tight ball that prevented her from counting them.

  Taking in the whole scene, she noticed the grass had been recently cut. The FBI agent touched her pistol to remind herself she was working and needed to be careful.

  Knowing the sheriff’s deputy had touched the doorknob, she went ahead and did the same. The new knob turned effortlessly, and she pushed open the door.

  “Is anyone home?” she called, and added a quick “Hello?”

  Silence greeted her, so she was convinced John Allen wasn’t home. She flipped on a light and surveyed the room. The furniture looked like it had been purchased recently at a chain furniture store. There were no pictures hanging on the walls, but she wasn’t there to judge John Allen’s tastes in decor. She looked for signs of a struggle or for a clue that would indicate where he might be.

  On the floor was a slip of paper that turned out to be John Allen’s pay stub from Choctaw Nation. She couldn’t help but look at the amount but didn’t compute his salary from it. She thought that was a bit odd. That’s not something someone leaves lying on the floor, especially someone as neat as John Allen appeared to be.

  Moving into the bedroom, she saw a few drawers open, just like the deputy had said. Although it looked like a teenage boy’s room, something seemed out of place. Studying the room more carefully, she noticed a leather change holder beside the bed. It didn’t have any change in it, but tucked in the corner was John Allen’s wedding ring. Now that seemed odd. She hadn’t seen him yet without his wedding ring on. She doubted he’d gone anywhere without it unless he was playing golf. She figured some guys probably took off their wedding rings to play.