by Jeff Carson
“What did you do to her?”
“We’ve done nothing, Deputy. Please take a seat and we’ll explain,” Frye said.
Patterson stood motionless for another second.
“Deputy, please.”
She sat.
MacLean nodded at her, looking none too happy that his office was being used as an FBI command post for the second day in a row. His silver goatee seemed to have less luster, his impeccably groomed hair a dollop of grease too heavy.
His eyes were creased with a hint of worry, devoid of the cock-sure glow they normally possessed.
“Deputy Patterson, do you know where David Wolf is?” Frye asked.
“No. Now explain to me why my mother is sitting in this office. Did you bring her here from Aspen? Don’t you know that her husband and two sons are extremely accomplished lawyers?”
“And she’s going to need them,” Frye answered without hesitation.
Patterson looked at her mother.
“I’m sorry, honey.” A tear fell down her mother’s cheek. “I didn’t want to get you in trouble.”
“Your mother had a busy day yesterday, colluding with your Aunt Margaret to help Wolf escape from Rocky Points. Your aunt drove him out on County 17 and met your mother, where Wolf swapped keys and got into your mother’s truck, with her consent of course, and escaped over the mountains to the west. We have your mother’s confession all on video.”
Patterson looked her mother in the eye and squeezed her hand. “Good job, Mom.”
Frye smiled and sat on the edge of MacLean’s desk in front of her. “Not a good job, Mom. Jail time, Mom.”
Patterson lifted her chin and glared at Frye.
“Have you spoken with David Wolf, Deputy?”
“No.”
“May I please look at your cell phone?”
“Not without a warrant.”
Frye flicked a finger. “Cumberland, can you bring Deputy Patterson down to a holding cell until we line up that warrant, please?”
Patterson pulled out her phone and flung it at Frye.
He caught it and poked the button with his index finger. “Thank you.” Keeping completely silent with his head down, he perused her phone.
Patterson reached over and squeezed her mother’s arm.
Her mother nodded and tried to smile.
“As you can see, I have not spoken with David Wolf.”
He turned the screen and thrust it toward her. “What did you two speak about on Tuesday morning?”
“You’ve already asked me that and I told you.”
Frye smiled. “I don’t believe you.”
She shrugged. “Like I said, we spoke about how you guys were suddenly so interested in him. And now that all this is happening, I’ve gotta say, I’m finding the whole thing very interesting.”
Frye raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really? Do tell.”
“Gail Olson’s time of death was seventy-two hours ago.”
“And how do you know that?”
“So why is it that she was killed seventy-two hours ago, supposedly by Wolf, and yet you guys didn’t see him leave his house to do it?”
Frye blinked rapidly and turned down the corners of his mouth. “Care to elaborate?”
“Yes. You were watching his house with three surveillance teams, and the two guys in the unmarked on his road, and yet he escaped and went to go kill Gail Olson?”
Frye raised his hands. “You said it yourself, he escaped. He’s a very slippery man.”
Patterson shook her head. “No. Your teams would’ve seen him leave. He’s not in any condition to be walking out of there across the wilderness. Hell, Gail Olson was found twenty-five miles away over the other side of Williams Pass. Wolf couldn’t walk up the low hill we climbed and back without passing out after we were done, much less hike a mountain range. No, you guys are hiding something.”
MacLean closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. “He could have used the motorcycle in his barn and taken some trails to go kill Gail Olson.”
“He hasn’t used that motorcycle in ages. The gas is probably bad in the tank. Otherwise he would’ve used it to slip away yesterday morning, and not risk floating by your two agents in a canoe.”
She leaned forward. “And what about Gail Olson’s mother going missing in Las Vegas? Are you thinking he had something to do with that? Are you thinking I, or Deputy Rachette, or any of the other Sluice County deputies had anything to do with that? No, of course you’re not.”
She looked over at her mother.
Her mother was glaring at Frye with the hint of a satisfied smile.
“You’ve been working your own investigation, Deputy,” Frye said slowly.
“I’m a cop. It’s what I do. And my investigation is telling me that someone is setting up my old boss. Who happens to be the best man I’ve ever met.”
Frye pointed at her and smiled. “ME Lorber. That’s your source.”
She ignored him. “This investigation is BS.”
“We found the murder weapon in Wolf’s shed yesterday.”
“Brought to you by the anonymous, garbled, untraceable voice on the telephone.”
“That voice was right about Gail Olson, and right about the weapon’s location.”
“It would’ve been a crappy frame job if it had been wrong.”
“Wolf was jealous of Carter Willis and Sarah Muller’s relationship and killed them both.”
“Wolf loved Sarah Muller with every fiber of his being and would never have hurt her.”
Frye stood up abruptly and paced in front of her, his hands clasped behind his back. Then he stopped.
The door to the office flew open and an agent leaned inside. “Sir.”
Frye looked up, annoyed.
“The Gunnison County Sheriff’s Department has found Wolf and Special Agent Luke.”
Patterson sat straight. “Luke is with him?”
Frye ignored her and stepped out of the office, Cumberland on his heels.
MacLean, Patterson, and her mother watched silently as Frye’s head bounced up and down outside and the agents scattered at a full run.
Frye walked back into the office, his eyes locked on Patterson, and stalked to the edge of MacLean’s desk. Resuming his seated position, he breathed deeply through his nose, contemplating something.
“You’re free to go, Deputy. Please stay available.”
“What are you going to do with my mother?”
“Put her back in the holding cells downstairs with your aunt.”
“Sir,” she looked at MacLean, “surely you gentlemen know my mother and aunt were just trying to do the right thing. They had no intention of breaking federal laws.”
MacLean held up his hands and flicked a glance at Frye.
Frye stood up and walked from the room. “Agent Cumberland,” he said, and Cumberland followed him out.
Patterson sat with her mouth open and then glared at MacLean. “Mom, just stay strong. We’re going to prove that Wolf is innocent of any wrong-doing, and then they’re going to let you go.”
“Okay, honey.” Her voice was barely audible.
Patterson looked at her and gripped her arm. “I promise.”
MacLean stood with an apologetic look. “Deputy, please.”
Patterson left the office, and her mother to cower in a jail cell.
Lancaster materialized next to her. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“To work.”
Patterson followed silently behind the undersheriff, giving a final glance back to her mother, who was being escorted out of MacLean’s office without handcuffs. At least that was something.
Chapter 18
Wolf jogged fast through the rear parking lot of the restaurant and veered to the right, down a dirt two-track alley backing the Gunnison Main Street storefront buildings.
Luke strode next to him and cracked the lid of the to-go container.
“I hope that’s the best breakfast burrito you’ve ever
had in your life,” Wolf said. “When Toby figures out you stole food, there’s no telling what he’ll do. Maybe he’ll call the cops.”
She ignored him and jabbed the fork inside the box.
“I hate to tell you this, but holding that burrito is now a liability.”
She looked down at the container she’d worked so hard for, closed it, and slam-dunked it into the next dumpster. “Damn it.”
As they approached the first cross street, Luke held out the storage unit key to him. “You go to the storage yard across the street. I’ll be behind you.”
“Good idea. They’re looking for two of us.” He glanced backwards. Still no pursuit from Toby or anyone else. “I’ll cross the street here and walk up the other side.”
“I’ll wait a bit and cross at the next block.” She leaned against a brick wall.
Wolf fingered a small plastic puck dangling from the keychain. “What’s this?”
“I don’t know. Just go.”
Wolf ducked back into the alley next to her and then took the plastic puck off the key ring. “It’s a magnetic key fob. It must be to get into the exterior gate. They had a concrete wall around the whole place. I’ll leave this on the ground outside next to the gate so you can get inside.”
“All right. Go.”
He walked around the corner and immediately saw two police officers milling around on the corner a half-block straight ahead. He stepped off the curb and crossed the street, keeping his hands in his jeans pockets and his head down.
In his peripheral vision, he saw the two officers walk to his right down the sidewalk, toward the restaurant.
He needed to move.
Reaching the intersection of the side street and Main, he stopped, pushed the crosswalk button, and then stood patiently.
A couple of officers were jogging down the sidewalk toward him, and he held his breath as they drew nearer.
The light turned, and the little white man told him to walk, so he did.
He stepped fast, resisting the urge to break into a run.
Crossing onto the other side of the road, he saw that every single patron on the sidewalk was either slowing or already at a complete stop, gawking at the action on the other side.
As Wolf swerved between people, he decided to openly gawk himself. Because to not do so would bring attention.
Directly across the street, a growing group of law-enforcement personnel from the Gunnison County Sheriff’s Department and Gunnison Police Department swarmed around their abandoned truck.
He locked eyes with a cop, who assessed him for a second and then slid his gaze further down the sidewalk.
Wolf zipped up the sweater and caught a glimpse of Luke crossing the street to his left.
He smiled at a nearby patron and walked on. After crossing another intersection, he reached the entrance of the Trout Creek Moving and Storage, which was a bent wrought iron gate with a magnetic key panel mounted on a concrete wall next to it.
He placed the key fob on the reader and the door clicked and squealed open with a gentle push. He walked in, and then bent down and slid the fob up under the gate as it latched closed.
He stood up and walked inside, feeling a small sense of relief being obscured by the concrete wall of the grounds and hidden from the eyes of his gaggle of pursuers.
The numbers of the near units were in the single digits and he needed to get to #62, so he got his bearings and walked to his left.
Stopping at the next row, he counted the units along one side and calculated it ending at #50, so he moved on to the alleyway of doors.
As he reached the next row he heard the metal gate in the distance close. Luke had made it inside, but he didn’t bother looking back, because his eyes were locked on a huge diesel pickup truck parked down the row of units he was about to enter. Up on the left side of the alley, a man leaned inside the passenger door of his huge, lifted, vehicle, while his piece-of-crap storage unit door yawned open behind him, revealing a darkened space.
Hopefully it wouldn’t come to stealing this man’s truck, compounding the severity of their criminal spree, he thought. But, at the moment, there was no other way out of here, other than on their own two feet.
Hopefully inside their destination storage unit was so much evidence, such a glaring nullification of Wolf’s guilt, that he and Luke could simply walk across the street and hand it over to the nearest cop.
Passing #54, he counted two digits at a time so he could lock eyes with the unit and will it to contain what he needed as he approached.
His heart skipped when he reached the number 62 and landed on the man with the truck, who was now walking back into the open storage unit.
Wolf counted again and came up with the same destination.
Walking back out into the sun, the man eyed Wolf for a second and then disappeared again inside.
Wolf shoved his hands in his pockets and walked at an even pace, veering slightly to his right to give the truck a wide berth. When he passed the unit, he glanced over at the darkened interior and was surprised to see wide eyeballs staring back at him. Like a ghost in a dark room, a white-skinned, muscular, man stood inside, looking out like a rabid, albino, animal.
Wolf suppressed any facial expression and gave a curt nod. “Morning.”
Then his view was blocked out by the huge pickup, which upon second glance looked more ominous than before. It was lifted with knobbed tires, with an extended cab lined with jet-black tinted windows. The truck bed was covered, it too lined with obsidian-colored glass too dark to see inside.
Head down, Wolf continued past the truck and felt the man’s eyes on his back.
Wolf was unarmed, and with each footstep he felt more vulnerable as he thought of the laser glare of the man in the unit.
“Sheriff Wolf!”
A jolt of adrenaline shot through him at the mention of his name, but he kept walking.
“How about this. Stop right there, Sheriff Wolf, or I’m going to shoot you in the back of the head.”
He stopped and turned around, holding his hands out from his sides.
The guy was outside of the storage unit now, thrusting what looked to be a Beretta M9 handgun in his direction. His skin glared like snow in the sun. His blonde hair was cropped to the skull, almost as white. With eyes now squinted, he used his free hand to block the sun, displaying an elaborate tattoo on his skin.
Wolf saw the ink running up the man’s arm was a rendition of the Pope, dressed in his papal tiara and costume, pointing his staff as if firing a machine gun. The holy man’s teeth were bared, lips curling, eyes dark red. Fire shot from his staff into a crowd of people, which had been expertly drawn as exploding into chunks of flesh down his forearm.
He noted the barrel of this pigment-challenged man’s gun shook in his meaty fist.
“I think you’re mistaken.” Wolf cowered down submissively, keeping his hands high. “My name’s not Wolf. I’m not a sheriff.”
The guy stepped all the way to Wolf and put the barrel inches from his forehead. Four months ago, Wolf would’ve had the pistol and the guy on the ground. Today, he hesitated, doubting the speed and strength of his vastly injured body against this man who was clearly a fan of lifting weights.
Stepping back quickly, the man smiled, revealing crooked teeth. “Not a sheriff, huh?”
“My name’s John. I’m just going to my storage unit, there.”
“I know exactly who you are, Sheriff Wolf. And I’m damn glad I caught up with you. I heard you’d escaped.”
A siren whooped in the distance and the man’s eyes bulged. “Wait a minute, you brought them here?” He looked over his shoulder toward the concrete wall at the end of the row and did a double take at the sight of a woman walking toward them.
Lowering his pistol, the white-skinned man bared his teeth. “You say a word or make a move, I shoot you in front of this bitch, and then I shoot this bitch. Got that? Now lower your hands, damn it.”
Wolf lowered his hands.
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Glancing between Wolf and the approaching woman, the man turned to the side and lowered his pistol to his thigh.
For a few moments, Wolf watched as thoughts went through the guy’s brain. One second the man was looking at the ground, and then he creased his forehead and looked up, locking eyes with Wolf.
When the man’s eyes widened and he turned to study Special Agent Luke walking closer, Wolf stepped straight into him, blocking the rising gun with his left arm while he punched as hard as he could in the man’s throat. In his peripheral vision, he saw Luke spring forward, bounding toward them like an Olympic sprinter.
Momentarily stunned, the white-skinned man croaked and his eyes bulged; then he erupted into frenzied action.
Wolf gripped the man’s gun arm with both of his hands and backed into him, and it felt like grabbing the hoof of a rhinoceros after kicking its balls.
A vicious blow slammed into the back of his head while his body was thrust forward. Tasting blood as he bit into his own tongue, his vision blurred for an instant as another flurry of blows hit him from behind on the neck and skull.
But Wolf held his relentless grip, knowing that if he gave back control of the arm he and Luke were both dead.
Then he was lifted from his feet and everything swirled, and then he was on his back and staring at the gun from a new, worse, angle.
But still, he had a hold with both hands, and the pistol was aimed at the ground a few inches to the side of his head.
Behind the gun, the man’s face was shaking but otherwise completely calm. With sheer force, the barrel of the gun twisted ten degrees, then twenty, then pointed at Wolf’s left eye, the cold steel almost touching his eyeball.
“Don’t shoot. They’ll hear you,” Wolf said. “Then they’ll come for you.”
The man’s eyes narrowed.
Then the black blur of a shoe came into view, accompanied by a slap as it connected hard with the man’s white face.
His eyes rolled to the back of his head as he toppled sideways. His grip on the pistol let up and Wolf wrenched it away.
As the man teetered, Luke reared back and kicked his face again, and when she connected, it was even more of a vicious blow, whiplashing the man’s head back.