by Bob Mayer
Chase turned the DVD off. This wasn’t getting him any closer to Vladislav or Rivers. Chase pulled out his hand-cruncher and began squeezing it hard.
He turned the DVD back on. The camera panned over the bodies of the girls and the woman. Some had died easily-- a bullet to the head. Others not so easy. Blades and blunt objects and suffocation had done the work. Chase remembered reading about the killing fields in Cambodia, where to save the price of a bullet; they put plastic bags over victims’ heads with their hands tied behind their backs. Some of the girls had died the same way. At one point, there was a close-up of a girl, maybe ten or eleven, with the clear plastic over her head, a man’s hand twisting it tight behind her as she kicked mouth open, eyes wide. The hand had a large gold ring on the middle finger. The camera stayed on the girl’s face until she died.
Three seconds of black with a sound Chase tried to place.
A drill. A dentist’s drill.
A man was tied to a heavy wood chair. Two soldiers had their arms clamped on his head, holding it back, their arms muscles bulging in their attempts to keep it immobile even with the leather strap tight around the man’s forehead assisting them.
A man in a black fatigues was leaning over the man’s mouth. He was a big man, his hands holding a drill. He turned his head to call over his shoulder and--
Chase dropped his crunch ball and stared at the screen. He knew the man.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Masters’ face was pale. He’d already puked his lunch into Chase’s sink. That had happened only thirty seconds into the blow-torching opening.
Chase fast-forwarded to Vladislav doing his work, skipping the rape scene. “That’s him. New name is Peter Watkins.”
Masters washed his mouth out with some water. "The husband of that woman you interviewed at the country club?"
Chase nodded. "Linda Watkins.” He paused the screen, freezing his face turned toward the camera.
There was a hand over the edge of the camera, that same large gold ring glittering. Chase forwarded a couple of more frames until he had a clear view of Vladislav’s face.
“And he’s dealing drugs?” Masters rubbed a palm across his forehead as he thought about it.
“And I have a very good idea how he gets the drugs into the States,” Chase said. “The Patriots bring it in via Canada. Right over the border, probably in four-wheel drive vehicles on old mule and jeep trails. They bring it down here to Boulder and probably do a dead drop that Vladislav services.
“Then Vladislav passes some or all of the drugs on to Rachel at the swinger’s club, which is a perfect cut out. It was his way of insulating himself from whomever he was dealing to. Rachel Stevens was his cut out. She picked up the stuff from the swingers club. Think about what a great cover that place was. No one admits being there; no one knows the others real names. It’s perfect. Vladislav followed me home from the club that night I was there, killed my landlord’s dog and took a shot at me.
“Rachel dropped the drugs in the gym bag off at the lockers in the CU library. She probably in turn picked up the cash her next night at school and brought it to the damn country club when she played Linda in tennis. Whoever was getting the drugs had no idea Vladislav was the supplier. He or she could even watch Rachel do the drop and not know.”
The pieces were falling in place in Chase’s mind faster and faster. “That’s why Rivers was hitting up dealers. He was trying to work his way up the supply chain. The only problem is that we taught Vladislav how to use such things as a cut out and a dead drop ourselves. Right here in the States at Fort Benning at the School of the Americas.”
Masters pointed at the TV screen. “This guy is bad news. Really bad news. Let someone else deal with him.”
“Who?” Chase asked. He was looking out the door at the spot where he’d buried Astral.
Masters had no answer. “Did he kill Stevens?”
“Probably. I’ll ask him when I see him.”
“So you’re going after him now?”
“Not directly.”
Masters frowned. “But you just said—“
“I’ve got to close it all out,” Chase said. “Go to the airport, get the bird ready, and I’ll give you a call when I’m ready.”
Masters nodded. “Roger that.”
After Masters left, Chase went to his bedroom and pulled out a geographic map of the Boulder area. He called Thorne and wasted no time with pleasantries.
“Where did you meet Rivers in the mountains?”
“Eldora ski area. Next to the lake as you drive in.”
“Do you have a night vision scope I can mount on an M-21?”
“Yes.”
“Have it ready for me. I’ll be by in an hour.”
Chase clicked the phone off and looked at the map. That made sense. The ski area was closed for the season and no one would make the precipitous drive up there unless they had a very specific reason. There were thousands upon thousands of acres of wilderness in the Roosevelt and Arapaho National Forests surrounding Eldora. Tourists rarely went in that area, the vast majority flocking to the better-known Rocky Mountain National Forest to the north.
Chase sat on the floor, the topo map spread out before him. He was Rivers, looking for an isolated base-camp to operate from while he snuck into Boulder every so often, trying to track down Vladislav. Chase let go of his surroundings and enveloped himself entirely into the situation.
His eyes kept being drawn to the south and west of Eldora, to a black line crossing the Continental Divide. He knew that the only way to drive across the Continental Divide in this part of the Rockies was either I-70 out of Denver, which was south of Boulder, or to drive all the way up north to Estes Park and go through the Rocky Mountain National Park on Trail Ridge Road. Over fifty miles of impassable mountains in between. Except for this one black line. But it wasn’t a road. He’d been there and knew exactly what it was; and he knew that Rivers would go there. They’d gone through the same training and a lot of the same experiences. Civilians wouldn’t understand it. But it was the place because Rivers also had something special in his file.
The place was Moffat Tunnel.
Thorne had mentioned that Rivers had been a tunnel rat in the 101st Airborne during his one tour as a young private in Vietnam before coming back to the States and going into ROTC in college after the war. That took a weird mindset to be willing to crawl into a small, narrow dirt tunnel with just a flashlight and .45-caliber pistol in hand, searching for the enemy. Hell, Chase thought, compared to what he’d crawled into in Vietnam, the Moffat would look like the Ritz to Rivers.
Chase reached over and searched through the pile of magazines and books next to his bed. He found what he looking for-- a guidebook to the trails and parks of Colorado. It had a page on the Moffat Tunnel.
Just before the turn of the century, the Union Pacific had only two routes through the Rockies. One was way north of Denver through Wyoming. The other was a hundred miles south through Pueblo and across Royal Gorge. David Moffat, a local businessman, realized Denver was being bypassed. He got together the financing to try to build a rail line due west out of Denver. Construction began in 1905.
The line went from Denver into South Boulder, just a few miles from where Chase was sitting. Originally, Moffat ran the line over Rollins Pass, building a two-mile long snow shed over the tracks to keep it open the half of the year the pass was inundated with snow. Even with the shed, though, delays were common. Moffat even had the rotary snowplow for trains invented to try to keep his line running, but he realized he needed another answer. He died before he could implement the new solution.
In 1923, construction started at both ends of what was to be the Moffat Tunnel. Cutting right through James Peak it would reduce what had been a five-hour train ride over the pass in good weather to twelve minutes in any weather.
It took five years to cut, but eventually both side met up, only and the tunnel was completed. Over 6.2 miles long it cost 29 lives and mill
ions of dollars to complete. It was still the highest rail line in the United States and the perfect place for Rivers.
Chase figured the Colonel would camp outside the eastern portal to the tunnel. The only people who ever went up there-- besides the trains-- were ice climbers in the winter and mountain bikers in the summer, both of whom had to brave a long unmarked, dirt road that switch backed off the Rollins Pass Road to the east portal
Chase knew the elevation and view would give Rivers extended warning of anyone coming on the road. If he sensed a threat, he could retreat into the tunnel, which reduced the bad guys to approaching from one direction and being easy targets.
To coordinate bringing people in both sides of the tunnel at the same time would require sending those coming in from the west on a three hour ride south, through Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70, then thirty miles north on a hard climb to the western portal.
There was a lot of land west of Boulder where Rivers could be hiding, but only a couple of places where he might be, and Chase was sure this was the one place he would be.
Chase put on his fatigues, combat vest, grabbed his gear and went out the back door. Louise was in the yard with Star scampering around her. She was watering his garden. She looked at Chase, noted all the gear he was carrying and the way he was dressed and turned the hose off.
“Horace.”
Chase paused.
Louise pointed at the turned up dirt. “Your plants are growing.”
Chase hadn’t noticed, but now that he looked, he saw a few short shards of green poking through.
“Be careful, Horace.”
“I will.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Masters brought the chopper in fast to the hospital helipad, flaring about twenty feet up. The Huey’s skids touched down lightly as Masters kept the power revved up. Chase threw his ruck and duffel bag in the back and climbed into the front left seat.
Masters had the bird airborne, gaining altitude, before Chase had his seatbelt fastened. Masters was chewing gum, blowing a large bubble that almost reached the shaded visor he had pulled down over his eyes. The bubble popped. Chase put on a headset.
“This is a maintenance test flight,” Masters said. He already had the aircraft about two thousand feet over Boulder. Chase could see the large COLORADO painted in each end zone of CU’s stadium. “Where to?”
“You know where Moffat Tunnel is?”
“South of Rollins Pass,” Masters was pointing the nose of the Huey west. “I usually take Rollins any time I fly west. Easiest and most direct way to get through the mountains.”
“Can you put me on top of the east portal?”
“Sure thing. Be there in fifteen minutes.”
Chase took off the headset and climbed between the seats to the rear, careful not to hit Masters’ arm. Chase put on his old battered green beret, with the 10th Group flash still sown above the left eye, the gold leaf of a major pinned on top of the flash. Chase grabbed the MP-5 and slung it over his left shoulder, cinching down the sling so it was secure. Then he pulled out the long case for the M-21. He put the headset back on over the beret.
“Going hunting?” Masters asked, glancing over his shoulder.
“Yes.”
“I’m just a glorified taxi driver, remember.” Masters was rubbing in Chase’s face a comment he’d made at the Wagon Wheel one night about helicopter pilots.
Chase had been so busy making calls and getting gear together, that he hadn’t really thought about the entire situation much after making his plan. Chase knew if he thought about it too much the holes would start appearing.
“Five minutes,” Masters informed him.
Chase sat back on his pack-- the rucksack flop as instructors in Ranger and Special Forces School called it-- and thought about something other than the flimsiness of the plan. Here he was, on board a chopper, weapon across his knees. Sylvie would have used the term déjà vu.
That was another bad thought. A dark place to send his mind when he was four minutes out from possibly confronting the most dangerous man he’d probably ever meet. A man who was trained in all the black arts like Chase, but had practiced them for real a lot longer; and in a lot more places. And who had slid over the edge from sanity. Chase believed Rivers had checked his conscience at the door when he decided to go after Vladislav and that made him unpredictable. Chase reached up and felt the green beret scrunched on top of his head. He hoped it would give him a few seconds.
“One minute. How you getting home?”
“I’ll call you on the satellite phone. Can you set down somewhere and monitor for me?”
“Roger that. I’ll just go back to the airport and camp out in the maintenance room. Just don’t call me in to a hot LZ.”
“There’ll be one man left standing, one way or the other.”
Cody pulled up the dark visor and his eyes met Chase’s. “Good luck.”
The top of James Peak loomed ahead. The storm clouds Masters had noted earlier loomed above it. Chase could see the rail line coming up a long spur and disappearing into the side of the mountain about six hundred feet below where the chopper was headed. He didn’t tell Masters they were probably already in someone’s rifle sights.
Masters did his usual expert job of standing off to the side of mountain, one skid on, one off. His head was turned left, paying close attention to where the blades were.
Chase opened the door and got out onto the left skid. He slid the door shut behind him, then jumped. His feet hit loose rock and then he slid about ten feet down the side of the mountain, underneath the chopper even as Masters banked away and flew off to the east. Chase came to a halt, the M-21 held out away from the body, the MP-5 having dug a gash out of his back.
Chase spit out dust and slowly sat up, feeling the rocks digging into his butt. He shook his head and then ducked as a rock about three feet to his left explode into fragments, peppering his side with rock splinters. The echo of the shot came a second later. Damn, he hated being right.
* * * * *
Rivers was looking over the M-21, which he had across his lap. The MP-5 and Glock were to his left. Chase was seated on the other side of the remains of a small campfire. Dry wood, which produced no smoke, was piled nearby, but the fire was long cold.
“Son, you’re out of date with this,” Rivers shook the M-21. “They got fifty caliber sniper rifles now that can blow a big hole through a man at a mile.”
Chase spoke his first words since Rivers had appeared from behind a boulder, his AK-47 aimed at Chase’s mid-section: “It’s what I was trained on.” Chase had simply put his hands up in the air, and Rivers had collected the weapons and walked Chase to his camp.
Rivers had made his home about twenty meters to the south of the east portal for the Moffat Tunnel. It couldn’t be seen from the rail line, and he had an excellent view of the dirt road that ran up from Rollinsville for miles and miles. Very far in the eastern distance in the haze, Chase could even make out the Great Plains.
Rivers had a rucksack leaning against a log and nothing else. Chase imagined the old man took his poncho hootch down every morning, rolled his sleeping bag and put it in the ruck-- regardless of whether he was going anywhere. Just good old SF training.
He wore faded OD green jungle fatigues. A Special Forces patch adorned the right shoulder indicating combat service in SF. A CIB with two stars-- combat infantry badge, the stars indicating he’d fought in two wars beyond the first one that he had been awarded the CIB for-- was sewn above his left chest pocket.
The man inside the fatigues was old and tired. Not the young buck who’d been in the picture on Thorne’s wall. The years spent in God-forsaken places around the world were etched on his face. He had a few wisps of white hair on his wrinkled skull. He was stick thin, as if wasting away. He should have been presiding over a grandson’s birthday party, not sitting in the mountains adorned with the tools of killing.
His eyes, though, were icy blue and pierced right through Chase as h
e looked up from the wallet which he’d appropriated when he expertly patted Chase down, removing the knife hidden in the left boot, the garrote under the belt, and the back-up .22 caliber derringer Chase had hidden inside his boxers, right next to his dick.
“What kind of bullshit is a Federal Liaison Investigator?”
“I’m not here in an official capacity.”
Rivers tossed the wallet into the dirt. “I’m assuming you earned that beret on your head. You wouldn’t be stupid enough to come up here wearing it if you hadn’t.”
“I was in Group and Delta for ten years after being in the Infantry.”
“Well, you can’t be all stupid. I know no one could have told you I was here cause no one knows I’m here, so you figured it out.” Rivers had the AK loosely cradled in his right hand, lying across his lap. He wiped his left hand across his forehead. Chase noticed that hand was shaking slightly. The one on the gun was rock steady. “But you’re on the wrong end of the gun so you can’t be all that bright either.” He thumbed through the stuff he’d taken out of Chase’s shirt pocket and stared at the picture. “Who is this?”
“My father.”
Rivers nodded. “Bill Chase.”
“You knew him?”
“Met him in-country,” Rivers said. He looked at Chase and his eyes narrowed. “Interesting. They never found his body after his camp was over-run.”
“I know.”
“Last someone saw of him, according to the Medal of Honor citation, he was manning a .50 caliber machinegun, covering the withdrawal of the rest of his team and the indig’s they were advising. Saved a lot of lives.”
“That’s what it says.”
“Of course, there’s shit it doesn’t say,” Rivers noted. “Like everything else, there’s another level to every story.”