He suspected that description could easily fit her as well. “How did you get to know special ops so well?” he asked.
“Just do,” she replied. He realized she was shutting down again, and he didn’t want that. It felt important to keep her talking.
“How long have you been out?”
“A little over six months. You?”
“A year and a half. You been doing the VA shrink thing?”
She nodded as she sheathed the knife. “Yeah. Does it get . . . any better?”
It was his turn to stare into the distance. “Yes. It takes time though. A lot of time. I’m not there yet.”
“It’s why I like the swamp,” she said. “It’s quiet out here.”
“No sudden noises, right? At least not the man-made kind. Out here, things are trying to kill you, which means you feel right at home. Back in the real world? Not so much.”
Their eyes met again. “That’s it exactly. Because all the real world does is mess with my head.”
She was up and moving away before he could comment.
A Marine, one who hadn’t found a way to adjust to civilian life. At least not yet. There was sadness and anger in her eyes. Hopefully that anger hadn’t found a home in one of the anti-government groups, because if she had joined up with them, he’d have to take her on. One thing he knew for sure, Marines never went down without one helluva fight.
Chapter Seven
One by one, the exhausted campers turned in about an hour after sunset. Even Preston called it a night after yet another warning about the raccoons. Cait sat on the platform, listening to the night sounds and watching the stars come out.
In the distance, a bull gator bellowed. Another joined in. In contrast, an owl hooted nearby, as the heavy dampness of the swamp blanketed the air. She’d already picked out a few reflective eyes in the water as the gators trolled around the platform. That might keep the raccoons at bay. Still, she and Preston had made sure the food was secured in the rafters, along with the trash.
Her nerves were still on edge, like fire ants racing up and down her back. She wanted to be anywhere but here, and the urge to jump into one of the canoes and take off was nearly overwhelming. And if she didn’t want to be found, Cait knew how to hide, even from a Ranger. Learning that Hardegree was one of them had helped fuel that desire. Those bastards were deadly—she’d seen them in action. Disabling a car would be child’s play to him.
The sound of deep, slow breathing came from the tent next to hers. His tent. Hardegree had wished everyone a good night, zipped up the flap, and was asleep in a few minutes. Another sign he’d spent time doing special-ops work: You slept when you had the chance.
75th Ranger Regiment. The elite of the elite. What were the odds? Too unlikely to be coincidence. The ex-soldier wasn’t the only one who made her skittish; the photographer was closemouthed, not fiddling with his camera gear nearly enough. Susan’s constant prattling had nearly driven her nuts, until Cait realized it was far too targeted for the woman to be an airhead.
Patti was bitchy, slinging biting comments at her boyfriend anytime he came near, and James looked nervous if you caught him just right. Only Bill was oblivious, writing reams of notes on a legal pad. He, of all of them, seemed true to character.
Why would someone want Mike off the tour? Why did they think he was a threat? What might happen if he wasn’t here? She had no answers to those questions.
Knowing it’d be another night wrestling with insomnia, Cait made one last trip to the toilet, then unzipped her tent. If she was lucky, she’d fall asleep for a couple hours. She knew better than to let herself sleep for much longer than that, or the nightmares would crowd her mind. They were bad enough when she was alone, but these folks would not understand her flashbacks, her screams.
Crawling in, she settled on her bedroll. After taking a series of deep breaths to relax, she tried to clear her mind. She’d just let her eyes drift shut when she heard the creak of someone walking on the platform. Instead of moving past her, to the toilet, the footsteps left the platform and headed into the woods. You’ve got to be kidding me.
Cait crawled back out of her tent, closing it behind her, then strapped the knife sheath to her leg. She gripped a flashlight in one hand and headed into the woods. It was easy to track her quarry. She’d expected it to be one of the guys, out for a rustic pee, but it wasn’t. A match flare illuminated Patti’s face and then went dark. The distinctive smell of top-grade marijuana came Cait’s way.
Tempting as it was to get in the girl’s face, she waited as Patti smoked part of the joint, then ground it in the dirt. To Cait’s surprise, she unscrewed the cap on a bottle of water and drowned the spot where the weed had landed. At least she’d listened to the fire-safety briefing.
Patti turned and began to walk in her direction, then came to a sudden halt when she saw Cait. “Holy shit! You scared me.”
“Better me than an alligator.” Cait had a couple ways to play this, both of which could go bad. Instead, she waited to see how the girl would react.
“So go on, give me the lecture,” Patti began. “No wait, I have it memorized. I’m a supreme disappointment to my family, a drug addict, a bitch, and a loser.”
Cait shook her head. “Maybe you are all of those. Maybe not. I don’t give a damn. You want to smoke pot, fine. I just don’t want you getting toked up out here. Too many critters can kill you if you’re stoned and not paying attention.”
“Why would you care?” the girl shot back.
“Because I don’t want to tote your dead ass back to base camp. In this heat, you’ll just draw a bunch of flies and I hate it when that happens.” Patti stared at her, stunned. “Now let’s go to bed. Dawn comes too early around here, and I’m a bitch if I don’t get my sleep.”
“Sounds like you’re a bitch anyway.”
Cait winked. “Now you’re getting the picture.” She gestured back through the woods toward the platform. “After you.”
Patti threw her a middle finger as she stomped past.
Cait made sure the teen didn’t see her smile. It was like looking in a mirror when she was about that age. Mouthy, disrespectful, pissed at the world. At least until the Marines had gotten hold of her.
“Some folks never change, until they’re forced to,” she muttered.
*~*~*
Brannon was up at dawn, long before any of the others. Except Cait. From the dark circles under her eyes, he wondered if she had slept at all. She’d already made coffee and was frying bacon on both of the portable camp stoves.
“Good morning,” he said, keeping his voice low.
“Morning,” she replied. Clearly, she wasn’t up to believing anything was good about it.
“Raccoons wake you?”
She shook her head. “There weren’t any. We had a couple gators cruising around last night, and that kept them away.”
“Who said those monsters aren’t useful except for fancy shoes.”
Keith rolled out of his tent, followed shortly by the others. Brannon took the opportunity to walk a short distance away and turn on his phone. The e-mails scrolled in, one by one.
The first reported that the tour operator’s car had been tampered with, and that the cops had opened a criminal investigation. The second e-mail relayed that another armored-car robbery had occurred in Jacksonville late yesterday afternoon. This time, one of the robbers had been caught and it was the addict, Craig Bettis. While it was good news he was off the street, it was bad news for Brannon. Clarke wouldn’t have ratted him out, probably because he feared Ellis more than he did the FBI. Bettis would crack once he went into withdrawal. It was only a matter of time before he fingered Brannon for the earlier robbery.
The third e-mail said that the team at Veritas was still working on the background dossiers of his fellow campers, based on the photos he’d sent them last night. Th
e Jeep belonged to Caitlyn Landry, the sedan to a Wiley Davis, last known address in Alabama. Had one of the campers borrowed it from a friend or a family member? And if so, which one? The remainder of the cars were rentals, like his. Those would take longer to track down.
Brannon quickly e-mailed back what he’d learned about the Marine, her time in the military. That’d make the process a little quicker, at least in relation to her. He requested further info on her, but also Keith and Susan’s bios. Something about both of them twitched his antenna.
He finished his e-mail in time to get a cup of coffee and listen to the secretary chatter about how hard it was to sleep because it was so quiet, and how disappointed she was that no raccoons came to visit them.
Finally, James crawled bleary-eyed out of his tent. He accepted the coffee Preston handed him, took a sip, and then strolled to the toilet. When he swung the door open and found it empty, he looked back at the group, confused. Searching faces, he frowned. “Where’s Patti?” he asked.
Cait came to her feet. The girl’s tent flap was open. “Patti?” she called out. There was no reply. She walked out into the woods and called again. No reply.
On a hunch, Brannon went to the far side of the platform, where the canoes were tied off. He did a quick count. “We’re missing a boat,” he announced.
“Ah, hell. Is she crazy?” Cait said, shaking her head.
“She had to have left in the middle of the night,” Brannon said.
“Yeah, sometime between three and five, when I was asleep.” She grabbed up her rucksack and hastily repacked it. “Preston? Can you take these folks on to the next platform? I’ll go find her and make sure she’s okay.”
Surprisingly, the assistant didn’t give her any lip. “No problem.”
“I’ll go with you,” James offered.
“It’s best if you stay here.”
“No,” the young man protested. “She’s my . . . girlfriend and—”
“You’re staying here,” Cait insisted. “This might require some serious tracking skills if she went off the main canal.” She looked over at Brannon now. “You game?”
He nodded. “Let me pack my gear.”
*~*~*
Cait used every curse word she knew and invented a few more as she and Brannon paddled their canoe back the way they’d come the day before. Leaving in the middle of the night was an insanely stupid move, especially if the girl had still been stoned. If she got lost, headed in the wrong direction, God knew what might happen to her. She could tip over her canoe and end up in the water. They’d never find a trace of her if a gator found her first.
At least by sending Preston and the group to the next destination, he could check if the girl had gone that way. Unlikely, though, unless Patti go turned around. Cait’s guess was that she was headed back to the tour headquarters, especially after James announced his car keys were missing. Somehow, Patti managed to lift them out of his pack, probably when he’d made a toilet run.
“You keep thinking that hard for too much longer and your head’s going to start smoking,” Brannon called out from the back of the canoe.
“Just wondering if I screwed up somehow.”
“Why would you think that?” he asked, as their oars dug into the water at twice the speed of the day before.
Cait abruptly stopped paddling and he did the same. As she turned, she could see the concern on his face. “I caught her smoking weed last night. I got in her face.”
“As one does,” Brannon said, setting his oar aside and loosening up his shoulders. They’d been at it hard for the last hour, gliding along, and they hadn’t seen anything more than the usual wildlife. No sign of the missing teen.
“Maybe if I hadn’t gone off on her, she wouldn’t have bailed on us,” Cait replied.
“You’re guilting yourself for no reason. She’s what? Eighteen?”
“Seventeen, according to the paperwork.”
“Well, right now she’s acting like a spoiled child.”
Cait sighed, rubbing her neck. “Something had to make her bolt.”
“I don’t think it was you. I think it was her boyfriend. Did you notice how they weren’t sitting together last night?”
“I chalked it up to her being jealous because he was fawning all over Ms. Flirt,” Cait replied.
He grinned. “No, I think it was more than that. James wanted her to share his tent and she refused. The girl doesn’t feel comfortable with him.”
Cait frowned, thinking that through. “He didn’t strike me as creepy. Well, not any odder than most young guys.”
“I know, but something’s off with him.”
“I’ll trust your gut on that. If we don’t find her, we’ll have to call in the search-and-rescue folks.”
“We’ll find her. She couldn’t have gone that far,” Brannon said. “She just needed some space, I think.”
“God, I hope you’re right.”
Chapter Eight
It was her companion who spied the canoe two hours in, tucked up near the shore, but not tied off. Just resting there. As they drew near, Brannon leaned over and grabbed its front gunwale. To Cait’s dismay, the canoe was empty.
“Damn.” She raised her head, looking around. “You think she went ashore somewhere?”
“No, I don’t.” He retrieved a half-empty bottle of cheap whiskey, holding it up. “I suspect she got drunk and then had to take a leak. I bet she stopped at the toilet and failed to tie up the canoe, so it floated here. Probably why it’s headed in the wrong direction.”
“If we’re lucky, that’s the case,” she replied. “If not, she’s lost somewhere in the woods.”
And my responsibility. Dammit, Mike.
Brannon carefully transferred over to the other canoe, then paddled alongside hers. As they neared the structure, he smiled and pointed. Patti was asleep on the platform, curled up in a fetal position.
“God, I was just like that at her age. Minus the blue-hair thing,” Cait groused.
“You got drunk and stole boats?”
“For me, it was a neighbor’s Harley. Luckily, my dad found me before the cops did. And before I wrecked it.”
Brannon gave a low whistle. “How old were you?”
“Sixteen, going on terminally stupid.”
He laughed. “Been there, done that. For me, it was a boat and a bottle of vodka. I still can’t touch the stuff, makes me sick just thinking of it.” He pounded his oar on the side of the platform. “Time to wake up, sunshine!”
Patti’s head shot up, revealing a pea-green face that screamed brain-pounding hangover. “Go . . . away.”
“Not happening,” Brannon said, rapping the platform again. “We missed you at breakfast. We had lots of greasy bacon and scrambled eggs in butter.” None of which they’d gotten to eat, but that didn’t matter, as Patti’s eyes went wide, her throat convulsed, and she scrambled to the side of the platform to retch.
Cait shook her head. “That was cruel.”
“Absolutely,” he replied, grinning now. “Used to do that to my younger brother when he stayed out all night.”
“I’m surprised you’re alive to tell the tale. I would have killed you in a heartbeat.” She turned back to the girl. “Patti? You hurt?”
The girl raised her head weakly. “No, I—” Without warning, she leaned back over for a new round of vomiting.
“Yeah, just like me at that age,” Cait said.
It took some time, but eventually Patti was settled in Cait’s canoe, once again in a fetal position. Cait sent a quick text to Preston, letting him know the missing camper was safe. As she turned her canoe around, Brannon did the same.
“If I were you, I’d just drop her off at headquarters, since she’s going to be a pain in the ass,” he said.
“Ditching on the tour is what she wants. She needs to learn
that she has a responsibility to others, not just to herself.”
“I can hear you,” Patti groaned from the bottom of the canoe.
Brannon rolled his eyes, trying to keep the laugh out of his voice. “Your call.”
They set off at a strong pace, side by side.
“Was that a lesson you had to learn as well? That you had a responsibility to others?” he asked, watching her closely now. When Cait nodded, he added, “Is that why you joined the Marines?”
“No, I wanted to piss off my dad. He was regular Army, all the way. We had a gigantic argument, and The Major said he was going to send me off to some Christian college in Texas. I was so mad I signed up that afternoon. I was eighteen, so they were happy to do the honors.”
“Did that piss him off?”
Cait shook her head, frowning now. “No. When I told him what I’d done, I figured he would go ballistic. All he did was slap me on the back and say, ‘About damned time you grew up, Caitlyn.’”
“Caitlyn, huh?” Though she thought he didn’t really look surprised by that.
“Don’t go there.”
“I’m cool,” he said innocently, but she could see the grin. They were pushing their pace again, Brannon’s canoe abreast of hers.
Cait moved her oar to the other side while Patti dozed on. “I hated boot camp. It sucked, but I was used to higher-ranking males telling me what to do, and so I did fine. Once I was deployed, I found my home. My dad said he was real proud of me.”
“And now?” Brannon asked. It seemed a very personal question.
“He and my mother worry about me because I don’t come home very often. Too much noise. Too much fussing. I tend to . . . overreact.”
Her companion grunted in sympathy, no doubt knowing exactly what that word might mean.
“PTSD?” She nodded. “Ever considered getting one of those service dogs to help you with that?”
She thought on that for a time. “No, there are other guys who need one more than I do. I’ll be okay.”
“Most of them say that, Caitlyn.”
Killing Game (Veritas Book 2) Page 6