“That’s her, Dolly. She’s the same…” My voice trailed off as I felt my wife slump her shoulders, like a fighter who couldn’t go another round. Not just exhausted, emptied out.
—
“I need Dolly out of the house from, say, nine to as long as you can keep her.”
Mack didn’t ask why. Probably didn’t want to know. But he hit his cell as he put some distance between us, talked for a couple of minutes, then came back to where I was standing.
“She says it’ll be easy.”
“You called Dolly?”
He gave me a look I couldn’t read. “No,” he finally said. “Bridgette.”
—
“I’ll be back later,” Dolly said, smacking the side of her hip to tell Rascal to heel at her side.
“I’ll send that new info to Undercurrents inside an hour,” she assured me.
“Perfect,” I told her. “I’ll probably be later than you. There’s something I have to look at.”
She was as curious as Mack had been.
—
It was 21:25 by my watch when the monitor showed Franklin’s truck pull in.
By the time I wheeled the motorcycle outside, they were both standing behind the tailgate.
“We’ll have to grab some planks to make a ramp,” I told them, pointing at the bed of the truck. “There’s lumber in the—”
“How much does that thing weigh?” MaryLou cut me off.
“Probably around four fifty,” I said.
She made a kind of snorting noise, then unlatched the back of the big pickup and said, “Bring it as close as you can.”
I pushed the bike until the front wheel was almost touching the bed. “You jump up there,” she ordered. Then she turned to Franklin. “Ready?”
If he said anything, I couldn’t hear it.
They each took one side of the handlebars and lifted the bike until the front wheel was sitting on the bed.
“Hold it steady,” she told me.
I grabbed the handlebars. I couldn’t see where they grabbed the rear of the bike, but as soon as I saw it come up I began walking backward. It fit with plenty of room to spare.
“Can you lay it on its side?” she asked me. “It doesn’t have to be all the way, just enough so it won’t show.”
Before I could answer, Franklin leaped into the bed and took the bike from me. He pulled it over toward himself until it was below the rail of the bed and asked me, “Is this far okay?”
“Sure.”
By then, MaryLou was next to me. “We’ve got a bunch of tarps back here, and if we take that…”
Franklin shoved a roll of thick tree limbs into the empty space between the side of the bike and the floor of the bed. MaryLou had covered the entire bed with a heavy tarp. “No point scratching it up,” she said.
It didn’t take much more wood to wedge the back wheel. Then the bike went under a blanket of more of the tarps.
We all jumped down. Franklin opened the driver’s door. MaryLou climbed in, and he followed her. When I got into the passenger-side seat, he was behind the wheel.
“Let’s go,” MaryLou said.
—
We off-loaded the bike, reversing the way we’d put it in the bed.
“It’s a little before midnight,” I told them. “We already know her car’s still in its slot. By now, Dolly’s e-mail to Undercurrents about the rumor that the same group that bought up that strip of land by the bay is connected to one of those ‘green’ organizations is already in their server. We know the person feeding info to Benton is this Rhonda woman. She couldn’t count on always being the one picked to investigate, but she’s always notified, so the boss is playing some game with her. Which means she has to know how to find him.”
“That quick?” MaryLou asked.
“I don’t know. But the only way to find out is to follow her…if she leaves, and we can’t know that she will. So you and Franklin go wherever you want, it doesn’t matter. I’ll meet you up the road, that spot we picked out. I won’t be any later than five in the morning, win or lose.”
“What if that girl doesn’t go out tonight?” Franklin said.
“Then I’ll try again.”
“How many times?” from MaryLou.
“As many times as you’re willing,” I said to them both.
—
The rumor that Dolly had sent to Undercurrents wasn’t just a fraud to draw Rhonda Jayne Johnson out; it was a safety play.
Benton had warned Dolly about not running around half cocked after the hard info about someone buying up a whole strip of worthless land had been sent. This latest e-mail wasn’t just soft info, the kind still worth checking out—it was dead wrong.
If Benton moved Dolly from “threat” to “gossip” in his mind, he wouldn’t be warning her again. Why would he? The more nonsense she sent to that ultra-blog, the less anything she sent would be respected. Probably not even get past whatever BS screens they had set up.
But Benton would still be notified. Enough gossipy garbage and he’d figure out that Dolly really didn’t know anything. She wasn’t investigating; she was just passing along anything she heard other people speculate about. That would move her all the way down the threat scale and up the other side. All the way to “Diversion.”
Hell, if she kept on gossiping, he’d get what he wanted, and it wouldn’t cost him a dime. Next time he ran into Dolly in that coffee place, he’d tell the barista the drinks were on him.
—
I didn’t have long to wait.
Or far to go. The target wasn’t on the highway more than five miles before she turned off.
When she turned off the road, I turned off the bike’s headlight. A two-lane blacktop could make following a car a lot trickier, but only if the driver’s rearview mirrors showed anything.
Traffic was so light at that hour that the only danger to me would be some drunk who crossed the dividing line. I kept the rear light of the bike on, to warn off any idiot who believed intense tailgating made him a Le Mans candidate.
The taillights on her little blue Audi were a beacon I could have followed even without the night-vision goggles, but when she turned off again, I was glad I had them; the road she was following was still two-lane, but it curved through what looked like a forest on both sides.
When she turned again, she slowed way down to follow a narrow path. I gambled on that being a driveway, the kind Martin and Johnny had. So I pulled off the road, stashed the bike quick, and cut through the woods in the same direction she’d been headed, following the sound of her car. I left the helmet with the bike, but kept the goggles on.
Good thing I did—she parked her little Audi right in front of what looked like a giant log cabin, but I could see it wasn’t any slapped-together build. The whole place looked like money—subtle money. It took me a few minutes just to circle it, and the stained-glass windows on the left side completely covered a tower of some kind. It was high enough to be a second story, but when I got around the back, I could tell it was an atrium. There was a greenhouse back there, too. No grow lights, so not a marijuana farm. I guessed the angle had been picked to grab the sun’s rays for a few hours every day.
On the far side, a stand-alone garage, built of the same kind of logs. Cedar-shingled roof on it, too, just like the house.
I made my way back to the bike, pulled it upright, and walked it against what could be oncoming traffic for what I guessed was about a quarter-mile before I crossed the road and started it up.
After that, I was a man out for a ride. Headlight on, goggles in the saddlebag.
Franklin’s truck was easy to spot, parked overlooking the ocean. No cop would even be curious about it—the hour was late, but the surf was foaming, and a man and a woman were inside, very close together.
“Did you get what you wanted?” MaryLou asked, on the drive back.
“Yes” is all I said. And I wasn’t lying—all I wanted was to be able to find my way back, and that was so
easy I wouldn’t need the data recorder I wore like a wristwatch.
“When are we coming back?” Franklin asked.
“Soon,” I said, wondering how he could know that I’d need a ride again. Maybe MaryLou had told him what she’d figured out on her own, and he just spouted it out. Or he was on the scent, same as I was.
It didn’t matter. Because what he said told me what I needed to know: They were going to go the distance with me. They didn’t need to know what the job was to be in on it. Together.
—
Dolly usually slept right through when I got in very late, knowing if everything else failed Rascal would always be between her and any intruder.
Not that night. She wasn’t in bed. Or even at her workstation. She was lying back in the oxblood leather recliner in what she insisted on calling my “den.” I don’t know if she’d been sleeping, but she was wide awake when I walked in. Rascal’s sharp bark hadn’t been a warning—he could detect me coming easy enough. He just wanted to register his unhappiness at being away from his usual post.
“Dell! You know where I was tonight?”
“No” is all I said. She was charged up about something, and I didn’t want to get in the way of whatever it was.
“There was a meeting of the Town Council. An open meeting, I mean. I always go to those when something hasn’t yet been decided—we have to bring a show of force to get them to really pay attention. Otherwise, it’s the usual bunch of cranks who just want their three minutes at the microphone. It’s so much worse now that the local cable channel actually carries whatever goes on. Now they think they’re celebrities.
“But that’s not what I need to tell you,” she went on, as if I’d interrupted her. “A man waited his turn. No one knew him. He was nicely dressed, suit and tie, not the way people do around here—not even the council members or the Mayor. He said he had an announcement to make concerning the whole town. Everyone went quiet.
“He said his name—I don’t remember it, but it’ll be on the record of the meeting—and he was the authorized spokesman for TrustUs, LLC. You know, the one that’s buying up all the—”
“Yes.” I had to interrupt her then. Otherwise, she was going to talk around whatever she had to tell me, like an airplane circling in to find the best spot to land.
“Well, guess what? He said his corporation was willing to donate that land to the city.”
“Provided what?”
“That’s what everyone wanted to know. I mean, if they were giving us the land, we’d have to make it part of the city to accept it. So there’d have to be power lines run, maybe even water pipes. That could cost a lot of money, and the taxpayers would have to cover it. And how much taxes could a piece of land like that ever pay back?”
“You said everybody wanted to know. You mean, they all asked him questions?”
“They wanted to. But the president of the council, he said this wasn’t on the agenda, so they’d treat it like they would any other announcement. If this corporation wanted to donate land, they’d have to put the offer in writing, so the council would have time to study it before they made a decision.”
“They could just say ‘yes’ on their own?”
“Sure. That’s what I meant about packing the place. If the council decides on anything like that, they always tell the newspaper, and that sorry rag will print it. Word for word, no questions asked. So, if people want to, say, oppose whatever the council signed off on, they have to show up. And be serious about it.”
“Sending a message? If the council doesn’t change its mind, those people are going to get out the vote against them when they have to run again?”
“I guess so. But it’s really just to show the flag. They don’t all run for reelection at the same time, so knocking off one or two of them wouldn’t give us a majority. But what people can do is recall any of them. Or all of them, if they put together a big enough voting bloc.”
“Recall?”
“That’s the only way to get some things done. You need a certain number of signatures to put something on the ballot. People say that you need twice that number, to keep signatures from being challenged and struck off.”
“You can challenge them if they’re not—what?—registered to vote?”
“Maybe. I don’t know that much about it. But I’m going to find out.”
“Dolly, if they give the land away, how could that help them? You said the guy wasn’t even from around here, so it’s not like he wants to be the next mayor or—”
“I said nobody recognized him, Dell. That’s not the same thing. The way this village is set out, you could live here for years and pretty much no one would know. Know you by face, I mean.”
“I need some sleep, honey.”
“I do, too. I was in your chair because I was reading. I knew, once I hit our bed, I’d be out like a light.”
I walked into our bedroom. It was all I could do—Dolly was ready to spend a half-hour on every sentence. Rascal gave me one of his looks on my way out.
—
By the time I got up, took a shower, and got dressed, I could see that if I wanted something to eat I was on my own.
Dolly was talking on her cell phone, two lines, telling one person to hold on, the other that she’d call them back, and sending out e-mails or texts using her tablet at the same time. She looked up just long enough to let me know she’d seen me.
Rascal didn’t even go that far.
I never bring food into the basement, so I chewed on a piece of baguette I’d pulled off, and washed it down with some of Dolly’s jungle juice. Taking my time about it—I had a lot to think about.
—
No invasion plan is risk-free.
An amateur never thinks about this, but even a professional knows you can’t plan against random chance. Surprise always adds a player to the game—the best you can do is eliminate as much of that as possible.
There hadn’t been any dogs at that log cabin Rhonda Jayne Johnson had driven to. They wouldn’t have had to be outside for me to know that: anyone who knew enough to train no-bark night dogs—Dobermans are still the best for that—would leave them loose, and any dog will bark inside his own house if he picks up on a stranger approaching. Just like Benton’s house, I thought.
The blue Audi made the usual car noises—its door gave off a solid thump when it was closed. Rhonda Jayne Johnson had hammered some kind of metal-on-metal door knocker, too. So even if she wasn’t a stranger—and she couldn’t be, not from the confidence she’d shown driving there—all those sounds wouldn’t have been ignored by any dogs inside.
No fence. The windows hadn’t been shielded with one-way glass; some didn’t even have the curtains drawn. Maybe there was the kind of alarm system the owner could arm when he went out, but that didn’t matter—when I invaded, I wanted him to be at home.
I hadn’t gotten close enough to the house to see if it had security lights. It felt like it didn’t—I’m not sure how to explain that, but I trusted it. That house’s security was its location. It was probably listed on the tax rolls, but on an unnamed street—not the kind of place anyone would stumble across by accident.
I hadn’t seen any signs like the ones we had nailed to one-by-two stakes at the beginning of our driveway.
NO TRESPASSING
BEWARE OF DOGS
PROSELYTIZING PROHIBITED
But even those house-to-house missionaries who were constantly canvassing like it was some kind of competition to see who could get the most doors slammed in their faces probably wouldn’t visit a house they couldn’t see from the road.
That didn’t help me; I wasn’t going to be knocking on the door.
I wasn’t going to be smashing my way in, either—too much risk, in too many ways.
Real surveillance would take weeks. Did the guy inside have a wife or girlfriend? Roommates? A schedule he kept to? That and a hundred other things I’d want to know.
I didn’t have so much time. What I did ha
ve was the certainty that he had to have some kind of Internet connection for what he did. A good one. He’d want to be off the grid for connecting to the Undercurrents server. Cable can be plenty fast around here, but all commercial cable goes through a shared pipe, so the speed would vary. Worse, no matter how much security you added, there was nothing to stop a cable company—or a DSL service—from data mining. Or some dummy could leave his laptop in his car. Not secure at either end.
But with all those trees, I couldn’t see how he could be using his own satellite signal.
Wait! stabbed its way into my mind. Before I could blink, I was back to checking for an overlook.
I went upstairs, hand-signaled to Dolly that I’d be using the Subaru. She made a “Go ahead” gesture.
—
“Hey, Mr. Dell!”
“Franklin, didn’t we make a deal about—”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot. ‘Dell,’ right?”
“Right. I came out here because I thought you could help me with something.”
“Me? Sure. But I have to wait until I get off work. MaryLou’s home—you want me to call her?”
“She can’t help me, Franklin, not with this. I don’t need something done, I need your knowledge.”
“My knowledge?” The huge man couldn’t decide between surprise and pleasure, so he crammed them both into those two words.
“Yes. You know those giant trees, the ones that grow on the back of our property?”
“The Douglas firs?”
“If that’s what they are.”
“If you mean those really tall ones, that’s them. But they’re not really fir trees—that’s what Mr. Spyros taught me.”
“Okay,” I said quickly; I didn’t want to learn everything Franklin knew about the damn things. “Good. Do they grow all around here?”
“Oh, sure, they do. There’s no place near the coast that doesn’t have them.”
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