The Killing Season

by Mason Cross

  “Juba?”

  “God.”

  Blake’s face broke out in a grin, and he shook his head.

  “Something funny, partner?” Wardell asked sharply. Blake didn’t seem to be at all afraid of him, and the guy was beginning to push the boundaries of his not-inconsiderable patience.

  “It’s just, you’re describing it like it’s a new idea. The way you’ve been killing.”

  “Nobody’s done what I’m doing, Blake.”

  “You really think so? Disgruntled Marine sniper comes home and decides, ‘What the hell? Why not shoot a few people from a distance?’ Just off the top of my head, we’ve got Muhammad in Washington, 2002. Charles Whitman in Texas in sixty-six. And Lee Harvey Oswald, of course.”

  “Marksmen, Blake, not snipers. There’s a big difference. I mean, Oswald? Not in the same class at all. I wouldn’t need three shots to kill a president.”

  “Why not? You needed two to kill a fat, slow delivery guy.”

  Wardell shook his head and tightened his finger on the trigger. “Time to say good night, Blake.”

  “Wait a second,” Blake said hurriedly, obviously realizing he’d pushed his luck a little too far.

  “You used up your last second, partner.”

  “The red van,” Blake said quickly, giving Wardell a moment’s pause. “Haven’t you wondered about the red van?”

  “Haven’t paid it much mind, to be honest with you,” Wardell lied. He glanced up at the hill as he heard the buzzing of one of the FBI helos. It sounded like it was a little closer. It was time to get moving.

  “I don’t believe you. And that first call to the press, the one that blew the media blackout—that wasn’t you, was it?”

  “Get to the point, Blake,” Wardell snapped. “You’re trying my patience, and I got places to be.” The chopper was definitely getting closer. In another few seconds it would be overhead, and it wouldn’t take long to pick them out with the searchlight.

  If Blake had noticed, he gave no indication, just kept talking. “Somebody’s going out of their way to make things tough for the task force. To make things easy for you. Some­body with connections, inside knowledge.”

  “So?” Wardell said, growing tired of the conversation. It was time to bring this exchange to a close. “Somebody’s helping me out a little. Maybe he’s a fan of what I do. Makes no difference to me.”

  “Helping you out is one way of putting it. How about looking at it a different way?”

  Wardell said nothing, waited for him to continue. Every instinct in his body screamed, Do it now. He held firm.

  “I don’t think you’re being helped, Wardell. I think you’re being used.”

  The helicopter broke the cover of the trees at the top of the hill, its beam directed straight into Wardell’s eyes. He jammed them shut and fell behind a tall monument as the beam continued its sweep for twenty yards before zipping back to his position as the operator tried to confirm what he’d just seen.

  Wardell swore as he stuck his head out from behind the monument and saw Blake too had taken cover. The oppor­tunity for a clean kill had vanished. He’d played straight into Blake’s hands. There was one last ace in the hole. Wardell reached into the drag bag and withdrew the last pipe bomb. He snapped the fuse off close to the cap, leaving about three seconds, then lit it and tossed it to Blake’s last position.

  An orange and black cloud of flame and grave dirt exploded up into the rain, forcing the helicopter to swing back and upward. It would be good enough for a distraction, to allow him to escape the chopper’s searchlight. It ought to take out Blake, too. It ought to rip that bastard into a few thousand bloody pieces and wipe that goddamn knowing expression off his face for good. But Wardell wasn’t counting on it. He wasn’t counting on it at all.

  50

  1:50 a.m.

  Banner stood beneath the shelter of a tall pine as she watched the deluge continue, blurring the blue lights of the fire trucks and ambulances closer to what was left of the house. On the other end of the phone line, her sister’s voice was utterly devoid of its usual critical undercurrent.

  “Thank God you’re okay, Elaine. Is everybody else . . . ?”

  Helen’s sentence trailed off there, and Banner realized she already knew the answer to that question if she was within sight of a television. It was the reason Banner had called Helen as soon as she could, despite the hour. She had to avoid the possibility that she—or, God forbid, Annie—might hear about this on the morning news and fear the worst.

  “No. We lost some people. Good people.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I saw on the news about Rapid City. They’re saying he killed a young girl this time.”

  Banner closed her eyes, and the image of the girl in the blue raincoat flashed before them once again. She’d been seeing that image all day. It was one of the ones that would take time to go away, if it ever did.

  “That’s right, Helen. She was only a few years older than . . .” This time, it was Banner who trailed off, unable to complete that thought.

  “Elaine, I don’t know what to tell you. Part of me wants you to get the hell out of there. Part of me wants you to hunt that son of a bitch down.”

  She allowed herself a smile. “Let’s go with the second option for now. Tell Annie I love her and I’ll call her ­tomorrow.”

  There was a long pause; then Helen said, “Okay. Stay safe, Elaine.”

  Banner murmured a hollow reassurance and hung up. She kept looking at the blue lights in the darkness for a while, feeling a longing to be home, to crawl into Annie’s bed and hug her tightly until the morning. This manhunt had taken Banner far from home and might still take her farther, but at least that meant Wardell was far away from Chicago, from Annie. One thing to be grateful for.

  She hurried across to the Bureau van that was parked at the side of the access road and climbed into the back. The female paramedic was almost done with Blake. Banner allowed herself a wry smile at Blake’s wince as the paramedic tugged a little on the last stitch in the long gash on his forearm. She shook her head.

  “You tough guys.”

  Blake looked up at her, raised his eyebrows questioningly.

  “You’ll happily get in a gunfight, dive headfirst off a cliff, stand next to a grenade, but subject you to anything medical and you start crying.”

  “It wasn’t a grenade; it was a pipe bomb.”

  “Whatever. You ought to be dead.”

  “You can thank Edward R. Garrett that I’m not.”

  “Who?”

  “1837 to 1879. Luckily for me, they built headstones to last in 1879.”

  “And to absorb blast damage.”

  “Indeed. How’s Castle?”

  Banner bit her lip. They’d used one of the search heli­copters to transport Castle to the regional hospital in Rapid City. It had reduced their capacity to search for Wardell, but it had saved Castle’s life. For the moment, at least. “Critical but stable, is what they’re telling us.”

  “I’m sorry,” Blake said.

  “Don’t be. The only reason he’s still breathing is you.”

  The house was a still-burning pile of rubble, the mobile command center a partially burnt-out crime scene. Wardell had melted into the thick woods after the explosion in the graveyard, and either he’d had a vehicle hidden somewhere off the grid, or he’d stayed on foot. Whatever the case, he hadn’t left a trace.

  Blake was stripped to the waist, having discarded his torn and soaked shirt. Banner noticed that there was a long, ­whitened scar running from his left pectoral all of the way down to his waistline. Blake caught her staring at it and looked away. She decided not to ask.

  The paramedic finished the stitching and tied it off. Blake flexed the fingers of his hand, testing the strength of the stitches, findi
ng them adequate.

  “What the hell happened in there?” Banner asked after a minute. “Inside the house, I mean.” Blake had already briefed her on what had taken place down in the old graveyard.

  “Somebody was helping Wardell.”

  “What?”

  Blake reached for the blue FBI T-shirt they’d scavenged for him, pulled it over his head. “You people really like this color, huh?”

  “What do you mean somebody was helping him?”

  He shrugged. “That’s the way it worked out, anyway, whether or not it was the intention. But I think it was.”

  “Hold on a second, Blake,” she said, shaking her head. “How the hell would anyone get inside the damn house? We had that place sewn up tighter than—”

  “It was one of your guys.”

  Banner felt like somebody had punched her in the gut. She opened her mouth to tell him he was crazy, or at the very least mistaken. That no one on the task force could have been involved in helping Wardell. But did she know that for sure? Really know it?

  Blake’s face was sympathetic as he watched her struggle. “Or at least he was doing a fair impression of one of yours. The only reason I knew something was up with him is because I’d seen him before, at the Fort Dodge scene.”

  “Is that a surprise? We had lots of agents at the scene.”

  “But he was there right after the shooting, long before your people got there.”

  Banner suppressed the barrage of questions that welled up inside her, decided to focus on the events in the house. “So what happened?”

  “He coldcocked Castle, led Hatcher right into Wardell’s sights.”

  “He was covering the front of the building, just like we thought,” Banner said. “Brazen asshole was actually perched on top of the command center’s roof. Killed another two of our guys who were in his way.” Our guys; that brought the question of an inside man back into focus. “What would one of us have to gain from helping?” she asked. “Who the hell is this guy? What does he look like?”

  “As of right now? I’m guessing extra crispy. Castle shot him in the fight. We left him in the room at the front, the one where Hatcher died.”

  “All right. What did he look like, then?”

  “Like one of you,” Blake said. “Like your stereotypical anonymous G-Man. Dark suit, white shirt, quiet tie. Glasses. Tall, with a slight build.”

  “And our only lead, up in smoke,” Banner said, shaking her head again.

  “Not quite.”

  Blake was reaching into the pocket of his pants. He withdrew a small black leather ID wallet and tossed it to her. She caught it one-handed and flipped it open. The object was as familiar to Banner as her own front door. In the bottom half, a metal shield with an eagle and the words “Federal Bureau of Investigation” and “Department of Justice,” gold on gold. In the top, a photo ID card.

  “Anyone you know?” Blake prompted, adding, “The name’s unlikely.”

  “‘John H. Edgar,’” she read from the ID. “I guess J. Edgar Hoover would have been too on the nose.”

  “Is it a fake? Looks pretty good to me.”

  “It must be. But you’re right; it’s a good one. We have guys from all over the country on the task force, way more than a hundred people here tonight. You can’t know everybody by sight. In fact—” Banner stopped midthought, looking at the gaunt, balding, unsmiling head shot in the photograph. The man in the picture wore no glasses. “You said he was wearing glasses?”

  “Yes.”

  “I saw him too. Allanton, after Wardell killed his father.” She closed her eyes and summoned the memory of the man she’d seen outside Nolan’s cabin. It was the same man in the picture; she was almost certain. “Blake, what the hell is going on here?”

  Before Blake could begin to answer, a voice rang out from behind them.

  “Funny, that’s exactly the question I was going to ask.”

  Banner and Blake looked over to the open rear doors of the van. It was Edwards. He wore a dark raincoat with the hood up, and he looked pissed.

  “Edwards,” Banner said. She closed the ID wallet and put it in her pocket. “Is Donaldson coming down?”

  Edwards bristled at this but didn’t answer. He turned his gaze on Blake. “You assaulted one of my agents,” he said slowly, as though he could barely entertain the notion that such a thing had occurred.

  “That’s ridic—” Banner began, the words dying in her throat as she saw the look on Blake’s face.

  “Actually, it’s true. I forgot to mention that.”

  “He’s in the infirmary with a broken finger, a broken nose, and a concussion.”

  “I’m sorry, but he wouldn’t listen and he was in the way.”

  “He was in the . . .” Edwards blinked as though a bucket of water had been thrown over him; then he really lost his temper. “You are in my fucking way, Blake. And as of now, you are officially out of my fucking way. You are off the task force and off the payroll, and if you don’t get the hell out of my sight in the next ten seconds, I’ll have you arrested for the attempted murder of a federal fucking agent.”

  “Wait a second—” Banner started.

  Edwards ignored her. “Get out of here, Blake.”

  Blake glanced at Banner, then stood up slowly.

  “Stay right there,” Banner said, then turned back to Edwards. “We need him, sir. He saved Castle; he nearly got Wardell; he—”

  “He compromised this operation. He got the person we were here to protect killed, and then he let the target escape. We can do without his kind of help. And quite frankly, Agent Banner, we can do without yours for a while too.”

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  Edwards smiled for the first time. “Castle is out of action. The special agent in charge has reorganized the command structure of this task force. As of five minutes ago, I’m in operational command here. And I think you need to take a step back.”

  “With all due respect, you need me. And Blake.”

  “Three days’ leave, Agent Banner. Don’t force me to make it a suspension. Wouldn’t look good on your record, would it?”

  Banner opened her mouth to say something, then bit her tongue. She glanced at Blake, who locked eye contact and gave her a barely perceptible headshake. Edwards stared at her, daring her to protest. When she didn’t, he nodded.

  “Don’t worry. You can help with the cleanup after we get Wardell. Good night, Banner.” He turned and strode away. “Don’t let me see you again, Blake,” he called without looking back.

  51

  2:00 a.m.

  Edwards had been right about one thing, Banner thought: She had to take a step back. Even without the enforced leave of absence, she needed time to think, to take stock. She didn’t need to ask Blake if he was still in; the look in his eyes said he was down for the long haul, and fuck the paycheck. She thought about that. What was still in it for him? She wondered if he pursued all of his subjects with this kind of relentlessness, or if there was something special about Wardell, something that he hadn’t told them.

  She had found them a pair of rooms at a motel on the outskirts of Rapid City. They made the first half of the short journey in silence, Banner driving again. The rain had let up, finally, and a bitter, wintry cold had rushed in to fill its place.

  “So, where to tomorrow?” Blake asked.

  Banner took her eyes off the dark road for a second to glance at him in mock astonishment. “You mean you don’t know?”

  “I don’t know,” Blake said. “I have a few ideas.”

  “I thought you might.”

  “He’s hurt, thanks to you,” Blake said. “That might buy us a little time.”

  “First Nolan, then Hatcher,” Banner mused. “You were right about him targeting his enemies. Who’s next, logically? I’d expect him to go for Stewart, the de
tective who brought him in, but—”

  “It definitely won’t be Stewart, because he’s already dead.”

  “You really did do your homework. So who’s next? Where’s next?”

  Blake turned his head to look out at the dark landscape as he thought about it. “Who? I think he’ll want to hit somebody important. But he’ll want to do it somewhere where he can take out lots of other people, too.”

  “Why so sure?”

  “Because of something I said. Or rather, because of his reaction to something I said.”

  “What was that?” Blake had given her the gist of their conversation in the graveyard—all the stuff about Juba, but not the specific details.

  “Basically, I was just trying to keep him talking, because as long as he was talking he wasn’t putting a bullet in my head. At one point I pushed his buttons about needing two shots for the delivery guy. I knew right away I’d pushed him too far.”

  “And then?”

  “And then I just said the first thing that came into my head, to make him hesitate. I asked him about the red van. About the fact somebody’s been helping him, the thin man.”

  “And what did he say?”

  “He let slip that he didn’t know any more about it than we do. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure that the diversions were nothing to do with him until that moment, but that re­action convinced me. Then he said he didn’t care if somebody wanted to help him out. Like it made no difference to him. And that’s when I said it.”

  “Said what?”

  “It hadn’t occurred to me before. I don’t think I really meant anything by it; I was just trying to throw him off. Screw with his head.”

  Banner slowed the car abruptly, steered right, and brought the car to a sharp halt at the side of the road. She just looked at Blake, waiting for him to get to the point, not sure whether he was being deliberately infuriating or if he couldn’t help it. She realized the irony: This was probably exactly how he’d made Caleb Wardell feel earlier that night.