Strong from the Heart--A Caitlin Strong Novel

by Jon Land

  Bone was perched in a tree a cool hundred yards from the soccer field where the kid was practicing. He’d heard the legends about how his Comanche ancestors could make themselves invisible to their prey. He wasn’t sure he believed that, but he definitely could have used that particular skill now.

  As it was, the dark camo gear he was wearing was more than sufficient, since the park wasn’t all that crowded and a person could look straight up into the elm tree in which he was hidden and not see him—like he was indeed invisible, for all intents and purposes.

  Plenty of men he’d encountered, on both sides of the scale, detested the notion of killing a kid, to the point where it became the one indelible line they refused to cross. These men were capable of far more heinous acts than he would even consider, but they clung to that one exception, as if it might maintain at least a semblance of their humanity.

  It was different for a true Comanche warrior, who understood that knocking off the young eliminated your future enemies even as it did the same to your enemy’s future. Long before the white man came to town, you raid a village, you don’t just kill the chief and his best warriors but also their heirs, so there’d be nobody to come for you when they got older. Or, if they were young enough, you’d kidnap and then indoctrinate the kid to your ways.

  But this was about more than just tradition and legacy. This was about inflicting pain on the woman Ranger named Caitlin Strong, a delicious, tormenting pain that would never fade and that Bone would be able to feel emanating from her forever like a rechargeable battery. He should probably be thanking the bitch for this new gift she’d somehow delivered to him in that steaming pool of oil, and his thanks would come in the form of a lifetime of heartache, the worst pain of them all.

  Bone’s fondest memories of his difficult youth growing up on the reservation were the stories his mother would tell him of the old times. Some of these had sad endings, the hero falling in the end. On that, his mother would comfort him with the old proverb that they are not dead who live in the hearts of those they leave behind. As he grew older, though, Bone came to realize that was bullshit. Dead was dead and there was no coming back from it in anyone’s hearts or minds. The kid he was about to kill wasn’t going to live on in the hearts of his father or the Texas Ranger who’d left Bone smelling like a gas station. The kid was going to have his insides scrambled by a high-velocity bullet the size of a finger, finishing the job the drugs had started four nights back.

  Bone raised the sniper rifle into position, settled his breathing, and searched the scope for a jersey with the number thirteen stenciled on it. While hunting, he’d once heard, the Cherokee would pray to the wind, rivers, and mountains for success. After killing an animal, Comanche hunters would ask the gods’ forgiveness for taking its life. After killing a deer, the hunters would throw the tongue and some of its meat into the fire as a sacrifice. While Bone didn’t believe in the practice of such rituals, his mother had made him promise on her deathbed that he would always recite the most hallowed of Comanche prayers before knowingly taking a life. And so he did, while he followed Luke Torres through the sniper rifle’s crosshairs, waiting for him to be still.

  “Ga lu lo hi gi ni du da…” And then in English, “Sky, our grandfather…”

  The target was still in motion, a virtual blur. No reason to risk a shot, even as Bone’s finger pawed the trigger.

  “Nu da wa gi ni li si … Moon, our grandmother … E lo hi gi ne tse … Earth, our mother…”

  The soccer team was gathering in front of the far goal on the field, setting up to practice penalty kicks. This was more to Bone’s liking, since it was the goalie versus the shooter, mano a mano, not unlike the parameters that defined his life.

  “Ga li e li ga … I am thankful…”

  But the kids, who looked like a blotch of blue as they milled about in front of the goal, kept covering his target like a cloud covers the sun. Bone willed himself to be patient and continued with his prayer.

  “Si gi ni gé yu … We love each other…”

  Finally, Luke Torres was captured alone in his crosshairs, number thirteen lit up so big and bright that Bone thought he could reach out and touch it. He briefly held his eye closed in a last, silent moment, opening it again, ready to fire, with the boy locked squarely in his sights. Once again close enough to touch, with the barrel aimed between the one and the three on the back of his jersey.

  “O sa li he li ga … We are grateful…”

  Bone felt the slight smack of the superheated gases propelling the shell forward, the bullet exploding from the barrel, before he even realized he’d fired. Through the scope, it looked like the kid had been punched in the back. A frothy blood burst exploded from the front of his chest as the back of his jersey darkened in a widening blotch that spread outward from between the numbers.

  Dead center.

  Bone had squeezed his eyes closed by the time the boy fell, feeling his pain, a single explosive burst of it accompanied by a flash brighter than the sun. In Bone’s mind, that moment lingered, stretched into something eternal that would remain forever indelibly imprinted on his consciousness. A souvenir to be pulled from a shelf of memory to be enjoyed again and again. Feeling his own pain was nothing compared to that of others; he had Caitlin Strong to thank for delivering this new gift to him, and he knew just how to thank her: by taking the Ranger’s own pain from her and storing it on a shelf all its own.

  When he killed her too.

  80

  SHAVANO PARK, TEXAS

  “That’s Caitlin’s spot,” Cort Wesley said to Leroy Epps, who’d taken her place on the porch swing.

  “Since she’s currently taking Washington by storm, I figured you could use the company, bubba. You mind handing me that root beer you were kind enough to fetch from the fridge?”

  Cort Wesley leaned over to pick up the bottle of Dad’s Old Fashioned Root Beer and laid it down on the bench between him and the ghost.

  “New brand?”

  “Sorry, champ. I couldn’t find the Hires you like. I don’t think they make it anymore.”

  “Nothing changes for the better, does it?”

  “Not much, anyway.”

  Leroy’s eyes regarded the bottle closer. “Means we can only do our best and make do with the results, right?”

  “I suppose,” Cort Wesley said, and sipped from his bottle of craft beer.

  “Maybe it’s time you gave me one of those.”

  “Can ghosts get drunk?”

  Leroy flashed his big toothy grin. “Won’t know until we try, bubba.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Since you’re buying, fire away.”

  “Doyle Lodge asked me if you were a colored man.”

  “‘Colored man’? I’m surprised he didn’t say ‘Negro.’”

  “I never told him you were African American.”

  “You haven’t asked me your question yet.”

  “Did he see you, champ?”

  “You ask him?”

  “I didn’t know how to.”

  “Without him thinking you’d lost your marbles, you mean. Don’t matter a lick, anyway, ’cause what you really want to know is something else: Is he headed my way?”

  “That’s the gist of it, yeah.”

  “Are you, bubba?”

  “Am I what?”

  “Heading my way, on account of the fact that you’re looking at me here and now.”

  “No more than any other time in the past ten years or however long you’ve been visiting.”

  The ghost smacked his lips. “Man, that is some fine root beer…”

  “Is that an answer?”

  Leroy’s eyes seemed to widen, looking sad and somber. “Not him, no.”

  Cort Wesley could smell the sweetness of the root beer on the air between them, the beer he was drinking starting to turn his stomach sour. “What’s that mean?”

  “What’s one plus one?”

  “Two, last time I checked, champ.
”

  “You can do the math here just as easy.” The ghost smacked his lips. “Yup, this is some fine root beer. Anyway, you’ll know how it adds up soon enough, bubba.”

  That’s when Cort Wesley’s phone rang, the number in the caller ID belonging to D. W. Tepper.

  “You looking for Caitlin, Captain?” he asked, suddenly alone on the porch swing, foam having filled the drained portion of the Dad’s Old Fashioned Root Beer bottle he’d left for Leroy.

  “No, Masters,” Tepper said, sounding like he was about to choke up. “I’m looking for you.”

  81

  WASHINGTON, DC

  Caitlin went straight back to the airport after her meeting with Senator Lee Eckles, even though she had three hours to kill before her flight was scheduled to depart. There was something about Washington that gave her chills as soon as she reached the city limit. She saw politicians like Eckles as the cesspool of humanity, faceless men whose features formed according to the moment, as pliable as Silly Putty and as changeable as a kid’s Etch A Sketch drawing toy. She’d once heard that whatever a politico told you was likely to be ten percent true, and that might be generous.

  She’d left her meeting with Lee Eckles certain that he was in league with Roland Fass on whatever it was she’d uncovered in Texas. If Jones was right, the CIA’s illicit drug operations hadn’t gone away at all; they’d just transferred to new regions, new drugs, new acronyms, and new players. She had pushed Eckles only so far because it was clear he was just one of those players, likely getting rich and solidifying his hold on power through his involvement in a drug operation of mammoth proportions.

  As Caitlin read things, the senator and others must have tired of collecting whatever perks and cash lobbyists were able to pony up in return for looking the other way when it came to the drug industry. Sitting at the gate in the airport terminal, she even began to wonder if the congressional crackdown on Big Pharma had been bred of a desire, and a plan, to create a void that the group represented by Eckles could move in to fill.

  It never ceased to amaze her how the Senator Lee Eckleses of the world inevitably retained the likes of lowlifes like Roland Fass, men whose skill sets were neither impressive, remarkable, nor even reliable. They’d always find a way to mess up somewhere, and Caitlin figured powerful men like Eckles naturally gravitated to those they could make utterly beholden to them. After getting out of prison, the only real work Fass could find was rumored to be with an underground, bare-knuckle fighting network that moved about various locations clustered around the border. She would have thought cockfighting to be more up his alley.

  The likes of Eckles and Fass had united to form a network centered around the illicit production of opioids somewhere in Texas, which were then distributed nationwide. The amount of money they were making, under the circumstances, must be staggering, at the expense of taking, or destroying, tens of thousands of lives.

  Caitlin imagined they had any number of canned excuses prepared to rationalize their actions, all easy to dismiss when she considered kids like Luke Torres getting snared in the web created by the most dangerous drugs in the world becoming so readily available. Those running the distribution and supply channels from the bottom up were acting with impunity, thanks to the blind eye being turned their way.

  Until they ran afoul of the likes of Cort Wesley Masters, who was now determined to smoke them out. Literally, in this case, though Caitlin couldn’t see him torching all of their distribution centers.

  Her flight had just started boarding when a call came in from Cort Wesley.

  “I’m just boarding the plane now after swabbing myself with Handi Wipes.… Cort Wesley?”

  Nothing.

  “Cort Wesley?”

  Dead air.

  “I’m still here, if you can hear me,” Caitlin said, but the call had already ended.

  82

  HOUSTON

  Cort Wesley ended the call and pocketed his phone, having second thoughts about telling Caitlin what had happened when she was fifteen hundred miles away.

  Matzke Park had been evacuated and closed to the public. Those remaining were all clustered about the soccer field where the shooting had taken place. There was a sea of uniforms and flashing lights as the Houston police continued trying to make sense of what had happened, even though it was painfully obvious that a sniper’s bullet had done the trick. He did notice some Houston detectives checking trees that offered a clear view of the soccer field, though it was doubtful they’d be able to do a full reconnaissance, now that night had fallen, meaning crucial evidence might be lost.

  “Be a good idea for you to keep yourself scarce,” D. W. Tepper warned him, returning from a brief exchange with the Houston chief of detectives who’d taken charge of the scene. “As hard as that might be for you to manage.”

  Cort Wesley nodded, figuring he owed the captain that much for first informing him personally of what had happened and then arranging for transport for both of them on the Ranger chopper.

  “After all, Mr. Masters,” Tepper resumed, “it’s not your son tucked inside a body bag. Guess you could call this your lucky day, all things considered.”

  “When I can see Luke?” Cort Wesley asked the Ranger captain, not feeling so lucky at all.

  “As soon as the Houston police are finished with their Q and A.”

  “I’m his parent. Don’t I have a right to be there?”

  “I wouldn’t push too hard on that. They’re just trying to sort all this out—like why he was wearing the wrong uniform.”

  Cort Wesley spotted Nola Delgado lurking at the outskirts of the activity, fake press credentials dangling from a lanyard draped over her neck and carrying a camera to complete the disguise.

  “Let’s see if I can give them a hand with that.”

  * * *

  “You switched the uniforms,” Cort Wesley said, as soon as he’d drawn close to her.

  “You’re welcome,” she said, her face devoid of expression.

  “I didn’t thank you for anything.”

  “You should have, since switching those uniforms is what saved your boy’s life.”

  “What about the kid who took a bullet between his shoulder blades?”

  “Close your eyes and picture your son wearing that uniform instead.” Nola finally turned all the way toward him. “Think even Tide would get the bloodstains out?”

  “You have any idea how much I’d like to punch you right now?”

  She smiled at him. “Go ahead, Pops, take your best shot. And while you’re at it, go thank the dead kid’s parents over there for his standing in for your son.”

  “The dead kid’s name was Ben Brussard. I met him the other day. He was the one who came clean about where he got the drugs from.”

  “Enabling you to burn down the place that was dispensing oxy and fentanyl like a gumball machine.”

  Cort Wesley cast his gaze toward the largest congestion of humanity, where he figured he’d be able to find Ben Brussard’s family. “Maybe I should go see his parents.”

  “I’m sure they’ll be comforted no end by the fact that it was your kid that was supposed to die instead.”

  Cort Wesley was left shaking his head, trying to make sense of how anyone could be this cold and indifferent, could give no thought to the fact that her actions had caused the death of a high school kid.

  “You tell the Ranger, Pops?”

  “None of your business.”

  “I’ll take that as a no. Otherwise, she’d be here. What is she, taking some time off, maybe honing her shooting skills?”

  “You don’t want to take her on, Nola, believe me.”

  “We’re sisters, remember? Why would I want to do a thing like that?” Nola asked him, seeming to mean it.

  “You were baiting a trap,” Cort Wesley realized in that moment. “You were expecting this to happen.”

  “Preparing for the possibility is different from expecting it, Pops. And if it was just about setting a trap
, I wouldn’t have needed to switch those jerseys.”

  “Did you spot the shooter?”

  “All of a sudden, you’re interested…”

  “Just answer the question.”

  “I zeroed the tree he fired from as soon as the kid went down. But he was gone by the time I got there. In the wind, as they say, like he pretty much up and disappeared.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “I just told you he was gone by the time I got there.”

  “No, you caught a glimpse, probably from afar. But you let him go.”

  “Now why would I do a thing like that?”

  “Because you didn’t want to leave Luke alone.”

  Nola forced a smile, pretended to fumble for her camera. “You don’t know me at all, Pops.”

  “I don’t think anybody does, not even your mother.”

  “The shooter was too far away for me to go after or risk a shot, with all the people around,” Nola told him.

  “You expect me to buy that?”

  “Your son’s alive. Can’t you just leave it there?”

  “Tell me about the shooter.”

  “He was big, I mean real big. Not as big as my sister’s personal assassin, but close. And he was Native American, Comanche or Cherokee being my best guess. Sound familiar?”

  83

  HOUSTON

  Cort Wesley felt a numbness settle over his spine as he recalled Caitlin’s description of the killer she’d chased through University Hospital and ended up spilling a pipeful of oil on. He slid off to get some distance from Nola Delgado and called Caitlin again, but this time it went straight to voicemail, meaning her plane headed back from Washington must be in the air. He couldn’t hold back from telling her that the pro who’d killed Lennox Scully and seven others at University Hospital had just shot a young man who was wearing Luke’s uniform, which meant …

  What did it mean, exactly?

  Cort Wesley couldn’t get control of his thoughts, beyond the obvious: the huge illicit drug ring he’d uncovered with Nola’s help was somehow connected to what had happened in Camino Pass.