by Hunt, Jack
Travis chuckled patting him on the shoulder. “Just get inside before real trouble shows up.”
It struck him as odd especially after his grandfather had been shot. If he believed gangs were in the neighborhood he would have taken extra precautions, of course unless it was just another lie and he was the one responsible.
He would have to be tactful in his line of questioning.
While he didn’t feel threatened by Travis, he’d seen the way things could turn on a dime. “Here, you want a beer?”
“Sure.”
“Tate, grab Liam a brewski and get me one too.”
As they entered the guts of the store, he glanced around looking for Harry. “Where’s Harry?”
“Down below. Resting.”
Which meant in the bunker.
“Sorry to hear what happened to him. You find out who did it?”
“No, but I’m sure it’s the same guys who killed my grandmother and took out those cops.”
Tate returned with three Budweisers. He tossed each of them a can. Travis cracked his open and took a seat in a camping chair. They’d set the chairs in a circle near a display area for camping gear. They were in the middle of playing a game of cards. Liam gave a nod to Joe who was peering at him through a set of binoculars with a big grin while he puffed away on a Cohiba.
“Here, you’ve got to try one of these,” Travis said, crossing the room and returning with a portable humidor. It was made of rosewood. He cracked it open and inside was a line of fat cigars. “One hundred percent Cuban.”
Travis clipped the end and gave him one, then brought a flame to it as Liam turned it in his fingers, and smoke billowed around him.
“Good, right?”
“Not bad,” Liam said with a smile, leaning back in his chair.
Travis closed the case then sat across from him. “Man, it’s good to see you again. It was getting a little boring around here without you. So… that bit of ass you’re with. You banging her?”
Liam blew out smoke. “Don’t be rude.”
Travis cracked up. “Ah man, I’m screwing with you.” He smiled. “Seriously though, you hooked up?” He burst out laughing and tapped him on the knee. “I’m just messing with you.”
Tate peered over his beer can, amused.
“So what did you want to see me about?” Liam asked.
“Huh? Can’t old friends have a drink together?”
“It’s just Garcia made it sound like you had a reason.”
Travis leaned forward in his seat and cast a glance over his shoulder as if making sure Harry wasn’t listening. “I do but we’ll get to that. All in good time, Liam. So you guys set up the cabin?”
“Yeah.”
“And what’s the deal with this Garcia fella?”
“What about him?”
“Seems a little odd. When’s he heading back to Petaluma?”
“Why? You have a problem with him?”
“Me? No. Of course not. Just think it’s odd. What about you, Tate?”
“Real peculiar.”
“Joe?”
He sat up and removed a pair of dark shades that still had a price tag dangling from the corner. “Strange.”
Travis rose from his seat and took a swig of his beer. “Come with me for a minute. I want to show you something.” Liam went to put his beer down and he told him to bring it with him. “Guys. No looking at my hand. You got it! That means you, Joe.”
Joe rolled his eyes. “Like I would do that.”
As Travis led him up onto the roof, he kept talking. “You remember when we were kids we used to come up here and pretend we owned the town?”
Many a fond memory came back to him. “Yeah.”
“Seems like a world ago. Who would have imagined that it would come to this?” Travis unlocked the hatch and pushed up. Once on the roof, he extended a hand down and helped Liam up. They strolled over to their spot at the front of the building and Travis sat down, his legs dangling off the edge. “Sit.”
Liam sat beside him and Travis pointed to some tar they’d engraved their names into one summer, a few days after his grandfather had put the new roof on. When they were youngsters they would sit there for hours, eating food and watching bicyclists, dog walkers, and people driving by or visiting Harry’s place or the convenience store across the road. “Remember getting that old guy to go in and buy us our first pack of cigarettes and a pack of Budweisers?”
Liam smiled. Those were better days. Summers that seemed to last forever. There was no sense of danger or panic like what they’d gone through. As they stared out at the empty street it felt very different, cold, even though they were in the midst of summer. Memories rolled through his mind.
Travis took another hard swig of his beer and set it down. He inhaled his cigar then spoke as wafts of gray smoke came out of his mouth. “You remember what I said to you back when we were fourteen?”
“You said a lot of things.”
“No, I mean about this town. That one day I would run it,” he said glancing down the street.
“Yep!” He took another swig.
There was a pause and without Travis looking at him he replied.
“What if we could, Liam?”
“What?”
“The population here is 4,875, give or take. Nothing but a speck on the map to most, but to me, it’s my entire world. This is my America. My patch.”
“What are you talking about?”
“1862. President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act. You know — to allow settlers to claim lots up to 160 acres as long as they lived there and improved the land. What a time that must have been. No one telling you how much you needed to pay. No one telling you what you needed to do. You just showed up in an area and as long as it wasn’t claimed, you could put your roots down and create a life, a real life.” He looked at him. “That was the way it was meant to be. Not today. You know I tried to get an apartment in this town. You know how much they wanted?”
“Nine hundred?”
“And the rest,” Travis said, chuckling.
“C’mon, even if it’s fifteen hundred. That’s not bad.”
“Not bad?” He nearly spat out his beer. “Yeah, maybe on your salary but not on mine.”
“Your grandfather pays you well.”
He laughed. “My grandfather pays me what he thinks I deserve. Big difference.” Travis shook his head. “No, there was a time it would have cost nothing. Nothing to build over there,” he said pointing to a lot that was in the early stages of development. It looked as if they had laid the foundations for an apartment block. “I mean of course you would have had to find your building material but…” he trailed off. “If the bombings hadn’t happened where would we be?”
Travis shook his head and took another swig of his beer.
“Everything okay, Travis?” Liam asked, sensing that something was amiss.
“Yeah. Yeah. Drink up,” he said slapping his back. “How’s that arm of yours?”
“Painful but I’m managing.”
“I thought you got it to match Long Legs.”
“Travis.”
“I’m messing with you, man. Geesh, when did you lose your sense of humor? So serious.” He blew out more smoke then tossed his cigar.
There was a long pause as they sat there.
“I need to tell you something,” Travis said. “I’m not proud of it but…” he trailed off. He breathed in deeply. “The shootings at the police department. It wasn’t a gang. I lied.”
“What?”
He looked at him. “Those cops. It wasn’t a gang, at least not the kind you had in mind. Like Garcia I mean.”
“Travis.”
“Listen to me. Hear me out. You know me, right.”
“What have you done?”
His hand started shaking ever so slightly and he closed his eyes. Travis then got up and drained the remainder of his beer and tossed the bottle. It smashed as it hit the ground near one of the dead bodies. “You wer
e always going to do something with your life. Me? No. I would be stuck here forever.”
“That’s not true. Your grandfather would pass on the store and —”
Travis cut him off. “No. Liam. He was planning on selling it.”
“Oh.” There was a long pause. “Well, I’m sure he needed the money for his retirement.”
He snorted. “That old coot has more money in his account than he knows what to do with. He didn’t need the money. I tried to get him to change his mind. You know, even sell it to me, of course for a discount price that I would pay back over time, but he wouldn’t listen. Said he wanted top dollar, upfront. A businessman through and through.” He looked resentful. “You know I put hours and hours of my time into this store, working for chump change in the hope that one day when it came time to sell he would…” He trailed off and shook his head. “No. He wants to leave me out of the loop. I mean I could run this store with my eyes closed, couldn’t I?”
Liam nodded.
“What have you done, Travis?”
He’d never seen Travis this shaken up. Travis brought a hand up to his face and ran it over his head. “When the bombings happened I figured he would want to get out of town, you know, get away. I saw an opportunity. I told him I would look after the store. Sell out what was there but he wouldn’t do it. He wanted to close up, shut it down and…” He paused for a second. “I just wanted to scare him, Liam. That’s all.”
Liam stared at him. “Garcia was right.”
Travis shot him a look. “About?”
Liam moved away from the edge. “He saw you with a group. The same ones that shot up this place. He knows you’re behind it.”
An expression crossed his face, undisguisable. “Who else knows?”
Liam stared back at him. “All of them.”
Travis looked despondent.
“And your grandmother?” Liam asked.
“It was an accident. Things got out of hand.”
“Out of hand?” Liam backed up, squinting at him. “You killed her?”
“No. God no. It was them.” Travis dropped down to a crouch, bringing both of his hands up to his face. The realization set in. He might not have been the one who pulled the trigger but he’d put them up to it. “The cops hadn’t figured it out but there was a witness. We umm…”
Liam shook his head. “Took care of the witness.”
“Yeah but she wasn’t the only one and…”
“So you had to deal with the cops.”
“Not exactly. It’s complicated.” Travis groaned. “After the bombings their resources were strained. There were only a few holding down the fort so…”
Liam approached him and gave him a shove. “Damn you. Damn you!”
“I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt. You’ve got to believe me, man. I just…”
“You let them do this. Harry could have died because of you.”
“I… I know. They weren’t meant to go that far. I reamed them out but it was too late.”
Liam shook his head. “You need to tell him.”
“I can’t. I just can’t.”
“Then I will.”
Liam went to walk by him but Travis quickly got in front of him, hands extended. “Liam. Please. I will do it but not now. Not while he’s in that state.”
“You know I used to look up to you, man.” He shook his head. “We are done.”
“Liam.” He grabbed his arm but he shrugged it off.
“Tell him tonight or I will.”
As he went to leave, he stopped at the opening of the roof and looked back at him. “What did you hope to achieve? Huh? It wasn’t like you would have taken over the business. Look around you, Travis. The town is in ruins. The people are scared. Scared of people like you. You!” he said. “You call this town your everything. Your America. If this is what you think America is, I don’t want any part of it.”
With that said he climbed down. On the way out, Joe called out to him. “Hey, dude, you want another beer?”
“Keep it.”
He marched out, shouldering the door.
He had been both right and wrong.
Garcia was right about his involvement but wrong to believe that he did this. Travis didn’t have the nerve to do it. He was a coward who relied on others to do his dirty work.
As he went to get back in the cruiser, he looked up at the roof and saw Travis crouched, his head in his hands. He couldn’t believe the same kid he’d grown up with had spiraled down this far. Sure, chaos could bring out the worst in people but there was always a line that should never be crossed. In times like this, family was everything and he had just lit a fuse and let it burn.
17
Meadow was absent from breakfast the following morning. After he inquired, one of the servers told him she’d gone into Denver with Star. As he drank a cup of coffee he looked at the others roaming the room. Were they like Meadow? Were they being held here against their will? Did they know what Meadow knew? Why hadn’t anyone done anything?
Alex hadn’t got much sleep that night. It was a combination of things: the disturbing conversation with Meadow, the uncomfortable chair with a spring that stuck into his upper back, and then Sophie who’d returned to the room at a late hour.
She’d entered sometime after midnight.
Surely Abner couldn’t have talked that long?
He’d pretended he was asleep when she crept in, stripped down to her underwear and slipped beneath the covers. It had been a long time since he’d seen her without clothes on, even longer since they’d slept together. Under a faint band of moonlight seeping through the drapes Alex gazed at her, questions roiling in his mind. The past, the present, the future. At some point he’d drifted off, managing to get a few hours. It was certainly more than he got on the road.
Later, he’d exited the room and roamed the grounds in hopes of seeing something unusual, anything that might give him an indication of what was really going on. Meadow’s words came back to him. What was in the barn on the far side of the lake? He’d made a beeline for it, however, before he got halfway around, a golf cart rolled up beside him with Abner and one of his followers. That’s what Alex was calling them now — followers. Like a cult, placing a man on a pedestal as if he was somehow closer to God, they seemed to hang on his every word, and gaze at him, as if he possessed some kind of unknown power.
Abner sat casually in the passenger side, his arm resting on his thigh as a long-haired follower with a gaunt face leaned against the steering wheel. “Morning, Alex. Beautiful day, isn’t it?” Was this guy out of his mind? He acted like the world was fine. It wasn’t. It wouldn’t ever be fine. “Jump in, I’ll give you a ride back to the house.”
Alex waved him off. “I’m good.”
“You’re not hungry?”
“Not yet.”
“Then let’s talk. Sophie told me a lot about you.”
“She’s…”
“Divorcing you.” He nodded. “I know. Jump in.” He jerked his head to the rear where there were two more seats.
Alex looked off toward the barn. “What’s that used for?” he asked before getting in the cart. Abner followed his gaze across a glistening lake that reflected the blue sky.
“Horses, hay. General essentials for the animals. C’mon, hop in.”
Reluctantly he took a seat.
The cart lurched forward and he gripped a railing as they swung around, away from the barn and onto a winding path that led into the forest. “I know you have questions, Alex, everyone does when they come here and I’m here to answer them. However for this place to function efficiently it requires that we all make sacrifices.”
“And by that you mean?”
He turned in his seat. “Sophie wants to stay longer.”
“No, we’re leaving.”
“It’s not forever, just a few days. I think it would be good for both of you.”
“Yeah, well, I appreciate that but we’ll be heading out this morning.”
“And how do you expect to leave?”
Alex raised an eyebrow.
“You’ll need a ride, I mean.”
“Right.”
“As much as we would like to give you one, the need here is great. Now, if you stayed a while longer and contributed, we might be inclined to gift you a vehicle.”
“Or I could search the back roads and homes and take one.”
“You could,” Abner said, nodding. “But let me ask you this, Alex. Where is this all heading? This race to get back to California?”
“My daughter.”
“You think you’ll find her?”
His questions were irritating him. “I expect to.”
“And if you don’t?”
He paused for a second. “Listen, Abner. I can see you affect the people here. I don’t know how or who you are to them — a friend, a leader, a guru or a god, but I will make it home and I will find my daughter.”
“I’m not saying you won’t. But if she’s not alive. How will you cope? Surely you’ve considered this?”
“That’s between me and Sophie.”
“Then that’s a conversation you will need to have as she’s made up her mind.”
“And we will on our way out.”
He nodded and chuckled as if finding something amusing. The cart weaved its way up through a forest of spruce and fir, then continued until it reached a clearing at the top of a hill that overlooked the entire property. The driver stopped the vehicle and Abner got out. “Come, I want to show you something.”
He led Alex to an outcropping of rock that provided a breathtaking view of the valley below. A blanket of green spread for miles around, highlighted by the rising sun. Abner clasped his hands behind his back. “What do you see, Alex?”
From their vantage point he had a clear view of the ranch, the surrounding forest, and the city of Denver in the distance or what was left of it. “What do you want me to see?” he said in a way that made it clear he was frustrated.
“Hope. Despair,” Abner said. “People are lost without a shepherd to lead them.”
Alex scoffed. “And let me guess, you’re this shepherd?”
“I’m whatever you choose me to be. You asked how Star was able to elude the drones. Do you still wish to know?”