A Cold Copper Moon (The Cooper Series Book 3)

by Richard Conrath

  “For some cops, I hope, Lone Ranger.”

  “We already have cops,” I said. “We’ve got you.”

  “Right,” she said. “Make your call.”

  Richie and Huck had dropped onto a bench aft. Richie had his hands hard against his ears. “Can’t you shut this thing down for a fucking minute?” he said. “I think I’m going deaf.”

  Louise cut the motors back. Good thing. I couldn’t use the phone anyway from the noise.

  I called Cleveland Wong on his SAT.

  Chapter Seventy-Five

  Nearly Home

  The Boy strained to see the clock on the outside wall of the Greyhound station in Charleston, West Virginia. It was 10:11 p.m. A fog had set in, blurring the lights around the station. And buses rolled in like creatures from outer space, their passengers barely visible through the fog as they pressed their faces against the windows—orphans waiting for a welcome.

  “Got fifteen minutes,” announced the bus driver as he pulled into one of the parking slots circling the station. There was a hiss and a rush of cold air as the driver opened the door. “Temperature’s 33 degrees,” he said, pointing to large red digitals on the side of the station. The Boy pulled on his jacket. It was a warm-weather jacket not one suited for the kind of weather that plagues the north in December. As he climbed down from the bus, frigid air hit him in the face forcing him to pull his hood over his head. He headed for the doors of the bus station, shaking from the cold as he swung through. Inside it was warm. He beat his hands together to chase away the chill that ran like needles through his fingers.

  “Not used to this shit, huh?” said his friend from the bus. “Just wait. This ain’t nothin’. When January comes, you’ll see what cold is.” He rubbed his hands together like he was standing in front of a bonfire. The Boy tried to remember what it was like back then—before the men took him away. He found a cup of watery hot chocolate at a newsstand that stood dirty and dark at the far end of the station. The steam warmed his nose and his insides. A few minutes later both boys were re-boarding the bus.

  The big doors hissed closed and the driver backed out of the station, his headlights penetrating the darkness like a lighthouse beam. They were back on I-77.

  “Next stop, Ohio,” the driver said, matter-of-fact, as he wound the bus’s motor up to speed.

  Home was only a few hours away, and the Boy’s stomach began to hurt again. He wondered if he would have a place to sleep tonight. Maybe in my own house, he hoped. He could picture his bedroom, and he hoped that his mom had left it just as he remembered, all warm and cozy. Not at all like his bedroom back in South Carolina. Not at all like that. So, he stared into the darkness as the bus rolled past the West Virginia countryside where there were no lights except for a lonely one now and then—from a distant farmhouse—or when they came to a rest stop—there were plenty of those along the highway. Then it would get dark again as the rest stop settled in behind them, and the Boy would get to thinking again—of his home in Muskingum, Ohio. And hope. And worry.

  Chapter Seventy-Six

  Cleveland Wong

  Friday Night, December 9

  Cleveland Wong doesn’t have a life—or a wife. His life is Homeland Security. Assistant Secretary. But once in a while he gets away—hides out in his second home in Delray Beach, Florida. His first home, of course, is in D.C. That’s where he spends most of his time. I wondered where he was tonight.

  “So, where do you think I am, Cooper?” he said testily.

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “Would you guess...on vacation?” he said.

  “Oops,” I said. “So, you’re in Delray.”

  “Nice,” he said. “I’m vacationing in Delray—one of my few vacation weeks of the year. And here I am talking with you,” he added, turning to sarcasm.

  “You’re resorting to sarcasm to bug me,” I said, calling him on it.

  “You are right.” A pause—an angry one. “So now that you are part of my vacation. What’ve you got?”

  I told him about the drilling. I told him about Dr. Graham Bell’s lab findings. I told him about our suspicions about drug trafficking from the oil rigs. I told him about the go-fast boat. About the airboat and the shooting at Shark River. He listened—didn’t interrupt once. But he was almost too quiet.

  “Let me talk with him,” said Louise, impatient.

  “Hey,” she said.

  I heard him grunt.

  “This is Louise.” She paused. Breathing harder than normal. Upset. “We’ve got trouble down here in paradise and we need your help.”

  I heard a Damn straight from Richie and a You bet your ass from Huck, both loud enough for Wong to hear. Louise put the phone on speaker.

  “You’ve got your gang members with you, Cooper?” Wong said after Louise handed me back the cell.

  “I do,” I said. “And we have an incursion into U.S. territory that you need to be concerned about,” I added.

  “Okay, okay, okay,” he said, still impatient. “Tell you what, Cooper. I’ll fly down there and meet you. Where are you now?”

  I told him.

  “I’ll meet you at your house. Give me four hours. Okay?” The ’okay’ was just politeness.

  “You gonna call the Coast Guard?”

  “Damn right,” he said. “Four hours. And get some coffee ready—not decaf!” And he was gone.

  I checked my cell. It was 10:00 p.m. and we were west of Sable Key. We had to make time to get back to the marina and then back to Oceanside and Sammy. I was trying to picture Wong landing the helicopter in my back yard, and the neighbors thinking an alien ship was landing. Close Encounters of a Fourth Kind, maybe.

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Joe E Lewis

  Friday Night, December 9

  “So, where you heading?” his new friend said.

  The Boy studied him and wondered how old he was. He didn’t have any facial hair, his face looked young, but he acted older, like maybe seventeen or eighteen. And his hair was long—kind of scraggly—like he didn’t take care of himself. His pants were worn and baggy—and there was a hole in the knee. And he had a long sleeve shirt—like a grown-up—blue, like denim, and a jacket with the letters WASPS across the back, big and black. They matched his hair color.

  “Muskingum,” the Boy said, leaving the rest of the story alone. But Joey continued and asked why he was going there. And the Boy told him it was his family’s home. And then Joey—his new friend—maybe his only friend—introduced himself: Joey Lewis.

  Named after the famous comedian Joe E. Lewis, by a nun who found him on the steps of the orphanage, and she was crazy about the guy, so the nun gives him that name but—

  “I’m no comedian,” he said. “I’m a real orphan! And then I find out that it was my mom who left me at the orphanage—on the steps—and she comes back later and tries to take me but I tell the nuns to tell her to go fuck herself. And the head nun washes my mouth out, see, but then she doesn’t let her take me, anyways.”

  And then he continued—on a roll—about his father. “Forget him. He didn’t know nothin’ about the orphanage I was in. It was in South Carolina,” he said turning to the Boy. “Or about the nuns who raised me. They were nice but one of them—the head penguin, the one who washed my mouth out, she was a bitch, and she kept on me all the time until...” and the Boy dozed off as Joey Lewis spoke and as the bus rolled through the Ohio Valley—through the darkness—and he woke and the boy was still talking—about an uncle who he learned about from his delinquent mother—who, by the way, doesn’t live in Columbus, but his uncle lives there, and his delinquent mother—who gave him away—said that he should go visit him sometime. Stay close to the family, she told him. “Probably feeling guilty for being a stupid mother,” the boy said, good old Joey Lewis, otherwise known as Joe E. Lewis.

  “So, I called him—my uncle—and he said, ‘Yeah, your mom told me all about you. And, yeah, I would love to have you stay with me.’ And he told me to
call him when I get into town.” He stopped, breathing hard since he had been talking forever. Then, he leaned back in his seat, turned to the Boy, nodded and said, “Cool!’

  The movement of the bus rode the Boy to sleep, and he dreamed of the telephone wires that lined the road when he was in the car with the two men who had taken him, and of the smell—like rotten eggs—as they got closer to his new home in South Carolina, and of the Man, and of the Asp...

  And Joey was now watching him when he woke and the Boy said he was sorry that he slept and Joey, said no worries, and why was he going to Muskingum? Maxie told him about the house in South Carolina, and the Man and the Asp—and maybe the Asp was looking for him—even now, the Boy worried—but he hesitated, hesitated telling his new friend, Joey, about why he was in South Carolina.

  Joey pressed him—of course he would. Joey was like a street kid, and he was smart. So, Maxie told him what had happened, about the men who had taken him. His new friend, gasped and said, No shit! And Maxie nodded and went on and told about how his parents had been killed, or something; and that he was sort of locked up in the house in South Carolina—and he didn’t know just where that was; and about his tutor.

  And Joey said: You mean you never went to school?

  Maxie said: Of course.

  Joey said: I mean to a real school?

  Maxie said: Well, no.

  Joey: Did you ever go out? I mean to a movie?

  And Maxie said: No.

  Joey: Or to the store?

  Maxie: No.

  Joey: Or anywhere?

  Maxie, embarrassed to say, hesitated, but he didn’t have to answer because the boy, Joey, his new friend, already knew.

  “Shit!” Joey said. “They kidnapped you!”

  And Maxie’s world ended—right there.

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  Good Ol’ Joey Lewis

  Joey saw the look on his face and knew he said the wrong thing.

  “Sorry, dude....”

  Maxie was quiet. Kidnapped. All these years. The Man telling him his parents were dead—maybe they were; never being able to leave the house; the tutor; Asp who was probably looking for him now; it was all a make-believe story; it was all a lie. How was that possible? And Maxie shut out the world, shut out the boy who claimed to be Joey Lewis, his friend. Was that also a lie? Shut out the sound of the bus as its tires sang out the fact that they were—no he was—Maxie—on his way home.

  “How do you know I was kidnapped?” asked Maxie, turning on Joe E. Lewis. Angry, not believing. How could he believe it? Everything he had lived for the past eight years—was it all a lie? “I wasn’t kidnapped! My parents weren’t able to keep me and then they were killed in an automobile accident and....” and it all began to sound strange to him and the story began to fall apart, like an avalanche, beginning with a single stone, then...the whole explanation, which he had accepted so easily when the Man explained to him about why he had brought him to his house: his parents in trouble, then killed in an automobile accident, it all sounded so believable, and he wanted to believe it, or else...the alternative...

  He looked over at Joey, whose face was in shadows. That’s because the bus driver had turned off the lights, and most of the passengers seemed to be asleep—except for the two of them, of course. And Maxie’s stomach ache was now a ten. A doctor had come to the house one time and asked how much he hurt when he had bruised his knee in a fall—and he had said, Tell me, on a scale of one to ten, with ten being the worst, how much pain are you feeling? That was like a five. But right now, Maxie was feeling a ten.

  “I’m sorry, dude. I shouldn’t...” Joey struggled with the words.

  “No, you shouldn’t. When you don’t know...”

  “But dude...the men who took you, the man who wouldn’t let you out of the house, the tutor you talked about, and this guy who is supposed to be following you...”

  “The Asp,” Maxie finished.

  “Yeah.” Then as though done with the argument, Joey, his new friend, the boy who was named by some nuns, a name that he thought he would change sometime, because why not? it wasn’t his real name anyway, this friend, Maxie’s only friend, continued, “Okay. Forget about the kidnapping thing. Let’s get back to your story. You never finished it.” And Maxie marveled how old Joey acted. He was probably his same age but he acted like a grown-up. “I mean you never really told me about what you’re going to do in old Muskingum of O.H.I.O. I mean, who do you think is going to be there?”

  So Maxie told him he just wanted to see his house, see if somebody—maybe his mom, maybe his dad—was there. Joey nodded, sympathetically, like the Artful Dodger might do in his shabby clothes and his face all dirty with soot. Then, “Hey, what if nobody is at home, dude? Where you going to sleep?”

  Maxie thought, I know. Then, “I was hoping...”

  And the kid said he would go with him to his parents’ house—if it was still his parents’ house—and see what’s up. “My uncle will be at the bus station in Columbus. But I’ll call him and he’ll come and pick me up in Muskingum—no problems.”

  So Maxie thought about it and thought about his last days at his house in Muskingum, near the college, not far from Anthony’s Antique Shop, and about his room, and the toys, even though he was too old for them now, but he wanted them anyway, and the baseball mitt, and his dad. And his mom at the screen door. His eyes watered as he fought the tears but he couldn’t, so he turned toward the window again where the boy couldn’t see him and he saw his face again, but he didn’t see the tears, because of the darkness. And this face—in the window—looked sad to him, soft and sad. And it stared back so he turned away, but he knew it would still be watching him even when he would sleep.

  Then his eyes drooped, and shut, and he slept, while the boy next to him, Joey Lewis, watched him. The Boy dreamed about the field down the street from his house and wondered if it would still be there and if he would be able to find it. In the dark. In the snow. It was so long ago.

  Joey pulled out his cell as he watched Maxie sleep and made a call.

  Chapter Seventy-Nine

  Cleveland Wong

  Early Saturday Morning, December 10

  A winter storm was blowing into the Midwest from Canada—Canadians hate to be blamed for the weather. But the storms do develop in the north and the worst of them penetrate into Florida, chilling even south Florida, including Miami, where even the palms would wrap themselves in their branches if they could.

  The temperature was dropping quickly—down to 53 degrees already—as I steered the Canyon down the waterway that led into the Pilot House. No lights were on in the houses that lined the channel. It was after 1:00 a.m. Everyone was tucked in. By the time we docked and tied the boat down it was nearly 1:30 and Wong would be landing near my house somewhere around 2:00. I wanted to get there before he did—warn the neighbors.

  Wong touched down at 2:05. It was a Bell 407 with a long sleek body, built for easy egress for an assault team. The noise from the copter was deafening. If anyone in the area was asleep, they were awake now. He landed in a field nearby, one that he had used before. The pilot was a Coast Guardsman—it was a Coast Guard copter.

  Richie, Louise, Huck, and I were waiting about a football field away—just to make sure we didn’t lose our heads in the blades. It’s happened. That’s why people duck. The pilot shut the motor down and then there was silence. I waited for the sirens—neighbors complaining to the cops. Matter of fact my nearest neighbor was about a mile away. Most of the land surrounding me was Everglades. No sirens. Just the noise of the door of the copter opening and Wong climbing down. Wong is tall, six feet two at least, with black hair and a young face belying his fifty years. He crouched under the main rotor wing even though the blades were idle. Habit. The pilot remained in the cockpit and waved.

  As soon as we were all clear, the pilot started the copter, warning beeps first then the whine of the turbine as the engine began the slow process of turning the blades. Then the
noise grew, making me cringe as I thought of neighbors—even though the closest was a mile away—and the blades whipped the air, sounding like the world’s largest lawn mower, and rose slowly, angling toward the open field. Then it dipped its blades forward and roared east toward the Miami skyline.

  “Fucking better be a good reason for all this, Cooper,” were the first words out of Wong’s mouth as we all watched the lights of the copter disappear over Oceanside. But then he took my hand and gripped it firmly. “Good to see you again.” Sign of acceptance. We started for the house.

  “So, Richie, how’s Cleveland these days?” he said as we followed the beam of my flashlight over the uneven ground.

  “Same old, same old,” he said. “Bad guys are still winning.”

  “So that’s good for you, right?” and Wong chuckled over that.

  “I’m one of the good guys. Ask Coop,” Richie retorted.

  “Uh-huh. And you keep the bad guys out of your territory, right?” Another chuckle.

  Richie growled and muttered under his breath.

  Then Wong turned to Louise. “How you doing?”

  “I’m good, Cleveland,” she said.

  Wong had known Louise through her father, an important national police administrator in Colombia. He was working with Wong to curb Cartel operations in the U.S. when he was assassinated in front of his family home. Louise was just a young girl when she witnessed it. After that horrific incident, Wong felt responsible for the family and helped bring Louise to the U.S. He was Director of ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) at the time.

  “You still shooting buffalo?” Now picking on Huck. He likes to stir him up.