Dante didn’t use his physical height to intimidate people much, but seeing his wife grabbed had made him unconsciously do it as he loomed almost a head taller than the angry man, his face a rictus of anger.
“Fine,” he said. “Follow me.”
“How about some of you work on checking alibis and stuff? I mean, I’m sorry y'all's only theory just got deep sixed,” Angelica said, “but hard work is hard. You just have to do the work, instead of jumping to conclusions.”
“Listen, I’m sorry,” the angry one said. “We were and are well within our right to bring her in for questioning. But given the circumstances and what we now know, there’s no way Leah could have been anywhere near where the sheriff was. So, either all of you doctors are now suspects, or none of you are.”
“We just got over the Wuhan Flu. You boys know this. We’ve been quarantined with the exception of checking on neighbors who were exposed the night of the attack.”
“Did Leah mention her phone call to any of you?” The female trooper asked. Dante was already nodding affirmative.
“Roscoe, Ranger, stand down,” Rob said, giving them the verbal command to relax, which made the officers settle down a little bit more than they had before.
“Ok, let’s get this over with. Please send our condolences to his wife,” Leah told them.
Nineteen
“I’m not going to push it,” Leah told Dante. “It’s been a week and honestly, I can understand why I was a suspect.”
“But they put their hands on you,” he said softly. “You have a bruise on your shoulder.”
“But it’s not a deep one, and it’s almost gone already,” she told him. “I’m more worried about who got him.”
“The men in black,” Dante said quietly. “They knew he wouldn’t roll over for them.”
“When has the USDA’s enforcement arm ever been given permission to force a heart attack on somebody and kill them?”
“Maybe it wasn’t just the USDA,” Dante told her.
They were laying in bed, enjoying the afterglow of spending some alone time together.
“I’ve been trying to read up on what happens when the districts are spun up, but with the stock market staying down, nobody is really talking about anything else,” Dante told her.
“I wonder if the president even knows about this?” Leah asked him.
“I doubt it. He’d tweet about it, and it’d be all over the news. Maybe the agents in our district panicked and did something out of the ordinary. Maybe all the mess is done with now?”
“If they were done and this wasn’t normal, why kill Sheriff Robertson?”
“I know, it’s a circular problem. None of it makes sense to me,” Dante said.
Rob was having a hard time sleeping. Angelica had done her level best to wear him out, having caught the baby fever again, from Leah. He was not going to complain, but now she was out cold, and he was wide awake. He decided to check on things and take a long walk. Ranger followed him as he quietly crept around the place. Harry was sleeping soundly.
“You want to stay with him?” Rob asked the pup.
Ranger just rubbed his head against Rob’s leg. He left his son’s door open a crack. He was almost beyond waking up and crawling into bed with Angel and him, but with the dog not on sentry duty in the hallway he figured he would make it easier for him in case he woke up. The two of them got ready in silence. Rob pulled on some clothes and made sure he had a pistol on him. He debated putting on his vest and taking his rifle, but he wanted to burn off some steam and did not think there was any reason to carry it. It would be heavy and would help him wear him out, but he wanted an evening stroll.
With his dog.
Ranger had been a puppy that he had run across while stationed overseas. He’d started out as the camp pup, but Rob found himself working with the dog more and more. He had not trained as a dog handler, but had befriended one over there who had taught him the commands. When he was not out on a mission, he would be working with the dog who followed him everywhere. He had almost gotten into trouble when he’d tried to smuggle the furry companion home, but his CO had pulled some strings and gotten the proper paperwork.
Now, the little traitor was Harry’s best friend. He just hoped Harry never had to know or learn what Ranger was truly capable of.
“Let’s go boy, heel up,” Rob said as they went out the front door.
The Arkansas air was thick with moisture. It had started cooling off some at night, which meant that it was still around seventy degrees. That worked perfectly for him. He did not want to disturb the doctors, and knew Roscoe had taken to sleeping on Doctor Mallory’s cabin porch. If the big mutant started baying, he might wake up everyone.
Rob decided to do a perimeter walk, knowing he could always cut it short if he got tired. Swatting at a bug, he headed out, giving soft commands to Ranger.
“Go out,” Rob said, and Ranger burst ahead of him and started moving ahead of Rob in half circles, looking back to make sure he kept the same thirty foot distance he’d been trained to do. Nose to the ground, smelling for threats, Ranger went to work.
They had made it three quarters of the way around the property when Ranger stopped, tail wagging, alerting Rob that he had caught sight or scent of something.
“What is it boy?” he asked Ranger.
Ranger let out a soft bark, then started walking ahead slowly, telling Rob to follow him. Rob did, and was not surprised that the dog started towards the part of the farm that saw almost as much action as the front gate: the woodlot, where the caves were. Rob did not try to stop his pup, but he doubted he was chasing a recent scent. The state police had been out there with dogs a couple of weeks back, and there were deer that liked to bed there during the daylight hours. But what would cause the doggo to alert to the area?
Rob pulled out his phone, knowing if he sent Angel a text, he would not necessarily wake her up long term.
I was restless. Took Ranger for a walk. He alerted on something in the woodlot. Be back in bed soon, just going to take a peek.
Ranger was impatient to get on the scent again, but Rob noted that he waited rather well for him. He let out a low impatient whine and then started moving forward as Rob did, keeping the distance between them constant. Rob watched as Ranger led them back to the area where the caves had been found. He groaned and killed the small flashlight in his hand, standing still for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the dark.
“Heel,” Rob said in a low voice.
Ranger did not like it, but he did as Rob commanded. Rob patted his head and scratched his ears while waiting.
The enemy was dropping mortars, which was a change. His team was pinned down by sniper fire and Russo had gone down. Their short-range comms were out of commission, and Russo had the radio. “Ranger, fetch Russo,” Rob had commanded, hating to do it.
The dog looked at him funny, head cocked to the side. “Bite fetch Russo,” Rob repeated, hoping the two commands together would clear the matter up. Ranger kept his head cocked for a half a moment longer, then took off in a brown and black streak. The Jihadis picked that moment to send more mail and Rob had to duck, not seeing where his dog went. Thunder and what seemed like lightning shook the ground all around them.
Something thumped down in front of Rob’s knees. He looked down and screamed, falling over backwards as a mortar fell short. Ranger had fetched. He’d fetched the part of the arm that had been blown loose of Russo. The shock of it had surprised him, but the dog was wagging its tail, waiting to see if he had been a good dog or not.
“Good boy, bite fetch Russo,” Rob said again, pointing and repeating the command from earlier. Ranger took off to his left and again things got busy. Rob saw movement in front of him. The insurgents were moving closer under cover of mortar and sniper fire. He lined up his shot, let out a slow breath and started engaging targets as his team did the same on either side of him.
“Your dog is a fucking hero,” Yaeger called to him.
“What?” he yelled, doing a magazine change without looking.
Ranger had the back of Russo’s vest in his mouth and was pulling the man’s torso backwards, toward the hastily dug in emplacement they had been hiding in. Rob could see Russo was dead, saw bullets hit off the hard-packed sand and stone all around Russo and Ranger, but the dog was doing it. Rob popped up and started firing again, losing track of how many times he fired at what target. He wanted the dog to get to them and was laying suppressive fire down for him. When Ranger bumped into Rob’s side, he looked down and smiled. Ranger did not appear to be hit or hurt anywhere.
Two of his team were attempting to revive Russo. Rob slung his carbine and crawled to them, pulling the radio out.
“Robin Hood, this is Little Rob. We’re pinned down by mortar and sniper fire. Send air support. Do you copy? Over.”
“Copy that, Little Rob. We’ve tried to be in contact for the last twenty minutes and decided to see what the drone overhead was looking at. Sent in a few A10s your way three minutes ago. Find a hole and pull it in over your head. Over.”
“Copy that Robin Hood. Hunting a hole. We have casualties, will need extraction. Over.”
“Area’s too hot, five clicks southwest at secondary extraction point still clear. Over.”
“Understood, secondary extraction point. Little Rob out.”
Rob sat there long enough to almost relive that memory. When he opened his eyes, he could see in the darkness the way a predator could. He used the scant moonlight to show him what the darkness wanted to hide, and the light from somebody who thought they had been hidden. Faint light came up from a fissure in the ground, about twenty-five yards away. The night was so black that he could pick that out from as far away as he was in the trees.
“Quiet, heel, follow,” Rob told him, in that order.
Ranger stayed at his side, or just behind him as he picked through the trees. Rob was almost sure that this fissure led into the cave where Angel and Harry had come in from, but things looked different in the dark. The shadows in the night were a mass of black, but within what should have been a pitch dark hole was the sound of somebody cursing softly.
“Get ready boy,” Rob told Ranger and then pulled his pistol and walked to the fissure in the ground.
Steff was on her butt, her knees pulled to her chest, rocking and cursing softly. A section of rope was curled next to her.
“Maybe if I call Daddy, he’ll come,” she muttered to herself.
“Do you have cell phone signal down there?” Rob asked her.
She startled so badly, Steff dropped the phone she had been using as a flashlight. Rob looked all around the fissure and saw part of the bark on one of the nearby trees had been rubbed raw.
“I don’t know,” she said, pulling her phone to her. “Besides, it’s almost dead.”
“Well then turn it off and I’ll use my flashlight,” he said, holstering his pistol and replacing it with his small flashlight.
“Ok,” she said, killing the flash on her phone. “Can you help me out of here?”
“Maybe,” Rob said softly, “but you’re going to have to tell me what you are doing down there. I thought you were all sick?”
“I haven’t been for almost a week now,” Steff said. “And I don’t care, your family will find out what this is about anyway.”
She walked over to the edge and was able to get her hands on the edge of the fissure, but then turned and got the rope, tossing it up. Rob took it and dropped it off the side and got down on his knees. He put his hands down and she gratefully grabbed his wrists. He did the same and simply stood up, pulling her out of the ground in one shot. Ranger barked and spun in a circle.
“Yeah, you’re a good boy, but heel, guard,” Rob told Ranger.
“Thank you,” Steff said, rubbing her wrists. “I wasn’t strong enough to pull myself out and the rope…”
“Came untied. Who would have thought a cowgirl could get knots so wrong?”
“You weren’t always married to Angel, I wasn’t always married to Don. You should know that one.”
“Don’t bring it up, we were in high school,” Rob said, disgust in his voice.
“Fine, fine. Yeah, the rope didn’t hold when I went down to look in the cave and after being sick, I couldn’t pull myself back up. I kind of fucked this up all over the place. Thanks again for getting me out.”
“Want to tell me what’s going on?” Rob asked, pressing the issue.
“Those bodies that were found? One of them was my oldest sister.”
“What?” Rob asked, shocked. “She’s been gone since kindergarten!”
“The other body, they think… it might be… my momma,” Steff said with a hitch in her voice.
“I heard rumors that one was some kind of relation to your dad. But one of them might be your Mom?”
“Yeah,” she said softly.
“Wow,” Rob muttered, “So what… why are you out here, and why are you spelunking in the dark?”
“I... I was hoping to find Momma’s necklace. I know it’s crazy, but I always thought she’d taken it with her when she left. Then I find out she never left, she died in a hole in the ground…?”
“I’m sorry,” Rob said. “Why… I mean, the state police have the case… Did they say why they think they were there?”
“No, but Daddy thinks it has something to do with the rumors of the treasure. I mean, I’ve been through every little cave system in the area as a kid, and I never found anything.”
“You?” Rob asked, surprised. “I’ve never even heard the buried treasure story or anything about it until after Dewayne was buried.”
“I guess maybe it’s a family secret,” Steff said softly, “but it’s also got me scared, and I need to know what happened.”
“Why? How come?”
“My daughter. When she passed, she had fallen badly. Now I don’t want to sound too crazy, but three ladies from my family all die mysteriously in falls?”
Rob grunted; that was a lot to take in and he figured that had been a lot more truth than Steff had given him last time.
“You suspected some of this before? Like the first time the dogs knocked you down?” Rob asked.
“Yeah. I have been coming out here once or twice a week, looking for clues. My momma didn’t leave us, she died in some stinking hole, and my sister went missing a year later. Both bodies found next door, on your family's property.”
Rob shuddered as the implications hit him. What had happened? Could the state police determine the cause of death with decade old bones? They had been able to get enough for a DNA test, but…
“Why was your father’s DNA in their databases?” Rob asked.
“He was in the Navy,” Steff told him. “I done asked him that myself.”
“How is your father taking the news?” Rob asked.
“We only just found out that it might be Momma and Sis. He is about as drunk as a skunk in a funk right now. I had hoped that if I had found her necklace and took it back to him…”
“I get it, I do, but that could have been you in there for decades this time,” Rob stressed to her.
Steff shivered, wrapping her arms around herself.
“Ranger, protect,” he told him, then checked out the fissure for himself. If he went in sideways, he might fit, he thought to himself.
“What are you doing?” Steff asked.
“Just wait here a second. Ranger will keep an eye on you.”
“I don’t need to be watched,” she said, stamping her foot. “I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”
“I said that wrong,” Rob said, squeezing in the fissure, waiting until he could expand his chest again to finish. “He is going to protect you. After all, people have died around here, and right close by. I can get in and out of here by myself and I am bringing the light. So, if you don’t want him to stick close…”
“No, no, it’s ok,” Steff said quickly.
Rob grunted and then turned, ducking. He had
been given his nickname by the kids in class when he was little. He was the size of a grown man by the age of twelve, and with his last name of Little, it was a funny, ironic joke that had carried over into the military. Now, he wished he were not so big and tall.
His flashlight illuminated the small cave and the passage that went back deeper. He could see dozens of footprints in the dust and dirt from the crime scene techs. He followed them out to the pool of water that Angel and Harry had described. He flashed the light down at the pool, seeing it emptied into a crack up on the side where the water had eaten away at a softer stone. He knelt and cupped his free hand, dipping it into the water and pulled it out, smelling it. Slightly off, but nothing horrible. Rob took a sip and could taste the heavy minerals in it.
They had been worried it would be sulfurous, but as it turned out it was not bad. But if the water went through the side of the rock here and kept going, it had to go somewhere. An underground stream? He tried to picture in his mind how far away the other cave was, but was finally getting tired, and his small spike of adrenaline was wearing off.
Rob pointed the flashlight upstream and saw the gentle slope the water was coming down. He could sort of straddle it a bit, and with a hand to the wall he made his way up the slope slowly.
“I can’t see your light any more,” Steff called from behind him.
“That’s ok, I’m just moving and looking at stuff.”
Rob could tell that the techs had not come upstream. He was leaving prints in the rock dust and sand that lined the channel Harry had called the slip and slide. He found the rock his son hit his head on and knelt down, shining his flashlight on it. He was looking for blood, hair, anything to prove that this was the place his son had come out. Instead, he saw something glittering at the base of the rock, fully submerged and invisible unless his flashlight hit it just right.
He pulled out a locket. Only part of the hasp was shiny, the rest of it was a verdigris green. Rob figured it was silver. The hasp had to have been made out of another material. Stainless steel? Rob did not know, but he had found far more than he’d been out looking for when he couldn’t sleep. Heading out to the main cave portion where the fissure was, he pocketed the necklace and lifted himself out.
Behind The Curve-The Farm | Book 2 | The Farm Page 12