Blood and Ashes

Chapter 34

‘Ever feel like we’re being poked and prodded like a bug in a Petri dish? That we’ve been cultivated all this time, till we’re a more virulent strain than the disease itself?’

That caused me to blink at the morose face of my friend. ‘Christ, Rink, that’s heavy thinking for an ignoramus brute like you.’

Rink nudged my ribs with an elbow, taking the gibe for what it was. ‘You know exactly where I’m coming from, Joe.’

‘That I do, Rink. That I do.’

We were back in the FBI chopper, swooping low over the wooded hills of northern Pennsylvania, en route for Hertford. Vince had sat up front this time, alongside the pilot. It was as much an excuse to nurse his painful jaw without looking a wimp as it was an opportunity to conduct business in private. I was glad that the FBI-cum-Arrowsake stooge was out of the way. It gave us the opportunity to talk about Walter’s denouement without having to worry about our words reaching the wrong ears.

‘I’m even surprised that Arrowsake chose to show its face in this,’ Rink said.

‘They didn’t have to show up; I already had no option but follow instructions,’ I said.

‘You coulda chose to go to prison.’

‘Yeah, right, like I was going to do that? Seriously, the FBI offered me a deal. Stop Carswell Hicks and my involvement would be buried. Now you and I both know that the FBI doesn’t have the power to offer a deal like that, so it was obvious that someone else was behind it. Soon as I heard Walter’s name mentioned I knew. Still, I have to admit it’s strange that the commanders made things official by giving their personal nod of approval.’

‘Maybe they don’t trust that frog-gigger, Vince, to get the job done.’

‘There’s more than Vince dealing with this. Rest assured. Homeland Security, NSC, FBI, CIA; everyone will have their own team on it. Plus, there’ll be others from Arrowsake.’

‘It’s not a good feeling knowing that there are others from our unit out there.’

‘Not from our unit, Rink. These are a new breed.’

‘Yeah, I get that, but you know where I’m coming from. And what that might mean.’

‘You think they’re using us as scapegoats and they’re prepared to sacrifice us?’

‘Like I said, germs in a Petri dish. If we’re their superbugs, you can bet your sweet cheeks they’ve designed an antidote.’

‘If that was the case, Walter would have warned us.’

‘Walter would sell us down the line as quick as that!’ Rink snapped his fingers. ‘Don’t know how you can trust him after the way he’s used us all these years.’

‘We’ve used him, too.’

Rink didn’t make comment, he knew that without Walter’s intervention we’d both be doing hard time, or dead.

‘I suppose you’re right. Walter has helped us, but it was always for his own reasons. Maybe he was even ordered to help us, I don’t know. Perhaps that’s why Arrowsake have chosen now to show their faces, so that we realise who it is we’re really obligated to.’

‘I don’t feel like we owe them a thing. They made monsters outa us, then they kicked us loose like we were dog shit on their shoes, remember?’

Dreams still tormented me: the screams of accusation, the faces of the countless dead, all those sent howling into my nightmares because Arrowsake pointed at them and ordered me to kill. In those dreams I was under a bruised sky where the clouds were the shifting faces of the damned, striding across the blood-soaked earth, the arms of my victims reaching for me, tearing at my clothing and flesh, the ground sucking at my boots, trying to draw me into its embrace. Sometimes I’d give in to the inevitable, and wake varnished in sweat, but other times I’d fight my accusers, blasting their faces apart with my fists and my gun that seemed to have a never-ending supply of ammunition. While doing so I’d laugh hysterically, like it was the greatest enjoyment imaginable. Yes, Rink was right when he said that Arrowsake had made a monster of me.

‘Walter’s still our friend.’ There was finality to my statement.

‘I know that you love the old fart, Hunter, but you’ve gotta see him for what he really is. Where his loyalties lie.’

‘I just don’t see him standing by and doing nothing to warn us. Not if you’re right and we’re not coming back from this.’

‘If what he says is true, then there’s little hope of that happening anyway.’

‘There’s no need for you to come along, Rink. I’m the one who has the threat of prison hanging over me.’

The suggestion didn’t merit an answer. Rink shook his head. ‘I vote we tell Arrowsake to go fuck themselves, then we disappear. We could do that, you know.’

Rink was as serious as an April Fool prank. He grinned, shook his head again, resigned to the fact that we were buried in Arrowsake’s plan as deeply as an Arkansas tick in a bull’s ass. It didn’t matter that we were being manipulated into becoming assassins again; I had a personal reason for wanting Carswell Hicks and his followers dead. I’d sworn to end the threat to the Griffiths family and to get that done even Rink could see that it was better we worked with Arrowsake than against them.

The weather front coming down over the Great Lakes had finally spent itself over the Alleghenies, and Hertford was spread out below us, twinkling wetly under the winter sun. Hertford City Medical Center was a series of whitewashed buildings on the northern side of town, and the chopper banked that way, heading directly for the hospital’s helipad. I adjusted my coat. Covering my weapons was a necessity, but I also suspected that the sun didn’t hold much warmth yet.

Disembarking from the helicopter, we attracted a crowd of onlookers who were familiar with the local air-ambulance but not this sleek airship. Maybe they were expecting the men in black, because they seemed singularly nonplussed when Rink and I stepped out. Vince followed, and he did look more like the popular image of an undercover agent. It helped when he thumbed on some obligatory dark shades and strode purposefully for the hospital, his mouth set in a tight line. We shared an amused glance at his expense.

Don Griffiths was no longer ensconced in the Intensive Care Unit, but had been shifted to a private room. It was as much for the privacy of other patients as for Don, due to the number of FBI personnel who’d come and gone over the last few days. There was a guard on his door, who moved away when Vince gave him the signal. Don was lying in his bed, eyes closed, with the soft beep of machines marking his progress back to recovery. Don looked twenty years older than the last time I’d seen him. I turned to Vince. ‘Give me a few minutes, will you?’

‘I want to know everything he says.’

‘Fair enough, but he won’t say anything with you standing there.’

Vince scowled at the old man in the bed. ‘It doesn’t look like he’s going to say anything whether I’m here or not.’

Rink took Vince by the elbow. ‘C’mon. You can go get a coffee with your old pal, Rink.’

‘Oh, so we’re friends now?’

‘So long as you’re buying.’

Vince pointed a finger at me. ‘ Everything he says. OK?’

‘As long as you get me a coffee, too. Strong as it comes, extra shot of espresso.’

Rink ushered the FBI agent away, closing the door behind him. When I was sure that Vince was out of earshot, I said, ‘You can stop pretending now, Don, the feebie’s gone.’

Don slowly opened his eyes, as though checking the coast was clear. He shifted himself on the bed, groaning as much as the springs. ‘How did you know I was awake?’

I nodded at the cardiac monitor, how closely together the spikes and corresponding beeps had become. ‘Bit of a giveaway. Luckily Vince was too busy listening to his own voice to notice.’

‘There’s no fooling you, Hunter.’

Don’s words held more meaning than even he’d intended. His cheeks flushed, a stark contrast to his white hair and beard.

‘I need to know it all, Don. Everything. You ready to talk?’ The question held room for only one reply. Don closed his eyes. He was ordering his words, and I gave him the time. There was a jug of water on a bedside table and I poured a glass, held it out to the old man. ‘Here, take a drink.’

Don sipped, holding the glass in both hands like a chalice. The glass was something he could concentrate on, to help steady himself.

‘When I first came to see you, you mentioned that you’d received an email,’ I began. ‘I didn’t attach too much importance to it at the time, but it’s been there niggling away at the back of my mind. I assumed that you had received a message — perhaps intended for someone else — and had read into it something that wasn’t even there. But when events overtook us, I never bothered asking who it was from or how many times you’d got mail prior to that because by then, well, it was a given that the mail had come from Hicks or someone close to him. I was wrong, wasn’t I?’

Don’s mouth made a tight gash and he dipped towards the glass again. He licked his lips, trying to get his mouth to work in time with his thoughts. ‘You’re partly right, Hunter. The messages did come from someone close to Hicks, only they were without his knowledge.’

‘Someone betraying Hicks from the inside? Not Vince?’

‘No, not Vince. I had no idea… what Vince really was until he came across me at the logging camp and told me.’

‘Who, then?’

‘Better that you understand what than who. Back when I was an analyst for the think-tank, I discovered this man. He was deemed a low threat, no one of any consequence. He had a deep-seated hatred of the government for what he saw as a betrayal of the Vietnam veterans, but he was more hot air than anything and was never going to progress further than nasty words or propaganda. Under the first amendment, he had a right to shout and scream all he wanted, and he was happy to do that. Posing as a sympathetic ear, I got close to him and he began telling me about this other bunch, an offshoot disowned even by the National Alliance, white supremacists who were planning a major event. Are you familiar with The Turner Diaries, Hunter?’

As someone who had been tasked with taking down paramilitary killers I was all too familiar with the book. Written under the pseudonym of Andrew MacDonald, it was actually penned by Dr William Pierce, the founder of the National Alliance, and was about a race war with a group of militant whites successfully overthrowing the US government. Many racists saw it as a prophetic tale of future events and some had used it as a blueprint for their actions. Timothy McVeigh, the man convicted of the Oklahoma bombing, had confessed to attacking the Federal Building after reading the book. Back in the 1980s, Robert Matthews and his group had gone on a spree of robberies and murder before he was killed in a stand-off with the FBI. Matthews was also an advocate of the book.

‘Hicks was planning a coup?’

‘That’s what my contact told me. Except it turned out that Hicks was more interested in attacking the banking system than the government.’

Hit them where it really hurts, I thought. ‘Which was when you supplied the information and Hicks was arrested.’

‘That’s right,’ Don said. ‘My friend was pissed at me of course; he suspected that I was the one behind Hicks’ capture. But he was a forgiving soul, so as long as I paid him a few grand he promised to go away.’

‘And you gave in to his demand.’

‘It suited me,’ Don admitted. ‘Cracking that case was the making of me, gave me everything I needed. I was grateful and paid him.’

‘When Hicks escaped from prison, this man found out that he wasn’t dead. He didn’t come back to warn you as an old friend, he was after more money?’

‘I didn’t believe him. As far as I was concerned Hicks was dead and gone; what threat was he to me or my family?’

‘Then Brook died.’

Don’s eyes grew teary. ‘Then Brook was murdered.’

The words of the email made sense now. How many more must die or who will you lose next? Something along those lines. The message was really asking, ‘How many are you prepared to lose before you pay me?’

I said, ‘You sent for me, even after you paid him. You didn’t trust this man.’

Don shook his head wearily. ‘I sent for you, I only got back in touch with him after you turned me down. Remember how you walked away from me? Well, I transferred the cash to him then — fifty thousand dollars. I wasn’t to know that you were going to change your mind, was I? Maybe if Hicks’ men hadn’t approached you at the Seven-Eleven then you’d have got in your car and headed back to Tampa.’

I couldn’t deny that Don had a point. ‘So what was this man offering in return? He obviously didn’t give a damn about you or your family. What was the money for this time?’

‘Information on Hicks’ latest plot.’

‘Did he send it to you?’

‘Yes.’

‘So where is it, your computer?’ The FBI had already trawled through Don’s computer and had come up with nothing of significance. There wasn’t even a history of the alleged emails.

Don tapped his head. ‘It’s all up here, Hunter. We used the draft email facility between our computers and deleted as we went. There’s nothing but what I’ve retained up here.’

‘This man-’

‘Jim Lloyd,’ Don interjected. ‘You know what he is now, so you may as well know his name.’

‘OK. This Lloyd, do you trust his information?’

‘I’ve no reason to doubt him. He wants Hicks stopped as much as I do. He’s frightened that Hicks has figured out who supplied the info that originally betrayed him, and that harm will come to his family as a result. He told me his daughter is part of Gant’s crew and he was terrified of what Hicks would do to her.’

Sonya Madden. I thought of what Vince had done to the girl and that Lloyd’s fears had come true, albeit in a roundabout manner.

‘Yet he was more interested in extorting money from you than getting his daughter out of harm’s way.’

‘I think he was planning on using the cash to take his daughter somewhere safe. He wanted out of Manhattan, that was for sure. That was another reason he wanted Hicks stopped. He says that Hicks forced him into bartering a deal with some old contacts of Lloyd’s out in the Far East. He said that if Hicks’ plan works out there’s no way he wants to stay in New York.’

‘Tell me Hicks’ plan.’

Don told me.

Holy shit, Walter wasn’t that far away from the truth, only it was much worse than he or Arrowsake had even anticipated.

I was running when I met Rink and Vince returning from the cafeteria. The extra shot of caffeine would have been good, but I just snatched it from Vince’s hand and slung it in a waste bin. They followed me, pounding towards the waiting helicopter, Vince asking what the hell was going on. Over my shoulder I said, ‘The deal’s still on, Vince. You bought the coffee, so I’ll tell you everything Don said. But I’ll tell you on the way to New York because we haven’t a single second to spare.’