If I Should Die

THIRTY-FOUR

The Lock and Barrel was nearly empty.

Sean and Patrick sat at the bar; each had a bottled beer in front of them that they hadn’t drunk. Sean put down his phone. “That was Dillard. He knows where the Foster place is and is headed there now. ETA ninety minutes. Once Ricky is out of town, that’s one less person we have to worry about.”

“The bartender is very interested in us,” Patrick said.

“It’s pretty safe to say that he’s probably in on it, too.” Sean motioned for Trina to come over. She did so reluctantly. “Where is everyone?”

“Don’t know.” She shrugged, refusing to look at him. The bartender was still watching.

Sean smiled casually. “Odd for a Saturday night. We came in to say hi to Jon.”

“I don’t know where he is,” Trina said.

Sean leaned forward. Keeping the smile on his face, he whispered, “I know there’s trouble. I’m here to help.”

She bit her lip.

“Smile,” Sean told her.

She did. She looked ill. “Two more?” she asked brightly.

“We’re good.”

Sean waved to the bartender. “Reggie, do you know where Jon is tonight?”

“Nope.”

“What about your boss?”

At first, Reggie didn’t know what he meant. Then his eyes narrowed.

“Exactly. Your real boss. Where is she?”

“I’d tell you to get out of town,” Reggie said, “but it’s too late for that.”

Reggie reached under the bar and Patrick had his gun out so fast Sean almost hadn’t seen him move. “Keep your hands where I can see them,” Patrick ordered. The bartender complied.

“Where is Bobbie Swain?” Sean said. “You can get her a message for me, right?”

Reggie glared. “I’m sure you don’t want to do that.”

“Tell her I know what’s going on here, and there’s a price for my silence. Have her call me and we’ll talk. Got it?”

Reggie scowled.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” He put his business card on the bar and he and Patrick walked out.

“You bluffed?” Patrick said.

“I have to force her hand. If she thinks whatever they’ve got planned for tomorrow is at risk, she’ll expose herself. If we can neutralize her, I can get Henry Callahan and his wife and Ricky Swain to safety.”

“You know, it has yet to be proven that Bobbie Swain has committed any crimes,” Patrick said.

“So she’s wanted for questioning,” Sean said. “Does that work?”

They got into the truck and Sean headed toward the Foster property on the far side of the Hendrickson land.

“You must know the woman is up to her neck in illegal activity,” Sean said. “Drugs, perjury, conspiracy, murder.”

“Without any evidence-” Patrick quickly added.

“Yet,” Sean said. “That woman has been controlling this town for a long time. I just need one person to talk-and find whatever it was that Victoria Sheffield found that got her killed.”

Patrick shook his head. “Yeah, wish it were that easy. When are Lucy and Noah getting back?”

“They should be done with the reconnaissance and landing at a small airstrip outside Potsdam.”

His call to Lucy’s cell went straight to voice mail. He tried Noah’s. It rang six times, then went to voice mail.

He hung up. Cell reception in the air or the mountains was spotty. They’d left Albany nearly three hours ago, but they were making the loop around Spruce Lake searching for the drug warehouses Sean suspected were storing marijuana. Noah hadn’t sent him a location yet to check out; maybe they hadn’t found anything. Maybe Paul Swain had lied, hooking Sean in and diverting his attention.

Sirens cut through the air and Sean slowed down until he realized they were coming from the substation up the highway outside Spruce Lake and heading toward town. An engine and the chief’s truck passed him.

“Scanner,” Sean told Patrick.

Patrick opened Sean’s laptop and logged into the law enforcement frequency for the area. Sean’s program took the radio waves and converted them so he could listen over his computer.

Sean pulled over before he reached the turnoff that led to both the Callahans’ and Hendricksons’ places, and impatiently grabbed the laptop. It was his program; he’d find what he needed faster.

Small plane reportedly landed in distress three-point-two miles north-northeast of Highway 56 at marker A332. Survivors unknown.

Sean whipped the truck around and floored it, following the fire truck.

“We don’t know-” Patrick began.

“We damn well know it’s them. It’s no fucking coincidence.”

“Adam,” Ricky whispered. “I hear cars.”

He motioned for Adam to follow him to the back door, where they could see two trucks winding down to the valley where the Fosters’ cabin sat. As they watched, the trucks rounded the last curve and turned their headlights to parking lights.

“We need to go,” Adam said. “That’s not Sean.”

Ricky grabbed his backpack and Adam pocketed his gun and put on his jacket. They slipped out the back and were on the porch when the trucks stopped out front.

Vehicle doors opened and closed. “It’s dark,” a man’s voice said.

Butch.

Butch was working hand in hand with Bobbie, but Ricky knew no family loyalty from his uncle would save him.

Adam motioned to the edge of the porch. The house was on a slope, so they had to crawl under the railing and lower themselves down, falling the last four feet.

They crawled up the slope so they could observe the driveway. There were three men. “That’s Tim’s truck!” Adam said.

“Shh,” Ricky admonished.

They both looked for Tim, but the guy leaning against the driver’s door was Andy Knolls from the Gas-n-Go.

“Butch, search the house,” ordered Gary Clarke. “Andy and I will walk the perimeter. Bobbie wants the kid alive, but he’s a little prick. If I find him first, I’m going to teach him a thing or two about loyalty.” Ricky hated Gary. He wasn’t from Spruce Lake; he was loyal only to Bobbie.

As they watched, the men disbanded. Fortunately, Andy went in the opposite direction of the slope they were lying against.

On the deck above them, Gary said, “We wait until the kid gets here-or Rogan. Whoever comes first. Bobbie wants Rogan for leverage, but either way, we can’t go back empty-handed.”

Adam and Ricky crawled along the slope at an angle so that when they emerged on the driveway, they weren’t in the direct line of sight from the house.

Adam squinted at the driver’s side of Tim’s truck. “That looks like blood.”

“Was your brother at the lodge?”

“He was looking for you at the mine.”

Ricky didn’t know how Bobbie’s crew knew he was here, but he couldn’t think of any logical reason for Adam to turn him over to his aunt. And if it was Jon Callahan, why send him here in the first place or give him a gun?

“It’ll take us twenty minutes to circle around to the ATV, but it won’t take long to get to the mine entrance,” Adam said.

Ricky hesitated. Adam said, “We can’t stay here. He’s my brother. I’m not going to bail on him. He needs help.”

Ricky followed, still unsure what to do, but he didn’t want to wait around here. “You need to warn Sean about Gary and Butch. Where’s your cell?”

“In the house. Yours?”

“In my car.”

“We’ll get it when we pick up the ATV, tell Sean what happened, and find Tim.”

Ricky hoped he wasn’t making a mistake to trust Adam but he didn’t see that he had a whole lot of options. They bolted across the driveway and disappeared into the dark.