Killer View

20

BY ONE P.M. WEDNESDAY, WALT WAS BEGINNING TO WORK the evidence. The first was the result of Randy Aker’s blood workup out of Boise. It confirmed both medetomidine and ketamine, the same doping agents used on Kira Tulivich and Mark Aker.

The second was the broken glass and plug of ice-now melted-that he’d had one of his men hand deliver to the Boise lab. Its contents might suggest who’d left it. He suspected it was a gift from Mark Aker; but, with little to back that up, he hoped for the lab’s clarification.

The third piece of evidence was the torn triangle of paper found stabbed into the wall in Mark’s cabin.

Nancy entered his office and unrolled a topographical map across the mounds of paperwork piled on his desk. This was, in part, a comment on the neatness of his desk.

“Took no time at all,” she said. “The librarian recognized it immediately by the shade of green. She’s a hiker. Uses topos all the time. Sent me over to the Elephant’s Perch and it was the same thing there, only, this time, because of the number printed on it, they pulled the exact map. We matched the torn corner to it.”

“Mark had a topographical map of the Pahsimeroi Valley hanging on his cabin wall?”

“Correct.”

The map did not include his cabin’s location, which intrigued Walt. It covered the valley forty miles to the southeast. He turned the map right side up, putting what would have been the torn piece into the lower-right corner.

“Get Fiona,” he instructed Nancy. “Tell her I need the reconstruction of the cabin wall. She’ll know what that means.”

By two P.M., Fiona and Walt had overlaid the topo map, already pinned to corkboard, with the photographic enlargements, all done to scale. Seven eight-by-ten printouts had been taped together to form a whole. These were fitted over the map, using the torn corner piece and the three other corner pushpin marks as references. With the map now fully covered by high-resolution shots of Mark Aker’s cabin wall-the coarse texture and yellow color of rough-sawn timber-it looked as if they’d removed a piece of the wall and had brought it with them. It was the three black dots, like flyspecks, that interested Walt.

He double-checked the alignment of the photos over the map. Allowing for the fact that three other corner pins might be off by a quarter inch or so, it looked like a good job.

Fiona eyed it proudly. “You realize the map went on the wall, not the other way around? Shouldn’t we put the wall behind the map?”

“Yeah, but I want to use the holes that were in the wall to mark our map. We saw three pushpins on the floor. What if they were marking certain spots?” Walt withdrew a pushpin from the side of the corkboard and answered her by carefully poking the pin’s needle through each of the three black specks. He then removed the photographs, leaving the map with three new pinholes in it.

Fiona went quiet as she watched him work. He crossed to a computer and called up a mapping website that included hybrid images of maps overlaid onto satellite imagery. A few clicks later he had zoomed in on the Pahsimeroi Valley, with small, circular green dots, each the product of a pivot irrigation system-a huge, wheeled sprinkler arm that irrigated a quarter square mile of ground. These identified working ranches. He then cross-referenced the two maps and used the cursor on the computer to give him latitude and longitude for each of the pin markings.

He wrote down the three locations, knowing they held significance for Mark Aker. It was possible that Aker had visited them, either professionally or otherwise.

“How’d you do that?” she asked.

“You just saw me.”

“No. I mean, how’d it occur to you to do that?”

“It’s what I do,” he answered.

“Three pinpricks in a log wall. Are you kidding me?”

“Three ranches,” he said, standing and studying the topo map. “A vet,” he reminded.

The discovery that Aker had pinpointed the ranches intrigued Walt. As a vet, the man did plenty of house calls without marking them on maps. He’d been told of Mark’s secretive ways over the past month, of Mark’s spending extra time up at the cabin. But no one knew he’d actually been at the cabin; he could have easily been over in the Pahsimeroi.

He opened the door to the incident room and called out loudly for Tommy Brandon, startling Fiona with the sharpness of his voice.

Brandon appeared, his left arm in a sling. It was the first the two had seen each other since the shooting. Other deputies would have taken a week’s leave, but Walt had received no such request on his desk and knew Brandon would give him no excuse to be put on leave.

“You okay?” Walt asked.

“Fine.”

“Want to take a ride?”

“Where to?”

“Randy Aker was shot with a ketamine cocktail before he dove off those rocks. He was wearing his brother’s jacket-his brother’s scent. Now, come to find out, Mark was drugged by the same cocktail. And he was interested in three ranches over in the Pahsimeroi. He marked them on a topo map he had pinned to his cabin wall. Whoever took Mark probably took the map as well.”

“Count me in,” Brandon said.

21

BEFORE HE GOT OUT OF THE BUILDING, WALT WAS GRABBED by the officer on duty and introduced to a gorgeous woman from the Denver office of the CDC. Lynda Bezel was in her early thirties and wore a dark blue suit. It wasn’t a look typically seen in Hailey, Idaho. The Sun Valley look was Patagonia and Eddie Bauer; faded jeans, hiking boots, and clinging tops. She had a creamy complexion, and pale eyes that opened wide as she spoke.

“This might be better discussed in confidence,” she said. She had a raspy bedroom voice and the coy smile that went along with it. She sat in Walt’s intentionally uncomfortable visitor’s chair. She crossed her legs with a whisper of panty hose.

“I’ve come here as a courtesy,” Bezel began, comfortable with taking the lead. “Daniel Cutter is on probation, as we understand it. Because he’s in the system, I thought it only right to pay you a visit and let you know I intend to question him later today.”

Walt had a history with Danny Cutter that went back several years. Patrick Cutter, Danny’s older brother, now ran a billion-dollar cellular company. Danny, whom Walt liked better than his far-more-successful brother, had a prior arrest and conviction on drug charges. He’d spent time in a federal minimum security facility before returning to Ketchum, just in time to be caught up in a murder investigation-the valley’s only murder in six years. He was a womanizer, a hard-partying boy who had cleaned up his act and, as part of his attempt to reestablish himself, had founded a bottled-water company, called Trilogy Springs, based in Ketchum.

“Concerning?” he asked.

“We were contacted by a Salt Lake City hospital. Two of Mr. Cutter’s employees have taken ill. Their condition is listed as serious. Doctors have not been able to stabilize them. I’m here to interview Mr. Cutter about his company’s role, if any, in these illnesses and to question him about his actions. We have a full inspection team on the way to the Trilogy Springs bottling facility, near Mackay, Idaho.”

“What actions?”

“It has come to our attention that Mr. Cutter may have flown the two employees in a private jet to Salt Lake City while possibly denying them medical care locally.”

“You think he tasked those two down to Salt Lake to avoid being found out? That doesn’t sound like Danny. Listen, Salt Lake ’s the better health care. All our Life Flights go to Boise or Salt Lake.”

Bezel jotted down something into a small notebook. She looked comfortable in the chair. Maybe she was into yoga; she looked it.

“You said you came to me as a courtesy,” Walt said, somewhat suspiciously.

“Exactly.”

“Is there a probation violation?”

“He traveled with the employees out of state. I assume that was with your knowledge and permission?”

He was getting the idea now. Beneath the superfeminine façade was a bulldog. “I’m not his probation officer.”

“But, as a felon, he’s required to notify your office if he intends to travel out of state, is he not?”

“He is.”

“Did he do that in person or by phone?”

Walt felt cornered. He wasn’t going to lie for Danny Cutter, but he didn’t like the idea of the CDC playing babysitter.

“I could check with his PO.”

“Would you, please. The point is, if he entered this facility-your offices-there’s the possibility of contagion.”

“The illness is contagious?”

“There are two patients with similar symptoms. Tests are being conducted. Doctors have not yet identified the illness. We’ve asked both Mr. Cutter and his assistant to keep themselves isolated prior to my arrival. My job is to track their movements since their contact with the individuals in question. We’ve also notified the pilots as well as employees at the Fixed Base Operation that serviced the plane.”

He read between the lines. “Are you saying this is somehow terrorist related?” He’d had the recent warning from Homeland concerning activity by the Samakinn. “Was Trilogy contaminated intentionally?”

“We don’t know what we’ve got, much less how Cutter’s employees might have contracted it. But, with your permission, we’d like to pass out tags to everyone employed here.” She produced what looked like a car air freshener, a round disc in a cheap plastic frame divided into six wedges of different-colored paper. It dangled from her fingers like a Christmas ornament. “And we’d like both physical swabs of the environment and a few blood samples.”

“Jesus.”

“Your deputies and staff come in contact with the public. Should any one of these indicators change colors, no matter how subtle, we need to hear about it.”

Walt knew from recent training that such indicators had been proven to help field investigators narrow down searches and limit exposure. He had a box of similar tags in a cupboard in the incident room. He’d never had use for them.

“Sure,” he said. “I don’t have a problem with that.”

“We’d appreciate it if every member of your staff-”

“I get it,” said Walt, interrupting. “Leave them with me. I’ll see to it.”

“Companies in your county are aware of their obligation under federal guidelines to notify both you and our center in the event of suspected contamination or unexplained illness, are they not?”

“I would assume so. We’ve spread the word, and there’s been a lot of literature.”

“Can you think of any reason Daniel Cutter would elect not to notify either of us?”

“They’re guidelines, recommendations, not requirements, if I’m not mistaken.”

“But you’d think with his history-”

“This is the first I’ve heard of it. I’m sure if you ask him, he’ll tell you. Danny isn’t what you’d call shy.”

Bezel said, “Please instruct your officers to remain alert for flulike symptoms and nosebleeds.”

“You make it sound like Ebola.”

“We don’t know what we’re dealing with,” Bezel said, her face suddenly severe, her husky voice an octave lower. “I wouldn’t be making any jokes.”

“Nerves,” Walt said. “I’m not real comfortable with biological agents.”

“Neither are we, Sheriff,” Bezel said.

22

“I T’S REALLY QUITE SIMPLE,” THE MAN SAID, OVER THE sound of wood popping and crackling inside a woodstove. Aker sat, tied to a ladder-back chair, wearing a black hood. A syringe and some vials sat in an enamel tray on a game table to his left. A dog was curled up by the woodstove. The ceiling was vaulted to the cabin’s roof, the scissor trusses exposed. The air smelled strongly of coffee and, less so, of the distinct but foreign odors of pharmaceuticals.

“We need you to write up a report on what you found,” he continued.

“Found where?” Mark Aker asked through the fabric of the hood.

“The sheep. Don’t play dumb with me.”

“Writing a paper requires lab work, research, patience, and a lot of time,” he said.

“You’ve done all that.”

“I did some. It’s true. But I need more time. If you release me…”

“All I’m talking about is a discovery of findings.”

“I’m a long way from that. It’s true, I have theories. If you want me to stop my research, I will. No questions asked.”

“To the contrary: I need you to scientifically confirm what I already know. You can help me here. I want you to publish what you’ve found, not hide it.” He paused. “You think I’m trying to fuck you, don’t you? I’m not! I want you to publish.”

“If you want me to do that, I will. But first you need to drop me off near a hospital and you need to do it real soon, if you’re going to avoid manslaughter charges.”

“I’m not going to kill you. Relax. This isn’t about stopping you from doing your research; it’s about publishing it. You’re misunderstanding. Publish what you know and we’ll release you.”

“It’s you who’s not understanding, asswipe. See, I’m an insulin-dependent diabetic. In a couple of hours, if not sooner, my heart rate’s going to increase, I’ll start breathing rapidly, and I’ll pass out. I’ll go into shock. And if I don’t receive medical care, I’ll die. As for your report: I won’t live long enough to write the first paragraph. Get me to a hospital; I’ll do whatever you want.”

A dark musical score ran through his head; it had begun with the mention of diabetes. He untied Aker’s feet and wrestled to bring his unwilling body out of the chair. Aker fell sideways and the chair crashed to the floor. Aker thrashed, and landed a kick to the man’s left ear, before he was restrained. The man unfastened Aker’s belt and pulled his pants down.

Aker’s left buttock was riddled with circular bruises, the result of insulin shots.

“Motherfucker!” the man shouted. He snorted and paced the small area angrily.

“I need insulin, Coats,” Aker said.

During the ruckus, the hood had come off.

Roy Coats heard his name spoken. He stared at his hostage. How in the world?

“R. Coats, right?” Aker said. “And she would be Dimples,” he said, referring to the dog, now by the fire. The dog had gotten close enough earlier for Aker to see down through the opening at his neck. And he’d recognized her. “Front right paw bitten by a rattlesnake… what, two years ago? You owe me a hundred and eighty bucks for that, Coats. I tend not to forget the customers who don’t pay.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“What are you going to do, kill me?” he said, amused. “I’m going to die here, Coats. And let me tell you something: it won’t be pretty.”

“You’re not going to die. You’re going to write your report.”

“Would if I could, but I don’t think so. I don’t remember how you got me here. I don’t even remember how you found me. Ketamine?” he asked. “Headache tells me it’s ketamine. But there’s not a sound anywhere near us. Not even planes going over. So I’ve got to think we’re a long way from anywhere. And that doesn’t bode well for me. Challis? Salmon? The Pahsimeroi? Stanley? You’re never going to get the insulin in time.”

Coats paced between the stove and back again, his head hanging, the fingers of his right hand tugging at whiskers in his beard. Then he stopped and addressed Aker, who remained on the floor. “The islets of Langerhans,” Roy Coats said.

Aker couldn’t conceal his astonishment.

“My mom was type 1,” Coats explained. “I know all about acidosis.”

Aker’s focus changed as he took in the cabin walls, all floor to ceiling with books. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of them.

“The second coming of Ted Kaczynski?”

“I’d watch my mouth, if I were you.” Coats began searching the stacks for a particular title. “There’s a cow, two pigs, and some chickens out back.”

“I’m a little old for a petting zoo. I’ll pass.”

“Last warning about that mouth.”

“What exactly do you think you’re holding over me, Coats? Without insulin, I’m on my way out.”

“Bovine and pig insulin kept diabetics alive for decades. It wasn’t until the nineteen fifties that they synthesized it.”

“You cannot be serious,” Aker said. “Oh, I get it: you’re Frederick Banting, not Ted Kaczynski.”

“Both the pig and the cow have a pancreas, and that’s all we need.” Coats pulled a book from a shelf, returned it, and selected another. “All I’ve got to do is keep you alive until the next radio check. We stay off the airwaves. Only check in once a day. You’re the vet. You want to live, doc, you’re going to have to earn your supper.”

23

TWO MOUNTAIN PASSES THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN AVAILABLE to Walt in the summer months were closed by snow for the winter, forcing him to travel southeast around the ends of three mountain ranges that pointed like fingers into central Idaho’s vast, arid plain. He and Brandon said little on the two-hour drive that took them through Carey, Arco, and, finally, the tiny town of Howe, which consisted of a Church of Latter-day Saints, a post office, and a general store. He drove northeast into the Pahsimeroi Valley. With long, subzero winters, and only enough surface water to support a dozen ranches, the Pahsimeroi existed in a time warp, virtually unchanged for a thousand years. Majestic mountains surrounded a valley floor of rabbitweed and sagebrush. Aspen and cottonwood trees lined its few streams and creeks. Herds of antelope flashed their white tails like garden rabbits while red-tailed hawks sailed effortlessly on the steady winds that made this place so inhospitable to man.

A two-lane road, dead straight, plowed through a tablecloth of white, splitting the valley in two. It was as breathtaking a piece of Idaho scenery as could be found, and Walt never grew tired of looking at it.

“You get over here, it’s like another world,” Brandon said.

“My father used to hunt here.”

“You don’t hunt,” Brandon said, as if it had just occurred to him.

“No.”

Brandon tracked a handheld GPS, the topo map unrolled on his lap, his actions awkward due to the sling. He cross-checked the map with the device, occasionally glancing over to the right, where he imagined the first of Mark Aker’s three pinholed locations.

“You think I’m nuts coming here,” Walt said.

“Did I say anything?”

“It’s all we’ve got to go on: three pinholes in a map.”

“Maybe it’s enough,” Brandon said.

Walt gripped the wheel more firmly. The tension he was feeling had nothing to do with the snow floor he was driving on.

“There was a time I wanted her back,” Walt said.

Brandon took the opportunity to check the GPS and then to look out the window for the umpteenth time.

“If I fire you, I look resentful. Maybe you sue me.”

Brandon reached for the door handle. “I could walk home from here; it’s only a couple hundred miles.”

“It’s the girls I’m thinking about,” Walt said. “First and foremost, it’s the girls.”

“Shit,” Brandon whispered. “Can we stop this?”

“You want to fuck my wife, that’s your business. Your risk. But you’re fucking me along with her, and you should have thought about that.” He glanced over at Brandon.

“You think I didn’t?”

“Ketchum has an opening for a deputy. Bellevue, maybe.”

The suggestion hung inside the car as it raced up the empty two-lane road. Walt felt insignificant and small.

“My guess is,” Brandon said too loudly, acting as if the recent exchange had not happened, “we’re not going to get in there because the road won’t be plowed.”

“It’ll be plowed,” Walt said. He answered Brandon ’s puzzled expression. “Mark visited here. He called on a client. And, in this valley, it’s either cattle or sheep. They’ll keep the road open in winter in order to feed. The satellite map had four or five pivots clustered out there. That’s a ranch, for sure.” Walt having said that, an interruption in the plowed bank appeared a quarter mile ahead. He slowed the Cherokee.

“She complains, I’ll bet,” Walt said. “About your trailer being so small, about your work hours.”

“Is that why you asked me along, Sheriff? Make sure I log in a lot of OT?”

“Yup.”

Brandon winced. He hadn’t expected the truth.

He was squirming inside, right where Walt wanted him.

“Did you notify the Lemhi sheriff?” Brandon asked.

“I might have forgotten,” Walt said.

“Because?”

“Lemhi’s a different kind of county. You can’t throw a stick without hitting someone’s nephew or cousin. It’s too cozy. I don’t want to give him a chance to rehearse anything.”

“What would he rehearse?”

“How would I know?”

“Then why say that?”

“Something got Randy killed. Maybe it was the poaching, but I’m not so sure. I think it was the coat he was wearing: Mark’s coat. And now that Mark’s been abducted, and we’ve found the same date-rape cocktail in Randy’s blood, I’m guessing Randy’s death was some kind of misfire. So it’s all on Mark and whatever he was hiding up in his cabin, which means one or all of these ranches are involved.”

“No shit.”

“What gets a vet in trouble? One thing keeps coming to me: mad cow. That’s something any rancher, and especially these good old boys out here, would make damn sure to keep quiet.”

Brandon was no longer paying attention to his GPS. He was leaning in his seat toward Walt, hanging on his every word.

“So what they’d be rehearsing,” Walt said, “is some piece of fiction to provide cover for Mark coming out here, and tracking their ranches, and sticking goddamn pushpins in a map to mark their homesteads, something that has nothing to do with whatever was the original reason they called him out here in the first place.”

“Mad cow.”

“It’s got to be something along those lines. Something big. Something that makes the truth too expensive.”

“So why go to the trouble of abducting him? These old boys are plenty used to the rifle. I don’t see them getting all sentimental.”

“Who knows? Could be they wanted to establish if he’d told anyone. How far along he was in his findings. Could still be their plan to kill him. He could be dead right now.”

He wished he could take back what he’d just said. Saying such things gave them weight. He drove through an open gate in a wire fence and bounced the Cherokee across a cattle guard. Thing rattled to beat hell. A pair of steel grain sheds rose from the snow like gray hats to his left. He drove past a hundred-acre field that was probably knee-high with alfalfa in the summer. Black veins of meandering cow trails cut through the deep snow. A herd of seventy or eighty Angus was wedged tightly into the field’s southwest corner, their backs to the wind.

Walt directed the Cherokee toward the granaries, two wood barns, and a two-story gray clapboard house with white trim. He studied the cows for signs of illness but didn’t know what he was looking for: they all looked mad to him.

In the field directly ahead, sheep fretted, dancing nervously back and forth, as Walt’s Cherokee drew closer. White on white, broken by black legs and black heads. Puppets on unseen strings.

“The thing I’d never get used to about living on a farm like this,” Brandon said, sniffing the air, “is the stink.”

“It’s usually not so bad in winter,” Walt said. “I’ve got to admit: that’s funky.” It was a horrid, bitter smell. Sour and permeating. It only hit them now, as they drove close to the buildings.

“A smell like that,” Brandon said, “no wonder they called a vet.”

24

LON BERNIE MET THE CHEROKEE WITH FOUR DOGS AT HIS side. In his late fifties, with a florid complexion and soft gray eyes, he wore dirty canvas coveralls, a smudged cowboy hat, and large rubber-coated gloves. His nose carried a curved scar the size of a thumbnail, as pink as Pepto-Bismol. A front tooth had been chipped in a bull-riding championship when Bernie was nineteen. He still wore the belt with the oversized silver buckle to dances at the Grange Hall on Saturday nights, after a steak at the Loading Chute.

“I see a sheriff’s car coming, I expect it to be Ned,” the rancher said, tugging off his glove and offering his calloused hand to both men. His voice sounded like a gearbox with broken parts. “You’re a long way from home.”

“Couple questions, is all, if you’ve got the time,” Walt said.

Brandon banged his boots together, already cold. Windchill was pushing the mercury into the single digits. “Ain’t got nothing but time, this time of year.”

Lon Bernie looked out over Walt’s head-the man was a giant- surveying his animals. He reminded Walt of Hoss Cartwright. Walt sensed in him a cautiousness, a reluctance. It felt for a moment as if the rancher might be considering inviting them inside or to follow him on his chores. Something flickered in his gray eyes as Lon Bernie sucked some air through his top teeth.

“Be my guest,” he said.

Walt shot a quick glance over at Brandon. His deputy stopped banging his boots together.

“Mark Aker, Sun Valley Animal Center, did some work for you recently.”

Lon Bernie’s gray eyes iced over. There was no change in his otherwise-pleasant expression. A fog fled his mouth on each exhale. Lon Bernie: a steam engine climbing the hill.

“Had a cow down with the bloat,” the rancher said. He didn’t seem to feel the cold. Walt was freezing. “Mel Hickenbottom was busy up to Challis. He’s usually the one I’d call. This Aker fellow stepped in. You can’t wait too long with the bloat.”

“Well, that’s a good start for us. You remember how you paid him?”

Lon Bernie briefly lost his composure. “I paid him good, I’ll tell you what. It’s a long drive over here, and he charged by the hour. How is it my livestock is any of your business, anyway, Sheriff? You going to answer me that?”

“The vet’s brother was killed two nights ago. Now the vet’s gone missing. Mark’s last business brought him over this direction.” Lon Bernie’s face remained expressionless. “Mark doesn’t often tend to the bigger animals. That’s his brother’s job. Seems he made an exception. That interests me. The appointment book shows it was Mel Hickenbottom who called the center. Said your sheep were suffering. Your sheep, not your cattle. No mention of bloat.”

“Could be right,” Lon Bernie said, without missing a beat. “Coulda been the way you say. Maybe it was Mel handled the bloat and the Glitter Gulch vet the sheep.”

The nickname for the Sun Valley area was not new to Walt. The valley’s wealth and glamour offended people like Lon Bernie, and there was nothing to be done about it. Most of the resentment stemmed from jealousy and ignorance and was therefore undeserved. Most but not all. Not by a long shot. Lon Bernie was letting him and Brandon know they were outsiders here and therefore unwelcome, business or not.

“Was it the cattle or the sheep?” Walt asked pointedly.

“I said one of my cattle had the bloat, didn’t I? Something’s always sick around here.”

“What specifically was wrong with your sheep?”

“If I’d known that,” Lon Bernie said, “I wouldn’ta needed no vet, now, would I?”

“Did you get an answer? A diagnosis?”

“You ever been around sheep, Sheriff?” The rancher looked to his right and the hundreds of thick wool coats milling about. “Dumb as paint. You look at ’em wrong and they take sick. Or they throw themselves in the irrigation ditch and their coats get too heavy and they drown themselves in two feet of water. I leave ’em to the vets. A couple of shots and they’re right as rain. I pay my bills on time, and that’s about all there is to it. I’m not asking for no diagnosis, just results.”

“The sheep are better now, then? Did Mark Aker have success with the sheep? Or was he working on your cattle?”

Lon Bernie’s eyes went stone cold. A grin twitched at the edges of his cracked lips.

“Maybe what happened,” Walt suggested, “was that Mel called Mark about the sheep, but then, when Mark got here, it turned out Mel had misspoken and it was actually the cattle having problems.”

“You think I don’t know which of my animals is having problems, Sheriff? You got a dog? A cat? You can’t tell the difference? Not me. A head of cattle had the bloat. That’s all.”

“My brother,” Brandon said, “once had a cow with bloat. Stuck his Swiss Army knife in the cow and about the worst smell I’ve ever smelled came out. But that cow stood up five minutes later and went on her way. He never even called the vet.”

“Cattle’s got three stomachs, son. Depends which one catches the bloat. I put a knife to our cow three times. Doggone pincushion. Got nothing. Then I called Mel. I thought I was the one called your Glitter Gulch fellow, but, maybe you’re right, it could have been Mel. Don’t see how it matters.”

“Mel took care of the bloat. Mark worked with the sheep,” Walt stated. He did not ask.

“Hell, it has been a month or more, Sheriff. What do I know?”

“Have you heard of any illness at your neighbors’ ranches? Sheep or cattle?”

“No, sir, I have not.” The man’s answer came out much too quickly and sharply. He’d been expecting that question.

“Would you happen to have a bill handy?” Brandon asked. “Could we maybe get a look at it?”

“I pay ’ em and I throw ’em out, son.”

“It’s ‘Deputy,’ or ‘Deputy Sheriff,’ not ’son,’” Brandon said, making no effort to conceal his contempt. “The vet, Hickenbottom, would have records?”

“Might have. You’d have to ask him.”

“We will.” Brandon withdrew his notebook and scribbled in it.

“I don’t see what all the fuss is about,” Lon Bernie said.

“A man’s dead,” Walt reminded. “That’s fuss enough for us.”

The wind picked up. At a certain temperature, it seemed it couldn’t get any colder, but it always did. Lon Bernie still didn’t seem to feel it.

“Ever had any sign of mad cow over this way?” Walt asked, hoping for a reaction.

“That’s never come down from Canada, as far as I know.”

“And the last time you called upon either vet would have been…?”

Lon Bernie cocked his head toward Walt, as if he had only one good eye. “A while,” he said.

“Can you be more specific?”

“Out here, time kinda runs into itself. Drive a man half mad, this time of year. Maybe more than half.”

“Cattle bloat from eating too much green grass,” Walt said.

“A month ago, we had green grass. Early winter this year. Moldy hay’ll do it too. You trying to make a point, Sheriff? ’Cause you’re going the long way around the barn to find the door.” He looked first at Walt, then at Brandon.

“I’ll tell you what I need: I need the truth, Mr. Bernie. And I don’t believe I’m getting it.”

“You calling me a liar, Sheriff? ’Cause, over here, that’s not terribly neighborly. Listen, I’ve got chores to do.” He never flinched, as he maintained eye contact with Walt.

He turned and walked toward the barns.

The foul smell had not been apparent while Walt and Brandon had been out of the vehicle, but as they drove away from the ranch it filled the car again. Complaining, Brandon rolled down the window.

That seemed to only make matters worse.

Like burning hair.

25

ROY COATS TRUDGED AROUND BEHIND THE CABIN ALONG a path shoveled through four feet of snow that created a trench with six-foot-high walls. He avoided the piles of frozen dog excrement, as if they were land mines.

The narrator in his head wouldn’t shut up.

The rebel soldier must learn to improvise if he is to survive. The needs of the few give way to the needs of the man. Faced with the possible death of his hostage, he’s willing to make a sacrifice.

Coats called the two cows and the pig by their names: Bess, Tilda, and Pinky. He didn’t think enough of the chickens to name them. He had, on many occasions, launched into rambling diatribes with only these three as his audience. He’d gone on about the injustices to society brought on by the immigration influenza, the disease of poverty eating into society like a cancer. He had stood on the milking stool and lectured for ninety minutes at a time, his voice carrying over their heads and fading into the thousands of acres of empty wilderness that surrounded his homestead. The government had lost its way, focused entirely overseas, when there was cleaning up to do at home. He’d chosen the name Samakinn carefully, never mind that his recruitment had not gone well. A spear was needed. The Romans, the Croats, the Uzbeks, the Hutus all had the right idea: ethnic cleansing. But it started with being heard, being taken seriously. The government thought they could silence their voices by denying their acts. But once the people heard of what they’d done, how powerful they were, the Samakinn’s message would be heard. Supporters would swell their ranks. Change would be at hand. He sought legitimacy, nothing less: credit where credit was due. The doc would make his report-who didn’t believe a doctor?

He had a long night ahead of him, dressing out whichever beast he decided to kill. It was a great deal to ask of him. The sacrifice had begun.

As prearranged, the daily radio call didn’t happen until midnight; that meant it would be a while before Gearbox could arrive with the insulin. He had no choice but to act, compounding his resentment.

The cows gathered on the other side of the fence, expecting a feeding. Pinky was smart enough to wait inside the pen. He hadn’t realized how difficult this would be. Like killing a house pet. He was willing to see Aker or others die for his cause but not one of his stock.

He considered Pinky first. He had no great rapport with the sow and considered her a dirty, though lovable, companion. But the size of the pancreas mattered, and that quickly took her out of consideration. It was either Bess or Tilda, and Bess’s condition demanded it be her.

He used a can of grain to lure her through the side door of the ramshackle shed at the corner of the paddock, the chickens making noise in the coop as if a fox were on the prowl. He wanted her as close to the block and tackle as possible, knowing he’d have to rig some kind of motor or winch to hoist all eight hundred pounds of her.

He got a harness on her head while she was still standing. Attached a length of chain to the front ring and secured it to a two-ton pickup truck that hadn’t run in years. She was chewing on the grain, the first she’d had in a long, long time, and he knew that for a cow this was as close to heaven as it got.

So he scratched her on the head between the eyes, feeling the hard bone beneath the tough skin. Dust rose from the black-and-white hair. It had formed a permanent layer on both animals.

“You’ve been a good girl all these years, Bess,” he said, his throat tightening. “Your being pregnant is your downfall. What can I say? No greater honor than to fall a martyr for a cause. I ought to know that. I expect I’ll be seeing you soon.”

He stabbed the knife in sharply at the jugular. Dragged and twisted its blade until she sprayed, her eyes pure white, as she reeled and cried out. Leaned his weight into it, pulling for her windpipe, wanting this over with.

Resentment filled that part of his heart emptied by grief. He would see the vet dead for this, after he’d written the report.

26

WALT STOPPED THE CHEROKEE BESIDE THE CLOSED FENCE gate. He could see the end of a double-wide trailer, some outbuildings, and curved mounds in the snow about a hundred yards past the gate.

“Looks like snowmobiles been running in and out,” Brandon said. The track started on the other side of the closed gate and had been beaten down by a good many trips.

“Roads are all snow floor,” Walt observed. “A snowmobile’s as good as a car.”

Walt leaned on the horn, and they waited for some sign of life from the ranch. When none was forthcoming, they left the Cherokee parked where it was and went in on foot. As they neared the cabin, they saw that the snowmobile track connected with others, forming a network of beaten-down paths leading to and from various outbuildings.

Walt shouted, “Sheriff’s Office!” It wouldn’t have surprised either man to be greeted by the wrong end of a shotgun, and Brandon walked with his good hand resting on the stock of his pistol. The cold dry snow squeaked beneath their boots.

When their knocks on the door went unanswered, they checked the neighboring outbuildings. One was a working garage, the other a storage shed overrun with junk.

A snowmobile track continued past a granary, leading toward the fence line.

“I know you think she’s using me to get at you, but that’s not the way it is,” Brandon said, as they trudged through the snow.

Walt stopped and turned to make sure Brandon heard him. “You’re my best deputy. You think that’s coincidence?” He turned and walked on.

“You two were separated.”

“She convinced herself she was a lousy mother. She envied how easily the parenting came to me. It isn’t about you. It’s about the kids. She’s having second thoughts now. She’s going to fight for them. Are you ready for that?”

Brandon stopped short, and the distance between them grew. He had to hurry to catch back up.

“I want to work for you. This is where I belong.”

“Grow up.”

The rancher was a pack rat. The mushrooms of snow seen from a distance turned out to be junk: dishwashers, farm implements, tires, car parts, tractor parts, furniture. It surrounded every building, looming mysteriously out of the snow.

“Damn,” Brandon said.

“You notice what’s missing?” Walt asked.

“Human beings?”

“Listen.”

The two men stopped. Absolute silence.

“It’s quiet enough,” Brandon admitted.

“And then some.” Walt led Brandon along one of the snowmobile paths to a fence line. The snow out in the pasture was rippled and dented by interconnecting seams, not flat and pristine. It reminded Walt of a brain. But there was no recent activity. All of the wandering seams connected into a single point down the fence line near yet another outbuilding.

“Those lines mark where the snow was trod down by livestock,” Walt said, pointing toward the shed. “Then a fresh snow covered them up.”

“So where’s the livestock?”

“That’s the point, Deputy. Moved ’em off the place.” Walt pointed to where all the paths connected. His eyes couldn’t make out a gate there, but he expected to find one. “I’d say it was probably to another field, but we’re not hearing them.”

“Who moves their livestock in winter?”

“It’s a pain,” Walt agreed. “Unless a water line froze or the snow got too dry. They might move them to make feeding easier.”

Walt started down the fence line through the knee-deep snow.

“What the hell?” Brandon called out, hesitating to join him.

“Check the trailer again. Another reason the livestock would be moved is if someone died.”

Brandon mulled that over. Walt kept on walking, trudging with difficulty through the snow.

“Are you mad at me, Sheriff? For what I said?” Brandon called out.

“Shut up and check the trailer.”

“Yes, sir.”

The farther down the fence line he went, the tougher it got for Walt, his legs growing weary from the deep snow. Sweat ran down his rib cage, despite the harsh cold that whipped his face, but there was something else he felt: an unease brought on by the utter stillness of the place, and the growing sensation he and Brandon were being watched.

As he drew closer to the shed, he picked out the outline of a feed trough, a double-hung gate, and a pair of automatic waterers. He arrived to the feed trough and saw it was filled with snow, suggesting the animals had been moved sometime between the two most recent snowstorms-in the last five to six days. He studied the sweep of the gate, the way it had pushed the prior snowfall ahead of it as it had been opened. This too confirmed his time line. Mark Aker had made a two-day trip to his cabin a few days earlier, just before the search and rescue that took his brother’s life. Had this ranch been a stop for him during those two days? What had he found? Why had the livestock been moved?

Fighting the deep snow, he wrestled open the shed’s large door far enough to squeeze through. It was dark inside, shafts of sunlight appearing as Walt kicked up dust from the dirt floor. A milking station and some stalls. A squeeze chute, used to isolate an animal for doctoring or branding.

He slipped back through the door to the outside. He might have missed it had he not visited the shed, for only now did he get a good look at the automatic waterers.

The waterers were clear of snow but dry. Warmed by a thermostat in winter months, with a float valve to control the water level, the devices were used to save the rancher from fighting ice and trying to keep his cows drinking. Walt studied the jerry rigging: on each device, baling wire had been twisted to hold the float valve up so the bowl wouldn’t refill.

He pulled off his glove and tested the metal bowl; it was warm to the touch. That explained the snow having not collected on it but not the floats being wired up.

Some kind of problem with the waterers would explain the livestock having been moved. A frozen line, or intermittent power.

Chicken or the egg: had the livestock been moved and then the water turned off or had the water been turned off and then the livestock moved?

The unexpected visit at his office from the CDC woman-what was her name?-replayed vividly. Danny Cutter’s employees, sick as dogs. Flown out in a private jet-literally, under the radar. Danny’s most recent enterprise was Trilogy Springs: spring water from a source “two miles deep.”

Maybe it wasn’t mad cow after all. Something to do with the water?

To his left, Walt noticed an area that had been blocked from view by the shed.

Walt plodded along, ten yards, twenty, thirty. A hundred. He climbed a fence, where a snow-covered trail led through a gate. He was soaked through with sweat now, his breathing heavy. But there was more to it: his nerves all ajangle.

Maybe it resulted from the frank talk with Brandon. Maybe those wounds weren’t meant to be reopened.

His thought was interrupted by the sound of animals-a sound so unique and, prior to that moment, missing.

As he crested the hill and looked down, he saw five hundred sheep-a half a band-spread out along the edge of a fog-shrouded creek. The fence crossed the creek in two places and rose to include another twenty acres on the far side. The sheep had been fed hay from the far side of the enclosed pasture. Some of the hay remained scattered. Mist rose from five holes in the creek ice, each hole roughly chopped open with an ax. The rancher had traded more difficult feeding conditions for easier access to water, explaining the empty pasture behind him.

But it drew his attention back to the condition of the water. The sheep were now being offered surface water in conditions that likely required grunt labor to keep the iced-over water holes open and accessible. If a line had frozen in the waterers behind him, then it made some sense to move the sheep.

He retraced his own tracks through the deep snow to the waterers. Slipped off his gloves. Began untwisting the wire used to keep the floats up.

If the waterers were broken, then moving the sheep made practical sense.

But if the waterers worked, then why had the rancher chosen labor-intensive surface water over automatic waterers? That might require an explanation.

The last twist freed the wire.

Walt released it and watched.

27

ROY COATS’S APRON AND BOOTS WERE COVERED IN BLOOD, as he returned to the cabin, sweat running down his face. Aker was asleep, his head slumped forward, the rest of him still tied to the ladder-back chair. His breathing sounded sharp and fast and shallow. As Coats shut the door, Aker lifted his head. His skin was sallow, his eyes bloodshot.

Coats hoisted the freezer-sized Ziploc bag. Inside it, Bess’s unborn calf’s pancreas slid around like a dead fish. “Now what?” he said.

Aker’s eyes rolled in his head.

Coats crossed the room, stiff-legged and fast, and took Mark Aker by the chin. “Do not pass out on me! I’ve done my part. Now, you tell me what’s next. You hear me?” He raised his voice. “Doc! You hear me!?”

Aker vomited into his own lap.

Coats stepped back, grumbling. “Jesus!”

“Not doing real well,” Aker managed to croak out.

“Shit!”

“Fluids,” he mumbled.

Coats cut him loose and poured him a glass of water. Aker gagged it down. But he shook his head, as he handed the empty glass back to Coats. “From here, I dehydrate. The vomiting won’t allow me to keep the water down. I’m going to lapse into a coma at some point. Be ready for that. You’ll have to do this on your own, Coats. Have some sugar water or juice ready, because you probably won’t get the dosage right.” His eyes bobbed. “You got all that?”

“You gotta stay with me, Doc.”

“I’m trying.”

“Grind it?” Coats asked, indicating the baggie on the table.

“Mortar and pestle. Coffee mug’ll work. Handle end of a screwdriver, but you’ll need to boil it first. Ten minutes. Do you have any saline?”

“Contact lens solution.”

“That’ll work. You may need that. Not much. Enough to liquefy. Then get the extract into the syringe.”

“I mush it up. Add the saline. How much do I give you?”

Coats was already over at the stove. He dropped a screwdriver in the kettle of boiling water kept there to throw moisture into the air. He located an oversized coffee mug, rinsed it with some of the boiling water, and put the contents of the baggie in the cup. It looked like a piece of liver but was, in fact, pancreas.

Aker muttered. Coats returned to him and put his ear by Aker’s trembling lips. “If I start sweating and shaking… this is after the injection… then you gave me too much. I need the-” Aker vomited, pitched forward, and passed out. Coats shook him, but it was no use: he was unconscious.

“You need what?” Coats screamed at him.

Coats didn’t have ten minutes to sterilize the screwdriver. He used a pair of barbecue tongs to fish the screwdriver from the boiling water; he dried it on a clean dish towel and used the butt end to smash the tissue in the mug. In a matter of minutes, he had the tissue reduced to a mushy gruel. He added a small amount of the contact lens solution, and then he tipped the mug and drew the extract into the same syringe originally intended to get Aker to cooperate.

The fluid was a horrible color and consistency. He couldn’t see how this could do anything but kill someone, but Aker was on his way out as it was. He pulled down Aker’s loose pants and stabbed the syringe into the man’s flank and gave him 20 ccs.

Aker’s reaction was surprisingly quick. Less than two minutes after the injection, he snapped awake, lifting his head. Color had returned to his face. He glanced around the cabin. “Interesting,” he said.

Coats noticed beads of sweat forming on the man’s brow.

“You’re sweating.”

“Juice,” Aker said. He grabbed the arms of the chair as his limbs began to shake. “Get the juice, you moron!” he shouted. The entire chair was shaking now, dancing on the floor.

Coats had neglected to have this ready. The only juice he had was frozen orange juice. He placed the can into the sink and ran water on it. But Aker’s chair was going like a paint shaker. It tipped over and crashed to the floor. Coats fumbled with a water glass, spooned sugar in it, and filled it with water. He stirred it up, and slopped it out of the glass as he hurried to Aker. Sat Aker up and got him drinking, the water spilling down his front.

Aker returned to the living, and, unable to measure his blood sugar, took inventory of how he felt. Five minutes after he’d been going like an earthquake, he sat calmly in the chair.

“We can expect some secondary problems, Coats,” Aker said.

“Such as?”

“The extract will be weak. I’ll need injections every few hours. But we’ll have enough for that. Dosage is obviously going to be the problem. There will be warning signs: I’ll know when I need more. But the bigger issue will be the allergic reaction to the extract. Possible infection at the site of the injection. That’s basically a given. The reactions can be anything from some discomfort, in the form of a skin rash, to something much more severe. We won’t know until we see them. And we will see them. You’ll want to watch me fairly closely, and I’ll do my best to monitor how I’m feeling. Tell your guy I need Lantus. One dose lasts for twenty-four hours. Until we get the Lantus, we’re not out of the woods. Not yet.”

Coats barked out a laugh. Some spittle escaped onto his beard and he wiped it away.

“Something funny about that?” Aker asked.

“Doc, we are so deep in the woods it would take an army to find us.” He amused himself. “A very big army.”

“Get me a clean shirt,” Aker said, testing how much leverage he’d gained over his captor. “Mine’s filthy.”

Coats hesitated a moment, unsure how to respond; but then he crossed to a footlocker by the only bed in the room and dug around in it for a shirt.

Mark Aker did not allow his captor to see the smile that slowly formed. Coats had done as he’d asked.

There was hope yet.

28

SENATOR JAMES PEAVY’S WHITE HAIR ESCAPED FROM BENEATH his cream-colored, beaver-felt Stetson, his blue, steely eyes never leaving Walt as he paced the living room of his homesteaded farmhouse. He was the fourth-generation Peavy to run the twenty-thousand-acre sheep ranch and he looked the part, with his large belt buckle, the pressed blue jeans, and the pair of Tony Lamas.

“That’s a hell of a question, Sheriff,” he said.

“It’s simple enough, Senator.” The man hadn’t been a senator for twenty years, but respect where respect was due.

“What’s your man doing out there?” Peavy asked, his back to Walt as he faced the window.

“You said he could look around.”

“He’s walking across my pasture.”

“He’s an overachiever,” Walt said. “Let’s not worry about him.”

“We use Mark- Sun Valley Animal Center-exclusively. It’s not as if it’s unusual for him to pay us a visit.”

“It’s not as if you’re answering the question,” Walt pointed out.

“We run nine band of sheep, Walt. That’s nine thousand head. I have a ranch foreman, an overseer for each band. It’s not as if I know every time we call a vet or what the ailment was.”

“So you don’t know why Mark was called? That’s simple enough.” Walt stood from the couch. “Maybe you could introduce me to your staf f?”

“Sit down,” Peavy said, his voice suddenly too loud for the room. He moved to another window, still fixated on Brandon ’s activities. “Enough of what Mark Aker did or did not do for us. What difference can it make? What’s important here is your next election. That’s what I thought you came here for. Let’s get down to brass tacks: what can I do to help?”

“You’ve always been more than generous, Senator.” Peavy supported sheriffs in at least three counties, including Blaine.

“I hear you have some real competition this time around in Richie Dunik.”

“Well-organized.”

“And I hear you’re… distracted by this divorce. Damn sorry to hear about that. Talk about bad timing.”

Walt clamped his open palms between his knees and leaned forward, trying to keep from saying something offensive about Peavy’s insensitivity.

“I could arrange for each of my bosses to make contributions, Walt. Up to the accepted limit. There are ten to twelve who would do this, if I asked.”

“I don’t think I’m supposed to talk about ways to get around the election laws, Senator.”

“Christ! Do I look like I’m wearing a wire? I’m making you an offer. I’m trying to help.”

“Help is always appreciated.”

“If you need financial help, I can arrange it. That’s all I’m saying.”

“I need to know what brought Mark Aker out here. I need to identify whatever it was that made your sheep sick.”

“Who said my sheep were sick? Don’t go jumping to any conclusions, Walt. I’ll tell you what. Mark comes out here as much to vaccinate and geld and deliver calves as he does to doctor.”

“Did you know he’d recently made house calls to two of your neighbors?”

“Should that surprise me?”

“There’s no paper trail for any of these visits over here. His office knows next to nothing about them. This, from a type A, meticulous professional who, I’m told, would never have made a trip this distance without billing for it. Much less three such trips.”

“And this interests you because…?”

“If I could just say something here, Senator? That is, that every time I ask you a question, or say something about Mark Aker’s visits, instead of an answer I get a question. We both know what a skilled orator you are, but, frankly, you’ve never treated me the way you’re treating me today. I find it offensive. I’m sitting over here wondering what the hell is going on.”

Peavy abandoned the windows for the time being, moving into the center of the room. It was a luxurious living room, with leather couches, a Remington sculpture, some western landscapes on the wall. The hearth was stacked stones covered in a patina of black carbon surrounded by a wire-mesh spark screen. The hearth had the original wrought-iron hook for warming pots. Peavy stopped on an enormous sheepskin rug that was covered by a tan pelt of some four-legged creature that, without its head, was impossible for Walt to identify.

“I heard about Randy. He’s come over here for us as well. I assume your questions about Mark, being that it’s you asking and you’re a long way from home, must have something to do with that tragedy. I don’t know what it is exactly that you’re asking me, Walt. Mark’s visits to my neighbors is news to me. Maybe we all got a bad batch of vaccine or something. Maybe it’s something contagious I have yet to hear about. I just don’t know. I’ll ask my boys and I’ll get back to you. That’s the best I can offer.”

“Can’t argue with that.”

“I’m serious about helping out your campaign.”

“Much appreciated.”

Lingering on Walt’s tongue was a question about the quality of the senator’s water supply. He kept that to himself for now.

Peavy stepped closer to shake Walt’s hand. He had a firm grip, for an older guy, and he looked Walt in the eye. Walt sensed he was about to say something as well. They shook hands for a little longer than was comfortable. If that was supposed to communicate something to Walt, he missed it. Gail would be the first to tell anyone who would listen that Walt’s communications skills were lacking.

Peavy opened his mouth. Once again, Walt expected him to say something. The senator shook his head, more of a twitch than anything else, and exhaled deeply.

What? Walt wanted to ask.

But his host left him guessing, as he ushered Walt to the door and saw him off.

Brandon was tromping through the snow, making his way back toward the farmhouse. He picked up his pace when he saw Walt waiting by the Cherokee. The house was a mile behind them before Brandon broke the silence of the car’s interior.

“There are five automatic waterers in that field, all over by the hay shed, in the southwest corner.” He paused to adjust his arm in the sling, which Walt thought was more for dramatic effect than anything else. “Not one of ’em’s working.”

“Not working or not turned on?”

“Dry. And the same’s true of three more over by one of the barns. I tried to get into that barn to check the stalls, but a Mexican basically kept me out, saying, ‘Mr. Jim. Mr. Jim.’ Meaning Peavy, I assumed. I passed a stop and waste on the way back. Get this: locked.”

“The stop-and-waste valve was locked,” Walt repeated. A stop and waste was a freestanding water spigot that ran year-round.

“You’ve been in Idaho ten times longer than I have, Sheriff, but I’ve never, ever-not once-seen one of those locked. For one thing, that’s about the only absolutely guaranteed water in winter, in case of fire, since those things never freeze.”

“The senator skillfully avoided lying,” Walt said, his hands gripping the wheel more tightly.

Far in the distance, but presumably still on Peavy’s ranch, rose a charcoal gray plume of smoke. Probably ranch hands burning off slash, thought Walt. Winter snow made for the safest time to set such fires. It looked beautiful in the slanting afternoon light, lifting and coiling into the blue sky.

“Damn!” Brandon said, rolling down his window. “That’s that same funky smell.”

Walt sniffed the air and knew Brandon was right: a sour, bitter stench. Memorable. He turned the wheel. The car skidded on the snow floor. He backed around in a three-point turn and headed for the fire, stopped ten minutes later by an unplowed road. Brandon consulted the topo map: the road they traveled showed on the map as dirt. It went unplowed in winter.

Brandon ’s thick finger traced a second road-also marked as dirt- that accessed that same area from Peavy’s ranch.

The stench was noticeably stronger there, at the end of the road, the connection to the fire inevitable though unconfirmed.

The two men got out of the car and climbed the snowbank. Walt slipped his hands into his pockets to fight the cold. Brandon tried to warm the fingers that protruded from the sling.

A sign on a fence warned PRIVATE PROPERTY, NO HUNTING, NO TRESPASSING.

“The senator couldn’t keep his eyes off you the whole time you were out in his field.”

“What was that about?”

“He kept what he told me very controlled, but I was much more interested in watching him.”

“What’s this about, Sheriff? You think it’s something to do with the water? That makes the most sense, right?”

“Makes the most sense,” Walt agreed.

“You think we’re going to find Aker? Alive, I mean?”

“We sure as hell better.”

“You think he’s over here somewhere?”

“I haven’t the slightest.”

“You think the senator knows?”

“No. For whatever reason, I doubt that. I didn’t get any sense of that.”

“But he’s involved.” It was a statement.

“He basically offered to single-handedly pay for my reelection,” Walt said, taking his hands out and rubbing them together vigorously. “He’s definitely involved.” Walt turned around and looked back over the vast expanse of the valley, stunning in its emptiness. A neighbor might see such a fire, but he’d never smell it, not given the distances between ranches. “There’s something connecting the three ranches. Mark knew what it was and it got him kidnapped. Got his brother killed.” He headed back to the car. “You hungry?”

“I could eat a horse,” Brandon said.