“Right. You want some help? I hire out cheap.”
“I think you need to leave. Right now.”
Stone turned and walked out.
As soon as he’d left another door opened and Judge Dwight Mosley walked slowly into the room. His tie was undone and his shirtsleeves were rolled up.
“Shirley, was someone here? I thought I heard you talking.”
“Just to myself, Judge. Just to myself. You know how I get sometimes.”
“Yes, I know.” He smiled and went back through the door.
Shirley puffed on her cigarette, staring thoughtfully at the wall.
CHAPTER 46
JOE KNOX LAY in his underwear on a thin piece of puffed-up nylon masquerading as a mattress while he tried to connect the dots. Carr had killed a deuce, a mighty prominent deuce, and hit the road after slipping past the feds disguised as a bushy-bearded, gimp-legged village idiot. He’d gotten sidetracked on the train and ended up in this cluster of shacks. Where he was now, Knox had no clue. By asking around he’d discovered that the bus had headed out the very night the man had gotten to town, lucky, lucky him. By now, he could be pretty damn far away.
He sat up, jerked on his pants, socks and his Timberlands. He washed his face, finger-brushed his teeth and smoothed down his hair with the palm of his hand. If he was going to be on the chase much longer, he’d grab some clothes and toiletries other than the small travel bag he always carried with him. He slipped on his shirt and checked his cell. No messages, though the bars were looking a little jumpy at this altitude in the middle of nowhere.
Hayes was the show-runner on this dramatic piece; Knox his faithful attack dog. Well, the “faithful” part was in serious doubt right now. Knox chewed some gum and stared out the window of Skip’s Motel. Checking in last night he’d actually run into said Skip, an ancient man who said little, but his hand had shot out for the cash that was required to stay here with the jab speed of a welterweight in his prime. Old Skip apparently did not believe in the merits of consumer plastic.
Hayes had a hard-on for Carr for reasons he had not bothered to share with Knox, but which were growing a little clearer each time Knox thought about the possibilities. If Hayes had his way when Knox caught up to Carr, the man would not be read his rights, have his call to a lawyer or his day in court. But why kill the Medal of Honor man? It would have been a feather in the cap of then Major Macklin Hayes’ career to have had such a soldier in his ranks. Carr had certainly pissed off his leader somehow. The paper trail had demonstrated that the lower chain of command had had no issue with Carr getting the mother of all American medals pinned to his chest. It had stopped at Hayes. What had Carr done to merit that sort of stonewall; a grudge that had apparently lasted over thirty years?
Now Knox’s dilemma was obvious. If he did his job successfully and found Carr, he would, in essence, be delivering him to his executioner. A part of Knox said that was neither his business nor his battle to fight. Turn him over, be done with it and start collecting your pension. Rome in summer, his kids, sailing in the Med, the wine, the food. His kids.
If only that damn aneurysm in Patty’s head hadn’t popped—
The other part of Knox fell down on this theory like a four- hundred-pound WWE monster coming off a wrestling-ring rope. If Carr had killed the men, he would have to be proven guilty of those charges and then punishment could be meted out. Once you let way too smug and smart men like Hayes call those kinds of shots, play God for all seasons and all reasons, it was over. You might as well pull the democratic tent poles and phone in for Joe Stalin to make a comeback. The old US of A was finished. And Knox would not be a party to that. Twenty years ago the answer might have been different. But not today, not now. It was funny and a little ass-backwards, but he believed in the principles that made America what it was more strongly now than when he’d first started out in this line of work. Back then he was a raw, snot-nosed kid fresh from the military grunt side itching to carve out a credible rep as an intelligence op. He did anything and all to accomplish that goal, many things just over the line and a few that obliterated it. Looking back, he was not particularly proud of those moments, but he also took some solace in the fact that his work had saved lives and also that he’d eventually come around to the good side again. He knew many others who had never accomplished that last step. Hayes was clearly one of them.
It wasn’t that he wasn’t cynical. You couldn’t do this job as long as he had and not cross that line a long time back. Experience without cynicism was a sure sign your brain had dry-rotted and you hadn’t bothered to notice. He went into every high-level meeting these days knowing there were at least three agendas and also knowing he’d only be told one of them.
He put on his jacket and fingered his wallet with one hand, his rental truck keys with the other. He could also run, head for the hills, let Hayes find another lackey to do this job. There were plenty waiting in line. And truth be known, Knox was finding his enthusiasm for locating Carr waning the more he learned about the man and the more he found out about Hayes’ probable reasons for taking down a war hero who’d never gotten his due.
He went down to his truck and debated whether to go to the One T and give it another whirl. He decided that might be worth it but he would do it later. First, he wanted to take a drive around and see what the night had hidden from him. He highly doubted one of those things would be John Carr. He had started out wanting no more than to find the man. Now a part of him was hoping it would never happen. And not just because a run-in with Carr, the grizzly bear of government assassins, would probably not end well for Knox.
It had something to do with justice, a concept Knox had not entirely forgotten, even if his boss apparently had.
CHAPTER 47
“THERE HE GOES,” said Annabelle. They watched from inside their van parked at the corner as Knox drove off.
“What do we do?” Caleb asked.
“Follow him.” She held up a device. “I’ve got another tracker I can put in that truck.”
Caleb put the van in gear. “You come prepared, I’ll give you that.”
“Just wait till you see what Reuben’s bringing.”
They followed from a discreet distance as Knox did a sweep of the area before parking at the One T and going inside.
“This should be interesting,” said Annabelle with a grin.
Knox sat down at the counter. Herky, who was two seats down and working on his third plate of food, looked up, scowled and moved over next to Knox as the same waitress hurried over to take his order.
“Back again?” said the waitress.
“Thought the night might have refreshed your memory,” Knox said.
“Only thing it refreshed was me knowing I was right to tell you to blow it out your butt.”
Knox dialed back his natural anger and tried his best to keep it light. “Hey, give Uncle Sam’s guy a little more respect than that, will ya?”
Herky moved slightly and bumped Knox in the arm. He glanced over at the big man. “Is there a problem?”
“No problem,” said Herky, whose menacing features clearly said otherwise.
The waitress moved away to make a phone call.
“So you got any kids?” said Herky.
Knox looked surprised, but said, “Yeah, two, why?”
“So why don’t you take care of ’em?” Herky snapped, stuffing a biscuit in his mouth.
“What the hell are you talking about? My kids are grown and gone. They should be taking care of me.”
“Asshole,” said Herky between bites.
“What?”
“You leave your wife and kids with nothing. Asshole,” he said again.
“Herky!” the waitress said as she rejoined them. “Shut up!”
“Doris, this man is letting his wife and kids starve.”
“Starve! My wife’s dead. Who the hell have you been—”
Herky bumped him again. “I got a mind to take you out back and teach you some manner
s, mister.”
“I wouldn’t advise that.”
“Advise this!”
Herky swung a big fist. Knox caught it, twisted it around Herky’s back and then slammed the man’s face into his grits and eggs.
“Hey!” the waitress screamed as other men in the One T started rising from their chairs to help their friend.
Knox pulled his badge and his gun. “Everybody sit their butts back down in their chairs unless they want to spend some quality time in a federal prison a long way from here.”
The men froze, all except Herky, who was snorting out grits and egg yolks.
Knox looked at the waitress. “Who the hell told you that I—”
The waitress committed the mistake of glancing toward the door.
Knox burst outside, his gaze sweeping up and down the street.
Annabelle peered back from inside the van, the front of which was just barely in Knox’s line of sight. She was still holding her phone from when the waitress had called her. “Damn it, they must have tipped him off somehow. Caleb, put the van in reverse and very slowly back up.”
Caleb did so, and then once out of Knox’s sight he backed into a parking lot, shifted to drive and sped off.
“That was close, but at least I got the tracker on his truck while he was in the One T.” She looked at a small device in her lap. “He’s on the move. Let’s go, but take it slow.”
Knox knew that someone was on his trail, but he wasn’t sure who. Hayes would have most likely taken a direct route. Was it one of Carr’s friends? The chick with the fast tongue? The Secret Service agent? But how could they have possibly followed him here? He kept gazing in the rearview mirror as he drove to the bus station. It wasn’t due to be open for another day, but Knox was done waiting. He didn’t like the sensation of people creeping up behind him. He would tear up this whole town and find somebody who could tell him something.
He banged on the door of the bus station long and loud enough till a middle-aged man looking very put off came into view. Knox plastered his creds against the glass. When the man saw them he paled and quickly unlocked the door.
“Can I help you?” he said in a trembling voice.