Prey (23 page)

One minute later, the manager of the men's clothing store and the mechanic at a Ford dealership were duking it out.

All in all, it was a very confusing night in North Arkansas. And the night was still young.

The woman called Bea was still alive, but unconscious, suffering from a broken nose and jaw and a fractured skull. The sentry Barry had trussed up in the cave was defiant and would give only his name, serial number, and old military rank.

“Get him out of here!” Van Brocklen said, then turned to face Stormy.

“It's all coming back to me now,” Stormy said. “I was so traumatized by everything. You see, I was blindfolded. I didn't see who it was who rescued me.”

“Right,” the inspector said, very drily. “I'm sure that's what happened.”

Will stood off to one side, smiling.

Van Brocklen glared at the man. “You find all this amusing, Mr. Will?”

“Shore do,” the older man replied.

“You have a very strange sense of humor, sir.”

“That's what my wife used to tell me.”

Van Brocklen shook his head. Twice he had told Will to stay out of the cave. Twice Will had smiled and ignored him.

“Must be half a million rounds of ammunition stored down here,” a Secret Service man said, walking up. “Cases of everything from grenades to MREs to you name it, it's here.”

“They were preparing for war,” an FBI man said.

“Just make shore you guys are on the right side when it kicks off,” Mr. Will said. “And it's gonna kick off, bet on that.”

“Problem is,” Van Brocklen muttered under his breath, “he's probably right.”

Only Will heard him. The older man cut his eyes, smiled, and whispered, “You better believe I am, sonny.”

* * *

Barry squatted in the timber, trying to decide what best to do. With the help of a few of his four-legged friends of the forest, he had located the underground bunker complex where they told him a man was taken against his will earlier that day. They showed him one of the many entrances and exits, and then vanished into the night.

Barry finally decided that the best thing for him to do was nothing at all, except alert the FBI and let them handle it. He shape-shifted and began his run through the woods. His friends had also told him where he would find a lot of strangers—told him with no small amount of animal humor in their eyes and position of their ears and tails. Barry knew exactly where his friends meant. Animals, especially wolves, coyotes, dogs, and cats, had a fine sense of humor. But it was awfully difficult for most non-animal lovers to see it. Even many dog and cat owners often failed to recognize it.

Barry knelt above the bunker entrance he and Stormy had left only hours before and waited. Mr. Will finally came out and stood for a moment, smoking a cigarette.

“Mr. Will,” Barry whispered. “Tell Van Brocklen I want to see him. Make sure no one else hears you.”

The older man nodded and stepped back into the darkness of the cave. A moment later, Inspector Van Brocklen stepped out, looking all around him.

A scratching sound above and behind him turned the FBI man around. He sucked in his breath at the sight before him. The biggest timber wolf he had ever seen stood above him, the yellow eyes glowing in the night. Van Brocklen didn't know much about wild animals, having been city born and bred, but he had seen enough wildlife documentaries to know better than to reach for a gun. He remained motionless, but his heart was beating so fast he thought it might explode.

Then, suddenly, the wolf was gone and Barry Cantrell was standing where the wolf had been, smiling at him. “Eight and a half miles due west of here, Inspector, there is a small valley. A tumbledown old house sits in the center of the valley. Part of a native rock fence is still standing. I'm sure Mr. Will knows where it is. That entire area is honeycombed with underground bunkers. President Hutton is being held there. How you get him out is up to you.”

Van Brocklen's mouth opened and closed silently a couple of times. He finally found his voice. “How did you . . . I mean . . . you were a
wolf!
How ... ?”

But Barry was gone, melting silently into the night.

* * *

John Ravenna rented a car at the airport and drove to a motel in the suburbs, not far from Senator Madalaine Bowman's home in Northern Virginia. After checking in, John stood by his rental car for a moment, parked in front of the motel room, and then shifted into his Other.

Thirty minutes later, he was standing in his human form in Senator Bowman's bedroom. He smiled, then shifted. As his Other, he growled once, and Madalaine opened her eyes. Her nose wrinkled at the strong animal smell, and she sat up in bed. She had only a second to form a scream in her throat that never made it past her lips before the huge spotted hyena leaped. Within two minutes' time, the bedroom walls were splattered with blood and gore. The sounds of bones cracking under the force of powerful jaws filled the death house. Then . . . silence.

Two more U.S. senators would die that night, under the most horrible of circumstances. Hard-nosed investigators from the Virginia State Police and seasoned agents from the FBI would, to a person, be sickened at the carnage. None of them had ever seen anything like it in their long careers.

“It would appear,” an FBI spokesperson would later read from a carefully worded statement, “that after the victims were killed, the flesh was torn from the bones by some sort of animal with very powerful jaws, and then . . . eaten.”

“Motive?” a reporter asked.

The agent shook her head. “We don't have one as yet.”

* * *

The firefight at the underground bunkers that night in North Arkansas was over very quickly. To a person, those holding President Hutton captive committed suicide rather than be taken alive, but for reasons that would be forever unknown, they spared the life of President Hutton.

He was treated at the scene by emergency medical services personnel and then flown to Little Rock for surgery on his injured leg.

A very weary Van Brocklen and Chet Robbins were back at the motel complex a couple of hours before dawn. Both of them wanted no more than a long, hot soapy shower and a few hours sleep. They were stopped by the sight of a wolf peering around the corner of the building at them.

“That's him,” Van Brocklen said.

“I don't believe it!” Chet said.

Barry shifted.

“Son of a bitch!” the Secret Service man whispered, as both men stepped closer to the corner of the building.

“President Hutton is all right, Barry,” Van Brocklen said.

“I know. Friends of mine told me.”

“Friends of yours?” Chet questioned.

“Please don't ask who,” Van Brocklen said.

“What friends?” Chet blurted.

“Friends in the forest,” Barry replied.

“You had to ask,” Van Brocklen muttered.

“If you're interested, we can wrap this all up tomorrow morning,” Barry said. “Meet me on that side street behind Nellie's Cafe at nine o'clock. Inspector, I expect you to keep your word about trying to get the government off my back.”

“I said I'd try, Barry, and I will. I'll do everything within my power. But don't expect me to work miracles. I'm just a minor cog in a great big bureaucratic wheel.”

“I'll see you in the morning.”

Chet started to speak, then closed his mouth. Barry was gone. He shook his head and said, “This is the strangest case I have ever worked.”

“And it isn't over yet,” FBI added.

“You just had to add that, didn't you?”

“Won't Inspector Van Brocklen object to my being along?” Stormy asked.

“Probably,” Barry replied. “But you will at least be able to get film of them taking the man away. That is, if they have proof enough to do that. I really don't know what they have.”

She had watched Barry pack his few belongings and then muscle the camper shell onto the bed of the pickup and bolt it down. He had laid a thin mattress on the bed of the truck for the dogs to lie on.

“Do you know where you're going?” she asked, as they sat on the front porch of the house, sipping coffee in the relative coolness of morning.

“Yes. I'll let you know as soon as I'm settled in.” He smiled. “And I promise one of the first things I'll do is get a telephone.”

“Promises, promises,” she teased him, then her smile faded. “Do you think Inspector Van Brocklen has enough stroke to do any good, Barry?”

“No. But he'll try. And while he's doing that, I might gain a little time.”

“How about Robert Roche?”

“He's the one that worries me more than the government. After what I did to him, he'll never quit chasing me.” Barry smiled. “But it was worth it.”

Ki pulled in, and the three of them walked through the house, checking to see if Barry had missed anything. He was leaving his furniture, including the television and satellite dish. When Barry left a location, he broke clean.

“The president and the Speaker are going to be all right,” Ki brought them up to date. “They've both scheduled press conferences for later today.”

“That will be either a very interesting event,” Barry said, “or a very boring one. What is the mood in town?”

“Relief that it's all over,” Ki replied. “But I get the funny feeling that some people around the county know a hell of a lot more than they're saying.”

“Sure they do,” Barry said. “And certainly not just in this area. Lots of unrest around the nation. Militia groups springing up all over the place. But the government doesn't seem all that interested in addressing the problems these millions of people point out. At least the party in power doesn't seem interested. It's just the same ol' political Potomac Two-Step, day after day. When the Republicans point out that government needs to be downsized, programs need to be cut, departments cut back or done away with completely, they're vilified by democratic left-wing extremists as advocating children starving, old people left to die, et cetera, et cetera. Any thinking person knows all that is a crock of shit. Both parties spend far too much time conducting witch-hunts against the other, instead of addressing the problems facing this nation...”

Barry noticed that Stormy had clicked on her small cassette recorder and was getting his words on tape. He did not object. She would probably use it as an anonymous “man on the street” interview.

“We've been all through this several times,” Barry continued. “You both know how I feel. I've seen governments rise and fall, and most of the time it's because those in power did not listen to the people. But”—he held up a finger—“it's not necessarily those in the majority that should be listened to; it's those who can do the most damage. The left-wingers in this country know this, and that's why they're so intent on disarming the American public. But all they're doing is making criminals out of thousands of heretofore law-abiding gun-owning citizens and setting the stage for dozens or perhaps hundreds of resistance groups to form. And these democratic left-wing extremists are so naive they don't, or can't, understand why Americans won't just willingly and happily hand over their guns, agree to more government control of their lives, and consent to higher personal taxes and a never-ending national debt so the left-wingers can fund more unworkable and unpopular social programs. The balloon has to pop one of these days, and in my opinion that day is not far away.”

“Do you think the majority of Americans support an armed revolution?” Stormy asked.

Barry shook his head. “No. But when it comes down to the nut-cutting, many will hold their noses and champion the revolution as the lesser of two evils. It all depends on how the revolutionaries put it all together.” He paused for a moment, then said, “Don't forget, I've seen it happen before. Americans won't support racist or hate groups, but many will support groups attempting to return to a more common-sense-based form of government. A government where the law-abiding have more rights than the criminals. Where a citizen can protect his or her property without fear of arrest, prosecution, or civil lawsuit should the criminal get hurt or killed. Where the tax system is more evenly established and millionaires pay their share. Americans have advocated a flat tax rate for years, yet Congress won't do a damn thing toward setting that up. And the fault lies on the shoulders of both political parties. Neither wants to give an inch on their favorite programs. So ... many Americans have decided that if elected government officials won't get this mess straightened out, they, as citizens, are going to have to do it themselves. And more than one great American leader has stated that the citizens have the constitutional right to do that. Hell, revolution has happened all over the world at one time or another. Why should America be immune?”

“You're convinced of some sort of civil uprising, aren't you, Barry?” Ki asked.

“Yes. And sooner than later.”

* * *

The four of them walked into the office to face the man, sitting behind his desk, a pistol in front of him. Van Brocklen had asked Stormy to wait outside.

“I know you didn't put it together,” he said, looking at Van Brocklen. “You people are too goddamn stupid.” He cut his eyes to Barry. “You did, didn't you?”

“That's right. Almost from the very first.”

“How?”

Barry smiled. “Let's just say you were careless.”

“I don't believe that. Let's just say you got lucky.”

“Whatever it was, you're finished.”

The man smiled, his eyes drifting to the pistol on his desk. “I might be, but the movement isn't.”

“You're probably right about that,” Van Brocklen said. “But why would you people plot to grab the president and the Speaker?”

“We didn't. Even if we did, you think I'd admit it? But I have . . . ah ... shall we say people highly placed in and around Washington. Planted so deep you'll never find them. They told me late last night the plot to kill Hutton and Madison came from the halls of Congress.” He grinned. “How about them apples, boys?”

Neither Van Brocklen nor Chet Robbins replied to that. They already knew it. They also had been informed early that morning of the bizarre deaths of three very prominent senators.

The man behind the desk grinned up at those standing before him. “Aren't you forgetting something, boys? Aren't you going to read me my rights?” Then his grin changed to a laugh. “Oh, I see. You don't have enough proof to arrest me, do you? Well . . . you must be close or you wouldn't have chanced coming to see me.” He looked at the serious expressions on the faces of the feds. “No? Then . . . I don't understand.”

“We're not here to arrest you,” Chet said. “Just to tell you that you're all finished in this area. You've had a lot of people fooled for a long time, including us, I have to admit that. But no more. You're through.”

The man behind the desk looked first at the two federal agents, then at Barry, then at the man standing beside the immortal. “Well, I'll just be damned. It was you, wasn't it?”

“I talked to Barry about you late last night,” the man said. “We agreed it had to be you.”

“I always figured you for the dumb sort. Guess I was wrong. ”

“We're open for a deal,” Chet said, a hopeful note to his words.

The man shook his head. “No way. No deals. Why should I? You just admitted you don't have enough on me to arrest.”

“You know the answer to that,” Van Brocklen said.

“Sure. The IRS is going to be all over me now. You guys are going to start investigating me, word will quietly leak out about it, and that will finish me in politics. Am I getting warm?”

“Your words, not ours,” Van Brocklen was quick to speak.

Jim Beal sighed audibly and said, “Man, you're the sheriff. The most powerful man in the county. You had it made. Why get mixed up with Vic Radford and Bubba and the others?”

Sheriff Don Salter leaned back in his chair and smiled. “Who says I was?”

“The deal Chet mentioned is still open, Don,” Van Brocklen said. “We could use a man like you in this area. You know it's only a matter of time before we close in on you. We're going to sweat Bubba and a few of the others. We'll lean on them so hard they'll think they've been hit by a truck. One of them will break. You know what happens to cops in prison, Don.”

Don's grin didn't fade. “You'll never put me in prison. The movement's too big for that to happen. I'll just go underground and help run operations from there.”

“I'd start sweating Vic Radford first,” Barry spoke to no one in particular. “He's the weak link and he's still alive.” He looked directly at Don. “The Bureau found the tunnel under his house, Don.”

“We'll get him, Don,” Chet said. “His kind can't keep their mouths shut. You know that. That's why you planted that automatic weapon in Vic's house and blew up your own jail trying to kill him. Barry told us about you not knowing he had made bail that evening.”

Don's grin faded just a bit. “Prove it!”

“Oh, we will,” Van Brocklen told him. “In time, we will.”

“You want to work with us, Don?” Chet asked.

“Turn against my own people?” the sheriff replied. “No way. Movements like mine are the only thing that's going to keep America strong. We've got to knock the Jews out of power and slap the niggers back down where they belong and we can keep an eye on them. You boys know damn well crime didn't start to skyrocket until the nigger civil rights bill became law and we couldn't roust them. Niggers have virtually destroyed this nation and you know it. They're nothing but savages. Work with you? No way. Go to hell. And get out of my office. You boys got nothin' on me.”

Outside the sheriff's office, Jim Beal said, “Your bluff didn't work.”

“It was no bluff, Mr. Beal,” Chet replied. “He'll be under arrest by noon. We have federal arrest warrants on the way now. We just would rather have had him working for us, that's all.”

“Am I free to go?”

“You were never being detained, Mr. Beal,” Van Brocklen said. “We don't like militias, but you haven't broken any laws. We think your philosophy is all cockeyed, but you're not a suspect in any plot to subvert the government. Thank you for your cooperation.”

As Jim Beal walked away, Barry said, “Don will never be taken alive. You both know that.”

“Yes,” Chet replied with no change of expression. “We know.”

As if to punctuate that remark, the sharp crack of a pistol came from inside the sheriff's office.

Barry met the eyes of both federal men. “If I was a suspicious type, I'd think you boys planned it this way.”

Something moved behind Van Brocklen's eyes. “You'll play hell proving it.”