The Vulture (7 page)

Chapter Twelve

Billy Sutherlin grabbed Charlie Picket and the new kid and hopped into the Department's only available cruiser, the Ford Vic with two hundred thousand miles on the odometer and slated for trade-in as soon as there was some wiggle room in the budget. They headed east toward the Blue Ridge Parkway. Ike's A-frame was situated on a six-acre plot down the mountainside and off a road that briefly paralleled the parkway. The radio crackled. Sam forwarded a 9-1-1 call that reported an explosion, possibly at the A-frame. Billy lit up the cruiser and stomped on the accelerator. The old-school siren howled as they climbed up into the mountains. A second message from Sam told them to be on the lookout for two perps possibly hanging out near the house driveway and also that Ruth was okay and staying out of sight. She would come out when they signaled an all clear.

Charlie Picket said, “Did that voice on the 9-1-1 call sound familiar to you?”

Billy's answer was lost when a sedan with rental tags roared past them headed the other way. Billy reckoned that the bad guys must have heard the siren and decided to take off. He suppressed an urge to put the car into a drift-spin and chase after them. Instead, he had the kid call in as much information about the sedan that the three of them could recall and request anyone in the area to intercept.

The A-frame appeared past rescuing by the time they arrived. The front wall had been blown out and the floor buckled upward at a sixty-degree angle. Fire licked at what was left of the interior. Broken glass, shards of plasterboard, and timber littered the driveway and adjoining wooded area. The stone fireplace still stood, but leaned to one side at a dangerous angle. Billy thought it lucky Ike wasn't there to see it. It would have broken his heart. The three men spread out and scoured the surrounding area for any sign of the bombers/arsonists, even though Billy felt sure they were the pair he saw blow by them in the car earlier. The fire trucks arrived a few minutes later.

First Ike, now his retreat. What was going on? Were they after Ruth like Frank thought? It sure seemed like it. Why? Billy understood that Ike might have made a shitload of enemies in his time and would be a candidate for killing, but Ruth? Who wants to kill a college president? The fire captain strolled over.

“You're local?”

“No, Picketsville. Our boss…that is our former boss, owned this place. We came up to pick up his wife is all. What happened?”

“I'm no expert, but it looks to me like the propane tank blew. Funny thing is, I can't for the life of me see how. Them things' usually pretty inert unless you work at it and then they mostly sit off to one side of a house, you know? Just being careful means putting them against a non-life-threatening wall, and isolated from any kind of a spark. This one looks like it might have been located right under the damn floor and that doesn't make sense. And the other thing—”

“Could it have been knocked there by the explosion?”

“It'd be a stretch but maybe. I don't know. We'll have to wait for the arson investigator to say. It don't seem likely to me. Lucky nobody was here when she went up, though.”

“Yeah, lucky. You started to say something else, ‘another thing' you said.”

“I did? Oh yeah. That's way too much damage for a blown propane tank.”

“Something else exploded?”

“Can't say, but I'd bet the rent on it.”

“How long you reckon you'll stick around here?”

“Another hour or so. Long enough to douse the hot spots and be sure she's plumb out.”

Billy checked in. Sam said to hold, then told him to work his way down a path behind the house. Ruth would be waiting for him. He did as he was instructed and met Ruth on her way up the mountain in Ike's old Jeep. She didn't look too good. Her clothes were all crooked like and buttoned wrong. Probably pretty shook up.

“You okay, Miz.…Doctor…?”

“I'm okay, Billy. What happened to the house?”

“It's pretty busted up. Propane tank blew. Maybe an accident, maybe not. The fire guy thought the tank might have had some help. Do you know if it was situated up under the house?”

“The propane tank? No, it was out in the areaway on the side of the main building. Why?”

“No reason, only it seems like it got relocated under the floor and the fire marshal reckoned that was a peculiar place to put one.”

“I guess it would be. How would you fill it? You think somebody moved it? Could they? It must weigh a couple hundred pounds.”

“I don't rightly know. Anyway, it's okay to come out. We been thinking, Miz. President—”

“Could you call me Ruth? Maybe not on campus and so on, but…you know…”

“Right. Okay. So, me and Frank reckon that whoever killed Ike…sorry, umm…Whoever done that is out to get you too.”

“It's a thought.”

A thought? “Well, more than just that, see—” Billy scratched his head. Ike's wife didn't seem even a little surprised about what him and Frank had figured out. What the heck was going on here? His radio crackled again. Sam.

“Billy, here's the thing. The FBI plans to put Ruth into protective custody. Wait for a black SUV and a guy named Hitchens to arrive. He'll take Ruth. You three stand down, Okay?”

“Hitchens? FBI? You sure? Sam, we can protect Ike's wife just fine. We don't need no Feebies doing our job. No offense to Karl, and all.”

“Sorry Billy, that's the drill. Hand her over to Hitchens.”

Billy did not like this at all. Nobody ever believed he was stupid. Not and live. He studied Ruth carefully. She seemed too calm to be still grieving, to hear she might be a target, and what was up with the FBI suddenly putting themselves in the play? He frowned and tried to think of any circumstances that would reconcile all three. The SUV arrived. It did not look like an FBI vehicle. Billy did not know why he thought so, but his gut told him that something was about to go down.

Hitchens introduced himself and took Ruth aside. They had a few words then Hitchens said, “Okay, Deputies, we'll take it from here.” Billy didn't budge. “I said you guys can go.”

Ruth waved. “It's okay, Billy, really. You three head back. Sam will explain.”

How'd she know that Sam would have anything more to say? He spun and squinted into the trees down the path. His friends and family often said that Billy had “quick eyes.” He saw things others missed. They depended on him to spot street signs when they drove in the city, and lurking rabbits during hunting season. As to the latter, he was better than Buster, their beagle. When he scanned the trees down the pathway, he thought he saw movement. Maybe not. He looked more closely—nothing. An idea stirred in his head. It was too fantastic to be true, but it was the only explanation that made any sense at all, given what he'd seen so far. He headed to the cruiser.

“Okay, people, the service with the jurisdiction will take it from here.” He turned back for a second. “You probably should check for some C4 residue or something like it around that propane tank. It didn't get over there under the floor by itself, but you probably already thought of that. Oh, and say ‘Hi' to him for me.”

He slid into the cruiser and drove off not sure if he should feel angry, cheated, or elated at what he believed he'd just figured out.

Holy cow, what if I'm right?

“Say ‘Hi' to who?” Charlie Picket asked.

“Nobody. I was just having a go at the Feebs.”

Holy cow!

Chapter Thirteen

When Billy and the two deputies disappeared around a bend in the road, Hitchens had Ruth climb into the SUV. He then drove down the pathway and into the trees. Ike stepped out from the shrubbery and climbed in. Hitchens reversed and regained the road.

“You don't look anything like FBI,” Ike said.

“Don't need to. Your people just have to believe we are.”

“They are not that slow, son. Next time try to look a little more rumpled. Where to now?”

“Mr. Garland will meet us at the Motel 6 down the road. I don't know what happens after that.”

The ride to the Motel 6 “down the road” took two hours. Down the road meant somewhere around Mount Airy, North Carolina. Hitchens pulled into the parking lot and drove to its farthest end. He braked, hopped out, and knocked on a door. The door opened a crack; he mumbled something and came back to the car.

“End of the line, folks. Thank you for choosing Air America. Please do not tell your friends and neighbors about your trip.”

Ike and Ruth stepped out of the SUV and approached the half-open door. The SUV disappeared in a cloud of North Carolina dust.

“Well, come in, you two. I don't think anybody followed you. Hitchens said you were clean, but why take a chance?”

“That's Charlie Garland, isn't it?”Ruth said. She did not look happy. She pushed the door the rest of the way open and she and Ike slipped in.

“Adjoining rooms,” Charlie said. “One for you two and one for the rest of us for the time being, although I do not think we will be staying here very long. We need to get you two far, far away.”

“That will be difficult,” Ike said. “Ruth can't just drop off the map like that. People back in town will want to know why and then there is the follow-through on my death to set up.”

“Follow through? What do you mean?” Charlie sat at a desk with a laptop open and glowing in its center.

“I'm dead, remember? Either I surface or there will have to be some public acknowledgement of it—a funeral—something.”

“We can't have a funeral, Ike.” Ruth sat and folded her hands in her lap. “A funeral is so…final. Something else, please.”

“Well we don't have that many choices. But the point is, if Ruth disappears with no notice, more questions are going to be raised and the news media will be full of it. That could make hiding very difficult.”

“Relax,” Charlie said. “Are you hungry? I'll have some sandwiches sent over with a pitcher of something cold and we can figure this out. The important thing is, as far as whoever is behind this knows, you're dead and Ruth is pretty shook up. The bad guys will not be surprised if she attempts to go into hiding for a while. So we will set that up and while they chase around the country looking for her, we will triangulate on who they are.”

“What? Ike, what did Garland just say?”

“I think he said they will leave a trail of credit card purchases here and there and see who is willing to chase after you. They can then be back-traced and if they get enough contacts, calculate the starting point. You, on the other hand will be somewhere else entirely.”

“But won't they get suspicious when I seem to be in so many places?”

“You won't be in that many and there will be a logical sequence to them. They might wonder after a few days, but not right away.”

“Okay, I see, but that still doesn't address the first part. What about the folks back in Picketsville?”

“The word out of the Sheriff's Department will be that the fire at the A-frame meant you had to move to a motel for a few days. Meanwhile, the DNA has confirmed the ID of Ike. You will release a message that the body, because of the fire and explosion and so on, had to be cremated and also, because of the timing and your state of mind, blah, blah, blah, you have decided to postpone any official memorial for a few days, maybe a week, and then there will be a service at the…what's the name of that church you don't attend?”

“Stonewall Jackson Memorial.”

“Exactly, that one. Now, we need to plan on where to stash you while we unearth the bastard who started this.”

“I have an idea,” Ike said.

“Okay, I am all ears,” Charlie said.

“After we eat. It's been a long day. Send for the sandwiches and instead of, or in addition to the pitcher of cooling liquid, could you order up a bottle of decent hooch? Oh, and get us a change of clothes or two. We'll talk after we eat. I need a little time to think it through.”

***

Billy was hot. He slammed into the sheriff's office and stared hard at his brother. “When did you plan on telling me?”

Frank looked up from the photo-spread on his desk, eyebrows raised, and put a carefully constructed look of innocence on his face.

“Tell you what?”

“Now I know why you and Sam have been acting all strange like. He ain't dead, is he?”

“Billy—”

“Don't you go giving me no guff about how you don't know. Ike is alive and kicking somewhere and you knew it and didn't say anything. So, why? I'm your damned brother, Frank.”

“Keep your voice down, dammit. Someone might hear you.”

“Well,why not?”

“Why not what? Not let people hear you or why not tell you? Here's the why of both. If the people who tried to kill him knew they failed, they'd try again. The bomb they planted in that car was too big for just someone trying to kill a cop. There's got to be more. Then they take a run at Ruth, see? So, that's why we keep it on the down low. As to not telling you, Ike said if you knew too soon, you'd tell Essie and then everyone would know.”

“Essie wouldn't tell anyone.”

“She wouldn't have to. She'd light up like the Fourth of July and Christmas combined, and anyone who had eyes on us would figure it out.”

“That's stupid.”

“That's the truth and you know it. So, now that you know, you can't tell Essie. If you do, you have to send her away for a while. Billy, we all love your wife and would do anything for her, but she is as transparent as glass. Look, since they took a run at Ruth up there at that cabin, they must have known where she was. That means they have ears in here somehow. Get it?”

Billy sat down in a heap. Frank waited for him to cool down.

“You can't tell her, you know. Okay, what happened up on the mountain?”

“How am I not going to do that? Lord knows she's about as shook up as if her own daddy was dead. Frank, she could lose the baby if she don't come up out of that funk she's in.”

“I don't know, Billy. Look, how about this? She isn't worth a bucket of spit around here lately anyway, so you tell her she's on baby-sitting duty for herself and Sam. Once she's okay with that, she can camp out at Ma's and then maybe tell her, but be careful with that. Even out and away…who knows? And for sure don't tell nobody else, got it? Not even Ma.”

“She might buy that.”

“She'll have to or you're both off the case and on vacation somewhere and I can't lose another man. So, you figure it out. Meanwhile, what about your run up to the cabin?”

Billy filled him in on what happened at Ike's house and how the FBI showed up and took Ruth away. He guessed Ike went with them. He did say he didn't like the looks of the men who said they were FBI, but Ruth seemed okay with them so he didn't say anything. Frank smiled and filled Billy in on who the men were and Charlie Garland's role in the transfer. Billy allowed as how he was okay with the spooks, he just didn't like the FBI, Karl Hedrick excepted, of course.

Frank couldn't tell him just then but it was the spooks, not the FBI, who were running the show at the moment.