Broken Heartland (16 page)

“I don't care if you're Jesus H. Christ,” the trooper said. “Toss the gun or eat buckshot.”

It wasn't supposed to happen like this. “There are dead kids in this building,” Doc said. “I'm guarding an exit for the sheriff.”

The trooper didn't care. Maybe he was angry, humiliated by what he'd done to his vehicle. Maybe he was on a power trip. Maybe he was just scared of what he was getting into. The officer dropped his microphone, racked the shotgun, and brought the weapon to his shoulder.

Doc stopped arguing. He tossed the Luger and dropped to the ground. He spent a brief moment, while the gun was airborne and before he was hugging dirt, wishing he'd had time to set the safety before he threw it. This cop was going to shoot if that gun went off when it hit the ground.

The Luger landed safely in a clump of grass and the trooper didn't kill him. “You've got to cover the back of this building in case the killer tries to get out,” Doc said.

“I got to do nothing, old man,” the officer replied. “Put your hands behind your back and shut up.”

Doc's cell phone started ringing. He'd promised to keep the line open in case Englishman needed to talk to him. He started to reach for where he'd clipped it to his belt.

“Touch that and I'll blow your head off.”

Doc stopped. “But that's probably the sheriff. If he's calling, it's important.”

“Ask me if I care.” The trooper was on top of him now. The shotgun touched the back of Doc's skull as the man kicked his arm, hard, and then bent and cuffed Doc tight enough to interfere with circulation. Doc decided not to complain. Apparently it wasn't Chucky Williams who was likely to kill him today. It was a Kansas Highway Patrolman with an attitude as bad as his driving skills.

“Careful, Officer,” Neuhauser called from where he'd ducked behind a nearby tree. “The old guy's got a concealed weapon in his belt.”

Doc had forgotten. He still had Neuhauser's gun there. Doc had a bad feeling the patrolman wasn't going to like that.

***

“Do you think it's safe to leave him here?” Mad Dog asked. He felt like he should give Pam an excuse to stay with Mark Brown.

They had found a hiding place for Mark in another warehouse, one that was farther from the house and, if the dust and cobwebs on the machinery were any indication, one that wasn't regularly used. They picked the cab of an old combine. It didn't look like it had been out for the last wheat harvest, back in June. The milo crop was mostly cut, though one field stood ripe and ready just east of Galen's house. Someone might show up to service this machine, but it was the best spot Mad Dog and Pam had been able to come up with.

Mark's opinion was that they should all get the hell out of there. The problem was, his keys had been confiscated, too. Mark's truck was old enough that Mad Dog thought he might be able to hotwire it, but he wasn't ready to try. His curiosity was up. He wanted to know what was going on out here before he ran from it. Besides, Mark's truck wouldn't be fast enough to outrun Galen's Dodge, or much of anything else. And Mad Dog didn't know where Hailey had gotten off to.

“Mark doesn't need a babysitter,” Pam said. “And I'm just as curious about what's happening as you are.”

For some reason, Mad Dog was inordinately pleased by her decision. Of course, it was probably just for the excitement and had nothing to do with which guy she'd rather be with.

The flip side of having her join him was that they'd already had a gun pulled on them. A warning shot had been fired. And they'd been locked in that grain bin. Those were pretty good indicators that further snooping wasn't the safest thing they could do. Still, he had the impression Galen hadn't wanted to hurt Pam. Not kill her, anyway. He wasn't so sure about himself. That was why he'd armed himself with a scoop shovel. It wouldn't be much use against Galen's pistol, but it made him feel better.

“What are we waiting for?” Pam stuck her face up against a dusty window that looked out on the back of the first warehouse they'd entered. “The coast is clear. Let's play spy.”

“Hang on,” Mad Dog said. “We've been inside three of these warehouses now. There's nothing interesting in them. I'm thinking we need to check the house, but there's no vegetation around it for us to hide behind. How do we get there and how do we get in…without Galen filling us with lead?”

“Follow me, mighty Cheyenne warrior.” The smile in her voice matched the one on her face. She was enjoying this. He wondered if she was taking it seriously enough. He wondered if he was.

Pam led the way through an exit from this warehouse, then turned in a direction they hadn't explored yet. It kept them behind one of the long steel buildings. Pam hugged it, staying in its shadow. That was a good decision. They got to the far end without being discovered by anything more dangerous than an occasional Mexican sandbur. The thorns hurt like sin and reminded Mad Dog how nice it would be to find boots to go with their coveralls.

Pam stuck her head around the building's corner and invited him to join her. “See. We're on the garage side of the house now. No windows. And no one's out in the yard.”

Clever girl. Mad Dog would have told her so, but she was already halfway across the farm yard to the side of the garage. He followed. At the wall, he asked her, “Now what?”

“I'm thinking we just let ourselves in the front door,” she said.

That seemed too easy, but she was probably right. People in Benteen County didn't use their front doors except for formal events. Front doors opened on living rooms, and those didn't get much use either, except for entertaining.

“When I was over here with Mark, we'd leave his truck back by the kitchen and go in its door. Aside from a house tour, we were never in the front room.”

“And I don't suppose the front door's more likely to be locked than the ones to the warehouses.”

“I'd be surprised, but there's only one way to find out.”

Mad Dog shouldered the shovel. “Let me lead.”

She waved an arm. “You'll do anything to show off that cute butt, won't you?”

Had she really said that? Mad Dog shook his head and pretended she hadn't. He tiptoed to the front corner of the garage. No one was out front, either.

“All right,” he whispered, though there was only the wind to hear them. “Here goes nothing.”

The concrete drive was warm on their bare feet. As they were passing the second of the four doors, an electric motor whined to life and the door just behind them began rising. There was no place to hide. The front of the house was flat and empty of anything but driveway and that patch of grass in the front yard. They could dash past all manner of windows and try to get around the far corner of the house. Or to the front door, but by the time Mad Dog considered those options he knew they didn't have time. The door was open and a car was backing out. He grabbed Pam and swung her behind him and then edged up against the second door, shovel raised in a two-handed grip in case anyone came out with the car.

It was an anonymous white sedan, a Ford designed to look like all those imports that were selling better. There was one person inside. The man was a stranger to Mad Dog, and as surprised to see him as Mad Dog had been by the garage door.

“What are you doing?” the man said.

Mad Dog lowered the shovel back to his shoulder. They were on the wrong side of the car for it to be of any use. He smiled and tried to look innocent. He couldn't think of an answer.

“And what's with the shovel?”

“Ah, gophers,” Mad Dog improvised. “We're supposed to dig the gophers out of the lawn.”

“Oh,” the man said. “Well, good luck.”

Mad Dog and Pam smiled and waved at him as he backed down the drive. They were still smiling and waving when Galen came around the corner of the garage door with his pistol.

“I don't have gophers,” he said.

***

The sheriff tried the high school's number. He got their automated system telling him no one could answer his call right now.

Stupid! He hadn't gotten the principal's cell number earlier. And he didn't know cell numbers for anyone else who might be in that locked-down gym.

Doc. He had Doc's cell on speed dial and Doc would be right out there with the law enforcement that had driven up behind that siren. But Doc's cell just rang, unanswered, until it rolled over to his message option.

Who else? He had to get someone who could either carry word to the gym or who knew the phone number of someone inside. Of course, Mrs. Kraus. He hit the speed dial number for his office and got a busy signal. Damn!

He started trying random numbers in the courthouse. No one answered. His own office was busy when he tried it again.

Somewhere, ahead of him in the labyrinth of air ducts that fed the school, Chucky Williams and an automatic rifle were making their way toward the gym. The sheriff couldn't just sit there continuing to waste time on his cell phone. He had to head for the gym, either through these air ducts—with a chance of catching Chucky before he started executing more children—or outside them—hoping to persuade those in the gym to open up for him, and then evacuate before Chucky got there.

It was a crap shoot. He had no idea how far he'd have to travel through the ducts. Not far, he guessed, but Chucky might ambush him on the way and still manage to pull off a massacre. The sheriff made a decision. Out. He was getting out. He turned and began retracing his path toward the grates under the study hall. That would be the fastest way.

He was just short of the first of them when his cell rang. He grabbed it out of his pocket and just said, “English,” when he answered.

“Dad.” It was Heather, his new deputy. “I thought I'd never get through to you.”

“Just listen,” he said, continuing a one-handed crawl toward the study hall. “I need you to get word to Mr. Juhnke. You can't call the regular school numbers because the whole school is locked down.”

“What's going on?”

“One of the kids has gone on a rampage. Students have died here. A teacher. Tell Juhnke, or whoever you can get, that the shooter got out of the high school basement. He's in the air ducts on his way to the gym. They've got to get those kids out of there fast.”

“Are you okay, Dad?”

“Do it now,” he said, and disconnected as he began pushing on the air grate at the north end of the study hall. The thing wasn't as easy to lift as he'd expected. He managed to get one corner up when his cell rang again.

The sheriff clawed the thing back out of his pocket. He hit the answer button and said, “Heather, don't call me, call….”

But the voice on the other end of the line wasn't Heather's.

“Hi, Sheriff. Do you know who this is?”

The voice was little more than a whisper, but he knew.

“Chucky?”

“You asked me what I wanted,” Chucky said. “Well, I think I've decided.”

The sheriff shouldered another corner of the grate free and pushed the thing aside. “What's that?”

“New hostages, for a start.”

The sheriff kept the phone to his ear as he sprinted across the study hall toward the staircase and the main exit. “After what you did to the last ones? No way. You'll get no replacements.”

“I think I will,” Chucky said. “'Cause I'm in the gym. You'll either give me the hostages I want or I start shooting. I don't think anyone can get out of here before I kill them all. What do you think, Sheriff?”

The sheriff thought Chucky might be right. “Okay,” he said. “Don't shoot. Just tell me exactly what you want.”

***

Heather English was at the intersection across from the Gas — Food beside the Buffalo Burger Drive In. She'd stopped at the four-way and there wasn't any traffic. It had seemed like a good time to try Englishman again. If she could finally reach him, he could tell her what to do with the “stem cells.”

But what he said turned her heart to ice. All this time, while she'd been protecting him from the investigation by sneaking off to do it on her own, something bigger and more dangerous had been going on right here in Buffalo Springs. No wonder she hadn't been able to get through to him or get Mrs. Kraus at the sheriff's office. And she knew Englishman. He was right in the middle of it. If kids had been killed, if someone was trying to kill more, her dad was doing everything he could to stop it. Trying to put himself between a killer and those kids, probably.

It only took her a moment to decide. She didn't know any of the numbers Englishman wanted her to call. None, except his office. But the gym that needed to be warned was only half a mile away, just across town. She could be there, carry the warning herself, faster than she could contact someone to get it passed along.

The Civic burned rubber as it pivoted through the intersection. Fortunately, Main Street was empty, just the way it usually was, because she got the Honda up to eighty before she began slowing for the turn into the school. Her eyes flipped from cross-street to cross-street. The citizens of Buffalo Springs were unaccustomed to traffic. Many of them ignored the stop signs that should give her the right of way. She lucked out. The only moving car she saw was still a block south when she flashed across the intersection ahead of it.

She was so busy watching for traffic that she never saw the cluster of black walnuts she hit just before she got to the school. They exploded, like a string of firecrackers—or an automatic weapon—as she braked and downshifted and went through the gate to the school's parking lot like one of those daredevil drivers at the state fair.

She was surprised to find a wrecked Kansas Highway Patrol Vehicle blocking her way. She tapped the brakes, feathered the accelerator, and got past it by the slimmest of margins. Gravel from her tires ricocheted off its body work. She hadn't done the undamaged part of its paint any good.

Coming on the patrol car had been a shock, but it didn't begin to compare with the feeling she got when a trooper rose up from behind it, throwing a shotgun to his shoulder. She watched, fascinated, though her rearview mirror, until he disappeared in the cloud of dust she'd thrown at him. Then she couldn't see out her rear window because the officer had just shot it out.

She popped the clutch and drove past several lines of cars before ducking behind a row, stopping the Honda where it was temporarily out of the trooper's sight. What was this about? He was treating her like she was the school shooter. That didn't make any sense. Her dad had said the shooter was a student in the heat ducts on his way to the gym. She needed this guy's help. Instead, he and that shotgun could keep her from delivering her dad's message. The gym was just a hundred yards away, back across the parking lot and up a long sidewalk. But she'd never get there. Not on foot. She could already see the trooper's broad-brimmed hat bouncing toward her, threading between cars. She could surrender and explain, if he'd let her, or….

Heather hit the gas and released the clutch again. The Honda created another smoke screen—dust thick enough to sow with winter wheat. The Honda spun in a circle, tires digging through dirt and gravel to the solid earth a few inches down. She got herself aimed the right way and went barreling across the parking lot.

The gym's front doors were flanked by floor-to-ceiling glass panels. Just behind was the foyer with its ticket booth and concession stand. Thanks to all that glass, she could tell that the foyer was empty. She heard another explosion behind her—the trooper, doing his strange shoot-first, ask-later routine. He was too late.

She spent a brief moment wondering if an insurance company would ever cover another car for her. And then the Honda ran over a polling place sign and hurtled through the windows to the right of the door in a burst of sparkling shards. The car bounced off the counter in front of the concession stand and she spun it around and nosed it through the wide doors to the gym, barely moving as she did so in case there were kids behind those doors.

Juhnke had the students and teachers neatly arranged in the bleachers on either side of the basketball court. There were a few voters and poll workers with them. Perfect. She gunned the Honda to mid-court and spun it so it faced the emergency exit in the middle of the building.

Faces gaped at her, slack-jawed. She didn't blame them.

“Follow me,” she shouted. “He's in the heating ducts with a gun. Dad says you have to get out of here now.”

Juhnke tried to ask her something, but she didn't think they had time to discuss it. She hit the gas and hoped. Out wouldn't be as easy as in. The doors she planned to lead them through—they were steel.

***

“What's that? Who's shooting?” Chucky's voice went from menacing to panicky in an instant. The sheriff was moving before the echoes of the firecracker-like pops died. He kept the cell pressed to his ear with one hand and his .38 ready in the other. He went down the stairs and out the front doors of the high school as fast as when he'd taken that dare to flush a cherry bomb down the boys' toilet.

The sheriff was in time to see Heather's Honda make the turn into the parking lot. Damn! He hadn't wanted her to come here, into danger. He hadn't known she was so close.

A shotgun boomed.

“What?” Chucky's voice cracked into a terrified falsetto. “Who's out there? What are they shooting at?”

“Jesus!” the sheriff said. A state trooper was in the parking lot, firing at his daughter.

“Answer me?” Chucky sounded like he was about to cry, but the sheriff didn't have time to reassure him just now.

“Don't you shoot anybody,” English told the boy. Then he broke the connection and sprinted into the parking lot. Heather's car was near the far side, but the trooper was sprinting toward her with that shotgun. And then Heather was moving and the guy was putting the shotgun to his shoulder again.

The sheriff screamed at the top of his lungs. “Hold your fire!” The trooper may not have heard him over the howl of Heather's engine. She launched the Honda toward the gym and the trooper pulled the trigger. The sheriff heard her go through the front windows, and knew she was all right, because the Honda's motor revved again and her tires squealed as she continued maneuvering the car. But he didn't see any of that. He was busy staring down the barrel of his .38…at the three bullet holes he'd just put into a Ford F150 right behind the trooper.

“Drop it or die.” The sheriff meant it. Hell, he wasn't sure he hadn't tried to kill the guy with those first three rounds.

The trooper must have believed him. The shotgun dropped onto the gravel as the officer slowly turned to face English.

“There's gonna be a bunch more troopers here any minute,” the man said. “Then we'll see who dies.”

The sheriff was jogging across the lot, closing the distance. “Use your left hand and drop your belt,” the sheriff said. The trooper had a service revolver against his right hip.

“You're going to do a lot of very hard time for this,” the man said. “You might even get that chemical cocktail if any kids die because you interfered with the law.”

Another, much louder crash came from the direction of the gym. The sheriff couldn't afford to look. And he couldn't afford to answer his cell phone, which had suddenly begun an insistent ringing again. The trooper did as he was told, though. His pistol dropped to his feet to lie beside the shotgun.

“Lean your face up against that truck and put your hands behind your back.” The trooper did it, but not without continuing his litany of dire predictions for the sheriff's future. The sheriff slapped a set of cuffs on him, tight. Too tight, probably. Then he looked toward the gym. Heather's Honda, seriously battered, stood at the edge of the practice football field. Steam poured from under its hood as kids flowed around its sides. His daughter opened the driver's door and was immediately surrounded by teachers. But not before giving him a cocky little mission-accomplished salute. God, he was proud of her.

The sheriff's cell stopped, then immediately started ringing again. He took a breath. He hadn't heard any more shots. Chucky hadn't made good on his threat. Heather had saved the day, for now, at least. And this crazed Kansas State trooper wasn't trying to kill her anymore. The sheriff kept his gun on the man, who was continuing to sputter oaths and threats.

“Sheriff English,” he answered his cell.

“Sheriff?” the trooper said. His square jaw dropped and he stopped running his mouth.

“Yeah,” English told him. “Benteen County Sheriff. And that young lady you were shooting at may have just saved the lives of all those kids. She's one of my deputies, you imbecile.
Now
which of us do you think will do jail time?”

“Who's that you're talking to?” It was Chucky again, still panicky, but a little more in control. “Have they come for me?”

“Has who come for you, Chucky?”

Chucky paused. “You don't know, yet, do you? So maybe I've still got time to stop them before they get me.”

“What…?” But that was all the sheriff managed to say before Chucky hung up on him.

“Who was that?” the trooper asked, more subdued now.

“That was our killer,” the sheriff spat. “The one you may have just helped get away because you're out here firing on my deputy. He's gone, unless our coroner and my two volunteers manage to cut him off.”

“That guy really is your coroner? Those two old farts, they were helping you?”

The sheriff swung his gun back into the trooper's face. “You haven't shot any more of my people, have you?”

“No, no,” the man said, trying to back through the truck. “We've just had us a real failure to communicate, that's all.”

“Where are they?”

“I cuffed them. They're in the back seat of my unit,” the man said. “I'd be happy to let them go for you.”

“Bet your ass,” the sheriff said. But he was already wondering where Chucky was going and who “they” were. And most of all, how to get himself between Chucky and his next target.

***

Heather Lane found unobserved spying on the Siegrist farm wasn't that easy. Not with the way Galen had torn out the hedge trees that used to line the roads surrounding his place. Getting an unobstructed view was no problem. But not from anywhere close.

Windbreaks weren't as popular in central Kansas as they had once been. Corporate farmers, like Galen, made use of every inch of their acreage. And they weren't prepared to trade the water those Osage orange trees drank for the shelter they gave from the wind. The nearest line of trees to Galen's farm dead-ended half a mile north.

Chairman Wynn and Heather found a spot to pull their cars off the road and hiked to the end of the hedgerow. Galen's house, with its metal outbuildings and grain bins, shimmered in the distance across a plowed field. Of living things, including humans acting in a suspicious fashion, there were no signs.

The chairman was exasperated. “Now what?” He spread his hands in frustration and then rested them on his hips.

His holstered pistol was strapped to his belt on one of those hips, not that being armed was of much use under the circumstances.

Heather had brought her fanny pack along, the one she kept in the car for when she went hiking, exploring the country around Albuquerque for archaeological sites. She had a bottle of water in there, along with a Brunton compass, some New Mexico USGS maps, a notebook, a couple of high-energy snack bars, and a trowel. And something else. Something she thought might actually come in handy.

“Why are you wearing that gun?” she asked, digging through the pack's contents.

“It's legal,” he said. “We've even got a concealed carry law now.”

Heather remembered hearing Kansas had passed that legislation. Not that the law's absence had kept people she knew from packing heat when they wanted. This was the West, after all. Wyatt, Doc, Bat, and many other notorious gunmen were more than just historical figures. Locals knew you could never be sure whether you'd meet up with a Hickok or a Hickock—a Wild Bill or a Richard, the latter being one of the men who killed the Clutter family and played a prominent role in Truman Capote's
In Cold Blood
. Englishman always said people were more likely to shoot themselves or one of their family members with their guns. Few people believed him, but the statistics bore him out.