Divine Justice (16 page)

Stone hung up the phone and walked toward the front of the shop, managing a smile at Wanda as he passed her.

She said, “Heard about Willie. That sure was real smart of you.”

“I’m just glad I could help.”

“I told my husband about it. He was in the army. I told him I heard you were too. He wanted to know which part.”

“The part that fought in Vietnam,” Stone said as he closed the door behind him.

He went back to the rooming house and packed his few belongings. The bus ride to the vicinity of Divine had taken three hours from where they had gotten off the train. He remembered the general direction they’d come, but the corkscrew roads and hairpin curves were impossible to recall with any specificity. He thought back to the night he and Danny had come here via hog truck. He remembered the towers of Dead Rock prison. The main street of Divine. The warm bed above Rita’s. The shotgun in his face the next morning. Abby Riker’s scowl that had somehow turned to a smile.

He waited until it was well dark and then headed out of town. His route carried him past the road leading to Willie’s place. A few minutes later he saw the burn of car headlights coming his way and he quickly stepped off the main road and onto the dirt one leading to Willie’s trailer. He quickly retreated into some bushes lining the dirt drive as he waited for the car to pass. He only got a glimpse at the driver as it sped by and continued to watch as the car kept on going before it rounded a curve and its rear lights vanished.

Stone looked back at the main road and then glanced the other way. He was on his way again when yet another car came along the main drag, forcing him to scurry once more back down the road to Willie’s place. He obviously hadn’t waited until it was late enough. Right now, for him, every car could be a state trooper with his digital picture painted on the laptop computer in the cruiser.

He hustled down the dirt road and stopped. The car was parked in front of Willie’s trailer and there was a light on inside. He glanced at the car; it was a small red two-door Infiniti. He looked inside. There was a purse on the front seat and the smell of cigarette smoke was heavy. He peered around at the trailer. The front screen door was partially open. He heard a small crash from inside.

He quickly moved up the steps and said, “You okay?”

“Who is it? Who’s there?” It was a woman and her voice trembled.

She appeared at the door a moment later; a tall bleached blonde with a spare tire wedged into slim jeans and spiky heels. A cigarette dangled from her left hand. She looked to be in her late forties, although the amount of makeup she had on made it difficult to tell.

“I’m Ben, the man who helped Willie last night.” Her features looked familiar. “Are you Willie’s mom, Shirley Coombs?”

She took a drag on her cigarette and nodded absently, but the suspicious look only deepened. “How’d you know that?”

“You look like each other.” Stone glanced over her shoulder into the trailer. She followed his gaze and said hurriedly, “I came over to check on things when I heard ’bout Willie. Got folks round here that might take advantage of him being laid up in the hospital. Messing with his stuff and all.”

It occurred to Stone that Mom might’ve been messing with her son’s stuff too.

“Have you seen Willie yet?”

“Planning to get over there soon. Long drive. And my car’s not too dependable.”

Stone glanced back at her car. “Looks to be pretty new.”

“Yeah, well, it’s a piece of crap. Keeps stalling out on me.”

“Everything look okay in there?” he asked.

“Willie’s not the neatest person in town, so it’s hard to tell, really. Looks okay, I guess.”

“You need any help?”

“No,” she said quickly, a beat too quickly actually. “I mean, you’ve helped enough. Willie would be dead except for you. I thank you for that.”

“I’m glad I was around. But Bob helped with Willie too.”

Her features turned dark. “Yeah, old Bob is real good about helping folks. At least ones he likes.”

“He doesn’t include you in that group?”

“You could say the whole town doesn’t include me in that group.”

Okay.
“I was sorry to hear about your husband.”

She stiffened. “Who told you about him? Bob?”

“No, Sheriff Tyree. He mentioned the hunting accident. Pretty tragic.”

“Yeah, real tragic.”

Stone looked at her quizzically. “I hope Willie will be okay,” he said, after an awkward silence.

“Hell, he’ll be fine. He’s got four shotguns, a deer rifle, two hunting bows, a pickup truck, his own double-wide, cable TV and propane to keep warm, a camp stove to cook on and folding money from the mine. What’s not to come home to? My boy aimed high in life, didn’t he?” She smiled. But then it quickly faded. “Look, I got to go,” she said. “Thanks again for saving my baby.”

She closed the door behind her and moved past Stone.

He watched as she got in her car and drove off.

He hoisted his bag and walked back to the main road.

Five minutes later the truck almost hit him as it flew by. He dodged out of the way, rolled and came up in time to see a man throw himself out of the truck cab and land hard in the road. Stone raced toward him and turned him over.

It was Danny. He was badly beaten but still breathing. And then Stone looked up. The truck had stopped. As he watched it turned and headed toward him, stopping a few feet from where he knelt next to Danny. Three men climbed out and each one carried a baseball bat.

CHAPTER 31

J
OE
K
NOX SAT
in his town house having a cup of coffee and pondering his next move. The idiot Agency artist he’d requested to do a composite had gotten lost on the way to Leroy’s place. And when he’d gotten there Leroy had gone off on his damn boat. Leroy didn’t have a phone so the best Knox could do was send another agent up there to try and pin the man down. Until he had a picture to show around, Knox was at a standstill in his investigation. And if Leroy had been involved and was now on the run after Knox had conveniently warned him?

There will be no way to explain such a junior mistake to Hayes.

He decided to run through again what he’d learned at the military records center, in case it might suggest something. A half hour later he was no further along. Maybe he should go back to the records center and go through some more documents. The attendant had been able to easily find the other boxes for him. It probably wouldn’t take—

Knox slowly set down his coffee cup. The next moment he was racing to the phone. He got the number for the records center and punched it in. A minute later, after being forwarded along to several extensions, he heard the voice of the man who’d helped him before. Knox identified himself and then asked the question.

“How did you find what I wanted so easily? It was like the boxes were already out.”

“Well, actually they were,” the man replied a bit sheepishly. “I mean, they’d been checked out some months back. Maybe six months or so, and I’m a little embarrassed to say that no one had filed them away yet. And we’ve been a bit shorthanded as of late,” he added quickly, as though suspecting that Knox might actually be some sort of military archives inspector trying to pull a slick one.

“So someone else was looking at those records?” Knox said slowly. “Can you tell me who?”

The man excused himself for a minute. When he came back on the line he said, “Guy named Harry Finn. Says here on the sign-in log he used to be with the Navy SEALs. He had the credentials and top secret clearances to get access to the boxes you looked at. That help you any?”

“That helps me a lot, thanks.” Knox clicked off and spent the next hour tracking down Harry Finn, former SEAL.

An hour later he pulled his truck to a stop, got out, walked up to the steps and rang the doorbell. A few moments later it opened and he was staring across at a tall young man whose gaze burned back into his.

“Harry Finn?”

Finn didn’t answer. His gaze instinctively checked behind Knox.

“I’m alone. Well, as alone as is probably possible on something like this.”

“Something like what?”

“Can I come in?”

“Who in the hell are you?”

Knox flipped open his creds. “I’m here to talk about Oliver Stone. Or you might know him as John Carr.”

“I’ve got nothing to say.”

“I’m not sure why you were looking up the guy’s military record, or whether you’re his friend or not. But he’s on the run and somebody’s going to get to him at some point. And when they do.” Knox simply shrugged.

Finn was about to say something when Knox’s cell phone rang. He’d been half expecting it actually, even as he glanced over his shoulder and saw the black sedan parked down the road. His expert gaze, however, did not pick up the nondescript white van parked farther down. It was Macklin Hayes on the phone, and as usual he got right to the point.

“What the hell are you doing there, Knox?”

“Where?”

“Harry Finn is off-limits.”

Knox backed down the steps and turned away from Finn. “Nobody told me that.”

“I’m telling you now. How did you get on to him? Anything to do with your visit to the military records center?”

“And why do you find need to follow me, sir?” Knox turned and waved to the men in the black sedan.

“What did you find?”

“Not much. He fought in Vietnam. He was a good soldier. Then he just disappeared. Probably when he was recruited for”—Knox glanced at Finn and smiled—“for that thing that doesn’t exist.”

“You are to leave that house now and never go back.”

The phone went dead. Knox put it back in his pocket and turned to Finn.

“You’ll be happy to know that you’re officially off-limits, or so my boss just told me. But just keep in mind that something really screwy is going on with Carr. I’ve already gabbed with his friends, including the lady who calls herself Susan Hunter. She told me Carr had the goods on Carter Gray but that Gray got it back probably at the Capitol Visitor Center. You probably already know that from your suitably blank expression. Maybe you were even there. All I can tell you is I’ve been assigned to track Carr down. That’s all. But when I do track him down, and rest assured I will, other people will show up and take over. And I doubt they’ll have his best interests at heart. Whether you give a shit or not, I don’t know and really don’t care.”

He put out a hand for Finn to shake. When he did, Finn came away with a business card with Knox’s contact information on it.

“You have a good day, Mr. Finn.”

Knox walked back to his truck while Finn stared after him.

Knox didn’t know exactly why he’d done that. Well, maybe he did. John Carr had gotten his ass shot up for his country and they’d screwed him. Whatever else the man had done, that just wasn’t right.

In the white van, Annabelle punched in the number. A moment later Harry Finn answered. He relayed to her what Knox had told him and she in turn filled him in.

“Do we trust this guy, Annabelle?” Finn asked.

“I didn’t at first, but now I’m not so sure. He seems to be caught right in the middle.”

“So what do we do?”

“Sit tight. I may need your help later. Or more to the point, Oliver will.”

“I owe Oliver everything. So I’ll be there if you need me.”

CHAPTER 32

S
TONE ROSE,
his right hand undoing his belt as he did so. He slipped it off and held it by the buckle. The silver pointed end dangled a few inches from the road.

The men circled him, holding their bats ready.

“Odds don’t look too good for you, pops,” said one of them.

An instant later he was on the ground, his face covered in blood from where the belt point had bitten into his eye.

As he writhed and screamed with his hands over his face, one of his buddies took a step toward Stone and swung his bat with all his strength. Stone ducked under the blow and snapped his belt against the side of the man’s face, gouging it. The fellow yelled in fury and came at Stone again, his bat whipping back and forth. Stone dodged out of the way, but one of the wild blows caught him squarely on the arm. He dropped his belt, rolled and snatched up the fallen man’s Louisville Slugger with his good arm. One smack to the man’s knees brought him down; the second to the base of his neck kept him there.

The remaining attacker dropped his bat and ran. Stone turned and threw the bat he was holding. It whipsawed through the air and nailed the guy in the back. He screamed, dropped to the road, picked himself up and kept going. Stone started to go after him but stopped when Danny moaned. He raced back to his side even as the truck sped off.

“Danny, Danny, can you hear me? Can you get up?”

Stone looked around. One man unconscious. The other still rolling around on the ground. He was worried the third attacker would go get reinforcements. And his arm was killing him.

“Danny, can you walk?”

Danny finally focused on Stone and nodded. Stone heaved him to his feet, the pain shooting across his injured limb. He was still able to support Danny as they made their way down the road. They reached Willie’s trailer. Stone loaded Danny into the truck and raced into the trailer. He found Willie’s truck keys, ran back out, fired up the truck and pulled off.

He drove first to Doc Warner’s office but no one was there. He changed direction and headed to the hospital.

Danny lay against him in the front seat. His face was bloody and one arm hung limp. “Hold on, Danny, we’re going to the hospital.”

Danny mumbled something.

“What?”

“Call my mom.”

Stone watched as Danny slowly dug his hand in one pocket and drew out his phone. Steering with his knees, Stone flipped it open, found the number on the speed dial and hit the key.

It took a few rings but she finally answered. “Hello?”

“Abby, it’s Ben. I’ve got Danny. He’s been attacked by some guys with baseball bats. I’m taking him to the hospital. Meet us there.”

To her credit the woman didn’t scream or start crying. All she said was, “I’m on my way.”

Less than an hour later Stone once more pulled into the hospital parking lot. He half carried Danny into the emergency room entrance. While they were working on him Abby screeched to a stop in the parking lot, jumped out of the Mini Cooper and rushed in. Stone met her at the door and took her to Danny, who was lying on a gurney in the triage room.