One Mile Under (30 page)

“It’s just not that easy, Dani. We can report a crime, but then we’d have to go back. The Templeton Police Department has jurisdiction there. You’d have to make a deposition against them.”

“Damn right I’ll make a deposition. I’d do it laughing in their faces.”

“And we’d have to find a lawyer there who’ll go to trial. And be around there. And face a jury of people from the town. I’m not going to risk that. Not till I know that whoever the state attorney is there will bring charges up. And then you’d have to testify at trial …”

“So what are we going to do? Just let them get away with it? Like they wanted?”

“First, I’m taking you back.”

“No. Uncle Ty, we can’t—”

“That’s all there is, Dani. I should have done this days ago.”

She stared, more fragile than he’d seen her before, the courage and the rancor and maybe even a little belief in him draining from her face. “All we’ve talked about was me. They told me you were dead. What about you?”

Two hours ago, a bullet had narrowly missed his head, plowing into Watkins. Hauck started the car up and backed out of the space. “I’ll be fine.”

“What do you mean, you’ll be fine? You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.” Hauck pressed the accelerator and turned back onto the access road, melding back into traffic.

“They killed Trey, Uncle Ty. They killed the others, too. And they tried to kill me. We can’t just go back,” Dani said again. “We can’t just let them win.”

He switched lanes. Carbondale was still two hours away. He looked back at her. “Who said anything about letting them win?”

The call came in from higher up. McKay was already at his desk back at the office.

“So how’s our situation?” Moss inquired. McKay detected a ripple of nerves in his voice. The RMM executive was an oilman at heart, West Texas through and through. Who turned a blind eye to the kind of tactics McKay employed. Still, he had hired him.

“Nothing you’ll have to worry yourself about anymore,” McKay replied.

“And that means …?”

“It means it’s not a problem anymore. No one who saw anything that could lead back to you. No more mouths running off that can get us in trouble. You don’t have to know any more. I assume that’s what you wanted to hear when you said to handle it my way.”

“Yes. I guess it was.” The oil executive blew out a breath. “And not a day too soon. Just to be clear, we
are
talking both of them, aren’t we?”

“I’m afraid Mr. Hauck is still at large. But he’s useless now. He has nothing that connects directly to anything we need to hide. In fact, it may have even worked out better for us. Call it a bonus …”

“Bonus?”

“The farmer. Watkins. Apparently the old man took the shot intended for Hauck.”

“Is he dead?”

“Let’s just say I don’t think you have to worry about any pain-in-the-ass lawsuits anymore. I didn’t think you’d be crying to hear that.”

“Good. This will all make the process go a whole lot smoother.” Moss exhaled, relieved. “I’ll pass the word upstairs. I’m sure there’ll be something in this deal for you and your team.”

“We do aim to please, Wendell,” McKay said, with pride.

His cell phone vibrated. Another call coming in. “Hold on.” McKay checked the screen. “That’s my man now.” He put the RMM executive on hold and went on his cell. “John …?”

“We’ve got a problem,” Robertson said.

“What kind of problem?” McKay felt a flutter in his chest.

“She’s gone.”

“Who’s gone?”

“The girl. We drained the tank. She wasn’t in it. We searched everywhere. Somehow the damn bitch managed to get out.”

“Someone just doesn’t get out, John. Are you sure you locked the containing door?”

“Of course I locked the door. Anyway it wasn’t opened. That tank was airtight. The only thing I can even think of is maybe through one of the water ducts out to the river. But that would be … We searched the area. All I can say is that she’s gone.”

McKay thought for a second about what this meant. Everything he had just told Moss was untrue. Everything the man was probably now drafting in an email, assuring his superiors about it being smooth sailing from here on in. But it was even worse. She had seen him. His face. A rare mistake, but one he thought came with zero risk. If she was talking to the authorities now, they were totally screwed …

“What if she talks, John?
I
damn well would. We’re the ones she can pin it on. We’re the ones who have everything on the line.”

“I know that, Mr. McKay.”

“Find her. We don’t let people down, John. Either here or back overseas. That’s not just a phrase, you realize. It’s a commitment. It’s what we stand for. And now we’re about to let a whole lot of people down. Important ones. You find her. Both of them. And when you do, you do what you have to, and do it right this time. This isn’t Alpha anymore, you understand that? This is us. This is one big, giant shit ball now.”

“I understand.”

He hung up. McKay’s stomach ground as tight as powder. He took in a breath and got back on the phone with Moss. “You’re on your cell, Wendell?”

“I am.”

“It might be a good thing to destroy it. Take it apart. Remove the chip. Maybe toss it down one of those wells of yours. Today, if you can manage the time.”

“What’s wrong?” the RMM man asked, hearing the sudden change in tone.

“What I told you before, about that problem we discussed … I’m afraid I may have been a little premature …”

They made it back to Carbondale just after five
P.M
. Before heading to Dani’s, they stopped to pick up Blu where he’d been staying for the past four days.

As soon as he saw her get out of the car, he bounded up and smothered Dani with kisses, his paws up on her chest, almost as if he sensed what had happened. Dani put her head against him, knowing that was true. “Oh, Blu, baby, you sure are a sight for sore eyes. You have no idea how close I came to never seeing you again.” He eagerly hopped in the back of Hauck’s SUV, his tail wagging happily.

They all went back to her ground-floor unit in town. Dani’s roommate was still on the West Coast. Exhausted, Dani sank wearily onto her couch, Blu climbing up, one leg at a time, and resting his chin on her thigh.

“Who can you call?” Hauck asked her.

“Who can I call for what?” Dani replied.

“Who can you call to come and stay with you? Or better, who can you go stay with? I don’t want you here alone.”

“C’mon, I can take care of myself, Uncle Ty. I’ll be fine. Honest.”

“I saw that, but not for the next couple of days. You’ve been through a lot. You haven’t even started to deal with what just happened. You need to take it easy and regain your strength. Personally, I’d take you to the hospital …”

“I don’t need to go to the hospital.” She shrugged. “I suppose I
could
call Geoff.”

“Your Aussie boyfriend?”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” she said defiantly.

“Okay, your friend. Your boss. The one who’s called you a couple of times up in Templeton. The one you’re not supposed to be canoodling with.”

“Okay.” Dani finally gave in. “Yes. Him.”

“Call him then. But you can’t just stay with him. Wade might know.”

“No one knows … Besides, he lives in Glenwood Springs. That’s fifteen miles away.”

“Find some other place. Somewhere they can’t trace. Otherwise you can go visit your father in Chile.”

“Uncle Ty, don’t you think you’re taking this a bit too far …?”

“Just find a place, Dani. For once, just trust me, please.”

“Okay, okay … If I had a phone maybe I could. Mine’s still back in that asshole Robertson’s car. Shit, along with my wallet and my license and all my credit cards. And my river guide ID …”

Hauck sat across from her. “If I told you back in that tank that you could get out, but you’d have to leave your phone and credit cards behind, what would have been your answer?”

“I would have said, can’t I just take my river ID with me, please …? All right, I hear you. I’ll find a place.”

“Now.” Hauck tossed his phone over to her on the couch.

She glared at him. “I mean, just what is it you want me to say, Uncle Ty? ‘Someone tried to kill me and I’m too scared to stay at my own place right now’?”

“I don’t care what you say. Say you’ve missed him. Say you’ve been away three days and you need it bad. Tonight. Whatever you want to say. Just make the call.”

She rolled her eyes, pouting, but picked up his phone. She started punching in the number. Then she stopped. She looked up at Hauck, like a wave of new concern had come over her, her eyes reflecting something more serious. “What are we going to do about Wade?”

“I’ll handle Wade.”

“I don’t mean about
that.
I’m not scared of him. For God’s sake, the man was my stepfather. He practically raised me. I mean, I can’t just go on here as if nothing has happened.”

She was right. Wade complicated things. “You just call.”

She dialed the rafting company and Geoff did come on, and he seemed to be as happy to hear from her as Hauck had hoped he’d be, not to mention just as worried not to have heard anything from her these past few days. Apparently he’d left some messages that had gone unreturned.

All she told him was that something was going on and she really needed a place to be that night. It didn’t seem to take much convincing. He said he’d come by and pick her up when he closed things up around half past six.

“He said he has a friend’s house up in Snowmass. The guy’s out of town, okay. Happy?”

“You know, the same people who put you in that tank know the way up here,” Hauck said, putting it back in his pocket.

“Well, now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to jump in the shower. I don’t think I’ve ever felt slimier in my life.”

“That’s a good idea.”

Hauck stepped out on the back deck, which was bordered by two other ground-floor units. He sat in one of those mesh infinity chairs, reclining all the way back, and took a sip of a beer he found in the fridge.

There were two ways Alpha could go on this. They could figure he and Dani had gotten the message and wanted to get as far away from this mess as they could. Like any sane person likely would.

Or they could make sure they covered all their tracks. He and Dani still knew about Trey and how that tied in to Rooster’s balloon mishap. They could finger Robertson and McKay in what had happened today at the river. If he were them, Hauck decided, he’d want to make sure that there was no trace left to follow and no one to turn them in.

But they wouldn’t just follow them back up here. It was too soon. Too obvious. Fingers pointed at them.

Besides, they already had someone up here to do the work.

But he knew they’d come. No doubt about it. Eventually.

These sorts of things, these kinds of people, they always did.

His cell phone chimed. He took it out and checked who it was. The readout said Washington, D.C.

“Hey,” Hauck answered, shifting back in his chair.

“Hey back,” Naomi said. “So how did your day go?”

“Typical,” Hauck said back with a snort.

“Typical as in, just another day at the office? Or typical of someone who’s pushing back against a very powerful company and is probably getting in way over his head.”

“You decide. Right now I’m staring at a beautiful snowcapped peak.”

“Where are you?” Naomi asked.

“Back in the mountains. We left.”

“Well, that’s the best new I’ve heard all day. You finally came to your senses?”

“If that’s what you call having a bullet go right by your head and your goddaughter being drowned to within an inch of her life, yes, I did.”

“Oh my God! You’re both okay?”

“Yes. She’s all right, too. Just a bit shaken.”

“What are you trying to do, Ty, get her killed? Over fucking water rights …?”

“Yeah.” He rubbed his head. “She got sort of a crash course in that subject today. At least now you know what I meant by ‘typical.’”

“Ty, are you trying to just scare me or does this just come out naturally? I got in touch with an assistant AG at the Colorado attorney general’s office today. I’ve had some dealings with him in the past on some banking litigation the states are signing on to. I ran the whole water rights thing by him, how local supplies are being bought up or diverted for outside commercial means and he immediately went: ‘You mean energy companies?’”

“I get it. It’s not exactly secret out here.”

“He said that was mostly governed under local ordinances, so I asked, what if people were colluding to divert them unfairly. Like companies paying off politicians or town managers. Or diverting water that the community needed. As in a drought.”

“And …?”

“And he basically just laughed. He recommended I contact the state’s department of environmental affairs. Department of Violations and Policing, or some bureaucratic office like that. You can only imagine where that will get you.”

“Yeah.” Hauck grunted with frustration. “That’ll take two years.”

“He asked, just for argument’s sake, which company I was referring to, and I told him RMM.”

“That must have made him laugh even harder.”

“No, that made him go silent. For about a minute. Then he went into this speech that the energy trade is responsible for almost a third of the job growth in the state, and RMM a good portion of that. And that they’re tied in with half the politicians in the state and have built more in terms of infrastructure for the towns—new schools, parks, civic centers—than all the public money combined. He pretty much said in the current administration you’d have better luck taking on the NRA to cancel a gun show in Fort Collins than get an inquiry into RMM.”

“What about murder and bribery?” Hauck sighed sarcastically. “Aren’t those crimes?”

“I asked that. I had to be a little vague, Ty—I mean, I’m financial fraud, not Justice.”

“I understand.”

“But I said, just for argument’s sake, if, say, a capital felony had been committed, and it led back to an oil company in an attempt to cover up the improper granting of water rights, what would be the disposition of the state to look into that?”