Winterkill (30 page)

“I’m sorry about that,” Joe said earnestly.

Cobb shook his head, then nodded toward the window. “He tried to get the Sovereigns to shelter him, but they wouldn’t. I don’t blame them, but then I would have been rid of him.”

“That’s what they told me,” Joe said. But something didn’t fit. He thought of the porch steps he had come up when he approached the trailer that morning. They were completely untracked. How could Spud have told Cobb about what had happened? Joe had the impression that Spud had entered the church in secret. “Did Spud tell you that?”

Cobb shook his head.

“So you’re in contact with the Sovereigns. How? By telephone?”

Cobb sipped from a mug of coffee. He nodded toward a PC in a darkened corner of the trailer. The computer was on, a screen-saver undulating on its monitor. “E-mail,” Cobb said.

“With who? Wade Brockius?”

Cobb looked away. “Wade and I have corresponded for years. He’s a brilliant man and a good friend.”

“Are you the one who suggested they come to Twelve Sleep County?”

“Yes,” Cobb said. “I thought they would be safe here. Now I wish to God they had never come.”

Joe sighed. “You’re not the only one.”

Cobb handed Joe the telephone receiver and shuffled away in the direction of the computer to give Joe some privacy. Joe walked into the darkened kitchen, as far as the cord would allow him to go. He dialed the sheriff’s office.

“Portenson.”

“Joe Pickett. Can you tell me what’s going on?”

Portenson’s voice sounded tired. “All law-enforcement personnel in Twelve Sleep County are under orders to maintain radio silence.”

Joe had never heard of this happening before. “Why?”

Portenson hesitated. “The assault team left this morning in the Sno-Cats. Agent Munker was afraid the Sovereigns had scanners up there and that they would overhear the chatter and know they were coming.”

Joe felt his skin crawl. “They’ve already left?”

“They assembled at four this morning and rolled at five.”

Joe did a quick calculation. The Sno-Cats, he determined, would be at the Sovereign compound within the hour.

“Portenson, can you reach them?”

“I told you, their radios are off.”

Joe held the telephone away from his ear for a moment and looked at it. Then he jerked it back. “I’VE GOT SPUD CARGILL!” Joe shouted. “I arrested him at a church fifteen minutes ago. He’s NOT at that compound.”

“Oh, shit.”

“Oh, shit is right,” Joe said. “How can we reach them to call off the raid?
Think!
”

“Oh shit, oh shit,
oh shit,
” Portenson repeated, his sense of alarm coming through the receiver.

“Hold it,” Joe said suddenly. “Why aren’t you with them?”

“I couldn’t go.”

“What do you mean.”

“I mean I fucking couldn’t make myself go!” Portenson cried. “I quit! I think this whole operation is a cluster-fuck in the making, just like Ruby Ridge and Waco. I insisted that we wait for approval from the director before moving on the compound, but the director’s overseas and won’t be back till Monday. Munker and Melinda Strickland refused to wait even three days because they’re afraid the press will be here by then!”

Joe listened silently. Rage and desperation began to fill him again.

“Melinda Strickland, that nut, wouldn’t even compromise with me and go on Saturday, you know why?”

Joe said nothing.

“Because she said she doesn’t want to work on the weekend! Can you fucking believe it? She only kills people when she’s on the clock! You should have seen her this morning, it was unbelievable. She was sitting in the backseat of the Sno-Cat all bundled in blankets like she was going on a fucking sleigh ride. And she had that damned dog with her. She’s crazy, and so is Munker. I hate this operation. I hate this town.
I HATE THIS GODDAMNED SNOW!
”

Joe hung up on Portenson in mid-rant.

While he had raced down Timberline Road just a few hours before, the small convoy of Sno-Cats and snowmobiles had
been rumbling up the mountain on Bighorn Road toward the compound. He had not only missed Cargill coming down, he had missed the assault team going up. He slammed the counter with the heel of his hand and made the coffeemaker dance.

Joe opened the front door and stood on the porch. Nate saw him through the windshield and lowered his window.

“They’ve already left for the compound,” Joe said flatly.

If Nate registered any alarm, Joe couldn’t see it in his face.

“Nate, will you please check to see if Spud has his wallet? I’m going to need his identification to prove to Munker and Strickland that we’ve actually got him in custody.”

Nate nodded. “Are we going to try to head them off?”

“
I’m
going to try,” Joe said. “You have even less credibility with those folks than I do. I need you to take Cargill to the county building and make sure he gets booked into jail. Just ask for Tony Portenson. I just talked with him; he’s at the building.”

Suddenly, there was a flurry inside the cab of the truck as Spud Cargill tried to cold-cock Nate while he was talking to Joe. Joe saw Nate’s head jerk from a blow. But instead of panicking, Nate signaled to Joe that everything was okay and closed the window. Nate turned his attention to Spud Cargill.

Joe was amazed.

“
W
arden?”
It was B. J. Cobb from inside the trailer.

Joe turned, assuming Cobb was going to ask him to close the door.

“You need to come see this.” Cobb’s voice was deadly cold.

Joe stepped back in and walked with Cobb across the cluttered living room. Cobb sat down in front of his computer.

On the monitor, an e-mail program was fired up. In the “In-box” was a message from W. Brockius to B. J. Cobb.

The subject line of the e-mail was:

THEY’RE HERE.

The body of the message was short:

THEY’VE ESTABLISHED A PERIMETER. HELP US, MY LOVE.

Joe was just about to ask Cobb why the e-mail said “MY LOVE” when he heard a scream outside that set his teeth on edge.

J
oe
left the trailer and shut the door, looking for the source of the scream. Nate Romanowski was now outside the pickup, rubbing his bare hands with snow.

“What was that?” Joe asked.

Nate gestured toward Joe’s truck. Inside the cab, Spud Cargill was holding his hands to the sides of his head, his eyes white and wild, his mouth wide open. He looked like the painting by Edvard Munch. He screamed again.

“I got his wallet, but I didn’t think that would be enough,” Nate said. “Munker would just think you found his wallet in his house or workplace.”

Oh no . . . ,
Joe thought. “Nate . . .”

Romanowski held his palm out. “So I got you his ear.”

J
oe seethed as
he attached his shotgun to the back of the snowmobile with bungee cords in the parking lot of the church. He could not believe that the assault team had launched in the bad weather, and he was furious that he had wasted so many hours chasing Spud up the mountain, down the mountain, and back to where he’d started in the first place.

Nate Romanowski declared that he should go to the compound as well. “You might need me,” he said.

Still reeling from pocketing Spud’s severed ear, Joe snarled at Nate.

“You cut off his ear!”

“Hey, once you think about it you’ll agree with me that it was a good idea. Hell, you took the ear, didn’t you?” Nate said. “The little bastard deserved it. Think about everything he set in motion in this valley.”

Joe breathed deeply and collected himself. Nate was right, but the whole episode—his own behavior and Nate’s—still disturbed him. Joe pulled on his thick snowmobile suit and started zipping the sleeves and pant legs tight.

“Nate, I need you to take Spud to jail so we know where to find him. I can’t spare the time it would take to book him in.”

Nate began to protest, but Joe cut him off.

“Just sit Portenson down and tell him the whole story. Maybe he can figure out a way to intervene. Maybe he can contact his director, or talk some sense into Melinda Strickland or Munker.”

“I’m not sure you know what you’re dealing with here, Joe,” Nate said.

Joe had no response, but pulled his black helmet on.

“Don’t worry, Joe, I’ll take him to jail. And I’ll give Marybeth a call.”

“Good,” Joe said, turning the key in the ignition. “Thank you. You’ve been more than enough help already.”

Nate saluted, and grinned crookedly. Joe wondered whether or not Spud Cargill would make it to jail in one piece. Actually, he conceded to himself, he didn’t really care that much either way.

O
n
the snowmobile, Joe Pickett rocketed through Saddlestring and out the other side on unplowed streets with no traffic. Despite the protection of his helmet and Plexiglas shield, his face stung from the cold wind and the pinpricks of snow. The windscreen had been smashed by Spud Cargill. The crack in the snowmobile’s hood concerned him, but there didn’t seem to be any indication of engine damage. The tank was full, and Joe thought that would be enough gasoline to get him to the compound. In his parka pocket was Spud Cargill’s wallet and driver’s license, as well as his ear.

The Sno-Cats had groomed a packed and smooth trail up the mountain road, and Joe increased his speed. Dark trees flashed by on both sides. He shot a look at his speedometer: seventy miles per hour. Even in the summer, the speed limit for Bighorn Road in the forest was forty-five.

Help me save her,
he prayed.

L
ord,
he was tired.

The high, angry whine of the engine served as a soundtrack to his aching muscles, broken rib, and pounding head. He had not slept for twenty hours, and he rode right through spinning, improbable, multicolored hallucinations that wavered ahead of him in the dawn. More than once, he leaned into what he thought was a turn in the road only to realize, at
the last possible second, that the road went the other way.

Despite the icy wind in his face that made his eyes water and blurred his vision, Joe’s mind raced.

He thought about the words on Cobb’s computer screen:
THEY
’
VE ESTABLISHED A PERIMETER
.
HELP US
,
MY LOVE
. “My love”? Cobb had said he admired Brockius, but . . .

Joe shook it out of his mind. At this point he wasn’t sure that it mattered. Maybe later, once April was safe. There was no time now.

If he could somehow buy an hour back, he thought, he would pay anything.

Spud’s driver’s license should do it,
he thought. The ear definitely would, as unorthodox as it was. Even if Munker and Strickland didn’t back off, surely Sheriff Barnum would move to retreat or delay the assault, wouldn’t he? Not because he cared a whit about the Sovereigns, but because Barnum was politically sensitive and the next sheriff’s election was a year away. Barnum didn’t have as much invested in this thing as Strickland and Munker did. Barnum could come out looking good by putting his foot down, stopping the assault by pulling his deputies out of it. That was how Barnum operated, after all. He wanted to look good.
Robey!
Maybe Robey was up there, Joe hoped. Robey could shut things down in a hurry and threaten action against Melinda Strickland and Munker if they didn’t back off. Although Strickland didn’t care much about the law, she might listen if Robey convinced Barnum to pull his men out.

He hadn’t really thought through what Romanowski had told him about Melinda Strickland and Dick Munker, but he knew they spelled trouble. The thought of Melinda Strickland sitting, as Tony Portenson had described her, bundled in blankets and cuddling her dog as she ordered her minions to ascend the mountain, made him coldly angry.

Because he wasn’t paying attention, he almost missed a turn; he would have been launched over a bank into a deep slough. But he corrected himself at the last moment and leaned into the track of the road.

Think of something else,
he pleaded to himself.
Something better.

So he tried to imagine how he would feel coming back down this road in a little while with April bundled up in his lap. Under his helmet, he smiled. And he vowed to make that scenario real.

A
man on a snowmobile blocked the road that led to the compound, and Joe figured he’d probably heard him coming from miles away. The man wore a heavy black snowmobile suit and had an assault rifle clamped under his arm, and he waved his hand for Joe to stop. Joe slowed—his broken rib and the muscles in his back were screaming from riding so hard and so fast—and he unbent from his forward lean while the snowmobile wound down. Joe stopped a few feet in front of the man. Early-morning light filtered through the canopy of pine trees but was absorbed by the heavy snowfall, giving the morning a creamy gray cast.

“Turn it off,” the man ordered, nodding at Joe’s snowmobile, which sizzled and popped as it idled.

Joe ignored him and raised the shield on his helmet with a squeak that broke a film of ice from the hinges. Joe’s breath billowed in the cold from the exertion of the ride.

“Oh, it’s you,” the man said. “I recognize you from the meeting at the Forest Service.”

“Are they up there?” Joe asked anxiously.

The man nodded. Joe recognized him as Saddlestring police, but didn’t know his name.

“Anything happening yet?”

“I haven’t heard anything. No shots fired,” the officer said. “Our radios are off, so I don’t know if they’re negotiating or what.”

Joe exhaled deeply.
Thank God,
he thought,
I’m not too late.
“I’ve got an emergency message for Sheriff Barnum.”

“I can’t let you in,” the officer said.

“I said it was an emergency, deputy.” Joe’s voice took on a mean edge that he didn’t recognize. “No one has been able to reach him because all the radios are turned off.”

The officer hesitated. “I can’t exactly call ahead and ask about this.”

“No, you can’t,” Joe said. “Which is why I’m going.”

“Well . . .”

Joe flipped down his shield and roared around the officer and up the road. In his cracked rearview mirror, Joe saw the policeman throw up his hands and kick at the snow in frustration.

T
he
Sno-Cats were nose-to-tail on the road in front of the Sovereign compound, forming a glass-and-steel skirmish line, and snowmobiles were scattered at all angles behind them. Joe slowed and rose in his seat as he approached, trying to assess the situation as he squinted through watery eyes and snowfall so heavy that it obscured the scene like smoke.

As he approached the gathering of vehicles, he saw that the assault team all wore identical black snowmobile suits and black helmets, just like his own. Inside those suits were Highway Patrol troopers, Forest Service rangers, sheriff’s deputies, Saddlestring P.D., maybe even more FBI—but he couldn’t tell who was who. He wanted to start with local guys who might know and trust him, but he had no idea where to begin. Obscured by their suits and helmets, Joe thought, these men could be capable of anything.

Most of the men were huddled behind the steel wall of the Sno-Cats with their weapons pointed across the hoods of the vehicles toward the compound. Someone in a black snowmobile suit waved at him—he couldn’t tell who—and another stepped away from the line and blocked his path.

“Who in the hell are
you
?” the man asked, and reached over and flipped Joe’s shield up. Angrily, Joe leaned forward on the handlebars and reciprocated, and the man stepped back as if slapped. It was Deputy McLanahan. Joe could see his dumb, rodent eyes and the bruises on his face.

“Where is Barnum?”

“Why in the hell are you here?” McLanahan asked.

“I asked you a question, McLanahan.”

McLanahan squared his shoulders as if he were about to charge.

Joe instinctively reached back for his shotgun, which was still attached to the seat with bungee cords. McLanahan hesitated.

“Knock it off, deputy,” Joe said. “I need to talk to the sheriff NOW! Spud Cargill isn’t up here. I can prove it.”

Confusion overtook McLanahan’s tough-guy face.

“What?”

“He was at the church all along. The First Alpine Church. He tried to come up here but they wouldn’t let him in. I arrested him and he’s in your jail. Now, step aside.”

“Bullshit.”

“I can prove it,” Joe shouted, turning the handlebars so the front skis pointed right at McLanahan. Joe engaged the gears and raced the engine. McLanahan knew enough about snowmobiles to know that Joe was poised to run right over the top of him if he didn’t answer. “Now, where’s Barnum?”

McLanahan stepped aside and pointed. Joe should have noticed it earlier—a single Sno-Cat parked behind the skirmish line.
That would be the one holding the leaders, the one out of fire,
he thought. He revved his engine and covered the fifty yards in a flash.

Joe shut down his engine, leaped off, and ran around the Sno-Cat. Its exhaust burbled in the cold. Joe threw open the door and stuck his head inside, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust.

Sheriff Barnum sat in the front seat, behind the wheel. Elle Broxton-Howard sat next to him in her faux fur-lined parka. Melinda Strickland took up the entire backseat, just as Portenson had described, her cocker spaniel snuggled into the blankets with her. She held a small two-way radio in her gloved hand. All of them were shocked to see him.

“You scared me!” Strickland said. “I wasn’t expecting you, ya know?”

“Jesus, Pickett. What are you doing up here?” Barnum growled. “You’ve got no jurisdiction in an operation like this.”

“Is Robey here anywhere?” Joe asked.

“Nope,” Barnum said.

“Listen,” Joe said, trying to calm himself, wishing he could have started this with Robey present. He was out of breath, and shaky from the ride up the mountain. “Spud Cargill is in the county jail. I arrested him about an hour and a half ago.”

The three of them looked at each other in disbelief.

“We couldn’t call you to let you know because you were
running silent, for some stupid reason,” Joe said, looking from Barnum to Strickland to gauge their reaction to the news.

Then Joe realized: Where was Dick Munker?
Probably on the other end of Strickland’s radio,
he thought.

“You’re not pulling our chain, are you?” Barnum asked.

Joe fought an urge to smash Barnum in the mouth. He shook it off and briefly looked away, before turning his focus back to Barnum.
Someday,
Joe said to himself, drilling Barnum with his eyes,
you and I are going to go at it.

“No, he’s in jail,” Joe said. “Look. I can prove it.” While he dug into his pocket, he told them about finding Cargill at the church and running him down.

Pulling the worn black wallet out of his pocket, he flipped it open to Cargill’s Wyoming driver’s license. “I took this off him.”

Melinda Strickland reached for it and looked at the license with distaste. “I don’t know what to think,” she said. A hint of confusion that Joe welcomed clouded her features.

“Are you sure you didn’t find that in his truck or at his house?” Barnum asked, raising his eyebrows as if he had just come upon a clever discovery.

Again, Joe had to hold himself back. Nate had been right.

With his glove, Joe reached into his parka. Cargill’s ear felt like a thin, greasy slice of apple. He flipped it onto Barnum’s lap like a poker chip.

“Here’s his ear.”

“Oh, my God!”
Melinda Strickland cried.

“That is absolutely disgusting,” Broxton-Howard said, hiding her face in her hands.