Текст книги "The Call of the Mountain"

Автор книги: Sam Neumann

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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 16 страниц)

50

I went to work the day after I met Korman. It took everything inside me to make myself go. I forced myself through the drive, and when I parked, my body almost refused to go in. My sense of self-preservation was screaming to me, trying to take command of my will. But I had to go, to keep appearances until we had a plan in place. I sat at my desk for five hours and did very little work. Vince stopped by once, for which I was prepared, and asked again about declining numbers. I gave him my usual answer and he moved on.

As soon as was reasonable, I walked to my car to leave. Even then there was no relief, only more anxiety and anticipation. This was my new default state.

I texted Raphino and we met at Earl’s. He had been waiting to hear from me.

He sat at the same end of the bar he had the first night we met. The bar was similarly empty. He was in one piece, but pale and skittish. There was a cut on his right cheek neither of us addressed.

“Tell me something good,” he said before I sat down.

“I’ll try,” I said. I ordered two shots of Jameson and started talking.

51

Raphino’s initial reaction to the full narrative was the same as mine had been: disappointment. He realized, just as I had, we were still at square one, and there might not be a square two.

“I’m not sure what I expected,” he said between sighs, “but I guess I was just hoping.”

“Me too,” I said. “Something concrete, something we could use. We could go to a different precinct and report the corruption, get them to launch an investigation.”

“Yeah,” he said, “we could’ve done that before. Right now we have unsubstantiated evidence—they’d still have to prove everything. Nothing from Korman would be admissible. That would take a lot of time, and I’m not even sure they’ll all get locked up. If we come forward with this, we need to know these guys are gonna be put away.”

“Yes,” I said, “it would be a risk.”

We decided our best plan was to attack Ben Murray. Korman uncovered enough for us to start building a case, and for the police to investigate. They could offer us protection through the feds, which Raphino seemed to balk at but ultimately agreed it may be necessary. He had pride, in his community and in himself, and it deeply bothered him that the place he loved was being run by evil men. If he had his choice, he would have put a stop to it himself.

His concern was the Denver police might be corrupted as well. Not the full-blown, wild west way his force was, but he was wary of a mole or informant within the department.

“It wouldn’t surprise me,” he said. “These guys have gone a long time without getting caught, because they’re careful. Denver’s too close to not have someone inside that force, at least.”

I ordered two more shots. “So what are our options?”

“Let me think it over. I’m working tomorrow and have to go in—taking a day off would be a red flag for anyone watching.”

“Right.”

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow night and we’ll figure it out.”

“We need to do something soon, Mike,” I said. “I understand the methodical approach, but the longer this cloak and dagger operation goes on, the more chance we have of getting caught.”

“I know, I know,” he said, nodding. “Tomorrow we’ll have an answer. Just give me until then.”

“Fine. Think about Korman’s suggestion. Just go to Denver, simple and easy.”

He nodded. “It’s a risk, though. You’re being watched, and I’m pretty sure I am.”

“We’re going to have to take a risk somewhere.”

“Yeah. I know. But…Denver.”

“What?”

He took the shot in front of him, tipping his head back violently. “City boys, man. They don’t get us, never have.”

“It sounds like they’re our best bet, Mike. Chances are, ATF or FBI gets involved, anyway.”

He shook his head. “It’s just, mountain business is mountain business. Should be able to be handled up here. Shouldn’t need city boys swoopin’ in.”

“Well, if you have a suggestion on how to do that, I’m all ears,” I said, putting my coat on. “But I think we have to put egos aside here.”

“Right,” he said. “Talk to you tomorrow night.”

52

The next day was the twenty-third of January. I remember this. I don’t know which day either of my parents were born, nor most of my close friends. Twice during our marriage, I had to be reminded the date of Megan’s birthday. But I remember the twenty-third of January.

I remember the snowfall from the previous night, blanketing the rooftops in virgin white and covering the roads in brown slush. I remember how it stuck to the tree limbs, turning them to beautiful silhouettes. I remember how the sun shone on the snow, reflecting. I remember the temperature was warm enough to go without gloves on short walks. I remember making a fried egg sandwich in the morning—two eggs and a piece of leftover ham on white bread, the .45 loaded on the counter beside me.

I remember hearing a noise I thought was a knock, and the relief when I saw it was my neighbor tapping the snow off his shovel. He was young; I hadn’t seen him before.

I remember the anxiety of the day, the waiting. I remember wanting it to be night, to hear what Raphino came up with. I remember thinking we should leave then, that the middle of the day would be the best time to escape. That Korman’s suggestion was the right one. I remember wondering what Korman was working on, now that he had left. I wondered if he was thinking about us.

I remember needing to know. I remember needing more answers. The truth was addicting. And the need for truth is the reason I remember the twenty-third of January.

It was late afternoon when I contacted her. The winter sun had already ducked behind the mountains, casting a calm twilight on Otter Ridge. I sent a text message asking her to meet.

Your place? she responded. The prompt reply gave me relief.

No, I said. The Mitchum pass trailhead, from our hike last summer.

It’s closed. It’s winter.

Trust me, I said, and waited three minutes.

20 mins. Better be good.

I grabbed my coat.

I had grown so used to carrying the .45 in my waistband, I was hardly aware of it. When I reached the trailhead, the sun had set fully, and day had peacefully rolled into night. The temperature was crisp but still bearable. I walked to the trail and could see my breath.

She hadn’t arrived yet. Alone on a closed trail, covered in packed snow and surrounded by forest, I stopped and listened to the silence. The parking lot was out of sight from where I stood. I leaned on a wooden post marking the start of the trail. It hadn’t been used in months.

I scanned the surroundings and was satisfied with the level of isolation. I was alone.

“What is it?” she asked, appearing through the trees, the snow crunching under her designer boots. “You want to fuck out here?” Her top lip curled into a half smile, half snarl.

“Might be fun,” I said. I played along.

She stopped in front of me. “Seems overly complicated.”

“How are things on the mountaintop?”

“Fine,” she said. “Normal. You’re up there, you should know.”

“I’m not in the master suite.”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Not all it’s cracked up to be.”

I looked her in the eyes. Her dark blonde curls spilled gracefully out of a knit hat, like a model in a ski magazine.

“So what is this?” she asked, looking around. “Really. Some clandestine meeting in the woods? You think you’re living a Bond movie, Julian? You gonna kill me out here or something?”

I laughed. She did too.

“I get it,” she said. “We can’t be together, it isn’t right, blah blah blah. Fine. To be honest, I’m over it. But you didn’t have to drag me out to the woods in the middle of the damn winter.”

“Where’s the money going, Adeline?” I asked.

“Pardon?”

“Why is the business losing money?” I stared into her.

“It’s not,” she said. “You know it’s not. You do the finances. Profits are slowing, yeah…”

“For the first time ever,” I said.

She took a moment to reset. “Well, our distribution has leveled off. That’s about the extent of it, from what I know. We’re reaching as far as we can, already overextended as it is. You can’t force them to shoot up.”

My jaw was tense. “You’re full of shit.”

“How?”

“I see the books. I keep the books. I know what’s in them. We’re moving more product than we ever have. And it’s still growing.”

She scoffed. “Listen, if you drug me out here just to bitch about profits, I’m afraid I don’t have the time.” She turned to leave.

“You’re skimming off the top,” I said.

She stopped and turned back halfway. “Excuse me?”

“Someone is,” I said. “Numbers don’t add up. My guess is it’s you, Miss I’m-in-charge-here.”

“If you actually think I’d steal from my own business, you’re dumber than I thought.”

“It wouldn’t be stealing, really. Just taking a little off the top. Something for the effort. Make it worth your while, for everything you do. Why should Vince get all the glory?”

“We’re partners,” she said.

“You get paid like a partner?”

She looked at the ground.

“Look,” I said, “Adeline, I don’t really care. I get paid no matter what. I’m not going to go to Vince with this or anything. I just need to know.”

She looked back up. “Can I go now?”

“Sure. But you’ll be admitting I’m right.”

She approached me and smiled. The snarl was back, along with the swagger. “Just what in the hell are you trying to do? Are you trying to scare me?”

“No. Honestly, no. It’s just…there are things happening…”

“You think you could ever scare me?”

“It’s not like that.”

“It is like that.” She became taller. The momentum had shifted. “You’re a manipulator. You’re trying to get past me in the business. You have been for a while.”

“I can promise you that’s not true.”

“Oh, fuck off,” she said. “I know what’s going on. Vince has had a hard-on for you since you showed up. And you think you’re gonna be his successor.”

She stepped closer and stared into my face. She was less than a foot from me now. Our noses could have touched.

“That’s what you’ve wanted the whole time,” she continued. “That, and me.”

Adeline reached over and grabbed my belt. Her slender fingers sunk beneath my waistband and touched the gun.

She knew immediately.

I tried to jerk away but she already had it in her hands. Quickly, in one motion, she stepped back and pointed it at me with both hands. She held the gun high, level with her eyes. Her expression hardly changed. It was not an awkward fumbling but a slick pickpocket; she just lifted the gun right from my waistband. And now she was pointing it at me.

“Hands up,” she said. Her breathing was normal. Her face was relaxed. How in the hell did she take it from me so easily?

I put them up.

“Higher.”

I raised them higher.

She smiled and glanced at the gun. “I know this wasn’t issued by us. That’s a big no-no, you know.”

“Okay, just listen.”

“What exactly were you planning on doing with this shiny pistol?”

“Just…nothing. Let me explain.”

“Nah,” she said. “I think I’ll just tell Vince about this.”

My hands were numb. “Adeline, you can’t.”

“I think I’ll just tell him about all of this. And about us.”

“Please,” I said, dropping my hands. “Please, you can’t tell him.”

She shook her head. “So sad. Your days as the golden boy will soon be over. Hands up.”

“Listen,” I said. “Something’s going to happen. I can…I can help you.”

Adeline tilted her head back and laughed. She started backing up through the snow, the gun still pointed at me. “Goodnight, Julian.”

That was it; she was walking away. So I walked after her, because I had no choice.

“Ah ah ah,” she said. “You’re going to stay right there.”

I kept walking. “Shoot me,” I said. “Shoot me, you heinous bitch.”

On one level, it would have been a relief.

Her face changed. Only a little, but it changed. “Julian, stay there.”

“Shoot me, Adeline. Do it. Shoot me.”

“Stay there.”

“Shoot me.”

She tried to walk faster and said nothing.

“Shoot me, dammit.”

I caught up to her and made my move. I shot my hands out beneath hers and shoved the gun out of the way with a grunt. I forced it upward, both of us holding it now, pointing at the sky. The trigger pulled and the pistol shot once, a deafening, deep explosion that sounded like a cannon, sailing off into the night.

We wrestled for a moment; I wasn’t prepared for her strength. Our arms swayed the weapon from side to side, until she caught me with an elbow across the face. My vision flashed white and I fell down in the snow.

The gun was no longer in my hands. Face down, I waited to be shot from behind, for the darkness of death to take me. It did not. I rolled over and expected to see her there, standing over me. She was not. I pressed my hands down on the snow to get up, and my left hand touched the .45.

I could hear footsteps running through the snow. I sprinted toward the parking lot to follow, but when I got there, she was gone.

53

“Mike, it’s Julian. We gotta go, man. We gotta go.”

“What’s going on?”

“Ah shit,” I said. “Ah shit ah shit ah shit. I might have screwed up.”

I sped through the back roads that led away from Mitchum Trail, thirty miles an hour over the speed limit, going nowhere in particular. My headlights ricocheted off the pine trees that lined the road.

“I ran into one of the crew,” I said. “Adeline, Vince’s girl. Ben’s girl. Whatever. We got to talking and had an argument. She might know what’s going on. There was a gun involved.”

“Jesus,” Raphino said, “you shot her?”

“No, no. We’re both fine. But she just…she ran off and she might be telling Decierdo about it now. Murray. Fuck.”

“Is our cover blown?”

“I don’t know, probably. Yeah.”

“Shit,” he said.

“Yeah. Listen, we gotta go to Plan B.”

“There’s no Plan B. There’s hardly a Plan A.”

“Well, we need to figure one out. I’m driving right now; there isn’t time for me to get all the way to Eagle. Can you meet me between here and there?”

We met in the parking lot of a liquor store off the interstate. The store was closed, the lot empty and dark. I listened to the hum of the freeway as I stood outside my car and waited.

Raphino pulled up in an unmarked car ten minutes after I’d arrived. The door swung open and he looked around.

“Clear?” he asked.

I nodded.

“Okay,” he said, studying the surroundings and getting his bearings. “Do you think they’re coming after you now?”

“Probably not yet. If she actually ran to tell Murray, they’re probably discussing it right now.”

He lit a cigarette. “How much does she know?”

I spoke quickly. “Not that much, but I’m not sure it’ll matter. I asked her about the money disappearing—accused her, really—and she flipped. She doesn’t know about you or anything. But she’s going to tell him something, and they’re going to come after me. I’m sure of it.”

When I stopped, I was out of breath.

“She knows you know something.”

“Pretty much. And she’s to be taken seriously, Mike. She’ll do whatever she needs to get what she wants. There’s evil in that woman.”

Raphino took a drag and nodded.

“I screwed up by talking to her. I screwed up bad. That’s on me.”

“What happened with the gun?”

“We were just talking, and then she…touched me and took it. She just picked it straight from my waistband. Happened so fast. I was able to get it back from her, but she said she was gonna tell Murray, either about our affair or our conversation. Either way he’ll have me dead.”

“Were there shots fired?”

“One. When I grabbed it back we wrestled for a bit. One bullet into the air. No damage.”

He held the cigarette in one hand and rubbed his face with the other.

“Listen man,” I said, “I don’t know what we can do other than get out of here. Like, now.”

Raphino frowned.

“Anything else is too risky,” I said. “Let’s just hop on 70 west and go. Regroup when we get to Denver. I’ll leave my car and we’ll go in yours; they won’t even notice. There’s no tail on us now. You have Korman’s file, right?”

“Yes.” He thought about it. “Denver?”

“Yeah, Denver.”

“And then what?”

“And then? I don’t know—we’ll figure it out when we get there. At least it’ll be safer. Listen, my life’s in danger here. Maybe yours, too.”

He flicked the cigarette and thought. Arms folded, leaning on his car, thinking. “I don’t think that’s gonna work.”

“What? Why? They’ll have no idea.”

“We go to Denver. Maybe we’re safe. Then who’s gonna bust them?”

“We’ll figure that out. State police. Hell, we’ll get the feds involved. Right now I’m more worried about staying alive.” I was becoming increasingly anxious as time drug on. I expected someone to pop out from behind a tree and empty a clip.

He nodded. “See, I’m afraid that doesn’t work for me.”

“What?”

He looked around the night, motioning with his hands. “What does that do, if we leave? Makes us safe, maybe? What does that do for the mountains? What does that do for my home?”

“Jesus, Mike. We’ll get ‘em somehow, alright?”

“We cut and run when there’s trouble, we’re just like everyone. Just like the cops who want cash more than justice. The politicians who turn their backs on it. We leave and hope someone else cleans up the mess? No. That’s what created these problems in the first place. That’s a cowards way out.”

“Mike, we can’t take them on by ourselves.”

“It’s a cowards way,” he said, and turned to look at the highway.

I stood there, incredulous, as he pondered the passing cars. I looked over my shoulder and around the corners of the darkened liquor store. We were still alone.

“We take Decierdo,” Raphino said, his back still to me. “To hell with the rest of them.”

“Murray,” I said.

“We arrest him and head east. We lock him up in Denver. He can’t skate if he’s locked up.”

“You’re not worried about a mole anymore?”

Raphino turned back to face me. “It’s our only option. Bring him in and let them sort it out.”

“He’ll be barricaded up there,” I said. “He’ll be surrounded by his people, especially now.”

Raphino shrugged. “We only need him.”

We stood silent for a good minute, the night air biting my ears and fingers. A gentle breeze moved through the pines. He’d made up his mind.

“I’m no Rambo,” I said.

He was silent for a moment.

“Mountain business is mountain business,” he said. “I have a responsibility.” He put another cigarette between his lips and sparked a lighter. “This is my home. You got a home, Julian? You got a home.”

I exhaled. “Sort of. Give me one of those.”

He pulled a cigarette from the pack and handed it to me. “Sorta? Everyone’s got a home.”

I lit the cigarette with his lighter and inhaled. It tasted filthy, like licking a fireplace. The tobacco made a low crackle as I sucked in, burning orange in the black of night.

“Yeah but I left mine,” I said. “Made a new home. Then left that one too.”

We stood together, watching the freeway. The moon was behind a cloud, darkening the pavement underneath us. I took another drag.

“I’m not police,” I said. “What the hell am I supposed to do?”

“Citizens assist officers all the time,” he said. “It’s no big deal.”

I exhaled.

“You do what you want,” he said. “You can get in your car and head east right now, no hard feelings. If it ain’t your fight, it ain’t your fight. But I’m going up there.”

The wind picked up and I flicked my cigarette, still half unsmoked, and stomped it out. A fleeting tobacco buzz swirled in my brain, not helping the anxiety. I exhaled and watched my breath leave my lungs. There was a lull of cars on the highway. The night was quiet.

54

Raphino drove and I directed him. We had, I estimated, forty-five minutes until we were there. I hoped he was home. I hoped more he was not.

I didn’t even say “yes.” I just nodded my head finally and got in the car. The first five minutes were silent, then he began with instructions.

“Surprise will be important,” he said. “We can’t just bust in the front door.”

“No shit,” I said.

“We’ll park far enough away they won’t see us coming,” he said. “We’ll case the place, then find a weak point of entry.”

“Don’t we need a warrant for that?” I asked.

His head bobbed from side to side. “Technically. Don’t worry about that.”

My mind skipped back to Dartmouth, sitting in an angular wooden desk in a cold lecture hall. The hardest class I took was a pre-law course my junior year. I was completely out of place; wedged between the finance and econ courses I breezed through was this single class focusing on the fourth, fifth, and sixth amendments. I knew little about the constitution and even less about law, and I struggled mightily. How did I even end up there? I must have needed another political science credit.

The professor was a tall, thin woman with some sort of walking impediment. She was a monster. Socratic method, each student badgered on a daily basis, nowhere to hide. It was the only class I got nervous about attending. By the end of the semester, the student roster had been cut in half due to drops.

My fear of being exposed made me prepare for each class diligently, and as a result I retained the information well into my adult life. So I knew something about search and seizure, warrants, and what is admissible in court. And I knew going into a house to make a warrantless arrest was generally frowned upon. I tried to explain this to Raphino.

“You’re right,” he said, “when it comes to evidence being admissible in court. We’re not worried about gathering evidence. We just want Decierdo. Murray.”

“Can we arrest him in his home without a warrant?”

He was driving faster now. “When I put the cuffs on him and throw him in the back of the car, there’s not going to be a lawyer there to tell me I can’t. So yeah, I can arrest him. Technically correct or not, when they see what he’s done, he’ll be charged.”

“Okay,” I said. Pine trees rushed past the window. “I just think…maybe it would be better to do this by the letter of the law.”

“The letter of the law is how criminals get off,” he said. “We turn in the evidence we have, they spend six months building a case, and someone tips him off. By the time they’re ready to move on him, he’s buried somewhere in South America drinking margaritas. Long gone.”

I motioned where to turn. The car braked hard and started up the hill.

“How many rounds you got?” Raphino asked.

It hadn’t dawned on me until then that the box of hollow points was still tucked under my bed, in my apartment. I had only what was in the magazine; eight or twelve or something.

Raphino frowned. “Okay.”

“If we get to the point where I have to shoot, we’re screwed anyway,” I said.

I tried to think back to times in my life when I’d killed things. Bugs, spiders in the house, a few frogs one summer with those asshole neighbor kids. There had to be a mammal in there somewhere. Mice in mousetraps, of course. I handled that fine. Anything bigger than a mouse? I was fairly certain I’d taken a squirrel or bird at some point, but I couldn’t place it. The men in my family weren’t hunters.

The radio quietly hummed a country song. Raphino maneuvered the car up the winding mountain road, quickly and skillfully. In town and on the interstate, the street surfaces were cleared of snow and ice, but the farther away from civilization, the less they were maintained. Here there were patches of packed snow in some places. Raphino managed to miss the bad spots and whip us around corners. The speed felt unsafe for a mountain road, but the car remained in control. More than once it felt to me like we were headed off the road, before he jerked the wheel and set us straight. There was a reckless order to it.

We turned off on the long, narrow road to Ben Murray’s chateau. Raphino killed the headlights and slowed down. The car crawled now, guided by the dim light of the moon and stars reflecting off the snow. It was enough.

“Park it about a mile up,” I said. “That should be enough space.”

I wiped my palms on my jeans and felt for the pistol. It felt different now that it had been fired. Warm, alive. I held it differently, touched it differently.

The road was familiar. We saw no other cars, no other houses. I practiced breathing and tried to calm my mind. I closed my eyes and focused on something, anything in the blackness, and I saw Megan. Right there in front of me, for the first time in a long time. I saw her face, relaxed in a gentle smile, her black hair falling down to the sides. I saw her the way she was before all of it. It was good to see her.

I missed her the most right then. Good God, I missed her.

He stopped the car and killed the engine. We whispered for a minute, and I told him what I knew about the layout of the house. There was a basement door around the back; I’d never seen it, but knew it was there. Party guests used it to smoke cigarettes. If we could get in through that door, we could reach the stairs to take us to the main level, where—if he was in the house at all—Ben Murray would most likely be.

“Just pay attention to what I say,” Raphino said. “I’ll be using hand signals. Follow my instructions, we’ll be fine.”

We exited the car and carefully pressed the doors closed. I mirrored Raphino’s movements, tiptoeing just behind him on the edge of the road, where the snow was packed down and didn’t make noise under footsteps. He went into a half crouch and so did I. We skirted the road until the winter air began to freeze my fingers, and the outline of the house came into view. The windows were dark, the porch light was off. The driveway was empty.