14bis Plum Spooky (19 page)

TWENTY-ONE

I
HAD THE
twelve rockets rammed into the Buick’s trunk. Problem was, they didn’t entirely fit.

“Should I tie a red flag on one of them?” I asked Diesel. “I don’t want to get stopped by the police.”

“You need more than a red flag. You’ve got stolen rockets hanging out of the back of a Buick. We need to wrap them.”

Ten minutes later, I had the rockets wrapped in my only quilt.

“I’ve got an open line to Rangeman control room,” Diesel said. “And I’ve got another line open for you. I’ll be on the road, following you from a safe distance.”

Lula’s Firebird swung into my lot and parked next to the Buick.

“Is that the rockets all wrapped up in the quilt?” Lula asked. “That’s real pretty. No one would guess they’re rockets.”

That was true. Most people would guess dead body. Lula and I got into the Buick, and I drove out of my lot to Hamilton.

“I’m supposed to go to the corner of Broad and Third to get directions,” I told Lula.

“I know that block. The corner of Broad and Third is a 7-Eleven.”

I turned onto Broad, and two blocks later, I was at the 7-Eleven on Third. A man in a khaki uniform was waiting in the lot. I pulled up to him and identified myself. He looked in the Buick, then he gave me another envelope.

“I need one of them big pretzels and a drink,” Lula said. “You want anything?”

“No.”

“Just park over there by the post,” Lula said. “I’ll only be a minute.”

“I don’t think I fit in that spot.”

“Sure you do. Back up real slow.”

A ’53 Buick is a whale. There’s no real beginning and no end. It’s like parking a giant sub sandwich. I inched back and
crunch.

“Uh-oh,” Lula said, turning in her seat, looking out the rear window. “I think you dented one of Mr. Wulf’s rockets. Maybe you need to pull forward a little. Do you want me to go around and take a look?”

“No! I want you to get your pretzel so we can get on with it.”

I called Diesel and told him the next address. It was a motel on the outskirts of Bordentown.

“He’s taking you south,” Diesel said. “He’s going to bring you to the Barrens.”

“Okay” Lula said, back in the Buick with her drink and her pretzel. “I’m ready to go. You always need food like this on a road trip.”

“This isn’t a road trip,” I told her. “We’re ransoming Gail Scanlon from a scary maniac.”

“Yeah, but I need to keep my strength up in case we need to kick ass.”

Another uniformed man was waiting for me at the motel. He got into the back of the Buick and directed me to a light industrial park just off Interstate 295. I couldn’t call Diesel, but I knew I was a blip on Ranger’s screen, and I suspected Diesel was close. I wound through the industrial park to a ware house. A bay door rolled up, and I was told to drive in.

“I don’t think so,” Lula said to the guy in the backseat. “We don’t do none of this drive into a ware house shit. Someone wants to see us, they gonna have to come out.”

The uniform got on his phone and relayed the message. There was an entire conversation in Spanish. A man peeked out from the ware house, looked us over, and retreated. More Spanish. Finally, a shiny black van pulled out of the ware house and drove up next to us.

Four men got out of the black van, removed the rockets from the Buick, and loaded them into the van.

“This was easy,” Lula said to me. “We didn’t have to worry after all. We didn’t even have to go to all five locations. I might need to get another pretzel on the way home.”

I wasn’t that optimistic. I saw five uniformed guys with guns strapped to their sides. Two of them had assault rifles hanging on their shoulders.

“Now you will get out,” the one uniform said to me.

“No way” Lula said. “You got your rockets. We’re gonna go get more pretzels now.”

Everyone aimed a sidearm at me.

“Okay” Lula said. “We don’t need more pretzels, anyway.”

“You can stay with this car,” the uniform said to Lula. “This other one will go with us.”

Okay, I said to myself, so I go with these guys, they take me to the Pine Barrens, and Wulf gives me over to Martin Munch. How bad could it be? He probably isn’t operating at peak efficiency after that shot I gave him in the nuts. Maybe he’d be happy watching
Star Trek
reruns. Maybe he’s just lonely.

“It’s okay” I said to Lula. “I’ll be fine. Take the Buick back to my apartment.”

I was guided into the back of the van and sat between two of the armed men. No one spoke for the duration of the ride. There were no side windows. No windows in the rear doors. It was difficult to see the route through the windshield from where I sat. Once we were in the Barrens, it was all trees.

The ugly truth is that I’ve had my share of terrible moments since I’ve become a bounty hunter. I’ve managed to survive them, and while I wish none of them had ever happened, I have to admit there are things I’ve learned. I’ve learned that one of my best traits is that I’m resilient. And I’ve learned that fear is a normal reaction to danger. And I know for certain that panic is the enemy. So I sat in the truck and I tried to keep it together.

I felt the road change from smooth pavement to rutted dirt. Occasionally, I would hear the scrape of brush on the side of the van. I checked my watch. We’d been on the dirt road for ten minutes. The van took a right turn, and after a couple minutes, we entered a cleared area and stopped.

We all got out of the van, and I looked around. The clearing was small. Nothing that would attract attention from aerial surveillance. A crude, one-story, cinder-block building had been erected at the edge of the clearing. Maybe 1,500 square feet. The size of my apartment. It looked like new construction. Nothing fancy. Utilitarian windows and doors. Tin roof. Single metal pipe chimney sticking up out of the roof. The land around the building was raw. No grass, no flowers, no shrubs to soften the landscape. Gravel had been dumped and graded to make a drive court and walkway to the building.

“What is this?” I asked one of the uniforms.

“House,” he said.

Kind of grim for a house, I thought. The Easter Bunny’s trailer was more appealing than this.

A black SUV with dark tinted windows drove into the clearing and parked behind the van. Wulf and Munch got out and made their way over to me. Wulf was wearing Armani black, dressed more for Monaco than the Pine Barrens. Munch was wearing jeans with the cuffs turned up and a
Star Trek
shirt.

Munch was practically vibrating with excitement. Wulf, as always, showed no emotion. His face was as cool and smooth as alabaster, his eyes were obsidian.

“We will try this one more time,” Wulf said to me. “I’ve brought you here so you can be nice to Martin. If you kick him, bite him, spit on him, or break his nose, you will answer to me. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Take her into the house,” Wulf said to the uniform standing next to me. “Restrain her and leave two men to watch the house.” He turned to Munch. “We have everything we need to go forward.”

“We don’t have enough barium.”

“The barium is in transit. The progress of this operation is delayed by your sulking. You have an hour to satisfy yourself, and then I expect you to return to work.”

“I’ve only got an hour with her?”

“We need to put a rocket up to night. And you need to finish your calculations. When the rocket is successfully launched and we’ve retrieved the data, you may return to your toy. Ms. Plum will not be leaving us so long as you wish her to stay.”

Munch looked at me and grinned ear to ear. I was Christmas morning. Lucky me.

The interior of the house wasn’t much better than the exterior. The smell of fresh paint mingled with the smell of new carpet. The furniture was tasteful but bland. Marriott meets college dorm. There was a living room with a couch, two club chairs, a coffee table, and a tele vision. Two small bedrooms with queen-size beds. A bath and a half. An eat-in kitchen that opened to a family room that ordinarily would have had a tele vision and a comfortable couch, but in this house was set up as an office and lab. This was Munch’s house, I thought. Hastily finished when the ranch-style house burned down.

Munch, the En glish-speaking uniform, and three other uniforms with guns drawn led me to the kitchen. A uniform pulled a wooden kitchen chair to the middle of the room, sat me down, and secured my hands behind the chair back with cuffs. He cuffed my right ankle to a chair leg, my left ankle to another chair leg, and he took a step back and set the key on the kitchen counter.

“Is that okay?” he said to Munch.

“Yeah,” Munch said. “That’s great, except she’s got all her clothes on.”

The uniform opened a couple kitchen drawers, found a pair of scissors, and handed them to Munch.

“Have fun,” the uniform said.

The four henchmen left, locking the front door on their way out. There was the sound of two vehicles moving on the gravel surface, and then it was quiet. Just Munch and me left in the cement-block house.

“So,” I said to Munch, “see any good
Star Trek
reruns lately?”

“Yeah. All the time. I have the whole collection. All the seasons. And all the movies.”

“Wow, that’s amazing. Do you want to watch some?”

“Maybe later. I only have an hour to have fun with you.”

“What does fun involve?”

“You know . . . fun.”

“It looks like you work here. That’s a serious-looking computer.”

“It’s okay. Mostly, I work at the main facility.”

“Where is that located? Is it far away?”

“It’s through the woods. Everything is through the woods here.”

“Wulf said you were sending a rocket up to night. That’s pretty exciting. I wish I could see it.”

“It’s not that exciting. It’s just a small X-12 King. When we get the barium, we’ll fly the big bird, the BlueBec. It holds twenty-three hundred pounds of propellant, and it’s got a full payload. It’ll be the first real test. If it works, we’ll go global.”

“Global? What does that mean?”

“It means we’ll be able to control weather. Well, not entirely. I can’t do everything with the waves. At least, not yet.”

“What
can
you do?”

“I can make lightning. Not just a single strike, either. I can create the most terrifying storm you’ve ever imagined. And I can make it rain. Not a sustained rain, but a deluge. I can make the kind of rain that can do damage. Rain the earth can’t absorb fast enough.”

“Why would you want to do that?”

“I don’t know. Why do people want to paint pictures? Why do people want to design skyscrapers? It’s just what you do. It’s what’s in your head. I tried to get Brytlin to fund my research, but they thought I was a nut. All they wanted was a better magnetometer.”

“What about Eugene Scanlon?”

“Eugene was okay. He saw what I was doing with the new antennae grid design and the miniaturization. He’s the one who started all this in the Barrens. He had some land here, and since the Barrens are filled with nutcases, he figured we wouldn’t be bothered by anyone. The problem was, we didn’t have any money. All I could do was computer-generated stuff. We did a couple tests with the little rockets, but then we were broke.”

“That’s where Wulf comes in, right?”

“Yeah. He’s got money coming out of his ears. I don’t know where he gets it. It’s like he makes it in the basement or something.”

“Why did he kill Eugene Scanlon?”

“Eugene wanted Wulf’s money, but he didn’t want Wulf involved. Eugene wanted to be the boss. And then Eugene got all in a snit and said he wanted Wulf to buy him out. Eugene wanted fifty million dollars or he was going public with my research. So Wulf killed him. Wulf doesn’t mess around. He’s got four BlueBecs on pads for me. You know what they cost? About two million apiece. Not that it’s a big loss. He’ll get all that money back and more. Once I’m up to speed, I’ll be able to destroy every power grid in the country. They’ll pay us what ever we want.”

“You’d blackmail cities?”

“Yeah. How awesome is that?”

“If Wulf has so much money, why did you steal the transmitter?”

“It was going to take too long to order one. We have a generator that we’re using now, but it doesn’t give enough power. The radio station had a monster.”

“Where’s Gail Scanlon?”

“She’s at the main facility. She’s part of a side experiment I started. Turns out the human brain operates on low frequencies of electromagnetic energy. When you’re in active thought, it’s maybe at like fourteen cycles per second. When you’re sleeping, it’s more like four cycles. I can alter that with my machine. Only problem is, I needed to put the helmet on my test subjects so their brain waves would match the resonant frequencies I chose to generate. I can’t really control thoughts yet, but I can make monkeys fall asleep or get depressed or enraged. Human trials are my next phase.”

Seemed to me that monkeys spent a lot of time sleeping anyway. And as for depressed and enraged, I’d feel that way, too, if I was forced to wear a helmet while Munch conducted experiments on me.

TWENTY-TWO

M
UNCH PICKED THE
scissors up from the table. “I should start working on your clothes before my time is up.”

“These are the only clothes I have with me,” I said. “If you cut them up, I won’t have anything.”

“Yeah, but you won’t need anything. I figure you’ll just go naked all the time.”

“That feels sort of icky.”

“You’ll get used to it. You’ll be like my sex slave. Besides, once I perfect my mind-control device, I’ll be able to control your mood, if you know what I mean.”

“Wouldn’t you rather have a girlfriend?”

“Are you kidding?” Munch said, looking for a place to start with the scissors. “What man wouldn’t rather have a sex slave?”

“Lots of men.”

“They’re lying. Sex slave is the way to go. You could do anything you want to a sex slave.”

I was wearing jeans and Diesel’s sweatshirt. The sweatshirt was thick and didn’t have a front zipper. Munch started cutting at the bottom of the sweatshirt.

“Ow!” I said.

“What?”

“You stuck me.”

“I did not. Stop squirming.”

“What do you mean, you can do anything you want to a sex slave? You aren’t weird, are you?”

“I don’t know. I want to try stuff.”

“What kind of stuff?”

I really didn’t want to hear any of this, but he only had twenty minutes left. If I kept him talking, I could considerably delay the whole naked thing.

“Everything.”

“I don’t do everything,” I said.

“A sex slave does everything.”

“Not this one.”

“Jeez,” Munch said. “Give me a break. I went to a lot of trouble to get you here. The least you could do is cooperate.”

“I could cooperate better if you uncuffed me.”

“I don’t trust you. Last time, you kicked me in the nuts.”

“I wouldn’t do that this time.”

“Wulf would be mad at me. He told me not to do that.”

“How are you going to do
everything
if I’m attached to this chair? A lot of my best parts are inaccessible.”

“Wulf already thought of that. He said I should have fun with you like this, and then when I want to do something different, like some of the
everything
stuff, I should get the two men outside to help me.”

I felt all the blood drain from my head, and I broke out in a cold sweat.

“That would be rape,” I said.

“You could think of it like it’s a science experiment,” Munch said. “And like those two guys are lab techs.”

“If you unlocked the restraints around my ankles, you could pull my pants off,” I said to him. “It would be okay because my hands would still be cuffed behind my back on this chair.”

Munch thought about it. “I’d like to pull your pants off,” he said. “It’s going to be hard to cut through the denim with these scissors.”

“I’m wearing a thong,” I told him.

“Okay,” he said. “But you have to promise not to kick me.”

“I promise.”

Munch unlocked the ankle cuffs and returned the key to the counter. He reached for the snap on my jeans, and I kicked him in the nuts. He went to his knees, his eyes bulged out of his head, and he crashed onto his face.

“If you so much as squeak, I’ll kick you again,” I said.

I stood and worked my arms up the chair back. Once I was free of the chair, I took the key off the counter and unlocked the cuffs. Munch was curled into a fetal position, the sweat soaking through his
Star Trek
shirt, his breathing labored.

I needed a place to stash him. The bathroom was no good. I couldn’t lock the door from the outside. Broom closet? Wouldn’t fit. Coat closet? No lock. Cellar door? Yes! The cellar would be perfect. I grabbed the back of his shirt, dragged him moaning to the cellar door, and shoved him down the stairs.
Bump, bump, bump, bump.
I locked the cellar door and crept around the house looking out windows. The two uniforms were in front of the house, laughing and talking, sitting on leftover cement blocks.

I tiptoed out the back door off the kitchen and quietly disappeared into the woods. My heart was pounding so loud I was afraid the guards might hear it in the front of the house. I had no idea where I was going. The Pine Barrens were huge, and if I walked in the wrong direction, I could walk for days and never see a road or a human being or hut. Problem was, I didn’t know the right direction from the wrong direction. I would walk a little and then stop and listen. Sooner or later, Wulf would discover Munch in the cellar, and he’d set out to find me. I walked for an hour and came to an ATV path that turned into a dirt road. I followed the dirt road, and in twenty minutes, I was on a two-lane paved road.

I looked at my cell phone. Still no reception. It was five-thirty p.m. and twilight. I saw a pickup truck in the distance, heading in my direction. I could hear the broken muffler a mile away. The truck was a wreck. Not something I could see Wulf owning. I stepped into the road and flagged the truck down.

“I need a ride,” I told the driver. “My car broke down on the dirt road. I need to make a phone call.”

“There’s a gas station and con ve nience store at the crossroads,” he said. “I could take you there. There’s a phone inside the con ve nience store you could use.”

I climbed into the truck. “That would be great. I really appreciate it. I’m Stephanie.”

“Elmer.”

He was in his late sixties. His hair was gray and thinning on top. He was wearing a plaid shirt, a navy quilted vest, and khakis. There was a thick layer of dust inside and outside the truck. The floor was littered with fast-food wrappers, and the upholstery reeked of smoke. Not that I was going to judge. I was happy to have a ride.

“What road are we on?” I asked him.

“This is Banger Road. The gas station’s at the corner of Banger and Marbury. I guess you’re not from around here.”

“I’m from Trenton. I was visiting a friend, and I got lost.”

“Easy to get lost here. The gas station is just up ahead.”

He reached the corner of Banger and Marbury, and the gas station and con ve nience store were closed.

“This here’s run by Booger Jackson. I guess Booger had something better to do than keep things open to night,” he said. “That’s the way it is in this neck of the woods.”

I looked at my phone. Still no reception.

“I’ll give you fifty dollars if you’ll drive me to Trenton,” I said.

“Fifty dollars. That’s a lot of money.”

I wasn’t convinced his truck could make it all the way to Trenton, but I’d go as far as he could take me. If I had to flag down another driver in Cherry Hill, it was better than staying here.

“Okay” he said. “I guess you must be in a bind to get home.”

He took Route 206, and I didn’t object. I didn’t think the truck was Turnpike material. Twenty minutes later, I had cell ser vice, and I called Diesel.

“I’m on my way home,” I told him.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. I’m surprised you’re not combing the woods, looking for me.”

“I was in the air with Boon all afternoon. He just brought me back to Trenton. Ranger has twenty men on the ground. You need to call him.”

“I have a favor to ask. I have no clean clothes. Could you take the laundry basket to my mother’s house and ask her to throw everything in the washer?”

“I’m on it.”

I dialed Ranger.

“I’m okay,” I said.

“Where are you?”

“I’m on my way home.”

Lula was next on my list, and then my mother.

“I’m sending Diesel over with laundry,” I told my mother. “I’d really appreciate it if you’d throw it all in the washer.”

“Where are you? I tried to call. I made lasagna. It’s still warm.”

“Give some to Diesel when he gets there, and I’ll be there in about a half hour.”

“Was that your mom?” Elmer asked.

“Yes. She’s going to hold dinner for me. You can take me to her house in Chambersburg.”

“I haven’t been to Trenton in about twenty years. You’ll have to give me directions.”

I
T WAS DARK
when Elmer finally chugged to the curb and parked behind the Subaru at my parents’ house.

I wrenched my door open and jumped from the pickup. “I’ll be right back with your money” I said.

“I’ll be here.”

A black Porsche Turbo slid to a stop behind the truck, and Ranger got out. He closed the distance between us, pulled me to him, and held me tight.

“Are you really okay?” he asked.

“Yeah. It was scary, but I got away before anything bad happened.”

His voice softened and dropped to a whisper against my ear. “I had to see for myself.”

I allowed myself a moment to relax into Ranger. He was warm and strong, and all the bad, frightening things in life went away when he held me like this.

“How did you know I was here?”

“I have the Subaru tagged.”

I could feel Ranger smile. He saw the humor in his obsession to keep me on his radar screen.

“Does Diesel know?”

“Hard to tell what Diesel knows.” Ranger pulled back a little and looked at me. “Diesel has superbad enemies, and the people he chases aren’t normal. You need to be careful if you partner with Diesel.”

“He popped into my apartment, and I can’t get rid of him.”

“You could move into Rangeman until he leaves.”

“That’s going from the frying pan into the fire.”

The smile was back. “In some ways.”

“Anyway, he feels like a brother.”

“I’m sure he would love that description,” Ranger said.

Grandma Mazur opened the front door and looked out. “Stephanie? Is that Ranger with you? Is that your truck?”

“I have to go,” Ranger said. “Try to stay out of trouble.” He kissed me on the forehead, jogged back to his car, and took off.

Grandma came to see what was going on with the truck. “Who’s this?” she said, looking inside at Elmer.

“This is Elmer,” I said. “He was nice enough to bring me home when I got stranded in the Barrens.”

“He’s a cutie,” Grandma said. “He don’t look too old, either.”

“I got most of my original teeth,” Elmer said.

“We got a lot of lasagna,” Grandma said to him. “We kept it warm for Stephanie. You’re welcome to come have some lasagna with us.”

“That would be real nice,” Elmer said. “I’m starving.”

I looked back at the house and saw Diesel standing in the doorway, waiting for me.

“I had to buy more Pepto-Bismol,” he said when I reached him. “You’re giving me an ulcer.”

“I have a lot to tell you.”

“What’s with the sweatshirt? It looks like someone took a scissor to the bottom of it.”

“Munch was trying to get it off me, but it didn’t work out.”

Diesel grinned. “You kicked him in the nuts again, didn’t you?”

“It’s my signature move.”

He looked beyond me. “Who’s the guy with Grandma?”

“Elmer. I flagged him down after I escaped, and I bribed him to drive me home.”

“Elmer? And he’s from the Barrens?”

“Yeah.”

“Honey, you didn’t bring Elmer the Fire Farter home with you, did you?”

I glanced back at Elmer. “He didn’t say he was the fire farter.”

Diesel hooked an arm around my neck and hugged me to him. “This is why I love you.”

“Everyone sit down,” my mother said, setting the tray of lasagna in the middle of the dining room table. “Frank,” she yelled to my father, “come to the table.”

“I already ate,” my father said.

“You can eat again. Stephanie is here with guests.”

My father heaved himself out of his chair. “The big one isn’t a guest. I don’t know what he is.”

“He’s like a member of the family,” Grandma said.

My father looked down the table at Diesel. “Heaven help us,” he said.

Grandma poured Elmer a glass of wine and gave him a slab of lasagna. “We got red sauce for the lasagna, too,” she said, passing the gravy boat to Elmer.

“This looks good,” Elmer said, digging in. “I can’t remember the last time I had a meal like this.”

Diesel ate some lasagna and leaned close to me. “This is filled with cheese and hot sausage. I hope Elmer isn’t lactose intolerant. He’ll burn his truck down on the way home.”

At the other end of the table, Elmer was shoveling the food in.

“He doesn’t look lactose intolerant,” I said. “He’s putting extra grated cheese on his lasagna.”

My father was swiveled around in his seat, trying to see the tele vision. He was missing a
Seinfeld
rerun.

“It was real nice of you to bring Stephanie home,” Grandma said to Elmer. “Do you live in the Pine Barrens?”

“Yep,” Elmer said. “It’s the best place on earth. It’s filled with interesting people, and you don’t hardly ever see any of them.”

“I go to Atlantic City once in a while,” Grandma said, “but the bus don’t stop in the Pine Barrens.”

“Too bad,” Elmer said. “We got some good things there. Antique stores and such.”

Grandma gave him a second helping of lasagna. “Do you have a job?”

“No. I’m retired. It’s hard for me to keep a job on account of I have an affliction.”

“What kind of affliction?” Grandma wanted to know.

“I can’t talk about it,” Elmer said. “It’s unmentionable.”

Diesel and I exchanged looks.

“Oh boy,” I said.

“Are we done yet?” my father asked.

“We haven’t even had dessert,” Grandma said. “Hold your shirt on.”

Elmer scraped his chair back. “I might have to use your restroom.”

“It’s at the top of the stairs,” Grandma told him. “I’ll get the coffee started.”

Elmer climbed the stairs, and moments later . . .
BAROOOOM!

“What was that?” my mother asked. “It sounded like an explosion.”

Diesel pressed his lips together, and his face turned red.

“I appreciate the effort you’re making not to laugh,” I said to him, “but you’re going to burst all the blood vessels in your head if you keep holding it in.”

“I can’t believe you brought the fire farter home,” he said. “Couldn’t you have gotten a ride from the Easter Bunny or Sasquatch?”

“You should have been taking better care of me. It’s all your fault. I got kidnapped by
your
cousin. I’m lucky Martin Munch doesn’t have me pinned to a board like a frog in biology class.”