Reapers (15 page)

But that would take her away from Tilly. And long ago, when the shit was still being slung fresh from the fan, she had promised to keep Tilly safe.

A new idea stood up in her head. One that required Kerry's absence. She sat near the pier and bided her time jotting notes on the conversations she'd had with those with criminal records. She was scribbling gibberish by the time a man walked out of the converted restaurant and called Kerry's name.

"Stay put," Kerry told her.

Her heart thundered. He walked down to the restaurant and met the man who'd called him over. Lucy scanned the barge but couldn't find her mark. As she watched, Zoe trudged up from belowdecks bearing a cask, her face red with strain.

"Hey Zoe," Lucy called.

The round-faced woman glanced her way and continued down the plank to the dock.

Lucy beckoned. "Set that thing down and have a rest."

Zoe got down to the pier and set down the cask and pulled off her gloves. "What do you want?"

She fiddled out a filtered cigarette and lit it. "I need to follow up on yesterday's conversation. Won't take but a minute."

"I got work to do."

"Your back will thank you for it." She exhaled and held out the cigarette. "Take it. I got more."

Zoe examined it, the smoke twisting up from the cherry, then accepted. "If Kerry comes over here, you better let him know this is your idea."

"Don't worry about it. How
is
your back, Zoe?"

"Tight as a frog's asshole."

Lucy nodded and took a deep breath through her nose, as if she were enjoying the brisk morning air. "I gather you aren't too happy with your work here."

"Keeps food on the table and wood in the stove."

"It would be a hell of a thing to run a place like this, wouldn't it? Stand around watching while people like you and me do all the heavy lifting." She chuckled.

Zoe sucked on the cigarette and coughed and looked at it as if considering stamping it out. Way down the dock, Kerry continued his conversation.

Zoe eyeballed her. "You sound like you're planning a takeover."

"This is just a routine employee satisfaction survey." At the restaurant, Kerry took a step away from the man and nodded his head. Lucy raised a brow at Zoe. "You been moonlighting?"

"Moonlighting?"

"Your old back can't take this work forever." Heavy footsteps approached from down the dock. "Was that your retirement plan? Sell Distro out to the up-and-comers?"

The woman gave her a skeptical look, dropped the cigarette, and toed it out. "I don't know what you're talking about."

She turned her back and picked up the cask, grunting. Kerry came to a stop behind Lucy. As Zoe walked the cask over to a wagon waiting by the front curb, Lucy smiled at the ground, then bugged her eyes.

"Ho-lee shit," she said. "You see that?"

Kerry cocked his head. She crouched and spread out her arms as if warding people away from the scene.

"Kerry, you see me talking to Zoe Goodwin? She was having a smoke?"

"I saw. She just left."

Lucy sat back, withdrawing her body from its protective crouch. "What do you make of that?"

Kerry leaned over the crushed butt. "Looks smoked."

"Tall as you are, I know it's tough to see through the clouds, but use your damn eyes, man."

He glanced at her, then edged closer. His face went blank. "Oh."

"As in, 'Oh shit, we got our traitor.'"

Kerry picked up the spent cigarette and examined the tiny gold crown stamped on the filter. He whistled up the dock. "Zoe! Zoe Goodwin!"

Down the way, Zoe got an aggrieved look on her face like someone had spit in her soup. Then she saw it was Kerry and she clenched up like she had to use the bathroom.

She set down the cask and walked up to Kerry. "Yes, sir?"

He held up his hand in the okay sign, cigarette pinched between his thumb and forefinger. "You dropped something."

She looked over her shoulder at the barge wallowing beside the dock. "We bringing in ethanol or something?"

"Playing dumb again?" Lucy said. "You already know exactly what's on board, don't you? And so do the Kono."

"With all due respect, what the fuck is going on here?"

Lucy nodded at the little yellow stub in Kerry's hand. "Last time you met with them, you left your spoor, Zoe."

Zoe worked her mouth, then turned on her, face going purple. "You gave that to me!"

"Like hell!" She popped open her bag, jumbling the contents in Zoe's face. "You see any filters in there?"

"Save it," Kerry said. He jabbed a thick finger at the rotunda atop the converted restaurant. "Upstairs."

The lot of them marched up to the top floor. Nerve turned from the window, gaze ticking between them. "What am I looking at?"

"The gal who sold you out," Lucy said.

"Bullshit!" Zoe lunged at her. Kerry grabbed Zoe from behind and locked his elbow around her throat. She grabbed his thick forearm with both hands.

"After the attack, me and Kerry went to where I saw the Kono planning." Lucy paced the fancy hardwood floor, hands folded behind her back. "Found a few cigarette butts. Hadn't been there more than a few days. Now I find out Zoe Goodwin smokes the same brand."

Crushed in Kerry's sleeper hold, Zoe made a choked noise. Nerve made a small gesture and Kerry relaxed enough for the woman to catch her wind.

"These are lies and poison," Zoe coughed. "I don't know what the hell her problem is, but she's playing you for a fool."

"Check her house," Lucy said.

Nerve tipped his head to the side. "What will I find there?"

"Thirty pieces of silver." She watched Zoe's face. "Or is it solar?"

Zoe gaped, eyes receding. "That has nothing to do with this!"

"Pretty sweet deal. No need to pay for heat or juice. You might even be able to sell the extra to the Feds."

"Nerve," the woman said, voice gone fluttery. "How long have I worked for you?"

"I think we're all rats at heart," Nerve said. "You seen a rat when it's hungry? They'll chew off your lips in your sleep."

He made another gesture to Kerry. Zoe was a well-built woman, hefty-hipped and bulky in the shoulders from hauling crates, but Kerry lifted her clear of the ground, elbow crooked around her throat. Zoe choked and whaled her heels against his knees and shins. He didn't flinch. She drew her head forward, but he pressed the side of his head against hers before she could bash him. When she reached to claw his face, he gnawed her knuckles.

Zoe shuddered, arms flapping, heels jerking, and went limp. Kerry breathed out and held tight as her face crossed from bright red to hurt purple. He hung onto her for what felt like forever, forearm bulging, elbow projecting like the figurehead of a galleon. Zoe's gummy eyes bulged dumbly, bright red with popped vessels.

He let go. Her tongue flopped from her teeth. She thumped the hardwood, arm flopping straight at Lucy.

"Day of surprises." Nerve extended his hand. "Welcome to Distro."

10

They searched the house twice, including the closets and bathtubs and basement, then opened the barn doors and swept flashlights through the dark corners while Dee stood in the fields with the dogs and called Quinn's name. Ellie trusted logic and numbers, not her gut, but her gut was telling her they could yell Quinn's name for a year and not get an answer.

Because he'd been taken.

George reached the same conclusion. "It was Mort Franklin. They kidnapped him."

"In the middle of the night?" Ellie said.

Wind blew dead leaves across the cut stalks of wheat. "Sure. They come prowling around, make a bit of noise to lure Quinn outside, then sock him on the head and drag him off. No doubt they got wind of the sheriff's plans. Decided to preempt us with a hostage."

"Or he could be hurt somewhere. Broke his ankle in the woods and can't get back. Fell in the lake."

George turned to her, face twisted with anguish. "How can you say a thing like that?"

Her cheeks went hot. "I'm not trying to upset you. Just identifying other possibilities. Which means we shouldn't ride in guns blazing."

"The Franklins took him. Mark my words."

"Could be. So first thing we do is confirm that—or rule it out." She motioned toward the treeline, where Dee called into the woods, a golden retriever snuffling through the brush. "I don't want to leave her alone. I'm going to see the sheriff and find someone to stay with Dee. Then we'll head to the Franklins'."

"What if they took him, Ellie?" George's face was pinched and his eyes were as bright as the lake under a July noon. "What if they hurt him?"

"They won't. Not if their goal is to use him as leverage." She put her hand on his shoulder. "Keep looking. I'll be back soon."

He smiled and sniffed and walked across the field, brittle wheat stalks crunching under his shoes. Ellie grabbed a bike and rode straight to Lake Placid. November had arrived and brought the cold with it. She knew it might not turn warm for a long time.

In town, she hit Main Street and prepared to swing north toward the sheriff's, but she spotted the wool-suited official speaking with a knot of people on the patio of what used to be Bozer's Grill. She squeaked to a stop and climbed off her bike and strode toward the sheriff.

"Quinn Tolbert's gone missing," she said. "George thinks it was the Franklins. If we don't act fast, he'll charge in by himself."

Hobson brushed his palms down the front of his suit and nodded to the four men and two women around him. "I was just gathering our deputies."

"Can you leave one at the Tolberts' with my daughter?"

"Wouldn't she best be overseen by George?"

"Sheriff, he thinks Mort Franklin has Quinn tied up in a dungeon. He's not going to sit on his rocking chair sipping lemonade while we go ask about his son."

"I would hope not, now that I think about it." Hobson stroked his mustache and considered his people. "Harold, you know Miss Colson? Could I impinge on you to stay with her daughter at the farm?"

Harold Dunston shrugged his bearish shoulders. "I dunno, sheriff. I might rather get my crown shot off at some fanatic's compound."

"What rustic wit," the sheriff said. "Miss Colson, as soon as you're ready, we're at your service."

Harold borrowed a bike and followed Ellie back to the lake, pedaling awkwardly, his heavy knees jutting to each side, bike squeaking rhythmically from the strain.

"Think there's gonna be a shootout?" he said.

"Considering the Franklins have already proven willing and able to open fire?" Ellie squinted against the eye-watering cold wind. "It's more likely than I'd prefer."

That satisfied Harold, who was one of those stolid farmer types who'd give the same nod of acknowledgment to anything that passed before his eyes, be it a casual acquaintance or a fire burning down his barn. Good man to leave with Dee. As they approached the farm, Dee and George's voices filtered from the woods. Ellie called them in.

"George tell you the plan?" she asked Dee.

Dee nodded and hugged her elbows in front of her body. "You won't get hurt, will you?"

"We'll have the law with us. A posse, too. Mort won't want to endanger his own family."

That seemed to console her, although Ellie didn't believe it herself. Fanatics
wanted
to be persecuted. To prove the rest of the world was as base and evil as their prophets claimed. Dee and Harold returned to the woods to search as Ellie and George departed for town. George had a rifle slung over his shoulder and a far-off look on his face.

"I think we should let the sheriff take the lead," Ellie said.

The highway whisked along beneath their bikes. "The sheriff is nothing but an empty suit."

"You were perfectly willing to defer to him when you thought Sam Chase was the villain."

"With a badge, even a fool can frighten a child. A true believer respects no law but God's."

Her rifle weighed on her shoulder. In Lake Placid, the sheriff was still on the patio of Bozer's, but he'd found another deputy to replace Harold. Sheriff Hobson approached and shook George's hand with both of his own.

"I respect your role as father," Hobson said. "At the Franklins', please respect my role as sheriff."

"What I respect most is results," George said.

Hobson frowned but said nothing. He turned to his deputies, who were mostly middle-aged and overweight, although in the way of farmers and tradesmen who have as much muscle under their skin as fat.

"For most of you, this will be your first time on the front lines of the law. I value you as volunteers but value your safety most of all. Don't draw weapons unless and until you intend to use them. With any luck, we shall effect a peaceful resolution."

They nodded their agreement. William Mooring had brought his horse-drawn wagon and most of the deputies rode in it, seated on the boards, rifles sticking up beside them. As they rode down the highway, Hobson asked George the usual questions about when he'd last seen Quinn and when the boy went missing, but drew nothing from George's answers.

The posse reached the path to the Franklins' by late morning. The deputies dismounted from the wagon, feet thudding into the gravel on the shoulder of the main road. The sheriff raised his eyebrows and led the way into the woods.

Ellie watched the trees. Songbirds trilled. Leaves crumpled underfoot. The posse was silent. And so, when they reached the clearing, was the compound on the edge of the pond. Halfway across the wild-grown grass, Hobson gestured the others to a stop, then continued toward the house.

"Mort Franklin!" the sheriff called. "My name is Sheriff Hobson. I serve the order of the lakes and surrounding lands. Step outside to speak with me, and I assure you as a gentlemen that words will be the only thing exchanged on this day."

Movement in the windows. Ellie's hand twitched. A crow cawed from the pines by the shore. The front door opened and Mort Franklin emerged into the overcast day. His hair grew like white kudzu. A shotgun dangled from the crook of his elbow.

"Quite a host you have gathered for this reckoning, sheriff. A distrustful man might think you aim to use it as a bludgeon."