SecondWorld (23 page)

“Your mother?”

“A wet blanket.”

“A wet blanket?”

“You know. Like when— Forget it. We need to go.”

“I think I understand,” she said, and took the shoes from him. She gave them a once-over, shrugged, and then tossed them over her shoulder. They hit the water with a splash and floated away.

“What?” she said when Miller just stared at her.

He pointed to the woods. “I don’t know how far we have to walk, do you?”

She shrugged. “You’re tough.”

Miller smiled. He wouldn’t admit it, but being free of those shoes was a relief. At first he thought they were a good reminder of what the enemy intended to do to the world. But their repeated attempts to kill him kept their lethality on the forefront of his mind. He said a silent thanks to Dave, wrapped the guns in his shirt, and headed for the woods.

The half-mile walk over a pine-needle-covered path actually felt good on his bare feet. The dirt parking lot filled with jagged rocks, not so much. But he quickly found a vehicle that would suit their needs.

The black pickup truck had a sticker of Calvin—from the
Calvin and Hobbes
comic strip—peeing, a set of rubber “truck nuts” hanging from the rear hitch, and a bumper sticker that said
YANKEES SUCK
. While none of these things made the truck desirable, they did ease Miller’s conscience about stealing it. And the toolbox in the bed made it possible.

“Hop in,” Miller said. He opened the driver’s side and placed the shirt-wrapped weapons on the seat. Then he headed for the back and opened the toolbox.

Adler looked around nervously like a true first-time thief. “What if someone shows up?”

“I’m a Navy SEAL, remember? And we have guns.” He paused. “Of course, if skinhead Nazis show up, be sure to let me know.” A moment later he found what he needed and joined Adler in the truck’s cab.

He placed a flathead screwdriver in the ignition and held it tight. “Give me a little room,” he said, raising a hammer. Adler leaned back and Miller gave the screwdriver two hard whacks. He gave the screwdriver a twist and the truck roared to life.

He hopped out of the truck and patted the driver’s seat. “Slide over. You’re driving.”

She complied, but asked, “What are you doing?”

“Research,” he said. “But first I need to castrate this truck.” Walking around the back, Miller kicked the oversized rubber testicles from the back of the truck and then got into the passenger’s seat. He closed the door. “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?”

“I’ll let you know when I figure that out. For now, let’s just get out of here before Bubba comes back.”

The truck rumbled out of the dirt parking lot and onto a narrow paved road. Miller took out the iPhone and flicked it on, but before he could get it to work, Adler hit the brakes.

“Shit,” she said.

Miller looked up and saw two police cars ahead. “Don’t slow down!”

Adler flinched. “You don’t want me to ram them?”

“No. Just don’t act nervous.”

“But they’re looking for
us.
”

“We don’t know that.”

When they were twenty feet from the squad cars, an officer stepped forward and raised his hand, motioning for them to slow down. The officer, who couldn’t be over twenty-five, approached the passenger’s side. Miller relaxed when he saw the officer’s dark black hair and Hispanic facial features. Racial profiling probably wasn’t the best idea—people could be bought—but he doubted there was a good reason for a small-town Hispanic police officer to be on the take. He rolled down the window and leaned out casually. “Something going on?”

“There was a shooting across the lake,” the officer said. “You folks didn’t see anything … weird? Or hear anything?”

“Heard the gunshots, I think,” Miller said. “Thought they were fireworks at the time.”

The officer gave a slight nod, and then leaned down. “How ’bout you, miss?”

“No. Nothing.”

Miller heard the same thing the officer did. “Nothsing.” Adler tried to mask her German accent, but failed miserably. At first, Miller wondered why she bothered, but when the officer stiffened and stepped back, he understood. Being white and German in a country on high alert for Nazis made Adler a potential enemy. Everyone was profiling.

“Could you step out of the car,” the officer said, hand moving to his hip.

“Don’t do that,” Miller said. “Please.”

Keeping his hand on his sidearm, the officer reached his free hand up to the radio strapped to his chest. Before he could speak, Miller pulled a Walther P38 out from under his shirt and pointed it at the officer, just feet from his face. The man froze.

“Toss the gun,” Miller said. “Now.”

The man slowly drew his weapon and tossed it into the woods behind him.

“What’s your name?” Miller asked.

“Miguel Lewis.”

“Officer Lewis,” Miller said. “Look—”

Before Miller could speak again, a loud voice shouted, “Everything okay, Lewis, or do you need a real cop to come do your job?”

A large white man leaned out of the second squad car. Jowls hung from his portly face. The officer took off his cap and stepped out of the car. Miller doubted the man could run fifty feet, and the walk to the truck winded him.

Miller pulled his hand with the gun back in the car, and gave Lewis a look that said, “Not a peep.” Lewis gave a nervous nod.

The heavyset officer bumbled up to the driver’s window. “Now what the hell is taking so long?” He stopped to look Adler over and grinned. Then he looked up and saw Miller’s face. The smile fell away and was replaced by recognition. And not the happy kind.

Miller couldn’t see the man’s hands, but he could tell he was fumbling for his gun. “Don’t,” Miller said.

“Barnes, don’t,” Lewis said. “He’s—”

Barnes was a surprisingly fast draw once he found his gun. He whipped it up and squeezed off a round. Miller was a little faster, firing three rounds in the same time, and much more accurately—two to the chest, one to the head. Barnes fell away, dead.

Miller spun, expecting to find Lewis taking action, but the man was nowhere in sight. A cough drew Miller’s attention down. Lewis lay on the ground, a wound in his chest. Miller flung open the door and knelt by the fallen man, lifting his head. He inspected the wound. There was nothing to do for the man. He was already dying.

Lewis tried to speak, but only managed a gurgle before he died.

Miller laid Lewis down and shook his head.
How many of these assholes are there?
he thought. Without another word, he stood, got back in the truck, and closed the door.

Adler rubbed her ears, which rang from the gunshots, and looked at the body of the fat, dead cop. “Should we take their guns?”

Miller rolled his head toward her and held up the German pistol. “This seems to work fine.”

“But—”

“Just drive,” Miller said. “Please.”

Adler steered the truck onto the intersecting street and drove away from the two fresh bodies.

As the woodsy air erased the smell of cordite from the truck’s cab, Miller leaned his head back. There was a lot to figure out, but they had a new problem to take care of first. His face was becoming a liability. And to a certain extent, Adler’s was, too. With every sleeper Nazi in the country taking potshots they might never make it out of New Hampshire, never mind find Milos “Wayne” Vesely, the mysterious last name on the hit list. “Stop at the first drugstore or grocery store you see,” he said. “It’s time to say good-bye to your pretty blond hair.”

33

Miller sat in the cab of the truck, elbow propped in the open window. He’d just eaten a cheeseburger and was waiting for Adler to complete her makeover in the fast-food restaurant’s bathroom. They had found a pharmacy in town where they bought supplies and changes of clothes. Now dressed in cargo shorts, a T-shirt, and a pair of cheap sandals, he looked like any other summertime local. He’d also shaved his facial hair into a goatee, trimmed his hair to a quarter inch, and donned a green John Deere cap. He completed the disguise with a pair of NASCAR sunglasses. Not even his mother would recognize him.

With his stomach full and the pain in his head dulled by drugs, Miller switched on the iPhone and connected to the Internet via Wendy’s free wireless connection. He opened Safari and then did a Google search for “Milos Vesely.”

The first return was a Wikipedia page about a Czech bobsledder. He opened it, scanned the contents, saw nothing of interest, and decided he’d found the wrong man. Heading back to Google, he scrolled through the rest of the top results. There were a slew of Facebook pages and message board entries, but still nothing that would make any of them a person of interest to Nazi assassins. Nothing he could see, anyway.

He went back and searched again, this time for “Milos ‘Wayne’ Vesely.” The first hit—a book—caught his attention.

“
Nazi Wunderwaffe and Secret Societies,
” Miller read. “By Wayne Vesely.”

This is more like it.

He clicked the link and was surprised when the complete text of the book opened in Google Books. The black cover held a hand-drawn sketch of a bell surrounded by what looked like electricity, or fire. The poor skill of the artist combined with low resolution made it hard to tell. He jumped to the end of the book and found an About the Author section. A black-and-white photo of Vesely showed him wearing a cowboy hat, aviator sunglasses, and a cocky grin. A paragraph of text below the image read:

Wayne Vesely is the author of three previous books,
The Nazi UFO Connection, The Zero-Point Reich,
and
The United States of the Fourth Reich
. When not preparing for what he calls the Fourth Dawn—also the title of his next book—Vesely can be found lecturing throughout Europe. When not traveling, Vesley resides in
Č
esk
ý
Krumlov, the Czech Republic.

The guy’s a conspiracy theory nutjob,
Miller thought.
But if they’re after him, he must have got something right.
And that meant he might have answers.

It took Miller just one minute to access the white pages for the Czech Republic, type in “Milos Vesely,” enter “
Č
esk
ý
Krumlov,” and get the man’s phone number. Being so easy to find, Miller thought for sure the man would be dead already, but when he dialed the number, a man answered on the second ring.
“Ahoj?”

“Ahh, hello,” Miller said. “Is this Milos Vesely?”

There was a silence on the other end for a moment, followed by a tentative, “You are American?”

Miller noticed that the man’s accent sounded like Chekov from
Star Trek
and said, “Yes.” For a moment he considered posing as a publisher interested in his books, but there wasn’t time to play games. Vesely might have answers and his life was certainly in danger. “Am I speaking to Wayne?”

The tone of the man’s voice changed again, this time to a hush. “How do you know that name?”

“It’s on your books.”

“But
Milos
is not.”

Miller looked at the book. He was right. The hit list revealed his full name.

“Listen closely, you now have thirty seconds to explain who you are and how you obtained my name,” Vesely said. “I’m counting.”

It took Miller ten of those seconds to decide on the one and only explanation he felt wouldn’t result in the man hanging up. “I found your name on a hit list I took off the body of a Nazi assassin.”

Miller waited for some kind of explosive reaction, but heard only silence. Then breathing. Vesely hadn’t hung up.

“And who, my American friend, are you?”

“Lincoln Miller. My name is two spots above yours on the list.”

“Miller? The Survivor?”

“Why is everyone calling me that?” Miller asked.

“It is the news,” Vesely said. “They have deemed you The Survivor. Capital T, capital S. It is a good code name, no?
Survivor.
You may call me
Cowboy
if you like.”

“Listen, Milos—”

“Cowboy.”

Miller sighed. “These guys are going to come for you.”

“I am ready for them.”

“Ready for them?”

“I am Cowboy. Gunslinger.”

The nickname “Wayne” suddenly made sense. The man fancied himself an honest-to-goodness cowboy. A UFO-hunting, conspiracy-junky cowboy.
Great,
Miller thought, wondering how difficult it would be to separate fact from fiction. Then he wondered aloud, “How did you know they’re after you?”

A red Mustang pulled up next to the truck. Its loud engine and pounding bass made Vesely’s next words hard to hear.

“I knew when I saw the red sky,” Vesely said. “I predicted it.”