Third Degree Part 23

As the sheriff glanced out at the ever-darkening clouds, Danny checked his phone for text messages.

There were none.

Carl Sims slowly worked his way back to the front of the s.h.i.+elds property, naturally moving from tree to tree, a.s.sessing the cover-and-concealment potential of each position. Snipers liked open s.p.a.ces about as much as deer and rabbits did; they would do almost anything to avoid them. Twelve minutes after he'd started, he returned to the stand of trees that half hid the trailer serving as the TRU's tactical command post.

He needed to take a leak. The most sheltered spot was a narrow s.p.a.ce between the trees and the rear of the trailer. He set his rifle b.u.t.t-first on the ground and leaned it against a pine, then unzipped his fly and began to urinate against the next tree. He'd developed this habit as a boy and refined it in Iraq. p.i.s.sing against a tree or a wall could be almost silent, if you did it right; this practice had probably saved his life once in Baghdad. He was half-finished when he heard voices on the air. He quickly zeroed in on the source as a small, screened window in the back of the trailer. After zipping up, he moved toward the opening and peered through it from an off angle.

Ray and Trace Breen sat hunched over a Formica table, smoking cigarettes and talking in low voices. A pack of Camels and a .40 caliber pistol lay between them on a topographic map of the area. The smoke was so thick in the trailer that a steady draft of it was being forced through the window beside Carl's face. He had to struggle not to cough.

"h.e.l.l, I wish he'd pop off a round in there," said Ray. "Something. s.h.i.+t, if he don't, we're liable to be here all night listening to the sheriff holler through a bullhorn."

Trace nodded and blew out a long stream of blue smoke. "Yep."

"I tell you what else worries me. Our sharpshooter."

Trace snickered at the word.

"You know what I'm talking about?" Ray said.

"d.a.m.n straight. That n.i.g.g.e.r might of killed a bunch of towel-heads over in Iraq, but I don't think he's got the stomach for shootin' Americans."

Ray was nodding. "You saw what happened at the bank. Sheriff told him to take the perp out, and what did he do?"

"Blowed the motherf.u.c.ker's hand off instead. What if he missed? A hand's a h.e.l.l of a lot smaller than a head."

"Moves a lot more, too," Ray observed. "That c.o.o.n can shoot, I'll give him that. But what he can't seem to do is follow orders. Which is strange in a marine."

"Awful strange."

Carl was tempted to shove the barrel of his Remington 700 through the window screen and scare the p.i.s.s out of both Breen brothers, but he didn't. He had been quiet before, but now he stood with the sniper's stillness, a motionless state he equated with absolute zero, that condition of coldness in which not even electrons spin around their respective nuclei. Carl could remain in that state for many hours, and had, more times than he could remember. His respiration and heartbeat slowed until it seemed an age between each, an age during which he had almost infinite leisure to pull his trigger without being disturbed by the movement of breath or blood.

"You want to know something?" Trace said. "Something you don't know?"

"If you ain't told me yet, maybe I don't need to know. 'Cause Lord knows you can't keep a secret."

"I kept this one."

Ray chuckled and took a drag on his cigarette. "How long you kep' it?"

"Twenty years."

Ray coughed up smoke. "If this has anything to do with my wife, I'm gonna kill your a.s.s. I'm telling you that right now."

Trace shook his head. "It's about that c.o.c.ky sumb.i.t.c.h up in the house. The doctor."

"s.h.i.+elds?"

"Yep."

"What do you know about him?"

Trace's eyes smoldered with secret knowledge. "Plenty. Remember when he kilt that boy in his parents' house? Jimmy Birdlow?"

"Course I do. We were just talking about it outside."

Trace nodded. "Well, I was there."

Ray sat up at the table. "What?"

"Sure was. This was back when I was gettin' high a lot. And Jimmy was always gettin' high. He wanted some Dex to stay awake, and we didn't have no money. We just happened to be over in that neighborhood, and the s.h.i.+eldses' house was the closest one that didn't have no lights on. Jimmy figured he'd just slip in and grab a TV, something he could trade for the pills. But the old man must have been awake, 'cause next thing I know, I'm staring in from the back patio at Jimmy and Mr. s.h.i.+elds screaming at each other. Jimmy was trying to explain, but the old man wouldn't give him a chance. He started yelling how he was going to call the police. And the next thing I know, Jimmy pulls out a gun."

Ray was staring at his younger brother with wide eyes. Carl blinked slowly, then leaned forward so as not to miss a word.

"Jimmy wouldna shot him," Trace a.s.serted. "He just didn't want the man to call the law."

"Why didn't he just run, then?" Ray asked.

"He tried to, but s.h.i.+elds's daddy tripped him up. Then he got between Jimmy and the door. Then the mama come in there, too, wearing her d.a.m.n housecoat."

"When did s.h.i.+elds show up?"

"h.e.l.l, I didn't even know he was there till he shot Jimmy in the back. Sumb.i.t.c.h didn't give Jimmy no warning or nothing."

Ray leaned back in his chair and silently regarded his brother.

"b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Trace muttered. "Blew Jimmy's heart out the front of his chest."

Ray shook his head. "You said Jimmy was holding a gun on his daddy."

"He wouldna shot him!"

"You think s.h.i.+elds knew that? Jimmy broke in their G.o.dd.a.m.n house! I'd of shot him, too. You're lucky he didn't shoot your a.s.s through the window."

Trace shook his head bitterly. "I tell you one thing, if I had a gun that night, I'd of killed that motherf.u.c.ker dead."

"Boy, if a bird had your brains, he'd fly backwards. I can't believe you didn't wind up in Parchman before your twenty-first birthday."

"I ain't stupid. And I'll tell you something else. I hope that sumb.i.t.c.h tries something up in that fancy house. I hope the sheriff sends us in there. 'Cause I will blow his s.h.i.+t away, no lie. For what he done to Jimmy."

"Jesus, Trace. You need to calm down."

"You said the same exact thing a minute ago!"

Ray sucked thoughtfully on his cigarette.

"I don't like him," Trace insisted. "People act like he's a d.a.m.n saint or something. You ever see him out at the baseball field? Sumb.i.t.c.h thinks the rules don't apply to him. Or his kid, neither."

"I forgot," said Ray. "s.h.i.+elds's team beat your boy's like a drum last spring, didn't they?"

"Cheated us, is what they done."

Ray stubbed out his cigarette and stood as best he could in the low-ceilinged trailer. "n.o.body's called on the radio. Let's get out there and see if we can't make something happen before Billy Ray gets here."

"d.a.m.n straight. What about that government man? Beagle."

"f.u.c.k him. Billy Ray ain't gonna give him the time of day."

Trace pushed himself up off the table, leaving his cigarette burning in the ashtray. "d.a.m.n straight."

Like a lizard clinging to the window screen, Carl watched the two deputies leave the trailer. He wasn't sure what, if anything, to do about what he'd heard. Sheriff Ellis wasn't going to change the makeup of the Tactical Response Unit in the middle of a crisis. And Trace Breen's presence at a shooting twenty years ago couldn't be corroborated by anyone; therefore, his motive for revenge could not be proved. As for the racist remarks about Carl, that was just the reality that underlay the veneer of courtesy he encountered every day. The president of the United States couldn't change that, much less the sheriff of Lusahatcha County. But Ray Breen was right about one thing: marine sniper Carl Sims did not intend to kill another living soul unless it was to save a life in clear and present danger.

He shouldered his Remington and walked soundlessly around the trailer to join his fellow deputies.

Chapter 16.

Danny just beat the storm clouds to Athens Point. He flew low over the city, angling along the hills, then cutting eastward once he'd pa.s.sed the old sawmill. His nerves were jangling, but at least he knew Laurel was alive.

Five minutes ago, Trace Breen had tried to patch Dr. s.h.i.+elds through to Sheriff Ellis on the radio. The connection had been poor, but Danny had heard Laurel's voice when the sheriff asked s.h.i.+elds for confirmation that she was all right. Laurel told Ellis that Beth was asleep, but she fell silent when he asked her about Dr. Auster. After s.h.i.+elds took back the phone, Ellis had informed him that he was flying next to the doctor's old flight instructor. s.h.i.+elds asked Danny how he was doing, and Danny said fine. The whole conversation had the feel of a family phone call, like talking to relatives on vacation in a foreign country. The connection died soon after that, and when Trace called s.h.i.+elds back, the doctor didn't answer.

"I want you to stay close to me when we land," Ellis said as they dropped toward the earth. "I'm thinking this chopper might make a good diversion if we have to go in hard."

Danny nodded, trying to swallow with a mouth devoid of saliva.

"That's the neighborhood, isn't it?" Ellis said, pointing down to some patches of open gra.s.s in the forest below.

"That's it. s.h.i.+elds's land is in a bend of Larrieu's Creek."

Danny picked out the serpentine creek and followed it eastward. Soon he saw the slate blue roof of the s.h.i.+elds house, nestled in a curve of trees that grew along the waterway.

"d.a.m.n," said Ellis. "There's at least fifty meters of open ground on all sides of that place."

"Except that back corner." Danny pointed through the winds.h.i.+eld. A broken line of trees marched up from the creek's ravine to the southwest corner of the house.

"That must be where the son got out," Ellis said.

They could see the cruisers gathered in front of the house, and a roadblock at the entrance of Lyonesse Drive. Someone had even put up a red flag as a wind indicator, Danny noticed, on a pole standing in the clear s.p.a.ce behind the department's camper trailer.

"There's the command post," said Ellis. "Set her down, Danny."

"Twenty seconds."

The sheriff unhooked his harness as Danny pulled back on the cyclic and flared in. Then Ellis opened the door and jumped to the ground like MacArthur going ash.o.r.e in the Philippines. "Remember, stay close!" he called over his shoulder.

Danny checked his phone for new messages. Finding none, he climbed out and secured the main rotor to the tail boom with the tie-down kit. There was liable to be some real wind before he flew out of this place again.

When he was satisfied, he walked over to the command post, where a small knot of men had gathered around the sheriff. Three of them wore dark business suits, and one seemed to be getting in the sheriff's face pretty good.

The aggressive stranger's hair was cropped short, and it had receded on both sides of his scalp, leaving a sharp V of aggression in the middle of his forehead. He looked about forty-five, but the flesh of his face was tight, with no sagging around the jaws. The kind of guy who woke up at 5 a.m. every day to run four miles. As soon as Danny was close enough to hear, he realized that the man in the suit was the agent Ray Breen had been complaining about: Paul Biegler.

"States' rights versus federal authority," the sheriff was saying. "Somehow, it always seems to come down to that with you people. I guess you want to refight the Civil War right here, Agent Biegler."

"Yankee sumb.i.t.c.h," someone muttered.

"I was born in Arkansas," Biegler snapped, cutting his eyes at Trace Breen.

"Well, I don't have time to debate const.i.tutional issues with you," Ellis said. "I've got a crisis to resolve."

"How?" asked Biegler. "You don't have any intelligence."

Ellis drew himself to his full height. "You people may think we're all dumb down here, but we-"

"Information!" Biegler snapped. "You don't have any information about your subject. Intel, Sheriff. Ring a bell?"

For a moment Ellis was speechless, so Biegler charged on. "I've spoken to Kyle Auster's office manager at the hospital. She's in critical condition. Third-degree burns over forty percent of her body. She told me that she and Auster were behind the fraud. They've been having an affair for years. s.h.i.+elds went along with some of it for the past few months, but that's all."

"If s.h.i.+elds is the good guy in all this," said the sheriff, "then why did he shoot Auster?"

"Maybe Auster provoked him."

"Or maybe this office manager's really been s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g Dr. s.h.i.+elds," suggested Ellis, "and she's trying to do whatever she can to protect him."

Biegler shook his head. "Vida Roberts has worked in medicine for twenty years, Sheriff. She knew she wasn't going to make it when she talked to me. That's a deathbed confession. Admissible in court."

Ellis's face was getting redder by the second. "So, what are you saying? We should just pack up and go home? Let these two fine fellows work things out on their own?"

"Of course not! I'm saying that if Auster's still alive, you've got two different subjects in there. Two different psychologies. And you don't know who's really controlling things."

"I think Auster's dead," Sheriff Ellis said with conviction. "I just talked to Dr. s.h.i.+elds. I heard his voice when he said Auster couldn't come to the phone."

"You'd better be sure."

Ellis gave the agent a patronizing smile. "Well, I sure thank you for your brilliant insights."

"Sheriff, listen-"

"Now, I'd appreciate it if you'd carry your a.s.s about four hundred yards that way." Ellis gestured back toward the highway with a sweep of his big forearm. "Down past my perimeter. I don't want to see you back up here unless you've got something that will give me a tactical advantage in this standoff. Are we clear?"

Biegler's eyes went flat as a shark's, and he spoke in a low voice. "I can federalize this scene, Sheriff. I will bring the FBI down here from Jackson."

"This thing's gonna be over with before you get anybody down here."

Biegler sighed. "If you think that, you don't know much about hostage situations."