Back of Beyond (43 page)

“It’s Gracie.”

“Gutsy as hell, Gracie.”

She nodded and he liked that she knew she’d been tough.

Gracie nodded toward Mina’s body. “She’s just so …
dead.
”

“That’s how it goes,” he said. Then to the others, “You can all come out now.” He almost said,
Even you, Ted, you stupid moronic son of a bitch who just about got your daughter killed.
But he didn’t.

*   *   *

Cody looked up to see two figures
coming out of the woods. One of them had a flashlight.

“Justin?”

“It’s me.”

His son shined his flashlight beam up so his face was illuminated. Although the shadows should have looked monsterlike, Cody saw a huge smile and an expression he could only think of as awed.

And for the first time in at least ten years, Justin walked straight up to him and threw his arms around him. Justin said, “My God, Dad. I just knew you’d come. As soon as things went bad, I knew you’d be here.”

Cody said, “You
did
?”

“I had faith in you,” Justin said.

Stunned, Cody said, “Hell, I didn’t.”

“I did,” Justin said, squeezing harder. “I can’t believe you. I just can’t frigging believe you.”

Cody grunted but hugged him back for a moment.

*   *   *

Gracie ran to her dad, Danielle
behind her. He was crying with joy, tears on his face. She helped him walk up over the lip of rock, and wrapped her arms around his waist.

“Careful,” he said, sobbing, “I think I broke my tailbone.”

“Jeez, Dad,” Danielle said, and Gracie could almost feel her sister rolling her eyes in the dark.

*   *   *

Cody said to Justin, “Can you
build a fire?”

Justin stepped away. His face was still lit with wonder, and he shook his head as if trying to wrap his mind around what had just happened. Cody felt the same way as his adrenaline crash started to take hold. He noticed his hands were trembling.

“Yeah, I can make a fire. We’ve had a lot of practice the last couple of days.”

Cody nodded. “Then please gather some wood. Maybe you can get your girlfriend to help you.”

“Her name’s Danielle,” Justin said. “I don’t know if she’s my girlfriend.”

“Can she help gather wood?”

“I guess.”

“Good enough,” Cody said. “I’m going to make a couple of calls and get us out of here.”

*   *   *

An hour later, Cody peered
down the crevice. The beam of his Maglite wouldn’t reach the bottom where Jed’s body had ended up. He could see bits of clothing and blood on the walls where Jed’s body had pinballed his way down.

From what he could discern, Jed had been telling the truth. The fuselage of the airplane had been ripped open by the trees and peeled back like the lid of a soup can. One wing had come off and likely fallen to the bottom and the other was mangled and parallel to the crack in the opening.

Two partially clothed skeletons hung from the cockpit by seat restraints. Inside the plane, Cody could see mounds of shredded money as well as a few skittering field mice. It was possible, he thought, there could be some intact bundles of cash buried deep or even down on the floor of the crevice. That would be for the investigators to determine.

He heard a bass thumping in the night sky and turned around. Justin and Danielle had built a massive bonfire that crackled and lit up the rock walls and the trees and threw off so much light the stars had retreated into urban mode. Ted Sullivan lay across two downed logs, suspending his injured tailbone.

Cody said, “Helicopters coming.”

In the distance he could see approaching lights in the sky. Two sets of them. He hoped the pilot of one of them would see the fire from Camp Two and swoop down for the others, as he’d instructed the dispatcher.

He hadn’t noticed Gracie approach him until he looked down. She was a slip of a girl.

“I want to thank you,” she said.

He nodded.

“Justin’s really proud.”

“That means a lot. Your dad should be proud of
you.
”

“Yeah.” She shrugged.

“Don’t be too hard on him,” Cody said. “He came up here even though he couldn’t ride. He obviously cares about you and your sister.”

Gracie nodded, looking over at her father on the downed trees. “He does, in his way,” she said. “I feel bad that Danielle and I thought he’d run. Rachel pretty much convinced us. You see, he told us why he showed up late at the airport to get us. It turns out he was late because he was booking a weekend at a spa for us in Billings when we were done with this trip. He’d arrived the day before to meet Rachel and he wanted us to feel all girly again when we went back home. And the reason he wasn’t in the camp was because he was feeling sick and resting in his tent. He had no idea Rachel told us that story.”

Cody had nothing to say.

“Rachel had me completely fooled,” Gracie said.

“She fooled a lot of people.”

“Even though she’s dead and I wanted her to be, I feel kind of bad. Jed, too.”

Cody squeezed her on the shoulder. “You should feel that way,” he said. “It’s the difference between you and them.”

She nodded, not sure.

“I hope you don’t mind if I smoke,” he said, digging the last of D’Amato’s cigarettes out of his breast pocket.

She looked up, said, “Justin said you’d quit.”

“Nope,” he said, lighting and inhaling as deeply as he could without falling back into the crevice.

Three days later, Cody Hoyt
slumped in the uncomfortable chair across from Sheriff Tub Tubman’s desk, but Tubman wasn’t there yet. Undersheriff Cliff Bodean perched as he usually did on the corner of Tubman’s desk, looking down at him. Cody had brought a small briefcase with him filled with statements and his files and another object and had placed it near his feet.

“He said be here at eleven to discuss my situation,” Cody said. “So I’m here.”

“I don’t know where he is,” Bodean said, shooting a cuff to look at his watch. He gestured toward the credenza in back of the sheriff’s chair. “His hat is here.”

“Goddamn it,” Cody said, standing with difficulty and walking around the desk to turn the hat crown-down, “the man doesn’t
listen.
”

Cody sat back down in the chair and moaned. It seemed like every inch of his body still hurt. The gash on his face across his nose was stitched closed and there was a fresh bandage on his ear. His body was a mass of bruises. His knees still hurt from riding the horses.

“Frankly,” Bodean said, “I’m surprised he’s taking you back.”

Cody snorted in response.

“The coroner is likely to use it as a campaign issue against him,” Bodean said, shaking his head. “You’re coming out pretty damned good on this. I don’t know how you do it. Larry used to joke about you having illicit photos of him. Is that the case?”

Cody looked up and grimaced. “I’ll never tell.”

Bodean looked at his watch again. Then: “I hear there have never been as many Feds in Yellowstone for an investigation before. They’re practically tripping over each other. They’ve got FBI, DEA, Park Service, Homeland Security, not to mention detectives from Minnesota, Utah, California, Wyoming, and our state guys. You must have given a lot of statements.”

Cody grunted.

Bodean said, “I read your initial one. I noticed you didn’t say anything about being suspended while you were there.”

“It wasn’t relevant.”

Bodean raised his eyebrows. “Oh really?”

Cody said, “I could have told them, I guess. But then I’d have to tell them the reason I was there was because I was freelancing on a murder investigation prohibited by my superiors. How do you think that would play in the press?”

Bodean didn’t respond.

Cody said, “I’ve got requests from
USA Today, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal,
AP, and five cable news shows. I haven’t called any of them back. Would you like me to amend my statement before I call them so they know why I was in the park on my own?”

“You can be such an asshole,” Bodean said.

Cody shrugged.

“Following up on your statement,” Bodean said, “are the other survivors back home?”

“Far as I know. Bull Mitchell is back with his daughter and his wife in Bozeman. I guess he’s quite the local celebrity. I owe him a lot of money but he’s graciously set up a long-term payment plan. Knox is doing a lot of interviews for the New York press. I’ve seen a couple of them. As you can imagine, it’s quite a story there. Donna Glode isn’t talking. Walt went home with his tail between his legs.”

“What about the Sullivan family?”

Cody nodded. “They’re okay. My son Justin is constantly texting the older daughter. They’re scheming something but I don’t know what. I plan to keep in touch with the younger one, Gracie. She’s a smart little lady.” When he said her name he smiled. He couldn’t help it.

Cody said, “They found Gannon where we hung him up. He’s singing like a bird, from what I understand. Telling the Feds everything he knows. Pieces are falling into place.”

“Speaking of,” Bodean said, “I understand he’s accusing you of torturing him. Of shooting him in the ear and the knee to get him to talk.”

Cody shook his head. “That guy. I shot in self-defense. You can check it out with Bull Mitchell. He’ll corroborate my story.”

Bodean smiled bitterly. “I don’t know how you keep getting away with it.”

“I chalk it up to clean living,” Cody said. “Mind if I smoke?”

Bodean looked at the ceiling tile and took a deep breath.

Cody withdrew a packet of cigarettes from his jacket and tapped one out and lit it. He tossed the spent match on the little placard on Tubman’s desk that said
NO SMOKING.

Bodean said, “So you say the Feds are putting it all together, connecting the dots. I assume you mean they’re getting evidence linking up Mina, Gannon, Jed, and maybe an outside accomplice working with Mina.”

Cody studied Bodean’s face, letting him go on, but saying nothing.

“That Rachel Mina or Chavez, or whatever,” Bodean whistled, “she must have been something. I read all of Larry’s files, the stuff he got from the San Diego PD and DEA. He traced her all over the country, to every one of those murders. She operated completely under the radar. I saw photos of her. She was a looker, but not a knockout. She must have been something,” he repeated. “A stone-cold killer who looks like the cute girl next door.”

“She knew she had to get to Yellowstone,” Cody said. “When she met that poor schmuck Ted Sullivan she planted the seed. Of course, he accommodated her. She knew a single woman on a trip like that would draw suspicion, so Ted was her cover.”

Bodean nodded. “So as far as you’re concerned, she was working with Wilson—I mean Gannon—and no one else?”

He seemed to be prying, Cody thought. He refused to play.

“When’s the funeral?” Cody asked.

“Larry?”

“Who the hell else?”

“Tomorrow. I’m surprised you didn’t get the e-mail. Wear your Class A’s.” That was department-speak for dress blues.

“I didn’t get the e-mail because I was giving statement after statement in the park,” Cody said, annoyed, “and I was still officially suspended, remember? I didn’t have fucking
access
to my e-mails.”

“Oh, yeah.”

Cody felt like standing up and decking him, but he fought back his rage.

“As soon as we’ve buried Larry,” Bodean said, “we’re ramping up our effort on going after his killer. Everything gets shoved aside. Finding the bastard who did it is Job One.”

“It’s about time,” Cody said, gripping the arm of the chair so hard he was surprised he didn’t leave dents in the wood.

“Jesus,” Bodean said, looking at his watch again. “Where the hell is the sheriff?”

Cody shrugged. Then he changed the subject. “Larry always used to lay things out for me in the most methodical way. It used to drive me crazy, but he wouldn’t let me rush him. He told me things his way, which was deliberate as all hell and very linear. I used to beg him to get to the bottom line but he’d never get there until he was good and ready after he had the storyline laid out.”

Bodean looked puzzled. “So?”

“So pretend I’m Larry,” Cody said, “and listen. You might want to sit down until the sheriff gets here. This won’t be as good as if Larry were telling it, but I’ll do my best.”

Bodean started to object, but bit his lip. His eyes showed concern. But he moved around the desk and sat in Tubman’s chair and leaned forward holding his hands together, fingers loosely laced.

“The assumption here with the Feds,” Cody said, “is it’s all connected, as you said. Mina, Gannon, Jed, maybe even Dakota Hill. And given that assumption, there’s the assumption Mina’s net spread farther out, that she had an accomplice on the outside. Whoever it was tried to burn me alive at Gallatin Gateway and was more successful with Larry. And that suspect is still out there.”

Bodean broke in: “I’m confident the Feds will find him with all the cooperation they’ve got. They can do a nationwide investigation. We’re limited to the county—”