Authors: Renee Simons
"Only that they needed protecting."
"Didn't O'Neill come to you with a proposition to steal the codes and the keys to deciphering them? Didn't he offer to split $1,500,000 with you if you did? And didn't you kill him and keep the money for yourself?"
"Some jackpot," Stormwalker said with a whistle. "Did you get them?"
"Yes, and delivered the money as scheduled. The next day, we heard he was dead."
"Were they of any use?"
Fields, who had been coolly in command of the conversation until then, suddenly seemed ill at ease.
He looked down at the table, spinning
Stormwalker's
.45 with one finger. Finally, he looked up. "They were phony. To complete the misfortune, we never recovered a single dollar."
"Why'd you set me up?"
Field shrugged his beefy shoulders. "When Dar was killed, we thought you had the money. You were transferred home before we could get to you. So we had to shift our focus to the States. We thought that while you were awaiting trial we would have time to figure out a new plan."
"And what was that?"
"While you were still walking around free, one of our agents would find you here and apply "appropriate pressure" to determine what you did with the money. Something went wrong. Once the court martial began we no longer had access to you."
"What's the rest of it?"
"My position was in jeopardy because of the loss of the funds but with you in prison, I had no recourse. In addition, I was desperate to protect the persona that had been established for me nearly twenty-five years earlier.
"Glasnost and the new accord enabled us to send intermediaries to Mac and tell him what we thought. He didn't believe them, of course. He was sure you were innocent. Finally we sent someone to confirm his belief. He let you out to prove it. We thought it would be easier to get to you."
"Someone tipped him to a mole. That's what started the whole thing unraveling."
Ian looked chagrined. "Yes, well, unknown to me, I'd outlived my usefulness."
"So even with
Winter
helping, things didn't work out the way you planned."
"Winter did his best to harass you, but Alexandra kept intervening and your other friends wouldn't cooperate."
"Burning down our house is a damn site more serious than harassment. And we could have died in that camper."
"An act of frustration and stupidity."
"Or self-protection?"
Fields looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"
"If Zan and I died and Winter along with us, you would have gone on your way convinced the money was lost forever. And whoever had it could keep it."
Before Fields had a chance to respond, the door opened with such force it slammed back on its hinges, one of which cracked under the strain. Zan stepped into the room. Becker entered right behind her. He held a rifle and a .44 as his gaze darted from one man to the other. Fear and a feverish excitement had created red blotches on his fair skin. His ever-present blue oxford shirt looked rumpled and sweaty, his hair more tousled than usual. He seemed barely in control.
"Are you okay?" Zan asked Stormwalker. "You have a weird look on your face."
"I can't seem to get away from you."
The devilish light in her eyes died. "We can easily fix that."
He turned to Becker. "What the hell's going on?"
"Time to close the books and move on," the man replied, his voice strained and tight.
"What are you talking about?"
"She'll tell you." He waived the handgun in Zan's direction. "Go ahead. Tell him."
"Dar left me a letter in the computer. He spelled out the whole scheme, how it played out and fell apart over the money. He admitted that they'd framed you to cover up their own actions."
Stormwalker watched something like guilt flicker through her eyes. Finally, she added, "He said if he turned up dead, whoever had the money would have been responsible."
He stifled the relief he might have felt if not faced with two desperate men, either one of whom could crack and turn this confrontation into a massacre.
Anger had turned Fields livid from his chin to the top of his bald head. "Well, I don't have it," he said. "If I did, none of this would have been necessary." He looked at Becker.
"Don't look at me," Kenny screeched. "You know he's got it." He pointed the gun at
Stormwalker's
forehead and jiggled it back and forth, as if for emphasis. "It's out here somewhere.
That's why he came back. To get it so he can run away and live on it for the rest of his life."
"Then why am I still here?" Stormwalker asked in a quiet, reasonable tone. "I've had plenty of time to rescue it and be on my way."
Kenny's eyes narrowed and a sly smile twisted the corners of his mouth. "Maybe you're afraid to go after it with so many people watching you. Or maybe you can't get it because . . . " He looked from one face to the other.
"
Because it
was destroyed
when the house burned down. Or maybe it was hidden in her camper and blew up. Or. . . ."
"Stop this insane babbling." Ian's expressionless voice seemed to take on an ominous quality. "I know. Do you understand? I know you killed O'Neill. I know you have the money. And now everyone else knows, too."
Becker's whole body shook. His face went ashen.
"Give it up, man," Stormwalker urged in a calm tone.
"You've lived a lie for too many years," Zan said softly. "Not many men could have survived under deep cover so long. It's time to rest, to let someone else do the dirty work."
"You're wrong," Kenny whispered, nearly but not quite in tears. "I was a good agent, taking every assignment and slogging away at it 'til the job was done. I gave my life to the Agency, sacrificed years and my right to a family to do the government's work in the field.
During the toughest years of the cold war."
His voice steadied as he talked. With his next words his watery blue eyes turned cold and hard. "I came back expecting some appreciation for what I'd accomplished. A decent position back here in the States, a promotion, something that would help me build for the future. Instead, I was passed over in favor of a neophyte with a Mensa intellect and a flair for the dramatic. That yuppie brother of yours,
who'd
inherited the 'family business' but who'd never been out on the line like I had, who couldn't possibly understand the battle from personal experience."
He turned to Zan. "I had to show them," he said with a bitter smile. He gestured toward himself with the thumb of his gun hand.
"I would grab the brass ring before anyone knew I'd climbed aboard the carousel."
Pointing to Fields, he continued. "You think this whole thing was O'Neill's idea? Well, it was mine. I thought it up. I made it happen. And you're right. I have the money."
A smile of satisfaction spread across his face. "I earned it the same way I earned that lousy thirty-thousand-a-year pension the Agency saw fit to grant me for all my years of service. And when you're moldering in your graves, I'll be on a ski slope somewhere enjoying the proceeds."
He pointed the .44 at Fields and giggled. "Payback's a bitch, a glorious bitch."
Stormwalker pushed Zan out of the way and tackled Becker just as he got off a shot. It barely missed the side of Fields' head. Ian pointed his gun at his partner.
"And then you die," his haunting voice said as he pulled the trigger.
The bullet hit the man mid-chest, flattening him. Stormwalker rolled in Zan's direction, placing himself between her and oncoming fire. There was none. He looked up to see Fields raise both hands above his head as Mac sauntered into the cabin. Two men in dark suits and walkie-talkies filed in behind him and flanked the door.
"Don't waste another bullet on this piece of scum," Mac said as he eased the man's gun out of his hand. He checked Becker's non-existent pulse, closed the dead eyes and turned to Stormwalker and Zan.
"You two okay?"
"How long have you been out there, you bastard?"
"Tsk, tsk." Laughter glittered in his dark eyes. "Is that any way to talk to your best friend?"
"Why didn't you come in sooner?"
"Without getting confirmation of our findings?
Not a chance."
"He could've killed us all." Stormwalker found it hard to control his anger. "How could you put your own sister in danger?" He shook his head in disbelief. "Where's your common sense?"
"We've had her under surveillance. We had guys on you. We bugged everything, including this place. The bugs had bugs. It just didn't make sense to stop before we got the whole story."
"You wasted your star witness. He could've given you even more information."
Mac made a sign of dismissal with his hand. "Between what we heard here and what we found in his crib, diaries, computer files, even most of the money, we have more than enough." He turned to Fields. "You saved the American taxpayer a wad of cash."
He took him by the arm. "Let's go see a man about a deal."
He
look
at Zan and Stormwalker. "You guys coming?"
Stormwalker looked at Zan. "Why don't you go back with them? I have something I need to do before I can leave."
Zan stared at him for a moment. Nothing he could have said would have made his feelings any more clear. Though gentle in tone, his words told her that whatever they might have had just wasn't meant to be. Silently, she joined her brother and his men.
Stormwalker climbed Thunder Butte. The ceremonial pipe Grandfather had carved for him when he was ten rested in the crook of his elbow. On the opposite shoulder, he carried the poles he'd made to mark off the area for the vision quest. Making his way up the slope, he felt the effects, both good and bad, of the sweat bath he'd just undergone.
He'd repaired what remained of the sweat lodge after years of disuse and began the ritual late in the afternoon, finishing at dawn. At times, it seemed that his father, his grandfather and Old Elk, the wise man, whispered in his ear, guiding him as they'd done when he was young. Their images swirled in a mist scented with sage and cedar bark; he was sure they'd forgive any mistakes he might make.
The sweat had poured from his body, cleansing him, healing him, helping him put aside anger and bitterness, leaving him young and trusting as he'd been the first time. In the moist, heated darkness of the
inipi
, the sweat bath, he forgot Stormwalker the man and became once again Stormwalker the boy.
Out in the open now and on his way to the site of the vision quest, some tenuous thread still connected him to the spirits of the
inipi
, giving him the illusion that two beings inhabited his body, the boy he'd been and the man he was.
For the next two days, his younger self-guided him through the ritual, reminding him how to pray, to walk, to chant. On the third night, he leaned back against the center pole. Smelling the sweet aroma of the sage around him, he wondered if he would receive a vision during the few hours still left to him.
A sudden arrow of blue-white light slashed through the blackened western sky, followed by others in rapid succession. He felt the air vibrate as thunder rolled in across the valley with wave after wave of deep, rumbling sound. The ground shook beneath him with tremors of increasing strength, setting the poles to swaying, although no breeze blew. He pulled his blanket more tightly around his body and watched a familiar scene unfold.
The lightning marched steadily across the sky with the thunder hard on its heels. As it approached the butte, the spidery shafts of light changed color, taking on an eerie yellow-green glow that lit up the sky before fading and merging with the blackness.
Finally, the sound and the light reached the butte and surrounded him. A gentle breeze cooled a brow feverish with anticipation and awe.
"Child of the storm," a voice whispered from within the neon glow. "Why do you wait for me?"
Stormwalker rose to his feet. He held his pipe in the crook of his elbow and asked, "Who are you?"
"Who comes to this place with lightning and thunder yet brings no rain? Even one as young as you should know."