Stone Cold (29 page)

He took another sip. How could she know his feelings toward Liv, other than Missy's innate intuition and lizard-like genius for self-preservation?

“I think we understand each other, right?” she smiled chillingly.

“I think I understand
you
,” he said.

“So as far as you and I are concerned, we're acquaintances from another time. I'm not aware of your questionable background, and you know very little about my . . . history.”

It was said as a statement, not a question.

She said, “I better get back to our guests. It was nice seeing you, Nate.”

With that, she turned to rejoin Templeton.

Nate said, “By the way, Joe's here, too.”

It froze her for a second before she turned back around. He knew he'd hit the target. She took a breath, gathered herself, and said, “Joe is on the
ranch
?”

“He's working in this county.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Keep him away from me.”

“He probably feels the same way about you.”

“And keep him away from Wolfgang.”

With that, she turned away to sidle up to Templeton again. Her smile hadn't lost any wattage.

Nate returned to the bar and found himself eyeing Liv closely, imagining her . . .
gone
. He thought that very soon this new world he had entered would blow up. His sudden goal was not to blow up with it.

Or Liv.

Or Joe. Damn him for showing up.

Bearlodge Mountain Cabin

Twenty-two miles away, Joe and Latta were outside the cabin in the dark, gathering wood from a snow-covered half-cord under the bobbing glow of Latta's headlamp. Without electricity, there were two sources of heat inside: the fireplace and a woodstove in the master bedroom. They needed enough of the soft pine to get them through the night, and each had already delivered an armload.

The windows of the cabin glowed with warm pinkish light from the kerosene lamps inside. The sky had cleared and the starlight turned the snow on the ground from white to aquamarine. Emily waited inside at the window, watching them, her head a silhouette. Daisy was beside her with her front paws on the sill and her nose pressed against the glass.

“First real cold night,” Latta observed.

“Yup.”

Since they were out of Emily's earshot, Latta asked, “So we can expect the task force to show up tomorrow morning?”

“That's what Agent Coon told me,” Joe said. He needed to knock the snow off each length of wood before stacking it in the crook of his arm. “Midmorning is more likely. He said they're arming up and getting the vehicles ready tonight and the DOT promises the roads will be open and clear an hour after sunrise.”

“Assuming there's no wind,” Latta grumbled. “It's never just the snow. It's always the damned wind.”

“Yup.”

Latta paused and looked hard at Joe. “What do you think? Am I gonna be okay after this?”

Joe said, “Probably not. You'll lose your job, for sure. But if you cooperate with the Feds you might stay out of prison. That's probably the best you can hope for, I'd suspect.”

“What about my pension? You think they'll let me keep it?”

“I don't know, Jim. Director LGD has her own way of doing things.”

“I've heard,” Latta said, shaking his head. “I'm surprised I made it all the way up to badge number six in seniority. Now I'll get busted and you'll move up a notch.”

“I really don't care about my badge number,” Joe said.

“Well, this ought to work out for tonight,” Latta said, nodding toward the cabin as if to reassure himself as well as Joe. “We're lucky he keeps some food in the place, even though you took care of that tonight.”

Two hours before, Joe had tracked a wild turkey in the pine forest on the east side of the cabin and killed it with a blast from his
shotgun. For dinner, the three of them had roast turkey breast, canned potatoes, and half a jar of green beans. Latta had located the owner's liquor stock as well and had placed an unopened bottle of Evan Williams bourbon on the counter for later.

“We'll have to keep track of everything we use so we can repay the owner when this is all over,” Joe said. “I might even pay him a visit to thank him in person.”

“He's a prick,” Latta said. “He's got a nice place, but he's one of those rich guys who bends your ear telling you how much better everything is in Florida. And on and on about the damned weather. I don't care that it's warm in Florida. It's also humid and filled with bugs. Just send him a check.”

“Why does he come here, then?”

“Who knows? Maybe Daytona Beach isn't so wonderful in the summer.”

Joe looked toward the cabin and asked, “Do you think Emily is doing okay?”

“Yeah, she loves it. It's like camping. You're going to have a tough time getting your dog away from her, though.”

“You should get her a dog, Jim.”

“I have enough trouble in my life as it is,” Latta said, grunting as he stood erect with his load of wood.

“Yeah, I guess you do.”

•   •   •

A
S BOTH
MEN TRUDGED
from the woodpile toward the cabin they heard the phone ring inside. When Joe looked up, Emily was gone from the window.

“Who in the hell is calling?” Latta asked in a desperate whisper.

“Maybe Coon or my wife,” Joe said. “I gave them the number here.”

“But what if it's someone else?” Latta said, and let his load of wood clatter to the snow. Then, shouting: “Em! Don't answer the phone!” He sidestepped the dropped wood and ran toward the cabin.

Too late. Joe could see her straining her arm up from her wheelchair and bringing the receiver down to her face.

•   •   •

W
HEN
J
OE
CAME INSIDE
with his load of wood and closed the door behind him by leaning back against it with his butt, Latta appeared panicked and Emily frightened by her father's reaction.

“Tell him what you told me,” Latta said to his daughter.

“Some man called.”

“Did he identify himself?” Joe asked. “Did he ask for me?”

“No. He asked if my dad was here and I told him he was. He asked if we were okay.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him we were fine.”

“Did he ask who was with you?”

“Yes. I told him there was another game warden here—my dad's friend Joe.”

Latta said, “Jesus, Emily.”

She was hurt. “Dad, if I did something wrong . . .”

“It's okay,” Latta said. “You're not in trouble. Just think back to every word that was said. Think, Em, did he say his name?”

“No. But he seemed happy to hear we were here. I asked him if he
wanted to talk to you and he said no, he just wanted to make sure we were safe.”

Latta and Joe exchanged looks.

“He said to stay here until they could send someone to help,” she said, looking from Latta to Joe. “He said not to tell you so it would be a surprise. Then he hung up.”

Sand Creek Ranch

While the bartender was getting ice, Nate slipped behind the bar and made his own drink: tea, ice, and water. It looked close enough to what he'd been sipping to pass, he thought. He needed a clear head as the guests were shooed by Liv into the cavernous dining room.

There was a preordained hierarchy to the seating plan.

Templeton and Missy sat at the head of the table side by side. Nate located his card—to the right of Missy at the end of the table. Whip was directly across from him, so the two of them were literally displayed as Templeton's right- and left-hand men. Rocco Biolchini was sandwiched across the table between Whip and Liv.

Nate winced as Sheriff Mead took the seat to his right. Next to Mead was Judge Bartholomew, then the Wedell chief of police, Dale Miller, in his dress blues. Miller was infamous for the speed traps he maintained on both ends of town that served as his department's primary source of outside income. The rumor was Miller took a
personal cut as well. He was red-faced and crude, and had started pounding beers long before he arrived at the ranch, judging by the flush in his face and his glassy eyes.

Locals occupied all of the rest of the chairs on both sides of the long table, but two seats were empty. Nate noted the cards for the missing guests: Bill Critchfield and Gene Smith. He thought it was odd, and wondered if an explanation would be offered.

It was raucous: dozens of individual alcohol-fueled conversations going on at once among locals, ranch staff, and the people Templeton had positioned nearest to him. Nate didn't say a word to anyone and he noted Liv was silent as well. She was attentive to all that was going on and busy surveying the guests to make sure everyone was in their correct place and the discussions were quasi-civil.

Jane Ringolsby and the ranch staff quickly served the first course: small grilled mourning dove breasts shot by Templeton himself and sausages from Templeton's own processing facility. Red wine was poured into every glass. Nate glanced down the table. It was obvious many of the locals were nervous and thrilled at the same time—and drinking too much. He saw one woman instructing her husband which fork to use first.

Missy simply glowed while she followed Templeton's every word. He was telling a slightly bored Rocco Biolchini how white-tailed deer were kicking the remaining native mule deer out of the Black Hills. She seemed entranced with him, Nate thought, and very well practiced in the art of alert subservience. She tittered at his jokes and shook her head solemnly while he told a story about encountering a wolverine while bird-hunting. Only once did she slip, when her eyes darted away from Templeton to Nate. Nate grinned back at her as if to say,
I'm on to you.

•   •   •

R
OCCO
B
IOLCHINI
was deep into his story—one he had no doubt told many times—about his undergraduate years in an Ivy League university, his lack of success with athletics or the opposite sex, his early infatuation with computers and the Internet, his desire to connect similarly minded geeks into a network where they could make fun of the jocks and arrogant handsome pricks who sucked up all of the oxygen in every room—without any of the golden boys knowing about how they were being mocked. The website later morphed into in a social-media empire with millions of users.

Nate thought Biolchini spoke as if he were used to being listened to, as if the listeners were of course as fascinated by Rocco Biolchini as Rocco Biolchini was. He paused at the end of passages for listeners to say “Wow” or “Oh my God” but didn't invite questions or urge others to add anything. It was a monologue, not a dialogue. While he went on through the salad course, Nate noticed two figures skulking outside the dining room in the great room, looking furtively around the doorframe.

The two men, Smith and Critchfield, weren't dressed for dinner. They wore heavy coats still glistening from outside snowfall and their cheeks were flushed from the cold. They looked inside the dining room, imploring someone to invite them in, it seemed.

Nate observed what followed as Liv spotted the two men and excused herself with an exasperated smile. She strode toward the two men and walked past them so they had to follow her into the great room and farther from the guests. There was a heated exchange, with Liv refusing something at first and pointing toward the front door as if ordering the dog to go outside, but she soon relented as they
continued to gesticulate. She put her hands on her hips and told them to wait where they were for the time being, then reentered the dining room and whispered a long message into Templeton's ear.

Templeton's eyes narrowed, but his face gave nothing away. Halfway during the message, he glanced up at Smith and Critchfield and shook his head, then looked away with annoyance. The cacophony in the room never wavered—no one else was paying attention to what was going on. Nate saw that Missy had her eyes averted from Templeton but her head cocked in a way that indicated she could hear everything that was said.

When the message was delivered, Liv paused for a response. Templeton took a deep breath, sighed, and turned toward Missy and had a whispered conversation. Then, with a tiny sour nod, he indicated,
Okay.

Liv left him crisply to return to Critchfield and Smith. In a moment, the two men were gone. And when Nate looked across the table, so was Whip. He hadn't seen him slip away.

When Liv sat back down, her eyes were downcast and there was a concerned set to her face for a moment, but she quickly recovered when one of the locals said something to her.

Nate had no idea what had just happened.

Rocco Biolchini was now into his entrepreneurial phase in the Silicon Valley, where his once-trusted partner was beginning to “put the screws to him” by turning his corporate board and the
Wall Street Journal
against him . . .

•   •   •

“
Y
OU AND ME,
we're okay, right?” Sheriff Mead asked Nate, while Nate tried to put together all the nonverbal clues as to what had
transpired among Smith, Critchfield, Liv, Templeton, Missy, and Whip.

“What?”
Nate asked, annoyed by the interruption.

“I mean, what you said after I searched you for weapons. We're okay, right? After all, we're all on the same team here.”

“I'm not on anyone's team.”

Nate didn't want to engage in conversation with the sheriff. He'd seen the man down four quick glasses of wine and the main course hadn't even arrived yet. Mead seemed like the type who would just get louder, although even Mead would have trouble out-trumpeting Chief Miller or Biolchini, who was reciting some of the charges his bastard partner's lawyers had made against him in their first epic legal showdown . . .

“Excuse me,” Nate said. “I'll be right back.”

He got up without fanfare and passed the locals, who seemed not to notice he was leaving the room. The din died as he stepped outside onto the front porch and closed the door behind him.

The sky had cleared and the moon now had a halo. Thick bands of stars were brushed across the sky. He could smell the fireplace smoke as the coming low pressure tamped it down. It would be a very cold night.

Smith, Critchfield, and Whip were long gone.

•   •   •

“
A
RE YOU
ALL RIGHT?”
Liv asked, startling him. He hadn't heard her open the door.

“Fine,” he said. “I needed a break. When the air is that thick with bullshit, I have trouble breathing.”

She laughed and said, “I've seen worse. Sometimes the locals get
completely out of control and we need to drive them into town. They seem more restrained than usual tonight—probably because of
Herself.”

Nate grunted.

“It's probably time to come back in. The steaks are ready to bring out.”

“What happened in there?” he asked her sharply. “What did Templeton agree to?”

She paused. “I really can't say.”

“Sure you can. It seems like an odd thing to happen during a dinner that supposedly requires mandatory attendance.”

“I told you—I can't say. I've already told you too much about what goes on around here. Besides, I didn't think you cared.”

“I don't. But I'm stuck sitting there with the sheriff on one side, Missy on the other, and Biolchini going on and on right across from me. It's my idea of hell on earth. If anyone's going to bolt this place, it ought to be me.”

“Oh dear,” she said. Then: “Hold on for a second. Don't leave. I've got to clear something with Mr. T.”

Nate nodded.

When Liv withdrew and closed the door, Nate acted quickly.

•   •   •

H
E WAS
BACK ON THE PORCH
when the door opened again. But instead of Liv, Wolfgang Templeton stepped out on the landing and closed the door behind him.

“It's going to get cold, isn't it?” Templeton asked, looking up at the sky as Nate had.

Nate didn't respond.

“Liv said you saw something going on in there and it bothered you. I thought rather than have her play go-between, we could talk about it briefly ourselves.”

Nate nodded.

“Whip has been with me for a lot of years. There would be problems if I didn't reach out to him first in an emergency situation. I hope you understand that.”

Nate squinted at Templeton in the dark. Templeton seemed to think Nate was miffed he hadn't been chosen to go with Smith and Critchfield. Nate let him think it.

“So what's going on?” Nate asked.

“Just a local problem,” Templeton said with a sigh. “There seems to be more and more of them all the time and they're making me weary. I despise these situations and I'm frankly
sick of dealing with them
.”

Templeton spat out the last few words with the kind of vehemence Nate had never experienced in him before.

“When I moved here, this county was like some kind of transplanted backwoods Appalachia,” Templeton said. “The people were lazy, unemployed, and without hope. You've never seen so many EBT cards floating around. The responsible citizens were leaving in droves. It touched me and I wanted to help those who stayed, but I had no idea what kind of monster I was creating. They've become totally
dependent
on me for everything. No one has any drive or ambition—they just want to suck on the tit of Wolfgang Templeton.

“At first, I admit, it felt kind of good to be held in such regard. Every man wants to be liked and admired and looked up to. I helped everyone I could—entire families! But by helping them—giving them what they said they needed to survive—I created my own entitlement state. The more I give them, the more they want. They
don't seem capable of solving their own problems anymore, and whenever one comes up, who do they come to? Me!”

Templeton shook his head. “In the most bizarre and unexpected way, I find myself being held hostage to them. If I don't give them what they ask, I fear they'll turn on me. On
us
. They'll keep our secret as long as the trough is full, but they keep demanding more of me. I can hardly keep up.”

Nate said, “That's why you brought me on. To double your output.”

“
Our
output,” Templeton said. “We're in this together. I thought that by stepping up what I could give them, I could live a more comfortable life without all these constant problems. But it hasn't worked. In fact, it gets worse every day. And in order to keep up, I have to become less discriminating in the kind of work I accept. I used to turn clients away if what they asked didn't feel right. But now . . .”

“Now we've got people like Rocco Biolchini,” Nate said. “Who just wants to get revenge on his business partner.”

“Exactly,” Templeton said, his eyes suddenly moist. Nate was surprised by the honest emotion. “Exactly, Nate. In the past I wouldn't have even invited him here. But now I'm weighing the payoff over the justification of the assignment. I used to take only jobs when I knew we were the only people professional and thorough enough to get to a bad guy who was above the law because of his wealth or connections, and leave no trace. It is a
righteous
line of work. We right wrongs and make the world a better place. We take out the most expensive garbage. I firmly believe that.”

“So do I,” Nate said. “At least I used to.”

“It can be like that again,” Templeton said wistfully.

Nate repeated, “Go out and do some good.”

Templeton smiled sadly. “That's what it was all about. After all, even the president has his kill list. We're private sector, and the private sector is always better at everything than the politicians. But I never thought it would come to this . . .” he said, gesturing vaguely toward the lodge and the guests inside. “They're all leeches who could turn on me any minute. If there were any way I could do this all again, well, I'd do it differently.”