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NINE
The cabin in the forest had come to my attention last year after the Wicked Witch of Baldwin’s Shore catnapped Pickle.If ever there was a candidate for ketamine, it was her, but I’d have to pay an after-hours visit to the veterinarian and pick up a cow-sized dose first.
But Pickle was safely back at the craft store now, and the cabin had been abandoned once again.Rumour said the place was haunted, a rumour that I’d never admit to starting, but I had to get my kicks somehow, didn’t I?
The cabin was perfect for our purposes—completely off-grid and miles from civilisation, but the rutted driveway that led there from the main road was still passable.The cops had even pruned back some of the trees to get their own vehicles through during a recent murder investigation.Behold, our tax dollars at work.
“The floor in the far corner isn’t good,” I warned Alex.
“As evidenced by the hole?”
“I think the roof leaks.But the rest of the building is sound.”
As were the sturdy old dining table and chairs pushed into one corner.They didn’t make furniture like that anymore.I lined up three of the chairs by the front window, backs to the glass, and positioned the fourth opposite.Yes.Yes, this was good.
“Let’s bring them in.I can demonstrate my macramé skills.”
“What should I do?”Hallie asked.
“Do you have someone who can trace calls?”
“Yes?”
One after the other, I tossed her the three phones I’d confiscated from Moscow, the Mule, and the driver, and she caught them with a little juggling.I’d unlocked them already—the beauty of today’s super-secure facial recognition technology was that you could simply hold the device in front of an unconscious person and…voila.Oh, sure, there was meant to be protection against that, but a flaw in many biometric systems meant they struggled to process glasses.All I’d had to do was borrow the driver’s spectacles and create a rudimentary pair of “eyes” using microporous tape and a Sharpie.Voila—their secrets were mine.
“Burners, I’m certain of it, but we need to find out who they called and when, and who called them.And when you havethosenumbers, trace their call histories too, and if you can, ping them and find out where they are right now.”
“The signal’s intermittent out here.I only have one bar.”
“If you head south for half a mile, it gets better.”From the way Hallie glanced around, it was clear she had no idea which direction south was.“And you can prepare.Find the numbers and go through the call histories.Check the messages.See if there’s anything useful.”
“Emmy will have a spare burner as well as a satellite phone if we need it,” Alex said.
Of course Emmy would have a spare burner and a satellite phone.How long until she arrived?Ten minutes?Twenty?Whatever, we didn’t have to wait for her to supervise our activities.I was more than capable of handling three second-rate shits by myself.Hmm… How to approach this?
“I want to get them inside before they wake.”I’d topped up the sedatives on the journey, and they’d slept through the whole trip.“Once they’re secured to the chairs, we can let them come round.Should I take the head or the feet?”
“Relax, I’ve got this.”Alex slung Moscow over one shoulder effortlessly.“I don’t know what macramé is, but I look forward to finding out.”
Relax?I couldn’t relax, but at least I didn’t have to carry two hundred pounds of dead weight.Wait… Was that a good thing?Or did Alex think I was incapable of doing my own job?Rad would have told me to take the feet.Having someone take the load off me—both physically and metaphorically—was a strange concept.
Hold on a second… This wasn’t my fucking job anymore.
Was it?
Today, I’d make an exception.Getting a man to talk was always a challenge I enjoyed.
And every man—or woman—wouldtalk.I merely had to phrase the questions in the right way and provide a suitable incentive to answer… But whatwerethose questions?The obvious one was who did thesemudakiwork for?And what did Ottie have that they needed?It would be useful to find out their future plans, but if Moscow was a hired gun, he wouldn’t know the details.Or where the weapon was.If I were his boss, I wouldn’t have told him.
The men hadn’t been carrying much.Just the burner phones, weapons, and in Moscow’s case, three syringes—one empty and two filled with a milky liquid.Had he planned to use the contents on Ottie?To knock her out?I suspected not.These men had spent enough time in the hospital to know she was scheduled for tests this morning, so they must have been aware she was unconscious.
No, the syringes were part of the distraction.Inject as many innocent victims as it took to get the staff out of the way, and then Moscow and his team would have a clear run to Ottie.What was in them?From the colour, I suspected a cocktail of propofol and something else.Potassium chloride?Calcium gluconate?I’d use the latter—the electrolyte imbalances it caused would slow the heart, but in a hospital setting, they could probably fix the problem by giving extra fluids or even using dialysis.Depending on the dose, of course.In that situation, I’d be conservative.Keep the staff busy.There was simply no challenge for them if the patient died right away.But would Moscow take the same approach?
I studied the man slumped in front of me as he twitched.The Mule.Did he get the same nightmares that I did?About the things he’d done?I hadn’t shared Vik’s relaxed attitude when it came to collateral damage, but sometimes, I’d had to weigh one life against the greater good.
What about Moscow?How much of an asshole was he?Theywerebig syringes…