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THREE YEARS LATER

A little before midnight the man pulled his vehicle off the blacktop onto an abandoned logging road in the Cumberland Plateau in Russell County, Tennessee. Seconds later he climbed out and shot a glance toward thick clouds that smothered the full moon. A gust of wind brought with it the promise of a storm. Hurriedly he slipped on the night goggles, adjusted the strap, and set out for his target.

Fifteen minutes later he emerged from the woods that abutted the property belonging to former Pearl Springs city councilman Joe Slater. He couldn’t see the back of the house, but darkened windows along the front indicated no one was up. The garage was connected to the house with a covered breezeway, and he crept toward a side door. Once inside, he found Slater’s fancy SUV parked beside his wife’s Escalade. The GMC Hummer was the only vehicle Slater drove.

He slid under the SUV and found the nut assembly that held the tie-rod in place. Using tools he’d brought with him, he pulled the cotter pin locking the castle nut in place and let it fall to the floor while he tackled the nut. Once it was off, he wrapped it in a handkerchief.

He crawled out from under the Hummer, and his heart almost stopped at the opening click of a door. He wriggled back and snapped his flashlight off a split second before the door opened. Overhead fluorescents lit up the room. He barely breathed while he slipped his hand in his pocket, where he carried a Glock subcompact semiautomatic.

Footsteps approached the passenger side of the Hummer. Plaid pajamas and leather house slippers came into view and stopped so close, he could grab Slater’s legs if he wanted to. The man muttered something under his breath about an insurance card as he opened the truck door and fumbled in the glove box.

“Told her it was there ...” Slater grumbled and slammed the door. “Don’t know why she couldn’t wait till morning.”

Less than a minute later, Slater killed the lights, plunging the garage into pitch darkness. Tension eased from the man’s body, and he took a shaky breath. That was close.

He checked his watch and forced himself to wait thirty minutes before easing out of the garage with the castle nut in his pocket. As tempting as it was to keep it for a souvenir, it might be better to toss the nut on the shoulder of the road for the cops to find—that way they would think it simply came loose and fell off.

He was halfway across the front yard when a dog yapped. An ankle biter—it figured that Slater would have the kind of dog that sneaked up behind a person and sank its teeth into their ankle when they weren’t looking.

The front porch light flickered on, revealing a large “Harrison Carter for Senate” sign in the yard. He stepped back into the shadow of the garage, his jaw clenched so tight that pain shot down his neck. After a few seconds, the dog quieted and the light went dark.

A whip-poor-will’s lonely call filled the June night as he entered the woods. Legend said that the bird was an omen of death.

Thunder rumbled, and he turned and stared at the dark house. Slater had lined his pocket with taxpayers’ money for the last time.