Page 67 of Rising Tiger

He was tall and thin with a full face of perpetual stubble. He had his credit card out and was entering information into his phone.

“Christmas shopping already?” Nicholas asked as he walked over to greet him.

Sutton looked up and smiled. “Renewing my subscription to The Blaze.”

The man was an information junkie. He couldn’t get enough. He claimed that his insatiable appetite for it was what had made him so good at his job.

Putting his phone and wallet away, he hopped off the back of the Bronco and shook hands with Nicholas. “If you’ve got a minute, there’s something I’d like to show you.”

“Did you find the spot?” the little man asked.

Sutton nodded. “I certainly did.”

“Let me run inside real quick and then we’ll go.”

The man nodded and Nicholas headed inside. He wanted to check on Nina and grab the dogs.

Five minutes later, the garage door opened, and Nicholas pulled outin a black, off-road side-by-side vehicle. Like his van, it had been fully customized.

Argos sat in the passenger seat and Draco was in the second row. In the cargo area were a bunch of OD-green Storm Cases of various sizes.

Sutton offered to ride along in the side-by-side, but Nicholas said that he’d prefer the man drive his Bronco and that he would follow. He didn’t plan on coming straight back. Once Sutton showed him what he wanted to see, he was going to be out there for a while.

The main reason Sutton had been sent out to the little man’s estate was his human-tracking skills. He not only knew how a sniper thinks and acts, but he was also a distinguished graduate of the U.S. Army Combat Tracking School at Fort Huachuca in southeast Arizona, just fifteen miles from the Mexican border.

As the men drove, both dogs stuck their heads out the lowered windows and breathed in the fresh autumn air. Nicholas had been worried about them. But seeing them now, they appeared to be fine. The vet had provided some low-level pain pills and Nina—a vet tech by training—had been keeping an eye on them. So far, so good.

Though Nicholas had had a splitting headache and nausea, after a few hours in the hospital it had passed. It had felt like fighting off one of the worst hangovers of his life. IV fluids, anti-inflammatories, and pain medication had been a godsend, but heneverwanted to experience that kind of pain again. He especially didn’t want Nina or their baby to, either.

A few minutes later, when Sutton’s Bronco came to a stop, Nicholas parked nearby and, along with the dogs, dismounted.

“So,” Sutton began narrating as he walked and pointed things out, “there are a handful of things I was looking for. One, the shooter had to be able to see the target—aka you. He needed a line of sight to the house. Two, unless he time traveled, he would have arrived via some sort of vehicle, parked it, and hiked in. Based on the road system beyond your property, coupled with the view of the house, that made this area the most likely. So, this is where I started.”

“And what did you find?” asked Nicholas as they trudged deeper into the trees.

Sutton led him to a specific spot, stopped, and pointed to the ground. “I found this.”

Nicholas looked down, expecting to see something out of a movie that proved the attacker’s presence—cigarette butts, a candy wrapper, a water bottle. There was no such evidence. It just looked like moss, grass, and fallen leaves. He couldn’t see whatever it was that Sutton was trying to show him.

“Look at how this area is flatter,” the man said, crouching down to point directly at what he wanted Nicholas to take notice of. “The grass here is bent and the twigs here and here are broken.”

“I’m not doubting you,” the little man replied. “But we’ve got more deer around here than we know what to do with.”

“This wasn’t deer,” Sutton stated as he lay down in the same spot. “This was someone who had lain prone.”

“Like a sniper.”

The man nodded. “Like a sniper.”

Nicholas turned and took in the view back to the house. This was as good a place as any, he supposed.

Sutton stood back up. “I also picked up his trail. I know where he entered your property and a couple of other hide sites he considered.”

“Show me,” said Nicholas. “All of it.”

CHAPTER 36

It took Sutton an additional twenty minutes to show him everything. After that, Nicholas thanked him and told him that he would be back up to the house in a little bit.