Page 18

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Eagle Mountain Club

“T WO HUNDRED TWENTY PSI and climbing fast,” Lee Ogburn-Russell called through the sliding window in the back of the pickup at four-thirty the next morning. “The air compressor seems to be working like a charm.”

“Gotcha,” Cates said from behind the wheel.

“Can you please turn the heat up in here?” Johnson asked. “It’s fucking freezing.” She was in the backseat. Soledad rode shotgun.

Cates said, “Sure,” but did nothing. He liked the sharpness of the cold morning on his face, which was why he kept his window open. It made him hyperaware and alert.

Cates doused his headlights as he crept the vehicle over a suspension bridge that spanned the Twelve Sleep River four miles downstream from the Eagle Mountain Club. The old planks on the bridge made a rat-tat-tat as his tires rolled over them. Cates could see the white undulating reflection of the moon and stars on the black surface of the river as he passed over it.

On the other side of the bridge, he turned left onto a grassy two-track that paralleled the river to the north. Spring floods had washed out parts of the road, and he flashed on his lights at a couple of turns to make sure he didn’t drive over a gouge-out into the water. As soon as he was confident of the pathway ahead, he turned his headlights back off and navigated by natural light. It was pure luck that the moon was full and bright enough to illuminate the silvery branches of the ancient cottonwood trees and cast shadows across the road.

“Five hundred PSI,” LOR announced from the back through the window.

*

T HE E AGLE M OUNTAIN Club was the very exclusive gated country club and golf course outside of Saddlestring. Cates knew it well because he and his high school buddies used to sneak onto the property and steal all the flags from the holes the night before summer tournaments, which enraged the members. There was a real clear “town vs. gown” atmosphere in those days, when ultra-wealthy Eagle Mountain members arrived on their jets and held their noses as they passed through Saddlestring by limousine from the airport en route to the club. At the time, there was very little interaction between the members and the locals, and few if any local members. Locals were hired to clean rooms, landscape the grounds, and pick up garbage. The club even brought in their own waitstaff from other clubs for the summer.

But once the Eagle Mountain closed in late September, it was a ghost village until the following May. There were dozens of magnificent homes that sat empty for the entire winter and the greens of the course were covered by tarps. Elk, mule deer, and moose wintered on the property. Fewer than six homes were occupied during those months.

Which played right into Cates’s plan.

*

W HAT HADN ’ T PLAYED into his plan was what had happened an hour ago, before they left the Cates compound.

Johnson was in the backseat of the pickup, bitching about having to get up so early. LOR was in the back of the truck beneath the covered bed, starting up the electronic air compressor. The pump hummed and rattled at times like a pressure cooker on a stove as it began the process of filling the two floor-to-ceiling gas cylinders that had been repurposed from LOR’s welding use. It took quite a while to fill the two eighty-cubic-foot tanks.

“Getting up this early really sucks,” Johnson moaned as Soledad slid into the passenger seat next to Cates. Soledad laughed in response.

Cates had started the engine so that the air pump wouldn’t draw down the battery any more than it had. As he reached for the gearshift, Soledad leaned over and placed his hand on Cates’s arm.

“Hold on a second,” he said. “I’ll be right back. I forgot something.”

Cates watched Soledad propel himself across the yard toward the front door.

After a half a minute, Cates got out. He wanted to tell LOR in back to open the slider between the rear window and the covered topper over the bed so they could communicate. He could see LOR systematically checking pneumatic hoses and gauges on the device by flashlight.

Then, from inside the house, there were two sharp sounds followed by two more.

Snap-snap. Then: Snap-snap.

Cates paused. The sounds were familiar to him.

A moment later, Soledad appeared at the front door smoothing the hem of his jacket in the front and back as if he’d just tucked something into his waistband.

Soledad looked up and saw Cates observing him. They kept eye contact from the porch back to the pickup, but Cates said nothing.

“Had to be done,” Soledad said.

“Twenty-two?” Cates asked.

“Double-taps.”

Cates looked over to see if Johnson or LOR had noted the gunshots or the exchange he’d had with Soledad. LOR was still scrambling around the equipment in the back like a monkey, his flashlight gripped in his mouth. Johnson huddled in the far corner of the backseat with a blanket she’d borrowed from her bed over her head. Neither showed any cognition of what had just happened.

He guessed that the rattling hum of the air pump might have drowned out the snap sounds from inside.

“I wish you’d talk to me about these things,” Cates said in a low rumble.

“Like I said, it had to be done. You know that, too.”

*

“S IX HUNDRED TWENTY - EIGHT PSI,” LOR announced as Cates entered the club grounds by the obscure river road that was used by local cowboys to move cattle on the pastures near the river. The road was virtually unknown to members of the club and most of the staff. It was the route Cates and his buddies had used to steal all the flags. Some of which, he guessed, still adorned basement wet bars in town.

There were three ways to access the gated property, Cates knew. The main gate had a guardhouse as well as closed-circuit cameras. In the offseason, members could enter by key code, but every entrance and exit by vehicle or foot was recorded. It was the same situation at the service entrance on the other side of the golf course.

But the river road had no gates, no cameras, and no security system.

*

W HEN C ATES DROVE out of the tangled riverside brush and downed trees onto the manicured Eagle Mountain grounds, everything opened up and he could see clearly. The clubhouse was huge, dark, and boxy at the top of the hill and was flanked by empty cottages and visitor lodging. Showy homes lined the outside of the fairways surrounding the course, and old-growth pine trees stood like sentinels to break up the contours of the long fairways.

He took a paved narrow golf cart path and ascended a long slope on the left flank of the clubhouse facilities until he could see the back side of the lighted front gate.

Cates pulled over to the side of the road and turned to address Bobbi Johnson.

“This is where you get out,” he said. “Stay hidden in the bushes on the side of the road and call me if anyone comes through the gate. Remember: don’t let yourself get seen by anyone.”

“I remember my instructions,” she said sullenly. “But I wish you’d give me back my real phone.”

“We’ll talk about that later,” Cates said.

During the night at his old house, Soledad had convinced Cates over glasses of pinot noir apparently brought there by the llama people that Johnson couldn’t be trusted with her phone.

“We don’t know who she’s texting or what she’s saying,” Soledad had whispered.

“I think it’s her sister,” Cates had responded.

“She’s a security risk.”

He was right, Cates had concluded. So while she was sleeping, they’d replaced her iPhone with a burner from Walmart. She was told to communicate with them only with that, and she hadn’t received the news well.

“You’ll get your old phone back when we’re through,” Soledad had assured her. Cates was impressed by what a convincing liar he was.

*

“B UT IT ’ S SO cold,” Johnson said as she climbed out of her own truck.

“It’ll warm up,” Cates said. “Now, like we talked about, call me with a vehicle description if anyone comes into the club.”

“ Yeah-yeah-yeah ,” Johnson grumbled as she walked away. She chose a good hiding spot in a bed of chin-high junipers, where she could clearly see the front gate but couldn’t be seen by the entrants.

As Cates backed the truck away, Johnson gestured at him with her middle finger.

“What a charmer,” Soledad noted.

*

C ATES DROVE TO a dense copse of pine trees and high juniper bushes on the side of the eighth fairway that bordered the cart path. Before plunging straight into it, he clicked on his headlights so he could navigate the pickup between two stout tree trunks. He drove into the copse far enough that the back end of the vehicle couldn’t be seen from the path itself.

“Eight hundred eighteen PSI,” LOR reported from the topper.

Cates turned to Soledad. “Keep it running until we reach max air pressure.”

“Will do,” Soledad said.

“I’ll set up the camera,” Cates said. “Keep a good eye on the truck camera as well. You should have two good angles.”

“Got it.”

“Axel,” Cates said, narrowing his eyes. “No more surprises.”

“You got it, partner,” Soledad said with a hard grin.

*

A T THE REAR of the truck, Cates activated a battery-powered miniature video camera and placed it on the bumper pointing to the south along the path. After it was set, he checked in with Soledad, who had moved from the passenger seat to behind the wheel.

“How does it look?” Cates asked.

Soledad drew out his phone and punched up the app that received the live stream. “It looks good,” he said. “It’s dark, but I can see all the way down the hill to the houses.”

“Good.” Cates was both impressed and a little intimidated by all the new technology that was available for pennies at places like Walmart. A lot had happened during the years he’d been incarcerated when it came to new gadgets.

“Are we sure he’ll be coming from that direction?” Soledad asked.

“I think so,” Cates said. “His house is to the south up there on that bluff. What about the north?”

Soledad shifted his gaze from his phone to the video screen mounted in the dashboard. “I can’t see a thing.”

“Put the truck’s transmission into reverse, but don’t go anywhere,” Cates said.

Soledad did so and the screen lit up with a view from the backup camera. “Perfect,” he said. “I can see anyone coming down the path from the north.”

Cates tapped on the sheet metal of the door to indicate his approval, then he pushed along the length of the pickup to the back again. The brush and branches clawed at him as he did so, and one branch tried to take his hat off. When he got to the tailgate, he twisted the handle of the hatchback window and let the pneumatic gas springs raise it up. The inside was crammed with equipment. LOR, who was on his side in the bed of the truck checking the fittings in a snarl of thick rubber hoses, looked up and the beam from the flashlight in his mouth hit Cates in the eyes and made him recoil.

“Sorry,” LOR said.

“Does everything look okay?”

“It does. I found an air leak a minute ago on one of the hose fittings that goes to the device, but I tightened it up and all is good.”

“What’s our pressure?” Cates asked. He wasn’t at a good angle at the back of the truck to see the gauge that was mounted on the bed wall between the air tanks. LOR contorted himself so he could see it behind him.

“Right at twelve hundred PSI.”

“Great,” Cates said. “Keep an eye on it and watch the gauge. We can’t let it go over two thousand, and nineteen hundred would be perfect.”

LOR grunted and grumbled. He hated it when anyone told him how his own device should be armed and deployed. Cates knew that, but he didn’t care.

“Now move aside so I can get in there and get to the controls,” Cates said as he stepped on the bumper and began to climb into the back.

*

O N HIS WAY to the metal bucket-chair seat that had been liberated from an old tractor left in a field outside of Jeffrey City, Cates shouldered past the complicated device. He was again struck by the Rube Goldberg–style engineering LOR employed when designing mechanical devices.

There were tangles of electrical wire and thick coils of pneumatic hoses looped in the bed of the pickup as well as zip-tied to the interior walls. Inside, it smelled of rubber, machine oil, and Lee Ogburn-Russell’s flatulence.

The device, which Cates had dubbed “Zeus II,” took up most of the back and stretched from the tractor seat on one end to the massive shooting head aimed out the open back window on the other. Cates shimmied along the side of it toward the seat, which was mounted on the inside of the front wall. As he passed the gaping wide-open steel jaws attached to the telescopic scissor jib, he reached over and touched the tips of the original Zeus’s teeth, which had been fastened to the jaws with stainless steel screws. The teeth were yellowed but extremely sharp. Cates cleaned out the rind of a cantaloupe wedged between two of the long incisors before proceeding.

“I told you to clean the teeth,” Cates said to LOR, who grunted an uninterested response.

“Seriously,” Cates said as he swung up into the seat. “What if the wounds are contaminated by fruit? That wouldn’t look very good.”

“Not my problem,” LOR said. “My problem is to make sure this thing works perfectly. You can brush its teeth. Or better yet, make Bobbi do it.”

Cates settled into the seat and grasped the joystick with his right hand. LOR had looted an old video game setup and repurposed the controller.

With his left hand, he reached back and closed his fingers around the grip of a wooden thirty-four-inch Louisville Slugger baseball bat propped in the inside corner of the bed. The barrel of the bat bristled with wicked curved bear claws embedded in the wood with the points out. It was a vicious-looking weapon, and the sharp claws ripped through fabric and flesh like a scythe.

Then he sat back, feeling fully prepared.

The air compressor hummed, and Cates used the light from his burner phone to check the numbers. They were at seventeen hundred PSI in the tanks. “Move aside,” he said to LOR. “Let’s get ready.”

*

Z EUS II WAS a marvel, Cates thought. Complicated, ugly, and temperamental, yes. But still a marvel that only someone like LOR could build. It had exceeded Cates’s expectations.

Hidden behind the smoked windows of the cab-over so no one outside could see it from the outside, Zeus II weighed over eight hundred pounds and consisted of scrap metal and industrial wire and tubing originally designed for heavy diesel land-moving equipment. The scissored jib arm, which could shoot out to exactly fifteen feet in a straight line, came from an old wheeled device that had been used by the mining company to retrieve heavy fallen tools and parts from deep inside crevices and shafts.

At the end of the jib was the shooting head, a wide-open set of steel jaws cut and refashioned from the rims of an abandoned heavy-duty utility truck. The rims had been cut in half and polished by LOR and shaped to become the two oblong, tooth-filled, U-shaped jaws.

Zeus II was powered by an explosive release of compressed air pressure from the two welding tanks within the cab. When it was deployed, it created enough velocity to rock the truck on its springs. At the push of the red button on the top of the joystick, the head would blast out and, at the apex of the extension, the steel jaws would clamp down with twelve hundred pounds per square inch of pressure. With the remaining air in the tanks, Cates could jerk the joystick and shake the victim like a rag doll.

They’d addressed the problem of aiming because the point of impact had to be exactly fifteen feet. Any closer, and the open jaws would simply be a high-powered battering ram. It would bludgeon the target but not clamp down. And if the target was farther away than fifteen feet, the jaws would snap down on air with a terrifying hollow clack ing noise.

That was why they’d experimented on melons in Powell. LOR had come up with the idea of using a small laser pen beam aimed at the void in back of the truck and a golf range finder to measure the beam when it struck something solid. When an object, whether a person’s head or a cantaloupe on a stick was at exactly fifteen feet away, the jaws of Zeus II could be unleashed.

They’d been lucky before that the shooting head had hit its target. But firing it in the dark was much different than during daylight hours.

The Louisville Slugger, when swung with power, created slashes and rips that looked as authentic as hell, he thought. There was no reason to improve or modify that particular tool.

Cates looked over his shoulder at the gauge and announced, “Two thousand PSI. Axel, you can turn the truck off now. I’ll kill the air compressor. Just keep the power on inside so you can view the rearview camera.”

“Roger that,” Soledad said from inside the cab through the open slider. Cates appreciated the man’s military manner. He planned to ask Soledad more about his history when they had the time.

Then Cates connected with Bobbi Johnson on his new burner phone.

“Anything going on, Bobbi?”

“Nothing. I’m colder than hell.”

“It shouldn’t be too long now.”

“When this is over, you need to thaw me out,” she said. “I have some ideas how to do that.”

“You’re on speaker right now, Bobbi. Everyone can hear you.”

As if to illustrate his point, LOR leered at him from beside Zeus II and waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“Text me if anything happens,” Cates said to her. “I’ll do the same.”

He lowered the phone to his lap, screen down so there would be no glow that could be seen from the outside. The eastern sky had begun to fuse with vanilla light. It was a matter of time before the stars to the east blinked out and the sharp outline of the Bighorns formed from the gloom.

With the engine and air compressor off, it was completely silent inside the pickup. Magpies from the brush near the distant river were already starting to call out.

“Get ready,” Cates said again to everyone.

*

J UDGE H EWITT EMERGED from his home on the thirteenth fairway the only way he knew how: in a hurry. He’d been up well before dawn and had reviewed his overnight emails, perused the Wall Street Journal , and checked out the latest posts on his favorite trophy big-game-hunting sites. Then he drained his coffee cup and pulled on a base layer of merino wool long underwear before stepping into Kuiu camo trousers. He then topped off his walking ensemble with a light Kuiu shell and stocking cap.

As he strode down the hallway beneath the glass-eye gazes of a dozen mounted big-game trophies, he slung on his shoulder holster with his .44 Magnum revolver.

Hewitt had briefly wondered who had been responsible for the blink of red brake lights he’d seen an hour before in the distant trees on the golf course. It was too early in the morning for the maintenance crews and too late in the season for golf course greenkeepers. Trespassers—locals, mainly—sometimes sneaked on the property to poach, steal things that weren’t nailed down like lawn furniture and outdoor grills, or just go where they weren’t normally welcome. Sometimes, one of the more ostentatious homes was vandalized simply for the reasons of jealousy and resentment.

But whoever had been on the grounds had apparently left. And if they hadn’t, he’d arrest them for trespassing and haul their asses into the courthouse while reminding them that he was an officer of the court. He’d done it before.

Hewitt silenced his phone before slipping it into the zipper pocket on his shell, then strode down the sidewalk to the golf cart path. As always, he bent his head forward and swung his arms from front to back as he walked.

His brisk pace was useful not only for warming up in the morning but for burning calories as well. He walked every day no matter the weather. He had for years.

Judge Hewitt’s morning routine was well known, as was his wrath if anyone tried to reach him while he was on his walk.

*

A FEW MOMENTS later, Soledad spoke with an urgent whisper: “Here he comes. Bearing south.”

Cates sat up in his seat and LOR shinnied to the side of Zeus II, between the device and the topper wall. As he did, he readied his laser and range finder, one in each hand.

Cates studied the framing for the shot, which should have been straight out through the open rear topper window toward the cart path. It was a few degrees lighter now, and for the first time he could see a wall of pine trees bordering the other side of the fairway.

He could also see the bottom of an overhanging branch stretching across the top of the opening. It looked like a crooked arm with a bent elbow and it hung in clear view of the framed opening. Cates cursed quietly to himself, wishing he had known it was there and wondering how he’d maneuvered the truck into the alcove without hitting the branch in the first place. If he’d known, he could have repositioned the vehicle.

It was too late for that now.

*

J UDGE H EWITT POWER walked down the golf cart path. It was a straight shot down the fairway to the distant green, and it was light enough now that he could see the limp red flag at the pin.

When his phone vibrated, Hewitt cursed and drew it out while he walked. It was Jimmy Newman, the campaign manager for Governor Rulon. He had to take it.

“Damn it, what?” he said.

“I wanted to go over some scheduling with you—”

“I’ll call you back,” Hewitt said, cutting him off. “I’m on my walk.”

Then he disconnected the call and strode on.

*

C ATES HEARD A snatch of the phone conversation and was surprised how close Hewitt was. The man could really move .

LOR heard it, too, and thumbed on his laser pen and pointed it out the back. In the distance, Cates could see a pinprick of red on the trees on the other side of the fairway. He hoped Hewitt wouldn’t notice it, that bastard.

With his other hand, Ogburn-Russell raised the range finder to his eye and aimed it toward the cart path, where he guessed the beam and his distance-reading device would intersect at exactly fifteen feet.

*

“F EARLESS ” F RANK C ARROLL , the newest deputy in the Twelve Sleep County Sheriff’s Department, eased his just-assigned SUV from the county road toward the main gate of the Eagle Mountain Club. He was excited.

Although just twenty-four years old, Carroll had been a dedicated and passionate trout fisherman since he was eight and growing up near the Encampment River in southern Wyoming. He embraced the rudimentary training he’d received thus far in Saddlestring, finding it less rigorous than he’d received at the Wyoming Law Enforcement Academy in Douglas. What was more challenging, though, was learning about the geography, the locals, and the county itself. He had already met more colorful characters than he thought could actually be concentrated in a single area, and he’d heard stories from other deputies that were wild and hard to believe. After his second week on the job, he had started to wonder if he was in over his head, and that he’d never be up to speed on all the local miscreants and the extended lineage of so many notorious ranch families.

What had snapped him out of his doubts, though, was when he was given the key code to the front gate of the Eagle Mountain Club and when he’d been asked to patrol the hallowed grounds at least once a shift. He’d learned the layout of the place and that was when he saw big fish rising in Lake Joseph. The private, members-only lake was stocked with rainbow, brown, and tiger trout that averaged twenty inches or more. In his life, Carroll had only caught a few fish that big.

And now that the club was closed and virtually empty, he knew he had his chance. Yes, he was well aware that he didn’t have permission to fish there. But fish belonged to whoever caught them, right? Sneaking onto the grounds before anyone was awake and still being present at the county building an hour later for the morning briefing with no one the wiser? What could be better?

His fly rod was assembled and rested on the top of the headrests of the SUV from front to back. His vest and waders were in the backseat.

It was a good plan and he was excited. He took his job seriously, but there had to be perks, right?

There was a reason they called him Fearless Frank, he thought.

*

T HE BURNER ON Cates’s lap vibrated, and he glanced down and flipped the screen toward him.

A Sheriff’s Dept. truck just came through the gate! Headed your way.

Cates took a deep breath. He didn’t have time to answer Johnson. He could hear footfalls outside.

*

J UDGE H EWITT SENSED something different in the thick copse of trees and brush to his right as he approached it. It seemed darker than usual, as if there was a large object inside.

He slowed his pace and reached across his body for the grip of his .44 as a red beam of light hit him squarely in the eyes and blinded him, stopping him cold.

*

T HE LASER BEAM appeared on the bridge of Hewitt’s nose directly in front of Cates. The judge clamped his eyes shut while he drew his weapon. Cates said, “ Asshole, ” and jammed the joystick button down. The jaws of Zeus II exploded out the back of the truck but glanced off that underhanging branch, which slightly altered its trajectory. The pickup shuddered from the release and Cates hadn’t seen the exact point of contact because he was distracted by the explosion of falling bark and pine needles from the damaged branch.

“He’s down!” LOR cried. He had a better angle. All Cates could see was that the scissor jib was bent down toward the path due to the weight of the target in its teeth. “He’s fucking down,” LOR shouted. “Grab the bat and finish him off.”

“We don’t have time,” Cates said. Then to Soledad, “Get us the hell out of here— now .”

“Roger that,” Soledad said while turning the ignition. Cates was grateful the man hadn’t asked why and delayed them any further.

*

F EARLESS F RANK C ARROLL cruised along the eighteenth fairway and marveled at the huge empty houses. The house he’d grown up in, in Encampment, could fit into one of their garages, he thought.

He made the turn at the end of the golf course and could see Lake Joseph glow with dawn light through the trees to the right. Even though he wasn’t close yet, his heart skipped a beat when a big trout rose and created a pattern of concentric ringlets on the surface.

“Damn,” he said aloud.

For reasons he couldn’t later explain, Carroll looked up the golf cart path that ran along the side of the fairway to his left.

On top of the hill, a pair of red taillights blinked out as a vehicle crested the rise and vanished down the other side. Then he noticed the heap of dark clothing sprawled across the path halfway up the hill.

Like the reflection of the dawn sun on the surface of Lake Joseph, a stream of dark liquid glowed on the concrete path as it poured from the victim.

*

A T HOME , J OE sat up suddenly in bed. He was instantly wide awake and checked the clock on the nightstand. It was six a.m.—he’d slept in.

Marybeth stirred beside him. “Joe, are you all right?”

He shook his head. “I just had a bad dream. I dreamed that grizzly came back.”

As he said it, his phone on the nightstand lit up with an incoming call.