72 Hours (A Thriller) (39 page)

“You don’t have power over anyone, Dunbar.
 
No one cares how you die or when.”

Dunbar grinned.
 

“You are a sad little man, Special Agent Kline.
 
You are pathetic.
 
I’m the only person in this entire world who can give you what you want, and so you are reduced to crawling on your knees and bowing before me to beg and grovel, to plead for my cooperation.”
 

Kline didn’t respond.

“I’m going to give you the bodies,” Dunbar continued.

“I’m listening.”

“I know what it’s worth to you.”

“Do you?”

“Of course.”

“So tell me.
 
Where did you put them?”

Dunbar smiled.

“You will be quite surprised.”

“Tell me.”

“I’m going to give you ten minutes to make a very important decision.
 
Perhaps the biggest of your pathetic career.
 
Do you think you’re up to it?”

“Try me.”

“I will personally take you to the bodies.
 
We will leave at noon.
 
We will ride together, you and I, and I will lead you hand in hand to the place I put Sidney and Robin.
 
You will have them today.”

“No,” Kline said, flushed with rage.
 
“Forget it.”

“Ten minutes,” Dunbar said.
 
“Make a phone call if you have to.
 
You will agree to let me breathe fresh air one last time, or this conversation is over.
 
Your time starts now.”

*
   
*
   
*

Kline stood on the lawn outside the emergency room door with an unlit cigarette between his lips.
 
His cell phone was glued to his ear.
 
He glanced at his watch.
 
He had to give Dunbar his answer in less than three minutes.

The conference call was a screaming match between the governor, the DA, Leonard Monroe, and Kline himself.
 
The governor had been dragged from bed after a late night raising money for his reelection campaign.
 
He roared like a lion over the fiber optic lines.

Kline held the cigarette between his fingers and stared at it, listening to the yelling and cursing.
 
The moon was fading beneath the treetops beyond the far edge of the parking lot.

A decision was finally reached.

Kline again glanced at his watch, dropped the cigarette into the newly mowed grass, and stepped back through the automatic doors.

He was down to less than thirty seconds when he stood next to the table and glared down at Dunbar.

“OK, you win,” Kline said.
 
“We leave at noon.”

CHAPTER 111

The colors of dawn burned across the horizon.
 
Alternating stripes of black and purple and gray giving way to brilliant shades of orange and pink and indigo rising slowly over the distant mountains.
 
Archer could feel his eyes growing heavy with the monotony of the highway.
 
He grasped the wheel hard with both fists.
 
Forced himself to focus on the road.
 
Willed himself to fight through the exhaustion.
 
For hours he had listened to the moans of pain coming from the rear of the Hummer.

As the first light of Saturday morning broke before them, Archer eased off the gas.
 
The Hummer drifted onto the gravel shoulder so that he could check on Raj.

Both kids were asleep, piled together on one side of the vehicle.

Lindsay was sitting up, her eyes open but full of weariness.
 
She looked up at Archer.

“Where are we?” she asked him.

“My best guess is the middle of nowhere.”

“I haven’t seen a town in a couple of hours.”

Archer nodded.

“How much longer?” she asked.

He shrugged, glanced ahead at the highway.
 
“We’ll get there when we get there.”

“Raj won’t make it.”

“He’ll make it.”

“He needs help or he’s going to die.”

“I won’t let him die.”

“Please hurry,” she said.

Archer nodded.
 
Closed the back door, put the SUV in gear, and drove toward the sunrise.

*
   
*
   
*

The town was exactly as Simeon had described.
 
A dot on the map.
 
A city limit sign flashed by, the triple-digit population mostly scratched out and faded by wind and dust and decades of the sun’s intensity.

The town had a gas station with a tiny video rental store and a coin-operated laundry attached like cancerous growths, and a couple of diners facing each other from opposite sides of the highway, competing for the same sparse business.
 
Most of the buildings looked abandoned.
 
It was just a town that had risen out of the sand and heat in the middle of the Nevada desert, forgotten by time, baked by the sun.

Archer spotted a motel sign sticking up on the side of the road at the far edge of town and pulled the Hummer into the lot.
 
A light was on in the office.

Archer paid cash for a room and sat on the edge of one of the beds and grabbed a battered phone book from the nightstand.
 
Flipped through the pages until he found a listing for the only doctor in town.
 
Dr. Fay Macintosh.
 
He dialed the number on the ancient phone bolted to the nightstand.

A gravely voice answered, “This is Dr. Fay.”

“Good morning, doctor,” Archer said.

*
   
*
   
*

They left Ramey and Wyatt at the motel.
 
They told them to lock the door and keep the lights off and to not answer the door for anyone but them, no matter what.

Archer followed the directions Macintosh had given him over the phone.
 
They pulled down a side street to a low cinderblock building with a long Buick parked in the rear.
 
The building was sheathed in dust just like everything else.
 
Archer couldn’t imagine grinding through years of undergrad and med school to end up in a dustbowl like this, barely scraping by.
 
Everyone has a story, he thought.

The door opened and a short man with bright green eyes and a wild, sprawling beard stepped out.
 

“Dr. Fay?” Archer said.

“Was yesterday, and hope to still be tomorrow,” the doctor replied.

“Where’s the patient?” the doctor asked.

Archer pointed at the SUV.

“Bring him,” the doctor said.

“Could you give me a hand?”

“Most certainly, most certainly,” the doctor said with a nod.

Together they hoisted Raj out of the Hummer and moved him inside to a table in Dr. Fay’s ramshackle little medical clinic.

Dr. Fay was dressed in a stark white, long-sleeved button-down shirt and blue slacks.
 
His thick-soled loafers had to have been twenty years old, Archer guessed.

“What’s the story?” the doctor asked.

Archer glanced at Lindsay, then at the doctor.

“Gunshot wound,” Archer said.

“Uh-huh,” the doctor frowned.

“Long story,” Archer said.
 
“Please don’t ask.”

Dr. Fay hitched his hands on his hips.
 
Glared at Archer, then flicked his gaze to Lindsay.
 
Stared at her long and hard.

“Yes, yes,” he said, combing his fingers through the tangled curls of his beard.
 
“I believe I know who you are, young lady.
 
Yes, indeed.
 
Quite a story there.
 
I’m a bit surprised to see you still alive, actually.
 
Figured someone would have gotten you by now.
 
Looks like you are quite the trooper, though.
 
Yes, indeed.
 
Good for you, honey.
 
Don’t worry about your friend here.
 
I’ll get him patched up.
 
No problem.
 
No problem at all.”

“Thank you,” Lindsay said, hugging her arms around the elderly doctor.

“So you understand that no one can know we are here?” Archer said.

The doctor offered a quick wink.

“Don’t worry about me, son.”

“Can we leave him here for a few hours?”

“You’ll have to if you want him to live,” Dr. Fay said.

“Thank you for understanding,” Archer said.

Dr. Fay nodded.

“Now, if you folks will excuse me, I need to get to work on your friend,” he said.

*
   
*
   
*

The Hummer sat at a stop sign where the gravel side street intersected the highway. Archer and Lindsay sat for a moment in silence, listening to the big V8 idle.
 
A few lights had by now blinked on in windows inside various businesses along the strip.

“Do you know the way?” Lindsay asked him.

“Yes and no.”

Archer had counted on Simeon coming along and being present to lead the way, but now he had to rely on the crude map Simeon had scribbled in the dust across the hood of the Hummer.

“We might make a few wrong turns, but we will find it,” he said.

His left hand was at 12 o’clock on the wheel, his right hand gripping the knob on the shifter on the center console.
 
The sun was visible on the horizon, razor-sharp rays of morning light streaming down the highway and between the buildings of the town.

Lindsay placed her hand on his.

He cocked his head a half-turn.

She rubbed his thick knuckles with the soft smooth flesh of her thumb and she stared at his face without blinking for a long moment.

Archer did not look away.

Lindsay leaned toward him.

Archer reacted by leaning in.
 
He kissed her once, but then reluctantly leaned away.

“What?” she asked.
 
“Is something wrong?”

“Lindsay, we have to finish what we came here to do,” he said.

“You’re right,” she said.
 
“You’re right.”

Archer put the transmission in gear and accelerated out of the side street, turning west.

*
   
*
   
*

The Hummer turned off the highway at a road directly across from the gas station and headed away from town.
 
A battered asphalt strip ended at gravel after several hundred feet, and the gravel faded into a dirt lane a couple hundred yards after that.
 
They could see the tiny old church long before the rolled up to it.
 

The church looked like a prop taken straight out of an old spaghetti western movie.
 
It was a small stone structure with a steep-pitched roof.
 
The front door was wood, painted white, faded and peeling and filthy with dust.

Archer bumped the Hummer up the dirt track that opened into a very primitive parking area.
 
He pulled nose-in at the front of the building and shut the engine.
 

“Sit tight a minute,” he said.

Lindsay nodded.

Archer studied the horizon in all four directions.
 
There was nothing of note except the outline of the buildings from town three-quarters of a mile to the south.
 
Nothing in any other direction for miles but vast empty desert terrain.
 
Dirt.
 
Sand.
 
Scrub brush.
 
Stunted, withered trees.
 
Rocks.
 
Weeds.
 

Three wooden steps had been added to the front of the tiny church building.
 
Steps leading up from the ground to the front door.
 
They looked like they’d been there a thousand years.
 

Archer marched up to the top step and turned the doorknob.
 
The old hinges groaned as he swung the door slowly open.
 
The old church was mostly dark inside.
 
The light was filtering in through tall, narrow stained-glass windows set into the stone walls.
 
The stained glass depicted the Birth, the Life, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection.
 
A nice, tidy summation of the gospels within the span of six lovingly handcrafted tapestries of glass.

The floorboards of the humble little mission groaned under his weight as he strode cautiously between the short rows of pews towards the alter.
 
The floor was covered in a fine dusting of grit.