Lethal Force (7 page)

Now Bill looked stunned. “Are you serious? What did they want from you?”

“I can't discuss that. But I'm just putting them on notice right here on your show. If anything happens to anyone I know. If an associate of mine stubs his toe. If Congresswoman Lori Freeman so much as comes down with an unexplained cold. I will find you.” He pointed his finger at the camera now. “I will hunt you down. And you will pay. You can count on it. You know what I can do.”

For the first time in years, Bill O'Reilly was speechless, his mouth hanging open.

Jake pulled out his ear piece and left his chair in front of the camera.

Before leaving the building he found a land-line and made a quick call.

“Lori,” he said. “Jake. Where are you?”

“I'm at home,” she said. “Why?”

“What are your plans this weekend?”

“Jake Adams. Are you asking me out?”

He hesitated as he glanced around the dark corridor outside the studio. “Maybe,” he said.

“Well, you must be psychic. I was just about to call you. Our professor is in custody in Whitefish, Montana.”

“What the hell's he doing there?”

“Not over the phone.”

They agreed to meet and then hung up.

Outside and in a taxi, Jake looked at his cell phone and wondered if he should get rid of the tracking chip inside. Not yet.

The cab dropped him off at a coffee shop down the block from Congresswoman Freeman's condo complex. She was already waiting at a table away from the front window in a corner booth. She had a large coffee half full in front of her and a medium backpack on the bench next to her. Good, she had taken his advice.

“You want a coffee?” she asked him.

“No, I'm fine.” He sat down and shoved his rolling duffle bag under the table.

“If the tabloids see us,” she said, “they'll guess we're going off together for the weekend.”

“We are.”

“You know what I mean.”

He smiled and then said, “I'm guessing you watch FOX News and Bill O'Reilly.”

She admitted this with a shrug.

He explained what had happened to him since they had last met, including his kidnapping but leaving out some of the brutal details, and ending with his visit to Bill O'Reilly. “I won't apologize for what I said there,” he said. “I needed to put them on notice.”

She leaned across the table closer to him. “Do you really think I'm in danger?”

“It's possible. You might have been flagged with some of the inquiries you've made.”

She shook her head. “I don't think so.”

“Regardless, you and I have been linked. So someone is making the assumption that I'm working for you. That's not a good thing for either of us. We need to get out of town. What's on the agenda next week?”

“We're on a break until the State of the Union,” she said. “I have a trip to South Korea with a bi-partisan committee to attend six-party talks with the North.”

Jake thought about his next move. “So, you were planning on going back to Montana anyway?”

“Yes, but I'm not sure what you have in mind.”

“We'll travel together alone.” He smiled at her and continued, “Let's go Lori. We have a plane to catch and a professor to meet.”

Her sigh said everything as they got up and left the coffee shop.

Whitefish, Montana

The Whitefish Police Department consisted of ten patrol officers, a few sergeants and lieutenants, the assistant chief and the chief of police, Buddy Grimes, a gruff old guy with a beard who had spent most of his time in Army military police and as a Montana State Trooper before ‘retiring' to sleepy Whitefish, where nothing much happened.

During the past dozen or so hours, Professor James Tramil had heard nearly every story the police chief could summon from his many years in law enforcement. Tramil thought the guy had a special place in his heart for his time in the Army. It took Tramil a couple of hours to convince Chief Grimes that he wasn't a dirtbag. That he wasn't trying to have sex with another man in the Amtrak bathroom. That the man had held a knife to his throat and had actually drawn a little blood. And that this same man had killed his friend and colleague back in Corvallis, Oregon. Once the chief confirmed his story, sort of, with the Oregon State University campus police and the Corvallis police, the man had calmed down some and started in with the story telling.

Part of Tramil wished he was still inside the small holding cell like the first few hours in custody. Somehow he'd felt safer in there. Also, the chief wouldn't be recycling some of the same stories.

Now, ten p.m. quickly approaching, Tramil sat at a small table in the main area of the small police department building.

The police chief was on the phone again with Amtrak authorities. They had searched the train many times for the mysterious man, first as it sat at the Whitefish terminal, and then a few more times as it traveled east toward Minnesota.

Chief Grimes set the phone back down and said, “Still haven't found the man. He's like a ghost. One of the passengers admitted to taking a picture of the man. We should get that by e-mail in a short while. You mentioned he looked like a 50s throwback, with a buzz cut and horned rimmed glasses. You want some more coffee? I could make a fresh pot.”

“No, thanks,” Tramil said. “I'll be up all night as it is.” In fact, he wasn't even sure where he would stay this night.

The chief of police shrugged. “As far as I'm concerned, you're free to go. Your story checks out. We've got no reason to hold you.”

Tramil didn't think he was really being held. He was there more for his own protection from the killer. “Where do I go from here?”

“I don't know. Back to Oregon.”

A young patrol officer approached cautiously, like a coyote sneaking up on a bear over an elk kill. “Sir, you have a call on line one.”

“Thanks, Johnny.” The chief picked up the phone and listened, his posture changing from somewhat slouched to nearly military attention. “We have no reason to hold him.” His eyes shifted toward Tramil. “Yes, ma'am. Will do. Is there anything else I can do for you?” He tightened his jaw, said goodbye, and then hung up the phone. Then he scratched his beard, a confused look on his weathered face.

“Everything all right?” Tramil asked.

“Don't know. Our congresswoman from Montana will be here in the morning. She wants to talk with you about something. Very strange. What have you done?”

“Nothing,” Tramil said. “What does she want with me?”

“I have no clue. I told her we have no reason to hold you. She said to put you up in a hotel. It's too late for you to go anywhere tonight anyway. You have no car. There are no more flights out of Kalispell this evening. And the next Amtrak train to come by will be tomorrow's eastbound Empire Builder.” He checked his watch. “The westbound train just left about a half hour ago. There's a nice old western historic hotel a couple blocks from here. They also make a great breakfast.”

Tramil didn't really have a choice. He could decide in the morning where he would go next. “All right,” he agreed.

Just as Tramil stood to leave, slinging his backpack over his shoulder, a man came through the front door of the small police department office. Before Tramil could speak any warning, the man pulled a gun and shot the young patrol officer. Police Chief Grimes barely got his gun out of its holster when a shot blew through his shoulder and sent blood spray onto Tramil. Both police officers crashed to the floor as the man with the gun, the same man who had threatened Tramil on the train and killed his friend, moved around the police officer and picked up their guns and extra magazines, shoving them into his jacket pockets.

The man pointed the gun right at Tramil's head and said, “My patience is really starting to run out with you. If they didn't want you alive, you'd be bleeding out like these two. Let's go.” He grasped Tramil by the collar and hauled him out the door into the cold Montana night.

The two of them had traveled all night from Washington, DC to Whitefish, Montana—a trip that had taken them to Denver, their hometown of Missoula, and the short flight to Kalispell that morning. Jake had slept like a baby. The congresswoman had spent far too much time on her cell phone checking e-mail and listening to voice mails. It wasn't until they were actually on the ground in Whitefish that they learned about the shooting there and the kidnapping of Professor James Tramil.

They entered the hospital, which was more like a clinic, and quickly found the room holding the police chief. It was the one with a gaggle of reporters hanging around for a statement.

“Go into the bathroom for a minute,” Jake said to Lori. “I'll get rid of the reporters.”

“I do have to go,” she said and shoved her way through the door before the reporters recognized her.

Jake smiled and walked up to the group of reporters, a serious look on his face and a hurried pace as he got closer. “There's been another shooting,” Jake yelled. “Down at the post office.” He swung his arm toward the front door.

It worked. Every last one of them rushed out the door to try to get the scoop on the new shooting.

Jake knocked on the bathroom door. “They're gone,” he said.

Lori came out and hit Jake in the chest. “No kidding. They're going to be really mad when they find no shooting.”

“Really? Well that's just sick.”

“You know what I mean.”

Jake and Lori got to the police chief's room and went inside. A young cop with a flattop pointed his gun at them.

“Put the gun away before someone gets hurt,” Jake said calmly.

“I didn't hear about any new shooting,” the officer said, his gun still aimed at them.

“Put the gun down, Tom.” This came from the man in the hospital bed. “Don't you recognize Congresswoman Lori Freeman? Montana only has one of them.”

The young man smiled. “Oh yeah,” he said, lowering his gun into its holster. “I voted for you.” He looked confused. “So there's no shooting at the post office?”

Jake shook his head. “Just trying to get rid of the reporters outside. Would you please guard the door from outside? Make sure none of them get in here.”

The young patrol officer looked at the police chief in the bed.

“Go on,” Chief Grimes said. “And don't say a word to any reporters.”

“Yes, Sir,” the officer said as he left the room.

The both of them introduced themselves officially. When done, Lori said, “Tell us what happened.”

The police chief explained in detail, as if testifying before a jury, all that had happened in the past twenty-four hours. At the end he said, “Johnny, the officer killed, was my wife's nephew. I got him a job on the force. I suspect she's not very happy with me right now. She's down at Big Sky skiing this weekend with a bunch of her girl friends. You're familiar with that area Mister Adams? I understand you're from Missoula.”

“Yes, I am,” Jake said. “You said the shooter was the same man from the Amtrak train. How do you know that?”

The chief picked up his phone, clicked a button and turned it to Jake and Lori. “A cell phone photo taken by a woman on the train. That's the guy who shot me. Buzz cut and horned rimmed glasses.”

“Where do you think the man took the professor?” Lori asked.

Chief Grimes tried to hunch but it brought a grimace from the pain. “Don't know. But not far. Within a few minutes we shut down every highway into Whitefish, the airport, and we've got folks posted at the train station. They've gotta be somewhere close.”

“You've got enough personnel to cover all this?” she asked him.

“Yeah,” Chief Grimes said. “We got help from the state police and the county sheriff's office. The FBI is on its way.”

Jake thanked the police chief and then hauled Lori outside. They had taken a taxi there and had it wait for them, but now Jake realized they needed a vehicle of their own. He really needed to get back to Missoula to pick up a few things, yet he wasn't sure how he would do that right now, especially if the police chief was correct and they had been able to keep the kidnapper and Professor Tramil somewhere in Flathead County. However, he also knew that there wasn't a blockade that could not be beat. He'd proven that many times himself.

“What are you thinking?” Lori asked him on the drive back to the airport.

He didn't want her to know what he was really thinking. That he needed to get a gun. That Professor Tramil had perhaps twenty-four hours before that man killed him, assuming he could hold out that long. And there was more. Instead of the truth, he settled on something else. “I'm thinking we need to get a vehicle and then a proper breakfast.”

“Agreed.”

They did just that. The only vehicle left at the airport was a Ford Explorer with four-wheel-drive, a ski rack, and beefy tires. A lot of folks used this area as a jumping off point to Glacier National Park in the summer. But the winter was limited. Most of the roads were closed in the park. Snowmobiling was banned. But some hearty souls used cross country skis to access some of the lower elevation trails. There were other areas in the county to snowmobile, though. And, considering the fresh snow, Jake guessed many were taking advantage of that this weekend.

He drove them to a family restaurant in downtown Whitefish, where they sucked down eggs, hash browns and burnt coffee. They were in a back corner booth, Jake hoping nobody would recognize the congresswoman. So far nobody had.

“Where do we go from here?” she asked him and then took a sip of her coffee.

“I don't know.” That was honest. “They could be anywhere.” Jake stared at his phone and wondered if he knew someone who could help them. But it wasn't like he could have the NSA redirect satellites like they do in the movies, and pinpoint their location. Well, he might know someone.