Perilous (16 page)

“Not that I know of.”

I stood. “Let’s go take a look.” I scooped my father’s keys from the key holder mounted by the front door and walked outside. Sommer followed.

Ramon held his stomach with both hands, and blood ran through his fingers. “Shit,” he said.

Rodrigo put the car in park and exited the driver’s door. He walked to the passenger side, opened Ramon’s door, and leaned in. “How bad is it?”

Ramon pulled his hands from his stomach. Blood ran from his shirt and pooled in his lap. He said nothing.

“Where is your phone?” Rodrigo asked.

“Top pocket,” Ramon said. He squinted his eyes and leaned his head back against the headrest.

Rodrigo reached in and unzipped the breast pocket of Ramon’s jacket. He slid the phone out. “What’s the number of our employer?”

“Last number called in the log.”

Rodrigo pulled up the menu and hit the number to dial. It rang.

“Do you have confirmation?” Yury asked.

“No. There have been…” Rodrigo paused. “There have been complications.”

“What complications? I drove past the scene, littered with local cops. Obviously, you made an attempt.”

“Ramon has been shot. One of our others as well, I believe. What do you want me to do?”

“Who is this?”

“Um, do you want my real name or the one on the false documents?”

“Whatever. It doesn’t matter. Is the cop dead?”

“I don’t believe so.”

“Where are you?”

“Outside the house where we are keeping the parents.”

“How far away is it from the scene?” Yury asked.

“A mile or two.”

Yury let out a breath in frustration. “Go inside and grab the parents. Blindfold them. I’m going to send an address to this phone of where you should meet me. Be there in a half hour.”

“Okay. What about the other rental car here?”

“Leave it. It’s clean.”

Rodrigo cracked his neck side to side. “Our prints are in there.”

“Do you have any gas?” Yury asked.

“I think I saw a can in the shed of this place.”

“Light it up before you leave. Grab all the guns from it.”

“Okay, what do you want me to do about Ramon? He needs a hospital.”

“Bring him. No hospitals.”

“He’s not going to make it without help,” Rodrigo said.

“I’ll get him taken care of when you get here.”

“Okay.”

Yury clicked off.

Rodrigo walked to the passenger door. “We are supposed to meet him with the old couple. He says he will get you taken care of.”

Ramon looked out the car door at Rodrigo, his face pale. “Okay.”

Rodrigo closed the passenger door and headed toward the house. He went inside, to the bathroom. Inside the bathroom, the old man and woman were both handcuffed twice—once binding their wrists, once securing them to their respective anchors. The chains of the man’s handcuffs were secured around the room’s radiator, next to the toilet. The woman was secured around the steel pipe of the shower.

“Relocation time,” Rodrigo said.

The man pulled at his cuffs. The woman cried something into the gag in her mouth.

Rodrigo went to the old man. Dried blood covered the side of his face and ran down into his white beard. The wound under his short white hair was still wet with blood. Rodrigo pulled his pistol from his tactical thigh belt and held it on the old man. “You first. If you give me any bullshit, I’ll put a round through your lung. You’ll be alive long enough to watch me put another through your wife’s skull. Got it?”

The man mumbled something into the cloth jammed and taped into his mouth.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Rodrigo said.

He unlocked the cuffs securing the cop’s father to the radiator and stood him to his feet. “Don’t move,” he said.

He took the second set of cuffs that secured him to the radiator and locked them around the chains for the cuffs securing his wrists. He clicked the second cuff around the man’s belt. Rodrigo walked the man to the kitchen and grabbed two dishtowels. With a hand on the old man’s shoulder and the pistol jammed in his back, Rodrigo walked him outside to the back of the car. He popped the trunk and removed the cell-phone jamming box. “Inside.” He waved the man in with the barrel of his gun.

The old man didn’t move.

“Do you want to have a race back inside and see if I can kill your wife before you stop me?”

The old man sat on the lip of the trunk and swung his legs inside. Rodrigo pushed him the rest of the way in and tied one of the dishtowels over his eyes as a blindfold. He slammed the lid closed. He repeated the exact process with the woman. With both hostages stowed in the trunk, he transferred all the weapons from one vehicle to the other.

The only thing left was to torch the car. He walked to the small storage shed and swung the door open. He flipped on the light. Next to a snow blower sat a metal gas can. Rodrigo lifted it up—full. He searched the shelves, and a box of matches caught his eye. He scooped them up and walked over to the second rental car. With the driver’s door open, he unscrewed the nozzle on the gas can. Rodrigo soaked the front seats, carpet, and dash. He walked to the back door and emptied the rest of the gas can. Rodrigo tossed the empty gas can inside, and backed a few feet from the open car door. With a quick flick, he struck a match and flung it into the car. The car erupted in a ball of flames.

He headed back to the other rental car and took his seat behind the wheel. He looked at Ramon. “Stay with me.”

“Trying.” Ramon pulled in a breath through his teeth. “How far away is this place?” Ramon asked.

Rodrigo pulled up the address on the cell phone and got the GPS to direct him there. “It says fifteen minutes. North for ten minutes then west for five.”

“There’s nothing but woods north,” Ramon said.

“That is the address he gave me.”

Rodrigo backed from the driveway onto the street. He set the phone on the dash and headed north.

I unlocked the service door and flipped on the lights. Two trucks sat inside. My father’s old, rusty Ford with two-hundred-plus thousand on the clock sat closer to me, and my stepmother’s shiny new Ford sat on the other side. Beyond the trucks, at the back to the left, were two four-wheelers and a snowmobile. To the back right were the stairs leading to the second level. Commercial-grade woodworking machines lined the perimeter of the room. The half-pegboarded walls held antique tools.

“This is quite the shop,” Sommer said.

“Yeah, my father’s pride and joy.” I scanned the room, and nothing looked out of place. “Let’s check upstairs.”

We walked past the wood stove that heated the shop, to the flight of stairs at the back, and went up.

The upstairs was unfinished, yet considerable progress had been made since my father had last sent me photos. The upper level was to be guest quarters once completed. As it sat, it was insulation and partially finished walls. A reclaimed wood floor that my father had purchased from an estate sale was installed and seemed complete. We had a quick look around, but found nothing of interest. We started back down the stairs, and chatter came through Sommer’s radio. He stopped halfway down the steps to respond. I caught bits and pieces of the communication.

“Come on,” he said. “We need to go check something out.”

“What happened?” I asked.

“Auto fire at a home up the street. Caller said it was a black sedan—no one present at the house.”

“Let’s go.”

We jogged from the garage.

“You can ride with me.” Sommer pointed to his cruiser. “Hop in. I’m just going to grab another deputy and let Esler know what’s going on.”

I nodded and waited at the car.

Sommer doled out his orders and hopped into the driver’s seat of the cruiser. We made a Y-turn in the driveway and pulled out. Another squad car did the same behind us.

“The address is only about a mile or so up the road here,” Sommer said.

“Where’s your local fire department?” I asked.

“They are volunteers out of Townsend. Only one man stays at the station. We’ll beat them there, but they are pretty damn quick to respond.”

We saw the smoke and fire through the trees as we neared.

We pulled into the driveway and off to the side. I yanked the door handle to let myself out, and Sommer did the same. The other sheriff pulled in behind us and jumped out. We walked over to two snowmobiles and their owners, standing near the house.

I looked at the man wearing an Arctic Cat jacket and snowmobile pants. He held a helmet under his arm. “You the guys who called this in, I take it?”

The guy on the right nodded. “We were coming off the trail up the street there.” He pointed north. “I’d smelled smoke for a bit, but when we hit the street to cross, we saw the glow of the flames. I hung a left quick to check it out. When we saw the car on fire, Jason here called it in.”

“You’re Jason?” Sommer asked.

The other rider nodded.

Sommer looked back at the first guy. “Your name?”

“Ryan.”

“You checked for anyone inside?” Sommer asked.

“Yeah, we went up to the house and beat on the door. No one ever came, though,” the one named Ryan said.

“Did you guys see anything else? Cars, people, anything?” the other deputy asked.

They both shook their heads.

I walked toward the car. The roof had begun to sink, but the back was still fairly intact. I could read the
Chevy
and
Malibu
emblems. It looked like the car from my sister’s driveway. Flames rolled out of the car’s broken windows.

“Get back from that thing. It’s going to blow up,” Sommer said.

“No, it’s going to burn, not blow up. Any evidence inside will be lost if we don’t do something.”

“What’s the plan?” the other deputy asked. “Should we throw snow on it?”

“Unless you have a dump truck full, it’s not going to do anything,” I said. I glanced at the base of the house facing the driveway, looking for a hose spigot—nothing. “We need to get water from the house,” I said. “Sommer, see if the water is on. If it’s not, find a way to get it on. I’m going to dig through the shed for a hose.”

“Do you guys need a hand?” the guy named Jason asked.

“Yeah, you come with me. Help me find hoses.” I said. I got the other rider’s attention. “You go with them, find anything that can hold water, get it filled, and get it on that fire. Let’s go. We need to move.”

“Okay,” he said.

I jogged over to the shed, and Jason followed. The two deputies and the rider named Ryan ran for the house. I swung the shed door open, flipped on the light, and rummaged around. The small building was filled with junk. On the back wall was a hose coiled on a hanger.

“There,” I said.

Jason slipped past the contents of the shed, toward the back wall, and grabbed it.

“Is that the only one back there?” I asked.

He looked around. “I can’t tell. There’s so much crap in here.”

I motioned for him to toss me the hose he had in his hand. He did.

“Keep looking,” I said. “I’m taking this one in.” I swung the coiled hose over my shoulder.

“Got it,” he said.

I ran toward the house. The front door stood open, and I rushed in as Ryan passed me with a pail of water.

“We found a couple things we can use under the counter. The water is on,” Sommer said. The two deputies stood at the sink, filling the bucket.

“Here.” I went over with the hose, turned off the faucet, and attached the end to the sink.

“That’s not going to be long enough to get outside to the car,” the other deputy said. The name plate on his jacket read Wakkman. He was a short, husky man that looked to be in his later forties. A thick brown mustache hid his upper lip. “What should we do?” he asked. “Is that the only hose?”

“The Jason guy in the shed is looking for another,” I said.

I glanced out of the kitchen window, which faced the driveway and the fireball that was a car. “Open that,” I said.

Wakkman went to the window and tried lifting it. “Shit. Painted shut or sealed somehow,” he said.

I shook my head and made for the window, holding the other end of the hose. “Watch out,” I said. I slammed my elbow through the glass and knocked out the remaining shards with the back of my hand.

The two deputies stared at me.

“You guys already kicked in the front door. What difference is a window going to make?” I tossed the hose outside, kicked on the water at the sink, and walked out the front door as Ryan hurried back through the front with the empty bucket. “Where did you fill it?” I asked.

“The bathroom tub.”

“Keep filling buckets. Wakkman, Sommer, you guys run them back and forth.”

They all nodded.

“Come on,” Sommer said.

I ran outside and rounded the front of the house toward the car. The flames hadn’t subsided. With the end of the hose spilling water, I stuck my thumb over it and focused the spray at the sedan. Wakkman came with a full bucket thirty seconds later. Immediately after him, Sommer came with another.

Jason appeared from behind the house with a spraying hose. “I found a hose reel and a water faucet at the back,” he said.

“Spray it down. Focus on the heaviest flames.”

The two deputies jogged back and forth with buckets of water. I kept the hose at a steady stream. Within a few minutes, we had the flames knocked back, and in another ten minutes, the car was mostly out. The wreckage smoldered before us.

“That’s good!” I shouted.

Jason went to the back of the house and turned off his hose. The deputies and Ryan stopped their train of water.

I stared at the sedan. The only paint left was at the back of the trunk and the area around the front bumper. The roof was bare metal and had collapsed down into the passenger compartment. I heard the honk and siren of a fire truck in the distance. It came into view, following a red pickup.

Both vehicles neared the driveway. The red pickup truck parked at the street and let the fire engine pull in. The man inside the truck walked the driveway toward us.

“Sommer, what have we got?” he asked.

“Car fire. She’s mostly out now.” Sommer pointed at me. “This is Carl Kane. He’s law enforcement from Tampa. This is Ken O’Neil. He’s our local fire marshal.”