SHATTERED (16 page)

Why was he acting so odd? How had he gone from the lover of the night before to this hard-to-read, all-too-typical guy? Was it her fault? And why had she insisted on accompanying him when it was clear he’d rather she didn’t? In the back of her mind, she asked herself a question: Was it possible she’d made the error of mistaking sex for genuine feeling? Mistaking passion for compassion?

Or was Nate rediscovering his old self, the cop under his skin, and with that, his swagger? And if that were true, perhaps it was also possible he was beginning to reexamine his severed relationship with his fiancée. Perhaps letting her go now seemed a huge mistake he needed to rectify.

She dug in her purse when they stopped for gas and Nate got out to stretch his legs. The whole stack of Johnny’s letters came out and with it, a much folded and unfolded piece of paper she recognized as having been wrapped around the storage-garage key. She was about to stuff it back in her handbag when she saw writing on one side.

“What’s that?” Nate asked as he climbed back in behind the wheel of the rental.

“A name. Morris Denton, with
Seattle
written under it followed by a question mark. What do you suppose that means?”

“Is that the missing page from the notebook?”

“It looks like it. It was wrapped around the key I found in Dad’s safe. I’m so stupid. I should have recognized it, but this is the first time I really looked at it.” She handed the paper to Nate.

“I have no idea why he’d include Seattle unless Denton is from there or was going there. We’ll get Gallant to check on it tonight.” He gestured at the letters still in her lap. “What are those?”

She looked him in the eyes. “Johnny wrote me these before we were married.”

“That’s what you went to the garage to get,” he said.

“Yes. I wanted to read them again.”

“You really loved him, didn’t you?” he asked her.

She nodded. “I really did. I’m funny that way. When I give my heart, I give my heart.”

“I’m sorry I pried,” he said, starting the truck, and from the tone of his voice, it was clear the letters held little interest for him. Sarah took a deep breath and thanked her lucky stars. If he’d asked why they were important to her, she would have told him, and now was not the time—not when things had gotten so strange between them. She stuffed the letters back in her purse right as a road sign announced Helena just ahead.

Chapter Sixteen

The town of Helena was home to a small college, which considerably boosted its wintertime population. And on this chilly Monday afternoon, the one-way street leading into town was jammed with traffic. Even the sidewalks were crowded, and everyone moved in the same direction toward the center of town.

“This is Union Street,” Sarah announced as they crawled along. “It leads to Memorial Plaza, and if I remember correctly from the one and only time I’ve ever been here, there’s a big old statue of George Washington right smack in the middle. I never put the two together before.”

“Washington Memorial,”
Nate whispered, his gut sending signals again. “This is it. Something is going to happen here.” He stopped for a group of people who were crossing the street and added, “Where is everybody going?”

“Judging from the red-white-and-blue banners, I’d say a parade or something. Look, the road is blocked off up ahead.”

Nate followed behind a trolley until he saw a sign directing him to a makeshift parking lot and pulled out of the traffic. “We’d better walk from here,” he said as he turned off the engine. “Are you up to it? Maybe you should stay in the truck.”

“Why do you keep trying to get rid of me?” she snapped. “What’s gotten into you?”

“I don’t want you to get killed,” he grumbled as he slipped Mike’s old leather notebook into the breast pocket of his jacket. He wasn’t proud of the childish way his emotions were getting the best of him. If something happened to her that he could prevent and he somehow missed the mark, like he had on Labor Day with those kids, he’d never forgive himself. He’d never make it back to anything approaching normal. For both their sakes, he wanted to park her in a steel vault until this was over.

“I’m a big girl, Nate,” she said as she took his hand, clenching it in hers and tugging slightly for effect. He stopped to look down at her, but the crowd swept them up and they moved with everyone else toward the town square.

Helena’s elevation was lower than Shatterhorn’s, hence the pavement was clear of snow and nearly empty. As they staked out a piece of curbside real estate, a chill wind carried the sound of an approaching brass band. Across the road, Nate could see the grassy square and the top of Washington’s head. His pulse raced as he looked for anything amiss.

Within minutes, everyone seemed to turn in unison to watch the distant corner with murmurs of expectation. As the music grew louder, two brown quarter horses made the turn, their riders carrying the state and national flags.

The crowd cheered as the horses, followed by the Helena High School Tigers band, pranced by. A float complete with three young women draped in period clothes topped with fur coats, as well as two guys dressed as Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, came after the band. The girls waved like prom queens while the guys looked embarrassed and cold. A dozen or so kids riding decorated bikes and so bundled in parkas their own mothers probably couldn’t tell them apart followed the float. A half dozen brave girls in brief uniforms twirling batons preceded the next float, which featured a seated woman hand sewing the Stars and Stripes—à la Betsy Ross—onto a huge flag. Every so often she reached into a sack and threw a handful of candy to the kids.

Nate grew increasingly anxious. This was exactly the kind of venue these “random” shooters had been choosing—crowded, everyday Americana events, complete with families and celebration, as though the whole point was to underscore that no one was safe, not at school or in a library or on a beach. He looked back at the parade as an open car drove by. Two men were seated in the backseat, and by the banners affixed to the door, Nate figured out one was the mayor of Helena and the other was the governor of Nevada. Nate was kind of surprised Bliss wasn’t in the car with them.

He tore his gaze away from the men and went back to scanning the crowd. A few minutes later, his heart leaped into his throat as he recognized a face in among the strangers.

He grabbed Sarah’s arm, propelling her forward with him lest he lose sight of his target. “Go get the police.”

“Why?”

He tore his gaze away from the opposite side of the street. “I just saw Jason Netters. I have to follow him.” Nate began walking again, aware Sarah was close behind. He apologized to an older woman as he sidled past her, moving faster than the parade now, out in front of the horses in an effort not to lose sight of Jason.

“I’m coming with you.”

He glanced down at her again. “Go find help,” he pleaded. “Tell them anything you can think of to get this crowd dispersed. I have to keep up with Jason.”

“Where’s he going? Can you tell?”

“It looks like he’s headed to the end of the parade route.”

He ran off, not pausing to look back. He had to find Jason and stop him before it was too late.

* * *

S
ARAH
LOOKED
AROUND
desperately for someone in a uniform, and when she finally spotted an officer working crowd control, she hurried to speak to him, her leg throbbing in protest.

The man was several inches taller than she was, and the noise of the crowd drowned out her voice. Plus, he was involved in another situation and was only paying her cursory attention. When he turned the opposite direction to control a horde of little kids, she grabbed his arm, and he turned to face her, annoyed now that she’d interfered with him.

“A guy wanted for questioning in the shooting death of a man in Shatterhorn this morning has been sighted on his way to the end of the parade,” she explained breathlessly. “Is there a gathering down there?”

“Yeah,” he said, shooing the kids back.

“Get on your radio and tell the others to be alert. There’s reason to suspect this person is armed and might be getting ready to fire into the crowd.”

“Are you serious?” he asked.

“Dead serious.”

“What’s his name?”

“Jason Netters. About eighteen, blond, medium sized.”

“That describes two-thirds of this town,” he said, but he was fingering his radio as he spoke. “And who are you?”

“It doesn’t matter who I am. Please, do something. I have to go.”

* * *

A
CONGESTED
BARRICADE
at the end of the sidewalk directing pedestrians to cross the street and continue down toward a park Nate could see through the trees caused him to lose sight of Jason. He crossed with everyone else, keeping his gaze peeled for a glimpse of the boy, but Jason wasn’t a big guy and he wasn’t particularly distinctive.

Wait—he’d been wearing a green camouflage-type coat. Those were hardly rare in rural Nevada, but at least it gave Nate something to be on the lookout for.

Checking the street, he saw the parade was now making its way to the park, where bleachers were beginning to fill with people. He, along with two dozen others, got stuck behind the last float, and by the time Nate made it to the park, the car with the dignitaries had come to a halt. The governor and Helena’s mayor were in the process of climbing up to a platform where a podium had been situated. There was no sign of Mayor Bliss, which seemed odd. The band launched into another march song and people cheered. The noise and confusion made concentrating that much harder. Where was Jason?

He caught a glimpse of the back of a head covered with straw-colored hair and took off after him. Three minutes later, he touched the guy’s shoulder. A man spun around and raised his eyebrows. He was ten years too old. “Something wrong, pal?” he asked.

“Sorry,” Nate said. He made his way back to the bandstand and climbed up three or four levels. Since the park sat on a slight incline from the town, it gave a panoramic view of things. Nate scanned the almost deserted streets and saw nothing and no one suspicious. Turning his head, he caught traffic and a glimpse of movement headed toward a freeway underpass not too far away. He kept staring until two figures emerged from some deep shadows and came briefly into view before disappearing again.

One guy had buzz-cut silver hair and wore a long coat; the other one wore a camouflage jacket. The mayor and Jason walking together, Jason’s hand on the mayor’s arm as though forcing him to come along, the mayor’s gait stiff and labored.

Nate jumped off the bleachers and started winding his way out of the park in the general direction of the freeway, his eyes peeled for some sign that Sarah had managed to find a cop. No such luck. For a second, he thought about returning to the stands to warn people, but warn them about what? If Jason’s goal was to conduct a random shooting into the crowd, he wouldn’t be taking the mayor the opposite direction, would he? And panicking a large group of people could lead to a stampede and trampling.

For about the fortieth time since leaving Arizona, Nate wished he’d kept his badge and his gun. Who had he been trying to kid? He was who and what he was—a deputy, plain and simple. He didn’t want to sit behind a desk as sheriff. He didn’t want to spend his life hiding on his ranch. He just wanted to be a decent lawman again, but this going at it through the back door was crazy. At least Sarah wasn’t in the middle of it for a change, and that was something to be thankful for.

The noise of the crowd behind him quickly began to fade, but traffic picked up and cars sped by on the road to his left. Nate stopped running after a few minutes in order to slow down and look around. Where had the two men gone?

The sky had clouded over, the shadows under the overpass ahead deep and dark. Nate stopped altogether and stood with his back against a signpost, listening. A car whizzed by followed by another car, and as the noise of their engines drifted away, Nate heard a voice coming from the dark part of the overpass.

“Come to your senses, son,” the mayor said, his tone reasonable and calm. “Shooting me won’t bring back your father.”

“I’m not your
son,
” Jason said. In contrast to the mayor’s voice, the boy’s reply was raspy and raw with emotion.

Nate peered into the gloom and saw the flash of metal. There were two men in there. How did he approach them? They’d see and hear him the moment he got closer.

Headlights coming from the other direction were mounted high enough to announce they belonged to a large semitruck. Nate looked off to his right and glimpsed a subtle path etched into the dirt leading up the embankment and under the overpass. He pictured a shelf of sorts where people with nowhere better to be waited out rain and snow. Using the roaring noise of the approaching truck as cover, he scrambled up the dirt trail, and sure enough, erupted onto a narrow ledge littered with cast-off garbage. He hunkered down and considered his options.

He was now directly above the two men, whose voices were still drowned out by the sound of the retreating truck. They were standing on a very wide sidewalk, facing each other. Jason was holding a gun close to his own body, pointed at the mayor’s chest.

Nate knew he had one chance to get this right. He had to throw himself down the ten feet of slope, hit Jason dead-on and knock the gun out of his hand. He knew the moment the kid became aware of Nate’s presence, instinct would guide his next move. He would turn his weapon and fire without hesitation.

“You don’t get it, do you?” the mayor was saying as Nate’s muscles bunched in his legs.

“I get it,” Jason said. “I just don’t want any more. I can’t do it.” He reached out and shoved the mayor, who stumbled backward.

Another car was coming, and once again, Nate used the distraction to cover himself. He started down the slope. When he saw Jason’s head begin to turn, he launched himself into the air. A second later, he collided with the boy, who folded under the impact of Nate’s body.

For a second, they struggled, then Nate wrangled away the gun. He stood, keeping the kid under cover, breathing heavy from exertion and adrenaline. His hat had flown off in the attack and lay in the middle of the road. The mayor had stumbled backward after Jason’s shove and now stared at the boy, his face red beneath the tan, his eyes all but popping out of his head, the tendons in his neck bulging.

“You okay?” Nate hollered as a car roared by, its tires flattening his hat.

The mayor limped toward him, heavily favoring his right leg. With a start, Nate realized this was the first time he’d seen the man stand since getting to town. “Thanks to you,” he said.

“Stop him!” Jason shouted, still on the ground.

Nate’s brow furled. “‘Stop him’? What are you talking about?”

“He shot my dad,” Jason said, sitting up now, holding his head.

“You can’t believe that,” Bliss said. “The boy is obviously crazy.”

“I’m not,” Jason said, and for the first time this trip, he met Nate’s gaze with his own. He got to his feet, lurching a little, unsteady, rubbing his chin, then he turned his attention to the mayor. “You shot Dad because I told him who you really are. He went to work early. He said he was going to call you and demand you come talk to him. And you shot him, you bastard!”

The mayor looked at Nate’s hand. “Give me his gun.”

Nate clutched the weapon tighter. “The police will show up here sooner or later. We’ll let them figure this out.”

“This isn’t any of your business,” Bliss said.

Nate glanced at Jason again. “What exactly did you tell your father?”

It took Jason a few moments to speak. Tears streamed down his face and his voice trembled. “Dad said he was going up to B-Strong to interview Morris Denton. I told him the truth. Horrible things.”

“You’re not making sense,” the mayor said. He’d moved to within four feet of Nate and Jason.

“Morris is a doper,” Jason said.

“Watch what you say about people,” Bliss hissed.

“You really run the camp,” Jason continued, his voice icy calm. “You choose people to do what you want. You chose me. Today was my turn. I was supposed to shoot into the crowd, keep my bullets low so little kids would get it in the head and adults in the gut. You said—”

The mayor struck fast, hitting Jason in the face with his fist, knocking the boy to the ground. The action jarred Bliss’s body and he wheeled away. A truck drove by and Nate caught a momentary glance of startled faces. No doubt they thought there was some sort of drunken brawl going on. Good—maybe they’d call the police.