The Falling Away (9 page)

But there were other favors he himself had to repay; such was the life of a man with a lot of business contacts.

He wasn't an importer, like Krunk down in Billings. Or an exporter, like Prince Edward up north of the border. Didn't specifically handle contraband merchandise at all. But those kinds of people were his best customers, because Andrew was . . . well, he was an information merchant, wasn't he? That's what his business was: buying, selling, exchanging information.

There were many, many people out there searching for the kind of information he could provide.

Dylan had called on him as a “cousin,” as a fellow Indian, to provide such services. He'd done as much. Probably saved the white boy's life. But when the two of them had walked out of the trailer, their transaction had ended.

Now Andrew had other information that could be shared. Could be sold.

He looked at his mobile phone. No service, even back in town. Probably because of the snow that was starting to fall—often, out here, he was lucky if he had one or two bars. He crawled out of his truck, went to the pay phone. Pay phones weren't all that bad. He rather liked using them every now and again, though they were something of an endangered species.

On the rez, though, pay phones were still vital links.

He picked up the black receiver, admiring the cold, solid heft of it in his hand, pulled a calling card out of his wallet, punched in the code, and connected.

13

Quinn was running her fingers over a needle embedded in the fleshy part of her stomach when the cell phone rang.

The ring was “Thus Spake Zarathustra,” the familiar tones of the music from that old movie
2001: A Space Odyssey
. Quinn loved that movie, loved the open, airy feel of it. At the beginning, the people in the space station floated, free from gravity, free from pressure.

Quinn grabbed the phone and flipped it open. “Yeah.”

“Quinn. How are you?”

When Andrew talked, Quinn always had the impression he was the only person in on some kind of joke; it was as if Andrew were always on the verge of laughing, even when he was trying to be serious. Wind blew into the mouthpiece of Andrew's phone, creating harsh bursts of static. Obviously, he was outside.

“What do you have, Andrew?”

Information, obviously; that's what Andrew's calls were always about.

“Right to the chase, Quinn. That's what I like about you. No great-weather-we're-having, just right into what-do-you-have.”

Quinn hadn't looked outside recently, but it had been snowing at last check. “We're not having great weather.”

Andrew's laugh sparkled on the line. Come to think of it, Andrew wasn't just on the verge of laughing all the time; he really did laugh all the time. Part of what made Andrew so interesting. Not trustworthy, of course, but interesting. Which made him a good source of information—Andrew always had an ear to the ground.

“You remember we talked about a mutual acquaintance,” Andrew said. “Dylan Runs Ahead.”

Quinn sat up straight. “I remember.” Actually, Quinn had about a dozen people across the state keeping tabs on Dylan Runs Ahead. The only chosen in Montana right now, and the first one Quinn had been asked to monitor. So far, HIVE didn't know who he was—even Dylan didn't know who he was—but he was becoming more mobile now. That brought in so many variables Quinn couldn't control.

“Told you I'd call if I heard from him,” Andrew said.

“And you did.”

“He left just now.”

“Great Falls?”

“Harlem. I'm over on the rez.”

Quinn had made the right call, tracking Greg to Great Falls and neutralizing him. But the timing was poor, because it had kept Quinn from tracking Dylan on his drug run, making sure he made it back to Billings without causing a ripple.

The fact that Andrew was calling meant there was a ripple now. Maybe even a wave.

“Tell me about it.”

“He called me out of the blue. Needed a bit of help. That's what I am, you know: a statewide help desk.”

She could hear his smile through the phone line. “What kind of help?”

“Showed up with a white guy. Needed some . . . medical assistance.”

“Medical assistance for what?”

“A gunshot wound.”

Alarms went off inside her head. “He got shot?”

“No, no, not Dylan. His buddy.”

Webb, the guy who had made the drug run with Dylan. This wasn't good; it meant Dylan and Webb would be on the run.

And often, people who ran ended up running into traps.

For several months Dylan had stayed quiet, confined to his home on the south side of Billings, popping his pills and sinking into oblivion.

Which had been simultaneously easy and aggravating. Easy because a man who never went anywhere, never did anything, was simple to keep out of trouble. Aggravating because knowing he was chosen made her impatient. So many times she had wanted to burst into his home, shake him, and tell him that he needed to make things happen, that being a chosen meant he was destined for big things.

But she couldn't do that. She couldn't activate a chosen; only God could. People inside the Falling Away had tried to enlist the chosen to their cause, and instead only caused their ruin. Sometimes the chosen were overrun by the disease before they could accept what they were. Sometimes they simply disappeared, unable to grasp what it all meant. Sometimes the chosen had killed themselves, seeking escape once they realized the full magnitude of what they represented.

Now Dylan was on the move. The drugs had gone from help to hindrance. A local dealer, guy by the name of Krunk, had sent Dylan and his friend out on an assignment in exchange for free scrip drugs.

Which had made her assignment much more difficult.

“You still there?” Andrew asked.

“Sorry. So what did you do with Dylan and his buddy?”

“I took them to see a friend named Couture.”

“And what's Couture's story?”

“He's a vet.”

“As in veteran, or veterinarian?”

Andrew laughed. “Both, actually. But he's a good Indian. Knows how to keep quiet. Too quiet, actually.”

Quinn sighed. Andrew always treated their conversations like a game.

“Okay, so what happened?”

“Couture patched up his buddy and sent them on their way.”

“That's it?”

“Yeah, that's pretty much it.”

“Nothing out of the ordinary? Nothing . . . strange . . . happened while you were there?”

“Other than a white boy with a gunshot wound getting treated by an Indian veterinarian?”

“Other than that.”

“Well, Couture had . . . kind of a bad reaction to Dylan.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don't know. Maybe not a bad reaction, but . . . scared. Yeah, that's it. Like he was scared.”

“Why, do you think?”

“Well, he kind of went a bit sixth sense on him. Said he was . . . what did he call it? Marked. Chosen.”

Quinn's face began to tingle. “Chosen?”

“Told Dylan bad people were gonna come after him.”

Quinn took a deep sigh. There were a small number of people who could sense the undercurrent of this world's physical reality. Many of them, like her, were part of the Falling Away. Those outside the Falling Away invariably succumbed to their neuroses and compulsions, never fully understanding why they felt driven to escape what they sensed. This Couture was obviously one of these anomalies.

“You've never talked about your friend Couture before.”

“Because he's not a friend. Just a business contact, you understand. I got more business contacts than friends. Part of my curse.”

“You said he's an Indian?”

Andrew laughed. “Yeah, Couture's an Assiniboine.”

Quinn nodded silently. “Dylan say anything about where he was headed?” she asked.

Another tittering laugh from Andrew. “Nah, but I bet he's headed back to Billings. Crawl into his hole.”

“How long ago did he leave?”

“Fifteen minutes, tops.”

Quinn wasn't so sure Dylan was headed to Billings, but she didn't have any better information to go on. If he was, Harlem was probably about eighty miles east of the cutoff at Eddie's Corner. Great Falls, where Quinn was still cleaning up after neutralizing Greg, was about eighty miles west. With any luck, Quinn might catch them there.

“Okay. Thanks, Andrew. What do I owe you?”

Andrew paused. “I'm thinking of a quid pro quo here. A
Quinn
pro quo.” A giggle at his own pun.

“Just spit it out, Andrew.”

“Let's just say, he might be carrying some cash.”

“You're thinking you might get some reward money out of this? That what you're getting at?”

“Yeah, yeah. Me being a good citizen and all.”

“I can probably swing a Good Citizenship Award.” Quinn had no intent of doing so, didn't care how much money was involved. But it was best to let Andrew think he'd been a good dog, that he had a nice juicy treat coming.

“Appreciate it.”

Quinn hung up the mobile, stared at it for a few moments.

Dylan Runs Ahead was running.

And Quinn would be running behind him.

14

Andrew wasn't done after hanging up with Quinn. Not at all. Information falls into your lap, you start working all the angles you can. He smiled, picked up the phone, dialed again.

“Hello?”

“Krunk, how you doing this fine morning?”

“What do you want, Andrew?”

“Oh, it's not what I want. I'm calling about something you might want.”

“What's that?”

“Dylan.”

Andrew noted a brief hesitation before Krunk answered. “What about him?”

“It seems Dylan and his buddy, whatever his name is, ran into a bit of trouble this morning. Think they might be . . . ah, what should I say? . . . a little scarce. They were working for you, I believe.”

“And what makes you say that?” Krunk asked.

Andrew felt his smile falter a bit. He'd expected an expletiveladen reaction from Krunk, not a quick game of Twenty Questions.

“Please,” he said, recovering. “A magician tells you how he does the trick, it kills all the magic.”

“Not interested.”

“Really?”

“Really. Dylan's not going anywhere. He knows better than to double back on me.”

“Well,” Andrew said, leaning back in his chair. “Your faith in Dylan is admirable.”

“Good-bye, Andrew.”

Andrew sat for a moment, listening to the connection drop after Krunk hung up.

Well. He'd miscalculated. Obviously, Krunk didn't value the information he'd been given. Bad move on Krunk's part.

Andrew scratched absently at his face for a few moments. Dylan was claiming he'd run into a bit of trouble. Obviously, a deal gone bad. Nature of the business; it happened sometimes. People decided they wanted to go into business on their own.

If Dylan and his buddy had walked away—even though his buddy had a gunshot wound—that meant whoever they'd met had
not
walked away. Dylan Runs Ahead, getting all entrepreneurial, decided to take the cash and drugs and disappear with them. Krunk didn't want to believe that, well, that was Krunk's own downfall. He'd always felt Krunk was a little too soft anyway. Someday that softness would kill him.

Well. His information was still just as valuable. Maybe even more valuable, whispered into other ears. Neither Dylan nor Krunk knew just how deep Andrew's network of information ran; no one really knew. For instance, though he didn't know the specifics of this morning's drop—other than the scattered bits Dylan had shared—he had a very good idea who had been on the other side.

Fine. He might be a red-skinned Indian, but he was also a red-blooded American. He'd given Krunk first crack, but he was an equal-opportunity broker. Time to make a call north of the border, see if the Canadians wanted to pay to play.

He punched in his call code again, dialed a new number from his memory. This time a rough, cracking voice answered.

“Prince Edward,” Andrew said through a smile.

Everyone in the trade called him Prince Edward, because he'd originally grown up on Prince Edward Island before relocating to British Columbia. Few people knew Prince Edward's real name, Andrew himself being one of those few.

“What's on your mind, Andrew?”

“Well, I've just seen a Very Bad Thing, and I feel a need to make a confession. I'm Catholic, you know. Most of us Indians are.”

“What sort of confession?”

“I must confess I heard that you had a delivery that was supposed to go south this morning. Trouble is, it
really
went south.”

“I ship a lot of merchandise, Andrew. You know that.”

“Yeah, well, this merchandise was scheduled for delivery over Port of Turner way. Let's just say your delivery service didn't absolutely, positively get the packages there. Shoulda used FedEx.”

The line was quiet for a few seconds. “Let me call you back.”

“Sure, sure. I'm not on my mobile right now, though. Let me give you the number.” He read the number off the faceplate of the phone, and Prince Edward hung up.

He considered another cigarette, then decided against it. Especially not out here in the wind, which would burn through the tobacco in just a few minutes. Really needed to cut down on the cancer sticks, anyway; these things would kill you.

Right now, Prince Edward would be trying to raise his two lackeys, putting out feelers for confirmation of their border transaction. He would get none.

Two minutes later the pay phone clattered with a sickly ring.

“Yes?”

“Andrew. I checked my records, and I don't have confirmation those packages were delivered. I'm listening.”

“Yes, yes, of course. Matter of fact, I happen to know the packages have been intercepted by an alternate delivery service, but they . . . well, I can't say they'll get it to the place you're going. Not very reliable themselves.”