And then went ahead and rigged it with a transmitter and detonating device, just for the hell of it? Some random truck parked on the side of the road?
Yeah, right, that makes a lot of sense.
Lightstone mentally put the past day's events in chronological order.
Bobby finds an old coot wandering around his ranch supposedly looking for Bigfoot who offers to sell him a genuine Apache Indian hunting charm. We show up at Bobby's place for dinner. Susan tells us about the old coot. Bobby and I meet him at the pancake house the next morning. Then the old guy takes me to meet a very attractive woman who seems unsure of her name and who has an overgrown house cat for a pet. The goons show up the next morning, one of them wearing a bear-claw necklace, looking for their letter, and get seriously pissed at the woman when it's not there. And I end up out in the woods with a truck rigged to squeal… or blow, depending.
So what kind of trail is that?
And more importantly, what do I do now?
That's reasonable.
And explainable.
And useful.
The big cardboard sign in the shop window said CLOSED, and the small block lettering on the inside of the window confirmed that 5:30 was the customary closing hour.
I need to do something that makes sense, maintains my cover, and allows me to put Bravo and Charlie Teams on notice.
And something that allows me to move about, communicate, and track back on these characters.
But at the same time, something that nobody really expects me to do.
Henry Lightstone blinked.
A helpful, smiling face appeared before his eyes.
And at that moment, he knew exactly what he was going to do.
The owner had closed the shop at five-thirty as advertised, but business was slow this time of year, he explained when he noticed Henry and opened the door. Besides, his wife never had dinner ready until seven at the earliest, so he certainly didn't mind opening up again for a serious customer.
Lightstone assured him he was quite serious.
The new models tempted him, but the image was all wrong, so he reluctantly shifted his attention to the used ones the owner displayed in the back of the store.
'What's the story on this one?' Lightstone pointed to a red-and-white Honda with visible dents in the gas tank and numerous gouges and scrapes on the fenders, exhaust, and chrome.
'That's a real sweet little machine. Honda XR 250L. Five years old, thirty-two thousand and change on the odometer. Owned by a real nice local fellow who used to play around with it on weekends. Rode it hard, but took real good care of it. But then one night he took it to a bar, had a couple beers too many, wound up in a ditch, and decided he'd probably live a whole lot longer if he stuck with four-wheeled vehicles.'
'Smart man.'
'Yeah, I guess that's pretty much what his wife said, too, among other things. Anyway, my son — who's a pretty decent bike mechanic — took it all apart. He says the bike's solid, no internal damage, just looks a little rough around the edges. I've listed it at twenty-five hundred for quite a while now, but as you can see, it's still here.' The owner looked thoughtful for a moment. 'Guess I could let her go for twenty-one,' he offered hopefully.
'What would you say to twenty-five hundred even for the bike, plus one of those used leather jackets, a pair of halfway decent leather gloves, like maybe that pair in the display case, and one of those new two hundred-dollar Bell helmets?'
'I'd say 'cash, check, or charge?'' The shop's proprietor grinned broadly.
'Cash, if you don't mind.' Lightstone withdrew the nylon pouch from behind his back and counted out twenty- five one-hundred-dollar bills. 'I'm not much for credit cards or checking accounts,' he explained as he pushed the pile across the counter. 'Lot easier to keep track of your money when you can actually see and feel it.'
'A man after my own heart.' The owner quickly recounted the notes, his sharp eyes automatically noting the worn condition of the bills and the widely varying serial numbers. 'Tell you what,' he looked even more cheerful once he dropped the folded bills into the safe slot under the cash register, 'why don't you pick out your jacket, gloves, and helmet while I work out a receipt, and we'll get you and that Honda on your way.'
At nearly eight o'clock that evening, the woman was clearing the last of the tables when she heard a motorcycle rumble into the parking lot.
She glanced up through the screen door and vaguely noticed the dark, leather-jacketed figure stepping onto the porch with his helmet in hand.
'Don't turn everything off yet, Danny. Looks like we've got one more customer,' she called out to the cook. She continued wiping the last table with her back to the door while the motorcycle rider entered the dining area and pulled out a chair.
'Welcome to the Dogsfire Inn,' she greeted him without looking up. 'Be with you in just a second.'
'No hurry,' the rider replied.
The sound of his voice caused her to freeze. Then Karla turned slowly and stared at him for a good ten seconds.
'Never mind, Danny,' she called out toward the kitchen. 'Go ahead and shut down.' Then she walked slowly toward Henry Lightstone.
'Does that mean dinner's out of the question?' Lightstone asked.
'I thought…' She stopped and shook her head. 'I thought we decided we all needed to cool off for a while. You, me, Sasha, your macho playmates.'
'I don't know about anyone else, but I'm so cooled off right now, what I really need is to thaw out.' Lightstone gestured toward the helmet, leather jacket, and gloves resting on the nearby chair. 'And those yahoos weren't my playmates. I never saw either one of them before today.'
'Do you do that a lot?'
'What?'
'Make such violent first impressions on people?' Her gold-flecked green eyes locked onto his.
The covert agent met her gaze squarely. 'I was raised in a fairly strait-laced household. My mom insisted I say 'yes, ma'am' and 'no, ma'am,' and be polite to my elders, you know, help ladies cross the street whether they really need help or not.'
He deliberately emphasized the word 'ladies' just to see how she'd react. When he saw her hand ball into a fist, then almost immediately relax, he figured he had his answer.
'You ever call me 'ma'am' again, or try to help me cross a street, you're going to be picking up your teeth,' Karla warned. 'But as long as we're on the topic of your mother's influence, did she also teach you to break people's wrists when you get into conflicts?' She looked at him suspiciously.
'That was my dad's influence,' he admitted, trying not to notice the way her hips flared out from her trim waist.
Uh-oh, watch yourself. You don't know who she is, or how she's related to the guy with the funny eyes… or why this is the drop point, he reminded himself.
'Dad believed in being polite, too, up to a point.' Lightstone spoke cheerfully, hoping to diffuse her suspicions as well as his own, increasingly physical, thoughts.
'And then what?' She continued looking more defiant than amused.
'You stand your ground,' Henry replied, making it quite clear he didn't intend to budge an inch in that particular situation either, in spite of how much his plan depended on her cooperation.
'I see.'
Karla stared down at her interlaced fingers for a few moments. 'You know, back in junior high my girlfriends and I used to get a kick out of watching the younger boys — probably kids just like you — in the playground standing up to the older boys — probably kids just like those two this morning.'
'Let me guess. The younger ones usually got their butts stomped?'
Karla nodded her head solemnly, 'just about every time.'
'Did you or your girlfriends ever notice that after one of the younger boys finally managed to win one — or at
