Nathan said nothing.
“I wouldn’t agree to your involvement unless I knew exactly who you two were.”
“Understood,” Nathan said. “I would’ve played it the same way.”
“Not many would’ve survived what you went through.”
“I did the best I could under the circumstances.”
They were silent for a few seconds. Billy’s shovel clanked on metal.
“You don’t have many friends,” she said.
He kept his voice low so Billy couldn’t hear him. “Just Harv.”
“I don’t either. You didn’t seriously hurt them in there, did you?”
“Not really.”
“Did you want to?”
“No.”
“We should get up to that cabin.”
“Let’s play this out. A few more minutes won’t make or break things. James Ortega’s been missing for over a week.”
Henning retuned and joined them. “What have we got?”
“We’re about to find out,” she said.
Billy was just finishing the dig. On his knees, he cleared the last of the dirt away with his hands. He looked up.
Holly told him to pull the first one out slowly.
“Could be a gun in one or more of them,” Nathan said.
“Agreed.”
Billy did as he was told. He reached into the hole, tore the plastic garbage bag away, and tugged one of the handles. He hefted the ammo can out and set it on the ground. It was matte-green and about the size of a large shoe box. Nathan read the five lines of yellow stenciled lettering and knew the can used to hold a disintegrating link of one hundred, armor-piercing, incendiary, fifty-caliber rounds with every fifth round being a tracer.
Billy looked up and squinted against the flashlight beams.
“Pull the others out,” Holly said, “and place them five feet apart with their latches facing us. Stand behind the one on your left, reach over the top, and pull its lid open. Do it slowly.”
Nathan knew that wasn’t going to work, but didn’t say anything. To open an ammo can like that, especially one that had been buried, you had to hold the carrying handle below its latch with one hand and yank the latch cover with the other hand. Unless it was filled with ammunition weighing it down, it would take two hands. He also saw dried sealant, probably silicon, under the rims of the lids. As predicted, Billy struggled with the can. Every attempt he made to lift the hinged cover didn’t work. The entire can lifted into the air. He wasn’t getting the necessary leverage.
“May I?” Nathan asked.
She nodded.
“Step away, Billy,” Nathan said as he holstered his gun. He walked forward and showed Billy the exact technique needed to open the can. “It takes two hands, like this.” He grabbed the carrying handle with his left hand and grabbed the latch cover mechanism with his other. “You have to give it a quick tug in opposite directions.” He stepped back and crouched down.
Holly and Henning followed suit. Billy grabbed the ammo can like he’d been shown and gave the latch a yank. The lip popped open. Billy stared straight down into its contents. “Oh, man.”
“Open the others,” Holly said.
Five seconds later all three ammo can were open. Billy couldn’t take his eyes off the contents.
“Move away, Billy. On the ground again.”
Billy didn’t comply. He just stood there, licking his lips.
“Back away, Billy, on the ground. Do it right now,” she said more forcefully.
The three of them walked forward and looked down. Staring up at them were bundles of used bills. Lots of them. Stacked upright in two rows along each can’s long axis, the bundles were a near-perfect fit. The distinctive smell of greenbacks scented the air.
Henning let out a low whistle.
Nathan crouched down and pulled a bundle from each can. The middle can held stacks of one-hundred dollar bills and the other two cans held stacks of twenties. Each stack was about half-an-inch thick and secured with a rubber band. Probably one-hundred bills. Nathan counted the bundles. There were twenty-two stacks of one- hundred dollar bills and forty-four stacks of twenties. Nathan ran the calculation. “Two hundred-twenty plus eighty- eight. That’s… three hundred and eight grand, assuming that each of those bundles contain one-hundred notes of the same denomination.”
“Incredible,” Holly whispered. “You think they have stashes like this in other locations?”
“Count on it,” Nathan said. “I’m going to check on my partner.” Ten feet from the front door, Nathan stopped and issued a whistle. He received the same whistle from inside. He found Harv sitting on the chair, facing Knife. “Billy wasn’t lying about the money.”
“How much?”
“Just over three hundred grand.”
“Nice little stash.”
“Yep.”
“What now?”
Nathan looked at Knife. “After you and your brother change into dry clothes, you’re taking us up to that cabin.”
Fifteen minutes after the discovery of the buried cash, a caravan of three FBI sedans was ready to leave Sacramento and motor toward the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The ammo cans were locked in Holly’s trunk. Larry Gifford and two SWAT team members had arrived with two additional vehicles, one of them designed for transporting perps in custody. There was no way to know what to expect up there, so the extra firepower was a prudent call on Holly’s part. The SWAT agents were dressed in black overalls, but they hadn’t donned their SWAT gear yet. There wasn’t a need until they arrived at the cabin. Gifford, who he’d met at the Bridgestones’ compound, wore blue jeans and a navy-blue golf shirt. Like Holly and Henning, his gun belt held a standard-issue Glock 22, two spare magazines, and a set of handcuffs. He looked a lot different out of SWAT gear, but he had the same intense expression Nathan remembered when they’d first met.
Nathan and Harv shook hands with Larry Gifford and the two SWAT team members. Nathan was pretty sure these were the same SWAT agents who’d made the leapfrog approach to them yesterday. It made sense. They had already seen Nathan and Harv and already knew of their involvement.
“Special Agents Collins and Dowdy, if I recall,” Nathan said, pumping their hands, “but I don’t know who’s who.”
Holly smiled.
Henning glared.
“We’ve got a long drive ahead of us, let’s get moving,” Holly said.
An awkward moment followed.
Nathan looked at Harv for several seconds, but said nothing.
“I’ll… ride with Gifford,” Harv said. “If that’s okay.”
“Come on, then,” Gifford said to Harvey. The two SWAT guys exchanged a glance before sliding into the rear seats of Gifford’s sedan. Harvey climbed in next to Gifford.
Henning secured the Bridgestone cousins into the rear of the transport sedan and got behind the wheel. Nathan slid into Holly’s sedan. Ten seconds later, all three vehicles were headed down the road with Henning’s sedan in the lead.
Nathan settled in for the long drive into the mountains by sliding his seat back as far as it would go and reclining it slightly. He wasn’t sure what to expect conversation-wise. She was, after all, a complete stranger. Might as well start with an observation.
