It was dusk and night was falling rapidly. As was the rain that peppered the roof. Not a good night to be out in the elements but Buck saw it differently. If he could make the trees, the rain and wind would be his ally. Cover his sounds and movements and make him more difficult to track.
“When you headed out?” Jessie asked.
Dalton glanced at his watch. “Maybe half an hour.”
Jessie looked at Buck. “You got everything ready to go?”
“Mostly. I’ve got all the materials I’ll need stuffed into plastic trash bags. It’ll just be a matter of getting Dennie wrapped up and protected from the rain.”
“When we get back,” Dalton said, “it should be a quick deal to get him loaded up and hit the road.”
“This still isn’t a good idea,” Buck said. “All that movement and bouncing could make him bleed again.”
“Then you’ll have to be ready to fix it.”
Buck locked gazes with him. “Why not leave us here? Let me get him to the hospital? You guys can take off.”
Dalton took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “We’ve been through this. My brother ain’t going to prison and I ain’t leaving him behind.”
Buck hadn’t expected any other response but felt he should take one more shot at reasoning with Dalton. “So, if we’re heading out, why do you need these other guys? Why not just cut and run?”
“That’s what you and Dennie and one of the guys are going to do. I got some business to take care of around here.”
“Like what?”
“That ain’t none of your concern.” Dalton gave him a hard look. “Stick to your own business. I’ll take care of mine.”
Buck gave a quick nod, and stood. He rinsed his bowl and spoon in the sink and then began looking through the cabinets until he found what he wanted. Things he had seen earlier. Time to get the ball rolling, and set the stage. He removed the bottles of whiskey, vermouth, and bitters he had seen earlier and placed them on the counter.
“What’re you doing?” Dalton asked.
Buck opened the refrigerator and lifted a small jar of maraschino cherries from one of the door shelves. “Making a drink. I need one.”
“You think that’s smart?”
Buck turned toward him. “Nothing the last two days has been smart. Now I’m making a drink, unless you want to shoot me.” He stared at Dalton. “Or you could join me.”
“Sounds good to me,” Jessie said.
Dalton shrugged. “Why not.”
Buck removed three glasses and filled them with ice. He added the bourbon, the vermouth, and a splash of bitters.
“What’s that?” Jessie asked.
“A Manhattan. Sort of. This is bourbon and not rye, which I think makes a better one, and I don’t have any orange peel. But it should work.”
“I ain’t never had no Manhattan,” Jessie said.
“You’ll like it.” Buck added some cherry juice and a single cherry to each. He walked two of them to the table and placed one in front of each of them. “Enjoy.”
He then lifted his from the counter and took a swig. “Not bad.”
Dalton took a sip. “Interesting.” He took another. “Actually, it’s pretty good.”
“I saw some chicken broth in the cabinet,” Buck said. “I’m going to heat a little for Dennie.”
“I thought he couldn’t eat nothing,” Jessie said.
“He can’t. Not yet. But this is how we progress things after surgery. First sips of water and then broth. I’d give him Jell-O if we had any, but he needs the calories. He’s got a hard trip ahead of him.”
Dalton took another sip and leaned back in the chair. “I bet you’re a pretty good doctor.”
“I hope so,” Buck said. “For Dennie’s sake.”
CHAPTER 45
Cain and Harper returned to the Beverley B&B. It was eight, now dark outside. The rain continued, mostly light, punctuated with more intense waves. They each downed a couple of granola bars and a bottle of water while Cain called Mama B. His phone lay on the bed with the speaker function activated.
“You must be clairvoyant,” Mama B said. “I was getting ready to give you a call.”
“We must have sensed your bat signal was coming,” Harper said.
“You always seem to.”
“What’ve you got for us?” Cain asked.
“These hombres you asked about. They the ones who snatched the doctor and did all the killing down there?”
“Looks that way.”
“Well, they’re surely the type. Dalton Southwell seems to head the crew over in Memphis. He has a fairly long record. Multiple arrests for assault, a couple for possession, meth, and one rape allegation. Most got tossed. He did two months a few years back but that hardly seems much for a career like his.”
“I was afraid of that,” Cain said. “A guy with a violent history.”
“Of course, we expected that,” Harper added.
“It gets stickier,” Mama B said. “He’s apparently hooked up with a guy named Frank Campanella. Folks call him Frankie the Finger. Apparently if old Frankie fingers you, they never find your body. Suspected in a number of hits but none ever stuck. Seems he has a couple of judges in his pocket.”
“You thinking he might have had the Finley boy targeted?”
“I’m getting to that,” Mama B said. “Southwell’s crew consists of a half-dozen guys. Mainly his brother, Dennie Southwell, and another fine citizen named Jessie Parker. The trio supplies meth and marijuana, and some Oxy and black tar to several small-time dealers in central and eastern Tennessee. Including Tommy Finley, it seems.”
“And Tommy crossed the boss, Frankie, somehow?” Harper asked.
“I reached out to a friend at the DEA. She said she’d heard some chatter about a couple of Frankie’s dealers going rogue and hooking up with another supplier. She didn’t know who but the trail seemed to lead to the Knoxville area.”
“That fits with what we’ve uncovered here,” Cain said. “Our witness saw two men take the doctor. I suspect there was a third and he was
