Gideon's Corpse

building fires. You’re going to love it when all this goes off—if you like explosions, that is.”

“I love explosions,” he said. “All kinds. In fact, one of the things I do at Los Alamos is design high-explosive lenses for nuclear implosion devices.”

Alida stared at him, what little friendliness there was leaving her face. “How awful. You design nuclear bombs?”

He hastily changed the subject. “I only mention it because what you’ve got here isn’t so different. I imagine all these pyrotechnics are connected to a central computer controller, which will fire them off in the right sequence.”

“That’s right. Once the sequence starts, they’d better be rolling, because there aren’t any retakes and there’s no turning back. If they miss the shot, a couple of million dollars’ worth of pyrotechnics are wasted, not to mention most of the set.” She slipped a pack of cigarettes from her breast pocket, shook one out, lit up.

“Um, should you be smoking here?”

“Absolutely not.” She exhaled a long stream of smoke in his direction.

“Let me have one.”

With a wry smile she slid one from her packet, lit it for him, flipped it, and inserted it between his lips.

A short, bowlegged, cranky-looking man with a shaved head came walking down the street on stubby legs, bawling in a megaphone. She held her cigarette behind her back and Gideon followed suit.

“Isn’t that—?”

“Claudio Lipari. The director. A real Nazi.”

Gideon noticed movement out of the corner of his eye and turned. A dozen sedans were arriving, bringing in a rolling cloud of dust, but instead of stopping in the parking lot they drove over the plastic tapes and continued on toward the town, fanning out as they came.

Lipari saw them. He stopped and stared, frowning.

“What’s going on?” Alida asked.

“Crown Vics,” said Gideon. “It’s law enforcement.”

The cars parked at the edges of town, surrounding the place. Doors opened and four men got out of each car—all wearing bulky blue suits leaving little doubt there was body armor underneath.

The director began walking toward the closest car, his face furious, waving them off with his arms and shouting, to no effect. The men in the blue suits came forward, spreading out, flashing their badges, moving in a well-coordinated action.

“Classic,” said Gideon. “They’re about to make an arrest. A big one.” Are they after Blaine?

“God, no,” said Alida. “Not right now.”

To his surprise, Gideon saw Fordyce get out of the lead car. The FBI agent seemed to be scanning the area. Gideon waved his hand; Fordyce saw him and began walking over. His face looked grim.

“Something’s wrong,” said Gideon.

“This is unbelievable. This can’t be about my father.”

Fordyce arrived, face red, brow furrowed.

“What going on?” Gideon asked.

“I need to talk to you in private. Come over here.” Fordyce pointed to Alida. “You move away, please.”

Gideon followed Fordyce away from Alida and the bustling main street. They walked over to a quiet area behind one of the false facades. Gideon could see wires everywhere and a scattering of flash pots. Fordyce had his weapon out.

“You’re making an arrest?” said Gideon.

Fordyce nodded.

“Who?”

The gun came up. “You.”

32

Gideon stared first at the pistol, and then at Fordyce. He glanced around and saw that, indeed, the blue suits were all in position, weapons drawn, blocking his avenues of escape.

“Me?” Gideon asked, incredulously. “What have I done?”

“Just turn around and put your hands on your head.”

Gideon did as he was told, the butt of the cigarette still burning in his mouth. Fordyce began patting him down, removing his wallet, penknife, and cell phone. “You’re quite the artist, aren’t you?” Fordyce said. “A master manipulator. You and your friend Chalker.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“You did a fine job of pretending to dislike the guy—and here it turns out you’re best buddies, in with him from the beginning.”

“I told you, I couldn’t stand the bastard—”

“Right. All that stuff on your computer—frigging jihadist love letters almost.”

Gideon’s mind was moving a mile a minute. The cluster-fuck had turned into a veritable orgy of incompetence. This was truly incredible.

“You really had me going,” Fordyce said. His voice had the bitter tone of a man betrayed. “That trip up to your cabin. Dinner and male bonding. And that sob story about your terminal illness. What a crock. This whole trip west was nothing but an intentional wild goose chase—I should have seen that on day one.”

Gideon felt a surge of furious anger. He hadn’t asked for this assignment. It had been forced on him. Already, he’d wasted a precious week of his life. And now this: he was probably going to spend the rest of his all-too-short life dealing with this bullshit—maybe even from the inside of a cell.

Screw ’em. What do I have to lose?

Fordyce finished patting him down. He grabbed one of Gideon’s upraised arms by the wrist, jerked it behind him, slapped on the handcuffs. He reached up to grab the other wrist.

“Wait. The cigarette.” Gideon plucked the smoldering butt from his lips—and tossed it into the flash pot adjacent to Fordyce.

It went off like a cannon, with a concussive boom that slammed both of them to the ground, followed by a huge outpouring of theatrical smoke.

Staggering to his feet, ears ringing, Gideon saw that his shirttail was on fire. The smoke engulfed them, swirling about in crazy billows. There was a sudden volley of shouts and cries.

He ran. Bursting out of the smoke bank, he saw Alida, back on her paint horse, staring at him. The blue suits were all beginning to converge—and their weapons were trained on him.

Another loud explosion took place, followed by a carronade of booms.

There was only one chance—one slim chance. He sprinted forward and leapt onto the back of Alida’s horse.

“Ride!” he yelled, jamming his heels into the horse’s flanks.

“What the hell—?” She reined in the horse.

But Gideon was on fire, and the horse, already spooked by the noise, wasn’t going to wait. With a snort of terror he bolted, galloping down the street toward the church.

For just a second, Gideon got a glimpse of Simon Blaine, framed in the doorway of the sheriff’s office, still as stone, looking at them with an indescribable expression on his face. Then Gideon began ripping off his burning shirt, popping all the buttons, searing his skin in the process while Alida screamed “Get off my fucking horse!” as she tried to get the panicked animal under control. Behind, he could hear another thunderous roar, followed by flash-booms, interspersed with shouting, the blue suits running this way and that, some racing for their cars, others pursuing him on foot. Now the entire town was starting to go up. People were fleeing in all directions, willy-nilly.

Alida swung back her fist and tried to bat him away, striking him in the chest, nearly dislodging him.

“Alida, wait—” he began.