Free Fire

“If my banker doesn’t confirm that the transfer has been made within twenty-four hours, I call in the FBI. Simple as that. If they want to negotiate, it’s the same as saying the deal is off. No more delays, no more Plan B’s. Tell them,” McCann said.

“Tell who?” Layborn asked weakly.

The lawyer rolled his eyes and snorted. “Too late for that. I can tell you know exactly what I’m talking about, and you know exactly who to talk to. Why pretend you don’t? It’s just us pals now, Ranger. Just us buddies. And we’ll all get rich, won’t we? In the meanwhile, I want you to personally start working on transferring me out of here to a federal facility. I’ve spent more than enough time in the Yellowstone jail.”

Layborn shook his head. His face was pale. “All hell has broken loose out there,” he said, mumbling. “You’ve got no idea what’s happened in the last twelve hours. That game warden and the ranger, they’ve done all kinds of damage.”

McCann thought this was interesting. The game warden? What was it with that guy? Suddenly, he knew who had been watching him the day before. The game warden should have gone away by now, it seemed. The park was about to close, and he was just a state employee. His business card wasn’t all that impressive, after all.

“I really don’t care,” McCann said after a moment. “I’ve got more important matters to contend with. So do you, I suspect. And so do your bosses, although I’m sure you’d rather I call them your business partners. I hope they’re smarter now than they’ve been so far, don’t you? They need to forget about some stupid game warden and think about me. Me.”

Layborn looked up. “The whole world doesn’t revolve around Clay McCann, you know.”

McCann arched his eyebrows, said, “Actually, right now it does. You forget, I’m free to go. All I have to do is walk outside and talk to the first reporter I see. I know they’re out there, Ranger. Imagine what a scoop I can provide! It’ll make the story of the Zone of Death and my first incarceration here seem like small potatoes.”

Layborn took a long breath, then blew it out. His shoulders slumped; he looked beaten down.

McCann thought, That was easy.

For the first time in two days, he allowed himself to visualize himself on that beach with a drink in hand, millions in his account,a girl at his side. Not Sheila, though. Too bad, he thought, he was really starting to like her. Killing Sheila was the only thing he really felt bad about.

25

Like any family on vacation in yellowstone National Park, the Picketts did the sights. First the Upper, then the Lower Loop; Yellowstone Falls; Hayden Valley; Fishing Bridge; Old Faithful (where they ate cheeseburgers for lunch in the snack bar because Old Faithful Inn was closed); FountainPaint Pots. Winter was held off for yet another day althoughit didn’t even attempt to hide its dark intentions anymore, and the weather was cool and clear. Pockets of aspen performed maudlin Technicolor death scenes on the mountain-sides,and brittle dry leaves choked the small streams and skitteredacross the road with breaths of wind. Sheridan and Lucy were delighted with the park, Marybeth was cautiously relaxed.Oncoming fall brought out the wildlife. Sheridan kept track of The Animal Count in a spiral notebook, noting elk (twenty-four), coyotes (one), bald eagles (two), moose (one), wolves (two), trumpeter swans (seven), Ridiculous-Looking Tourists (five), and buffalo (eighty-nine and counting). Lucy claimed to have seen a bear but it turned out to be a tree stump, thus was docked ten points in Sheridan’s counting system, which she seemed to be making up as they drove along to ensurethat she would win.

Marybeth played referee and awarded Lucy five points back for “looking cute,” despite Sheridan’s protests.

Joe tried to join in, tried to relax, but he felt like an impostor. The.40 Glock was clipped to his belt and was uncomfortable. He felt his heart race every time he saw another vehicle, and his palms broke out in a sweat at the sight of a dark one.

At norris geyser basin, the girls ran ahead on the boardwalk.Joe and Marybeth dawdled, holding hands, letting them get ahead.

“Your heart’s not in this, is it?” she asked him once the girls were far enough ahead not to hear the conversation.

“It’s not that,” Joe said. “I really want them to have a good time. I want you to have a good time. This is such a great place.”

“You’re wound tight,” she said. “I feel like if I let go of your hand, you’d unravel. Is it because your father is here somewhere?”

He tried to laugh but it sounded like a cough. “It’s not about my father. Well, maybe a little. He’s a distraction, but that’s all he is.”

“Cold,” she said.

“He’s nothing to me. I don’t want him involved in our girls’ lives, or in ours. I don’t want them to even meet him.”

“It might be unavoidable.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“And that’s not all, is it?”

“Nope.”

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed,” she said softly. “You’ve got your gun with you even though you’re trying to hide it, and you keep checking the rearview mirror to make sure Nate’s Jeep is still behind us.”

“You saw him back there, huh?”

“I don’t miss much.”

They walked along in silence, until Joe said, “It’s hard to believeso many bad things can happen in such a good place.”

“Stay strong, Joe.”

“I’m trying,” he said. “There’s so much going on, and so littleI’m able to change or figure out. I want Judy to recover. I want my father to recover. I want to know what causes a flamer, who killed Mark Cutler, and why Clay McCann assassinated six people. I want to talk to Chuck Ward and make sure the governor is still engaged and that I’m still employed. And I want to talk to you alone, and to Nate. He’s hovering, as you know. He knows something and he’s waiting for the right opportunityto tell us.”

Marybeth nodded toward Sheridan and Lucy, who had paused at the railing to stare into the depths of a hot pool. Lucy shouted for them to hurry up so they could see the bones deep in the water. After seeing Cutler’s body, Joe didn’t think he wanted to see any more bones.

“We’re not here at the best time, are we?” she said.

Joe pulled her close. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. Havingyou and the girls here helps me focus. But after what happenedlast fall. .”

“Enough,” she said, but squeezed his arm in appreciation.

He said, “So I hope you don’t mind that I slipped the desk guy Simon fifty bucks before we left this morning and asked him to move all our stuff to another cabin during the day but not to reflect it on the register. I know that sounds paranoid. .”

“Yes, it does, but I appreciate it.” She looked up at him, smiled. “I hope we can find a little time together before I have to get the girls back.”

He laughed. “Me too.”

“But we have these darned girls with us.”

“You’re the cleverest person I know,” Joe said. “You’ll think of something.”

“Where there’s a will,” she said, letting her hand slip from the small of his back into the back pocket of his Wranglers.

“You haven’t said much about your mother lately,” Joe said. “Are things going okay?”

They drove on the road that connected the upper and lower loop toward the headwaters of the Gibbon River. Joe had noted how pleasant it looked a few days before when he passed, and noted trout rising in the evening. He thought Sheridan and Lucy might like to try fly-fishing there, although both were napping in the car at the