Chapter 4

“She just came out of her apartment,” Ron Verwalde reported into his mobile phone. “She has another woman with her.” He briefly described the woman he saw walking with Karena.

“I believe that’s Donna, her roommate from college,” Dan Starney answered. “I take it that means she won’t be calling me back. So, can I lean on you, since she isn’t going to help me get out of this jam? I’m going to need to move. She probably made good on her threat to tell the police everything she knows. I’m going to ditch this phone, not sure how long it will take me to find another. Can I rely on you to be on call the rest of the day?”

Ron nodded out of habit despite the impossibility of his former teacher seeing him. “Yes, definitely. Are you able to move, though?”

“Not much choice, although I’m going to stuff this phone in a mayonnaise jar I found here and send it down the river, to throw them off my location until they figure out that ruse,” Dan answered. “Hopefully that will give me time to crawl somewhere useful. It’s getting worse, though, no doubt about it. Go ahead and get the gear from my grandmother’s bedroom, you’ll want to extract that before things get too hot at my house. Oh, wait. Sorry, the pain is making it hard to think straight. Have you lost Karena yet?”

Ron looked over to see Donna’s car pulling out of the parking lot. “Not yet, but they’re on the road as of now.”

“Stick with them a bit longer and see where they go, and contact Brianna to pick up the tail,” Dan instructed. “Karena told me her car was torched, meaning the cops aren’t treating it as an accident, so she may have an ongoing threat against her. You sure you didn’t see anybody around her car?”

“Yes and no,” Ron answered as he started his car. “Yes I didn’t see anybody, but no, I can’t be sure there wasn’t someone around because I was watching her, not her car.”

“Okay, well, I want someone close by in case something happens to her, to help her out if possible,” Dan said.

“Right,” Ron replied. “Not sure why you care at this point, but we can discuss that later.”

“Right,” Dan commented. “Talk later, bad time for you to get pulled over for talking on the phone while driving.”

Ron shook his head and tossed his phone on the passenger seat. He turned out of the parking lot in the same direction that he had seen the two women go, and hit the gas more aggressively than usual to try to catch up. He caught sight of the other car promptly and held back to avoid being noticed. After some seemingly-random driving in the small town, the other car stopped at one of the nicer local restaurants. Ron parked abruptly by the curb before reaching the restaurant and he waited there until he saw Karena and her friend go into the restaurant. When they did not come out promptly, he grabbed his phone and hit the speed dial button for Brianna Atkins.

“This is Brianna,” the soft, young-sounding voice answered his call.

“Bri, Ron,” Ron said succinctly. “Tristan lives. He’s injured and one step ahead of the English. Isolde is dining with a friend. This pigeon has a new home. You need to pick up Isolde at Alexa’s on Fifth. Be advised that unknown party may have lethal interest in Isolde and interdiction is mandated.”

“Understood,” Brianna replied, although the irritation in her voice indicated more than mere understanding. “Thirty minutes?”

“Okay, but no later,” Ron agreed, and ended the call abruptly. He checked his watch, and then pulled out a crossword puzzle book to pass the time. After only about a quarter of an hour, he noticed the movement of somebody approaching his car and he looked up to see that Brianna was already there. Ron pressed the button to roll down the window on the passenger side, and the young woman stooped down to talk to him through the open window.

“I’m glad to hear he’s alive. Details on the tail?” Brianna asked, sounding bored.

“They’re still inside. I guess the woman with Karena is her college roommate, and her roommate is driving.”

“OK,” Brianna said. “Any details on the threat against Karena? And do you personally think it’s legit or is this not something to take too seriously?”

Ron raised one eyebrow. “No, no details, and I’m assuming it’s legit until I get some indication to the contrary. I know Mr. Starney always told us that he didn’t want us to be non-thinkers just following and doing what they’re told, but on the other hand, with things as tenuous as they already are, I don’t think it makes sense to raise questions unnecessarily.”

“Yeah, okay,” Brianna said with a shrug.

“Anyway, her car fire was apparently arson, so he’s worried about what else might happen.”

“I’m on it.” Brianna stood up and walked back toward her own car.

“Weak links in the chain,” Ron muttered to himself as he rolled up the window. Now that Brianna was taking over his prior task, he was free to move on to his next assignment, and he wasted no time getting rolling again. He took a circuitous route through town to watch for any tail of his own, but once he was satisfied that he wasn’t under surveillance he turned and headed toward Dan’s house on the outskirts of town. He still kept his eye on his rearview mirror, but nothing he saw caused him any concern.

When he reached Dan’s house on the left, Ron drove past the entrance and continued on the road until he saw that he was approaching a bridge over a creek. He pulled onto the shoulder before reaching the bridge and took a hard right turn onto a moss-covered remnant of an old concrete road that once ran along the creek. This led him around a curve that mostly hid him from the main road, at which point he could see an old barn. Moving quickly and with heightened awareness of the surrounding area in case anyone was around to observe him, he got out of his car, pulled aside the barn door, and then drove his car into the darkness of the small building. Ron retrieved his large flashlight from his back seat before closing the barn door behind his car.

Ron was one of very few people who knew that the woman’s name on the title for the property where the barn stood was an anagram for one of Dan’s long-dead aunts. Only Dan’s inner circle knew that he had purchased the property as a way to establish an emergency route in and out of his home. Construction of the secret passage was one of Dan’s most closely-guarded secrets.

The woman persona behind the landowner alias was reputed to be a crazy recluse living in another country. When the contractors who installed the large storm drain pipes across the property tried to talk the land owner into a more sensible and affordable way of handling the occasional and minimal floods that affected a proposed “building site,” the friendly neighbor, who was none other than Dan himself, told them it was a lost cause to talk sense to the woman and to just enjoy the profits from the big project.

With his flashlight turned on, Ron walked quickly to a specific horse stall and stuck his hand deep into what looked like a pile of full garbage bags. His fingers brushed the handle he sought, and a moment later the secret access door with its fake garbage pile had swung to one side revealing steep stairs down into the dank passageway toward Dan’s house. Ron descended the steps promptly, then reached up and closed the secretive portal above him. He shivered slightly from both the cool air and the uninviting view of the metal tube leading away from him, but he snarled to himself about not being weak. He checked to make sure that his phone was silenced and started walking. There was a narrow false floor running along the bottom of the pipe, covered with carpet remnants to allow silent movement, but the pipe was so large that he only had to barely duck his head and he was able to maintain a brisk pace.

It did not take long for Ron to cross from one property to the other and reach the other end of the pipe. When his flashlight revealed the other end, he slowed down suddenly and moved forward very carefully and quietly. When he reached the door he stood and listened carefully, counting out five full minutes as he had been trained to do. Only when he was confident that there was nobody on the other side did he turn off his flashlight and open the tiny peephole that looked into Dan’s basement. It was dark, although a few thin windows at the top of the basement wall let in a small amount of daylight. Again he waited, counting out time, to see if there was any movement. He breathed a sigh of relief when the last minute was up.

“Okay,” he said to himself, almost inaudibly quiet. He slowly and quietly released the latches that held the door in place but could be released from either side. With a gentle push, the door opened and Ron stepped through. He closed it behind him, and once again it looked like a typical shelf with miscellaneous cleaning supplies and other dusty old items on it. He paused to listen again, and then moved slowly toward the stairs, glancing briefly at the bricked-over entrance to Dan’s firing range.

Ron ascended the stairs, then slowly and quietly let himself into Dan’s kitchen. A quick glance around confirmed what he had suspected before, that Karena had been there recently and had brought food in. A faint odor of rotting meat made Ron wonder if he should take the garbage out or just leave things exactly as Karena had left them. The smell annoyed him, but he knew the safest option was to not touch anything unnecessarily.

Unwilling to risk any extra noise in case he was wrong about being alone in the house, Ron didn’t dare even whisper to himself as he crept through the house toward the main stairwell. He was nervous about being so exposed on the stairwell, but there was no way to avoid it. He moved to the upper level as hastily as he could while keeping the noise of his movement to a minimum. By the time he was moving along the upstairs hallway, toward the bedroom that was once used by Dan’s grandmother and was still filled with her furniture and personal belongings, Ron was starting to feel more comfortable that there was nobody else in the house.

Ron left the bedroom door ajar to improve his chance of hearing any movement outside of the room. He went straight to the old wooden dressing table with its slightly-cracked mirror and lifted the dust cover enough to pull one of the drawers completely out. Taped to the back of the drawer were two keys, which Ron promptly pulled off and stuffed into his pocket. He put the used tape onto the back of the drawer again before pushing it back into place and lowering the dust cover.

A large chest of drawers was Ron’s next stop, where he lifted the dust cover to reveal the drawer fronts. He firmly grasped the handles of one drawer and slid the false front to the right. With it out of the way, he was able to slide out a large, locked rolling case hidden behind it. After retrieving that case, he replaced the false drawer front and removed the left-sliding false front two drawers down to retrieve another case. After replacing the second false front, he lowered the dust cover.

One case had a small capital letter A stenciled on it, and the other had a capital B on it. Ron set the “A” case flat on the floor and knelt by it after fishing the keys from his pocket. The matching “A” key easily opened the well-lubricated locks on the case. The case was full of equipment, but Ron was initially focused on getting a firearm. He found two Glock pistols, a model 23 and a model 27, and he chose the larger Glock 23 to carry. He hastily opened a fresh box of .40 S&W jacketed hollow-point ammunition and loaded two magazines to maximum capacity. Ron looked through the gear expecting to find a holster for a more secure carry, but gave up when he couldn’t find it quickly. He closed up the box of ammo and put it back in the case, then closed and locked the case.

After slipping one magazine into the gun and the spare into his pocket, Ron stood up and extended the handles on both cases. He knew the cases rolling along the floor would probably make a fair amount of noise but he had no choice. He also knew that he couldn’t effectively carry the pistol and pull both cases, so he grimaced and stuffed the pistol into his waistband at the small of his back. He peeked out the door of the bedroom to verify again that he was alone, then returned to the cases and began pulling them behind him.

The noise from the cases rolling down the hall was not as bad as Ron had thought it might be, but it still made him nervous. He reached the top of the stairs without incident, and paused to consider whether he should try rolling both cases down at the same time, probably pushing them in front of him, or carry them down separately. He was eager to be gone from the large, silent house, but he opted to carry them down separately. After getting the second case down to the bottom of the staircase, Ron was about to head toward the kitchen when he spotted something white on the floor by the front door.

“Dan Starney or Agent” was printed neatly on the envelope that Ron picked up after cautiously approaching the door. The envelope had wrinkles and dirt smears that indicated it had been shoved under the door despite sturdy weatherstripping. Ron shrugged, folded the envelope in half to fit it into his pocket, and returned to the cases. The term “agent” made him think it was related to real estate, and he wondered if somebody was making an offer on the vacant house. It was something to deal with later, much later. For now he was focused on getting back to his car and away from the area.

The trip back through the kitchen, down into the basement, and back along the underground passage was slow but Ron was thankful that it was uneventful. After verifying that the darkness of the barn held no unpleasant surprises, he hoisted the cases up through the concealed hatch and then restored the fake garbage pile to its proper place. He quickly checked his phone to make sure there were no messages, then loaded the cases into his trunk. He carefully and slowly opened the barn door to check the surrounding property to make sure nobody was around. Satisfied, he went to his car, started it, and backed out. Now that his engine was running and making noise and he was visible, he moved quickly to close up the barn and get moving back to the road.

By this time daylight was starting to fade, although it was not yet fully dark. Ron drove with his headlights off while approaching the main road, hoping that any drivers on the road would be using their lights so he could time his final approach to when nobody was around. He could not be sure, however, and he regretted that Dan had disagreed with him about installing some small mirrors to be able to check for traffic on the road before going around the final bend that would reveal the car to the main road. Once he was on the main road without being observed, he turned on his headlights and hit the gas hard as he drove away from Dan’s house and away from Branner Glen.

The first town that Ron reached was relatively tiny, and he had no interest in stopping. Knowing that traffic tickets were seen as a revenue source in the town, he dropped his speed accordingly and proceeded through the few scattered buildings at exactly the speed limit. Ron was glad to reach the county road on the far side of the town where he could speed up again, although he still kept his speed reasonable to avoid any interaction with the local sheriff. After driving along country roads for nearly an hour, Ron reached the outskirts of Fahrenton at dusk. The town was large enough to have a good selection of motels, restaurants, retail outlets, and more, and it would be a good place to stop for the night.

“Just yourself?” the middle-aged woman behind the counter asked when Ron checked in at the first decent-looking motel he found. He nodded wordlessly in confirmation. “How long do you plan to stay?”

“Probably just one night,” Ron answered. “I’m just passing through town.”

The woman nodded, accepted his payment, and handed him his room key. “Check out is at eleven. We offer a little do-it-yourself breakfast buffet in that room over there,” she said, pointing toward a closed door. “It’s included with the room cost. It’s not fancy but it’ll save you a few bucks and time if you don’t want something bigger.”

“Thanks,” he replied, “I’ll probably give that a try.” He returned to his car where it sat in front of the motel office and drove it around the building to where it would be close to his room. He was glad that he was on the second floor, although he knew it meant more work to lug the heavy cases from his car to the room.

Before digging the cases out of his trunk, Ron went up to the room to check it out. The motel room doors all faced out to the parking lot, and the second floor access was provided by a walkway that ran the length of the building. The room itself was basic but clean, and the single large window gave Ron a view of most of the parking lot as well as a good portion of the road and the small shopping center across the street.

Satisfied with the room and its location, Ron returned to his car. Between the cases from Dan’s house and his own overnight bag and other belongings, it took him a few trips to get everything of value up to his room. On his last trip from the car to the room he stopped by a vending machine to buy something to drink. Once he was done moving things to his room, he locked, deadbolted, and chained the door.

Ron slipped the pistol out from its uncomfortable position in his waistline and set it on a nightstand by the bed. He then opened the “A” case to look again for the holster. Once he located it, he closed and locked the case again, but he only put the holster next to the gun and left both items on the nightstand. He wanted to go through both cases to see what all was available to him, but if he needed to leave in a hurry he didn’t want to be slowed down by any unnecessary repacking.

“Still nothing,” Ron said to himself after checking his phone for messages. “I hope this isn’t all for nothing.” He sat down on the bed and used the TV remote control to turn on an all-news channel. The story of unrest in the Middle East didn’t capture his attention, so he sent a text message to Brianna asking for an update on Karena. While waiting for a reply from her, he thought about sending a message to his girlfriend, but he and Sarah had not been getting along well and it was not a good time to risk another argument.

“No change, still in restaurant,” Brianna’s terse reply finally came back.

Ron nodded to himself thoughtfully. There was not much more for him to do at that point, so he adjusted the pillows to make it comfortable to sit against the wall and put his feet up on the bed. He flipped through channels on the TV, hoping for either news that might relate to Dan or at least something that would be interesting to watch, but he had little luck. More than once, Ron picked up the pistol and inspected it thoroughly, but that did little to ease the growing boredom. He finally decided to unlock the cases to look through them without unloading them.

In the “A” case, in addition to ammunition for the two pistols, Ron found two crank-powered radio/flashlight units, cooking materials, fire starters, plastic gloves, leather gloves, playing cards, writing materials, chemical light sticks, smoke canisters, water filters, and other survival items. In the “B” case, Ron found even more survival items including a compact ABC fire extinguisher, a two-person tube tent, emergency blankets, first aid items, and several rolls of duct tape. The second case also contained an inner case that had a combination lock, for which he did not know the combination.

After fiddling with the contents of the cases for awhile, Ron closed and locked them again. He glanced out the window and saw that it was fully dark now. Having still not heard from Dan, his imagination offered an ongoing stream of possible negative outcomes. The last update from Dan, before he assigned Ron to get the gear from his house, was that he was near the river into which the car driving him had been forced, and he was within sight of a farmhouse. One of his legs was in a lot of pain and possibly broken, he had a significant injury on one side of his head above and behind his ear, and he had a variety of cuts and bruises in various places on his body. All in all he was in bad shape, and now he was out in the cold and dark without any preparation or assistance.

Ron’s phone buzzed suddenly to indicate a new text message, and he grabbed it promptly, hoping to get some word about Dan. Instead, it was another terse message from Brianna. “Back to Ireland. Remain?”

“AFAIK,” Ron texted back. Ireland was the code word for Karena’s home, to match Isolde as the code word for her. Ron understood that Brianna was wanting out of the duty that was assigned to her, but he had no other guidance and he was not aware of anyone who could take over for her. He realized he would need to explore some options for that, however, especially as his trust for the attentiveness of Brianna was fading. He hated to admit that his own attentiveness was also fading as the evening wore on.

The TV news caught Ron’s attention briefly when it covered the story of Dan’s transport vehicle being run off the road, but they reported no new information, so he tuned it out again. As he was flipping through the channels again, thinking more about who could step in for Brianna than what was on the TV, he suddenly remembered the envelope that he’d found by Dan’s front door. He pulled it out of his pocket and held it up to the light. He didn’t plan to break its seal, but he expected it to be mundane and he didn’t think Dan would really care if he saw something through the envelope. Ron could see that it contained a typed letter, but he could not make out the words.

“Yeah, probably an offer on his property,” Ron said to himself, just as his phone rang. Startled, he grabbed his phone and answered it, “Ron here.”

“Hello, Mr. Verwalde?” an unfamiliar male voice asked.

“Yes,” Ron acknowledged, “who am I speaking with?”

“This is Bob Zammet,” the man answered. “You don’t know me, but I was given your number and asked to pass along a message from a friend of yours. You got a pen and some paper? I have an address that your friend would like you to meet him at.”

Ron paused as he rummaged through the night stand in hope of finding writing materials, but the drawers were empty. “Um, hold on, let me grab something,” he said as he started to unlock Dan’s “A” case to retrieve the writing materials he had seen in it. “Okay, go ahead,” he continued when he was ready.

The other man read off the address to Ron, after which Ron thanked the man and ended the call. It seemed the man had not known that Dan was a fugitive, but Ron couldn’t understand how that could have been true if he had seen Dan. Regardless, the fact that Dan was alive and in a location where he could stay long enough to be picked up was good news. He sent a quick message to Brianna that alluded to what he would be doing and suggested that she seek a replacement to take over for her. Without waiting for her reply, Ron began moving the gear cases and his belongings back to his car. Once it was loaded and he was ready to leave, he walked back to the motel office.

“Problem with your room?” the woman said when she returned to the front desk from a back room.

“No, it’s fine,” Ron answered, “but unfortunately a family emergency has come up and I need to leave, so I need to check out already. Here is the key.” He put the key on the counter and turned to leave.

“Oh, well,” the woman said, “do you want a refund? You were only in the room a short time.”

Ron looked back with a quick smile. “No, thanks, it’s all right. Thanks anyway!”

On the way out of Fahrenton, Ron stopped to fill his tank with gas, as he knew he had a long drive ahead of him. To avoid leaving an electronic trail, he used a disposable debit card. With a full tank and a selection of caffeinated drinks to help keep him going, Ron headed out of town with his car stereo thumping to some new dubstep he had discovered a few days earlier. Although the burst of action helped bring him back to full alertness, in retrospect he wished he had taken a nap during his short stay in the motel room. He remembered hearing that soldiers in wars would sleep whenever they could get a chance, and he decided that would be a good habit to develop.

It took over two hours to get to the area of the address hastily scrawled by Ron on a legal pad that now sat on his passenger seat, and by that time Ron was starting to feel tired enough that he was looking forward to stretching his legs. The address was in the suburbs of a small city that was about twice the size of Branner Glen, and as he navigated the tidy streets Ron wondered how Dan managed to get there and what he might find when he finally located the address. After a few wrong turns in the unfamiliar neighborhood, Ron finally came up to a two-story house that was dark and appeared vacant.

“Now what?” Ron asked himself as he pulled up to the curb and stopped in front of the house. He looked around to see if anybody was around, or if anybody was watching him from within their home, but so far it appeared that nobody had noticed him and he was alone. Ron redundantly felt for the pistol in its holster and then got out of the car, trying to look casual and like he belonged, although he expected any neighbor would be able to pick him out as a stranger there. He suppressed the urge to look around quickly, and instead swept his gaze slowly and casually from one side to the other as he approached the front door of the house.

Ron pressed the doorbell button and heard the sound of the doorbell through the door. There seemed to be no reaction, so he pressed it again. No lights came on, and no sounds could be heard within the house. Growing more nervous, Ron waited a few more moments and tried one more time. He did not wait long after the third ring, however, and turned to go back to his car. As he did, his darkness-adjusted eyes caught sight of a white piece of paper stuffed into a landscaping bush where it would not have been seen from the road. He walked past the bush toward the car and quickly grabbed the paper as he went. Without delay, he got in his car and drove several blocks away before stopping to look at the paper.

The paper had three words: “Rick’s Roadhouse. Trailer.” Ron stared at it for several moments, shaking his head in puzzlement. The writing did not look like Dan’s. Muttering to himself darkly about clues and treasure hunts, he pulled out onto the road again and went in search of a pay phone, with the hope of finding a phone book that might answer whether Rick’s Roadhouse was a local establishment. The meaning of “Trailer” would hopefully become apparent after he solved the first part of the clue.

It was not easy to find a pay phone thanks to mobile phone usage greatly reducing the demand for them, and the first one Ron found was missing its phone book. The second one still had its book, and despite being very battered and weathered Ron was able to confirm that Rick’s Roadhouse was local. With a slight twinge of guilt, he tore the page out and went back to his car.

When he found it, Ron discovered that Rick’s Roadhouse was a tough-looking bar on the edge of an industrial zone of the city. He pulled in to the parking lot and looked around, leaving his engine running and making sure his doors were locked. The neon signs on the building were still lit, but the parking lot only had two other vehicles, and he wasn’t sure they were in working order. Ron couldn’t tell whether the bar was still open or if it had closed for the night. He could not see a trailer parked on or near the property, and he sighed in irritation.

“This is bullshit,” he finally said aloud. “I am tired and after all this work I just have unintelligible clues and I’m sitting outside some dive with….” Ron’s voice faded as his peripheral vision caught his attention. He turned toward what had seemed like a tiny flash or spark. He saw a truck trailer without its tractor parked along the road, and just as his mind connected the word “trailer” he saw a series of three quick flashes of light from under the trailer. As he stared, he saw three more flashes.

Ron put his car in gear again and pulled out of the parking lot. He drove over to the trailer and pulled up to a stop next to it. Even though he partly expected it, he was startled to see Dan’s blood-streaked face suddenly appear by the passenger window. His prison jumpsuit was a muddy and torn mess and if Ron had not known him there was no way he would have let him in. Ron quickly reached for the power lock switch. Dan hastily opened the door and virtually fell into Ron’s car. Wincing and stifling a groan, Dan sorted himself out on the passenger seat and slammed the door shut. He then looked over at Ron.

“What are you waiting for? Drive!” Dan instructed, startling Ron out of his shocked stare.

“Right. Right!” Ron answered, turning his attention back to the road and pulling away from the trailer quickly. “Okay. Wow. You look terrible.” He glanced over at Dan again. “Where should I take you? We need some place that will give you medical attention without unwanted kinds of attention.”

Dan let out a pained sigh. “Yeah. Purthansburg. Know where it is?”

“Uh, yeah,” Ron acknowledged slowly. “I think so. Small town, northeast of here?”

“Right,” Dan said tightly.

“That place is too small for a hospital, isn’t it?”

“Don’t worry about that,” Dan answered after a moment. “I have a contact there who will be better than a hospital, and without all of the ‘first responder’ types who are in and out of a hospital like ants in a pile.”

“Okay,” Ron said again, nodding. He was keeping his speed reasonable like before, but at the same time keeping a wary eye out for any police. “You take anything yet for the pain?”

Ron thought he saw Dan shake his head minimally in the dark car. “No chance for that.”

“We have first aid supplies,” Ron said. “I did a hasty inventory of the cases. I’m carrying the G23, but I can take the 27 if you don’t want it. Anyway, there’s probably a pain killer of some sort in there, even if it’s just some over-the-counter thing.”

“Yeah,” Dan agreed with a faint gasp. “Once we get out of town. There might be something more potent in there. Not sure if it’s fresh enough, though.”

They fell silent as Ron worked his way toward a highway interchange. There were other cars on the road, but the late hour kept traffic down. One city police car passed them going the other way, but the officer at the wheel apparently took no interest in them. Ron was thankful for the darkness of night, for in the day Dan’s bloody face or prison jumpsuit might have been noticed.

As he drove through the unfamiliar city streets, Ron mentally sifted through everything that had happened, from the time he heard about Dan’s disappearance, to being contacted by Dan after the crash that sent him into the river, up to the late-night drive to pick him up. “What were you flashing under the trailer?” he asked when that memory came up.

“Lighter. Spinning the wheel. Got lucky enough to find one that still made a lot of sparks,” Dan explained. “Look, I’m going to try to snooze a bit. I don’t think I can actually sleep but I need to grab whatever light rest I can get. Just wake me up when we get out of town, in case I do fall asleep, so I can take that pain killer. That should help me sleep more deeply, although I can’t tell you how good a real bed sounds right now.”

Ron nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure. Well, nap if you can, I’ll wake you when I reach a good place to pull off.”

They continued in silence, with Dan leaning against his window and Ron yawning regularly as his own need for sleep kept making itself known. He thought about stopping briefly at a 24-hour espresso drive-through but decided against it because the barista would probably be able to see Dan well enough to become alarmed.

Ron eventually found a highway that would take him north, and it felt good to him to accelerate away from the city limits. He kept going until he reached an isolated interchange with a large, brightly-lit truck stop. Ron took the exit and headed for the truck stop, driving directly to the fuel pumps in the passenger vehicle section. He stopped at the pump that was least visible from the small convenience store.

“I’m going to buy gas, Mr. Starney,” Ron said, giving Dan a gentle nudge on his shoulder.

Dan startled awake. “Oh, uh… okay,” he answered groggily.

“I’ll move the ‘A’ case from the trunk to the back seat while the pump is running,” Ron continued. “If you can’t move enough to get into it, I will get the first aid supplies out after I’m done.” Not wanting to look suspicious by not getting out of the car promptly, and knowing that Dan was not fully alert anyway, Ron got out and got the gas pump running. He stood casually by the pump for a few moments to discreetly check to see if anyone was paying undue attention to him.

When he was comfortable that nobody was paying attention, Ron opened the driver door again and pulled the lever to open the trunk. He moved the gear case into the back seat, moving efficiently to make the change as fast as possible without looking like he was hurrying. He then closed the trunk and went back to the driver’s seat briefly to pull a street atlas from his glove box. After verifying the route to Purthansburg, he was about to get out again to finish pumping the gas when Dan stirred next to him, apparently waking up more.

“Need key,” Dan said when Ron got back in the car.

“Oh, right,” Ron said. “Never mind, I’ll get it.”

Ron got out and retrieved the first aid supplies before finishing up at the pump. He handed the first aid kit to Dan as he climbed in again. Since he was eager to be on the move again, Ron drove out of the truck stop promptly, leaving it up to Dan to find what he needed. Once they were back on the highway, he glanced over at Dan and saw that the older man was already closing up the kit.

“Find something useful?” Ron asked.

“Hydrocodone,” Dan answered. “Expired, took it anyway. I’m sure it’s safe. Hopefully it’s still potent enough to do the trick.”

The two men continued down the road in silence. It didn’t take long for Dan to nod off, and shortly after that he started snoring very lightly. Ron was glad that the older man was getting some rest, but he couldn’t help feeling a bit envious at the same time. He was glad that they were not far from their destination and he hoped they would stay there long enough for him to catch some sleep. When they finally reached Purthansburg, Ron took the only exit and awakened Dan when he reached the bottom of the off-ramp. Dan gave him driving directions from there, and soon they arrived at a rambler that looked like it was built in the 1960s or earlier. At Dan’s suggestion, the younger man pulled in and stopped the car in the gravel driveway.

The house seemed to match the surrounding neighborhood in multiple ways, from the brick construction to the lack of maintenance for the landscaping. Personal effects strewn recklessly around the building looked like a mix of forgotten items and simple garbage. The house had an attached single-car garage, but Ron wondered if the grimy wooden garage door had been opened at all in the past decade. Parked outside the garage sat a large, green, four-door sedan that Ron guessed was from the 1970s. He was glad that Dan knew the area, and he was even more glad that they were both armed.

“Let me do most of the talking,” Dan instructed. “Jeff is a decent guy in his own way, but the less you say, the better it will be. And definitely be quiet at the front door. At this hour he won’t be expecting anyone and we don’t want to scare him. That would not turn out well.”

“Okay,” Ron responded, feeling surprised. “Will we be here long?”

“Don’t know,” Dan said with a slight shrug that made him wince in pain. “I hope we’re here long enough for me to get patched up and get some different clothes on. We could be here anywhere from five minutes to a couple days. Depends on Jeff.” Ron nodded but said nothing. “It’ll be easier if you help me walk,” Dan said as he opened his door.

Ron got out quickly and moved around the car to help support Dan. Once the older man was out and was leaning on Ron for support, Ron pushed the door closed and turned them toward the front door. He tried to ignore the junk they passed as they made their way slowly along the cracked concrete walkway that led from the driveway to the front door. There were a couple small steps up to a wide area at the front door but Dan was able to navigate them well enough. Once they were at the door, Dan pressed the button for the doorbell, but they could not hear if it had any effect.

“Guess I’ll have to knock,” Dan whispered. “Didn’t want to. Doorbell is gentler.”

Ron nodded but remained silent. Dan’s words did not make him feel any more comfortable about the person he was about to meet. Dan reached out with his free hand and rapped on the door frame. When there was no answer, Dan tried again. Still there was no answer. Dan shook his head and sighed, and then knocked much harder. From what Dan had said earlier, Ron was not thrilled at all about the more aggressive knocking, but they also couldn’t stand on the man’s doorstep all night.

“I don’t know who the hell you are,” a woman’s sharp voice suddenly said behind them, “but I can tell you’re trouble. We look out for each other in this neighborhood. You’d better turn right around and move real slow. One fast move from you and you’ll find out the hard way what buck shot feels like.”

Ron glanced quickly over his shoulder. “This man is injured,” he whispered harshly at the woman. In the dim light from a distant streetlight, Ron could see that the woman was short but very wide, and true to her word she carried what looked like a shotgun.

“I ain’t stupid, I can see that,” the woman said. “I said turn around. You ain’t got no business hammering on Jeff’s door at this hour. Besides, he’s probably dead drunk anyway.”

“Jeff doesn’t drink,” Dan spoke up, speaking at a normal volume as he and Ron slowly worked to pivot in place. “If you know him, you know that. What’s really going on?”

The woman was silent for a moment. “You’re Dan Starney,” she finally said, lowering her gun once they were turned around. “Couldn’t be sure without seeing your face, although the prison duds were a pretty good clue. C’mon, Jeff is out but he said you might show up, once he heard on the TV that it was confirmed that you were still alive and on the run. Let’s get you over to my house, Jeff won’t be back for another hour or so, but I can help you get comfortable. Who’s this kid?”

“This is Ron Verwalde,” Dan answered. “And you are?”

“Becky. Becky Halbrenn,” the woman answered. “Well, are you coming?”

“Yes,” Dan said simply, moving forward with Ron’s help. “Thank you for your help.”

“You lock your doors, Ron?” Becky asked. “If not, you best do that now before we go to my house. This neighborhood ain’t the worst, but it ain’t the best neither.”

“No, not yet,” Ron admitted. Becky moved to help support Dan, and Ron went back to his car to lock it. As soon as he returned, he and Becky supported Dan on both sides, almost carrying him vertically next door to Becky’s house.

Once they were in the woman’s house, they made Dan as comfortable as possible on the ratty sofa in her living room. She then disappeared into another room and returned with a hot wash cloth to clean up Dan’s face, after which he used it to wipe some of the dirt off his hands. She explained that she didn’t have any men’s clothing for Dan to wear but that Jeff would probably have something once he got back.

After offering the men something hot to drink, which they both declined, Becky provided them with blankets so they could get some rest while they waited. After Dan was settled, Ron sat down in a large recliner and leaned back before spreading the blanket out over himself. Despite the unfamiliar surroundings, it did not take him long to push aside the chaos of the evening and fall asleep.