I saw them in a hotel parking lot in Texas Canyon, Arizona,” Ethan managed to say a few seconds later.
Nash, who was still wearing the VR helmet so he could return their UAV to their location, said, “So you were followed.”
“I swear I didn’t think they’d use a UAV to track me. I mean, who thinks like that?”
Nash gave him a long look, then shrugged. “Too late for that. I’m betting that old couple is going to be saying the same thing when we take them down.”
“Wait.” Ethan turned toward Nash. “What?”
“You heard me. Time to go on the offensive. We’re going to get them and find out who they are.”
“Council of David or Six-Fingered Mafia.”
“Exactly. Now drive.”
Ethan put the van in gear and sped off. They were less than half a mile away from the RV park. A couple of lights and a stop sign later and they saw a DAVY CROCKETT RV PARK sign with the torso of a buckskin-wearing man with a long rifle pointing toward the sky.
Ethan slowed the van as they entered the RV park, which seemed to be laid out in a huge circle. RVs filled every spot on both sides of them. They came in all shapes and sizes, from an immense Serrano to a Fleetwood that was mounted on the back of a truck. He even saw a couple of vintage Airstreams, recognizable to Ethan by their silver bullet shape. Most of the RVs looked permanent. Awnings were out. Lawn chairs were arranged around fire pits. Clothing flapped on lines. Here and there a pair of elderly folks walked or talked in the shade of an awning. They glanced at the van as it passed, then turned away.
As Ethan drove around the circle he noticed something was missing. Children—there were none. This was probably a fifty-and-over park. That was also probably why he was being checked out. They wanted to make sure no screaming rug rats were about to disembark and destroy their pastoral RV living.
And there it was. Ethan slowed, pulled over, and killed the engine. The RV was the same Winnebago he’d seen in Texas Canyon. He was certain of it. Although it was a common type, there was something about the arrangement of the stickers on the back window. It was about forty feet long, and like most of the others, parked nose out. It wasn’t new by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t old, either. An awning was retracted on the side of the vehicle. That told him they weren’t planning on staying long.
Nash was jerking free of his VR helmet by the time Ethan was out the door.
Nash joined him in the street. “Landed the Phantom half a mile that way.” Nash pointed with his left hand. “Don’t let me forget it.”
“Fuck the Phantom,” Ethan said. He felt cold and on edge. It was a feeling he’d never felt before, but it felt good. “I’m here for some revenge.”
“Let’s try to get some information out of them first.” Nash pulled out a set of clear glasses that had an earbud cable attached. He handed it to Ethan. “Suz wants you to wear this.”
Ethan took it and examined it. Sturdy black frames, thicker than they needed to be. Clear glass lenses and the earbud with the cable. When he held them close, he detected a small glass circle on the upper left of the frames. “What is it?”
“Just put on the damned thing.”
Ethan did as he was told. As he slid the earbud into his ear, he heard Suz tell him, “Let’s do this thing. Tell Nash to go around the back of the RV. You take the door.”
Ethan glanced at Nash. “Is that you? Oh, this is a camera.”
“Fifty points for Captain Obvious,” Suz said. “Now let’s go.”
Even from miles away she could make him feel idiotic.
He sighed. “Suz wants you to go around back,” Ethan said before hurrying across the road. He wasn’t used to the feeling of glasses on his face, so he was hyperaware of them. Once he was next to the RV, he put his back to it, careful not to pass in front of a window. He shouldn’t have worried, though. All the blinds were pulled down.
He ducked around the front just in time to see the side door opening. He rushed toward it and caught the man descending the three metal stairs. Ethan pressed the pistol into the man’s gut and whispered, “I don’t think so. Get back inside.”
The old man’s eyes widened, and his mouth made a little O. “I thought you were dead.”
“I got better. Inside. Now.”
The old man went backward up the stairs, and Ethan followed him into the RV.
Ethan checked to see if the old man had any weapons, but none were apparent. He scanned the inside and saw the old woman, her nose inches from a small flat-screen monitor showing the broadcast from their other UAV. The interior smelled of fried chicken and dirty clothes.
He pushed the old man toward her.
“Both of you get down on the ground, now,” Ethan said, channeling Clint Eastwood and John Wayne.
She turned. It took a moment for her to realize what was happening, but when she did her eyes darted to where a nine-millimeter pistol rested on the counter only a few feet away.
“Don’t even try. I won’t hesitate to shoot. Not after all I’ve been through.”
“Easy there, slugger,” Suz said in his ear.
He ignored the voice and waved his pistol. “I said get down. That means get out of the chair and put your ass on the ground.”
Suddenly a ball of fur ran from the bedroom and began barking and nipping at his ankles. It was ludicrous, really, but it was also annoying. Thankfully Nash came in and closed the door behind him.
“Want me to take care of the mutt?”
“If that means kill Pooxie, then hell no. Just lock it in the bedroom for now.”
It took three attempts, but Nash finally grabbed the dog. He held it at arm’s length so it wouldn’t bite him, then tossed it on the bed and closed the door. When he came back into the room, he spied the pistol and grabbed it.
The inside of the RV was more spacious than Ethan would have believed. A lounge chair sat to the immediate right of the door. Across from it was a medium-size leather couch with crocheted blankets draping the backrest. Next to that on the same wall was a small dining table with a bench seat on either side. The flat-screen monitor was on this table. Next to that was a stove and microwave. Across from this was the sink and the food-prep counter where Nash had grabbed the pistol.
Ethan began to notice the smaller things now. A map of the western United States on a corkboard with pins in it. A long rifle mounted in brackets on the ceiling above the dining table. A set of walkie-talkies in a charging rack next to the sink. Binoculars hanging from the wall.
His eyes narrowed as he took in all of this. Staring at them, they could be anyone’s grandmother and grandfather. The man was bald and as tanned as anyone Ethan had ever seen. His wrinkled face reminded Ethan of an old-time actor who’d played a private detective… Rockford Files, he thought. One of his eyes was cataract white. The other was bright blue. He wore a golf shirt from Pinehurst golf course, yellow shorts that ran to the knee, and docksiders. The woman looked older somehow. It had to be the way she squinted through her eyeglasses and her blue hair. Definitely the blue hair. She wore a pink shirt with small dogs cavorting across her chest and a skirt that dropped just below the knees. Neither fit the profile of international Six-Fingered Mafia spies… which was probably why they were so good at not getting caught.
“How long have you been following me?” Ethan demanded.
“Shouldn’t we formally introduce ourselves?” the old man asked instead of answering.
Ethan looked from one to the other. “Fine, what are your names and how long have you been following me?”
The man smiled widely, not even remotely intimidated by Ethan’s pistol. “I’m Horace and this is Edna. We’re the Johanssons, originally from Minot, North Dakota.”
“I’d introduce myself, but you know who I am.”
Edna spoke for the first time. “This is not what you think, son.”
Ethan rolled his eyes. “How do you know this isn’t what I think? I’m tired of people trying to read my mind. You don’t know what I think any more than Nash standing over there knows what I think.”
“Smooth move, Ex-lax, now they know his name,” came Suz’s voice in his ear, with all the tact of an older sister.
“You know what?” Ethan jerked the earbud out and ripped the camera glasses off his head. “I don’t need this shit, either.” He tossed the setup to Nash, who barely managed to catch it with a look of surprise. “You want an electronic leash, you can have it.”
He leveled his angry gaze on the Johanssons. “Back to you, Horace and Ethel.”
“Edna.”
“She wants to talk to you,” Nash said, pointing to the glasses he now wore on his face.
Ethan ignored him. Through gritted teeth, he said, “Fine, Edna. How long have you been following me?”
“We set up in Texas Canyon, hoping you’d stop. We had folks north on I-17, west on I-10, east on 60 and 87. We were hoping to get to you sooner.”
“So if we’d continued past the Thing, then you never would have found me.”
Horace smiled slightly. “Seems a likely conclusion.”
Ethan glanced at Nash, who just shook his head and looked pained, which told him that Suz was giving him an earful.
“Who are you working for?”
Horace shifted uncomfortably. “We’re not exactly working for anyone. We do this because it suits us. Me and Edna could just as well pitch our RV in a place like this and live out our days.”
His wife poked him gently in the ribs. “But you’ve always liked the chase. You know you couldn’t just play golf and breathe like the other old-timers.”
He grinned and glanced at her lovingly. “Yeah, I suppose I do.” To Ethan he said, “I was a deputy US marshal for forty years. I’d wanted to be one ever since I heard the story of John Dillinger. Now there was a man to be reckoned with.” He rubbed his grizzled face. “When the chance came to make a difference in another way and keep up my chasing skills, I couldn’t pass it up.”
“Who is it then? Council of David or Six-Fingered Mafia?”
They both grinned.
“Mafia? I like that,” she said.
“I want to ask a question,” Nash said, pointing to the glasses.
Ethan shook his head. “That’s just what… Walter called it. The Six-Fingered Mafia. Is that who you work for? I mean, who you’re with?”
The old man nodded. “It is.”
Ethan let out an explosive breath. He hadn’t realized the tension that had been building inside of him. “Finally, a straight answer. Why were you following me?”
The old man shrugged. “Initially it was because we wanted to see where you went. You were chasing the bones just like we’ve been doing, only the council got there before we could make our move.”
“You mean the compound.” Gunfire slammed into Ethan’s memory. The smell of cordite mixed with the screams of the attacking men. The whump whumps of a helicopter merged with a shadow dragging away Shanny’s body.
Nash was at his side, a hand on his shoulder. “Easy there. You okay?”
Ethan realized he’d gotten wobbly and had almost fallen over, plus he’d let the point of the pistol drop. He pushed Nash away and raised the gun again, pointing it straight out. “What did you do with Shanny’s body?”
They exchanged glances. It was Edna who spoke.
“We didn’t do anything with her body.”
Ethan was so tired of the obfuscation. So tired of everything. Before he knew it he was on a knee, the gun almost jammed in Edna’s face, his mouth wrenched. “Not you personally, but your people. What did you do with her body?”
“I told you,” Horace said, patting the air next to Ethan, trying to get him to calm down. “You don’t understand. It wasn’t us at all. It was the council who came and took your girlfriend.”
“The council?”
“Yes, the council.”
“Then why were you there?”
“Initially we were there to see if you could lead us to any bones. But when we saw that the council had come, it was to protect you.” Horace must have seen the look of disbelief in Ethan’s eyes. “Surely you must have seen us shooting the attackers.”
Ethan did remember shots coming from outside the compound and men falling, but he’d attributed that to Freivald and his backup. He watched as Horace glanced at the rifle attached to the ceiling.
“I grew up hunting antelope and deer. Got to be a pretty good shot. Then Vietnam came and I became an even better shot.” He shook his head. “Never did like killing a man, though. Nope, never did.”
Ethan realized that his thoughts were everywhere and nowhere. He had to focus. What had Horace said? He locked onto the words and formed his next question. He kept his voice as steady as he could, but it still quavered. “You said the council came and took Shanny?”
Edna nodded. “We tried to track them, but they were moving too fast.”
Ethan gulped. “What are you saying?”
They stared blankly at him. “I don’t know, son. What are we saying?” Edna asked.
“My girlfriend… Shanny…” Ethan felt the air leave his body. “Is she dead?” he asked, emotion choking the last word.
Horace’s eyes narrowed, making his eyebrows merge like that of a dark gray caterpillar. “I don’t know if she’s dead now, but last I saw her, she was still breathing. She had fight in her, that one.”
“Kicked one of her captors, she did,” Edna said.
“Still breathing?” Ethan realized he’d lowered the gun, but he lacked the emotional strength to raise it. “And kicking?”
“I tracked her through my scope.” Then the old man gasped. “Oh, hell, boy. You’ve been thinking she was dead all this time.”
Edna put her arms around Ethan.
He let three tears squeeze free before he clamped them down and his heart filled with so much air that he felt as if he were going to explode. Was this what hope felt like? There was one last question he needed to ask.
“Do you know where she is?”
Both Edna and Horace Johansson frowned.
Edna spoke first, “Sorry, son. We have no idea.”
“She could be anywhere,” Horace said.
Ethan suddenly felt as if his brain were on fire. He looked from Nash to Horace to Edna. He pushed away from the old woman and backed to the door.
“What’s wrong?” Nash asked.
Ethan shook his head.
Nash tried to put his hand on Ethan’s shoulder, but Ethan shook him off. “I gotta go. I can’t stay here. I gotta go.”
And then he was out the door and running across the street to the van. He leaped inside, closed the door, jammed the keys into the ignition, and roared out of the Davy Crockett RV Park, his mind filled with ants who were busy rebuilding the possible futures, just now realizing that Shanny might still be part of one.