Dani pumped gas into the cruiser, processing the shit show that had become her life. They were still no closer to figuring out which college was going to be hit, and she was all out of ideas. Spivey wasn’t answering his phone, and Step and Kenny were AWOL. If it were anyone else, she’d be worried about them. As it was, she was just pissed.
She pulled out her phone to try and reach them again, but grunted when she discovered there were no bars. She held the phone above her head and moved it around, eyeing the display to see if she could find the magic spot that would give her cellphone reception. Nothing.
A silver-and-blue bus parked at the back of the truck stop, and she took only casual notice. Her focus was on the phone display. A number of Wayne Drake Community College students disembarked from the bus and chattered away as they passed the Baptist Flats Sheriff’s Department cruiser. She paid a little more attention than before, noted how thick they were and concluded they must be football players. Back to the phone for one last try at finding the sweet spot. When it wasn’t to be found, she sighed and returned the phone to her pocket just as Nola exited the truck stop and had to sidestep two of the college students. That’s when Dani saw the back of their shirts. GO TERRIERS! The big white lettering hit like a bolt of lightning. “Terriers,” she whispered.
Nola reached her and nearly laughed at the look of awe on Dani’s face. “What is with you?”
Dani snapped back to reality. “Do you have your phone?”
“Yeah,” Nola said, pulling it out of her back pocket.
“Do you have bars?”
Nola looked at the screen. “One…No…It’s gone…” She held it up and took a step back. “Yep, one bar…Maybe two.”
Dani grabbed the phone from her and looked for the spot that gave her the two bars. She quickly dialed the sheriff’s office.
“Baptist Flats…” Friar started before Dani cut him off.
“Put Luna on the phone.”
“Dani?”
“Friar, put Luna on the phone.”
“You’re cutting in and out. What’s a pluma?”
She spoke slowly and deliberately. “Put. Luna. On. The. Phone.”
“Roger that. Hold on.”
A full minute passed before Luna grumbled, “This fat fool won’t get me or my dog nothing to eat…”
“Luna, listen to me…”
“We’re starving and he won’t…”
“Luna…Stop…Listen…”
“I’m just saying we’re hungry….”
“Tell me about the dog.”
“The what?”
“Tell me about the dog. Jack Spivey.”
“What about him?”
“You said Mac bought it for you, right?”
“Yeah. Called me from Nashville. Said she got it at the pound. Last time I talked to her as a matter of fact.”
“The last time?”
“Never heard or seen her again. She went off with Harley that morning. Called me from the pound and said she was getting me a dog. Named it Jack Spivey. Said that had to be the name. Give me the number of the kennel and said to keep it handy.”
“You never saw the dog?”
“Nope. She went straight from the pound to the kennel. I think…” There was a pause before she added, “I think she knew something bad was gonna happen to her. Probably talked Harley into doing one last sweet thing for me. She was always doing sweet things. Give that Carson boy her wallet the week before that. Don’t know how much cash…”
“She gave Parnell Carson her wallet? Her ID?”
“I guess it had her ID in it. I didn’t ask…”
“Shit,” Dani said just before hanging up the phone. She stared off into space for a few seconds before Nola chimed in.
“You gonna tell me what’s going on in that head of yours?”
“Jack Spivey,” Dani said. “The dog. He’s a terrier mix.”
“So?”
“So, hear me out. Mac embeds herself with the Gray Rise through her connection with Luna. She starts noticing that they’re collecting college catalogs. It doesn’t fit.”
“Exactly. Nothing about that is right.”
“So she figures out that they are going to hit a college campus. She doesn’t know where. She doesn’t know when. She goes in deep. Cuts herself off from Spivey. She immerses herself in the militia’s cause. All the time, she uses the catalogs to record what she’s seeing. Finds out all the details we’ve uncovered. The only thing she never finds out is what college they’re going to hit…until the day she disappears. Fuck…”
“What?”
“If I’m right, Mac is even smarter than we thought.”
“I’m still not getting it.”
“Look, she knows she’s done. She can see the writing on the wall. She puts the bundle together and has it delivered to a safe house just before Harley takes her to Nashville. If he’s as sadistic a sumbitch as Luna says, he pretty much lets her know this is her last hurrah. He gets a kick out of watching people suffer. She asks him for one last favor. She wants to leave a present for Luna. He indulges her because he’s an arrogant bastard. What the fuck does it matter?”
“What present?”
Dani points to a Wayne Drake Community College student coming out of the truck stop.
Nola doesn’t get it. “A college kid?”
“No, Wayne Drake’s mascot, it’s a terrier. Just like Jack Spivey the dog.”
Nola stood in silence for a moment. She finally said, “But how would she know we’d find the dog?”
“She didn’t. It was a stab in the dark, but she had no other recourse. It was a desperate move because she was about to die. She just had to hope someone would find the dog before it was too late…” Dani held up a finger as she searched her memory banks. “Was there a catalog for Wayne Drake in Mac’s bundle?”
Nola considered Dani’s question before giving a hesitant, “No.”
“I know most of the schools in this area, and I’m guessing we’ve got all of them within about a 250-mile radius of Baptist Flats, except one.”
“Wayne Drake.”
One of the college kids overheard Nola and yelled, “Go Terriers!”
Nola watched the kid walk by. “So, what now? Call the feds?”
“Nope. We go check out the campus.”