High up in the cab of the Freightliner, the driver leans forward at the wheel. He’s bearded, skinny, wearing a woolen Broncos hat.
“Where you headed?” Whicher says.
“Pueblo.”
“How far is that?”
“Twenty. Twenty-five.” He pushes at the sleeve of his sweater. “God knows if the truck can make it. I been stopped in Lamar, again in Swink.”
“How is it further east?”
“The same. Like this.”
The marshal looks at him.
“You can barely see a hundred yards. I come out of Dodge City this afternoon, from Kansas. It's been bad all the way—snow and broken down vehicles. Only gettin’ worse.”
Lauren sits silent between the two men, arms folded.
The driver jabs a thumb over his shoulder at the sleeper cab. “If it gets too bad, I guess I can bunk down.”
The wipers beat back and forth on the windshield.
“Get us to Pueblo,” Whicher says, “we’ll get out.”
Belaski checks his driver mirror—a single set of lights behind him, nothing else out on the road.
Wind is streaming through the broken window, the muscles of his body starting to seize.
He eyes the freight truck in the distance, he can tail it, catch it. To stop it on the highway, to stop it and then to get to her—there’ll be the escort to get past, the driver of the truck.
He lets his speed drop, listens for anything on the police-band radio—still nothing, no report of anything wrong.
The Ford is shot up, if he pulls alongside the rig, they’ll recognize it.
The freight truck starts to pull away, he lets it disappear in the dark and snow.
Belaski eyes the transceiver on the dash-hook, reaches for it—pulls hard, ripping it from its moorings.
Switching on the red and blue flashers, he steers out into the middle of the twin-lanes, lets his speed fall away.
He checks—sees the vehicle behind start to slow.
Belaski rolls the Ford to a stop.
He puts the suppressed SIG in the pocket of his parka. Watches for the car to come to a halt.
Pulling the keys from the ignition, he steps out, walks fast to the stationary vehicle—an old Chrysler sedan.
Inside, the driver's a young guy in a hooded sweat. Nobody with him.
“What's going on?” the kid calls through the window.
Belaski draws the gun from his pocket. He points it at the young man's face.
The kid's eyes go wide.
“Get out of the car.” Belaski steps to the driver’s door.
The young man folds forward, stumbles out.
Belaski gets in, points the gun at the kid’s midriff. But doesn’t fire. Robbing, not killing—two separate wires in his mind; different lines.
The kid’s jacket is on the passenger seat, his cell on a dash-mount.
Belaski tosses the jacket out onto the road. Puts the car into drive.
Three o'clock in the morning, downtown Pueblo is deserted. Ice at the banks of the Arkansas River, snow blowing thick in the air.
Ahead, along the sidewalk, a motel building is lit up. Whicher eyes the cars and trucks outside in the lot.
Beside him, Lauren buries her face in her upturned collar.
The marshal takes a hand from his pocket, points along the sidewalk at the motel lobby.
“Anywhere,” she says, “just get us out of this wind.”
Whicher scans a side-street, thick with snow, blurred halos at the street lamps.
Lauren slows her step. “Why do you keep on looking?”
He clamps his hat down on his head. “Army habit.”
“You think somebody will be out there?”
Two hours, now.
Millersburg, two hours back.
The woods, the cabin.
Thirty long miles behind.
Parked at the curbside in the stolen Chrysler sedan, Belaski watches a city police car make its way along the street.
The Chrysler’s covered in salt and snow—only its headlights showing—no way to see the make or model, no way for the cop see the plate.
Parts of the city are blacked out, the power down—law enforcement would be busy with a hundred things.
The patrol car reaches an intersection—makes a turn, continues on its way.
Belaski studies the building fifty yards off. A motel. One entrance. An eight-feet high wall in back.
They’d walked.
The two of them, after the truck set them down.
Half a mile into central downtown, they’d found a motel, they’d gone into reception. Five minutes later, a clerk opened them up a room. They’d gone in. They hadn’t come back out.
Wind nudges at the car, rocking it. Belaski huddles in the cold.
They’d feel safe, now. Finally. They hadn’t seen him. All he needed was to pick his moment.
He stares down at the SIG on the passenger seat, thinks of putting the can-like suppressor to Jimmy Scardino’s head.
Jimmy was dying, shot up, he was only going to slow it all down.
But still.
The son of a made man.
Belaski’s stock would be in free-fall, everything he’d worked for, year on year.
How to justify, how to explain?
Deep shit.
Deep, deep shit.
He thinks of the big bastard coming out of the cabin.
Your life is mine now, Belaski breathes in the silent car.
The terms of the deal on Lauren DeLuca were irreversible—killing the man who shot Jimmy Scardino would be personal accounting.
He checks his watch, checks the cell phone in the well above the shifter—it’s showing full.
Three o'clock in the morning in Colorado, four o’clock in Chicago.
He can’t call him, can’t call Coletti.
Cold rage roils in the pit of his belly, he clamps his mouth tight.
If he can get it done, only if he can get it all done, he tells himself.
He pushes back in the driver’s seat.
Only then.