Close To Danger (Westen #4)(66)
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Just before six the next morning, Earl stepped out onto the back porch of the First Baptist Church of Westen and closed the door behind him. Thanks to the new wool winter coat Ms. Lorna over at the Peaches ’N Cream had given him, the cold air wasn’t so bad today.
Pulling out his pack of smokes, he slipped one between his lips, lit the free end and inhaled a lungful of smoke, closing his eyes briefly to let the nicotine hit his system. He supposed Pastor Miller might not mind him smoking down in the church basement where his rollaway bed was, but ever since he was a small boy watching his father and the other men of his hometown church go outside to smoke after services, Earl had always considered it disrespectful to God to smoke in his house. And that man upstairs already had enough to be angry with him about. No use adding to the list of his sins.
So, here he stood outside on a cold, crisp winter morning smoking his first Camel of the day. Old man winter had been busy dumping more snow on the town last night. Looked like he was going to have to shovel the church porch, steps and sidewalk again today. That was all right with him. Keeping the porch safe for people to come inside the warm church was a good way to earn a place to sleep and a few good meals.
The night the blizzard roared through town, Pastor Miller had insisted he come home with him and share dinner with him and the misses. Earl had wanted to tell them no, but one whiff of her chicken soup and he couldn’t think of a reason to leave. Not even when they insisted he sleep in one of their real nice guest rooms.
After working at the church yesterday, the pastor invited him home once more. Only the house was full, as two families with four little ones between them had come to stay. Both families were without heat at their places. Earl enjoyed the meal of delicious roast beef, potatoes and carrots, along with Mrs. Miller’s melt-in-your-mouth cornbread. He’d used the new guests as an excuse, though, to head back to the church for the night. From the look in her eyes he knew the pastor’s wife wanted to protest, but instead sent him along with an extra big slice of homemade apple pie.
That woman sure could cook. He patted his stomach just thinking about it.
The clock in the church’s tower chimed six times signaling it was six a.m. The loud hourly chiming was something he’d had to get used to when he first came to town years ago. Now it was like his own personal time keeper. He glanced down the road in the direction of the Peaches ’N Cream. The light was on upstairs, which meant Pete, the cook, must be up for the day.
Guess he’d mosey on down that way. If he wandered in sober when Pete started his prep for the day’s cooking, he’d let Earl peel vegetables in exchange for a meal. Even though the pastor paid him for his work, getting to eat with Pete and sometimes Ms. Lorna’s nice daughter Rachel was worth pulling K-P duty in the back of the warm café.
He pulled one last drag off his cigarette, stubbed it out and left it where he’d be sure to clean up when he came back to clear the steps after breakfast. With a tug on the collar of his coat, he braced it against his neck to keep out any biting wind gusts and headed down the street.
One block down Main Street he heard a noise coming from the new apartment building, built to house some of the new comers to town after that big explosion last spring. He moved to stand beside a thick oak tree, knowing his coat and clothes would blend into its shadows in the near dark. Slowing his breathing just like he had in the war, he watched the parking lot.
The figure emerged from the stairwell on the side of the building, dressed head-to-toe in all white, a long black gun case strapped on one shoulder. With a click of a button the headlights of a big pick-up truck flashed. The figure turned to put the gun case inside. The light of the parking lot caught the face dusted with freckles and the long ginger-colored hair that escaped from beneath a white knit cap.
Hannah, the newest waitress over at the Peaches ’N Cream.
She climbed into the truck and started the engine. As she drove it out of the lot and turned right, Earl hugged the tree, doing his disappearing act. She drove past him, headed out towards the North end of town.
Now where was she headed this time of the morning, dressed like that and carrying a rifle?
*
Hannah parked her truck in the shelter of two old evergreens and some downed oaks and maples half a mile from the main road and equal distance from Wes’s place. She’d scoped out this spot when she first arrived in town and learned where he lived back in the fall. The roads had iced over after dusk yesterday and the new snow last night had made driving on them just as treacherous as right after the blizzard drove through. It also meant no one was on the roads to see her coming this way.
The clock on the dashboard said six-twenty. She checked her watch to be sure they were in sync. Perfect. If anyone had a clue what she was up to, it would take them some time to get here. Wes Strong was not going to survive until they did.
Sitting in the warm truck cab, she opened the sniper drag bag. Dad had bought her one when she hit the buck nearly five-hundred meters away just after her eighteenth birthday. Her chest ached with the memory. That had been the first time she’d gone hunting with Dad by herself. Isaac had joined the army right after graduating college and was in basic-training. They only saw him in between deployments after that, only sharing one more family hunting trip before Dad died and Isaac disappeared into the world of clandestine operations—following Wes Strong like a loyal pup.