Dark Sky (Joe Pickett #21)(49)

“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Earl asked Kirby.

“I am,” Kirby said.

“What?” Joannides asked impatiently. “What is it you two are seeing? All I see is snow on the top of grass.”

“You already said that,” Earl replied.

“We’ve lost the track,” Kirby explained to Joannides. He did so in the tone of an adult speaking to a small child.

“What? Why do you say that?”

Kirby chinned toward the clearing. “We’ve been following the creek in the timber for a long time where you couldn’t see footprints on account of the hard ground and all the rocks. But anybody can see that no one’s crossed that meadow up ahead. If they did, there would be fresh tracks in the snow.”

“Maybe they went around?”

“Not likely.”

“This is unacceptable,” Joannides fumed. “How could you let this happen?”

Earl turned his most withering deadeye stare on Joannides. It didn’t have the desired effect. Joannides was miffed and apparently wanted it known to all.

“It’s unacceptable, is it?” Earl asked him.

“How could we possibly lose them?” Joannides said, his voice rising with anger and panic. “They were ahead of us. We were right behind them, or so you said. Now they’ve vanished into thin air. I’ve done my job: I delivered him to you. Now you have to do yours.

“Do you realize that with every hour that goes by, more and more ConFab followers will start to talk and wonder why they haven’t heard from Steve-2? The speculation will begin, if it hasn’t already. It’ll become a really big thing in the online world. It’ll be one of the biggest business stories of the fucking year: ConFab Founder Goes Dark.

“Do you realize,” he continued, “what will happen to me if somehow Steve-2 and that game warden make it down the mountain and start talking to the police?”

“Yeah, I think I know,” Earl growled. “But you won’t be the only one in the shit.”

“Except I matter,” Joannides said.

The words just hung there for a moment. Earl felt his face get hot. He could sense a certain stillness in his son Kirby that was often the calm before the storm. Joannides seemed to realize he’d said the wrong thing.

“You know what I mean,” Joannides said. “I mean I’m in the tech world. They’ll crucify me, or at least some of them will. There are people who hate Steve-2 as much as I do, people he’s fucked over. But we’re kind of in two different worlds, wouldn’t you agree? Not that I’m better than you, just that we exist in completely different universes.”

“And you matter in yours?” Earl asked quietly.

“Really, man, I didn’t mean it to come out that way. I was just upset.”

Earl took that in without comment. Inside, he seethed.

“The guy is right about one thing,” Kirby said to Earl. “Steve-2 has millions of followers out there. And Price never shuts up—he posts his thoughts constantly. People will start to wonder why he stopped.”

Earl turned away from Joannides because he couldn’t stand to look at or listen to the man for another second.

“What do you propose we do?” Earl asked Kirby.

“Buy some time,” Kirby said. “Then double back and find where those sons of bitches cut away from the creek. As you taught us, everybody leaves tracks behind. We just have to find them.”

Then to Joannides, Kirby said, “You know what to do. Maybe you can dig your way out of the shithole you put yourself in.”

Joannides nodded his head and dutifully climbed off his horse.



* * *



—

Ten minutes later, after Joannides had made a ConFab post using Steve-2’s satellite phone and personal account, he looked up to see that all three Thomases had dismounted and were surrounding him. Earl observed the man carefully.

“What’d you say?” Earl asked.

“I retrieved a selfie from yesterday that Steve-2 took when we were riding up the mountain. He looks really happy in it. I said, ‘Enjoying the big sky and the mountain air. It’s fun to be off the grid for a while.’”

Earl grunted his approval.

“Now his followers won’t get too concerned if they don’t see another post from him tonight. They’ll figure he doesn’t have cell service. They don’t know about all the gear we brought along to make sure he’d never be off-line.”

Joannides looked expectantly to Earl, then to Kirby and Brad. He obviously wanted someone to validate his actions and forgive him for his slip of the tongue earlier. Earl eyed him with complete contempt.

Earl said, “Show Kirby here how you did that.”

“Did what?” Joannides asked. He was in the process of returning the satellite phone to the saddlebag where he’d retrieved it.

“How you sent that message or whatever you just did.”

Joannides paused.

“I need his password,” Kirby said.

“But why? I’m here. I can handle it.”

“You won’t give me his password?” Kirby asked.

“I . . . I didn’t say I wouldn’t,” Joannides stammered. “It’s just . . .” He let his sentence drop away.