Long Road to Mercy (Atlee Pine, #1)(41)

The sun was just starting to rise.

“How did you get the message from the office?” asked Pine.

“I didn’t until I checked the line early this morning.”

“How early do you check it?”

“Four o’clock every morning. Just in case. I wish I had checked it before.”

“There were two men,” said Pine as she took off the head bandage and dropped it into a trash can. “We were intentionally run off the road, and then a chopper landed. There were two guys in body armor with combat weapons. One of them threw a flashbang or concussion grenade and knocked me out. I’d already been hurt in the crash, so that accounts for what happened.” She looked at the sky, checking the status of the rising sun. Her watch had been damaged in the crash and her phone had run out of juice. “I must’ve been out for about eight hours.”

She looked over at Blum. “Do you believe me?”

“I would hope you wouldn’t have to ask that, Special Agent Pine. Of course I believe you. So the people in the chopper must have taken the two men.”

“Or else the car that hit us came back for them. But yes, they were taken.”

“Does this involve the dead mule case and the missing person, Ben Priest?”

Pine nodded as they reached Blum’s light green Prius in the parking lot.

“Only the Ben Priest that went missing wasn’t the real Ben Priest.”

They climbed into the car and Blum started it up.

“So where is the real Ben Priest?” Blum asked.

“He was one of the men with me last night. He and his brother, Ed. Ed flew in from the East Coast and called me. I picked him up at an IHOP in Flagstaff and took him to my place. He tried to kill me while he thought I was sleeping.”

Blum took this startling information in stride. “Did he indeed? How badly did you beat him up?”

“I didn’t have to. He chickened out. He’s actually not a bad guy. His family was threatened. It was them or me. So he came out here to do the deed, then got cold feet. But through him I was able to connect with the real Ben Priest. We met last night at El Tovar. Then we got in Ben Priest’s Explorer and drove off heading south. That’s when we were attacked.”

“That qualifies as a busy night.”

“We need to go to the site of the crash. I need to check some things.”

She gave Blum the directions, and about an hour later they arrived at the spot.

There was nothing there.

The burned-out carcass of the Explorer was gone. The tire marks on the shoulder had been tidied up and the debris field policed.

Blum pulled off to the side of the road and they got out.

They walked the site together.

“They did a good job cleansing the site,” said Pine. “But not good enough.”

She pointed to a felled tree.

“Somebody cut this tree down last night with a chainsaw. You can see the teeth marks on the wood. Then they used the chainsaw to tear up the spot where the Explorer hit the trunk. But if you dig in there, you’re going to find the green paint and other residue from the truck.” Next, she pointed to patches of dirt along the grass shoulder. “They had to cut those out because the grass there was burned. And I’m betting that if you brought a metal detector out here, you’d find a shitload of tiny pieces from the Explorer. And when it blew up, I’m certain there are parts of it that ended up far away, and in the woods over there.”

“Still, someone went to a lot of trouble to clean this up,” said Blum.

“I pulled both guys from the truck. When it blew Ed got hit with a piece of shrapnel in the arm. That’s why my jacket is missing. I used it to wrap his wound.” She pointed at her shirtsleeve, where there were traces of blood. “And they missed this. It’s his blood. Some got on me when I was tending his injury.”

“You said you called the police?”

Pine nodded. “And I imagine they would have gotten here at some point. But there was no way they could have gotten rid of all the evidence before then.”

“I can check on that,” said Blum. “And see what happened.” She paused as she stared around at where the attack had taken place. “You didn’t tell anyone about the imposter Ben Priest?”

Pine glanced at her. “No, I didn’t.”

“Because you felt something was out of sorts?”

“Yes.”

“Well, with choppers, body armor, and soldiers carrying assault weapons and throwing flashbangs at you I can see why.”

“This is getting weirder by the minute.”

“Oh, I always thought it was a little weird to begin with. I mean, you don’t see a dead mule with letters carved on it every day of the week.”

They had just arrived at the office and gone inside when Pine’s phone buzzed. She had charged it using Blum’s car charger. She did not look pleased at the name on the caller ID.

Blum glanced at her. “Let me guess. The chain of command is calling?”

Pine grimaced. “Yep.”

“The only question is, how high up?” said Blum.

“Looks to be pretty damn high,” said Pine grimly.





Chapter

23



C?LINT DOBBS was the special agent in charge at the Phoenix Field Office. He was ultimately in charge of every FBI office in the state of Arizona and had a legion of agents under his command. But right now, it seemed, all his attention was focused on one, who held down the newest and only one-agent office in the entire state.