Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
D
arren had only a moment to compose himself when he pulled the edge of the curtain aside and saw the sheriff walking toward the door from the vehicle he’d parked in the driveway. What the hell did he want?
“It’s the new sheriff,” his wife said, frowning as she went to answer the door. “Morning. Everything okay?”
Darren stepped up behind her, concealing his concern. “Sheriff. What can we do for you?”
“You’re Darren Lassiter?”
“Yes.”
The sheriff glanced at his wife and back. “Can we talk alone for a minute?”
“Of course. Be right back,” he said to his wife, who he knew would be listening to every word as he stepped out and closed the door behind him. “What’s this about?”
The new sheriff’s posture and expression radiated calm authority.
Confidence. Darren had voted for him. “As you’re no doubt aware, I just took office, so in some ways I’m still getting the lay of the land, so to speak.
” He paused, his clear amber gaze unwavering.
Making Darren brace for whatever he was about to say next.
“I’ve heard whispers about a local militia here on the island and thought you might be the man to talk to. ”
He kept his expression neutral. “A militia? Here? That’s illegal.”
“Yeah, it is. I’m happy to hear you’re aware of that too. So what kind of group do you run, then?”
“We’re just a gun club. Completely legal, everything done by the book. We’ve got a board, minutes of all our meetings. It’s all legit.”
“Good to know. I’m also told you’re the man in charge.”
“That’s mostly right.” Although someone far more powerful than he was calling the shots these days.
“Thing is.” Torres folded his arms, the sleeves stretching under the bulge of muscle. “We recently found evidence that might link your organization to a large cache of ammunition buried near a residential neighborhood.”
“I don’t know what you found, but that’s not us.”
“It’s not?”
“No, we keep all our equipment locked up in the storage facility at the range.”
“Very responsible of you. Where’s that at?”
“Few miles from here.”
“You wouldn’t mind showing me, would you?”
He was already regretting his vote. “No, of course not. When are you thinking?”
“Now’s a good time. If that’s convenient.”
It wasn’t. Nothing about this was fucking convenient, and the bastard knew it. “Sure, that’s fine. I’ll just get my keys, and you can follow me over.”
“Great.”
He kept his anger from showing on his face, but it burned like a hot coal under his sternum. Maybe bringing in a young, rookie sheriff hadn’t been such a good idea after all.
“What’s going on?” his wife whispered when he walked inside.
“I’m taking the sheriff to the range. Don’t know when I’ll be back.” He grabbed his keys and headed out into the blinding sunshine before she could ask anything else.
“See you there,” Torres called out before getting into his own vehicle.
Darren pulled out onto the road and used the hands-free device to call Greg on his burner. “We’ve got a major problem.” He quickly explained what was happening. “Meet me at the range. Wait near the entrance out of sight until he leaves.”
“Got it.”
The range was empty when they arrived. He parked near the trailer they used as an office, got out, and waited while Torres walked toward him.
“Never been out here before. Is this private property?” Torres asked, removing his sunglasses as he looked around.
Darren had served in the military long enough to recognize a fellow warrior.
Would have known Torres was a veteran even if he hadn’t read his bio prior to voting.
That unsettling amber gaze missed nothing and gave nothing away.
“That’s right. Belongs to one of our members.”
“I’ll need his name before I go.” He took another glance around the property, noticing the row of targets set up at the far end of the outdoor range and the two other trailers off to one side of it. “What’s in those?”
“Our equipment.” Darren walked over and unlocked the first one. The best way to get the new sheriff off his back was to cooperate fully and not do anything to raise suspicion.
Torres stepped inside, looked around in silence for a few seconds. “Not much in here.” He inspected the shelving units containing plate carriers, boxes of ammo and gun parts. “Where are the weapons you use?”
“Next door.” He left to open up that trailer.
Torres did another, more thorough inspection of the firepower inside. “Not much in here either.” He took down a rifle to check it with expert movements. “How many members do you have currently?”
“Seventy-three.”
Torres turned to him. “Really. That’s strange, I heard it was double that at least.”
“Who’d you hear that from?”
“A reliable source.” He put the rifle back in place. “So where are the rest of the weapons, Darren?”
“Most members use their private weapons.”
“They’re all acquired legally, too, with the paperwork to prove it?”
“Of course.”
“I’ll need to see all that.”
“As long as you have a warrant.”
Torres inclined his head. “I’ll take care of that.”
Oh, I bet you will. Darren gave him a tight smile that didn’t quite hide his resentment. “I’ll get it all to you as soon as I can.”
“I appreciate that.”
They stepped back outside into the sunshine. It was hot on Darren’s back, but inside he was cold.
He left the trailer unlocked, silently fuming and trying not to panic. This was slipping out of control fast. He had to do something. If the people he answered to found out the sheriff had been sniffing around and knew about the ammo cache...
“Did you hide ammo and weapons across the island, Darren?”
The question made him blanch. “What? No, of course not. Why would I do that?”
“You tell me.” Torres stood there with his hands on his hips, the uniformed deputy positioned behind him within earshot. Watching them and listening to every word.
“I don’t know.” He barely kept from growling it.
Torres stared at him. Cool and composed as he assessed him. “You sure about that?”
“Yes.” He could feel beads of sweat starting to break out along his spine.
“All right, that’s all I need for now. I’ll be in touch if I have any further questions.” He started for his vehicle. Stopped partway there, putting an end to Darren’s short-lived relief that he might still be in the clear. “Oh, one more thing.”
“Yes?”
Torres turned around to face him. “What would you say if I told you I’ve got a map with all the cache locations marked on it?”
Fuuuuuuck. “I’d say I still have no idea what you’re talking about.”
They stared each other down for a long, tense moment. Torres inclined his chin slightly. “Well, if anything comes to mind about that, you let me know.”
Darren’s hands balled into fists in his pockets as he watched the sheriff and deputy drive off. As soon as the vehicle was out of view, he went into the second trailer and took out a rifle. Loaded a fresh mag into it and stalked over to the first lane of the range.
He put the butt of the weapon to his shoulder, took aim at the target in the distance and sighted down the barrel, picturing Torres’s face in the center of it.
Letting out a deep breath, he stared at the target and squeezed the trigger. A burst of semi-auto fire erupted from the barrel. Each round struck within inches of the center of the target a split second later.
He moved to kneeling position. Fired another burst. Then laid down in prone position to finish off the magazine. Imagining every single round punching holes in Torres.
Feeling only mildly better, he rose, glanced behind him as Greg’s truck came into view. He waited while the other man parked and got out.
Greg’s expression was anxious. “Well? What happened?”
“He knows about the militia. And he said he’s got a map with all the other cache locations on it.” Was it true? It made him want to shoot something else. “How is that possible?”
Greg blinked at him in horror. “I dunno, I just returned the book the other day—” He stopped, his face turning ashen.
“What?” Darren said impatiently, pulse quickening.
“Willow works at the library.”
Darren stared at him. Since when? “You’re sure?”
“Yeah, I’ve seen her in there.” He shifted his stance, ran a hand over his chin. “Maybe she found the bookmark and recognized the symbol from the sheet in the cache...”
Fuck sake. He didn’t know if it was true, but he couldn’t say it wasn’t. “You think it’s possible she cracked the coding? This fast? Because I find that hard to believe.”
“She’s smart. I don’t know the specifics, but I heard she worked for some big museum or something in New York as an archivist. She’s got a Master’s degree.”
“In cryptology?” he said in a bland voice.
“No, but... Maybe someone she showed it to broke the code.”
“So you’re telling me that she could have found the bookmark, realized it was linked to the ammo cache, somehow had it decrypted, and whoever did that figured out it listed coordinates to put on a fucking map?”
“It’s possible.” Greg ran a hand through his hair. “Shit, this is bad. There’s no way we can move everything in time if the sheriff actually has all the locations.”
No. Fuck. “We need to find out how much they know.”
“How?”
“Willow.”
“Okay,” Greg said slowly, frowning at him in growing concern. “What are you thinking?”
“I’ll handle it.” He would handle this personally. Take her when she was alone. Drug her and interrogate her until she’d spilled everything she knew about the code and map. Only then could he implement some kind of damage control.
“You sure?” Greg asked, looking relieved.
“Yeah. But I need eyes on her, and it can’t be me now that the sheriff and I have been personally introduced.”
“Okay, I can do that.”
“Find her and watch her. She might be with Tripp. Report back once you’ve got a location. And in the meantime, we need to organize individual teams to move the caches.” The clock was ticking. They had to get it done before Torres got there.
“On it.” Greg turned and strode for his vehicle.
Darren pulled in an unsteady breath, trying to block the trickle of fear seeping into his gut. Greg didn’t realize that this situation was much worse than he imagined.
If this got back to the people Darren was working with, he and a handful of others would wind up in an enforcer’s crosshairs.