Page 103 of South of Nowhere

Debi Starr walked into the tent.

The siblings and Olsen turned to her. “I found the shooter’s nest in the rocks on the south side of the valley.”

It was a huge area, he was thinking. How on earth had she found exactly where he’d shot from?

She explained. “I nailed the slug. Good news it went through soft tissue—both good for Edandfor the forensics—and ended up in the dirt. I stuck a straw in the bullet hole in the ground and sighted up it. Adjusting for elevation and a little wind, I found the nest pretty easy. If he had a rest for his rifle it was silicon and not a cloth sandbag. No fibers. And no brass. He’s a pro, no doubt about it now. Remember what I said about not having anything personal on him?

“He tried to walk away from the nest careful and was pretty good at it, but he planted a foot right in a bit of soft mud. Probablydidn’t bother to clean it because he was in a hurry—andbecause he doesn’t think much of us poor small-town constables.

“But he’s in for a surprise. I drove out to the bridge where you got attacked this morning, Colter. Found matching boot prints. So Bear’s the sniper. I’ll write an application for a warrant and, you”—a nod toward Colter—“do an affidavit putting the shooter at the copper mine earlier today. And we pay Mr. Redding a visit.”

44.

Gerard Redding surveyed the sandbagging around the fence and decided it was as good as it was going to get.

Five of the six feet height were protected. And any flooding this far from the Never Summer—about a mile—would probably rise no more than a meter or so.

He was standing in the circular yard of the front of the company. He had always thought of this portion of his business as Cerberus, mythical three-headed dog guarding the entrance to the underworld.

This entryway was the body.

The three shafts—Hell, Hades and Inferno—were the necks.

The rock faces, a half mile down, the snarling heads.

It was a labored metaphor but he liked it.

He called to his workers. “Okay. That’s good! You can go home now.” He repeated the message in Spanish. He held up envelopes, each containing a hundred dollars in cash.

The half dozen men and women walked up to the fence and took the bonuses gratefully. They then hurried to their idling cars and made their escapes.

Hugh Davies, the operations manager, walked out of the office, looking over the barricade as well. “It’s good, don’t you think?”

Davies, a foot shorter than Redding, had a dapper, distinguishedair about him. Even today—a day of alarm and extremes—he wore a white shirt and tie.

Redding nodded.

The manager continued, “She’ll get the flooding worse than us.” Eyes cutting across the highway, which separated the mine from Annie Coyne’s farm.

“Bitch,” Redding muttered.

At least, he had the satisfaction of knowing her frustration and anger every time she saw the north four hundred—the huge plot of farmland her father had lost to Redding’s sire in that fateful poker game. Redding was a miner, not a farmer, so he’d let the property go to seed. All he cared about was the mineral rights and that particular parcel had exceeded the old man’s expectations. He could have leased agrarian rights to her. But hell no.

“Everything secure?” he asked Davies.

Referring to moving the computers and paperwork to a safe location.

“As long as it doesn’t turn into Niagara Falls.”

It wouldn’t. Redding’s calculations had confirmed this.

“You want to leave?” Redding asked. “We can move the barricade.”

“If you’re not, think I’ll stick around too. In case your ass needs bailing out.”

“Ha.”

He believed that Davies had a crush of sorts on him. But it was as nebulous and unformed as it would forever be.

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