Chuck Logan - Homefront

“You have a dog?” Nygard asked.

Broker shook his head and motioned to the two other men to follow him. As they left the radius of the yard light, Broker pointed the way up the connecting trail.

When they came to the ski pole where the trails T-boned, Broker stopped and switched on the light. Griffin and Nygard continued forward, stood looking at the stuffed bunny for a full minute. Slowly Griffin took out a pack of cigarettes and an old Zippo lighter. He lit the cigarette, put the lighter back in his pocket, then turned to Broker.

“Bloody nose to crucified bunny. He escalated on you,” he said.

“Every morning Kit makes her bed and puts that bunny in the same exact place on her pillow. Last night after the tire and the antifreeze happened, the toy was missing. I’m thinking somebody was in my house yesterday when Kit and I where out on the ski trail. Maybe he was watching the house, waiting until we left…”

“What about your wife? Was she home?” Nygard asked.

“She wasn’t feeling good and was taking a nap when we left,” Broker said.

Nygard waited for Broker to continue. When he didn’t, Griffin steered off Nina, asking Nygard, “Jimmy?”

Nygard nodded. “He’s dumb enough to do something like this, ’specially if Cassie was egging him on.”

“There’s more,” Broker said, extended his hand, finger pointing. “Check the collar around the bunny’s neck. Our kitten disappeared last night. Nina and Kit think the cat got out because I left the garage door open.”

“ Was the door open?” Nygard asked.

“No,” Broker said. Then he bit his lip, thought. “I don’t think it was.”

“You positive someone came in your house?” Nygard asked.

Broker exhaled. Saw where Nygard was going. “Not for sure. The toy could have been in the truck, the truck wasn’t locked. The bowl with the antifreeze could have been on the deck with cat food in it.”

“Okay,” Nygard said carefully, “without getting too far into exactly who you are-’cause it ain’t really my business-” He stared at Broker for several seconds. “What I want to head off here is you and Jimmy going back and forth with this feud until you bump into each other at the gas station and somebody winds up in an ambulance.”

“I just want to be left alone,” Broker said.

“Don’t take this wrong,” Nygard said, “but to stop this fight that’s brewing here, somebody gotta step up and be the adult.” The comment, coming from the younger man, struck Broker as quietly bristling with hair-shirt Scandinavian piety.

“Sheriff-” Broker started to protest.

Griffin interrupted, “Hear him out, Broker.” Broker relented, raised his hands, gloved palms open, let them fall.

“Okay, then,” Nygard said. “Griffin and I are thinking you and me should take a drive, fill you in on some background about Jimmy Klumpe and Cassie Bodine. Might help you manage this situation better.”

Broker nodded. “Uh-huh. This teacher at the school cautioned me about ‘rubbing up against the local soap opera.’ Is this what you’re getting at?”

“I guess,” Nygard said. Then he turned and walked back up the trail.

Broker looked at Griffin. “You two are in cahoots.”

“Yep,” Griffin said. He plucked the bunny off the ski pole and thrust it in his parka pocket. “Somebody’s got to sew this up so Kit don’t notice. That wouldn’t be you or Nina.” He pulled the pole from the snow and handed it to Broker. They walked back toward the house. Nygard went through the garage and got in his truck, started the engine.

“So what’s Nygard know about me?” Broker asked, placing the ski pole with its twin in the garage.

“Ask him,” Griffin said,

“You think he can smooth over all this bullshit?”

“Yep.”

“Hey, Griffin, somebody broke into my house-”

“You assume.”

“Bullshit. This guy had a plan. He took my kid’s toy, then he took the cat. Shit, man; there’s tracks leading off the deck into the woods, doubled back.” Broker flung his arm toward the trail behind them. “I spent an hour working out his pattern. He came in on skis, through the woods. Yesterday afternoon there was all kinds of folks coming down that trail on skis.”

“On skis, huh? You sure?” Griffin stopped, thought a moment, then turned deliberately. “Maybe you’re a little stressed right now and not thinking too clearly. In the scheme of things, this really where you want to make a stand? Defend your homestead, put down roots, plant a garden?” He puffed on his smoke, looked away. “Ain’t why you’re here. Hell, man. I can get you another cat. You go on with Nygard. I’ll hang back, keep an eye on the house.”

Broker ducked into the kitchen, kissed Kit good night, and told Nina he was going into town with Harry. She protested mildly when he took her fresh carafe of coffee and three travel mugs. He left her heating water for another pot and staring at Hardball on the TV screen, where Chris Matthews was talking twenty times faster than General Wesley Clark about the invasion of Iraq.

Griffin took his cup of coffee and parked his Jeep down the road. Broker got in Nygard’s Ranger and doled out coffee as Nygard drove up 12, away from town, continued north, and shifted the Ranger into four-wheel drive as they went beyond where the snowplow had stopped. They followed a single set of tire tracks dwindling in a foot of snow. Soon it was pitch black, no yard lights, just a light snow sparkling in the high beams. Nygard slowed as a doe and two fawns meandered across the road.

“Jack Pine Barrens, big fire in here, oh, twenty years ago,” Nygard said, waving his hand at the darkness. “Hardly anybody lives up here anymore.” After another three minutes, Nygard addressed the silence in the Ranger. “Okay. The way you put Jimmy on his ass got my attention. So I called Griffin, and then I called this copper in St.-”

“Who?” Broker asked.

“Jack Grieve, sergeant in narcotics. We met when I went through the academy. We keep in touch. He comes up summers to fish. Stays with me.”

“I know Jack,” Broker said. “Good no-bullshit cop.”

“Asked him if he knew of a Phil Broker,” Nygard continued. “‘Why do you ask?’ Jack says. Got him staying in my county, I says.” Nygard turned and looked directly at Broker for emphasis. “‘Won’t get anything direct from me about Broker,’ Jack says. Fair enough. How ’bout indirect, I says. ‘But that would be gossip,’ Jack says.” Nygard paused to sip his coffee. Waited.

Broker accepted Nygard’s workmanlike preamble. “So we’re off the record,” he said.

Nygard grunted affirmatively. “Hell, man; we’re driving into the Washichu. Pretty soon we’ll be clear off everything .”

“You mind if I smoke?” Broker asked, pulling out his cigars.

“Crack the window,” Nygard said. He probed his pocket and withdrew a toothpick, which he held in his fingers like a cigarette before putting it between his lips.

Broker dialed down the window several inches, lit the rough wrap, and waited.

Now Nygard was direct. “Basically Jack said you were always more an adventurer than a cop. Paid your dues in St. Paul, made sergeant fast, and developed a real taste for undercover work. Then you worked a deal with BCA. And here Jack says something happened. A supervisor made a mistake; let you take the bit in your teeth, go too deep, and stay there. You got out eight years ago. Married this heavy-duty lady in the Army. Rumor is, every once in a while, you do things that don’t get written down. For the feds. Got this little resort up on Lake Superior. But Jack says that ain’t really where you get your money.”

“That it?” Broker said, staring ahead, rolling the cigar across his mouth.