Craig Johnson - Hell Is Empty

It had taken us only a few minutes to get going once we discovered the makeshift handcuff key, but it was taking an agonizingly long time to get back to Meadowlark Lodge-we’d run off the road three times already.

I held the mic from the Feds’ radio close to my mouth. “Come in, unit one, this is unit two; Agent McGroder, this is Sheriff Longmire. Over?”

Static.

Sancho risked a look. “This isn’t good.”

“No, it’s not.”

I braced a hand against the dash as we made the turn at Powder River Pass on the Cloud Peak Skyway, almost ten thousand feet above sea level. The storm had gotten serious, and the sleet now pounded the top of the Feds’ Suburban like a snare drum. Sancho was doing his best, but the puddles of slush that pooled in the tread swales of the mountainous road made every turn feel as if we were attempting to corner an overloaded rowboat.

I pulled out the Basquo’s cell phone, but there were no available bars. He glanced at me. “Anything?”

“Nope.” I’d had Holli make the 911 call down the mountain with the landline she had in the lodge, but we weren’t likely to get cell reception again until we got back to Meadowlark.

“Line of sight, or it could just be interference from the storm.”

“Yeah, but they’ve also got those satellite phones, so somebody ought to be able to get through to them.” I pressed the button on the mic again. “Unit one, this is unit two. How ’bout it, McGroder? Over.” I waited a second and then depressed the button again. “Anybody?”

Static.

Sancho gained a little speed on the straightaway as we sluiced past the cutoff to county roads 422 and 419 where Shade had buried the remains of the boy. After a few minutes we could see the lights of something in the gloom of the darkened sleet up ahead. “Are those headlights?”

“No, it’s something else.”

As we got closer, we could see that the gas pumps at Meadowlark Lodge had exploded, billowing black smoke and flames into the sodden night. The Basquo slowed and reverted to his mother tongue. “Kixmi.”

We turned and continued down the sloped parking lot and could see the reflection of the chemical bonfire in the lodge windows, and the melted sheen of the parking lot glowed in triplicate in the freezing fog. I kept thinking that if I looked at the images long enough, perhaps what they mirrored wouldn’t be real.

The Feds’ other Suburban was lodged sideways into the pump island at a crazy angle, and we could see the still-burning bodies slumped in the driver and passenger seats. I drew the. 45 from my holster, held on to the door handle, and nodded to the left of the Suburban. “Over there.”

The Basquo steered our vehicle toward the building, but a safe distance from the heat and flames. “What if the tank on that thing goes?”

“It already has.”

We slid to a stop, and I lurched from the SUV. Glancing at the flaming T-boned Suburban, I extended my firing arm as I rushed toward the front door of the lodge, where I could see a body.

The tactical yellow lettering across his shoulders bore the three letters. I was careful to walk around the blowback of what must have been the original shot and the trail of blood that he had made while trying to get to the main building. The blood was already frozen in the spot where he’d been gunned down, and it was probably the heat from the fire that had kept his body from freezing to the surface of the parking lot. He was still dragging himself toward the door.

I could feel the pressure of the air moving toward the fire, creating a vortex that pulled the sleeting snow along the ground and back up into the flames before disappearing into the conflagration. I glanced toward the lodge windows, but it was only cursory; with the DOC van missing, it was obvious where they-or, more important, Raynaud Shade-had gone.

I placed a hand on McGroder’s shoulder, and he stilled. Some of the air went out of him as I pulled him over: double-ought buck, his thigh and the oblique muscles torn to shreds. His eyes didn’t focus, and his lips hung open, but he was breathing. “Michael?”

He gargled, and his throat pulled and constricted as the blood drained from the side of his mouth. His face contorted, and it took a moment for me to realize that he was trying to speak.

“Michael? ”

With the surging noise of the fire and the continuing wind, I bent lower to hear his voice.

“Where-do…” He coughed, and more of the coagulated blood pushed out of his mouth. “Oh, hell…”

“Lie still and stop talking.” I had to get him inside. With the lack of blood pressure and the cold, he would soon go into shock if he hadn’t already; I had to get him stabilized. I glanced at the Basquo, who had approached the burning vehicle, braving the blown-out heat of the fire to check for survivors. “Sancho! ”

McGroder’s eyes wandered but then settled on me. “Who?”

“Walt Longmire, the sheriff. Remember?” It was textbook shock from blood loss. “Sancho!”

A moment later, he was beside me. “They’re all dead.”

McGroder’s eyes remained unfocused, and the pupils began clicking back and forth like a metronome. He jolted at the statement. “Oh, God

…”

“Help me with him.” We lifted the FBI agent as carefully as we could, with me taking his shoulders and Santiago his legs. I butted the glass door open with my back and we laid McGroder on the bar to our left. I unzipped his jacket and pulled aside his shirt and thermal. The wound was gaping, but it didn’t look as if it’d gotten any of his organs, so we were just battling blood loss.

There was a stack of bar towels under the counter, and I packed them into the wound in an attempt to stanch the bleeding, hepatitis C be damned. The Basquo returned from the back with a pile of wool army surplus blankets, folding one to place under the agent’s head and then covering him with another three.

Sancho tapped numbers into his cell phone then snapped it shut in disgust and grabbed McGroder’s satellite phone from the floor, where it had fallen from the table. The weather conditions must have screwed up the cell service. I lowered my face to the wounded man. “Michael, can you hear me?”

I supported the side of his head with my hand.

He swallowed. “Procedure perfect.”

“I’m sure.”

“Don’t know what happened.”

I nodded. “They took our van?”

“Killed Benton and the other marshal, Jon Mooney, right off, shot me before I could even get my… Took my sidearm.”

I nodded. “Was it Shade alone?”

“Yes.” He swallowed. “He got Benton and Moody in your DOC van. I heard the report and ran out, but he was already standing there and he shot me with the marshal’s shotgun. He took my Sig, went inside, and got the keys from the table.” He tried to swallow again. “Can I have something to drink?”

“Can do, buddy. The EMTs are on the way.” I leaned in closer-his eyes were clearing a little, and the focus was returning. “When did your other vehicle show?”

“Just as he was taking off in your van. He slammed into them and then unloaded on the driver, then the passenger-Pfaff was in there.” He sighed a rattling gasp. “Set the whole thing on fire with the pumps

…”

Saizarbitoria appeared on the other side of the wounded man with the satellite phone still in his hands. “Need to talk to you, boss.”

I glanced back at McGroder. “You’re going to be okay, just rest easy and we’ll get you something to drink.” I stepped around the bar toward the windows that still reflected the collective bonfires. “East slope?”

“Everybody’s coming, but it’s going to take forever. They’ve closed off the road; the whole east side at Powder River Pass is covered in ice and they can only go maybe fifteen miles an hour. I’ve alerted the DOJ and marshal’s offices. Henry and Vic are on their way with the EMTs and HPs.”