John Gilstrap - At all costs

He brooded on what he was about to do. What if the EPA know-it-alls were right? What if we are walking into a toxic nightmare? Even if he and Jake and Carolyn could figure a way to engineer the hazards down to the remotest possibility, how could he ever justify taking this kind of risk, just to put the past back on the right track?

As the sound of an approaching automobile pulled his attention back through the front window, he realized his answer had just arrived.

“I’m not staying here,” Travis said firmly as he climbed out of the Cadillac and saw what was left of the Ouachita Grove Motor Hotel.

“Hush, Travis,” Carolyn hissed.

“But I…” Jake’s gentle hand on his shoulder told him that it was prudent to shut up.

Carolyn moved only her eyes as she took it all in, her jaw slightly agape. “Oh, my God,” she whispered.

“One each, Arkansas-issue ghost town,” Jake mused aloud.

“You guys actually slept here?” Travis asked.

Jake smiled. “Well, it wasn’t quite this bad back then.”

They all jumped as the door to room 24 opened, and Jake and Thorne simultaneously swung their hands to their holsters. Jake stopped the instant he saw who it was, but Thorne kept going, bringing a huge, chrome-plated. 45 to bear on the new arrival.

“Freeze!” Thorne shouted.

Nick Thomas’s eyes popped to the size of saucers, and he threw his hands in the air. “Jesus!” he shouted. “Holy shit!”

Jake threw a hand toward Thorne. “No! That’s Nick! Don’t shoot him!”

Thorne held his aim for another second or two, just to make sure, then brought the gun down. “Goddamn amateurs,” he grumbled, stuffing his weapon back under his sports coat. “You keep surprising people like that and you’re gonna die young.”

Nick haltingly lowered his hands, and his legs wobbled a bit as color drained from his face. Carolyn darted forward to help him sit down before he fell. “Holy shit,” Nick said again. It seemed to be the entire breadth of his vocabulary. “Holy shit.”

Travis started to chuckle but stopped when Jake nudged his shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Nick,” Jake said, hurrying over to help. “Are you okay?”

“He nearly shot me!” Nick declared. “You send some thug to drag me all the way out here, and then you point guns at me?”

“He’s not a thug,” Carolyn corrected, but no one seemed to hear.

Jake shrugged, looking a little pained. “We didn’t know it was you, Nick. You just startled us.”

Nick looked at him like he’d grown a third eye. “Startled you?” he said incredulously. “Jesus, Jake, you were gonna shoot me for startling you? Suppose it hadn’t been me?”

Jake and Carolyn shared an uncomfortable glance, then changed the subject.

“So. What’s new?” Carolyn asked, sparking a welcome laugh all around. She ventured a hug, as best she could there on the sidewalk, and Nick returned the effort.

“Jesus, you guys look awful,” he said.

Jake helped Nick back to his feet. “How nice of you to notice. Diplomacy is still your specialty, I see.”

Nick wanted to laugh-to lighten the moment-but he couldn’t. “Seriously, Jake, are you all right?”

Jake’s look said it all: Are you nuts? “It’s been a tough fourteen years.”

“And who’s this?” Nick nodded toward the boy.

“This is our son, Travis,” Jake said proudly. “And our fourteen years don’t hold a candle to his last two days. He didn’t know about any of this.”

Travis offered a boyish, uncomfortable smile and extended his hand, just as he’d always been instructed.

“Nice to meet you, Travis.”

The boy nodded, then took his hand back and chased a rock with his sneaker.

The sound of tires crunching gravel startled them all, but when Jake saw no aggressive movement from Thorne, he relaxed.

“That’s the same car and driver who brought me here,” Nick explained.

As the green Chevy pulled closer, Thorne waved to the driver, who slowed to a stop. The two of them chatted for a while through the window. When Thorne came up for air, he strolled over to Carolyn.

“Okay, Sunshine,” he said. “I’ve got to go now. Mr. Sinclair wants me to keep a low profile. I’ll leave the Caddy here for you to use.”

“You can’t go!” Travis said. “You’re…” He shrank away from Thorne’s piercing glare.

“Everything you asked for should already be in the room. Mr. Sinclair said he’d take care of all the other details, whatever they are. Just be sure to be back at the airport on time tonight.” He delivered his entire speech to Carolyn, as if no one else was even there.

“Thanks, Thorne,” Carolyn said with a smile. She offered him her hand, but he looked confused. “And thank Uncle Harry for me, too.”

Suddenly, Thorne looked like he’d run out of words. He grasped her hand quickly, scowled, and disappeared.

“Well, you certainly have a way with criminal types,” Nick said after Thorne had climbed into the car.

“Stop calling him that!” Carolyn barked. “I owe that man a lot.”

Conversation stopped as everyone watched the Chevy leave. When it was gone, Carolyn abruptly shifted gears again. “So are we going to be able to pull this thing off or not?”

Bonnie Jerome checked her watch. She’d skipped lunch to be ready for Frankel’s return call, and now here it was nearly two, and her stomach was ready to consume itself.

To hell with him, she told herself. If Mr. Important didn’t have the common decency to return a simple phone call, then she wasn’t going to wait around all day. What was it about the executive mind-set, she wondered, that made them think people had nothing better to do than wait for them to bestow their precious attention?

The really irritating part was, she didn’t even care about the damn call. It was probably some computer glitch, anyway. With her luck, when Frankel finally rang back, she’d get an earful of just how important he was and how he didn’t have time for petty issues like this. That was certainly the impression she’d gotten from his secretary when Bonnie refused to pass along the substance of the message.

“I’m cleared for everything,” the secretary had pointed out.

“Not according to the message,” Bonnie countered, after which the conversation had ended abruptly.

Maybe she should just call and get it over with; just leave a message with the secretary and get on with her day. Much as she hated to admit it, the prospect of talking to the heir apparent for the directorship had Bonnie a bit frazzled. All things considered, she’d be just as comfortable…

The phone rang, nearly launching her through the ceiling. It had been like this all day. Every time the phone chirped, she’d assumed it was The Man, only to find it was business as usual.

Don’t seem overly anxious, she told herself

The phone rang again. Bonnie hovered her hand over the receiver until it just started into its third ring. “Information Systems,” she said, picking up. “This is Bonnie Jerome.”

“Hold for Deputy Director Frankel, please.” She recognized the secretary’s voice from that morning, and she found herself on hold before she could say a word.

Here we go.

An abrupt click, and he was there. “Hello, Ms. Jerome, this is Deputy Director Frankel. I understand you have a message to relay to me?”

It was him! She recognized his voice from all of the training videos she’d watched and from his appearances on television.

“Um, h-hello, Mr. Frankel,” she stammered. “Th-thanks for getting back to me.”

“What is it you needed?” Suddenly his tone was flat; all business.

“Well, I work down in Information Systems. Actually, I’m a supervisor down here…”