Neil McMahon - Lone Creek

The logistics of covering my tracks were trickier. The mistakes I'd made with Kirk still scared the shit out of me. The upside was that I'd given a lot of thought to what I would have done differently, and that kicked in. The downside was that my margin was a lot narrower this time. For openers, the sheriffs weren't going to have any trouble finding the crime scene. I could only try to minimize the risks.

First came the rifle. I had barely touched it-just picked it up by the stock to put it in the truck, back at the campsite-and I'd carefully wiped it clean since then. But I couldn't count on doing that again effectively, in haste and in the dark. I didn't have gloves, and I didn't want to chance buying anything that a clerk might remember. Wrapping it would be easiest, but that might leave fabric traces, even microscopic, that were identifiable-any clothing or gear that belonged to Laurie or Madbird or me could link it to us. I didn't want to use anything from around Great Falls, either-the fact that I'd been staying there would be known, and material from there turning up at the scene would be a highly suspicious coincidence.

The safest course I could see was to go scavenging when I got to Helena. I could filch a garbage bag out of a dumpster for wrapping the rifle. The thin plastic wouldn't impair my shooting, it would keep my clothes and skin free of residue, and I could shove it inside my shirt when I dropped the weapon and burn it on the way home. I'd obscure my boot prints by lashing a couple of small green pine branches to the soles like miniature snowshoes. There were plenty of haystacks along the way where I could cut baling twine.

The best thing about this, giving me a grim and maybe ugly satisfaction, was that it would point strongly to Kirk's settling a score with Balcomb-exactly the setup that Balcomb had intended for me. Besides obvious evidence like the rifle itself, there were some extra factors that stood to work for me more subtly, such as that Kirk had almost certainly loaded the clip. I hadn't touched it and I didn't see any reason why Balcomb or John Doe would have, so Kirk's prints would be on the shell casings. Wiping down the rest of the rifle but forgetting the bullets was just the kind of fuckup that everybody knew he was airhead enough to pull.

The aftermath was likely to be the most treacherous part, but that was falling into place, too. Laurie would maintain that she'd sensed her husband's long-standing menace toward her jumping to an almost psychotic level over the past days. When he'd left the house Sunday afternoon, she'd discovered that he'd taken her purse, including the keys to her SUV-leading her to think that he intended her harm. There were a few ranch vehicles around, and she knew that the keys were usually left in them. That was how she'd gotten this pickup truck.

She'd fled in panic, coming to me because I was also on Balcomb's wrong side, I knew my way around this area, and she felt an affinity for me. She'd insisted that we not call the sheriffs, fearing that they'd inform Balcomb and he'd find her. We'd driven around until we were too worn out to go any farther, then checked into the motel. The following day-the day that stretched ahead now-we'd learned the shocking news about her husband.

What would happen next with her and me, we hadn't talked about. But we both knew what had started.

The future hinged on getting clear. There'd be suspicious investigators-Gary Varna, for damned sure-and it was all too possible that I'd get tripped up by my own bungling or some forensic detail I'd never imagined. But I'd have a powerful ace in the hole-precisely the kind of slick lawyers that I'd feared, but on my side. All I had to do was stay within the limits of reasonable doubt.

That, and kill Wesley Balcomb.

But by the time I got to the red rock canyons of Wolf Creek, I'd become aware of a disturbing undercurrent that I couldn't get hold of. It wasn't any hesitation about whether I could pull the trigger. It wasn't fear, either. I'd been getting more scared as the reality neared, true, but also more exhilarated. It was something like getting into the ring, although with infinitely higher stakes.

I turned off the freeway at the exit to Lincoln, the shortest route to the Pettyjohn Ranch. But then I pulled over and waited by the roadside a minute.

I hadn't planned on seeing Madbird-I figured I'd bring him up-to-date as soon as I got the chance. But now I decided it would be best to warn him-even Madbird might slip up if he got blindsided. I'd made good time getting here and it wouldn't take much longer.

At least that's what I started off telling myself. But really, it was about that different world that I'd blundered into, where nothing would ever be the same again. Madbird had opened his great fierce heart to me, been my guide and protector, taken huge risks, for no reasons that logic could touch-just his odd liking for me and the joy of being a guerrilla Indian.

I was a child there. I needed him again, this time not for tangible help, but for some form of blessing. Maybe that would quell the uneasiness that was crawling around under my skin.

I got to his place, pulled the pickup into his drive, and waited beside it. He'd hear it and come out, although he wasn't going to be real happy to see me in the middle of the night.

The door opened a minute later. He walked out wearing jeans and a sweatshirt that looked hastily pulled on.

"What's the problem, you run out of beer?" he said.

"Sorry to wake you."

He grunted, his gaze checking out the truck.

"Where's your pal?" he said.

"Great Falls."

"Lucky girl. So what's going on?"

I had a hard time speaking the words. They felt like bluster.

"I'm going to take out Balcomb," I said. "I thought I'd better tell you."

Madbird folded his arms and cocked his head to the side.

"Well, I ain't saying that's a bad idea," he said. "I hope you got it figured real careful. You know the cops are going to come down hard on you."

"The best I could. Whatever happens, I'll keep you out of the loop."

"Laurie OK with this?"

"She told me how to set it up."

"No shit?"

"He'll be in his office," I said. "Lit windows, easy shot."

"What about after?"

"She'll back me up with money and lawyers."

"No shit," Madbird said again.

Then he stepped forward, a movement so swift and abrupt it was almost a lunge, and clenched my shirtfront in his fist.

"Let me tell you something, white boy." His voice was harsh and his eyes were hard. I stared into them with disbelief. Madbird had never treated me like that.

"You remember when she said she lost her watch? That was bullshit. I seen her pull it out of her pocket. She wanted a excuse to ride with me. Soon as she got in, she was all over me-tongue in my ear and her hand like this." He slapped his inner thigh.

My jaw sagged open. I couldn't speak. I felt like I was floating, with no power of control.

"She wanted me to ditch you," he said. "Said she knew I was the warrior that got sent to save her. I told her, go home with the one that brung you."

He shoved me ungently against the truck and stalked back to lean in the doorway.

"You got to kill that motherfucker, go kill him," Madbird said. "But don't do it for her."

With the blinders ripped off my eyes, I saw with sudden vicious clarity the imp that had been tormenting my subconscious, hidden under the intensity of the long day past.

When Laurie had come racing to my cabin to warn me about John Doe, how the hell had she known how to get there? Finding a place like mine took work. Even with directions, maps, a GPS system, somebody who didn't know the area wasn't about to home straight in on it, let alone when she was driving in panicked flight from a hired killer.