C Box - Winterkill

“I figured that out.”

“This is a list of things she can’t eat. I guess she has a stack of these all made up and ready to send to people when she gets a dinner invitation.”

“Apparently.”

“Says here she doesn’t eat beef, poultry, pork, olive or canola oil, sugar, processed foods of any kind, or genetically enhanced products.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“She has a suggested menu here. Baked trout, steamed broccoli, and brown rice. Hell, we don’t have any of that stuff,” Joe said.

“No, we don’t-although I’d be happy to get it for you and your friend for your little dinner.”

“That’s not necessary, Marybeth.”

Marybeth turned on her heel and went up the stairs to get dressed.

Joe cursed, and crumpled the paper into a ball and flipped it toward the garbage can in the kitchen.

In a foul mood, Joe left the house and drove into the mountains on the Bighorn Road toward Battle Mountain and the Sovereign Citizen Compound. Again, McLanahan’s Blazer blocked his path. Joe eased up to it and stopped, while the sheriff’s deputy slowly climbed out into the cold to greet him.

“Still on roadblock duty, huh?” Joe asked, opening his window.

“Yes, goddammit,” McLanahan said, his teeth chattering. Twin plumes of condensation blew from his nostrils.

“Is there any traffic up here?” Joe asked. “Do the Sovereigns come and go much?”

McLanahan shook his head. “Every once in a while there’s a truck or two. But they also use Timberline Road on the other side of the mountain, so I don’t see ’em all.”

“Any activity this morning?”

“Just you,” McLanahan said. “Things pick up at night. Those two FBI guys have been through here a lot. They had quite a bit of sound equipment with them, and I guess tonight they’re planning a new phase.”

“A new phase?”

McLanahan shrugged. “Don’t ask me. They don’t tell me anything, and I’m not here at night. All I know is that that Munker guy is a real prick.”

Joe cocked his thumb toward the back of his truck. “I’ve got some clothes and toys to deliver to the compound for our daughter April.”

Marybeth had packed the boxes early that morning, before it was light out. It must have been very hard on her, but she didn’t say anything about it. Marybeth was not talking with him, and neither was Missy, which Joe counted as a blessing.

McLanahan shrugged. “I’m supposed to inspect all deliveries.”

“Feel free,” Joe volunteered.

McLanahan developed a pained look, and Joe could see him weighing the time it would take to search through the boxes in the bitter cold versus climbing back into his warm Blazer. He stepped aside and waved Joe through.

At the gate to the compound, Joe stopped as he had before, and got out. A bearded man in a heavy army-surplus parka emerged from the nearest trailer and approached on the other side of the fence. He didn’t carry a rifle, but Joe guessed that he was armed. Joe stacked the boxes and suitcase near the barbed wire.

“What you got there?” the man asked.

Joe explained that it was for April Keeley. “Is she here?” Joe asked. “Is Wade Brockius around?”

“I don’t give out that kind of information,” the man mumbled. “Is it important?” He reached through the strands and opened the top of the highest box to confirm that it was clothing.

“It’s important.”

The man lifted the top box over the barbed wire and carried it back to the large trailer that Brockius had come out of the last time Joe was there. “We’ve gotta go through all this stuff,” the man said over his shoulder. “Then I’ll be back for the rest. I’ll ask about Wade and Jeannie.”

“I’ll wait.”

Joe turned to get back in his pickup, his eyes sweeping through the timber around him. Something seemed out of place, and he tried to figure out what it was.

When he saw it, he was surprised he hadn’t noticed it earlier. Four silver speakers poked into the sky above the tops of the trees. Their fluted metal openings were aimed at the Sovereign Citizen Compound. The speakers were mounted on poles that were apparently secured to tree trunks within the forest. The speakers were silent, for now.

Munker and Portenson had been busy.

Wade Brockius emerged from the trailer and walked slowly down to the fence. His gait suggested arthritis, or a leg injury. Joe went out to meet him.

“This cold weather stiffens me up,” Brockius mumbled. “The clothes are thoughtful. Thank you.”

“There’s two more boxes,” Joe said. “Some of April’s toys, too.”

Brockius nodded, and Joe thought he looked uncomfortable. “Thoughtful,” he said again.

Joe looked into the compound at the trailers and RVs. He hoped to catch a glimpse of April, or even Jeannie Keeley, through a window.

“Can I see her to make sure she’s okay?”

“She’s with her mother right now, Mr. Pickett.”

“Does she know I’m here?”

Brockius sized up Joe from beneath his heavy brow. “No, she doesn’t.”

“Can you tell her?”

Brockius shook his massive head. “I’m sorry. I really don’t want to interfere.”

Joe swallowed. “I want to let April know that we miss her, and that we love her very much.”

Brockius appeared to think it over. Then he shook his head again. “No, I don’t think it would be a good idea,” he said with finality.

“Just tell me she’s here and that she’s okay,” Joe asked. “It would mean a lot to my wife to know that.”

“She’s here,” Brockius said, in a tone so low that Joe could barely make it out. Then Joe realized that Brockius didn’t want to be overheard by anyone in the RVs or hidden away in the brush. “And she seems fine.”

“Thank you,” Joe said.

“You best move on now, Mr. Pickett.” Brockius’s voice was raised back to normal now. “We’ll make sure the clothes and toys go to good use.”

Obviously, the conversation was over as far as Wade Brockius was concerned. He handed the remaining boxes to Brockius, who took them. He and Brockius exchanged a long, silent look. Brockius appeared troubled by the situation with April. This is not the kind of thing, he seemed to be communicating, that I want to be involved in.

“What comes out of those speakers back there?” Joe asked, as he prepared to leave.

Brockius paused and looked up and over Joe’s pickup at the speakers.

“I don’t know yet,” he said in a bass rumble. “But I suspect we’ll be finding out soon.”

“Did your people have anything to do with that dirty trick down on the BLM land?” Joe asked, out of the blue.

Joe wanted to see Brockius’s reaction to the question.

Brockius’s face hardened, as it had before. He was not puzzled by the question, which to Joe meant that the Sovereigns were in communication with someone on the outside-or that they were involved with the ambush. Brockius turned to walk back to his trailer.

“I’d suggest you look a little closer to home, Mr. Pickett,” Brockius said over his shoulder.

The opportunity to look closer to home came almost immediately, as Joe descended from the snowy mountains. He was still in deep snow, with twenty miles of rugged BLM breaklands laid out in a vista below him. The town of Saddlestring, beyond the breaklands, glittered in the morning sun.

His radio crackled to life.

“I think I’ve got a situation out here.” The signal was strong, and the voice belonged to a woman. “This is Jamie Runyan calling BLM headquarters. Does anybody read me?”

Joe heard a rush of static and assumed it was somebody trying to reply to Jamie Runyan from town.

“I didn’t get that at all,” she said. “Try again.”