Regan Wolfrom - After The Fires Went Out - Coyote

“I dumped them.”

“Bullshit. You’re a fucking tabber, Baptiste. Matt told me about you and Kayla and your little mini raves. You’ve got them hidden somewhere.”

“And you want them, do you?”

“Tell me where they are.”

“Or what? You’ll have Matt pretend to shoot me?”

“I’ll kill them, Baptiste. All of them.” He grabbed Kayla by her hair and pulled her to her feet. “Starting with her.”

“She’s as good as dead anyway. She told me she’d rather die than be taken to Detour Lake as some prepper’s fucktoy.”

“You think this is an empty threat? You think I won’t torture her to death while you watch?”

“You don’t have the balls for that, Justin. You’re too soft. That’s kind of your big secret, isn’t it?”

“We all know,” Kayla said. “You’re a fucking pussy, Justin.”

“I’m not an idiot,” Justin said. “You can’t goad me into doing something stupid.”

“You’re not going to hurt her,” the man with the eagle helmet said.

Justin turned to face him. “Just shut up, Eagle…okay?”

“Just kill me,” Kayla said. “Slowly if you’d like.”

“Come on, Kayla,” Eagle said.

“Fuck you, Bren.”

“They have a history,” Justin said. “They’ll work it out. Now…the drugs…”

“You can’t get information out of me unless I want to give it to you,” I said. “So let’s make a deal. A real deal, not one for a moron like Matt.”

“Like what?”

“I’ll get you the drugs. And you give me the girls. You can keep Matt.”

“What the hell?” Matt said.

“Shut up, Matt,” Justin said. “Sorry, Baptiste…those girls are worth more than a little ecstasy.”

“One of those girls is spoken for,” Eagle said.

“I’ve got more than little ecstasy,” I said. “I have a shit-ton of meth as well. I’ll bet they’d love a piece of that down in Timmins. You’d be ass-deep in biker handjobs.”

“How much is a shit-ton?”

“At least twenty bags…maybe a couple kilos each…”

“Okay…so carry the Y and that gets you Kayla. I keep the redhead and I’ll put a bullet in Matt for everyone’s sake.”

“I want Gwyneth, too.”

“I want Kayla,” Eagle said.

Justin didn’t seem to hear him. “I need at least one, Baptiste. So unless you want to bring Fiona over here to trade, I’m keeping the redhead.”

He didn’t have Fiona.

“Okay,” I said. “You can have the redhead.”

“Screw you, Baptiste,” Matt said.

“I’ll need your truck,” I said. “And Matt to help me load the drugs.”

“You can take Tiger,” Justin said.

“Who the fuck is Tiger?”

“The guy with the motherfucking tiger stripe.”

“I’m not revealing the location. I bring a small sample up front. Then I trade you Matt for Kayla and we take our leave.”

“I want all the drugs,” Justin said. “Not just a sample.”

“I’ll give you the location when I have Kayla.”

“How will I know you’re telling me the truth?”

“Why would I lie?”

“To fuck me, Baptiste.”

“Well, this is a pickle, then. Someone has to have a little faith here.”

“You bring all the drugs. Or I hurt Kayla.”

“I bring a sample. You take me at my word. If I’m lying, you can chase on after us. We won’t be hard to catch.”

“I don’t want to waste my time on this.”

“You won’t be wasting your time,” I said. “You see, I won’t just be taking Kayla with me. I’ll also have Fiona. So if I renege, you get to take both of them. Three girls instead of two.”

It felt weird to talk about them like they were commodities; but that’s all they are to guys like Justin Porter.

Justin nodded. “I think we’ve got a deal,” he said. “Don’t fuck this up, Baptiste.”

“I wouldn’t dare.” I tapped Matt on the shoulder. “Time to go, buddy.”

“This isn’t the plan,” Eagle said.

“Just shut up,” Justin told him. “We’ll buy you someone better.”

“I want Kayla.”

“Shut up, goddamnit. Or I’ll shoot your goddamn nuts off.”

That shut him up.

Matt and I climbed down from the truck.

I looked over at Gwyneth.

She gave me a nod.

It looked like she knew.

I figured that Justin knew, too.

That I wasn’t about to let him walk away with anything.

We took one of the cargo trucks back to McCartney Lake; I had Matt drive as I sat in the back, to make sure we weren’t being followed.

The gate on Nelson Road was wide open, as though someone from McCartney Lake had opened it up after I’d left for New Post. Part of Matt’s deal, I assumed.

Matt pulled in front of our cottage.

I waited until he got out of the truck before I climbed out of the back.

“Tell me you’ve got a plan,” Matt said.

“Other than letting Justin kill you?”

“Come on, Baptiste…”

“I’ve got a plan…well…I’m working on it.”

“That’s something, I guess.”

“Give me the truck keys.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t trust you. Now wait here.”

I went down to the basement. I pulled up the plywood subfloor with no real thought to the mess I was making.

I grabbed a bag of MDMA and a bag of meth.

I loaded them into the front of the truck.

“Get in,” I said as I climbed into the driver’s seat.

“Still not getting this plan…”

I drove the truck up the road, to the Williams cottage.

“Fiona isn’t there,” Matt said. “I looked.”

I climbed out of the truck. “I know. Maybe if you hadn’t booted me off the network, I’d be able to find her.”

Matt got out, too.

We walked over to the shed.

“She didn’t take her tablet,” Matt said. “She didn’t want to be found…guess she didn’t want to waste time figuring out how to disable the locator.”

Fiona would have known I’d come looking…

“Get back in the truck,” I said.

“What?”

I got back in.

Matt hopped in just as we started moving.

I took the keys with me again, having Matt wait at the truck. I ran down the path that followed the lake, around the bend, to the maple tree.

I stepped off the path. And that’s where I found her.

Well, the dogs found me first. Des and Juju ran up and started jumping.

Fiona was sitting in the snow, keeping her head low with the thicket.

“You’re okay,” I said. “I’m glad you took the dogs this time.”

“I’m okay.”

She stood up.

I gave her a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

“Have you found Kayla and Gwyneth?” she asked.

“I know where they are. We’re going to get them back.”

We jogged back to the cottage.

“What’s he doing here?” Fiona asked, pointer her finger at Matt. “He’s working with them.”

“He’s an idiot,” I said. “Not a traitor.”

“He let them in. He opened the gates. He pointed the shotgun at Kayla.”

“Yeah…he tends to do that. He pointed an unloaded rifle at me. We need his help to pull this off.”

“What is it we’re going to do?” Matt asked.

“Simple,” I said. “We’re going to burn the forest down.”

Fiona drove the truck, which I think was the first time she’d ever driven anything other than an ATV; luckily the truck wasn’t old enough to have a manual transmission.

Des and Juju were on the bench beside her, happy to be going for a ride.