Chapter Thirty-Three
Dwayne
I grabbed a donut from the convenience store shelf and slammed it down the counter. The cashier was a pimply-faced post-adolescent with yellow spiked hair and teeth to match. “That all?”
“Yes.” I pulled out my card, and my phone started vibrating. “Hello?”
“Howell, I just got done spending four hours trying to convince a group of Afghani policemen that they couldn’t smoke weed on the job. This’d better not be a joke.”
“No, I called you because I need you, and you’re the only one that can help me.” I swiped my card and pressed the credit button, hoping to get out of there as fast as I could.
“Are you sure that it was Harris? Have you been having flashbacks?”
“It’s not a flashback. I’ve gone over it and over it. It’s him. I don’t what he’s doing, or why he’s doing it, but it’s him. Are you really all that surprised? The man is crazy.”
“It’s out of nowhere.”
“Do you have any idea why he would be doing this?” The receipt popped out of the register. I took it and walked back to my car.
“No, I don’t, but I don’t like it. He’s an ex-SEAL. The man spent years learning to kill people. Can you imagine the kind of damage he could do running around like that? You need to take him down.”
“That’s what I’m planning on doing, but I need to find him.”
“I don’t think I can give you any information.”
“You have to. You’re the only person that can help me.”
“Personal records are classified. I’m sorry.”
My phone beeped and I got a text from an Afghani number that read, “You tell anyone and I will kill you. 435 Hartford.”
“That’s alright,” I said. “I’ll find another way.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t be of any help. Let me know if you have any trouble.”
“Yes, sir.” I waited for her to say that I was dismissed, then caught myself. “Thanks.” I hung up and called Fred.
“Tell me something wonderful.”
“I know who it is.”
“You do? How’d you find that out?”
“He’s my ex-partner from the SEALs. He’s dangerous, Fred. We need to find the man right away — before he starts blowing things up.”
“How dangerous is he?”
“SEAL,” I said slowly.
“I get it. What are you going to do?”
I wanted to tell him that I was going straight to the police, but I knew that I had to be fair. He’d always had my back. I would’ve been dead if it weren’t for him. Now I was ready to throw him in jail without finding out what was going on. I owed him more than that, regardless of how annoying he was. “I don’t want to go to the police right away. I need to find out what’s going on with him.”
“Why? He destroyed our security console.”
“I know how it sounds, but you have to understand, I’ve known this man for years, and he’s saved my life a thousand times. I don’t want to betray him before I know why he’s doing this.”
“What if it doesn’t work, and he just comes back to do it again? I need this contract, and Julie’s already freaking out.”
“I’ll deal with her.”
“Really?”
“You have to chew her out. She likes that. It’s… This is the right thing to do. Let me handle this. He looks up to me. I really think I can talk him down.”
“I want this handled quickly. If you’re not sure, you put him in jail.”
“You don’t have to worry. I’ll take care of it.” I hung up and looked the address up on my phone. I pulled up the street view to get a good look at it. It was an empty clearing surrounded on all sides by thin trees that grew so close together, it would’ve been impossible to walk through.
I zoomed out to see the neighboring properties. It reminded me of something that I’d seen in Kabul. It was an upper-class neighborhood surrounded by razor wire with half-finished houses covered in concrete and mud brick. The people there had purchased old trailers and were slowly building their houses around them. It looked like the people in Jason’s neighborhood were doing the same thing.
I threw the car into gear and reached back behind my seat to pull out my gun. I’d only touched it once since I got out of the navy and that was so I could put it behind the seat. It felt cold and weighty, not like the familiar automatic strapped around my shoulder.
I checked the clip while I flew down the freeway towards the Tennessee River. Then I put it back behind the seat, glad to be rid of the thing. I didn’t want to use it. I didn’t hate Jason. He just annoyed me. I would’ve been dead if it weren’t for him.
I didn’t like going after him, but he’d put himself in this situation. He didn’t leave me with any other choice. I couldn’t understand what he was trying to do. It occurred to me that he hadn’t actually broken into the building. He had plenty of chances. It didn’t make sense.
I crossed the river and started driving through the back streets, hoping to avoid the afternoon traffic. I didn’t know what I was going to say to Jason. The man was stubborn. Once he got something in his head, he had to follow it through. I wasn’t sure if he’d give this up, but I knew that he wouldn’t do anything to hurt me. He’d warned me about working for the security company, and he’d never shown any sign of hostility towards me.
The city was starting to fade. The woods were taking over, covering every square inch of dirt with spiny trees like overgrown sticks. The branches reached out over the road, creating a tunnel that blocked out the light, leaving only patches of sun that managed to pierce through the trees.
I was stunned by the landscape. It’d been so long since I’d seen anything as verdant as this. It was such a contrast when compared to the sand. It made sense Jason would live out here. It was quiet. There weren’t a lot of cars on the street, and you could explore the forest for years and never get tired of it.
When I pulled into Jason’s neighborhood, I slowed down so that I could have a look around. On one the corner there was a single-wide trailer, surrounded on three sides by a concrete shell, reinforced by chicken wire. The roof had been covered up with a tarp, presumably to protect it from the rain.
Just past it was a crumbling wooden shack that looked like it’d been built in the 19th Century with a caved in roof, drenched in moss that fell in tiny strands through the hole in the ceiling. There were three trucks parked out front.
It was just like Afghanistan — subhuman conditions and a wave of extremism, evident in the confederate flags posted up in front of the houses. One man had painted the flag on the hood of his truck with a picture of a noose in the center. It made me shudder. Jason hadn’t strayed very far from what he was used to.
The spaces between the houses grew larger and larger until there was nothing but forest and wild meadows, dotted with spiny pink flowers and white lilies. The air coming in through the cooler vent had the scent of pine, and when I pressed my hand to the window, it was cool to the touch. I was starting to get into the mountains.
Jason wasn’t stupid or sentimental. He planned things out in a practical manner. He wasn’t there for the forest, or so he could get a view of the city. He was there because he needed privacy. What was he doing?
I imagined myself looking at a barrel full of manure sitting out in the sun. He’d collect the chemicals he needed to create a bomb and plant it in the basement of the building so he could destroy the databases. The thought gave me chills. Was he that crazy? Why was he targeting the building that I was working for?
There had been no signs that he was starting to unravel. I would’ve noticed. For years, he followed me around everywhere I went, making vulgar comments at all the wrong times. Maybe the jokes were a way of playing off the way he felt inside.
I felt the familiar rush of adrenaline as I got closer to his property. I scanned left to right, searching for any sign of movement other than the trees waving in the wind. My senses were heightened and my body tense, listening for any sign of trouble. The slightest movement would’ve been enough to set me off.
On the edge of the clearing, there was a motion sensor and a security camera pointed at the road. He was keeping track of who was coming and going. Either he had something going on that he didn’t want people to see, or he was trying to avoid getting caught.
I pulled up to the motion sensor, grabbed my gun, and stuffed it into the seam of my pants, then got out of the car with my hands held up, facing the camera. “I’m not going to do anything, Jason. I just want to talk to you.”
A crack of thunder echoed through the trees, and I felt a burst of air pass by me. “Did you just fucking shoot at me!?”
I was answered by another shot whizzing past me. “I warned you!” he yelled from the back of the clearing.
“What are you doing? Put your gun down. I’m not going to do anything to you.”
Another blast, and I froze. This one was closer. He was an excellent shot. I’d never seen him miss. He was trying to scare me off. He wasn’t going to shoot me. I stepped closer into the clearing. “Back off!”
“Jason,” I said as I took another step forward. “I want to know what’s going on. I want to help you.”
He responded with a burst of gunfire, this time landing at my feet, spewing dust into the air. “Don’t come any closer.”
“Jason, what’s wrong? Why are you doing this? I’m your friend.”
“No, you’re not. You hate me. You’ve always hated me.”
“Do you remember that night in Kabul, when those men ambushed us and took me hostage? They were going to kill me, but you rushed in and shot all of them. You saved my life. You’re like a brother to me. That’s why I’m here. They know it’s you. They were going to call the police, but I told them that I wanted to talk to you first. I’m trying to save you.”
He stepped out of the trees at the back of the clearing. His face was covered in dirt, and he was wearing a stained pair of fatigues, holding a semi-automatic rifle. He looked like he’d been sleeping outside. “You can’t save me, Dwayne. I’m too far gone.”
“You can stop this.” I took another step forward and he let me. “You can walk away. You don’t have to go to prison.”
“I’m not going to prison.” He smiled.
I took another step forward. A twig cracked and something caught my foot, wrapped around my ankle, and pulled me up into the air. I was trapped, caught in a vine-woven net, hanging more than six feet up in the air. “Jason, you let me go right now.” I reached for gun, but it wasn’t there. I looked down to see it laying on the ground below me. It must’ve fallen out.
Up until now, I had been confident and relatively calm. I’d been relying on the fact that Jason and I were partners. I thought he worshipped me, that he actually considered me his friend, but something had taken ahold of him. He had always been crazy, but this was different. His mental state had degraded to the point where I didn’t recognize him any longer. I was terrified.
Even for a criminal, this behavior was absurd — psychotic. There was no way of knowing what he would do. He walked forward and pointed his rifle straight at me. “You ain’t going nowhere.” He pulled the trigger. I was vaguely aware of something piercing the skin on my neck, then black spots clouded my vision and I blacked out.