Chasing Fire Part 45

"I'm going to do what I have to do for me. I have some thinking to do about that, but I'll be leaving, most likely to move closer to Shiloh. I'll take my half of whatever's left once this is said and done, and leave you yours."

He jerked back as if she'd slapped him. "You're going to leave me like this, when I'm locked up, when I need my wife to stand with me?"

"You need," she repeated, and shook her head. "You're going to have to get used to your needs being down the line. After Shiloh's and after mine. I'd've stood with you, Leo. I'd've done my duty as your wife and stuck by you, whatever it took and for however long. But you changed that when you proved you wouldn't do the same for me."

"Now you listen to me, Irene. You listen to me. Somebody took that rifle, took that gun, right out of my house. They did that to ruin me."

"I hope for the sake of your soul that's true. But you and Dolly made our house a battlefield, and neither one of you cared enough about me to stop the war.

She left me without a second thought, and when we took her back, because that's what a parent does for a child, she lied and schemed just like always. And you fought and clawed at each other, just like always.

With me in the middle, just like always." G.o.d help her, Irene thought. She'd mourn her child for the rest of her life, but she wouldn't mourn the war.

"Now she's gone, and my faith's so broken I don't even have the comfort of believing it was G.o.d's will. I don't have that. You left me alone in the dark when I most needed a strong hand to hold on to.

"I don't know what you've done or haven't done, but I know that much. I know I can't depend on you to give me that strong hand, so I have to start depending on me. It's past time I did."

She got to her feet. "You should call your lawyer. He's what you need now."

"I know you're upset. I know you're mad at me, and I guess you've got a right to be. But please, don't leave me here alone, Irene. I'm begging you."

She tried, one last time, to reach down inside herself for love, or at least for pity. But found nothing.

"I'll come back when I can, and I'll bring you what they say I'm allowed to bring. Now I've got to go to work. I can't afford to take any more time off today. If I can find it in me to pray again, I'll pray for you."

L.B. HAILED MATT as Matt came back from his run. "Have you got your PT in for the day?"

"Yeah. I was going to grab a shower and some breakfast. Have you got something you want me to do?"

"We could use some help restocking gear and equipment as it gets inspected.

The crew got in from Wyoming while you were out." "I saw the plane overhead. Man, L.B., did they have trouble, too?" "Another bad pumper." "Well, s.h.i.t."

"We've got mechanics going over every inch of the rest of them, the saws and so on. We're unpacking all the chutes, and I've got master riggers going over them. Iron Man's here, so he's helping with that."

"Jesus Christ, L.B., you don't think somebody messed with the chutes?" "Are you willing to risk it?"

Matt pulled off his cap, scrubbed a hand over his hair. "I guess not. Who the h.e.l.l would do something like this?" "We're d.a.m.n sure going to find out. Iron Man had news. Leo Brakeman turned himself in this morning."

"He's back? In Missoula? The cops have him?"

"That's exactly right. It makes me wonder how long he's been around these parts."

"And he could've done this. Screwed with us like this." Matt looked away, stared off, shaking his head. "Threatening Ro, shooting at her, for G.o.d's sake.

Now messing with equipment. We never did anything to him or his. Never did a d.a.m.n thing, and he can't say the same."

"Right now, we take care of our own, so grab that shower and some chow, then report to the ready room." "Okay. Listen, if you need me back on the jump list-"

"We'll leave you off for now."

"I appreciate it, a lot. My parents should be in late this afternoon. I'm going to let them know I might have to cut it short. I don't want you having to shuffle somebody into my spot with the other c.r.a.p on your plate, too. You call me in if you need me."

"Copy that." He gave Matt a slap on the shoulder. He headed back into Operations. He had twenty-one men in Alaska, and didn't expect to see them back until the next day, soonest. Another load barely touched down, and a fire in California where they might need some Zulies before it was said and done. Dry conditions predicted for the next two weeks.

He'd be d.a.m.ned if he'd send the first load up without being sure, absolutely sure, every strap, every buckle, every f.u.c.king zipper and switch pa.s.sed the most rigorous inspection.

He thought of Jim, felt the familiar heartsickness. Accidents couldn't be controlled, but he could and would control this human-generated bulls.h.i.t.

AT THE END of a very long day, Lieutenant Quinniock drove out to the base.

He wanted to go home, see his wife and kids, have dinner with them the way men did who weren't cops.

Most of all he wanted to be done with Leo Brakeman.

The man was a stone wall, wouldn't give an inch.

Every pa.s.s he or DiCicco had taken at him-together or separately-met with the same result. Zero.

Brakeman just sat there, arms folded, eyes hard, jaw tight under that scruffy man-of-the-mountain beard. He'd lost ten pounds, gained ten years, and still wouldn't budge from his I'm-being-framed routine.

Now he demanded-through his lawyer, as he'd stopped talking al-together-a polygraph. So they'd have to go through that dance and shuffle. Quinniock suspected if the polygraph results indicated Brakeman was a lying sack of s.h.i.t who couldn't tell the truth over the size of his own d.i.c.k, he'd claim the polygraph framed him. They had circ.u.mstantial evidence aplenty. They had motive, means, opportunity and the fact that he'd run. What they didn't have was a confession.

The DA didn't want to charge Leo Brakeman, former All-State tackle, a Missoula native, with no priors and deep ties to the community, with the murder of his own daughter without a confession.

And since every G.o.dd.a.m.n bit of that evidence tied Dolly's murder with Latterly's, they couldn't charge him with that, either.

Need a break, Quinniock thought. Need a little off-the-clock before going back the next day to beat his head against the DA's. But first he had to see what the h.e.l.l Michael Little Bear wanted.

Once on base, he aimed directly for Little Bear's office. "You looking for L.B.?"

Quinniock stopped, nodded at the man who hailed him. "That's right." "He just walked over to the loft. Do you know where that is?"

"Yeah, thanks."

He changed direction. It struck him how quiet the base seemed. None of the crew training outside or hustling from building to building, though he had seen a couple of them hauling a.s.s down one of the service roads in a jeep. Either a test or a joyride, he decided.

When he made his way to the loft, pa.s.sed what he knew they called the ready room, he saw why.

Here the hive of activity buzzed. Men and a handful of women worked on tools, taking them apart or putting them back together. Others pulled equipment off shelves or replaced it. Routine inspection? he wondered, considered the organized chaos as he entered the loft.

There he saw chutes spread on counters, being unpacked or meticulously repacked. More hung in the tower waiting to be inspected or already tagged for repair or repacking.

He spotted Little Bear standing beside Lucas Tripp at one of the counters.

"Iron Man." Quinniock offered a hand with genuine pleasure. "Have they talked you back on the team?" "Just helping out for the day. How's it going, Lieutenant?"

"I've had better days, and I've had worse. You wanted to talk to me?" he said to L.B. "Yeah. Where's the tree cop?"

"Seeing to some tree cop business. Did you want her here?"

"Not especially. I have crews in Alaska, and another just back this morning from Wyoming." "I heard about the fires in Alaska, threatening Denali Park.

What's the status?"

"They hope to have it contained within a few hours. It's been a long, hard haul and my people jumped that fire with defective equipment." "Is that what this is about?" Quinniock took another look around the loft. "You're running an equipment inspection?"

"What this is about is the fact that the equipment was tampered with.

Stripped valves in pumpers, and one of them went into Wyoming. Chain saws with burned-out spark plugs and a frayed starter cord."

"I don't want to tell you your business, but all of that sounds like it could easily be simple wear and tear, something that got overlooked during the height of a busy season." L.B.'s face went hard as stone. "We don't overlook a d.a.m.n thing. Equipment comes in from a fire, it's gone over, checked out and checked off before it goes back in rotation. The same valve stripped on three pumpers, and two in the load that went to Denali?"

"Okay, that's a stretch."

"You're d.a.m.n right. We're inspecting everything, and we've already found two more defective saws, and four p.i.s.s bags with the nozzles clogged with putty.

We're not careless; we can't afford to be. We don't overlook."

"All right."

"We have to inspect every chute, drogue, reserve. And thank G.o.d so far none of the ones we've gone over show any signs of tampering. Do you know how long it takes to repack a single chute?"

"About forty-five minutes. I've taken the tour. All right," Quinniock repeated, and took out his notebook. "You have a list of who checked off the equipment?"

"Sure I do, and I've gone over it. I'll give you the names, and the names of the mechanics who did any of the repairs or cleaning. It doesn't fall on one person."

"Are any of your crew dealing with more than the usual stress?"

"My people in Alaska who had to jerry-rig pumpers with duct tape, G.o.dd.a.m.n it, or lose their ground."

As he also sent men out into the field, bore the weight of those decisions, Quinniock understood the simmering rage. He kept his own tone brisk. "Have you had to discipline anyone, remove anyone from active?"

"No, and no. Do you think one of the crew did this? These people don't know when they'll have to jump or where or into what conditions until they do. Why in the h.e.l.l would somebody do this when they might be the one with a starter cord snapping off in their hands, or scrambling with a useless pump with a fire bearing down on him?"

"Your support staff, your mechanics, your pilots and so on don't jump."

"And Leo Brakeman walked into your house this morning. He's already shot up mine, and isn't shy about starting fires. Tampering with the equipment here takes a little mechanical know-how."

"And he has more than a little." Quinniock blew out a breath. "I'll look into it. If it was him, I can promise you he's going to be sitting just where he's sitting for some time to come."

"His wife's leaving him," Lucas put in. He'd finished packing the chute, tagged it, then turned to address Quinniock. "She's giving the baby to the Brayners, the father's parents. They're coming in from Nebraska. She's making arrangements to turn the house over, to sell whatever she can sell, cash out whatever she can cash out. She's thinking about moving out near the Brayners so she can be near the baby, help out, watch her grow up."

"You're well informed."

"My ..." Did a sixty-year-old man have a girlfriend? he wondered. "The woman I'm involved with is a close friend of Irene's." "Ella Frazier. I'm well informed, too," Quinniock added. "I met her at the funeral."

"She's helping Irene as much as she can. Irene told Leo all this when she went to see him this morning." Quinniock pa.s.sed a weary hand over his face. "That explains why he shut down."

"It seems to me he's got nothing left to lose now."

"He wants to take a polygraph, but that could be the lawyer's idea. He's sticking with the same story, and the more we twist it up, the harder he bears down. Maybe tossing this tampering at him will shake him. I want the timelines, when each piece was last used, last inspected, by whom in both cases if you can get that for me. I have to make a call first."

He flipped out his phone, called the sergeant on duty and ordered a suicide watch on Leo Brakeman.

CHAPTER 27

The plane touched down in Missoula shortly after ten A.M. They'd hit very rocky air over Canada, with hail flying like bullets while the plane rode the roller coaster of the storm.

Half the crew landed queasy or downright sick.

Since she'd slept the entire flight, Rowan calculated she felt nearly three- quarters human. Human enough to take a yearlong shower, and eat like a starving horse.

As she and Gull walked to the barracks, she spotted L.B. with Cards, supervising the off-loading. She suspected L.B. had been waging his own war while they had waged theirs.

She didn't want to think about either battle for a little while.

She dropped down to sit on the bed in her quarters, remove her boots. "I want lots and lots of s.e.x." "You really are the woman of my dreams."

"First round, wet shower s.e.x, after we sc.r.a.pe off a few layers of the Alaskan tundra, then a short and satisfying lunch break." She unbuckled her belt, dropped her pants. "Then a second round of make-themattress-sing s.e.x."

"I feel a tear of grat.i.tude and awe forming in the corner of my eye. Don't think less of me."

G.o.d, the man just tickled every inch of her. And, she decided, even with the scruff on his face, his hair matted, tw.a.n.ged her l.u.s.t chords.

"Then a quickie just to top things off before I start my reports. I'll have to brief with L.B. at some point, and squeeze in daily PT, after which there must be more food." "There must."

"Then I believe it's going to be a time for relax-into-a-nap s.e.x." "I can write up an agenda on this, just so we don't miss anything."

"It's all here." She tapped her temple. "So ..." She strolled naked into the bathroom. "Let's get this party started."