Chapter 45

45

"So, what's up?" Garner said as Shaw walked back into the post office parking lot with the others.

Travers was with him. Of course he was, Shaw thought. They came as a unit, a duo. New England's Beavis and Butt-Head.

Too bad Shaw wasn't in the market for comic relief after the nightmare that had just gone down.

Casualties, especially civilian ones, were not encouraged at Vance Holdings. Now out of the gate, they had not one but two.

"So," Garner said again.

Shaw peeled off the fireman's jacket and tossed it on the loading dock as his four men climbed into the BearCat and roared it on.

"The pizza parlor and bar are clear," said Shaw.

Boy, are they clear , thought Shaw as he pictured the kid he'd shot.

"So, we think we have them contained at The Forge, then?" Travers said.

"Roger that," said Shaw with a nod. "That's my hunch."

"What's up with your guys and the cat?" Garner said as his men rumbled the truck out onto North Street.

"Have to check something out near the bar," Shaw lied. "Another quick sneak and peek just to be safe."

The truth was that they had to go into the bar and get the body of the dead drunk kid and then go down Main Street and pick up Big Joe.

Then they had to bury them both in the woods.

And the chief and his college security guard sidekick don't need to know anything about that now, do they?

Shaw needed total cooperation from the locals until the mission was over. Letting them know there were already two casualties wouldn't be real good for morale.

The only positive was that since they had successfully cleared the area, it was only the folks who had been outside in front of The Forge who had witnessed the shooting of Big Joe.

They were fish in a barrel, penned in, no comms and they had nowhere to run with the roadblocks. They were in a container. One that Shaw could open up and reach into anytime he wanted.

And the fact that the group from The Forge hadn't immediately run to their cars but had gone back into the restaurant made him seriously think that the women were in there.

Maybe they already knew there was nowhere to run.

Shaw hopped up on the loading dock and went into the command center. From the Box O' Joe on the card table, he poured himself a paper cup full. As he sipped at it, he lifted a cinnamon doughnut hole that was there and peered at it in disgust.

He had been off seed oils for years. They basically existed to pork up the populace. They literally made it impossible for you to lose weight.

And this fried little sucker was a solid block of canola oil.

Why not just eat rat poison? he thought as he tossed it in the trash.

"We're in the bar," said Carpenter in his earpiece. "One down."

"Roger," Shaw said.

When he turned, Chief Garner was standing there. He had snuck up on him. Interesting. Moved quiet for a pudgster, didn't he? Travers was not there shockingly. Probably had to take a leak.

"What's the next move, Agent?" Garner said. "I got the head of the town council coming in. You need to keep me informed here so I don't look like an idiot."

"Of course, Chief," Shaw lied. "We'll go over the next phase after my guys get back with the latest intel. How's that?"

"Okay," he said. "Another ten, fifteen minutes?"

"Less," he said. "Here, have a cup and relax. And try a doughnut hole. They're really good."

Poor Garner had no idea of the level of sinister hombres he was in bed with right here, did he? Shaw thought as he poured the chief a cup of coffee.

Killing the investigator and bagging the woman was his mission and priority. How that happened—if it left a smoking crater in place of this town—wasn't his lookout.

Garner thought that they were on the same team. He had no idea that to Shaw, Garner was no different than some local warlords up on top of an Afghani camel mountain.

If it came to it, he'd stack Garner and every member of his entire backwater department like firewood to fulfill his mission with no thought to it whatsoever. And it would be about as effortless and remarkable as clipping a toenail.