CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

The federal prison wasn’t exactly where Chief and Hex wanted to spend their day. They’d rather be home with their wives and their team, but this was important. Not just because Emelia was involved but because, ultimately, it affected all of them.

Showing their IDs to the guard, he nodded, opening the door as they walked inside. Another guard led them to an interrogation room.

“Guards will bring them down together like you asked. Not like they’re running anywhere. Gotta give them old folks credit, though. They tried to stick it to Uncle Sam, didn’t they?” Hex and Chief just stared at the guard, not finding humor in his comments. He cleared his throat, leaving the men inside.

A few minutes later, they could hear the sound of chains clinking against the concrete floor. Chains. Three senior citizens, not in great shape, were chained. They knew that there were two sides to the prison, one for males, one for females. When the guard opened the door, he led the three to their chairs and then chained them to the table.

“Is that really necessary?” asked Chief.

“Policy, sir. We make no exceptions. Just knock on the door when you’re done.” Chief and Hex nodded at the man. The two men seemed to scoot further away from the woman.

“I hope you feel good about yourselves,” said Anne. “Imprisoning three senior citizens.”

“Lady, don’t fuck with me or attempt to make me feel bad,” said Hex. “You’re the one that broke the law and raised two law-breaking sons. You have a chance to redeem yourselves. Any information you provide to us will be seen as support and will reflect positively at your trial.”

“I’m not telling you shit,” said the old woman. The others just shook their heads.

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know,” said Joey. “So will Shel.”

“Shel. That’s your name?” asked Hex.

“Shelly. My dad had a great sense of humor,” frowned the man. Chief and Hex said nothing, just nodding.

“We need to find the others. We think they’re in danger and are going to do something really stupid this time. Jeffrey is crazy if he thinks that just because Ryan is his brother, The Silencers won’t kill him on the spot.”

“They won’t!” snapped Anne. “They wouldn’t dare. Ryan would never let them hurt his brother. Never!”

“Lady, you’re delusional. The Silencers kill. They don’t care who, they don’t care when, they don’t care how. It’s the only damn thing they’re good at. They will kill Jeffrey once they have their shit back,” said Hex.

Anne was smart enough to not say anything. She knew about The Silencers and how they operated, and she knew that Ryan could be ruthless. But she also knew that Jeffrey was able to control his brother’s temper. Usually.

“Look, they’ve left the area, and we want to know where they would have gone,” said Chief. “Are there any more safe houses, any other properties of your deceased friends?”

Joey looked at the men, shaking his head. They knew it all. They’d been fools to think that they could get away with this.

“No. No more safe houses,” he said. “They probably tried to find someplace they could pay cash for, although they don’t have much cash.”

“What the hell? They’ve been robbing banks. How do they not have cash?” asked Hex.

“Because they never kept much for themselves,” said Shel. “Don’t you guys get it? They were truly giving it all to the rest of us to help us. They’d keep a few thousand for food, utilities, anything else, but they didn’t get rich from it. Hell, they were driving a ten-year-old mini-van for a while.”

“So, places they would need to pay cash for,” repeated Hex. Shel nodded. “Motels, not hotels. Campgrounds. Mobile home park rentals.”

“I guess,” said Joey. “I know you have to do this. I know they killed those two agents, but I also know they didn’t mean to. Before you say it, I know that doesn’t matter. But you boys have to understand how much good they’ve done. Dozens, hell, hundreds of people who have their medications, surgeries, treatments because of them. I know it was wrong. We all know it was wrong, but in a lot of ways, it was right.”

“Joey, we do understand what you’re saying, but we can’t condone bank robbery and murder. We just can’t. The system is broke, no fucking joke about that,” said Hex. “We’ve got some friends working on making changes right now. I wish to Christ that we would have known about this sooner, and we would have figured out a way to help.

“Their intentions were good, but their methods failed. Now, the people who really need help may not get it because of them. They’ll either be seen as crazy old people gone off the rails, or Robin Hood and his merry men. We just want to find them so that no one else dies.”

“Do you have a phone number or e-mail address for them?” asked Chief.

“We don’t use e-mail much,” said Shel. “We know that you kids can track that stuff nowadays.” The two men smirked at being called kids. They weren’t much younger than the people seated before them.

“They didn’t like using cell phones much. Jeffrey told them not to because they could be traced as well. He bought them throw-away phones. You know, the ones that you can use once and toss in the garbage. Had a whole bag of them. We never knew what their numbers were.”

“That’s more helpful than you think,” said Hex.

“Help?” scoffed Anne. “You can’t trace an untraceable phone.”

“News flash, Anne. Nothing is totally untraceable.” She gave a deathly glare to Hex, and he returned the favor.

“Look, you can think what you want,” said Joey, “but we would do it all again. We’re sorry about what happened with those agents, but everything else? Well, everything else we did intentionally.”

“I wouldn’t tell the judge that,” frowned Chief. The two men stood, knocking on the door for the guard. When he opened it, they turned to the others and just stared at them.

“You know what makes me really sad about this?” said Hex. “You all were supposed to be part of the greatest generation, the baby boomers, with work ethics and intelligence that only experience and wisdom could bring. I still believe that. I’m just sad that all of you didn’t exemplify it.”

Hex and Chief dragged their feet as they left the interrogation room. They’d freed women and children from traffickers. They’d brought down drug lords. They’d killed terrorists. But somehow, in some strange way, this felt like the worst case of their lives.