Chapter 13

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The drive back into Doyle was just as it had been since encountering the man known as Snake: quiet and tense. Brandenburg had started some small talk, asking about Rocky Points and the state of the department, but had little interest in Wolf’s responses. The interaction shook the man, and Wolf didn’t blame him. They were a small department here in Doyle, a fraction of what Wolf had backing him down south, outnumbered ten or fifteen to one, and they’d definitely kicked the hive.

When they reached the edge of town, Wolf pulled his phone out of his pocket and read a text from Waze.

How’s it going? Anything interesting happen?

Yeah, kind of , Wolf thought, but he typed: Following up a lead now. I’ll keep you posted.

Waze replied, almost instantly: Good. Yes, keep me posted.

Wolf pocketed his phone as they pulled into the parking lot of the Anniston County Sheriff’s Department and parked .

Wolf followed the sheriff inside, which was freezing cold.

“Where’s Nichols?” Brandenburg asked, walking straight to his office.

“He’s in the bathroom,” said the new man sitting at one of the desks. He was large and muscular, with a shock of red hair and pale skin covered in freckles. “Hi, I’m Deputy Larkin.” He stood and held out a hand to Wolf.

“Oh, yeah,” Brandenburg said, his voice coming from his office now. “That’s Larkin. Larkin, that’s Wolf.”

“Nice to meet you,” Wolf said.

“You, too.” Larkin sat back down. “So? How was the visit? I heard you guys went to the SOV compound.”

“Wolf!” Brandenburg barked. “Back here with that USB.”

Nichols emerged from the hallway, rubbing his hands on his pants. “So?”

Wolf fished the USB drive out of his pocket and held it up, walking toward Brandenburg’s office. “We got some surveillance footage from the night of the shooting at the SOV compound,” he said, using Larkin’s shortened term for the gang.

“Oh,” Nichols said, watching him enter the sheriff’s office.

Sitting behind his desk, Brandenburg held his hand out, fingers flicking impatiently.

Wolf gave him the USB, and Brandenburg bent down to put it in his computer tower. He paused for a moment, looking at the skull and crossbones scrawled on the side of the device.

“Cute, huh?” Wolf asked, sitting down.

Brandenburg grunted and grabbed his computer mouse .

Wolf scooted forward to the edge of his seat and angled himself toward the monitor. The screen crackled to life, and the cursor went to a single folder named Pig File. Brandenburg double-clicked on it.

One image inside was named by a string of random digits and letters. The file was two megabytes—nowhere near big enough to be anything but a single image and not security video footage.

Wolf’s insides dropped. He didn’t like having someone call his bluff, but clearly, Snake had made them all wait for nothing. This was probably a picture of a man’s bare ass with Die Pigs written in lipstick across the cheeks.

Brandenburg clicked open the file.

It was a real photo, a still shot from the night of the killings.

Wolf blinked. There was a lot to take in from the one picture. The man in the image carried an assault rifle Wolf recognized as a Heckler and Koch.

His face was in full light, staring straight into the lens of the camera. His eyes were green, with dilated pupils. Behind him, two men were lying in the hallway, covered in blood. The picture looked to be taken seconds after the gunman had mowed them down.

Wolf leaned forward. There were words overlaying the image as well. They read:

Lawrence Hunt

14 Antelope Flats

Doyle, CO

Wolf looked at the sheriff. Brandenburg stared, his mouth hanging open. He appeared to collect himself and cleared his throat .

“Lawrence Hunt,” Wolf said. “Is that who this is? You know this man?”

“What’s happening?” Nichols’s voice came from the doorway.

Brandenburg looked at his deputy for a moment, then gestured to the screen. “Our shooter.”

Nichols walked in and went to Brandenburg’s side, looking at the screen. His face froze in similar astonishment as his boss’s, and then he shook his head. “Lawrence Hunt.”

“I take it you two know this guy?” Wolf asked.

Brandenburg and Nichols shared a meaningful glance, and then Brandenburg nodded. Nichols's eyes glazed over as if he was now in deep, troubling thought.

“What’s going on?” Wolf asked. “Is the man in this photo Lawrence Hunt? From this address here in Doyle?”

“Yes,” Brandenburg said.

“Lawrence Hunt was the shooter?” Larkin’s voice now came from the doorway. “Is that what I just heard?”

When Brandenburg and Nichols remained silent, Wolf turned around. “Yeah, you know him?”

“Yeah,” Larkin said.

“Larkin, please,” Brandenburg said. “Nichols, why don’t you two head out? Give us some space.”

Nichols remained staring at the screen.

“Nichols.”

The deputy blinked. “Right.” He left, and Larkin followed him into the front room.

Wolf turned to the sheriff and raised his eyebrows inquisitively.

The chair creaking in protest, Brandenburg sat back and folded his arms. He gestured to the monitor. “Lawrence Hunt came into us last month. His son had gone missing, and he was upset.”

“Okay.” Wolf narrowed his eyes. “That’s interesting. What happened there?”

Brandenburg wiped his forehead. “His name, Lawrence’s son’s name, is Irving. Twenty-eight years old. Irv, he went by. Grew up here in town.”

“And what happened?” Wolf asked.

“He was…” Brandenburg’s eyes glazed over. He stood up and shut the door, then came back.

Wolf wondered why the sudden secrecy but remained silent as Brandenburg sat.

“He was running with the bikers,” Brandenburg said. “That’s what happened. The kid was always a troublemaker, and he was hanging around with the wrong crowd.”

“He was with Sons of the Void?” Wolf asked.

“He rode around on a bike, he hung out at the Dusty Thorn with the rest of them, he did drugs.” Brandenburg shrugged. “Maybe. We’re not sure if he was a true member or not. When Lawrence came in here looking for him, I didn’t know what to tell him. His kid could have been up in Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, rolling with any of the chapters these guys have. I told him I couldn’t do anything for him.”

“Did Lawrence know his son was an SOV?”

“Yeah. Didn’t you just hear me?”

Wolf ignored the indignation rising in the man’s face again. “So, what made him think his son was in trouble and not just out with them in some other state?”

Brandenburg bridged his fingers. “He made a stink about Irv not checking in like he used to. That, and he said he’d heard something…that Irv was in a fight with one of th e other members of the gang.” Brandenburg scoffed. “I was like, ‘What do you want me to do? Go start interrogating the SOV about getting in scuffles with your kid?’” Brandenburg stood up, turning to the back of the room. “Damn fool. The guy’s got hell itself coming after him now.”

“So, this is all revenge for his son,” Wolf said.

Brandenburg turned around. “It fits.”

Wolf stood up as well.

“Well, Detective,” Brandenburg said. “You came up and saved the day. We got us an ID. Lawrence Hunt. You can head home and let your boss know he’s got some answers. We’ll take care of the rest.”

Wolf raised an eyebrow. “I’m here to find the man responsible, not learn his name.”

“The APB will take care of that.”

“We have a blue truck without a license plate. That’s not going to help us. Not in this country.”

“We’ll update the APB with a full description and DMV photo,” Brandenburg said.

“What’s the resistance here?” Wolf asked.

“No resistance. You’re just in a jurisdiction that’s not your own. We have capable men who can take over from here. We don’t need, nor did we ask for, the help of an outside agent coming in here, telling us how to do things.”

Wolf smiled.

Don’t give them any rock to stand on. When Waze’s last words ran through his mind, the smile faded.

“I’m not telling you how to do things. If anything, just giving good suggestions—ones that produce results.” He pointed at the computer screen.

Brandenburg walked to the door and opened it .

“Fine,” Wolf said, walking past him. “Fourteen Antelope Flats. I’ll stop by Hunt’s house myself on the way out.”

“You do that, and we’re going to have some trouble with each other.”

“Not any worse than the trouble I’m going to have going home empty-handed.” Wolf nodded at Nichols and Larkin as he walked through the room to the front door. He pushed outside to his SUV and sat behind the wheel, turning on his Mobile Data Terminal to pull DMV information for Lawrence Hunt.

A few seconds later, the front door of the office opened, and Brandenburg came out, Nichols in tow. Nichols went to Brandenburg’s truck and sat in the passenger seat, but Brandenburg broke off and walked to Wolf’s vehicle.

Wolf rolled down the window.

Brandenburg put both hands on the door, exhaling heavily as he looked somewhere in the far distance.

They sat like that for almost a full minute, Wolf sitting silent and Brandenburg contemplating.

Finally, Brandenburg slapped his roof and turned to leave. “Follow us.”