Betrayal: A Liv Dricol Novel
Michael Wolfam
Smashwords edition
Copyright 2010 Michael Wolfam
Learn more at MichaelWolfam.com and LivDriscol.com
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Chapter 1
Liv lifted a stack of menus off the counter and watched the group stumble from the limo into the diner. There were eight of them. Five she'd known since high school, three were strangers. All were drunk. "Someone’s gonna end up on the floor bleeding," she groaned to no one in particular. Stray flecks of glitter, left behind by women with names like Candy, sparkled in the fluorescent lighting. The scene always ended the same way.
Ignoring the ‘Please Wait to be Seated’ sign, the rowdy group piled into a red, naugahyde covered corner booth in her section. Of course they would choose a booth in her section. At least they were far away from the regulars.
"You're up awful late," she said to Cal, the leader of the group. "Aren't you getting hitched this afternoon?"
"Liv Driscol's my waitress!" he slurred, ignoring the menu she was trying to hand him. "Liv Driscol—the sexiest piece of... "
She tapped his cheek lightly with a menu. "Don't finish that sentence, Cal. Just go on and quit while you're only a little behind."
“Alright, alright. We just got back from partying all night in Denver. Me and my boys need some serious food. Mel’s diner is the best. I fucking love Mel’s,” he paused trying to focus his red eyes on Liv.
“Our specials today are-“
“Dudes,” Cal whispered loudly. “Hey guys, this is that chick I was telling you about,” the drunken groom swayed in his chair. “Back in high school she raced the whole football team shotgunning a six pack. She finished a whole beer ahead!”
“Yeah, a real high point in my life. Now what can I get you boys to drink?” Liv pulled a worn yellow pad from her apron as the group settled into the table.
“Then she puked hot wings and beer all over the quarterback’s Camaro! It was so awesome. She’s a freaking legend!” Cal paused momentarily, trying unsuccessfully to look sober. He put his fist over his heart. “She’s my hero,” he sniffed dramatically as the table dissolved into drunken laughter.
“We went to high school together didn’t we? The last time I saw you was at graduation. You got freakin’ hot. How much for a lap dance?” the man who had supported the groom on the way into the diner giggled. The rest of the table held their breath, eyes focused on Liv.
“Hey Cal, you want to do this the easy way or the hard way?”
“Hey, easy there Liv, Mark’s my best man. Remember, we were best buds in high school before he went off to get all educated. Besides, you know how mad Michelle’s gonna be if he has a black eye in the wedding pictures.”
“Alright, but you keep em’ in line,” Liv warned. She shot the best man a look that would freeze a polar bear dead in its tracks.
After taking their drink orders between drunken nonsense, Liv stormed over to the soda fountain behind the counter and began filling drinks.
“You alright?” Mel, the rotund owner of the diner, asked as Liv slammed a red plastic glass on the counter.
“Just one of those days.”
“Hey is that Cal Huron over there? I haven’t seen him in forever.”
“Yep, that’s him. He’s getting married this afternoon, in the park.”
“Oh yeah, I got an invitation rattling around somewhere. Is that his bachelor party over there?”
“Yep. Apparently they’ve been out all night partying or something. Speaking of which, I need a bowl of jalapeños. Dumbass number one over there bet dumbass number two five bucks that he wouldn’t eat a bowl of jalapeños.”
“Who’s dumbass number one?” Mel raised a thick, burly eyebrow as he surveyed the full table.
“Pick one. Doesn’t matter.”
“I can give Jenny that table if you want. Those guys look like they’ll be a real barrel of assholes. Don’t want anyone getting hurt.” Mel winked as he plopped a bowl of chopped jalapeños in front of her.
“Nah, I’ll keep my tables. I can handle them. Don’t worry about me.”
“No one’s worried about you,” he laughed, wiping his hands on his stained apron. “Well, either way I can’t wait to see how it turns out. I was figuring it would be a pretty boring Sunday morning. Hell, that bowl of peppers is on the house. Totally worth it for the entertainment value.”
“Personally, I could really do without entertainment today.” Liv gathered up the tray of glasses and headed back to the pack of drunken hyenas.
She distributed the drinks quickly.
“Alright boys, what’ll it be?” she fished out her order pad.
A pudgy frat boy giggled, “I was looking at the pigs in a blanket,” he and the guy next to him burst into fits of hysterical laughter, “and I was wondering how you would look in a blanket?”
“You would at least need to be funny to find that out,” Liv sighed.
“Fuck it, Cal. I’m putting the whole table down for Mel’s hangover special. No more orders.” The excited look on the faces of the local boys confirmed that she had made the right choice.
Mel’s hangover special was beyond legendary in the small town of Eagles Landing, Colorado. Mel would whip up the greasiest assortment of meats, mix them with scrambled eggs, douses the whole thing in white gravy and serve it with biscuits. Accompanied by unlimited coffee, residents swore it would cure the worst hangover in minutes. Legend had it that it could turn a bottle of Jack Daniels sober.
“Mel, hangover specials all around,” she hollered at the kitchen. The sound of bacon sizzling on the hot grill filled the small restaurant as Liv went to check on her other tables.
“Hey Mr. Taylor, how’s that omelet? Where’s the Missus?” Liv asked, stopping at a small booth on her way back to the kitchen.
“Omelet’s great. Just like it always is.” The elderly man hooked his thumbs into the straps of his coveralls. “Wife thinks I’m home sick. Truth is, I didn’t want to go to church today. I woke up dreaming about eating one of Mel’s sausage green-chili omelets. I figured Jesus would understand. If he comes back anytime soon, he’ll stop by this place first.”
“I would really hope he has better things to do... unless he comes back drunk. Then this is the place.”
“Speaking of fire and brimstone, I need to get the check and get home before Momma gets out of church. We’ll probably be back for lunch before Cal’s wedding so, if you don’t mention you saw me here earlier, I’ll make it worth your while.” The white haired man dropped two fives on the table. “Hey, look at me, I’m like Jim Wilke’s Booth the way I’m dropping Lincolns.” He slapped the table, laughing at his own wit.
“That’s funny and terrible Mr. Taylor, I’ll get the check for you. Don’t worry, I won’t rat you out,” Liv winked as she rushed off to the cash register.
Chapter 2
“Got you now, you thieving bastard. I fucking knew it.” The muscle-bound man pounded the keyboard triumphantly, freezing the offending image on the large monitor in front of him. He rubbed his eyes wearily. Sometimes, being head of security was a real bitch. But after more than five hours of pouring over surveillance footage, he had finally found the proverbial smoking gun.
As he stood and stretched, the man known as Max the Enforcer looked around the small, windowless room. He liked the isolation the bunkhouse command center offered. His own personal fortress of solitude, complete with shag carpet. Only the glow of two computer monitors and a bank of telephones kept him company. The small army under his command, the one that normally swarmed the bunkhouse, was off on their assigned duties and this allowed him the rare opportunity to escape the charade that was his current life. The melodic strains of Handel’s Rinaldo swelled through the room, stirring his soul. He could speak six languages without a hint of an accent. The ability to understand Italian Opera was his reward for the effort it took to reach that level of proficiency.
Max the Enforcer was simply another language, a tool, a method for blending in. No one had called him by his real name in over fifteen years. To everyone who knew his true name, he was dead, lost in an operation deep in a godforsaken Columbian jungle. Now, for the time being, he was Max the Enforcer. From experience, he knew that if one looked the part and spoke the part, no one questioned who you really were. The CIA trained him to run black ops. Because of this, he preferred to be faceless, efficient and deadly. But his current position required people to know and fear him. The pay and power afforded him was worth the burden of playing this character.
He paused the music, pulled out his satellite phone and dialed a number he’d committed to memory long ago. Storing numbers in his phone was too big of a risk. His phone had been specially modified to erase any numbers the moment the call ended. Like the rest of the organization’s phones, his connected to a Korean satellite using heavy encryption. It rang eight times before the man at the other end answered.
“Mr. Conroe? It’s Max.” He tapped his finger impatiently as the man responded. “I’m sorry sir, I didn’t realize what time it was. I try not to bother you during church,” he lied. “But since you’re on the line already, I was calling to tell you that you were right. Some of those fucking miners are stealing from us.” He paused. “Sorry sir, I’ll watch the language.” Max paced the room impatiently. “Anyhow, I caught one of them in action. I know how he’s been getting away with it.” Max stared intently at the image of a grizzled man holding a yellow plastic capsule, about the size of a thumbnail, in the palm of his hand.
“Yeah, after you pointed out that some of the miners had lower returns than the other guys, I put a bunch of security cameras around site 4. I caught the fuc – funny-looking punk in action. Looks like we have ourselves a colon smuggler.” He flipped to the next image, where the man was holding the capsule up to his mouth. Max sat down in the ergonomic office chair and zoomed in on the image. He was constantly amazed at the quality that cheap security cameras provided these days. He could make out every feature on the ugly troll’s face. Not even a mother could love this one.
“Yep, okay, Mr. Conroe, I’ll personally take care of it. Don’t you worry. After today, all the loads are going to be pretty fuc – uh, durn consistent.” Max hung up the phone and shook his head. “What a fucking hypocrite,” he muttered. “Doesn’t mind telling me to kill some asshole, but I can’t cuss? Talk about misplaced priorities.” He flicked the music back on. Treachery and deception, as only Opera could deliver, filled the room.
He consulted the schedule lying on the cheap, steel desk in front of him. All of the gold miners were working at site 5 today. Their shift would be over in about two hours. “No point in wasting him before his shift is over. May as well get all the work out of him we can.”
He saved the image to a secure, offshore storage system in Malaysia. Data that could be used as evidence was never stored locally. He logged off and headed out the door. There would be just enough time to finish the Opera while he ran five miles in the adjacent gym. Then it would be time to become The Enforcer once again.
Chapter 3
“Thanks Mrs. Turner, see you next time.” Liv sorted a wad of bills and placed them in the cash register before heading back to her last occupied table. The breakfast rush was winding down, but the hyenas showed no sign of stopping.
“Hey bacon wench, more bacon for the king,” Cal slammed his fist down on the table, eliciting peals of laughter from his wedding party.
Liv rolled her eyes. “Should have gone to college or joined a convent,” she muttered. “Hey Mel, you got any bacon with extra spit?” Liv stood in the doorway of the diner’s cramped kitchen, hands on her hips.
“Don’t you let them get under your skin Liv. They’re just having a good time. Boys will be boys you know.”
“Yeah that’s what I’m worried about. They’re getting to that obnoxious point. It never gets better after this.”
“Speaking of which, how’d that jalapeño eating wager go?”
“Now that was funny. Dumbass number two looks like some kind of emo goldfish out of water.”
“Yeah, he should,” Mel chuckled. “I mixed in a few habaneros from my personal stash!”
“No wonder he wants a glass of milk so bad. I guess I should get that at some point, but I just keep forgetting. Like four times in a row!”
“Ha!” Mel laughed. “I see you finally got that crappy little Porsche working again,” he pointed out the kitchen window at the white 944 parked in the gravel lot. “When you gonna get a nice reliable car like my Ho--“
“Don’t you dare say the H word,” Liv warned. “As soon as I decide life is too boring to even commit suicide, I’ll get a car like yours. Until then, I want something fun to drive and pretty to look at. Besides, Murphy wasn’t completely broken, I was rebuilding the turbocharger last week. I put in a ceramic turbi--”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Mel interrupted. He grew bored of her car obsession quickly. “One of these days you’ll get a nice practical car. Looks like your fan club misses you,” he motioned toward the rowdy table.
“Fan-freakin-tastic,” Liv rolled her eyes. She caught a glimpse of silver over Cal’s cup of coffee and raced over to the table.
“Hey, give me that,” she demanded, reaching her hand out to the best man. “Michelle’s gonna be less pissed about you having a black eye in some pictures than she’ll be about her future husband showing up to his own wedding drunk. Trust me.”
“You want some of this?” Mark slurred cockily, putting flask to mouth. “Hey Liv, how come you never left town like I did? I thought you were smart, gonna go to a fancy college or something,” he said as he smacked his lips.
“Liv’s like me,” Cal interrupted, banging his mug of Irish coffee down on the table. “We got left behinded.”
“That’s not even a word,” she sighed.
“Is too. We’re left behinders. Everyone else got knocked up or got out of town except us. But they don’t understand how awesome it is to stay here. Everything is the same and familiar. I’m gonna be like my grandpop. Born here, died here.”
“You’re way too pretty to be stuck here in Eagles Landing with this loser,” the best man eyed Liv. “Why don’t you marry me and get the hell out of here? What do you say fellows?” The table roared their approval.
“My second marriage proposal today!” Liv exclaimed. “Hey, I got a better idea, why don’t you give me the flask and take drunky drunk over to get his tuxedo. Your lifespan will be much longer that way.”
“You threatening me?” Mark pretended to be offended.
“It’s not me you have to worry about. It’s the lady dressed in white. Now give me the flask.”
“Fine,” Mark placed the flask on the middle of the table, crossed his arms and looked at her defiantly.
“Goddamit, this counts as your wedding gift Cal,” Liv reached over the table and grabbed the flask. Mark reached over and pinched her ass. With the exception of the best man’s laughter, the table froze, silent.
Mark never saw the punch coming. His drunken laughter ended abruptly as he fell to the sticky, linoleum floor like a sack of flour.
Trying to stifle his laughter, Mel rushed over. “Okay boys, party’s over,” he clapped loudly. “Time to get on with life and get hitched. No more fun for you ever again. Cal, you better drag your unconscious best man out of here or I’m putting him in the dumpster with the other trash.”
Wide eyed, Cal nodded. The conscious men at the table dropped piles of cash next to their food and dragged Mark to the waiting stretch limo, warily keeping a watchful eye on Liv.
As soon as the bell above the door stopped ringing, Liv gathered up the cash. “I knew it, bastards stiffed me!” she held the stack of one dollar bills in her clenched fist.
Angrily, she started clearing the table. Half full cups and plates clattered into a white plastic bin with such force they threatened to break. Her hand was throbbing from the punch.
“Whoa, hang on there. This is cheaper than replacing all my dishes,” Mel tossed a wadded up twenty from the register and an ice pack in her direction. “I started keeping these in the freezer after last time. Take the rest of the day off, Jenny can take care of it. We probably won’t have much of a lunch rush since nearly everyone in town is going to Cal’s wedding this afternoon. Go take a drive and blow off some steam. Alright?”
Liv nodded and headed to the restroom to change. She opened her locker, pulled her duffel bag out of the way and then reached for a change of clothes. As if dressing for a date, Liv changed from her practical pants, embroidered work shirt and comfortable shoes into a short gray skirt, a tight blue sweater and a pair of knee-high, black leather boots. She shook her hair out in front of the small mirror.
Liv made it almost a religion to drive the curvy mountain roads of northern Colorado every Sunday after her shift ended. It let her blow off the frustration that came from working a dead end job at Mel’s. Dressing up was part of the ritual that helped keep her sane.
Satisfied that she no longer looked like a waitress, she exited the bathroom.
“Here,” Mel shoved a picture, fresh off the printer, into her hands. “I hung one just like it next to the first dollar I ever made!” he exclaimed proudly, pointing to the wall above the cash register.
Liv snickered at the grainy image captured by the diner’s security camera. Frozen in time, was the exact moment when her fist connected with Mark’s surprised face. “Priceless. Thanks Mel, I’ll hang this on the fridge. Grannie’s gonna be so proud of me!”
The bell tinkled as Liv headed to her car. She fished a worn key from the small pocket of her skirt and opened the driver’s door on the old Porsche. She dumped the duffel bag on a collection of fast food wrappers and cups in the passenger floorboard, then started the car. The engine kicked to life with a healthy roar, its idle full of promise.
She pressed a button and the fingers holding the sunroof in place released their grip. She manually opened the front latches, then fully removed the thin metal sunroof and stowed it in the rear hatch. Liv clicked on her red mp3 player, cranked up the volume, shifted into first and raced out of the gravel parking lot, tires scrambling to find traction.
Chapter 4
Liv threaded her way through the rustic town square of Eagles Landing. Soon the small town, high in the Colorado Rockies, disappeared from sight as she raced along her favorite winding mountain road. “Sorry Johnny,” Liv pushed the skip button on the small mp3 player, “but sometimes a girl needs some bass.” The distinct voice of Johnny Cash faded, replaced by the thunderous intro to Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.”
As if possessed by the thumping subwoofer, she pushed harder on the gas pedal. The grin on her face grew as the turbocharged car skimmed the curvy blacktop. She zoomed past a stand of naked white aspens as if the devil was in hot pursuit. Fallen leaves captured in the vortex created by the car chased after her like a yellow tornado. The roar of the throaty exhaust was barely audible over the riffing baseline and her lively singing. The late October air blasted through the open windows and sunroof, tousling her hair and blowing a few wayward strands over her lips sticking them gently to her vanilla flavored Chapstick. She brushed them away and the scenery became a blur as she gleefully shifted gears. Streams and aspens gave way to rocky cliffs and lichens as she snaked her way above tree line.
Liv’s body relaxed as she flung the Porsche through a particularly tight turn. The car stuck to the road like superglue, dutifully responding to her every command. The wind rustling through her hair and the feedback from the road through the steering wheel massaged away all thoughts of the rough morning.
A steep grade loomed ahead. She wanted all the speed the German engineered car could muster. Liv downshifted the short-throw five speed into third gear, revved the engine and dropped the clutch. The tachometer rose, and hot exhaust spooled the turbocharger, forcing pressurized air into the engine. The little car surged forward, tires chirping.
“Good boy Murph, that’s it,” she encouraged. The grin on her face widened in proportion to the difficulty the tires had gripping the cool, dry blacktop. “Got tired of sitting in the garage with your hood up, huh? I told you it would be more fun if you would just start working!” Her green eyes widened with excitement as she rocketed towards the summit, music blaring. “Oh yeah, Bullitt time! Steve McQueen and that Mustang got nothing on us!” Liv knew that if she hit the top fast enough, she and the car would become airborne for one shining moment of freedom; freedom from everything. None of the constraints on her life mattered in that perfect instant and she never grew tired of it.
The old Porsche wasn’t especially powerful by modern standards, but she loved its perfect weight balance, which allowed the car to hug turns at speeds far above the legal limit. The grin on her face turned devilish as Liv brushed another wayward strand of dark hair from her face and prepared to hit the top of the hill, speedometer pegged at 88 mph. Just in case time travel was possible. Liv bit down on her lower lip, mashed the gas pedal to the floor and the Porsche erupted over the pinnacle, tires grabbing nothing but thin, mountain air. Liv could no longer contain herself and a squeal of delight escaped her from her lips. The car’s 50/50 weight balance kept the Porsche level to the road and she was lined up for a perfect landing.
The sense of freedom washed over her body and time slowed. She felt a oneness between machine and body as the two melded together. Liv imagined it was the same way Buddhist Monks feel a oneness with the earth during meditation. She gripped the steering wheel tightly with both hands. Her stomach twisted in excitement. The only other time she felt this way was during the intense moments of freefall that occurred before she opened her parachute on one of her all too rare skydiving excursions. Her momentary defiance of gravity couldn’t last forever and she prepared to reenter reality.
Abruptly, at the height of the jump, thick white clouds of steam poured out of the hood, obscuring her vision, filling the air with the distinct smell of scalding antifreeze. The cloud of steam was so thick that Liv could taste it on the back of her tongue. “Shit.” Liv braced herself for impact as the laws of physics pulled the car toward an uncertain landing. Her Grannie often joked that Liv drove this particular road so many times that she could do it blindfolded. Liv desperately hoped it was true.
The car came to a skidding halt, tires smoking. It had been a close call; the Porsche sat on a dirt patch inches from the ledge, overlooking the deep canyon. “Shit shit shit, no! Bad Murph, bad bad bad!” Liv pounded the steering wheel in frustration. Hands shaking from adrenalin, Liv reached down, popped the hood and stepped out of the car.
With her long, athletic legs and olive complexion given to her by her handsome Texan father and lithe Vietnamese mother, Liv was a striking figure standing in the steam pouring from the open hood. She waited several minutes for the thick vapors to clear before she diagnosed the problem. “A hose clamp? Really? You couldn’t find something better to break? You better not make me late for the wedding. Grannie and her book club are making a giant batch of Grannie’s special chicken fingers. You know how much I like those chicken fingers. I was gonna share with you this time, but not anymore.” Liv kicked the front tire in frustration. She grabbed a screwdriver from a canvas tool bag in the back seat and tightened the loose clamp.
Liv looked up and down the deserted road hoping to see a car. She didn’t have much hope because of the remoteness of her location. No car had passed her the whole way up and it could be hours before help arrived. After the nearby expressway was completed, no one used this old stretch of blacktop. Liv loved this road because she could drive for hours without seeing another person. However, this feature was turning into a real problem. She checked her cell phone. As expected, there was no signal to be had this high in the mountains.
The Porsche had been nothing but trouble since she bought it. It seemed like every time she fixed one thing, something else broke. However, when the sports car worked, it made her forget about its quirks and troubles. Liv’s father had instilled in her a love of cars, which became more of an obsession when he disappeared three days after her thirteenth birthday.
Her father had a weakness for older cruisers, but Liv fixated on performance-oriented cars she could afford on her waitress salary. Murphy fit the bill. He was a white, 1988, turbocharged Porsche 944. She acquired him for next to nothing after the water pump seized on the previous owner and snapped the timing belt. The precise dance between pistons and valves went haywire without the timing belt. Instead of moving out of the other’s way, they slammed into one another, rendering the engine unusable. After nearly a month of hard work Liv got the car back in working order. At least, most of the time.
She waited a few minutes for another car to appear before heading out to find water. If she wanted to make it back to town without the car overheating, she would need to refill the radiator. Liv sighed, grabbed a couple of empty soda bottles from the passenger floorboard and headed for a mountain stream she knew was nearby.
Before her father had disappeared, they had travelled into the mountains whenever possible. Jack Driscol had been convinced he would strike it rich and was thrilled that his daughter wanted to prospect with him. To Liv it didn’t matter what they were doing; she loved anything she did with her father.
For once, her time prospecting was going to pay off. She knew the exact location of a nearby stream because she had spent hours panning it for elusive gold flecks and nuggets.
Cursing her choice in fashionable footwear, Liv started toward the stream located on the other side of a nearby hill. “Stupid car, stupid mountains, stupid boots,” she grumbled. “Oh, you know I didn’t mean it boots; I spent too much money on you to ever hate you.” Liv knew from the moment she tried them on, she had to have them. They cost nearly a month’s worth of tips and were totally worth it because of how great they made her feel. She paused to adjust the boots, making them slightly more comfortable, then resumed her quest for water.
Chapter 5
Sheriff Tom Warner peered intently through the expensive Trijicon scope. He dialed in the distance and centered the crosshairs on a mountain goat scampering down the side of an impossibly steep cliff. “Always better tenderized,” he muttered as he pulled the trigger on the custom made, .30-06 caliber hunting rifle.
The small bullet flew true. The goat stumbled and plummeted more than a hundred feet to the bottom of the cliff, bouncing off protruding rocks the entire way down. Tom chuckled and thanked god he was Sheriff of a small Colorado town where no legitimate business required his full attention. The two young deputies under his command were more than capable of watching over Eagles Landing, leaving him to pursue the finer things in life.
Sheriff Warner took a deep breath of chilled mountain air. He packed the rifle carefully into its case in the back seat of his pride and joy, a yellow H2 Hummer. Tom plopped himself into the driver’s seat, fired up the big V-8, shifted into drive, pressed the button for four-wheel drive low, and headed toward the goat’s carcass.
“Oh man, this is gonna look good on the old trophy wall,” he said aloud to no one in particular as the Hummer bounced over the rocky terrain. “Well as long as the fall didn’t mess that poor critter up too bad,” he chuckled.
The trophy wall in his oversized living room was a source of pride for Sheriff Warner. The log cabin walls were filled with mounted animals of every size and shape. It was impossible to miss when visitors walked through the front door. A massive chandelier made of elk antlers hung over three leather couches, giving the room the appearance of an expensive hunting lodge.
Neither the house nor the Hummer were affordable on an honest police officer’s salary, which was why Sheriff Warner was no honest police officer. The finer things in life were worth getting your hands dirty for.
-------------------
Under the less than watchful eye of two bored guards, the miner known as “The Mole” reached into the bottom of the rickety mine cart he had pushed to the surface. He stuffed a small, golden nugget into a sealable, yellow plastic container. Peering out of the corner of his eye to make sure none of the guards were looking his way, he sealed the vial then quickly swallowed it. The Mole ran his grubby fingers through his stringy brown hair, then turned and emptied the cart into the mine dump that stained the tundra yellow.
The Mole received his nickname after miraculously escaping a collapsed mine shaft that killed three other miners. What nobody knew was that The Mole had set the dynamite charges that collapsed the ceiling on his partners. It was just plain bad luck that the timer malfunctioned and went off before he was clear of the shaft.
The Mole was trapped underground for five days before he managed to claw his way back to the surface. A thin stream of water kept him from dehydrating during his escape. The ordeal had been worth it. With his partners gone, he was the only one who knew of the deep vein of silver buried in the Montana wilderness.
The Mole lived high on the hog for more than five years on the ill-gotten gains he extracted from the shaft. But the mine played out quickly. Between his drinking, womanizing and gambling habits, the money disappeared soon after. A prudent man could have retired using the riches The Mole had extracted from the ground.
After the money ran out, he developed a reputation of being difficult to work with. His habit of drinking on the job was widely known, making it hard to find work. He was like the other miners working the site; rejects whom no one else would hire. The pay was lousy, but this was the only life he knew.
The company that employed him was a strange one. The owners were rightly paranoid. He and the other miners were made to strip down for the guards at the end of every day and the clothes they wore were thoroughly examined. But The Mole was clever when it came to making enough money to buy booze, so he swallowed a few choice samples every day and retrieved them later in the privacy of his rickety survival shack.
The Mole never knew which mine he would be sent to from day to day. There were a total of five shafts, each within a few miles of each other. Strangely, some of the mines never seemed to produce anything of value. They kept widening the shaft, but never found anything worthwhile.
He hated working those mines because there was never anything to steal. Luckily they were working the lowest altitude mine, following a promising vein of quartz and gold. There would be a fine bottle of whiskey in his future. The very thought of liquor made him thirsty. As he gazed intently at a nearby stream carving its way through the tundra, he took a swig from a plastic water bottle. The vodka soothed his tongue. The Mole was about to head back into the darkness with the empty cart for another load when a newcomer arrived at the site.
The Mole let out a low whistle when he saw the approaching vehicle. The freshly waxed, solid black SUV with extravagant glossy black rims, a lift kit, and knobby off road tires glistened in the sun like a million bucks. “Bet that thing is worth some money,” The Mole muttered as he briefly entertained the thought of stealing the SUV. He would be able to buy a lot of booze and hookers if he could get it to the right customer.
Must be some big shot in the organization, The Mole thought. No one would bring an expensive vehicle like that all the way up one of these old mining roads without a good reason. “Wonder what’s going on?” The Mole muttered nervously, his beady eyes darting about the worksite.
Chapter 6
Max stepped out of the Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT-8 and surveyed the mining site. His muscular frame cast an imposing shadow on the rocky parking lot. Through his dark tinted aviator sunglasses he noted the worthless guards doing their best to look competent. The Mole, the reason for Max’s unannounced trip to this wretched site, was slinking behind the four pickup trucks the workers used to travel between the nearby town of Eagles Landing and the mine.
Like the rest of the miners, he was hired because of his dubious moral fiber and easily corruptible nature. This made The Mole cheap labor since no one else would hire him, but it also created certain, predictable problems. While no other type of miner would ever work for an operation like theirs, it did mean, as head of security, Max had to be extremely watchful of the employees.
Max could hardly blame the guards for their listlessness. Day in and day out it was an incredibly boring job. However, it was their job to perform. After today, he was certain they would start paying much closer attention. “Squeaky wheel gets the greasy bullet,” Max eyed the man who was trying his best to turn invisible.
Max felt under his Hugo Boss suit coat jacket for the reassuring feel of his fifty caliber Desert Eagle semi automatic. Like the suit and the Jeep, the gun was excessive, but nothing made a person come around to his way of thinking faster than the chrome plated fifty-caliber hand cannon pointed between their eyes.
The man playing the role of Max preferred a smaller FN Herstal Five-SeveN pistol, like the one tucked into his ankle holster, but the Desert Eagle had become his trademark, a core component of Max’s character, and Max owned it.
“Gather the other miners,” Max ordered the two guards. “Bring them up forcefully if you have to. Now!” The guards nodded, rushing to obey the order, a fearful look in their eyes.
“You!” thundered Max, removing the Desert Eagle from its shoulder holster and pointing it at The Mole. “Over there,” he commanded motioning with the barrel toward a flat spot on the edge of the rocky parking lot. Max pulled a cinnamon flavored toothpick from his breast pocket, stuck it in his mouth and chomped down menacingly.
The Mole knew his number was up. No one would mourn his passing or even think of reporting the incident to the police. Half of the miners were on the run from the law as it was.
The others emerged from the darkness at gunpoint. Each fearfully observing the newcomer and the gleaming pistol. Max kept the gun trained at The Mole, but turned his head slightly to address the assembled group of scraggly rejects. “I will no longer tolerate theft of company property. You steal from the company you steal from me,” he said in a quiet voice tinged with malice.
“If I ever have to come back again, there will be a new crew in your place the very next day and no one will ever find your bodies or care what happened to you. Do you understand!” he thundered at the assembled men. Observing their cowed, silent faces, Max twirled the pistol around his index finger, once, twice, three times. It stopped mid spin. Max instantly transformed his body into a professional firing stance.
The silence was shattered by the deafening report of the Desert Eagle. All eyes turned from Max to the condemned man. The Mole dropped where he stood, half his head splattered across the tundra behind him.
“Clean that shit up,” Max ordered the guards. “And get back my stolen property. That rat bastard probably swallowed it. Use your imaginations to figure out how to get it back,” he paused to let his words sink in.
“I better not see another miner stealing my property. Understood?” The sullen guards nodded and went to work cleaning up the mess. “The rest of you assholes get back to work!” Max growled at the miners. They rushed to comply. Satisfied, Max turned back toward the Jeep and allowed himself a small, self-satisfied smile. “That ought to keep everyone in line for a while,” he said as he re-holstered the pistol.
Chapter 7
Liv stopped cursing her bad luck when the stream she had been searching for came into view. The blue ribbon was still a good distance away and she would have to climb down a steep hill to reach its cool waters, but at least she could see it.
Liv and her dad had visited this particular stream many times when she was a young girl. A small tear came to her eye as memories came flooding back. She, her dad and his best friend Mitch, who often accompanied them, would joke with each other while panning the little stream winding through the high country in front of her. Those had been happy times and Liv always looked forward to their next excursion with the same excitement most kids reserved for trips to Disneyland.
Their prospecting expeditions always started before daybreak. Mitch would spend the night and stay up late, playing poker with Liv and her dad. They would drag themselves out of bed at four in the morning, take her dad’s Jeep up steep mining roads and shallow streams until they found a spot to spend the day.
Liv was in charge of packing lunch and took her duty seriously. They feasted like kings. Her grandma would take her on a special trip to the grocery store the day before in preparation.
During the course of their expedition, Liv often grew bored with searching through endless pebbles in her pan and would wander off to explore nearby meadows and pine forests. Mitch always joked that Liv was bad luck when she was in the stream. Every time she returned they would usually have a large gold nugget to show her.
For a while, Liv bought into the idea that she might be jinxing their expeditions. Until she realized it was always the same nugget, vaguely shaped like Donald Duck.
Periodically, they would find something worthwhile and the money was pooled together and split up at Christmas. Panning for gold was how she got her first Playstation and a bunch of games. Though she wasn’t a full partner, she didn’t mind. Any excuse to hang out in the mountains with her dad was fine.
“Oh, thank god,” Liv muttered to herself with relief as a group of men, clustered next to a group of generic, white trucks and a shiny, black, SUV came into to view. Because of her obsession with cars, she instantly recognized the SUV as one she had seen in a magazine. With over 400 horsepower, the sleek, all-wheel drive Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT-8 was one of the fastest vehicles on the planet. “Nice,” Liv commented, admiring the exotic vehicle. “This improves my day dramatically.” Liv quickened her pace and headed toward the group, eager to find water or get a ride back to town where she could call a tow truck.
Strange, she thought staring at the fresh tailings of yellowish earth near a gaping hole carved into the side of the mountain just above the stream. “I didn’t know anyone was mining out here. Wonder what they found?”
The shot from Max’s pistol interrupted her musings and stopped Liv dead in her tracks. A gasp escaped her throat as The Mole’s brain matter painted the tundra behind him red. Liv stumbled, dropped the soda bottles she was carrying, turned and ran for her life, back up the hill. She ignored her feet, which screamed at her with each stride.
Chapter 8
Max was opening the door to the Jeep when he noticed a figure scrambling over the top of the hill, above the mine. He whirled around and pointed at the nearest guard. “Is anyone else supposed to be out there?” he demanded.
“No, just us,” the frightened man responded.
“Shit. Saddle up boys. We’ve got a witness to take care of. One of you is going to earn a silver notch today.”
“You,” he pointed to the less experienced guard, a large black man from Alabama that had recently joined the company, “take one of the work trucks.”
“And you! Take the Jeep, but don’t fucking scratch it,” Max pointed at the other guard, a seasoned veteran. The stocky red haired man carrying a suppressed M-16 nodded, stowed the assault rifle in the back of the SRT-8, jumped into the driver’s seat and fired up the engine.
“I saw someone up on the ridge above the mine. Go get whoever it is before they get to the road,” Max ordered. His tone implied that the guards would meet a fate similar to The Mole’s if they failed him.
He hated not taking care of business himself, but Max the Enforcer was in a position of command. Max needed to set up damage control and deal with the remaining miners. For better or worse, he and Max were one and the same to those around him. While the guards had become lax, they were not incompetent. They could surely track down a lost hiker and dispose of the unfortunate soul on their own. There were times when he resented Max’s character for holding him back, keeping him from the hunt where he could use his natural talents to their fullest.
The guards were part of an elite group of men, carefully recruited for their ruthlessness, and capabilities. The belts were an integral part of a system that helped guarantee their loyalty and provided a macabre competition between the killers. Each man in Max’s organization was given a special black alligator skin belt when they joined. Carved into the leather was a notch for each confirmed kill the man racked up before joining Max’s personal army. Kills made while working for Max were marked by a notch filled with silver. Silver notches were highly coveted and competition for them was fierce. The monetary reward accompanying each silver notch wasn’t shabby either.
The tundra above the mineshaft was steep, but relatively smooth, allowing the extended cab 4 X 4 work truck and the Jeep to chase after the fleeing figure. Their careless driving destroyed the delicate tundra, but the guards had other things on their mind. Specifically, Max’s fifty caliber Desert Eagle and the gaping hole in the unlucky miner’s head. They were not going to fail.
Back in high school Liv hadn’t been the fastest runner on the track team. But at this moment, Liv was certain she was breaking a few dozen world records. She desperately raced back to the road and possible salvation.
She heard the roar of two engines starting. Though she didn’t think it possible, Liv ran even faster, gulping down mountain air as her muscles responded to her flight instinct.
Liv nearly tripped over her own feet when she heard the loping exhaust note from a high-powered engine. A turbocharger wastegate blew off excess pressure. “Ooo! It’s got a Hemi. And a turbo!” she thought in spite of herself. Liv couldn’t believe her brain. She was going to die and all she could think about was how awesome the truck was that would run her down. She mentally shrugged. “At least if I’m going to die it won’t be because I got run over by some piece of shit Honda.”
Chapter 9
“Mr. Conroe, we may have a slight problem,” Max said into the satellite phone. “Someone saw me taking care of our little colon smuggling operation at site five.”
“Well, that is unfortunate, but you are taking care of this aren’t you Max?” came the voice on the other end of the line.
“Yeah. Don’t worry boss. Probably just a lost hiker or something. Whoever it is won’t make it too far. My boys are giving chase right now. Just someone in the wrong place at the wrong time. Shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.”
“Great! It’ll work out, I know it will. You’re the best man I’ve got. By the way, how’s the new Jeep working for you?”
A grin briefly crept onto Max’s face. “Great sir. That motor is a beast. Its got more power than a tank. I even brought it up to the site today. That Hennessey turbo kit you had installed is awesome. I raced some guy in a Lamborghini the other day and blew its pants off. I can’t drive through town without at least a dozen people staring at it. I’m just glad it has dark tinting.”
“Yeah, it’s a looker, all part of keeping up an image. I always want you to remember how important that is. The clients respect an image. They pay more if they think the head of security is some kind of stereotypical, blood-thirsty Terminator.” The man who played Max the Enforcer understood this lesson very well. “Anyhow, I’ve got work to do, so keep me posted. Give Tom a call if you need anything. He always comes through.”
“Will do. I’ve got to shut the site down. Weather forecast is predicting a huge snowstorm on the way. We’re probably going to suspend operations for a few days until we can get the road opened back up.”
“Yeah, saw that in the paper. I was really hoping we might make more progress before the first big snow. I’ve got a really good feeling about site five. Might be the one we’ve been looking for. But sometimes the good Lord has other ideas about our time schedules,” he sighed. By the way, is everything in place for the shipment coming in tomorrow?”
“Yep, we’ve got it secured. The buyer is already in place. All we need is the supplier. They should be getting in tonight.”
“Great, great. Let me know how things go.”
“I’ll keep you posted,” Max hung up the phone. He turned his attention to the tundra above the mineshaft. The truck and the SRT-8 were in a race to the top. Even without a low four wheel drive gear, the sheer power of the Chrysler V-8, force-fed cold mountain air by the twin turbochargers from Hennessey Performance in Sealy, Texas, allowed it to climb like a mountain goat, leaving the Chevy pickup further and further behind.
Chapter10
The relief from reaching the Porsche was quickly dashed when Liv remembered why she had been hiking through the tundra in the first place. She frantically dug into the small pocket of her skirt, nearly flinging the key into the canyon as she yanked it out. “That would have been just about right,” she thought.
Liv’s heart pounded like a sledgehammer in her chest. The blood coursing through her veins was ice cold as she pushed the worn key into the ignition, hastily cranking the engine over. “Come on, Murph. You get me home in one piece and I promise to get you anything you want. I know you’ve been looking at those new tires and shiny chrome rims. They’re yours, I promise.” As Liv sweet-talked the car, she glanced at the digital temperature gauges mounted to the dashboard.
She had added the precision instruments after rebuilding the engine. Her dad’s love of gadgets had rubbed off on her and she had wired several thermocouple temperature sensors to critical points of the car. With a quick glance, she could see the oil, cylinder head, and transmission fluid temperatures. The gauges allowed her to keep tabs on the car’s health.
Today, Liv hoped these gauges would save her life. The factory installed temperature gauge wouldn’t work without water in the cooling system. The digital gauges were her only chance of keeping the engine working long enough to make it back to Eagles Landing. If the engine got too hot it would seize as metal expanded against metal, locking together under extreme heat, killing the motor.
The situation wasn’t completely hopeless. The road to town was mostly downhill. Liv could turn the car off periodically to try and save the engine from itself. It was a long shot, but the only one she had. Liv punched the gas and let out a scream.
Shamus O’Donnell, the current driver of the Jeep, smiled a wolfish grin as he crested the hill well ahead of the trailing Chevrolet 4 X 4. “Holy shit, that’s one good lookin’ bitch,” he savored the sight of the visibly shaken Liv jumping into the little white sports car parked on the edge of the road next to the canyon. If O’Donnell could ram the car before she moved, he could knock it over the edge, sending her tumbling to a certain death below. O’Donnell stomped the gas pedal to the floor. The turbo infused V-8 pushed the Jeep forward, gobbling up the distance between the two vehicles. A two-ton arrow aimed straight at the heart of the white Porsche.
Only Liv’s lightning fast reflexes and the extreme responsiveness of the Porsche caused the big Jeep to miss. “Holy shit that guy can drive,” Liv watched the driver of the SRT-8 narrowly avoid going over the edge of the canyon. She popped a quick u-turn and scraped past the nearly out of control Jeep as she raced toward safety.
“It’s okay Murph, he’s bigger, faster, and more powerful. But we own him because I know this road,” she tried to steady her nerves. “Wouldn’t be fair to him if we didn’t have a busted radiator.”
As the Jeep shrunk in her rear view mirror, the cylinder head temperature quickly climbed into the danger zone. With dread in her heart, Liv turned the engine off and let gravity take over.
Without the motor running, the Porsche was eerily silent. The only sound was the wind rushing through the open windows of the speeding car. In her rear view mirror, the menacing black SUV grew larger as its driver worked to close the distance.
Liv tightened her grip on the steering wheel, adrenaline tingling through her body, and prepared to enter the first major bend in the road.
From experience, she knew the approaching turn was tricky. She zoomed past a yellow traffic sign urging drivers to take the curve at less than half the speed indicated on the speedometer.
Liv had only one shot at making it through this treacherous curve. On the right side of the bend, a solid rock wall towered over the road. On the left, only a flimsy guardrail stood between the road and a sheer drop into the canyon beyond.
“On the plus side Murph, the faster we go, the more your engine temperature drops. I bet if we fly through that guard rail, your motor will be ice cold by the time we hit the bottom. You’ll run great then!”
Chapter 11
O’Donnell was flying, almost literally. The rush of the chase made him feel alive. It beat the hell out of babysitting a bunch of thieving miners. He craved action. Chasing down this sexy little bird with the powerful SRT-8 was the thrill of a lifetime. He was savoring every moment, almost hoping it would never end.
But, unfortunately, it was time to stop the chase. She couldn’t be allowed to make it back to town. O’Donnell briefly considered grabbing the M-16 sitting in the backseat, but decided it would be too unwieldy to shoot the fully automatic assault rifle and drive at the same time.
With one hand on the wheel, he instead reached into his jacket and plucked his Glock 17 from its shoulder holster. O’Donnell liked the gun. He and the Glock were like brothers. With no safety, and a rock solid performance record, it was no frills. Always ready to go.
The Porsche’s worn, but solid tires screeched in protest as they were expertly pushed to their limit through the tight curve. The rear end nearly slid out of control before Liv counteracted the slide, using a skilled combination of braking and counter steering. She didn’t dare look at the speedometer. She concentrated on not slamming through the guardrail and into the canyon below. Diverting her attention, even for a moment, would spell certain disaster.
The mirror on the driver’s side slammed against the aluminum guardrail. It was violently ripped off and flew over the ledge into the canyon below.
“Shit, sorry Murph, I’ll get you a new mirror. You don’t need it anyways. You’re still pretty. None of the other cars will make fun of you. I promise.”
As Liv exited the curve, a plan formed in her head. “Wonder how good this asshole really is Murph? I bet you a new SpyderCo knife I can get this butt munch off our back. Hey, by the way, you owe me like twenty seven knives man. When you gonna pay up Murph? You’re a really sore loser you know that? This is gonna make twenty eight,” she pet the steering wheel with a mix of affection and apprehension.
After her father’s disappearance, Liv spent much of her free time begging rides into the mountains, or going with her Grannie to search for any trace of him. Her mother had died in a drunk driving accident when she was three. This made the loss of her father all the more devastating. After several years, the trips became less frequent, but she grew to love the backcountry and still clung to the hope of one day finding her missing father.
“All that time in the mountains is gonna to pay off today Murph. Let’s see what you’ve got.” Liv switched the key on, pushed in the clutch, shifted into fourth gear, then released the clutch, kicking the dormant engine to life.
“Got ya now, bitch. You’ll be just another silver notch in my belt in a few seconds,” O’Donnell salivated as the powerful SUV closed in on the white car. “Just a little love tap at this speed and down into the canyon ya go. We’re going so fast, I bet you’ll smash into the other side before you hit bottom,” he chuckled at the thought.
O’Donell was close enough to read the eclectic mix of bumper stickers plastered to the rear end of the little car. “NRA and Greenpeace, huh? I bet your funeral is gonna be fun.”
Whenever possible, O’Donnell tried to attend the funerals of his hapless victims. Witnessing firsthand the anguish and grief he caused always made the kill better and allowed him to savor the moment longer.
He pressed the gas, hoping to end the chase quickly in the upcoming turn.
Just as he was about to execute a perfect push on the car’s bumper, sending it sliding into an uncontrollable spin and certain doom, O’Donnell realized that he would certainly follow the car into the canyon if he didn’t slow immediately. He slammed on the massive Brembo brakes and fought to keep the taller Jeep from overturning in the curve. The Porsche gained several hundred feet before he managed to straighten out.
“Oh come on, right into the canyon,” Liv pleaded at the SUV in her rearview mirror, watching it fishtail and sway as it made the turn at an unsafe speed. “Damn!” she cursed as it maintained a precarious grip on the blacktop.
Ahead, the road became a long downhill, filled with challenging twists. During one of the straighter sections, Liv reached over and dug through the empty fast food cups and wrappers littering the passenger floorboard until she found her ‘Go Bag.’
Her father always kept an army green, canvas Go Bag packed and ready. With it, in a moment’s notice, he had every essential ready to go, no matter what the emergency was.
Liv made fun of the bag as a kid and took great pleasure in switching it out for counterfeit luxury bags whenever possible. It made her giggle to think of her dad carrying a poorly copied Louis Vitton bag while escaping some heinous situation. After his disappearance, Liv had adopted his habit.
The bag had come in handy more than once. She did however, add her own touch. Inside the duffel bag were first aid supplies, makeup, a Leatherman multi-tool, food, a Buck Strider pocket knife, water, a change of clothes, other assorted survival items, and most importantly, her Steyr M9 pistol.