“Where’re we headed?” Jericho asked after they were well out of town, on their way up into the mountains. They hadn’t left the main road, but there were no other cars in sight. At this time of year, traffic was always sparse. Not that it got much heavier any other time.
“We’re just going for a drive,” Mike replied casually.
Should Jericho be trying to work his cell phone loose? He could dial Kayla, let her hear whatever conversation he and Mike were having, and then she could track him using his GPS. But with what end in mind? Did he want her to burst into whatever was going on and rescue him?
No, he didn’t think so. No rescue needed. He was fine, and didn’t want to mess up whatever chance he might have to get some more information.
They pulled into a spot where the shoulder widened into a sort of parking area, forest sloping up beyond it, cliff falling away on the far side of the road. Broad daylight, reasonably public area. Everything was good.
Mike opened his door and climbed out, still without speaking, and Jericho followed him. “Okay, seriously, what’s up? I have shit to do today, so you can either start talking or—or I guess I’ll have to hitchhike back to town.”
“Settle down,” Mike said. He sounded amused, before saying more seriously, “Hey, can I borrow your cell? My battery’s dead and I need to make a call.”
It was a setup. Jericho might not be used to undercover work, but he wasn’t completely witless. Still, he had no idea how to refuse without sending the whole conversation south.The bikers have no reason to want me dead.He fished the phone out of his pocket, keyed in the password, and handed it over.
Mike looked down at the screen. “No coverage.” He tapped a few buttons, then slipped the phone into his pocket. “I’ll hang on to it, and maybe I’ll try the call a few miles down the road.”
“What’s going on, Mike? Why am I out here, and what are we doing that you don’t want me to have a phone for?”
Mike sighed. “I just wanted us to have a little talk.”
“Excellent. Talking sounds like a definite improvement.”
“Don’t get all touchy, man. This was how the last guy wanted it. We always had to meet out of town, away from spying eyes.”
It was tempting to observe that picking someone up on Main Street in the middle of the day wasn’t exactly keeping things on the down-low, but Jericho managed to bite that comment back in favor of asking, “The last guy?”
“Posniewski.”
“Oh. Posniewski.” The ex-deputy had confessed to selling department information to the bikers, but the bikers weren’t supposed toknowhe’d confessed. The bastard was living it up down in Helena, sitting on his fat ass in protective custody as his lawyers worked out the details of his deal. But Mike didn’t seem too worried about any of that, and Jericho needed to keep talking about the current issue. “So you’re looking for a replacement? You’re going to pay me for information? We need to set up what kind of intel you’d find interesting, and how much you’re willing to pay.”
“Slow down, now. It would be illegal for us to buy confidential information from you. And I’m not saying we bought anything from Posniewski, either. He just liked to talk to us, sometimes. Community policing, I think you’d call it. And we trusted him with some of our money, so he could make donations to the people he knew needed it most. You know, because as a police officer, he saw people having a tough time, and he wanted to help them. But you guys don’t get paid shit, so he couldn’t do it on his own.” Mike smirked, almost comically smug with his double-talk.
“That sounds like a good system.” Jericho crossed the road and peered over the barrier, down the cliff. Kay would kick his ass, but he couldn’t walk away from something like this. “I’d like to be part of your system. I see a lot of people in need every day. And, yeah, like I said yesterday, it’s important that locals stand together against all this out-of-state bullshit. You want to call it community policing? I’m fine with that.”
Mike moved to stand beside Jericho, and they stared down the cliff together for a few moments before Mike said, “The community needs to deal with the out-of-towners, for sure. And we’re expecting more trouble from them. The first three who came? Well, it was really too bad what happened there. I guess they made a mistake, and this isn’t a business that accepts a lot of mistakes.”
“What mistake did they make?” Jericho asked, but there was no answer, so he changed tacks. “You know where these guys are coming from? Who’s sending them?” He waited to give Mike a chance to speak, then kept going. “You know what they want? They coming all this way and making all this fuss for a little weed?”
“I think maybe you misunderstood. The idea is that the information will comefromyou, nottoyou.”
“How can I know what information will be useful to you if I don’t know what’s going on?”
Mike snorted. “Right now, we don’t need any information from you. Seems like we’ve got a hell of a lot more than you do. What wedoneed is a show of support. We need new visitors to realize we’ve got law enforcement under control. We need to show outsiders you won’t be a problem for us, butwillbe a problem for them. You know?”
“You want toshowthem. What exactly have you got in mind?”
Mike’s smile was slow and lazy. As irritating as Wade’s, with none of the added sexiness. “Be patient.”
Jericho didn’t have to follow that instruction for long. He heard the approaching vehicle before he saw it, a low hum that turned into a rumble as the heavy SUV pulled around a bend a hundred yards or so away. It approached slowly, so Jericho had lots of time to see Mike looking satisfied and completely unsurprised by this arrival.
“What’s going on, Mike?”
“You’re being useful. Keeping the peace, serving and protecting. All that wholesome cop shit.”
“Could I get a few more details on that?”
But Mike didn’t answer, just waited as the SUV pulled to the side of the road in front of them and the driver’s door opened. The man who stepped out was younger than Jericho had expected. Well-dressed in a suit that made Jericho’s beige polyester feel even itchier than usual, with his blond hair blowing just a little in the breeze. He looked like he belonged on Wall Street, not the Montana back roads.
