Wade nodded his understanding, but Jericho knew that was all the gesture meant. Wade understood, but he wasn’t agreeing to anything. And sure enough, after a moment he said, “You know I can’t do that, Jay. I can’t make a deal.”
“Can’t? No, that’s not the word you should use. You should just say you won’t do it. That’d be a hell of a lot more honest.”
Wade’s smile was gentle. “What do you think would happen to me if I made a deal with the feds?” He waited for half a second, not long enough for Jericho to process the emotions the question had caused, then leaned in closer. “What do you think happened to Mike DeMonte this afternoon? He talked, and—”
“Wait. What? Mike DeMonte? What the hell happened to him?”
Wade seemed genuinely surprised. “You hadn’t heard about that yet?”
“Heard about what?”
“Mike’s dead, Jay. The wrong people heard he was talking, and they shut him up. Seriously, nobody thought to mention that to you?”
“Jesus Christ.” Jericho’s stomach churned, and he half turned to face the forest, searching for some calm. He hadn’t liked Mike; the guy had been a damn psychopath. But still. “He was in protective custody. How the hell did they get to him?”
“The protective custody slowed them down, but it didn’t stop them. Nothing will stop them.” Wade shuffled around so he was in front of Jericho again. “So when I say I can’t make a deal? I mean I don’t want to, sure. I don’t want to break the code, don’t want to betray people who’ve trusted me. But I also mean I can’t, not if I want to stay alive. And I do want to stay alive.” He grinned like a little boy. “Especially now that you’re back. You’ve stirred shit up, and I definitely want to be around to see what the world looks like when it’s all settled.”
“If I understand your imagery, the world’s going to be covered in a layer of shit.”
“The world’s always covered in a layer of shit. But sometimes it’s thicker in certain areas, thinner in others.”
Jericho stared at Wade’s shoes and tried to organize his thoughts. He couldn’t let himself be led into the shifting sands of Wade’s conversation; this was no time to talk about the world, or how shit-covered it was. “Mike DeMonte is dead.” He glanced up. “That’s handy for you. And for Nikki. He was about the only witness tying her to Eli’s death, and I don’t even want to know how much he had on you.”
Wade shrugged. “It’s handy for ex-Sheriff Morgan too—it shut up one of the witnesses against him and probably put a pretty good scare into the others. And I wasn’t disappointed to hear the news, no. But there were other parties—much more powerful parties—that had at least as many reasons to want him shut up. He did some deals with the militia, and the Chicago crew didn’t just disappear. It could have been a lot of people, Jay.”
He hadn’t firmly denied his own involvement, but Jericho didn’t have the heart to push for any more. Instead he said, “So what else is going on with the militia? What can you give me?”
Wade sighed. “I can’t give you much you don’t already have or can’t guess for yourself. The only names I know, you’ve already got. I’m not sure about numbers. The last time I was out there it was just Sam’s crew—maybe thirty people in his family and their gang, maybe fifteen or twenty of them active in the militia part of things—plus a couple of these new guys. Rumor is the number’s a hell of a lot bigger now, but I don’t know if that’s true, and Sam wouldn’t tell me.”
“So if you haven’t been out there, how’d you hook up with Sam tonight?”
“He wanted to talk to you, so he contacted Scotty and Scotty passed the message on.” Wade raised his eyebrows. “Guess it’s not only the feds keeping track of things between you and me.”
“Really? What the hell happened between Sam wanting to talk to me and him coming on so strong a few minutes ago?”
“He’s putting on a show. Pride, you know? He’s a big talker with his militia bullshit about personal responsibility and laying down your life for your beliefs, but now that it’s actually happening, he’s running scared. Kay can handle him better than you would—she’s got a bit of tact, now and then.”
“So what’s he not going to tell her? What can you tell me that she isn’t going to hear?”
“Not much.” Wade didn’t seem too worried about his lack of helpful hints. “Except maybe that these guys—they’re deluded, no doubt. But they’re not stupid. That mess yesterday? They wanted that. I don’t have confirmation, but I believe it was one of them who called the tip in to Kay about the arms shipment. They wanted her to bring in the feds, wanted things to go to shit just like they have. And once things got started yesterday? I don’t know the details of how they saw it playing out, but they had to know reinforcements were on the way and they could have escaped. Taken the two kills and fought another day. That would have been the smart move, but they didn’t take it; I don’t know why, but it wasn’t because they were too stupid to know what was going to happen to them. You know?”
“Trying to become martyrs,” Jericho said. It wasn’t exactly a new idea.
“Yeah,” Wade agreed, “but living martyrs really aren’t that impressive. Those boys took themselves out of the fight for the rest of their lives, and for what? They can say some crazy shit at the trial, get some coverage they wouldn’t have gotten if they’d been dead. But I don’t know if that’s enough for them.” He shrugged. “It sure as hell wouldn’t be enough for me.”
“So what are they up to, then? What’s the next step?”
“I have no idea.” Wade shook his head. “And I don’t think Sam knows, either. They’ve practically got him held hostage—he had to get their permission to leave tonight—one of his grandkids is diabetic and was low on insulin, so they let him sneak to town to go get more. Everything under their control, they’ve got totally planned out, but a sick kid? That’s something they couldn’t have foreseen.”
“But Sam could have. If he’d known the showdown was going to happen, he could have gotten the kids out of there, or at least stocked up on medicine.”
“Yeah. And hopefully that’s what he’s telling Kay.”
“So—damn. What are we supposed to do with any of this information? Sit back and wait for their next move?”
“How about we do our sitting back on a beach somewhere?” Wade suggested. “You were only sticking around to help Kay out with this, but the feds have taken over now. So you’re right, you don’t have a role to play. Let’s get the hell out of town, you and me.”
“I can’t do that.”
