Firepower, John Cutter [best summer reads .txt] 📗

to Gus Gresley. Then there were people who had to be rushed to hospitals, there were militiamen to interrogate, and the bodies of many more Brethren shot to pieces near the memorial. All that had to be dealt with — and all of it was going to be overwhelming the local police for a good long while. They likely had no clear description of the helicopter gunman.

Unnoticed by police, Vince headed toward the state line, and Alexandria.

And to the first of many buses he planned to take on his way to a certain town in West Virginia…

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The rain came and went, and came again toward the middle of the next morning as the semitruck roared through the mountains.

“Sure glad to have the company, seeing as I got to drive across two states,” said Dutch. That’s what he said people called him, Dutch, because his family was from Holland. He was a ginger-haired fellow with a clipped red beard, lots of freckles and lots of forehead revealed by a receding hairline. Vince liked the affable trucker. He had freckles on his thick forearms and even the back of his big hands as he manhandled the heavy black steering wheel.

Vince had found that changing buses was going to take too long. He didn’t want to rent a car in case the feds had an alert for him, so early that morning, a hundred miles east of Alexandria, Virginia, he’d gotten out of a bus near a truck stop. He’d spotted half a dozen eighteen-wheelers in the parking lot and chatted with the drivers outside. Hoping for a ride going his way, Vince came across Dutch, the friendliest of the lot.

Dutch had been in the army, in Iraq — his tattoo had given Vince a conversation starter — and when he heard Vince was a former Ranger, Dutch’s interest perked up. He’d asked a few questions to see if the story was bullshit, of course. Lots of guys claimed to be ex Special Forces who weren’t. But he was soon convinced. Vince didn’t mention his service in Delta Force. Neither Delta Force nor the CIA encouraged discussing it.

“I tell you what,” said Dutch as they screeched around a turn in the mountain highway, “I admire you re-enlisting as much as you did. Four years over there was enough for me. My left arm and ear all fucked up from an IED, my buddy killed…” He shook his head. “But the service helped me get a loan to buy this truck.”

“You like being a wildcatter?” Vince asked. “Not tempted to just join a big company and let them worry about maintaining the rig?”

“Sometimes, because maintenance is a headache for sure! And I got to take a lot of work to make ends meet. Got to drive all the way across the country, some trips. I’d like to work regionally, round the Carolinas, where I live, so’s I can get married. I got a girl, but…” He shook his head. “Don’t know if I can ask her to put up with me being gone so much. Now, if I joined up with a company, I would always be getting paid. Right now, I got an empty trailer, coming home. Couldn’t find anything to haul back…”

Vince could feel the trailer’s emptiness when they took the curves. Dutch liked to push his speed to the limit, and without much drag the empty trailer swung out on the curves in a way that made Vince nervous. His own nervousness amused him. Bullets had come zinging past his skull like hail, recently, and he was worried about a trucking accident? Human nature. All the same he had a tendency to clutch at a grip bar atop the door when they whipped around a tight curve.

Dutch reached out and turned on the radio. “…earlier reports of two hundred domestic terrorists killed at the Lincoln Memorial were false. DCPD has just given us a count on eighty-eight killed, twelve seriously wounded, fourteen arrested unhurt or with non-life-threatening injuries. Police believe six others may have escaped. Seven people, targeted by the terrorists, are dead as a result of the terrorist attack, including one police officer, with eight more hospitalized… The vigilante who used a machine gun to stop the attack has been tentatively identified as—”

“That sure was a helluva thing,” Vince said, hoping to cover up the mention of his name. He had given his name to Dutch as Vince. There were a lot of Vincents around. But the media would probably mention his background, including the Rangers. “I heard a report on someone’s laptop, the guy sitting next to me on the bus. Lot of those American Nazis killed, all at once. Wild.”

“Yeah, it was that.”

The radio news segment ended, replaced by a country singer, something about trucks.

Dutch was frowning now, as if puzzling. But he said, “Hell, I don’t think anybody but their mamas will miss them Nazi assholes. But it’s sure too bad that fella couldn’t have told somebody, they could have called that thing off. Then no innocents would’ve gotten killed.”

Vince nodded dourly. “Yeah. It’s too bad.” He shrugged. “I understand he and an FBI agent tried. There was a lot of confusion. No one was listening. I heard.”

Dutch glanced at him, still looking bemused. “You said you were coming from the D.C. area?”

“Alexandria.”

“And you’re headed to Wersted? You got family there?”

“No, some business to finish.”

Dutch nodded. “Yeah, I don’t know why anybody’d go to that town unless they have to. Lot of crooks there. Russian mafia came in, bought up the town. It’s mostly whorehouses and crooked gambling now.” He hesitated, then said, “I hope that doesn’t offend you. Maybe you got work there. Friends and stuff.”

“Nope, no friends there. Only work I have there is… unpaid. Just some old business to take care of. I hope to be in and