Hidden Allegiance: A Jackson Quick Adventure Read online

  “Of course it does. And nothing’s changed since 1993. Koresh is still God to the Davidians and the ATF still overreaches in its authority. But that ain’t gonna stop me from exercising my second amendment right to keep and bear arms. You know as well as anyone, with the blood you’ve seen, that a well-regulated militia is what keeps us from turning into Moscow or Beijing or Havana.”

  “So they don’t know about this stash?”

  Maybe my flush of worry was overblown. Or maybe the door behind me is about to rumble open, revealing a cadre of paramilitary troopers.

  “Hell, they probably do know. But what are they gonna do about it?”

  “Take them,” I state. “Arrest you.”

  “Think about the optics of that,” he says, rummaging through the bag to check its inventory. He makes room for the MacBook and the hard drive and places them inside the bag, alongside the Kel-Tec and a large first aid kit. “I was falsely arrested and paraded through the media as some wacko, neoconservative gun nut. Then I’m released and the district attorney publicly apologizes to me for the ‘rush to judgment.’ You think they’re gonna come after me again without probable cause?”

  “They could.”

  “They could,” he nods. “But this is still Texas. People like their guns and their right to own them. They like to use them to hunt and protect their property. All of these weapons are legal. I got paperwork for all of it.”

  “If they’re watching you,” I counter, “and you’re hanging out with me…” I let the thought waft in the stale air for a moment.

  “They’re not watching. All of these cameras I’m watching you ogle are encrypted. The pictures go to a private server. Nobody but some professional Chinese hacker is getting into the system.” He lugs the bag over his shoulder and walks around the table toward me. “Jackson, what’s going on in that head of yours?”

  “Coming here was a bad idea,” I say, stepping back toward the wall. “I don’t think you can be sure that nobody’s watching.”

  “Nobody’s watching,” he tries to reassure me. “You’re understandably spooked. But let’s be honest, if I ain’t paranoid, you shouldn’t be either.” He pulls an iPhone from his pocket and slides his finger across the screen before punching up an app.

  He hands me his phone. “Here, this is the video feed from the cameras mounted on the outside of the unit. What do you see?”

  On the screen is a live view of the storage units opposite the one in which we’re doing business. To the left of the view is the cab of Ripley’s well-worn F-150. There’s no movement.

  “Push the little icon on the bottom left. It’ll switch the view to the camera at the front gate.”

  I touch the orange triangle at the bottom left and the screen fills with a menu.

  BREAKNECK SECURITY

  REMOTE OPTIONS

  CAM1 CAM2 CAM3

  CAM4 CAM5 CAM6

  “Which one?”

  “Camera one.”

  I press the icon.

  Nothing.

  “It’s not working.” I hand him the phone.

  “Let me see that.” He pushes the same spot on the phone a couple of times, each touch more aggressive than the previous. “I’ll try camera two. It’s also at the—” His eyes grow wide at the same instant the blood drains from his face.

  “What?” I move a step toward him as he holds up the phone, revealing a screen filled with flashing blue and red lights right before the screen goes black.

  They were watching.

  “We’ve got to get you out of here.” Ripley slips the phone into his pocket and shoves the duffle bag into my chest. “Take this.”

  I laugh incredulously. “Where am I going to go? There’s no way out of here.”

  “Yeah there is,” he says. “But I need your help.”

  Quickly, Ripley moves to the back of the storage unit. He grabs the vertical frame of one of the shelving units and pulls. One half of the shelf slides away from the wall, leaving just enough space between it and the adjoining shelf for a person to fit through.

  I hadn’t noticed it before, but there are tiny plastic discs on the bottom corners of the shelf, making it easier to slide, and the hinge midway along the shelf was nearly invisible.

  Ripley pulls a key ring from his pocket and slides through the opening. He mumbles something to himself and reappears less than thirty seconds later.

  He puts his hands on my shoulders, gripping with his fingers. “There’s a door behind there. I just unlocked it. Go through it, turn to the left, and you’ll be fine.”

  “What’s to the left?”

  “A way out.”

  “You coming too?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? You don’t have to sacrifice yourself for me.”

  “I’m not doing it for you, you narcissistic prick,” he spits, his fingertips and thumbs digging into my shoulders. “I’m doing this for my son. You are the only way I see justice. Plus, somebody needs to stay behind to lock the door and slide the shelf into place. I’ll buy you time to escape.”

  He slips me his phone, tells me the PIN code, and pushes me into the opening between the shelves. I duck through the door, feel a slight shove from Ripley, and tumble into the tight, dank passageway. The door creaks behind me and clicks shut just as the cops start banging on the metal garage door at the front of the unit.

  I’m in total darkness.

  ***

  Lying on my side in a quasi-fetal position, I push the home button on the iPhone. The dim glow from the screen illuminates the passageway enough for me to see a couple of feet in front of me.

  The space is maybe five foot cubed. The walls are cinderblock, as is the ceiling, but the floor is concrete. It’s probably the unfinished slab beneath the building. It’s cooler in the tunnel than in the storage unit, though the air burns my nostrils with the sting of mildew.

  Maneuvering my body one hundred and eight degrees, I press my ear against the door. Ripley’s muffled voice yells something about the Fourth Amendment, but it’s mostly unintelligible.

  I thumb the home button on the phone and enter Ripley’s PIN code to turn on the flashlight function. It illuminates the corridor better than the dim backlight of the screen.

  Dragging the duffel alongside me, I push through the cramped tunnel maybe fifty yards or so before it turns to the left. I can’t quite stand and find it better inching along on my knees so there’s less stress on my back. Even though my knees don’t care for it, it’s the most efficient way to move.

  I turn the corner to the left, and the space becomes more confined. Above my head are a series of white PVC pipes running parallel to one another beneath the ceiling. I aim the small flashlight on the back of the iPhone at the ceiling, and a pair of tiny, reflective yellow eyes peer back at me before disappearing and scurrying off. The pipes disappear upward into the ceiling at elbow joints at various points. The joints are slathered in the dried blue and purple expo plumbers use on plastic pipes to affix them to one another. Still, some of them glisten with leaks. The dank odor of the catacomb is strongest here.

  The light, aimed directly ahead of me, illuminates the darkness. This hallway is longer than the one before it, but within a couple of minutes I reach another turn. I crawl to the right this time and am met immediately by a dead end and what best resembles an attic access panel. There’s no handle or lock or obvious mechanism for opening what has to be the exit.

  I run my fingers along the raised edge of the panel and find a pair of small grooves at each end, tugging to loosen the panel.

  This is the way out.

  Before I pull the panel inward, opening the tunnel to the outside world, I sit down and lean against one of the concrete walls. Punching Ripley’s code again, I unlock the phone and turn off the flashlight. Double clicking the home button reveals the list of open applicat
ions on the device, and I scroll to the surveillance program Ripley showed me earlier. I find it and thumb it open. The screen fills with orange and black lettering against a white background.

  BREAKNECK SECURITY

  REMOTE OPTIONS

  CAM 1 CAM 2 CAM 3

  CAM 4 CAM 5 CAM 6

  I punch cameras one and two before remembering that both are disabled. Camera three is the view Ripley first showed me. It’s aimed at the storage units across from the Ripley’s armory. His truck is still to the left of the screen, but now there are at least half a dozen armor-clad troopers positioned outside the door.

  Several of them are kneeling, semi-automatic rifles aimed at Ripley’s unit. A couple of them are standing behind the truck, using the hood to brace their weapons. I push the small triangle at the bottom of the screen and switch to camera four.

  It’s mounted on the opposite corner of the unit and provides a similar option as camera three. From this angle, it’s easier to see the sniper team resting on top of the building opposite Ripley.

  He’s not getting away.

  Camera five is inside his storage unit. Mounted high in the front of the unit and to the left, it provides a fisheye perspective of Ripley in his lair.

  He’s pacing back and forth, and despite the lack of audio, I can tell he’s shouting at the men outside. His arms are gesticulating wildly as he talks, as if he’s a flightless bird frustrated with his lot.

  Ripley’s unarmed, unless you count the endless supply of weaponry surrounding him. He’s not stupid. He knows when those officers force their way into the unit, his only chance of survival is being empty handed with his arms raised above his head.

  Camera six provides a better perspective of what’s coming. It’s affixed to the back left corner of the unit and offers a view of the garage door. Ripley’s pacing back and forth, clearly anxious about what he knows is coming.

  I turn off the phone. I can’t watch it. Placing the phone on the ground next to me, I reach into the recesses along the top of the panel and pull it toward me. After resisting for a moment, it slips easily from the wall and provides an escape from the tunnel.

  I don’t know what to expect on the other side of the opening, but it’s certainly not what I find. Ripley is a freaking genius.

  ***

  I feel guilty for doubting Ripley’s intentions. Maybe I merely underestimated the all-consuming desire of revenge. He called it justice. He wants the men responsible for his son’s execution to share the same fate.

  I don’t judge him. It is what it is. As far back as Hammurabi’s Mesopotamia, men were exacting what they called justice. Four thousand years later, we haven’t changed much.

  Power. Greed. Revenge. They’re fundamental to who we are. I’ve accepted it. I appreciate it. I also appreciate Ripley’s foresight.

  Emerging from the tunnel that wound its way secretly through the walls of the storage facility, I find myself inside another unit. A motion sensing light hums to life an overhead fluorescent light. Taking a deep breath, free of mold, I rise to my feet and pull the bag into the room.

  It’s roughly the same size as the armory, but this unit is empty except for two things: a large refrigerator and a silver Toyota Camry. This is my escape pod.

  The refrigerator is stocked with bottled water and Gatorade. I grab a twenty ounce bottle of the fruit punch flavor, unscrew the cap, and guzzle it before picking up a couple of waters for the road.

  The door to the Camry is unlocked, so I toss the waters onto the passenger seat and reach next to the driver’s seat to flip the trunk lever. It clicks and the trunk thumps open. Aside from a road hazard kit, the trunk is empty, so I heave the weapons bag into the space and unzip it to pull out the Kel-Tec. In the middle of swigging the Gatorade, I realized I left the 9mm on the table in the armory.

  Popping out the magazine on the Kel-Tec, I quickly fill its thirty round magazine and palm it back into place. It’s a nasty looking gun, lightweight and lethal. I hold it in my right hand, testing its feel, wrapping my fingers around the front strap. The nylon grip is comfortable against my palm.

  With the duffel reorganized and zipped, I reach up and pull the trunk closed, careful to make as little noise as possible. The keys are in the ignition and on the sun visor is a remote control for an automatic garage door opener with two buttons.

  Only now do I notice the mechanized arm attached to the bay door of the unit and I’m about to push the button when I stop short. Opening the door, with its humming and whirring, will make too much noise. I get out of the car, stand on the edge of the doorframe, and reach up to pull the emergency release cord on the opener’s gearbox.

  Thunk!

  The door separates from the automatic opener, allowing me to slowly, quietly, roll the door upwards manually. I only raise it a foot before lying flat on my stomach to peek out from under the opening.

  It’s dark outside now. The only light is the dim yellow glow of the overhead lamp a few units down to the left. In front of the unit, and to the right, it’s black. My eyes adjust to the darkness and survey the landscape.

  I’m at what must be the back of the property. There’s a narrow asphalt driveway running between the storage units and an eight-foot wooden fence. At the edge of asphalt, about fifteen feet directly in front of me, is a wrought iron gate. Beyond the gate, as best I can tell, is a dirt path that leads into a thicket of pine trees.

  The stormtroopers haven’t found this part of the property yet, so I quietly roll the garage door the rest of the way along its tracks and slide back into the driver’s seat.

  Before starting the engine, I flip the headlights on to get a better look at the gate. It’s mechanized, with a control arm on its far right side. The gate opens outward and into the trees.

  Figuring it has to work, I push both buttons on the remote control on the Camry’s visor, and the gate slowly hums to life and swings outward. It’s fully open by the time the Toyota’s rear wheels spin past the gravel beyond the fence line. I punch the buttons again to close it behind me and navigate the dirt path away from the storage unit. The clock on the Camry’s dash tells me I’ve got ninety minutes to make it to the airport. I check Ripley’s phone to confirm the time before I toss the potential tracking device out of the window and into the brush.

  ***

  Within a quarter of a mile, the dirt road gives way to a dead end street at the back of a neighborhood. The homes are modest but well kept, the yards lined with recently planted oak trees all equidistant from the curb. It’s the developer’s attempt to make the neighborhood more appealing, but even in the darkness of early evening it seems forced.

  With a decent sense of direction I maneuver my way out of the neighborhood to a feeder road for the highway. I look to the left before turning and notice a grouping of flashing red and blue lights before realizing Ripley’s self-storage business is right next to me.

  The flashing illuminates a pair of white vehicles parked awkwardly against the edge of the feeder road. One of them is a small SUV, and on its hood is a logo for one of the local news radio stations, NewsMachine 88.5. The other is a van with a small satellite dish atop its roof. It belongs to News 4 Houston, George’s station.

  How did they get here so fast?

  I’m tempted to sit at the intersection and gawk, but that would just call attention to me. And I’m running out of time to get to the airport in Conroe. I tune the radio to 88.5 FM, and turn right onto the feeder road.

  “…for about a half hour,” the radio reporter says breathlessly through the tinny resonance of his cell phone. “A source tells me the people inside the storage unit are wanted for questioning in the deadly shootout in southwest Houston earlier today. We have confirmed, among the dead, is thirty four year old KCLA television reporter, George Townsend.”

  I press the accelerator to merge onto I-45 and head north. There’s very litt
le traffic, aside from some rumbling eighteen-wheelers, so I should make it in time.

  “Investigators here at the scene are not talking to us yet, but we do see what appears to be SWAT officers positioned across the expanse of this property. And a quick records search tells us that the owner of this self-storage business is Roswell Ripley, who you may remember,” the reporter slows his cadence to stress the importance of his next point, “was accused of shooting a gubernatorial candidate. Though he was later released and cleared of any wrongdoing, he is known for his fringe political views and a penchant for weapons.”

  That was not at all biased.

  “Our source would not confirm Ripley is a suspect, only that he and at least one other individual are persons of interest. Of course, we’ll be here at the scene, bringing you updates as they happen. For the News Machine in north Harris County, I’m Bill McNeal. Back to you, Catherine.”

  “Thanks for the update,” the anchor says. “Recapping our top story, the Department of Public Safety and the Harris County Sheriff’s Office are in a standoff with a person or persons of interest in the mass shooting early this evening in Southwest Houston at the home of a local television reporter. We will keep you updated on this breaking story as it warrants. You’re listening to the News Machine. I’m Catherine Duke. Now for an update on this evening’s forecast let’s get an update from meteorologist Max Lewis...”

  I tune out the weather report. The speedometer tells me the Camry is cruising at seventy miles per hour.

  It’s a good moment to take inventory.

  Hopefully Bella and Mack will beat me to the airport. I’m out of cash, spending my only five dollars on the beer at the bar, but Bella had money and I imagine Mack did too. They should be able to make their way north without a problem, especially now that there’s so much attention focused on Ripley. If we can get onto the plane, take off, and hit cruising altitude, we’ll be okay.