Allegiance: A Jackson Quick Adventure Read online

  I get up quickly and open the accordion door to the bathroom at the rear of the bus, close it behind me, and lock it. I turn around to face the toilet, and puke into it. I keep vomiting until there’s nothing left and my stomach muscles burn from the contractions. The mirror above the small sink shows me that my eyes are sunken and my skin is pale, almost green.

  I got him killed. It’s my fault.

  I fill the small sink with cold water and splash it on my face. I’m cleaner but not cleansed. I grab a handful of paper towels and wipe the area around the toilet seat, wiping up residual vomit. I wash my hands again before I return to my seat.

  Bobby’s wallet is holding a hundred dollars in twenties. Mine has blood on it. There’s still forty dollars in it. My credit cards are no good. Neither are Bobby’s. I toss them out the window, hoping someone might find them and use them. That might throw off whoever it is that wants me dead. It’ll keep the police from finding me until I can sort this out.

  It’s only a matter of time before they see me on the surveillance video in the store. They’ll trace me to the car. My fingerprints are everywhere in the vehicle and in the bathroom. I need to hurry.

  The bus is half empty. Nobody seems to notice me. I tilt the baseball cap back on my head and stare out the window.

  We pass a mileage marker on the side of the highway. HOUSTON 94 MILES. That buys a little time to think.

  ***

  I’m sick to my stomach. My throat burns. Whoever killed Bobby wants me dead.

  Slouching in my seat on the Houston-bound bus, I dial 4-1-1 on my new phone and tell the operator I need the number and address for Channel 4 in Houston. I have the information texted to my phone and wait for the operator to connect me.

  “News 4 Houston,” the voice answers. People who work the assignment desks in newsrooms are either old and homicidal or young and stressed. This woman sounds young and stressed. I ask her for George Townsend. She sighs loudly and her yell for George gets cut off when she puts me on hold.

  “George Townsend.”

  “George, this is…I’m the guy who called you earlier about Ripley.”

  “Yeah,” he says. “I’ve been trying to get a hold of you. Your phone goes straight to voicemail.”

  I had forgotten my discarded phone was his only way to reach me. “This is my new number, sorry. The old one’s no good anymore.”

  “Okay,” he says. I can hear him typing. He’s always typing. “I have good news.”

  “Really?” I could use some good news.

  “I found Ripley’s son.”

  “You did?”

  “He’s here in Houston.” Townsend stops typing. I assume he’s waiting to hear my response.

  “Good,” I say. “I’m on my way to you right now.”

  “What?” He sounds surprised. “Why?”

  “Someone is trying to kill me. Whoever it is has something to do with Ripley.”

  Townsend says nothing.

  “George?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you hear me?”

  “I heard you.”

  “Say something.”

  “That’s not the quid pro quo I was hoping for.”

  I tell him I’ll meet him when I get into town and that he needs to have a place for us to meet privately. He hesitates.

  “Look,” I say, “my name is Jackson Quick. I work for the Governor. Google me. I am legit. I am not crazy. I am telling you I am connected to the attempt on Don Carlos Buell’s life, Ripley, and his son. I need to find out how. You can help me.”

  “Okay,” he sighs. “I’ll get us a place to talk. I’ll see you when you get here”

  He hangs up and it takes everything in me to press the END button on my phone. I am spent. I send Charlie a quick text message from the phone. I don’t want her to worry:

  it’s jackson. have new temp phone. taking bus. lots to tell u. will call l8r from houston. <3

  I close the phone and lean my head against the window. The adrenaline rush has faded. I need some sleep.

  ***

  The dream is always the same.

  I’m trapped in a school locker. I bang on the door and scream for help. There’s nobody there, and I am running out of air.

  Through the slits, I can see my mom. She’s in the distance, maybe a hundred yards from me, running toward me as fast as she can.

  My dad joins her from out of nowhere. Side by side, they’re coming. They’re on their way to rescue me.

  I bang harder and harder against the door of the locker. My hands are bruised but I keep banging. I need them to hear me. They need to know I am still here.

  As my mother’s hands reach for the latch to free me she bursts into flames. My father catches fire too. I can smell their burning hair, hear their primal screams as both of my parents are incinerated into piles of ash on the ground. Trails of smoke waft from their remains and in through the slanted vents of the locker. I can feel the space shrinking around me, trapping me more impossibly than before. As I am about to be crushed, I awake. The image of the flames is still there.

  I am still alone in the back of the bus, bothered I’ve left one nightmare for another. The UT cap is again pulled low over my eyes. My arms are folded across my chest. I can feel the sweat under the brim of the cap, against the small of my back, and under my arms.

  Through my drowsiness and the window, I recognize the Houston Galleria. We’re heading south on what’s called The Loop, passing the high-end shopping district southwest of downtown.

  The traffic slows and I check my cell phone. There’s a missed call. The phone’s on vibrate and I haven’t set the voicemail yet, so there’s no message. I hit redial for the number, which has a Houston 713 area code, and wait for an answer on the other end.

  “George Townsend,” he answers. “Is this Jackson?”

  “Yeah it’s me,” I speak softly, trying to remain as invisible as I can on the bus. “I’m here in Houston.”

  “I tried calling you again,” George says. “You didn’t pick up.”

  “New phone. I didn’t know the volume was off.”

  “I’ve got a place we can talk. Where are you?”

  “We’re about to get off of The Loop and head back north on highway 59 toward downtown. The bus station is there.”

  “I know where it is,” he says. “I can meet you there in ten minutes. I’ll be in a black Lexus SUV.”

  When we pull up to the station ten minutes later, Townsend’s Lexus is already there. I step from the bus and scan the parking lot for a dark sedan with tinted windows. I don’t find one. I’m startled when the bus releases its air brakes. I can’t believe this is my life. I take a deep breath and lower the cap on my head as I approach Townsend.

  He’s taller than I expected. Thinner too. He’s wearing tan suit pants and a white dress shirt with French cuffs. His shoes are worn, brown leather loafers. It reminds me reporters always have horrible shoes. He has a cell phone in his left hand and offers his right as I approach him. I grip his hand with the little strength I can find and look him in the eyes, searching for signs of skepticism. He blinks and smiles.

  “I’m George.” He shakes my hand up and down a couple of times and lets go. “I’m glad you made it here. I’m really interested in what you have to share with me.”

  “I bet,” I chuckle at his honesty. “Aren’t you underdressed? I mean, no suit today?”

  He shrugs and glances down at his clothes “I’m not on the air today. I’m part of the investigative team, so I’m not on the air every day.”

  “He gestures to the passenger’s side of his car and turns to open the driver’s door. “So,” he says, “let’s hit the road.” He’s acting as though this is a Sunday drive, like I’m not some hit man’s target and he could be in danger now too. I’ll let him doubt me for now. He’ll find out I’m for real soon enough. I hope he doesn’t run when he does, or even worse, come to the realization the instant before two bullets rip through his head.

 
I slide into the car, toss my backpack into the back of the SUV, and am hit with the smell of cigarette smoke. The air is stale and sour and I can feel it in the back of my throat. There’s a half empty pack of Winston’s and an open can of Dr. Pepper in the center console. Everybody drinks Dr. Pepper. It’s the national drink of Texas or something.

  “Who’s trying to kill you?” he asks me without any hint of disbelief in his voice. It catches me off guard.

  “I don’t know, but it’s obviously got something to do with Don Carlos Buell and Ripley.”

  “What’s your connection to them?” “I’m not ready to talk about that yet,” I say. “Let’s wait until we get to where we’re going.”

  “Okay,” Townsend sounds frustrated. He has his arm around the back of my seat as he backs up, brakes, and pulls out of the parking lot and onto the street. He purses his lips as he merges into the left lane of traffic. “This seems to be a one way deal right now.”

  “But I do have a question for you. What can you tell me about Buell?” I ignore his complaint. “I mean, what do you know about his background?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, what’s he into? People like him aren’t wealthy because they’re good people. They all have things in their past.” I can feel the congestion building in my nose from the latent cigarette smoke. I sniff and wipe my nose with the back of my hand. I turn around and look out the rear window. Nobody is following us.

  “I thought you worked for the Governor.”

  “And?” We’re not getting off to a productive start.

  “And,” he says, “I would think you would know your opponent’s baggage.”

  “I know spin,” I admit as I check the passenger side rear view mirror. “I don’t necessarily know the truth. Remember, everything I know comes from politicians. How trustworthy can that information be? I want to know what you know.”

  I don’t want to tell him I’m increasingly aware I’ve been played somehow. I am not some trusted confidant for the Governor; I’m a tool. For a confident twenty-something with the ego I have, it’s not an easy self-admission to make.

  “Fair enough,” he spins the steering wheel to the left. “Well, we know he’s into energy. He’s always worked hand in hand with fuel exploration companies and end-user energy providers. Kind of a collusion to keep everybody happy.”

  “How’s that?”

  “He invested heavily in exploitive energy. His companies backed mountaintop removal coal projects in Appalachia, and tar sands exploration in South Texas and in Western Canada, both really nasty ways to get energy out of the earth. Environmentalists hated him. They protested him and his shell companies. He made a lot of money.”

  “And?”

  “And he suddenly pulls out of everything. Almost overnight he gets out of the earth-raping business and becomes eco-friendly.”

  “Why?” I knew he’d switched sides, so to speak, but never heard a rational reason why.

  “The conventional wisdom is that he set his sights on public office. Since the days of ‘Drill Baby Drill’ ended with the 2010 BP Macondo spill in the Gulf, Buell knew he needed to be a kinder, gentler energy magnate.”

  “What’s the unconventional wisdom?” I sniffle again. My throat is starting to feel scratchy. Damn smoke.

  “He figured out he could get richer by conserving energy as opposed to harvesting it.” “What do you mean?” We’re driving next to a light rail train and heading north toward the edge of downtown. I duck as the train moves alongside us. Townsend probably notices my nervousness but doesn’t comment.

  “I’ve been working on stories about Buell for a long time now,” he continues. “About two years ago he moved the vast majority of his holdings into a small Texas company called Nanergetix,” Townsend slows the SUV and parallel parks in front of a large white building, a restaurant called Spaghetti Warehouse. “Nanergetix is heavily involved in vanguard, energy-related nanotechnology. Some people think they’ve discovered an additive that triples the efficiency of fossil fuels. I’ve been working on this stuff for months, but I can’t get any of it nailed down.”

  “If that were true then it would piss off the oil companies and make the price of gasoline, oil, natural gas, and coal drop like a rock, right?”

  “Exactly.” Townsend puts the SUV in park and pulls the keys from the ignition. “And it would make Buell very, very wealthy.”

  “He’s already rich.”

  “You shouldn’t be that naïve, Jackson.” He looks at me as though I am an idiot. “People like Buell can’t ever have enough money. They can’t ever have enough power.”

  “I still don’t get what that has to do with me or Ripley or Ripley’s son.” I unbuckle my seatbelt and turn in my seat to face the suddenly condescending reporter. He must be a liberal. Most reporters are and don’t even know they’re liberals. They think of themselves as open-minded and fair.

  “Well, I am not sure there is a connec—” he stops mid-sentence. His eyes widen and he smiles broadly. His teeth are perfectly straight and too white for a smoker. He’s liberal, condescending and vain. Perfect for television news. Just when I think it was a bad idea to connect with George Townsend, he changes my mind.

  “I get it,” he says. “Nanotechnology.”

  I don’t get it. “Nanotechnology?”

  “Ripley’s son works at Rice University in the nano lab…the lab where they conduct more nanotechnology research than anywhere else in the world.”

  ***

  The restaurant is empty except for Townsend and me. We’re sitting at a small corner table with two glasses of water and a basket of bread between us. I have my back to the wall so I can see everybody who comes and goes.

  “We’re going to Rice to talk to Ripley’s son?” I ask. My hands are clasped in front of me on the table. I’m leaning on my elbows.

  Townsend takes a piece of bread from the basket and stuffs half of it into his mouth. T.V. people eat too fast. It comes from downing lunch in a live truck between interviews or at a desk between phone calls.

  “Yes,” he says, “as soon as you tell me why you think you’re caught up in the middle of whatever this is.” He chased the mouthful of bread with a swig of water.

  “Okay,” I relent. It’s time for me to share what I think I know. “It’s because of the iPods.”

  Townsend, his mouth full of another wad of bread, looks puzzled. Of course he is. I’m burying the lead.

  “Over the past six months, I’ve traveled the world delivering iPods.” I take a sip of water, slip a cube of ice between my teeth, and chew as I continue to tell him about what I’ve done on behalf of the Governor. I can feel my hand trembling almost imperceptibly when I put the glass back on the table. Townsend doesn’t see it.

  “What was on the iPods?’ He’s entranced, as though I’m telling him the plot of some fictional political thriller.

  “I don’t know,” I lie. Sort of. Despite what I’ve been telling myself, I do have a hint what was on those iPods...

  ***

  My trip to Anchorage was the last one on the Governor’s agenda. Like the other trips, it was short. When I landed at the Ted Stevens International Airport, I caught a cab to Elderberry Park. It was short ride along the shore of Cook Inlet. In the distance I could see Mt. McKinley and Mt. Foraker. It was beautiful. The sky was crayon blue and cloudless.

  “That’s it,” the cabbie said as he pulled over on M Street in front of a brown and yellow wooden house in the center of the park. “That’s the Anderson house.”

  I thanked him, gave him the fare, and got out of the cab. I stood on the sidewalk with my bags for a moment to stretch my right knee and to look at the Oscar Anderson House, a historic landmark built by one of the city’s first settlers. The exterior of the house was yellow on its main floor. It was painted brown on both the top floor and on the exterior of the basement that extends above ground. There was a tall evergreen nestled against the left side of the house and an American flag
flying on the right. I walked slowly up the cobblestone ramp to the small brown front door, a bag slung over each shoulder.

  My instructions were to take the guided tour of the home. At some point during the 45-minute history lesson, my contact would find me.

  I was standing on a large rug, admiring the red brick fireplace, when “Mary Brown” approached me and asked me what music I had downloaded on my iPod. Apparently, that was the cryptic, cloak and dagger clue to who she was and what she wanted.

  “A little bit of everything,” I answered. She nodded toward the front door and led me out of the house.

  Once I clumsily slugged my bags down the hall and through the narrow front door, I saw her standing at the end of the cobblestone ramp. She was in a button down chambray shirt with dark denim jeans and a heavy brown blazer. She had her jeans tucked into knee high brown suede boots. Her blonde hair was cut short like the 1970s ice skater, Dorothy Hamill. She was attractive if a little harsh. Her features were angular, her nose long and thin.

  “Let’s take a walk in the park,” she suggested and continued to walk ahead of me. I shifted the bags on my shoulders. She turned around and saw me struggling but didn’t seem to care. She walked past a swing set and stepped on a hike/bike path that ran along the water.

  After a couple of minutes on the path, she came to a small garden dotted with boulders. Brown stopped at one of them and sat, placing her palms flat on the rock and inching herself up onto it. She crossed her boots and folded her arms, waiting for me to catch up. I could imagine myself running along the path, getting in a couple of miles along the coast. What a view.

  I finally caught up to her and lay down my bags on the ground next to the rock.

  “This is called Hannah Cove Garden,” she said. “It’s a memorial to children who died young.” She looked out onto the water and toward the Alaska Mountain range in the distance.