Free Fire - C. J. Box [124]
“But,” Joe said, “four innocent people . . .”
“No one is innocent,” McCann said definitively.
Joe just stared at him, hatred building.
“Joe . . .” Nate cautioned.
Joe took a breath. “What happened next?” he asked McCann.
“Barron recruited Chuck Ward from your governor’s office so Ward would be available to head off any action that might stop EnerDyne at the state level. And he got Langston to buy in, knowing Langston was a few years from retirement and wanted a huge payoff.”
“Those bastards,” Joe said.
McCann shrugged. “It’s amazingly easy to buy public officials.Everybody knows that. Barron was a master of it, and quite a salesman.”
Joe was disgusted. The governor’s chief of staff and the chief ranger for the park had exchanged their positions of trust for big personal payoffs. Worse, they’d gone off the deep end to protect their interest, including the ambush of Judy Demming, the likely murder of Cutler, and targeting Joe and his family. As much as he despised McCann, Langston and Ward were as bad or worse.
The snow was building up on the road and Joe had to slow down. At least four inches had fallen and stuck. Park policy was not to plow the roads in winter, but to let the snow build up untilonly snowmobiles and snow coaches could use them. That meant if he got stuck, it could be days before someone found them. And, based on what they were learning, there were no guarantees that whoever found them would be friendly.
“Okay, so EnerDyne wants to harvest the microbes,” Joe said. “That I understand. But how did it happen that you turn into Rambo?”
For the first time, McCann smiled. Joe could see him in the mirror, and he thought McCann looked smug.
“That came about by happenstance. One of my clients is an elk poacher. He kills the elk, cuts off their antlers, and sells them to Asian firms who grind them up and sell it as an aphrodisiac.”
“I hate poachers,” Joe said, “nearly as much as bureaucrats who go bad.”
“I’m a lawyer, I don’t make moral judgments.”
“Which is why you’re an asshole,” Nate growled.
“Anyway,” McCann said, gaining in arrogance as he went on, Joe thought, “his hunting ground is near Bechler ranger station,technically in Idaho. He was contacted by the Idaho Fish and Game, who told him they were watching him. He came in to see me to find out whether Idaho could arrest him or not, since he was doing his poaching on federal park land. So as I researchedhis question, I found the loophole. I couldn’t believe it when I found it. I told Barron about it and said I’d take care of his Hoening problem if he’d make me financially secure for the rest of my life. You see, I’d learned about the annual reunions of the Gopher State Five from Hoening himself. I knew where they’d be, and when they’d be there.”
“You sound proud of yourself,” Joe said.
McCann shrugged. “Why shouldn’t I be? I committed the perfect crime.”
“So why didn’t you just leave with the money after you killed Hoening and the others?” Joe asked. “Why stay around to be caught?”
“First, I’m not caught,” McCann said. “Second, Barron renegedon me. It turned out he’d filed false financials with the SEC, and all that public money he promised was tied up in regulations.He simply didn’t have the cash. He lied to me.”
“Imagine that,” Joe said.
“Worse than that,” McCann said, “they panicked. They really are amateurs. Instead of concentrating on ways to get me the money, they screwed everything up by lying and delaying further. I knew they had decided to get rid of me somehow, so I stayed ahead of them and got myself put in their own jail where I’d be high profile and safe. Meanwhile, they tried to eliminate all of the witnesses, or anyone who might potentially be a witness. I want no part of them anymore, or EnerDyne. I just want my money.”
“But they want you,” Joe said, “so you won’t talk and implicatethem.”
“Yes.”
“Why did you kill that woman and the ex-sheriff?”
“They knew too much. If someone got to them, they might have exposed me.”
Joe said, “So you lured them into Idaho to kill