Free Fire - C. J. Box [33]
While Joe talked on the mike, Bear was handcuffed to the bumper of his pickup, embarrassed and angry, scowling at him.
“You going to stick around?” Haley asked. “Grab a burger with me?”
“I’m here just long enough to give you the tape and turn him over,” Joe said. “I’ve got a meeting to get to in Yellowstone.”
“I heard you were back,” Haley said. “How’s it going, Joe?”
“Outstanding,” Joe said.
“We’re all trying to figure out what’s going on with you. Did Pope give you a district?”
“Nothing like that,” Joe said, not wanting to explain the situationfurther.
“What are you up to, then?”
Joe thought. “Special projects,” he said, not knowing what else to say. Special projects sounded vague yet semiofficial.
“Well, welcome back.”
“Thanks, Bill.”
“See you in a few.”
“GF-fifty-four out.”
“Fifty-four? They gave you fifty-four? For Christ sake.”
The speed limit through the Wapiti Valley en route to the East Entrance of Yellowstone dropped to forty-five miles per hour and Joe slowed down. He checked his wristwatch. If he kept to the limit and didn’t get slowed by bear jams or buffalo herds, he should be able to make it to the park headquarters at Mammoth Hot Springs by 3:30 P.M., enough time to locate Del Ashby and get the briefing.
As he drove on the nearly empty road, winding parallel to the North Fork of the Shoshone River, Joe thought again about the murders and how they’d taken place because the circumstancesof the crime bothered him. All those shots, multiple weapons. That’s what jumped out. Most people reading the reportswould come to the conclusion the park rangers apparently had, that the crime had been committed in anger, in passion. Joe wasn’t sure he agreed with that assessment, despite all the blasting.Just because Clay McCann fired a lot of shots didn’t mean he had gone mad. It might mean he wanted to make sure the victimswere dead. Most of the wounds Joe read about could have been fatal on their own, so they were well-placed. There was nothing in the reports to suggest McCann had shot at the victims as they stood in a group, or peppered the shore of the lake with lead. Just the opposite. Each shot, whether by shotgun or pistol, had been deliberate and at close range. Although there were no facts in the file to suggest McCann was anything other than what he was—an ethically challenged small-town lawyer—Joe couldn’t help thinking the murders had been committed by a professional, someone with knowledge of death and firearms. Since McCann’s biography didn’t include stints in any branch of the military and didn’t include information that he was a hunter, Joe wondered where the lawyer had received his training.
Joe had spent most of his life around hunters and big game. He knew there was a marked difference between the way Bear and his friends killed those elk and the way the men on the porch hunted. Bear and his friends were clumsy amateurs, firingindiscriminately at the herd and finding out later what fell. In contrast, the men on the porch were careful marksmen and ethical hunters.
Simply pointing a long rod of steel (a gun) and pulling the trigger (Bang!) didn’t instantly snuff the life out of the target. All the act did was hurl a tiny piece of lead through the air at great but instantly declining speed. The bit of lead, usually less than half an inch in diameter, had to hit something vital to do fatal damage: brain, heart, lungs. To be quick and sure, the bullethad to cause great internal damage immediately. Rarely was a single shot an instant kill. That only happened in the movies. In real life, there was a good chance a single jacketed bullet would simply pass through the body, leaving two bleeding holes and tissue damage, but not doing enough harm to kill unless the victim bled out or the wounds became infected. Pulling the triggerdidn’t kill. Placing