"40 minutes out. " He repeated. And something in his voice finally cracked entirely the last of his bravado draining away into something that looked for the first time all morning genuinely and completely afraid. "Give or take. " Duke said. "Plenty of time for you to think real hard about whether you want to keep playing this the hard way or whether you'd rather start talking about who exactly hired you to run interference on those transport routes. Because I promise you deputy the people who actually run this operation are not going to be nearly as gentle with you as we have been once they realize you let evidence walk right out of your hands and into a state investigator's file. " Margaret watched Pierce's shoulders sag.
Watch something break loose behind his eyes. Some final calculation of self-preservation finally overriding whatever loyalty or fear had kept him running his mouth for the last hour. "I want a deal. " Pierce said quietly. "Before anybody else gets here. I want it on record that I cooperated.
That's not up to me. " "I see. " Duke said. "That's between you and the actual law once the state it shows up. But I'll tell you this much for free Pierce. Every minute you keep standing there posturing instead of talking is a minute less goodwill you're going to have when they do. " It was West still seated on the step with his broken legs stretched awkwardly in front of him who spoke next his voice carrying an authority that seemed to surprise even him. "Tell them about Sheriff Callaway. " He said.
The yard went very still. Margaret felt something cold slide down her spine. "The sheriff. " She said slowly. "Our sheriff. The one who came to my kitchen and warned me about bikers passing through the county.
The same one who happened to warn you specifically 2 days before I ended up crashing on the exact stretch of road that runs past your property. West said, not looking away from Pierce. That's not a coincidence, Margaret. That's a man making sure the only witness on this ridge was already primed to be afraid of the person she was about to find dying in the snow. Isn't that right, Pierce?
Pierce said nothing, but his silence was its own confession, his eyes sliding away from all of them toward the ground. Callaway runs it. West continued, and now he was speaking as much to Margaret as to anyone else, laying out a truth he had clearly pieced together over months of terrified, careful investigation. Not alone, but down. There's a whole network above him.
We don't have every name yet. That's part of what's on the drive, but Callaway is the one who made sure local law enforcement stayed blind to what was moving through this county. He's the one who assigned Pierce to the transport routes. And when word came down that I was carrying evidence that could expose all of it, Callaway is the one who would have known exactly which roads to watch, exactly which houses were isolated enough that nobody would hear a struggle. Margaret's hand went instinctively toward her chest to the memory of Sheriff Callaway sitting in her kitchen with his hat in his hands warning her using the exact kind of practiced concern that made a lonely widow feel cared for and afraid in equal measure.
He sat in my kitchen, she said, her voice shaking now with something closer to fury than fear. He drank my coffee, and the whole time he knew. We don't know for certain yet, West said gently. But Margaret, I would bet everything I have left that the timing of his visit wasn't concern for your safety. It was reconnaissance.
Down by the tree line, the man in tactical gear, still restrained and now conscious, let out a low, bitter laugh that drew every eye in the yard. You people have no idea, he said, his voice thick with pain and something that sounded disturbingly like amusement. How far up this actually goes? Callaway's not even the ceiling. He's barely middle management.
"Shut your mouth. " Pierce snapped, but the tactical man only laughed harder, blood-flecked and reckless in the particular way of a man who has already decided he has nothing left to protect. "No, no. Let him hear it. " The man said, twisting to look at Margaret with an expression that made her skin crawl despite the restraints holding him down. "Sweetheart, you think dragging your little biker friend inside made you a hero? All you did was paint a target on your own porch.