The Bone Tree

As soon as we reach Broadway, everything changes. The wind is stronger here, racing up over the face of the bluff after its long journey across Texas and Louisiana. As we turn the corner in front of Edelweiss, I look back and see John Kaiser following at a discreet distance. He means to make sure we’re safe, even if he has to provide the protection himself.

A

“Is Papa going to be all right?” A

“I know. I’m not sure yet what’s going to happen with Papa. We’re just going to have to do all we can to make sure Gram gets along as best she can.”

After some thought, A

She waits until the barges vanish around the bend. Then, very softly, she says, “Somebody at the jail said you killed the man who killed Caitlin. He whispered it, but I heard him anyway. Did you really do that, Daddy?”

I consider lying, but what would that achieve? One day she’s bound to learn the truth. I suppose today is as good a day as any.

“Yes, Boo,” I tell her, squeezing her shoulder. “It’s a secret. We can’t tell anyone else. But I did.”

A

This hurts me more than anything I’ve heard in the past week. “You don’t have to be scared anymore, Boo.”

A mile downriver, another long string of barges appears, pushing slowly upstream. We watch it labor through the current for a while, then A

“They made it,” she says with relief.

“They did,” I agree. This far, anyway.

CHAPTER 94

FIFTY MILES SOUTH of Natchez, Snake Knox piloted a Cessna 182 along the floor of the cloud ceiling above Zachary, Louisiana. His son Billy sat beside him, trying to hide his fear. This was a dangerous area to depart from regulation procedures. Baton Rouge’s main airport lay only ten miles to the south, and even though Snake had filed no flight plan, commercial airliners might pick him up with their anti-collision radars, not to mention the possibility of an actual collision. Snake had already been challenged once by an air-traffic controller from the airport, but he’d ignored the call. If he hung around much longer, he might find an F-16 on his wingtip.

“Keep your eyes peeled to the northeast,” he said. “There’s a little town over that way. Ethel, it’s called. I’m thinking that’s where it went down.”

“How do you know it went down at all?” Billy asked, shielding his eyes from the sun glaring through the scratched Plexiglas.

“Because I knocked it down.”

Billy blew out a rush of air and lowered his face into his hands. “I haven’t heard anything on the radio about it.”

“You will, any second.”

“Wait,” Billy said, the moment he looked up. “I see something! Can you drop a little lower out of these clouds?”

“Sure, if you want to go to prison for the rest of your life. What do you see?”

“Fire. Fire in the trees.”

Excitement ran through his son’s voice like an electric current. Snake banked so that he could make a pass with the fire on his side of the plane. Just as he was coming into position, the Baton Rouge air-traffic controller said, “This is Metro Center. All aircraft, be advised, we have reports of a downed aircraft in the vicinity of Ethel, Louisiana. Aircraft is U.S. government Cessna Citation. Please report any visual evidence of debris in the vicinity of Metropolitan Airport.”

Snake felt the primal pleasure he’d always experienced after making a kill shot as a sniper, or even hunting game—only magnified by a thousand.

“How can you be sure all the FBI’s evidence will be destroyed?” Billy asked.

“I couldn’t be, if all I did was bring the plane down. That’s why I used two devices.”

“Two bombs?”

“Bingo. The first one brings down the plane, the second sets the fuel on fire. If I’d blown the thing to pieces in the air, the fuel would have been wasted, and most of the evidence would eventually be recovered. But by bringing down the plane relatively intact and then setting the fuel on fire, abracadabra—nothing left. No bones, no guns, no nothing.”

“Are you sure, Pop?”

“You’re damned right I’m sure,” Snake said irritably. “Jet fuel’s what melted the steel in the Twin Towers.”

Snake could see the crash site now, thirty feet of white-hot flames climbing out of a charred section of scrub pine. At least two vehicles were moving on the ground nearby. Time to bug out.

He climbed fifty feet higher into the clouds and started his last turn.

“Where are we going now?” Billy asked. “I feel like we ought to head for fucking Mexico.”

Snake laughed. “To hell with that. We’re going back to your place on Toledo Bend, just like I told you. We’re go

Billy’s eyes filled with disbelief. “Is that even possible now?”

“Sure it is. The Bureau will hang everything that’s happened around Forrest’s neck, just the way he was go

Billy rubbed his head with his hands as though trying to hold himself together. “I still can’t believe Forrest is dead.”

Snake shrugged. “He pushed somebody too hard, just like I told you he would someday. And he paid the price.”

Snake checked the GPS and smiled with satisfaction. There was nothing like flying VFR on a pretty day in the good old USA.

“So what about Pe

Snake could hardly believe it, but his son sounded almost hopeful.

“Christ,” he muttered. “You gotta know me better than that, boy.”

Snake craned his neck around and took one last look at the burning wreckage on the ground. Then he opened the throttle to maximum and headed for Texas.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

First and foremost to Stanley Nelson, the heroic reporter who cracked the Silver Dollar Group cases. Watch for his upcoming nonfiction book on those cases, Devil’s a-Walkin’.

To David Highfill, Liate Stehlik, Tavia Kowalchuk, Danielle Bartlett, and Eric Svenson (and all the reps who worked so hard), my heartfelt thanks. And to Laura Cherkas, a special thank-you.

To Charlie Redmayne, Julia Wisdom, Louise Swa