Mind's Eye - Part 12
As she neared Prime Hook, just ten minutes outside Georgetown, Parker dialed Sydney's phone. He picked up on the first ring.
"Sydney," he said.
Her foot pressed harder on the accelerator as she maneuvered around light evening traffic on the highway. "Sydney, have Broots send a sweeper team to Prime Hook. I'm betting the world's guardian angel is on a camping trip there."
"Parker, where are you?"
"Just outside the park. I'm going in to find him."
There was an awkward pause. "Don't you think you should wait for the sweeper team? They can be there in less than an hour."
"There's no time," she argued. "I'm not going to sit by and watch Stoltz ruin three years of fun if Jarod's where I think he is. If all goes well, I'll have three heads on one platter when this is all done, including Raines."
She snapped shut the phone and drove even faster toward Prime Hook and was soon on the main road in to the park. It switchbacked like a snake until it emptied into a large parking lot designated for hikers and day visitors. It was there that she encountered a checkpoint. A park ranger approached her car, his flashlight shining at her face.
"Evening, ma'am," he said. "How are you tonight?"
Parker could not discern his features for the beam of the flashlight in her eyes. This guy was wasting her time, and the aggravation it caused made her face feel hot. "Swell," she said shortly.
"You have business here in the park tonight?"
Of course he was going to make this difficult, she grumbled inwardly. She would lie, lie, lie until she got to where she needed. If lying did not work, she felt inclined to shoot her way in to the park office. "My boss wants to have an office camping trip. I'm here to book some sites."
It was quite possibly the lamest explanation she had ever concocted, but the quality matched the effectiveness of the checkpoint. A few seconds of silence hung in the air as he considered her reason. Then he let her pass, sending her on her way with country bumpkin good evening pleasantries.
She suppressed the urge to floor the car down the road. Parker followed the signs to the park office, which was nearly a mile inside the gates. It was lit up and in business when she parked near the door. Her heels clacked on the asphalt pavement as she approached. Inside, she could see an older woman at the main desk, presumably the secretary or dispatcher. She looked up when Parker entered.
The woman's demeanor was suspicious. "May I help you?"
Parker strode to the desk. "I'm looking for Neil Case. It's very important I talk with him."
"And you are?"
"Parker. I have information concerning Peter Stoltz. I need to speak with him right now."
At the mention of Stoltz, the woman became alert. Mildred, if the nameplate on the edge of her desk was correct, straightened. "What kind of information?"
"I'm afraid I'll need to speak to Mr. Case about that."
"Captain Case," Mildred said, emphasizing the rank, "is not here at the moment. He's on patrol. Perhaps I can take your name and number and have him call you when he gets in?"
Parker's impatience reached its threshold. "Look, lady, I don't have time to play games. Send out bloodhounds if you have to, I don't care. Just find him."
Mildred was about to protest when the dispatch radio made a scratching sound, distracting both women. "Mildred, this is Roy. You there?" said the voice over the speaker.
She picked up the mic to answer. "I'm here, Roy. What can I do for you?"
"Mildred, I need some backup at site eighty-eight on the double. Bunch of college kids are fighting. Can you send a couple of units over here to give me a hand?"
She seemed to hedge at the request. "Is it really that bad, Roy? We're shorthanded tonight. I'm not sure we can spare anyone."
Shouts of anger could be heard in the background. "Yeah, it's bad. I need at least two units. These kids are pretty tanked. You better put another pot of coffee on."
"Stand by, Roy," she said. After hitting a switch on the radio, she made a call to the other units. "Units four and five, do you copy?" When they acknowledged, she said, "Roy needs you two out at eighty-eight to settle down a fight. Are you available?"
Both units were and reported back that they would respond to the call. She looked at Parker for some sort of sympathy. "Oh, I don't like having to do that. Everyone has a patrol tonight. Captain Case will probably have a word to say about it."
"Well, why don't you find out if he does? It's very important I speak with him."
The woman sighed deeply. With unabated reluctance, she tried to raise Case on the radio. Static was the only result. Mildred tried again to no avail. "Oh, dear," she said. Her alarm was clear.
Parker could not blame her. It was an eerie occurrence that there would be no response when Stoltz was probably already in the area. "Try again," she said with insistence.
Mildred complied, but there was still no response. She called to the other patrol units to see if any could check in on Case. Three, four and five were engaged in breaking up the heated brawl. Six was preparing to respond to the fight at the request of the other units.
Parker mulled options in her mind. One popped to the fore of the list, and it seemed good. It would take advantage of the situation, getting her what she wanted most.
"Mildred," Parker said, checking the nameplate once more to make sure she had it right, "why don't you tell me where Captain Case is, and I'll go check on him for you."
Mildred had a curiously amused look on her face. She inventoried Parker's attire. "I'm not sure it's wise to send you where he is. We've had a lot of rain here in the last few weeks. You don't look like the kind of lady who takes kindly to mud, if you know what I mean."
Of course Case would be in some sort of mud pit. No matter, she was always prepared for the unexpected. "I have a change of clothes in the car. If you'll just show me how to get to him, I'll go there and make sure he's all right."
Mildred pondered the offer. Parker could almost see the scales inside the woman's brain dangling side to side with indecision. Finally, she gave in to the suggestion. "You can change in the store room. I'll get you a map of his patrol route."
She felt a surge of relief. If Mildred had put up a fight, it would have sat like a rotting carcass on Parker's conscience to use force to find Case. "I'll be right back," she said.
She turned on her heels and headed out to the parking lot and to her car trunk. Inside was a duffel bag that contained a pair of black fatigues, boots, a long sleeved shirt and an equipment vest with multiple pockets for multiple items of war. She had never been a Girl Scout, indeed never had the opportunity for a normal childhood outside the control of the Centre; but she did believe in being prepared for the uncommon situation. The duffel had sat in her trunk, unused, since the day she had assembled it. The sweeper teams had always shown up in time to do their job. One day, she knew, it would come in handy. Tonight was the night.
She grabbed the bag and headed back into the station, going to the back storage room at Mildred's urging. Quickly, Parker changed, folding her business clothing and placing it in the bag. When she went to put the blazer in the bag, the small picture frame Sister Mary had given her slipped out of the pocket and skidded across the floor. She picked it up carefully, afraid she had damaged the photograph inside it. To her relief, her mother's face was still there, still safe and sound under the tiny glass plate.
Her mother's eyes peered back at her with spiritual encouragement. Parker swore she could hear her mother's voice telling her this was the right thing to do. Both mother and daughter had promised a priest and a nun that they would protect helpless children against the monsters lurking within the Centre. Sister Mary's words rang out in her head like a bell.
"She was willing to die for them; but what about you, Miss Parker? What are you willing to risk to protect them?"
Once again, Parker's fingers touched her mother's image in a loving caress that was the result of nearly a lifetime of heartache. Her eyes closed as she yearned for her mother's intercession.
"Help me, mama," she whispered.
That brief moment of prayer was all Parker would allow. Her eyes opened, and she cleared her head and focused on the task ahead of her. She slipped the frame into the lower pocket of the vest and zipped it closed. She transferred her holster and gun to the belt of the fatigues and made sure the rig was out of sight when she pulled the vest down over it. There was no doubt in her mind that Mildred would go off the deep end if she saw that Parker was armed.
When she exited the storeroom, Mildred was waiting by the desk with map in hand. She clutched the folded paper in her hands with nervous fingers that belied her worry for Neil Case. Once again, she took in Parker's attire. This time, the reaction was one of surprise. Parker had gone from VIP to commando in three minutes flat.
All Parker wanted at that point was to get on the road again to find Case. "Is that the map, Mildred?"
Mildred realized she was crumpling the page and tried to smooth the folds. "Yes, this is it," she said, handing it to Parker. "Captain Case and Ranger Greer are patrolling the south hills of the park on Burke's Trail. I outlined the trail for you."
Well, there was a new name – one that Parker's senses zeroed in on instantly. Rhetorical though she knew it was, she had to ask. "Ranger Greer? Who's that?" she asked with feigned innocence.
Mildred smiled, and a flush crept into her cheeks. "Oh, he's a very handsome young man that just transferred into Hook."
Bingo, Parker cheered mentally. "Let me guess – tall, dark, obnoxiously nice?"
"Well, I wouldn't call his kindness obnoxious. Jarod's anything but that," Mildred protested.
"Jarod? His first name is Jarod?" Parker's heart skipped a pace at the confirmation. Her instincts had been right. If there was one thing she loved, it was being right. She could not contain a quiet chuckle of giddiness over the irony of the situation. Jarod had been just twenty minutes away from her twice that day and only forty from the Centre.
Mildred nodded. Her cheeks flushed to an even darker tone.
Parker spotted a portable radio set into a charger on the wall. She took it out of the pack and hooked it to her belt. "I'll call you when I find them."
"I'll try to have those other boys get up there to make sure everything's all right once they clear up the fight."
Parker gave an impatient flip of her head in acknowledgement and headed out the door to her car. She sat with the door open so she could read the map by the dome light. As promised, Mildred had highlighted Burke's Trail in pink highlighter. The trail followed the southern horseshoe rim of Prime Hook. It would be easy to follow once she got on to the trail.
With all the other rangers responding to the fight call, Parker took the liberty of racing the roads to get to the southern part of the reserve. In less than five minutes, she saw the sign for the turn off into a parking lot that began Burke's Trail. She pulled in quickly and parked the car once more. There was a Mag light under the seat, which she retrieved. After taking one more look at the map, Parker stepped out of the car and into the cold night air.
She set out on the trail without need of the Mag. The moon was high and bright in the night sky. A brief glance at it caused a flash of memory to spark in her mind of Thomas, a camp fire, the telescope, the first time she had allowed herself to be vulnerable to someone, the first time she had trusted. Parker allowed it only a moment's consideration before she pushed it away, back to the quiet room in her mind reserved for such memories. Thomas lived in there, along with her mother and the fancy that Parker's father truly loved her without ulterior motives.
The trail began to rise up with the land. Fine gravel scraped under the soles of her boots as she walked at a quick pace. Then the gravel was gone. A worn path through the forest was the way Burke's Trail would run until the next parking lot.
She had no idea where Case or Jarod might be, but Mildred had said they would patrol the trail. There were no offshoots, no forks in the road that might allow them to go one way and she the other. It was a curving trail that followed the southern rim of Prime Hook. Eventually, she figured she would run into them sooner or later. If she missed them, the sweeper team could move in and do the job.
As she neared the top of the small hill, shots rang out in the distance. At least two were fired off, echoing through the crisp air with staccato beginnings that quickly decayed into silence. She broke off into a full sprint toward the sounds. No one was going to shoot the man she had been chasing for so long. He was her ticket to freedom, and damned be anyone who stood in the way of that.
Another shot rang out, and she knew she was closing in on the area. The source of the volley shifted to her left, somewhere off the trail. Parker stayed to the trail, determining it was the fastest route to the location. She would cut through the woods laterally once she got near enough to zone in on the battle. Her gun was drawn when another round cut through the night. She was close, running at a full clip. If Jarod was there, she had no intention of missing him.