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“Maybe.” Stryker shrugged. “But I got a funny feeling about this, Vern.”
“Okay, let’s take a look, but there’s too many trees right here to get a good view across there. We’ll scope it out, and you know that whatever it is, we’ll take care of it.”
“I know they’re a whole mountain away,” Stryker told him, “but I’ve just got an itchy feeling about them. I mean, in the five years we’ve been making our headquarters here, there’s been nobody over there ever.”
“We haven’t had more than a couple of stragglers over here on our mountain,” Vern reminded him. “You know, sightseeing along the highway for the peak.”
“Yeah,” Stryker snorted, “and we took care of that.”
“We did, but if we do that too often, we’ll call down attention we don’t want. Okay, if we can see the people over there with high-powered binocs, they can see us. Maybe they’d get curious or nosy. Or maybe they just decided to scope out the area to see what it looks like.”
“Fuck.” Stryker spat the word.
“Double that. And they can certainly check out the whole range here if trail riding is part of their activities. I think I spotted some four wheelers and motorcycles over there, but I didn’t want to stare too long. But that kind of shit can take them anywhere,” Stryker argued. “Who knows where they could decide to go joyriding. They could hit the whole mountain range, if that’s part of their agenda. Jesus, Vern. We don’t even know who the fuck they are. We need to find out who this Patterson guy is. And if he’s any kind of danger to us.”
“Let’s not panic.” Vern sighed. He sure didn’t want to have to eliminate a whole bunch of middle class strangers. That could be a problem, but problems were his specialty.
“We need to take a better look first,” Stryker insisted. “You’ve got better eyes for stuff like this than I do. We can’t afford any loose strings with what we’ve got going on. It’s too big. The biggest thing we’ve done yet. Right?”
Vern looked around at the rest of the men who were waiting for his reaction. This—these people—could be nothing, but with so much at stake, they could not afford to take a chance.
“Okay. Let’s do it, then. We obviously can’t drive over there and pretend we’re tourists checking things out. If we give them a look at us, we’ll be in their crosshairs the whole time they are here. And I can’t take a whole crowd with me to check them out.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“Stryker, you come with me. Let’s drive to the top of this peak, just the two of us. I think we can see more from higher up. The rest of you take a break for a few.” Vern dug keys out of his jeans pocket and flipped a set to Stryker. “The bikes are gassed up. They’ll be less obvious than a pickup and, when we get to the top, we can hide behind trees and boulders. Let’s get up to the top here. The sooner we take a look, the sooner we can figure it out.”
But he had a feeling it wasn’t going to be quite that simple.
Fuck.
They pulled two of the motorcycles out of the cave, cranked the engines, and took off up toward the top of the peak. Vern thought he actually could relax with the sun on his face and the breeze cooling him if he wasn’t off to check out something that could fuck up their plans.
The road curved twice, and each time he got a glimpse of activity on the peak off to their right. Stryker wasn’t kidding. There were a lot of damn people over there. When they finally reached the top, they pulled over to the shoulder and stopped their bikes. Vern lifted the binocs that were hanging around his neck and looked across to the mountain on his right.
Holy shit!
Like most of the other mountains in the range, it had flat places that had been worked over by the rangers to create places for picnics and casual events. He estimated there were about thirty people in the group, most of them male, but there were a few women. A tent, open on the sides, had been set up, and there were picnic tables scattered around where people were eating. There were various pieces of apparatus arranged around the area, and, from what he could see, they reminded him of some of the training activities they’d done in the Army.
What the hell was this? Who were these people? And who were those very few women who were included? What was so special about them?
Vern got an itchy feeling on his spine, the kind that signaled trouble could be waiting. Well, they couldn’t delay moving the stuff out of the cave. The event where they’d make their biggest statement yet was only a few days away. But they could stagger their exits and alternate which way they left the cave. It would be a fucking pain in the ass, but he could manage it.
But first he had to figure out a way to get information on the people occupying the mountain next to him. Who they were. What they were doing. And how long they would be there.
And, most of all, if they were there to scope out the Loyalists. He couldn’t imagine how that was possible. For five years, they’d been very careful not to give away their location to anyone. But he’d been around long enough to know anything at all was possible. So, figuring out a way to get the information he needed was a top priority.
He was not going to be stopped from the biggest event of his life.
