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All was quiet, as it had been for the past half hour. As it should be, after the ground-up Ambien I’d slipped into his coffee while he’d been off in the woods, doing his business.
That had been the trickiest part of tonight’s operation. The one with the highest risk of detection.
Yet I’d pulled it off. He hadn’t spotted me.
I flexed my fingers inside my latex gloves and gave the dark, wooded area another scan.
Weird how anyone could find such solitude and isolation relaxing. And who could possibly enjoy the constant fight with mosquitoes, the primitive facilities, the hard dirt for a bed beneath a sleeping bag that provided minimal cushioning?
But his preference for dispersed camping in national forests provided a tailor-made location for my task, even if getting here had been a bear and would require me to forfeit a chunk of this night’s sleep.
Worth it, though, to ensure the last person on my original list got the justice he deserved.
Thank goodness he kept the same evening schedule on his camping trips as he did in the city. It would have been difficult to get here in time to doctor his coffee if he went to bed earlier than ten.
I opened the backpack at my feet and extracted the syringe of fentanyl. Not an over-the-top amount, but combined with the Ambien, it would suggest to whoever investigated this tragedy that drugs had played a role in the death.
Just as they’d played a role in the other deaths.
Leaving the backpack at the edge of the clearing, I crept toward the tiny one-person tent, the fabric too flimsy to offer protection from a storm or an animal ... or a sharp needle.
Since he always slept pushed up against the side, I circled around to the back, where the thin polyester outlined his body.
Exactly as expected.
I knew my targets well. And what I didn’t know, I researched.
Keeping watch for any nocturnal creatures that might be prowling about, I moved in close, positioned the syringe beside the appropriate bulge, and slid the needle in nice and smooth.
He didn’t stir.
Step number two finished.
The rest would be easy.
I crossed to his stash of dried, seasoned wood, gathered up several kindling-sized pieces, and placed them in his campfire, which had gone dark for the night. But the ash was warm, and it took mere seconds for my butane candle lighter to ignite the wood.
While the kindling burned, I moved the small pile of firewood next to the tent.
Of course, no one should stack logs close to a tent or go to bed until a fire was out for the night, but if you were druggedup, you could forget those rules. And in a breeze like the one blowing tonight, glowing embers were apt to drift.
Perhaps toward that stack of firewood.
I pulled the fine-nosed pliers from my pocket, knelt in front of the zipper on the tent, and worked a few teeth loose near the bottom, above the pull. To ensure the zipper would stick, in case he roused enough to try to escape.
Not much likelihood of that, but it was important to plan for all contingencies.
I stood, returned to my backpack, and pulled out the two fire-starter logs I’d cut in half. Back at the wood pile beside the tent, I tucked them in among the logs.
Done.
No need to collect a souvenir here. I already had one more significant than anything in this bare-bones campsite.
It was time to ignite the pyre.
After crossing to the edge of the clearing, I hefted my small backpack into position and settled it on my shoulders. The walk back to my car in this oppressive darkness held zero appeal, but I’d do it fast. And before anyone spotted the blaze at this off-the-beaten-path campsite, I’d be long gone. Heading home to try to catch a few hours of shut-eye.
Candle lighter in hand, I crossed back to the stack of logs beside the tent. Held the flame against all of the fire-starter sections. Backed away, into the shadows of the surrounding forest, waiting until the pile was ablaze.
