Peak Oil (9 page)

Alexa shrugged and went back to her chair. “The Legion.” She closed her eyes for a couple of seconds and then opened them again. “He wasn’t trying to kill us.”

Neil frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Check the bullet holes.”
 

Neil examined the holes on the bed and then traded a knowing look with Alexa. The bullets would have missed them: both shots had been aimed at the bottom, to the side of the bed.
 

Definitely not kill shots.
 

Alexa and Neil left Voelkner behind to clean up the mess. They had decided to take a drive to the police station to report the attack. Missy would probably need a case number to file for an insurance claim. They reasoned that they might be able to extract some more information from Harvey at the same time.
 

The roads were busy. People were hanging banners between lamp posts and banging signs into the grass next to the road: “Congratulations Andy Fitch —Texan Businessman of the Year” and “Tiger Fitch, Welcome Back.”
 

Alexa pulled into a parking lot in front of the police station and killed the engine. They entered the building, and it seemed even colder than yesterday, the temperature having been adjusted to the blast chill levels.
 

Tony looked up from his desk and immediately picked up the phone, as Neil guessed he was instructed to do whenever he saw the pair of Interpol agents. The man placed the phone back on the cradle and smiled at them. He wore a yellow Hawaiian floral shirt and a woolen scarf and seemed to be in a good mood. “Please take a seat. The deputy will be over in a minute,” he said, nodding toward the chairs in the waiting area.

They needn’t have bothered. Deputy Dwight Harvey appeared from behind a divider at the back of the counter, and he waved them to his office. Harvey motioned to the chairs. “Please, sit.”

“We had quite an evening,” Alexa said, sliding into the chair as she watched for any reaction.

The deputy raised an eyebrow but kept quiet, waiting for her to continue. He blinked a couple of times and twitched nervously.

Alexa pursed her lips. “Someone broke into our room at the Ocelot Inn and tried to shoot us.”

He looked at them both. “He missed, I guess,” he said with a chuckle; then he cleared his throat and frowned, serious again.
 

Alexa folded her arms and sat back. “Obviously.” She cast a sidelong glance at Neil, who snorted.

Harvey picked up his phone and started punching in a number. “I’ll send a trooper around, see if he can find any clues.”
 

Neil leaned forward and rapped the table with his knuckles. “Don’t bother. We already checked.”

Alexa imagined Neil rapping Harvey’s head and smiled.

Harvey held up the phone in front of him and then shrugged. “Okay, you guys are the professionals.” He cradled the phone on the receiver and leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over his gut. “So what can I do you for?”

Alexa nodded her chin toward the window. “What are all the banners for?”

Harvey smiled and sat up straight. “Haven’t you heard? Mr. Fitch is paying us a visit.” Harvey made a sweeping motion with his arm. “He employs the entire town. He’s kind of become the unofficial custodian of Dabbort Creek.”

Alexa raised her eyebrows. “He employs the entire town?”

Harvey gave a couple of jowl-bouncing nods. “Yep, at the Refatex refinery, thirty miles out of town. If he pulled out, this town would die. He's sort of our guardian.”

Neil studied the man’s face with a calculated look. “Does he employ you as well?”

The deputy shook his head and gave a throaty laugh. “Nope, that would be impartial, wouldn’t it?” He leaned back and steepled his fingers on his stomach. “The state of Texas does.” He winked. “But we do get some generous benefits.” His chair protested as he rocked back and forth. “Mr. Fitch looks after his own.”
 

Alexa looked amused. “How?” she asked, brushing her long bangs behind an ear.

Harvey stood up and sauntered to the window, staring outside. “He subsidizes our gas bill. We only pay twenty percent of the standard rate,” he said with his back to them. He turned around to face them, his thumbs hooked into his belt. “Plus he funds Saint Josephine’s, the best damn hospital in a hundred mile radius.”

Alexa folded her arms and tapped her lips with a forefinger. “Does he fund the academy as well?”

“Yep, he built it. It has a fantastic library and a history of oil museum. You should visit it sometime.” Harvey unhooked his thumbs from his belt and marched over to his table and then flopped into his chair. He pulled a notepad toward him, picked up a ballpoint pen, and then cleared his throat. “In fact, he subsidizes the majority of the businesses in the entire town.”

Alexa smiled at his nonverbal “would-that-be-all?” cue. “When is he expected to be here?”

“Day after tomorrow, at noon. He’ll visit the refinery and then stay over at his ranch for a couple of days. Then back to HQ in Houston, I guess. Same old.”

Neil cast a quick glance at Alexa, and she nodded. It felt like they had overstayed their welcome. They both stood up.

“Thank You, Deputy.” They shook hands and said their good-byes.

Tony gave them a friendly wave on their way out, and Alexa almost felt relief as the warm blast of Texas air heated her skin. They climbed into the rental and sat in silence for a moment.

“It seems as if Fitch is doing a lot for the place,” Neil said.

Alexa nodded thoughtfully. “Well, his refinery payrolls the entire town. I guess happy residents make for happy staff.”

Neil cranked the ignition. “Should we pay the refinery a visit?”
 

Alexa leaned back and placed an arm over her forehead. “Can’t do any harm. I’m straight out of ideas on how to proceed. We need more intel.”

They drove past the shop fronts and the bus depot. A mile down the main strip, the concrete sidewalks gave way to green lawns as they entered suburbia. The houses were luxurious and well-maintained, built on large sprawling plots of land.
 

Neil glanced at Alexa, a naughty grin on his face. “Do you know what Mary-Lou asked me this morning?”
 

She cocked her head, interested.

“She wanted to know if you would be her mommy.” He smiled. “Apparently you remind her a lot of her mother.”

Alexa frowned, momentarily taken aback, and then smiled slowly. “What did you say?”

He looked at her then back at the road and shrugged.

She punched his shoulder. “What?”

“I said that you hated kids.” He flinched as she punched him again, harder this time.
 

“You did not.”

Neil chuckled. “No, I asked her where her real mommy was, but she shut up like a clam.” His lips pressed together and he cast her a conflicted glance. “She just stared at me.”

Alexa looked straight ahead. She could see that his interaction with the kid had upset him somehow. She turned in her seat as she noticed a patrol car with flashing lights in front of one of the houses. “Slow down.” She craned her neck. “What’s this all about?”
 

A yellow truck was parked on the lawn. The cargo bed contained a huge metal spool with a roll of thick black pipe. Alexa recognized the Becks, the couple they had met at the inn. They were involved in a heated exchange with an officer, pointing fingers and gesturing at their backyard. The officer was shaking his head.
 

They drove by unnoticed.

Neil picked up speed and gunned the Chevy out of town. They cruised past a man wearing blue overalls and an orange neon jacket. He was attaching a sign onto a pole next to the road. It said, “Welcome to Dabbort Creek, Population 687, Home of the Ocelot.”

“That was quick,” Alexa said. “Two new people and the sign has already been changed.”

Neil shrugged. “Like you said, happy staff, happy residents.”

Alexa jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “Well, those two didn’t look happy back there.”
 

He nodded slowly. “Yeah, I wonder what that was all about.”
 

She guessed he was still thinking of the conversation he had had with the little girl.

They drove for twenty-five miles and cruised past a road sign that announced, “Refatex Refinery, 5 Miles Ahead.” They made good time, and Neil turned into the gates to the refinery. They eased in next to a guardhouse with a boom gate. A security guard slid open the window and touched his hat.
 

“Good day. How may I assist you folks today?” he asked in a nasally tone. He looked like a retired boxer; he had a skew nose and cauliflower ears.

“We’re here to have a look around,” Neil said.

The guard pursed his lips and shook his head firmly. “No can do. You need to tell me who you’re here to visit or state the nature of your of business inside.”

Neil fumbled for his Interpol ID Badge and then handed it to the guard. “It’s official.”

The guard got on a phone and punched in a number. After a while, he put it down and turned back to Neil. “Sorry, no can do. Unless you have a search warrant or something, entry is denied.”

Neil frowned. “Why?”

The guard handed Neil a business card and his ID badge. “Because Mr. Bledisloe said so. He’s the Refatex lawyer.” The man slid into his chair. “Call him if you want,” he said before sliding the window closed.

Neil backed away from the boom and turned onto the shoulder of the highway. Alexa punched the number into her cell phone, and a female voice answered. “Mr. Bledisloe, please.” After a click, the phone rang.

“Yep,” someone replied.

“Mr. Bledisloe?” Alexa asked.

“Yep, that’s me.”
 

“Mr. Bledisloe. Captain Alexa Guerra, Interpol. I need to visit the facility at Refatex in Dabbort Creek, but I was refused entry. Could you tell me why?”

Bledisloe went silent for a moment. “Interpol, hey? What, do we have an international security situation on our hands?” He chuckled wheezily.

“As a matter of fact, we do.” Alexa closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “One of our field agents disappeared a couple of days ago.”

Bledisloe chuckled again. “Report it to missing persons then. That’s not an international security risk. What was he doing in Dabbort Creek in the first place?”

Alexa slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand. “That matter is sub judice. Are we going to gain willful entry or not?”

“Sub judice my ass,” Bledisloe rasped. “I would have known about it. You’re not getting in without a warrant.”
 

Alexa slammed the dashboard. She closed her eyes and counted to ten, slowly. She could hear the man’s labored breathing. “Very well then. Thank you for your time,” she said calmly.

“No problem,” Bledisloe said and hung up.

Alexa looked at Neil. “Someone doesn’t want us in there.”

Neil put the car in gear and gunned the gas. “I think we may have our first lead, Captain.”

Neil kept quiet on his way back to town. He had an uneasy itch in the back of his brain that he couldn’t shake: that the reason they were here was only the tip of a much larger iceberg.
 

Alexa stared out of the window, deep in thought. She wore a light, floral summer dress. She had kicked off her shoes and was sitting cross-legged, her dress pulled up high on her tanned legs. He wondered if she was thinking the same. He put his hand on her knee, and she threaded her fingers through his without looking up.

“Slow down,” Alexa said again as they neared the house where the police officer and the Becks had had their altercation less than an hour ago.

The patrol car was now gone. Neil recognized David Beck, the man they had met at the diner at the Ocelot Inn a couple of days ago. His dark hair was plastered to a sweaty brow. He was working a mechanical lever on the back of the truck, rolling up the thick rubber hose onto the large spool that stood on the loading bed of the truck.

Neil slowed down and pulled up on the grassy shoulder of the road in front of the house. He pushed a button, and the window slid down. “Oi,” he called to David, waving a hand.
 

David Beck looked up and wiped his brow with a muddy hand. He hitched his dirty jeans above his hips and wiped his hands on a soiled T-shirt. He smiled and waved when he recognized Neil and jumped off the truck.
 

“I noticed you had a visit from the local law enforcement,” Neil said as Beck approached.

Beck leaned forward, resting his hand on the roof. He shook his head. “Asshole.” He bent down and greeted Alexa. “Come in. I have some coffee on.”
 

They undid their seat belts and followed Beck into his home.
 

“Excuse the mess, we’re still getting settled in.” David Beck pointed around the foyer.
 

Cardboard boxes stood scattered, some empty and others halfway unpacked. The house had a modern, spacious interior with upscale finishes. The living room was tiled with white, polished marble, and the large, glass sliding door opened to a view over the valley and the forest below. A row of framed watercolor paintings were propped against a corner in the living room, but Neil didn’t recognize any of the artists.