Sam could hear Fletcher scribbling notes.
“Mountain Blue and Gray. Got it. What else?”
Sam shifted the phone back toward her. “I started to go through her photographs, but there are thousands of them. It’s going to take some time to sort through them all. I was trying to focus on the events that she had public photos of, but there’s just too many. I’ll keep looking, but if you have help, that would be great.”
“Sure. I’ll get Inez on it. But what are we looking for?”
“I don’t know. Maybe nothing. But a woman so committed to detailing every bit of her life must have secrets. You’re starting to think the three dead were targeted, right?”
“Right. I’m about to go talk to Marc Conlon’s mother and get into his computer. Just waiting for the warrant. I need to go ahead with a warrant for Ledbetter’s work as well, even though we have pretty open access already, just to make sure we don’t run into an issue down the road. Should have all my ducks in a row in an hour or so.”
“What about the congressman and his...other issue?” She didn’t know how much they should discuss on an open cell line until Fletcher was certain about the case.
“Waiting on the DNA. Even with a rush it’s going to be a day or two. In the meantime, I’m trying to talk to the cop who handled it so he can fill me in. I have an appointment with the wife...oh, crap. I gotta leave right now to go meet her. Thanks for all of this. If you get more, let me know right away.”
“Will do, Fletch. Be safe.”
They hung up and Sam rested her head back against the seat, suddenly exhausted.
“You okay?” Xander asked.
“Yeah. It’s just been a really long couple of days.”
“Why don’t you shut your eyes for a little bit? I’ll wake you when we’re close.”
She didn’t need asking twice. She twisted in her seat so her seat belt was still on but not cutting into her shoulder, and lay down with her head in Xander’s lap. He ran his hand along the back of her neck, kneading the knots out, playing with her hair as he drove, and the lulling rhythm of the car’s tires on the highway and Xander’s ministrations did the trick. She was out before she knew it.
Chapter 29
Dillon, Colorado
Alexander Whitfield
Xander watched for deer as he guided the truck higher and higher into the mountains, thinking simultaneously about how lovely Sam looked when she slept and about the Mountain Blue and Gray.
His “friend” was named Stephen Upland. In the unit, they called him 7UP for his upbeat personality. Xander hadn’t known him well—he was attached to Bravo Company and 7UP was in Charlie Company—but they crossed paths occasionally, and since they came from the same part of the world in their civilian lives, they occasionally hung out and talked about what they missed from back home. He had lived in the Mountain Blue and Gray community since he was a little kid, and had volunteered to go into the military to gain the training necessary to be the head of their defensive system should the economic collapse they feared occur.
He remembered the flack from Ledbetter’s book now. She’d posited that the Mountain Blue and Gray, and groups like them, were cults. That hadn’t gone over well at all. If he remembered correctly, there were some group members from other survivalist camps who’d been quite keen in showing Dr. Ledbetter what a cult was really all about.
But that had all gone down seven years or more ago. The groups weren’t necessarily fluid, but seven years is a long time for a group of survivalists not to have some changes in dynamics. People come and go.
He started racking his brain to think about where those threats had come from. Not from people he knew; Xander wasn’t a prepper, or even a survivalist. He didn’t think the world was going to go down in a blaze of glory in the next few years. He recognized the resiliency of the American people, the ease with which governments shifted from party to party, without protests in the streets and journalists being kidnapped and beheaded and bright fires burning down the cities. In another country, the situation could easily grow dire—my God, the things he’d seen in Afghanistan and Iraq would turn any logical person into a survivalist—but in the United States, he firmly believed that even if the absolute worst were to happen, it wouldn’t be as difficult to put the pieces back together as it would elsewhere. Some of the preppers were downright insane, truth be told. His friends were more a group of like-minded men and women who didn’t make preparing for an unknown event the main focus of their world, just shared some handy information in case the shit hit the fan.